We discussed this in the Games Room thread but just saying “half of game players are women” isn’t really appropriate in this regard. I won’t say that women playing Flash or Facebook or Mobile games “don’t count” in general but they really don’t count when you’re producing console or PC games. Then the number that matters is “how many women own consoles or gaming PCs?”
I suspect that the demographics for console/Gaming PC owners skews pretty heavily male. Those are the games we’re talking about though. No one’s making videos decrying the sexism in mobile platform gaming.
Good catch. I saw that, figured it was another one of the Gish Gallop lies, rolled my eyes, and ignored it.
Stayed tuned for blindboy’s next post, which will have another half dozen or so new false charges in it and fail to admit any of his myriad errors that have so far been pointed out.
I think that’s the wrong way to look at it because the development teams behind many of the biggest mobile/Facebook games are the same teams behind console/PC games. To a game publisher, they don’t care if women play on PC, console, of mobile. They’ve got development teams working on all of those platforms. So recognizing that women make up half of all gamers is very important to allocating developmental resources.
And look at the attendance of the various PAX shows. Women make up a growing proportion of the people on the show floor. I’m not sure it’s 50-50 yet, but it is VERY close. Publishers who ignore that do so at their own peril.
Sure, but they’re producing two different kinds of games. Women own mobile devices so you make sure your mobile games appeal to them. Men own consoles/PCs so you try and make those games appeal to them. It’s not “ignoring women” because they’re making games attractive to women on the gaming devices women own. If more women owned consoles, making games appealing to women on consoles would be a greater priority but it’s not the developer’s job to try and make women buy $400 consoles so they can play their game.
Right, but gamemakers (like Ubisoft and the Assassin’s Creed Unity fiasco) shouldn’t go out of their way to produce games that alienate women either. They are not a “zero percent” part of the industry. And games like Mario and LittleBigPlanet and (believe it or not) Borderlands really appeal to women.
Well, sure… it’s got that Girlfriend Mode DLC (I kid!)
I’m certainly not advocating going out of your way to alienate women gamers when designing console games or implying that developers never make just plain stupid or sexist decisions. I’m just saying that “50% of gamers are women” isn’t a particularly useful statistic when discussing Lollipop Chainsaw.
No, that’s wrong. When those *other *people do it they’ve evil SJWs. When *they *do it, they’re brave warriors fighting for justice using social media. Completely different.
No. You have already stated you don’t hate Zoe Quinn. We are specifically talking about the people who funded TFYC because they hated Quinn. You’ve already agreed with me that that was the primary reason 4chan was able to raise the money.
The hatred started well before anything with TFYC. I don’t think anyone would have bought their transparent attempt to ride the Gamergate wagon if not for the misogyny.
I’ve also learned from reading TFYC’s tumblr that they don’t actually think she did it out of some desire to harm them, either. They think she misunderstood the project, said some stuff, but that her “followers” did most of it. Also, she didn’t in any way destroy the company. They lost a supporter and some money, but the TFYC was still fine.
It’s not an assumption I’m making. It’s something they’ve said, and how she is currently being used. She was specifically created to “troll the feminists.” And she is mostly being used to back up the #Gamergate subculture that is antifeminism.
You also are ignoring her personality. She:
[ul][li]Tough loves video games[/li][li]loathes dishonesty and hypocrisy[/li][li]low affect, grumpy, perpetually fed up and tired[/li][/ul]
And that’s the ordinary female gamer. I’m not sure what the first one means, and the second one sounds nice, but look at that third one. She’s a depressed girl who acts like an asshole. Are you starting to understand the misogyny? The typical female gamer has to be a horrible person.
I don’t know where the stuff I read went, but it was pretty bad. But I think I’ve done a pretty good job above explaining why I think she is anti-feminist and misogynist.
But, also, when it comes to a mascot (and it is a mascot since VJ is used on all TFYC videos), your history is extremely important. Where she comes from is important. Vivian James is inextricably tied to #Gamergate. She has a ton of baggage.
Well, I disagree with you. But there’s no point in quibbling on that, because TFYC is not only taking their money. They are directly supporting them. And not just in using VJ. The TFYC are outspoken supporters of 4chan in general and /v/ specifically. They are only now realizing that they have to shed all of Gamgergate, and are even making nice with Zoe Quinn. Because THAT’S WHAT YOU DO if you want to distance yourself from something.
That’s the reason I don’t support Gamergate. They haven’t done so. And neither did /v/. They flat out said they were doing all this to troll.
No, the end result is they gave the company a little money. The project was not in any danger. That’s yet another thing I discovered on TFYC’s tumblr. They had a ton of money before all this.
But, even if you were right, I’m not an ends justify the means type of guy. Sorry.
And, now, to my chagrin, I have to be done with this. In researching all this crap, I had to encounter so much fricken hate that it made me sick. I did at one point want to believe that /v/ really did this to stick it to the misogynists that created Zoegate. But you, BPC, seem to be the only one supporting it that isn’t full of hate.
I’d love to believe there were more people like you on this, but my experience is otherwise. Too much freaking hate.
So I’ve made my last case. If you pick it apart, you pick it apart. But it is exactly what has led to my conclusions about this whole thing. I can only hope that this article is right about what happens to Vivian James. Then maybe I can look past her #Gamergate roots.
Because, believe it or not, I used to think more highly of 4chan, even if it’s not for me. Maybe with #Gamergate being kicked off, it can be better again.
Also, sorry if some of the above is a bit hard to follow. Stuff was written at different times. I just realized that I seem to contradict myself when I say TFYC are keeping VJ but shedding Gamergate, when I also argue that VJ is inextricably connected to Gamergate.
Well, what they are doing is trying to divorce themselves from Zoegate, while still supporting /v/ and 4chan. They are also distancing themsevles from the current Gamergate movement, which is really full of hate and conspiracy nuttery and misogyny and just plain stupidity–all of which you guys know from certain posters here (though it gets much, much worse.)
Honestly, I probably should have left that part out.
Thankfully, no one who actually matters cares what you idiots think. You had your time in the spotlight, and all you managed to accomplish with it was showing anyone with a shred of decency how little you deserve to be listened to. Please slink back to your echo chambers on 4chan and stop sullying the term “gamer” by association.
As you said you were done, I’m just going to address a handful of things.
See, this comes back to the main issue. One guy said “hey, wouldn’t it be funny to troll these guys by making a real character rather than a LOLWTF freakout?”. This is then taken as admission that the character exists solely to troll? Even taken at face value it doesn’t necessarily mean “the purpose of the character is to piss people off”. It could easily mean “hey, let’s surprise them by not fitting their stereotype of us”. Trolling is a very broad term that’s often assumed in the nastiest way. But even then, why take it at face value? It’s one random dude on /v/.
Maybe you’re missing something about /v/ - “low affect, grumpy, perpetually fed up and tired” defines most of the forum. This isn’t a criticism of female gamers - this is self-impression, and to whatever degree self-critique. They’re not saying “Girl gamers are bad people” (indeed, I hardly think being low-affect, grumpy, or perpetually fed-up qualifies as “horrible person”). They’re saying “this is us”.
Thank you for recognizing that, but I’ve seen quite a few people, including game developers, who are coming at this not from a position of hate but rather out of worries about the industry. Indeed, a lot of them are trying to get the more hateful members to step out and shut up.
I like Vivian James. Her creation reminds me a bit of how you get a 3 yr-old to put on their shoes by betting them they can’t. 4-chan decide to behave like decent human beings for the shock value. I’d better pretend to be horrified and outraged just so they keep doing it.
Her being grumpy and fed-up is not misogynist. I like it. She doesn’t have to smile all the time, make everyone feel good, be nice and sweet. As Big T’s article says, it’s usually only men who get to behave like that.
If she does become some kind of gamer icon, in 2 years time, no one will care that she came from 4-chan. “She’s actually a very misogynist character because of some internet drama, umm I don’t remember the details, it was all very confusing”. Pfft, who cares.
So a bunch of dudes, in the middle of emailing death threats to a woman and calling her dad to tell him his daughter is a whore, in the middle of declaring her a fake feminist because she sexes people who aren’t them (or something, their argument isn’t entirely clear), decide to show women what a REAL feminist gamer is by creating a fictional one.
I don’t think it’d be possible for this to be a clearer example of mansplaining.
I know 4-chan are misogynist assholes and the bullying, threats, harassment are wrong, unjustified and unwarranted. I just quite like Vivian James, on several levels.
No, I didn’t mean you (although the temptation to explain to you that you’re the problem is almost irresistible–I love me some multilayer irony). You’re not the problem, IMO :). And stripped of everything else, I haven’t seen things about Vivian James that make me think in isolation the character is bad.
I was just talking about the character’s development, and its use by 4chan and MRA creeps to show women what a real feminist looks like, unlike those whores who spend their time making feminist critiques of games.
