How exactly does covering up a character show that sexy outfits aren’t empowering exactly? That and how does dressing up male characters in sexy outfits making a point?
It’d be easy to ask the inverse: how does dressing up female characters in revealing outfits make them empowered?
To answer this question we’re going to do an exercise that anyone familiar with the internet can participate in. First: imagine an adorable kitten (if you’re having trouble, Google images is rifewiththem… like I said: internet). Now, imagine that adorable kitten wielding a weapon (ohheyGoogle). Are these cats now empowered? Or has the situation gone from visually appealing to funny?
That’s what most female character design does: creates a juxtaposition of eye candy that thinks just because it’s started wielding weapons and calling itself tough, suddenly it’s empowered. It isn’t. It’s a cat with a lightsaber.
As for how dressing up a male character in clothes usually reserved for their female counterparts makes a point, well, mostly it helps show how ridiculous these outfits (and also the way the women are generally posed) are. We’re so used to seeing our female characters looking (and acting) this way, that it often doesn’t register. It helps get people asking why it’s okay for a woman to go into battle like this, but it’s funny when a man does.
-Staci
PREACH!
Throwback Thursday time!
Today’s throwback:repair-her-armor‘s sideblog, ria-rha, makes the most apt comparison to explain why bikini armors are inherently silly and not really empowering.
How exactly does covering up a character show that sexy outfits aren’t empowering exactly? That and how does dressing up male characters in sexy outfits making a point?
It’d be easy to ask the inverse: how does dressing up female characters in revealing outfits make them empowered?
To answer this question we’re going to do an exercise that anyone familiar with the internet can participate in. First: imagine an adorable kitten (if you’re having trouble, Google images is rifewiththem… like I said: internet). Now, imagine that adorable kitten wielding a weapon (ohheyGoogle). Are these cats now empowered? Or has the situation gone from visually appealing to funny?
That’s what most female character design does: creates a juxtaposition of eye candy that thinks just because it’s started wielding weapons and calling itself tough, suddenly it’s empowered. It isn’t. It’s a cat with a lightsaber.
As for how dressing up a male character in clothes usually reserved for their female counterparts makes a point, well, mostly it helps show how ridiculous these outfits (and also the way the women are generally posed) are. We’re so used to seeing our female characters looking (and acting) this way, that it often doesn’t register. It helps get people asking why it’s okay for a woman to go into battle like this, but it’s funny when a man does.
-Staci
PREACH!
Throwback Thursday time!
Today’s throwback:repair-her-armor‘s sideblog, ria-rha, makes the most apt comparison to explain why bikini armors are inherently silly and not really empowering.
It’s really terrifying how common this piece of rhetoric is and how extreme people will take it. I have lost count of the number of people who say that if you view the clearly hyper-sexualized female character as objectified maybe it’s you that’s the problem.
The characters we critique cannot have agency, and their creators are responsible for choosing what aspects of the character they communicate and when. When they make “sexy” be the top and almost singular priority for a female character – it’s a problem and it’s the creator’s fault.
– wincenworks
The myth of fictional characters possessing agency and thus “choosing” to dress a certain way has always been a pervasive rhetoric against BABD and similar sites/communities. That’s why it’s on the bingo.
Over time, we’ve collected a bunch of posts devoted to debunking that mentality, so I went back and introduced a tag for them.
The quotes near the bottom are what concerned me the most…
“Anyway, as it turns out, a female martial arts instructor I was talking to recently revealed to me over a Skype chat that ‘no matter how much you try to prevent it from happening, you can’t stop them from jiggling’.
‘They’ll jiggle?” I inquired.
‘Yes, they will,’ she replied, ‘in my case, they absolutely will jiggle.
‘When they jiggle, how is the movement like?’ I inquired further.
We went back and forth like this for about 15 minutes, before I was forced to conclude that, no matter how much you try to control it, it’s only natural for them to jiggle.”
I feel like this kind of stuff entitles the developers from Namco (They make Tekken and Soul Calibur) and other companies to add over the top and ridiculous breast physics.
Some of the comments on that page from the users also made me pretty uncomfortable…
I can’t get over the idea that comical jiggle physics in Tekken are for “realism” but none of the realism advocates want the female characters to dress in that would have a chance of containing their boobs.
We decided to introduce Throwback Thrursdays to BABD! From now on, one of the Thursday’s post is going to be something brought back deep from bikiniarmorbattledamage‘a archives, to promote older posts that are still very much on point.
Today’s throwback: Why jiggly boobs, while real, are not realistic in games. Also why it’s important to reduce the jiggle while performing sports and martial arts.
Given that Blizzard has said they’re making this game to improve representation for women in video games and even address things like “why all the bikinis?”
Zarya is currently the quick “we fixed it” response from a company with a long history of going back on their “fixes”. They’re preaching that they want to fulfill the desire for diversity – but the sexy purple skinned assassin lady, a robot, a gorilla all got priority over so many types of real people.
Currently they are only vaguely close to meeting their stated goals due to a few isolated, individual characters. Pretty much all the tokenism alarm bells are ringing loud and clear.
“Much good work is lost for the lack of a little more.“ – Edward H. Harriman
– wincenworks
*Not to say that Zarya is ugly. She’s still “unconventional” in the safest way possible.
