Tag: ask

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So I hear you say that nearly every muscular man in media is a male power fantasy so I have been meaning to ask what is a woman power fantasy. I mean what criteria have to be met for a power fantasy for women since for a man the criteria is to be fit and attractive to look as said from your post here that Dolph Lundgren Ax here and Conan. I mean can’t a woman who is attractive and so skilled she can kill enemies without armor be a fantasy for women as well.

Wow, that’s some fundamentally loaded question…

The premise of asking for ultimate criteria of gendered power fantasy is kinda flawed… First, there are VERY different facets of indulging in the male fantasy. Let’s make it clear: strong, overly-muscular men aren’t the only representation of male power fantasy, they’re just the most obvious one, cause they’re extending the stereotype of maleness to ridiculous degrees. They appeal to the deep-rooted societal notion that male = stronger, that’s why to make the character seem powerful the designers exaggerate the “manly” aspects of the him.

But when it comes to female characters, it gets complicated.
The thing is, our culture tends to view things almost exclusively from the (straight) male point of view. Men try to extrapolate their own experiences onto us and assume that how they feel is how we feel. That’s why conventional female “power fantasy” either emulates the male one (butch warrior woman) or (more often) assumes that female power comes from controlling sexual availability to men. That’s where the sexy femme fatale warrior stereotype comes from. Men imagine that the only area where women can be in total control is sex.

Going back to the male power fantasy, it’s important to realize how Buff Warrior Dude type basically comes down to eliminating the fear of ever being threatened by other men. Notice how Sexy Warrior Babe type, instead of eliminating the fear women have (of being overpowered, assaulted etc.), feeds onto the fear men have (of being rejected and/or sexually controlled by women). That’s why villainesses are very likely to be portrayed in most sexual characters.
This disingenuous female power archetype is the result of filtering everything through male perspective.

To create a genuine power fantasy, female point of view must be applied and male one must be deconstructed. We can’t latch onto the simplistic and hurtful notion that associates maleness with strength and femaleness with weakness.
I touched upon this recently, but the genre of magical girl narrative is one of the basic deconstructions of that: the powers, weapons and outfits of the heroines are usually designed to be as girly as possible, so that monsters are defeated not with the male-coded brute strength, but with sparkly magic beams from pink, heart-shaped rods and jewelry. Things associated with the “weak” part of femaleness stereotype become the source of their power.

That said, it does not mean that no female character ever can find their strength in being butch or sexual. Just that those female power stereotypes (especially the sexual one) have so far been framed in how men see them and thus, problematic.
Also, Sexy Warrior Babe type of character is vastly overused, so it’s really hard to to make it work without looking like you’re playing it straight. That’s one of the reasons this blog exists.

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Big thanks to our dear friend ami-angelwings for helping me to put our collective female perspective on the subject to words.

~Ozzie

(Disclaimer: wincenworks is a cishet male so can only give information from observation and received from women who have spoken about the issue)

Firstly, the story of a character who is so badass that they can run into fights with no protection and be assured of a victory without injury is a pretty boring story.  There’s no tension or drama if the outcome is pre-ordained – even less so if it’s only pre-ordained to justify a costuming decision.

Secondly, the buff barbarian look isn’t about selling men a fantasy of being fit and attractive (Conan is traditionally not a pretty man, he often gets injured and he’s not above wearing armor) – it’s about recognized as physically powerful and coded as a great warrior and one who is above caring what regular think of them. Howard wrote about the appeal of this aspect at length in letters and at least one artist has already explored what Red Sonja might look like if she was given the same visual coding Conan is.

Bikini armor on fictional women doesn’t project this, because after decades of it’s being used for senseless titilation, for Ms Male Characters and damsels who are to be rescued by manly men.  They’re not designed with the intention of anything done, or having other primary traits other than “sexy” by Male Gaze standards.

This leads to (in case you missed it, at the top of the post you’re replying to):

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See female power fantasy characters are meant to reflect female fantasies and it turns out women are people.  So their fantasies tend to be more complicated than “look sexy to the assumed straight male audience and be do something badass to justify my position as ‘strong’ character”.  

Thus a female character is more likely to read as a female power fantasy characters if she looks more like:

Than Tyris Flare, Fran or Shia.

That said, many characters who are wearing outfits that are not particularly power fantasy inducing have become female power fantasies to certain groups of women via particular traits, their personalities and their stories.

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None of these function on the half-arsed justification of “I mean can’t a woman who is attractive and so skilled she can kill enemies without armor be a fantasy for women as well.“  They tend to be things more like “I’d like to treated with respect regardless of my body or how I dress, be feared by tough guys and able to smack them down if they threaten me.”

Most women, in my experience, are not really that adverse to the idea of having or wearing awesome armor which is why our “positive examples“ posts tend to get lots of love and we get awesome asks like this one from yondamoegi :

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So in summary, the primary flaw with your argument is that women shouldn’t be expected to be for men’s benefit.  The secondary flaw is that women actually aren’t expected to wear armor more than they are bikinis so have no reason to wish they could be free of armor.

– wincenworks

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Any thoughts on this new Impa? She’s been a decrepit and ancient advisor, fit and muscular bodyguard, dark skinned and swift magical warrior, chubby and joyful nanny, and now she carries a sword so big and heavy she could kill somebody by just dropping it on them. Half of the posts in Tumblr seem to be about wanting to get the game for Impa, and half complains about Shia, the new member of the evil sexy ladies of Zelda (seriously Veran, armor bra?)

Also in a previous ask:

“Boobplate Witch” version 3 actually. The original Boob Witch is Twinrova and the second to appear is Veran iirc. Vera comes with metal armor, boob window and midriff showing.

Impa

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I feel that Impa is just begging for someone to write a thesis titled “Secondary characters, room for artistic exploration or lazy recycling of names?”

The Warriors of Hyrule incarnation is pretty badass looking, dressed pretty consistently with male characters in Zelda and I can see why people are itching to have her bust some moves on the battlefield:

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I mean we could discuss things like the open toed boots, or the eye on her boob – but overall her outfit is stylish without being ridiculous or heavily sexualized.  Since armor has traditionally not been a big thing in Zelda (Link usually runs around his normal clothes) the lack of it and the presence of fantasy fueled weapons is consistent with the narrative of the setting.

It’s also pretty cool that they gave her the big bruiser sword.

Twinrova

Honestly I am not that big a Zelda fan, so Twinrova and Veran didn’t even occur to me when I saw Shia – but they don’t really lessen the wtf value of Shia in any way.

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The first and most obvious difference with Twinrova to me is that “Can I fap to this?” was probably not a design priority.  I mean yes, it’s a huge jump from what the sisters look like prior to combining  – but mostly it seems focused on projecting the idea that they’re no longer old – they’re now young and powerful and still utterly bizarre.

There is some genius creativity that went into this image and while it’s certainly playing on some sexualized characteristics (wasp waist, boob plate, etc) it’s not something that would make me hide it from children.

Veran

Oh yeah she has an armor bra, personally I find that headpiece more terrifying – it seems an accident waiting to happen:

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However, like Veran’s boss – Twinrova, there’s a lot more actual creative design here – it looks less like lingerie armor more like couture gone mad.  There was also no reasonable expectation that you’d see Veran looking like this in the game, since well it was on the Gameboy Color:

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So while it’s not good, and is frankly kind of weird – it’s still a fairly basic example of sexying up a villainess because she’s evil and looks like someone put some real effort into making look unique and recognizable even with the limited resolution and palette.

She also came back in 2001 and I haven’t seen any attempts to try to make her iconic in the Zelda franchise since.  She was also an antagonist who operated primarily through possession and shape-changing – so no real expectation of her wearing combat armor.

So while she’s definitely part of many problematic tropes, including villainess armor – it would be disingenuous to pretend that she’s a particularly bad or outrageous offender.

Shia/Cia

This is the main antagonist in a Zelda spinoff that is supposed to be entirely about fighting on battlefields full of soldiers, using cool weapons and combos and stuff.  Everything suggests this is how she will appear in game:

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She’s strutting about in a gown, wearing a ball masque headpiece that has no eye-slits.  And this is what happens when I go to Nintendo’s page promoting the game:

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And guess what! Shia/Cia is not on the “suitable for all ages” page for Warriors of Hyrule.   Also, I don’t read Japanese so I have to take a fan Wiki’s word on this translation, but this is what we’ve been told about the character:

Cia is a witch tasked with maintaining the balance of the Triforce. Although a good person at heart, she comes to harbor serious affections for Link which in turn becomes deep-seated jealousy directed towards Princess Zelda. Cia then becomes possessed by a dark force. This leads to her waging war on the kingdom alongside her companions Valga and Wizro.

Yes she was a good person but being jealous over Link has allowed her to be possessed with evil (women aren’t allowed to be evil just for themselves and are apparently prone to possession) who walks around in a costume Nintendo won’t show you (or at least English speaking audiences) on their own site.  Not even an attempt at creativity – for a game that’s to be released on a console that Nintendo says:

Wii U is a brand new home videogame console from Nintendo that fundamentally changes the relationship between you and your TV and how you, your friends and family all connect.

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– wincenworks

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weerlegion replied to your photo: “Since Shia from Hyrule Warriors, or as I prefer to call her, the…”:

That can’t be boobplate. Boob something for sure, but it doesn’t even attempt to come close to enough coverage to be called a plate.

Frankly, winceworks proposed that once I make version 2.0 of the bingo, a square named “wtf is this?” should be there for the unidentifiable pieces of the outfit.

For now, though, this is close enough for me to count as a boobplate. It “covers” boobs, is clearly made of sturdier material and generally looks and works on boobs like a boobplate would… but has a giant piece missing.

~Ozzie

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ghostofcrux:

On the topic of people defending bikini armor by saying that they’re distracting,

Does anyone really think about boobs when they’re in a place where their balls could be chopped off? Just asking, since I’m female and all.

I highly doubt it, but let’s ask the cishet male mod. So, wincenworks?

~Ozzie

As a man who is attracted to women (which I think is the larger part of the issue), I would say the answer is: No.

I can say that with great certainty because I have:

  • Attended numerous Dr Sketchy’s and similar art events where sexy models pose in very sexy outfits, and artists (many of them men) concentrate and draw them in short periods of time – somehow overcoming the distraction
  • Been to at least one high speed car race where there were numerous cases of women flashing their breasts to the crowd and the racers – and not a single accident or near miss as a result
  • Seen acrobats and aerial performer groups in titillating outfits perform stunts without getting distracted and injuring themselves
  • Talked to multiple bouncers who have assured me that even when there is a performer doing a full blown strip show, it’s not that hard to keep your attention on your job
  • Helped out a women’s self defence course (I was the fencing dummy) which covered a lot of techniques and tricks – not one of which involved using sexual traits for distraction.

It turns out, amazingly, that straight men as a group are capable of focus and basic self control when necessary!  Shocking I know!

It’s also always baffling to me that the only “distractions” that supposedly generate this bonus are sexy bits on ladies.  I mean, there are other things that’d keep me distracted with sheer puzzlement or shock for much longer.

Juicy!

Since there are apparently men who want to contradict this claim, making this argument with all seriousness – I’ve included five points to highlight just how stupid this claim is – beneath the cut.

-wincenworks

1. You never see straight male gamers complaining about the sexy female opponents in fighting games

People get really excited about their video games and analyse them.  They analyse them really well, especially when it comes to things that might effect their effectiveness – like when Age of Conan gave female characters slower animations.

Now, given AoC is a game with a lot of Player vs Player action, and one with plenty of female enemies is questionable attire – one would think that the predominantly male player base would have celebrated when Funcom reduced bust sizes.  Nope, they rioted and demanded the big boobs come back!

I have never seen any noteworthy review, play guide or walkthrough warn that a particular opponent would be difficult due to THE DREADED DISTRACTION FACTOR. I have never seen anyone indicate that a female character is too powerful due to the distraction factor – even in games like Soul Calibur, Dead or Alive or Tekken where players need intense focus so they can make decisions instantly while fighting jiggling beauties in improbable costumes. Not one.

2. If distraction bonus actually applied, sexy armor mods would be self sabotage

Not only do audiences not complain about “distraction factor” getting in their way – they actively sabotage themselves. Visit NexusMods, search for “armor”: Even without enabling “adult content”, I guarantee you that you will come across multiple mods that are pitched entirely on their sex appeal.

Why oh why would any player sabotage themselves like this?  If the sight of a perfect butt is so overwhelming it leads to a fatal mistakes, why would anyone set themselves up to be thwarted over and over?

3. Zero historical precedent

I hear the cries already, “But those are just video games – it’s different in real life!”.  However, if history is to be believed – there is clearly no basis behind this.

Not a single army in modern times that allows women in combat has proposed capitalising on “distraction factor”.  Military groups around the world have tried a lot of tricks to give them advantages over the enemy, none of them have deployed cleavage armor.  As we’ve covered before, there is no shortage of female soldiers in history.

Spartans were quite accepting of homosexuality and the fiercest warriors in Ancient Greece – apparently their soldiers were never distracted by one another.  Amazons were feared due to stories that they sacrificed a breast in order to shoot their bows better, not stories of hypnotic cleavage.

4. Nobody is that good looking

How would you even know if the people you’re fighting are going to be into you?  Despite the constant pressure by modern society to force heterosexuality and a singular beauty standard – there are many people who’s tastes differ radically.  

There are people who are primarily attracted by a particular build or physical trait. There are people who are not attracted to popular aesthetics at all.. There are people who are not attracted to women. There are people who are not really swayed by physical appearances and there are people who not attracted to anyone.

Even if you have a body that is attractive to 90% of your opponents, that still means one in ten opponents is going to be completely unhindered and have a massive advantage since your tactics hinge on this “distraction factor”.

5. Fights are messy and it only takes one mistake

Okay, you’re fighting away in a group against another group, hypno-boobs swaying seductively at all who approach from the front – someone stabs you from the side: Game over.  

The guy who’s just not into you (see above) attacks from the front, blocking the view for another of his buddies: Game over.  

It’s dark and so they can’t see your hypno-boobs: Game over.

Incoming burning oil, a magic fireball, incoming projectiles, rabid wolves and all manner of fantasy monsters are completely indifferent to hypno-boobs.

It is really a lot easier to die in a sword fight than most people give credit for, because there are so many viable targets (many take a while to kill you, but that’s of little comfort while you’re dying)

In summary: “It’d defend them by distracting the enemy…” is perhaps the worst possible defence anyone can bring to the table, ever.  There is only one appropriate response to someone making this as a serious claim:

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What are your thoughts on magical girl anime/manga outfits? Not talking about shows such as Kill La Kill or magical girl shows for adult men, but ones such as Precure, Sailor Moon, or Tokyo Mew Mew. Do you believe these are excused due to either being created by women, or intended for a young girl audience?

I don’t believe that “created by women” or “made for female audience” is ever an excuse if the product is problematic, especially in terms of sexism.
After all, women sometimes work on the stuff we feature here (like the design of warrior princess Solange). And because those female creators internalized the harmful ideas about gender expectations, their designs aren’t inherently any better than those made by men.

As for mahou shoujo/magical girl anime and manga, they’re generally hand-waved by the “a wizard did it“ principle. The characters are magical girls and their powers usually oscillate on the edge of exaggeration, so their battle outfits aren’t expected to be exactly fully-protective armor.
There’s this popular argument that the whole point of magical girl genre is to empower little girls by weaponizing femininity: everything is designed around female appeal, so that the audience can see that a hero can be an epitome of girlishness while still beating the crap out of evil monsters.

Which of course is not an excuse for why some of those battle uniforms and transformation sequences tend to be… questionably fanservice-y.

It’s really a classic ‘childhood ruined’ moment when a little girl grows up and realizes just how absurdly short Sailor scout’s skirt were and that the sparkly transformations she admired so much were someone else’s fap fodder. Especially considering most magical girls are underage.

~Ozzie

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Hey! I came here to ask for your help. I recently had a discussion about female armour in video games with a male friend. The thing is, while i tried to convince him about how it was sexist and fucked up in so many levels, he said a lot of stuff like: Most of these are from oriental games, only men play video games in asia, sexy women sells because mostly men are buying. I want to know what I could say against that, because I know it doesn’t make it ‘okay’. Thank you <3

Okay… wow at your friend’s assumptions… this is going to take a while.

Firstly and foremost, there is a reason why Ozzie put “She was designed in a country where sexualization is cultural!” prominently on the Female Armor Rhetoric Bingo card.   Actually there are two good reasons:

  1. Local cultural differences don’t excuse how you treat roughly half the population of the world.  Objectifying people is not about sexual expression within your culture, it’s about reducing them down to something less than human.  
  2. The vast majority of people who make this claim don’t know anything at all about the region they’re referring to and are just outright spreading ignorance.

So, with that second point particularly in mind… let’s move on to:

“in Asia…”

Any time you hear someone try to use the justification of cultural differences with “Asia”, you should remind them (violently if necessary) that Asia is not:

  • A culture
  • A country
  • A hivemind
  • A magical wonderland where the rules of reality are suspended and hence things happen with no explanation

Asia is a collection of countries which all have their own cultures and values.  Those cultures are always evolving and the values vary from individual to individual (the individuals also grow – they are people after all).

Often, when people talk about “Asia” (or Asian video games) they mean Japan and/or South Korea. To claim that women in these areas don’t play video games is completely absurd.  I mean lets look at some photos of gaming Internet Cafes in South Korea… notice something?

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(x)

Japan actually has a whole genre of games which are heavily targets at women, Otome.  It is a thriving genre, the same company that makes action games like Dynasty Warriors also makes otome games (along with like fifteen other major companies). It’s also the home of Nintendo – the company that produces gender progressive games like Pokemon.  Japan is also the home of Square Enix, the creators of the famous Final Fantasy – a game with a massive female fan base if ever there was one.

After we received this ask, I messaged a female friend in the South East Asia region over Steam and asked if she thought there was any truth to your male friend’s idea.  Her response:

“only men play video games in asia???
doood
plenty of females play video games in asia. at least half of my friends do. and they’re not just homely wallflowers either”

(After this we discussed what a seriously hot and awesome cousin-in-law my friend has.  It’s not really relevant to games, but her cousin-in-law is awesome… and hot.)

This is not to say that any of these nations are some sort of post-sexism gaming wonderland. Rather that it’s fairly safe to say that the blanket notion of women in Asia don’t play games is just absolutely ridiculous. So on to…

“Most of these are from Oriental games”

Some of the games with terrifying female armor are made primarily in Asia. Some of them are made primarily in the western world. Many of them are made collaboratively and ALL of them are made for the global marketplace.

There are numerous games made in one region with the story based on culture or region of another, stories of how games had to be modified for different markets, etc.  Game companies have been marketing to the world at large for a long, long time.

Due to the increases in customer expectations and the need for broader markets, many  MMOs now involve partnered companies from multiple regions.  AAA games developers now frequently outsource large parts of projects to studios around the world.  

To further confuse things: The Japanese company Square Enix owns several games studios based in and found in Europe.

The line between “Asian” or “western” games on in the marketplace has been really blurry for a long time.

“sexy women sells because mostly men are buying”

If there is one thing I’m sure of, it’s that sex doesn’t sell (unless you’re selling sex).  

There’s seriously no history, precedents or market research to suggest trying to sex up your game has ever helped sales.  It’s just something people do because they want to believe there’s an easy way to get sales.

Bayonetta marketed heavily on sex appeal in order to try to expand from the audience of those who liked the Devil May Cry franchise and ultimately sold less copies.

Duke Nukem Forever heavily marketed it’s own crass version of sex sells… it didn’t impress anyone or help save it from being a dire warning on how not to make video games.

The Dead or Alive franchise invested in the “sex sells” approach with not one, but three “extreme beach volleyball” games.  After all that pandering, the franchise still has no advantage over it’s competitors and struggles to meet it’s (relatively modest) sales goals.

None of these games sales figures can compare in the slightest to Minecraft’s selling over 49 million copies or Call of Duty 2: Modern Warfare selling over 28.5 million.

Even the undeniably vulgar Grand Theft Auto 5, which sold over 32 million copies, didn’t rely on sex to sell it’s product.  Instead the vast majority of the marketing was focused on the three main protagonists and the franchise it belonged to.

All of which is to say that if it were just cultural differences, these games wouldn’t become mainstream titles in the English speaking world.  They’re mainstream titles because lots of people in the western world buy them.

– wincenworks

edit: important note!

satyabear said:

Fabulous post. Also worth mentioning that the term “oriental” is colonialist, racist, and highly offensive.

Posted on

Am I the only one who’s getting sick of the excuse of “That’s how the artists want to draw, so stop telling them what to do!” excuse when it comes to terrible bikini battle armour? It’s like these people expect all designs to be nothing down to personal preference, and yet never think about the bigger picture of just how many male artists are part of our culture that influence these decisions? Seriously, it’s a poor execuse and I’m sick of hearing ut.

We’re definitely with you there, friend! That’s why there’s the “art shouldn’t be censored!” rhetoric bingo square: cause “creative freedom” should not be a Get Out of Jail Free card of character design.
As femfreq puts it:

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Yup, it’s all about the big picture of our media, not individual examples. Crying “artistic freedom” (or “stylization”, for that matter) to justify questionable design ignores seeking for the reason artist decided to make such choices.

Publishing this ask cause those points need to be iterated more.

~Ozzie

The other important thing that people should remember is that commercial art (such as covers, character designs, 3d models in games, etc) is not intended to be a purely artistic experience – it’s a product for consumption.

Artists will have to follow briefs that tell them kind of mood to give the work, what characters to put in it, what themes to put in – unlikely that an art director adding “Don’t put the female characters in ridiculous and hyper-sexualized costumes” would somehow break a professional artist’s will to create.

– wincenworks

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hyratel replied to your photo “For the record: BABD is generally not devoted to reviewing personal…”

Costume Design Community Service seems to be either shut down or on hiatus, they’re a blog intended for this kind of review

Yup. I would recommend submitting the designs for to costumecommunityservice if not for the fact that this blog (which I highly recommend, BTW) stopped doing the reviews (went on hiatus with them?). Though it’s pretty understandable why, reviewing art takes a lot of time and effort (that’s why both of my reviews weren’t published right away).

~Ozzie