The most interesting one of the batch may be the one that’s tried a unique variant of “She was designed in a country where sexualization is cultural!” specifically…
Throwback time: A list of toootally valid “reasons” for reducing female presence in video games to walking pair of boobs (sometimes almost literally… remember Haydee?).
~Ozzie
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Maybe it’s because you’re taking the same strategy you would in designing characters for comics or video games and applying it to real people, except fictional characters are a representation of how you choose to see people or wish them to be portrayed, whereas real people get to do their own choosing, because nothing is more sexist than denying someone the right to choose, regardless of what that choice may be.
Worth bringing back – this quote from a pretty great analysis of complex problems with perpetuating sexism. The quoted part and image are the ones most relevant to BABD’s subject matter, but the article is still worth reading whole.
As we saidagainandagain, in our agency and cosplay tags, real people possess the free will to dress however they like, while fictional characters look a certain way because someone decided so. Judging real women harshly for making a choice of dressing skimpy, especially paired with celebration gratuitously half-nude nonexistent women is the sort of cognitive dissonance we refuse to stand behind.
However – unlike that other list, which attempted to claim Bayonetta as a proper example of sexual female character in fiction – this one uses Namor to remind us that, while flaunting his amazing body, he’s still an example of male power fantasy, so it isn’t exactly fair to compare him to female superheroines clearly designed solely as eyecandy.
However – unlike that other list, which attempted to claim Bayonetta as a proper example of sexual female character in fiction – this one uses Namor to remind us that, while flaunting his amazing body, he’s still an example of male power fantasy, so it isn’t exactly fair to compare him to female superheroines clearly designed solely as eyecandy.
There is one important criticism I want to address with this article, specifically the handling of spot #1. Bayonetta. That is, even if you find an example where you think it’s better or avoids the hazards of the others – do not take it upon yourself to give it an official “not sexist” stamp. Seriously.
Their confession that they wanted her to be sexy doesn’t make their explanation that somehow she doesn’t wear clothes because she can make clothes out of hair except when she’s launching her most powerful attacks (ie the time when you really don’t want to be exposed).
It’s also worth keeping in mind that Dante’s “cool” factor comes from him being the son of the greatest hero in history, and so badass he can take down monsters of unimaginable power. Hence the confidence boost and the willingness to focus on style over efficiency.
With Bayonetta the only reason for her being defined by sexiness… is they wanted to cram more “sex appeal” (targeting cishet men as always) into it while also wanted to be taken seriously as a Devil May Cry type action game because as long as we say it’s sexy, it can’t be sexist right? Glossing over her exposure is not one of the things that makes moves like this awesome:
Whether you like the game or not, that’s all kinds of bullshit and the games don’t deserve a free pass because because the creator admits the blatantly obvious (while still adding layers of bullshit so as to claim “creativity”).
There is one important criticism I want to address with this article, specifically the handling of spot #1. Bayonetta. That is, even if you find an example where you think it’s better or avoids the hazards of the others – do not take it upon yourself to give it an official “not sexist” stamp. Seriously.
Their confession that they wanted her to be sexy doesn’t make their explanation that somehow she doesn’t wear clothes because she can make clothes out of hair except when she’s launching her most powerful attacks (ie the time when you really don’t want to be exposed).
It’s also worth keeping in mind that Dante’s “cool” factor comes from him being the son of the greatest hero in history, and so badass he can take down monsters of unimaginable power. Hence the confidence boost and the willingness to focus on style over efficiency.
With Bayonetta the only reason for her being defined by sexiness… is they wanted to cram more “sex appeal” (targeting cishet men as always) into it while also wanted to be taken seriously as a Devil May Cry type action game because as long as we say it’s sexy, it can’t be sexist right? Glossing over her exposure is not one of the things that makes moves like this awesome:
Whether you like the game or not, that’s all kinds of bullshit and the games don’t deserve a free pass because because the creator admits the blatantly obvious (while still adding layers of bullshit so as to claim “creativity”).
The most interesting one of the batch may be the one that’s tried a unique variant of “She was designed in a country where sexualization is cultural!” specifically…
The most interesting one of the batch may be the one that’s tried a unique variant of “She was designed in a country where sexualization is cultural!” specifically…
Really not happy with the summary of Mario – however I feel that the fact that everyone gets what they mean when they summarize Samus as being novel for ‘not being half-naked’ says everything important about mainsteam video games.
Also, as someone who was really excited to play the first generation of FPS games – I can’t help but feel that they sort of set the the standard for this sort of generic hero.
Meanwhile, Jurassic Park: Trespasser, one of the first FPS games to star a female protagonist didn’t give her a face and had a… unique way of displaying the health bar:
Yeah.
– wincenworks
edit: Now also tagged for ableism in the “Good” panel. Sorry we failed to tag the post initially and thanks to readers for pointing that out.
