The alt-right and conservatives don’t mind strong female characters… so long as those strong female characters are ones they can objectify and ogle. Alita is literally objectified and infantilized by her surrogate father figure in her own movie, whereas Captain Marvel is never seen in a revealing or skimpy outfit. Brie Larson also made fun of trolls who told her she should smile more, and was openly outspoken about harassment she had received over her role. Is it any wonder that the alt-right would not take her side?
PS: I knew the connection to the alt-right was strong, but upon researching this topic again I realized that the guy who created the “alitachallenge” hashtag in the 3rd panel is the same troll who managed to get James Gunn fired from Disney.
—
So… I made this a week ago, and in that time a NEW story has dropped which only goes to confirm what this comic is talking about.
And yup. Sure enough, the same people who complained about Captain Marvel are now going after Birds of Prey. Why? Because they’re unhappy with how Harley Quinn looks in the film, and because the film is being directed by a woman. Which again goes to prove this point. They don’t mind strong female characters, as long as those strong female characters are dressed in a way that they approve of. Harley’s outfit in the new film is far less objectifying/infantalizing and has a lot more personality.
And here’s some evidence for good measure:
#OP is right and deserves to say it
I think it important to note that the one they considered exemplary of female virtue was literally…a robot designed by a man.
??? They don’t think HQ in Birds of Prey is sexy?
Are they blind and deaf?
Just backwards as all hell and probably don’t wash their butts
Me reading all these idiot men’s comments be like:
Note that the whiny pissbaby fanboys came out in either greater droves for Captain Marvel, amping up their campaign of abuse and vitriol than they did for Wonder Woman. They did embark on a hate campaign for Wonder Woman, but not with the same level as what they brought to Captain Marvel. Why is this?
The reasoning is obvious: with Wonder Woman, they still had the hope that this movie would fail like most of the other female superhero movies of the past and then they could take comfort in knowing that it would be decades before they have to :gasp: suffer the indignity of seeing of seeing a female superheroine in the lead, kicking ass and taking names, her plot :gasp: being about something besides getting a man or being fetish material they could jerk off to.
Because when a male hero fails, Hollywood’s like, “Whelp, shouldn’t have gone with that script/director,” and hero gets a reboot before too long. When a female hero fails, Hollywood’s like, “Whelp, guess people don’t want female superhero-led films,” and women have to wait years, possibly decades before they get another film.
Before Wonder Woman, the last female superhero movies were Elektra and Catwoman. Do the math to figure out how many years separated those movies and Wonder Woman. While you’re at it, count how many male superheroes we got in that time period. Freaking Ant-Man got a film before Wonder Woman, even though Wonder Woman is part of DC’s trinity and is a hella much more prominent character than Ant-Man.
It never seems to occur to Hollywood that maybe people would go to female superhero movies that didn’t suck. Nope, must be the female hero. That’s clearly why the film failed. Women pretty much had to do constant “Please don’t let this suck” prayers/dances to the movie gods because if it failed, it’d be decades before we would ever see another one again.
The whiny pissbabies could also reassure themselves with the knowledge that the DCEU’s quality had been incredibly uneven at best. With all this in mind, they weren’t too scared about Wonder Woman.
But Wonder Woman didn’t fail. Wonder Woman brought audiences in droves, the film critics adored it, and it is still seen as the best DCEU film by many. Basically, it proved their beliefs to be bullshit. People can and will see female superheroes and might, nay, prefer those movies over ones with :gasp: :choke: :pearlclutch: male heroes.
So now they’re running scared and it’s for this reason, they redoubled their efforts to try to sink Captain Marvel. I’m afraid we’re going to have to put up with this for a while.
Here’s hoping Hollywood continues to cram as much diversity into these fuckers’ faceholes as possible. The way I figure, either the pissbabies will scream themselves into apoplexy or they’ll be like, “Hey I like and relate to this character, even though they have [a different gender identity/higher melanin count/orientation] than I do,” and grow the fuck up. Either way, the world would be a much better place for it.
Though frankly I thought that Black Panther was even more radical in its usage of female characters, almost as radical as their usage of Black characters. By virtue of :gasp: :choke: having more than just one character to represent women as a whole, we were able to see, relate to, and understand women with a wide variety of viewpoints.
The multiple female characters was also another reason why Birds of Prey was so great. Having multiple female characters allows them to be actual characters with flaws, ambitions, and actual personalities, rather than token representations of half the world’s population.
It’s insane how rare this phenomenon of multiple female characters is.
In addition to this (which is a spot-on observation BTW), there’s the added fact that Wonder Woman and Alita are presented in a more “conventionally attractive” sort of way. Both Wonder Woman and Alita follow the “born beautiful yesterday” trope, and Alita is infantalized in her own film. While they are strong female characters, they’re also easier to objectify too.
Captain Marvel on the other hand goes out of her way to signal that she’s not “available” so-to-speak. In Captain Marvel there’s literally not a single shot of her that could be taken as objectifying. She is never in a skimpy outfit, shown naked, has her skin exposed…etc. And the actress is vocally open about sexism and misogyny in the industry.
The idea that a woman could be strong and powerful and NOT be openly available to them is the root fear and cause of so much of their outrage. Like I said before, they don’t mind if a female character is strong and powerful… provided that they’re conventionally attractive to men.
This is something we discussed before, in regards to Strong Female Character™/”weaponizedfemininity”/Fighting Fucktoy trope. Women are basically expected to pay a “female representation tax” by seeing female bodies in media framed almost exclusively through male gaze, even in woman-centric stories.
Movies that include female characters being badass without objectification are scarse, and the few that exist get cyber-dogpiled by the whiny manbaby alt-right trolls even before they’re released. Often in favor of just another Fighting Fucktoy film that undermines its heroines with creeper-friendly framing, regardless of how well they’re written.
I think this comic and the subsequent commentary thread (especially @godloveyell’s addition) perfectly summarize the systemic problem of dudebros telling us womenfolk that we’re not allowed to see ourselves in movies (and comics/games/etc.) without their “hot enough for a cishet guy to masturbare to” stamp of approval. And how they insist that the rare media in which women aren’t sexualized just so happen to be much worse… because they say so and no other reason, really.
Whilst Overwatch does have some diversity in its female cast, I find myself incredulous that people can’t see the sexism in the predominant tropes: skin tight outfits; boob plates; and very skinny women are the most commonly occuring design choices. There are no conventionally unattractive female heroes, whereas there are male heroes like Winston, Junkrat, and Roadhog. There are good elements to Overwatch’s character design too, but plenty to critique.
THANK YOU and THANK YOU for the tag about the racism
The pants aren’t just tight, either, they’re so tight they practically go up into their assholes, like a reverse camel toe (I wouldn’t be surprised if they made versions with camel toe, just like the artists kept naughty drawings of Jessica Rabbit on their cubical walls). I won’t get into the sexism too much except to add that the combination of infantilizing and sexualising women at the same time disturbs the fuck outta me, and Blizzard did it unashamedly. You can make a character sexy without turning them into a sexual object but apparently Blizzard didn’t get that memo.
And then there’s the racism. What I find absolutely outstanding is that this game was Blizzard’s attempt at diversity and being less sexist. And people (mostly white people, I’ve noticed) have just lapped it the fuck up. As a non-white, non-American I’d like to tell Blizzard to stay in its fucking lane because it’s so painfully obvious that they looked at other cultures and races through a white ‘murican lens that I want to break something. But of course, the fans are very quick to jump on anyone who claims or even mentions it. Nah, there’s nooo problem with the offensive skins, no problem with the white-washing of characters, no problem with the fact that some skins are from the wrong fucking culture to the character it’s on! We’re just being over sensitive! It’s just a fun game! It’s just a stereotype! Eat my entire ass. People would rather bury their heads in the sand than admit that they like something racist. Fun fact, we have an Indigenous tv show here called Cleverman and the writers and producers are Indigenous and had to ask their elders for permission to show the world parts of their culture/history/knowledge before they could begin the project. They had to earn the right to make a tv show like this. Because funnily enough, just having diversity doesn’t get you a get out of jail free card on racism. If the characters and their culture aren’t treated with respect, it means dick all.
In particular, Symmetra broke my fucking heart. My dad is from India, I get a lot of news from India. I grew up with a lot of stories. I have Indian friends. The rape culture is – bad. Very bad. Worse than you can imagine. And I stand with the women of India, who have to fight tooth and nail to be treated like human beings not their fathers/husband’s possessions. Who have to fight even outside of the country. So when I saw her design and broken-doll pose, I felt my heart sink. And when I saw the pathetic attempt at a Kali skin I felt my face get hot with anger. Kali is supposed to be like this:
“
Kali is represented with perhaps the fiercest features amongst all the world’s deities. She has four arms, with a sword in one hand and the head of a demon in another. The other two hands bless her worshippers, and say, “fear not”! She has two dead heads for her earrings, a string of skulls as necklace, and a girdle made of human hands as her clothing. Her tongue protrudes from her mouth, her eyes are red, and her face and breasts are sullied with blood. She stands with one foot on the thigh, and another on the chest of her husband, Shiva.
“ –
Subhamoy Das
She’s ferocious power, she’s terrifying, she’s empowering – and what did Blizzard do? Ignore all that (like most men do) and turn the skin into an utterly incorrect, utterly ignorant pinup costume. A sexual object yet again, one of the many things Indian women are fighting against. Her skulls aren’t even on her neck! She only has two arms! They moved her skulls to her hip so they didn’t cover her breasts! The fact that people are going around calling it “the devi skin” says volumes about the utter ignorance surrounding this. Ignorance might not be done maliciously, but it doesn’t excuse people or make it less racist. It just proves that the majority of people don’t care about the cultures that Blizzard is using for profit.
Thank you for this really important addition.
This post has picked up almost 5,000 notes since the addition which I’m super glad about because the added detail deserves all the attention; but I just want to point out that this is the post where the first thousand reblogs (and my inbox) are full of people telling me that no one cares, or that it’s just a game.
Well, clearly, we care. Don’t let anyone tell you you shouldn’t.
Anyone who followed us for extended amount of time would know that we agree entirely. We’re sick of Overwatch being given all the credit for doing diversity right/doing women better when at best it’s just the minimal token effort, sprinkled generously with overt sexism and racism on top.
Speaking of which, Blizzard fandom is easily one of the most belligerent ones, consistently replying to any post we make about their games with defiance, trolling and abuse. And often insisting that their headcanons should be accounted for in judging the quality of OW’s designs, story and characters.
@feministgamingmatters‘ and @flamingtrashcans’ posts above are almost 4 years old and no less topical than they were back in 2016. If anything, the amount of problems with Overwatch piled on since then and we have an archive of posts to prove it.
(Note that vast majority of the links here are dated after the original publication of the above post. And it’s by no means a complete list of all the problems with sexism/racism the game has.)
~Ozzie
Some stats, counting out of 30 heroes, since Bastion doesn’t have gendered pronouns:
Total female-coded characters: 14
Women of color (robots don’t count): 6
Lady characters who are not human: 1 (counting the robot) (vs 3 men)
Lady characters whose entire face is hidden: big fat 0 (not counting the robot) (vs 5 men, also no robots)
By far the most common certain demographic response seems to have been to claim that it’s fine that literally none of Overwatch’s 25 playable characters is a black woman because line up includes robots, an ape and a hamster… so naturally is the most diverse range possible.
That of course, is not even vaguely what “diversity” is about and even Blizzard executives Chris Metzen (now retired) and Jeff Kaplan (definitely not retired) understand that:
The problem is: Overwatch got prematurely rubber stamped for “good diversity” primarily for having higher than the (abysmal) industry standard for female, brown and old lady characters. (ie, some characters exist).
Now they’ve got that kudos, they’re not interested in actually delivering on promises or even maintaining the baseline.
Well it’s either that, or they decided that a key demographic who needs over representation is conventionally sexually attractive white women. Specifically ones who are almost identical to Widowmaker. [link]
Blizzard already has a bad track record for disregarding concepts of characters of color in favor of making them white and blonde (specifically Mercy and Junkrat) and otherwise ignored concepts for characters of color that they’ve showcased for PR but apparently will never develop
There is seriously no way that anyone can believe that Blizzard, as a company, have any interest in good representation and making everyone feel welcome beyond sound bytes and quick stunts they can do to seek publicity boosts.
So I was looking for some silly RPGs to play to pass the time and I found Valiant Force, which is where this lovely piece of work comes from.
And a piece of work it is. It’s always a trip to see generic bikini armor that is at the same time exceptionally overdesigned. (Also I just want to note that her back leg is fully on the ground, heel and all, which means her legs are different lengths.)
So Valiant Force is another mobile action MMO where you collect the greatest “Heroes (capitalized) to have ever existed.” And just like all the other similar games we’ve featured here, the sexy girl aspect of it is completely irrelevant to gameplay. Or anything.
But that doesn’t stop the game’s website to feature this in its promotional art:
Apparently, according to all the people who were upset that we dared to call out Hideo Kojima and implied that his use of Quietin promotional materials was objectification and pandering, you can also act like it’s totally subversive by writing a long back story for the character.
It doesn’t have to be, or really their own back story, or one that the majority of players will even experience – just so long as there’s something there to claim that you “totally humanized and made worthwhile” the character who’s boobs appear in every promo post.
Then it becomes a deep commentary of the “reality of women in these situations”… there being so many women who run around in bikinis on battlefields in reality.
– wincenworks
Since “weaponized femininity” got namedropped in that post we reblogged this weekend, let’s maybe bring it back today. And wonder once again how exactly does displaying a conventionally attractive heroine’s
tits and supermodel strut equally as much as her
weapons and battle prowess count automatically as female empowerment and not thinly-veiled pandering to cishet men.
And also let’s remember another, more evocative name which Miss Represenation documentary gave to this Totally Subversive™
With a very few exceptions, pretty much every time I see a game brag about diverse body shapes – I wonder if they hired the same “expert” consultant that Levi’s did:
Since everyone can predict us talking again about Overwatch in the near future, this week’s throwback is the video game industry’s bafflingly narrow definition of what “diversity” among female characters looks like.
~Ozzie
Posted on
I remember when Fortnite first came out I had a look and felt that while it was kind of nice they were doing a little body diversity, they had a pretty clear agenda when it came to the Female Constructor design:
Apparently there are still those out there for whom this is not sufficient conformity to traditional pandering, even if this character is also an option in the original game (no PhotoShop required)
Have to say though, I feel pretty proud that “tumblrization” is credited for any sort of deviation from these designs. Another bright side is this has pretty great meme potential (with a few great ones in the Twitter thread already).
– wincenworks
It’s quite telling about attitudes towards beauty standards when a slightly cartoony female character of average human built, with tan skin tone and clad in regular street clothes (and not the “unfeminine” full battle gear) is such an unbearable level of SJW pandering which the status quo warriors find necessary to “fix” with whitewashing, bikini tops and photoshop-based plastic surgery.
Just imagine how they would “un-tumblrize” Constructor if her original design wore a bulletproof vest, had darker skin and hair, zero makeup, fatter body and more detailed, less smooth facial features.
~Ozzie
Credit to icantatricks and mitotic for the discovering of the photoshopped image,
So, I was watching the Smite 4.21 patch notes, and I was really impressed by the quality of the skins.
Nemesis’ new skin actually looks like half decent armor, minus the high heels.
Discordia looked cute and mage-y.
And then there was this.
This is “Exterminator Kali”, who is supposed to have a “superhero feel”. She looks like one of those flag girls from car races. Had me going there for a minute with the improvement, Smite…
Ok, that Nemesis skin looks surprisingly interesting and not particularly sexualized in SMITE’s very low standards, especially compared to her default design. It’s not perfect, of course – you mentioned high heels, but there’s also spandex chainmail on her legs and skin-tight material around waist… Though this is probably the closest they ever got to practical female breastplate.
Dicordia could use a longer skirt, but her design at least has some personality, something nonexistent among other goddesses in this game. As a side note, her lore starts as a coherent story (Eris flees Troy after successfully spreading chaos of war there, reinvents herself as Dicordia) and quickly spirals into something that spits into face of everyone even remotely familiar with Greco-Roman myths and history (she makes a character who is neitherthe ancestor of Romulus nor
and
Remus the original founder of Rome instead of the twins). Sometimes I feel this game exists only to troll mythology nerds with blatant disregard for everything that makes those stories and characters special.
Speaking of which, can we ALL, as the humanity, please stop sexualizing the Hindu goddess Kali FOREVER? What’s video games’ problem with her? There was a super-porny version (NSFW link!) in Rise of the Incarnates (the game doesn’t seem to exist anymore). Overwatch also felt justified in turning this powerful female deity of a living religion into a “sexy”skin for Symmetra, because the character is Indian.
We referenced SMITE’s disgusting treatment of Kali in this 2015 post about exotification and it’s as topical now as it was then:
Other than sporting four arms and blue flesh, that “Exterminator” skin doesn’t even have anything to do with Kali’s default SMITE design. And what’s “superhero” about it, too? The biggest connection I can think of is that she looks like an ultrasexualized Guardians of the Galaxy reject.
~Ozzie
edit:A reader informed us that SMITE Wiki misspells the character’s name in Discordia’s lore: the article says Aeneus, an unrelated Greek mythology character, rather than Aeneas, the protagonist of Virgil’s Aeneid, bridge between Greek and Roman myths and ancestor of Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome.
Howdy folks, Myriad of Nocturnes here. I’m thinking of starting a series of posts where I bitch about shit that really grinds my proverbial gears. So, being the bonafide robot lover that I am, I thought I’d start us off with something that really just seems lazy to me.
Robots, Gender Roles, and You.
Credential wise, I’m a Transformers fan, Gundam fan, and fan of pretty much every robot focused franchise you could care to name. I love pretty much every sort of robot design, but there is one in particular that really annoys me.
You’ve all seen the content, i’m sure. A big, hulking inhuman (but masculine coded) robot with all sorts of deadly implements of war, death, and what have you….who shares a setting with a robot with ‘feminine’ coding who looks like a shrink wrapped supermodel.
It’s cowardly, if you ask me. People feel the need to assign some sort of humanity to their robot, rather than allowing it to be a robot. Why does your robot have to conform to hetero-normative gender roles? Why are all of your lady robots running around looking like human women with fancy helmets? Why does a robot have to act in a manner consistent with the way people act?
Ya’ll often share posts about making monster girls more monstrous. I just passed one today that called for people to give their orc women fangs, tusks, scars, and muscles.
I say let your robots of any gender coding have multiple arms, inhuman features, and alien thought processes. Be creative! Let your robot be any gender it desires. If you want your robot to be feminine in some manner, let it, but don’t show us that it’s feminine by giving it big anime titties.
We talk a lot about suspicious dimorphism among design of living creatures, but when this trope regards robots, it’s a special case. There’s no “they’re just naturally like that” Thermian argument to juggle. Instead, there might be the “Don’t blame us for how that fictional robot looks, blame its equally fictional creator!” variation of the agency argument.
@femfreq has an old episode regarding the inherent sociological problem with sexualizing female-coded robots:
The video focuses exclusively on gynoids in advertising, so doesn’t really touch on the even bigger problem in various science fiction and similar media.
Popular media tends to assume a robot, an artificial (not always sentient) being should either be coded male or assumed male in absence of gender signifiers. A female-coded robot is generally requires a “good” justification to look like a lady – usually some combination of being seen as subservient, providing fanservice or the Smurfette Principle. Thus making them look feminine is a bigger priority than taking advantage of the fact that robots can look like whatever – that privilege is reserved to machines which are male by default.
That leads me to quite a bold conclusion that Orisa is by far the best female playable character design in Overwatch – bearing very little gender signifiers (particularly compared to all the human women in the game) and having silhouette that is both very bulky and not entirely humanoid.
