Tropes vs Women

So, there's a wonderful site called Feminist Frequency that is releasing a series of videos hosted by Anita Sarkeesian concerning various Tropes vs Women as seen in video games. In the last few days this has blown up and taken on a sinister bent as many male gamer fans have taken to Twitter to abuse and threaten her, to the point where she's had to flee her home and involve the authorities.

Now, I know some might think that is barely relevant to this forum, I'd say it's perfectly relevant. Though there is a lot of overlap in the target audiences, not all SFF fans are also video game fans. So how and why is this relevant here, in General Book Discussion? Because many/most of these Tropes vs Women are not limited to video games. They are seen across media, especially in science fiction and fantasy. To get to the point, they are considered a feature of grimdark, rather than a bug.

Most relevant here is the two-part Women as Background Decoration videos (part 1, part 2). Similar to TVTropes, Tropes vs Women seeks to identify, define, and properly label tropes in various media, though their focus is in video games.

Tropes vs Women defines the Women as Background Decoration thus:

"Women as Background Decoration: The subset of largely insignificant non-playable female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty, or racy flavoring into game worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male players."

Now, editing slightly to fit all media rather than simply video games...

"Women as Background Decoration: The subset of largely insignificant female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty, or racy flavoring into fictional worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male audience."

(To be utterly transparent: I removed the phrase "non-playable", changed "game worlds" to "fictional worlds", and changed "straight male players" to "straight male audience".)

This trope is based largely on sexual objectification. So here's that definition too:

"As the term implies, sexual objectification is the practice of treating or representing a human being as a thing or mere instrument to be used for another’s sexual purposes. Sexually objectified women are valued primarily for their bodies, or body parts, which are presented as existing for the pleasure and gratification of others."

It's fairly clear how this applies to many fantasy and science fiction works, and unfortunately is a staple of some authors' styles and entire subgenres, but it is a problem for many professionals and fans. When a sizable portion of the community actively supports this kind of sexism and objectification, and turns to such cowardly tactics as online abuse and threats, the rest of us are tarnished. We are lumped in with the jack-holes and assumed to be just as bad as they are. This is not limited to video gamers of course, just look at all the recent bolshevik about SFWA Bulletin covers and announcers at the Hugo Awards.

Honestly, I'm kinda over it. I'm over defending the community while simultaneously pretending there aren't a dozen more just like these cowards still quite prominently on display on both sides of the professional / fan divide in the community.

When someone with privilege has that privilege questioned or threatened, it's scary. When underprivileged people stand up for themselves and question the status quo the privileged can lash out. When you've had privilege for decades or longer in a community it's frightening to see that slip away or even questioned. It can feel like the "natural order" is changing, it can feel like special treatment for the Other. But it's not special treatment; it's simply the loss of privilege. f*ck I hope this sh*t really changing in SFF soon.

Last up, a great quote: "As always, please keep in mind that it's entirely possible to be critical of some aspects of a piece of media while still finding other parts valuable or enjoyable." -Anita Sarkeesian

I believe you are correct that this is something we should be concerned with and welcome those who have time to dig through the material to keep us updated on all of the issues.

It is unfortunate that there is a whole community[one whose credentials would be shady in the very least if we could trace them]dedicated to squashing the intellectual capacity of the Internet in favor of their own form of bullying.

More unfortunate is that there is another whole community that seemed to be designed as a disinformation factory to further muddy the issue, which is why I have backed off from investigating such things as the Trope vs Women in forums on the Internet.

Hopefully opening the topic in this forum will not result in opening that can of worms.

I think we've discussed this sort of thing before and managed to keep it civil...

I think there's a mirror of it in life in terms of the casual sexism a woman often faces in the workplace and in general in rl. As we challenge it in rl, perceptions will change. So hopefully it will then be challenged more in fiction. And sff has always had tropes that do support an, at best, passive view of women. (I'm being generous here.)

I also think publishers and agents are becoming more sensitive to it - in terms of not being seen to uphold such tropes for fear of being cited. I mentioned it in crits a few days ago where a synopsis (because the writer had been advised to use few names) sounded a little like the female character fell into the trope of a woman used to drive the male storyline. I think agents are much more leary of such stories now, because diversity is the key word at the moment.

In general, it's good to talk about these things, but it helps no one to get vitriolic/rude/too unmoving when we do.

Juliet McKenna is doing great work on this issue. More power to her.

springs said:

I think we've discussed this sort of thing before and managed to keep it civil...

I think there's a mirror of it in life in terms of the casual sexism a woman often faces in the workplace and in general in rl. As we challenge it in rl, perceptions will change. So hopefully it will then be challenged more in fiction. And sff has always had tropes that do support an, at best, passive view of women. (I'm being generous here.)

I also think publishers and agents are becoming more sensitive to it - in terms of not being seen to uphold such tropes for fear of being cited. I mentioned it in crits a few days ago where a synopsis (because the writer had been advised to use few names) sounded a little like the female character fell into the trope of a woman used to drive the male storyline. I think agents are much more leary of such stories now, because diversity is the key word at the moment.

In general, it's good to talk about these things, but it helps no one to get vitriolic/rude/too unmoving when we do.

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Perhaps when discussing this, the casual sexism displayed against men as depicted in the mass media and in advertising ought to be mentioned as well; in adverts men are either jerks or completely useless buffoons, in sitcoms and the like the same.

Indeed. Although I was referring to real life as opposed to media portrayal. I suspect for every example you gave of a male being stereotyped I could come back with a female one. It'd turn into a pretty tiresome thread, though.

The bottom line is if you are a woman, in various parts of the world, you will face obstacles which men don't, or not to the same extent. Right to education, right to a sexual freedom, right to expression, right to equal pay. As long as it is okay to see women as somehow lesser, for whatever reasons, then we don't challenge the stereotypes. And if stereotypes are okay in the real world, then why would we rail against them in escapist fantasy (but we do of course.)

But by all means let's talk about men being stereotyped. (I had my eyes opened on this recently on a throwaway comment I made about man-flu. Made me think.) But I'd suggest starting a new thread for fear of being seen/acccused of derailing this one, as so often seems to happen.

I think the whole issue goes deeper than some people want to delve.

What I mean by that is that when I agree that there are bad tropes in games and fiction I mean that there are bad tropes both in male and female category and often the discussion covers only the female trope vs woman thing when perhaps it would do well to cover the male trope vs man.

First lets draw away from the fiction itself and focus on the reader or the game player. There is a trope right there because people who play the games are given an identifiable trope in their lives based on a perceived notion about people who read those books and play those games. Perhaps in some cases they are consider misogynistic male dominants. But what does it say that there is a segment of players who are women.

But lets take this, in fairness, to another media. What about romantic novels and the general perception that primarily women read those novels. There is something to be made of the statement this makes about women, but you would have to examine the material to grasp the nature and understand that there is a strong resemblance between romance fiction and some of these games. Trope to Trope you will find some surprising similarities.

There is enough resemblance that if it were valid to raise question about the tropes in games and transfer that over to our fiction then should we not just raise the question about what might be considered misogynistic in this other media. Should we then assume that there is a much larger than assumed male readership of these novels because of that.

Or; should we step back and realize that these alleged tropes are part of the world building and part of the character development and that the sensitivity to these issues as they are brought up will for the most part run the danger of removing some of the believability of both the internal world and the characters. And that the sensitivity to these issues in games is something far different from what is in fiction and should be handled it such a way. These issues are like apples and oranges.

Or are they? Well, I'll let the game people argue their half.

It is a certainty that not all of life should be mirrored in fiction, just from the standpoint of half of what happens to me in a day is pretty boring.

But it's also just as true that the things in many of these tropes still exist today and still happen and are a real if dark part of life. That's part of the reason we have police forces and often the reason many chose that profession. Where should we draw the line and say that this issue from real life should never be discussed in fiction and where should we say that it is an overused trope. Most discussion like this end up being an attempt at censuring the writing and the writers who use the tropes. But if the trope were an overused trope that would mean that it did not have the power that is attributed to it and it would be a moot point because it would be something that would not sell books. But the arguments used suggest that it does sell books which means that it's a trope that evidently is not a tired and overworked one. That gets us down to the censuring of something that is a mirror of past and present real life and an issue that this very thread suggests is important enough we need to examine it and you can't examine it by burying it in censure.

So like everything else in writing we should be made aware of these tropes, but not so that we stop using them. Just as with everything in writing we should be fully aware of them and the ups and downs; and pluses and minus; and good and bad, so that when we use them we have a full knowledge of what they are and why we are using them in our fiction. Being aware of its nature does not mean that you can't and shouldn't use a trope and if it belongs in the scene, then it belongs in the scene.

If on the other hand that scene is one of your darlings... Well, that's another issue entirely.

I see progress in SFF on this front--more than in gaming, possibly in part because people who read for pleasure are a smaller, generally more intellectual and reflective group, featuring a lot more older (and thus on average more mature) and female fans. (I say this as an avid gamer.)

Even in grimdark fantasy, which has rightly been the subject of some debate, you have authors like Joe Abercrombie being reflective on their own use of tropes (and moving away from them in later books) and then there's Kameron Hurley's recent The Mirror Empire, which you could argue is "feminist grimdark."

Not saying SFF has moved past its sexism issues (it has not, and it's worse I think once you leave the world of books and examine the world of cons and fan spaces). But I see more cause for optimism than in the world of gaming.

I wholeheartedly agree that it is an issue that deserves attention and effort in order to implement change. That being said, I have personally grown extremely tired of having discussions about these sort of issues with random individuals. With certain people in certain settings? Perhaps. But by and large, it is one of those issues that I have long since run out of patience for the sort of discussions that are usually generated by the topic.

springs said:

Indeed. Although I was referring to real life as opposed to media portrayal. I suspect for every example you gave of a male being stereotyped I could come back with a female one. It'd turn into a pretty tiresome thread, though.

The bottom line is if you are a woman, in various parts of the world, you will face obstacles which men don't, or not to the same extent. Right to education, right to a sexual freedom, right to expression, right to equal pay. As long as it is okay to see women as somehow lesser, for whatever reasons, then we don't challenge the stereotypes. And if stereotypes are okay in the real world, then why would we rail against them in escapist fantasy (but we do of course.)

But by all means let's talk about men being stereotyped. (I had my eyes opened on this recently on a throwaway comment I made about man-flu. Made me think.) But I'd suggest starting a new thread for fear of being seen/acccused of derailing this one, as so often seems to happen.

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Point taken. Although there are still a few things worth mentioning on this subject, at least regarding Western countries. Men wanting to be teachers face serious obstacles, not least among which is the fairly serious risk to their careers and their liberty posed by the attitude of the "liberal" establishment to men accused of sexual misconduct - particularly but not exclusively with regard to teenage girls under their tutelage. Even if such accusations are disproved - even if the nasty little [insert insulting word] who made the accusation admits it was a lie - the teacher's career is still over. Mud sticks.

This does not, of course, apply to female teachers. There have been several recent cases of 40-year-old female teachers seducing 14-15 year old boys and getting away with it scot free.

Something similar also applies to male university students being accused of rape or sexual assault on campus, often on very tenuous grounds. Unless, of course, said male students are on athletic scholarships which seem to be a stay out of jail free card.

I strongly suspect, albeit without proof, that the gender disparity in income between men and women of the same age in the same job arises very simply because the men, on average, have been doing the job for longer. Women tend to take career breaks for fundamental biological reasons which are obvious and aren't going to change any time soon.

And finally, male homosexuals seem to attract more opprobrium than female ones.

And yet this stated bias towards men in education doesn't present a barrier to them becoming headteachers at a greater ratio:

http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-...-headteachers-education-glass-ceiling-careers

It is awful when someone is accused of a crime they didn't commit. It happened to a male lecturer of mine when I was a student and you're quite right, mud stuck. It was wrong. But it's not relevant to this thread, which is about tropes in fantasy that impact on our view of women. Once again, if you want to discuss male teachers facing accusations of rape, the world affairs forum is just the place for it. Or whether having babies is, in fact, the reason why women earn less. I have plenty to say about that, in the right place.

But placing it in this thread derails this one, a common thing that happens when these sort of threads start.

Yep, let's keep to the point in issue, folks. We're talking unsatisfactory tropes in SFF and gaming, and while we might allow some latitude into examining all unsatisfactory tropes in SFF, including those which demean/belittle/reduce men (though even then, if we want to discuss those other tropes at length, a separate thread would be best) issues of real life except as how those issues are used or reflected in SFF etc, belong elsewhere.

And the BBC has now reported on the threats against Sarkeesian http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-29028236

The Judge said:

And the BBC has now reported on the threats against Sarkeesian http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-29028236

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Suffice to say that whoever made the threat is a pathetic excuse for a human being.

These are the sort of moments that I have little response for people when they react to developing technologies in such a negative way. Saying something along the lines of 'there will always be bad apples' just does not cut it, anymore. Sarkeesian, Robin William's daughter, the hacking of iCloud to steal nude pictures of celebrities, the list goes on.

Edit: A short little article about the whole thing over at vox.

Mirannan said:

Something similar also applies to male university students being accused of rape or sexual assault on campus, often on very tenuous grounds. Unless, of course, said male students are on athletic scholarships which seem to be a stay out of jail free card.

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Not really sure this is a point you want to hang your hat on. If we're talking US college campuses, sure there are false accusations, but they are probably outnumbered 10 to 1 by date rape cases that go unreported. Not saying false accuations aren't a problem, but it doesn't really support your argument that men face all kinds of sexism. Even the teacher/job thing is pretty tenuous.

As to the tropes, there's some truth to it, but I generally in these instances don't take to the malicious view. I think women end up as background in video games and SFF mostly for financial reasons. IIRC, there have been numerous studies that show girls will play games or read books where the main character is male, but most boys will NOT do the same if the main character is a female. No male would be caught dead with a copy of Twilight, but girls have no problem reading Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, etc. From the gaming perspective then, if you make your protagonist a woman, you risk losing a ton of cash on an expensive investment and nobody wants to be the company willing to eat that loss of profit just for a little favorable PR.

Honestly, I think it has less to do with malicious sexism by men, or men trying to demean/limit women than it has to do with insecurity regarding masculinity, particularly in the west. The worst insult a boy can get is to be labelled "queer" or "a fag", and a good way to do that is to read a book with a woman on the cover or play a game where you "are" a woman. The other kids will never let it be forgotten that you "want to be a chick." Thus, boys won't touch anything that seems female-driven for fear of having their masculinity questioned, but the opposite is not true. So financially-speaking, you're better off having the main character be a man.

This doesn't cover everything though, as it still doesn't explain why all these incidental characters are always Barbie-ized. That I WOULD chalk up to pandering to adolescent male sexuality, but I again see it as profit-driven. Any study of arousal shows guys are "easy" and women are very complicated, so any attempt to titillate in a game will lean male, because all you need is an exaggerated figure. To titillate female players/readers takes a lot more effort and you may wind up changing the tone/content of the game. I see it as akin to adding tar to cigarettes... you don't need it and it's not the main attraction, but it IS something addictive that will keep people coming back even if they don't realize why.

I'd also say a lot of this is overblown. There are almost no women in the Bible, and what few there are are little more than child producers. Does anyone know anything about Helen of Troy other than the fact that she was so pretty the Greeks fought a decade-long war just so her king could get her back? This trope long precedes video games, and I think it's kind of unfair to single video games out and act like they should be responsible for changing cultural forces ingrained in us going back thousands of years. If we're going to talk about video games or genre fiction as offering disturbing and distorted content that promotes or reinforces bad behavior, I don't see why we zero in on the fact that video game girls are over-sexed and give a free pass to the endless amount of violence and gore in them. If they can support/promote sexism, then they also encourage violence, which many of the same gamers decrying objectification don't give a second thought to. They don't have a problem with Lara Croft killing hundreds of people over the course of those games, but they DO have a problem with the fact that she has a huge rack because it's "unrealistic and demeaning." You can't have that both ways.

I also find a lot of feminist critique to be way off base and indicative of even less understanding of men than men have of women. The fact is, I objectify women all the time. I'm not totally proud of it, but there it is. It's not that I think women are lesser or incapable or bad at maths or whatever, it's just that I don't care about those things. If we work together, I assume you're competent and expect the same from the women as I do from the men. Nonetheless, the first thing I notice about a woman is whether I'm attracted to her or not. Is it because I think her sex defines her, or because my sexuality has enormous power over me (as it does all humans) and I only want sex with women? I suspect if I was gay, it would be the same way with men, and I think that has more to do with how males are hard-wired than some effort by men to keep women down.

I'd say the debate over rape is also indicative. Feminists are quick to claim all rape is purely about power and never remotely has anything to do with sex. I think this is more a defensive view than a true one. It allows women to paint rapists as cowardly momma's boys that are afraid of women, which saves their ego (to an extent, maybe this is necessary to recover from the psychological damage the act causes) and turn them into faceless monsters instead of real people (as well as connect rape to their political points about equal pay and the like, which I think does a disservice to both issues).

I also think it terrifies women to think that some rapists really are just doing it for the sex, because it forces them to acknowledge the all-consuming nature of male desire. Most rapes are "date rapes" committed by acquaintances and I truly believe in most of these instances, the guy really does just want sex. Most women have told me that while PMS is overblown, it really does wreak havoc on your hormones and they've all said they had "meltdowns" they knew were irrational or overreacting but they just had to let fly. I think male desire is similar. It's an old saw, but there really are times (especially in adolescence) when guys get so wound up it's hard to think. The notion that this could go so far it might lead an otherwise seemingly normal guy to rape a woman he claims to care about (as happens too often on college campuses) is truly frightening.

Tying this back to the subject, as a result, we have more T&A in video games and SFF because it will keep boys/men coming back by activating their brain in the same way a cigarette or junk food does at the cost of turning off a handful of female fans that are repulsed by it. If you flip the script, you risk turning off a LOT of boys/men afraid to seem un-masculine while gaining maybe a handful of new female gamers. Cost-benefit ratio says better not to rock the boat.

soulslinging: you could argue that if the system perpetuates sexism even in the absence of, as you call it, malicious sexism, that would explains why it is so insidious and such a problem. (But looking at the reaction to Sarkeesian, I think we can also conclude that there is a lot of malicious sexism among gamers as well.)

And FTR I think it's way, way more apparent in gaming than in SFF. Not saying it's absent in SFF (it's not), but at least there are books marketed to women and books by women and books written with female audiences in mind. Where are they on, say, major video game consoles? Sure there are some (the last Tomb Raider springs to mind), but these are very much the exceptions. I started playing Metro 2033 Redux the other day and it struck me--there is not a single female NPC I've yet to encounter in the game. Not one.

Nerds_feather said:

Sure there are some (the last Tomb Raider springs to mind), but these are very much the exceptions.

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The Tomb Raider reboot was an excellent example of how to handle a wide variety of characters in less stereotypical and harmful ways. Good point bringing that one up.

Also just read this article on Sarkeesian, which has a good quote at the end:

The threats against Sarkeesian have become a nasty backdrop to her entire project — and her life. If the trolls making them hoped for attention, they've gotten it. They've also inexorably linked criticism of her work, valid or not, with semi-delusional vigilantism, and arguably propelled Tropes vs. Women to its current level of visibility. If a major plank of your platform is that misogyny is a lie propagated by Sarkeesian and other "social justice warriors," it might help to not constantly prove it wrong.

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How myopic, provincial, and sad.