Comment by chiubaka | Hacker News Reader

Comment by chiubaka | Hacker News Reader

Wow, I'm really glad I read this.

I'm making a video game myself right now, and this such a relevant issue that I never even thought about. It never occurred to me that women in the gaming industry were mistreated, but it kind of makes sense-- video games often cater to young males, and often the easiest way to cater to those young males is by over-sexualizing women.

I'm not going to say that that strategy doesn't work on me (I am, myself, a young male), but I am going to say that I don't think it's right for games and other media to capitalize so heavily on that. I think the over-sexualization of women in games and in other places often makes men think with their penises instead of their brains. They say and do stupid things that they really never should. It's inexcusable, and it's a two-way street: men should know better, and mass media shouldn't be encouraging that kind of thinking. I also don't think it's right that someone who just wants to follow their dreams in the gaming industry (or really any industry) should ever experience what any of the case studies in this article experienced.

I'm not sure what I can do to help here, but if I find a way, I hope I can! Right now I'm working on a gaming startup with a couple of my best friends and, at the very least, we have made a commitment to ourselves to never resort to over-sexualizing women in order to advertise our game (many similar games do, and it frustrates me). I'm also going to make a conscious commitment right now to be aware the way I behave around women in the gaming industry and make sure I'm doing my job to help stop the issue, not propagate it.

Thank you so much for sharing this.

> I think the over-sexualization of women in games and in other places often makes men think with their penises instead of their brains.

Why do you think so? Personally, I think it's the other way around - the cause is that people (not just men) respond better to "shallow" things - i.e. pretty things/landscapes/photos/people, which is why marketers/companies create things that are pretty. If your target audience is males, then it makes sense to use what males most powerfully respond to in your ads - pretty women.

I would argue against calling it "shallow" but maybe more base/instinctual/primal perhaps? I would agree with tomp that it's probably because this is what works on the target audience. This creates a terrible cycle where the inherent hostility towards women in the marketing of video games means less women will be interested in playing which means the target audience doesn't change and the cycle repeats.

You're right, this absolutely goes two ways. And, honestly, I really do like pretty women. But it bothers me a lot that most of the advertisements I see for games on the web today feature almost nothing but scantily clad women with large bosoms.

I want people to play games because they are amazing, because they have great concepts, and have been wonderfully executed. I don't want people to play games because they have boobs in them.

This may or may not be an unattainable ideal, and certainly it would require change for both the advertisers and the target consumers.

The men are usually represented in the same way. Muscular, Agile, etc.

But the men aren't presented that way because they're objects of sexual desire for the target audience, they're strong and tough and agile to fill the player's fantasy of power and control. Besides, the argument that men are portrayed the same way quickly breaks down when you compare male "functional" armor and female "sexy" armor, which is a common trope in a lot of games.

I worked in advertising for a number of years. Men are presented primarily in one of 4 ways.

1) Handsome 2) Stupid 3) Authority 4) Bro

Men are presented as objects just as women are, that is how you sell in 20 seconds.

> Men are presented as objects just as women are, that is how you sell in 20 seconds.

It's not the same, because women are politically/socially much more vulnerable. If you are one woman in an office of 10 men, one of the men objectifying you is a threat, but not vice-versa. If you are blue in a world run by green people, constant advertisements objectifying blue people is threatening, but not those objectifying green.

Men are found in the top and the bottom of society. Men are much more likely to be wrongfully accused of incest or sexual offending children.

It's not the same I agree. But men are equally vulnerable just about other things.

Visit your local state capital, Washington DC, the executive offices of Fortune 1000 companies, etc. What do you see? Who has power in our society?

> Men are much more likely to be wrongfully accused of incest or sexual offending children.

I would be very surprised if this compares to the incidence of sexual assault. Also, men are much more likely to sexually assault women (and children), so perhaps the false accusations are proportional.

EDIT: Added last sentence of first paragraph.

Now narrow it down to Fortune 1000 companies the last 5-10 years and you will see quite a big change.

We often forget that things take time to change. There are primarily CEO men in fortune 1000 companies be because of historical reasons.

Of course you are going to find an overwhelming number of men at fortune 1000 companies but the more you move towards today that will shrink.

Now go down to the homeless shelters and tell me what you see. Who is in the bottom of society?

Men are generally found in the top and the bottom of society but the reasons have changed radically the last 50 years and they have nothing to do with women being treated unfairly.

If you consider an object as something to be acted upon, of the 4 ways of representation you cited, only the first usually applies. Other ways of representation, in the examples I can think of, are often of active characters, either the corporate alpha male, or the frat-house bro. Sure, these are simplifications and stereotypes of men, but I don't think they can compare to the objectification of women through their sexuality, as portrayed through our mass media. Men act, women are acted upon.

I think they do.

But the target demographic for games doesn't just have to be males. There was a great piece by Tracy Lien detailing the history of video games and how marketing is the direct cause of the stereotype that video games are for males. Video games don't inherently appeal to a specific gender. Indie games, in general, are a great example of how games can have gender inclusive appeal.

Anyways, here is her article. I really enjoyed it and it's a great piece if you want to learn more about video game culture.

http://www.polygon.com/features/2013/12/2/5143856/no-girls-a...

Obviously. E.g. The Sims was probably targeted more at girls/women than at boys/men. But that is irrelevant, different games are targeted at different sectors of the market, and some are targeted specifically at men (violent games come to mind).

I would think that the marketing of video games is more connected to the fact that in the beginning, most games were developed by males (simply because most programmers/geeks were men, developing games that they would enjoy themselves).

My point is that games don't have to target a specific gender. Not only does that encourage gender stereotyping, but it limits the games available for either gender. It might be a viable market practice, but it should be criticized for its negative social effect.

Just fyi, but Sims wasn't targeted towards a specific gender. Its marketing was focused on young adults and casual gamers. The Sims is slightly more popular with females, but that doesn't mean it was specifically intended for a certain gender.

In addition, you don't need to speculate on the marketing of video games. The article I linked gives a very thorough walkthrough of its history. The very first games were predominately designed by men, but the content wasn't targeted towards males. For example, Pong, Breakout and Centipede are relatively gender neutral. The extreme marketing bias was introduced after the video game industry crashed in 1983. Companies had to be more careful of the products they created and Nintendo took the lead on the initiative to specifically target males.

Except that it is appropriate to think of landscapes as things and inappropriate and harmful to think of of women as things.

You just spent a few paragraphs breathlessly and remorselessly gender shaming heterosexual men.

How do you feel about that?

Only heterosexual men who dehumanize women: that is not an intrinsic part of being a man and I'm rather insulted you believe it is.

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