Response and deconstruction of Sarkeesian's 'Women as Background Decoration Trope'

This week Anita Sarkeesian has released another video for her series 'Feminist Frequency' on youtube. This is generating a ton of heated debate online, with arguments from extremists on both sides giving me a headache as I read the comments.

Normally I like to stay far away from such debates as it is hard to make an opinion without being labelled as a hater or sexist, or extreme feminazi and so on. The current trend in gaming journalism to focus on these social activist issues really irks me lately but that rant is for another blog.

In Anita's latest faring "Women as background decoration" parts 1 and 2. She has made some good arguments and points but she has also focused on certain games and scenes that I feel have been totally misrepresented, cherry picked and twisted in order to fuel her agenda. I would like to point out that I am not claiming that sexism in games is a non issue, it is, but Anita's representation of the issue leaves me feeling that she is a bad figurehead for the feminist voice, as many feminists have said so themselves.

She has a goal in mind, an axe to grind and only picks the information that suits her agenda. She rarely acknowledges when things have been done right as well as wrong. She feels it is easier to complain without offering any clear solutions or ways to improve. She is beginning from her conclusion 'Video Games are sexist: Let me show you why." instead of "Are Video Games Sexist? Let's see." This method irritates me no matter the subject of the argument, and this is an important subject to discuss.

This video has numerous problems, especially the video games chosen as representation. This stems from games such as Assassins creed, Red Dead Redemption and Dragon Age being 'period pieces'. As a feminist she should be aware of the state of affairs in these eras, horrific violence against women was shockingly common and and much more distressing than anything I have ever seen in a game. There are endless historical accounts of women being beaten, attacked and tortured as punishment or for the entertainment of males in those eras. While this by no means makes it any less shocking, she fails to acknowledge this context.
Showing violence against women in this case is not only about realistically reflecting reality, but also realistically reflecting human behaviour. Wouldn't completely omitting the acts and glossing over the fact be equally as bad?

Dragon Age Origins

Let's look at some specific examples...
The Dragon Age example is an historical reference to a practice called "First Night" which some argue was law in England, though as this custom has many sceptics, this could also refer to other media references to the custom. LA Noire pays homage to Noir fiction. Red Dead Redemption, a lightweight representation of Wild West fiction. For Assassin's Creed's, any violence against women is far, far tamer than what commonly occurred in the areas in question, which even includes some of the famous historical figures they use.
Sure we can argue "let's show experiences better than what occurs in the real world" but what if the author's and creator's intention is to depict the harshness of the real world, in a different environment?

Around the 26 minute mark she made the statement that a lot of the violence against women is "inescapable, unchangeable", yet earlier in the video she mentions, as well as fails to mention that the player can intervene, prevent or skip certain scenes entirely. Many scenes are there to engage the player and have them act, not as some gory side show. One reference that irritated me was that in Red Dead Redemption she mentioned that the same act happens repeatedly, in order to desensitize and titillate the player.
Has she no knowledge of how side quests work in a sandbox world? The worlds are huge! If certain side activities only happened once they could 1) Be easily missed 2) Are not a fair representation of the Wild West and 3) The game wouldn't have any lasting content/atmosphere. Eventually making the game dull and lifeless. (This counts for any sidequest - not just sexual violence).

Thunderf00t on youtube has made a very strong argument that Anita has made incredibly black and white statements and has completely taken one game completely out of context. That game is Hitman Absolution.
Please see his full video tomorrow, with particular focus on his argument for Hitman.

Sarkeesian's depiction of this game ENTIRELY focuses on the strip club scene, the game has 20 missions, 7 parts in each. Only 2 parts in a sole mission take place in a strip club. She shows the strippers being killed and dragged around for the sick enjoyment of the player. However Thunderf00t went through roughly 60 streams of players going through this segment and only one player had shot the guard and strippers. None had 'toyed with the bodies'. Many people are questioning where she gets such footage. Did she manufacture this content herself? Did she beat the strippers and drag them around just so she can be disgusted at what she had just done? Players are PENALISED for killing innocents, female or male. It is actively DISCOURAGED for the player to engage in such behaviour, with negative reinforcement through guard alerts, point loss or reputation loss. When she cherry picks and twists the representations of scenes just to support her argument, it undermines her legitimacy.

She almost never highlights the countless violence that occurs to men in video games either. If women are indeed 'background decoration' then violence to men is most definitely the 'main attraction'. It is Anita's complete unwillingly to explore the other side of the argument that makes her lose face. Yes there are indeed, many crazy people outraged enough to give her death threats. People make death threats to everyone about anything it seems. Hell, people stab and shoot each other at Walmart. The world sucks. But there are also many people who give constructive and level headed arguments that she completely shuts off in the areas that she controls. I'm sure if she opened the gates, many more opinions and videos such as Thunderf00t's would blast her arguments wide open.
Violence IS done to innocent, helpless men and in at least one case in for a few games she featured, it IS mixed together with sexual objectification. In Far Cry 3, a protagonist's male friend is purchased and used as a sex slave. In Dragon Age Origins, a nude male is found being tortured in a dungeon. In Red Dead Redempion, as part of a stranger quest, Marston finds a merchant who is in the process of being raped and eaten by a cannibal. This however doesn't match her argument so she either ignores it completely or uses blanket phrases such as "rarely do we see".

There are many other specific cases we could mention such as God of War, Bioshock and so on but my argument would spill onto even more pages so I will stop here.
It is an important issue to discuss, and it IS good that it is getting discussion, but we need a more balanced representation and view of the issue. Not a cookie cutter, cherry picked view that does not even attempt to consider the counter argument.