The gaming enthusiast known as seanmalstrom seems to be on a personal crusade to challenge the stereotype of men as the โlogical sex.โ He does this mostly by 1) being a dude and 2) writing things that make no sense at all.
In a recent post on his blog Malstromโs Articles News โ no, thatโs really what itโs called โ Mr. Malstrom attempts to rebut a piece by John Walker of the gaming site Rock Paper Shotgun that challenged misogyny in the gaming world.
Itโs not much of a rebuttal, but Mr. Malstrom makes a couple of, er, “arguments” that grabbed my attention. At one point he suggests that if game developers stop populating their games with sexy lady characters with giant boobs and long legs, American men will have no way to exercise their God-given right to ogle sexy ladies with giant boobs and long legs.
There is a great question I have yet to hear anyone in the Game Industry answer. If women cannot be depicted fantastical (big boobs, long legs, slaughters armies single-handedly) in fantasy entertainment, where can men go to see fantasy women? Women have their fantasy men from endless soap-operas, romance novels, chick flicks, and such. Are men not allowed to have fantasies in entertainment?
True, that is a question Iโve yet to see anyone in the game industry answer, largely because most of the people in the game industry, whatever their flaws, live in the real world, and in the real world images of sexy ladies with big boobs are not exactly difficult to come by.
Mr. Malstrom goes on to argue that men in the English-speaking world have the greatest need for sexy lady video game characters, because the women they run into on a regular basis in the real world are all fatties. In the Cold War era, politicians warned about a โMissile Gapโ with the Russians. Today, apparently, we and the Russians have a Fatty Gap.
In Russia, it is stunning to see alcoholic bums of Russian men with model quality looks Russian women. In the same way, in the United States it is stunning to see wealthy, hardworking, handsome American men with an American woman who looks like a Troglodyte. Of course, this is just a generalization. The point is that the typical American male has a better worldwide value if they stop thinking the local obese women around them are โthe normalโ. They arenโt the normal worldwide.
If anyone needs fantasy depictions, it would be English speaking men who donโt have access to the worldwide standard.
Mr. Malstrom is also bothered by the suggestion that video game makers should try to make female characters more interesting. You know, with personalities and motivations of their own, and stuff like that. To Mr. Malstrom, thereโs nothing more interesting about a women than her body.
What makes a woman interesting to men?
The truth is that interesting women needs youth, big boobs, long legs, long hair, and an hourglass figure to be interesting to men. The more women go away from this, the less interesting they become to men. This is why women when inevitably age, they become more and more invisible to men. It is just Nature at work. Ironically, for men the older they get, the more interesting they can become to women as their earning potential goes up. This balances out how most young men are invisible to women when they are younger. After the age of 25, men tend to become the more interesting ones compared to a woman of equal age. This is why mothers always advised their daughters to โsnag him when he and she are both youngโ.
Indeed, Mr. Malstrom argues, men who insist that women be depicted as sex objects are doing women a giant favor.
And we should only hope that women wish to be depicted as sex objects for that is how they become love objects as well. No man wants to marry a women they arenโt attracted to. Last I checked, marriage rates were plummeting in the West. Perhaps journalists should strive for โpositive changeโ by suggesting to women to be depicted more as sex objects so they can attract a man for marriage before they get too old. That would truly help women and make men happier as well.
Mr. Malstrom concludes with a stirring call for women to stop being such fat fatties.
It IS tasteless for using women as sex objects to sell games. Why? It is because real life women should be sex objects to begin with. If that were the case, putting them on a game cover wouldnโt be selling the game. This used to be the case decades ago. Since obesity in women have skyrocketed and attractive women have diminished, putting attractive women on game covers definitely attracts men more than it should.
It IS sad that women canโt find themselves sensibly portrayed in the games they play. It is not because the women in the games are โtoo attractiveโ, it is because the women playing them tend to be โtoo fatโ. It is sad for women that they are fat. It is also sad for men. What John Walker should do is to advise women to get in shape and try to look like the depictions of women that men are attracted to. This would be โpositive changeโ we could all get behind.
I hate to burst your bubble, Mr. Malstrom, but I donโt think there was any era of history in which women looked like this.
It’s probably just as well, as Lara here doesn’t seem to have eyelids and her head isn’t properly connected to her neck.
Note: Thanks to Tatjna for pointing me to Mr. Malstrom’s post!
Actually, let’s start a comic and base each heroine on a female stereotype, like — The Cougar, The Silver Fox, Crazy Cat Lady — yep, she’s magical and has a gang of cats with super powers that only obey her!
@pecunium and Marie
thanks, but no need for sympathy, that was years ago and the memory, while creepy, still makes me feel like I’m an awesome ninja ๐
I always feel bad when you are so nice because of such old stories, and I’ve lived through far worse than that. Might explain why I was actually really calm in that particular situation.
I think it is useful to know whether one tends to be calm angry, frightened or panics, it helps to know what we would be capable of (and what not)at those moments. For example I try not to talk or say something smart(not good at it). I’m told I sound arrogant and so far, that only provoked assholes even more. If I have to say something, I get aggressive right away.
Shiraz,
Have you read Infinite Jest?
Just asking
When I become invisible, I intend to bring down entire governments. You guys think way too small!
can i be the manic pixie dream girl — AND BE A REAL PIXIE?!?!
โSchrรถdingerโs Attackerโ is why the idea of Schrรถdinger’s Rapist never bothered me.
Feel free to disseminate the idea, if it’s helpful in making the, “but you say all men are rapists” when some moron tries to complain about Schrรถdinger’s Rapist.
TomBcat: We could swap stories. I had an “interesting” youth/young adulthood.
Eli, no, I haven’t read it….and I do read comics. What’s it about?
Bahumbugi — holy shit, Maic Pixie Dream Girl as a heroine? Now that’s a good one! Who else can we get?
I bags Crazy Cat Lady!
Also on being invisible, I’m thinking small. Things like … oh, having an invisible water-pistol to put out public smokers’ cigarettes. Repeatedly.
Manic is spelled manic, not maic. *shrugs*
Of course, pecunium, that is what made the encounter today so frightening and why I went to a public place with a human that I had reason to believe from previous encounters was a decent human being.
it sounds like the three of us could trade stories. sad stories can become empowerment stories…narrative reworking can be good…like now you feel like a ninja.
also @eli – i’m not a fan of cops. victim of violence by men or sexual assault or sexual harassment? no attention for you. my wallet was stolen once — then they cared oh so much! my dear friend is a lawyer, and she saw a man groping a woman in the subway. she then went up to the precinct right above, and explained what she saw. the police officer goes, oh, well, i’m sorry, we need her to make the complaint. and she goes, excuse me, if i had seen her abused or seen her robbed, you would not make this request. and then she was mad.
It might sound like maic if it was said wif a really strong East End accent. All those consonants, lost forever.
::channels Polly Page from The Bill::
i will use my ukulele strings to slice off heads and heads
@tomBcat
Well, glad that you’re fine ๐ And internet hugs can be offered on many occasions, not just super bad ones! (though if I’m bugging you w/ them I’ll stop). And you are awesome ๐
@MordsithJ
All hail our new feminist overlord!
@bahumbugi
Of course! What should I be? I’m so uncreative. Give me a straw feminsit trope.
Sorry Shiraz, It’s a mega-massive novel. My copy is 979 pages plus 304 pages of endnotes. You unwittingly made reference to an insidious terrorist group that lurks its pages. I love this book and am embarrassed to admit how many times I have read it. Because I love it. The author is David Foster Wallace and he committed suicide a few years back. (So now you have to read the book again….)
bahumbugi – the cops here are the same. One time I’ve been attacked (a road-rage creep) I had a witness who gave his name and number, had the dirtbag’s license number, went to the cops straight away, lodged a complaint, and they never followed it up. Mind you it was a notoriously corrupt station.
They’re the same with drivers who race past trams. People have been killed getting out of trams, and I’ve seen one incident where a woman was hit (I don’t think she was badly hurt, thank goodness). But the police’s attitude is the same: if they didn’t see it, it basically didn’t happen. Never mind you’ve a tram driver and a whole tram full of people who saw it, they aren’t interested. Makes you wonder if the corpses just disappear so the cops don’t have to bother themselves about the fatalities.
@bahumbugi
Yes on the whole beauty standard thing.
Though I feel like it doesn’t matter all that much how women look like, their bodies are always treated like public property by some. Be it that you appeal to them, are not appealing enough or even that people want to know ‘what’ you are when they can’t quite tell your ethnicity (I feel this happens to women far more often, but that might be confirmation bias because I get asked and my male friends do not).
My favourite: Making a “compliment” on something that appeals to their personal fetish. Sometimes even expecting you to drop on your knees because “thank god I found a man who doesn’t find me repulsive!” I saw it with a very overweight friend of mine every time we went out, there were either some idiots informing her that she was overweight or a guy who told her that he was into ‘big girls’.
if you want a quick cheat into the awesomeness of DFW, you can read this speech:
http://publicnoises.blogspot.com/2009/05/david-foster-wallace-kenyon.html
…this is water. this is water.
Marie – i guess you could be the damsel in distress — but the secret is you actually control the dragon.
bahumbugi-
I don’t recall saying I was fond of the cops, I just recall saying I found them in my yard chasing after errant beagles. And that the one I found there was being ineffectual. If I said otherwise, I’d be happy to be corrected.
@bahumbugi
hmmmm….I’ll take that. Dragons are cute ๐
Oh, Marie, it’s fallen off the Recent Comments already, but I left a YAY comment to your answer to Hershele in the Reno thread (about atheism etc).
You guys ever here of The Tick? In his universe there’s a hero called SuffraJet. She’s dressed like an old-timey suffragette and has a rocket strapped to her back, enabling her to fly. I think her battle cry is, “I vote for goodness!”
I’m so getting lost in this thread.
@pecunium
From what little I’ve read on your blog so far, I don’t feel like I can or should ever compare.
eli – I read bahumbugi’s comment as “I’m not fond of cops either” following your description of the useless ones, not as a suggestion you said you were fond of ’em.