When women, in conversations online, point out the ridiculously tiny percentage of video games that feature women as protagonists, they tend to get flooded with responses from indignant gamebros telling them that if they don’t like the games out there, they should just make their own.
The gamebros mean their comments to be conversation-enders. Just as Vivian James, #GamerGate’s imaginary girlfriend, tells game critics to “shut up and play,” these guys are telling critics of the retrograde gender politics in gaming to “shut up and make games.”
It never occurs to them that some of the women they smugly tell this to … might already be doing this.
One of the more entertaining aspects of following the Twitter account of much-harassed game developer Brianna Wu — known in #GamerGate circles as Literally Who 3 — is watching clueless gamebros try this “argument” on her.
LOVE IT when men tell me, "Don't like how women are represented? Make your own games!" Lol. http://t.co/LlkDLnmOVs pic.twitter.com/n0BgqwvH2B
— Brianna Wu (@BriannaWu) October 26, 2014
The whole thread is here if you’d like to see what an unpleasant fellow this Simon Wood really is.
Oh, but there’s more:
It never ends:
Of course, some of her, er, critics seem to realize that she already makes games. But somehow this doesn’t keep them from yelling at her to make games anyway.
@iMatthewCM @Swispy @SmegmaKing @Spacekatgal fuck the trolls. If you have a bitch fit about gender/races in a game, go make one twats
— Timothy Sleeper (@Sleeper83091) October 26, 2014
https://twitter.com/mchugepants/status/524445877398544384
Others demand that she start making GOOD GAMES.
https://twitter.com/BABPEEGTWO/status/525769579595718656
(Huh. Seems like a decent number of people think the game she just releaased is good.)
And this demanding GamerGater wants to know why she doesn’t make MORE games.
Oh. That.
This guy apparently thinks that instead of criticizing the game industry, Wu should be personally training a new generation of girls to make games.
@Spacekatgal Just because they are mostly designed by men doesnt women cant enjoy them and if they don't, teach women so they can make games
— Dragonslay3r94 (@Dragonslay3r94) October 22, 2014
It must be hard to find time to make games with all these dudes yelling at her to make games. And then yelling at her more when she does.
Thus Spake Zarafriday jones:
Looks like a Dead Space necromorph to me. And I think that’s a trilby.
@Pocket Nerd
Wow, those “reviews” are something else. Especially the one that said the game was LITERALLY rape. No, it is not. Rape is rape. I just can’t with these people
Why are they telling women to make games if they don’t like women being involved in gaming at all?
(And yes I am aware it’s actually about ethics in journalism, but my question still stands).
Btw, isn’t this whole gamergate shilling pretty much the result of…a woman making her own game? And they hated the game so much, and they hated the idea that people might like the game that they started a hate group?
So yeah fuck that shit yo.
Johanna: but words don’t have meanings, remember? So these guys can use whatever they like to describe their feeeeelings.
I would paint a target on that guys back just for committing the gross sin of using “literally” to describe a metaphorical situation. And it’s not even a good metaphor! Playing as an opposite sex character is not rape for ducks sake.
It’s about ethics in games journalism, which is why I’m going to give your game a negative review due to personal disagreement.
Gamergate: never don’t be hypocritical.
@Sunnysombrera: Silly me, my female brain totally forgot that men are allowed to use words however they want and randomly assign new meanings to actual words because MEN. Teehee!
“It’s not our fault [media makers] don’t have more diversity” isn’t a strong argument in general, but in this case it’s also a flat-out lie. You guys are actively being barriers to entering the field, on purpose, in an attempt to restrict it to your demographic, so don’t start with that crap.
A “funny” thing like that happened to me the other day.
I commented on a Polygon article that I liked it and appreciated that they were taking a stand on this.
A (self-defined GamerGate supporter) male commenter replied with a rant about journalists not doing their jobs and some insults and slurs. The thing is… I’m a journalist myself, though I don’t work at Polygon or any other gaming media.
So, I stated and reminded him of two important things they usually seem to conveniently forget:
1. How could he dare to tell me and any other journalists out there how to do our jobs?
2. (Backfiring GamerGaters’ own argument) If you don’t like it, why don’t you do it yourself?
@Johanna Roberts I don’t know why but I imagine you saying the TeeHee is the most demonic sounding way.
I heard Brianna Wu interviewed on the radio a little while back. She’s a very clever, interesting, and apparently thick-skinned person. I’ve never heard of or played her game, but it is clearly a game, so I don’t really know where all this “go make your own game” nonsense comes from.
Well, actually I do, but it isn’t a very nice place and I think I’ll stay away from it.
@Pocket Nerd: So much for “Objectivity” in gaming reviews.
Some slight good news, I justgot a notice that the awful anti-semitic “Triumph of the Shill” attack page on Facebook actually _did_ violate their community standards, and was taken down.
Weeks late and weak sauce, but at least it’s down.
I’m working on a game with my brother. Time will tell if a three person project ever leads into anything lol. Usually, I just provide him with ideas and character designs, but now he wanted to know that if I wanted to make a game of my own, he would help me and do the programming, if I provided him with detailed plans and designs. I’m hyped, but scared at the same time.
On another note, just heard that, apparently, Thunderf00t had said something silly about violence by men / women. Something about testosterone explaining the differences of violence committed by each gender. I don’t follow him personally anymore, trying to spare myself from the headache. I still follow a handful of people who do call him out on his bullshit, though.
There are so many things about this argument that get me, but one facet of this shitty jewel that rarely seems to come up is that making your own production level game is rarely a solo activity — it is extremely challenging and requires expertise in a hugely diverse subset of skills (developers, writers, artists, musicians, not to even start on production support staff like a QA team).
Dudes who whip out this argument are usually the type of dudes who don’t know the first thing about making a game, and that’s the ridiculous part, these arm chair game experts who issue torrents of curses because Depression Quest isn’t extremely technically complex (as if that’s important to making a compelling game) but have no idea what goes into making any game.
The easier way, by far to start building games, is to get your feet wet working for a game dev studio, and uh, we know what hiring practises in tech are like.
@leftwingfox – I was surprised (and pleased) when I saw that Facebook suddenly decided to revise its decision and take down the page. It’s late, but I think it’s better than leaving it up.
Always hilarious when this happens; a woefully ignorant or self-righteous person throws out a challenge they think is just so brilliant it will end things in their favor, but the other person doesn’t follow their “script”. I have radical political views so I’ve had this happen to me before.
“That’s socialist!”
“Yep.”
“… um… well…”
Not in the script. You can practically see the gears lock up in their heads.
Too bad it won’t stop these jackasses.
Because they know that the vast majority of people talking about this are not game developers and don’t have the time or the skills to put out their own games. It’s just a silencing tactic. These types say the same things when diversity in other types of media are being discussed.
It’s about ethics in games journalism, which is why I’m going to give your game a negative review due to personal disagreement.
Gamergate: never don’t be hypocritical.
Didn’t you know? Only feminist and “SJW” opinions are political and biased. Gamergater opinions are inherently logical and objective and true due to their manliness. Therefore everything they say is automatically right. They don’t have to make an effort to be ethical or have integrity. It just comes naturally to them!
See, but Brianna isn’t making REAL games. She only makes silly girl games, and those aren’t REAL games, unlike manly boy games made by manly dudes. Also, something something bonbons.
I really don’t know what to make of ever vigilant GGers coming out guns blazing in order to prevent women from publicly discussing video games. Is this going to go on forever or will the eventually pick up on the fact that Sarkeesian’s videos haven’t had any discernible effect on their beloved billion dollar industry? Do they think women who they don’t agree with are feminist world dictators or powerful witches who can force massive change by merely expressing an opinion? Why can’t they wrap their brains around the fact that many adults do in fact enjoy discussing, analyzing and critiquing games and other forms of media?
These dipshits aren’t going to do productive, non-idiotic things on the internet anytime soon but you’d think the frothing hysteria would die down a bit at some point. I have enjoyed how every anti-feminist of **snicker** note have publicly hitched their wagon to this clown car of internet trolls. Stay classy nitwits.
I still can’t get over their Vivian James myopia. “Shut up and play” apparently doesn’t apply to them, since they’re certainly free to rant and rave about things that upset them about video games and related and not-related stuff.
Wait a minute. Vivian James is the ideal “girl gamer” of their fantasies, she’s saying nothing critical of the current state of video games, her ire is directed towards people who care about social issues (the whole point of the “shut up” thing), her role is being the shield of accusations of misogyny (rightfully) thrown #GamerGaters’ way, and they’re making porn of her and talking about her boner pleasability.
Oh god. It all falls back on them wanting to have an agreeable, easily controlled mommy figure whom they can fuck. Just like the rest of the manuresphere.
I just can’t with these guys. When will they finally realize no one is buying their “ethics in games journalism” shit? When will this fucking bullshit end? I have been unable to read gaming related articles or even touch a controller in the past few months because I’m so fed up with “gamers” and “gaming culture” and “oppressed gamers” and “ethics in games journalism” and “indie games are destroying ‘Murica” and whatever.
To think I once absolutely adored video games of all kinds. I just can’t anymore. On the upside, I’ve been doing a lot more reading lately! I just picked up Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. She lived in the 18th century and had more advanced ideas in her pinky finger than the entire manosphere has today.
@Estwald
…uh, “feminist friendly” game doesn’t mean “female protagonist.” It means “women are treated like people in this game.”
Also, assuming you mean “both female and male protagonists” by feminist and dudebro coexisting… You do realize exactly how small the number of games with female protagonists is? And the harassment that happens when games do have them? And the sexualization that happens to them?
A few “feminist” games do not cancel out all the horribleness. I’m a gamer, by the way. And it is *really* hard to find games with female protagonists or gender options.
Of course, even the games that have them don’t often bother to be on Mac. Thank the tiny digital gods for Crossover.
@Estwald
Name one person who has said that we should “replace” dudebro games.
Gee, why would anyone assume that men who are angry at the prospect of diversity in games would be part of a “movement” that exists to drive women out of gaming? Yes, it makes so much more sense to assume that random people who have nothing to do with gamergate just decided for no good reason to gang up on Brianna Wu!
That was sarcasm btw. This isn’t. Fuck you for putting the word ‘harassed’ in scare quotes. She got death threats. If that doesn’t qualify as real harassment, what does in your book?
Yeah right.
I guess you missed the part where gamergaters have a code name for her?
I hope from now on whenever you pee, the urine stream splashes back up in your face.
I don’t know if anyone has seen the GamerGater cartoon on Daily Kos
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/10/29/1339617/-Cartoon-Gamergate-Contagion-Spreads#