Dignity and the Media!

On The Escapist forums there was recently a thread about how the unrealistic portrayal of women in games objectified them and served only to make them seem as sex objects. It was argued that it harmed their dignity. It was a rather hot topic with people on both sides of the spectrum. Any gamer out there is sure to know of at least one scantily clad female character who wears almost nothing and has over-sized breasts and an over-sized bottom.

Ivy, a female fighter in the Soul Calibur series. As you can probably see from the above posted image, she's quite curvy... And her breasts are rather large to the point of being somewhat ridiculous.

So do these portrayals of women in games really objectify or harm people's dignity? My answer is a clear-cut no. I'll explain my answer further soon enough, but let us first look at another similar argument that is being used against the Pornography industry. Some people out there don't like porn, and that's fine they're allowed to have their opinions on it. It's when they start to attack the porn industry openly; then try to make pornography illegal by saying it is dangerous for society that problems can arise. The argument against the porn industry is that it gives men an incorrect portrayal of romance which is just utter bullshit. Pornography does not equal romance, it never will. We men know the difference between fucking and making love.

You may be asking how this has anything to do with video games and I'll explain. In many video games females are portrayed as dressing in rather overt and sexual outfits. They sometimes have rather unrealistic figures where their breasts can be quite large. Some female gamers think this makes men predisposed to being attracted to these kinds of women in our daily lives. Other female gamers think that it portrays females as sex objects. There's no debating that these characters are there to look sexy. Let's face it, sex sells. There's no two ways about that. Let us be clear on one thing about video games here; they are fictional. Video games are not real, and they never will be. Some games may be simulations and thus they attempt to simulate real life, but these games don't portray females in such sexual manners. Other games are not so realistic, they're clearly fantasy and thus I fail to see how it objectifies women. People know the difference between fantasy and reality. Those who don't know the difference are the ones you find locked up in asylums and prisons.

I don't think there's a problem with video games with half-dressed female characters. I think that those who are offended by it should simply not play the game, or ignore it. Those who think it objectifies women, or sets unrealistic standards for beauty need to learn to accept themselves for who they are. They need to stop comparing themselves to Ivy. You are your own harshest critic, you need to learn to accept yourself for who you are. We all have flaws, we're not perfect. What is portrayed in the media often looks down on these people. These are people who need to break out of their self uncertainty and learn to simply say "Okay, she has really big breasts, who cares?" I don't mind these female characters at all, I even find a few of them to be attractive in a strange way. Personally, though I much prefer more realistic and down to earth portrayals of women on games.

I really like the characters that have flaws about them. The ones that are imperfect, yet interesting. These are characters like Zoe Castillo on the right. Zoe is indeed very attractive, but she's obviously not overtly dressed, and her breasts are of reasonable size. She was featured in the game Dreamfall: The Longest Journey as the main protagonist. I really enjoyed the game and I found Zoe to be a great example of a well written character. Now I'd admit that I'd love to see more characters such as her, but I don't believe characters like Ivy are actually objectifying women in any way.

I think the problem here is that people are allowing themselves to be objectified by these fictional characters. It's not something that will go away, and thus it's better to either accept it or simply ignore it. The day you say "Oh, look at the size of those breasts. Mine are nowhere near as big as those, but who cares. I'm still much more intelligent and much more interesting then that character." is the day that you will finally realize that these sex symbol characters are nothing more then fictitious characters. Many male and female gamers alike think characters like Ivy and Duke Nukem are hilarious. Why can't others do the same?

I'd like to end this little blog with a little fact about freedom of speech and how it works. To accept freedom of speech also means that you must accept that you may be offended by someone's opinions, art or work. You must accept that what others say may offend you, lest you may say something that others may find offensive as well. You must also accept that your own work may be criticized, and you are indeed entitled to your own criticisms against someone's work. You can criticize all you want as long as you don't seek to censor someone's work because you do not agree with it. And that is the single most important part of freedom of speech. So long and thanks for all the fish.