Author Topic: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?  (Read 21374 times)

Offline crackdude

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #15 on: October 06, 2014, 05:28:10 pm »
(sorry, i can't quote properly)
Quote
I don't see anything wrong with joking about either. However it's important to discern between joke and seriously held view, there's not really evidence to suggest men are "childish", maturity is a tad subjective. Brutish is kind of an odd one too given the majority of our preeminent scientists and greatest minds have also been men but on the flipside, most violent criminals are men too. Regardless best not to stereotype folks, unless relying on significant data and the means of your discussion require generalities.

For the sake of comedy though, anything goes.

Well, yes. Jokes rely on stereotypes, and I think there's nothing wrong with that as long as they aren't blatantly negative or degrading ("all men cheat" "black people steal" "chinese have tiny dicks", and so on).

Some stereotypes make great comedy (I'm not mentioning any because people are way too fucking sensitive), but rarely do they reflect real life people.

Example:
You can joke about all americans being overweight.
Is this true? Of course not, but it makes good jokes.
Should anyone be offended? Well..if it doesn't reflect real life, why should they?
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Offline inthesky

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #16 on: October 06, 2014, 09:23:54 pm »
Hopefully all yall can find your appropriate responses cause I just put them into one post

The only thing that bothers me with that is "training". Regardless it's nothing to throw a fit over imo, just don't buy the shirt. Some people might like the significant other aspect to the shirt. I do, I'd consider buying a "Wonder Woman's Husband" shirt if it had a cool design, nothing offensive about the significant other aspect of it.

That's...a view I didn't expect to see, or an angle I didn't think of. Would you mind saying what you think? Regarding "training"

But in general women ARE physically weaker. And there is NOTHING wrong with that. Nor with joking about it, as you can joke about men being childish or brute.

(image removed because it's large, if people want to go see it they can still check out crackdude's original post)

okay, so first note, what does this have to do with my original question about what sexism is "good"? like, I'm not debating on average that women are physically weaker than men today, but what meaning does that have anyway? we used to deal with lots of cultural messaging in the past that suggested women to be docile, like The Cult of Domesticity and certain excerpts from Poor Richard's Almanac. Also, I am very slender as a guy and lightweight, I don't think it means anything. It's one thing to be attracted to softspoken women, women who like to shop or gossip, or women who exhibit traits considered conservative or stereotypical or whatever, it's another thing to see it as a fundamental essence of being.

second, what is that? is that an image from a gay pride parade, how is it radical pro-gay? the whole point of LGBT-affirmative events (basically movements or events that promote LGBT stuff) is that they are underrepresented in society and are maligned by some people, in a way that is generally not experienced when someone is straight or "cis." all you have to do is look at some jokes about fags, dykes, etc, use of "gay" as pejorative. that isn't particularly radical.

I mean, "die cis scum" would be kind of dumb, but that's not what's going on here =P

When I mentioned it being a 'fad' I should have clarified that I meant in relation to things like 'pop culture critics' and nonsense like that. I don't mean meaningful forms of anti-racism and feminism, I'm talking about this weird 'slactivist' phenomena where people petition Nintendo and complain on NeoGAF about not being able to play a transgender in a video game or about characters not having French accents in a fantasy game or something.

As for the idea of right-wing governments I'm mostly referring to Europe. Look at Greece, Golden Dawn is a far-right fascist party that gained enough support to enter parliament. Look at the Austrian  MP Ewald Stadler going ballistic against the Turkish ambassador in relation to the 'One way tolerance' towards Turks.

Obviously it's not related to things like 'Social Justice Warriors' directly, but I do feel that the backlash against them leads to more conservative political views as a direct contrast/counter.

Regarding transgendered characters in games, are you talking about stuff like Mass Effect and Tomodachi Life? Because I've seen some of those discussions. I don't see what the problem would be...but for the fact that in order to be transgendered you have to either formerly be a different gender or desire to be a different gender, and you can't really convey that with one avatar, as far as we know.

French accents, are you thinking of VA's from different countries? That might be cool actually, I thought Xenoblade's VA cast was pretty refreshing. Some games can get stale with the VA cast, Johnny Yong Bosch, Yuri Lowenthal, Laura Bailey, etc. unless you are just throwing out hypotheticals for fun. anyway, slacktivism is a thing, but in any given cause some people are slacktivists and some people aren't, it's not really possible to judge that just by evaluating any one issue, has to be judged per person.

As for your political points, I'm sorta familiar with that, and Golden Dawn, which took parliament two years ago IIRC. The racially motivated ones are often a form of populism that involves into protofascism. Greece was in a crisis situation and in crisis political climates it's easier to convince the public of scapegoats for countries' problems. Cause people tend to want a solution. It doesn't help that sometimes Golden Dawn had decent PR, because they'd offer to help Greek citizens with like, food or something. I forget.

Your point about Social Justice Warriors and conservatism, well first I want to make the distinction between conservatism and autocracy/authoritarianism. You can have social hierarchy without government, there are some conservative people (or conservative-ish) who are, to put it MEGA broadly, anti-government. Anyway I think I know what you're generally saying. In political circles of minority ideologies, people are sometimes tempted to either violent or aggressive behavior, polemic, or autocratic governments so they can get their changes made quickly. i.e. Ecoterrorism, Pol Pot, etc.

That being said I don't see anything like that happening with feminism and racial equality stuff and etc. There is no organization that takes those issues seriously enough to do that right now, and no government who will do that. I don't figure the Black Panthers/White Panthers were facist, for example. They were anti-capitalist, and they had aggressive members, but I don't think they fit your description.

I just saw those T-shirts, and I really think this is a case of someone rushing to be outraged so they can look important. 'I only date heroes' being offensive because "WOMEN CAN BE HEROES TOO". Really? Holy shit, it's a $5 shirt made to sell to nerd couples who just walked out of watching the latest summer blockbuster.
Maybe I should get offended that a woman chooses to ignore men who don't conform to their unrealistic ideals of what a Hero is, and that shirt makes me feel inadequate and depressed because I don't have a physique like Superman or Batman, and it belittles me and emasculates me because of that.

As Taro said above, who would get up in arms if there was a 'Looking for my WONDER WOMAN!' shirt for guys?

Well, if you feel like some women do have unrealistic ideals about men, that could be totally fine and be something to explore, as long as nobody hates either gender. That was a central point for one female character in this (IMO great) movie, Don Jon, which came out a year ago... The whole idea here is that sometimes in media certain ideal of people are propped up above others and that ideal is often suggested to be more desirable. The argument is the industry is structured so that different depictions of people are drowned out and not everyone has the ability to separate reality from fiction.

As for Taro Yamada's idea, well in some of the shirts the problem also lay with the image, not just the words. =P But the whole point of feminism is that it suggests that society generally suggests women and men to be not equal in terms of worth and individuals supporting this view do harm. And that this is all A Very Bad Thing.

Just the words that Taro was suggesting seemed not big a deal though

No shit sherlock. But that one had the most complaints. Which is the reason why Hollywood reporter had that as their MAIN Image. And the reason why i went with THAT image. Geez...use you're frigging brains.

They all had complaints. Your second post that I replied to only referred to one shirt. I could still argue how that original shirt is potentially problematic though less so than some of the others IMO. The totality of the responses to all of the apparel in question is what prompted DC's acknowledgement.

I generally think that your portrayal of the issue was dishonest, tacit assumption that feminism is a frivolous concern aside. Sure, you disagree with the protestors' premise, that's fine. And I don't think overly formal writing is necessary either. But people criticizing DC's shirts were responding to a lot of their apparel, it wasn't just some isolated incident and the opening post misrepresented the issue.

This whole concept that feminism is frivolous is something I don't understand either. What is it that we assume people sympathetic to feminist ideas are going to be doing with their time instead of being interested in depictions of women in media? Do people raising issues related to feminism somehow take too many hours in a day/days in a year or otherwise cause too much hassle for media companies, artists, legislators, etc.? They're all getting paid either way.
« Last Edit: October 06, 2014, 10:16:42 pm by inthesky »
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Offline tarpmortar

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #17 on: October 07, 2014, 03:39:37 am »
I guess my issue with the term "training" is that it sounds like a job? I guess. It's also a bit sexist? I think about when I see women writing about "boyfriend training" shit and it's just like, grow. the. fuck. up. and find somebody who you get along with, you entitled, petulant, child.

 It's a small issue for me, it's not like I'm outraged. It's more like.... that's a bit dumb. Once more though, I think it's absolutely idiotic to be offended about the significant other aspect of the shirt, and says more about the person outraged than anything else.

Offline ROJM

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #18 on: October 07, 2014, 06:07:18 am »




They all had complaints. Your second post that I replied to only referred to one shirt. I could still argue how that original shirt is potentially problematic though less so than some of the others IMO. The totality of the responses to all of the apparel in question is what prompted DC's acknowledgement.

I generally think that your portrayal of the issue was dishonest, tacit assumption that feminism is a frivolous concern aside. Sure, you disagree with the protestors' premise, that's fine. And I don't think overly formal writing is necessary either. But people criticizing DC's shirts were responding to a lot of their apparel, it wasn't just some isolated incident and the opening post misrepresented the issue.

This whole concept that feminism is frivolous is something I don't understand either. What is it that we assume people sympathetic to feminist ideas are going to be doing with their time instead of being interested in depictions of women in media? Do people raising issues related to feminism somehow take too many hours in a day/days in a year or otherwise cause too much hassle for media companies, artists, legislators, etc.? They're all getting paid either way.

is that the best you can do? They all had complaints? That's tthe most stupid answer i've ever read. I said clearly that the superman and wonder woman one had the most complaints. MOST. Read the dictionary if you don't understand what that word means. Why? Maybe because of the fact it uses Wonder Woman..an iconic figure for women in pop culture in a position with Superman in a risque comment. The same with Superman whose image with most fans is always about how clear cut he is. So no doubt those two groups of people will complain. Then you have the feminists who will complain about something at a drop of a hat..as long as its popular enough in the public eye so they can get attention and so forth....

ITS POINTLESS its only a Tshirt and as you have stated it will make DC more money than not. Its like stupid blacks who complain about stupid whites using the N word than go and say it themselve while listening to rap records. Or people complaing after seeing a teddy bear get blown up. What the hell has happened to this world where everyone will cry after a litle pinch. Goodness gracious if Eddie Murphy or George Carlin was coming up in today's world no one would see their talent because people will lock them away because of oversensitivity. Arnie is right...the world has become a bunch of grilie men....

Offline TruthEnigma

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #19 on: October 07, 2014, 09:09:11 am »


You know what, this is seriously wrong! Boys can be superheroes, girls cannot? Whomever designed these should be fired for being an idiot.

Offline MadeManG74

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #20 on: October 07, 2014, 09:12:04 am »
Women being encouraged to date only men who fit a narrow and unattainable ideal as represented by Superman?

SEXIST! Stop making men feel inferior because we can't live up to unrealistic standards!

Whoever designed those should be fired for being an idiot!

Offline ROJM

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #21 on: October 07, 2014, 01:15:03 pm »
Women being encouraged to date only men who fit a narrow and unattainable ideal as represented by Superman?

SEXIST! Stop making men feel inferior because we can't live up to unrealistic standards!

Whoever designed those should be fired for being an idiot!

YOU'RE BEING RACIST AGAINST SUPERHEROES!!!....OMG!!!..I'M GOING TO COMPLAIN!!!!!!!!!!!

Offline MadeManG74

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #22 on: October 07, 2014, 01:50:10 pm »
YOU'RE BEING RACIST AGAINST SUPERHEROES!!!....OMG!!!..I'M GOING TO COMPLAIN!!!!!!!!!!!

But just look at the facts! Crime is higher in all the neighbourhoods where Superheroes make up a considerable percent of the population. Look at Gotham City! They are obviously predisposed towards violence and crime.

Offline ROJM

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #23 on: October 07, 2014, 02:36:53 pm »
OMGOD! SO RACIST! OMIGOD!WAIT TILL I TELL MY BLACK SUPERHERO LESBIAN PIMP WITH ONE LEG ABOUT YOU....AND I'M A FEMINIST...TOO...YOU BAD BOY...

Offline crackdude

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #24 on: October 07, 2014, 07:10:01 pm »
inthesky,
most homosexuals don't identify themselves with the gay-parade folks..

It's degrading. People do what they want with their personal lives, but a man butt-naked on the streets with his schlong bouncing about is a buffoon, gay or otherwise.
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Offline crackdude

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #25 on: October 07, 2014, 07:12:49 pm »
I find it funny how there's always a black guy in every movie, but he is always completely stereotypical and/or the first to die.

People pretending to be "socially-righteous" are the worst.. Either make a great black character or don't bother.. Unless it's on purpose for comedic effect.
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Offline MadeManG74

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #26 on: October 08, 2014, 08:49:38 am »
inthesky,
most homosexuals don't identify themselves with the gay-parade folks..

It's degrading. People do what they want with their personal lives, but a man butt-naked on the streets with his schlong bouncing about is a buffoon, gay or otherwise.

I agree, I was asked by a friend to go to some Pride parade recently, and I thought it was really ridiculous. It was super commercialised for one thing, with a load of corporate sponsors just advertising and appropriating slogans and stereotypes for their product. The rest was just exhibitionism. I could tell most people were there to see a 'Freak Show' of sorts, which just made me sick, I wanted to leave.

There were a few things I respected like 'School Teachers supporting homosexuals', 'Catholics supporting gay rights' and things like local firemen/police in their uniform supporting homosexual colleagues etc, but that was the exception to the rule of topless men and women running about in face paint with water guns shaped like dicks and generally carrying on like fools. What has that got to do with being gay?
Hopefully all yall can find your appropriate responses cause I just put them into one post

That's...a view I didn't expect to see, or an angle I didn't think of. Would you mind saying what you think? Regarding "training"

okay, so first note, what does this have to do with my original question about what sexism is "good"? like, I'm not debating on average that women are physically weaker than men today, but what meaning does that have anyway? we used to deal with lots of cultural messaging in the past that suggested women to be docile, like The Cult of Domesticity and certain excerpts from Poor Richard's Almanac. Also, I am very slender as a guy and lightweight, I don't think it means anything. It's one thing to be attracted to softspoken women, women who like to shop or gossip, or women who exhibit traits considered conservative or stereotypical or whatever, it's another thing to see it as a fundamental essence of being.

second, what is that? is that an image from a gay pride parade, how is it radical pro-gay? the whole point of LGBT-affirmative events (basically movements or events that promote LGBT stuff) is that they are underrepresented in society and are maligned by some people, in a way that is generally not experienced when someone is straight or "cis." all you have to do is look at some jokes about fags, dykes, etc, use of "gay" as pejorative. that isn't particularly radical.

I mean, "die cis scum" would be kind of dumb, but that's not what's going on here =P

Regarding transgendered characters in games, are you talking about stuff like Mass Effect and Tomodachi Life? Because I've seen some of those discussions. I don't see what the problem would be...but for the fact that in order to be transgendered you have to either formerly be a different gender or desire to be a different gender, and you can't really convey that with one avatar, as far as we know.

French accents, are you thinking of VA's from different countries? That might be cool actually, I thought Xenoblade's VA cast was pretty refreshing. Some games can get stale with the VA cast, Johnny Yong Bosch, Yuri Lowenthal, Laura Bailey, etc. unless you are just throwing out hypotheticals for fun. anyway, slacktivism is a thing, but in any given cause some people are slacktivists and some people aren't, it's not really possible to judge that just by evaluating any one issue, has to be judged per person.

As for your political points, I'm sorta familiar with that, and Golden Dawn, which took parliament two years ago IIRC. The racially motivated ones are often a form of populism that involves into protofascism. Greece was in a crisis situation and in crisis political climates it's easier to convince the public of scapegoats for countries' problems. Cause people tend to want a solution. It doesn't help that sometimes Golden Dawn had decent PR, because they'd offer to help Greek citizens with like, food or something. I forget.

Your point about Social Justice Warriors and conservatism, well first I want to make the distinction between conservatism and autocracy/authoritarianism. You can have social hierarchy without government, there are some conservative people (or conservative-ish) who are, to put it MEGA broadly, anti-government. Anyway I think I know what you're generally saying. In political circles of minority ideologies, people are sometimes tempted to either violent or aggressive behavior, polemic, or autocratic governments so they can get their changes made quickly. i.e. Ecoterrorism, Pol Pot, etc.

That being said I don't see anything like that happening with feminism and racial equality stuff and etc. There is no organization that takes those issues seriously enough to do that right now, and no government who will do that. I don't figure the Black Panthers/White Panthers were facist, for example. They were anti-capitalist, and they had aggressive members, but I don't think they fit your description.

Well, if you feel like some women do have unrealistic ideals about men, that could be totally fine and be something to explore, as long as nobody hates either gender. That was a central point for one female character in this (IMO great) movie, Don Jon, which came out a year ago... The whole idea here is that sometimes in media certain ideal of people are propped up above others and that ideal is often suggested to be more desirable. The argument is the industry is structured so that different depictions of people are drowned out and not everyone has the ability to separate reality from fiction.

As for Taro Yamada's idea, well in some of the shirts the problem also lay with the image, not just the words. =P But the whole point of feminism is that it suggests that society generally suggests women and men to be not equal in terms of worth and individuals supporting this view do harm. And that this is all A Very Bad Thing.

Just the words that Taro was suggesting seemed not big a deal though

They all had complaints. Your second post that I replied to only referred to one shirt. I could still argue how that original shirt is potentially problematic though less so than some of the others IMO. The totality of the responses to all of the apparel in question is what prompted DC's acknowledgement.

I generally think that your portrayal of the issue was dishonest, tacit assumption that feminism is a frivolous concern aside. Sure, you disagree with the protestors' premise, that's fine. And I don't think overly formal writing is necessary either. But people criticizing DC's shirts were responding to a lot of their apparel, it wasn't just some isolated incident and the opening post misrepresented the issue.

This whole concept that feminism is frivolous is something I don't understand either. What is it that we assume people sympathetic to feminist ideas are going to be doing with their time instead of being interested in depictions of women in media? Do people raising issues related to feminism somehow take too many hours in a day/days in a year or otherwise cause too much hassle for media companies, artists, legislators, etc.? They're all getting paid either way.

I don't mean to ignore you, but there's a lot to respond to here, and I generally check this site in quick breaks at work or the like so I haven't tried to address everything.

Tomodachi life/Mass effect: I was thinking more of AC Unity and the backlash against no females. I don't see why it's an issue frankly, the story was created with the idea of a male lead/s. Why should they be 'required' to include a female? Same with any other title, in any medium. As I said, should we vilify David Lean for not having any speaking roles for females in Lawrence of Arabia? Should we vilify Sergio Leone for not having any females in 'The Good, the Bad, the Ugly'? If it doesn't fit with the creative vision, why should there be a forced inclusion of any type of character?

As for the Voice acting one, that was AC unity, some people were complaining about Ubisoft not giving the characters French Accents. Although it makes no sense to have them speaking english with a french accent, they may as well be speaking English with an American accent. It'll spare us bad stereotype Pepe-le-Pu style voice acting. Yet people took it upon themselves to complain about a non-issue.

I personally would have prefered it to be entirely in French with subtitles, but I know most people hate subtitles which is a shame.

RE: The goverment stuff, it was probably a stretch on my part, but I see a loose correlation between the general attitude and issues that caused Golden Dawn getting support and general xenophobia etc  in a lot of countries/societies. I guess I just mean that it seems likely there will be more conservative/right wing emergence in opposition to strong left wing style movements, even if it's just small scale.

As for:

Quote
This whole concept that feminism is frivolous is something I don't understand either. What is it that we assume people sympathetic to feminist ideas are going to be doing with their time instead of being interested in depictions of women in media? Do people raising issues related to feminism somehow take too many hours in a day/days in a year or otherwise cause too much hassle for media companies, artists, legislators, etc.? They're all getting paid either way.


I don't think all feminism is frivolous or silly, but I'm talking about people like Anita Sarkeesian (sp?) who calls herself a 'pop culture critic' (what the fuck is that?) and takes to youtube to argue how video games are sexist, or people who complain about Comic Book covers depicting women too busty or buxom.


I don't mind them speaking their mind, but it seems to blow out to a ridiculous level sometimes.

Offline inthesky

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #27 on: October 09, 2014, 12:56:27 am »
is that the best you can do? They all had complaints? That's tthe most stupid answer i've ever read. I said clearly that the superman and wonder woman one had the most complaints. MOST. Read the dictionary if you don't understand what that word means. Why? Maybe because of the fact it uses Wonder Woman..an iconic figure for women in pop culture in a position with Superman in a risque comment. The same with Superman whose image with most fans is always about how clear cut he is. So no doubt those two groups of people will complain. Then you have the feminists who will complain about something at a drop of a hat..as long as its popular enough in the public eye so they can get attention and so forth....

ITS POINTLESS its only a Tshirt and as you have stated it will make DC more money than not. Its like stupid blacks who complain about stupid whites using the N word than go and say it themselve while listening to rap records. Or people complaing after seeing a teddy bear get blown up. What the hell has happened to this world where everyone will cry after a litle pinch. Goodness gracious if Eddie Murphy or George Carlin was coming up in today's world no one would see their talent because people will lock them away because of oversensitivity. Arnie is right...the world has become a bunch of grilie men....

And you think feminists are the touchy ones!

Your now present insistence on "MOST" in the above first paragraph wasn't in your OP, which I was responding to. There was barely anything in your OP besides one shirt and the link, and your other comments about how dumb the whole thing is. The whole thrust of my complaint on the OP is that you took arguably the least offensive shirt and offered barely context in what comes across as an attempt to portray the idea that the whole thing was a small-scale conflict. There's a ton left out of this whole story in your OP. I could take care of the whole "bloody feminists and people are oversensitive" thing separately.

The idea with the shirt in the OP anyway doesn't have to much to do with Superman being clean cut IMO. It's that one of the most prominent female superheroes, an Amazon, is being eclipsed by superman Scoring and Doing It Again. The art for that shirt was actually taken from another cover where Wonder Woman had Superman in her lasso. But in this, it's just Superman doing it again and according to the shirt Wonder Woman is just there. To say nothing of "scoring women." If media companies are going to make money off of boring blockbusters and pop culture icons why can't they make money with non sexist material? That's the point of my money-making comment, not the idea that it doesn't matter what's being made - I think it should matter.

Interesting comment on George Carlin by the way. He had some bits that were supportive of women like the thing on Abortion, and also criticized feminists. I think his feminism criticism is short-sighted. He thought it was a movement comprised of bored and privileged women that was problematic for being both not concerned with ethnic minorities and tied to a form of class privilege. He agreed with a lot of fundamental feminist ideas but didn't like the restrictions on speech. Well...so what, there's nothing functionally different from being criticized for saying socially hostile things, in comparison to the other stuff he says against other parties like when he rails against conservatives for various reasons, elected officials, obese people, even people who ride bulls. It puzzles me that he was selective about what people were too sensitive about and what apparently he was appropriately sensitive about, because he was very much interested in social issues and took a bunch of left wing positions.

But that's the thing about social issues and politics, it didn't start or end with George Carlin, insightful as he often was, and I mostly really like the guy! But I also know he made a really dumb rape joke and thought it was funny to call Wayne LaPierre's (NRA person) last name fruity. Like, I don't even care for Wayne LaPierre's politics, but that's pretty dumb. He hit ton of right notes IMO and funny notes but didn't get everything and sometimes said dumb shit.

And that's quite a sexist comment at the end of your post there! What was so important about what you said that you have to call it "girly men" behavior?

inthesky,
most homosexuals don't identify themselves with the gay-parade folks..

It's degrading. People do what they want with their personal lives, but a man butt-naked on the streets with his schlong bouncing about is a buffoon, gay or otherwise.

What does it matter if they do or don't identify with themselves with a broader gay community that celebrates their sexuality? Lots of people from a particular hobby or interest do not identify themselves with any broader group. People can be fans of Sonic but just because there are people in the community that like furries or like fanfiction and such doesn't mean the identification needs to be shunned. It's the same thing as MLP fans have had to deal with on occasion. I like Smash Bros but don't consider myself a part of a Smash Bros community. I like Mega Man and do consider myself an active fan of Mega Man games. None of this has anything to do with some image issue that other people may have.

It isn't entirely mature, I would think not everyone is familiar with the history of an ideology and oppression and blah blah blah but that's sometimes a high hurdle. You don't necessarily have to do so to celebrate being gay. These things often has to do with sexual liberation and ownership of identity. Some of these people might come from restricted backgrounds that either discouraged being gay or trans outright or perhaps just flamboyant behavior in general. It's about not letting the narrative for what's socially acceptable be written by people who may be hostile to their sexual identity. like, if I were gay I wouldn't be interested in participating in these parades more than once but there isn't anything problematic.

And why does someone doing what they want with their personal lives become an issue when they in your opinion are being a buffoon? Well...who cares? I mean, if one hypothetical individual can reach the point where they realize that stereotypes and image often mean little, then why is it different here? It's more a problem when someone becomes a douchebag.

I agree, I was asked by a friend to go to some Pride parade recently, and I thought it was really ridiculous. It was super commercialised for one thing, with a load of corporate sponsors just advertising and appropriating slogans and stereotypes for their product. The rest was just exhibitionism. I could tell most people were there to see a 'Freak Show' of sorts, which just made me sick, I wanted to leave.

There were a few things I respected like 'School Teachers supporting homosexuals', 'Catholics supporting gay rights' and things like local firemen/police in their uniform supporting homosexual colleagues etc, but that was the exception to the rule of topless men and women running about in face paint with water guns shaped like dicks and generally carrying on like fools. What has that got to do with being gay?

Your first paragraph touches on an interesting point. At times businesses align themselves with certain social causes to increase their profile. This works both towards "progressive" causes (for one example, look up "Greenwashing" and have a field day) and "conservative" causes (Hobby Lobby, Chick Fil-A, Shooter Grill). The sincerity of any particular entity varies on the situation but also I veer on the edge of being cautious. "CBS Cares"...well, CBS is a pretty large group, I'm sure somebody doesn't. But in any case I guess it's better that more things support stuff like gay marriage instead of taking the opposite stance.

As for the second, well IMO it's sort of like what I wrote for crackdude. It isn't entirely mature, I would think not everyone is familiar with the history of an ideology and oppression and blah blah blah but that's sometimes a high hurdle. These things often has to do with sexual liberation and ownership of identity. Some of these people might come from restricted backgrounds that either discouraged being gay or trans outright or perhaps just flamboyant behavior in general. It's about not letting the narrative for what's socially acceptable be written by people who may be hostile to their sexual identity.

I don't mean to ignore you, but there's a lot to respond to here, and I generally check this site in quick breaks at work or the like so I haven't tried to address everything.

Tomodachi life/Mass effect: I was thinking more of AC Unity and the backlash against no females. I don't see why it's an issue frankly, the story was created with the idea of a male lead/s. Why should they be 'required' to include a female? Same with any other title, in any medium. As I said, should we vilify David Lean for not having any speaking roles for females in Lawrence of Arabia? Should we vilify Sergio Leone for not having any females in 'The Good, the Bad, the Ugly'? If it doesn't fit with the creative vision, why should there be a forced inclusion of any type of character?

As for the Voice acting one, that was AC unity, some people were complaining about Ubisoft not giving the characters French Accents. Although it makes no sense to have them speaking english with a french accent, they may as well be speaking English with an American accent. It'll spare us bad stereotype Pepe-le-Pu style voice acting. Yet people took it upon themselves to complain about a non-issue.

I personally would have prefered it to be entirely in French with subtitles, but I know most people hate subtitles which is a shame.

RE: The goverment stuff, it was probably a stretch on my part, but I see a loose correlation between the general attitude and issues that caused Golden Dawn getting support and general xenophobia etc  in a lot of countries/societies. I guess I just mean that it seems likely there will be more conservative/right wing emergence in opposition to strong left wing style movements, even if it's just small scale.

As for:


I don't think all feminism is frivolous or silly, but I'm talking about people like Anita Sarkeesian (sp?) who calls herself a 'pop culture critic' (what the fuck is that?) and takes to youtube to argue how video games are sexist, or people who complain about Comic Book covers depicting women too busty or buxom.


I don't mind them speaking their mind, but it seems to blow out to a ridiculous level sometimes.

Just in case, because I think you quoted my entire post, you didn't have to read all of it. I tried to compartmentalize whose responses were meant for whom. Unless you were trying to respond to the entire thing.

And pop culture critic is pretty straightforward. She takes a critical eye to pop culture, generally from the lens of her brand of feminism. Not to say that I always agree with her but, it's a straightforward definition. There are way more pop culture critics out there besides her, it's a practice older than modern times, and is not exclusive to feminists.

I find it funny how there's always a black guy in every movie, but he is always completely stereotypical and/or the first to die.

People pretending to be "socially-righteous" are the worst.. Either make a great black character or don't bother.. Unless it's on purpose for comedic effect.

I too would like awesome black characters. =D Instead of lazier efforts. What a surprise what people can have in common =p
« Last Edit: October 09, 2014, 01:42:50 am by inthesky »
Proud recipient of the second ever Gary Player Award!
I support Shenmue and Skies of Arcadia HD ports!

Offline tarpmortar

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #28 on: October 09, 2014, 01:42:00 am »
Here we go with that SJW censor joke nonsense, rape jokes can be funny. You don't get to deem what is and isn't funny and what should and shouldn't be said, comedy can go anywhere it damn well pleases and so long as the joke is well written and well told it's good comedy.

I've heard and laughed at jokes about topics far more grim than rape, from famous and well known comedians. People who push this BS narrative that some topics are "out of bounds" and "not okay" don't know comedy, period.

Offline inthesky

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Re: Sexist superhero Tshirts...really?
« Reply #29 on: October 09, 2014, 01:50:15 am »
Here we go with that SJW censor joke nonsense, rape jokes can be funny. You don't get to deem what is and isn't funny and what should and shouldn't be said, comedy can go anywhere it damn well pleases and so long as the joke is well written and well told it's good comedy.

I've heard and laughed at jokes about topics far more grim than rape, from famous and well known comedians. People who push this BS narrative that some topics are "out of bounds" and "not okay" don't know comedy, period.


Is the irony lost on you that your position suggests that what's comedic and what isn't, what's well written/told and what isn't are all appropriate limits but somehow all topics are all open season and have no limits? That apparently people who can't appreciate any type of "well-done" comedy, from the blackest of humor to the most vanilla family friendly stuff, simply don't know comedy and good writing? How can you reconcile your position on freedom of expression with social criticism, which should be perfectly acceptable? I would expect otherwise from a position predicated on what's arguably subjective like "good craftmanship" and "understanding of comedy", especially from a vantage point that says I can't deem what should be said. A spin on your post:

"Here we go with that absolutely protected freedom of speech nonsense, social criticism can be helpful. You don't get to deem what is and isn't funny and what should and shouldn't be criticized, comedy can go anywhere it damn well pleases and so long as the criticism is well written and well told it's good criticism."

Which, subjectivity isn't bad, but you support absolutely protected freedom of speech, I support criticism of rape jokes and speech. Like "that's so gay" and other such things intended as humor. The fact that rape jokes can be funny doesn't mean much. There is an audience for any joke, however poorly crafted or well told or tasteful in subject matter or lacking insight or blah blah blah blah. Funny isn't an essential quality. It's a reflection of personal taste and social values. Rape jokes are problematic because of their relation to rape culture.
« Last Edit: October 09, 2014, 02:08:44 am by inthesky »
Proud recipient of the second ever Gary Player Award!
I support Shenmue and Skies of Arcadia HD ports!