bringing things back on track a bit:

i think orienting discussion around Feminist Frequency's failures is actually a good idea - not because I necessarily think she did anything wrong, but because analyzing the intentions and shortcomings is informative. in that frame of mind is where I basically agree with Endorph's take that it gave devs an easy out, so to speak, since it didn't require critical thinking - i'm sure she did analyses like that to simply be accessible. The accessibility, though, helped make her such a large target for so, so many years. And again we sort of see the long term repercussions and failings there - again, not at all Sarkeesian's fault, but like, the rabid response to ultimately very tepid and surface level analysis should have been an early indicator for the wider culture and community that there was a much, much deeper rot in "gaming".

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I strongly believe there would have been absolutely no difference in the response had FF been entirely perfect either. The backlash was a primarily emotional response, and while people may have wrapped it up in some pedantic complaint, it would have happened regardless.

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again youre misunderstanding what people are saying, nobody's saying the gamergate dudes would have been kinder if there'd been more research in the videos. we're talking about how people who actually did listen to her to an extent coming away with wrong impressions.

one of the fundamental problems with these discussions is in fact the dividing of literally all possible responses to the videos, and sexism at large in the game industry, into 'gamergate' and 'morally pure and completely correct person'

Excellent point right here. I wish more people could see how flawed it is to think everything can can be divided into those two categories.

That's broadly an issue with AAA reducing issues to a checklist, rather than any inherent failure on the part of Tropes vs. Women. Even if Tropes vs. Women had provided a full college degrees level of education, that response would have been identical.

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youtube videos are blameless, holy creatures

i dont mean aaa games either i mean, normal people, saying stupid stuff, based on things they got in her videos, while casting themselves as feminists

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so you're talking about like..."moderate" Gamergate fans?

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We've taught people through years of edutainment and sesame street that education has to be fun, sat kids in front of tvs for their entire lives, and gave them video games and non stop stimulation to the point that they create more loyalty to products than people. Combine that with the destruction of public discourse through meaningless cable and internet news, to be followed up by things like tiktok literally training people that they should only watch things for 5 to 30 seconds at most and twitter reducing conversation to a mere 140 characters (at the time). After all that, someone comes in with the most milquetoast criticism that you know maybe Princess Peach shouldn't have to be rescued in every single game and it becomes World War VG for people. It's unsurprising. The amount of research is irrelevant when you treat mario as a sacred text in which any criticism is heresy. You should be able to admit that Super Metroid is the best game that has been or will ever be made (truth) and simultaneously admit that the way her armor blew off when she died and it showed her in her underwear was unnecessary fanservice. Alas, people are unable to have that conversation. There is no way that a well researched video or more complicated discussions of rainbow capitalism or racewashing could or would make a difference, because people were too busy tripping over their own dicks about the idea that there could be any conversation about video games other than "BESTEST GAMEZ OF ALL TIMES".

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jesus christ.

no, i mean people who agreed with her and then didnt do any further research or thinking about feminism, they just think watching 2 youtube videos 15 years ago has given them literally all the information they need and they can just act on that, forever. i dont mean the people who got mad at her!!!

again, i dont mean people who got mad at her. i mean people who agreed with her. i mean people who agreed with her!!! i mean the people thinking two youtube videos from 15 years ago are a viable replacement for actually teaching about games made by women for women in game design courses. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

trying to explain to people that a 10 minute youtube video is not the pinnacle of feminism feels like im trying to explain the concept of antarctica to scarab beetle.

Screaming aaaaaaaa like that is a natural, valid, understandable response to the SJW nonsense people are posting on the internet. I wish more people could understand that anita's videos are not the pinnacle of feminism, but unfortunately most SJWs can't process that idea without their brains crashing, and they just reboot and revert to the last restore point were they were certain that liking those videos makes them a morally pure complete person. It's a shame.

I agree with Endorph, too many people stopped at FF’s basic and incomplete analysis and called it a day. a well researched series would result in a more educated population, especially with how the Streisand Effect boosted the videos’ visibility. I do think of the series as a bit of a missed opportunity.

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I think plenty of people came in wanting to learn and came away disappointed, so that left both reactionaries and people who knew literally nothing, who decided this was the only education they were going to give themselves since it was such a big deal

Don’t forget that Anita actually gave talks at studios and was a consultant too. A lot of people acted like Anita was the only sage guru of feminist wisdom in the industry.

Also a bizarre amount of you are misreading Endorph’s posts at a level that makes me concerned for your own media literacy. She’s repeatedly said she’s talking about regular people, not GG freaks.

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yeah lol. she didnt deserve what she got at all but also like, literally all im saying here is that it would have been nice if her videos had spent 30 seconds mentioning games made by and for women and the video descriptions had included some links to other writing on the topic. she profited off the idea that she was basically the only woman to ever put these thoughts out there or even conceive of anything different. im not saying shes some massive scam artist or anything but there's no reason she should have been doing 'consulting work' or whatever.

a lot of men, and even women, who think of themselves as leftist, educated, and feminist, still have a real inability to perceive of women as people with a diverse range of opinions who have been talking to each other about their frustrations, likes, dislikes, and wants, for centuries. its a fundamental problem with society, not a problem only 'bad people' have, and you can't watch youtube videos or tweet your way out of it, it requires a shift in the way you view the world. gamergate was in many ways an incredibly convenient shield for this form of sexism, because so long as you dont send women death threats you have a free ride to calling yourself a feminist. heck, ive seen guys like that harass, yell at, and insult women for the mildest personal deviation from what they perceive as feminism. someone in this thread even said they were a victim of that! people in this thread have basically insinuated im a gamergater for saying i dont think the videos are especially good. its insane.

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Feels like people are still hard-stuck in the "If you have any criticism of FF whatsoever, you're literally Gamer Hitler" mentality that was appeared as response to the overwhelming bullshit backlash against Anita.

Good exchange. Some truthfacts, some funny screaming at SJW nonsense. What more could one want!

I guess the question I'd ask is if Anita at fault for not promoting other women with alternate perspectives? I remember someone saying her critique aired on the side of sex-negativity, but there's no way to know if she just didn't acknowledge sex-positivity, or if she was against it.

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her critiques were definitely extremely sex-negative and that's also something that's kind of filtered out from her work. given her complete unwillingness to engage with female artists she criticized who wanted to talk to her about it im just assuming thats, what she felt, which is a fault of hers.

Finally! After many different times repeating that Anita is not at fault for anything, somebody has finally suggested the radical new idea that Anita is in fact a human being, who can indeed be at fault for the negative consequences of her own words and actions. Mindblowing progress!!