The confessions of a feminist gamer

Feminazi is a peculiar term. After all, the Nazis didn't have the best of records when it comes to women issues. Even more peculiar is the fact that the term was popularized within the gaming world, a community that really has no reason to feel hard done by the feminist movement. Yet, you will not find another online community that criticizes feminism as strongly as the gamers. What is probably the most surprising is the relative lack of backlash towards sexism in the gaming industry. Unlike in all the other youth-dominated places on the internet, we rarely see rational people showing their support for feminism in gaming.

I'm here to do just that, to speak out against moronic myths about feminist thought applied to gaming. First of all, feminism is not anything like Hitler Jugend, uniformity of opinions is not required. Calling myself a feminist doesn't oblige me to agree with every statement made by all feminists. A good example of that is my opinion of Anita Sarkeesian over at Feminist Frequency. Even though I admire her work in principle, I often disagree with her on individual assertions. Couple of months ago, her tweets about the new Witcher irritated me, since I felt that the depiction of female characters as well as other minorities was actually spot on.  Out of the 8 prominent female characters in the Witcher, only 1 of them was a one-dimensional stereotype. I called that a win, Anita  obviously did

not.  Does this make me or her anything less of a feminist? Not really. It is just a difference of opinion on how we should be arriving at the same goal - fair representation of women in gaming

Secondly, what's probably most shocking for me is the denial the gaming industry is in when it comes to depiction of female characters in games. Like with every other mental issue, the patient has to be aware of his predicament before the healing process can begin Personally, I'm a sucker for a great story in my video game.  A good story is driven by strong characters with interesting back-stories. More often than not female characters in games are there to serve as a standard Holywood love interest. I honestly have a hard time remembering more than a handful of  female character that would stay with me for longer than the duration of the game. On the other hand, we are surrounded by the Quiets of the industry who are there to flash their boobs and then be forgotten .

This situation in itself is not beneficial to anyone. It is not beneficial to female gamers who have to witness women being totally disregarded, and sometimes downright humiliated in games. Most importantly, the current situation is not in any way beneficial to male gamers. An oversexualized shell of a female character is quite simply boring to watch. As a proud heterosexual male I'm very

annoyed at how little effort is put into enticing me with female characters. At the end of the day, an intellectual "boner" is much more satisfying and long=lasting than a few seconds of titillation.

Lastly, it's upsetting that so few men speak out in favor of better representation, while things like Boycott Star Wars VII go viral in a couple of hours. The need for better representation of women in gaming is not a nefarious plot against men. It is a simple consequence of logical thinking. And since a lot of us love game solely because they force us to use our wits and logic, I see no logical reason why gamers wouldn't be able to extend their use of logic to demanding better, more complex female characters in games. It all comes down to the simple fact: Stronger female leads in games will empower narrative-driven gaming. Why would anyone be against making games better?