I've spent more hours than I care to admit over the last few days fighting with people on reddit about the
Tropes vs Women in Video Games series. I know, I know, it's
fighting on the Internet (and reddit specifically) but I just couldn't help myself after reading so many arguments that
a) Anita Sarkeesian thinks video games are evil,
b) Sarkeesian is a shitty journalist and
that's what the backlash against her was about,
c) it doesn't matter that the damsel in distress trope reduces women to objects because it's just a simple storytelling device, or
d) in fact the trope also objectifies the male hero figure so lets talk about
that.
Ugh!
Anyway, after putting so much energy into fighting about shitty responses to
Tropes vs Women in Video Games, the prospect of a video on the subject by MovieBob filled me with palpable fear. I really, really like MovieBob. I think he's a great, witty commenter who puts out a prolific amount of amazing content. I do not agree with all of his opinions, both on culture and politics, but generally I enjoy his perspective and look forward to his videos. However, when I saw that
he had put out a ten minute long video on Tropes vs Women I was nervous. A few days of fighting about it on reddit had more or les conditioned me to assume that any video on the subject would be frustrating and infuriating, and I wasn't sure if I could take that from someone I admire as much as MovieBob.
Thankfully, my gut reaction was completely misguided. It's like I forgot who MovieBob is, as he's repeatedly demonstrated that he has a solid understanding of gender politics. His video is a great addition to the debate going on right now, and more or less just calls out all the trolls who have been/still are freaking out over this. It's a solid video that does a better job at identifying exactly what Anita Sarkeesian is doing with her videos than anything else I've seen lately. Check it out, enjoy, and if you end up back on his
The Game Overthinker website avoid checking out the comments, because man are they ever depressing.