Friday, April 24, 2015

Over-Sexualizing Women In Video Games

            I don’t know about you, but when it comes to America, everything seems as though it has to be bigger, better, faster, etc. Whether its food, cars, clothes, or even bodies, America has a sense of pride in making things larger than life and as excessive as possible. This is no different when it comes to video games, cartoons, or movies. There is always a main character that is the hero and he is big, strong, fast, and brave. He defeats all of his enemies and saves the day for society. But where are the females in these storylines? Usually, the females are pictured as sex symbols or helpless characters that need to rely on the male “hero” to make their way throughout the story. For some reason, this is always a part of the story, and the only question that I can ask is, how realistic is this stereotype?  I know plenty of strong women that have never had to rely on a man or be a sex symbol to live their lives to the fullest. In this final blog, I will discuss women in video games and how they are over sexualized and exploited in many cases.
            In my personal experience, I have observed countless times in which females were “sexed” up or made helpless/ditsy in both video games and movies. For example, one of the biggest box office earners ever, Spiderman, has a character named Mary Jane which can fit into either of these roles. Mary Jane is the love interest of Peter Parker (Spiderman) and many times throughout the movie they force Mary Jane to rely on Spiderman to be saved, or make her seem as though she is a sex object/a goal for Peter to win her over. Another example of over sexualization is displayed throughout the video game Tomb Raider. Tomb Raider’s main character is Lara Croft, is a British archaeologist and an adventurer. She is one of the most influential female video game characters that have ever been created, and of course, like we discussed in class, she was made to look like an unrealistic sex object. She couldn’t just be a normal female doing extraordinary things, but instead they had to create her as a busty female with unrealistic proportions who was wearing very little clothing, even though she was going on all kinds of adventures. It made no sense for her to be dressed/proportioned like that, however, sex sells. In an article by The Orion, titled VideoGames Oversexualize Powerful Women, they discuss how women in video games are exploited and over sexualized. The article talks about how almost all women in video games have extremely large breasts, but not a proper bra, or one at all and also bring up the fact of how the women in these games wear significantly less clothing than makes sense to be fighting and battling as they do in the game. The article summarizes that video games give women this unrealistic stereotype that is offensive to many women across the world.

            Personally, I do not think that it is morally right for women to be displayed as they are in almost all video games, however, sex does sell in most cases, and that is why these video game creators portray women in this way. It may be offensive, but they believe that it makes the game more appealing for the average male that is playing these games. I do, however, believe that this problem is slowly changing and that in the near future, women will be seen as more realistic in video games.

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