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Video Games
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 <Background:
Like advertising video games display high levels of violence,
heterosexism, misogyny and death. One genre of advertising, the video game
ads, mirrors many of the problems with video games in general. The
overabundant masculinity of video games is discussed in a number of
excellent sources, including the Media Education Foundation’s Game Over.
Reflected below are a number of video game ads as well as some images from
actual video games. I hope to expand this section to include more of the
misogynistic examples of video games.
The
Ads:
What do the following ads and video games suggest about our society? You
might note that there is a parallel between the representations of women
in the video games themselves and the various gender ads. Women are often
thin, wrongly proportioned (especially the example of video game heroine
Lara Croft), behave stupidly, and are the subject of the gaze and actions
of men. Males are also stereotyped, particularly in games like Grand
Theft Auto and its spin-offs. Men are thugs, violent, overtly
masculine and without passion or intelligence. There are many good
Internet resources on video games and gender: here is
one by the Media Awareness Network.
Here is a
letter written in response to a sexist video game ad.
Questions: (1) What sorts of topics
seem to be the subject of popular video games? Create a typology of the
themes dealt with in them. (2) How is gender negotiated in the video game
world? What roles are expected of women, men? How is race, sexuality, and
social class dealt with in video games? (3) Conduct an Internet search on
the subject of (a) gender and video games or (b) race and video games and
determine the possible impacts of video game play on our relationships,
social expectations, and ideology. (4) Do you believe that video game play
and its myriad gendered dimensions have a greater, less or similar impact
on people as compared to gender advertising? >
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<presented by Scott A.
Lukas, Ph.D.>
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