Censorship: The Final Boss?

Video games are pieces of art.  They stimulate our eyes and ears.  The music, the visuals, the writing behind it all-yeah it's art.  Now it's important to note that video games have come leaps and bounds from pong and 3bit home consoles to those that employ visuals better than the special effects we were seeing in the late 90's early 00's.  People sometimes forget that the kids who grew up playing this stuff are now making the games for the next generation-in short sometimes people tend to forget that Gaming hasn't evolved or worse shouldn't evolve.  Somehow that medium should stay jumping over barrels and rescuing the princess.  Somehow I disagree.

As mentioned the kids who experienced early games are now making the games.  The gaming companies that aged with the users succeeded; the ones that did not went the way of the dinosaur.  Art is ever changing and ever elvolving and all these creations we had in our minds growing up are now coming to light in gaming. The question is when is the envelope pushed too far?  We all have a different answer and that is both beautiful and a problem.  You see, defining art is a fool's quest you cannot place a blanket definition over something so varied and eclectic.  Video games are going to range from kid friendly jump and run games to well...ones that might actually incorporate a sexual assault.

We are all probably aware of the next Tomb Raider and the controversy surrounding it.  (for those who don't know-Lara Croft will be sexually assaulted in that game during a cut scene)  I already wrote about how I feel when it comes to how women should be treated in games and I can't say that this idea is sitting well with me.  But here's the thing I also don't believe in censorship.  I'd like to see Lara treated better by her dev team but they made their decision-I won't be buying the game but that doesnt mean that there should be an empty spot on the shelf where it should be.  When someone moves to censor something they are literally saying "I know what is best for you more than you do."  That is probably the most insulting thing one adult can say to another.  I can understand why people would be uncomfortable about certain things but I feel that art should not be censored.  Don't agree with what's gonna happen to Lara?  Join me-I am not buying the next Tomb Raider.

Now is this game that contains sexual assault art?  I wince as I say yes.  It is art that makes me uncomfortable but that is a reaction artists sometimes seek to invoke.   Is it in good taste?  My personal opinion is NO but I can't sit here and say that this vision of Tomb Raider doesnt fit MY expectations so therefore it must be destroyed.  When has anyone ever said this about a movie?  "There is a sexual assault in the movie so it should not be finished and what a bunch of degenerate scum these people are to make this."  Maybe it has been said but it is never as loud or louder than the groups who try and shout down video gaming.

I believe in open discussion-shout the game down-applaud it-be apathetic whatever you want to do.  But please do not tell me what offends you.  I could spend all day telling you the things that offend me but in the end what good does it do?  I am not the moral guide stick of the world...in fact no one is.  All these folks who come out against this stuff love to think that they are moral crusaders and making the world a better place.  They often approach the situation in a way that they are trying to "fix" someone who has broken morals.  Or shake their finger in your face for indulging in something they don't like...so logically you're not supposed to like it either.  That is quite a way to think of yourself!  As mentioned I don't like this treatment of Lara but far be it from me to assume that I know the dev team although I am sure some people feel that they do based solely on this incident.

Stay with me on this one.  My grandfather served in WWII and literally saw the war from D-day to Berlin.  He was part of a war where at least 50 million people perished.  He saw his men mowed down in gunfire.  He literally wore the blood of the men he ordered into combat alongside him.  He watched helplessly as one of his men screamed for an hour with his guts hanging out before finally passing away as a handful of medical personal worked on him.  This man met his end laying there in the rain on a cobblestone street somewhere in France.  My grandfather personally broke the locks off the gates at some concentration camps.  Places where humans were systematically tortured and killed off.  Skeletons wrapped in flesh wandered around and begged him for food.  He shed tears at the sheer brutality and unimaginable treatment of fellow humans...Somehow this makes great video game material though.  How many WWII games are out there?  There have to be dozens.  When was the last time you heard of some group picketing a developer for making a WWII game?  Why not?  It was one of the darkest chapters in human history.  Humans were committing genocide!  Probably the worst offense we can commit on one another.  What-It had a "happy ending" so it's ok?  Well I am sure Lara ends up ok in this next Tomb Raider so what's the big deal?

Simply not liking something simply being offended by something isn't grounds for censorship.  If we as creators bowed to everyone who was offended-nothing would be created.  Literally nothing.  What it boils down to is cowardice.  These people who seek to censor this game are afraid to let the public decide if this game should be successful or not.  Should it be successful it would rock their world.  How can anyone like something that I don't?  Hell, it may be the best game ever made I don't know and neither does anyone else-but let's assume and further more let's act on an assumption is their attitude.  Not the best and most thought out strategy really.  I wholeheartedly disagree with what they are doing to Lara but I applaud this dev team solely on the grounds that they didn't cave in to try and please everyone.  Art is tough. As an artist (a literal one I do concept work) not everyone is going to like what I do and I am ok with that.  I have thick skin.  I hear "this design sucks" and "make it more like this and that."  Or "this isn't up to snuff."  Where is the thick skin in the acceptance of art?  What-if your idea of art is narrow I somehow have to pilot my art onto this narrow airstrip of yours in order for it to be ok with everyone?  No-just no.  I keep coming back to the fact that I don't like this but I accept it as a video game.

When developers cave in to special interests we suffer and we do not progress.  Somehow gaming is seen as something that is supposed to be pure or wholesome and I guess it would be cool if it was but why this expectation?  Where did this expectation come from?  How long before we realize that imposing a vision on an art in turn destroys that very art?  Now I am not saying that the sexual assault of Lara will help gaming move forward but it does indeed charge head on at a boundary that is seemingly very present in gaming.  Think of some good movies take Raging Bull for example I mean the guy flat out abuses his wife.  But it is an amazing and powerful story of a man who is battling inner demons.  This film is not censored.  La Motta (the character with the inner demons) beats his wife and it's hard to watch.  Somehow this is ok as entertainment but if I were holding a playstation controller while experiencing it-it now somehow becomes too taboo .  It almost turns my brain to shit thinking about it.
Oh and while we're at it...Raging Bull is considered by most critics as one of the BEST-FILMS-OF-ALL-TIME!  No one calls DeNiro or the critics who like it "degenerate scum" no, they are visionaries.

Tomb Raider isnt even out yet and people are saying it's the worst thing to happen to gaming and etc.  But let us not forget that gaming although amazing is still in its infancy.  Been around for what-roughly 40 years?  Not even an average human lifetime.  Every new art is criticized and shunned and there are movements to ban it. Rally the mob-bring your pitchforks and torches!  Comic books went through a witch hunt too. Some good companies and artists went down in flames because of it.  They were guilty of spreading Satanism and "instilling homosexuality into our youth" without so much as producing a shred of tangible evidence of a link between the two.  Gaming has already endured the rating system-which movies and music have so I suppose it's only "fair".  But now what?  Video games are the subject of a neo witch hunt so what's the end goal here?  What is it that we hope to accomplish?  By banning or censoring something the goal is to keep it out of people's possession.  This in turn generates a new kind of desire for said product but I won't even address that.

The end goal I can assume is nothing more than control.  Weak people with weak minds who cannot look past the surface of what they see or choose to stay within their sheltered confines and prefer if we all did would love nothing more than to make this world in their image.  A world where nothing is challenged and nothing explored.  The world is scary-bad things happen, disasters kill innocent people, maniacs go on shooting sprees this is our insane world.  The Tomb Raider guys didnt invent a horrible act-they mirrored what sometimes happens in reality.  While this fact absolves them of  nothing we often forget that art imitates life.  Lucky for all of us this life has something for everyone.  If beautiful sunsets and a porch swing is your thing-you can have it.  Why can't someone else have theirs?

Do Video Games Promote Violence Against Women?

Do Video Games Promote Violence Against Women?

When I was a kid...Forward, Down, Forward, High Punch and suddenly the world would never be the same.  In case you don't know that is the decapitation fatality for Sub-Zero in the original Mortal Kombat.  You could do it to Sonya Blade too but...no one really gave a shit about that-they just wanted the whole game obliterated.

Almost every game has a female in it these days.  Most if not always when they are hurt it is because they are engaging in combat themselves.  I like to think Violence begets violence and live and let live and etc.  Somehow some people don't see it that way.  For instance let's take a look at this:

Ok there is PLENTY to be said about this.  I want to start from the top.  Somehow when women show up in games they almost always wear lingerie and carry weapons.  Sure on the surface it looks cool but it makes no sense.  This is like a guy showing up in a pair of briefs wielding machetes-it is ludicrous.  Let's not forget to have a few gracious camera angles where we can see some ass cheeks or something too.  Try to think of it in terms of realism.  "We have to kill a highly trained assassin?  Should I wear the kevlar vest or the thigh high latex boots with corseted mini with attached garters?  Kevlar-or-hmm..."

Now the portion of the video where the Hitman proceeds to beat up and kill these women?  Well-what is the character supposed to do?  Let them kill him?  Wouldn't be much of a game if he did.  So he proceeds to beat them and shoot them like he would with any man who was trying the same.  Ok...

I don't know about you but I had a hard time watching this.  I can watch men beat each other up all day and thanks to my inner city upbringing it doesnt faze me.  This does.  Even though this is far from real there is something about dead women and beating them up that just doesn't sit well with me.  It doesnt bother me when it's a guy and I am aware that it is a double standard and I am trying to deal with it.

Yes these women were looking for a fight-yes they got it-no argument here.  My question is-well I have a few actually but why do they have to be lingerie clad women with guns?  why can't they look more like this?

If a hit team showed up looking like this would it be a big deal?  Would sales really suffer because of it?  I don't know.  In a game that strives to look real why do we suddenly take a detour when women are involved?  Make them sexy as hell make them pole dancers with guns-then go back to realism to show how they can be beat up and killed?   Look at how sexy these women are-now beat em up! what?  Kinda comes off a little Sado-Masochistic if you ask me.  Mind you these are active decisions made by development teams and publishers.  So it boils down to one thing...fantasy.

Some guy(s) somewhere had to hatch this idea and realize it into fruition.  I'll be honest I am guilty of creating female characters that appeal to my sense of sexuality and I'm pretty sure that's what happened here.  We basically got to see some dude's fantasy fight with chics.  If it wasnt that and simply about showing how bad ass our hitman was why not have a male hit team try and take him?

It would be silly not to explore the argument further 

Another question is:  Why is it that when men beat each other up it seems to be more accepted than when it's women being beaten?  I thought we were about equality in today's society?  Suddenly a woman taking a punch to the face is more over the top than a man taking a punch to the face?    Feminism would say that it promotes violence against women...they may be right to a certain degree but they don't seem to care that men are burned, blown up, dropped into acid, and shot in the face in games.  Saying one is ok and not the other is bull hockey.  Flat out bull hockey.  It means you care about how one group is represented more than another.  So let's call it how it is.  (the word is bull hockey) These feminists only care about a woman's plight and if men have to suffer in games well then fuck him-he's a man.

I personally didn't like seeing those women being beaten up and killed in that video even if our hitman did the moral duty of closing the eyes of the people he killed cuz you know that's pretty noble and the least he can do-we should look as peaceful as we can with broken necks and multiple gunshots to the chests anyone who doesnt do that for someone they killed is just an asshole.  Back to the other side of the ball.  Women who complain about this sort of thing usually have a "Women should do everything a man does" attitude.  Well in gaming this means fighting killing and...being killed.  Again I come back to Sonya Blade in Mortal Kombat the first time we really saw a woman (or man for that matter) being impaled on spikes or burned alive.  No one made much of a stink about the fact that it was a woman-parents and other supposed moral crusaders just wanted it off the shelves.  Sonya wasn't given special treatment in that game (aside from Johnny Cage's split punch didnt work on her but come on now)  So why is it that we suddenly feel women should be treated any different than a man in games now?

Are we not the protectors?

Well the answer may be that as a man I see stuff like this and you know call me "old fashioned" but I just don't like it.  I am more of the mindset that our women are our treasures.  When there is a disaster what is our programming? "Women and children first!"  We will and are expected to give up our seat in a lifeboat for someone else's wife or daughter.  This is what we are programmed to do.  There is a reason for that.  Nature made most men bigger and stronger than most women so we usually have a better shot at surviving physical harm.  Also let's not forget that women bear the children that are the future of our species so no doubt there is a primal urge to ensure their safety because of this.

So what we saw was fantasy.  Some sexy chics will come to your hotel room and instead of taking turns on you they'll try and take your life instead.  Um...ok not quite the fantasy story we are used to seeing/hearing about.  Snuff them out one by one and then when you can-gun them down and beat them up.  Yeah ok.  Listen you are to protect yourself from any danger male or female in this world but I highly doubt she'll be a latex clad 'nun' who uses rosaries to choke you out.  Just sayin...