One of the most common arguments for not calling one’s self a feminist is that there are inherent differences between the sexes; “men and women are fundamentally different from one another, and should therefore be treated differently.” Susan Douglas mentions how this idea was rejuvenated in the nineties by literature like the best selling Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus (105). These concepts permeate our minds in more subtle ways than we are often aware of, and activists work hard to bring those influences into the public conscience. But sometimes gender stereotyping is done with such deliberate action that it purposefully draws attention to itself as such. A number of websites host an online video game titled “Boys vs. Girls,” which seeks to do just that. It is a one-player game that begins with the following disclaimer:
“Boys vs. Girls” projects an image of a self-aware and highly exaggerated imitation of gendered video games, making it a good case study to better understand the sometimes more subtle messages being sent out to American youth through the video game medium. Establishing itself as a joke, though, does not make this game impervious to skepticism; it simply changes the way in which “Boys vs. Girls” contributes to the dynamic norms of our culture.
The game is introduced with this summary: “In this game you choose to be a boy or a girl and need to defeat crowds of the opposite sex members shooting them with your gun/magic wand.” Aside from being grammatically confusing, this is a pretty good one-sentence explanation. You continue past the warning screen to a menu image that summarizes the game even better.
A lightning bold divides the screen into boys’ and girls’ halves, requiring the player to choose one for their game identity. It doesn’t take a keen eye to notice the stark differences in color and design meant to appeal to the different sexes. The boy stands in front of a fiery thorn patch, black hat backwards, with narrow eyes focused and arm stretched out, aiming his gun forcefully at the girl’s face. The girl stands with an airy, floating posture wearing a pink shirt with ruffles in front of a green field, flowers, and a rainbow. Her large blue doe-eyes are focused on nothing in particular and her magic wand is held lightly in her hand without purpose. Even the fonts are gendered: BOYS is black, bold, and features crosshairs as the O; GIRLS is pink, squiggly, and a flower dots the I.
The game plays as one would expect. To the harsh sounds of electronic heavy metal boys run, duck, and jump through a strange desert landscape that has gun turrets, guillotines, and gallows in the background.
They shoot guns, dropping bloody women into heaps and try to avoid “cootification,” which eventually turns the player into a “Cootsie-wootsie teddy bear.” Girls move passed candy canes, gingerbread houses, balloons, flowers, and apple trees to the pleasant sounds of flute harmonies. As opposed to the boys’ “cootification,” girls try to avoid “pain.” If their pain meter reaches full, they die. Both sexes seek to defeat “the boss” at the end of each level. If girls succeed, they see a message that reads “dress him up” in rainbow colors and are given a time limit to dress the boss man in the best outfit possible, gaining points for “cuteness, style, and elegance.”
If boys succeed, they see a message that reads “finish her” written in blood across the screen. In Guitar Hero fashion, they must type the correct letters as they fall into the highlighted zone. Each time they do, the fists on screen punch the female boss in the face, making her bloodied and bruised, gaining the player points.
So what does this “parody” say about the “fundamental differences” between boys and girls? The video game medium requires two different approaches to that question because (1) video games always strive, in some way, to represent reality and (2) video games are a product being marketed to a specific demographic. So games like this not only reflect/affect how people see our society, they also try to appeal to the masses within it. That is to say that the images in this game reinforce the idea that boys are more violent, but the game as a product reflects an idea that boys want to see more violence. This is worth noting because it is a good example of how consumerism plays into the creation and perpetuation of gender norms.
Video games have long been a product marketed largely to the male youth, and therefore they often incorporate factors that are stereotypically considered to be of male interest. Sports, cars, aliens, competition, sex, and violence seem to be the key ingredients to successful video games. One advertising campaign for a game called Dead Space 2 featured a series of commercials showing mothers’ reactions to video game footage. The middle-aged women’s horrified reactions were supposed to entice American youth, particularly male youth, into purchasing the extremely violent game. The videos can be seen at www.yourmomhatesthis.com. This type of advertising strategy is a prime example of how driven this medium is by profits and specific marketing. The “your mom hates this” ad campaign shows a strong focus on males in their teens and twenties. Even more interesting though is how the advertisements don’t only ignore any possible female demographic, they actually go as far as ostracizing women by using mothers, specifically, as the people who hate it. This advertising style encourages the idea that males and females are inherently different by implying that because women (mothers) hate the product, boys should love it. That concept of opposite fears, goals, and aesthetic tastes is the same thing that drives “Boys vs. Girls” as a parody.
Undoubtedly a game like “Boys vs. Girls” would throw Susan Douglas into a fit of rage. I imagine she would apply her concept of embedded sexism by saying that the game offers an illusion of equality by allowing the player to choose either sex as the “good guy” or “bad guy.” But, much like the Women Warriors she talks about, the girls’ power in this game exists in an impossible and imaginary world where people can be turned into stuffed animals by magic wands. Meanwhile the boys’ power is very real, and a violent threat that happens every day. Essentially, the game asserts the idea that girls conquering boys is a concept that can only be illustrated in a magical, unreal context. Furthermore, as a product, the game contends that this is what girls want; they want to exist in a world of magic and they want to project their femininity onto others.
Many would disregard the above feminist analysis with an argument that the game is clearly a parody, as suggested by the warning that precedes it. So, if we consider this “parody” as the joke that it claims to be, what does it say about what we are supposed to see as comical? Who is supposed to see this as comical? The game seems to operate on the idea that, for females, it is funny or entertaining to completely emasculate boys, as suggested by girls turning boys to teddy bears and dressing them up in pink clothes. For males, the entertainment comes in the form of total violence, killing and beating women. By comparison, the definitions (even if they are exaggerations) of winning and losing are eerily different depending on sex; it is worse for boys to lose their masculinity, than it is for them to be killed.
Parody or not, “Girls vs. Boys” is not an unfair characterization of the video game industry. The industry blatantly and continuously churns out products that perpetuate gender norms and societal expectations for the sexes. Often the specificity of these expectations place males and females in direct opposition with one another, as in the violent vs. peaceful seen in this game. All of this upholds the crippling idea that men and women are somehow inherently dissimilar, justifying and perpetuating our society’s unequal treatment of the sexes.
Relevant online articles:
http://fubini.swarthmore.edu/~WS30/WS30F2000/compvideo.html
http://news.cnet.com/Video-games--a-girl-thing/2008-1043_3-5618256.html
This was really interesting! Video games have always been attacked for inducing more violent behaviors, affecting biological systems and even causing mental health problems. Whether or not any of the above are secondary effects of playing too many video games, I personally find the images/ messages of this video game very disconcerting, if not infuriating. It's scary how closely it exemplifies Douglas argument. A closer look at the images reveals the main player of the game as a blond girl. Yet, the female character the boy is hitting at the end of the video is NOT a blond girl but a character with dark skin and black hair! In a way, the video is not only making a parody out of gender but of race as well.
ReplyDelete