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Ice-Pick Lodge forums • Male bias - Page 4
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 13 Jan 2010, 22:11 
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I'm confused why anyone is bothering to argue with Bratt. He's either a troll or hopelessly archaic (or both), and I don't see him suddenly going "Oh, wow, thanks for providing that logical insight as to why my viewpoint is so damaging to the world." That said:
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If you take a group of apes and separate them from the others before they reach the age of mimicking, they won't know how and will live and die without breeding. If you get female apes that have not been around mothers pregnant, they won't know how to take care of their children (and won't even care). Sometimes they don't care even if they do know how (just like humans).
I am genuinely curious about this. Source? Sex strikes me as the sort of thing creatures should be able to figure out on their own through trial and error.

I think the Sisters and Brothers are absolutely supposed to represent women and man in a "traditional" patriarchal system. What I'm not sure is whether the game is actually saying anything particularly meaningful about that system. I'm not far enough through the game to figure out if there is a good or bad side. (I've just hit the point where Color is telling me to kill the brothers, and Yani is telling me that Color is selfish and doesn't care about me or the sisters, and the brothers are saying I'm worthless and should pretty much lay down and die). So far the only sisters I particularly like are Uta and Yani, who appear to be at least honest unless they're trying to manipulate me with reverse psychology.

So far the sisters all clearly have distinct personalities, and I think it's a fairly good thing to simply say "here's what appears to be a very stereotypical patriarchal system, but look it's really just full of individual people who are doing their best with the system they got." The brothers seem to have different personalities but I haven't talked with them enough to know who acts like what.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 00:04 
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I am genuinely curious about this. Source? Sex strikes me as the sort of thing creatures should be able to figure out on their own through trial and error.
It's preprogrammed instinct with essentially all mammals. Sort of like walking for humans, or bees dancing to show locations. Skills passed through generations via DNA. Taking care of your young is also a inherent trait with many animals(but not all).


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 00:09 
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I'm confused why anyone is bothering to argue with Bratt. He's either a troll or hopelessly archaic (or both), and I don't see him suddenly going "Oh, wow, thanks for providing that logical insight as to why my viewpoint is so damaging to the world."
Before accusing someone of being a troll be kind to provide footage. Nothing in this world happens suddenly, especially acknowledging one's viewpoint. You are influenced by your system of values as well as I am by mine. Show some respect, if your views are as proggressive as you claim.
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 00:20 
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Most of the research on primates and isolation comes from Harry Harlow. There's quite a lot of it and I don't have access to the specific papers at the moment but if you look him up you can read about his experiments - cruel stuff, but very educational. It just goes to show how much social interaction plays a role in the development of cognitively advanced organisms - so much that it supersedes biological instinct. The lack of mating ability or caring for their children stemmed from that basic social incompetence, which shows that these behaviors are very much learned.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 00:46 
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Well, there's a difference between "being able to procreate, period" and "being able to be a good parent." I got the impression from the original quote that the apes genuinely didn't know how to have sex at all.
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Before accusing someone of being a troll be kind to provide footage. Nothing in this world happens suddenly, especially acknowledging one's viewpoint. You are influenced by your system of values as well as I am by mine. Show some respect, if your views are as proggressive as you claim.
I said you are either a troll OR so set in your ways that's not worth trying to change your mind. When you make statements like:
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I was not talking about equality in general. I just expressed my condolences to the societies that force their women into labour depriving them of their primal natural functions and replacing them with such trivial priorities as career, feminism and such
there's pretty much nothing you can say to that. Society doesn't force women to go to work any more than it forces women to have babies. It just so happens that when you increase a woman's education and give them the same opportunities you give men (i.e. give them equality), they tend to want more out of life than being baby making machines. I'm pretty sure someone already tried saying something to that effect, and it frankly should be pretty self evident. What more do you want us to say that would actually contribute to meaningful discussion?


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 00:57 
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Oh, it goes both ways. The isolated monkeys in the experiments could not learn how to mate, having not been exposed to it in their childhood. The neglectful mothers in the social isolation experiment had to be impregnated by other means.

It's the latter part (neglectful mothers) that's not limited to social isolation; there's studies on that too but honestly it's something already very apparent in the human world - some people just do not care about children even when they have them.

A quote from the Wikipedia article about it:
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Harlow also wanted to test how isolation would affect parenting skills, but the isolates were unable to mate. Artificial insemination had not then been developed; instead, Harlow devised what he called a "rape rack," to which the female isolates were tied in normal monkey mating posture. He found that, just as they were incapable of having sexual relations, they were also unable to parent their offspring, either abusing or neglecting them.
The papers themselves are just hard to dig up (most universities will have them probably but I'm not affiliated with one right now) because these are experiments from way back in the 1950s. I'm sure you can find more articles about them, though, it's one of those "classics". Not a lot of them discuss the later parts of the experiment, though (failure to mate/parental neglect) past saying that the primates got messed up. I don't know why, maybe people are more squeamish about that sort of thing. So most of them focus on either the cruel nature of the experiment or just the initial question of the importance of social interaction. It was after all started as "do children rely on their mothers for just food and protection, or is there something more?"

...But this is really getting off topic, anyway. I'll see if I can find something more cohesive for you when I've got more time.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 01:21 
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they tend to want more out of life than being baby making machines.
Pretty obvious, but here we come to the ultimate male bias: a woman can achieve status and success only by following man's way.

In the Void, however, the roles are divided. As well as you can't say the sisters are completely helpless so you can't tell the brothers are overpowerful. They need each other.
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 14 Jan 2010, 03:00 
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I don't have a source on hand, but there was that asian couple some time ago who had problems conceiving and tried almost everything.

It turned out that hadn't tried having sex.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 15 Jan 2010, 08:20 
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Before accusing someone of being a troll be kind to provide footage. Nothing in this world happens suddenly, especially acknowledging one's viewpoint. You are influenced by your system of values as well as I am by mine. Show some respect, if your views are as proggressive as you claim.
Respect is earned, not commanded, son. And so far the only thing you've earned is scorn. Even your trolling is mediocre and has gotten stale.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 15 Jan 2010, 10:46 
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Respect is earned, not commanded, son. And so far the only thing you've earned is scorn. Even your trolling is mediocre and has gotten stale.
Now this is pure flaming. Too bad you resort to such lowly means. In any case I'm not willing to listen to a person who is so under the influence of his misconceptions that the mere acknowledgment of another view turns out a trolling accusation. Notice that despite of whatever I posted I never said anyone was a troll, although the walls of meaningless text you presented had nothing to do with the topic most of the time.
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 15 Jan 2010, 12:16 
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Ok... this is getting out of hand.

Please lock the thread as nothing more positive can come out of here.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 15 Jan 2010, 20:11 
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In general I'm opposed to locking threads as opposed to warning/deleting/banning individual posters, because that gives more power to the problem people. For the record, I apologize for my contribution to the thread's decline.

That said, while this is probably the most interesting thread in the forum, I think pretty much everything to say has been covered. (Well, at least everything I had wanted to say has been said already, and most of the discussions are getting repetitive). I want the discussion to continue but I'm not sure where else it might go.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 22 Jan 2010, 08:02 
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I think the Sisters and Brothers are absolutely supposed to represent women and man in a "traditional" patriarchal system. What I'm not sure is whether the game is actually saying anything particularly meaningful about that system. I'm not far enough through the game to figure out if there is a good or bad side. (I've just hit the point where Color is telling me to kill the brothers, and Yani is telling me that Color is selfish and doesn't care about me or the sisters, and the brothers are saying I'm worthless and should pretty much lay down and die). So far the only sisters I particularly like are Uta and Yani, who appear to be at least honest unless they're trying to manipulate me with reverse psychology.

So far the sisters all clearly have distinct personalities, and I think it's a fairly good thing to simply say "here's what appears to be a very stereotypical patriarchal system, but look it's really just full of individual people who are doing their best with the system they got." The brothers seem to have different personalities but I haven't talked with them enough to know who acts like what.
This is pretty much what I've gotten out of the game so far (just finished cycle 20). I agree that in the Void's world the power is in the hands of the males and not the females, but I'm not sure I think that the representation of a patriarchal system is necessarily a condoning of that system. Certainly, the game doesn't seem to shed a very favorable light on the actions of the brothers or the power dichotomy represented. Ultimately, I don't think that icepick were trying to make a statement on gender relations at all, and I'm not sure that their decision not to do so is an indicator of sexism or a condoning of sexist thought or systems.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 22 Jan 2010, 08:22 
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Regarding the sexism or anti-feminist tendencies of "gamers", I don't really think this is any more pronounced then that of society at large (and it is an issue with society as a whole). Even most females I know disown the idea of feminism as obsolete, and although this is usually due to a misunderstanding of the modern feminist movement it is still a very common sentiment. A lot of that just has to do with a lack of eduction all around. I think overall you're probably getting a much more receptive and educated group here then you would taking a random sample of people at large, despite the fact that this forum is predominately male. This isn't to say that this reaction is "right", but to make the assertation that this belief is particular or particularly pronounced among "gamers" doesn't seem very fair to me. Then again I'm from the USA so I don't really know what the general climate is like about these things in Europe (where a good deal of this forum is from)

For the record, I'm a male and consider myself a feminist. :wink:


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 24 Jan 2010, 02:41 
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Long time lurker. I am female and an artist. So, here's my two-cents.

Art is something generally left entirely to public interpretation. For those who want to argue this basic fact, look to advertising industries. Ads use art all of the time to generate an emotion or use cultural associations to create an idea. Children can explain this logic to you. Pink at baby showers means a girl, blue means a boy. This, while a "sexist" stereotype, is a cultural truth. We are taught the basics, and as our minds expand we can accept more abstract ideas. Homosexuality, for example, is an abstract idea. It defies not only rational thought, but the predetermined ideas brought on by our biology.

As much as you passionately try to fight it, these are the truths. Using traits and symbols with predetermined ideas attached to them is a key part of character design. If you want something to look scary, you color it black. To make someone look innocent, you depict them as younger with wider eyes.

Now, lets step back and reexamine the opening of the game. What we have established is the death and loss of a soul, but also a birth. We are taught by a mysterious figure how to feed ourselves and others, how to grow our own food, and how to defend ourselves. Does she not stand as a mother figure? Did she not call forth our soul and give us life? You are "birthed," and this the role of a female. If we tried to attach the idea of a male giving birth, this would require a much more abstract thought process. I know that might not hold true for all, but lets think generally here. When you were first born you emerged from your mothers womb and drank her milk. A common idea that we can all understand. Perhaps, one day, games as art will become more accepted and we will not have to use such simple logic, but for now we'll have to tough it out.

Now let us continue, with the idea that we are still a child. Is it not the father's role to establish order? Of course, this is not true for all households, but think generally here. The Brothers come in, they slap our wrists for misbehaving, and they teach us the "rules." We observe how they treat the Sisters, beings we have come to associate with life and love. We recognize an enemy.

Do you see how from just reading this description, even if I were to remove all gender references, you have reached an understanding of the opening of the game? Now pretend you are the designer. How would you sit down and try to establish a clear of level of consistency in the characters? The Sisters are mothers, they are female. In order to not blur the lines, so that the player can always recognize friend from foe, make the Brothers male.

I could go on, referring to how they feed the Sisters who create the new world (Did you seriously not read "SEX" in that sentence? Seriously?), but I don't have all day :P
However, does this train of thought make sense? Their gender roles are not assigned to them because the developers are sexist bigots, but because the characters display traits that can be easily recognized by gender.
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 30 Jan 2010, 01:14 
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Feminism was developed by analyzing culture to determine what aspects of culture were preventing women from living their lifestyle of choice or being denied opportunities because of their gender. The feminist movement has certainly provide significant advances in freedom for women in many areas of the world. In some places, women are pretty much free to take on any role, or combination of cultural roles they would like.

Unfortunately, as feminism has evolved, like most ideals it has become a paradigm with a strict ruleset that defines something as either acceptable or unacceptable within an ideal feminist framework. The problem this creates for those who define themselves as feminists tend to analyze everything through a feminist lens to determine its status in that framework before any other labels or definitions are applied. This is a problem because actions and stories and art or whatnot tend to be defined as profeminist or antifeminist, when a depiction of gender roles was either incidental or inherent to the work. I agree that it is important to be wary of cultural phenomena that promotes limiting the freedom of individuals to choose their role in society; but not everything we encounter needs to be labeled as such.

The story and characters in this game can certainly be said to incorporate some traditional gender roles in the way in which you interact with them. It's all about manipulation with them, with variations of masculine and feminine manipulation (as is prominent in popular culture) in the form of intimidation and seduction, respectively. The developers chose to do it this way, and it is very effective. Could they have chosen to mix the genders in these respective roles? Sure. Would it have been effective? If they did it properly, I bet it would. Would it be more effective? That's somewhat a matter of taste, but I don't think it would for me. The developers chose a particular type of storytelling and it worked very well. There are sexist overtones inherent to the story. This is not the same as promoting sexism.

Offnote: I really hope this mature and artful manner of story telling in games continues. If it does, I'm sure we'll get to see lots of genders in lots of different roles!


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 30 Jan 2010, 03:59 
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lots of genders
lol. made my day.
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If you do not describe your attack in a gloriously cinematic fashion, the difficulty increases one step. (c)


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 02 Feb 2010, 18:14 
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lots of genders
lol. made my day.
It's worth noting that "gender" is not always synonymous with "sex" and, consequently, there can be, are, and have been, more genders than "male" and "female." For example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijra_%28South_Asia%29


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 04 Feb 2010, 23:44 
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Haha. I went to the local gamestore today and since I came the owner whom I know very well asked me to give a piece of advice to some customer guy (40+ years) who wanted an RPG. I showed him the Armored Princess 'cause he liked the original King's Bounty and he told me that he was not buying this for the woman should stay in the kitchen, not roam the lands and fight dragons or whatever. Some male bias that was. I live in a small town with the population a little over 500k ppl, just saying.
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Knows nothing, but slaughter.
No use to cry quarter!


If you do not describe your attack in a gloriously cinematic fashion, the difficulty increases one step. (c)


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 05 Feb 2010, 05:24 
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Wow :shock:


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 05 Feb 2010, 16:02 
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Seriously - I think you're dramatizing it, bratt_n. I mena, there are assholes (or just shovinists) in any society. It can't be THAT bad even in a small town.
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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 05 Feb 2010, 20:28 
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lots of genders
lol. made my day.
It's worth noting that "gender" is not always synonymous with "sex" and, consequently, there can be, are, and have been, more genders than "male" and "female." For example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijra_%28South_Asia%29
Yep. There's an entire subculture of people who identify as "genderqueer." It's always been an interesting subject to me.


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 07 Feb 2010, 02:03 
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Here I've found a very curious view of feminism, not as bashing as mine by the form it's given, but the same in its core. The basic thesis is - feminism in the way it exists now is biologically ineffective and harmful, for biologically the males as a gender exist to try out different ways of adaptability and females - to imprint the most successful and useful male qualities into the species genotype, therefore males generally possess more physical prowess than females. On the other hand the modern urbanized society where a large part of labour is intellectual erases natural limitations and females begin to play a more significant role in society. But!!! The abscense of limit doesn't mean the society is supposed to divide all areas of life in eqaul parts for both genders. If a woman feels like she wants to become, say, a politician there must be no obstacles for her to become one, but it doesn't mean, 50% of politicians absolutely must be females. The reviewer insists that the feminism today mixes two different fundamental definitions - equality and parity - and until it does, it is harmful for evolution.
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Knows nothing, but slaughter.
No use to cry quarter!


If you do not describe your attack in a gloriously cinematic fashion, the difficulty increases one step. (c)


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 07 Feb 2010, 19:26 
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Feminism is supposed to be about choice, though. There's nothing "unfeminist" about being a housewife unless a woman was forced to become one. The only problems they have with parity are when there's a disparity caused by discrimination - e.g. even if the number of women who wanted to be and would make good politicians was somehow only 1/3rd of that of men, it makes no sense that over 90% of politicians would be male with no discrimination (of equally skilled candidates) involved.

That biological imperative makes no scientific sense either. It's a 50-50 split of random genes from either parent, both adapt and imprint equally. Men are physically bigger because of the much higher levels of testosterone they support due to not having the capacity to give birth, it's got nothing to do with being "more adaptive".


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 Post subject: Re: Male bias
PostPosted: 07 Feb 2010, 19:57 
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it makes no sense that over 90% of politicians would be male with no discrimination (of equally skilled candidates) involved.
It's only a single case, if you give it some thought you would see that parity is less common even in the areas where discrimination is irrelevant.

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both adapt and imprint equally.
True, but only the best males give their 50 in nature. Naturally males are born more often than females, but many die due to different reasons and only the adaptable remain to continue the species. In human society this mechanism is broken with no adequate replacement.
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If you do not describe your attack in a gloriously cinematic fashion, the difficulty increases one step. (c)


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