Anita Sarkeesian

[Grimfan]

The message I think that should be taken away from her videos (and I'd rather not talk about her personally because her message actually does have some merit past her personal views) is that it's very possible to enjoy the material that you're experiencing while being critical of it. That's what everyone in this thread appears to be missing, and it's what most of the people that get angry when they watch her videos miss. She explicitly says that there's no problem with enjoying the games that you do, just that sometimes you should look at them through a critical lens instead of just accepting what is put in front of you.

She's probably going to go over the Witcher games at some point, and if anyone has played them they're very overtly sexist, and it's not just in the first Witcher game either, where you collect nude cards of the women that you've managed to seduce. In the second Witcher game there's an option to talk to an Elf woman who talks about how women can be just as powerful as men on the battlefield, they can kill, and they put their lives on the line the same as the other men, but when they exit the battlefield they tend to not be put in leadership roles.

Geralt, can respond in two ways, he can tell her that not very many women share her view, and she responds surprised saying, that in actuality, many women DO share her views, but are too afraid to talk about it. In which Geralt can tell her that she's wrong, and to give up, or to pursue her ideals and become a great leader.

The interesting part about all of this is that while as an Elf she is under a male leader (Ivoreth) but as a member of the army there, she's actually really under a strong female leader (Saskia, a female Knight) who, to legitimize her role as a leader is both described as having a masculine figure with a feminine appearance, and as a virgin. If you walk in the marketplace in Vergen (the city all of this is in) you'll hear tales of her virginity, and you will even hear a dwarf question why her purity means anything in the face of the enemy.

I can honestly say that if I hadn't watched any of the videos that she has put out, I wouldn't be able to effectively understand and cope with the concepts that are shoved at me in this game. I'd just ignore most of this as background filler and walk on. Instead, I really feel her message of critically playing your games, while still enjoying them, is really what people should do.

Anyway, sorry if I broke into the flame war.