Social Justice (at least what we are describing here) is a unified set of ideas, that all revolve around the concept of intersectionality; feminism, racial grievance movements, and others who claim to be oppressed all fit into this framework.
For what it's worth, intersectionality is an academic buzzword,* feminism is a collection of numerous different schools that have shifted in their goals and ideology over the past hundred years or so, we have no definition for the meaning of "racial grievance movement," and "others who claim to be oppressed" can include everyone from American blacks to American whites to the Rohingya to Palestinians, Indian Christians, Indian Hindus, Kurds, Native Americans, and Holocaust survivors. Plenty of people from all of those groups claim to be oppressed, including majority groups like American whites and Indian Hindus.
*From what I can tell, the entire concept of intersectionality is this: different forms of oppression "intersect"--that is, they're related, or come from the same source. Compare it to the intersectionality of acorns and walnuts: you can say they're related and similar, but that doesn't really convey any meaningful information or any new ideas. I think the only reason the term "intersectionality" is popular is because it lumps together various movements (movements against racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, and transphobia) which happen to be popular among the left. It's a way of saying "we minorities and anti-oppression folks are united against the patriarchy/hegemony power structure" (which is just as poorly defined as SJW and just as much of an imaginary boogieman).
This is why I think the term SJW is largely meaningless: it's a huge catch-all term that applies to vast groups of people. Feminists alone comprise 33% of American men and 60% of American women. I'm guessing not all of those 150+ million people are SJW's, so which ones are? What distinguishes an SJW from an ordinary liberal or feminist?
You know, if you want a definition of a Christian, you can pin down some very specific beliefs:
1. There is a God who plays a positive role in our world, which he created. 2. Jesus Christ died to save humankind in 30 AD. 3. Christ's teachings about love and brotherhood should guide humankind. 4. The Bible is the literal or metaphorical word of God. 5. The exact text of the Old Testament is not as authoritative as that of the New Testament (you have to love thy neighbor; you don't have to sacrifice goats).
Christians are a very diverse group, and even they can agree on all of these things. There are Christian authority figures and Christian organizations. Christianity has formal denominations. They have a holy text. "Christian" is a Christian-invented word that Christians proudly call themselves, and which basically no one uses as an insult.
There's no SJW Bible, there's no SJW manifesto, there's no list of unified SJW beliefs, there's no President of the SJW's, and there's no "American Social Justice Warriors Association" headquarters in Georgie or "Mothers for Social Justice War" church in North Dakota.
Hence, it's not a real group. It's just a pejorative that can be--and has been; I've seen it--applied to virtually anyone who is left-leaning on any given subject.
It's like when some guy called me a white knight feminist libtard for complaining about a rape joke. It's a slur used by people who pride themselves on not being white knight feminist libtards.
I don't know exactly where all this hoopla got started, but something tells me Bioware offering readily available same-sex romances in massively popular games is somewhere at the genesis of it. Fast forward a few years, and I was watching a trailer for the game "Prey" and the comment section was completely overrun by people claiming (I kid you not) the option of a choice between a male and female protagonist was "SJW propaganda". If there was ever a point to this entire line of thinking (and I don't personally think there ever was much of one) it has LONG since devolved into the same kind knee-jerk, blanket self-parody it was supposed to be rebelling against.
Supposedly Gamergate was a movement about ethics in "video-game journalism" rather than a massive anti-feminist internet troll mob. The reason I never took this seriously was the very IDEA that anyone would take video game journalism seriously. Caring about integrity in that field is like worrying about the competitive fairness of a professional wrestling match.
I hope for future products that Beamdog writers try not to make their NPCs overt mouthpieces of the writer's political opinions. Sure, make LGBT characters or whatever else, not an issue, but maybe don't overly emphasise and trumpet that aspect to the point where that's the only thing that matters to the character or defines it. That's a solid recipe for a crappy one-dimensional character, no matter anyone's political orientation. And it's not just a matter of getting annoyed by having a certain kind of politics asserted against you, but it feels disruptive to the experience and like a breach of the fourth wall.
You write a lot of things I agree to @semiticgod. As an example, I am a monogamous person who absolutely adores relationships (though I've just failed mine, but that's another story). I will not commit to sexual acts without an emotional attraction, which comes before physical attraction for me. Whenever I speak about this, or my lack of "ONS" in the past, both men and women usually look at me with a mixture of surprise, disbelief and ten other similar feelings. I'm not a 10 on the scale, but I look decent enough and have had my share of interests from women, but it's like just because I am male I am supposed to act according to the norm (aka the stereotypical alpha male). Manhood 1.0 is absolute crap and only ends up with emotionally retarded males who cannot handle emotions or more complex relationships. I've been struggling with anger outbursts all my life becuase I was never taught to deal with it in a mature way. Happyness, hornyness and rage were pretty much the three only feelings a man should feel. All the intricate feelings ranging from sadness, to emptyness, to lonelyness etc are replaced by rage, anger and hate.
Screw that, I'm done with that crap. Here's for Men 2.0! I'm joining them and leaving this old shit behind.
"Manhood 1.0 is absolute crap and only ends up with emotionally retarded males who cannot handle emotions or more complex relationships. I've been struggling with anger outbursts all my life becuase I was never taught to deal with it in a mature way. Happyness, hornyness and rage were pretty much the three only feelings a man should feel. All the intricate feelings ranging from sadness, to emptyness, to lonelyness etc are replaced by rage, anger and hate."
You do know exactly the same can be said about women?
Some women are more aggressive in social situations (ask any law enforcement when the pubs turn out), some women handle emotions incredibly badly, some women are not taught to handle emotions in a mature way, some women bitch, ostracize, bully and scheme far more than men and never let things drop. About the only difference is that some women are never happy because there's always something wrong with the world rather than with themselves.
How about instead of pointing fingers and saying this sex or that sex has all the bad, people start to admit there are a lot of people who everybody would be better off crossing the road to avoid until they learn how to behave.
How about instead of pointing fingers and saying this sex or that sex has all the bad, people start to admit there are a lot of people who everybody would be better off crossing the road to avoid until they learn how to behave.
That's what I'm saying, yes. I don't know why anyone would think I wasn't--I certainly never said otherwise.
SJW is descriptive in a sarcastic way and contain a kernel of truth. NPC is not - it is literally the Incels / MGTOW / PUA / whatever that don't get to play. SJW:s are NORPs and NORPs are...
I'm so happy that I don't know what most of these abbreviations represent. More space in my brain for useful stuff instead...
I hope for future products that Beamdog writers try not to make their NPCs overt mouthpieces of the writer's political opinions. Sure, make LGBT characters or whatever else, not an issue, but maybe don't overly emphasise and trumpet that aspect to the point where that's the only thing that matters to the character or defines it. That's a solid recipe for a crappy one-dimensional character, no matter anyone's political orientation. And it's not just a matter of getting annoyed by having a certain kind of politics asserted against you, but it feels disruptive to the experience and like a breach of the fourth wall.
I've played the games and recruited all the EE NPCs, and none of them ever did that. After years of hearing this complaint, I've never seen a screenshot showing any EE NPCs lecturing the player about modern political issues.
@deserk How is two lines of text trumpeting and over emphasizing a point? The expansion had as much dialogue as Icewind Dale, a full game. That's like saying the Lord of the Rings encourages perjeoratives because Frodo calls "Sam" and ass in one sentence.
@semiticgod Fun fact, the term "Chrisitan" wasn't actually inventied by Christians. Believers contemporary with the Apostles called themselves "Followers of The Way." "Chrisitan" started as an insult directed towards them.
@UnderstandMouseMagic I don't think @Skatan is saying that men have all the bad emotional habits. He is commenting on the common culture of, "Men should be tought, men can't cry or show emotion, etc." It sounds like an oversimplification, but until very recently, young boys were by and large taught exactly that. Its an atitude that prevails pretty strongly still today actually. Brining up an issue that one is familiar with, is not the same as denying other issues exist.
I know it is generally frowned upon to continue to talk about this at this point, but I remember looking into what was going on during the "Siege" controversy when it hit these forums like a ton of bricks. And I can say without any hesitation whatsoever that it was a manufactured controversy. The Gamergate crowd got wind of a game that had a trans NPC and they also had the bonus of an outspoken female developer. Thus, it was the perfect target for the anti-PC "crusade of the week".
The amount of people who still play Baldur's Gate at this point in history is, at best (relative to the rest of the gaming industry) a niche market. Those who would actually give a shit about an expansion to that game even more niche still. Yet somehow Siege of Dragonspear managed to create more Metacritic User review traffic than the current DLC to frickin' Fallout 4 (which is one of the best-selling games of all-time) and more GOG reviews within a week than some far more popular games had managed to accumulate in over a year. I know because I counted them at the time. There was no way in hell most of the people complaining about Siege of Dragonspear on those sites gave two shits about isometric RPGs, and most of them couldn't have told you what Thac0 was if you had a gun pressed up against their head. It was an effort to tank a game's review score simply to score points in some kind of internet culture war.
This is why I think the term SJW is largely meaningless: it's a huge catch-all term that applies to vast groups of people. Feminists alone comprise 33% of American men and 60% of American women. I'm guessing not all of those 150+ million people are SJW's, so which ones are? What distinguishes an SJW from an ordinary liberal or feminist?
60% of women describing themselves as feminists surprised me, since polls I had seen even from the similar sources put it at far less. I suppose it's all about the sample size.
I also agree with your point about intersectionality being an academic buzzword, and that is fitting, since alot of this stuff comes from these activist disciplines that are mostly about teaching political ideology and not fact.
Social justice as a concept is easy to understand, as is what makes a social justice warrior. Belief in these far left concepts and the mistreatment of those who don't, is what any defintion essentially comes down to.
@jjstraka34 Its telling that on Steam and GoG, filtering reviews to only show reviews from verified owners of the game, on average, give 20-30% more positive.
@WarChiefZeke "Social justice as a concept is easy to understand, as is what makes a social justice warrior. Belief in these far left concepts and the mistreatment of those who don't, is what any defintion essentially comes down to. "
No. The idea original idea of social justice, and not the dismissive insult it has turned into, is simply the idea that all citizens should have equal rights. That's it. That's why the earliest applications of the term were applied to those who fought for women's right to vote and civil rights. Its all about fair representation.
@jjstraka34 Its telling that on Steam and GoG, filtering reviews to only show reviews from verified owners of the game, on average, give 20-30% more positive.
@WarChiefZeke "Social justice as a concept is easy to understand, as is what makes a social justice warrior. Belief in these far left concepts and the mistreatment of those who don't, is what any defintion essentially comes down to. "
No. The idea original idea of social justice, and not the dismissive insult it has turned into, is simply the idea that all citizens should have equal rights. That's it. That's why the earliest applications of the term were applied to those who fought for women's right to vote and civil rights. Its all about fair representation.
I already mentioned the origin of the word, I fail to see what relevance it has to it's current usage. Those who it applies to are more likely to be fighting manspreading and the "concept of whiteness" then fight for women's voting rights which are not under threat.
I don't want to bring up The Dragonspear Debacle either, but while the subject has been brought up let me just throw out there that anyone with half a brain could have seen it coming and I am positive the backlash would have been significantly reduced if team members didn't go out of their way to do things like call Baldurs Gate sexist. That put the worst ideas of the developers in peoples heads, that they were more concerned with transforming BG for political reasons then treasuring it for what it is, and with the amount of politics in the product it's easy to see how they felt validated.
Even as a lover of Dragonspear and what it is to the series, this was always painfully obvious to me. People can say folks were just hateful bigots and all that jazz, but fact is good ol' BD put the blood in the water themselves, giving geniune reason to think the series was put into hands that didn't respect it.
I'm probably edging into Banhammer territory so let me just shut up.
I am probably wrong, but I still dare say that I don't think it will last. SJW is descriptive in a sarcastic way and contain a kernel of truth. NPC is not - it is literally the Incels / MGTOW / PUA / whatever that don't get to play. SJW:s are NORPs and NORPs are notorious for their ability to get a job, get laid and get a circle of friends.
So many things I had to look up here when the uncommon acronyms got busted out.
You know, if you want a definition of a Christian, you can pin down some very specific beliefs:
1. There is a God who plays a positive role in our world, which he created. 2. Jesus Christ died to save humankind in 30 AD. 3. Christ's teachings about love and brotherhood should guide humankind. 4. The Bible is the literal or metaphorical word of God. 5. The exact text of the Old Testament is not as authoritative as that of the New Testament (you have to love thy neighbor; you don't have to sacrifice goats).
Christians are a very diverse group, and even they can agree on all of these things. There are Christian authority figures and Christian organizations. Christianity has formal denominations. They have a holy text. "Christian" is a Christian-invented word that Christians proudly call themselves, and which basically no one uses as an insult.
(these numbers do not relate to the quoted numbers) 1. No, they can't all agree on that. See Unitarianism for one example. 2. Jesus died in 33 A.D. was my understanding of it. 3. You CAN NOT just DISCARD the Old Testament because it's "old". The Old Testament is about GOD. If Jesus Christ himself is the son of God, and you go to God through him, blah, blah, guess what, you're still, in the end, cozying up to a jealous a-hole who commanded his people to commit genocide, slavery, rape, and personally obliterated a couple cities. Oh, let's not forget the plagues of Egypt or sterilizing the Earth. If you go by the Old Testament.
It's like when some guy called me a white knight feminist libtard for complaining about a rape joke. It's a slur used by people who pride themselves on not being white knight feminist libtards.
Which I just can't wrap my head around it. Especially when it's from those aforementioned "Chrstians" (CINO = Christian In Name Only?). Well, actually, I can kind of understand it. Some are of the belief that all they need is faith in God and Christ, and whatever they did in life, no matter how much of a dick they were, all will be wiped clean. And amazingly, they also take to heart the inverse, the part about how no matter how much good you do in the world, if you don't believe in Christ, you're damned to hell foreverz.
It reminds me of the quote "Good people do good things, evil people do evil things, but to get good people to do evil things, that takes religion."
I do wish people wouldn't make these semi-sarcastic predictions about getting banned just because they mention a sensitive topic. It's possible to voice an unpopular opinion without breaking the Site Rules or having one's post flagged.
It's not like people aren't allowed to express certain opinions here. There are strident critics of Beamdog that never so much as received a PM from the moderating team, and it wasn't that long ago when one of Beamdog's most strident defenders got banned for flaming Beamdog's critics. You have to actually break the Site Rules to get banned, or even just warned.
I mean, yeah, if it's a sensitive topic, then be sensitive about it. But you don't have to self-censor your words.
"Transforming BG for political reasons"? Give me a break. It was two insignificant lines amongst thousands. This is patently ABSURD. Its amazing that Liberals are the ones that get called snowflakes, considering how much time and energy conservatives spend complaining about what other people do.
1. No, they can't all agree on that. See Unitarianism for one example.
As someone who was brought up as a Unitarian I nearly made the same comment yesterday, but didn't get around to it .
Well, my parents' church is Episcopalian. I don't know, I just never "got" religion, even when I was an acolyte, and by the time I got to college at 16 and was out of my hometown I'd already considered myself agnostic.
Nowadays I usually consider myself either a Pantheist or a regular Deist (usually the former). I don't really do religion, or even spirituality any more, I mainly just consider the possibilities and philosophies of how the universe came to be, not really looking at why some omnipotent being could have created it.
Oh anyways, got off track. The line you quoted, I was going to say "Jehovah's Witnesses", because my aunt is one, and they're...different than run-of-the-mill protestants. But I didn't think they were different enough to meet the statements laid out by semiticgod, so I dig some digging to find a Christian sect that violated one of those statements and went with Unitarianism.
I don't want to bring up The Dragonspear Debacle either, but while the subject has been brought up let me just throw out there that anyone with half a brain could have seen it coming and I am positive the backlash would have been significantly reduced if team members didn't go out of their way to do things like call Baldurs Gate sexist. That put the worst ideas of the developers in peoples heads, that they were more concerned with transforming BG for political reasons then treasuring it for what it is, and with the amount of politics in the product it's easy to see how they felt validated.
Even as a lover of Dragonspear and what it is to the series, this was always painfully obvious to me. People can say folks were just hateful bigots and all that jazz, but fact is good ol' BD put the blood in the water themselves, giving geniune reason to think the series was put into hands that didn't respect it.
I'm probably edging into Banhammer territory so let me just shut up.
Meh. Seeing how their Utopia lays somewhere between Gilead (from handmaids tale) and Duke Nukem, I don't think there is any way of avoiding putting blood in the water. Well, unless you want to make a politically neutral game. I mean, you could also make Duke Nukem... except then you will instead trigger the SJWs.
This's like this story from the Bible with the farmer, his son and the donkey. Well, at least I think that story is from the Bible? I haven't actually read it. Anyway, my point is, if you stick out your chin, people will take a swing at it. But if you don't, well, you might be doomed to obscurity, precisely because none will give a damn. So, just do your thing. Haters gonna hate.
I don't want to bring up The Dragonspear Debacle either, but while the subject has been brought up let me just throw out there that anyone with half a brain could have seen it coming and I am positive the backlash would have been significantly reduced if team members didn't go out of their way to do things like call Baldurs Gate sexist. That put the worst ideas of the developers in peoples heads, that they were more concerned with transforming BG for political reasons then treasuring it for what it is, and with the amount of politics in the product it's easy to see how they felt validated.
Even as a lover of Dragonspear and what it is to the series, this was always painfully obvious to me. People can say folks were just hateful bigots and all that jazz, but fact is good ol' BD put the blood in the water themselves, giving geniune reason to think the series was put into hands that didn't respect it.
I'm probably edging into Banhammer territory so let me just shut up.
Meh. Seeing how their Utopia lays somewhere between Gilead (from handmaids tale) and Duke Nukem, I don't think there is any way of avoiding putting blood in the water. Well, unless you want to make a politically neutral game. I mean, you could also make Duke Nukem... except then you will instead trigger the SJWs.
This's like this story from the Bible with the farmer, his son and the donkey. Well, at least I think that story is from the Bible? I haven't actually read it. Anyway, my point is, if you stick out your chin, people will take a swing at it. But if you don't, well, you might be doomed to obscurity, precisely because none will give a damn. So, just do your thing. Haters gonna hate.
Why wouldn't you want to make a "politically neutral" game? Would have thought that would be the most lucrative and sensible thing to do.
Sorta aside, but as I understand it, the bulk of Christians follow the Athanasian Creed as a quick run-down of your beliefs, and any deviation from the specifics of the creed means you aren't technically a Christian. This still left plenty of room for weirdness, but this is one standard that a huge portion of Christians accept. Its purpose is obviously to be able to say other people are or are not Christian quickly and easily.
Personally, I think there is some good in having a guideline about what constitutes membership in a group, lest people opposed to the group's goals will infiltrate and sabotage. For example, a Nazi could claim to be a social justice advocate, and without guidelines how do you exclude their toxicity? What if they are not excluded and convert a formerly 'woke' person to their evil ways? I'm really not explaining this very well I fear.
SoD was a politically neutral game. Acting like it had a political agenda at its heart is disingenuous. I couldn't believe anyone actually listened to the gamergate wackos arguing it did when there was 0 evidence for it. SoD was a fun game that felt thematically related to BG, nothing more.
It's kind of a moot point because there's no way of defining "politically neutral" that you could get a majority of people to agree upon. The closest thing would be "nonpolitical," but there's nothing wrong with a work of art that has a political bent per se. Animal Farm wasn't politically neutral or nonpolitical--it's one of the most didactically political books in existence--but it's still held in high regard, despite (or rather, because of) its political message. If Animal Farm can be respected despite being literally nothing but a political allegory, I don't see what's wrong with having politics in fiction.
Politics have been a major part of art, poetry, and storytelling for thousands of years. There's no reason that video games, a new form of art, has to be apolitical. No other medium was asked to be.
There's no reason that video games, a new form of art, has to be apolitical.
Correct. Just as there is no reason that video games, or any other medium for that matter, has to be political as well. I honestly have no interest in politics either way. Which is probably the reason as to why I can enjoy both political correct games and political incorrect games just as much.
I can only speak for myself, but over the years I've found that the most interesting games are those which can be both politically correct, politically incorrect and in some cases politically apathic, too. Fully depending on player choices.
The good ol' D&D's alignment system is kind of that, but it sadly all too often disregards the lawful vs. chaotic conflict in the main plots of games.
What is an apolitical game?? For instance, I'm getting serious about actually playing the Mass Effect Trilogy for the first time. The entire first portion of the first game is steeped in politics, yet it has almost no bearing on any actual real-world issue. It's sister series, Dragon Age, can start you off as an Elf living in an apartheid state who can take bloody revenge against your human oppressors. Again, a strictly political plotline. Would Dragon Age Origins be better without that starting zone?? I would hope to god no one would say yes. People who hope to avoid politics in their entertainment (and this is something you hear ALL the time from the right-wing in the States) is going to be sorely disappointed. Because politics is everywhere. No one is entitled to be shielded from it in their entertainment choices.
Remember, the word “politics” is used to shield one’s intolerance.
There is nothing “political” about being gay, let, trans or whatever.
There are policies that can revolve around being LGBTQ+, such as should free health care pay for a sex change, or should two gay people be married, but just being LGBTQ+, nope.
Remember, the word “politics” is used to shield one’s intolerance.
Obviously. Being intolerant is like the main requirement for IRL politicians to have. Second only to personal greed. Or stubborness, for that matter. Which is one of the many reasons I gave up all hope on them a long time ago. This goes to both national and international ones.
There are, however, many variants and degrees of ingame politics (or the lack thereof) that developers used for their titles. Pathfinder: Kingmaker for instance does politics actually well for a cRPG. Not only does it allows players to actively create their own kingdom. It also let them shape their laws, customs and alliances. It is however not flawless in that regard. That game could have for instance profited tremendously from including political marriages.
This of course would not have been limited to specific genders or sexual orientations per se. Even Chris Avellone said that he loved that backer idea and lamented the fact that he didn't took inspiration from Game of Thrones sooner for that.
People who hope to avoid politics in their entertainment (and this is something you hear ALL the time from the right-wing in the States) is going to be sorely disappointed. Because politics is everywhere. No one is entitled to be shielded from it in their entertainment choices.
I think the idea of something "lacking politics" in media (of any kind) is an inherently tricky proposition. In a pure sense, the idea that a political statement is not made in anyway shape should mean that media is apolitical. However, owing to the bias of the developers and the industry it is in, that's rarely the case.
When you ask someone to create something, you're asking them to use their own creativity to make that thing. Their creativity is subject to the same biases that inform all aspects of them... including their political leanings.
So when society asks that a video game developer make something "apolitical", they're actually asking them to bias themselves artificially in a way that is contrary to their personal/political beliefs. In a manner of speaking, they're being asked to be political in a way that is contrary to their own politics.
This is why asking a sports athlete to avoid making a political statement at a sporting event isnt necessarily an apolitical request.
Comments
*From what I can tell, the entire concept of intersectionality is this: different forms of oppression "intersect"--that is, they're related, or come from the same source. Compare it to the intersectionality of acorns and walnuts: you can say they're related and similar, but that doesn't really convey any meaningful information or any new ideas. I think the only reason the term "intersectionality" is popular is because it lumps together various movements (movements against racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, and transphobia) which happen to be popular among the left. It's a way of saying "we minorities and anti-oppression folks are united against the patriarchy/hegemony power structure" (which is just as poorly defined as SJW and just as much of an imaginary boogieman).
This is why I think the term SJW is largely meaningless: it's a huge catch-all term that applies to vast groups of people. Feminists alone comprise 33% of American men and 60% of American women. I'm guessing not all of those 150+ million people are SJW's, so which ones are? What distinguishes an SJW from an ordinary liberal or feminist?
You know, if you want a definition of a Christian, you can pin down some very specific beliefs:
1. There is a God who plays a positive role in our world, which he created.
2. Jesus Christ died to save humankind in 30 AD.
3. Christ's teachings about love and brotherhood should guide humankind.
4. The Bible is the literal or metaphorical word of God.
5. The exact text of the Old Testament is not as authoritative as that of the New Testament (you have to love thy neighbor; you don't have to sacrifice goats).
Christians are a very diverse group, and even they can agree on all of these things. There are Christian authority figures and Christian organizations. Christianity has formal denominations. They have a holy text. "Christian" is a Christian-invented word that Christians proudly call themselves, and which basically no one uses as an insult.
There's no SJW Bible, there's no SJW manifesto, there's no list of unified SJW beliefs, there's no President of the SJW's, and there's no "American Social Justice Warriors Association" headquarters in Georgie or "Mothers for Social Justice War" church in North Dakota.
Hence, it's not a real group. It's just a pejorative that can be--and has been; I've seen it--applied to virtually anyone who is left-leaning on any given subject.
It's like when some guy called me a white knight feminist libtard for complaining about a rape joke. It's a slur used by people who pride themselves on not being white knight feminist libtards.
Supposedly Gamergate was a movement about ethics in "video-game journalism" rather than a massive anti-feminist internet troll mob. The reason I never took this seriously was the very IDEA that anyone would take video game journalism seriously. Caring about integrity in that field is like worrying about the competitive fairness of a professional wrestling match.
You do know exactly the same can be said about women?
Some women are more aggressive in social situations (ask any law enforcement when the pubs turn out), some women handle emotions incredibly badly, some women are not taught to handle emotions in a mature way, some women bitch, ostracize, bully and scheme far more than men and never let things drop. About the only difference is that some women are never happy because there's always something wrong with the world rather than with themselves.
How about instead of pointing fingers and saying this sex or that sex has all the bad, people start to admit there are a lot of people who everybody would be better off crossing the road to avoid until they learn how to behave.
@semiticgod Fun fact, the term "Chrisitan" wasn't actually inventied by Christians. Believers contemporary with the Apostles called themselves "Followers of The Way." "Chrisitan" started as an insult directed towards them.
@UnderstandMouseMagic I don't think @Skatan is saying that men have all the bad emotional habits. He is commenting on the common culture of, "Men should be tought, men can't cry or show emotion, etc." It sounds like an oversimplification, but until very recently, young boys were by and large taught exactly that. Its an atitude that prevails pretty strongly still today actually. Brining up an issue that one is familiar with, is not the same as denying other issues exist.
The amount of people who still play Baldur's Gate at this point in history is, at best (relative to the rest of the gaming industry) a niche market. Those who would actually give a shit about an expansion to that game even more niche still. Yet somehow Siege of Dragonspear managed to create more Metacritic User review traffic than the current DLC to frickin' Fallout 4 (which is one of the best-selling games of all-time) and more GOG reviews within a week than some far more popular games had managed to accumulate in over a year. I know because I counted them at the time. There was no way in hell most of the people complaining about Siege of Dragonspear on those sites gave two shits about isometric RPGs, and most of them couldn't have told you what Thac0 was if you had a gun pressed up against their head. It was an effort to tank a game's review score simply to score points in some kind of internet culture war.
https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_3094917
I also agree with your point about intersectionality being an academic buzzword, and that is fitting, since alot of this stuff comes from these activist disciplines that are mostly about teaching political ideology and not fact.
Social justice as a concept is easy to understand, as is what makes a social justice warrior. Belief in these far left concepts and the mistreatment of those who don't, is what any defintion essentially comes down to.
@WarChiefZeke "Social justice as a concept is easy to understand, as is what makes a social justice warrior. Belief in these far left concepts and the mistreatment of those who don't, is what any defintion essentially comes down to. "
No. The idea original idea of social justice, and not the dismissive insult it has turned into, is simply the idea that all citizens should have equal rights. That's it. That's why the earliest applications of the term were applied to those who fought for women's right to vote and civil rights. Its all about fair representation.
Even as a lover of Dragonspear and what it is to the series, this was always painfully obvious to me. People can say folks were just hateful bigots and all that jazz, but fact is good ol' BD put the blood in the water themselves, giving geniune reason to think the series was put into hands that didn't respect it.
I'm probably edging into Banhammer territory so let me just shut up.
1. No, they can't all agree on that. See Unitarianism for one example.
2. Jesus died in 33 A.D. was my understanding of it.
3. You CAN NOT just DISCARD the Old Testament because it's "old". The Old Testament is about GOD. If Jesus Christ himself is the son of God, and you go to God through him, blah, blah, guess what, you're still, in the end, cozying up to a jealous a-hole who commanded his people to commit genocide, slavery, rape, and personally obliterated a couple cities. Oh, let's not forget the plagues of Egypt or sterilizing the Earth. If you go by the Old Testament. Which I just can't wrap my head around it. Especially when it's from those aforementioned "Chrstians" (CINO = Christian In Name Only?). Well, actually, I can kind of understand it. Some are of the belief that all they need is faith in God and Christ, and whatever they did in life, no matter how much of a dick they were, all will be wiped clean. And amazingly, they also take to heart the inverse, the part about how no matter how much good you do in the world, if you don't believe in Christ, you're damned to hell foreverz.
It reminds me of the quote "Good people do good things, evil people do evil things, but to get good people to do evil things, that takes religion."
It's not like people aren't allowed to express certain opinions here. There are strident critics of Beamdog that never so much as received a PM from the moderating team, and it wasn't that long ago when one of Beamdog's most strident defenders got banned for flaming Beamdog's critics. You have to actually break the Site Rules to get banned, or even just warned.
I mean, yeah, if it's a sensitive topic, then be sensitive about it. But you don't have to self-censor your words.
Give me a break. It was two insignificant lines amongst thousands. This is patently ABSURD. Its amazing that Liberals are the ones that get called snowflakes, considering how much time and energy conservatives spend complaining about what other people do.
Nowadays I usually consider myself either a Pantheist or a regular Deist (usually the former). I don't really do religion, or even spirituality any more, I mainly just consider the possibilities and philosophies of how the universe came to be, not really looking at why some omnipotent being could have created it.
Oh anyways, got off track. The line you quoted, I was going to say "Jehovah's Witnesses", because my aunt is one, and they're...different than run-of-the-mill protestants. But I didn't think they were different enough to meet the statements laid out by semiticgod, so I dig some digging to find a Christian sect that violated one of those statements and went with Unitarianism.
This's like this story from the Bible with the farmer, his son and the donkey. Well, at least I think that story is from the Bible? I haven't actually read it. Anyway, my point is, if you stick out your chin, people will take a swing at it. But if you don't, well, you might be doomed to obscurity, precisely because none will give a damn. So, just do your thing. Haters gonna hate.
Why wouldn't you want to make a "politically neutral" game?
Would have thought that would be the most lucrative and sensible thing to do.
Personally, I think there is some good in having a guideline about what constitutes membership in a group, lest people opposed to the group's goals will infiltrate and sabotage. For example, a Nazi could claim to be a social justice advocate, and without guidelines how do you exclude their toxicity? What if they are not excluded and convert a formerly 'woke' person to their evil ways? I'm really not explaining this very well I fear.
SoD was a politically neutral game. Acting like it had a political agenda at its heart is disingenuous. I couldn't believe anyone actually listened to the gamergate wackos arguing it did when there was 0 evidence for it. SoD was a fun game that felt thematically related to BG, nothing more.
Politics have been a major part of art, poetry, and storytelling for thousands of years. There's no reason that video games, a new form of art, has to be apolitical. No other medium was asked to be.
I can only speak for myself, but over the years I've found that the most interesting games are those which can be both politically correct, politically incorrect and in some cases politically apathic, too. Fully depending on player choices.
The good ol' D&D's alignment system is kind of that, but it sadly all too often disregards the lawful vs. chaotic conflict in the main plots of games.
There is nothing “political” about being gay, let, trans or whatever.
There are policies that can revolve around being LGBTQ+, such as should free health care pay for a sex change, or should two gay people be married, but just being LGBTQ+, nope.
There are, however, many variants and degrees of ingame politics (or the lack thereof) that developers used for their titles. Pathfinder: Kingmaker for instance does politics actually well for a cRPG. Not only does it allows players to actively create their own kingdom. It also let them shape their laws, customs and alliances. It is however not flawless in that regard. That game could have for instance profited tremendously from including political marriages.
This of course would not have been limited to specific genders or sexual orientations per se. Even Chris Avellone said that he loved that backer idea and lamented the fact that he didn't took inspiration from Game of Thrones sooner for that.
When you ask someone to create something, you're asking them to use their own creativity to make that thing. Their creativity is subject to the same biases that inform all aspects of them... including their political leanings.
So when society asks that a video game developer make something "apolitical", they're actually asking them to bias themselves artificially in a way that is contrary to their personal/political beliefs. In a manner of speaking, they're being asked to be political in a way that is contrary to their own politics.
This is why asking a sports athlete to avoid making a political statement at a sporting event isnt necessarily an apolitical request.
So reading the posts above, seems like it's inevitable that a game or something has a political bias?
So then what's the problem with people objecting to the political bias?
Isn't it somewhat contradictory to say on the one hand, "yep, there's going to be political bias within the product".
And on the other, "your objection to the product because of it's politics is invalid"
The recent news posted here is that the scores on Steam vary between those who actually bought the game and those who didn't.
But why should that matter if, as has been pointed out, it's about the politics?