|
Now, don’t mistake me for some prepubescent, whiny school kid who
still thinks girls are gross. I assure you, I’m halfway through my
sixteenth year of existence and have enough testosterone and sex drive
flowing through my veins to make up for an entire county’s worth of the
aforementioned schoolchildren. However...enough is enough.
When I see an advertisement for a videogame, I generally expect to see something that at least mildly
pertains to the game, perhaps a collection of the characters involved
or a battle shot. When I look at advertisements for games like Champions: Return to Arms,
however, I just have to stop and shake my head. You all know what I’m
talking about; the blond, big-breasted woman in the suit of armor that
resembles a bikini more than anything else. For a moment let’s
transcend reality and assume that this suit of armor will indeed
protect her from an enemy’s attack. With this assumption, we can move
on to the topic of this essay: the use of sex appeal in videogames, and
the subsequent objectification of women.
Nobody can deny that it’s happening. It has been happening for a
long time, actually. Lara Croft, the universal sex symbol for the video
gaming world, is one of the first and very best examples. She was
ridiculously proportioned, given a conveniently tight outfit, and could
oft be seen wearing considerably less than her regular outfit. From her
things merely escalated; the games utilizing female sexuality as a
central theme are too numerous to count. There’s Dead or Alive, Sudeki, Rumble Roses, Final Fantasy X-2, BloodRayne, Death by Degrees, Playboy: The Mansion, and Leisure Suit Larry for starters; I won’t even begin
to delve into every other game that has female sexuality as a secondary
characteristic, mainly because that genre concerns almost every other game ever created.
Then, of course, if I really wanted to I could also delve into the
recent issue of Playboy that featured several videogame females. But,
for the sake of attempting to be laconic, I won't.
And so I ask you, mankind, is it really so necessary to bedeck the
women of videogames in outfits that barely cover their bodies, while at
the same time making sure that they have ridiculously proportioned
assets? Aren’t we, as human beings, higher and more sophisticated than
this? After all, isn’t this merely one step below pornography? Not so
much the explicitness of pornography, but the implications of
pornography; more specifically, that women are simply objects (hence,
the objectification of women) and should only be used for pleasure.
And, as much as some of you would like to argue, a muscle-bound
gladiator hardly constitutes objectification of men. In fact,
comparatively speaking, there are relatively little male characters
today that actually sport gargantuan muscles in the first place. No,
this objectification is limited solely to women.
Now, I’m sure many of you right now are outraged. “How could he
imply that about me?!,” “I’ve never thought that about women!,” “This
is ridiculous!,” and so on and so forth. But you don’t have to
specifically think and believe that statement to commit the said crime;
all you have to do is accept and enjoy the sexual mediums in which
video game women are presented. So, my fellow human beings, the next
time you sit down to play a video game, think a little before
commenting positively on the boobalicious, scantily clad female on the
screen before you. I hate to break it to you, but women are human
beings too; they are not objects to be used simply for bodily felicity.
|
RSS feed
iTunes
