Objectifying Women In Video Games

A 2015 study by Entertainment Software Association (ESA) showed that 42% of Americans play video games at least three hours a week. The ever increasing popularity of video games begs the question of how it forms people’s perceptions about the real world. A particular area that garnered a lot of attention in the last few years is the gender representation, specifically objectification of women in video games. There is more than one way of objectifying women in video games, from hypersexualizing women to portraying them as damsels in distress. This inaccurate representation of women in video games can have a negative effect on anyone who plays them and game developers should take note of the role they play in shaping people’s perceptions and

Take for example Tomb Raider, a popular video game series featuring a female protagonist, Lara Croft, who manages to survive in the wilderness, fighting against wild animals and people, while wearing nothing but shorts and a tank top. She is, essentially, a “fighting fuck toy” as Caroline Heldman aptly labels the type in Miss Representation. While Lara Croft might seem empowered on the surface, doing the “men’s job”, she still exists as an object of desire for the average male player. And this is far from an isolated case. Karen E. Dill and Kathryn P. Thill found in their study, “Video Game Characters and the Socialization of Gender Roles: Young People’s Perceptions Mirror Sexist Media Depictions” that 60% of female characters in video games are sexualized, compared to just 1% of male characters. Their study, among others, confirms the prevalence of objectification of female characters in video game industry, but the real problem isn’t in the games themselves, it’s in the

Anastasia Salter and Bridget Blodgett state in their article, “Hypermasculinity & Dickwolves: The Contentious Role of Women in the New Gaming Public” that there are three ways that women are seen in the games: sex object, enemy, or simply invisible and jokingly erased. Their article discusses one particular case were tensions over gender came to head in the gaming community, Penny Arcade and the Dickwolves. In short, Penny Arcade, a webcomic and blog focused on video games, released a comic that was found offensive by a rape survivor. When that woman expressed her dismay and stated that she would boycott the next convention hosted by the creators of the Penny Arcade, she was ridiculed by the men who frequented the blog, as well as the creators of the blog. Moreover, they retaliated by making that offensive joke a bigger part of the blog, creating new comics using it, and even featuring it among the merchandise. This case shows that not only do video games unfairly represent women; they also seem to promote more hostile views towards women in the real