At the annual Feminists in Games workshop earlier this June, I had the pleasure of meeting speaker and video game personality Anita Sarkeesian.
Last year, Anita Sarkeesian started a Kickstarter campaign with a unique idea. She asked for $6,000 to produce a series of videos that critique the representation of women in video games. She was bombarded by death threats, rape threats, insults and sexist backlash.
To this date I still have friends trying to prove Sarkeesian wrong to me, and others attempt to make me stop viewing her work. I was told not to take her work seriously as Sarkeesian “complains more than she offers solutions” or is “man-hating and doesn't see the other side”.
Sarkeesian’s project was covered by IGN, a leading gaming site. In response to the article, a slew of readers chimed in to criticize Sarkeesian.
One reader, Muskatnuss, commented:
I am a female feminist at Ph.D level in political science and political philosophy... Sarkeesian isn't that smart... her “negative-libertied” egotistical approach to feminism doesn’t in nearly any way promote change… but simply attention to her own selfish realm and motivations…
CondorCalabasas piped in:
She is right about their being sexism, but thats where her being correct stops. Why? Female games are outraged, as you can see, they even get outraged by things that aren't even sexist….
The story had a good outcome, though: Anita Sarkeesian received $160,000 -- 26 times more than her goal -- and continues to produce the video series, “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games”.
However, the backlash to Sarkeeisan and her work shows opponents of a different viewpoint on video games are still criticizing the messenger. The real question is: How and when will the community think of ways to make games inclusive?
When I had a chance to speak with her, Sarkeesian noticed the Triforce tattoo on my right arm. I explained to her that I was a huge Zelda fan and I asked her why she didn't include Princess Midna in her Damsel in Distress videos. Midna is considered a feminist character in the Zelda canon.
Sarkeesian explained it mostly had to do with time constraints - she undertook Mario, Planet Dinosaur and many other video games in her analysis. But as someone so intimate with the Zelda series, I thought the story line offered a particular example of the potential to change the narrative in video games. The following is a response to Sarkeesian's critique of the Legend of Zelda franchise in her first episode of Tropes vs. Women in Video Games.
In the Damsel in Distress video, Sarkeesian critiques the standard “save the girl” story that’s used in games. Sarkeesian points out the problematic representations of men and women in the Damsel in Distress story.
In short, it leaves women powerless and men only able to express themselves through violence, making both gender characterizations repetitive and problematic. For example, consider the story of Zelda Ocarina of Time.
Ocarina of Time is one of most popular games in the Zelda series. After a strange series of events, a young boy named Link is told by the guardian of the forest, the Deku Tree to visit the Princess Zelda in Hyrule Castle. When Link visits her, Princess Zelda is a perceptive young girl who asks Link help her foil the suspicious Ganondorf’s plans.
Regardless of young Link’s efforts, Zelda must run off due to Ganondorf taking over the Castle.
Time passes in the game and Link becomes an adult. He is aided by a young man named Sheik, who teaches him songs to warp in the game, who gives him hints of what to do and at one point helps him fight a shadow monster that rises up from a haunted well. Sheik seems to travel everywhere, as Link bumps into him in every level and Sheik offers knowledge for each area of the game.
Spoilers start here. Prior to the final level, Sheik reveals himself to be Zelda in disguise. He transforms into a beautiful princess.
After revealing herself, Zelda gets captured by Ganondorf and she is trapped in a magical crystal. At this point, Zelda loses all of her power. Link must go to Ganondorf’s castle to rescue her.
When Zelda is saved, Link runs down the tower with her. Zelda screams and panics at falling debris in the castle, she holds at her head and stands stationary. In the final battle, she does not pass Link’s sword back when it is momentarily knocked away from him and lands right next to her. She stares helplessly at the fight between beast and hero.
Link feels a personal responsibility over the world’s destiny as he opened the gate into the sacred realm which Ganondorf used to enter the world and ssubsequently take it over. Link lost his childhood because he was sealed and put to sleep in the sacred realm after Ganondorf slipped in. Also, Link’s mentor and father character, the Deku Tree died to the hands of Ganondorf. Link also protects those he befriends without question from evil. He is a typical male character
But Zelda's life is not without tragedy. She lost her home and father as a child when Ganondorf took over Hyrule Castle. She watched her people live or die in terrible conditions: being eaten by a dragon, being frozen and paralyzed in an icy hell, etc. She observed the fact that her good friend, Link was denied a childhood because of the mission she sent him on. She’s had to live in hiding, and disguise herself as Sheik in order to survive and fight during those troublesome seven years while Link was asleep.
In the final level, Zelda has every reason to rise up against Ganondorf as much as Link does. Yet, here the princess stares frightened down at Link from her crystal prison. Zelda doesn’t even throw a comment at Ganondorf during the first fight in his castle, despite her alter ego Sheik never restraining "himself" in speaking. She floats helplessly and silently, devoid of any internal thoughts or commentary. She watches in horror as Link and Ganon beat each other up.
Why then Zelda is the centerfold of the game in which everything seems to revolve besides Link’s destiny as a hero? Their stories are linked together. The two are both the reason why they must go through certain events. They seem to be almost parallel in their struggles. Why is one a “Hero of Time”, the other the “Princess of Destiny”? They are both heroes.
This is where Sarkeesian's argument in her video can be applied. We get the same hero-orientated story in games, not a back and forth between both characters, but there are ways of inclusion that don’t necessarily need the main plot to be changed. Take for example a scene from the TV show Game of Thrones. Sansa, a young princess, nearly gets raped by a group of men but is saved by another character. Later on, the show dedicates another scene to Sansa's dream of this event as a terrifying nightmare. The scene shows that the attempted rape scene was just not used as a plot device to create excitement, then quickly forgotten after. Acts such as rape, abduction and abuse all have effects on the victim and GoT puts us in her shoes for a brief moment.
If games use abduction, abuse, murder or rape as a prime motivator for the hero's quest, the true danger lies in trivializing something that in reality is traumatic. Many damsels have the potential to become fuller characters and reach us emotionally in different ways as an audience.
There are many games that use this Damsel trope, and we should ourselves questions while playing them: What are the Damsels coping mechanisms? Are they external or internal? What is her will to live? Why is she constantly a victim?
The Damsel story can be told well and have meaning to it. The idea behind Damsel in Distress is the hero saves a helpless woman in peril, resulting in harmony and true love. But if the damsel story can move out of its classical realm of damsel naivete and give complexity to its victim, this goes beyond being a feminist question.
The inclusion of a victim’s story can give power to those who have been a victim regardless of gender, who feel powerless and are looking for a voice. What is the dialogue that goes on between Zelda and Ganondorf during her imprisonment? Where are her thoughts about Link, Hyrule, etc? Do the Princess and her captor just play cards, Ganondorf glancing at his watch, waiting for Link to come a-swinging?
Not every hero needs to be bold, daring, brave, or be the strongest or the loudest. We can be inspired by those who are oppressed yet persevere. Side heroes who symbolize a good in humankind that is abused. We can learn from observing these characters finding their self-actualization in their anonymity. This characterization can happen, but first we must let these damsels speak.