The Lurkdragon's Lair

fuckyeahvideogamewomen:

A lot of people may not realise it, but Pokemon is one of the best video games for equality for women in gaming today, especially in Generation 5.

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(via groovy-blaze)

suicunesrider:

queenofthewesternsun:

suicunesrider:

the-animation-alchemist:

People need to give Wii Fit Trainer a break.

• “PEOPLE ARE EXCITED BECAUSE SHE’S A GIRL?!?!? BUT THERE’S ALREADY GIRLS IN BRAWL YOU FEMINISTS NEED TO CALM DOWN. THAT SLOT COULD HAVE GONE TO A BETTER CHARACTER!” First off, reactions like that alone warrant her introduction into the series. The game has been heavily male-centric since the beginning, so having a new female character is pretty cool (even though the other two introduced characters are males, but hey, she’s still awesome). Another female in the game won’t hurt anyone, and additionally, it further adds to Smash Bros.’ message of “hey, women can kick ass too.” 
• “SHE’S FAT-SHAMING!” Get down from your ivory tower and calm down. She’s a physical trainer. It’s her job to help people stay in shape, or get in shape if they aren’t. She helps people live healthy, active lives, and there is NOTHING wrong with that. She’s from a game that is literally a fitness program and to be mad at her for that is like being mad at Sonic for going fast. It’s what she does. Leave her be. She is doing nothing wrong.
• “SHE’S WHITEWASHING AT ITS FINEST!” She isn’t a race. She’s literally white. She’s a digital personification of the Wii. Which is white. Calm. Down.
• going back to “THAT SLOT COULD HAVE GONE TO A BETTER CHARACTER!” What’s considered a “better character” isn’t your choice to make. If I were in Nintendo’s shoes, however, I would’ve agreed that Wii Fit Trainer was a good choice for the roster, because she diversifies it and ventures out from the staple series that Nintendo had been using for past installments. Did we need a 7th character from the Mario Franchise? Another non-Nintendo character? ANOTHER new Pokemon? Please, I’d love to hear your creative ideas. Your “revolutionary” ideas for the roster. 

Do you ever just slam your head into the wall because there are people who actually call this character out on “white washing.” First of all, what is wrong with white people existing? If she were realistically Caucasian skin coloured no one would care. It’s crazy disturbing that people can take her literal whiteness as “preaching purity” or something. The fact that she is coloured like a Wii is obvious. That’s like walking in on a kitchen refrigerator and screaming RACISM!!!!!

#DEATH TO REFRIGERATORS

God bless your tags

Don’t mention it, it’s the least I can do to take down fridges

those privileged bastards

Can I also just say that she’s a good character to include because of actual popularity?

Maybe not of her, but of her game. Wii Fit was the Wii’s killer app for a hell of a lot of gamers, and giving them a shoutout gives me fuzzies inside. Definitely counters the Frowns at the folks would would bleat that Wii Fit players aren’t ‘real gamers’.

No, it isn’t my kind of game, but SSB is supposed to be an over-the-top celebration of all things Nintendo, and Wii Fit was a very important game to the Wii’s success.

(via the-goggles)

wondygirl:

bradofarrell:

This year at E3 during the Xbox panel during a scripted “trash talk” bit someone made a scripted rape joke (male gamer to girl gamer who sucks at a game: “just wait, it’ll all be over soon.”) and then they acted like it wasn’t a big deal and then they released an expensive, anti-consumer (DRM on physical games) piece of hardware. And then Sony just released the PS4 which is just the PS3 but better graphics and $100 cheaper than the Xbox. So THAT happened.

But then Nintendo just quietly released a bunch of great looking sequels for all of it’s major franchises (Mario, Pikmin, Donkey Kong, and Smash Bros.) and every single one of those games interestingly features playable female characters who haven’t been seen in decades like Dixie Kong and Princess Peach - and Pikmin now has a new female hero.

One of my favorite things about Peach in the new Mario game is that one of the power ups is a literal “cat suit” and Peach’s “cat suit” doesn’t sexualize her at ALL. You can’t even see her boobs. She just looks like she’s wearing over-sized footie pajamas it’s so cute. Also they added a pink letter to the Mario logo just to accommodate Peach’s re-inclusion into the franchise as a character with actual agency!

So at the end of the presentation they tell you to go to the Smash Bros website to find out about new characters. And then they announced this character, Wii Fit Trainer, on the site. And in an interview the director said he gets thousands of requests for almost every video game character under the sun and he’s gotten absolutely zero requests for this character and he put her in the game to be funny and defy fan expectation. This character is literally “hey fuck you we’re the ones making the games around here, and we’ll be goofy and funny if we want to and also check it out another female character in Smash.”

Also the inclusion of the Animal Crossing villager is interesting because Animal Crossing is VERY popular with girls and even though the villager is male I’m 100% certain his alternate costumes will include the girl default villager character. So that’s neat. The three Smash characters they announced were two girl(ish) characters from two girl(ish) games and then Mega Man.

Also in the new Animal Crossing game boys are allowed to cross dress and all of the animals are explicitly genderqueer in the dialog. Characters say stuff like “Boys can ware make up if they want to, I mean, it’s 2013, who cares?” and just today a jock rhino was looking deeply into my eyes and asking me to hike a football and I asked him if he loved me (which was one of the option out of other options about sports) and he was like “Oh I guess a lot can happen when you look into someone else’s eyes like that, huh?” He didn’t even care that we’re both guys. Also in the new Pokemon game you can be black.

Basically what I’m saying is Nintendo is quietly and systematically making their games more socially progressive and Microsoft made a rape joke and then said “what? it was a joke.”

The only fail Nintendo has done with its female characters is Samus, with Other: M and those stupid sexual Japanese Zero Mission commercials, but the Smash Bros team seems to have treated her good so far.

Yeah Nintendo usually tries to be more fun and make family and all-ages games while Microsoft and Sony’s target demographic is to 17-30 year old males (who also criticize Nintendo as being kiddish because they don’t cater to them).

(via ryttu3k)

thatonevillager:

People bitching at the Wii Fit Trainer

People being sexist with the Wii Fit Trainer

People making rape jokes about the Wii Fit Trainer

(via groovy-blaze)

lagertha-lodbrok:

halfhardtorock:

friendlycloud:

agewa:

“We went to Kineshma, that’s in Ivanovo region, to visit his parents. I went as a heroine and I never expected someone to welcome me, a front-line girl, like that. We’ve gone through so much, we’ve saved lives, lifes of mothers, wives. And then… I heard accusations, I was bad-mouthed. Before that I’ve only ever been “dear sister”… We had tea and my husband’s mother took him aside and started crying: “Who did you marry? A front-line girl… You have two younger sisters. Who’s going to marry them now?” When I think back to that moment I feel tears welling up. Imagine: I had a record, I loved it a lot. There was a song, it said: you have the right to wear the best shoes. That was about a front-line girl. I had it playing, and [his?] elder sister came up and broke it apart, saying: you have no rights. They destroyed all my photos from the war… We, front-line girls, went through so much during hte war… and then we had another war. Another terrible war. The men left us, they didn’t cover our backs. Not like at the front.” from С.Алексеевич “У войны не женское лицо”

In Soviet Union women participating in WWII were erased from history, remaining as the occasional anecdote of a female sniper or simply as medical staff or, at best, radio specialists. The word “front-line girl” (frontovichka) became a terrible insult, synonimous to “whore”. Hundreds thousand of girls who went to war to protect their homeland with their very lives, who came back injured or disabled, with medals for valor, had to hide it to protect themselves from public scorn. 

This has always happened in history: Women do something important. Then they get shamed for it (so nobody will talk about it) and it gets erased from history.

And then certain men will say: “Women suck, they’ve never done anything important.”

Look into history and learn that women have played a far greater role then douches (present and past) wanted you to know.

This reminds me of how Egyptian women, who participated in Arab Spring protests in great numbers and were critical to the revolution that ousted Mubarak’s regime, have only been treated with great disdain and violence for their passion and work. 

http://www.impowr.org/forum/current-events/after-arab-spring-womens-rights-egypt

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ida-lichter-md/womens-rights-arab-spring_b_1169821.html

Remember that time I made a post reminding people that okaying women for front-line combat is not the beginning of women fighting in wars, but only the beginning of men finally realizing we weren’t going to shut up about it? Remember after I posted that some dudebro came into my inbox and tried to claim I was wrong and that only a few “rogue women” were fighters?

Again, we have fought in every conflict and every war since the beginning of time. We’re the ones most likely to be victims of war crimes so you better fucking believe we fight for our homes, our people, our lives.

We fight alongside men and help them, save them, die for them as battle buddies and they turn around and write us out of their histories. They erase our efforts, our sacrifices, our deaths.

(via darkwizardjamesmason)

theroguefeminist:

fatfemmefatale:

peechington-marie:

lilacscreams:

themanwiththebluebox:

This needs to fucking stop.  This is an absolute invasion of women, this is disgusting, and this Tumblr needs to go away.

We need to report both the Twitter and the Tumblr.

Creepshots is a website for men to take “sexy” pictures of unsuspecting women, and from their ‘About Us’ section it states: “Creepshots are CANDID pictures.  If a person is posing or aware that a picture is being taken, then it is no longer a creepshot.”  

These men take pictures of women who are unaware and post them.

 And then under their rules for getting the pictures removed?  One of the two options is to “appreciate” the fact that some fucking gross man took a picture of you.

Signal boost.

I’ve sent a report to tumblr and you should too.

To report a blog to tumblr, you need to email the full URL and name of the blog to tumblr.

Let’s get it taken down!

PLEASE SIGNAL BOOST

WE NEED TO REPORT THEM HERE’S HOW

there’s two ways-it’s more effective if you do both:

1) Block them here and then report for harassment.

2) You can also email tumblr at abuse@tumblr.com and tell them to ban creepshots. Provide them with the url to the blog (creepshots.tumblr.com) and explain why they should be banned. If you’re too lazy to write out an email, you can use mine:

Hello tumblr staff,

Please remove/ban the blog creepshots.tumblr.com. They post demeaning, humiliating and objectifying pictures of women (typically their asses and breasts and even under their skirts) that they take without their permission on the street and in public. These guys were banned and deleted from reddit. Can you really say that tumblr is less of a safe respectable place than reddit?

What they are doing is wrong. Many, many users on tumblr feel violated and unsafe by this blog’s presence in the tumblr community. These men are violating the privacy of women everywhere. They specifically state in their about me: “Creepshots are CANDID pictures. If a person is posing or aware that a picture is being taken, then it is no longer a creepshot. A true creepshot captures the natural sexy, embarrassing or funny aspect of the subject mater/person without their knowledge.” They specifically state that only accept pictures of people whose privacy has been violated (source: http://creepshots.tumblr.com/AboutUs).

Please do something to show that you care about the safety and dignity of women, particularly the women in the tumblr community. If you don’t care about that, can you at least ban/delete them in the name of protecting yourself from legal liability? because there’s a strong likelihood that some of those pictures are of underaged girls. Given that these men are taking pics of young women they don’t know, how can they know their ages for certain? All it takes is one concerned parent or adolescent seeing their picture on that site, and if you don’t take it down, legal action could be taken against you.

So please, in the name of what is ethical and right and even legally responsible and smart, delete creepshots. Thank you.

Sincerely,

________ (tumblr username/name)

If we use both methods, we’ll be more successful. LET’S FLOOD THE TUMBLR EMAIL WITH DEMANDS THESE FUCKERS GET TAKEN DOWN. WE CAN DO THIS.

Take these shitheaded fuckers down.

(via stfuconservatives)

the-goggles:

grabsomelasers:

In a perfect world, I wouldn’t be writing this. In a perfect world, none of the events that lead to just how uncomfortable I am would have ever transpired. In a perfect world, maybe I could have just watched E3 and seen some new games announced that would have piqued my interest and made me even a little hopeful for some new content. But this isn’t a perfect world. This is a horrible, disgusting world where I’m presented with rape jokes at the biggest gaming expo of the year.

“You like this!”

“I don’t like this!”

“Just let it happen, it’ll be over soon.”

Those were the lines uttered during Rare’s Killer Instinct demonstration at Microsoft’s Xbox One E3 event. As soon as they were said, I just kinda lost focus on the actual conference and the events. I went to look on twitter, and sure enough, other people had noticed and were commenting on it as well. Everyone seemed to recognise that this was a rape joke. For me, the wind was knocked out of my sails. It was one of those things where I was just left completely shocked, and it took me a while to figure out why.

Over the years, sadly, I’ve grown accustomed to rape jokes in my media. Usually it’s contextualised in fiction, and I can shove it aside with only minor discomfort because “it’s not real this time.” I shouldn’t have to shove that sort of thing aside, but I’ve come to accept it as a fact of life at this point. I imagine many other women have as well.

The conference was different, though. Instead of it being rooted in fiction, this was a real man and a real woman on the stage. These were words being exchanged between two people on the screen in front of me and, for once, I couldn’t shake it off. I couldn’t because it had crossed over from being fiction to existing in the real world again. I was forced to deal with the implications of rape, the effects it’s had on my life, and the effects it has on a societal level. It’s… kinda hard to enjoy the games conference after that.

But then it got kinda worse. Because after a while, the other implications began to sink in. The big one was that this woman, the second one I saw at that conference, was on the other end of a rape joke, which sends two strong messages. The first is that they thought that rape is an acceptable thing to include as a joke. That rape is a joking matter and not a problem endemic to modern society.

The second message it carried was one that hit far more close to my heart. It sent the message that women and rape survivors aren’t welcome in gaming. This is crushing to me and I guess I have to get personal about this because this is part of why I’m so bothered by this.

After my sexual assault, I was… pretty much completely locked up in my room away from the world. I couldn’t deal with anyone or anything at all without having panic attacks or turning into a horrible, blubbering mess. I couldn’t even go so far as to sit with my family at dinner. This went on for the better part of two years. Two years I spent in my room just reading books, watching horrible daytime soap operas, and playing videogames.

I didn’t have a lot of games then, only about 6 or 7 of my own. My dad was kind enough to one day dig the NES out of storage one day and leave it outside my room, which brought the collection to well over 50 games. I played those games for hours, since they offered me a nice escape from where I was at that time in my life. It’s largely thanks to this part of my life that I was ever able to realise that I want to make games. I’d spend time thinking about games critically so that I could figure out what best drew me in and helped me cope with my problems.

I fell a bit out of love with games a couple years later, when they had finally helped me work up the courage to apply for university. I’d still play older, emulated games on my computer during that time though. I even got a used Nintendo 64 which I spent a lot of time playing Rare games on. For all their flaws, I spent hours in Jet Force Gemini and Donkey Kong 64. They’re probably some of the most persistent memories I even have from university.

And I suppose that kinda adds insult to the injury, doesn’t it? That a company I once loved took the stage and made a joke about a really personal thing for me and millions of other women in such a way that I felt so excluded.

I don’t know what the point of all this is. I just need to vent and hope that maybe this helps me cope in the same way games did so long ago.

WOW I DIDN’T GET TO SEE THE MICROSOFT THING BUT

WOW

FUCK THAT

Hacker who outed Steubenville rapists could get more jail time than Steubenville rapists

thatpunnyguy:

kikkicat:

matthewkeys:

Meet Deric Lostutter, a 26-year-old cybersecurity consultant who also goes by the moniker “KYAnonymous.” Lostutter obtained and published tweets and Instagram photos in which members of the Steubenville High School football team joked about an incident in which a 16-year-old girl was raped.

Lostutter’s actions inspired a group of people to take justice into their own hands. A hacker called “Bobcat” vandalized the Facebook page of the Steubenville football team. Other hackers took similar action.

It’s unclear if Lostutter participated in any hacking shenanigans, but if he’s indicted and found guilty of any, he faces 10 years in jail. By comparison, the Steubenville rapists received one- and two-year sentences each.

It’s a sad day when violating social networking leads to a worse punishment than violating a human.

^That comment

(via the-goggles)

bebinn:

How To Identify Crisis Pregnancy Centers

Crisis pregnancy centers, or pregnancy resource centers, disguise themselves as medical facilities, but usually have no licensed doctors, nurses or counselors. They often appear under “Abortion Alternatives,” and may have names similar to abortion clinics nearby in order to confuse patients into entering their buildings instead of the real clinics.

Once you enter a CPC, their mission is to prevent you from getting an abortion at any cost. They will use misleading language, delay tactics, emotional manipulation, intimidation, and outright lies to either persuade you against abortion or to make you miss your appointment. The worst part? It’s all completely legal and funded by federal dollars.

CPCs do their best to appear as legitimate abortion clinics, so how can you tell which is which? Here is a list of red flags for CPCs:

• The words “crisis” or “resource” appear in the center’s name
• Their ads use language like “Pregnant & Scared?”
• They offer free pregnancy tests and ultrasounds
• When asked if they provide abortions or contraception, they will not give a direct answer
• The waiting room has biased pamphlets, sometimes with graphic pictures labeled as abortions
• They attempt to make you feel guilty about considering abortion
• They offer baby items, such as diapers and formula
• They downplay the effectiveness of contraception and emphasize abstinence
• They emphasize the dangers of abortion (Fact: fewer than 0.3% of patients experience complications requiring hospitalization)
• They discuss the false connections between abortion and breast cancer, infertility, or mental illness, often referred to as post-abortion stress syndrome
• Regardless of how you talk about the pregnancy, they refer to “your baby,” the “preborn child,” “post-abortive women,” and say that you are “already a mother.”

More on CPCs

How to Identify CPCs

Beware of Fake Clinics

Crisis Pregnancy Centers: An Affront to Choice

CPC Warning Stickers

A list of licensed abortion clinics in the United States can be found on the Abortion Assistance Blog.

(via the-goggles)

balderodinson:

boom

(via darkwizardjamesmason)

anghraine:

This is one of the most perfect things I have ever seen.

(via lesbianpokemontrainer)

stfuconservatives:

crowdog66:

socialistexan:mangoaway:

“But she is not just a 37-year-old woman on a massive shopping spree.”

Say what you want about Marissa Mayer and Yahoo’s acquisition of Tumblr, but this line just floored me. In a national newspaper? Would the same have been said about a 57-year-old male CEO making business decisions? Or even a 37-year-old one?

Men make acquisitions. Women “go shopping”.

When men buyout companies they’re being ruthless businessmen.

When women buyout companies they’re shopping.

See this? THIS is why feminism still needs to exist. 

Sexist fuckers being all fucked up need educating with baseball bats…

tee hee, you know those ladies with their shopping and international corporate tech conquests

vonnegutphile:

ainiente:

marchonlovely:

ohitsandreea:

The Purity Myth.

If you’re a female this should concern and frighten you in a big way.

THIS WATCH IT NOW

yeah no actually this is really fucking scary

woah

(via ryttu3k)

Indiana's Effort to Defund Planned Parenthood Is Dead

motherjones:

The Supreme Court declines to hear Indiana’s appeal to defend a 2011 law discriminating against abortion providers.

Reproductive rights supporters get a victory.

(via stfuconservatives)