The 'Self-Evident' truth isn't. (plus a random Nietzsche quote)

I get a cheap sexual thrill out of quoting Nietzsche as if his writings are religious texts.  With that in mind....

Aphorism 331 in Nietzsche's Human, All Too Human reads:

Indication of alienation.  The clearest sign that two hold alienated views is that each says ironic things to the other, but neither of the two feels the other's irony.

I think that part of the 'problem' that I ran into in the obscenely drawn-out thread on Socimages about Chell's high heels is that my point of view on the issue was so completely alien to the other expressed views that nobody was communicating their full thoughts, assuming that the other person would already be familiar with their fundamental assumptions.

It was a fun but ultimately pointless argument.

I remain convinced: Portal's Chell is wearing heels.

[04/27/2012 note: I wasn't expecting anyone to ever read this post and was sloppy when I wrote it.  It has since become the most read thing on my blog (awkward) and so I  going to be revising/updating this post in the near future.]

I love the Sociological Images blog.  It's one of the blogs that inspired me to start blogging too; not that I have any (admitted :P ) pretensions to being as excellent a blogger as the Socimages team.

In a post about a news report about the bullying the player is subjected to in the game, I commented that I'm disapointed by Valve's (The original Portal was made by a small team that was absorbed into Valve early into the game's development) decision to have Chell wear what I consider to be high-tech desexualized high heels.

My comment (a reply to another person's):

“That is, she avoided most of the problematic tropes female characters get saddled with.”

And yet they found a way to put her in heels the entire game; certainly in a de-sexualized way (they save her from breaking her legs when she falls from large heights) but I still found it disappointing that she *had* to be wearing lady-shoes just because she’s female.

I had thought that what I was talking about was completely self-evident.  Apparently I'm completely wrong, which is fine.

My reasoning is that her long-fall boots look like high heels, Valve obviously put a lot of thought into different ways to make her footwear similar to high heels, that referencing the real world prosthetics that inspired aspects of the boots design only reinforces my points because those prosthetics serve to mimic the function of running normally i.e. not with a person's heels propped up.

The discussion has been dragged out to a surprising length, though I think it can be condenced down to two posts.

A user named 'Cee' posted

So, you’re suggesting that real, useful designs should be banned because they happen to resemble historically gendered objects?

Yeah, that’s not sexist.

My response

WOW. I’m not saying it should be banned. I’m saying that since they’ve taken the fictional liberties of introducing trans-dimensional intergalactic warfare (Portal is explicitly part of the Half Life universe) and since they did such a good job avoiding or even head-on addressing most of the sexist tropes in video games; I find it disappointing that they went with that design, especially since if you look at the ‘real, useful design’ that was linked to above you’ll notice that it mimics the effect of running in regular shoes.

I’ll concede the point if they have Gordon Freeman running around with his heels propped up like that in the next game.

Not all of the opposing views were as nonsensical as Cee's; it you're interested you should definitely go read the entire discussion.  I do want to address another inane ad hominid (here, it would only be a distraction there) though.

I posted a link to a character study with four different versions of Chell (already linked to above).  In my initial post I stated that they are in a 'fashion-model' pose; very stupid of me.  I'll maintain that's an obviously feminine pose; I have no problem with that and I later clarified that "On second thought: ‘fashion-model’ is an overstatement since posing that way simply allows for more details to be seen."


After which JDP responded

In game, you can only see yourself in passing and at an oblique through portals. It’s not like you spend the whole game staring at your character’s butt like you do in many RPGs or third-person shooters. So you’re nitpicking about aspects of character design you literally never see.

I guess the bad guys make an issue about it. Like GLaDOS’s patently absurd statement about medical degrees in fashion from France.

Simply moronic.  It's not 'nitpicking' to discuss what is easily one of the most instantly noticeable features of a character, especially if its also what has become the one that is the most iconic after her gender (and the fact that she's an impressively non-stereotyped female player-character).  Valve did an entire teaser-trailer about the boots.


More importantly it's the hypocrisy that is the reason I'm disappointed.  GLaDOS does make a "patently absurd statement about medical degrees in fashion from France" and it's equally absurd that Chell couldn't have regular footing in her boots.


I love BloodRayne and Mortal Kombat (the newest MK is sssoooooo fun!) and am willing to roll my eyes at the hyper-heteronormative sexualization of the characters (male and female) because the games gleefully wallow in it and avoid all self-hypocrisy; I described MK as 'bloody sexy fun' in a post on Wired and I stand by that statement.


To summarize: I find it disappointing that, since they did such a good job avoiding or even head-on addressing most of the sexist tropes in video games, they went with this particular design; especially since if you look at the ‘real, useful design’ that was linked to above you’ll notice that it mimics the effect of running in regular shoes.


For the record: Portal and Portal 2 are amazing games that need to be played, and I think the way they portray Chell is brilliant.  I'm just a bit disappointed by the footwear.


Trivial Update: Oh, in general I have no problem with ad hominids, vitriol, and childish name-calling; all things I regularly employ.  The very first response (not reposted here, btw) to my original post, for example, is perfectly reasonable in tone and content.
/thought_policing

What the...

I woke up this morning and my dog was holding a potato three inches away from my face.  o.O

This raises many serious philosophical questions.

Pleasant update to the 'Profit From Suffering' post

I sent messages to the stock-photo websites that were selling images of piles of human skulls from the 'Killing Fields' in Cambodia.  The one I sent to stockpodium.com read:

You sell images of piles of skulls from the Khmer Rogue's killing fields in Cambodia. Making a profit off of that type of atrocity using images of the victims is very distasteful.

I just received this email back from one of their reps:

Dear Kafes,

I just found a few such images and removed them. Please verify if you still find such images on the site.

Actually we resell images from another image agency and their images are automatically forwarded to our collection.

The part with the profit is similar to how a photographer taking pictures of victims of a murder or of war will get paid by the press agency, and the press agency itself will get some money.

It's a kind of job and who do it get rewarded.

Anyway, please accept our apologies, while still keeping in mind that these images are part of history and having them somehow increase awareness of what has happened.

For example we here in Bulgaria also have the Batak massacre and don't feel like knowing about it is something bad.

Best regards,

[redacted]

I feel very pleasantly surprised that they actually took my message seriously; perhaps I'm getting a little to jumpy to assume the worst about people lately o.O?

I'm going to send a short email back thanking them.  I also want to say that I agree that it's certainly not something bad for people to know about.  My only problem was that the images were simply close-up shots of piles of skulls with almost zero context; selling images of the memorials or of historical photos I don't have a problem with.

Anyways, I have a lot of respect for the way they responded and definitely want to thank them for taking it seriously.

^_^ I'm Such A Shameless Hypocrite (video games this time)

Dark Souls.  Fuck yeah.  I love both of my Demon's Souls characters; one is zealous Temple Kight who slaughters the impure (ironic since his god is actually the source of all corruption) with his blessed Meat Cleaver (no really!) and Sword of Moonlight while wearing his Dark Silver armor that was, of course, looted off the corpse of a still-honorable knight who was honor bound to defend a fallen saint.  The other is a demented young woman of the royal family wielding a Blue Blood sword (damage increases with your 'luck' attribute, which is hilarious) and who has traded her royal garb for the 'Binded Cross' of a royal executioner (who she brutally murdered btw).

Shut up.  It's cool.

But I am hyped about the prospect of casting aside Demon's Souls for the newer, shinier corporate cash-in Dark Souls.

I just found out that there will be a new BloodRayne game.  I never played the second game and, let's be honest, the movies are unforgivably bad, and I know next to nothing about the upcoming installment in the franchise.  But it's a new BloodRayne game.  Yay!

The first game is one of the best from the last generation no matter what the entire rest of the world says. It is one of the definitive documents of stylized Nazi occultism, and Rayne herself is a surprisingly strong and fascinating character.  I don't (just) mean 'fascinating' in the "hetenormatively sexy redhead in skimpy leather" way.  I swear.

Then there's Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm.  I could whine about it being a obvious money grab from a shamelessly cash obsessed corporation.  I could whine about the transformation of Kerrigan from an agressive tomboyish genocidal maniac in the first Starcraft into the agressive feminine-looking genocidal maniac in Starcraft 2.  But seriously, it's Starcraft.  STFU.

^_^ +1

update: rapidly edited multiple times because of typos.

So... yeah (weird few days for me)

I've been posting random (not random to the specific topic just random in aggregate*) things on various websites the last few days.

If you found my blog from one of those posts... uh, congratulations?

The last few days have been weird. Not 'bad weird' or 'good weird' just surreal.

Just...... felt like saying that.

Yeah.

*as in "almost as random as this explanation"

Ahhhh Glenn Sacks. You certainly are an amusing bastard.

If you do a google search for that glorious patriarchal defender "Glenn Sacks" right now the top search result is "GlennSacks.com".

The excerpt from the website that shows up is "We Are The CHEAPEST Online-Drugstore >> Viagra For Sale."

Again that's just what's there atm, so once the ads rotate the excerpt will probably change.

Still. It's fucking hilarious how accurate that description is.

Anyways I had just gotten bored with David Brooks, only moments ago in fact, and decided to check in with Mr. Sacks. To my surprise I found an article that is not *entirely* bullshit. He recently wrote an article about lesbian divorces and child-custody issues. Admittedly I don't know very much about this issue, but to me it seems to be a surprisingly fair, if still somewhat slanted, assessment. (Although a cynic might point out that he only seems to be siding with certain lesbian women because they find themselves in a situation typically associated with fathers.)

But don't worry! Before things get too rational or fair Mr. Sacks sprints to the rescue with this tripe.

Copy and Pasted from the article "If Men Got Pregnant Would Abortion Be Legal":

Most people sympathize with women who have decided to terminate their pregnancies because they conceived as a result of being deceived into believing that their partners had vasectomies or were sterile. By contrast, courts have consistently failed to extend any consideration to men who have been deceived.

..................

Fetal protection laws also demonstrate courts' and lawmakers' concern for women's reproductive rights and disregard for men's; if mom doesn't want to be a parent, the unborn child is a meaningless fetus, yet if it is dad who doesn't want to be a parent, the fetus is considered a living human being.

He never explicitly states that the father should be able to force an abortion; it's still creepy that he would insinuate that.

The "Men's Rights" advocates are one of those bizarre groups of people who, so that I can fully articulate my point of view, force me to co-opt rhetoric that I normally oppose. o.O

In his insistence that fathers and mothers "be treated equally" he seems to miss that fact that there are massive biological differences between the two genders. I'm not entirely opposed to the idea of 'financial abortion', which is what I think he was actually trying to imply, where the father severs all legal and financial obligations to the child.

What's bullshit is when he draws a false equivalency between the biological processes that mother goes through and the inconvenience to the father who has to support his own child (a bizarre assertion that only becomes more deranged with his complete omittance of the mother's own costs of raising his child).

Meh. It's a waste of time whining about Mr. Sacks' juvenile dick-waving.

For much more interesting, dare I say fun, juvenile di..... uh.... entertainment go play the new Mortal Kombat.