Yes but at least that is acknowledging the fact.
This isn't an issue of facts that need to be stated at all cost. It's an issue of narratives, combating narratives struggling for attention space. When we have a discussion about the objectification of out groups in media, we do not need to insert the narrative of the objectification of the in group in media unless it informs the former.
How bad men have it does not inform sexual objectification of women in videogames.
Can we have a discussion about something that isn't directly relevant to our experience for a moment, or does everything have to be about us? How privileged are we, really?
Psychologically the "yes... but us too!" reflex has to do with when we subconsciously realise we've been shits by supporting a shitty culture and we race to find something that makes us good guys again... we have made women suffer buuuuuuuttttt... we suffer too! Everything's right inside now.
Don't do this. Stay on topic. If we're discussing feminism, we should be discussing feminism.
And I'm not saying that as a diversion, it is because I have personal experience of it.
It doesn't make sense for feminism that is supposed to mean equality between sexes to only acknowledge one side.
Why? Feminism is about women's rights advocacy. You and I - as males - are not included. We can be - and should be - pro-feminist, but we can't be feminists. We can support women in their fight for their rights in any way we can, but it will never be our fight. If they win their fight, we also gain much, but that doesn't make it our fight. Not everything has to be about us and include us. How privileged are we?
While placing all the blame on the other. We're all following the gender roles society has imposed on us.
You misunderstand most common strands of feminism - they do not blame 'us', or 'men'. They blame the patriarchy which is a structure that IS man-made but it's not made of men. It's a construct that is oppressive to all and serves the capital. You should do some reading before you describe feminism.
And it's not like a baby boy comes out of the womb and is all like "oh yeah let's enforce some gender roles!"
Women and men alike teaches children to enforce them and it is only recently that it's become a trend to try and break those norms.
Trend is an ugly word to describe [
a couple of centuries of struggle.
Well I'm lucky that I live in Sweden where people take this seriously.
And I dare to say no other country takes it as serious.
Good for Sweden. You've got reading to do and people to speak before you can say YOU take it seriously, however.
About obesity, I think it's sad that we're seeing a trend where some just give up and try accept their obesity as a good thing.
That's an incredibly prejudiced thing to say. Stop using the word 'trend' (which describes fashions in popular culture) to describe the sometimes superhuman struggles minorities have to endure to get equal treatment. Here, let me put it in a different way.
"About homosexuality, I think it's sad that we're seeing a trend where some just give up and try accept their homosexuality as a good thing."
The only way to stop thinking in normative terms is to have your male privilege challenged through study and discussion with people who are out of the norm. Talk on this matter with actual feminists, gay people, proudly fat people, don't talk to some male, white, straight, middle-lower class Greek nerd on an art forum.
In the same way we see people being proud of being ignorant or uneducated, these are sometimes the same people.
Congratulations, you have equalized body types with stupidity and ignorance. That's the closest you can get to commiting murder in philosophical terms.
I mean being an anorectic model is also bad for your health and a terrible ideal, but so is being proud of your obesity.
It makes me think the US is going in the completely wrong direction.
You are not in control of where the US or anywhere else is going. If an anorexic model wants to be proud of herself, I fully support her. If a fat person wants to be proud of themselves, I fully support them. If they then change their mind and feel there's negative impact on their helath by their choices, I will fully support them then. I will not support those who hide behind normative culture as a shield and use the power of 'normal' to hurt others. We must stand with those who are weak in our societies until they are no longer weak.
I mean here in Sweden we have [...] trends
In the US you have trends
Stop.
Of course it can be changed, but that might just be suppressing instincts and desires. Which everyone needs to do on some level to be a civilized person.
There is also the sublimation of low drives. Look it up.
edit: By the way, we already have a pixel piledriver thread that covers the male gaze.. (and maybe every other thread too)
Can't we start a thread for the female gaze, with sexualized men?
No.
Erekt,
I think that's a problem with this whole discussion. We are trying to generalize about gender roles in society, but even within our group of predominantly straight white middle-class males as you put it there's plenty of variation to be had.
Actually I do not see this variation. The reactions we've had so far are mostly luke-warm, everyone seems to be downplaying the issue. This is what privilege does, it makes us not care about the Other, at best, hate them, at the worst. And because Pixelation people are artists and introverts mostly, we do not get the outright worst. But we get indifference and 'meh' and 'nothing can be done'.