"Tropes Vs. Women" with Anita Sarkeesian

By Holly Strom

Screenshot of one of Sarkeesian's videos.

HIGH POINT, N.C. - "The world is made up of stories, not of atoms." So begins Anita Sarkeesian's presentation about the fight against sexism in video games.

Sarkeesian, a world famous media critic, was invited to give a speech at High Point University by the school's Women and Gender Studies and Communication departments on Thursday night. She discussed not only the sexism that was and is present in video games throughout history and how she fought against that, but also the backlash the she received because of her opinions.

As the creator of the "Feminist Frequency" blog, Sarkeesian's face is recognized by gamers around the world. In 2009, she created a video blog series titled "Tropes vs. Women in Video Games" that examines video game tropes that poorly represent women.

Sarkeesian's successful Kickstarter campaign.

The blog quickly gained notoriety when Sarkeesian began a Kickstarter campaign in an effort to raise money for it. Although the blog gained nearly 3,000 supporters, Sarkeesian also gained many haters.

 As Sarkeesian states, she was "viciously attacked by a cyber mob" on various social media platforms: Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and more. She was the victim of email, website and Wikipedia hacks. She also had her personal information leaked, which led to people calling her, going to her house and threats of harm.

Sarkeesian was also impersonated by haters who created fake profiles under her name, made up quotes and pretended to have insider information all in an effort to garner more hate towards her. People began vandalizing photos of Sarkeesian and posting them on the Internet.

A vandalized photo of Sarkeesian with the title
"Beat Up Anita Sarkeesian."

Despite the harassment that Sarkeesian faces on a daily basis, she continues to speak out against what she feels is unacceptable.

Sarkeesian discussed in her lecture a few different tropes that she disagrees with, the most common of which is the "damsel in distress" trope. This trope, Sarkeesian says, makes women look weak and prevents them from being the heroes they can be.

Sarkeesian disagrees with these tropes because she claims that they "perpetuate the myth that men are entitled to women's sexualized bodies."

She went on to say that, while she loves playing video games, she is constantly disappointed in the sexualizing and demeaning of female characters and that is the reason she continues to fight for equality in gaming.

Audience reactions to the lecture were mixed. Nicole Forman, a student at HPU, said, "I thought that it was interesting but I feel like for me, because I'm not a gamer, I didn't fully understand her points."

Melanie Thompson, another HPU student, had a similar opinion. "I understand and respect the points she was trying to make in terms of the feminist aspect of it, but I don't play video games so I didn't really get the connection."

Ryan Dillon, on the other hand, is a gamer and says he was able to connect with the lecture more. "It really made me think about the games I'm playing, and I see now how much sexism and sexualizing of the characters there really is in the gaming world. It was really interesting, definitely something I'm going to keep in the back of my mind."

For more information on Sarkeesian and her media critiques, please visit her blog Feminist Frequency.