Political Correctness VS. Factual Correctness

[Roy Karrde]

I do wish to point out that I think there is a time and place for Feminism. I believe the game industry is in a desperate need of rethinking how they design and create female characters, not just to attract a female audience, but to also serve as better examples for boys that not everything is about boobs and ass.

I also think that the Middle East is LONG overdue for a feminist uprising, and how countries treat women should be a prerequisite when it comes to military and financial aid in the Middle East. Along with taking many of the feminist organizations over here and turning to export their work into the Middle East.

[ChobiChibi]

Game industry is better than it used to be. Other than the bum and tits (I went british on yo ass, suckit), girls aren't just the ones that need rescuing anymore. Lightning and Fang in FFXIII, FemShep and Jack in Mass Effect (holy hell her VA is hot)... In fact, the fact that you're actually able to select female characters in RPGs like ME, Skyrim and Pokemon is truly a step forward in that respect. That and the stereotypes that surround girl gamers too... "Oh they only play Harvest Moon"... Pffftttt, that is virtually gone.

But as for the Middle East... A feminist uprising would be suicide... I mean, they shot a girl for speaking up about her education rights, they're not gonna be so easily persuaded towards a more equal existence when it states in their Religion that men are superior to women... Not saying it shouldn't happen, just saying it's not as easy as that.

[Plantae]

I think the problem with women's rights in the Middle East is more multi-faceted than some would like to believe. A lot of unproductive discussion arrives from some bad assumptions that are made by the majority of Westerners. It's important to realize that opposition by male (usually religious) authority is not the only issue. Moreover, it would be a rather blunt interpretation of Islam that suggests that the Quran holds women to be inferior. It's more complex than that. Many "feminists" in the Middle East work within an Islamic framework.

Female identity is different in the Middle East. For example, I think a lot of people assume that Muslim women would like to be "freed" from wearing the traditional garment, the hijab. For some women, the hijab is an imposition, but for others, it is an expression of their religious devotion and a personal choice.

As Westerners, we also tend to assume that the Middle East (with the exception of Israel) is somehow a homogenized Muslim culture, which is very far from the truth. Women are not unilaterally oppressed, and in some Middle Eastern nations, often have a considerable amount of freedom.

There is certainly a staunch opposition to women's rights in the most patriarchal Middle Eastern societies, but many countries in the Middle East have made recent gains in women's rights, even in the last ten years. There's hope for improvement, especially as the international community becomes more involved.

Nevertheless, I'll agree with Roy here that we should take women's rights, and more generally, human rights, into account when we determine what sort of aid we give to foreign nations. But I think it's important to recognize that sometimes, certain Western values can be an imposition on women in the Middle East and we must be sensitive to these concerns too.

[Heald]

I often passed several posters at university advertising all the different social and support groups there were for non-white, non-straight, non-male peoples (e.g. Asian society, Black society, LGBT society, women's society etc.). I always wondered what would happen if I put up a poster like the below up next to them:

WHITE? STRAIGHT? MALE?

No pussy support group here,
just a friendly reminder to keep being awesome.

[Blademaster]

Do it faggot.

I double dare you.

[Asilynne]

please do it.

[ChobiChibi]

Or perhaps the simple need to not argue pointlessly back and forth for weeks and weeks. I believe this simply shows that Oslo is more mature than certain nameless, but blatantly obvious, members that didn't know when to stop.

Or he's a busy bee *shrug*

[Oslo]

Oslo mature? :O That's the craziest thing said this entire conversation. I appreciate the sentiment, though, Becki.

Nah, I'll get around to making a response. Truthfully, I thrive off respectful, level-headed discourse; it mobilizes me into becoming a better thinker and a better person. I've had numerous civil conversations with masculists and I've loved those exchanges for their cooperative, generative potential. This conversation, with your misrepresentations and ad hominem smears and willingness to cry bigotry at ideas you've misunderstood, doesn't excite me. I have 4/5 of a response drafted in a Word Document—and it's quite a good response, actually, albeit omg so long—but I dread participating in conversations that risk bringing me down to a lower level, so I'm putting off finishing it.

But I'll post my reply eventually.

[ChobiChibi]

Okay, so the TPM mature scale goes like this:

Nameless, blatantly obvious members -> Oslo -> Becki -> Other people. XD

[Oslo]

I'm pretty sure I'm on a lower plateau than that. It's a cool place to be, though. We got stuffed Patamon toys and Kool-Aid. :3

[DarkestLight]

Okay, so the TPM mature scale goes like this:

Nameless, blatantly obvious members -> Oslo -> Becki -> Other people -> DL (top of food chain)

>.> Kool-aid is up here too, durr pe durrp!

[ChobiChibi]

Oh hush, DL, you're blates down near the bottom with Oslo and I.

[Blademaster]

Does x -> y in this instance imply that y is more mature than x or more immature than x?

Also where do I fall on this scale? Because Oslo kinda kicked my ass at debating which implies he's higher but I knew when to quit which has to count for something, right?

[Mikachu Yukitatsu]

Also where do I fall on this scale?

Me too! Meaning I'd like to know where I fall.

Also, this has become a crazy thread and I even have one post here w00t. No offence to anyone, I just don't comprehend this myself. Should read it through, but the only way to get it all read and understood would be after printing it. For me.

[Oslo]

I'm Oslolling right now.

Expect my response in, idk, a week?

[Oslo]

A few reasons, but "systematically annihilated" for the most part.

I didn't realize I was debating Duke Nukem...?

[Oslo]

Fair enough, but just recognize that we're coming at this from two vastly different mindsets. I take part in debate because I'm a student of the dialectical method. The sublation of opposing views is how knowledge is created. We don't just cut one another down; by forwarding cogent arguments, we build something. I don't expect to "systematically annihilate" anything because that's destructive, not generative. We don't get anywhere when we call the other a puppet or liken the other to a religious fundamentalist or claim the other is lying or accuse the other of gender hate or rephrase the other's arguments in a reductivist/patronizing manner. Sure, continue this Mack Truck style of debate if that really is how you roll—but I truly believe it takes us backwards, not forwards.

But even if we put my idealist cornball hippie tomfoolery aside, I'm quite confident that you have not successfully "annihilated" my points in any capacity, but we already know we're not going to see eye-to-eye on that...

[Oslo]

If you truly believe in the rhetorical validity of mud-slinging and suggest there is nothing destructive about a style of debate modelled after systematic annihilation, our views are too incompatible for there to be anything left to say on the subject. Hold tight until I get around to my actual response, I guess?

[Oslo]

You’ve misunderstood.

The dialectical method: thesis + antithesis = synthesis

Which is to say, opposing viewpoints come against one another to create a new understanding for both parties involved. This is the generative potential for civilized debate: using reasoned argumentation to build knowledge that is broader than the scope of either argument. It does not always play out like that and it certainly is not playing out like that between us—and here I implicate my own fallibility by suggesting I should perhaps be doing more to make this potential a reality—but this in my opinion is the ideal.

On the other hand, a form of debate focused on the totalized negation of “all” opposing views destroys that potential for collaborative knowledge-building. Discourse instead becomes a zero-sum game of winners and losers; indeed, judging by your earlier eager attempt to declare unilateral victory, this is clearly your terminal goal. While it’s the more common and socially validated method of conducting debate, it’s simply not my ideal method, especially when it lends itself to easy mud-slinging.

That’s all I mean when I say our mindsets differ.

[Oslo]

That was certainly, um, something. Welp, at least it's no longer hard to decide whether I want to continue with this topic, so that's good, I suppose?

[Blademaster]

Everything listed fits on your computer screen.

The posts a few above my own do not.

Do the math.