Warning: Pile of Soap Boxes incoming!
I think Defiance is the least sexist game I've played in recent memory. Maybe ever.
Rosa Rodriguez and her friend/partner/whatever aren't overtly sexualized.
Ara Shonduu dresses classy and acts classy.
The female Echelon Mercs don't break down in tears or wear bikinis' to a firefight.
Cass is a grifter (I disagree with 'prostitute'). She uses sex, violence, stealth, theft, and falsehoods (or any combination of the above) to get the job done. The 'job' being whatever she's after at that moment. Life is hard, you use the assets you have. Sometimes she even alludes to the fact that she used 'charm' to accomplish something and you find out that's not even the case. Cass is not representative of all women. Cass is just Cass.
For the record I think Rosa is way sexier than Cass, even though Cass has a nice body that is shown off way more.
You could make the argument that the game is also sexist against men being that Von Bach is the very personification of the leering male lecher that is the stereotypical negative portrayal of men, too. Adding on to the fact that the physically weak, bald, white rich guy is a trope unto itself.
You could argue about Cooper being typically DE-sexualized and made excessively violent like many Afro-American males in the media.
With regards to clothing, I see your point to a degree, but how many of the male outfits have exaggerated shoulder pieces and sculpted muscular-like plates? And it's early in the life of the game so you might be jumping the gun here just a tad.
What if I wanted to play a small, slim guy with no real musculature? 'Too bad, you're a beefcake, deal with it' that's what.
In short I'd say that men are sexualized too, but we're conditioned to see it as a good, strong, desirable way to be looked at/thought of. To the point that any guy protesting being 'sexualized' is immediately judged by his peers to be weak, stupid, homosexually inclined or whatever.
With regards to NPC's (especially enemies) I'd go check the statistics on violent crime and see what the ratio of male to female perpetrators are. Raiders are by definition violent criminals. 99ers were manual laborers before they went psycho-robot (statistically not a huge female population doing manual labor in mines) and Dark Matter we can't really assess as it is a non-human organization. I think the genders aren't represented in any kind of grossly disproportionate fashion to reality. Remember, this is Earth we're supposed to be on.
Personally, I'd say Defiance is doing a pretty decent job of extrapolating from existing social trends and then applying a liberal dash of regression due to a significant breakdown of society.
I'm not saying you are wrong, OP. Or that it's not there to a degree. I'm saying if you are looking for it, you will always see it and if you focus on it, the prevalence will seem exaggerated.
And now for the politically incorrect/unpopular part:
Our world is sexist.
Sex is the absolute most prevalent driving force in our common psychological makeup, whether we realize it consciously or not. We are built to survive and reproduce. Food is plentiful. Danger is rare. Men and women have lots of free time to fill up with thinking about each other and looking at each other. Sex permeates our lives in ways from the subtle to the blatant.
What stereotypically defines a man? What are 'manly' traits? Muscles. Deep voice. Stoic (lack of positive/nurturing emotions), willingness to perpetrate violence.
What stereotypically defines a woman? What are 'womanly' traits? Curves. Higher/softer voice. Gentleness (positive/nurturing emotions) lack of violent impulses aka patience etc.
As an extension of that how do we 'display our greatness' or suitability for being optimal mating material? We take those traits above and exaggerate them to varying degrees (Big muscles Big b00bs etc.)
Our digital avatars in any virtual world are caricatures that utilize these stereotypical traits because we find them compelling in the general sense.
Are they accurate in the specific? No. They are a reference framework that we operate within that is comfortable due to thousands of years of practice.
We haven't been 'civilized' all that long, evolutionarily-speaking (totally made that word up) but as far back as we can remember as a global society, that's how it's been.
This road we're on, of homogenizing gender roles, may not end up being a very satisfying destination. Roles are already being eroded to the point where young people often feel lost as they approach adulthood.
Everything is nebulous; We don't know what' we're supposed to be and the truth is a little scary.
There is no 'supposed to' at all. It's all arbitrary and the Sun is going to explode and eat the Earth in a half-million years or whatever anyway.
So bring on the pretty girls with the low cut blouses and tight pants, because it helps me to stop thinking about that big ol' supernova. And in return, I won't complain if you stare at my massive biceps. (lol right)
Real Message= Relax and love your fellow (wo)man and everything will be ok.
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Originally Posted by jdolden
