I think the game is a good idea in spirit. Women should have a way to get out their anger towards people who harass them. Besides, it should be obvious to anyone that if you are some woman in a situation where “All you want to do is to get home… You’re the last one out of the office. Its getting dark outside…” (taken from the game site) you shouldn’t have to be harassed. It should be obvious to guys that that is not a suitable place to approach a woman that you may fancy.

But honestly, and I’m actually asking here, what is? Because as a young man who believes he’s upstanding and decent, I don’t want to be the kind of jerk that this game aims to stomp out. Again, it’s obvious that you shouldn’t go up to a woman saying things like “I want to lick you all over” or “I like your bounce, baby.” Ew.

If I approach a girl at a bookstore while she’s browsing a section that I am too and seems interested, can I say hi? Ask for her number if we chat for a bit? What are the rules on this? Women deserve respect, but if the only place I’m allowed to make a move is a bar, then I’m just going to become homosexual.

And no, I’m not asking for dating advice, but rather making a point. It seems like there is a certain “feminist” way to approach women so they don’t feel objectified, but I don’t know what that is. I mean, I’m not saying pity men, but if I can’t have normal social interactions without being labeled a creep and pervert, that’s messed up.

I also agree with rxp. I mean, sure there are a lot of hyper-violent games out there, but I don’t recall any that specifically tell men to demean/attack women. Maybe I haven’t looked hard enough. I’m not sure. I may kill some people for a minute or two in a game like GTA, but I never specifically target prostitutes or women. And while brawling in the streets is a decent distraction, I was seriously kind of jarred when playing the infamous Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 level “No Russian” where your objective was to mow down an crowd of innocents in an airport.

Neither a) nor b) is really my objection. Violence in media isn’t necessarily bad, it depends completely on the context; and I try not to hold feminist arguments to a higher or lower standard than any other arguments. If I had to put my finger on it, I’d say that violence for the sake of wanting to see specific people getting hurt really creeps me out on some fundamental level. :/

I think there are real arguments against it, some of them might include:

(a) artistic pacificism, objecting across the board to artistic portrayals of violence, or at least to portrayals that encourage identification with the perpetrator

(b) a belief that feminist arguments should not stoop to using this kind of tactic: things that are used to portray misogyny should never be used to portray women’s rage or feminist messages

You need to be fairly explicit with argument (b) or it devolves into the “tone argument”: there’s always someone who thinks a message is rude, anti-men, reverse-sexist or simply unbecoming no matter how mild it is. There’s a range of criticisms of street harassment starting at, say, writing guides to men on how to express sexual interest in a feminist way; writing angry blog entries about harassment; making revenge fantasies [your reading]/unending and unstoppable harassment images [Schiesl's reading]; and at the far end use of actual violence against actual harassers. Where’s your line and why?

It’s not that I don’t feel merit in either (a) or (b). But as regards (a), I consume a fair bit of moderately violent entertainment with sympathetic perpatrators and as regards (b) I’m rather influenced by Schiesl’s reading.

I’m just as bewildered at the repeated comparisons to equally horrific games, as though it’s a justification. Um, what? Would you be okay with somebody using the same argument in reverse, and making a game with violence against women based on this?

Usually the defense of gaming is more emotional than rational (hence such phenomena as rabid console fanpersons), but maybe the existance of this game can also be a more emotional argument by turning the tables. Don’t like when virtual guys get shot in the face for saying the wrong thing? Good, but think about what it means to shoot a virtual prostitute in the face for money.

Although I’ve rarely encountered this harassment myself, Leigh’s article got to me, because I’ve found myself becoming increasingly sensitive in other areas of my life, where even innocuous things become rage-inducing, so I can easily see how that would affect women less fortunate than myself. I now have this image in my head of a four-panel xkcd-style comic, with a woman walking past men saying less offensive things each time, with her getting angrier each time, and she finally snaps and leaps at the guy asking for directions.

And now I feel a need for more Saint’s Row…