[gambler]

You describe objectification as patterns of behaviors and speech. However, the most common use of that term I see these days refers to female characters in fiction and advertising. There is a gigantic difference between these two notions.

In a similar fashion, your entire post is misaligned with the kind of feminism I see on the daily basis.

[new_corp_dev]

There is a very strong disparity between feminism's words and actions. They call for equality, but in reality use it as a sword to strike at men.

http://reason.com/archives/2015/07/23/sexist-scientist-tim-h...

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-goldberg-rosetta-...

Some small form of feminism may still be necessary in this day and age, but no meaningful progress can be made until the extremes of modern feminism are torn down.

[electronvolt]

> You describe objectification as patterns of behaviors and speech. However, the most common use of that term I see these days refers to female characters in fiction and advertising. There is a gigantic difference between these two notions.

This is true. Objectification is a complex subject with lots of potential targets: you can treat a person as a sexual object, you can portray/view a character as a sexual object, etc. In the context of that post, I was referring to specific complaints of flesh and blood women RE: being objectified. Objectification in fiction and advertising is a separate thing: characters who exist primarily to titillate a male audience's sexual desires would qualify... as would characters who exist primarily to titillate a female audience's sexual desires. (See: Magic Mike, Magic Mike XXL for really good examples of male characters who are pretty obviously objectified.)

To be completely honest: I don't have any serious problem with what I'd view to be pulp-y fiction or characters in the rough. (Hell, romance novel characters seriously qualify here too!) However, if it seemed like every male lead character in a genre primarily characterized by how they were "tall, dark, and handsome, with a bad boy streak and a heart of gold" then I'd probably get the message that the genre was not necessarily aimed at me or about characters I could relate to or find interesting. If that was true of all genres, or most popular works, then I'd probably get the message that I wasn't the audience for any genre, and perhaps even that men existed to be "tall dark and handsome" and should behave as "bad boys with a heart of gold". Being short and generally well behaved, I'd probably complain about unrealistic male characters who ride horses into the sunset and have perfect abs. Perhaps I'd even come to believe that I should wear platform shoes, work out all the time and never eat to get the abs I needed, start behaving like a bad boy, and learn how to ride horses so that I could meet a basic bar of manliness. Fortunately, that fantasy world that I just described doesn't exist for me, because romance novels are not the primary genre or what we base our societal expectations of men on, but replace "tall dark and handsome and a bad boy with a heart of gold" with "skinny, brunette, and buxom" and you begin to hit the issues that some women have with many video games.

> In a similar fashion, your entire post is misaligned with the kind of feminism I see on the daily basis.

The thing is, my post is aligned with the feminism I believe in and try to push forward. It's aligned with the feminism that I've heard expressed by my close friends, some of whom are activists for various feminist causes (equal job rights, etc.). That doesn't necessarily correspond with the loudest "feminist" voices on the internet (or tumblr), in the same way that someone like "Maddox" doesn't necessarily correspond to mainstream male views.

[gambler]

> Objectification is a complex subject with lots of potential targets: you can treat a person as a sexual object, you can portray/view a character as a sexual object, etc.

To me this sounds less like a product of a complex underlying notion and more like simple inconsistency created by equating fundamentally different things.

Characters are not people. They are fictional entities. Arguing that it is immoral to design them in a way that sets "unrealistic" examples of behavior attacks the foundational premise of fiction itself. There is no rational criteria that would make this a valid argument in regards to sexuality while sparing any other aspect of human behavior.

So yes, there are plenty of one-dimensional characters who are products of someone's fantasies, designed to appeal to a select audience. That's a design/writing issue, not moral/social issue. If you're arguing to the contrary, you're effectively demanding to edit all fiction to become a form of propaganda.

[ectoplasm]

I got a little lost reading your comment. Are you saying that it's fine having unrealistic fictional characters because it has no bearing on the real world? If so, then first, humans use stories as a primary means of teaching moral behavior. Second, when it comes to movies the actors playing the characters are real people. I mean, just look at all the damage done by the fictional stories in holy books.

[gambler]

Are you saying that it's fine having unrealistic fictional characters because it has no bearing on the real world?

No, I think we should put anyone who creates unrealistic fictional characters in prison. Maximum security. Single confinement on weekends. Or maybe just shoot the bastards.

[ectoplasm]

Now that would make for an interesting story! Just be careful not to stereotype the inmates...