Gaming disorder is to be recognized by WHO in 2018 as a mental disorder

[Time the Crestfallen]

I'm going to preface this by saying I'm sorry if I come off as a bit dickish here. I've been on SD long enough to know you're a pretty cool guy, I just doing think I can get the point across if I'm sugarcoating it.

To start off with, you're kind of moving the goalpost a bit.

2 hours ago, Tryhard said:

Alright, so it wasn't just necessarily the Godfather. Those games there usually promote some sort of freedom as sandbox-type games, and as far as I know don't really make any distinction between treating male or female NPCs like objects. I find the claim that the game encourages you to pick up specifically female bodies pretty ludicrous.

As seen here, your initial point framed Anita's arguments as if she were talking about all female NPCs, as opposed to a specific subset of them. This is what I meant when I sent people who don't fit into the hate-mob have their opinions coloured by her demonisation.

59 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

Fair on the Red Dead Redemption point (which I never went ahead and played), but I've played the other games there and Deus Ex, Dishonored, Godfather II, Fallout: New Vegas really don't have any affiliation for that other than having sex workers or scantily clad women exist. Which, y'know, if that's her problem, fine, but there might actually be quite a few feminists that disagree with her in that regard.

There's more to it than just the fact that they exist though, it's also about portrayal and how they're inserted into the game world.

I'd like it if you could watch the second part of the Women as Background Decoration, but I can keep going if you don't want to. The first part sets the ground work while the second part talks about said portrayal and how, in Anita's own words, "examine how sexualised female bodies often occupy a duel role as both sexual playthings and the perpetual victims of male violence." The gist of my point is that the inclusion of sex workers isn't the problem, it's their portrayal and implementation in gameplay. I'm extremely sex-positive myself, and I find the way game portrays the field to be rather disturbing for what it's worth.

59 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

 I remain unconvinced that the average background male character has any more traits than a female one.

As I said above, this is a misrepresentation of her argument. The video wasn't about a comparison of all male NPCs to all female NPCs, but rather a specific subset of female NPCs who are used as nothing more than cheap sex-objects for player enjoyment that you are sometimes given incentives to kill.

59 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

In GTA, drug dealers will usually drop the most money out of any civilian, to my recollection.

Yeah, but the drug dealers have guns and prostitutes don't. At least with drug dealers there's a certain level of risk vs. reward whereas with the prostitutes you're just mowing down defenseless sex workers. This is compounded by the fact that (to my knowledge, so please correct me if I'm wrong) in most GTA games, you can't actually buy drugs whereas sleeping with prostitutes recovers your character's health, upon which you are incentivised to kill them and get your money back.

59 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

The added benefit of the whole 'hire a prostitute and then kill her to get your money back' meme that is often cited about GTA is that they actually have a gameplay implication, but it isn't exactly the greatest incentive to spend your time doing.

Perhaps, but I'd argue that the existence of the benefit at all is at the very least worthy of looking at, both from a feminist perspective and from a sex-positive perspective, since the way many of these games portray sex work leaves a lot to be desired.

59 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

GTA is part social commentary to begin with, really, and is somewhat a satire of a hyperaggressive American-like society.

This video clip basically explains my view on this particular defence. I'd recommend watching it because he puts it way better than I could and I recommend giving the entire series a watch, but the gist of it is thus;

Some guy called Jason Rohrer releases a game called the Castle Doctrine that was criticised it's wife mechanic, the way the game works is that you have to try and defend your family with security systems and if a thief gets passed, the wife will try to run away with half your money, upon which the would-be robber has to murder the wife to get the money. While this is happening, you are trying to break into other people's houses and murder there wives to take half their money.

The game received some flak due to the fact that the sole female presence in the game was as a resource mechanic that you have to murder in order to get money, with no other way of going about it. Jason responded by saying that the game was supposed to be a critique of toxic male culture. The problem being that the audience had no way of knowing his intentions with the game, not to mention that his 'critique' was basically indistinguishable from being an 'example'.

This is part of what irritates me about people constantly using satire, sarcasm, and the like as a defence, because 'satire' only works when you can tell it apart from the subject matter and a lot of the time people's usage of satire consists of playing what they're satirising straight and getting irritated when people don't read their mind and instantly understand their intention.

My point is that if GTA's treatment of sex workers is supposed to be an example satire and/or social commentary, then they've done a rather bad job of it because their 'satire' is basically indistinguishable from being just a shitty portrayal of sex work, not to mention that this is only talking about GTA, and not the many other games with crappy portrayals of sex work that can't even begin to claim the shield of being satire.

Edited January 17, 2018 by Phillius the Crestfallen

[Tryhard]

8 hours ago, Phillius the Crestfallen said:

I'm going to preface this by saying I'm sorry if I come off as a bit dickish here. I've been on SD long enough to know you're a pretty cool guy, I just doing think I can get the point across if I'm sugarcoating it.

To start off with, you're kind of moving the goalpost a bit.

As seen here, your initial point framed Anita's arguments as if she were talking about all female NPCs, as opposed to a specific subset of them. This is what I meant when I sent people who don't fit into the hate-mob have their opinions coloured by her demonisation.

There's more to it than just the fact that they exist though, it's also about portrayal and how they're inserted into the game world.

I'd like it if you could watch the second part of the Women as Background Decoration, but I can keep going if you don't want to. The first part sets the ground work while the second part talks about said portrayal and how, in Anita's own words, "examine how sexualised female bodies often occupy a duel role as both sexual playthings and the perpetual victims of male violence." The gist of my point is that the inclusion of sex workers isn't the problem, it's their portrayal and implementation in gameplay. I'm extremely sex-positive myself, and I find the way game portrays the field to be rather disturbing for what it's worth.

Well, she was talking about a subset of them, but I meant that any civilian is treated more or less the same. I more or less stand by the same statement that I don't think that most of the games there are really encouraging you to dispose of any subset of female NPCs, whether they be sex workers, sexualised women in general, or whoever else.

To be honest, I think Anita's views are pretty sex-negative and would clash with sex-positive feminists. She's expressed disapproval of main protagonists of video games when they are sexualised regardless of their heroic elements, examples she gave such as Lara Croft, Bayonetta and Samus Aran, while many sex-positive feminists would find those characters liberating. I'm not really sure she's ever stated that she's actually okay with the inclusion of women as sex workers...

In fact, there have been some that have criticised Sarkeesian for using the term "prostituted women" instead of saying sex workers, like the following:

http://www.newsweek.com/pixelated-prostitution-feminist-sex-work-debate-bleeds-video-games-293311

Violence against sex workers is a serious problem, both nationally and internationally, and Sarkeesian makes a good case that the games she discusses treat that violence as fun, enjoyable or even laudable. But Sarkeesian's videos have not garnered much praise from those most directly affected by these tropes. On the contrary, many sex workers have argued that Sarkeesian's videos contribute to the objectification and stigma that she claims she is trying to reduce.

Much of the criticism of Sarkeesian has centered around her terminology. She doesn't call sex workers "sex workers." Instead she refers to them throughout her video series as "prostituted women." That's a term often used by writers who see all sex work as automatically exploitative or harmful to women, and by those who want to criminalize sex work.

Sex workers have repeatedly tried to ask Sarkeesian on social media to reconsider her language, but she hasn't responded and has continued to use the term. For example, in this recent tweet she says that fans of Grand Theft Auto have been harassing her by sending her images of "gameplay of the use & murder of prostitutes."

I don't think she ever addressed it, but to be honest I'd place a guess she's not actually approving of sex workers both in real life or in video games.

8 hours ago, Phillius the Crestfallen said:

As I said above, this is a misrepresentation of her argument. The video wasn't about a comparison of all male NPCs to all female NPCs, but rather a specific subset of female NPCs who are used as nothing more than cheap sex-objects for player enjoyment that you are sometimes given incentives to kill.

Yeah, but the drug dealers have guns and prostitutes don't. At least with drug dealers there's a certain level of risk vs. reward whereas with the prostitutes you're just mowing down defenseless sex workers. This is compounded by the fact that (to my knowledge, so please correct me if I'm wrong) in most GTA games, you can't actually buy drugs whereas sleeping with prostitutes recovers your character's health, upon which you are incentivised to kill them and get your money back.

Perhaps, but I'd argue that the existence of the benefit at all is at the very least worthy of looking at, both from a feminist perspective and from a sex-positive perspective, since the way many of these games portray sex work leaves a lot to be desired.

I don't really mind a critique of the former, it's just more so when she uses games in which there is no real emphasis placed on murdering what she sees as sex objects such as in Hitman, Deus Ex, Fallout: New Vegas, or forbid, vanishing bodies in Godfather II.

True, you could make that argument. At the same time, player agency is often pointed to when regarding things which are really not the main focus of the game. Everyone talks about the whole killing a prostitute to get your money back but you're never forced into doing so. If you wanted to find things that are more troublesome, they are often found more in the main campaign, both in terms of sexually and in violence. That's not to discredit that they are indeed aspects of the game, but in terms that the game never explicity tells you to go out and kill civilians for money, or have sex with prostitutes and then kill them to get your money back. The whole 'rampage' thing is pretty disturbing to go on a mass killing spree if you stop to think about it.

8 hours ago, Phillius the Crestfallen said:

This video clip basically explains my view on this particular defence. I'd recommend watching it because he puts it way better than I could and I recommend giving the entire series a watch, but the gist of it is thus;

This is part of what irritates me about people constantly using satire, sarcasm, and the like as a defence, because 'satire' only works when you can tell it apart from the subject matter and a lot of the time people's usage of satire consists of playing what they're satirising straight and getting irritated when people don't read their mind and instantly understand their intention.

My point is that if GTA's treatment of sex workers is supposed to be an example satire and/or social commentary, then they've done a rather bad job of it because their 'satire' is basically indistinguishable from being just a shitty portrayal of sex work, not to mention that this is only talking about GTA, and not the many other games with crappy portrayals of sex work that can't even begin to claim the shield of being satire.

I actually don't really disagree. I never said that it was a good piece of satire, and in the same way that torture is included in GTAV as a "hey, look at the bad things that happen in real life" controversy, it doesn't really presume to rebuke or offer any answers in regard to it. But I think it's an example of satire or social commentary nonetheless, even if an ineffective or perhaps bad one. It wasn't meant as an excuse, even if I do like GTA. 

It is a topic I would generally be more interested in talking about if the pool wasn't so toxic that you're either being called an SJW or a sexist normally.

Edited January 17, 2018 by Tryhard

[eclipse]

41 minutes ago, Tryhard said:

It is a topic I would generally be more interested in talking about if the pool wasn't so toxic that you're either being called an SJW or a sexist normally.

Hmmm. . .

This IS SD, so you're free to start a topic about this~!  Since this is the gaming disorder topic and all.

[Time the Crestfallen]

3 hours ago, Tryhard said:

Well, she was talking about a subset of them, but I meant that any civilian is treated more or less the same. I more or less stand by the same statement that I don't think that most of the games there are really encouraging you to dispose of any subset of female NPCs, whether they be sex workers, sexualised women in general, or whoever else.

Not really? Most NPCs you aren't even given any real opportunity to interact with. The portrayal of sex workers is a problem because they're elevated above other NPCs, but only to serve as background objects to make the game world grittier and for cheap sexual gratification for presumed straight male players while retaining the disposability of other NPCs. If there were also male prostitutes and strippers, I'd agree with you, but the fact that sex workers are almost always female and that the rare exceptions to the rule aren't anywhere near as sexualised ruins the point for me.

3 hours ago, Tryhard said:

To be honest, I think Anita's views are pretty sex-negative and would clash with sex-positive feminists. She's expressed disapproval of main protagonists of video games when they are sexualised regardless of their heroic elements, examples she gave such as Lara Croft, Bayonetta and Samus Aran, while many sex-positive feminists would find those characters liberating. I'm not really sure she's ever stated that she's actually okay with the inclusion of women as sex workers...

Link for the video please? I'm fairly certain I know which video you're talking about, but I'd like to make sure.

3 hours ago, Tryhard said:

In fact, there have been some that have criticised Sarkeesian for using the term "prostituted women" instead of saying sex workers, like the following:

http://www.newsweek.com/pixelated-prostitution-feminist-sex-work-debate-bleeds-video-games-293311

Violence against sex workers is a serious problem, both nationally and internationally, and Sarkeesian makes a good case that the games she discusses treat that violence as fun, enjoyable or even laudable. But Sarkeesian's videos have not garnered much praise from those most directly affected by these tropes. On the contrary, many sex workers have argued that Sarkeesian's videos contribute to the objectification and stigma that she claims she is trying to reduce.

Much of the criticism of Sarkeesian has centered around her terminology. She doesn't call sex workers "sex workers." Instead she refers to them throughout her video series as "prostituted women." That's a term often used by writers who see all sex work as automatically exploitative or harmful to women, and by those who want to criminalize sex work.

Sex workers have repeatedly tried to ask Sarkeesian on social media to reconsider her language, but she hasn't responded and has continued to use the term. For example, in this recent tweet she says that fans of Grand Theft Auto have been harassing her by sending her images of "gameplay of the use & murder of prostitutes."

I don't think she ever addressed it, but to be honest I'd place a guess she's not actually approving of sex workers both in real life or in video games.

This is why I asked you to watch the second part of the video, because it talks about how far more often than not sex workers in games are portrayed as the perpetual victims of male violence as well as sex-objects. Personally speaking, if Anita's view on sex workers in video games comes across as consistently negative, I'm far more inclined to say that based on my experiences it's because video games that feature sex work often portray it in a rather negative light.

3 hours ago, Tryhard said:

I don't really mind a critique of the former, it's just more so when she uses games in which there is no real emphasis placed on murdering what she sees as sex objects such as in Hitman, Deus Ex, Fallout: New Vegas, or forbid, vanishing bodies in Godfather II.

I'm fairly certain I conceded this specific point, although I'd still say that those game's portrayals of sex workers leaves a lot to be desired.

3 hours ago, Tryhard said:

True, you could make that argument. At the same time, player agency is often pointed to when regarding things which are really not the main focus of the game. Everyone talks about the whole killing a prostitute to get your money back but you're never forced into doing so. If you wanted to find things that are more troublesome, they are often found more in the main campaign, both in terms of sexually and in violence. That's not to discredit that they are indeed aspects of the game, but in terms that the game never explicity tells you to go out and kill civilians for money, or have sex with prostitutes and then kill them to get your money back. The whole 'rampage' thing is pretty disturbing to go on a mass killing spree if you stop to think about it.

This also links to the second part of the video, because in terms of story sex workers are often portrayed as the victims of male violence. Which is a fair cop, because sex work does have some undeniably malicious parts of it, but these games often want to have their cake and eat it too; portraying sex workers as the victims of men in story but at the same time, reducing them to objects for the sexual gratification of straight males that you get bonuses for subjecting to the same violence they condemn depending on the game.

And I'm fairly certain that the argument you'd respond to this with is that the same thing applies to murderous rampages to which I respond thusly;

1) Harming sex workers (and sometimes just women in general) is often portrayed as a particularly heinous act that designates when a villain is considered especially evil.

2) Even though most of them aren't portrayed as particularly murderous, none of the playable characters have any problem with killing. In fact, the fact that they only kill and more often than not detest drugs and other criminal activities is often used to portray them as more morally upstanding than others in the other characters in the game.

 

Edited January 17, 2018 by Phillius the Crestfallen

[eclipse]

That was a none-too-subtle hint to stop derailing the topic.

[Time the Crestfallen]

Looks like I forgot how to read today. Now excuse me while I backtrack and pretend I did nothing wrong. Delete posts pls...

Back on the topic at hand, this has got me thinking about how video games are designed and I can see how the addiction happens, but it's not as clear what the stem of the issue is and I'm curious as to what others think. Generally speaking, the source of addictive behaviour is the feelings that come from using the product and I'd personally say it's the sense of escapism combined with the fact that video games as an art-form are far more interactive than other forms of media.

Edited January 18, 2018 by Phillius the Crestfallen

[Shoblongoo]

...so the CNN article in the OP is poorly worded and a bit ambiguous about whether this is going to be a completely new diagnosis, or recognized as part of a preexisting one. (it has that purposefully clickbaity headline and then the substance of the article itself  seems to be more about persons now being able to claim treatment for videogame addiction as medical treatment for insurance purposes, where previously they could not). 

If addiction to video games is being made treatable on a theory that its a manifestation of addictive personality disorder, and the diagnostic criteria for addictive personality disorder are being  expanded to include excessive gaming as symptomatic of an identifiable, treatable, mental health problem --that seems correct.

In the case of "gotcha" games its literally gambling addiction. Which we've been recognizing and treating that for quite some time now.  

if its being declared its own separate disorder...yeah...that's silly... 

 

Edited January 18, 2018 by Shoblongoo

[Flee Fleet!]

Eh, I'm fine with this. Maybe declaring it as its own separate disorder is kind of stupid, so they might not want to do that.

 

The only thing I'm worried about this is my parents reading this up and then being instantly worried of me whenever I play games, haha. Buuut yeah, I'm kind of okay with this because you can get severely addicted to games to the point that you would be considered to have a mental problem. Although I think something like that happening is rare: most of the time, becoming too addicted to games just results in conflicts with family, haha.

Keeping a balance of time between games and other real life activities is necessary, after all.

[Magical CC]

Perfect! I heard failure to find a sexual mate is a disability. Not only I am a disabled person, I also have mental disorder now! When will I get my wellfare benefits?

[MacLovin]

I've gotta ask exactly how they would define "addiction". It just seems like every news article on this WHO recognition just features a poor choice of words and doesn't say much of anything pertinent to the issue.

I mean gaming addiction's a thing, but I just know there's going to be a lot of technologically unlearned parents and school officials misunderstanding this. 

 

[umerol]

Too much of anything can kill, video games are no exception. There should be limits to how long a person can play. But I do not think that it should be classified as a mental disorder. If I stretch it, I could say that it is similar to overworking. It's like constantly working yourself to the limit. For video games, you just work your eyes and hands non-stop.