I am "Woke" and I Get the Reaction Here

[Huckleberry]

I would likely be considered "woke" by many here. I believe that diversity and representation are valuable as goals of their own.

Diversity: In any arena, be it work, school, or on a team, diversity of backgrounds and experiences only brings strength to a group. Having people from different communities in a group broadens the thinking of the group as a whole and, ultimately, will strengthen the result for all.

Representation: I am learning, as my now 6-year-old daughter is growing up, how important this is. I grew up in a family of brothers. We are all white. I never thought about representation. Now, seeing how much my daughter identifies with the female characters in movies and books, I think about it a lot.

Having people that look/act like you in movies, games, books, music, etc. is very powerful and meaningful. I want my daughter to know that she can be anything she wants to be. The way she truly knows that is to see herself in others and learn by example. I believe everyone's sons and daughters should feel like they can be/do anything. I want all people to look at the world and see hope and joy, not fear and shame. Seeing others like you in art/media is a powerful way to create that hope and, therefore, I believe representation is vital to a world I believe most of us want for our children.

All that being said, I now understand why this forum is so filled with Anti-woke threads.

Between the review code embargoes and the ScreenRant review, there is a lot of stuff that is odd here.

I will say that, as much as I believe in what I wrote above, when I got to the part of the ScreenRant review where the author brought up representation I thought, "What?! This is video game based on a Chinese tale about demons, gods, and shape-shifting animagi." It immediately felt weird...even to my liberal brain. Certainly it is not my place to tell someone when or how they should feel represented, but this one felt strange even to me.

Additionally, the list of Do's and Dont's that the publisher game to content creators ahead of release, and have supposedly been confirmed, are also weird. Though, honestly, I still do not know if they are true.

Anyway, just wanted to throw in my two cents and say I can at least understand where the other side is coming from here. Not seeing much of that sentiment and thought the forum could use it.

Thanks.

[davidb11]

SMH at people making up nonsense about this game, and everything else, and resulting to weak insults like Beta.
LOL wut.
This isn't the Alpha/Beta/Omega fanfiction forum.
Last time I Checked.
And Alpha Male doesn't really have a valid opposite.

[Clockeye]

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

Having people that look/act like you in movies, games, books, music, etc. is very powerful and meaningful.

No, it's not.

[Supperdude9]

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

...when I got to the part of the ScreenRant review where the author brought up representation I thought, "What?! This is video game based on a Chinese tale about demons, gods, and shape-shifting animagi." It immediately felt weird...even to my liberal brain. Certainly it is not my place to tell someone when or how they should feel represented, but this one felt strange even to me.

Exactly. Now you know the major problem. Apparently it's "Liberal" to celebrate other cultures and folklore, but we finally have a game that does as such for Chinese mythology, and it's suddenly a problem for woke game journos. That makes no sense when you actually think for yourself on the matter.

They don't want to celebrate anyone's culture but their made up one. They aren't there to see representation. They want to push their agenda. And THAT is why I also, years ago, left being liberal.

[dark-lord21]

Clockeye lähetti viestin:

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

Having people that look/act like you in movies, games, books, music, etc. is very powerful and meaningful.

nope you are wrong on this one,i grew up wachting a ton of female and poc characters in games and movies,Xena,buffy,bionic woman,samus,she ra,princess starla,the og 3 angels of charlie,blade,eddy murphy movies,will smith movies,Michael Jai White movies,igre up listing to keith davids voice,i played tons of games with female lead characters bayonetta,jade from beyound good and evil,lara croft,samus,2B,chun lee,cammy,the girls from DOA,the girls from MK,tekken,i grew up watching bruce lee,jet lee,samo hung,the Five Lucky Stars movies,and never once did i need to see myself to enjoy or have the characters look like me,i am from austria the only time i got représentation in media was the bad guys ,some evil doctor;baron or yeah simple the evil evil really evil bad guys,(villans)that you see yourself in media to feel représentation is a dumb strawman created by some sjw woke profs,To force diversity,we did not need that for decades to enjoy media now in modern times we need it?yeah no thats dumb,also you better start showing your kid what reality is that she not become anything she wants,it will lessen the impact later when she is old enough and realises it herself,also the fact that some POC people thought wakanda was real and still think its real should show you what happens if people dont know what reality is,

[baerra]

The majority of people who play this game likely have no idea what it's like to be marginalized, a minority, a woman, or whatever else. I'd like to point out that a lot of the "woke" posts you find on Steam forums are written by people who are anti-woke, as a means to make fun of them. Lacking diversity is one thing, being seemingly sexist is another.

As a general rule of thumb, if someone regularly uses the word "woke" in their vocabulary I personally think their opinion is completely worthless. Learn to express yourself beyond using one word that's so broad it's lost all meaning

[dark-lord21]

Supperdude9 lähetti viestin:

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

...when I got to the part of the ScreenRant review where the author brought up representation I thought, "What?! This is video game based on a Chinese tale about demons, gods, and shape-shifting animagi." It immediately felt weird...even to my liberal brain. Certainly it is not my place to tell someone when or how they should feel represented, but this one felt strange even to me.

Exactly. Now you know the major problem. Apparently it's "Liberal" to celebrate other cultures and folklore, but we finally have a game that does as such for Chinese mythology, and it's suddenly a problem for woke game journos. That makes no sense when you actually think for yourself on the matter.

They don't want to celebrate anyone's culture but their made up one. They aren't there to see representation. They want to push their agenda. And THAT is why I also, years ago, left being liberal.

Exactly look what this woke wierdos try to do not only are the trying to insert themselfs into white centered mythology,history, with te ancient brits where poc,vikings had poc,medusa was black,cleopatra was black,literal poc knights in middle europe,amazons where trans,kelts,vikings had trans people BS,nope now there are trying to rewrite and insert themself into other countrys mythology and history,look at the whole yasuke the black samurai think,this is brainrot on some insane level,and thats is why the are angry and rage casue how dare the chinese make a game about there mythology and not include there stupid sjw world view(aka them)

[dark-lord21]

baerra lähetti viestin:

The majority of people who play this game likely have no idea what it's like to be marginalized, a minority, a woman, or whatever else. I'd like to point out that a lot of the "woke" posts you find on Steam forums are written by people who are anti-woke, as a means to make fun of them. Lacking diversity is one thing, being seemingly sexist is another.

As a general rule of thumb, if someone regularly uses the word "woke" in their vocabulary I personally think their opinion is completely worthless. Learn to express yourself beyond using one word that's so broad it's lost all meaning

I do that the moment the stop using buzzwords that end with ism or phob the moment the see and realise the people wont bent the knee to them ,but since that wont happen well 2 can play that game,also woke people are completely worthless in my book and should be ignored

[leo_gear]

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

...I want my daughter to know that she can be anything she wants to be. The way she truly knows that is to see herself in others and learn by example....

As an adult to an adult, I just want to say that no, your daughter can't be anything she wants to be. Not even a man can be anything he wants to be. In a world of realism, reality will hit you like a ton of bricks once you fall out of the wonderland of childhood and have to experience the world for what it is. In reality, your limitations can be pushed but only with great sacrifice can they ever be exceeded. How much would you want your daughter to sacrifice to be anything? Even at the cost of her life? It's all platitudes. You should just want your daughter to be happy, nothing more. You can be happy without the world bowing to you.

Your daughter can only see herself in others through empathy, compassion and reverence, not through representation. How would she ever see the suffering of others in war torn countries? Or the sacrifice of those that go above and beyond to protect her and her country? You experience those not by physically seeing yourself in them but understanding them and their struggles. You shouldn't have to be graped to sympathize with the graped, or be a gold medalist to feel the pride that comes with that achievement. Dividing your lived experience from those witnessed is the root of differentiating fiction from reality and back again. Don't doom your children to mediocrity by allowing them to live vicariously through a fiction made up in their brain by media influences.

[White Fire]

I appreciate your opinion. May I perhaps give my two cents, as a woman myself?

1) I think it's great that your daughter has female characters she likes, but she also doesn't need to wait around for a fictional character to do a thing to feel like that thing is now a possibility for her. We don't need to let fiction guide our lives.

2) A good character will naturally convey truths about humanity regardless of their appearance. We don't like all the old heroes from Western epics (Odysseus, Beowulf, etc.) because they're buff men, we like them because they awaken deep truths about humanity, including ourselves. A character that looks like you is nice, but if a character is a good character then that's completely unnecessary, in my humble opinion. For example, a character I really resonated with lately is Rintaro Okabe from Steins;Gate. Okabe is a male Asian teenager and I am very much a white American woman, yet Okabe's unique coping method for dealing with his lack of control over his circumstances spoke to me far more than seeing a character who looked like me ever did.

3) Stories should be about losing ourselves anyway, not always finding ourselves. Personally, I think it's a far better lesson in empathy to be putting ourselves into the shoes of people not like us than worrying about finding characters who are exactly like us.

This isn't a condemnation of you or your daughter. I think it's a wonderful thing that she's been enchanted by story so young, and props to you for encouraging her. I'm also not discouraging people from creating minority characters, I think that's great. I just think we've "lost the plot," so to speak, if our focus is too much on what characters look like and not what's on the inside. That applies to both audiences and writers.

[White Fire]

leo_gear lähetti viestin:

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

...I want my daughter to know that she can be anything she wants to be. The way she truly knows that is to see herself in others and learn by example....

As an adult to an adult, I just want to say that no, your daughter can't be anything she wants to be. Not even a man can be anything he wants to be. In a world of realism, reality will hit you like a ton of bricks once you fall out of the wonderland of childhood and have to experience the world for what it is. In reality, your limitations can be pushed but only with great sacrifice can they ever be exceeded. How much would you want your daughter to sacrifice to be anything? Even at the cost of her life? It's all platitudes. You should just want your daughter to be happy, nothing more. You can be happy without the world bowing to you.

This is correct. This should be very comforting. Many people have destroyed their lives and their sanity trying to become "literally anything" when they could have a happy life just accepting themselves as they are, limitations and all.

[McCoy]

As an Asian, I've played many games where my race isn't represented, and it has never bothered me or made me question my identity. The absence of representation has never undermined or diminished my sense of self. It's the snowflake generation and weak people like you, who are overly sensitive and quick to demand better treatment, who often exaggerate issues that aren't there.

[Gyoza_salty]

The most important thing is self esteem, self respect, she can be anything but not avoiding her responsibility of choice. And as asian I don't care about representation as long as story, gameplay are good, if I wanna represent myself so badly, the the Sims will be my game.

[davidb11]

dark-lord21 lähetti viestin:

Supperdude9 lähetti viestin:

Exactly. Now you know the major problem. Apparently it's "Liberal" to celebrate other cultures and folklore, but we finally have a game that does as such for Chinese mythology, and it's suddenly a problem for woke game journos. That makes no sense when you actually think for yourself on the matter.

They don't want to celebrate anyone's culture but their made up one. They aren't there to see representation. They want to push their agenda. And THAT is why I also, years ago, left being liberal.

Exactly look what this woke wierdos try to do not only are the trying to insert themselfs into white centered mythology,history, with te ancient brits where poc,vikings had poc,medusa was black,cleopatra was black,literal poc knights in middle europe,amazons where trans,kelts,vikings had trans people BS,nope now there are trying to rewrite and insert themself into other countrys mythology and history,look at the whole yasuke the black samurai think,this is brainrot on some insane level,and thats is why the are angry and rage casue how dare the chinese make a game about there mythology and not include there stupid sjw world view(aka them)

LOL wut Like none of what you claimed happen ever happened.
Only the Netflix Cleopatra thing is a real event.
Amazons and trans? Eh? Not a thing ever.

Yasuke was a real guy, but there's no evidence he became a Samurai in the real world.
That's basically it.
He was well respected by Nobunaga Oda but hey.
Also let's not forget that people in the Roman Empire had seen dark skinned people.

[Malker]

Huckleberry lähetti viestin:

I would likely be considered "woke" by many here. I believe that diversity and representation are valuable as goals of their own.

Diversity: In any arena, be it work, school, or on a team, diversity of backgrounds and experiences only brings strength to a group. Having people from different communities in a group broadens the thinking of the group as a whole and, ultimately, will strengthen the result for all.

Representation: I am learning, as my now 6-year-old daughter is growing up, how important this is. I grew up in a family of brothers. We are all white. I never thought about representation. Now, seeing how much my daughter identifies with the female characters in movies and books, I think about it a lot.

Having people that look/act like you in movies, games, books, music, etc. is very powerful and meaningful. I want my daughter to know that she can be anything she wants to be. The way she truly knows that is to see herself in others and learn by example. I believe everyone's sons and daughters should feel like they can be/do anything. I want all people to look at the world and see hope and joy, not fear and shame. Seeing others like you in art/media is a powerful way to create that hope and, therefore, I believe representation is vital to a world I believe most of us want for our children.

All that being said, I now understand why this forum is so filled with Anti-woke threads.

Between the review code embargoes and the ScreenRant review, there is a lot of stuff that is odd here.

I will say that, as much as I believe in what I wrote above, when I got to the part of the ScreenRant review where the author brought up representation I thought, "What?! This is video game based on a Chinese tale about demons, gods, and shape-shifting animagi." It immediately felt weird...even to my liberal brain. Certainly it is not my place to tell someone when or how they should feel represented, but this one felt strange even to me.

Additionally, the list of Do's and Dont's that the publisher game to content creators ahead of release, and have supposedly been confirmed, are also weird. Though, honestly, I still do not know if they are true.

Anyway, just wanted to throw in my two cents and say I can at least understand where the other side is coming from here. Not seeing much of that sentiment and thought the forum could use it.

Thanks.

sorry, as much as I like and share some of the thoughts of yours and I consider myself mostly woke too, but saying to a person 'you can be everything you want to be' can be rather harmful. Because this world doesn't work this way. Especially in times that are as divided as they are now in the western world. As you can see there are still people that won't accept the others for what they are. And life in most cases throws obstacles in your way. Saying 'be yourself and challenge yourself' is something more fruitful. But 'you can be everything' is setting the bar very high and is destined to fail for most persons.

But I agree there are a lot of weird things going on. Be it left or right.

PS it's good to read something sane in this mountain of ♥♥♥♥-talk

[uka21]

I feel bad for you. People like you cannot really differentiate between reality and fantasy. Games, movies, fantasy, sci-fi etc. books are not real, so why would anyone identify with game or movie characters? If people really need role models to cope, they should look for them in real life, look up to real people. Not some fantasy characters from games or books or movies. That's borderline unhealthy.

That's a problem with modern society - they can't tell the difference between reality and fantasy. That's just sad. I played a lot of games when I was a kid and I never wanted to be any of the characters from games. I just wanted to be, well, me. Playing games was just fun. Nothing less, nothing more. People are so insecure these days they have to identify with fictional characters? Maybe that's the real problem?