Another angle of this that I need to cover before I have to withdraw for a bit because of excessive processing and empathy overload (so many layers of feels)...
Okay, so, here's a thing.
The whole expectation that happens with a lack of learned empathy has an even uglier side that my partner experiences. If you never teach guys who're only capable of cognitive empathy the kind of pain women experience, those guys feel
ENTITLED to women being a certain way. I can't stress this enough.
So what happens when a woman is chubby, and has a gene that leads to more body hair than usual? Awful things.
The attitude of men then isn't: "
Hey, strip off so I can ogle your naked body! [Expletive that's insulting to women, here]!"
No.
Then it's: "
Shave and lose some goddamn weight so I can get off to you!"
This is the real world. This is what women deal with. I've always been sensitive to this (effective empathy et al, I am as much an empath as anyone can be). It really bothers me. And guess what happens if you don't reciprocate those demands?
Go on, guess.
"
The only way a [some expletive here] like you would get laid is if you were raped!"
Yeeeep.
My partner's been hit with that one. More times than I can count. Again, for those who don't believe that this is a thing, I will once again link this site.
http://fatuglyorslutty.com
That's worth a read, for about as far as you can go.
So this is why I think game developers have a responsibility. Instead of just creating these sexploitative worlds, where they basically are just a sexual fetish for the mainstream (guh). What they could do is either just respect women and allow them to be fully clothed so that women don't have to experience that trauma, or they could fully represent what they go through in the game.
By having heavily objectified women and
none of the reactions to that that real world women experience?
That's
cowardly.
It's sickeningly cowardly.
And that's why I haven't bought XBC2, nor have I played it. Nor will I buy or play other cowardly games of its ilk.
Okay, I'm done for now. Sorry. I just really have to stress that
it's important to read up on effective vs. cognitive empathy and the kinds of effects it can have on the mind that has one or the other.
If you only have cognitive empathy (sociopath), or you only have a small amount of effective empathy which is bolstered by a lot of cognitive empathy (neurotypical), then you're going to need to understand that there's a lot of empathy to be learned.
And yeah, things can really hurt people, traumatise them. So seeing a heavily sexualised, objectified woman brings back all the cat-calls and wolf whistles she's endured, or in the case of chubby women, something even worse.
Empathy is important.