GTA V Banned from K-Mart and Target Stores

Tora Chan

Tora Chan

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Target and Kmart stores pulled the game after a petition launched by three female survivors of violence gained more than 40,000 signatures.

Target said the decision "was in line with the majority view of customers".

Some fans of the game accused the stores of censorship.

The decision was made after three women set up a petition on change.org urging Target to withdraw the game.

"It's a game that encourages players to murder women for entertainment. The incentive is to commit sexual violence against women, then abuse or kill them to proceed or get 'health' points," the petition reads.

"To see this violence that we lived through turned into a form of entertainment is sickening and causes us great pain and harm."

It goes on to say that games like GTA 5 are "grooming yet another generation of boys to tolerate violence against women".

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30328314

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What are your thoughts on this?

I believe that this can set a dangerous precedent or slippery slope in gaming. Dont be surprised if you see the following:

- Ban Madden and NBA2K15 because there are no female players, and they show female cheerleaders in scantily clad clothing on the sidelines cheering for members of the patriarchy while not receiving equal pay to the male football or basketball players

- Ban Uncharted 4 because it is similar to the female-led Tomb Raider series, and is an attempt by the patriarchy to have a male character overshadow a female character in the same field

- Ban Metal Gear Solid because it depicts a male lead character killing female characters such as Sniper Wolf and Crying Wolf, who are female representations of women rejecting gender roles in gaming

- Ban Mortal Kombat because the players can use male characters to perform gruesome killing moves on female characters, which is a symbol of further opression towards women

- Ban Mass Effect and Dragon Age: Inquisition because the game rewards the player with a trophy/achievement for their sexual conquest of a female character, further promoting the idea that females are sexual objects to obtain

DO YOU SEE WHERE I'M GOING?

See how ridiculous those claims sound? If they really wanted to (and I wouldnt be surprised if they did), they could make these claims and probably get results out of it.
 
There's the saying that "The best revenge is success.".  In this case why don't we have more games with strong SOLO female protagonists(you can't choose a male)?

Besides Tomb Raider it would have been nice to get "Sleeping Dogs" to have a female like they had planned on at the beginning.

 
Sarang01 said:
There's the saying that "The best revenge is success.". In this case why don't we have more games with strong SOLO female protagonists(you can't choose a male)?

Besides Tomb Raider it would have been nice to get "Sleeping Dogs" to have a female like they had planned on at the beginning.
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So in order to combat "sexist games", let's create our own sexist game with females only? Is that what you're suggesting?

They have every right to create whatever they want actually. What frustrates me is how they screw with other game developer's artistic freedom to create any game they want, while complaining with the games that are already on the market with trivial and ridiculous claims.

Also, why don't feminists groups fund and create their own games? They have every right to do that. But they should not go so far as to force another game developer to make a game that suits their needs.

P.S. games with male protagonists easily are more successful than games with female protagonists. So I hope they don't see that increased success as "sexism".

 
MetalSlugger said:
Target pulling the game is not "banning" it. They just decided that they didn't want to sell it, which is their right as a retailer.
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It shouldn't be pulled at all though. One of the main premises of the petition was that GTA V is "grooming yet another generation of boys to tolerate violence against women", yet the game is 18+ and can be purchased by adults only. That makes no sense.

So should we ban pornography too? That is for adults only but still can be accessed by kids. How about alcohol and cigarettes? It is literally the same thing. All of those things are geared towards adults but can be accessed by kids in illegal ways, yet it is a reason for GTA V to be pulled from the shelves?

And it says violence against "women", which is OPTIONAL. Nowhere in the petition did it say anything about the MANDATORY violence against men, or even the mandatory TORTURING of men. I thought they wanted equality?

Thats why this is so ridiculous.

 
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Considering it's Australia, I'm surprised it wasn't banned day one already.

Joking aside, I remember seeing a video on this last night and the guy made a good point. If GTA had a female protagonist and was killing other female characters (or male for that matter), would there be an issue?

 
I in no way want to marginalize the experiences that those women went through but this is pretty ridiculous. This would like be war vets setting up a petition for Target to remove Battlefield and COD because they promote violence in the form of warfare, reminding them of tragic experiences they went through. 

 
I did not know that Sleeping Dogs was supposed to have a female main character.  Release a even more definitive version or a patch the game where Wei Shen is replaced with a female and a good voice actress.

So GTA V is pulled, what about GTA IV?  I take it there are missions/side quests in GTA V that are more violent towards women than GTA IV?

Edit: Just realized this is in Australia.  Didn't even know they had Kmarts and Targets.  Kmarts are disappearing around me. Used to be 3 within my neighborhood, now only 1.  :(

 
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Reminder that to anyone outside of the gaming world GTA is seen for the repugnant misogynist garbage that it is. But for gamers it’s normal.
 
JStryke said:
Considering it's Australia, I'm surprised it wasn't banned day one already.

Joking aside, I remember seeing a video on this last night and the guy made a good point. If GTA had a female protagonist and was killing other female characters (or male for that matter), would there be an issue?
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I would really like to play a GTA with a female protagonist. Would be fun I think, going to strip clubs and picking up hookers as a chick. Leading on guys than killing them while they wait in bed lol. Maybe even pretending to be a hooker waiting to get picked up than kill the guy lol.
 
I hate when people claim something "encourages" a gamer to do something. Such a dumb thing to say. I don't recall hearing ads saying "Play GTA V to kill women." Yes you can kill woman, but it's not the point of the game. Yes you kill many people in this game, but it's not like this is some unknown fact. 

I understand GTA has a lot of offensive material in it, at least to some, but it's a known fact that GTA is known to be violent and offensive. If you know this, why is it such a big deal? Don't play it or view its content. It's not teaching anyone to be offensive and hurtful to anyone, yeah some of the crazies may view the stuff they see in a game as exciting, but not every damn gamer is going to actively buy GTA V, just to sit down and kill women in it nonstop. 

I just hate how people throw fits at video games, but don't seem to do it anymore with movies, tv, music and other forms of media. 

 
Sarang01 said:
There's the saying that "The best revenge is success.". In this case why don't we have more games with strong SOLO female protagonists(you can't choose a male)?

Besides Tomb Raider it would have been nice to get "Sleeping Dogs" to have a female like they had planned on at the beginning.
Click to expand...

You do realize sexism is in the eye of the beholder correct? The answer isnt "Make more games with female leads", the answer is "Stop forcing a sexist perspective on games". People see sexism in most cases where they want to. Kind of like how as kids we didnt watch sesame street with any pre convieved notions, but as adults we think bert and ernie are gay. Nothing changed, except that now as adults people like to fancy themselves as savvy, insightful and so on so they will try and push their perspective into things that arent there. So yes sexism exists, but at the same time in most cases we want there to be sexism so we connect the dots in the order that supports what we think and want to see.

Besides, forcing more female characters into games is still sexist because its putting a characters gender before the game. Its just as sexist as saying "We need a sexist games so we intentionally are making the lead a male so he can have the spotlight over a woman".

But the root of the problem is in this day and age no one will not follow one simple ideal, if you dont like it then dont involve yourself. People like these refuse to just ignore what they dont like and instead focus on what makes them happy, they would rather search and dwell and focus on things they dont like which does nothing but perpetuate their unhappiness. If I find something offensive I simply chose not to watch, listen or pay attention to it.

But really? They want a game banned because you can beat up and kill a hooker? Thats like saying a book should be banned that is 650 pages because it has 2 sentence dedicated to rape. The sexual abuse towards women in a GTA isnt even an entire precentile of the overall game but these women think its a rape simulator designed to brainwash generations of men into unstoppable super rapists. Why? Because they are only interested in being outraged at something, anything.

Im not belittling them or making rape seem ok or anything but this sets a terrible presidence because where does it stop? This says that if you find something offensive you can get it censored or banned for everyone.

Sexual violence has been around since the dawn of man, before video games or movies. If nothing else it has declined as time goes by and this argument is stupid as saying "Playing call of duty makes you a murderer". The evils of man that exist right now have been here for thousands of years, and they will continue to always be here because mankind is vastly flawed and no video game has ever caused these problems.

There will always be a certain measure of sexism because it is ingrained in our DNA because in the animal world from which we evolved there is a heirarchy of sexism. Just like violence is part of our nature and will always be there, video games didnt suddenly bring them out in us in the past 30 years.

Blind hatred and misinformation that fuel censorship that power the ban machine does nothing but keep us from evolving, limits us and makes us more closed minded.

Again, Im not defending violence against females, all I am saying is when you can blindly without any insight or thought can get something banned for no other reason than you disagree then it is bad for everyone and for society.

 
anotherpoorgamer said:
I did not know that Sleeping Dogs was supposed to have a female main character. Release a even more definitive version or a patch the game where Wei Shen is replaced with a female and a good voice actress.

So GTA V is pulled, what about GTA IV? I take it there are missions/side quests in GTA V that are more violent towards women than GTA IV?

Edit: Just realized this is in Australia. Didn't even know they had Kmarts and Targets. Kmarts are disappearing around me. Used to be 3 within my neighborhood, now only 1. :(
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Yeah when "Sleeping Dogs" was "True Crime: Streets Of Hong Kong" you were a female lead. Personally I'm sick and fucking tired of always having a male as the main character to play in most games(take your pic). It's boring to just have one gender to choose being so dominant.

 
These folks are like PETA. I love animals and can agree with the basic idea of what they stand for, but they tend to focus on stuff that makes them come across as silly. Mario wearing a raccoon suit encourages people to wear fur coats comes to mind. If I remember right the issue was brought up by sex workers in Australia. They are claiming that GTA V encourages violence against sex workers. I've played all the GTA games since three and I've never picked up a prostitute in any of them( or IRL for that matter) and have only been in the strip clubs when the game requires it (I don't go IRL either, being an over all cheap ass seems like a waste of money). I haven't seen any evidence to show video games cause people to be violent in any way. GTA has faced criticism since it's been a thing so I don't think Rockstar is too concerned about it.

 
Tora Chan said:
It shouldn't be pulled at all though. One of the main premises of the petition was that GTA V is "grooming yet another generation of boys to tolerate violence against women", yet the game is 18+ and can be purchased by adults only. That makes no sense.

So should we ban pornography too? .
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Pretty sure Target and Kmart don't sell porn either. It's a retailer choice not a ban.
 
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