Anita Sarkeesian quotes

There's no such thing as sexism against men. That's because sexism is prejudice + power. Men are the dominant gender with power in society. (Anita Sarkeesian)
It's both possible, and even necessary, to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of its more problematic or pernicious aspects. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Well maybe the princess shouldn't be a damsel and she could save herself. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
It gets worse and worse, it reinforces this idea of women as sexual objects, right; there's this idea of women as playthings for their amusement... [that] we are not meant to be treated with respect. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
The power of pop culture stories should not be underestimated, and there is an enormous potential for inspirational stories that can have a positive, transformative effect on our lives. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
I was frustrated with how academia tended to present feminist theory in disconnected or inaccessible ways. I wanted to try and bring a sociological feminist lens to the limited and limiting representations of women in the media and then share that with other young women of my generation. YouTube was the perfect medium. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
We are witnessing a very slow and painful cultural shift. Some male gamers with a deep sense of entitlement are terrified of change. They believe games should continue to cater exclusively to young heterosexual men with ever more extreme virtual power fantasies. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
There's a toxicity within gaming culture, and also in tech culture, that drives this misogynist hatred, this reactionary backlash against women who have anything to say, especially those who have critiques or who are feminists. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
[On the GamerGate Controversy]: Ethics in journalism is not what's happening, in any way. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Anita Sarkeesian: I think it's important to recognize that harassment is, as someone had mentioned, it's not just what is legal and illegal, right? Harassment is threats of violence, but it's also the day to day grind of "you're a liar,” "you suck,” making all these hate videos to attack us on a regular basis, and the mobs that come from those hate videos, etcetra. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
If you want to get to know a character, learn about their interests, goals or desires, their butt is probably not going to give you that information. (Anita Sarkeesian)
For this video I tried to get a glimpse of Batman's rear end, but it's as if his cape is a piece of high-tech Wayne-Industries equipment designed to cover up his butt at all costs. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Not a coincidence it's always men and boys committing mass shootings. The pattern is connected to ideas of toxic masculinity in our culture. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Princess Peach is in many ways the quintessential stock-character version of the damsel in distress. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Anime is the most disgusting, sexist, and misogynistic form of media to ever come out of Japan. Anime defiles women and caters to perverts and losers. These cartoons are corrupting teenagers and promoting rape culture. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Anita Sarkeesian: For me, the big picture has always been culture change, and pop culture was just a vehicle and a medium through which cultural change can happen or it can be influenced by; so it's not actually about video games. But it's about video games, right? View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Why are [...] female characters in combat roles wearing high-heels? With all the fighting, running and climbing these women have to do, dressing them in high-heels is clearly a decision rooted in sexualized aesthetic pleasure rather than believability. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Buying 1,000 dollar shoes .... View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
The mystical pregnancy is one of the tropes that I loathe the most because while other tropes represent women in stereotypical ways, this one hits us on a biological level. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
We can trace the woman as reward trope all the way back the beginning of the medium itself as [...] upon successful completion of many arcade games players were rewarded with a related smooch of victory trope, so named for the kiss the hero received as a reward for rescuing a kidnapped princess. Sometimes the prize is blatant as with the standard hero reward in which the king will give his daughter to the hero. On other occasions it's taken a step further by employing the parallel of sex for victory or rescue sex trope. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Since mobile, indie and retro inspired games are built on a legacy of inequality in the medium the new wave of 80s and 90s nostalgia has brought with it a resurrection of the worst of the old-school damsel in distress stereotypes. Indeed, many of these new titles essentially function as love letters to the trope as a way of paying homage to classic games of years gone by. (Anita Sarkeesian)
When the media we create excludes girls and women, fails to depict them as leaders and innovators or treats them as little more than side-kicks, love interests and sex objects, is it any wonder that women are systematically excluded and under-represented in so many careers and leadership positions? View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Online harassment, especially gendered online harassment, is an epidemic. Women are being driven out; they're being driven offline. This isn't just in gaming. This is happening across the board online, especially with women who participate in or work in male-dominated industries. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian
Geraldine Doogue: I'm intrigued by Anita saying she had to learn about systems. You had to learn about the sociology of systems and structural change, and that was obviously quite a journey for you.Anita Sarkeesian: Yeah, absolutely. I sort of joke about how it was the most liberating thing that ever happened to me, and also the most frustrating for everyone around me. Cause, like, when you start learning about systems, everything is sexist, everything is racist, everything is homophobic, and you have to point it all out to everyone all the time. So there's a good year of my life where I was the most obnoxious person to be around. And then you settle into it, you start to understand, like, oh people have been living within these systems, and it was just sort of a liberating moment for me. You learn how to pick and choose your battles and that sort of thing. View quote
Anita Sarkeesian