Batman and Its Use of the Term, “Bitch”
I read last week an interesting article on how liberally Batman: Arkham City slings the word “bitch” about. I don’t yet have the game myself–of course I’m itching to play it–and I’ll wait until I get my hands on it to pass judgment. The articles that have stood out most to me have been Kotaku’s own articles on Batman’s weird “bitch” fixation and the hypersexualization of female characters in game worlds. I thought these two to be well-written articles that certainly incited a lot of discussion in their comments. That is, of course, never a bad thing–discussion begets critical thinking. Hopefully.
Bitch is a female-only slight, one that is used to demean both men and women. It’s a gendered insult, one that “degrades” males to a lowly, powerless female status. Yet the insults for men place no emphasis on gender and power placement. Batman is often called a “freak”–hardly an extremely offensive term, and one not even close to being on par with “bitch.”
As I said, I’ve yet to play Arkham City. I mainly posted to direct everyone to the articles linked here. I am looking forward to both playing it and analyzing the rampant sexism that others are discussing right now.
EDIT: Unfortunately the links aren’t working too well right now, so I’ve put them below instead of integrating them within the post. For whatever reason, it doesn’t want to work.
Links:
http://kotaku.com/5851358/batman-arkham-citys-weird-bitch-fixation
http://www.kotaku.com.au/2011/10/sexism-character-design-and-the-role-of-women-in-created-worlds/
http://www.next-gen.biz/news/out-there-batman-super-duper-sexist
Michelle
They are interesting articles, but I feel the bitch-fixation article is overthinking it a bit too much. If you’re a goon and Catwoman got in your way, you certainly wouldn’t call her anything but something offensive. The fact that Catwoman gets called a bitch just makes sense because she is a female character.
I believe it falls in the category of “appropriate insults.” For instance, as an Asian male, I would expect someone to call me a gook or chink if they wanted to insult me.