Man claims games are racist

[wraggster]

Article from Eurogamer

A graduate from the University of British Columbia has published his honours thesis on racism in games, claiming that negative representations of ethnic minorities are far too widespread.

23 year-old Robert Parungao spent around 100 hours playing Kung Fu, Warcraft 3, Shadow Warrior and Grand Theft Auto 3, analysing the storylines and characters in the games for around eight months as part of his Sociology degree.

"Parents, government and media watchdog groups have protested the widespread violence and sexism in videogames, but the blatant racism has gone largely unnoticed," Parungao said.

"Film and television come under greater critical scrutiny so civil rights and minority groups can voice their concerns and effect some change. But videogames have generally been seen as kids’ toys. There aren't the same mechanisms or critical forums to encourage game designers to evolve."

Parungao criticised GTA for featuring "non-white characters who are mainly triad members, Yakuza gangsters, latino gangs or black hoods.

"These stock characters are seen in a lot of games and function as narrative obstacles to be overcome, mastered or ultimately blown to smithereens by the white hero."

Parungao went on to claim that game developers "like to use a mix and match grab bag of Asian stereotypes that are often nonsensical", such as the villain in Shadow Warrior, who "goes by a Chinese name, Lo Wang.

"But when he fires his rocket launcher at his enemies, he screams: 'Just like Hiroshima.'"

Parungao concluded: "I hope to continue looking into ways to improve videogames because they’re fun and I’d like to see them turn into positive media instead of negative ones."

Do you agree or disagree, are games racist ?

[corenskae]

wtf the hero in gta3 isnt even caucasian
great job pal, you played games for 100 hours and think youve done the world a favor...politicians are noisy enough about this dont make it worse ffs

[Briggzy11]

How can Robert Parungao claim GTA3 is racist???

The white guy (the main character) is the worst gang member, killer, murderer etc in the entire game and its MEANT to be violent meaning all the characters are gang members, killers etc. The Yakuza's are suppose to be bad, if the story was about the Yakuzas giving flowers to everybody and singing hymns, GTA3 wouldnt be the same. The black hoods again are there to be killers and murderers, if you look at the pedestrians in the game there are black, white all sorts of pedestrians living normal lives and not killing at all.

If anybodys racist I think its Robert Parungao claiming racism in games. Just shut up and let games have what they like in them. Also I think Robert needs to research games like GTA3 a little more and get a glimpse of the surroundings in the game (again the peds)

How can you justify racism in games though???

Is POKEMON racist then? It must be because Pikachu is yellow and Squirtle is BLUE :O

[zrossaye]

wtf?

wat kind a idiot is dat robert guy

[splodger15]

the $#@!head needs to get a life

[Briggzy11]

Well to Robert EVERYTHING computer related is racist, If that means pokemon im gonna be so sad cuz I love pokemon...

I often wondered y all the pokemon were coloured different...

[publicprivates]

well, look at brock. he's the perfect example of video game stereotype. He represents a chinese person in japanese culture. Squinty eyes , darker skin ,unusually perverted.

[JoshM248]

Well, He can take that Sociology degree and shove it right where it should be.

[inlovewithi]

Wow, the guy is a nit wit, I cannot even put his dull logic into words. I bet he thinks he's a genius. He's a racist for thinking that everything is a big conspiracy against non whites. "Don't use the 'white man's' calculator, you got your own god given calculator, you have your fingers and toes."

[Galiano]

well personally i always had the view that in gta your character was a PERSON who shot or ran over other PEOPLE. can't say i ever really noticed what colour or creed they were.

When people like robert try to highlight racism wherever it lies they only help to point out the differences between different races.

Not that im saying highlighting racism is a bad thing (Quite the opposite) but to look for it in games when there are so many other causes is pathetic.
I hope he failed