Video Games Appeal to the Male Fantasy

About

Video Games Appeal to The Male Fantasy refers to a series of videos remixing a clip of feminists playing Grand Theft Auto posted by BuzzFeed. In the clip, presenter Claudia Restrepo says "I wrote a blog post a while ago about why I f***ing hate video games. They appeal to the male fantasy!" In the remix videos, after the presenter says that line, different clips meant to humorously illustrate "the male fantasy" are inserted.

Origin

On April 23rd, 2015, BuzzFeed Yellow^[1] published a video titled "Feminists Play Grand Theft Auto For The First Time." In the video, several presenters express shock and disgust at some of the game's violence and the way it objectifies women. About halfway through the video, one presenter, Claudia Restrepo from the blog Oscar Hates Sexism, plays through a scene that takes place at a strip club. The original video has since been removed. On April 25th, the video was reuploaded to Facebook (shown below).

"I wrote a blog post^[2] a while ago about why I fucking hate video games because this is what it does! It appeals to the male fantasy!"

Spread

On August 29th, 2016, YouTube user punpun paired the clip of Claudia talking about the male fantasy with a clip from Just Cause 3 of the main character attaching bombs to an enemy's crotch and watching him fly away. The video gained over 126,000 views.

This was the first of dozens of videos that remixed the clip. One of the most popular with over 277,000 views was posted by YouTube user Tom Benda, who included a clip of Han Solo dancing from the game Kinect Star Wars for the Xbox Kinect.

On October 2nd, 2016, YouTube user Graham posted a compilation of "Male Fantasy" remix videos. The video, shown below, is the most watched "Male Fantasy" video with over 280,000 views.

Image Macros

On October 27th, 2017, Facebook^[7] user Bejamin Foster posted a two-pane image macro featuring Restrepo saying "This is why I hate video games. It appeals to the male fantasy" above a screenshot from the game Europa Universalis IV. The post (shown below) received more than 1,000 reactions and 175 shares in less than three years. That day, it was posted to 9GAG, ^[6] where it received more than 12,000 points. Less than one month later, on November 22nd, 2017, Redditor ^[3] merapyara reposted the image and received more than 9,900 points (91% upvoted) and 740 comments in less than a month.

Shortly after the post was made, variations of the format began appearing on various websites, including Imgur, ^[4] 9GAG^[5] and more (examples below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References