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You have a habit of dissecting things into discrete components that you can fit together into your thesis, and ignoring vast swathes of context and nuance. You are also very guilty of typical-minding what you apparently feel.
You've built your entire hypothesis that "Actually, all men enjoy looting and raping" on the edifice of "We like competitive sports and violent video games." Numerous people have offered you other interpretations with examples, and you reject them because looting and raping sounds like a good time to you and therefore it must be natural to all men.
There was a lot of sentiment in Master and Commander. It was very male-oriented, yes, but the idea that men don't like or feel sentimental about things like home, family, nation, faith, is a stunning declaration.
In fact men did enjoy the sociopolitical commentary and ironies of the Sopranos. That's why it was an award-winning show. The Sopranos was in many ways a deconstruction of the Mafia glamor, and yet it had a very large male audience. Men like Mafia movies in general for the same reason we like all kinds of power fantasies, but most men want the money and the chicks but not to actually go around beating whores and shooting shopkeepers. Apparently you don't understand this. It may be that you are a more typical man and it may be that I am, but I know which way I would wager.
I don’t recall seeing an alternative explanation for the popularity of the violent männerbund video game genre in my replies. I’ll look again. There has been the argument that male video game players actually like a variety of genres, and while this is true, there’s still reason to believe that they especially like the violent genre. The reason this is the edifice of my argument is that it’s a surprisingly strong edifice. If there is one strong argument, there’s not really a reason to reinforce it with additional arguments, which often proves cumbersome in forum discussion imo.
I am curious why you keep bringing up rape. I never mentioned rape in my post. Why do you have rape on your mind? The Conan the Barbarian quote only mentions the lamentations of the defeated women. Very odd.
You’re welcome to peruse the script. They get very sentimental about Lord Nelson (in real life: an impious and vainglorious adulterer, who happened to be exceedingly good at killing the French, and thus became the eternal hero of Britannia). The sentiment is all between the männerbund. Here is what they have to say about the women back home: “(toasting) to wives and sweethearts: may they never meet”.
They do. But that’s not why they enjoy warring. And it’s not why the premiere guy movie is the premiere guy movie. I think the only women are some topless natives.
You must have watched a different Sopranos. Money and chicks factor very little in the show. Tony has, what, one mistress? Two? And an annoying wife? And enough money for a boat and a McMansion. This isn’t Entourage. The Sopranos is popular because it follows the conflict of Tony and his crew as they pursue dominance against their competitors. It’s crew vs crew conflict and inter-crew conflict. Men like to see Tony steal the resources and fealty from rivals. They like to see men act within a männerbund to win resources and power. Does the average male viewer really crave to learn about the sociology of the mafia in the turn of the 21st century? Is he a criminologist who wants to explore the depths of narcissism in Tony Soprano? IMO, no.
Men have power fantasies. They dream of being heroes, of being winners, of being the biggest and the baddest. We are competitive and we dream of glory. But generally speaking, we dream of doing that for a cause, for king or country or our family. Not just for the sheer joy of bashing another guy's skull in. That is the Kulak argument and yours, that we're all just chimps. This point has been made repeatedly to you, that while it may be fun to just blow up pixels in a violent game, it's not actually an urge a healthy person has, to destroy and kill for the sheer pleasure of death and destruction.
It isn't. "My edifice is very strong because my argument is correct because I have said my argument is correct" is not in fact a good argument.
Yet you keep harping on it, especially how much fun it was to isolate some group's girlfriend gamer and make her cry. You keep bringing it up as part of the whole destroy and pillage and conquer thing. I think you're being a little disingenuous here appealing to the dark violent urges you think every man has but pretending to be offended that I point out the obvious consequent.
It's your position that they "enjoy warring." It's my position that they enjoy winning wars and receiving the accolades and benefits of winning. Read the actual memoirs of soldiers from nearly any war in the past couple of centuries, and you'll find very few who really enjoyed the experience of war (some, but not many), and quite many who thought war was a horrible experience, even if they did consider it a noble cause, even if they are proud to have done it.
... You hear that joke made in a toast and conclude "Yeah, this is evidence that Real Men don't actually care about their women and families? They just love killing other men and destroying what others have built?"
Okay.
I said Mafia movies. Then I went on to point out that the Sopranos, specifically, is a deconstruction of the Mafia glamor.
You do this kind of argumentation a lot.
Sure, but they also like to see if Tony is eventually gonna get whacked. Most men don't want to be Tony Soprano, and those who do are people I would not want living near me any more than I'd want Tony Soprano as a neighbor.
And to get fucked up by their dumb choices, or wrecked when their plans go south. Most men aren't saying "Man, I wish that was me holding up bodegas and getting in gunfights with other mobs."
But those elements are what made Sopranos better and more popular than just another mob show.
I think you are very shallow consumer of media.
The problem with “men do not like the sheer joy of bashing another guy’s skull in” is that we literally have “sheer joy of bashing another guy’s skull in: the game”, and it is enjoyed by many men. Mortal Kombat and Tekken are also like that. A couple weeks ago there was “sheer joy of bashing another guy’s skull in: Jake Paul Version”, and this was watched on Netflix by 33 million people and hit #1 in 45 countries, including America. I don’t like these games, or boxing or MMA. But Jake Paul kind of got his skull bashed in. People loved it.
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