I thought I would use this essay as an opportunity to explain my 3rd blog more in depth. As I had said, “Gamer” functions as a social commentary and it reflects what life is really like. I’d like to go more in depth about what our society and culture has become. “Gamer” had many scenes in which women were showed in a very sexual way. They were dressed in very revealing clothing. There was also a scene in which two girls were kissing. The way the girls were dressed and the way they were acting shows the audience how much our society has changed and how we have come to accept many of these things. Years ago it wasn’t normal, but now we’re used to it. In a way, the movie also shows that as we go further into the future, society becomes more sexualized, but people aren’t shocked. Another aspect of our society that I mentioned in my blog was what our culture has come to be. Music is a very important part of our culture. These last couple decades, music has become very sexualized and it depicts what society is like. As I said girls are dressed way less now. Girls go to high school wearing short shorts and have their belly buttons showing. That would not be acceptable just a few decades ago. An example I brought up was Katy Perry. In her video for her song, “California Gurls”, Katy is shooting whipped cream out of her bra and in her “Teenage Dream” video, she is having sex with her boyfriend. Her song “Peacock” takes it to another level, in which she sings about wanting to see a guy’s “peacock”. Another example is the attention Nicki Minaj’s “assets” are getting. I’m not even going to talk about Kim Kardashian and her family. The part of “Gamer” that I mentioned about the two girls kissing, also imitates life because it shows how much more people have become liberal. The younger generation accepts everyone and isn’t shocked by it. During the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, Madonna kissed Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. Although, it was somewhat controversial, it was quite normal. Now, Lady Gaga has a number of videos in which she kisses girls. One of them is “Telephone”, where she kisses a girl while she’s at prison. What I’m trying to say is that “Gamer” imitates life by showing the audience how much our society has become sexualized and have come to accept everything.

“Gamer” functions as a social commentary in so many ways and it gives a good view of what life is like. The most obvious way the movie imitates life is by showing how people can get addicted to video games and virtual worlds. The best example of that is the fat man who plays the video game as the woman. He has become very fat and can’t even move he has to use a wheelchair. They made him look so terribly nasty; by making him look like this they were able to show the audience what people who are addicted to video games turn into. I think they did a very good job of showing it. Another social commentary was how men control women. That same fat man was playing the game as a woman. This shows that in our world men are always telling women what to do, no matter what it is. It could be how to act, what to say, and basically how to live. Another way art imitates life is by showing the audience that our society doesn’t care about the people on death row. People don’t really care what happens to them; whether they live or die, it doesn’t matter. One last social commentary “Gamer” made was the sexualization of our culture. There were many scenes with half naked women, which represent how our culture has changed from being ashamed to show sexuality in movies, music, and in society overall, to a very sexualized culture where you see it all the time. Girls are dressing less clothing now; their shorts keep getting shorter and their stomachs are opening up now. Pop stars have taken it to another level and act very sexually both onstage and in music videos; for example Katy Perry’s whipped cream bra and almost all of Britney Spears’ music videos. Overall, all the aspects of “Gamer” resemble life; it shows the audience how people can get addicted to games, how men control women, how people don’t care for the lives of the people on death row, and how our culture has become very sexual.

Waggoner’s essay was very relevant to “Gamer”. They both showed how people who play video games get really into them and become addicted to them. They allowed the audience to see how much of an impact these games have on those people who play them. They start only caring about the game and forgetting about reality. The virtual world becomes their reality. Basically, both Waggoner’s essay and “Gamer” reveal what happens to people who play video games.

I don’t play RPGs, I don’t play video games, and I do not create avatars. I have never played them and I have never really been interested in them. I don’t plan on starting to play these or to create avatars and to live in a virtual world. The idea of creating an avatar and creating a world and getting sucked into it is not appealing to me. A lot of people are addicted to these games and it kind of seems like, it’s highly possible for me to get addicted to it too, so I’d rather not play them. Although I don’t play RPGs and video games, I have friends who love playing them. They are always talking about the avatars they have created and they always mention the virtual worlds. They usually play this during their free time. Most likely they play it after school or work. It kind of allows them to forget about reality for a while and to go to another world. It also apparently releases stress. They really like playing RPGs and videogames but they are not addicted to it. My friends identify themselves with their real world identity (thank God!). Once they stop playing the games, they get back to their own personalities. It’s not like they’re always identifying themselves as the avatars when they are in their bed and they really want to jump back into the fake world, just like in Waggoner’s essay. My friends always have a sense of reality once they aren’t playing games. The real world identities and the virtual world identities of my friends are really different. In the virtual world, their bodies are very different and they do so many things that they wouldn’t do in the real world. They’re probably tougher in the virtual world (not that they’re weak in real life ha ha). They are also stronger and have so many powers that aren’t even possible in our world. Overall, the real world identities and the virtual world identities of my friends are immensely different. I believe in many cases, videogames play can impact identity formation, but from what I have seen (from my interview with my friends) is that it is possible to not get impacted. They are able to not play the games and not act like the avatar. They are able to stop themselves from turning into the character. They can tell the difference between the two worlds. Basically, video game play can impact identity formation, but in most cases it should not.