As you probably already know, about one day ago Blizzard released a Christmas inspired “Overwatch” webcomic called “Tracer Reflections”, and in that comic, it became officially known that Tracer is a lesbian woman (at least in the world of comics). Well, that shouldn´t be such a big deal right? I mean, it´s not like it´s 2016 or that there haven´t existed LGBT game characters in the past. Nevertheless, once it became publicly known that Tracer is gay “some” people started to use Tracer´s sexuality as a baseball bat against Gamers (as seen in the pictures down below). On a personal level, I think it´s pretty messed up that someone would use a fictional character for their own political agenda. Even so, it came as no surprise to me that the SJWs tried to use Tracer against #GamerGate and its supporters (it was bound to happen, more or less. As they take any given chance that they get to do so).
As for me though, I didn´t get upset or angry when I found out about Tracer being a lesbian woman (the SJWs tried really hard to sell the narrative that Gamers were angry and upset over the fact that Tracer is gay). You see, I have nothing against homosexuals whatsoever. In the matter of fact, some of my all-time favorite characters are gay. For example, just take The Walking Dead show and comics. You got freaking awesome characters such as Aaron, Eric, Tara Chambler, Denise Cloyd and Paul Monroe/Rovia Aka “Jesus”. Well, guess what? All of them are homosexuals. So, what about homosexual game characters then? I´m glad that you asked. So, do you want to hear a little secret? (that´s not really a secret for anyone who´s into games). It´s the same thing there, because we got top-notch LGBT characters such as the following (to name a few):
Kung Jin (Mortal Kombat X)
Tiny Tina (Borderlands 2)
Ellie (The Last of Us)
Steve Cortez (Mass Effect 3)
Dorian (Dragon Age: Inquisition)
Juhani (Knights of the Old Republic)
Dr. Jessica Kandel (The Division)
Furthermore, don´t forget that there exist quite a few lesbian Gamers out there, and as far as I know. Very few to no one from the SJW camp brought that up once the Tracer Internet drama show kicked-off. Let´s be real though, they never had any intentions of bringing that up. As it doesn´t fit into their agenda that all gamers are “sexist pigs”, “homophobes” and “misogynists” (which is false, as I hardly doubt +1 billion people are any of those things). Truth be told though, I´m a straight guy. So, yes, I do find lesbians to be attractive. However, that is quite normal for a straight guy, so I think that´s alright (at least, in my opinion).
Even so, I still find it to be pretty bizarre that “some” people claim that Blizzard only turned Tracer into a lesbian to please the straight male players. Because as far as I know, a lot of females play “Overwatch” as well. Furthermore, Gamers have had lesbian fantasies about pretty much every female “Overwatch” character before the game even launched. So turning Tracer into an official” lesbian wouldn´t do all that much for the straight gamers really. Nevertheless, some people believe that the whole thing “might” have been a marketing/PR-trick by Blizzard. I don´t know if there´s any truth that claim, but if that´s the case. Then I have a feeling that the truth will get out sooner or later.
All in all though, does it truly matter all that much that Tracer is gay? I mean, what does it really change? Because in my mind, love is love, no matter if it´s between a woman and a man, or between a woman and a woman. Simply put, my perspective of Tracer won´t change just because she´s now a lesbian. So I don´t quite understand why “some” people have turned this whole thing into a gigantic drama party (it´s soon 2017, so get a grip!).
Another thing, that´s worth pointing out. It was previously said that Russia banned the Tracer reflections web comic (I think Euorogamer broke that story first?). Well, that´s not entirely true, because Blizzard made the decision not to release the comic in Russia themselves (as seen in the pictures down below). I think that assumption came to be because a Russian MPs accused Fifa 17 of being “gay propaganda” not so long ago. Nevertheless, I´m not going to cover Russian politics at this time. So I´ll leave that matter for the time being.
Other than that, these are my thoughts about Tracer and lesbians in general:
And last but not least, we got the matter that concerns the lewd aspect of “Overwatch” and Jonathan McIntosh´s nonsense rubbish about Blizzard´s decision to turn her into a lesbian character. Nevertheless, I´m going to start with the lewd part first (I´ll get to the point shortly, so please bear with me), because the SJWs tweeted ut stuff such as “Tracer is gay fuck you Gamers“, “Straight people: I felt like I got shot cause a character I like is gay” and “Oh my god GamerGate is going to lose it´s damned hive mind”.
Right off the bat 1. There has existed lewd content for “Overwatch” for over a year (a lot of it is based on lesbian sex). 2. Most Gamers have zero to non problems with Tracer being a lesbian and 3. I (and many others) suspected very early on that Tracer was either a lesbian or a bisexual female (no offense, but her looks kind of gave that away).
As for Jonathan Mcintosh, the guy went on ranting about Blizzard and Tracer for hours on Twitter. That´s nothing new under the sun though. As that´s all he does during his awake hours. However, I did notice that pretty much everyone took a swing at Mcintosh this time (no matter if they were normies, SJWs, GamerGate supporters or neutrals). So I guess that most people are fed up with his rubbish nonsense projections and agenda. I highly doubt that Mcintosh will stop whining about everything and nothing though, because that seems to be his sole purpose in life. So in a way, that´s what keeps him going (in my opinion, Mcintosh is like a mix of Jack Thompson and Chris-Chan).
Any ways, at least it´s good to see that more and more people are calling Mcintosh out on his bs statements. So I´m rather curious to see for how much longer he will be able to keep up with his tweets, Youtube videos and whatnot. As it seems like everything and everyone has had just about enough of him (I wonder if that´s one of the reasons why Anita Sarkeesian tossed Mcintosh out from the Feminist Frequency camp?). Well, time will tell.
I got one more thing to add to this topic before I wrap this OP post up. Phil (he works for us) made a really good point over Twitter when I talked to him about Tracer and her sexuality. Long story short, Phil simply told me the following:
“A quick way to see if anyone has a problem with LGBT… “Did you ever see/read Ranma 1/2? If so, did you like it?”
I can´t speak for everyone else now, but I did watch Ranma 1/2 as a kid, and I enjoyed the anime quite a lot. However, at the time I didn´t even know what LGBT was all about. Nevertheless, I have never been homophobic. Furthermore, I only see good and evil in people. I don´t see gender, skin color or sexuality. As for games and Gaming, I just want to have a blast. So I honestly don´t care all that much about gender, skin color or sexuality.
And with that said, what´s your take on this matter? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section down below!
Sources:
Eurogamer
Heatstreet
BBC.co.uk
PC Gamer
Tracer reflections comic
Dakota Williams
#Tracer via Twitter
***Disclaimer***
This is a personal opinion of the writer, and it doesn’t necessarily represent the other writers (nor The Gaming Ground´s) opinions.
Robin “V-Act” Ek
The Gaming Ground
Twitter: @TheGamingGround
More by Robin Ek: