Geek Herring

Geek Herring tackles a tough issue this week, looking at a new video game called Rape Day. Yep, you heard that right - someone has created a game with the sole purpose of rape… and zombies. Because zombies are always fun, right? Trigger warning: We do talk quite in depth about rape, rape statistics, and murder - if this is likely to cause you distress, please don’t listen and join us again next week <3

Rape Day has thankfully been banned by Steam, the gaming platform it was submitted to. But this leads us to the question of Steam’s responsibility. They currently have a policy whereby so long as a game doesn’t depict illegal or obvious trolling, it’s open for submission to the platform.

The creator of Rape Day still intends release the game, and from the looks of comments and threads about it, there’s a large number of potential purchasers. However, Visa and PayPal are currently saying they won’t process any payments to the sale of this game, so the creator is having trouble finding a way to actually sell it.

What do you think about Rape Day or other games with a morally questionable premise? Do you think it’s Steam or other platform’s responsibility to make sure abusive games stay off their systems? How do you think Steam should improve their vetting process?

In this episode:

• What’s the problem with Rape Day?!
• Why games about rape are bad
• How a game about rape is different from a game like GTA or Call of Duty
• Check out Steam’s policy on what games they accept
• Steam’s response and reasoning for removing Rape Day from their platform
• What we think Steam can do to be a more responsible indie gaming platform

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others!

• Geek Girl in the News: February 2019
• Geek Discussion: All Those Video Game Boobs
• Geek Discussion: Fantastic Beasts and Where To Cast Them

Love Geek Herring? Please hop over to iTunes and leave us a review!

You can find us Online / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

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Get your high fantasy on with Geek Herring as we talk all about our love and respect for Robin Hobb and her 16 book epic, The Realm of the Elderlings. The reasons we truly adore these books might surprise you: they’re full of gender bending characters, moral decisions, LGBTQ+ themes, and challenging stereotypes. Don’t worry if you haven’t read the books yet - the first 45 minutes of this saga of an episode are completely SPOILER FREE.

In this emotionally charged episode of Geek Herring, we’re getting down and critical with a fantasy series spanning more than two decades. With overarching themes of acceptance, representation, classism, racism, duty, and prejudice, Hobb has created a masterpiece that will challenge your beliefs. 

Open up to this medieval fantasy world and experience the LGBTQ+ topics, strong, evolving, and gender bending characters, and all the awesome female role models you could ever want in a book. 

After the 45 minute mark with a SUPER OBVIOUS SPOILER WARNING, we head into the nitty gritty of the plot. Hear Amanda get all super choked up, Monika get riled up over paternal duties, and both geek out over how much they love this story.

Have you read The Realm of the Elderlings books? If not - after listening to this show, are you definitely going to!? What do you think about the relationship between Fitz and the Fool?

Rep The Liveship Traders with pride with this awesome Geek Herring t-shirt! 

Read all of Robin Hobb’s books for yourself on Amazon!

The Farseer Triology

• Assassin’s Apprentice Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE
• Royal Assassin Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE
• Assassin’s Quest Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE

The Liveship Traders Trilogy

• Ship of Magic Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE Part 1 | Amazon DE Part 2
• The Mad Ship Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE Part 1 | Amazon DE Part 2
• Ship of Destiny Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE Part 1 | Amazon DE Part 2

The Tawny Man Trilogy

• Fool’s Errand Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE
• Th...

Geek Girl in the News looks at the awesome or not so awesome news that will make you go either: "YAY" or "OMG I can't believe that." 

The latest and greatest geek girl news in February 2019 covers the Oscars, Twitch etiquette, awesome female scientists curing disease, how to make your tech team more intersectional, strong ass viking women, and Captain Marvel!

What’s your take on these news articles? 

In this episode of Geek Girl in the News, we covered these news stories:

• The Oscars happened!!
• Twitch Streamer Permabanned from Twitch for Saying “There are Only Two Genders”
• Mexican Scientist Cures the Human Papillomavirus
• How to Boost Intersectionality in Tech
• Watch Disney-Pixar's Short Movie: Purl
• Researchers Reaffirm Remains in Viking Warrior Tomb Belonged to a Woman
• ‘Captain Marvel’ Targeted by Negative Online Reviews Prerelease
• Brie Larson on superheroes, success and her Hollywood sisterhood

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others!

• Geek Discussion: All Those Video Game Boobs
• Geek Girl Rant: Gendered Clothes & Geeky Merch
• Geeking Out: Looking Forward Into 2019

If you’ve been loving Geek Herring, please hop over to iTunes and leave us a review!

You can find us Online / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

It’s all about the boobs, friends! Whether you love it or loathe it, from Lara Croft to Chun Li, Calamity to Bayonetta, Dead Island to Fortnite, and all those in between, video game characters with outrageously large, bouncy boobs are almost a staple component. Why is that?! 

This all started when Jaina’s Hearthstone portrait artwork was modified to cover up her substantial cleavage -- a totally unnecessary change that wasn’t addressed, explained, or mentioned by developers at all. What do we think of the change?? Well, Monika may be biased because she doesn’t notice boobs, but Amanda thinks the change was -- well, you’ll just have to check out the episode to find out!

Our conversation spiraled out to video game boobs in general, one of Amanda’s favourite topics, to why boob representation actually, really, truly does matter in games. We talked about games designed with boob bounce as the core purpose to Lara Croft’s diminishing cup size and just about everything in between.

In this episode:

• What Amanda and Monika did with their week off from podcasting
• Hearthstone covered up Jaina’s cleavage in her character portrait
• Why video games have so many scantily clad women with big boobs
• What breast physics is and why it’s present in so many video games
• Fortnite apologises for having character animation with boob jiggle
• Why boob representation in video games matters

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others!

• Episode 18: Geek Characters: Final Fantasy Reveals Playable Viera Race
• Episode 4: Geek Characters: Glorious Ladies of Warcraft
• Episode 3: Geek Girl Stereotypes: How the World Sees Us

If you’ve been enjoying Geek Herring, please hop over to iTunes and leave us a review!

You can find us Online / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

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Final Fantasy XIV is an MMO that has taken the manga world by storm. While the franchise has been around almost as long as video games have, the online realm has growing fanbase -- and for good reason! Their latest addition of the Viera race has us raising our eyebrows, however.

It’s no secret that us Geek Herring hosts have been living in Eorzea nearly everyday since before Christmas 2018. The story is captivating, artwork beautiful, and more than anything, the community that has built up once we started playing is unbelievable. Playing an MMO with a group of like-minded, kind hearted, and fun friends makes all the difference.

It’s truly refreshing!

We have had a bit of shock and disagreement, however, over the recent inclusion of the Viera: a playable anthropomorphic bunny race. Released as a female only race and, in the promo video, shown wearing naught more than a negligee, we can’t help but question the sexualisation of the game.

Today, we’re talking about the history of the Viera, briefly looking back through Final Fantasy’s history. We look at some of the reasons why the Viera weren’t an original playable race in the game. We also get into the gender roles associated with the Viera, the Au Ra, and the Roegadyn races and ask that important question: WHY?!

Then we get critical about their appearance, the sexualisation and fetishism over anthropomorphic races within fantasy games… plus, you’ll hear Amanda say one of the filthiest things that has ever crossed her lips.

What do you think about the Viera? Will you play this super sexy bunny race? Do you think fetishism in video games exists?

In this episode:

• What the Viera are and where they come from
• Why there are no male Viera
• What is actually up with the Au Ra
• How we feel about gender roles and playable races in Final Fantasy XIV
• What we really think about so-called slutmogs
• Why we think anthropomorphic races are fetishsised, especially in Final Fantasy XIV
• How we can combat these stereotypes and stigmas

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others!

• Geek Interview: Cosplay, Conventions, Community, & Gender with Anna
• Geek Girl Rant: Gendered Clothes & Geeky Merch
• Geek Characters: Glorious Ladies of Warcraft

If you’ve been enjoying Geek Herring, please hop over to iTunes and leave us a review!

You can find us Online / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

Geek Girl in the News looks at the awesome or not so awesome news that will make you go either: "YAY" or "OMG I can't believe that." The latest and greatest news in January 2019 covers Overwatch gender scandals, that Gillette commercial, studies about brainy tasks and gender, Indian female empowerment, sex toys, Mortal Kombat, and Ghostbusters!

What’s your take on these news articles? 

In this episode of Geek Girl in the News, we covered these news stories:

• Overwatch Pro Quits After Harassment Over Whether She Was Really Playing
• That Gillette Commercial
• Women and girls less likely to be considered for 'brainy' tasks – study
• Millions Of Women In India Join Hands To Form A 385-Mile Wall Of Protest
• Sex Toy Stripped Of CES 2019 Award Because Vaginas
• Ronda Rousey Confirmed As Sonya Blade In ‘Mortal Kombat 11’
• Leslie Jones Slams New 'Ghostbusters' Film: "It's Like Something Trump Would Do"
• Maybe It’s Time to Let the Ghostbusters Die

If you have any geek girl news articles, please send them to us and we’ll feature them on our next show!

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others! And don’t forget to leave an iTunes review and check us out on social media: @geekherring on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also find us on our website and over on Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

For the first episode of Geek Girl Reviews, Amanda & Monika talk about the book they wished they read when they were younger: 

Sam Maggs' book "The Fangirl's Guide to the Galaxy: A Handbook for Girl Geeks" might become your holy grail of girl geekdom if you ever wanted to find out more about Fangirls and eventually want to become one. 

Sam Maggs - who you can find on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook - is a Canadian expat writer living in Los Angeles who shows the reader in a fun, quirky and loveable way what it is to be a fangirl (CAN WE BE FRIENDS?), how to find geek friends and bring existing friends to the geeky dark-side, and all the things you need to know when you visit a Convention for the very first time (and all the other times after that). 

Not only does she give insights why Geek Girls rock, the book helps who feel a little bit like misfits amongst others, and helps them own their true selves.
 While there might not be a lot of new things for the hardcore-geeky hosts, they would recommend the book to everyone who isn't that knee deep into nerdism, or everyone who wants to find out more about the female identifying geeks in the world (AND WE ARE MANYYYY). 

You can get the book on:
 Amazon USA
Amazon UK
Amazon DE
and at your local book shop =) 

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others! And don’t forget to leave an iTunes review and check us out on social media: @geekherring on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also find us on our website and over on Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

Geek girls - how often have you tried to buy clothes of your favourite geeky things only to find that they don't exist for you -- or the little girls in your life? Gendered and preferential clothing has affected all of us female identifying geeks at one point or another. And while things are looking up for us (hello Her Universe) what about for the little geeks in our lives?

Where do you get your geeky clothing? Please share and let us know in the comments or on social media!

In this episode:

• The Tweet that started it all!
• The great Pink vs Blue debate
• Gendered marketing and how it affects our purchase decisions
• Jeff Russland Illustrations
• Her Universe

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others! And don’t forget to leave an iTunes review and check us out on social media: @geekherring on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also find us on our website and over on Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

What’s going on in the Geek world in 2019? Amanda and Monika get all excited about the movies, series, and general awesomeness (often lead by amazing females) that are going to hit us this year. Tune in if you want to be as excited as the hosts, and get some valuable tips on upping your geek girl feminism game as well.

• Get the list of all published works that move over to public domain here
• Read more about the Fortnite Worldcup
• Join the Mailing List for the Video Game Nonference in London
• Come with Geek Herring to Gamescom
• Join the Feminist Bootcamp by thefschool.com

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others! And don’t forget to leave an iTunes review and check us out on social media: @geekherring on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also find us on our website and over on Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring

Geek Girl in the News looks at the awesome or not so awesome news that will make you go either: "YAY" or "OMG I can't believe that." The latest and greatest news in December 2018 covers famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson sexual misconduct accusations, Bethesda’s firm stance on homophobic assaults, gender neutral cocktails, women in sports and more!

In this episode of Geek Girl in the News, we covered these news stories:

• Three Women Have Now Accused Neil deGrasse Tyson of Sexual Misconduct
• And Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Response to Alleged Sexual Misconduct
• Bethesda permanently bans Fallout76 players after homophobic in-game assault
• What Happened When I Told Men to Keep Their ‘Captain Marvel’ Hot Takes to Themselves
• This Swedish Cocktail Was Designed to Challenge Gender Assumptions
• Sophia Florsch: Formula 3 driver says it was ‘miracle’ she survived 170mph crash
• Not Here to Dance by Ada Hegerberg
• Amber Heard: I spoke up against sexual violence - and faced our culture’s wrath. That has to change.

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, please check out some of our others! And don’t forget to leave an iTunes review and check us out on social media: @geekherring on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also find us on our website and over on Patreon!

Geekily yours,
 Amanda & Monika

Support Geek Herring