Death Stranding’s Depiction of Queerness is Hamfisted and Creepy

Content warning: discussion of sexual assault.

We’re now in the post-Death Stranding world. The game has been released on PS4 (with a PC release date coming soon) and people are digging in to see what all the fuss has been about during the last like, five years or so. Hideo Kojima’s latest star-studded opus has quite a few people impressed, others nonplussed, and a growing number irritated at its hamfisted portrayal of certain queer communities and queerness in general.

There’s a specific memo you can find in the game from a counselor – presumably, of the psychological variety otherwise I don’t understand why the fuck they were talking about this – talking about the supposed glut of people identifying as a number of queer identities, including asexuality. The memo is as follows:

An Asexual World

Who: Counsellor

When: Three Years Ago

Where: Bridges HQ

Records suggest that the widespread aversion towards physical contact and intimacy was a phenomenon that had been observed even before the Death Stranding. One contemporary report, for example, details the increasing popularity of the “sexless lifestyle” among young people. A growing percentage of the younger cohort were self-identifying as asexual, claiming to be incapable of feeling desire or attraction. Accordingly, such individuals were less likely to have children or engage in sexual activity.

It should be noted, however, that many other unique sexual identities were being recognized during this period, such as demisexuals, who are incapable of sexual attraction without an emotional connection, and panromantics, who profess an attraction unrestricted by sex or gender – albeit one not necessarily sexual in nature.

One theory posits that the Stranding accelerated the proliferation of these sexualities. In a terrifying new world in which BTs (beached things) roam and annihilation is an everyday occurrence, people have grown reticent to form emotional connections with others.

Although there has been no measurable decrease in human fertility, the birth rate has nevertheless dropped dramatically. Incidence of sexual harassment and assault have also seen a sharp decrease, which seems to suggest that sex could not be further from our minds, for better or for worse. I must preempt myself by admitting that I do not have any empirical data– (screenshot cuts off)

So, let’s get into the depiction itself for a second. Asexuality is a sexual orientation. You “self-identify” as asexual just like you would if you were gay or bi or pan. It simply means you do not feel sexual attraction to anyone. It has nothing to say about sexual desires or libido or the amount of sexual activity you’re engaging in. Some people who are asexual are also sex-averse or sex-repulsed, which means they absolutely do not want to have sex. Some are sex-indifferent, and some are sex-favorable; in other words, if you asked them, they would say yes in the same way that they might if you asked to go to the park or play catch or something – it’s an enjoyable activity for them. Doesn’t mean they’re attracted to you. Let’s leave this here.

Kojima – or one of his writers – got a bunch of stuff materially wrong here, but they also showed their hand regarding how they feel about queerness in general with a couple of choice lines.

“I must preempt myself by admitting that I do not have any empirical data”

So there is a misunderstanding of queerness as deviancy, as being unhelpful to humanity in the sense that since we do not fuck for reproductive purposes much of the time, we can’t “be fruitful and multiply” (thanks Fuck Yeah Asexual for this point). So when Kojima – or one of his writers – writes a line like, “A growing percentage of the younger cohort [pre-Death Stranding] were self-identifying as asexual, claiming to be incapable of feeling desire or attraction. Accordingly, such individuals were less likely to have children or engage in sexual activity,” what they’re saying is we’re not out here having the right kind of sex, the kind that has an RNG shot at making a life nine months or so later.

But what is the truth? Are more people really “self-identifying” as asexual? Is it a sign of the end of the species or something? Well… no. Because Kojima (or one of his… you know) correctly identifies the proliferation of adjacent sexual and romantic orientations, namely demisexuality (on the ace spectrum) and panromanticism as occurring around the same time. This is also happening around the same time as DOZENS of queer identities are sprouting up. People are finding themselves right and left and jumping out of the gender binary and out of the sexual doldrums. This is seen as bad in this memo (and who knows, maybe by the game too), but it just means that we’re becoming more aware of ourselves and better able to articulate ourselves to each other.

So okay, that point is dumb. But here’s what really gets my goat.

“Incidence of sexual harassment and assault have also seen a sharp decrease, which seems to suggest that sex could not be further from our minds, for better or for worse.”

No, no, no no no, stop, hold the fuck up, no.

Sexual assaults are an act of violence, of one person attempting to dominate another in a literal physical sense. They have very little to do with actual sexual desire or attraction. Sexual harassment is the lead up to assault, and again, it’s about trying to dominate or control someone. Kojima or one of his writers is not only wrong about this depiction, but dangerously so, and given Kojima’s past characterizations of women and, frankly, vulnerable people, it sends up some mighty large red flags. The proliferation of asexuality would sadly have very little to do with the reduction in assaults – especially if the culture we live in doesn’t otherwise change on the off chance the Death Stranding occurs.

“People have grown reticent to form emotional connections with others.”

According to folks who have played the game (see: the Waypoint Radio episode on Death Stranding), Sam Porter Bridges may well be asexual himself. He has a touch phobia stemming from an apparent trauma in his past called aphenphosmphobia, and he bruises exceptionally easily when people touch him, which leads to the general sense from him that he would absolutely not like to be touched. But a touch phobia and allergy does not necessarily make Sam ace; many folks are touch or sex-averse and aren’t.

And if all we got was this shitty memo about asexuality and a character who is more or less ace doing stuff like making deliveries, killing spirits from the astral plane, and rocking a baby in a big mason jar back and forth til it stops crying, I don’t think a lot of people would have a problem with it. But the problem is that in the course of the game, people try like hell to hug him, touch him, give him a big ol kiss, all without his consent. No matter how much he explains himself, people keep trying to push his buttons. And honestly? That’s more fucked up than anything.

It’s a perfect representation of the absolute lack of give-a-shit many non-ace (and to be honest, non-queer) people display towards us in general. We explain ourselves regularly, explain what we want, what we’re about, what we like and don’t like, and in return we get ignored. If y’all make bad shit about us without us, we get mad, and then all of a sudden, we’re the bad ones! Why are we yelling? Why can’t we just be nicer? It happens like clockwork.

You can have queer people in games. You can thoughtfully make them. I know it can happen. I saw it just this month, with another game – The Outer Worlds, a game I didn’t otherwise care for all that much, has an asexual companion in Pavarti and she’s pretty cool. But if you’re just going to make this hamfisted and creepy shit, don’t bother at all.

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