Hate Mail: I Totally Destroy a Mortal Kombat Fan

It’s not very often that I get a reply or comment about articles I have written, but usually, it’s by some moron who tries to argue my opinion. Like a month ago, someone tried to pick a fight with me on Twitter over an article I wrote over three years ago because he thought that since he has more Instagram followers, he knew more about comic books than me. That’s not how an argument works, by the way, but also, Captain America’s strength level doesn’t matter because how strong he is based on artistic license. But anyway, this isn’t about that dumbshit, this is actually about an article I wrote back in May about Mortal Kombat 11.

In it, I pointed out that the game wasn’t being “SJW” because of the Jax ending, that anyone arguing it is just a racist and also how complaining about the way women look in that game is a sign that maybe porn is your thing and not video games. That article has generated the most traffic on my website and I figured it was only a matter of time before someone tried to defend their very wrong position. Today I was blessed by an e-mail from Sebastian Beeskow, who was so butt-hurt by my words that he felt compelled to write me an e-mail. Let’s pick it apart, shall we? He starts by saying….

Mate, I realize this message might be a waste of my time, but have you actually bothered to try and understand some of the "arguments" you "debunked" in that text you put up there?

So far so good, he realizes that his e-mail is a waste of time. If only had he stuck with his intuition and applied that assessment to his entire life and clicked delete instead of send. He’d save himself a lot of unnecessary embarrassment.

The Race Issue

“First off, the reasoning behind people critizising Jax's ending of slavery is that he specifically ONLY ends black slavery, not slavery of other ethnicities like in eastern countries or Africa. Netherrealm again protrayed slavery as if it was something that happened only to black people and only by the hands of white people, when that is straight up false and disproven by both history and the fact that, as mentioned, SLAVERY STILL EXISTS TODAY. AND IT'S NOT JUST BLACKS BEEING ENSLAVED.”

To be fair, Sebastian ends his e-mail with an apology that his spelling and grammar are not good because English is not his first language (Yeah, I noticed) but he is also very wrong here. Not only is Sebastian bad at writing but he’s also bad at understanding context, subtext, and favors straw man arguments. Let’s pick apart that ending for a second.

Sebastian’s argument is that Jax only frees black slaves. Which I can assume he is making this inference from this:

And the fact that they only depict images of black slavery.

Here’s the thing Sebastian: Yes, there is the slavery of many other people across the planet, it’s not just black people, but there is nowhere that Jax says that he is only freeing black people. You’re making that conclusion based on what you are seeing since it is images of black slavery that dominate the narrative of this short cut scene. But why wouldn’t it? Based on Jax’s background, the slavery of blacks in America is going to be the images that resonate with him the most because it was his people. It’s also a narrative choice in storytelling because those visuals match the character.

However, this does not mean he is only eliminating the slavery of one group of people to make the world a better place. In fact, he doesn’t say that at any point in the narration. A word of advice, Sebastian, make yourself familiar with this idiom: THE ABSENCE OF EVIDENCE IS NOT EVIDENCE OF ABSENCE. But since I’m probably correct in assuming you are an idiot (and a racist) let me boil it down to you: Because something isn’t implicitly evident doesn’t mean that it is absent from the observation. Putting this into context (also look this word up since it is also lost on you) the lack of reference to other historical slaveries in this cut scene does not mean that they were also likewise eliminated from history when Jax altered his timeline.

But even then Sebastian you’re wrong because at the very end Jax says this:

Emphasis added in case you are blind as well as stupid.

Jax says THE WORLD IS A BETTER PLACE FOR EVERYONE because he eliminated slavery. That implies that he eliminated all slavery, not just a specific kind and that he has created a world where people live in peace. That would not be the case if he only freed some kinds of slaves and not others. Which, as a character whose entire culture is dominated by past slavery, why would he condemn anyone to that fate just because they are different than him? I don’t know how the game could be any clearer other than pointing out that you are incredibly dense for not coming to that conclusion yourself.

Also what part of ending slavery is bad, or the work of a “social justice warrior”. Slavery is BAD regardless. Why are you spending time splitting hairs on something that isn’t there.

Putting it a different way, Sebby, when you take a look at the Barakka ending and the (new) Sindel ending, both of those characters use their altering of the timeline to make everyone their slaves. It’s not implicitly stated that they only enslave some more than others, but we accept at face value that they have enslaved everyone.

If anything your “counter-argument” speaks volumes of your own prejudices and racial insecurities.

On the Women

Sebastian isn’t done yet because his apparent goal in e-mailing me was to ensure that I was convinced that he is a horrible garbage person before he was done. He also had some things to say about the portrayal of women in Mortal Kombat 11. If you recall, the women in this game are more fully clothed and have smaller proportions than in previous games which usually portrayed women in skimpy outfits and big boobs. I posited the fact that this wasn’t a case of NetherRealm Studios being “woke” but more a monetizing method since the introduction of costume pieces and skins that are monetized. Not having characters in skin-tight bikinis made it easier to monetize these features. Of course, Sebastian ignores all that logic and says..

“About the fanbase beeing upset in regards to the female designs, it's relatively simple. They don't look female anymore. They barely have any curves anymore, their faces look like they were teenage boys, and the full bodysuit look simply isn't what Mortal Kombat has been for over 5wo decades.”

The only thing that’s relatively simple to understand is that the “fanbase” you speak of is comprised of misogynistic perverts wo have nothing better to do than body shame fictional characters since they can’t point out your toxic masculinity as real women do. But whatever, I’ll bite.

Your argument that the characters don’t look like women anymore is categorically wrong to the point where I wonder if you can actually recognize a female face when it’s not done up like a porn star. Since Injustice 2, NetherRealms has been some heavy-duty motion capture for every detail right down to facial expressions.

Those facial models are based off the real faces of real women who portrayed the characters

So the fact that you are looking at those faces and seeing “teenage boys” probably says a lot more about you and that perhaps you need to stay 500 meters away from places were teenage boys hang out.

As for the proportions of the women, them not being as curvy as in the past is actually much more realistic. Have you seen many female fighters in real life?

Again, the body proportions are based on the models who were motion captured. For example, they used Ronda Rousey as the model for Sonya Blade this time around.

It’s pretty obvious

I don’t know if you noticed, but she is not a curvy woman. In fact, most women who are professional athletes don’t tend to have a lot of body fat. Which means they aren’t as curvy that’s because they have less body fat and more muscle.

Now if you’re going to say “Well the women in WWE have curves”, well those aren’t professional athletes. Those are actors.

If you’re going to argue that Mortal Kombat’s blood and gore be more realistic, then the bodies of the characters are going to have to be realistic. If they were just going to change the female body shape to be the porn star ratio you’re looking for, then they would take hours of figuring out the physics to all those added dimensions.

If they’re just going to add different proportions to the characters then they may have just animated everything by hand. However, Nether Realms wants realistic fighting moves, which means motion capturing actual experts who, as I’ve already pointed out, have smaller proportions. In other terms: Why pay for the expense of motion capturing everything if you have to modify the model and then laboursly hand animate all the new, non-existent proportions?

As for what is “tradition”, those things change. When someone like you gets upset over something like this you blame it on some sort of progressive movement. Which, in a perfect world, it would be because of that. In reality, it’s a moneymaking. Companies now are noticing that they can make more money off their entertainment if they make it as open and inclusive to as many people as they want. They have reached peak angry-white-guy-who-lives-in-a-basement and are branching out to other more lucrative markets. These changes are less to do with being “woke” or being some kind of “social justice warrior” but more to do with cashing in on inclusivity to increase their bottom line. These companies don’t give a fuck about these issues unless they can manipulate it to make more money.

That said, and here’s something you don’t clearly explain Sebastian: Why do curvy women matter? Honestly. If you want curvy women, as I explained in my previous article, porn exists. There is also very specific Mortal Kombat porn out there if you’re so inclined. I mean, at the end of the day, that’s why you want these characters to be busty and curvy right? To get a boner and fire off some knuckle children?

Your argument is really confusing because on the one hand, you sound like you want to fuck teenage boys, but on the other and you want a video game with curvy women to jerk off too.

Just admit it, Sebastian, you like to jerk off to video games. There’s nothing wrong with that so just come out and say it.

In Closing

I think what’s most telling about Sebastian’s e-mail is his closing line:

“But I guess you will ignore all that in favour of sticking to blaring your counterarguments over whatever you interpret into the points I make and calling me names like you did.”

Dude is fucking insecure and he had his feelings hurt by a stranger on the internet. I don’t need to blare out any counterpoints because this isn’t a shouting match. You read a website on the internet and disagreed and you don’t have any confidence to actually admit the real issues at hand: You don’t like it when people imply that you are a racist and a sexist because of a video game. Congradu-fucking-lations.

Now the entire internet knows that Sebastian Beeskow — specifically — is probably an insecure racist misogynist. Hope it was worth it.