Unfortunately nobody here can really do anything about the fact that the main character of Super Mario Bros. is a man, you'll have to take that up with Nintendo. Making such a change today wouldn't be too difficult I'm sure, but back in 1985 I doubt such things were even on anybody's radar.
Which brings me to my next point, if Miyamoto wasn't even considering player gender as being a big issue then I doubt Mario was born out of a malicious desire to debase women(so no Warioesque mustache twirling then). The damsel in distress story is probably as old as storytelling itself, yes, it's a trope. Stories can enlighten us, make us think, make us feel, and of course entertain us; but we should not allow them to define us. I think that's a crucial difference between my beliefs Sarkeesian's, she wants to use the media to tell us how to think, act and believe, where I think we are perfectly capable of deciding that for ourselves.

I thought the solution was rather obvious, actually.

You fix things by making games where people are portrayed as... people. Not trophies to be acquired, not sexual objects to be drooled over, and not stereotypes.

You couple that with continued criticism of games that continue to rely on sexist, racist, or homophobic tropes.

And guess what? That's already happening. People have been saying that games need to change for a while before Sarkeesian showed up. Bioware acknowledged the issues and started trying to include more realistic characters in its RPGs years ago--and caught flak for it even back then.

To address your other... points?

My daughter asked me the other day why she can't play as the princess in Super Mario Galaxy 2 (or any of the other Mario games we own). And I had to tell her it's because the Princess got kidnapped. Her response was to ask if she could play as the Princess once we freed her from Bowser. And I had to tell her no.

There is something wrong with that!

After having that conversation with my daughter I fired up Torchlight, where I'm currently playing as a Vanquisher. Vanquisher's are rogue-like ranged characters and can only be female. If you want to be a warrior ("Destroyer" in game terms) or magic user ("Alchemist" in game terms), sorry--it's a men's only club. And not only that, but Vanquisher's--regardless of the armor they wear, must bare their midriff and wearing a mini-skirt showing lots of leg and cleavage (do a google image search for Torchlight Vanquisher to see what I'm talking about). Apparently you can't be a Vanquisher without being a sex pot too.

There is something wrong with that! (To be fair, they got better with Torchlight II and allowed any class to be any gender and allowed the women to cover up with armor OR choose to be sexy).

Society doesn't just change by itself. You're right, society is becoming more accepting of diversity--because people are fighting very hard for it.

Take America's attitude towards homosexuality. Look at the strides made in the last 20 years. That didn't just magically happen. There were TV shows that portrayed homosexuals as human beings worthy of respect. There were lawsuits. There were marches and protests. There were speeches. There were YouTube campaigns like "It gets better." A lot of people worked fucking hard to get the message out that bigotry is not okay.

Look, I'm sorry people pointing out to you how fucked up it is how women are sometimes portrayed in games is somehow ruining your ability to enjoy games. But there are serious problems here. Maybe not problems for you, but problems for people like my daughter.

The solution to these problems is not to lambast the people pointing them out. Nor is the solution to sit back and do nothing and hope it all works out for the best. One solution, as I've already stated, is to be openly critical of the messages contained in ALL media (including games). Another solution is to be vocal about the need for more realistic and diverse portrayals of people in ALL media (including games).

You can still have your Damsel/Dude in Distress trope, by the way. I have no doubt lazy developers will continue to use it as a substitute for meaningful story. Just don't expect people not to call out the utter absurdity of it, is all I'm saying.

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This video has been seconded as a duplicate; transferring votes to the original video and killing this dupe - dupeof seconded with isdupe by NicoleBee.

Seems to be a *dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Super-Mario-Mercedes-Benz-Car-Commercial-Japan

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Needs http://soundfxnow.com/sound-fx/super-mario-brick-break/ for the first 30 seconds.

Might I suggest to you and @lucky760 "the wages of fear"? My favorite movie, and the introduction of Super Mario (oddly I'm only kind of joking about that) in the 50's. It's about bums in Mexico getting a job driving trucks of nitro glycerin through the jungle to a burning oil well. Remade as "sorcerer" in 77 with Roy Schieder (see the original first) it's still my favorite movie, due largely to the last 30 seconds of the film (I won't spoil it). It's a bit of a slow start, like many older movies are, but it gains speed quite nicely. I still love it even though it's French (and I hold onto my irrational hatred of the French because, well, you gotta hate someone!)
Hope you like it if you try it.
Newt

Congratulations! Your video, Super Mario Theme Song Played on Ancient Chinese Instrument, has reached the #1 spot in the current Top 15 New Videos listing. This is a very difficult thing to accomplish but you managed to pull it off. For your contribution you have been awarded 2 Power Points.

This achievement has earned you your "Golden One" Level 6 Badge!

Tags for this video have been changed from 'sheng, china, coin sounds, italian plumber' to 'sheng, china, coin sounds, italian plumber, super mario, music, ancient, instrument' - edited by lucky760

Your video, Super Mario Theme Song Played on Ancient Chinese Instrument, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

This achievement has earned you your "Pop Star" Level 12 Badge!

this instrument really is amazingly close to the real super mario sound

Dafuq?

Some blokes used controller input to feed code into the memory of a regular Super Mario World, then managed to glitch the game into running the code, thereby transforming Super Mario into Snake/Pong.

I know Hollywood ruined that Super Mario Bros. film from the 80's, but no one ever told me about this terrible Half-Life film!

After 30 years since I first played Super Mario Bros. I'm finally realizing now that the two brothers are named after one of them (unless their last name is also Mario).

I don't know if it's stranger that they're named that way or that it's taken me this long to realize it.

*promote