Interesting article about Sexism in Geek Communities

[Pattern Ghost]

Wow. That's how you react to a simple question?

 

 

To be fair I can see how the post that provoked that reaction could sound a little judgmental. Tone doesn't always come through on the internet.

[Enforcer84]

To be fair I can see how the post that provoked that reaction could sound a little judgmental. Tone doesn't always come through on the internet.

Oh please, like anyone has ever come across in a way they didn't intend on the internet.

 

 

 

pull the other one while you're at it 

 

 

[Enforcer84]

Taking the heat off the Geeks, but still relevant due to the sexism....

 

http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/snggjc/the-broads-must-be-crazy

 

Though this first bit is more a set up for the second they both speak to the Media version of "Male Privilege" (which I still have trouble spelling) in the political arena.

So, are the geeks any more or less sexist by comparison? It can seem daunting - trying to change the world, let's face it as awful as some of the treatment happens here and in other first world countries, it's downright utopia in someways compared to other societies. 

 

oh here's the rest of the bit. 

 

http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/09yfp5/the-broads-must-be-crazy---belittled-women

 

at any rate, this thread has kind of fallen from discussion - though I've continued to read and respond to a series of articles/blogs/editorials either (depending on how you lean on the issues) shining a light on the darkness or hammering a point that has already been made. 

 

By and large, we're - at least publicly, I can't read PM's of other people of course - a pretty welcoming community here at HERO (opinions on this may vary). So this won't have the rancor and absolute proof of concept that say, the articles might provoke on (definitely) Reddit, or (possibly)RPG.net, or other free range websites where anonymity is held more sacrosanct than being polite to one another.  

 

Rambling again. 

 

At the very least this thread has "The more you Know" potential, and it has flared up as a true discussion on occasion (or at least an argument) but it's like any other thread on any other topic - it goes as long as someone cares to post to it. 

[Cancer]

With lots of the links posted, I have sympathy, but very little leverage. The anime/manga item, for instance ... that echoes (from a different perspective) something I have long thought about that genre, and I have not bothered to figure out whether it's a result of Japanese cultural biases or "just" the manga community itself. And I haven't bothered because I just don't read/watch the stuff. All the anime I have ever watched are a couple of Miyazaki's masterpieces. The rest strike me as creepy and I avoid it. I suppose I could make a declaration that its systematic misogynism is reprehensible enough that it is the reason I avoid the genre, but I generally consider people who, as outsiders, make declarations of that kind about other interest groups to be sanctimonious twits. Since I don't do MMOs, I've got no part in that community and its issues either. Ditto comics ... except for quasi-annual Girl Genius collections, I haven't bought a comic in about a decade ... except that I've got a daughter who does follow comics and comics-based TV and movies, so I have the "concerned dad" badge there ... and concerned dads also are, nearly by definition, in the sanctimonious twit bin and cannot possibly be reclassified out of it.

 

In some of those communities, there are old historical reasons for some of the misogynistic attitudes. I have this odd prejudice that I think reasons matter. Why does this phenomenon occur? Even historical reasons, bad historical reasons. And having recognized those, what can be done to remove those reasons, or point out they don't hold now (or perhaps never did, when examined rationally)? And having made those recognitions, then ... act. From within.

 

My community is where I work, since I'm an educator in both the astronomy and physics communities (and gawd, the physics community ... ). My professional societies, my on-campus work both in the classroom and outside it. There I do things both on the small scale and the large, watch the scene actively, and so on. But that isn't of interest to these forums. So I have nothing, really, to add.

[Sociotard]

[Cygnia]

 

Not All Men: A Brief History of Every Dude’s Favorite Argument

 

[Cygnia]

Why do we fight? On social justice in video games

 

(spoilers from World of Warcraft's "Warlords of Draenor" alpha)

[Zeropoint]

We fight for gold and XP. Mostly the XP.

[Enforcer84]

And Armor that makes me look cool. 

[Enforcer84]

IIRC, Female Orcs were not allowed to fight in the original Warcraft Games, it was only when WoW came out that they tweaked that. 

So the sexism existed at that time in game. And Thrall's Mother would probably have experienced it. Now if, in that scene it's used as an excuse to let her beat the "real man" down that's one thing.

 

On the other hand; I recall reading about her in one of the wow mangas. The gender divide wasn't used there. 

 

So I'll mark that down as a black mark.

Cygnia, are you planning on purchasing Warlords of Draenor?

[Cygnia]

Don't know yet.  Part of it is budgetary reasons and the changes they're making to healing mechanics.  And part of it is this initial "boys' trip" mentality that Blizzard is embracing.  I'm hoping they'll listen to concerns prior to Beta.

 

Not to mention, the rumours that they may not allow flying period in Draenor.

[Enforcer84]

Don't know yet.  Part of it is budgetary reasons and the changes they're making to healing mechanics.  And part of it is this initial "boys' trip" mentality that Blizzard is embracing.  I'm hoping they'll listen to concerns prior to Beta.

 

Not to mention, the rumours that they may not allow flying period in Draenor.

I will probably get it if Carol decides to. She's enjoying GW2 right now, the dyes and new wardrobe function have been fun for her designer nature as well as exploring a new world. Levelling is fun and we enjoy listening to the NPC conversations.

 

But it does seem like a step backwards for Blizz and I'm not terribly surprised just kind of sad. By and large the vast majority of players I've had any kind of lasting friendship with have been women - of my age group even. 

 

I know there's more guys playing but I can kind of avoid them...not intentionally but really, avoid anyone who calls you bro. That's a personal rule of mine.

I'm on team speak when I do World vs World in GW2 and there are a few women on all the time, which is nice

[Pattern Ghost]

I know there's more guys playing but I can kind of avoid them...not intentionally but really, avoid anyone who calls you bro.

 

Hey bro! I'm right here! I knew you were avoiding me!

[Pattern Ghost]

Why do we fight? On social justice in video games

 

(spoilers from World of Warcraft's "Warlords of Draenor" alpha)

 

 

I know two things about Blizzard: 1) It employs people of all genders and orientations, and seems not to be discriminatory in its hiring practices, and 2) A lot of their key people are pretty juvenile.

 

With that in mind, I'm going to post some thoughts on the points made in the above link:

 

The sexual harassment of Draka: We don't know what Draka's response is. So . . . what do we have? A villain saying something that's out of line to a major female lore character? How shocking that a villain would belittle a woman! It's really Draka's response that should form the context of this situation. It's stupid to say villains shouldn't ever say anything sexist. Next thing you know, people will complain if a villain kicks a puppy!

 

Rape jokes are even endorsed in hearthstone’s card set: There's no rape joke there, sorry. Typical bent over female elf, sure. I'll give you that one. Then again, female Night Elves are the warrior caste in WoW. Seems like NEs have a lot of female badassery going on. Not to mention the whole Sylvanus and her Dark Rangers, who are so badass that people have been asking for playable Dark Rangers since the game came out. It makes the whole bouncy-boobed idle animations, skimpy armor on females (belly button plate!) seem even worse, though. It's like, "Hey, we have badass female warriors!  . . . . In bikini plate!" Kind of a wash on how they depict females in game. But the negative there is really the art. There may be some bone-headedness in the placement of the text and the image, but I think claiming it adds up to a rape joke is a stretch.

 

What if gender roles were reversed for in-game dialogue? I actually thought the dialog sounded fine with Thrall being cast as the female. Well, not fine. It was some crappy dialog to begin with. The whole damsel in distress, implied rape thing is very tired, and yeah, more than a little sexist. I found two things disturbing about the "fixed" dialog. First off, it's "wreaked" not "wrecked." Seriously, if you're going to frame a large part of your arguments in semantics, learn the idioms of the language you're writing in. Second, she strikes out "my love." What in the holy hell is sexist about that phrase? Is it the "my"? My wife calls me "my love," and I call her "my love' all the freaking time. It's a term of endearment, not a term of belittlement. Striking the phrase strikes me as overdoing things just a bit. No. It strikes me as way too over sensitive and ignorant, but I was trying to be polite.

 

Here's the bottom line: World of Warcraft has always had cool, strong, female characters. They've frequently been given awesome storylines and dialog. They've also tainted them in some stupid, sexist ways starting with the art. Because nothing says powerful and respected female leader like belly button armor.

 

Will Warlords of Draenor actually be any worse than the norm for Blizzard? I doubt it. They don't have a sterling track record anyway. If the author of that article thinks Jaina's storyline in MoP was in anyway an elevation of the character, then she has some seriously rose-tinted glasses on, and that's only looking at the current expansion.

 

WoD will definitely have sexist elements to it, just like every past iteration of the game. But declaring it some kind of huge step back on the three above points is may be premature. The damsel in distress point -- particularly the talking around the implied rape -- is probably the most damning. But if that's the worst of it, then WoD will likely be about an average effort for Blizz in regards to sexism. Probably on par with Classic or BC.

[Sociotard]

The sexual harassment of Draka: We don't know what Draka's response is. So . . . what do we have? A villain saying something that's out of line to a major female lore character? How shocking that a villain would belittle a woman! It's really Draka's response that should form the context of this situation. It's stupid to say villains shouldn't ever say anything sexist. Next thing you know, people will complain if a villain kicks a puppy!

 

I think part of the problem is that it does seem so natural for a villain to demean a woman because she is a woman.  There's a sense that this is basically normal behavior.

 

 

See, it's only bad guys threatening to rape catwoman and calling her sexist slurs.  If Batman ever does get threatened with rape, it is nowhere near as common. It is only normal to make the threat to the woman.

 

[Pattern Ghost]

I think part of the problem is that it does seem so natural for a villain to demean a woman because she is a woman.  There's a sense that this is basically normal behavior.

 

 

See, it's only bad guys threatening to rape catwoman and calling her sexist slurs.  If Batman ever does get threatened with rape, it is nowhere near as common. It is only normal to make the threat to the woman.

 

 

A) He's a bad guy.  B... He didn't threaten to rape anyone.

[Sociotard]

But he made a sexist comment in a way that made sexism look normal.  which is a problem even for bad guys.

[Pattern Ghost]

That's an absurd argument. The writer simply chose a line of insult that would anger a female warrior. You could as easily infer that the line highlights the empowering aspect of the character. Which would also be reading too much into it.

 

And "in a way that..." really? What way was that? Did you see the context, what came before, and more importantly, after the comment? Did you hear any voice acting if there was any? No. Because no context means no context.

 

If someone suggested a bit of lazy or trite writing, and that perhaps it showed either a conscious or unconscious bias, then sure. That might be feasible. But that would still be making a huge assumption without information we cannot know. Like, you know, the sex of the author of that dialog. Blizz does employ females.

 

I think there are enough more egregious examples of sexism out there that we don't need to read into out of context quotes from unreleased titles just yet.

[Cygnia]

 

Yesterday, Chana messages CCCC to politely ask for a refund, due to her interactions with the page. She states that this is because she doesn't feel like it will be a safe environment for cosplayers. This message is copied and pasted into a post by Mark Martin, where he mocks her for feeling unsafe, and calls her "bat-shit crazy." His wife and friends belittle and mock her in the comments, and say she does crack. One suggests that she be forced to attend, and Mark replies that "We don't want her kind there."

Cherry City Comic Con Debacle.

[Zeropoint]

How the heck does anyone living in the 21st century fail to realize that stuff like this is no longer acceptable? I can understand someone still having private prejudices, and even still thinking that they "should" be allowed to express them, but how is anyone so unaware as to think it's okay to act like that in public?

[Cancer]

Salem, OR? Close enough to me to stay away from.

[Enforcer84]

That was not handled well. Oh Salem. 

[Cygnia]

[Cygnia]

 

Curbing Online Abuse Isn’t Impossible. Here’s Where We Start

 

[Enforcer84]

Wow disabled faction communication in Vanilla IIRC because of this. And, WoW can still be a pretty acrid place. If twitter doesn't consider rape threats harassment, what do they consider harassment? Saying something bad about a corporate sponsor?