So... let them have their event. Let them realize how by leaving men out that they are missing a key aspect of the gaming community. Learning by first hand experience is always the best way to learn.
Like I said, if it bothers you that much. Have a all male gaming event then.
So... let them have their event. Let them realize how by leaving men out that they are missing a key aspect of the gaming community. Learning by first hand experience is always the best way to learn.
The whole dang post
The difference is, nobody calls themselves cinephiles or bibliophiles
as I'm 28 years old
and have never once heard someone refer to themselves that way.
Gamer has been hijacked by the most toxic of our sub culture.
I'm not throwing gaming under the bus, or people who are gamers, but I think people who aren't shit lord gamer gaters should divorce themselves from the word "gamer" and move on.
What the flying fuck? Of course they do, don't be ridiculous. Hell, I'm a blibliophile myself.
As I'm 40 years old myself, I'll try not to treat you as a child. No promises.
Are you seriously suggesting that your life experience defines all of reality? Just google "I'm a blibliphile / cinephile" and see if nobody ever calls themselves that. Fucking hell what a dumb thing to say.
Gamer is a term with a very clear definition and has existed forever, long before videogames swerved misogynic. It's the entire industry that has a problem, not a single word that you can pile on your problems onto and then throw into the fire to make them disappear. You are in a videogame forum, you play videogames: you are a gamer. Period. Trying to distance yourself from what is wrong with gaming by removing this tag from you, as if it was a sticker that will magically make those things go away once you convince yourself you aren't one, is a childish reaction that changes absolutely nothing.
If you are so sickened of gaming culture that you want nothing with it, that's fair: stop playing games, stop coming to NeoGAF, and get on with your life. Only then will you have stopped being a gamer. Until then, you are a gamer, and calling yourself a striped Martian butterfly won't change a fucking thing, except alienating other gamers, including those you are supposedly defending.
What does giving up on the term "gamer" accomplish? Aren't "videogames" and "gaming" equally tainted? What will you call them when you explain what you're buying or playing to people? What will you tell people the G stands for in GAF? WIll you simply hide that part of your life to them, lie to them, tell them you're reading books? Do you expect everyone else to follow suit, hide their videogames like they were porn, play them when nobody is looking? How do you thing that stance makes it feel to minorities that are actually fighting to make gaming a more inclusive space, like the organizer of this event?
Hopefully I'm getting the point across that changing a label without changing anything else is the most possible fucking lazy move imaginable.
And I think that's lazy, stupid and cowardly for the reasons outlined above.
I think you could have mellowed the tone of this post a bit, jeeze. You're talking about whether or not someone wants to define themself as a "gamer". It's really not a big deal if they don't. I honestly don't blame anyone who wants to avoid that moniker nowadays.
You are so out of your depth here, I honestly feel bad for you. Life must fucking suck for you if this is the full extent of your ability to shift perspective and emphasize with others. Damn dude.
yeah let those women have their female-only event and realize they're fucking nothing without us
I was pretty clear on everything I said, you are the one taking things out of context and making assumptions. Ive been stating from the beginning that they should have their event. I see no problems with it.
Sharing is always great with people that share the same interest and the greater the amount better. This applies to all things outside of gaming. Humans are just social creatures and we thrive on it. You might not feel the need for men to be around to share something you enjoy but you cant speak for everyone.
You might not feel the need for men to be around to share something you enjoy but you cant speak for everyone.
Let them realize how by leaving men out that they are missing a key aspect of the gaming community. Learning by first hand experience is always the best way to learn.
And yet you have no qualms speaking for every woman and assuming they will feel empty without us men around. I mean:
Get the fuck out with that condescending bullshit.
Actually, wait, I do agree they will be missing (not having) a key part of the gaming community: all the harassment and belittlement. But I think they will not be missing them in the way you mean.
I feel bad for both of you if thats what you got out of my post.
People are having trouble with you in this thread because you don't seem to be acknowledging that the gaming community can be a horribly toxic place for women. You seem, on the surface at least, to be more interested in pushing some utopian ideal of everybody coming together in harmony and that's just not how the real world functions.
To be blunt, you seem to be living in blissful ignorance at best, and at worst your posts so far could be read as an attempt to ignore any of the actual substance of this issue while playing with words in a way that agitates people without saying anything that is outright abhorrent.
Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
The toxicity for men in gaming is no where near on the same level as it is for women (except for gay men, maybe).
I feel bad for both of you if thats what you got out of my post.
Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
No, the gaming community absolutely is not toxic for everyone. If you genuinely believe that, then you are living in blissful ignorance. As a straight, white man I can say with certainty that nobody in the gaming community is ever going to harass or bully me simply for being who I am.
This hasn't happened though. Men weren't excluded because they are all harassers, they were excluded because way too many are and they have been disrupting events similar to this. If someone has acted that way, it's not in this thread. So no reason to complain about it here.Its toxic for men too, its toxic for everyone. We all know this. Im just concentrating on the good. Which is sharing something we all love, gaming. Every community in all hobbies has its toxic side but if thats all you concentrate on than you arent going to enjoy what you love. I already state they should have their event but lets stop acting like all men in gaming are there to ruin it for the girls.
But you are correct that people don't get bullied and harassed for being straight white men.
You have no clue how they will be missed cause you can't speak for everyone.
I'd rather call myself a videogameophile, but I'm not a fucking weirdo, so I am just a person who loves games. I've always thought the term gamer was lame and corny as fuck, but now that it's associated with this misogynist "just pranks" sub culture, I will never use the word gamer to refer to myself.
I do.It seems like you understand exactly what I meant when I said those words, so I don't think we need to get into a debate about the vagaries of how to classify different levels of bullying, toxicity and harassment.
No one is saying this...but it's also not a stretch to say that (probably) all women gamers have experienced harassment online to some degree. Admittedly, that's speculation on my part, but it certainly seems the case to me from what I read online.
The toxicity for men in gaming is no where near on the same level as it is for women (except for gay men, maybe).
Dude, I don't know why youre attacking me over this. Of course the problem is with the entire culture, and I'm not trying to solve the problem by not calling myself a gamer, I just think the term gamer is fucking dumb. Get over yourself man.So you really think it's only "gamer" that's tainted, and not "gaming" or "games" or "videogames"? No wonder you think distancing yourself from that particular term is any kind of solution if that's your view of reality, but that sounds more like wishful thinking and cognitive dissonance to me, but whatever makes you happy at the end of the day.
Telling people to kill themselves or wishing them cancer because they don't perfrom well in game is toxic as fuck. You think that being straight, white and man stops that somehow?
No one is saying this...but it's also not a stretch to say that (probably) all women gamers have experienced harassment online to some degree. Admittedly, that's speculation on my part, but it certainly seems the case to me from what I read online.
The toxicity for men in gaming is no where near on the same level as it is for women (except for gay men, maybe).
I do.
Yeah as I bolded to make it clear, people don't get bullied for being men, straight or white. I'd love to get rid of racism, misogyny and homophobia. But personally I wouldn't stop there. I would also get rid of mocking of disabilities, body shaming, elitism that shows as bullying and insults and so on. I hate how people that are new to the game often get treated, like people having smurf accounts just so they can stomp and mock newcomers. But this topic isn't about that. It's about women in gaming who are indeed in a bad place.You don't think it stops a huge part of it? Think of being a woman or minority as an abuse amplifier: you get 10x the "normal" amount of abuse.
I didn't want to debate you, I wanted to correct you. I'm 33 with a lot of multiplayer gaming experience. If you think this is somehow relevant.If you understood what I meant with that statement, I don't understand why you would want this tangentially related debate with me.
I'm 36. Been gaming since I was a boy. Nobody has ever bullied or harassed me for being a man, or for being white, or for being straight.
That's it. I've got nothing else to add to that.
Dude, I don't know why youre attacking me over this. Of course the problem is with the entire culture, and I'm not trying to solve the problem by not calling myself a gamer, I just think the term gamer is fucking dumb. Get over yourself man.
I'm not attacking you, I'm debating a point; not even "against you", I've debated this before you mentioned it, with other posters, and will debate it again when it comes up again. If you don't want to keep debating a point, then don't debate it. It's not really that complicated.
I'm going to be honest: I think "gamer" is not a term we can afford to give up. It seems to me most people that believe we should just let it rot haven't taken a minute to think of the ramifications of doing so. Once you let GG-types co-opt the term, "gaming" and "games" are next, and then you've lost every gamer (sorry, "player of games") mindspace to them.
That's why I say that if you think it's just one term, then I understand you simply wanting to give it up. But hell if I'm going to sit here and take flak for defending something I believe is a crucial foothold in the fight against bigots.
As a white male in the US, I know I can't empathize with the organizers or even non-white/straight players,
I think that if a form of media consumption defines who you are to the point that you use a special word to define yourself, that's super cringey and lame.
We're on the same side in this thread, but you're being aggressively hostile about this argument, and you're kind of being a dick. Just chill out.
Yeah as I bolded to make it clear, people don't get bullied for being men, straight or white. I'd love to get rid of racism, misogyny and homophobia. But personally I wouldn't stop there. I would also get rid of mocking of disabilities, body shaming, elitism that shows as bullying and insults and so on. I hate how people that are new to the game often get treated, like people having smurf accounts just so they can stomp and mock newcomers. But this topic isn't about that. It's about women in gaming who are indeed in a bad place.
I didn't want to debate you, I wanted to correct you. I'm 33 with a lot of multiplayer gaming experience. If you think this is somehow relevant. I have a friend who has dwarfism and also in a wheelchair. The vile shit he has gone through makes me react when someone claims that he is safe of harassment because he is straight, white and man. Sure he would had it even worse if he was also a woman, but even as a man he gets made fun of because of his voice too. Which is because of his condition.
If you have no sympathy for him, please don't say anything about this issue. I really don't want to hear it.
Not gonna reply to everyone, I said what I had to say and if all you get is what you get from it than so be it. I was very clear on what I Expressed. Can't make everyone happy.
Not gonna reply to everyone, I said what I had to say and if all you get is what you get from it than so be it. I was very clear on what I Expressed. Can't make everyone happy.
You weren't clear at all. That's why people are taking away a different meaning from what you apparently intended even after your clarifications, which are also inadequate.
No it's was, that post is getting ignored. So now I'm done with this thread.
No it's was, that post is getting ignored. So now I'm done with this thread.
Not trying to start an argument, not trying to belittle what women are going through.
Just in my experience I can't agree with your last statement at all about toxicity levels, based on my own experiences. I've been online gaming since it's inception and nearly every game I've played with open chat, or voice, or a way to communicate with the other players I'm called to varying degrees and with varying ferocity a dick head, a piece of shit, a fucking asshole, that I should die, that I should kill myself, that I am the worst player they've ever seen, that they hope my family dies, etc. etc. etc. This goes for all of my friends that play as well. (am I allowed to use the explicit words above? If not, my apologies and I can edit them out).
Since I've been gaming so long, I shrug it off because it has simply become unfortunate, annoying background noise. Women definitely face more direct, targeted toxicity but I think that unfortunately gaming online, etc. as a whole CAN be a pretty toxic place.
Rookhelm, it really is a shame. I have two very young daughters, one of them is finally starting to "get" using a controller (if you have small children these controllers are enormous to them in their little hands). It's a shame that I have ZERO confidence in allowing her to communicate with anyone online in any game. Honestly i'm not sure what to do, she will eventually want to play online.