Something That Needs To Be Said About Women Gamers
- gamersunitedgg
- Feb 2, 2015
- 3 min read
Even with the development of GamerGate, I still continuously receive sexual harassment and threats for being in the gaming industry. No, I’m no big shot professional gamer or really in the public eye at all. I simply receive these threats for being in the gaming community.
Personally, I cannot say I am actually bothered by these messages purely because I understand it is probably some teenager behind his/her parent’s computer making empty threats. Be honest with yourself, on what social media platform have you not seen abuse? Sadly, it’s pretty rare in this modern-day to find any place on the internet that is not ridden with constant negativity and debate.
Regardless, there are constant waves of redundant negativity stating women should not be in the gaming community as a whole– whatsoever.
Now let’s preface this by stating I do agree that there are significant biological differences between men and women.
Before children of either sex are even introduced into their gender roles you can witness the gender differences taking place. The boys will not retain eye contact for long and need constant activity to keep themselves entertained. The girls, however, engage in more eye contact and seem to be focused on more relationship based activities. There are tons of studies done just to show how different men and women really are. Now, certain gender roles are in place for reason. For example, a woman would have a harder time performing up to standards to be a firefighter than a male would. Not to say a woman is inferior for the job mentally, but the physical difference is a huge factor in this example. If we are talking about a certain hobby, skill, or trade that would have definite factors that would make a single sex better for the task that would make sense and be perfectly logical, however, video games do not hold any grudge against either sex.
Video games do not require special skills that are only hardwired into men so the ill-conceived notion that women are not welcome in the gaming industry is thus invalid. Scientifically and biologically, women are just as capable to perform well in games as well as men can.
So, where is the judgement coming from?
There have been some complaints with the newer years that there has been more reported violence involving women and girls. There are many causes, but one that people are using as a scapegoat is women being portrayed as characters in video games such as Tomb Raider. Though, more women are being violent in movies as you can see with Black Widow from the Avengers, Angelina Jolie from Lara Croft’s Tomb Raider, and more. Is this a problem? No.
Emotions are felt the same in both sexes, the only difference is how they are expressed. Most of the men that do not want women in the gaming industry assert aggression. Aggression for men, is expressed when they want to assert control. Women assert aggression when they lose control, which naturally these differences can cause a lot of collateral damage.
The reason why it is socially acceptable for men to assert and show more aggression in public than women is because that is purely how men were taught. From a young age men were taught to fight their own battles, men do not cry, men do not get too excited, etc. Women were taught the complete opposite except anger was completely excluded from the list of emotions women were allowed to express.
Now what is it that is making the majority male party want to control women in the gaming community?
Men will tear women apart for being in a primarily “man’s world” when it comes to gaming, but when there are girls on Twitch streaming half-naked the same men that tore apart the women playing games are right there to support them. Sometimes I wonder if it’s at all a possibility that men are against women gaming is to possibly control the amount of sexualization in games for fear the feminists will reduce it to nothing. I will agree women are sexualized in gaming. Though, that’s not the only place women are being treated as such. Virtually everywhere in any media platform women are being sexualized, so video games are hardly the only portal in which this occurs.
Despite having those idiots who leave hateful remarks purely on my sex, I have found those people in support of women gaming to be amazing. I have never felt so welcome in a community before than I have with my Gamsels who aren’t just my fans, they are my friends.
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