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[smeeprocket]

My point being, there is a very hostile, dangerous male element in the gaming community that resents women being involved at all, (even though some of us have been here from the beginning, I've been gaming since before some of these noobs were born.)

Oh, definitely. I wasn't trying to say that there wasn't a bad male element; I was just saying that the majority of male gamers, while probably not actively trying to be progressive, aren't actually attacking women, feminism, or anything related. They're the silent majority.

Unfortunately, the most unpleasant people tend to be the most vocal.

One thing to consider is though, if the majority of male gamers are silent in the face of this discrimination and outright abuse of female gamers, are they not complicit in the act? By letting this happen, by not ostracizing or speaking out against these men, they are allowing the problem to persist.

BurnedToast, is this an issue for you though? Do you CARE about it? I don't consider rape and murder threats so serious a person has to leave their home or cancel speaking arrangements as just trolls and jerks. It is a dangerous criminal element. What have you, as a male gamer, done to speak out about it? What do you do in the face of sexism amongst your peers? Do you stop it in its tracks or do you remain silent and hope it goes away?

[Fniff]

By that logic, I condone the oppression of Australian aboriginals because I don't talk about it that often.
The fact of the matter is that at the end of the day, most gamers simply want a good game and don't really care about anything surrounding it. This doesn't make them bad people, and you can get things done even with the silent majority problem. The trick is to make their silence seem like an approving one.
Besides, what are you doing to stop harassment?

[Reelya]

It's also like claiming black people condone muggings because so few black people speak out against black muggers.

Generally there is a phrase "don't feed the trolls". Most people try and ignore the trolls because this is the #1 most successful action to stop them doing what they do. Loudly telling everyone what the trolls are doing - has that ever worked to stop trolls? It's the kind of attention they're actually after. Some idiot troll who is about 16 years old according to one feminist blogger in Australia - she ID'd her attackers on facebook, originally she had thought they were adult men - is just lapping that up if it becomes a big media stink over what he did. If there's a name attached to the comments, we can call them out and/or report them to moderators, but anonymous threats aren't easy to deal with. How to you ostracize someone who doesn't have a name?

Sure, come up with some effective suggestions on how we can even do that, and then we can try and implement. Loudly telling everyone what the trolls are doing has a few obviously flaws as a strategy.

[smeeprocket]

Well if you are Australian than yea, that should be a big issue for you that you are not silent on. So that sort of supports my point. I mean, the aborigines were raped and murdered out of existence, there are nor more pure members of that particular racial heritage. The last aboriginal male's testicles were made into a tobacco pouch. Their children were systematically kidnapped and raised as a servant class to the white oppressors that ruled over them.

Much like how Native American rights, which are still very much being ridiculously violated, are important to me and I make a point to try to educate myself on it (did you know 1 in 3 native american women will be raped?)

You don't have to approve of something to let it continue to exist, you just have to.. do nothing.

edit: reelya are you saying mugging is a specifically black crime? That's not the same, that's you making a racist assumption.

edit: fniff I network with other feminists, I educate, I speak out, when I see someone doing that shit I call them on it. I'm at a rather large risk of that all happening to me, tbh. It's terrifying.

[Virtz]

There are a lot of women that game, they are not any less capable of it than men. They represent a large enough group for their interests to be recognized and targeted. The absolute male dominance in the industry also suggests that females are very much being excluded from the process. Men aren't going to appeal to people that don't have their interest. Women would better be able to appeal to other women.

This is an issue that sort of cycles back on itself. People say there are not enough women gamers, women are viewed at inferior at games and in the industry (though the original programmers were mostly women, and the very first programmer was a woman,) they aren't hired, they aren't marketed to, and the majority of the male gamer populace (I stress majority, not saying all dudes,) go on about their business, and then get enraged anytime a female gamer speaks out or a game company tries to appeal to female gamers, often accusing them of having an "agenda"

I'll simply say, as someone who went through college with a major in Computer Science, I think there are very few female programmers in general. There were 3 female students in my group of about 40, and they all dropped out within the first year. I know of 2 that actually went and got a degree, one of them a Master's, in the higher years. That's a woefully low number, and chances are none of them went to work in the AAA games industry, as that's not the greatest career path for a programmer in general (I know I'm steering clear of it).

It's not the industry that's excluding them. It's not the school system either. Before college, every maths teacher I had was female, every information science teacher I had was female, and all but one physics teacher I had was female. There was nothing there to discourage them based on their gender. And yet the numbers are what they are.

One thing to consider is though, if the majority of male gamers are silent in the face of this discrimination and outright abuse of female gamers, are they not complicit in the act? By letting this happen, by not ostracizing or speaking out against these men, they are allowing the problem to persist.

BurnedToast, is this an issue for you though? Do you CARE about it? I don't consider rape and murder threats so serious a person has to leave their home or cancel speaking arrangements as just trolls and jerks. It is a dangerous criminal element. What have you, as a male gamer, done to speak out about it? What do you do in the face of sexism amongst your peers? Do you stop it in its tracks or do you remain silent and hope it goes away?

I've never seen anyone abused online based on their gender. If anything, I've seen favoritism in MMOs based on gender of the character a player was sporting (although I've heard this has died down by now).

Also, when rape and murder threats arise, that's when you call the police. If it's a criminal offence and it actually happened, you call the police. They have ways of tracking who did it. You live in a civilized country, call the police. Don't tweet about it to rile up a useless internet mob in outrage. Call the police.

[Fniff]

I'm not Australian, I'm Irish. One point of contention in my country is the divide between Catholism and Protestantism. What do I do about this?
... Nothing. There was years upon years of terrorist attacks in Northern Ireland that made it the Afghanistan of Europe for a while. There's still popups now and then. However, my response is to do absolutely nothing.
Because where do you start?
I mean, take me and women in gaming. I'm a man, so that's a point against me already. I consider myself a feminist but about the biggest contribution I've made to equality is making sure I have an equal spread in my Roleplay characters. If I ever made a game, I would make an effort for equality in it but I haven't made a game yet, have I.

This is the problem. There's no incentive for me to help from my position because there is nothing substantial I can do from my position. I imagine this is the same for most fairly privileged sixteen year old white males.

[smeeprocket]

There are a lot of women that game, they are not any less capable of it than men. They represent a large enough group for their interests to be recognized and targeted. The absolute male dominance in the industry also suggests that females are very much being excluded from the process. Men aren't going to appeal to people that don't have their interest. Women would better be able to appeal to other women.

This is an issue that sort of cycles back on itself. People say there are not enough women gamers, women are viewed at inferior at games and in the industry (though the original programmers were mostly women, and the very first programmer was a woman,) they aren't hired, they aren't marketed to, and the majority of the male gamer populace (I stress majority, not saying all dudes,) go on about their business, and then get enraged anytime a female gamer speaks out or a game company tries to appeal to female gamers, often accusing them of having an "agenda"

I'll simply say, as someone who went through college with a major in Computer Science, I think there are very few female programmers in general. There were 3 female students in my group of about 40, and they all dropped out within the first year. I know of 2 that actually went and got a degree, one of them a Master's, in the higher years. That's a woefully low number, and chances are none of them went to work in the AAA games industry, as that's not the greatest career path for a programmer in general (I know I'm steering clear of it).

It's not the industry that's excluding them. It's not the school system either. Before college, every maths teacher I had was female, every information science teacher I had was female, and all but one physics teacher I had was female. There was nothing there to discourage them based on their gender. And yet the numbers are what they are.

One thing to consider is though, if the majority of male gamers are silent in the face of this discrimination and outright abuse of female gamers, are they not complicit in the act? By letting this happen, by not ostracizing or speaking out against these men, they are allowing the problem to persist.

BurnedToast, is this an issue for you though? Do you CARE about it? I don't consider rape and murder threats so serious a person has to leave their home or cancel speaking arrangements as just trolls and jerks. It is a dangerous criminal element. What have you, as a male gamer, done to speak out about it? What do you do in the face of sexism amongst your peers? Do you stop it in its tracks or do you remain silent and hope it goes away?

I've never seen anyone abused online based on their gender. If anything, I've seen favoritism in MMOs based on gender of the character a player was sporting (although I've heard this has died down by now).

Also, when rape and murder threats arise, that's when you call the police. If it's a criminal offence and it actually happened, you call the police. They have ways of tracking who did it. You live in a civilized country, call the police. Don't tweet about it to rile up a useless internet mob in outrage. Call the police.

no rape and murder threats, especially anonymous, are not something the police will help you with. It happened, and the police did nothing, they don't even do anything about stalkers, they really don't care if someone is threatening you. They don't have ways of tracking it, and acting like remaining silent is a good idea is WRONG. The fact that you think speaking out about it is stirring the pot, that women should shut up and let the authorities handle it... or what? they are inviting more trouble and now they deserve it? I mean, police don't even actively pursue rape cases when there is evidence, why would they bother with a threat.

The fact is, the first programmers were women, the very first programmer was a woman (though she was waaay before the first computers,) women were crowded out early on. Again you are wrong. The reason you had female math teachers but you saw no female programmers is because teaching is considered an acceptable female profession. But, in general, both sexes perceive women as being inherently worse at math, and after middle school, about the time boys and their opinions start to matter, female math scores drop off. However, there are quite a few female game developers doing indie work, they just don't get into the big games and the big companies.

See this is a big problem. This "I don't see the issue so it doesn't exist" mentality is supporting this kind of degenerate behavior and general sexism.

Let me be the first and probably not the last to tell you that you, as a male, will not see the problem most of the time, you might even overlook it when you see it. As a female, I have had some of the most awful stuff said to me imaginable. I have had people do things for me, and then use that as a way to come on to me, as if I owed them some sort of sexual service, I have watched women get slut shamed for trading pics for in game currency when that is their body and their right to do (it is not the "problem" which you seem to think it is,) I have dealt with girls who had a guy guilt them into sharing pics because he said he had testicular cancer (he didn't and he did it to a lot of girls) then share said pics with everyone. Of course, they got slut shamed, but guys shared dick pics all the time, and no one shamed them. I had a guy intimidate me and frighten me by threatening to do things in game that would destroy my character's reputation (which was already bad as an authoritarian female figure, basically he was going to do something that I would have to kick him out of the city for, and inevitably, because he was a powerhouse pvp'r, everyone would hate me for it,) to get me to share sexual details and pics. I have had guys make nasty comments about my sexual organs because I owned them in pvp, and dear god, I don't dare do voice chat on games like TF2, the creepers come out in force. And I don't dare stream games because that brings them out also.

You have no idea what you are talking about and it behooves you as a gamer who I assume does not approve of this kind of thing to educate yourself to the problem.

[Neonivek]

I don't know smeeprocket it is kind of like if I judged 50% of all women to be "poor" because they are Liberals and I am conservative.

See this is a big problem. This "I don't see the issue so it doesn't exist" mentality is supporting this kind of degenerate behavior and general sexism

Which is what I can bring against 50% of all women. Afterall the Liberal mentality is anti-business and is one of the largest contributing factors for the current economic straights the USA is in.

[smeeprocket]

I'm not Australian, I'm Irish. One point of contention in my country is the divide between Catholism and Protestantism. What do I do about this?
... Nothing. There was years upon years of terrorist attacks in Northern Ireland that made it the Afghanistan of Europe for a while. There's still popups now and then. However, my response is to do absolutely nothing.
Because where do you start?
I mean, take me and women in gaming. I'm a man, so that's a point against me already. I consider myself a feminist but about the biggest contribution I've made to equality is making sure I have an equal spread in my Roleplay characters. If I ever made a game, I would make an effort for equality in it but I haven't made a game yet, have I.

This is the problem. There's no incentive for me to help from my position because there is nothing substantial I can do from my position. I imagine this is the same for most fairly privileged sixteen year old white males.

First off, good for you for considering yourself a feminist. That's an excellent position to take. You don't have to be a woman to care about equality for women.

You are in a position that I, as a female, am not. You have moments when other guys will start talking about women in ways they may not speak of in my presence. You have the opportunity to step in and shut down that kind of talk and to speak out for my rights to men who might value your opinion above mine. While I believe it should be women who lead the discussion on women's rights, including with regards to gaming, we need vocal male supporters to amplify our voices to people that don't think our opinions matter.

How can you change things? Speak out. If someone says something sexist or does something scummy, say something. Don't say things like say "I totally got raped by that guy" because that trivializes the term and is just painful for survivors to hear. If someone uses it, and you have the opportunity, let it be known that you think it's not appropriate. If someone starts talking about how much women suck at gaming or how this or that woman trades pics for her gear, shut it down hard.

All you have to do is speak up if you come across it. And educate yourself on the details. It's 2014, we should all be educated on these issues, we have the internet to access this stuff on for heaven's sake.

[smeeprocket]

I don't know smeeprocket it is kind of like if I judged 50% of all women to be "poor" because they are Liberals and I am conservative.

See this is a big problem. This "I don't see the issue so it doesn't exist" mentality is supporting this kind of degenerate behavior and general sexism

Which is what I can bring against 50% of all women. Afterall the Liberal mentality is anti-business and is one of the largest contributing factors for the current economic straights the USA is in.

I disagree with all of that. But you are just trying to use a decoy to distract from the issue because I don't know what any of this post has to do with the price of tea in china.

Also, being poor is not a crime. I'm not a bad person because I don't have money. I have had my life threatened by bad people because of it though.

But as I said, not on topic at all.

[Neonivek]

I stopped being a feminist, I just don't believe the full ideologies and even suggesting that men have any sort of disadvantage usually gets you sour looks in any feminist conversation... Even if your talking about the duality of the genders.

Feminism is often just a flat out ugly conversation.

But honestly, I still believe most of what I believed before. and honestly it helped the nuance of my understanding not to try to be feminist.

In otherwords I am a better feminist by not being a feminist.

I don't know smeeprocket it is kind of like if I judged 50% of all women to be "poor" because they are Liberals and I am conservative.

See this is a big problem. This "I don't see the issue so it doesn't exist" mentality is supporting this kind of degenerate behavior and general sexism

Which is what I can bring against 50% of all women. Afterall the Liberal mentality is anti-business and is one of the largest contributing factors for the current economic straights the USA is in.

I disagree with all of that. But you are just trying to use a decoy to distract from the issue because I don't know what any of this post has to do with the price of tea in china.

Also, being poor is not a crime. I'm not a bad person because I don't have money. I have had my life threatened by bad people because of it though.

But as I said, not on topic at all.

I am saying smeeprocket stop being antagonistic towards the majority of men.

[smeeprocket]

I stopped being a feminist, I just don't believe the full ideologies and even suggesting that men have any sort of disadvantage usually gets you sour looks in any feminist conversation... Even if your talking about the duality of the genders.

Feminism is often just a flat out ugly conversation.

I don't know smeeprocket it is kind of like if I judged 50% of all women to be "poor" because they are Liberals and I am conservative.

See this is a big problem. This "I don't see the issue so it doesn't exist" mentality is supporting this kind of degenerate behavior and general sexism

Which is what I can bring against 50% of all women. Afterall the Liberal mentality is anti-business and is one of the largest contributing factors for the current economic straights the USA is in.

I disagree with all of that. But you are just trying to use a decoy to distract from the issue because I don't know what any of this post has to do with the price of tea in china.

Also, being poor is not a crime. I'm not a bad person because I don't have money. I have had my life threatened by bad people because of it though.

But as I said, not on topic at all.

I am saying smeeprocket stop being antagonistic towards the majority of men.

I'm not, and if I have to defend myself against charges of being antagonist towards men, then you don't have to confront the very real issue. There are men that are the problem, I shouldn't have to say "not all men btw" every time I make a post. I mean, that's even an MRA hashtag.

Look it up, #notallmen

[Neonivek]

Not all men is just sexist all over to the extent that even people who reference it are sexist (especially if you read what they say).

[Reelya]

Well if you are Australian than yea, that should be a big issue for you that you are not silent on. So that sort of supports my point. I mean, the aborigines were raped and murdered out of existence, there are nor more pure members of that particular racial heritage. The last aboriginal male's testicles were made into a tobacco pouch. Their children were systematically kidnapped and raised as a servant class to the white oppressors that ruled over them.

That's not fully correct, Tasmania specifically is noted for completely killing off the indigenous australians ("aborigine" is seen as insulting, so shouldn't be used). There are in fact plenty pure blooded people especially in the warmer northern parts where Europeans didn't settle in large numbers. There are tribes out there still where many older members cannot speak any English.

As for "servant class" no you adopted/fostered them as your own children. Some people did adopt them and exploit them by making them work - but this also happened to substatial numbers of white children too. There was abuse, but English orphans were also sent out and fostered/adopted and they had the exactly same thing happen to them that happened to the black children. Here's a newspaper article about white children sent from England who had virtually identical experiences to the black children:
http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/stolen-generation-20110602-1fh3o.html

[smeeprocket]

Well if you are Australian than yea, that should be a big issue for you that you are not silent on. So that sort of supports my point. I mean, the aborigines were raped and murdered out of existence, there are nor more pure members of that particular racial heritage. The last aboriginal male's testicles were made into a tobacco pouch. Their children were systematically kidnapped and raised as a servant class to the white oppressors that ruled over them.

That's not fully correct, Tasmania specifically is noted for completely killing off the indigenous australians ("aborigine" is seen as insulting, so shouldn't be used). There are in fact plenty pure blooded people especially in the warmer northern parts where Europeans didn't settle in large numbers.

As for "servant class" no you adopted/fostered them as your own children. There was abuse, but English orphans were also sent out and fostered/adopted and they had the exactly same thing happen to them that happened to the black children. Here's a newspaper article about white children who had the same thing happen to them:
http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/stolen-generation-20110602-1fh3o.html

these weren't orphans though, they were ripped from their family's arms.

Also The pintupi nine were the last, I thought. Actually, I was reading a biology book by Dawkins (sexist pig that I learned he is) about them being gone for good.

edit: anyway, I don't want to get off topic. The point was that Australians should be interested and engaged in that. I don't know how that relates to Ireland at all, but whatever.