Feminism

[thestalkinghead]

i have been thinking for a while now that a way to stop sexism/mysoginism online and in the gaming culture would be to get people that men respect to say how wrong it is, imagine your hero/idol or someone you look up to telling you that you are an asshole for doing what you are doing, i think the message would get through a lot better if the person telling you about these issues didn't have to earn any respect because the respect was already there.

 

add that to what Codicier just said about getting some perspective from a few brave victims (maybe even heros interviews victims) and i think there would be a strong basis for change.

[Argobot]

Voting with your dollar isn't usually a strategy I enthusiastically support, but numerous people have attempted the one-on-one approach with PA and it never seems to stick. At this point, it feels like a lost cause and I don't begrudge people who no longer want to participate. I also don't blame those who still believe that PA is capable of change, I'm sure they are. But that change probably won't come without a high price, like lots of people turning away from PA and PAX because of their refusal to listen or learn from their past mistakes.

Edit: A lot of prominent men in the video game community already are speaking out against the sexist culture. Patrick Klepek, John Walker, the Idle Thumbs, hell, even Cliffy B said some positive stuff about Anita Sarkesian recently. I'm happy that these men are speaking out, but I wish that it don't take a male voice for people to recognize that sexism is a problem. Plenty of prominent women have been making this argument for years, but their concerns have generally been ignored.

[Codicier]

The names you mention are certainly doing a good job raising awareness, but in some ways the more prominent someone is the more "other" they feel to people, i just feel that the best hope of getting through to someone like the PA guys is that someone they are close to them spells it out to  in a way which makes them at least want to try change.

 

It's particularly sad to hear the one on one approach has been tried and failed, it just feels so strange to think that someone could be face to face with someone and hear about something so distressing and not be moved.

[thestalkinghead]

it may not sound to great to say that it would take men to stop sexism, it sort of sounds like backwards non progressive thinking, but if someone doesn't respect the opinions of women they aren't going to listen to women, so it wouldn't matter how balanced, well thought out and intelligent an argument is it just wouldn't be listened to.

 

i think this is why penny arcade is so annoying to people right now, because if Mike Krahulik had said he made a mistake and that everybody harassing the women that had campaigned against him were dicks, instead of cheers he may have made quite a few people in the audience rethink their opinions.

[Codicier]

it may not sound to great to say that it would take men to stop sexism, it sort of sounds like backwards non progressive thinking, but if someone doesn't respect the opinions of women they aren't going to listen to women, so it wouldn't matter how balanced, well thought out and intelligent an argument is it just wouldn't be listened to.

 

i think this is why penny arcade is so annoying to people right now, because if Mike Krahulik had said he made a mistake and that everybody harassing the women that had campaigned against him were dicks, instead of cheers he may have made quite a few people in the audience rethink their opinions.

 

I'm not sure I wholey agree with what your saying though I do get where your coming from, after all there's a certain twisted logic in saying that if we live in a patriarchy those most able to effect change are the patriarchs. But even if that's true, it feels like the way forward would be to change the way those patriarchs self identify first.

 

now of course getting someone who is really stuck in their ways to change isn't easy. To make them see themselves not as "a man" but just as "a person", to see what they have in common with other humans regardless of sex and not their difference is not going to be a short journey.

 

But perhaps it is one which could start with them feeling that being a gamer is more important to who they see themselves as than whether or not they are a a man. That once they no longer see their sex as their defining feature, a very small step has been taken down a road that might lead somewhere good.

 

Edit: & i suppose that's why I feel instinctively I feel boycotting PAX isn't productive. Its supposed to be show for gamers, about celebrating what brings us together as a community.  (note: it must be mentioned at this point that I've never been to a PAX & as someone living in the UK i'm never going to go to a PAX so it's the potential of the show i'm talking about rather than a concrete experience I've had).

[Patrick R]

Why change PAX? Just replace it. There's a billion ways gamers are brought together as a community in 2013. PAX only got as big as it did because it was a more palatable alternative to E3 for many people. Boycotting makes perfect sense. 

[Codicier]

I don't think you can underestimate the amount of infrastructure a equivalent event would need to match PAXs scale from a standing start.

But that's not even my problem. As I said earlier, isn't the big aim here to change minds?

To make things better?

Why not work towards uniting the community, instead of dividing it even if that task is far from easy.

Shutting ourselves off from those people who's attitudes may at times dismay us isn't going to help , if we aren't careful we end up just preaching to the converted.

[Patrick R]

How have efforts to change Mike Krahulik's mind gone so far? At a certain point, creating safe spaces away from regressive assholes is just a better goal than trying to save the world from hate. 

[Max Ernst]

The cultural and moral shit-soup that is PAX must survive at all costs. Daddy needs game trailers. 

[Sententia]

Ultimately the most convincing argument for people to hear, at least it was to me, is not about respect or having the correct attitude towards women, it's a one-two of the fact of our current situation and the physical real-world effects words have.

 

Certain crimes are committed against women with sickening regularity, certain career paths are severely more difficult for a woman to follow, and these are just first-world issues.  If you took the whole of living humanity, the situation of the average human woman is grossly abused and powerless relative to a man.  I think most people are able to see the truth in this as it's demonstrably the case.  The second argument is harder for people to understand but just as logically proven in my opinion, which is that speech has tangible effects on how people treat one another.  The difficulty is getting both of these concepts across in a way that's broadly understandable, even to the people who are most set in their ways.  It's also hard to get this message spread to people who aren't listening for it.

[Codicier]

How have efforts to change Mike Krahulik's mind gone so far? At a certain point, creating safe spaces away from regressive assholes is just a better goal than trying to save the world from hate. 

 

I guess Patrick that on a simple emotional level, i just don't want this to be true.

I don't want to see the world and the people who live in it as unchangeable. That I don't want to give up hope that making things better is achievable objective.

It just seems such a bleak way of looking at things.

 

But then again i say this from a position of privilege, he's not directly hurting me with his idiocy.

Perhaps in the end your right and that we need safe spaces because direct engagement might not work now. I hope however that direct engagement remains a aim for people to strive towards, that we can keep faith that things will get better.

[brkl]

The thing with PAX is that participation sends a message and that message is that what PA does and says is OK by you. It shows that even if people cry out when PA act like dicks, when push comes to shove it doesn't matter, they'll take part in their events anyway. If you want to separate yourself from PA and the culture they represent, you have to put something on the line like Fullbright did.

[Dualhammers]

I personally experienced some of the gross sexism of the industry when my wife and I were out to dinner with some devs on Sunday night. At two separate times over the span of just a couple hours both one of the devs we were having dinner with and another female dev we met were met with jokes and comments that were unbelievably sexist. I was very happy when both of these women stood up for themselves. One of them even said it was the first time they had ever done that, and they were emboldened by other women speaking out at PAX. 

The problem was, both of the men looked to me for confirmation. It was dumbfounding to me how completely inconsequential they seemed to perceive the objections of another human being simply because they looked female.

 

[Argobot]

I'm sorry that happened. The few times I've attended PAX, my experience as a woman was no worse than it usually is. Sure, occasionally a developer will only talk to my boyfriend and seem mildly surprised when I express interest in a game. Or random (male) strangers will stop me when I walk through the hall and ask me for a hug. Or even better, someone will use my gender as excuse for why I'm able to do something they can't: "He's only talking to you because you're a girl." "You're pretty good at this game [for a girl]."

 

All that may seem innocuous -- and I'm so grateful that I've never experienced anything worse -- but being treated that way really wears you down after awhile. It'd be nice if I could attend something like PAX and not feel like an unwelcome outsider.

[Dualhammers]

Do you think it's actually possible to create a space like that, or would it simply expose other more deeply-hidden prejudices?

[Zeusthecat]

Do you think it's actually possible to create a space like that, or would it simply expose other more deeply-hidden prejudices?

 

If that space was created by the Idle Thumbs community then yes, it's totally possible.

[tegan]

Wizardcon '98?

 

(it has to be called '98, every year)

[Zeusthecat]

And everyone has to be dressed as a wizard so there won't be any sexes, only wizards.

[Twig]

Everyone knows wizards don't have sex.

[feelthedarkness]

I think the closest thing to an answer is try and do your part to listen to women, not talk over/around them, and try to keep your community accountable to some minimum standards. once it's unacceptable to behave that way in a plurality of communities change is inevitable. 

[Argobot]

If that space was created by the Idle Thumbs community then yes, it's totally possible.

 

The Idle Thumbs community is already like this, for the most part. It's one of the reasons I like it so much.

[SecretAsianMan]

I hate myself for doing this because it has almost nothing to do with the central topic of this thread, but I have to step in here and defend PAX a bit.  I'm not defending PA itself or the things that Mike and/or Jerry say or do.  And obviously PAX is related to PA in a big way.  But at the same time, PAX is sort of being it's own entity.  I know several enforcers and they are the nicest people.  I plan to be one myself at the next PAX.  A lot of people who attend PAX know nothing about PA, they're just excited to see games.  If PA ceased to exist today, if Mike and Jerry fell of the face of the earth, PAX would find a way to continue.  Any of the negative experiences that women have (such as Argobot's and Dualhammer's wife) are more a result of the overall culture that is present in games/geek society than of PAX itself.  And I think most of us realize that, PAX just presents a convenient target. 

 

Sorry for derailing like that, I just get kind of upset because there are way worse offenders out there than PAX.

[osmosisch]

Everyone knows wizards don't have sex.

A wizard's staff has a knob on the end.

[sclpls]

I hate myself for doing this because it has almost nothing to do with the central topic of this thread, but I have to step in here and defend PAX a bit.  I'm not defending PA itself or the things that Mike and/or Jerry say or do.  And obviously PAX is related to PA in a big way.  But at the same time, PAX is sort of being it's own entity.  I know several enforcers and they are the nicest people.  I plan to be one myself at the next PAX.  A lot of people who attend PAX know nothing about PA, they're just excited to see games.  If PA ceased to exist today, if Mike and Jerry fell of the face of the earth, PAX would find a way to continue.  Any of the negative experiences that women have (such as Argobot's and Dualhammer's wife) are more a result of the overall culture that is present in games/geek society than of PAX itself.  And I think most of us realize that, PAX just presents a convenient target. 

 

Sorry for derailing like that, I just get kind of upset because there are way worse offenders out there than PAX.

 

It isn't really an issue of whether there are worse offenders or not. I live in San Francisco which has much less gun violence than the neighborhoods in Chicago where I used to live. It doesn't follow that I should ignore gun violence where I live now just because Chicago is worse. Sexism is always part of the overall culture because it isn't just gaming, and it isn't just American society, sexism is the dominant paradigm of human societies. Does that mean we have to give a pass for each specific instance just because each individual instance is part of a broader problem? If a woman has an experience at PAX that makes her uncomfortable should she refrain from criticism just because you know some good people there? It's fine to enjoy the good aspects of PAX, but that shouldn't make it immune from criticism.

[Twig]

It's fine to enjoy the good aspects of PAX, but that shouldn't make it immune from criticism.

That's not what he said.

 

A wizard's staff has a knob on the end.