Feminism

[SecretAsianMan]

So, I mean, surely you must agree that somewhere in the world there are at least two women who are qualified for the job, right? You don't think there are literally no women who could do the job, I imagine. So wouldn't it have made sense to hold out for those two women?

 

I'm sure there are women out there who are probably qualified.  But without knowing more about the circumstances and the process they went through, I'm not willing to crucify them because of one (albeit very important) issue out of several that one could raise about the whole thing.  Maybe they needed to fill those positions now and waiting wasn't a viable option.  Maybe they're huge assholes.  Maybe both.  What I'm saying is that unless told otherwise, I like to think that they didn't just outright reject the notion of hiring a woman because she was a woman.

 

All that said, I DO think it's totally fair to call them out on it.  I don't think they're completely blameless.  People are right to tell them that they should have tried harder or to should have included more diversity.  GB should be aware of these issues.

[Argobot]

The Giantbomb thing is mildly disappointing, but it feels like too many people are giving this situation more weight than it deserves. Not hiring a woman doesn't mean that games will never become better and if they had actually hired a woman, it wouldn't have magically fixed all those problems either. I wish we could stop pretending that meaningful social change is going to come from sources like Giantbomb, who will always be shackled to the demands of their community.

[SecretAsianMan]

Maddy Myers said on Twitter that Cara Ellison applied at GB. It's not a first hand account, but Maddy knows Cara well enough that I trust she's not BSing around saying that.

 

Cara's no Dan Ryckert in terms of experience, but she's no greenhorn either and her reputation is super solid. Her chemistry with the GB crew on the E3 podcast was really good, from the perspective of this listener.

 

So, if one of the most visible female freelancer rising stars was not accepted, who else applied who had similar if not better experience but may be less well known and got denied a hiring?

 

This was posted while I was typing my other response.  I'm not really familiar with Cara Ellison's work, but that's not a slight against her.  Honestly I'm familiar with no one's work because I don't read a lot of things.  I don't pay attention to individuals, just topics.  So I don't know firsthand how qualified she is (though I'm more than willing to believe that she is) and it's disappointing to hear that she didn't get hired if all that is true.  But again, I don't condemn GB because there are a lot of things to consider.  I'm certainly disappointed though.

[Bjorn]

Fuck, went link surfing through some stuff through that Critical Distance piece Reyturner linked.

 

Porpentine is dropping her RPS column.  Her goodbye is understandable, but infuriating.

 

4. Games culture is an abusive place to be, especially for trans women, or any femininely identified people who don’t conform on some axis. Over the years I’ve experienced a lot of aggressive and deeply inappropriate behavior (to name a few: shouting at me, phone harassment, comments about my body, pressuring me to cover or not cover games for this column), and trying to talk about it only leads to ostracism. I don’t have the stomach for it, and I want to participate in and foster spaces where marginalized artists have respect, dignity, and support.

 

5. I recognize that internal critique is harder than outward critique, but without that constant work, these spaces will continue to remain unsafe, for me and for many others. If you look around, the people you don’t see are the people who were too intimidated to show up.

 

6. My health has gotten pretty bad as a result. I’m going to keep doing all the porpy things I do but this is a necessary sacrifice to have the time I need to take care of myself and focus on my art.

 

Samantha Allen's piece anticipating white male hires at BG is infuriating:

 

When the next time rolls around, we’ll be the ghosts that the fresh-faced kids tell Twitter stories about. It might be premature, but I’m already in mourning for a generation of smart, savvy minority voices that will never find their full expression in this space. It’s heartbreaking to watch ourselves burn out.

 

Then there's Maddy Myers, which I can't even quote anything from, because it's all so personal and so interconnected.  Just read it.

[Bjorn]

Missed an article I meant to link, this critique of GB and others and how they go about considering GOTY contenders.  It's a good summary of why having women on staff matters, but also calls out the additional shitty challenges that come with being a female staff writer (callouts to the kind of abuse that Danielle and Carolyn Petit have to suffer through just to do their job). 

 

I'm not saying that this happened at GB, but I can imagine a group of men talking about hiring a woman at a gaming outlet, and being uncomfortable with the kind of comments you'll get and moderation you might have to do at times simply because you hired a woman.  Not that that alone would stop someone from making the hire, but it being another mental blow in favor of just hiring another dude like you. 

[clyde]

The Giantbomb thing is mildly disappointing, but it feels like too many people are giving this situation more weight than it deserves. Not hiring a woman doesn't mean that games will never become better and if they had actually hired a woman, it wouldn't have magically fixed all those problems either. I wish we could stop pretending that meaningful social change is going to come from sources like Giantbomb, who will always be shackled to the demands of their community.

My opinions on this issue aren't so much a wish for meaningful social change as much as they are a desire for something I used to enjoy becoming interesting and relevant again. I was already frustrated with what I perceive as a stagnation that in all likelihood would have been alleviated with the addition of two female cast-members.

[Argobot]

My opinions on this issue aren't so much a wish for meaningful social change as much as they are a desire for something I used to enjoy becoming interesting and relevant again. I was already frustrated with what I perceive as a stagnation that in all likelihood would have been alleviated with the addition of two female cast-members.

 

I seriously doubt that the stagnation you're describing would have been halted by adding women to the staff. That's not something that either of us can ever prove, but still. Injecting women into a community that is fundamentally the same community won't produce the dramatic effects that I think most of us are clamoring for.

[feelthedarkness]

The idea of "qualification" kind of gets to the heart of equal opportunity issues. If one says "there are no qualified women" but no place ever hires women, how will they ever find a qualified woman? Elevating one or two woman to a senior position would still leave them in a vast minority. I regard this GB thing as an abject failure precisely because they knew there have been perception issues raised to senior staff. 

 

It doesn't totally negate there are some funny people doing good work there, but as of 7/1/14 they have maintained an absolute boys club, and have had it pointed out before this most recent decision.

 

I also agree that adding a few women won't fundamentally change the culture, but a major institution stepping up and saying "we need to change this culture" and hiring (then not standing for harassment of) women is the first step to improving the culture. 

[clyde]

I seriously doubt that the stagnation you're describing would have been halted by adding women to the staff. That's not something that either of us can ever prove, but still. Injecting women into a community that is fundamentally the same community won't produce the dramatic effects that I think most of us are clamoring for.

Agreed that neither of us know, but let's not let that stop us from speculating.

I'll explain what my reasoning is. First I need to say that I'm not proposing that injecting a few women into the community as a whole would have much of an impact on my enjoyment of the Bombcast, but I am saying that injecting them into the cast-roster would. I don't have a large enough sample to give anything but anecdotal impressions, but the few times I've heard women talk at length about something they have been interested in on a gaming podcast have been so exciting for me. Hearing Lara's opinion about Dragon Age 2 on the Gamers With Jobs Podcast was incredibly enlightening to me. Her opinion was drastically different than any I had heard before. This is a game that is generally dismissed as a failure by the vast majority of male games and opinionators, while I know three women that enjoyed it immensely of three women who I know played it. Regardless of whether or not it's fair to do so, this makes me think that I'm missing out on something that gender may be a significant variable of. The Dragon Age 2 example is not the only one, but it was an extreme anecdote in my experience which seems like a fractal piece of a more general desire I have.

Also, I'm a person who has surrounded myself with women all my life and feel more comfortable around them than I do men. For me, one of the things I don't like about the Bombcast is that the all-men-all-the-time is actually distracting for me; I get the feeling that the prescence of women is undesirable for them compared to the GWJ, Gameological Society, or Idle Thumbs podcasts. It just seems weird and cloistered. I'm not suggesting an injection of a racial diversity because I personally don't think that I would notice, but I would certainly notice an injection of women into the cast.

[SuperBiasedMan]

The Giantbomb thing is mildly disappointing, but it feels like too many people are giving this situation more weight than it deserves. Not hiring a woman doesn't mean that games will never become better and if they had actually hired a woman, it wouldn't have magically fixed all those problems either. I wish we could stop pretending that meaningful social change is going to come from sources like Giantbomb, who will always be shackled to the demands of their community.

 

Social change isn't magical, but it is gradual and this is one gradual slight change that would've been a help. I dunno about blaming GB unless something specific that seems more shitty comes out, but at this point, realistically you should think about specifically hiring to diversify such a narrow range of employees. If your workplace is 100% male, surely you have to stop and think that maybe there's something to be changed. Perhaps it's worth specifically choosing the best female for the job in order to counteract a clear male bias (whether the bias is yours, the industry or the candidates themselves is irrelevant, it's worth working against). Hell, there were two positions, it's not like they couldn't have still hired one guy anyway.

[Argobot]

I understand how social changes happens.

[Gormongous]

I don't know about social change, but it would have been some kind of change just to add some female voices to the Giant Bomb. Because the gender (and social and racial) politics of this industry are so polarized, women (and queer and minority) writers almost always have a different perspective and that's something I want. I'm not angry, I'm not crucifying Giant Bomb, but I am disappointed, the way that your parents are disappointed when you're not all you can be. There's not much else for me to say besides that.

[Twig]

I fall on the same side as Gor, here. It's fine to be disappointed. I am, too. But I don't really think it's something people should be getting up in arms about. Well, that's a bit strong. It's not something I personally can find any reason to get up in arms about.

 

I'm also sort of a little just a bit uncomfortable with the idea that they should pass up on hiring someone they think is better suited for the job just to get more diversity. They should hire whoever's best for the position, not just whoever fits some arbitrary social responsibility they are supposed to have. 

 

Except that PASSING UP ON CARA ELLISON IS THE MOST HORRIBLE OF SINS. Let's all crucify Giantbomb! Who's with me?

[anthonyRichard]

Disappointment at a lost opportunity seems an appropriate reaction. Scorn seems ... understandable, but not really reasonable.

[tegan]

At least we have the Giant Bomb East hires to look forward to.

[sclpls]

I don't follow Giant Bomb like at all, but I just wanted to chime in and say Cara Ellison is rad, and what she is doing right now being embedded with game designers is a really excellent project that everyone should check out.

[Gormongous]

I'm also sort of a little just a bit uncomfortable with the idea that they should pass up on hiring someone they think is better suited for the job just to get more diversity. They should hire whoever's best for the position, not just whoever fits some arbitrary social responsibility they are supposed to have.

 

I think we agree, but I just want to take issue with this really quick. Whether or not someone is "qualified", especially in the tech and tech-reporting industry, is a fucking mess that's tied up in people's unconscious expectations and biases. Studies have shown time and again that people will say they're choosing the most qualified person, but once they are pushed beyond a concrete numbers-based rubric, what they are actually choosing is the most familiar or most conventional person. I don't doubt that Giant Bomb just wanted to hire some more people who fit into the office culture, so however unwittingly, "thirty-something white dude who served at a major publication" was probably part of their definition for most qualified.

 

Also, Christ. I just got home and read the links to Samantha Allen's and Maddy Myers' twitter feeds that JonCole posted. Never mind, maybe this is something to get mad about, if the other side reacts with such venom and bile to someone asking the simple question of why they didn't hire a woman.

[Twig]

I think we agree, but I just want to take issue with this really quick. Whether or not someone is "qualified", especially in the tech and tech-reporting industry, is a fucking mess that's tied up in people's unconscious expectations and biases. Studies have shown time and again that people will say they're choosing the most qualified person, but once they are pushed beyond a concrete numbers-based rubric, what they are actually choosing is the most familiar or most conventional person. I don't doubt that Giant Bomb just wanted to hire some more people who fit into the office culture, so however unwittingly, "thirty-something white dude who served at a major publication" was probably part of their definition for most qualified.

Yeah that is definitely true and I don't disagree!

[JonCole]

At least we have the Giant Bomb East hires to look forward to.

 

This is actually a good point. Maddy, who I linked earlier and also applied for the GB West job, is based out of Boston. Maybe a great outcome to this is they end up hiring her in the end.

[SecretAsianMan]

I'd also like to point out that the GB crew is telling the people who are being assholes to the women speaking out to fuck off.

[coaxmetal]

There's all sorts of scuttlebutt around the internet over this, as there always is, but it seems that at least some of the hate directed towards people who were criticizing giant bomb came from reddit's "mens rights" community, which is full of assholes, and not actually from people in the GB community. I'm sure some of it was though, which is unfortunate, but I have seen some pretty terrible stuff said on the GB forums occasionally. Glad that Jeff & co responded though. 

 

Wrt the actual hiring, I think Dan and Jason seem great, but also that that is a nonissue.

[Reyturner]

At least we have the Giant Bomb East hires to look forward to.

This is a good point. GB's product has always been their personalities interacting with games, not strictly games themselves. Between Chicago and NY, they have a chance to create whole new dynamics. If anything, differentiating the outlets with more diverse POVs will help prevent their content from running together.

There you go (hypothetical person who thinks a business should only be held to account for making decisions based business reasons), immediate, clear cut, short term business reasons for increasing diversity.

[prettyunsmart]

In other news, there are more gender-related conflicts in the world of digital sports. I can't say I'm surprised, but that doesn't mean I'm not consistently annoyed about most video-game-related things.

[JonCole]

This is the worst - 
 

Is PC gamer actually complaining that there are no co-ed sports? Like.. seriously?
And people in the comments agree with that?
You people DO know that there is a divide in sports between the genders to 
make it fair for women, right? Since you know, males and females of the 
human species are different in how they gain muscles without 
muscle-enhancing drugs?
This whole white guilt and Social-Justice Thing in America is getting absolutely out of control. The sheer amount of ignorance, hypocrisy and DOUBLETHINK it took to 
write this article is simply mind boggling to me.

Continued, as a follow up to "How exactly would muscle gains improve your Hearthstone play?"

Sports have gender segregation due to how differently musclegrowth and endurance works --> for esports to be recognized as sports you need to follow the same rules as sports -->
Hearthstone apparently doesnt have enough of a professional female player following as Star Craft for example until now.
Its not that hard to follow simple logic, you know?

 

For me, "consistently annoyed" is a wild understatement.

[SecretAsianMan]

Among the thousand other reasons it's stupid and disgusting, it's also an example of why I hate trying to make esports like actual sports.  Actual professional sports organizations are pretty terrible, I don't know why we're trying to copy their awful example.  To say that you're not letting in women in an effort to look legitimate is just pure bullshit.  If that's what makes it legitimate, then fuck being legitimate.