Sorry, dudes, but I think this blog has been on its last legs for a while, and I’m pretty much not keeping up with it.  I’m too busy, blah, blah, blah, etc.  But I had fun while it lasted, and I’ll still being playing my games, but I just don’t really want to write a blog any more.  In case you still want to read about teh womenzors playing teh games, check out http://gamingaswomen.com/

My three month hiatus was unfortunate, and not because things weren’t happening in my life that were feminism and gaming related.  In fact, many such things happened, including a game of Apples to Apples.

Yes.  Apples to Apples.

I have never much feared sexism from Apples to Apples.  Perhaps Cards Against Humanity.  But not Apples to Apples.

How wrong could I be.

Someone, who will remain nameless, threw down “Feminists” for “Cute”.  I joked that if I had been the judge, he would not have gotten away with that.  He then, knowing my stance on feminism, says something about how he “hates that feminists blame him”, which is something he has said before about (I believe) specific feminists he talked to in his past, but this general statement against all feminists raises my ire.

And you wouldn’t like me when my ire is raised.

I do what I would never do in a work situation.  I declare to the group “I am a feminist.”  The room goes silent.  Four pairs of eyes stare at me in wonder, as if I just declared that I am, in fact, actually a unicorn.  A strange, mythical beast, never seen but out of the corner of my eye.

“Why do you say that?” a woman at the table asks.

“Well, I think everyone at this table believes men and women should be equal.” I respond.

“Well, then I’m a feminist, too.”

REALLY?  They were all hanging on what I thought a feminist was?  And my answer is pretty much the definition of feminism?

What. The. Fuck.

I was irate the rest of the night, and wrote a very nice email to links that help explain my position to the couple who hosted (which included the “man-hating feminist” person).  I hoped I wasn’t too passive-aggressive, which is mostly due to my inner snark not being held on a tight enough leash (more on that another time - involving someone being wrong on the internet!), but the boyfriend looked it over and said it was good.  The woman wrote back to me, somewhat misunderstanding the point of some of the articles, but I’ve been busy and hadn’t had a chance to write back.  They are coming over tonight.  Hopefully, we won’t play Apples to Apples.  Apparently that game is too controversial.

burninglegend:

roleplaying-girl:

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

lostlittlebirdy:

wooglyoogly:

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

What is up with this stupid fucking female gamer elitism? If I enjoy multiplayer combat games, I’m just playing to impress people? Do we apply those standards to male gamers? Do we ever see men calling out other men on gamer cred based upon what games they play and why? Fuck no. If you’re wondering why, I’ve got the answer:

It’s fucking stupid. Seriously.

Stop fucking judging women over shit like this. It’s petty and divisive and it’s just really fucking dumb. Why do people even do this? Is it that hard to imagine that women play multiplayer FPSs because they like them, rather than to impress men? Why are women doing this? Why are men doing this? Maybe it’s because the industry is so male-oriented and women feel that they have something to prove. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter.

We have the same attitude toward women who dress ‘provocatively.’ We have it in our minds that she does it to impress the opposite sex. NEWSFLASH, PEOPLE: Sometimes, I like to look down and see my tits. I am not doing this for prospective partners. I am not doing this to look sexy. I am doing this because I fucking love my tits. Sometimes, I like to play Halo. I am not doing this to look sexy. I am doing this because sometimes I want to enjoy a harmless release of agression. My gamer cred should not be subject to more scrutiny than any other’s simply for the fact that I am female, particularly considering the fact that it carries no literal value.

Some people fucking love CoD. Some people fucking love mario. Our tastes have nothing to do with trying to be sexy or to impress anybody. Get the fuck over it.

Not to burst your little rant, but as a guy I can say that this standard does indeed go both ways haha. There are elitist gamers that play games such as skyrim, and fallout and resident evil and these artful games, and there are guys who call themselves gamers when all they play are CoD (aka the same game over and over that is a clear exploitation of the fanbase) and Madden.

And what this picture is saying to begin with , is that there are girls who will try to appeal to these ‘gamers’ by saying they love the video games that they play. Mainstream game number 1 being Call of Duty. There are girls who play the game that I know personally of. Becca, she plays it because she enjoys it, and even she knows and has admitted that there are girls such as this. 

My issue is that we accuse some male gamers of poor taste in games. We accuse their female counterparts of only playing the same games to impress guys, which is kind of really conceited on the part of males, and just really stupid coming from females. 

My issue is that this entire thing isn’t about sexism. I’ve seen these “girl gamers” and their ilk all over the ‘net, and the issue isn’t that they’re girls. The issue isn’t the games they choose. The issue is that the majority of them aren’t gamers. They are faking and nine times out of ten you can tell.

I’m not saying “male gamers” don’t exist, but what this is is going into something that is predominantly male and going, “LOOK AT ME! I’M A GIRL AND I LIKE SOMETHING THAT IS PREDOMINANTLY DISREGARDED BY MY GENDER! THAT MAKES ME SPECIAL RIGHT!?” And the only thing that makes this unique is because of the culture that prevents it from going both ways. Gaming is already a predominantly male-involved media.

You get the same issue going both ways in other things, like “traditional art” (hipsters), or music, (Twelve year olds on youtube, “Like this if you’re special because you’re twelve and your taste differs slightly from the norm of your age group! Also something negative about Justin Bieber here!”) or anything else.

Playing one video game doesn’t make you a gamer. Learning one song does not make you a musician. Drawing one picture doesn’t make you an artist and fixing one part on a car doesn’t make you a mechanic.

It’s not the fact that they’re girls that bothers anyone. It’s the fact that they’re stupid, and they just happen to also be girls. Their choices aren’t in poor taste, but in faking. Sometimes the poor taste is mistaken for faking, but there’s a major difference nonetheless.

But it is about sexism. We don’t call out gamers as a whole who ‘fake’ it. We call out ‘girl gamers.’ I’ve known guys to do this just as I’ve known girls to. I guess that it’s just something people do to fit in or something, gaming casually and then taking on a title for it.

My issue is that we target female gamers over this. And it’s predominantly women who promote this ‘better than you because…’ attitude. It’s idiotic.

Did you not read my first response? We do not just callout girl gamers. We also call out dudes. If you’re a fake gamer, gamers as a community can and will call you out. We don’t exclude a sex. Its more about elitism than it is sexism.

Yes, I read your response, but I don’t entirely agree with what you said. My issue is targeting females, as featured in the image. This sort of post is pretty common, and I think that it’s really stupid to target women exclusively in this way. Sure, males experience the same thing, but the context and attitude are entirely different. I’d really like to avoid arguing over this.

I’m not arguing this, I’m trying to show you, that you yourself have taken this out of context. This targeting the fake girls. As I have mentioned before, not ones who actually play games. The reason this was made was to pinpoint the girls who say they are a gamer to appeal to guys. Rather than the girls who play games to enjoy them.just because there is an image pinpointing females by no means there is not an equal dislike for males who. Call themselves gamers and are indeed not.

Dude, chillax.  You know what?  I have a band next door to me, and do I really give a fuck if they call themselves musicians or whatnot?  No, I care that they turn their fucking music down when it’s bedtime.

So here’s a tip - if it isn’t messing with your thing, don’t go telling people they can’t identify with whatever group they like.

And yes, it is something brought up as a reason to keep women out and not men.  Male gamers are what are expected, so no one questions them being playing games, and they don’t have to be the best to not be shouted out.  Women have to be better, faster, and deal with a hell of a lot more bullshit to just play games.  So yeah, if you could deal with you called fat, stupid, whorish, prudish, and told to go make everyone a sandwich and suck their dick EVERY FUCKING TIME YOU PLAYED AN ONLINE GAME and still played games, you can talk.  And that makes every woman who perseveres and plays a game Fucking Special.

By the gods its like you decide to ignore everything I’ve written or something. Apparently you have never really sat around a guy playing a video game or something because we are constantly told these things, save for the sammich comment. I walk onto gears of war and trash talking is immediately what I am confronted with. Saying that I am a: Faggot (or some synonym), a Fat ass, a virgin, a prude, cunt, dick, cock, pussy. And I do indeed deal with it. To assume otherwise because of my ‘Male Privilege’ or something of the sort is childish.

And from my experience, no one looks down upon a female gamer, especially in my circle of friends. We are all gamers, and we all accept everybody else. Now I’m not using this as a refrence because just because my friends are ok with it, means thats how it is in the real world. BUT here is the thing. I have interacted with many people outside of my circle, mostly because I travel around to different cities for work, go to conventions and things of the such. And know what I’ve found? With these thousands of people that cycle out of video games be it, WoW, CoD, GoW UMvC3 or anything, there is equal trash talking to EVERYONE. And not just one group of people.

I mean honestly though, you’re telling me to relax when there was no strain in any of my responses. No cursing, or anything of the such. So why tell me to ‘chillax’.? I have seen people bust their Xbox and other systems because of the way people talk on these online games. So to think that you’re getting singled out, you need to think again.

http://extra-credits.net/episodes/harassment/

http://fatuglyorslutty.com/

Please watch. Listen. Learn.

(via fooly-kili-deactivated20121231)

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

lostlittlebirdy:

wooglyoogly:

burninglegend:

wooglyoogly:

What is up with this stupid fucking female gamer elitism? If I enjoy multiplayer combat games, I’m just playing to impress people? Do we apply those standards to male gamers? Do we ever see men calling out other men on gamer cred based upon what games they play and why? Fuck no. If you’re wondering why, I’ve got the answer:

It’s fucking stupid. Seriously.

Stop fucking judging women over shit like this. It’s petty and divisive and it’s just really fucking dumb. Why do people even do this? Is it that hard to imagine that women play multiplayer FPSs because they like them, rather than to impress men? Why are women doing this? Why are men doing this? Maybe it’s because the industry is so male-oriented and women feel that they have something to prove. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter.

We have the same attitude toward women who dress ‘provocatively.’ We have it in our minds that she does it to impress the opposite sex. NEWSFLASH, PEOPLE: Sometimes, I like to look down and see my tits. I am not doing this for prospective partners. I am not doing this to look sexy. I am doing this because I fucking love my tits. Sometimes, I like to play Halo. I am not doing this to look sexy. I am doing this because sometimes I want to enjoy a harmless release of agression. My gamer cred should not be subject to more scrutiny than any other’s simply for the fact that I am female, particularly considering the fact that it carries no literal value.

Some people fucking love CoD. Some people fucking love mario. Our tastes have nothing to do with trying to be sexy or to impress anybody. Get the fuck over it.

Not to burst your little rant, but as a guy I can say that this standard does indeed go both ways haha. There are elitist gamers that play games such as skyrim, and fallout and resident evil and these artful games, and there are guys who call themselves gamers when all they play are CoD (aka the same game over and over that is a clear exploitation of the fanbase) and Madden.

And what this picture is saying to begin with , is that there are girls who will try to appeal to these ‘gamers’ by saying they love the video games that they play. Mainstream game number 1 being Call of Duty. There are girls who play the game that I know personally of. Becca, she plays it because she enjoys it, and even she knows and has admitted that there are girls such as this. 

My issue is that we accuse some male gamers of poor taste in games. We accuse their female counterparts of only playing the same games to impress guys, which is kind of really conceited on the part of males, and just really stupid coming from females. 

My issue is that this entire thing isn’t about sexism. I’ve seen these “girl gamers” and their ilk all over the ‘net, and the issue isn’t that they’re girls. The issue isn’t the games they choose. The issue is that the majority of them aren’t gamers. They are faking and nine times out of ten you can tell.

I’m not saying “male gamers” don’t exist, but what this is is going into something that is predominantly male and going, “LOOK AT ME! I’M A GIRL AND I LIKE SOMETHING THAT IS PREDOMINANTLY DISREGARDED BY MY GENDER! THAT MAKES ME SPECIAL RIGHT!?” And the only thing that makes this unique is because of the culture that prevents it from going both ways. Gaming is already a predominantly male-involved media.

You get the same issue going both ways in other things, like “traditional art” (hipsters), or music, (Twelve year olds on youtube, “Like this if you’re special because you’re twelve and your taste differs slightly from the norm of your age group! Also something negative about Justin Bieber here!”) or anything else.

Playing one video game doesn’t make you a gamer. Learning one song does not make you a musician. Drawing one picture doesn’t make you an artist and fixing one part on a car doesn’t make you a mechanic.

It’s not the fact that they’re girls that bothers anyone. It’s the fact that they’re stupid, and they just happen to also be girls. Their choices aren’t in poor taste, but in faking. Sometimes the poor taste is mistaken for faking, but there’s a major difference nonetheless.

But it is about sexism. We don’t call out gamers as a whole who ‘fake’ it. We call out ‘girl gamers.’ I’ve known guys to do this just as I’ve known girls to. I guess that it’s just something people do to fit in or something, gaming casually and then taking on a title for it.

My issue is that we target female gamers over this. And it’s predominantly women who promote this ‘better than you because…’ attitude. It’s idiotic.

Did you not read my first response? We do not just callout girl gamers. We also call out dudes. If you’re a fake gamer, gamers as a community can and will call you out. We don’t exclude a sex. Its more about elitism than it is sexism.

Yes, I read your response, but I don’t entirely agree with what you said. My issue is targeting females, as featured in the image. This sort of post is pretty common, and I think that it’s really stupid to target women exclusively in this way. Sure, males experience the same thing, but the context and attitude are entirely different. I’d really like to avoid arguing over this.

I’m not arguing this, I’m trying to show you, that you yourself have taken this out of context. This targeting the fake girls. As I have mentioned before, not ones who actually play games. The reason this was made was to pinpoint the girls who say they are a gamer to appeal to guys. Rather than the girls who play games to enjoy them.just because there is an image pinpointing females by no means there is not an equal dislike for males who. Call themselves gamers and are indeed not.

Dude, chillax.  You know what?  I have a band next door to me, and do I really give a fuck if they call themselves musicians or whatnot?  No, I care that they turn their fucking music down when it’s bedtime.

So here’s a tip - if it isn’t messing with your thing, don’t go telling people they can’t identify with whatever group they like.

And yes, it is something brought up as a reason to keep women out and not men.  Male gamers are what are expected, so no one questions them being playing games, and they don’t have to be the best to not be shouted out.  Women have to be better, faster, and deal with a hell of a lot more bullshit to just play games.  So yeah, if you could deal with you called fat, stupid, whorish, prudish, and told to go make everyone a sandwich and suck their dick EVERY FUCKING TIME YOU PLAYED AN ONLINE GAME and still played games, you can talk.  And that makes every woman who perseveres and plays a game Fucking Special.

(via fooly-kili-deactivated20121231)

Apparently, I let life get to me again, and I haven’t posted for oh, three months.  But I’m not dead yet, and I am feeling better.  So why don’t we have a little chat about women and gaming, or more broadly, women and geekery.

If you’ve been alive on the internet, you’ll heard the debate about what constitutes a “True Geek”.  And any time trots out the argument about what “true nerds” and “honest-to-goodness geeks” are or do, all I really want to say is this:

Fuck you.

Fuck what defines a geek, a nerd, a true believer or whatever.

I’m not going to get into the specifics (see John Scalzi’s blog for info about the Joe Peacock article and controversy surrounding it), but here’s what bothers me.

I spend so much fucking time trying to convince people I’m a nerd.

I do this in the hopes that someday, I won’t have to listen to patronizing crap about how to play my goddamn list.  I do this because I want men to stop ignoring me and only talking to my boyfriend about the new awesome video game they played.  I do this because I want to be included.

Here’s the thing: I am social awkward.  I don’t like situations that involve small talk.  I don’t do it well.  I want to talk deeply about things that excite me, and one of those areas is games.  But even among what I assume are a bunch of other social awkward people who share the same interest, I’m still subtly excluded, told through small actions, tones, and body language that I don’t belong.  Granted, it’s not everybody, and some people do notice this and go out of their way to make me feel included, which I appreciate.  But it keeps telling me that I am not nerdy enough, not geeky enough, not whatever enough because of something I can’t change.  Because real nerds aren’t women.

Granted, this is not what the people on the interwebs have been saying.  They only want to exclude the women phoneys, as if they are having Holden-Caulfield-like angst about gaming.  But why?  Why exclude anyone from a movement that is supposed to be a haven for all those who really have a hard time relating to the normal world?  Why say there are rules to being a nerd?

I have to say, if someone plays Farmville and wants to call themselves a gamer, fine by me.  Video games used to only be that complex, and yet no one calls Steve Wozniak out for his love of Tetris, which isn’t exactly a Dragon Age or Halo.  And that’s the thing: people who play those last two games are both gamers, but may not be able to relate at all because they are interested in totally different games.  It’s almost like saying you’re into games is about as helpful as saying you really like movies.  Just in general.  No genres.  Just movies.  “I am a movie-goer.  I truly appreciate movies, not like those people who watch sucky movies.”

I think that’s what’s odd.  Gaming is becoming more widespread as more people start realizing “hey, this is entertaining”.  And that’s awesome.  I want there to be games for everybody.  And that, I hope, will help women not have to defend their interest in a hobby.  Because, when you think about it, if you’re not making money playing your game, there are a lot of people more hardcore than you out there.  So spread the love of gaming, whether they be video games, table top games, or card games.  Because the more people we include in our world, the richer our world becomes.

Now, I would be totally remiss if I didn’t discuss the male/female ratio at Adepticon.

I was actually pleasantly surprised.

While there was nowhere near a fifty-fifty split, I was definitely not alone in a sea of men.  There were two other women in the painting class of about fifteen people, and although we all had boyfriends at Adepticon and were more less than five years of painting/playing, it was nice to see that no one made fun of them for either of those things.  Although, the instructor did say, “Women often become better painters in the couple”, which I felt was a rather odd complement, but at least it was a complement, and trying to be inclusive.

I also met another woman who played Legion of Everblight!  She came up to me and asked if I played, and I pointed to my army currently being played by my friend, who was just learning the game.  I felt a little embarrassed it wasn’t complete, but she said she played Legion and Cryx and wasn’t it nice that there were so many woman casters in Legion?  Yes, a thousand times yes!  We talked about our armies (I always feel a little embarrassed that I play Rhyas, because it is the general gamer opinion she sucks, but I think of it as a challenge) and introduced herself.

It made me so want to come back to Adepticon next year.

I think the thing is that I was afraid of how people would behave at these things.  I am easily overwhelmed by lots of people and if those people behave inappropriately, it can easily ruin my time.  But as far as I saw at Adepticon, people were polite and friendly, and I didn’t feel out of place at all.

That felt nice.

I walk into the hotel hosting Adepticon, and the first thing I see coming through the doors are several small tables, each with a Press Ganger.

In front of the Warhammer game room.

Granted, it was also the full of plastic crack of all forms (i.e. venders), but Privateer Press was plastered on swag bags, which had Hordes battle boxes.  New Colassals (and a Gargantuan) were on display in the WarmaHordes game room

Granted, Games Workshop was not a sponsor of Adepticon, but why not?  Privateer Press was everywhere that weekend.

And that’s when I realized: Warhammer just doesn’t need me.  They don’t care about me.  They don’t care to sponsor events, they don’t care to update their codices in a timely manner, they don’t care to send people to events to get players excited about the game.

They don’t give a fucking damn about me.

But Privateer Press, they want me to play their game.  They are excited about their game, they errata quickly, balance their factions, and try to push to new and exciting models.  They actually care about getting people into their game, which makes sense because they need to grow.

Warhammer doesn’t need to grow, so why should it care about it’s players?

This is the attitude that I felt from Warhammer at Adepticon and generally playing with my friends.  It’s the same feeling of a hipster at a vinyl record store rolling their eyes at you because you don’t know “music”.  It’s already an established scene and you’re either in the know or out of it, and they don’t really care to get more people in the know.

Personally, I never felt Warhammer was an accessible game.  The first time I played 40K, my friends felt unable to explain all of the game to me because that would slow the game down to an intolerable pace, so I’m throwing dice and they’re telling me what numbers to look for.

Comparing that to my experience with WarmaHordes, where my first game was small, manageable, and while I still don’t have all the subtleties down, I understood the game from day one.

So, Adepticon really didn’t change my opinion of Warhammer, but it felt like I understood why I like WarmaHordes better.  The rules are well designed so a player has options in the moment, the factions are balanced, the casters add variety, and the community is welcoming.  And they care, so freaking much more about their players.

I realize I have been lax about posting, but my perfectly good excuse is that I was trying to finish all my models for Adepticon (which didn’t happen) and, well, the life of a grad student is never dull.

But that’s changing this week.

I’m going to try to post about all the amazing things that happened at Adepticon, including:

• what I learned from a painting class with Mathieu Fontaine
• more of my thoughts regarding WarmaHordes vs. Warhammer
• why I might be too obsessed with Hamster Berserkers

Hopefully, it’ll be a sweet week of tabletop gaming goodness.

(via iffymoo)

My boyfriend’s Aiyana and Holt - I especially like how Holt turned out.  He looks like a BAMF.  Anyway, you guys get to see them because they were on the same upload and the Legionnaires.  Enjoy!