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Author Topic: Female gamers?  (Read 8430 times)

Kyle Aaron

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« Reply #15 on: March 01, 2007, 04:22:12 AM »
I cannot speak for Anemone or any woman, but my instinct is that if something like this thread gives a clue.

They speak of a woman gamer, Nina, who happens to be a mod at rpg.net. Anthrobot asks if she's hot. Then we got,
Quote from: Dan Davenport
Just for the record: having met Nina in person at GenCon '05, she is entirely worth having the hots for.
The responses were,
Quote from: Anthrobot
I've never found a 'holier than thou' attitude an attractive character trait in a woman, no matter how physically attractive she is. Nina's physical attractiveness is irrelevant to the matter of how she moderates. My asking Balbinus if he "had the hots for her?" was merely a joke.
Quote from: Mystic Loafer
"Worth having the hots for?" Specify, please. Do you mean "she's attractive, but only in the context of a Babylon 5 fan gathering" or do you mean "I'd stick it between her melons!". How hot are we talking here, Dan Davenport, if that's your real name? And if Dan Davenport is Dan Davenport's real name, are you the real Dan Davenport? Are you a Dan Davenport's Dan Davenport?
and
Quote from: Mr. Analytical
Yeah, we want a patented Davenport review of how hot Nina is.

"The melons would need some serious tweaking before I'd decide to use them for extended play rather than as a one-shot or some fun at a con"
Nobody asked if she were a good roleplayer or GM; you might think this would be relevant on therpgsite, but apparently not. Sure, Anthrobot was "only joking" when he asked if Nina was hot, but joking about whether or not some random woman most of us have never met and never will is hot, that leads to a masculine sort of atmosphere which isn't terribly welcoming to women.

If the talk then goes on to whether this woman is good for titfucking, well then that particular woman almost certainly won't feel welcome here, and probably women in general will feel a bit uncomfortable.

I mean, they don't come to therpgsite to talk about titfucking. They don't come to a roleplaying games discussion site to talk about sex, they come here to talk about roleplaying. If they find sex talk, well then they'll be less interested in the roleplaying talk. Of course, most of us men don't come here to talk about sex, either - but we've got a few lonely losers who do.

I've learned a lot from some articles and blogs I read recently, and I talk about them on my LJ here.

I stand ready to be corrected by Anemone or any other woman, but these are my impressions. If women want to talk about titfucking or how h4wt they are, they can go to (say) literotica.com; this is therpgsite.

My instinct is that if you want to make women gamers feel welcome, then you should talk... about games!
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GRIM

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« Reply #16 on: March 01, 2007, 04:37:35 AM »
Quote from: David R
Currently, four women and three men in my group. The women say they don't post on forums because they like playing rpgs not talking about them.


Uh, yeah.

And I run games for my exotic harem of a hundred beautiful wives.

They just don't like to post on forums either.

;)

(I kid, I kid...)
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Kyle Aaron

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« Reply #17 on: March 01, 2007, 05:02:54 AM »
Quote from: GRIM
Uh, yeah.

And I run games for my exotic harem of a hundred beautiful wives.

They just don't like to post on forums either.

;)

(I kid, I kid...)
Again, humour is to do with your sex fantasies. That David R talks about women gamers, and you respond by joking about harems, I think this tells us something about your idea of women. A harem is an institution where women have value solely as sexual objects; their own pleasure and desires are irrelevant, they exist to please the man in charge of them all.

Then if we have a look at your products, we can see,

Hentacle            
 Hentacle Expansion - Sloppy Seconds            
 Hentacle Expansion - Three's An Orgy


Granted, those are a few products among many others - just as your post about harems is one among many others. Nonetheless, what comes forth is an attitude that women are here for sex and for laughing at. You made a card game based on laughing about anime tentacle rape.

Your attitudes about women perhaps tell us why you've not got any in your game group.

When we respond to women solely as sex and humour objects, in a roleplaying game forum, amazingly not many are interested in talking to us. Funny, that.

Women are not delicate sensitive flowers who need to be protected from the rough force of male comments and sexuality. A joke about a harem or someone being hot, from male to female or vice versa, that's all part of living and most people don't mind it. You have to look at patterns, and atmosphere. And the atmosphere here is sexist and juvenile. "That Nina, so sensitive..." "Does she have nice tits?" It's moronic.

David R talks about gamers who happen to be women - GRIM's first thought is "harem!" Really I think that says it all.
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David R

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« Reply #18 on: March 01, 2007, 06:32:27 AM »
I wish I could say I had not heard GRIM's joke before on an online gaming forum, but sadly, I can't.

Besides the usual Lad behaviour that for some reason is not the most inviting atmosphere for female gamers, one post of late has been commented upon by the women who I game with, coincidentaly in a thread started by JimBob. Here's the post :

http://therpgsite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=76338&postcount=73*

So, here's a pretty interesting thread going on, folks are contirbuting constructively, a setting is being created - BTW this has nothing to do with TGA ,who I think contributes productively to this site, but rather about the atmosphere that JimBob was talking about, and my impression of it, informed by the comments of the women I game with - and all of a sudden there THIS. And it's stuff like this, that most often contributes to the negative impression women have of this site.

*Honestly explanations for slang like this, is what PM is here for.

Okay, so now, most folks are going to go on about how PC I am or that the women I game with are too sensitive. I don't think so. The fact is, if we just talk about gaming and leave all the crude sexist stuff out of the discussions, it would go a long way, in making this site accessible to women.

I come here to talk about games, and I think diversity is a good thing. I want more women participating in the gaming forums. I think this would be good for the site.

Regards,
David R

Mr. Analytical

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« Reply #19 on: March 01, 2007, 06:43:54 AM »
I don't think that post is sexist... the discussion threw up the term "tipping the waitress" as a nice sounding euphemism for something and the response was that it was already a euphemism.

The content of the euphemism is quite breath-takingly misogynist but I don't think the OP was condoning it.

Stumpydave

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« Reply #20 on: March 01, 2007, 06:49:30 AM »
Jimbob, you're not psycho-analysing Grims attitude towards women from a few internet posts and gaming products are you?
 

RedFox

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« Reply #21 on: March 01, 2007, 06:49:44 AM »
Quote from: Mr. Analytical
I don't think that post is sexist...


At the risk of sounding like a broken record, you're the one with "vaginal sludge" as a self-chosen title.  Despite your explanation the previous time I brought it up, I find it unlikely that it contributes to a positive, female-friendly atmosphere here.
 

Casey777

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« Reply #22 on: March 01, 2007, 06:50:03 AM »
Threads like We're unfriendly to women and homosexuals? likely didn't help. Well intentioned perhaps but it still comes off mostly as straight male "what's the problem? scratch grunt snort".

David R

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« Reply #23 on: March 01, 2007, 06:50:35 AM »
Quote from: Mr. Analytical

The content of the euphemism is quite breath-takingly misogynist but I don't think the OP was condoning it.


Very true. (And TGA I hope you don't think I was implying that you were condoning it) but sometimes, it's stuff like this that gives women (or at least the ones I talk to) a negative impression of the site

Regards,
David R

RedFox

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« Reply #24 on: March 01, 2007, 06:53:09 AM »
Quote from: Casey777
it still comes off mostly as straight male "what's the problem? scratch grunt snort".


It's an orc!  Kill it for xp!
 

Kyle Aaron

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« Reply #25 on: March 01, 2007, 06:58:55 AM »
Quote from: Stumpydave
Jimbob, you're not psycho-analysing Grims attitude towards women from a few internet posts and gaming products are you?
Nope.

I'm saying that what he has said in this forum has contributed to the atmosphere in this forum.

If I walk into a guy's house, and there are pictures on the walls of chicks wincing as they have large dildos put up their bums, and the guy says, "I don't understand why more women don't come here," it's not psychoanalysis to say, "look at the pictures on the walls, dickhead." He has said sexist things, and produced sexist products; you don't need to be Freud to figure out he's sexist (not that Freud would have known about sexism, but still).

Likewise, when we look at posts like those of Dan Davenport, Mystic Loafer, or Mr Analytical, specifically those I quoted above, or the one David R linked from The Good Assyrian, or this one by old Nox, well it's not psychoanalysis to say "mate, that is not making women gamers welcome."

GRIM also said he didn't have women in his group. Given that he made a comedy game about tentacle rape, and given his posts here and elsewhere, I'm not fucking surprised he doesn't have women in his group. If Dominus Nox told us that he'd never gamed with African-Americans, well again - it doesn't take any psychoanalysis at all to say, "well, that fits in with what you've shown us." Nox has made racist posts, so it's no great stretch to assume he's racist.

Maybe in his real life GRIM volunteers at a women's shelter or makes the volunteers on a rape crisis hotline cups of tea, how the fuck would I know? We're talking about online behaviour, and how it contributes to an atmosphere at a website. Specifically, "why is therpgsite such a boy's club?" The answer is that it's sexist.
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droog

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« Reply #26 on: March 01, 2007, 07:10:42 AM »
The way I see it is this: you can only be what you are. If you're a pig, well then, you're a pig.

Start worrying about what 'the ladies' think, and the next thing you have to start enforcing standards. That's the slippery slope to moderating for 'group attacks'.

I think my non-sexist credentials are okay, but I don't mind hanging out with the blokes sometimes either. I winced when people started talking about Nina's tits, but if you're going to have a site where everybody can say what they like, you're going to get that occasionally. At least until we enter a higher and better stage of society.

I think it's a pity Anemone feels that way. I read her comment about using male-directed instead of female-directed insults, and I thought it was pretty funny and to the point. A bit more of that would go a long way towards clearing up some of these issues. What the site really needs is a few women as hard-headed as some of the men, with acid tongues and razor-sharp wits. I know women like that in Real Life, but none of them are roleplayers.
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Mr. Analytical

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« Reply #27 on: March 01, 2007, 07:15:17 AM »
Quote from: RedFox
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, you're the one with "vaginal sludge" as a self-chosen title.  Despite your explanation the previous time I brought it up, I find it unlikely that it contributes to a positive, female-friendly atmosphere here.


  Oh come on... because of the word "vaginal" the whole forum is hostile to women?  it's not as if I even ever talk about vaginas.  In fact, I'd even forgotten I had this tagline until you just mentioned it.

  My original response to the person who took issue with my use of the term might contribute to the perception that the place isn't friendly to women I agree.  My response to her stupid comments was nothing short of a character assassination and it's rather unfortunate that this happened in the context of a discussion of whether the forum's GLBT and female friendly.

  However,

  1) I do believe that taking the word "vaginal" to be offensive suggests there's something of the misogynist about you and pretty much every feminist writer will back me up on that one.

  2) She posted in a rude and confrontational style and essentially accused me of being sexist.  If there's one think I will not tolerate it's being called misogynistic or homophobic.  Therefore I responded in an equally confrontational manner but... well... I'm just better at it :D

  If she had pointed the problem out in a polite manner I would have been open to taking it down, but if you leap straight to unfounded and insulting assumptions about me based on your own evident psychological problems and I will not be so accommodating.

  However, if you, Red Fox, want me to change my tagline, I will.

Kyle Aaron

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« Reply #28 on: March 01, 2007, 07:18:10 AM »
I agree with droog here. I'm noting causes and effects, not advocating moderator action. But I do think that we can try to be more aware of it. By occasionally pointing these things out, we can be more aware of what we say and its likely effects. Sometimes the first thing we think of to say isn't the best thing.

I don't think we can change the music. But we can try to turn the fucking volume down a bit.
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RedFox

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« Reply #29 on: March 01, 2007, 07:31:24 AM »
Quote from: Mr. Analytical
Oh come on... because of the word "vaginal" the whole forum is hostile to women?  it's not as if I even ever talk about vaginas.  In fact, I'd even forgotten I had this tagline until you just mentioned it.


I said I doubted that it contributed to a welcoming atmosphere to women, not that your title alone made the forum hostile to them.

But I have a penis, so take my post with the proverbial grain of salt.

Quote
However, if you, Red Fox, want me to change my tagline, I will.


I find it rather distasteful, just as I'd find the title "smegma" rather distasteful.  I certainly wouldn't enjoy eating noodles and having my eyes drifting over the phrase, as the mental image it conjures isn't the most appetizing in the world.

But I don't need to eat ramen and read therpgsite at the same time either, and my visceral reactions to phrases are my own problem.

I won't ask you to change it.  Just...  ew, dude.  Ew.