Being a gamer shouldn’t be easier for straight white males

Lazygamer has a cabbage as a journalist, it doesn’t get more liberal than that.

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Soooo… The problem is not gaming as such, but rather the douchebag behind the controller/keyboard? Am I wrong? Please if I am, tell me. Seriously.

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I understand what you are saying Alessandro and I agree with your sentiment. However, I still don’t think what she is doing is right.

Her efforts, while commendable and completely justified, is causing more of a rift than anything else. Her videos, when broken down like you did now, are good at pointing out the flaws but they also make male gamers feel bad. Yes, it’s not the point of the videos to do so, but it does.

Isn’t there a healthier way to do this? Instead of saying that men are so freaking privileged can’t she rather make videos that uplift woman in gaming instead of making it seem like they are being oppressed and that it’s all because of us straight, male gamers?

Why not make a 25invisible reasons it’s awesome to be a female gamer?

There are so many benefits to being a female gamer that people tend to overlook. One being that in a male dominated hobby there are changes happening at a rapid pace with the industry trying to be more inclusive of not only woman, but all other walks of life.

How awesome it must be to have an entire industry shift focus due to you simply being a woman and people realising that woman are as important as men for the industry.

But no, she acts like no one is stepping up to the plate to take action. She acts as if she and her fellow woman are the only ones fighting this fight and that no one cares.

Everyone cares about it and unfortunately yes, testosterone filled men who were themselves bullied/ are being bullied at school are making life difficult for all around them (Straight male, bi male, straight woman, bi woman) and yes they are far more vocal towards woman. No one can deny that. Pretending it doesn’t happen is stupid and doesn’t help.

But I still believe this argument of “We are being oppressed” should rather be turned in to “Look how we are changing the industry to include everyone! We are part of that and it is amazing that developers and the gaming community are taking notice” because lets face it, the changes ARE happening. People ARE noticing. People ARE standing up for the cause. People ARE becoming more tolerant while becoming less tolerant of the people who try to break down woman and people of other walks of life.

The industry isn’t against woman and people like Anita Sarkeesian need to see that and work with the industry instead of against it and its community. Especially considering that 50% of gamers are female. The community is no longer as male dominated as it always was so please, please stop pretending like woman find it difficult to get in to gaming when that clearly is no longer the case.

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I try to treat everyone with respect and dignity, I don’t always because hey I am not perfect.

In saying that I don’t get feminism, equality is a lie. But then again I am a straight male so I probably don’t feel the guilt of being a majority gamer. I am still trying to get over been responsible for most wars, genocides, slavery etc etc.

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I would just like to point out that two of our straight male journos have written opposing opinion pieces… and i disagree with both of them. Both make some valid points, but neither of them have any experience with the thing that they are trying to discuss. I’m glad we’re debating the topic, but it’s tiresome when people pretend to know how it feels, or try to tell me how i feel or should feel.

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She just needs a good dicking.

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“Sometimes we are bullied, or subjected to online nastiness. But it’s not based on or because of our gender.”
No but we do get it based on you voices, age, weight, sexual orientation, or anything else that any random troll on the internet decides to give someone shot over. The only difference is we don’t group together and complain about it. Maybe it has to do with thick skin?

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hit dat refresh!

Side Note: I don’t agree so much bro

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Again 95% of these are not really benefits of being a white male.

Not being attacked because of your gender, race or sexuality is not a benefit. It’s not a con either, it’s nothing. I gain nothing from not being attacked nor do I loose anything from being attacked.

All these points should not be between the sexes or race, they should just be how to treat your fellow human regardless of those points.

Yes women have more shit to deal with and it’s not right, but all these articles about the unseen “benefits” of being a white male gamer are bullshit.

Everyone needs to stop pointing out the gender, race and sexual preference cards and just be decent to whoever you are talking to regardless.

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I await the day that women’s romance novels go mainstream so that I can pull apart how sexist and unrealistic their portrayal of men are.

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I really would like to see an article some day that was on Objectification which actually addressed what it means, as it was designed and written about but the authrors of the framework theorem in 1997.It would be so nice to see because it would be such a clear sign that we were dropping the weapons and taking steps to heal wounds. I get all of the confusion of this issue, I really do. I understand, but I lack understanding of why it persists over and over without reaching for the sources.

Barbara L. Fedrickson, a psychologist, and Tomi-Ann Roberts, also a psychologist were the authors of Objectification theory. They came up with it in 1997. Reading the paper they published on this subject .. is disconcerting to me but some how liberating for many women. They came to this theory through the suggestion that the human body is constructed (physically built) not only through biological changes of growth and environment, but through sociocultural practices and discourse. — so to break this down and reiterate what we are agreeing to — The female body, as she walks through her day, collects and stores the negativity and sexual description, as well as the denoted value directed at her from the mouths of men, the posters on the wall, the cat-calls from the street, and the commercials on her TV.These energies churn in her and not only affect her mentally, but express themselves physically – bending her back, stooping her shoulders and sinking her eyes. That is the core of Objectification theory.

Now.. first of all, no, you can not objectify a man. The theory only describes the effects to a woman. Men are not arranged and developed by their environments or how you act toward them. If you say to a man “You’re a f-*ing sexist pig” it hurts.It bothers us. We will evaluate ourselves, take stock. Pause perhaps. But you are not altering us by these words. Nor do we objectify each other, or ourselves.

Second.. Objectification is only a framework theorem. It is not even a full theory,and no empirical data has ever been collected to move it forward. None needs to be gathered. It is a framework.It is .. well .. like a box you can safely play with other toys inside, without having to understand them completely. It is a Virtual World of sorts. As ta framework it still assists researcher to this day. Over 1800 papers have been written using this framework. It is considered very valuable.But it does’t describe anything that is going on in the real world. You are not being objectified.It doesn’t work that way.

So, the next year Nita May Mckinley published –“Gender Differences, in an undergraduate body esteem. The mediating effect of objectified boy consciousness and actual/ideal weight discrepancy — Sex Roles 39 1-2 –” That was basically a horror story which tried ot use the publication as if it were gods law on how the female body performed in social environments. I can’t imagine reading that and believing that was happening to me — would have scarred me for life. But then came Banishing the Beast, and A Mind of Ones Own, followed later with a clear left hook coming in from “Jane sexes it up: True confessions of feminist desire” by. Merri Lisa Johnson Now.. that is a mix for absolute confusion — if you don’t realize that Objectification Therory is not what you have been hearing in the magazines or at the coffee shop.

Most of the studies reaching back for the Objectification Theory are along the lines of Body Image Dissatisfaction and Depressive Symptoms. All of the ones I read show that the women,( both heterosexual and lesbian) find dissatisfaction with their bodies, and are more nervous about how they look if they believe they will soon begin a position of being judged, but all of them only show these limited depths in effect. An increase in active friendships, a increase in exercise, moral support, a loving relationship , all banish these feelings away like mist. Over and over again the framework offers a stable place to posit an idea from, but not a place available to land back down on. The internalization expected from the description of Objectification, simply doesn’t materialize into a physical or mentally altering state. It just doesn’t happen.
No empirical data is ever gathered.

Tomi-Ann Roberts (one of the authors) returned to Colorado College, with much different ideas on her mind, most of them going toward the essay of Rebecca Walker.

Roberts does three papers, which attempt to clarify the theory for her, but wind up pulling her down an unexpected direction. Then, in the Handbook of Experimental Existential Psychology Roberts gives us a glimpse and then a flood of this unexpected direction the work has led her too. (p.78)

… according to the position that we have provided, objectification of women serves an important existential function — it strips them of their creaturely connection and thus provides psychic protection from the threat of death. Thus it is not surprising that women objectify other women, additionally , it is also not surprising that women also objectify their own bodies, a phenomenon referred to as “self-objectification” and demonstrated by numerous studies …”

The 180 degree turn on what objectification is, and what it means, and who it means it too, is quite radical. However Roberts in her return to Colorado will hold on to these ideas, as well as refining them. It is always a noteworthy trait of a researcher to be able to drop their preconceived ideas and accept the direction further research reveals. It is unfortunate this trait is not as prevalent as it could be.

I do hope this clears some things up for you, because the way I have observed some women damaging themselves over the misconceptions prevalent on this topic, is very disturbing.

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