First I'm going to say that this post is a little bit of a rant on Gaming/Anime communities; racism/homophobia/transphobia/sexism and so on. I'm writing because I was just forced to leave (yet another) community and over the years I've just become increasingly dismayed, not just at the amount of sexism among communities and hobbies where there's a large male following, but also the racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc....(I'm also extremely angry about all this)
I understand that Anime/Gaming communities are generally full of teenage boys...To a degree, sadly enough, I expect the sexism. However, what I don't understand is how these communities can get away with being so bigoted on, literally, every level; racism, homophobia, transphobia, ableist, classist...Like I said, I was just was forced to leave a community after another member, who guessed at my sexual orientation (from my avatar), preceded in stalking me around the community posting homophobic and hateful comments after every post that I made. I made a complaint to the admin, however, there was little chance that the hateful posts would even be deleted since this kind of bigotry and harassing is actually encouraged in many of these communities. In fact, I even learned that the person harassing me was also an administrator! The response that I got from the admins was very telling I thought, I was told that it's just "personal opinion if someone here wants to be homophobic and express homophobia"...indicating to me, that in these communities many people are, to a degree, proud of their bigotry (and also that they could care less about anyone hurt by these hateful spews)...
I've seen entire threads dedicated to racist, sexist, ablist, classist, homo/transphobic, anti-semetic, etc. topics. People will openly proclaim things like "I hate X,Y,Z group of people because (insert degrading/false stereotype)" In the community that I just left, there was a thread talking about how anime is only for white people, and another where people were posting pictures of transpeople and then ridiculing them. What I don't understand, is what exactly do these members get out of all this bigotry. It certainly succeeds at keeping any non-white-straight-christian-disabled-cisgendered-male out. But is it really that? Do they really hate those that are different from them so much that they would seek to create such exclusively white-male-straight-etc.-etc.- communities?
The thing is, if anyone ever wondered some of the reasons why women, lgbt, poc, etc. form their own separate communities, just visit pretty much any largly male community on the internet. Sometimes, it's not that we necessarily want to separate ourselves, so much as that we are forced to. Don't get me wrong, I'm very grateful to have all these different communities for those of us who weren't "lucky enough to be born a perfect rich white straight christian male teenager(sarcasm)"...but I enjoy gaming, so why shouldn't I or anyone else be able to have the option of joining a gaming community if we want to, and still be treated respectfuly.
I'm not really sure if I had any larger point to this post. I guess I'm just interested to hear if others here have any experience regarding any other types of communities/interests that are particularly bigoted in any way. Is it just the anime/gaming communities or are there others that are also encourage this? Why do these communities use such hateful speech to the point of openly boasting about their bigotry? How much of this has to do with the concentration of teenage boys (probably also white/suburban/middleclass) in these communities? and what does this say about masculinity/white-male american culture? I don't really have any answers here, I'm just dismayed, offended, and angry...what do feminists here think?
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Gaming Communities and Hate Speech.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.feministing.com/cgi-bin/movabletype/mt-tb.fcgi/11833
What anime communities are you on? In my experience the anime fandom is pretty accepting. But the communities I visit are the forums for conventions I go to. People probably behave better there because there's a good chance they will actually meet the other people on the site.
I've belonged to communities in yahoo, livejournal, and then on regular internet forums that are just about general anime and gaming discussion...people talk about shows, characters, post artwork and so on...Again, I'm not saying that all fans are rude bigots...I'm just saying it seemed to be a pretty common thing where I would encounter really nasty hateful threads (like the one thread where some people were posting pics of transgendered people, followed by a whole bunch of people posting transphobic comments)...And it seemed everytime I would comment how these things were hurtful and whatnot...I would get told something like "well it's just my opinion" or "it's a free country, I have a right to say such and such" or "ha, ha, it's supposed to be funny, can't you laugh".
IDK, maybe I just had bad luck?
I'm often on LiveJournal. The problem with them is that cyberstalking and posting attacking comments are not against their TOS. I'm sure that's the case with a lot of other groups because it helps build a feeling of community, even though those communities often end up full of assholes. I'm a part of some of the fanfic-ing anime communities (don't laugh), and because those are full of young girls, often of lots of different backgrounds, it's a little kinder and gentler. But the wank, oh the wank.
Have you been to Mighty Ponygirl's blog? I'm not much of a gamer, but she seems totally awesome. Maybe that would be a good starting point.
Feministgamers.com is "shuttered" for the time being. MightyPonygirl hasn't updated it since last fall, which makes me very sad.
You had a problem with LJ? Odd. Thats the most accepting place I've found so far.
Some of them post such things because they get a kick out of trolling and offending others (ie they do it for lulz). They don't even necessarily believe what they're posting, nor are they all white teenage boys (altho most probably are).
There's also plenty of more mundane homophobia, sexism, etc online, just like in the real world. They're probably an easier problem to address than people who get a kick out of trolling, as they can maybe be convinced that they're wrong, whereas the others one just has to hope they'll grow up and move on.
No, I should note, that I'm not saying that all gaming/anime fans are white suburban teenage boys. And I've certainly met plenty of fans that are wonderful, polite, nice, etc...But to me it just seems that I've encountered an awful lot of hate speech in these communities...More so than say a community that talks about pets or something.
But again, just to be clear, I'm not trying to stereotype all anime/gaming fans (I'm one myself)...I'm just trying to say that it's a pretty common thing where I run into hateful speech in these communities.
My husband and I both play World of Warcraft, and we've seen some pretty disgusting behavior in-game. We've both been sexually harassed on more than one occasion (I guess these creeps assume he's female because he plays a female avatar) and from what I've seen, homophobia is rampant.
In a previous guild, we had to sort out the drama that occurred when a bunch of frat boys found out one of our guildies was a transwoman, and they all ganged up on her. My husband was the raid leader in that guild, and after she called us in the middle of the night crying, those boys were warned that if they ever did it again, they would no longer be allowed to play with the rest of us. In our current guild (where he's GM and I'm healing officer) we have a zero-tolerance policy for hate-speech and harassment. As in, you do it, you're gone. Doesn't matter if it was directed toward a guildie or someone outside the guild. If you're going to be an ass, we don't want you wearing our tag.
I love WarCraft. Any mmorpg it's tough to avoid that type of stuff. I thought of "feigning" straight male, just so I didn't have to deal! (but I feel a sort of kinship to other female gamers, so I don't want to hide that part of my identity)
I generally don't mention it either way when I'm dealing with players I don't know, but everyone in my guild and those outside that I've played with regularly know I'm female, and eventually most of them figure out my relationship to my husband.
Fortunately our guild is mostly made up of both men and women that are older university students, working professionals, and even a few retirees (our player age range is approximately 20-65). Since most of these folks have some life experience and a lot of them have families, rude behavior is much less of an issue. When we recruit, we tend to advertise ourselves as a family-friendly group that caters to the more mature player. We've been pretty successful as gamers too; We started raiding WotLK content around New Year's and have cleared everything but 25-man Malygos. Not bad, considering we only raid 2-3 nights a week ;)
I play WoW as well and am in an awesome guild that doesn't tolerate discrimination of any kind. It's run by an ex of mine who is bisexual (I am too) and we have a few gay members as well and a couple of other women. Since Wrath came out, there's been a big recruitment effort, but I still have yet to see any discrimination go on which makes me happy.
I run a growingcommunity forum and a feminist pro-queer/lgbt, anti-racist webzine/blog, RIOTgamer that deals with these issues. I started the site because I felt exactly what you're talking about. I feel that the gaming community is the way it is partially because of the gaming industry itself (which is also a reflection of societal bigotry and exclusion at large). Games and a lot of anime are marketed to white straight men...which is also inherent in game design. I've been a gamer since I was little and I still remember when my guy-friends decided that I couldn't play video games because I was a girl. The industry itself seems to take very small steps toward progress occasionally but...
Some ass from Stormfront.org has hailed Grand Theft Auto as a realistic representation African Americans stating, essentially, that they all act like the criminals in the game. That's scary. If games, to make a point David Leonard makes, we can see that we have problems here when white supremacist sites are hoorah-ing games like this as defending their beliefs.
And just like the whole of society...bringing up issues like this amounts to "whining". I talked about Fat Princess in one of my articles and the wealth of ugly feminist-hating in response to complaints lodged by Feminist Gamers and Shakesville. Hate-mongering boys (and girls) will be hate-mongering boys (and girls) but the gaming industry certainly does little to dissuade this or to prove them wrong.
Heather, thanks...I'm gonna check out your site (and mightponytail's blog too)...It's nice to get supports and acknowledgment that what I've been seeing is real (as opposed to a delusion in my mind which is the impression I get when hoards of these people tell me "ha ha, it's a joke, can't you laugh" whenever I point out the fact that something is offensive.)
Oh boy, GTA, don't even get me started...I can't believe how many people defend those representations of characters in that game, but the fact that a white supremacist is also lavishing praise on this same game is 10 times as scary.
ugh I'm still bitter over the fat princess debacle because before the trolls arrived there had been a really great idea about creating a game called 'arm the princess' I made concept art and everything >.
I just can't believe they had the audacity to ask if it was better because a woman designed Fat Princess...
Funny - I was from the Level Up! Games Brazil forum and, at least in the Ragnarök Online one (The older, I think) it was almost the contrary, at least in the Off-Topic section. The OT section was almost a kind of anonymous-less *chan -- Moderators didn't went there, so the players had to moderate without any power. My "group", the so-called "Old schools" and "Elites" were people that helped in the first forum (We had two) - Me, another lesbian and feminist friend, a lawyer and a feminist nurse (Note - He is a man and wrote an article about lesbian health, and in Bahia, Brazil. Think about that for a minute). I think you know what goes from now - Lots of polls and flames about gay wedding in RO, lots of flames about feminism and butthurt sexists, lots of flames about equal rights. We always fought for it. When the gunslinger class came to bRO, we discussed about the translation (A long story about double meanings and other things like that). And we discussed religion, too - As we discussed gay wedding, there were always bigotry (One muslim dude posted a photo of a beaten and bloody homosexual saying something like "In my religion, that's what we do with faggots". In a rare occasion, the mod showed up and B&'d him on sight).
To finish it: We discussed it so much and argued so much the moderators actually BANNED discussion about religion in the Off-Topic, with the excuse that "It would generate flame" (as virtually everything people can disagree on). T'was very amusing, imo. I mean, the majority of flames about religion was because of prejudice.
But, well, it isn't only flowers. The in-game was very different from the forum. Actually, there were flames beteween "forum players" and "real (sarcasm) players". The in-game was sad. As one would know, RO is an almost ripoff of Final Fantasy Tactics. We have female dancers and male bards, knights, "squires", blacksmiths etc. The dancer-bard classes are almost ripoff, even with the habilities. So, why so seri-- sad? At least FFT had full-clothed female characters (if not, as with the Geomancer, the male was also seminude). The ones in RO are so fanserviced it's ridiculous. A dancer in FFT wears a long skirt. A dancer in RO wears bikini. Yes, bikini. Just do a little searching to see how much it's fanserviced. And now, the fun part: One of the non-fanserviced classes (The only one, methinks), Crusader, had a very bad reception: The community tought of her as a "macho-woman", a lesbian, an almost-man, an ugly class. Just because she... Wears full armor. Yup yup. Pretty awesome logic.
So, I think there can't be a perfect animu/mango/gaem community, seeing that this media is bloated with fanservice. Fanservice pulls 13-year-old boys to the fandom. And you know what can come of it.
I loved your post, meenee. Sexism and general prejudice in animos/mangos/gaems can be discussed to no end, and I love doing this.
Sorry for any off-topic.
They have a thread about how a subgenre of animation that originated and is largely produced in JAPAN is only for white people? Really?
I don't think that the entire anime fandom is like this, I've also seen anime that deals with gay or trans themes and fandoms that focus more on this. Of course, though, even this kind of stuff can be open to critique. Female made yaoi can have a fetishization feel to it rather than an accurate representation of queer relationships (I read a quote by a gay anime fan once that described yaoi as "girls playing with dolls" or something like that.)but I suppose that should be it's own whole post.
Yeah, sometimes I think some people forget that it comes from Japan...they see the characters as being "white" and somehow only see reflections of themselves perhaps?
Actually, I talked to several hispanic/black members in the forums who had been personally treated like crap because they disclosed their race and then basically the people around them reacted towards them as if they had no right to like anime, and thus no reason to be in the communities. Part of it was just plain racism by certain fans who don't want to talk to anyone who is different from them...I commonly hear people using the N word and other derogatory racial epitaphs to insult one another and promote racist culture. I also think that there's this general assumption among many anime fans that only white people are into anime...and so there's this "what are you doing here" attitude that gets directed at anyone who isn't white. I've read many comments in the forums that make sweeping and false generalizations as well as justifications and perpetuations of many of the racial stereotypes that are presented in animes and games (think GTA) ...
The racism is definitely a part of these communities, yes...but my larger bewilderment is also at how all the many sorts of prejudices are combined and expressed so blatantly and heatedly in so many of these online communities...there's literally everything you can think of, from religious prejudice, to transphobia, to sexism, classism, ablism and on and on, and they all set off, as Metra said, these huge flame wars...which are usually accompanied by some other really disturbing behavior as well...from death threats and photos of transgendered people being posted and ridiculed, what I experienced recently aka "forum stalking"...to (!!!) what Metra experienced with a member posting a picture of a beaten and bloodied body with the caption "this is what we do to gays". All of it gives me the chills.
I know this is a topic we could all go on for hours about...but yeah, I agree that it's worth seeking out some feminist communities (just the prospect of not having to deal with all the sexism...heavennnn!)...so I'll definitely check out some of the websites that were suggested here. I just always wonder though...why do some people have to be so mean?
Maybe you should start your own "safe space" gaming and anime community!
I eventually hope to add a separate Planeshift game when RIOTgamer gets a large enough following to make a consistently interesting game.
But also, if anyone else started one that would be amazing too!
Mad props, Meenee. I agree with you 100%
Sexism and homophobia in the gaming community is a problem. I don't know about the anime community as a whole, but I can see that if the gaming community and the anime community were a venn diagram, the connecting wedge might be "the fandom for Final Fantasy and related JRPGs." I cans see that community having a lot of problems. Especially when you frequent internet forums.
All I can say is... take your time and weed out the unworthy. The people who are left will be the most awesome of friends. If you play MMORPGs, find a feminist guild or a guild for older, casual players. I'm 22 but I prefer to game with people who are 30+ and married with kids, because they're chill and helpful and I don't have to deal with adolescent bullshit. I've only seen sexual harassment in my guild once, and that person got chastised, reported, and banned.
P.S. Even if homophobia is more of a problem for you than sexism, find a feminist guild. There was a kerfuffle a while back when somebody tried to form an LGBTQ guild in World of Warcraft and actually got banned for advertising his guild and recruiting members. Why? Because the existence of a LGBT guild might incite flaming and harassment and the moderators didn't want to deal with it. Way to blame to go, Blizzard. Don't expect people to act like decent human beings to other players... expect people to act like assholes and penalize anybody who tries to change the status quo. There was a boycott and I think Blizzard did issue some sort of an apology, but I still think you'll have better luck finding a feminist community than a LGBTQ community on any MMO, and feminist communities tend to be gay-friendly.
The thing is, if anyone ever wondered some of the reasons why women, lgbt, poc, etc. form their own separate communities, just visit pretty much any largly male community on the internet. Sometimes, it's not that we necessarily want to separate ourselves, so much as that we are forced to.
Right on.
I have been there. I totally understand how you feel, and I'm sorry that you too have had to deal with these trolls.
I used to work at a fairly well-known RPG news/reviews site. I'd get all sorts of hate mail just for being a female gamer, and every now and then I'd see degrading comments about me and my work in other gaming forums.
One reader cyberstalked me by evading IRC chat bans (I'd banned him for harassing others in chat) and sending hateful emails. He also demanded that the site fire me and hire him, and he emailed me photos of his extensive game collection as "proof" of his superiority over me as a gamer. Yeah, he was a charmer.
Another guy sent me hate emails, then came into our chat room and started spewing venom about me. I'd never even spoken to him online before; he just saw me working on the site and decided that I needed to be put in my place or whatever. And they say chivalry is dead!
The bright spots were the times that I'd get emails from other female gamers thanking me for "being bold about being a female gamer and a feminist." Knowing that like-minded women were counting on me to be a voice in gaming helped me have the courage to speak my mind.
I eventually left that site, and I co-founded a new site with some friends. It's not as popular as the old site, but we're working on our own terms and having a lot of fun. I can't say it's a 100% "safe space," but we do our best to keep everything fun, friendly, and hate-free. We had a problem on our forums a while back with someone throwing out sexist bullshit and not behaving himself at the request of mods, but he has since left.
I also recently left a large gaming forum due to the fact that there were too many misogynists and rape apologists. I didn't make a scene about it; I just quietly left and I haven't been back. It wasn't a big loss, since a lot of the posters just imitated 4chan's style of humor and it was rotting my brain. I think my IQ has gone back up by about 4 points since I left.
Even in female gamer comms, I still see misogyny and homophobia. One of the girl gamer comms over on LJ sometimes divides into two camps over issues: the feminists, and the "omg, feminazis are soooooo stupid, tee hee! That [sexist comment/image/etc.] doesn't offend me so that means it's totally OK!" Ugh.
I don't exactly know why gamers are like this. I think some of it is the whole "person + anonymity + audience = fuckwad" theory in action. I also think that the worst ones are socially maladjusted and insecure. I noticed that some guys were really intimidated by the notion of a woman having any degree of authority/expertise/a voice in a traditionally male-dominated field, and I think that's why they try to push us out of their "territory."
Oh, have you looked at the Iris Gaming Network? It's not super active but it's a pretty good community.
Reasons why gamers might be like this:
They are engaging in an activity that requires more money and free time than others tend to have. Therefore, they are likely young enough not to need jobs and richer than others.
They're playing games that involve war and combat and stuff. In a world where those are "male," this will attract more men than women.
They're getting a hefty dose of their social interaction heavily mediated, and through an online network that caters to people who are "uncool." This means that they are a self-selected group of people who are far more likely to have problems with interpersonal interactions.
I'm not trying to say that what I just said is true of all gamers, but gaming websites are set up so as to attract disproportionate numbers of immature, maladjusted, white, rich men.
I can't at this point remember which sites the stats came from...so you'll just have to take my word for it I suppose - but when I was looking into starting RIOTgamer, I looked into the popular gaming sites to get an idea of what they were doing. Several had the stats of their male/female subscriber numbers and of those I found I averaged it out to be about 97% male.
It kinda goes like a circle:
College education is biased - particularly in technological sciences (that good ol' boy network's root). Those good ol' boys get the gaming industry jobs. They then create games with straight white guys in mind. Marketing folks market those games to their straight white male audience. That targeted audience buys up the games (those with the time and money to afford it). Few women bought in because they were ignored by the industry and by marketing. Industry leaders go, "Men like games" and make no changes. The cycle repeats. Then more and more women get involved int he industry. The industry execs think 'Well, Sh*t! Women can play games too! shucks. It's an untapped market!!!' They then scramble around like morons trying to figure out how to "tap the female market" and, geniuses that they are, come up with games that allow you to bake cakes and such. Some women bite...many don't. Right now from what I'm reading, I'd say they're still trying to make games "geared toward women" by relying on good old gender stereotypes.
What this means for gaming sites? Mostly what you were saying. Women and minorities (LGBT included) come and, after awhile, go because of all of the jackassery present on the sites already. It becomes too hard to be a part of a community that completely devalues you at best, and demeans and degrades you at worse. More difficult is that the main reason to take part in these things is the enjoyment that they bring. So expending the effort to try to fight that sort of systematic sexism, racism, and heterosexism within those communities is just too much...if you're going for fun, it's so hard to be political there. We form separatist places because we want to enjoy ourselves...and also with the hope that we can someday amass in a way which will allow us to effect change outside of our communities.
I'm right there with you - I tend to avoid the comments sections on game news sites now, because it's just not worth the rise in blood pressure.
I'm not sure why it happens, although I'd be tempted to peg it as a corrollary to John Gabriel's Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory. Something about the combination of anonymity and the sense of community spawned by being assholes together.
But anyways. There are places that come down hard on that kind of bullshit - in my experience, the mods on the Penny Arcade forums are good about heading that kind of thing off. I used to hang out at the 8-Bit Theater forums, and the Gamingforce.org forums, and I remember the mods there being pretty good about banninating people who were being asses, but that was a while ago and might have changed.
I left most of the forums I was once a member of for this reason. Their sexism alone was enough to make me walk away. The sad thing is..a lot of these forums actually had more women than men! They still got away with it!
I've found fandom to be one of the more accepting places on the Internet, in a way. It always seems close to 50/50 for sane, non-asshat individuals, and so long as you can find the places run by the sane people, you can enjoy some lovely smackdowns.
The problem is that the anonymity of the Internet allows people to be more casually homophobic/racist/sexist/etc., but I think think it also allows people to more easily call them out on it, as well.
On the whole, I think it's a bit better than meatspace. Bannination only works on the Internets.
I registered here just to respond to this! :D I feel your pain- "geek" hobby subcultures seem rife with sexism and general disgustingness. But you can occasionally find a decent oasis. The only game community I bother with are the aforementioned Iris Network and other feminist game blogs (when they're not dying off.. ;_;). Also the only anime community I bother with is Animenewsnetwork.com. There is still a decent population of bigots/idiots there, but the forum is heavily moderated and any kind of abuse would not be tolerated at all (I know many of the admins, and they are all good, pretty progressive people). Hang in there! On the upside, I get really kinda happy whenever I meet/read about another feminist-minded game/anime fan. :D
I used to be a member of a forum for International Baccalaureate students and alumni. There was one guy who'd say really douchey things to girls he was debating with, calling us "toots" and such. When I tried to point out how insulting and sexist such names were, he said I was just "taking things too personally" and later had a signature on his posts about how anyone "offended by [his] statements can go complain to the 'Thought Police'" which was a link to the ACLU home page. The moderators were friends of his and similarly privileged white males and would yell at ME for (again) "being too sensitive" when I complained. (The female moderators sometimes called them out but generally tried not to involve themselves).
I considered complaining to the admin - a fairly feminst-minded woman who'd probably sympathize with me - especially after I got the impression that the guy wasn't very liked on the board other than within his small group of douchey friends. But after I started having some other problems with people at school on the board figuring out who I was and spreading around some stuff I'd said about an ex-friend who had been cruel to me, I decided to just leave the board altogether. I think if that hadn't happened though, I would eventually have contacted the admin, because I enjoyed the other people on the board and that small group of sexist douches were ruining it for me.
Oh man I know what you mean. I'm a gamer and a member of a few gaming communities. The amount of sexism on there is ridiculous. First of all, when they found out you're female they insist on pics to "prove" it. Then, in the off topic areas the boards are littered with "my gf cheated, women are liars and whores" threads. Ugh. And everyone just agrees, even the women on there. The times I've stepped in and defended my gender I've been harassed for it. I also found it pathetic that there are so many references to violence against women on the boards, but when I made some joke about kicking someone on the nuts, everyone got all serious. Argh! I guess it's because of all the reasons everyone has stated here. The internet seems to bring out the asshole in everyone. You know they'd never talk like that to anyone's face.
Video game players are very anti-women. This is partly because women in this culture are very anti-gamer anti-geek. Video games are considered a male specific behavior in the US. Its different in Japan because girls play games there all the time. It has nothing to do with anime, in fact most anime fandom is in Japan where the teens aren't nearly as misogynistic as they are here in the US.