Reduced to incoherent rage

[drwex]

http://xboxlive.ign.com/articles/107/1079073p1.html

How to stereotype guys, cheapen women, and really just ladle on the sexist bullshit as thick as you can.

Oh, and for the record? The women I game with would KICK THEIR ASSES.

*rarghincoherentrage*

Comments

[woodwardiocom.livejournal.com]

Given that we have friends who are female sex workers — i.e., in the same line of work, only more so — I'm not sure why the rage.

So now that I'm a little calmer

[drwex]

I have no objection to sex work. The sex workers I know (and I think the ones you know) are up front about what they're doing. The coy "oh, we're playing GAMES nudgenudgewinkwink" is part of what irks me.

That this targets a community already burdened by stereotypes bothers me more. First, there's the stereotype that all gamers are males (wrong) who can't get a date (wrong). Second, there's the stereotype that women don't game (wrong) or only do so in order to get relationships with guys (wrong).

Finally, the entire thing seems like such a huge insult to my female gamer friends (not least of all my wife) that I take personal offense. It feels like someone saying "oh, they're not REAL gamers, they're just whores."

So, y'know, incoherent rage.

[heinleinfan.livejournal.com]

I've had rage about it too and I know many people who know sex workers who were also in the "why the rage?" category, like you are. "These girls are making some extra money gaming, how cool is that?" and so forth and so on.

But people that you and I probably know that are in this trade have made informed intelligent decisions to do this. They are probably not drug or alcohol addicts, victims of abuse that have never had any support or therapy for that abuse, not poor, not looking at no option, no career paths to them, no education, etc. etc. And they engage in their chosen professions in ways that keep themselves healthy and safe, emotionally and physically. And they also typically engage in a very specific type of sex work, some of it considered theraputic, and usually with a very specific and limited market. They're not sitting on a street corner in a mini skirt hollering out "hey, baby, wanna date?" while their pimp looks on from the alley.

That is not the majority of the sex industry.

And this is not the reality of the sex industry in our country and especially world wide. *Children are still kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery on our planet* and the sex industry as a whole, not necessarily the microcosm of Boston and it's environs and people we may know personally, but as a whole world wide is about teaching and encouraging men to horribly demean, disrespect and disregard women as people and instead turn them into objects, to be purchased and used for no other reason than the pleasure of men, and then discarded.


This site is telling teenage boys "forget all that having to get to know girls, or trying to talk to them or respect them or learn to flirt with them in healthy ways, you can just buy them!" It's teaching them young that women can and should be bought and doing so under a guise of "it's just harmless flirting, and gaming!"


I personally believe rage is *exactly* what is called for in this situation.

QFT

[drwex]

This site is telling teenage boys "forget all that having to get to know girls, or trying to talk to them or respect them or learn to flirt with them in healthy ways, you can just buy them!" It's teaching them young that women can and should be bought and doing so under a guise of "it's just harmless flirting, and gaming!"

Right. Adding that to my slightly more coherent set of "why i hate this concept" reasons.

Re: QFT

[sunstealer.livejournal.com]

I think an interesting riff on this idea would be to create an actual dating service based around gaming. Have people do the usual of submitting interests and so on -which would include games played- and then arrange dates based around a session of gaming rather than going out for drinks. Takes the whole idea and exploits it for positives instead of digging for the lowest denominator.