And while we're on the topic of gaming

[drwex]

sweetmmeblue sent me this link: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/04/pro-gaming-tournament-attempts-to-limit-gay-and-transgender-players?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Google%2B

Let us count the number of things wrong with this... no, is too long. Let's sum up. Gay != trans. Neither has anything to do with gaming. Gah. We know all this.

Also, for the language nerds like me "pro-gaming" is not the same as "pro gaming." The former indicates someone is in favor of gaming; the latter indicates someone is a professional gamers. Apparently the "pro-journalists" at the Guardian failed to notice this.

THAT all said, Current Genital Load-Out is totally my new band name.

Comments

[bluegargantua]

Here's the real question -- why is there a separate women's division for a video game competition? If there was ever one "sport" where physical prowess didn't matter, it's video games. And for LoL, a team game, there's no reason not to have co-ed teams.

later
Tom

[drwex]

There are at least three answers to that.

One is because ALL THE STUPID, as I mentioned.

Two is because e-sports are trying to be like physical sports, which often have separate men's/women's leagues. This actually matters because advertising contains the baked-in assumption that women are more likely to watch a women's league than a men's or mixed league. Of course, there's a giant mountain of gender-binary and frankly sexist assumptions built in there but the bottom line is "if you have a women's league you'll have more total viewers."

Three is because stars. In a mixed league male players are still likely to be the vast majority and so it'll be harder for women - even if somehow they magically got treated equally - to get the kind of star status that both brings endorsement/backing money and that gets them known. In a women's league the stars are going to be (duh) women. One can argue whether this is just promoting more separate-but-not-actually-equal or whether it's opening up a space for women gamers to get some attention. I don't have a strong opinion on that, but I do note that other women-only institutions (colleges, music festivals, etc) make similar arguments about creating such spaces.

[aelf.livejournal.com]

Chess also has separate women's divisions. My daughter competed in both coed and girls-only chess competitions. So much of it is baked into our current culture.