#gaming racism

[videogamesincolor]

White supremacy and the unattractiveness of Gaming in (white) Men

So, I was browsing on TikTok, and user (@) derrickthemindfulgamer (who has come across my timeline more than once) was talking about a website called "DEI Detected".

"DEI has been taking our culture for too long already, it is time to push back. Vote with your wallet!"

Effectively, it's a website designed to encourage the white supremacist, the smelly boot of the gaming space to boycott games developed by studios who hire sensitivity consultants, Black, and non-Black devs. Or games centered around (and written by) Black and non-Black identities.

This also includes games that are tweaked or patched for pre-existing issues, or issues that gamers raised a complaint about (if the devs didn't take it upon themselves to amend it without prompting).

His reaction was primarily amusement and bewilderment. Particularly because the intention of the website, designed to financially damage the games through boycotts, could also be used to direct interested parties toward games that aren't about what the website believes should be the standard of games. (The downside of course would be driving traffic to the site and boosting its ad revenue.)

The gaming side of TikTok in general seems to believe that bad actors are working tirelessly to reignite the GG movement (GG 2.0). And to that, I would say, typically the best way to handle that kind of behavior is to just never give it any fuel for its fire. Let them kick up a fit and bitch about people playing and making games that they enjoy.

The issue with that, of course, is that our mainstream gaming media and news outlets thrive on this kind of behavior, and have often encouraged it for the sake of revenue (if they aren't in support of it).

It's very much akin to the behavior that the Democrats displayed when they proactively encouraged Trumpet's campaign for the presidency back in the 2010s (and now in the 2020s), and legacy media fanned the flames.

Right now, there's naught but crickets, so I'm not terribly concerned. But I wouldn't be surprised if it kicks off one day and everyone from Polygon to Kotaku will be fanning the flames, and the bad-faith actors will be reveling in it.

It got me thinking about the news circulating about a poll where an overwhelming majority of people (presumably women) voted that men being gamers, or being heavily invested in gaming at all, was an unattractive trait.

The person doing the polling was (allegedly) a Right-Wing YouTuber (Liz Wheeler). What one considers unattractive about the still predominantly white and male gaming space, and what a Right Winger considers unattractive about men's gaming (at all) is probably night and day.

The whole thing caught fire on Twitter, and there was a lot of memeification and jokes about it. But also bafflement. That, or commenting on exceptions or outright rebuttals. The intention of the poll had successfully started up an online discourse about it, but it has since lost speed.

The thing of it is, even if that poll had been done in good faith and not by a reactionary right winger, the general behaviors in the gaming community, as defined by the DEI Detected website, don't disprove the idea that folk might find that hobby unattractive in men because of those sentiments.

That is to say, there is still a big concentration of men who make gaming their entire personality, who work to push Black and non-Black folks out of the games industry and community spaces altogether.

The sentiment regarding women engaging in the FGC and Esports has not disappeared. Neither has the toxicity women and people of color face for using voice chat in FPS online games or even playing games on Twitch. I think we've just done a better job at making those opinions extremely... unattractive to hold. So now only the most vitriolic (and generally most invisible) online reactionaries feel bold enough to say it for attention.

Gaming, comparatively, has the highest barrier for entry when it comes to establishing a strong enough groundswell where Black and non-Black folks can take place. Even with stories that aren't about constipated white men, exploitative depictions of (cis, white) women, and hyper-violence, they're not the norm.

The so-called hobby of gaming itself is more of a luxury than it is a genuine hobby, and the people who are typically 'othered' in the space (who make a niche of it) are exceptions, not the rule.

It's not enough that said folks and community largely keep to themselves, and have, as the atypically white and entitled gamer cries about, been making games and stories about themselves or particular groups.

The rebuttal "Go make your game, then!" (when faced with criticism of a game someone may have otherwise enjoyed beyond a few aspects) has never been a genuine call to action. Reactionaries have never really wanted the underrepresented to enter the industry or community with their stories.

If anything they're almost reassured that the expenses necessary to pursue game dev and writing for games are extremely high for underrepresented folk.

It's the same kind of energy AO3 stannies exude when someone criticizes the website's numerous issues and offers ideas for improvement. When they say, "Go make your own AO3", they don't really want that. They're reassured by the fact that coding and website building and upkeep (nowadays) are costly and the endeavor is unlikely to happen any time soon. If ever.

So when games like Control, Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Banishers of New Eden, Alan Wake 2, Usual June, Fields of Misteria, and other stories featuring white women, Black/Brown actors and characters hit the market - they lose their shit.

No matter the developer - they can't ignore it and just play the games that cater to them. Alan Wake 2 choosing to focus on a Black woman character instead of just two white dudes, is a threat to the status quo they know serves them specifically. So we end up with websites created by men who need their foothold in white supremacy reaffirmed through the financial deficit of games like Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn.

So, in this context, if this makes gaming as a hobby an unattractive preoccupation, I can't say that I blame the person who holds that belief.

But again, that poll, like the DEI website itself, was not made in good faith.

[prokopetz]

I'm all on board with queer liberation as a core theme in tabletop RPGs, but I've gotta ask: did you think this shit through at all? Yes, you've name-checked the X Card in your preamble and reminded players to choose their pronouns during character creation, and you've got a big stack of testimonials proclaiming that the mechanics of play are "genderpunk" – whatever that means! – but, like, your implicit setting still includes an out-group whose boundaries are delineated within the idiom of race science whom the text insists are ontologically okay to kill. Sure, they've got fash aesthetic, but I don't think making "cop" a biological category is doing the heavy lifting you think it is.

[spitedemon]

i really don’t think it’s “typical dragon age fandom nonsense” for people to be genuinely upset about the world state choices. combat, level design, art direction, gameplay gimmicks, those have all varied across each dragon age game. the one thing that’s remained constant are nods to our previous choices.

i wasn’t expecting my HoF to come riding in on a griffon, but i can’t find a monument dedicated to warden tabris somewhere around the anderfels? lucanis couldn’t have some lines about the time that one arainai boy was stirring up trouble in antiva city? you’re gonna tell me that making a mage the new divine wouldn’t have some impact on nevarra and antiva? on the anderfels, the supposed most devout militant andrastian nation in thedas? you’re saying nobody in the north is paying attention to who rules orlais or ferelden? come on.

[butchvamp]

veilguard is maddeningly racist and we have got to have this conversation outside of "fantasy racism" terms. we are not talking about fantasy elves. it is anti-indigenous racism, the elves are intentionally indigenous coded as previously stated by Gaider (and it honestly doesn't matter if it's been "confirmed," it is obviously true, no matter what Weekes tries to argue now) and insinuating that your indigenous coded characters 1. are deserving of their oppression, 2. are in any way responsible for it, 3. should feel guilty about it, 4. are foolish and dangerous for wanting to reconnect with and preserve their history, and 5. are "stuck in the past" and "too traditional," (why don't they just assimilate already?) are all insidious, racist ideas that this game perpetuates. and there is very little pushback from the narrative that the player can engage in, which is what a lot of the criticism is discussing. we're not talking about "fantasy racism" or fantasy slurs, we are talking about the real world racism this game is perpetuating.

[priceofreedom]

this makes me so sad and angry

John is easily one of the best voice actors in the game, but because Barret doesn't get enough appreciation, he doesn't either. i'm so tired of the Barret erasure man, and so is he, understandably. Barret is one of the MAIN!!! characters and he gets nothing every fucking time. WHEN will this change.

[bubblingsteam]

[probablybadrpgideas]

Ok, just thinking out loud, but maybe we should let the Great Old Ones out.

I'm just saying. Lovecraft wasn't exactly an unbiased source. Maybe they're perfectly nice. Maybe they just want to stop people saying slurs. Maybe they're just Welsh.

I'm not saying I want the world to end, but I think that it would be a decent compromise to maybe unseal one or two of the smaller ones, just to see what happens. I bet we could put them back if there's a problem. And maybe they'll give us candy!

If it's just one of them, and maybe just for the weekend, it'll be fine. Come on, guys. What's life without a little risk?

Ritual! Ritual! Ritual!

[dare-to-dm]

One criticism I saw about Dragon Age Veilguard was that everything in the game was kind of sanitized compared to past titles, making for overall weaker and less impactful writing.

And I would agree that Veilguard feels more "family friendly", which comes with both pros and cons. There's definitely a thoughtful critique to be made.

But the specific example used in this post was the Lords of Fortune and how they have scholarly experts examine their acquisitions to avoid stealing objects of significance from other cultures. And how this effort to avoid being problematic makes the entire faction seem more shallowly presented.

I think that ignores the fact that the Lords of Faction is led by Isabela. Isabela, who in Dragon Age 2 stole the Tomb of Koslun not really realizing what its value was to the Qunari people. Her ignorance directly led to so much conflict and literally hundreds of deaths in Kirkwall. It makes perfect character and narrative sense for her to have learned from the experience and to take pains not to repeat that kind of mistake in the future.

Isabela was always the kind of person who wants to make money with a minimum of effort and have fun. But even in her more selfish days, she never wanted to hurt vulnerable people to do it. I think her relationships with Hawke and Merrill helped her grow into a more thoughtful person, and the way she runs the Lords of Fortune is a reflection of that. It actually makes perfect sense.

[taashyvashedan]

Ya'll have noticed that nobody seems to be upset about the non-binary mayor of Treviso or Maevaris, right? Tarquin? The medic at the Warden Camp? Why is Taash getting all the flack for something already in the game with other characters?

Taash is non-white coded (I will die on that hill.)

Taash pushes back against the 'don't ask, don't tell' idea that queer folks shouldn't be "shoving it in your face."

Racism, Ableism & Homophobia and the inability to figure out or conceptualize nuance.

That's it. That's the post.

[thenonbinarydetective]

Things batfam stans need to leave behind in 2023:

Jason's Lazarus pit rage

Thinking Tim's parents were horribly abusive and hated him

Only caring about Stephanie in terms of her relationship to another person (ex: Tim's bestie/ex/gf or Cass' gf/bestie)

Treating Jason or Stephanie like they're stupid

Feral Demon Child Damian

Permanent sunshine boy Dick Grayson

Any "[blank] was the real violent Robin" discourse

Really just any reducing or sectioning of certain traits to certain batfam members and not allowing other characters to exhibit those same traits (ex: see sunshine Dick Grayson)

But also stealing traits from other characters and projecting them onto someone else (ex: Jason getting Dick's personality in fics. He is not the same type of big brother Dick is canonically)

Purposefully mischaracterizing characters for angst (ex: Dick sent Tim to Arkham, my beloathed. also again see Tim's parents)

Trying really hard to nuclearize the family. They are an unconventional family for many reasons, and that's why they're interesting.

"Alfred solos the batfam"

Making Duke "the normal one" and completely forgetting to give him an actual personality.

Cass using sign language because she can read body language (note: does not apply to YJ Cass who has damaged vocal chords)

Cass being used as a prop for her brothers

Tim being weak, woobified baby

Feel free to add on ~~

Don't send hate over these things because idgaf, they are harmful mischaracterizations, and many are built on total ignorance and often racism, classism, ableism, and sexism.

[thinkingofausername]

istg i'll never understand the whole "it's just fiction" mindset. thinking that you can't be racist/fatphobic/ableist towards a character because they're fictional is ridiculous. the way people interact with fiction says a lot about them and i'll always stand by this. "they're fictional, you can't offend them" yeah but you sure can expose your shitty attitude towards real people who are represented by those characters. fiction has always reflected reality and people's stand on it means more than they're willing to accept

[prokopetz]

Obviously bigotry in tabletop RPG writing is something that ought to be addressed, but it's starkly clear that a lot of us regard doing so as a tool for advocating for our favourite games rather than an end in itself – particularly when the games we're using it to advocate for do exactly the same shit. "Dungeons & Dragons is intrinsically and irredeemably racist due to its history of publication, and that's why everybody should play Vampire: The Masquerade instead" is maybe not an argument we should be making here.

[mxfrodo]

y'all for fucking real. don't fucking write slave fics or x reader fics of aventurine's slavery??? are you guys out of your goddamn minds???

[solitaireships]

I feel like I should say since there's been a recent uptick in a lot of communities I'm in/see stuff from a lot of white people pretending to be Asian, but you are not welcome here if you are in anyway stealing from Asian cultures for clout or the aesthetics of it

This includes if you're white and you give your self inserts Asian names, I truly do not care if your f/o is from an anime, you should not be using an Asian name under any circumstances. I hate that whenever I see someone using an Asian name online, I feel like I have to start searching their account to see if they're actually Asian or just a white person who likes the aesthetic of it bcs far too many white people will use Asian names here just bcs it sounds cool, with no regard for the actual cultural meaning behind it. Meanwhile actual Asian people will be mocked for their names, or treated like their names are too hard to learn to pronounce, or discriminated against based on their names

Asian cultures are not a fun little costume for people to dress up with. They aren't just a nice aesthetic, they aren't just a thing you can borrow from bcs you think it sounds cool

[lizzieraindrops]

You know what, I figured out why we're having so many errors in Destiny 2 now. It's because with the addition of Micah-10, we've finally reached a critical mass of women with drop dead gorgeous voices, and the game simply can't handle it anymore. It's like Telesto. Too powerful. If they'd actually put Ikora Rey in a rendered cutscene for more than 5 seconds it would have shut down the servers for good

[lesbianwyllravengard]

If I see one more person bitching ab the rat diet comment in Wyll's tag I'm going to kill someone. Shut the fuck up actually.