Countering Racism and Sexism within the Gaming Community

Birdie, of Street Fighter Alpha 3

Our lives are becoming increasingly disjointed. It is no accident--as status quo depends upon it--those who reap the most rewards from the current system (most often at the expense of the majority of humanity) need that "sleeping giant" to be utterly unable to draw parallels from one sphere of their lives to another, lest the masses come to the conclusion that things are not working out equally in their best interest. Indeed, even the concept of different "spheres" of life or activity (such as work vs. private life) has been drawn to accomplish that goal, only allowing people to come to conclusions by socially accepted syllogisms, rather than viewing their entire life in a holistic fashion. Men, especially, are trained to see their existence in a compartmentalized manner, as we are forced to identify as part of a largely ruling class, men over women, yet are still often subsumed under other men who have positions of power over us in fundamental ways.

Recently, this subject came to a head in my own participation within the gaming community. At Ars Technica, one of the premier technology sites on the internet, a poster in the gaming forum started a thread (local mirror) on his desire to create a web site specifically geared towards gamers of African decent. He prefaced his idea with an apologetic note, obviously aware that his idea would be greeted with skepticism if not outright hostility, and gave compelling arguments why such a Black Gamers' Network is necessary:

He also presented the fact that there are websites that accomplish exactly those goals for the community of female gamers. Womengamers.com does exactly that, including in depth reviews of not just games, but the few "digital women" who are included as protagonists, down to categories such as "look," "stance," and "attitude," in an attempt to see how far from stereotypical the female representation has been drawn.

Other posters came to the conclusion that such attempts on the part of minority communities to regulate their own image (as it is to a large degree manufactured and maintained by the "majority" group, having access to much of the capital resources within our society) is as or even more damaging to our society as racism and sexism perpetrated by the majority against minority groups. Most maintained that race and sex do not matter and that the internet and gaming community is a colorblind, genderless place. The true meaning of "colorblind and genderless" is that everyone is considered potentially white and male by default; that is not equality or diversity, by any stretch of the imagination.

Furthermore, several posters objected to the inclusion of politics within the gaming forum, as there is another forum at Ars Technica for the discussion of such issues, entitled "The Soap Box." However, the framing of that went beyond the mere conventions of how the web site was set up and moved into a philosophical groundwork that stated that all spheres of human activity should be compartmentalized:

Thus, three separate spheres are created: The Political, The Social, and that of Entertainment. Each of which is a discrete and independent entity which must be accepted on its own terms; no comparisons may be drawn, no conclusions can be made.

On the other hand, further evidence proved that those spheres were anything but disconnected in this scenario. The thread was locked by the moderator, Calvin, who left an impartial message that read, "This turned ugly pretty damn fast. If you can't play nice, guys, go play elsewhere," despite the fact that only one side of the debate was relying on ad hominem attacks. This was not the first time I had seen the results of such "even handed" moderation within the gaming community, such as a thread I spoke of in my article "Taking Back the Byte" where a feminist poster was banned by Paul Steed at the Polycount forums (local mirror) for challenging the status quo, while a poster who told her to "spin on his middle digit" received not so much as a reprimand.

However, there is more to this story: the originator of the "Black Gamers' Network" thread emailed me, thanking me for my support in that thread, as well as passing on to me a transcript of an IRC chat that an anonymous person had, in turn, passed on to him. You can read it in its entirety, here. While it is possible that the contents of chat log are a hoax, its very elaborateness defies such a notion given the presumably petty nature of the subject at hand. In fact, the participants of the chat are allegedly aware of the fact that they are being logged and it could be used against them and yet persist, an illogical but natural result of human nature that is hard to fake. In this IRC chat (which occurred in real time as the thread progressed), detailed plans were given as to how the thread must be "shitted" upon with hostile posts intending to get it "locked" so no new discussion can take place. The instigators continued by inviting others to participate in it (which even an Ars Technica content editor, Zach "johnnyace" Brookheart, did, by posting a rather gratuitous picture), and even asked the gaming forum's moderator, Calvin, who came onto the IRC channel mid-chat to lock the thread, as it had "…degenerated. it's turned on the creator's original intent." Never mind the inconvenient fact that they themselves had orchestrated that "turn" and were very much in favor of the degeneration.

It is fairly obvious that the non committal remark made by the moderator, intending to sound impartial with its syntax, was anything but partial--given his social relationship with those hostile to the idea of a Black Gamer's Network. Thus, rather than The Social, The Political, and Entertainment being separate entities, social interactions were used to exact political change (or stop it) within the medium of entertainment. Otherwise known as the "good old boys' club." By preventing others from making connections between such seemingly disparate spheres, by constantly advertising them as being distinct notions, the truth concerning power structures stays submerged behind the scenes, away from criticism.

Indeed, all positions are the domain of the status quo; it can absorb any argument, even those that are diametrically opposed. In the original thread at Ars Technica, one poster cemented his argument by saying "And don't even start, cause you don't know what race/nationality I am" while another prefaced his with the fact that "Just for the record, I'm black, and from Trinidad and Tobago as well" (the same nationality and ethnicity as the originator of the thread, a fantastic coincidence if his claim is actually true). At the same time, race is both irrelevant and key to arguments that support the status quo. Conversely, the fact that the thread's originator is from Trinidad and Tobago is proof of his bias and my identity as a white male prevents me from having an authentic argument against the status quo, a classic case of "heads we win; tails you lose."

The concept of "separate spheres" has long been a favorite among those who are proponents of BSDM sexual practices, to counter the feminist credo that "the personal is political" and maintain that what occurs in their bedrooms has no connections to other spheres of activity or implications concerning society as a whole. The fact that men are generally in a position of power over women is made irrelevant within the artificial construct of "consent" (indeed, even Sacher-Masoch, for whom masochism is named, was at the helm of his own "abuse," and in a position of power over the lives of those he demanded to play his "master") which stands as a red-herring, serving to prevent discourse on the reasons why one might consent to something in the first place, whether it be a rock or a hard place.

Ars Technica contains, among its various fora, one dedicated "to that other geek pursuit, pimpin'," under the label, "The Velvet Room." The forum's "charter," written by its moderator, Semi On, states:

Being that "pimping" is hardly a gender neutral word (and both "pimp" and "whore" can be seen as nouns, verbs, and adjectives on even the most respected and prestigious gaming and technology websites) it is somewhat surprising that the Velvet Room has the highest alleged amount of female participation of any of the discussion groups at Ars Technica, especially considering one must be a paid subscriber to even post there (the non-technical forums tend to be subscriber only).

What could account for that discrepancy? While the premise is probably wrong and there is no actual evidence to support that there is a higher percentage of women posting within the Velvet Room, the perception of that alone seems reasonable enough as posters might have a higher propensity to announce their identities as female. This is in part due to the subject matter where such details are more likely come out as part of the natural conversation, but that explanation does not account for the charter's implication that women are drawn to that particular forum and are more likely to pay money in order to participate there than to participate in the "Linux Kung Fu" forum for free.

If anything, logically it would follow that female posters are more likely to reveal their identities as females when it is advantageous for them to do so--and the way the men behave in the Velvet Lounge clearly makes that advantageous. Note, these are typically the same men who extol the virtues of the internet as a genderless, race free place. This is not a case of women "using their wiles" and exploiting men, but a case of men controlling the media on which discourse occurs, through official capacities as moderators and sheer numbers as participants, and being able to dole out special privileges to the women who jump through the right hoops to prove they are satisfied with the status quo.

Indeed, the rules in the Velvet Lounge are often violated, with men posting illegal photographs to the "Babe" thread and even revealing photographs of their wives, often flaunting the "no nipple or pubic hair" mandate in the "charter." In one case, demonstrating that sexism is even more pernicious than racism, as the sense of masculine entitlement runs easily across racial lines, a black man posted dozens of images of nearly nude black women in an attempt to "open the eyes" of his white peers, offering sexism as the antidote to racism.

How one behaves and interacts with others in one sphere of his or her life is generally in sync with behaviors exhibited in other spheres--largely because the arbitrary concept of "spheres" is meaningless. Semi On, the moderator of the Velvet Room, posted the following (local mirror) within a discussion concerning DVD pricing within the "Audio/Visual Club" (a forum within Ars Technica moderated by different parties):

The entire discussion then shifted to men's sexual conquests of women, giving strategies tying "good fuck movies" to certain women's personalities. Needless to say, the thread was never locked, even if it had "degenerated" and run afoul of the thread originator's intent, as it worked politically to further existing power structures. I agree that saying so might be a stretch if only these two contrasting examples are taken independently, both from each other and from similar cases--however, one does not have to look hard to find more examples and witness a pattern. At Anandtech.com, another premier technology site on the internet, I once participated in a thread (local mirror, page 1, 2) about how one could obtain a free sample of a perfume bearing the dubious name of "bitch." While many made light of the name, including a few posters self-identifying as female, as the jokes became increasingly misogynistic, those female posters disappeared as it became readily apparent who was in control of the discourse at the forum. When I objected to this turn of events, I too was even "feminized" by the other inhabitants of the forum, and forced to leave that discussion.

Web sites such as Ars Technica and Anandtech are scientific, social, and political enterprises. While they might not be raking in the money themselves due to the current downturn in advertising revenues, immense amounts of money exchanges hands (a plethora of bad reviews can sink a 100 million dollar product launch and a "hot deal" thread might inspire thousands of people to stand in line at a local electronics' chain store on a Sunday morning) because of the information they contain and the subsequent consumer discourse. Because of this, the technology industry stands up and takes notice (sometimes to the tune of even posting coveted job openings on such web forums); an industry which have a vested interest in promoting certain politics. The spheres of The Political, The Social, and that of Entertainment could not be more intertwined--and they are all run by men, most white, not all, but men none the less.

If the internet is a genderless and race-free zone, it is also an "ageless" one, as people are rarely forced to take responsibility for their actions. The internet allows boys to behave as if they have the authority of men and for men to behave as if they have the freedom of boys. The antics that might occur at Ars Technica pale before the ones at some of the less prestigious sites, such as Tribalwar.com, which is devoted to a relatively minor game franchise. Posters there once organized a mass "invasion" (local mirror, pages 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13...) of a feminist forum at the site of Ms. Magazine. It began when a single poster mentioned that his wife had spoken of the forums there and within a few posts--often laughing uproariously about "idiot feminist" posts at the Ms. site that were actually written by invading trolls such as themselves--plans were orchestrated to register at the Ms. over a period of weeks with multiple accounts and to post "goat.se porn" (rotten.com style photos with a sexual bent) on a selected date. While most men these days are typically exposed to such images to some degree through their own use of porn or their peer-induced curiosity regarding such imagery, most women are not typically exposed to the same degree, making this kind of imagery a doubly effective weapon against them. Ironically enough, Tribalwar's plans were foiled because of their technological ignorance regarding server logs.

Fighting racism and sexism is not easy. Not even within the confines of the web. While you might not have the same in-your-face repercussions as on the street in real life, it is frustrating, hard on your reputation, and sometimes defeating as you see forum posters whom you otherwise respect a great deal hold onto painfully outdated or scripted opinions. But the one thing that must be done is naming names. Remember what you see, take note of it, make connections, and above all--don't let them get away with it.

By Richard Leader