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Speaker 1: They see April Monsters to exist in this place. Animal Planets,

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Speaker 1: River Monsters returns with an all new season the Amazon,

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Speaker 1: the one place whose mysteries keep calling me by here,

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Speaker 1: I've seen many monsters, yet to see my last night.

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Speaker 1: River Monsters Sunday Nights at nine starting April six, Animal

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Speaker 1: plan and Surprisingly Human. Welcome to Stuff Mob Never told

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Speaker 1: you from how Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome

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Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Caroline and I'm Kristen. This is

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Speaker 1: part two looking at women in a video games. The

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Speaker 1: last episode, which I'm sure you listen to, was focusing

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Speaker 1: on women in the actual gaming industry, the women who

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Speaker 1: designed the games, run the companies, come up with these

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Speaker 1: great ideas, and the fact that well the numbers aren't great,

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Speaker 1: there is hope out there. We gave you a list

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Speaker 1: of a lot of really interesting women who are heading

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Speaker 1: up companies and designing the games. This episode, we're gonna

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Speaker 1: be talking about both the women playing the games and

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Speaker 1: the women in the games. Yeah, so let's kick off

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Speaker 1: with some numbers for a little refresher. Women comprise of

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Speaker 1: the entire gaming population and that includes all kinds of games.

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Speaker 1: And then from there we comprise of video gamers. So

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Speaker 1: anyone who says women and girls don't play video games

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Speaker 1: don't know what they're talking about. One thing that has

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Speaker 1: kind of lobbed against women gamers, though, is that a

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Speaker 1: lot of us play social games. These might be on

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Speaker 1: social media. They're called social or casual gaming, and it's

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Speaker 1: things like candy Crush for instance. Yeah. The interesting thing

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Speaker 1: is how King, which is a company that publishes Candy Crush,

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Speaker 1: actually tests all of its new games on a target

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Speaker 1: demo of women to fifty five and if they like it,

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Speaker 1: they go ahead and put it out because they've found

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Speaker 1: that if women to fifty five respond well to a game,

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Speaker 1: it goes on to be a smash hit with all audiences.

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Speaker 1: What do you know about that? Who knew? Well? So

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Speaker 1: women comprise of social gamers compared to forty six percent

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Speaker 1: of men, and the average age is forty what's up

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Speaker 1: with that? Why? Why do women make up such a

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Speaker 1: huge percent of social gamers. I think it could have

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Speaker 1: something to do with the fact that, I don't know,

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Speaker 1: we're busy and we might not have a tendency to

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Speaker 1: sit down and play Halo for five hours. Yeah. I mean,

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Speaker 1: first of all, we dominate social media. There are more

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Speaker 1: of us on places like Facebook, where you see so

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Speaker 1: many candy Crush updates and ads. Um. But experts suggest

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Speaker 1: that essentially women are adult women where I mean, think

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Speaker 1: about moms, Okay, working moms. They are multitasking, they have

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Speaker 1: so much to do. And there was a story that

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Speaker 1: I was reading interviewing one woman about her candy crush addiction,

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Speaker 1: and she I think she had she had a very

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Speaker 1: young child, and she said, I play it during naptime

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Speaker 1: because it's just this little window of time that I

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Speaker 1: have all to myself, and it allows me to forget everything.

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Speaker 1: She can't sit down and play Call of Duty for

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Speaker 1: eight hours, and she says that playing it offers her

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Speaker 1: just this window of escape and because she doesn't have time,

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Speaker 1: for instance, to not that all men have hours to

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Speaker 1: kill playing Call of Duty kill Call of Duty un pun,

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Speaker 1: but that they think that that's one reason why adult

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Speaker 1: women tend to play more on the go games is

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Speaker 1: just because we have smaller pockets of time throughout the day. Perhaps, um,

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Speaker 1: but this whole women being more drawn to social and

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Speaker 1: casual gaming as it's called. I kind of hate the

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Speaker 1: term casual gaming because it plays into the stereotype that

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Speaker 1: women aren't legit gamers because if you start talking to

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Speaker 1: quote unquote hardcore gamers and you are a female identified,

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Speaker 1: well just get ready because they will challenge your credibility

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Speaker 1: because they're gonna want to know. As soon as you

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Speaker 1: say that you enjoy games, you're gonna need you essentially

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Speaker 1: need to resume to prove that you know what you're

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Speaker 1: talking about, kind of like talking to like record store guys,

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Speaker 1: no offense. Yeah, well so you mentioned hardcore, like that's

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Speaker 1: that's actually a thing. That's a demographic. Hardcore gamers are

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Speaker 1: defined by play time per week and are basically a

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Speaker 1: smaller subset of a games core audience. These are the

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Speaker 1: top ten percent of gamers who spend the most time

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Speaker 1: playing per week, at nineteen hours a week. Nineteen hours

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Speaker 1: a week. That's incredible. That's a second job. That's like

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Speaker 1: a part time job. And Dennis Schameeca over at Venture

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Speaker 1: be looked into jen D and core and hardcore gaming

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Speaker 1: because don't confuse core gaming and hardcore gaming. Core gamers

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Speaker 1: simply refer to anyone who plays video games on consoles

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Speaker 1: like Xbox three sixty p S three UH as well

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Speaker 1: as like Nintendo we and UH three D s. And

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Speaker 1: when you look at the top selling super genres as

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Speaker 1: they're called for these core gamers as console players, it

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Speaker 1: is a lot of guy oriented stuff. First person shooter games,

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Speaker 1: action games, sports games. Those are the three, not surprisingly

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Speaker 1: top sellers, and they have overwhelmingly over male audiences. Although,

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Speaker 1: as we mentioned in that last podcast in part one

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Speaker 1: of our video game series, do not discount women for

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Speaker 1: not wanting to play first person shooter games, action games,

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Speaker 1: et cetera. Because what was it like thirty of women

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Speaker 1: enjoy playing violent video games. Absolutely, And when you talk

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Speaker 1: about these core gamers, these are the people who really

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Speaker 1: have the most influence over how the public thinks about

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Speaker 1: video games and gamers. So when you think of a gamer,

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Speaker 1: the image that comes to mind is not a forty

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Speaker 1: year old married woman playing candy Crush. You think of

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Speaker 1: that demographic that is playing a first person shooter game

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Speaker 1: on the Xbox three sixty for instance. So when you

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Speaker 1: look at the age breakdown for core and hardcore gamers,

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Speaker 1: the core audience has an average age of about thirty

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Speaker 1: and is excuse sixty forty mail. The hardcore average age

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Speaker 1: is lower, it's about five and skews eighty five to

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Speaker 1: fifteen mail and that I mean that breakdown of the

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Speaker 1: hardcore gaming population is where a lot of this idea

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Speaker 1: that well, women don't play video games, no women are

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Speaker 1: actual legit gamers. That's where a lot of this comes in.

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Speaker 1: But the thing is, you got to remember when you're

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Speaker 1: hearing from hardcore gamers, we're talking about like the nineties

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Speaker 1: percentile gamers. These are the people who play in the

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Speaker 1: top ten percent, like nineteen. Like you said, an average

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Speaker 1: I means some people play plenty more than nineteen hours

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Speaker 1: a week. These are It's like the voices a few

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Speaker 1: are being broadcast too many exactly. Well, now, Christine, you

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Speaker 1: said something a minute ago about like if if a

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Speaker 1: woman or a young girl says that she's a gamer,

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Speaker 1: she basically has to prove herself, like she needs a

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Speaker 1: resume to prove that she knows about and plays games.

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Speaker 1: This ties into the whole girl gamer stereotype, and girl

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Speaker 1: usually spelled when it's being used as a pejorative term

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Speaker 1: g u r L. Not to be confused with the

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Speaker 1: generic just a girl game or a female person who

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Speaker 1: plays games, and not to be confused with fake geek girls.

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Speaker 1: Like all of these things that arouse such ire in

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Speaker 1: a lot of young men playing video games, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of stereotypes that come up with this girl gamer

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Speaker 1: surround the idea that any woman or young girl who

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Speaker 1: is playing game games is just doing it for attention.

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Speaker 1: And god forbid you claim the term girl gamer for yourself.

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Speaker 1: God forbid you want to set yourself apart as a

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Speaker 1: woman and own it, because there's that notion that if

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Speaker 1: you're doing it, you do just want attention. You're not

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Speaker 1: even allowed to own your own femininity or femaleness. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and and this spawned an entire meme across the internet

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Speaker 1: where and you have like women participating in it as well,

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Speaker 1: talking down about oh, girl gamers. She's just the girl

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Speaker 1: gamerh did she instagram herself looking cute with her joy

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Speaker 1: stick in our hand? Then you're just a girl gamer.

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Speaker 1: You don't actually enjoy these games. And um, I got

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Speaker 1: into a little bit of a Reddit rabbit hole reading

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Speaker 1: up on girl gamers because it's just interesting to see

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Speaker 1: just first person these perceptions and people's supposed experiences with them.

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Speaker 1: And there was one woman's post on Reddit talking about

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Speaker 1: you know what, she kind of copped to it. She said,

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Speaker 1: I was a girl gamer for a while, she started

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Speaker 1: talking about how she kind of found gaming and it

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Speaker 1: was the first place where she ever received attention, any

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Speaker 1: kind of attention from God. She never really fit in,

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Speaker 1: she was overweight, she just never felt good about herself,

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Speaker 1: and finally when she found gaming, all of a sudden,

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Speaker 1: men were taking interest in her because she was into

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Speaker 1: this kind of male oriented hobby. And she said that

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Speaker 1: for a while she kind of played it up because

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Speaker 1: she enjoyed that so much. And to me, her experience

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Speaker 1: was telling because it seemed like this wasn't an issue

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Speaker 1: of oh, well, this most mean that women aren't legitimate gamers,

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Speaker 1: but more just has to do with you know, flirtation,

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Speaker 1: body image, how we deal with the world and our

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Speaker 1: attractions and attractiveness, etcetera. Where But but what is what

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Speaker 1: what it's led to is a lot of slut shaming

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Speaker 1: that happens and just ickiness that women have to deal with.

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Speaker 1: That was one of the main things that our Facebook

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Speaker 1: stuff Mom Never told you followers responded to when we

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Speaker 1: asked what we should talk about regarding video games. So

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Speaker 1: many women said, oh, please talk about girl gamers and

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Speaker 1: how I always have to prove myself. Yeah, but those

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Speaker 1: girl gamers are a lot of the times having to

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Speaker 1: prove themselves based on their looks, Whereas if a dude

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Speaker 1: comes along and wants to play a game, it's like, okay,

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Speaker 1: well we're going to test you based on your skill.

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Speaker 1: Are you any good at this? No? Okay, well then

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Speaker 1: obviously you're not worth it, Whereas when a woman comes along,

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Speaker 1: it's like, okay, well are you hot? Are you really

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Speaker 1: playing the game? Are you just posing with your joystick

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Speaker 1: and like licking it and posting pictures of yourself on

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Speaker 1: the internet, Like, yeah, first of all, why are you

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Speaker 1: looking at joystick? But that's the thing. There's like that

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Speaker 1: horrible divide where men at least get the get the

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Speaker 1: favor of being judged on their actual skill, whereas women

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Speaker 1: are just like are you cute or not? Or yeah,

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Speaker 1: I don't. I don't think i've ever heard anyone termed

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Speaker 1: a guy gamer. Oh he's a guy gamer. He's just

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Speaker 1: he's just posing with that joystick by his abs for

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Speaker 1: just just for the ladies. Well, then, I mean that's

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Speaker 1: another thing. You hear a lot of guys saying, like,

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Speaker 1: shut up about being a girl gamer. I don't call

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Speaker 1: myself a guy gamer. You're just a gamer and so,

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Speaker 1: but then that discourages girls and women who do want

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Speaker 1: to own it because yes, okay, well there's a girl

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Speaker 1: gamer demographic. That's like just doing it for attention according

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Speaker 1: to these guys. But then what happens when the girls

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Speaker 1: and women actually want to say, no, I'm different from you,

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Speaker 1: I play differently, I want different things, and why do

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Speaker 1: all of these criteria have to exist? Katie Heeney over

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Speaker 1: at BuzzFeed created just such a perfect collection of all

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Speaker 1: of the slut shamy, confusing, and sometimes straight up sexist

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Speaker 1: and contradictory rules for being a girl gamer, where it's like,

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Speaker 1: you gotta play games, but you can't be too obvious

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Speaker 1: about it, because if you're too obvious about how you

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Speaker 1: like games, and they're just going to assume that you're

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Speaker 1: a girl gamer. And then you know, they guys want

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Speaker 1: you to be attractive because we like looking at attractive people.

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Speaker 1: But if you're too attractive, you know, it's just like

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Speaker 1: and so that's why a lot of times women will

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Speaker 1: end up going just like won't speak, for instance, on

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Speaker 1: you know, like multiplayer games. They won't. They just keep

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Speaker 1: their femaleness as hidden as possible, just to not have

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Speaker 1: to even deal with it. Yeah, Blogger Stephanie ben Dixon

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Speaker 1: basically said the exact same thing. She was talking about

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Speaker 1: how she finds herself editing certain aspects of her femininity

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Speaker 1: for fear that it would somehow damage her credibility. And

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Speaker 1: I mean, this gets into all sorts of issues that

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Speaker 1: krist and I have talked about before as far as

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Speaker 1: fem phobia goes. But Stephanie says, hey, look, I have

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Speaker 1: a lot of pink tech accessories, and she goes into it.

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Speaker 1: It starts to sound really cool, and she's like owning

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Speaker 1: her differences. She says she accepts the term girl gamer

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Speaker 1: because for now we're still a minority that faces a

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Speaker 1: wall of angry nerd rage. But in talking about her

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Speaker 1: pink accessories, I noticed something very interesting because at first

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Speaker 1: she's like, yeah, I'm owning it, like pink is different.

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Speaker 1: But then she says, I liked the idea of how

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Speaker 1: this obnoxiously defiant and slightly sickening color would go against

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Speaker 1: the grain somewhat. And then I'm like, oh, it's Stephanie, Like,

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Speaker 1: there's still she while she is owning pink and owning

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Speaker 1: the term girl gamer, there's still sounds like there's from

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Speaker 1: phobia in that because she's calling the color pink obnoxious

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Speaker 1: and sickening, and so it still sounds like she's been

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Speaker 1: discouraged over her game playing career from kind of owning

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Speaker 1: her femaleness. Well, I think it's because of a lot

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Speaker 1: of those contradictory rules in quotes that pop up for

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Speaker 1: you know, just you can't you can't look like you're

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Speaker 1: trying too hard, you know. Um. And it's fascinating to

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Speaker 1: me that in this segment specifically like in gaming, that

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Speaker 1: it's such a prominent aspect of it, like this just

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Speaker 1: this common assumption that that women have some kind of

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Speaker 1: ulterior motive for wanting to play games. Um. But unfortunately,

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Speaker 1: like the kinds of you know, the issues of harassment

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Speaker 1: that women in the video game industry, the ones who

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Speaker 1: are making the games sometimes run up against. Another thing

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Speaker 1: that was echoed among people on Facebook was the issue

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Speaker 1: of also dealing with straight up harassment from other gamers

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Speaker 1: as soon as their female identity is revealed. Sometimes they

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Speaker 1: just get an onslaught of come ons, or just gendered epithets. Uh.

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Speaker 1: There was a survey conducted by Emily Matthew at the

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Speaker 1: price charting blog, which found that women are harassed four

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Speaker 1: times as often as men and six reported being called

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Speaker 1: a slut, whore or other words that I can't say

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Speaker 1: on this podcast. And there are also lots of charming

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Speaker 1: requests for women to just get back in the kitchen

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Speaker 1: and start making lots of sandwiches. Yeah, and in that

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Speaker 1: pole of the people she talked to believe that sexism

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Speaker 1: is rampant. Interesting don't but I mean, you know, you would,

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Speaker 1: you would think that they're okay. So there is a

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Speaker 1: degree of awareness, but it sure is still bad out

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Speaker 1: there despite out awareness. Yeah, I mean, and it does

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Speaker 1: go both ways. Fifteen point seven percent of men also

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Speaker 1: reported that they had experienced sex based taunting, harassment, or

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Speaker 1: threats while playing video games. Um and ten percent of

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Speaker 1: women unfortunately copped to using their gender for favors, basically

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Speaker 1: like strolling into a world of warcraft and being like, oh, yes,

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Speaker 1: you wanted to give me gold shore a no problem?

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Speaker 1: See he Well, and just like we talked about in

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Speaker 1: the last episode, where um, a lot of well not

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Speaker 1: a lot, but but many women, probably many more than

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Speaker 1: we even know. Many women have left the industry because

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Speaker 1: of the abuse. Nearly thirty six percent of women that

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Speaker 1: Emily Matthew pulled reported having to quit playing temporarily because

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Speaker 1: of the abuse and the harassment, versus eleven point seven

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Speaker 1: percent of guys that she pulled. Game is game is,

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Speaker 1: you'd be mean sometimes. We're looking a little bit deeper

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Speaker 1: into this issue. A team over at Ohio University looked

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Speaker 1: at the reactions by gamers to female voices versus male

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Speaker 1: voices on Xbox Alive, like looking at first person shooter games,

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Speaker 1: and they published a study in the journal New Media

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Speaker 1: and Society, and one of the researchers, why En tang Um,

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Speaker 1: explained how, on average, female voices received three times as

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Speaker 1: many negative comments as male voices or no male voices,

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Speaker 1: and on top of that, women's voices received more queries

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Speaker 1: and messages from other gamers than male voices or no voices.

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Speaker 1: So it's kind of the same thing of uh, just

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Speaker 1: by virtue of being a woman, you sort of open

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Speaker 1: yourself up to either being called terrible things or being

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Speaker 1: solicited for sex. Yeah, So you basically your option is

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Speaker 1: to speak and get abused or remain silent. Yeah, And

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Speaker 1: tang said, the take home message is that female players,

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Speaker 1: when heard aren't treated as well as their male counterparts,

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Speaker 1: despite skill level wins or losses. They women aren't attracting

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Speaker 1: negative comments just because they be terrible a gaming. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's like there's there's that little sign up on the

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Speaker 1: clubhouse store no girls allowed. Yeah, unfortunate. Although I know

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Speaker 1: that not all male gamers are like this. Guy. Guy

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Speaker 1: gamers listening, I'm gonna call you guy gamers, don't worry.

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Speaker 1: I know that it's it's again. I feel like it's

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Speaker 1: the loud voices of this horrific minority that often get

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Speaker 1: the most all. They're generating all of this negative press

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Speaker 1: because it's horrifying. It horrifying. So let's look a little

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Speaker 1: bit more, maybe into what women want in their games,

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Speaker 1: aside from harassment, obviously, because this is a question that

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Speaker 1: ties back to our part one episode, looking more at

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Speaker 1: the industry of like what they're trying trying to figure

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Speaker 1: out of well aside front, we know, we know the

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Speaker 1: Canadie Crush is popular, but what kind of games do

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Speaker 1: women really like playing? Because if you look back into

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Speaker 1: the early days of gaming, the titles that were made

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Speaker 1: specifically for women and girls were so hilariously riddled with

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Speaker 1: hearts and sparkles and pink. And there's actually a site

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Speaker 1: called femicom that's calm with an M, which calls itself

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Speaker 1: the Feminine Computer Museum. It's a website dedicated to archiving

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Speaker 1: these quote unquote girl games from like the early eighties

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Speaker 1: and nineties, and it's kind of fascinating to see. I mean,

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Speaker 1: these are also the days when you have alone Carol

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Speaker 1: Shaw or Donna Bailey at atari, like the only woman

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Speaker 1: like in the room. So not surprisingly that you have

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Speaker 1: such kind of overtly just let's play house. You have

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Speaker 1: to do the dishes for twenty points kind of games

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Speaker 1: coming up. Christen accepts that challenge. She will organize the dishwasher.

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Speaker 1: I will I would win that game, would but I mean, yeah,

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Speaker 1: the a museum founder I guess we'll call her, basically

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Speaker 1: said that she's preserving these games to spark conversations. Not

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Speaker 1: necessarily preserving them because they are so awesome, but preserving

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Speaker 1: them because nobody's playing them anymore and nobody's talking about them.

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Speaker 1: They're not talking about them the way you would like.

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Speaker 1: Duck Hunt, Like everybody has a duck Hunt memory of

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Speaker 1: standing up against the TV with the gun even though

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Speaker 1: you're not supposed to, but nobody has those collective memories

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Speaker 1: of these quote unquote girly games, and so she is

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Speaker 1: working to preserve them just so that we can take

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Speaker 1: a look at why we do the things we do,

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Speaker 1: why we look at certain games the way we do. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and and she pointed out how girly video games are

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Speaker 1: rarely advertised, reviewed or written up, and rarely demoed in stores.

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Speaker 1: And she says, even if it's a huge seller, like

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Speaker 1: the more recent game Style Savvy for Nintendo d S,

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Speaker 1: which I mean Style Savvy, come on, hardcore gamers roll

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Speaker 1: their eyes, but it's a big seller. And yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: kind of like um with fandom in general. A lot

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Speaker 1: of times, girly fandom is sort of relegated to the corner,

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Speaker 1: just like go Go Away hearts and Polka dots. No, no,

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Speaker 1: you over here. There's a little pink corner over here,

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Speaker 1: s behind that line. I picture like the Lego movie,

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Speaker 1: Like there's all these little universes, different universes for different videos.

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Speaker 1: Polka dot, Polka dots. You go over there and they're

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Speaker 1: all like pa dot. But the fact of the matter is,

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Speaker 1: don't don't worry women gamers listening We're not suggesting that

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Speaker 1: style savvy is what women want in video games. We're

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Speaker 1: also not suggesting the Candy Crush or Halo or Grand

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Speaker 1: theft Ato or whatever games. You know what people are realizing, Caroline,

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Speaker 1: women want different things. We don't all want the same

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Speaker 1: kind of game. Weird. Women are different then each other,

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Speaker 1: that's what you're That's what you're saying. Women are different

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Speaker 1: from each other. Yeah, you and me. We might even

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Speaker 1: want to play different games. I want to load, I

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Speaker 1: want to play the Dishwasher game. Maybe you want to

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Speaker 1: play Prince of Persia, Build the Sandwich game. Yeah, this

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Speaker 1: is coming from Kevin Kelly over at joystick dot com.

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Speaker 1: He was talking about how women do like story driven games.

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Speaker 1: We do appreciate in game tutorials because honestly, who reads

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Speaker 1: manuals or even like instruction manuals when you're putting together

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Speaker 1: in ikea shelf, Like nobody reads these things. Um. But

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Speaker 1: but the point is just making women aware of more games,

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Speaker 1: you know, letting them know that, hey, they might also

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Speaker 1: like Halo as well. But it's a matter of not

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Speaker 1: advertising it to everyone across the board with just some busty,

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Speaker 1: sexy sexpot on the cover. You know, keep in mind

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Speaker 1: that your audience is very diverse. Yeah, I mean, there

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Speaker 1: is market research that does suggest that certain themes, like

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Speaker 1: games that are more story driven or sort of a

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Speaker 1: more communication based the sims, for instance, massively popular among women.

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Speaker 1: Maybe games that might be a little more emotionally evocative

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Speaker 1: tend to appeal more to women. But don't get pigeonholes

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Speaker 1: in just trying to remake those games over and over again. Rather,

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Speaker 1: you know, consider all of these women who are also

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Speaker 1: really loving to frag people and see, hey, maybe we

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Speaker 1: can maybe we can put a female protagonist in there.

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Speaker 1: Put put a gun in the hands of a woman.

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Speaker 1: Shall we get video game wise? Well, we are going

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Speaker 1: to talk about women in video games, the female protagonist

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Speaker 1: of video games, and and how telling their roles are

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Speaker 1: when we come right back from the quick break and

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Speaker 1: now back to the show. So when we left off,

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Speaker 1: we had established that while market research has suggested that

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Speaker 1: there are certain types of games that women like, surprise, surprise,

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Speaker 1: women like different kinds of things. And yet if you

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Speaker 1: look at the legacy of female characters in especially like

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Speaker 1: big name video games, they start to fall into very

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Speaker 1: predictable types of roles. So for instance, in the late eighties,

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Speaker 1: this game called Metroid came out, and I'm sure a

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Speaker 1: lot of people have played Metroid, and it features this character, Sammuss,

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Speaker 1: female character, and for all of the game she's wearing

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Speaker 1: kind of this genderless robotic exo skeleton. But then and

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Speaker 1: it's like super cool because you can like play Sammy's

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Speaker 1: and she's doing all sorts of cool stuff. But then

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Speaker 1: when you win the game, the exo skeleton is taken

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Speaker 1: off to reveal her bikini body. Yeah, and and an

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Speaker 1: article about this had a really really important point about this,

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Speaker 1: which is that as you're playing the game, that robot

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Speaker 1: exo skeleton character that is you, You were the hero

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Speaker 1: and you were shooting. But once you win and the

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Speaker 1: robots suit is removed and you see a bikini clad woman,

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Speaker 1: then that character isn't you anymore. It's just a passive

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Speaker 1: object that you get to you get rewarded with. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and they out. We'll get into this a little bit more,

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Speaker 1: but speaking of that sort of the role playing that

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Speaker 1: happens within video games, there is a type of self

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Speaker 1: objectification that happens just by virtue of playing a character,

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Speaker 1: like you take on the role of that character, and

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Speaker 1: when you see that character then stripped down to reveal

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Speaker 1: a busty bikini body, studies have shown that it makes

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Speaker 1: us think about our own bikini bodies, and usually more

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Speaker 1: negative ways. And so there was a two thousand nine

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Speaker 1: study essentially that took a census of video games and

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Speaker 1: it found that not surprisingly, male characters not only outnumber

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Speaker 1: women in video games, but also female characters are overwhelmingly

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Speaker 1: stereotypical and sexualized, even the case of a potentially really

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Speaker 1: cool character like Sammus And now that's people are probably

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Speaker 1: but christ And that happened in like the eighties. That

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Speaker 1: was like the eighties. Things have like totally changed, right, No,

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Speaker 1: what who are these fictional people that you're referencing? Kristen

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Speaker 1: guy gamers? Yeah, no, things are not better. And someone

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Speaker 1: who has done a ton of research to dig into

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Speaker 1: these kinds of tropes is one Anita Sarkasian, who made

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Speaker 1: quite a name for herself in the video game industry.

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Speaker 1: For uh. She had done a Tropes Versus women's series

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Speaker 1: for a while, just looking at the portrayals of women

427
00:25:21,240 --> 00:25:24,080
Speaker 1: in pop culture, and she decided that she wanted to

428
00:25:24,080 --> 00:25:26,480
Speaker 1: really dig into the video game industry because it is

429
00:25:26,520 --> 00:25:33,119
Speaker 1: such uh massively popular and growing form of entertainment for people,

430
00:25:33,600 --> 00:25:37,960
Speaker 1: and she began she had a Kickstarter campaign, and essentially

431
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:39,880
Speaker 1: she got cyber mopped by a lot of people who

432
00:25:39,880 --> 00:25:43,359
Speaker 1: are not happy about someone wanting to talk about video

433
00:25:43,400 --> 00:25:46,879
Speaker 1: games from a feminist perspective, essentially kind of taking a

434
00:25:46,880 --> 00:25:49,440
Speaker 1: deeper look at like, well, what how do these video

435
00:25:49,480 --> 00:25:54,639
Speaker 1: games portray women? And the good news is her Kickstarter

436
00:25:55,040 --> 00:26:01,520
Speaker 1: massively exceeded expectations because she was see such an onslot

437
00:26:01,560 --> 00:26:05,080
Speaker 1: of cyber attacks from people, she publicized it and people

438
00:26:05,240 --> 00:26:09,000
Speaker 1: then rushed to her aid um, and she's still I mean,

439
00:26:09,040 --> 00:26:11,719
Speaker 1: if you google her name, especially if you look her

440
00:26:11,760 --> 00:26:13,960
Speaker 1: up in YouTube, you find her videos, but you also

441
00:26:14,040 --> 00:26:17,199
Speaker 1: find so many videos of people trying to discredit her.

442
00:26:17,320 --> 00:26:18,840
Speaker 1: So I feel like we need to give a little

443
00:26:18,920 --> 00:26:22,600
Speaker 1: context to who Anita Sarkisian is because if you are

444
00:26:22,600 --> 00:26:24,720
Speaker 1: a gamer, you've probably heard of her, and there's a

445
00:26:24,720 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 1: good chance that it isn't in a good light. But

446
00:26:27,160 --> 00:26:30,159
Speaker 1: I will tell you I have watched her videos. She

447
00:26:30,240 --> 00:26:33,800
Speaker 1: does a great job of offering a comprehensive and non

448
00:26:33,840 --> 00:26:38,240
Speaker 1: threatening look at women in games while admitting that she

449
00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:41,359
Speaker 1: still enjoys these games. She's not saying burn video games

450
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:44,960
Speaker 1: to the ground, but it's worthwhile to look into how

451
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,679
Speaker 1: women are portrayed, because she explained this so well in

452
00:26:48,720 --> 00:26:50,919
Speaker 1: an interview with I g N, saying, think of it

453
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,520
Speaker 1: this way. If gaming is the air we all breathe.

454
00:26:53,640 --> 00:26:57,000
Speaker 1: Right now, the air quality is currently extremely polluted with

455
00:26:57,040 --> 00:27:00,560
Speaker 1: thick clouds of toxic sexism with a radio actor particles

456
00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:04,639
Speaker 1: of misogyny floating around everywhere. Sounds terrifying, right well, that

457
00:27:04,800 --> 00:27:08,479
Speaker 1: society Hello, And of course that's not to say and

458
00:27:08,480 --> 00:27:10,520
Speaker 1: and christ and I are trying to drive home that

459
00:27:10,640 --> 00:27:13,040
Speaker 1: it's not everybody, it's not all the time, it's not everywhere.

460
00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:17,720
Speaker 1: But there are a lot of tropes in these games

461
00:27:17,760 --> 00:27:20,040
Speaker 1: that are worth talking about even if you do like

462
00:27:20,080 --> 00:27:22,560
Speaker 1: playing them. And we're not saying you shouldn't play them.

463
00:27:22,640 --> 00:27:25,200
Speaker 1: We are And so I think Sarkisian is pleading for

464
00:27:25,359 --> 00:27:27,400
Speaker 1: a little bit of media savvy to just be kind

465
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:29,520
Speaker 1: of aware of what you're looking at when you're looking

466
00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:31,920
Speaker 1: at it. And anyway, one of the tropes that she

467
00:27:32,080 --> 00:27:36,480
Speaker 1: focuses hard on is the whole damsel in distress. What

468
00:27:36,720 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: harm could a damsel in distress possibly have? But you

469
00:27:40,640 --> 00:27:43,840
Speaker 1: know a lot of these in your face. Things that

470
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,400
Speaker 1: we see over and over again tend to drive home

471
00:27:46,440 --> 00:27:48,800
Speaker 1: stereotypes about women and the way we think about women.

472
00:27:49,119 --> 00:27:53,840
Speaker 1: But anyway, before we get into that, what is this trope? Basically, Uh,

473
00:27:53,920 --> 00:27:58,560
Speaker 1: it's princesses, wives, girlfriends, basically women in these games who

474
00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:03,879
Speaker 1: often end up kidnapped or somehow frozen and disempowered, or

475
00:28:03,920 --> 00:28:06,760
Speaker 1: they're put under a spell, or they're frozen in a crystal.

476
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:11,480
Speaker 1: Basically they're trapped somehow. Yeah, and by trapping the women,

477
00:28:11,560 --> 00:28:14,359
Speaker 1: it gives the male hero some kind of incentive to

478
00:28:14,359 --> 00:28:17,399
Speaker 1: go through this journey. And hey, you know what, I

479
00:28:17,440 --> 00:28:21,280
Speaker 1: love Super Mario Brothers. Princess Peach. What a gal. She's great,

480
00:28:21,320 --> 00:28:25,399
Speaker 1: but she's kind of the quintessential damsel in distress um

481
00:28:25,480 --> 00:28:28,479
Speaker 1: And but this started even before Super Mario Brothers with

482
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:32,240
Speaker 1: Donkey Kong and Pauline also known as the Lady and Pauline,

483
00:28:32,480 --> 00:28:35,679
Speaker 1: who was a damsel in distress and Donkey Kong was

484
00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:39,920
Speaker 1: actually kind of the model for Princess Peach and Peaches

485
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:43,440
Speaker 1: kidnapped for instance, in thirteen out of the fourteen Mario

486
00:28:43,520 --> 00:28:46,680
Speaker 1: games she's featured in, and she's only a playable character.

487
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:51,960
Speaker 1: And Super Mario Brothers too, which came out in nine um.

488
00:28:52,000 --> 00:28:54,200
Speaker 1: And she also talks about how you see the same

489
00:28:54,240 --> 00:28:58,720
Speaker 1: kind of thing in Zelda named for the damsel in distress,

490
00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:01,640
Speaker 1: and she's really Zelda's never really been to star in

491
00:29:01,720 --> 00:29:05,040
Speaker 1: her own adventure, isn't Isn't that a sad metaphor? It

492
00:29:05,160 --> 00:29:09,560
Speaker 1: is it really is, ladies, let's not be Zelda's let that,

493
00:29:09,840 --> 00:29:12,960
Speaker 1: let him, let that to settle over the crowd um.

494
00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:16,600
Speaker 1: Although Sarkisian points out how she does sometimes get more

495
00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:20,080
Speaker 1: active roles, she becomes more of a helpful damsel at times,

496
00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:23,320
Speaker 1: but she always ends up at least getting re kidnapped.

497
00:29:23,680 --> 00:29:26,520
Speaker 1: She has to be saved at some point, and she

498
00:29:26,640 --> 00:29:29,640
Speaker 1: says this exists and pretty much any type of game,

499
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:33,280
Speaker 1: whether you're looking at first person shooters, RPGs, MMOs, like,

500
00:29:33,320 --> 00:29:39,160
Speaker 1: you're gonna find damsels in distress everywhere. And even when

501
00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:44,120
Speaker 1: you have a heroic archetype of the hero being imprisoned,

502
00:29:44,440 --> 00:29:46,400
Speaker 1: a lot of times the way that hero will escape

503
00:29:46,480 --> 00:29:50,360
Speaker 1: is through his own strength and cunning huzzah. And this

504
00:29:50,520 --> 00:29:53,120
Speaker 1: poor freaking damsel like so not only is she like

505
00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:56,959
Speaker 1: imprisoned in a castle or she's trapped or tied up

506
00:29:57,080 --> 00:30:01,000
Speaker 1: or whatever, she also is the victim of pretty horrific

507
00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:03,920
Speaker 1: violence and all these different kinds of video games. She

508
00:30:04,040 --> 00:30:07,200
Speaker 1: tends to be basically a disposable woman who falls victim

509
00:30:07,240 --> 00:30:12,040
Speaker 1: to any number of horrific violent acts. So Sarcassian takes

510
00:30:12,080 --> 00:30:16,440
Speaker 1: through all of these different game titles about how they

511
00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:19,800
Speaker 1: follow similar paths of for instance, the hero's wife being

512
00:30:19,800 --> 00:30:23,000
Speaker 1: brutally murdered and then you have to rescue the daughter.

513
00:30:23,160 --> 00:30:25,800
Speaker 1: That happens over and over and over again. Or you

514
00:30:25,840 --> 00:30:28,320
Speaker 1: have a wife or girlfriend's soul being trapped in hell

515
00:30:28,800 --> 00:30:30,920
Speaker 1: and so then you know the hero has to travel

516
00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:33,520
Speaker 1: to try to like save the soul. And then you

517
00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:37,719
Speaker 1: might also have damsels who martyr themselves that will then

518
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:41,680
Speaker 1: propel the hero on his journey. Sometimes also you have

519
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:46,360
Speaker 1: games that force the hero to brutally kill the wife

520
00:30:46,440 --> 00:30:49,520
Speaker 1: or girlfriend, either because it turns out done da da

521
00:30:49,600 --> 00:30:52,240
Speaker 1: da she was a villain the whole time, or that's

522
00:30:52,280 --> 00:30:55,560
Speaker 1: like the only way that you can win the game.

523
00:30:56,120 --> 00:30:59,720
Speaker 1: Violence against women solves everything according to these games, right basically,

524
00:30:59,800 --> 00:31:01,520
Speaker 1: I mean it's sort of the way that these a

525
00:31:01,560 --> 00:31:03,880
Speaker 1: lot of these games work is it sort of forces

526
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:12,280
Speaker 1: you into, you know, having one solution, which is beating up, killing, stabbing, shooting, strangling,

527
00:31:12,320 --> 00:31:15,160
Speaker 1: whatever it will take to kill these women. And that's

528
00:31:15,800 --> 00:31:19,400
Speaker 1: that's not so good Caroline now. And and you know,

529
00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:21,840
Speaker 1: you could be wondering, well, what does this have to

530
00:31:21,840 --> 00:31:23,960
Speaker 1: do with anything as far as real life goes? Why

531
00:31:24,000 --> 00:31:27,120
Speaker 1: do we care about violence and video games? Haven't there

532
00:31:27,160 --> 00:31:29,160
Speaker 1: been studies showing that it doesn't make us a more

533
00:31:29,240 --> 00:31:34,200
Speaker 1: violent culture. Well, actually, unlike needless violence against women and

534
00:31:34,240 --> 00:31:38,360
Speaker 1: all these games actually does have quite a big impact. Yeah.

535
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:41,760
Speaker 1: Why Yen Tang, who's one of those Ohio University researchers

536
00:31:41,840 --> 00:31:45,360
Speaker 1: we mentioned earlier, said quote, the general GISTs of sexual

537
00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:48,680
Speaker 1: content in video games is an exposure to such content

538
00:31:48,920 --> 00:31:52,520
Speaker 1: leads to attitudes that are unfavorable toward women. And you

539
00:31:52,560 --> 00:31:55,240
Speaker 1: see this reflected in so many studies. For instance, the

540
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:58,880
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve study found that a video game depicting

541
00:31:58,960 --> 00:32:01,760
Speaker 1: sexual objective a case of women and violence against women

542
00:32:01,960 --> 00:32:07,720
Speaker 1: resulted in statistically significant increase rape myth acceptance, essentially sort

543
00:32:07,760 --> 00:32:10,120
Speaker 1: of rape supportive attitudes, the whole idea of like, you know,

544
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 1: women asking for it, essential, etcetera. Um. And that was

545
00:32:14,440 --> 00:32:19,000
Speaker 1: more prevalent among male study participants, but not for female participants.

546
00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:22,480
Speaker 1: But that's not to say that these kinds of video

547
00:32:22,480 --> 00:32:26,360
Speaker 1: games that sexually objectify women don't have negative impacts on

548
00:32:26,560 --> 00:32:31,280
Speaker 1: female players. Right. Yeah. Stanford study found that women who

549
00:32:31,320 --> 00:32:36,840
Speaker 1: played with a sexualized avatar, whether it was basically with

550
00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:40,600
Speaker 1: her face on it or with another woman's face, engaged

551
00:32:40,680 --> 00:32:45,600
Speaker 1: in more self objectification and bought into rape myths more. Yeah.

552
00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:48,920
Speaker 1: You see this theme of increased rape myth acceptance a

553
00:32:48,960 --> 00:32:53,040
Speaker 1: lot in these studies. Um. Also in two thousand nine,

554
00:32:53,040 --> 00:32:55,800
Speaker 1: there was a study that came out which found stereotype

555
00:32:55,840 --> 00:33:00,080
Speaker 1: confirming virtual women correlated to higher levels of sex is

556
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:04,400
Speaker 1: them and again rape myth acceptance in male and female players.

557
00:33:04,840 --> 00:33:06,400
Speaker 1: And we could go on and on and on. There

558
00:33:06,400 --> 00:33:09,040
Speaker 1: are a number of studies finding over and over again

559
00:33:09,640 --> 00:33:14,479
Speaker 1: that hey, when we basically use women, highly sexualized women

560
00:33:14,800 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 1: in video games as props upon which to inflict violence

561
00:33:19,880 --> 00:33:22,400
Speaker 1: or rape, there are you know there there's the infamous

562
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:26,760
Speaker 1: rape UH scene in Grand Theft Auto. There was also

563
00:33:26,960 --> 00:33:29,160
Speaker 1: a rape scene I believe in I don't know if

564
00:33:29,200 --> 00:33:31,800
Speaker 1: it was in the game or just in promotion for

565
00:33:32,520 --> 00:33:38,400
Speaker 1: UH tomb Rator addition that came out and basically it's like, no,

566
00:33:38,520 --> 00:33:41,240
Speaker 1: we don't because we're playing. It's different. I feel like

567
00:33:41,240 --> 00:33:44,280
Speaker 1: It's different from sexual assault being portrayed in movies and

568
00:33:44,320 --> 00:33:47,560
Speaker 1: television in a way because it's almost more engaging because

569
00:33:47,560 --> 00:33:52,200
Speaker 1: you're playing those characters, right. And I feel like when

570
00:33:52,320 --> 00:33:56,440
Speaker 1: rape and sexual assault are depicted in movies and TV shows,

571
00:33:57,440 --> 00:34:01,000
Speaker 1: it's always a bad thing. It's always like a crime

572
00:34:01,000 --> 00:34:03,640
Speaker 1: and a negative thing that needs to be solved. Whereas

573
00:34:04,200 --> 00:34:06,840
Speaker 1: if you're the first person player in a video game

574
00:34:06,920 --> 00:34:12,120
Speaker 1: that involves rape and sexualizing women, objectifying women, it's there's

575
00:34:12,160 --> 00:34:14,880
Speaker 1: there's nothing necessarily telling you it's wrong. Yeah, it's fodder

576
00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:18,760
Speaker 1: for your heroism and and that can have negative impacts

577
00:34:18,760 --> 00:34:21,800
Speaker 1: on male and female players. And the solution isn't yet. Again,

578
00:34:21,880 --> 00:34:25,480
Speaker 1: it's not a call to get rid of video games,

579
00:34:25,680 --> 00:34:30,239
Speaker 1: but rather to ask for better raise the bar. I mean,

580
00:34:30,280 --> 00:34:33,319
Speaker 1: you can have you can you can shoot up as

581
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:36,319
Speaker 1: many things as you want to in games. This isn't

582
00:34:36,440 --> 00:34:41,600
Speaker 1: us railing against gun violence and video games, but rather,

583
00:34:42,520 --> 00:34:45,200
Speaker 1: like you said, you know, Sarkisian kind of requesting a

584
00:34:45,239 --> 00:34:47,640
Speaker 1: little bit of media savvy. It's important to pay attention

585
00:34:47,680 --> 00:34:50,919
Speaker 1: to what we're consuming, and yeah, and not do away with,

586
00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:53,160
Speaker 1: like you said, shoot him up games or whatever, but

587
00:34:53,400 --> 00:34:57,879
Speaker 1: just offer more and different things like left Behind, which

588
00:34:57,960 --> 00:35:01,160
Speaker 1: has garnered incredible praise. People are coming out of the

589
00:35:01,160 --> 00:35:03,279
Speaker 1: woodwork to be like, oh my god, this game is

590
00:35:03,320 --> 00:35:06,760
Speaker 1: amazing a change in my life. It features a fourteen

591
00:35:06,840 --> 00:35:11,920
Speaker 1: year old girl protagonist, Yeah, and she also interacts with

592
00:35:11,960 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 1: her best friend Riley, but she still has to do

593
00:35:15,040 --> 00:35:19,960
Speaker 1: a lot of really tough things. And Laura Hudson wrote

594
00:35:19,960 --> 00:35:23,880
Speaker 1: about left Behind recently in Wired magazine and it was

595
00:35:23,920 --> 00:35:26,400
Speaker 1: headlined something along the lines of left Behind was the

596
00:35:26,440 --> 00:35:30,040
Speaker 1: first video game that really made me feel like proud

597
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:32,560
Speaker 1: to be a woman, and she writes, we don't just

598
00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:35,480
Speaker 1: need more women in video games, we need more women

599
00:35:35,520 --> 00:35:38,879
Speaker 1: who don't fit in boxes. And she talks about how

600
00:35:38,960 --> 00:35:42,240
Speaker 1: left Behind isn't remarkable just because it meets a quota,

601
00:35:42,800 --> 00:35:45,960
Speaker 1: but because Ellie and her best friend Riley are people.

602
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:49,359
Speaker 1: They're fully realized, they're quirky, they're funny, and they're dangerous.

603
00:35:49,600 --> 00:35:52,240
Speaker 1: And she says that Ellie is there because she's herself

604
00:35:52,280 --> 00:35:55,680
Speaker 1: and for once, that's reason enough. She's not there to

605
00:35:55,800 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 1: just titillate and motivate. Players are like, oh, you know,

606
00:35:59,640 --> 00:36:03,839
Speaker 1: Ellie has been beaten, so go go kill somebody. Yeah,

607
00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:08,400
Speaker 1: it's all about her. And like we said in episode

608
00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:11,640
Speaker 1: number one. Uh, Call of Duty Ghosts, for instance, is

609
00:36:11,680 --> 00:36:15,560
Speaker 1: going to have a female playable character in its multiplayer component. Yeah.

610
00:36:16,120 --> 00:36:20,200
Speaker 1: BioWare's Mass Effect three has implemented changes that allow for

611
00:36:20,320 --> 00:36:23,720
Speaker 1: gay romance. I mean, diversity beyond just women is something

612
00:36:23,719 --> 00:36:26,440
Speaker 1: that we didn't even have time to talk about in

613
00:36:26,520 --> 00:36:31,560
Speaker 1: a two part series on video games. Um So, LGBT

614
00:36:31,719 --> 00:36:35,560
Speaker 1: acceptance and visibility in games is something too that needs

615
00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:38,400
Speaker 1: to be strongly addressed. Me. A lot of what we

616
00:36:38,480 --> 00:36:42,200
Speaker 1: see is is very headeronormative violence against women or just

617
00:36:42,239 --> 00:36:46,520
Speaker 1: headteronormative romances, and it's like, hey, uh, I'm over here,

618
00:36:46,520 --> 00:36:51,000
Speaker 1: I'm an LGBT player. I exist too, And not to

619
00:36:51,040 --> 00:36:56,200
Speaker 1: mention two racial diversity as well, overwhelmingly male or female,

620
00:36:56,280 --> 00:36:58,439
Speaker 1: the protagonists are going to be white. A lot of

621
00:36:58,880 --> 00:37:03,040
Speaker 1: the industry itself is very white. Um So, there's a

622
00:37:03,080 --> 00:37:06,480
Speaker 1: lot of room for improvement. And the thing is a

623
00:37:06,520 --> 00:37:09,200
Speaker 1: lot of gamers sometimes get up in arms about the

624
00:37:09,200 --> 00:37:11,600
Speaker 1: possibility of changes. You get attached to a game. You

625
00:37:11,640 --> 00:37:13,400
Speaker 1: love a game, if you're spending, like if you're a

626
00:37:13,400 --> 00:37:16,280
Speaker 1: hardcore gamer nineteen plus hours a week with a game,

627
00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:20,120
Speaker 1: it's understandable that you might be a little resistant to change.

628
00:37:20,680 --> 00:37:24,160
Speaker 1: But it's only going to make things better, yeah, you know,

629
00:37:24,239 --> 00:37:26,759
Speaker 1: and it's gonna make things better for you know, not

630
00:37:26,840 --> 00:37:29,439
Speaker 1: just the games, but for the people who play them

631
00:37:29,440 --> 00:37:32,560
Speaker 1: as well. And shouldn't that be the the ultimate goal? No?

632
00:37:32,960 --> 00:37:35,640
Speaker 1: Not for No, people want to people want to just

633
00:37:36,120 --> 00:37:40,080
Speaker 1: shoot things on a screen, right, Yeah, that's what it is.

634
00:37:40,160 --> 00:37:43,360
Speaker 1: Crush candies. I don't know the answer, Caroline. This is

635
00:37:43,640 --> 00:37:47,200
Speaker 1: this is why I really want to hear from listeners

636
00:37:47,560 --> 00:37:50,600
Speaker 1: on this issue. What is it like to be a gamer,

637
00:37:50,680 --> 00:37:52,960
Speaker 1: especially if you are a woman out there? I mean,

638
00:37:52,960 --> 00:37:56,160
Speaker 1: do you deal with issues of having to prove your credibility? Um?

639
00:37:56,200 --> 00:37:59,279
Speaker 1: Are you harassed or are you immune to all of

640
00:37:59,280 --> 00:38:01,719
Speaker 1: this stuff? Do you find this kind of these kinds

641
00:38:01,760 --> 00:38:04,440
Speaker 1: of issues sensationalized? We want to hear from everybody. What

642
00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:07,120
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on this? Mom Stuff at Discovery dot

643
00:38:07,120 --> 00:38:09,120
Speaker 1: com is where you can email us or you can

644
00:38:09,160 --> 00:38:12,000
Speaker 1: tweet us at Mom's Stuff podcast, And we've got a

645
00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:18,640
Speaker 1: couple of messages to share with you right now. Well,

646
00:38:18,680 --> 00:38:22,000
Speaker 1: I've got a message here from Christopher about our men

647
00:38:22,160 --> 00:38:25,640
Speaker 1: Scaping episode, and he said, I'd like to make a

648
00:38:25,680 --> 00:38:28,279
Speaker 1: statement of opposition in regard to your comments about male

649
00:38:28,360 --> 00:38:31,640
Speaker 1: body hair still being socially acceptable in the US. As

650
00:38:31,680 --> 00:38:33,600
Speaker 1: a twenty two year old guy with body hair, I

651
00:38:33,640 --> 00:38:37,640
Speaker 1: get ridiculed and laughed at on a nearly daily basis

652
00:38:37,680 --> 00:38:40,759
Speaker 1: by my peers and coworkers, and I'm often told that

653
00:38:40,800 --> 00:38:43,319
Speaker 1: if I want to get a girlfriend, quote, you need

654
00:38:43,360 --> 00:38:47,080
Speaker 1: to not be an abominable snowman bro. Maybe this is

655
00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:49,960
Speaker 1: just East Coast college town culture, but my experience here

656
00:38:50,000 --> 00:38:53,040
Speaker 1: and in Houston were about the same. As a side note,

657
00:38:53,040 --> 00:38:55,200
Speaker 1: I've tried manscaping in the past, both with near and

658
00:38:55,239 --> 00:38:58,360
Speaker 1: traditional methods, but removing all that hair is an arduous

659
00:38:58,400 --> 00:39:00,759
Speaker 1: task that rewards me within her own hair and a

660
00:39:00,840 --> 00:39:04,400
Speaker 1: sensation of sandpaper taped to the backside of all my shirts.

661
00:39:04,719 --> 00:39:06,560
Speaker 1: I can only hope that I find a lady who

662
00:39:06,600 --> 00:39:10,560
Speaker 1: doesn't mind my body hair if any exists, and Christopher,

663
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:15,000
Speaker 1: they absolutely exist. Yeah, I'm pointing at myself right here,

664
00:39:15,120 --> 00:39:17,560
Speaker 1: because my question to you about these people who are

665
00:39:17,640 --> 00:39:21,680
Speaker 1: like trying to humiliate you, are they all dudes? Because

666
00:39:21,920 --> 00:39:24,600
Speaker 1: there are plenty of ladies out there who don't mind

667
00:39:24,640 --> 00:39:29,120
Speaker 1: it or do like it. My my gentleman caller does

668
00:39:29,280 --> 00:39:36,040
Speaker 1: have quite a bit of hair in places, and he's

669
00:39:36,120 --> 00:39:39,839
Speaker 1: very handsome. Yeah, yeah, I say, don't don't listen. Don't

670
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:42,640
Speaker 1: listen to the hair haters. And this is also an

671
00:39:42,640 --> 00:39:45,360
Speaker 1: example too of why we wanted to talk about this issue,

672
00:39:45,400 --> 00:39:48,759
Speaker 1: because you're experiencing the same and so many other guys

673
00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:51,640
Speaker 1: i'm sure are experiencing the same kind of body hair shame.

674
00:39:51,880 --> 00:39:56,360
Speaker 1: There's usually just been targeted on women. But Christopher, don't worry.

675
00:39:56,400 --> 00:39:59,359
Speaker 1: There are plenty of women who don't mind, and might

676
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:02,080
Speaker 1: even a hairy bag. Yeah, because if you're getting a

677
00:40:02,120 --> 00:40:05,040
Speaker 1: bunch of that flak from fellow dudes, all that means

678
00:40:05,080 --> 00:40:07,600
Speaker 1: is that they're buying into the junk that like those

679
00:40:07,640 --> 00:40:12,799
Speaker 1: men's magazines are selling them, and they're probably voicing some insecurity. Okay,

680
00:40:12,840 --> 00:40:14,879
Speaker 1: I have a letter here from es may Um, also

681
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:18,480
Speaker 1: about our grooming episode. She says, for as long as

682
00:40:18,480 --> 00:40:20,399
Speaker 1: I can remember, as a woman, I have been very

683
00:40:20,440 --> 00:40:23,279
Speaker 1: aware of this expectation to remove almost all body hair,

684
00:40:23,320 --> 00:40:26,080
Speaker 1: and personally, it's never really sat right with me. I

685
00:40:26,160 --> 00:40:28,359
Speaker 1: was brought up with role models like Patty Smith, who

686
00:40:28,360 --> 00:40:30,160
Speaker 1: not only grew out their body hair, but we're not

687
00:40:30,200 --> 00:40:32,880
Speaker 1: afraid to show it off. The cover to Patti Smith's

688
00:40:32,920 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 1: album Easter is a perfect example of this. But as

689
00:40:36,040 --> 00:40:38,160
Speaker 1: a woman in her early to mid twenties. I've never

690
00:40:38,200 --> 00:40:41,040
Speaker 1: come across someone who shares the beauty in body hair.

691
00:40:41,360 --> 00:40:43,920
Speaker 1: I'm more than happy with every other aspect of my body,

692
00:40:43,960 --> 00:40:46,720
Speaker 1: but hate having to shave for other people. I found

693
00:40:46,719 --> 00:40:48,960
Speaker 1: it interesting when you spoke of the anxiety that some

694
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:51,160
Speaker 1: men and women feel when not shaving, and I think

695
00:40:51,239 --> 00:40:53,920
Speaker 1: I feel the opposite. I prefer how I look when

696
00:40:53,920 --> 00:40:56,040
Speaker 1: I let my body do its thing, and I wish

697
00:40:56,040 --> 00:41:00,319
Speaker 1: that wasn't seen as such a disgusting choice. So thank you, Esme,

698
00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:02,839
Speaker 1: and thank you for sending that picture of Patti Smith's cover,

699
00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:06,000
Speaker 1: and thanks to everybody who's written into us. Mom Stuff

700
00:41:06,040 --> 00:41:09,000
Speaker 1: at Discovery dot com is where you can send your emails.

701
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:11,400
Speaker 1: If you want to reach out to us on social media,

702
00:41:12,320 --> 00:41:15,160
Speaker 1: check out this podcast with all the links to all

703
00:41:15,200 --> 00:41:19,279
Speaker 1: of our sources, watch our videos, read our blogs. There's

704
00:41:19,440 --> 00:41:21,919
Speaker 1: one place to go, and that's Stuff I've Never Told

705
00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:28,000
Speaker 1: You dot com. For more on this and thousands of

706
00:41:28,040 --> 00:41:38,279
Speaker 1: other topics, visit how Stuff Works dot com