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Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stephane.

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Speaker 1: Never told you have a a prediction of I heart radio. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so you know, I in particular love lovelave love talking

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Speaker 1: about games and video games. Actually, I'm about to guest

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Speaker 1: on a podcast on the network called A Firm Role

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Speaker 1: by our friend Alex Williams. If you haven't checked it out,

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Speaker 1: it's awesome about video games. UM and we recently have

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Speaker 1: bridget on to talk about the whole thing that is ongoing. Yeah, Activision, Blizzard,

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Speaker 1: oh my god, they are and then Microsoft stepped in bottom. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: the whole thing, so many things. Yeah, But in that episode,

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Speaker 1: I said that recently there there had been a study

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Speaker 1: that showed that women play more video games than men,

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Speaker 1: including console games, And I wanted to clarify this point

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Speaker 1: because afterwards, through another project Samantha and I are working on,

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Speaker 1: I had to dig into that a bit more and

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Speaker 1: unfortunately that number was from yes, and the numbers have

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Speaker 1: gone back down. But there's a lot of complications in

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Speaker 1: this um. One being a lot of them are very regional,

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Speaker 1: so I'll be like in the US, or in the UK,

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Speaker 1: or or what have you. Another complication is a lot

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Speaker 1: of the researchers when they would ask follow up questions

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Speaker 1: to women women who said they weren't gamers, it turned

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Speaker 1: out that they were compared to like the same amount

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Speaker 1: men would say they were gamers, with the same amount

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Speaker 1: of experience that women would say they aren't. So who

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Speaker 1: gets to have that claim that as a title or

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Speaker 1: a label or an identity? Do you want to that's

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Speaker 1: also another question, So there's that complication. But then also

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Speaker 1: I think we talked about this in in several of

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Speaker 1: our video game episodes. Unfortunately we're going in the wrong direction,

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Speaker 1: like when it comes to people playing representation characters and

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Speaker 1: video games. I think since twenty nineteen and numbers have

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Speaker 1: gotten worse, the disparity has gotten worse. And when we're

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Speaker 1: seeing just these atrocious things happening at these video game

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Speaker 1: companies um and knowing we still have so much work

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Speaker 1: to do, that's very disheartening. Because that article that was

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Speaker 1: circulating that said women were playing more console games than men,

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Speaker 1: that was recent, but it was very specific. It was

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Speaker 1: like older women were playing more than younger boys, and

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Speaker 1: they were it was like a pretty big amount. But overall,

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Speaker 1: like the trend is not going the way that I

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Speaker 1: would say we wanted to go and so this I

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Speaker 1: just wanted to clarify that point because there are a

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Speaker 1: lot of caveats to it, as with a lot of

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Speaker 1: stuff we talked about. But also I wanted to bring

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Speaker 1: back this classic episode that me and bridget did on

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Speaker 1: online gaming and harassment in the Me Too movement. I

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Speaker 1: think there's there are some things in there that are dated,

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Speaker 1: but a lot of it, unfortunately isn't. It's still very relevant.

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Speaker 1: So with that in mind, please enjoy. Hi. This is Annie,

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Speaker 1: and this is Bridgett, and you're listening to stuff mom

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Speaker 1: never told you. Today we are talking about another important

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Speaker 1: aspect of my nerd life, which is gaming, and specifically

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Speaker 1: female gaming and specifically online gaming and what it's like

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Speaker 1: for women. What are your favorite games? Annie, Oh, I

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Speaker 1: am a big RPG role playing game, uh person, So

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Speaker 1: I really loved The Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts BioShock,

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Speaker 1: which I guess is I'm also a first person shooter,

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Speaker 1: which makes me kind of an outlier because women aren't

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Speaker 1: traditionally big into those, But I really love BioShock as

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Speaker 1: an evil and the Last of Us is like my

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Speaker 1: favorite and Kristen and Caroline did two part episode on

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Speaker 1: kind of the whole state of affairs of the video

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Speaker 1: game industry a while back, and we're going to be

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Speaker 1: rerunning those soon, so keep it keep an ear out

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Speaker 1: for that. I wanted to include listener Emma. She suggested

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Speaker 1: this to us. She emailed us a message, and I

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Speaker 1: wanted to read a bit of it at the top here.

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Speaker 1: I wrote this email because the action Picture episode that

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Speaker 1: y'all did, as well as several of your discussions about

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Speaker 1: violence towards women, got me thinking about how I have

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Speaker 1: slowly distanced myself from the video game community over time

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Speaker 1: because of the harassment that I have faced as a

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Speaker 1: female gamer, as well as the industry's lack of caring

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Speaker 1: when it comes to harassment and violence towards women, as

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Speaker 1: well as the continuous glorification of multiple forms of violence

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Speaker 1: against women. Just check out the game Agony and the

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Speaker 1: rape scene that was removed. Many male gamers seem to

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Speaker 1: think that, because they also face harassment yelling slurs at

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Speaker 1: each other, etcetera, that the harassment female gamers face is

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Speaker 1: on the same level. And I want to say a

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Speaker 1: wholeheartedly that being privately messaged to send nude photos are

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Speaker 1: hearing men try to basically have phone sex with you

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Speaker 1: when you're on MIC requires an unfair amount of energy

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Speaker 1: on our parts to tolerate if we want to continue

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Speaker 1: playing the games we love. Agreed, something I really want

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Speaker 1: to pars out from that message. First of all, Emma,

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Speaker 1: thank you for writing in. But it is different. It's

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Speaker 1: different when someone says, hey, face, you did a bad

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Speaker 1: job at this thing in the game. That's different. Then

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Speaker 1: I'm going to send you a private message and ask

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Speaker 1: you to send me pictures of your breasts. That's very different.

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Speaker 1: And so people who would argue that it's similar kind

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Speaker 1: of harassment that both men and women face in these

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Speaker 1: gaming communities, that's just willful ignorance because it's so different, right,

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Speaker 1: And like Emma sort of pointed out the trash talking

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Speaker 1: men get when gaming, that that's like very very different

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Speaker 1: than a solicitation of nudes or rape threats or death

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Speaker 1: threats of you and your children. And a lot of

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Speaker 1: female games have pointed out that, hey, we like trash

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Speaker 1: talking too if it's based on skill, but if you're

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Speaker 1: going to base it on gender, that's different and that's

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Speaker 1: not not fun at all. I gave up online gaming

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Speaker 1: after kind of my attempt at appearing gender neutral didn't

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Speaker 1: work out, and that is a common strategy for women online.

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Speaker 1: Did you have a mail or genderless avatar? Yeah? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I didn't ever add a picture. My name gave no

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Speaker 1: hint one way or the other, but I don't know.

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Speaker 1: Somehow it always seemed to come out. And this is

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Speaker 1: a plot point and ready player one actually for anyone

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Speaker 1: who's seen or read that. Another strategy is to never

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Speaker 1: use the microphone, which sucks because a microphone is meant

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Speaker 1: to make things easier and kind of enhance your gaming experience.

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Speaker 1: But as a woman, well, if you're if you're trying

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Speaker 1: to avoid being known as a woman, you will not

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Speaker 1: use it. So I never used it. You could do

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Speaker 1: what's the voice modification thing they use in the movie Scream.

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Speaker 1: I'm playing video. I'm playing you know, Last of Us

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Speaker 1: with the guy from Scream. Actually the killer was a woman.

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Speaker 1: Wait spoiler alert for Scream if you haven't seen it,

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Speaker 1: it's been off with tick twenty years. So also there's

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Speaker 1: like a lot of killers. Who knows which one we're talking? Okay,

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Speaker 1: Also good point. I did want to say that, I uh,

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Speaker 1: some places, some online spaces and games do have, from

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Speaker 1: what I've read, very lovely online community. So this is

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Speaker 1: a big brusher painting with and there are spaces that

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Speaker 1: are not this way. I have heard kind of in

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Speaker 1: an interesting benevolent sexism thing where some people are like, well,

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Speaker 1: I like it when people find out I'm a woman

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Speaker 1: because the men go out of their way to be

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Speaker 1: super nice to me in the game, and I'm like game.

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Speaker 1: Uh So, yes, those things exist, and you can love

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Speaker 1: something and critique it. As we've said before on here, Yes,

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Speaker 1: I know someone out there is going to be listening

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Speaker 1: and thinking like, why are you trashing video games? I

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Speaker 1: love video games from trash him. Just because you have

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Speaker 1: a critique about gaming or game culture doesn't mean you're

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Speaker 1: not a gamer, doesn't mean you're not a fan. It's

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Speaker 1: okay to critique art media, whatever, whatever we consume. It's

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Speaker 1: okay to critique it and still like it. Yeah, And

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Speaker 1: I would I would argue that you're trying to make

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Speaker 1: it better, You're trying to make it more than it

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Speaker 1: is right now. Yeah, because if you really love gaming,

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Speaker 1: you want it to be as good as it can be. Yes.

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Speaker 1: I want to be able to use the microphone and

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Speaker 1: not worry about some guy having sex. I can't believe

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Speaker 1: I even have to worry about that, but apparently apparently

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Speaker 1: we do. And Emma and I aren't alone in our

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Speaker 1: abandoning of online games in the face of harassment. We

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Speaker 1: found story after story, message board after message for or

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Speaker 1: of women sharing their experiences with sexual harassment when gaming online.

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Speaker 1: A twenty sixteen study published by Media and Society found

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Speaker 1: that quote both general and sexual harassment predict women's withdrawal

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Speaker 1: from online games. Sexual harassment, but not general harassment, leads

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Speaker 1: to rumination and subsequent withdraw Sexual harassment, perhaps unsurprisingly, seemed

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Speaker 1: to have an effect that ha ha, you suck and

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Speaker 1: are dumb does not. Yes, I would agree that is unsurprising. Well,

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Speaker 1: that's exactly what we were talking about before that. It's

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Speaker 1: this is not just your average, you know, trash talk,

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Speaker 1: which of course is going to happen in gaming. It's

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Speaker 1: happens in sports whatever. That's different than sexual harassment, rape threats,

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Speaker 1: that kind of thing exactly. And I I enjoy a

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Speaker 1: good trash talk session. I'm sure you do, knowing you,

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Speaker 1: I know that you do. I do, but it has

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Speaker 1: to be kind of like good and good spirit um

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Speaker 1: as competitive as I am. I like that, but not Yeah,

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Speaker 1: sexual harassment is completely different. And study was a study

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Speaker 1: of two ninety three women playing games in average of

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Speaker 1: twenty two hours a week, so not the most representative study,

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Speaker 1: but I do think it's worth mentioning, especially because there

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Speaker 1: aren't that many studies on this out there yet and

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Speaker 1: the paper didn't address this, but several others have. Rumination

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Speaker 1: is linked to negative outcomes, including depressive symptoms. So this

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Speaker 1: is it's not good. It's not good. And what pisses

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Speaker 1: me off the most about this, and there's so much

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Speaker 1: to be piste off about, is I know so many

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Speaker 1: people for whom video games is their stress relief. It's

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Speaker 1: their way to build community. They're living someplace so they

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Speaker 1: don't know a lot of people. It's their way to

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Speaker 1: feel like they have, you know, a social outlet. Imagine

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Speaker 1: all the women who are kind of pushed out of

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Speaker 1: this space that could mean so much for them socially, personally,

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Speaker 1: and they're pushed out because of jerks out there who

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Speaker 1: are treating women like this because they happen to be gamers. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's really it's not fair. No, No, it's not fair

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Speaker 1: at all. I did find one interesting account that's speculated

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Speaker 1: that maybe because so many of us women are pretending

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Speaker 1: to be male or I have like a gender neutral avatar,

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Speaker 1: that perhaps there are a lot more women playing than

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Speaker 1: we think. And I there was one story that really

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Speaker 1: caught my eye and kind of tickled me where this

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Speaker 1: one woman described her experience of like dominating the team

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Speaker 1: fortress to leaderboard, and everyone just assumed she was male

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Speaker 1: because she was good, so it must be male. Right

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Speaker 1: when she finally revealed she wasn't, several other players were like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I'm not either. Oh I love it. It's like they

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Speaker 1: all take off their masks and it's like, oh, we're

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Speaker 1: all women what this whole time? That's like something out

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Speaker 1: of a Oh my god, have you ever seen this

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Speaker 1: is so dumb? Have you ever seen the Little Rascals

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Speaker 1: that the remake. We're at the end, they're doing the

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Speaker 1: big race and it's and she takes off her helmet

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Speaker 1: and it's it's Darla, Like you think it's a male

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Speaker 1: driver because he's wearing like a This is so stupid.

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Speaker 1: But it's like that scene where she pulls off her

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Speaker 1: mask and it's a girl the whole time. You're right,

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Speaker 1: it's just like the Little Rascals. Most things in life

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Speaker 1: can be related back to the Little Rascals. Another note

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Speaker 1: before we dive in here. In the UN released a

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Speaker 1: sixty page report called cyber Violence against Women and Girls

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Speaker 1: a Worldwide wake up Call. But it contained several errors

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Speaker 1: in poor citations and was generally quite flawed. So hopefully

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Speaker 1: they will readdress that. Come back to that later. A

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Speaker 1: lot of people we mentioned they did call on to

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Speaker 1: speak at the event. It was the paper itself was

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Speaker 1: kind of had a lot of issues. Okay, so gaming

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Speaker 1: is a big business. As someone who doesn't do a

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Speaker 1: lot of gaming myself, these numbers I found were really

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Speaker 1: kind of shocking to me. In twenty six in the US,

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Speaker 1: consumers spent thirty point four billion on video games. Globally,

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Speaker 1: that number is an annual one and one billion, and

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Speaker 1: it's estimated at the growth rate until will be around

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Speaker 1: six percent. That means that forty million people worldwide play

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Speaker 1: video games. Yeah, and online games, specifically online games. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And I would guess when you think of a stereotypical gamer,

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Speaker 1: I mean, what do you think of bridget Definitely a dude,

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Speaker 1: probably someone who sits on the couch and you know,

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Speaker 1: dudes it out with this other dude friends. It's very masculine,

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Speaker 1: you know, like the common narrative of a gamer doesn't

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Speaker 1: look like you, doesn't look like Emma, I'm sure yeah.

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Speaker 1: And sixty of the public, when asked, would say something

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Speaker 1: similar it's a dude, probably a white dude, probably a

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Speaker 1: younger white dude. But statistics from the Pew Research Center

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Speaker 1: found that about fifty percent of both men and women

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Speaker 1: say that gaming on a PC, console or handheld device

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Speaker 1: is a pastime they participate in. Men are much likelier

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Speaker 1: to claim the game or label though, as compared to

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Speaker 1: women to six percent. So something that we were talking

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Speaker 1: about off Mike that again kind of made me scratch

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Speaker 1: my head was when you look at those numbers people

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Speaker 1: who pushed back on this idea that gaming is a

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Speaker 1: pretty you know, it's split pretty evenly between men and women.

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Speaker 1: I was like, wow, that's surprised, this is me. And

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Speaker 1: then you said, well, some people will push back on

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Speaker 1: that because they say a lot of women are gaming

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Speaker 1: on their cell phones, and some folks out there might say, oh,

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Speaker 1: that means they're not real gamers. To me, I thought, well,

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Speaker 1: they're fake gamers. They're imagining what does that mean? And

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Speaker 1: I have no idea that there was this connotation. Then

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Speaker 1: if you play games on your phone, you are a

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Speaker 1: fake gamer and should not be included in the quote

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Speaker 1: gamer label. Yes, And I think the more I kind

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Speaker 1: of thought about this, it kind of comes up a

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Speaker 1: lot where men have like they do the real thing

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Speaker 1: and women do kind of like the fake not. I

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Speaker 1: was just thinking about this in terms of politics, and

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Speaker 1: that studies show that women are a lot more likely

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Speaker 1: to get involved in politics, running for office because they

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Speaker 1: want to make change and they don't care about the glitz,

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Speaker 1: the glory, whatever, Whereas the research shows that men are

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Speaker 1: much more likely to do that same kind of thing

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Speaker 1: because they want the label of activists, of politician. They

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Speaker 1: want the thing ing the like stamp on their forehead

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Speaker 1: that this person is making X y Z kind of change,

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Speaker 1: isn't aren't they great? Whereas the data shows that women

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Speaker 1: just want to do the thing, they don't care about

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Speaker 1: the label. And I'm sure there are so many instances

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Speaker 1: where if men do it, they are assumed to be

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Speaker 1: the representative thing, you know, whether it's gaming, whether it's

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Speaker 1: an activist, whether it's you know, well, we talked about

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Speaker 1: a little in our fan fiction episode with writing science fiction,

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Speaker 1: where that was the real thing exactly. And Emily and

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Speaker 1: I had an episode on journaling where when women wrote journals,

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Speaker 1: it was just assumed to be these like little diaries,

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Speaker 1: not important, who cares. It's them writing about their feelings

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Speaker 1: and their crushes whatever. But when men write it, it's

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Speaker 1: it's their papers and it goes in a museum or something.

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Speaker 1: But for women it's just a little you know, women

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Speaker 1: aren't real writers. It's just their little doodles. The doodles.

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Speaker 1: When it comes to video games, there is like core gaming,

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Speaker 1: which is seen as like not phone playing games on

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Speaker 1: your phone, but most people do play games in their phone,

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Speaker 1: like not just women, most people, because we have them

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Speaker 1: all the time. And if you're just like kind of

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Speaker 1: waiting around, might as well play a game. I did

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Speaker 1: wanna mention that female video game developer interviewed about this

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Speaker 1: whole thing said one of her coworkers assumed that only

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Speaker 1: five percent of women were core gamers and the rest

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Speaker 1: are casual gamers. So developers are making the games for men.

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Speaker 1: The core gamers like with that in the back of

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Speaker 1: their head that women don't play video games. So I

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Speaker 1: make I make video games for them. That's so wild

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Speaker 1: to me, because what other industry is like that. If

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Speaker 1: you're someone who sees a movie in a movie theater

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Speaker 1: once a month and you're a casual movie, you know,

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Speaker 1: movie person, that people don't neglect you as an audience.

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Speaker 1: It just it's interesting to me that they're thinking, like, oh,

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Speaker 1: we can only market games towards people who are very

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Speaker 1: involved in this. I mean, it's interesting because this is

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Speaker 1: a whole other side conversation, and but it's interesting to me.

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Speaker 1: Like the identity label that is wrapped up in the

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Speaker 1: work gamer, I think there are so many other things

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Speaker 1: like pastimes that people do not make it part of

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Speaker 1: their core identity. I think gaming lends itself to people

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Speaker 1: taking it on as a kind of label about who

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Speaker 1: they are and their identity in the way that other

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Speaker 1: kinds of pastimes maybe do not. Yes, I completely agree

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Speaker 1: with you, and I do have an interesting quote about

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Speaker 1: that later in the episode. And to go back to

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Speaker 1: what you were saying about like marketing. Marketing research has

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Speaker 1: been pushing the video game industry to change. It's been

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Speaker 1: showing like you could be making a lot more money.

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Speaker 1: We found so many, so many market reports that concluded

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Speaker 1: that if the video game industry and markets behind it,

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Speaker 1: if they did make games for women, they could majorly

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Speaker 1: increase profits. So well, that's like our episode on action figures,

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Speaker 1: where there's money to be made. These people is holding

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Speaker 1: onto these not true, outdated ideas about who plays video

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Speaker 1: games and gender, is holding onto those rigid gender attitudes

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Speaker 1: more important than money. It seems like it is that

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Speaker 1: they could be making money. Do they not like money?

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Speaker 1: It was a deal. Yeah, they're they're entrenched in their ways.

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Speaker 1: And we're not going to touch on this too much

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Speaker 1: in this episode. But and one of the classics that

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Speaker 1: we're gonna be replaying that Kristen Caroline, did they talk

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Speaker 1: about how the industry is like ten to twelve the

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Speaker 1: designers making video games are women. So if it's that

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Speaker 1: small of a percentage, I can see how that would

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Speaker 1: kind of have ripple effects into what games are made.

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Speaker 1: And speaking of big business, let's talk about the sports.

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Speaker 1: E sports is like really growing very quickly. This is

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Speaker 1: organized and competitive play, usually of an online game that

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Speaker 1: has an aspect of performance that might be rewarded. Competitive

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Speaker 1: video gaming. Essentially, the sports have really really taken off.

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Speaker 1: They've doubled in size in the past three years, especially

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Speaker 1: in Asia, the US and Europe. The NBA is involved

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Speaker 1: in it, and in the next couple of years it's

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Speaker 1: expected to be valued at thirty five billion. From what

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Speaker 1: little data we have on this, about thirty percent to

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Speaker 1: professional gamers are female and people get paid for this.

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Speaker 1: If that's not clear, like some people millions. A report

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Speaker 1: in the VBC looked into China's female e sports team

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Speaker 1: and found that compared to men who can and have

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Speaker 1: earned up to two million, you know, pretty much celebrities,

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Speaker 1: women earn far, far less. In general, big companies don't

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Speaker 1: want to back female teams because they think that the

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Speaker 1: male teams people are more likely to watch them. We

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Speaker 1: hear that argument all the time. People want to watch

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Speaker 1: the male teams play, but not the female teams. China

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Speaker 1: has on seventy million esport players and made over half

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Speaker 1: a billion dollars for the country in this industry did

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Speaker 1: which is very impressive considering that from console games were

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Speaker 1: banned and labeled by the Chinese government as digital heroine. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think that for anyone listening was thinking, oh, why

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Speaker 1: are they talking about? Video games? Is just some stupid

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Speaker 1: pastime This is a very real part of economies. You know,

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Speaker 1: it's not just people's lives. It seems like a really

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Speaker 1: big part of what can make a country like China

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Speaker 1: function is video games. So it's not just some small thing. Yeah, no,

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Speaker 1: not at all. But I also found really interesting is

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Speaker 1: ex professional gamer Lillian Chen also known as a milk

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Speaker 1: Tea broth this viral blog post about what it's like

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Speaker 1: being a female gamer. So if you're curious, what is

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Speaker 1: it like being a professional female gamer? Who this is

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Speaker 1: not just a pastime, this is how you make your money.

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Speaker 1: She played Super Smash Brothers. Yeah, yeah, and so if

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Speaker 1: you want to know what it's like, it's actually fascinating.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, And one of the reasons video games have

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Speaker 1: for so long been masculinized does relate back to our

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Speaker 1: action figure episode. Um. In the ninety eighties, the video

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Speaker 1: game industry in the US had like way too many

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Speaker 1: video and arcade games, and American video game producers were

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Speaker 1: on the verge of bankruptcy. So there's solution was to

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Speaker 1: create more novel content that was reflective of the audience,

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Speaker 1: which meant they needed to narrow down the audience and

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Speaker 1: also increase visibility to that audience, so they decided to

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Speaker 1: move video games into the toy department, and since toy

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Speaker 1: departments were gendered, they picked boy over a girl. At

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Speaker 1: the time, boys played more games than girls. Video games

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Speaker 1: were then made with boys in mind, and therefore most

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Speaker 1: of the playable characters were male, and therefore women who

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Speaker 1: might have been into video games were turned away because

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Speaker 1: they weren't made for them. And not only that, female

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Speaker 1: characters and video games were seen as totally optional, and

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Speaker 1: when they were included, they were probably a hindrance, probably

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Speaker 1: an annoying one, our sex object, a prize to be one,

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Speaker 1: all of the above. And if that's what you're seeing

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Speaker 1: as a female player, yeah, you're probably gonna check out.

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Speaker 1: Video games are one of the most popular forms of

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Speaker 1: entertainment for children too, so we're teaching these messages at

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Speaker 1: very young ages. And it might go without saying, but

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Speaker 1: women are more attracted to games a female protagonists, which

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Speaker 1: are not supplentiful. For every five male characters, there is

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Speaker 1: one female one and that number gets even worse if

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Speaker 1: you look at door or action characters, and in over

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Speaker 1: games with only one protagonist, that protagonist is male. So

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Speaker 1: this actually reminds me so much of my childhood because

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Speaker 1: when we were growing up, we were obsessed with the

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Speaker 1: Ninja Turtles, and I always had to be April a

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Speaker 1: real meal because she was the girl. And the mall

401
00:22:31,160 --> 00:22:33,760
Speaker 1: Chesterfield Towns and tremol in my town when I was

402
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Speaker 1: growing up used to have this big arcade and the

403
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Speaker 1: best game they had was that stand up Ninja Turtles

404
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Speaker 1: game that you know where it was like four players

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Speaker 1: could play at once and you were all sort of

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Speaker 1: standing in a semicircle and it would be like my

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Speaker 1: brother and my cousin's all playing. But since I was

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Speaker 1: the girl, there was no there was no kind of

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Speaker 1: role for me. If you know that game, in the beginning,

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Speaker 1: Splinter and April are kidnapped and so that's when the

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Speaker 1: that's why the turtles are fighting in the first place.

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Speaker 1: And so because in my sort of family, when we

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Speaker 1: would do Ninja Turtles games and play Ninja Turtles in

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Speaker 1: the yard, which he did all the time I was April,

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Speaker 1: I had no role in that. In that game, you know,

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Speaker 1: there wasn't even a role for me. And I'll remember

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Speaker 1: this in the Mario franchise, you know how Super Mario

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Speaker 1: Brothers one, you're saving Princess Peach. But then the Super

419
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Speaker 1: Mario Brothers too, is like really strange and all this

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Speaker 1: strange stuff has happening. It doesn't look anything like the

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Speaker 1: other Super Mario games. Not to trash my brother but

422
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Speaker 1: when we were kids, we were playing in that game

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Speaker 1: for the first time, and in that game you can

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Speaker 1: actually play as Princess Peach. He was like, what is

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Speaker 1: Princess Peach doing in game play? Like she's supposed to

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Speaker 1: be being saved And I'll never forget that I was

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Speaker 1: a kid, but I was like, why can't she play?

428
00:23:42,920 --> 00:23:45,359
Speaker 1: She didn't even be saved all the time. Maybe she

429
00:23:45,400 --> 00:23:48,119
Speaker 1: wants to play. Do you remember that game. It's a

430
00:23:48,240 --> 00:23:51,600
Speaker 1: very strange game that involves you floating on a cloud

431
00:23:51,720 --> 00:23:54,680
Speaker 1: and there's a scene where like a chicken eggs being

432
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:56,680
Speaker 1: shot at it that now that it goes bowl, it's

433
00:23:56,720 --> 00:23:59,199
Speaker 1: like a very weird game. I feel like it's an

434
00:23:59,200 --> 00:24:02,560
Speaker 1: acid trip. Doesn't make sense in the franchise at all,

435
00:24:03,560 --> 00:24:05,800
Speaker 1: but you can play its Princess Peach, and that was

436
00:24:05,880 --> 00:24:09,840
Speaker 1: very important to me. Yeah. I had similar conversations with

437
00:24:09,840 --> 00:24:12,200
Speaker 1: my brothers, and yeah, not to trash talk them either,

438
00:24:12,280 --> 00:24:16,119
Speaker 1: but they were very It's funny because like compared to

439
00:24:16,119 --> 00:24:18,360
Speaker 1: the rest of the population. I am like a gamer,

440
00:24:18,760 --> 00:24:21,040
Speaker 1: but they thought I was a fake gamer, so they

441
00:24:21,040 --> 00:24:23,800
Speaker 1: would erase my video games because you could only have

442
00:24:23,800 --> 00:24:28,440
Speaker 1: three SAPs, right, Remember how if you like unplugged, it lost.

443
00:24:30,160 --> 00:24:33,800
Speaker 1: My friend of mine kept a plugged in small TV

444
00:24:34,320 --> 00:24:36,399
Speaker 1: in his room where it was like a sign that

445
00:24:36,440 --> 00:24:38,960
Speaker 1: said do not touch. Just trying to say the high

446
00:24:39,000 --> 00:24:42,040
Speaker 1: score for so long and I feel like this is

447
00:24:42,040 --> 00:24:44,440
Speaker 1: going to be buried with This was like ten years ago.

448
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:46,879
Speaker 1: This was well into when you could have been playing

449
00:24:46,880 --> 00:24:50,200
Speaker 1: a console that allowed for turning off the system and

450
00:24:50,320 --> 00:24:52,720
Speaker 1: not not having not saving a game. So many of

451
00:24:52,800 --> 00:24:55,720
Speaker 1: us were traumatized by losing games. Yeah, tune into our

452
00:24:55,800 --> 00:25:00,159
Speaker 1: spinoff podcast, Annie and Bridget talked about the brothers just

453
00:25:00,240 --> 00:25:03,159
Speaker 1: just talking. If you didn't get that idea from the

454
00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:06,960
Speaker 1: title if we If we go look at video game covers,

455
00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:09,840
Speaker 1: male characters are four times is likely to be featured

456
00:25:09,840 --> 00:25:13,119
Speaker 1: on the front and um. First person shooters, which I

457
00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:16,800
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, is a traditionally male dominated video game genre,

458
00:25:17,320 --> 00:25:20,200
Speaker 1: they have a much greater female playership. Studies have shown

459
00:25:20,200 --> 00:25:23,600
Speaker 1: if a female protagonist is involved, so games where you

460
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:26,240
Speaker 1: can customize your character generally pretty popular. Across gen or

461
00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:29,040
Speaker 1: divides too. It is worth noting that a lot of

462
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:31,640
Speaker 1: people do like to play as the opposite sex. It's

463
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:33,959
Speaker 1: not like if you see a male avatar, very well

464
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:35,760
Speaker 1: could be one, if you see a female avatar, very

465
00:25:35,760 --> 00:25:37,879
Speaker 1: well could be a man. But it's good to have

466
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:40,840
Speaker 1: those options. I know that in general, I always play

467
00:25:40,880 --> 00:25:43,440
Speaker 1: as a woman if it's an option. Um oh you

468
00:25:43,600 --> 00:25:48,080
Speaker 1: like this. Bridget In, the creative director of Ubisoft, made

469
00:25:48,080 --> 00:25:50,920
Speaker 1: headlines when he said Assassin's Creed didn't have a playable

470
00:25:50,960 --> 00:25:54,239
Speaker 1: female character because quote, it was really a lot of

471
00:25:54,280 --> 00:25:59,240
Speaker 1: extra production work, which led to the viral hashtag women

472
00:25:59,280 --> 00:26:05,400
Speaker 1: are too hard. Oh my god, that's that's all I'm starting.

473
00:26:05,400 --> 00:26:09,399
Speaker 1: It's hilarious. Yeah. I have one of my favorite video games,

474
00:26:09,680 --> 00:26:11,960
Speaker 1: Fantasy seven, has this scene that even as a kid,

475
00:26:11,960 --> 00:26:14,160
Speaker 1: I was like, this is weird. And one of the

476
00:26:14,200 --> 00:26:17,520
Speaker 1: main characters she has really big boobs, really big, and

477
00:26:17,560 --> 00:26:20,199
Speaker 1: there's a cut scene where she gets knocked over and

478
00:26:20,320 --> 00:26:24,560
Speaker 1: just the like motion I wish you could see what

479
00:26:24,600 --> 00:26:26,639
Speaker 1: and he's doing with her hands right now. It's like,

480
00:26:26,720 --> 00:26:28,560
Speaker 1: do her boots have a ripple of that? If you're

481
00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:32,359
Speaker 1: basically doing it. It was a site of a hold

482
00:26:32,480 --> 00:26:35,480
Speaker 1: and it's stuck with me years later. So you know,

483
00:26:36,160 --> 00:26:40,240
Speaker 1: maybe maybe there are challenges animating boobs. Who knows, I

484
00:26:40,240 --> 00:26:42,400
Speaker 1: mean not if you live in the world and observe

485
00:26:42,440 --> 00:26:45,399
Speaker 1: how bob Yeah, I really you could just kind of

486
00:26:45,440 --> 00:26:48,520
Speaker 1: leave them alone. I don't know. They really don't need

487
00:26:48,560 --> 00:26:50,919
Speaker 1: to do anything special in the video game. I don't think, no,

488
00:26:51,280 --> 00:26:54,280
Speaker 1: unless you're using them to shoot a gun or something. Sure,

489
00:26:54,800 --> 00:26:58,720
Speaker 1: using them for gameplay, yeah, I'm sure those games exist.

490
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:01,840
Speaker 1: And this is raging. More female and l g B

491
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:06,520
Speaker 1: t Q characters are becoming more common in video games.

492
00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:09,760
Speaker 1: In fact, Listener Rose, which was recently about the sighting

493
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:14,119
Speaker 1: Horizon Zo don overwatched Dragon Age Inquisition and Ellie from

494
00:27:14,240 --> 00:27:16,760
Speaker 1: Last of Us, which I mentioned at the top, and

495
00:27:17,000 --> 00:27:19,320
Speaker 1: that gameplay just came out recently for the second one.

496
00:27:19,320 --> 00:27:22,879
Speaker 1: It looks amazing, so some improvement, but we still have

497
00:27:22,960 --> 00:27:25,960
Speaker 1: a long way to go, and we're gonna get into

498
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:38,639
Speaker 1: that after a quick break forward from our sponsor and

499
00:27:38,800 --> 00:27:43,159
Speaker 1: we're back, Thank you sponsor. When when real life women

500
00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:47,080
Speaker 1: started venturing into this male world, a lot of intense

501
00:27:47,160 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 1: gamer dudes were not happy. They try to keep women

502
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:53,760
Speaker 1: out with insults, harassment, and even threats like gamer Gate.

503
00:27:53,800 --> 00:27:57,439
Speaker 1: I'm sure we're all familiar with gamer Gate. Anita Sarkasian

504
00:27:57,600 --> 00:28:00,000
Speaker 1: was threatened with rape and death, sent pictures of game

505
00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:03,840
Speaker 1: characters raping her and a game called beat Up. Anita

506
00:28:03,880 --> 00:28:07,520
Speaker 1: Sarkeesian was made um because she kind of intruded in

507
00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:11,480
Speaker 1: their world and started talking about feminism and sexist trokes. Again,

508
00:28:11,560 --> 00:28:15,240
Speaker 1: she likes video games. You can critique things and still

509
00:28:15,280 --> 00:28:18,919
Speaker 1: like them. She wasn't like, I watched the videos and

510
00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:21,520
Speaker 1: they're great, but yeah, she was just like, hey, let's

511
00:28:21,520 --> 00:28:24,160
Speaker 1: look at Sammy's for a minute. Yeah. I once had

512
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:27,000
Speaker 1: a really scary and eye opening situation. This was many,

513
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:29,840
Speaker 1: many years ago when I had first got into into

514
00:28:29,840 --> 00:28:32,640
Speaker 1: the mix writing and blogging, and I was doing a

515
00:28:32,680 --> 00:28:37,520
Speaker 1: review of one of Sarkasian's pieces and it was completely

516
00:28:37,600 --> 00:28:40,280
Speaker 1: by the book. I certainly did not editorialize it because

517
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:42,320
Speaker 1: that was not my job. I was just like, Oh,

518
00:28:42,600 --> 00:28:44,760
Speaker 1: this is a piece that she has, here's what she says,

519
00:28:44,760 --> 00:28:48,040
Speaker 1: blah blah blah, very by the book. Publish the amount

520
00:28:48,400 --> 00:28:53,240
Speaker 1: of vitriolic hate that I personally got just because she

521
00:28:53,280 --> 00:28:55,640
Speaker 1: happened to tweet this piece out because it was about her,

522
00:28:55,840 --> 00:28:57,880
Speaker 1: I have never seen anything like it, and I don't

523
00:28:57,880 --> 00:29:00,200
Speaker 1: think I'll ever see anything like it again. And bear

524
00:29:00,200 --> 00:29:03,600
Speaker 1: in mind, in no way did she say people who

525
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:06,600
Speaker 1: game are sexist and awful like. She didn't say anything

526
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:11,560
Speaker 1: like that. It was just a pretty mild breakdown of gaming.

527
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:14,360
Speaker 1: You know, the tropes in this game. It was. In

528
00:29:14,360 --> 00:29:16,640
Speaker 1: no way was it anything that anyone should upset about.

529
00:29:16,680 --> 00:29:18,840
Speaker 1: It wasn't. It was basically a movie review. If you

530
00:29:18,840 --> 00:29:20,800
Speaker 1: wouldn't think that a movie review would be something to

531
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:23,280
Speaker 1: lose your cool over, it certainly wasn't anything different from that.

532
00:29:23,480 --> 00:29:26,720
Speaker 1: And I just could not I could not believe the

533
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:30,640
Speaker 1: shocking level of response that she got. And then I

534
00:29:30,680 --> 00:29:34,000
Speaker 1: got this from a mild association with her work. I

535
00:29:34,040 --> 00:29:36,840
Speaker 1: was like, what the hell is going on? Yep, but well,

536
00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:40,720
Speaker 1: angry gamers trying to paint gamer gate as a response

537
00:29:40,840 --> 00:29:44,720
Speaker 1: to like a lack of journalistic integrity. It's about integrity

538
00:29:44,800 --> 00:29:49,680
Speaker 1: and gaming. It's about ethics and gaming journalism. Any that's

539
00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:51,560
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, we should rape this woman. I don't know,

540
00:29:51,680 --> 00:29:56,080
Speaker 1: it's about ethics. I can't believe you missed that. So

541
00:29:56,200 --> 00:29:59,040
Speaker 1: if we look at that, there's the story of Zoe Quinn,

542
00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:02,160
Speaker 1: who was an indie gamer developer who had a positively

543
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 1: reviewed game called Depression Quest, and an ex lover of

544
00:30:06,080 --> 00:30:09,960
Speaker 1: hers put transcripts of her life online, and here come

545
00:30:10,040 --> 00:30:13,040
Speaker 1: the gamer gators, alleging that Quinn's relationship with the journalist

546
00:30:13,080 --> 00:30:16,800
Speaker 1: was behind her games good reviews, and that was all

547
00:30:16,840 --> 00:30:19,360
Speaker 1: the excuse angry dude gamers needed to ask her to

548
00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:22,320
Speaker 1: the point that she went into hiding and hiding. I

549
00:30:22,400 --> 00:30:24,360
Speaker 1: just wanted to point out that gamers didn't go after

550
00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:27,800
Speaker 1: the journalist. If you, if you're wondering about that ethics

551
00:30:27,800 --> 00:30:29,920
Speaker 1: and video game journalism, why do you what? What? What

552
00:30:29,960 --> 00:30:31,640
Speaker 1: could be the difference? I don't know, I don't know

553
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:33,560
Speaker 1: what a good view it did find a really interesting

554
00:30:33,640 --> 00:30:36,880
Speaker 1: article written by Devon Ferarchi called why I feel bad

555
00:30:36,920 --> 00:30:39,719
Speaker 1: for and understand the angry gamer Gators. I have a

556
00:30:39,760 --> 00:30:41,920
Speaker 1: really long quote that I probably shouldn't read the whole thing,

557
00:30:42,000 --> 00:30:44,880
Speaker 1: but it was. It was interesting to read. It kind

558
00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:46,720
Speaker 1: of goes back to what you were saying Bridget about

559
00:30:46,760 --> 00:30:50,480
Speaker 1: how gamer is such an identity for some people. I

560
00:30:50,520 --> 00:30:52,880
Speaker 1: guess when you feel like people are intruding into this

561
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:55,680
Speaker 1: thing that you've producted and cultivated, when you are someone

562
00:30:55,720 --> 00:30:58,920
Speaker 1: who is an outsider, who is downtrodden, you will fight back.

563
00:30:59,840 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 1: I guess we could post it it is. It was

564
00:31:02,080 --> 00:31:05,400
Speaker 1: really interesting to read, especially because I know, I don't

565
00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:08,200
Speaker 1: know if I know someone who is is like a

566
00:31:08,240 --> 00:31:11,040
Speaker 1: gamer gater, but I know guys that are very very

567
00:31:11,080 --> 00:31:16,160
Speaker 1: protective of like they're gaming worlds. So full disclosure, Like

568
00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:18,360
Speaker 1: I casually sometimes play video games, but I would never

569
00:31:18,400 --> 00:31:21,040
Speaker 1: call myself a gamer. But so so I'm a little

570
00:31:21,040 --> 00:31:25,320
Speaker 1: out of the loop. Admittedly, are gamers like a downtrodden group,

571
00:31:25,640 --> 00:31:29,920
Speaker 1: well not anymore. Well, I don't know. I will say

572
00:31:29,960 --> 00:31:33,400
Speaker 1: we kind of touched on this before, where like nerds

573
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:37,320
Speaker 1: haven't inherited the earth, right, so I feel like in

574
00:31:37,440 --> 00:31:42,800
Speaker 1: the eighties nerds certainly was depicted as very downtrodden and

575
00:31:42,840 --> 00:31:46,400
Speaker 1: being getting picked on and bullied. I honestly can't speak

576
00:31:46,400 --> 00:31:50,440
Speaker 1: to right now. I will know, the most gamers I

577
00:31:50,480 --> 00:31:56,040
Speaker 1: know that are men are not perhaps they were nerdier. Yeah,

578
00:31:56,200 --> 00:32:00,000
Speaker 1: I again, and this is not this is Bridget's opinion, anecdote.

579
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,120
Speaker 1: All I've always pushed back against that idea that gamers

580
00:32:04,560 --> 00:32:07,920
Speaker 1: on a whole are this marginalized group. As you pointed

581
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:09,600
Speaker 1: out at the top of the show, a lot of

582
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:11,880
Speaker 1: people game and so it's the majority of people are

583
00:32:11,880 --> 00:32:14,680
Speaker 1: playing video games. They might not have this label of gamer,

584
00:32:15,200 --> 00:32:17,800
Speaker 1: but it's not a niche hobby. In fact, quite a

585
00:32:17,800 --> 00:32:20,840
Speaker 1: mainstream hobby, I would argue. And so I hear that

586
00:32:20,960 --> 00:32:24,680
Speaker 1: people feel that they have lived a life full of

587
00:32:24,880 --> 00:32:27,480
Speaker 1: hardship because they were nerdier, because they were skinnier, because

588
00:32:27,480 --> 00:32:30,560
Speaker 1: they were not popular or whatever. I understand that that's

589
00:32:30,560 --> 00:32:33,400
Speaker 1: how I felt growing up sometimes. But whether or not

590
00:32:34,080 --> 00:32:37,960
Speaker 1: they are actually like a marginalized group or who actually

591
00:32:38,120 --> 00:32:47,160
Speaker 1: is downtrotch, I'm always sort of skeptical about that. Yeah. Maybe, yeah, yeah, no, totally. Um,

592
00:32:47,200 --> 00:32:50,120
Speaker 1: I don't know the word for it. Most most gamer

593
00:32:50,120 --> 00:32:55,520
Speaker 1: gaiters are young. They're pretty young. So I don't know

594
00:32:55,720 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 1: if the movie should post the article. It's interesting to read.

595
00:32:58,560 --> 00:33:01,040
Speaker 1: There is one. There's one it I really liked where

596
00:33:01,600 --> 00:33:04,240
Speaker 1: it says these guys get told lies that I think

597
00:33:04,240 --> 00:33:07,360
Speaker 1: are really insidious, like it doesn't matter what's on your outside,

598
00:33:07,360 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 1: it matters what's on your inside, which leads to an

599
00:33:10,200 --> 00:33:14,000
Speaker 1: entire affinity of groups a dress and smell like and

600
00:33:14,080 --> 00:33:16,480
Speaker 1: don't take care of themselves, And this leads to a

601
00:33:16,480 --> 00:33:19,440
Speaker 1: horrible cycle where socially awkward weirdos who dressed like garbage

602
00:33:19,480 --> 00:33:22,880
Speaker 1: get rejected by attractive women, which causes socially awkward weirdos

603
00:33:22,880 --> 00:33:25,200
Speaker 1: to start blaming women in general for their problems and

604
00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:28,280
Speaker 1: reinforce their social awkwardness. They do it because they have

605
00:33:28,320 --> 00:33:30,400
Speaker 1: been raised in a world where women are not humans

606
00:33:30,400 --> 00:33:33,360
Speaker 1: but prizes, and so they can't see them as individuals.

607
00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 1: They can understand that they are women out there who

608
00:33:35,920 --> 00:33:38,880
Speaker 1: also are socially awkward weirdos who might truly be into

609
00:33:38,920 --> 00:33:42,560
Speaker 1: comic books, video games, thunder and dragons. Yes, Oh my god,

610
00:33:42,600 --> 00:33:44,160
Speaker 1: I have a lot to say. This reminds me so

611
00:33:44,240 --> 00:33:46,760
Speaker 1: much of the episode that we did a while back,

612
00:33:46,840 --> 00:33:49,360
Speaker 1: Emily and I on men going their own way, and

613
00:33:49,360 --> 00:33:51,280
Speaker 1: if you don't know what that is, basically, it's this

614
00:33:51,360 --> 00:33:55,520
Speaker 1: attitude that some men have today where they are basically

615
00:33:55,600 --> 00:33:59,680
Speaker 1: retreating from society. They don't want to have a romantic partner,

616
00:33:59,720 --> 00:34:02,680
Speaker 1: they don't want to be included in everyday society. The

617
00:34:02,760 --> 00:34:04,960
Speaker 1: reason why that topic was something that was on my

618
00:34:05,080 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: radar at all was this study that had come out

619
00:34:07,320 --> 00:34:10,359
Speaker 1: that had just come out then about young men and

620
00:34:10,600 --> 00:34:13,759
Speaker 1: video gaming and how the role it can function in

621
00:34:13,800 --> 00:34:15,640
Speaker 1: a young man's life in this day and age, and

622
00:34:15,680 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 1: it's a lot of what you talked about where young

623
00:34:18,040 --> 00:34:21,279
Speaker 1: men especially have been sold this kind of lie. I

624
00:34:21,320 --> 00:34:24,360
Speaker 1: guess there's no other word for it. That they will

625
00:34:24,600 --> 00:34:27,080
Speaker 1: grow up, be successful, get a job, to find a wife,

626
00:34:27,080 --> 00:34:29,880
Speaker 1: blah blah blah, like do the sort of white picket

627
00:34:29,880 --> 00:34:32,319
Speaker 1: fence American dream thing. But look around you. That's no

628
00:34:32,400 --> 00:34:35,520
Speaker 1: longer happening, and you know, gone on the days when

629
00:34:35,600 --> 00:34:37,640
Speaker 1: just by virtue of being born white and male, you

630
00:34:37,680 --> 00:34:40,759
Speaker 1: can be promised things like a spouse, things like a job,

631
00:34:41,160 --> 00:34:45,120
Speaker 1: successful life, and video games, it seems, are kind of

632
00:34:45,160 --> 00:34:49,040
Speaker 1: functioning as a a way to be like, Oh, the

633
00:34:49,120 --> 00:34:51,239
Speaker 1: life that I was sort of promised is not a

634
00:34:51,280 --> 00:34:53,680
Speaker 1: reality for me. I'll just retreat into video games and

635
00:34:53,880 --> 00:34:55,960
Speaker 1: new society. In that episode, we took a lot of

636
00:34:55,960 --> 00:34:59,040
Speaker 1: heat for almost humanizing young man who feel that way

637
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:01,840
Speaker 1: too much. But I do think it's like an interesting

638
00:35:02,440 --> 00:35:04,920
Speaker 1: position to be in because from that excerpt that you've

639
00:35:04,960 --> 00:35:06,880
Speaker 1: just read, it just sounds like we are not setting

640
00:35:06,920 --> 00:35:10,319
Speaker 1: these young men up for successful, healthy lives, and that's

641
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:12,080
Speaker 1: what it really comes down to. And so part of

642
00:35:12,120 --> 00:35:14,480
Speaker 1: me does feel sympathetic, not so sympathetic that they're out

643
00:35:14,520 --> 00:35:17,160
Speaker 1: there sitting rape threats and like making zo Quinn's life horrible.

644
00:35:17,800 --> 00:35:20,239
Speaker 1: But part of me can understand if you grew up

645
00:35:20,239 --> 00:35:22,920
Speaker 1: hearing that it's what's inside that counts, and that just

646
00:35:22,960 --> 00:35:25,080
Speaker 1: by virtue of being born white and male, you will

647
00:35:25,120 --> 00:35:27,360
Speaker 1: have X, y Z good things, and then come to

648
00:35:27,360 --> 00:35:30,680
Speaker 1: find out that actually you do need to have a

649
00:35:30,719 --> 00:35:32,919
Speaker 1: decent personality, You actually do need to take care of yourself.

650
00:35:33,000 --> 00:35:34,759
Speaker 1: You actually do need to have basic hygiene and like

651
00:35:35,120 --> 00:35:37,120
Speaker 1: a basic understanding of how to present in the world.

652
00:35:37,160 --> 00:35:38,719
Speaker 1: If you want to have good things in your life,

653
00:35:38,719 --> 00:35:40,719
Speaker 1: you actually do have to work for them. You know,

654
00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 1: it's not gonna get handed to you. You don't, you

655
00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:43,880
Speaker 1: don't earn it. It It is by virtue of being you.

656
00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 1: It's not a prize that you can just get by

657
00:35:46,160 --> 00:35:50,600
Speaker 1: showing up. Because we are filling these young men's heads

658
00:35:50,760 --> 00:35:53,880
Speaker 1: with those lives, and because of video games function, a

659
00:35:53,880 --> 00:35:55,640
Speaker 1: lot of them function in a way where that's the case,

660
00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:57,440
Speaker 1: you know, like we'll post it in the show notes.

661
00:35:57,480 --> 00:36:00,920
Speaker 1: This article talks about how so many games the reward

662
00:36:01,040 --> 00:36:04,279
Speaker 1: system rewards tasks in such a way that it can

663
00:36:04,320 --> 00:36:07,200
Speaker 1: almost mimic work. And so if you are someone who

664
00:36:07,280 --> 00:36:12,520
Speaker 1: is underemployed or unemployed. Gaming is designed to stimulate something

665
00:36:12,520 --> 00:36:15,040
Speaker 1: in your brain that maybe makes you feel like you

666
00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:16,960
Speaker 1: are working when you're not, you know what I mean.

667
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:18,759
Speaker 1: And so you're not gonna feel like you need to

668
00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:21,759
Speaker 1: go out and join society, join the workforce to get

669
00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:25,120
Speaker 1: those brain warm fuzzies if gaming provides it in a

670
00:36:25,239 --> 00:36:27,319
Speaker 1: kind of way. I know, I sound like someone who

671
00:36:27,440 --> 00:36:30,040
Speaker 1: I mean this people who are gaming or like getting

672
00:36:30,040 --> 00:36:31,920
Speaker 1: no bridget. But when I found this out, I thought, oh,

673
00:36:31,920 --> 00:36:34,000
Speaker 1: of course. And the reason why I found this out

674
00:36:34,040 --> 00:36:36,799
Speaker 1: is because I had someone in my life who was

675
00:36:36,880 --> 00:36:39,680
Speaker 1: underemployed and was like, yeah, video games are really getting

676
00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:42,040
Speaker 1: me through. And at first I thought, Jesus, that's satisfying.

677
00:36:42,160 --> 00:36:44,520
Speaker 1: But then I when I really unpacked it, I thought,

678
00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:46,399
Speaker 1: oh my god, it makes sense, and this is what's

679
00:36:46,400 --> 00:36:49,240
Speaker 1: happening to a generation of young men. And it explains

680
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:52,719
Speaker 1: so much about how young men see themselves in the world.

681
00:36:52,800 --> 00:36:55,000
Speaker 1: You know, if they're heterosexual, how they're functioning with women,

682
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 1: why they might want to check out of society if

683
00:36:57,040 --> 00:37:00,319
Speaker 1: they feel like they've been sold a lie. And I

684
00:37:00,360 --> 00:37:03,240
Speaker 1: mean it's not just video games either, those eighties movies.

685
00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:05,640
Speaker 1: This has been the story we've been telling for a

686
00:37:05,680 --> 00:37:10,080
Speaker 1: long time that eventually it's just gonna work out in

687
00:37:10,120 --> 00:37:13,040
Speaker 1: the end and you're going to get the girl. And

688
00:37:13,400 --> 00:37:16,080
Speaker 1: I'm glad we're moving away from that and telling different stories.

689
00:37:16,239 --> 00:37:19,920
Speaker 1: So many women, so many women have spoken up about

690
00:37:20,600 --> 00:37:24,480
Speaker 1: harassment in gaming. There's Jenny Honiver. She runs Not in

691
00:37:24,520 --> 00:37:27,200
Speaker 1: the Kitchen Anymore, a website dedicated to her experience as

692
00:37:27,200 --> 00:37:31,560
Speaker 1: a female gamer, particularly online. She records and transcribes audio

693
00:37:31,600 --> 00:37:34,400
Speaker 1: files of her interactions and post them and let me

694
00:37:34,480 --> 00:37:38,440
Speaker 1: tell you, it gets really grim fast. I think she's

695
00:37:38,560 --> 00:37:41,640
Speaker 1: stepped away from it so it's more of an archive now,

696
00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:44,319
Speaker 1: but if you're looking for reasons to get angry, it's there.

697
00:37:45,000 --> 00:37:48,040
Speaker 1: Julia Hardy, who was a gaming journalist, has a similar

698
00:37:48,040 --> 00:37:51,879
Speaker 1: website called Misogyny Monday, where she post abusive comments she's

699
00:37:51,880 --> 00:37:55,640
Speaker 1: received and her pretty hilarious comebacks. After someone tweeted it

700
00:37:55,760 --> 00:37:57,799
Speaker 1: her to go back to the kitchen and make me

701
00:37:57,800 --> 00:38:00,759
Speaker 1: a sandwich, she responded with, what is it that you

702
00:38:00,880 --> 00:38:03,560
Speaker 1: most fear about? Women? Are keen? Agility? Are the fact

703
00:38:03,560 --> 00:38:07,680
Speaker 1: our periods attract bears? Well, anyone knows that's true. I

704
00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:11,680
Speaker 1: know that's just science. Another website documenting abuse female gamers

705
00:38:11,719 --> 00:38:14,520
Speaker 1: receive online is fat, ugly, or slutty. It hasn't been

706
00:38:14,600 --> 00:38:16,839
Speaker 1: updated in a while, but this is another good one

707
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:19,000
Speaker 1: if you want to be mad um. I really like

708
00:38:19,040 --> 00:38:21,280
Speaker 1: the categories on the side because it kind of sorts

709
00:38:21,320 --> 00:38:23,959
Speaker 1: the comments and the categories are like sand which making

710
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:26,680
Speaker 1: one on one are crudely creative. I mean, if you've

711
00:38:26,680 --> 00:38:31,080
Speaker 1: got to put a silver lining on it, it's pretty good. Yeah. Honestly,

712
00:38:31,120 --> 00:38:34,080
Speaker 1: what this displays is that a lot of these digs

713
00:38:34,080 --> 00:38:38,160
Speaker 1: are just not very creative. Yeah. I wonder if I

714
00:38:38,239 --> 00:38:40,040
Speaker 1: still have any I should go look. A lot of

715
00:38:40,120 --> 00:38:42,440
Speaker 1: them don't make much sense. Yeah, So it's annoying to

716
00:38:42,440 --> 00:38:44,799
Speaker 1: get abuse online. I try to stay off social media

717
00:38:44,800 --> 00:38:46,920
Speaker 1: in these days, but when I do blog back in,

718
00:38:46,960 --> 00:38:48,360
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, yeah, this is why I left. What

719
00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:50,360
Speaker 1: I hate the most is when I'm thinking, that's not

720
00:38:50,440 --> 00:38:52,600
Speaker 1: even a good joke. It's not even a good comeback.

721
00:38:52,800 --> 00:38:54,960
Speaker 1: If you're gonna insult somebody that doesn't even make sense,

722
00:38:56,120 --> 00:38:59,200
Speaker 1: at least make it good. The gender based insult that

723
00:38:59,320 --> 00:39:01,799
Speaker 1: I would hear a lot of this take your tampon out,

724
00:39:01,800 --> 00:39:03,719
Speaker 1: and I was like, having a tampon it, this will

725
00:39:03,719 --> 00:39:05,319
Speaker 1: have an effect on your mood, Like, what are you

726
00:39:05,320 --> 00:39:07,279
Speaker 1: trying to say, if you've got an argument to make

727
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:10,480
Speaker 1: about me being on my period, make it succinctly. Just

728
00:39:10,560 --> 00:39:13,319
Speaker 1: wearing a tampon does not have any impact on how

729
00:39:13,360 --> 00:39:15,960
Speaker 1: I'm behaving. That doesn't even make sense. At least put

730
00:39:16,000 --> 00:39:17,799
Speaker 1: some thought into it. It's just insulting to both. It's

731
00:39:17,800 --> 00:39:19,719
Speaker 1: insulting to It should be insulting with the person who

732
00:39:19,800 --> 00:39:23,080
Speaker 1: was tweeting that you're better than that, you're gonna insult somebody,

733
00:39:23,160 --> 00:39:25,880
Speaker 1: put a little full thought into it. That should be

734
00:39:25,880 --> 00:39:29,560
Speaker 1: your response. Better than you're better than this, you can

735
00:39:29,640 --> 00:39:33,239
Speaker 1: do better. I used to collect my um any kind

736
00:39:33,239 --> 00:39:35,759
Speaker 1: of insults I received online, and I want to make

737
00:39:35,800 --> 00:39:39,399
Speaker 1: a modern art poster of them. But my favorite one

738
00:39:39,440 --> 00:39:42,000
Speaker 1: I ever got was I know the producer of this,

739
00:39:42,160 --> 00:39:44,319
Speaker 1: and she's a slut, because it's interesting to call out

740
00:39:44,320 --> 00:39:47,960
Speaker 1: the producer. The other one was her mouth looks like

741
00:39:48,000 --> 00:39:55,080
Speaker 1: it's made of crabs wasting the venarial disease or the

742
00:39:55,160 --> 00:39:59,640
Speaker 1: animal I don't know. I didn't If you're going to

743
00:39:59,719 --> 00:40:02,759
Speaker 1: insult somebody, those are important questions to ask. Yes, the

744
00:40:02,840 --> 00:40:05,319
Speaker 1: Tories and Culture editor at I G and Entertainment a

745
00:40:05,360 --> 00:40:08,000
Speaker 1: lot of tears. She has an interesting way of dealing

746
00:40:08,000 --> 00:40:11,400
Speaker 1: with perhaps some of these insults quote fairly randomly, I

747
00:40:11,440 --> 00:40:14,760
Speaker 1: get sent rape threats. Someone sent me a Facebook message

748
00:40:14,760 --> 00:40:16,440
Speaker 1: saying they would rate me if I ever saw me

749
00:40:16,480 --> 00:40:18,759
Speaker 1: in person. I checked his Facebook account and it was

750
00:40:18,760 --> 00:40:21,080
Speaker 1: a young boy. So I managed to find his mom

751
00:40:21,120 --> 00:40:23,560
Speaker 1: incredibly easily, and she made him hand write me a

752
00:40:23,600 --> 00:40:25,839
Speaker 1: letter of apology. So I doubt he will ever do

753
00:40:25,880 --> 00:40:29,239
Speaker 1: it again. Good on that mom. I love that. I

754
00:40:29,280 --> 00:40:31,080
Speaker 1: mean part of me wants to say, oh, it shouldn't

755
00:40:31,080 --> 00:40:33,920
Speaker 1: be up to this person's mom to to do this.

756
00:40:33,960 --> 00:40:37,080
Speaker 1: But if you're an adult, if you're young, good on

757
00:40:37,120 --> 00:40:39,960
Speaker 1: this mom for taking some initiative and saying no, you're

758
00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:41,560
Speaker 1: not going to treat somebody like that, You're gonna write

759
00:40:41,560 --> 00:40:44,600
Speaker 1: an apology letter. Also, making someone out a handwritten apology

760
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:47,880
Speaker 1: letter is is she's mom in real horror, She's a

761
00:40:47,880 --> 00:40:50,680
Speaker 1: mom in heart. Has a duma who has a pretty

762
00:40:50,719 --> 00:40:53,800
Speaker 1: sizeable YouTube gaming channel advises blocking your muting root comments,

763
00:40:53,840 --> 00:40:56,440
Speaker 1: So that's one way. Yeah. Something that I have found

764
00:40:56,560 --> 00:40:59,680
Speaker 1: is that if you're on Twitter, especially mute over block

765
00:40:59,760 --> 00:41:02,200
Speaker 1: if you can, because blocking is can sometimes be like

766
00:41:02,200 --> 00:41:04,240
Speaker 1: a badge of honor. Honestly, we should do an episode

767
00:41:04,239 --> 00:41:06,200
Speaker 1: on how to deal with online harassment in general. But

768
00:41:06,320 --> 00:41:08,719
Speaker 1: I have found that if I block someone, someone else

769
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 1: will tell me. Oh. They then tweeted a picture of

770
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:14,800
Speaker 1: the screen of you blocking them, and it sort of reverberates.

771
00:41:14,840 --> 00:41:16,799
Speaker 1: And so if you mute someone, they don't know that

772
00:41:16,800 --> 00:41:18,919
Speaker 1: you muted, but you don't get a notification that they're

773
00:41:18,960 --> 00:41:21,600
Speaker 1: mentioning you. So it's just them farting in the wind. Basically,

774
00:41:21,680 --> 00:41:23,759
Speaker 1: they can keep on talking. You won't see it, and

775
00:41:23,760 --> 00:41:25,880
Speaker 1: they don't get that badge of honor that oh, I

776
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:28,759
Speaker 1: ruffled her feather so much that she blocked me. Can

777
00:41:28,760 --> 00:41:31,560
Speaker 1: you believe this? You know? Um? So just a little

778
00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:36,960
Speaker 1: tip that I've learned Bridget's words of wisdom. Brianna Wu,

779
00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:39,680
Speaker 1: a game developer, hired an employed to deal with the

780
00:41:39,719 --> 00:41:42,280
Speaker 1: constant Internet trolling she gets. That's how much she gets.

781
00:41:42,320 --> 00:41:45,200
Speaker 1: After we posted a meme about gamer gators on Twitter,

782
00:41:45,480 --> 00:41:49,120
Speaker 1: they went after her company's financial aspects, impersonated her on

783
00:41:49,160 --> 00:41:51,440
Speaker 1: Twitter and launched a campaign to destroy her career by

784
00:41:51,480 --> 00:41:55,200
Speaker 1: sending emails to journalists from burner accounts. One of the

785
00:41:55,239 --> 00:41:57,920
Speaker 1: scariest messages she received was from someone claiming to know

786
00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:00,520
Speaker 1: where she and her husband lived, and the message described

787
00:42:00,520 --> 00:42:03,399
Speaker 1: in horrific graphic detail how he was going to kill

788
00:42:03,440 --> 00:42:06,800
Speaker 1: them that night, who wrote in an article They've taken

789
00:42:06,840 --> 00:42:09,120
Speaker 1: down women I care about, one by one. Now the

790
00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:11,839
Speaker 1: vicious mob of game or Gate movement is coming after me.

791
00:42:12,160 --> 00:42:14,080
Speaker 1: They've threatened to rape me. They threatened to make me

792
00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:17,800
Speaker 1: choke to death on my husband's severed genitals. They've threatened

793
00:42:17,800 --> 00:42:21,560
Speaker 1: to murder any children I might have. In interview with NPR,

794
00:42:21,680 --> 00:42:23,680
Speaker 1: she said that as far as she can tell, the

795
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:26,400
Speaker 1: video game industry has not had its me to moment

796
00:42:26,480 --> 00:42:29,640
Speaker 1: and that it really needs to quote, look at the hiring,

797
00:42:29,680 --> 00:42:31,440
Speaker 1: look at the culture, look at who makes up the

798
00:42:31,440 --> 00:42:33,920
Speaker 1: food chain, because we've really created a culture of silence

799
00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:35,960
Speaker 1: in my field that is very similar to why Harvey

800
00:42:36,000 --> 00:42:40,120
Speaker 1: Weinstein was able to go for so long unchecked. I

801
00:42:40,160 --> 00:42:42,680
Speaker 1: can completely believe that that is the case, and I

802
00:42:42,680 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: think it probably is one of those things. I mean,

803
00:42:44,760 --> 00:42:47,239
Speaker 1: it took so long for me to to trickle down

804
00:42:47,280 --> 00:42:50,399
Speaker 1: to industries like animation, and I think it's because they

805
00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:55,160
Speaker 1: are heavily male dominated, and because it's like a nerd

806
00:42:55,200 --> 00:42:58,440
Speaker 1: culture kind of thing. It is seen as if you

807
00:42:58,560 --> 00:43:01,440
Speaker 1: speak up about abuse, about terrible treatment, about that kind

808
00:43:01,440 --> 00:43:03,719
Speaker 1: of thing, you're not a cool You're not a cool

809
00:43:03,800 --> 00:43:06,040
Speaker 1: nerd anymore. You know, we had this free wheel in

810
00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:09,440
Speaker 1: thing if anything goes and a lot of really toxic

811
00:43:09,440 --> 00:43:14,720
Speaker 1: stuff confester and cultures like that. Yeah. Absolutely. In Washington

812
00:43:14,800 --> 00:43:19,560
Speaker 1: Post article, we did give some specific recommendations targeting Gamergate mostly,

813
00:43:19,600 --> 00:43:22,040
Speaker 1: but so major gaming institutions need to come out against

814
00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:24,919
Speaker 1: Gammergate and harassment in general. Hiring in the industry needs

815
00:43:24,920 --> 00:43:27,759
Speaker 1: to be looked at and examined at all levels. And

816
00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:30,960
Speaker 1: game journalism needs more women too. And as I know,

817
00:43:31,160 --> 00:43:33,640
Speaker 1: she's running for Congress in Boston are she was as

818
00:43:33,680 --> 00:43:38,719
Speaker 1: of recording this episode. Another woman who has spoken up

819
00:43:38,760 --> 00:43:41,719
Speaker 1: about this is Lena van de Venter, who, along with

820
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:45,040
Speaker 1: Dan Golding, co authored a book called Game Changers. From

821
00:43:45,040 --> 00:43:47,800
Speaker 1: Minecraft to Misogyny, The Fight for the Future of Video Games.

822
00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:50,520
Speaker 1: And here's just one of her encounters with sexual harassment

823
00:43:50,560 --> 00:43:53,120
Speaker 1: and online gaming. I could hear him masturbating on the

824
00:43:53,160 --> 00:43:56,440
Speaker 1: voice chat while playing. He would ask breathy, labored questions.

825
00:43:56,520 --> 00:43:59,400
Speaker 1: Other teammates found it hilarious. I wish I could focus

826
00:43:59,400 --> 00:44:00,960
Speaker 1: on my objective in the game, but I knew I

827
00:44:01,000 --> 00:44:03,680
Speaker 1: had to leave this server. My mouth was hovering over

828
00:44:03,680 --> 00:44:06,000
Speaker 1: the exit button when I heard him Climax moaning my

829
00:44:06,120 --> 00:44:10,200
Speaker 1: user name into his microphone. I mean, who thinks you

830
00:44:10,200 --> 00:44:12,759
Speaker 1: can play a game in those like conditions? But that's

831
00:44:12,800 --> 00:44:17,799
Speaker 1: what you were saying before. It's what pisces me off

832
00:44:17,840 --> 00:44:21,520
Speaker 1: about this. There's so much wrong with it, but it's

833
00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:26,000
Speaker 1: this idea that women who game have this unfair extra burden,

834
00:44:26,200 --> 00:44:29,439
Speaker 1: like male gamers are not dealing with someone moaning their

835
00:44:29,520 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 1: their user name into the god microphone that's are trying

836
00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:35,440
Speaker 1: to play, and so as bad as that is, these

837
00:44:35,600 --> 00:44:39,560
Speaker 1: male gamers still think that women somehow are not real gamers. Basically,

838
00:44:39,560 --> 00:44:42,520
Speaker 1: it's like that old quote, you know, that Ginger Rogers

839
00:44:42,560 --> 00:44:44,960
Speaker 1: quote that I do everything that Fred Astair does, I

840
00:44:45,000 --> 00:44:46,920
Speaker 1: do it backward at and heels. I guess what pisses

841
00:44:46,920 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 1: me off the most is that men then still acts

842
00:44:50,040 --> 00:44:52,520
Speaker 1: like women aren't real gamers, aren't good enough, blah blah blah,

843
00:44:52,680 --> 00:44:55,200
Speaker 1: when in fact they are having to do the same

844
00:44:55,320 --> 00:44:58,040
Speaker 1: challenges in these games that men are doing, but doing

845
00:44:58,040 --> 00:45:01,560
Speaker 1: it while somebody is breathing of God's name into a microphone.

846
00:45:01,560 --> 00:45:04,360
Speaker 1: Will they masturbate? Could they do that? No? They couldn't.

847
00:45:04,560 --> 00:45:06,960
Speaker 1: That's distracting and awful. We shouldn't have to put up

848
00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:08,800
Speaker 1: with it, but we are, And I guess it pisces

849
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:11,080
Speaker 1: me off that despite the fact that women are gaming,

850
00:45:11,400 --> 00:45:14,759
Speaker 1: playing the same games as men and doing so with

851
00:45:14,960 --> 00:45:17,960
Speaker 1: such an unfair burden, that they're still seeing as not

852
00:45:18,040 --> 00:45:20,320
Speaker 1: build gamers, when in fact they're putting up with more

853
00:45:20,440 --> 00:45:23,480
Speaker 1: than the men are. Yeah, and just like I remember

854
00:45:23,480 --> 00:45:25,520
Speaker 1: back when I still online games, and I would just

855
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:29,759
Speaker 1: be filled with trepidation every time I ventured in. It

856
00:45:29,840 --> 00:45:31,480
Speaker 1: was supposed to be a fun thing, but instead I

857
00:45:31,520 --> 00:45:33,759
Speaker 1: had like this nervousness about doing it because you didn't

858
00:45:33,800 --> 00:45:36,200
Speaker 1: know who you're going to encounter in there. And that

859
00:45:36,280 --> 00:45:38,680
Speaker 1: really sucks. It shouldn't be that way. There is a

860
00:45:38,719 --> 00:45:41,520
Speaker 1: whole movie about sexual harassment in gaming two called g

861
00:45:41,680 --> 00:45:45,280
Speaker 1: t f O, which creator Shannon's son Higginson, was inspired

862
00:45:45,320 --> 00:45:48,680
Speaker 1: to make after she saw a Capcom sponsored game stream

863
00:45:48,680 --> 00:45:52,560
Speaker 1: where the female gamer was harassed for thirteen minutes and

864
00:45:52,600 --> 00:45:55,920
Speaker 1: she did not return for the final round and the

865
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:58,160
Speaker 1: guy doing their harassing, and that video is quoted saying

866
00:45:58,320 --> 00:46:01,120
Speaker 1: the sexual harassment is part of the culture, and if

867
00:46:01,160 --> 00:46:03,279
Speaker 1: you remove that from the fighting game community, it's not

868
00:46:03,320 --> 00:46:08,279
Speaker 1: the fighting game community. Oh it's awful. I watched it

869
00:46:09,200 --> 00:46:11,600
Speaker 1: and it's gross. It was weird and gross, and it

870
00:46:12,040 --> 00:46:13,640
Speaker 1: just kept going on and on. And they were on

871
00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:17,560
Speaker 1: the same team too, but this is her teammate that

872
00:46:17,560 --> 00:46:20,759
Speaker 1: that's absurd. Okay, So when people say, how dare you

873
00:46:20,800 --> 00:46:24,040
Speaker 1: critique video games? I would posit that guys like this

874
00:46:24,080 --> 00:46:26,040
Speaker 1: who say, oh, if you don't like this, then this

875
00:46:26,080 --> 00:46:27,880
Speaker 1: is what the community is in a big homewark of

876
00:46:27,920 --> 00:46:30,120
Speaker 1: the community. I would argue that that guy doesn't like

877
00:46:30,200 --> 00:46:32,200
Speaker 1: gaming is in a real gamer. I would argue the

878
00:46:32,239 --> 00:46:34,400
Speaker 1: people who are saying, hey, that's not okay, don't do

879
00:46:34,440 --> 00:46:37,279
Speaker 1: this be better than this kind of sleazy people who

880
00:46:37,320 --> 00:46:39,239
Speaker 1: does it to their own teammate. I would say that

881
00:46:39,239 --> 00:46:40,920
Speaker 1: the people who are calling that out, they are the

882
00:46:40,920 --> 00:46:43,480
Speaker 1: ones who are true gamers who actually care about the industry.

883
00:46:43,600 --> 00:46:46,080
Speaker 1: People who are saying this is just how it is.

884
00:46:46,280 --> 00:46:48,960
Speaker 1: It's sleazy and it's bad, and that's how it is,

885
00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:50,920
Speaker 1: I would argue that that guy doesn't give it that

886
00:46:51,000 --> 00:46:53,440
Speaker 1: gaming it is not a real gamer. I mean, if

887
00:46:53,440 --> 00:46:57,400
Speaker 1: you were in any other industry and you tolerated and

888
00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:01,319
Speaker 1: accepted that kind of bad behavior you're you wouldn't be like, oh,

889
00:47:01,360 --> 00:47:03,319
Speaker 1: that's a titan of the industry who really cares about

890
00:47:03,360 --> 00:47:05,279
Speaker 1: the craft. If you were a surgeon and you just said,

891
00:47:05,680 --> 00:47:08,480
Speaker 1: I smoke cigars while I do surgery, that's just the

892
00:47:08,520 --> 00:47:11,279
Speaker 1: way it is. If you don't like it, yeah, if

893
00:47:11,280 --> 00:47:12,839
Speaker 1: you don't like it, that means you don't you don't

894
00:47:12,840 --> 00:47:15,000
Speaker 1: really love surgery. You would say that guy doesn't care

895
00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:17,600
Speaker 1: about surgery, doesn't care about the craft. How did we

896
00:47:17,640 --> 00:47:21,719
Speaker 1: elevate the people who vocally don't give a about whether

897
00:47:21,800 --> 00:47:23,640
Speaker 1: or not gaming is a good community. How did we

898
00:47:23,680 --> 00:47:25,719
Speaker 1: elevate them to be the spokespeople in the community that

899
00:47:25,760 --> 00:47:28,239
Speaker 1: they're the real gamers? How did we allow that? That

900
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:32,040
Speaker 1: is a great question. I also want to mention he

901
00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:36,120
Speaker 1: this guy, he pointed to his First Amendment rights when

902
00:47:36,160 --> 00:47:39,600
Speaker 1: people give me a break, of course he did. Journalist

903
00:47:39,640 --> 00:47:43,520
Speaker 1: Ali Fog had this counterpoint. What you fail to understand

904
00:47:43,560 --> 00:47:45,920
Speaker 1: is that the use of hate speech threats ambling to

905
00:47:46,040 --> 00:47:48,880
Speaker 1: terrify and intimidate people into silence, are away from certain

906
00:47:48,920 --> 00:47:51,160
Speaker 1: topics is a far bigger threat to free speech than

907
00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:54,239
Speaker 1: any lingal section. Imagine this is not the Internet but

908
00:47:54,280 --> 00:47:56,880
Speaker 1: a public square. One woman stands on the soapbox and

909
00:47:56,920 --> 00:47:59,759
Speaker 1: expresses an idea. She is instantly surrounded by an army

910
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:02,200
Speaker 1: of five thousand angry people yelling the worst kind of

911
00:48:02,200 --> 00:48:04,520
Speaker 1: abuse at her in the attempt to shut her up. Yes,

912
00:48:04,560 --> 00:48:06,960
Speaker 1: there's a free speech issue here, but it's not the

913
00:48:06,960 --> 00:48:09,520
Speaker 1: one you think. I love that. Yeah, I also think

914
00:48:09,560 --> 00:48:14,200
Speaker 1: that people misunderstand free speech. If there was one argument,

915
00:48:14,239 --> 00:48:17,440
Speaker 1: I wish that people would be a bit more thoughtful

916
00:48:17,440 --> 00:48:20,920
Speaker 1: about when they hurl. Yeah, it would be free speech. Yeah.

917
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:25,280
Speaker 1: A study reported on by wire In called Insights into Sexism,

918
00:48:25,320 --> 00:48:29,880
Speaker 1: Male Status and Performance Moderates Female directed, Hostile and Amicable Behavior.

919
00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:33,200
Speaker 1: That's quite a title, found that harassment towards women from

920
00:48:33,280 --> 00:48:36,839
Speaker 1: men goes up when men are losing. And I can

921
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:41,400
Speaker 1: a test to that. Sure. I won this tournament once

922
00:48:41,920 --> 00:48:44,879
Speaker 1: and the experience was so terrible. I have not competed since.

923
00:48:45,360 --> 00:48:48,719
Speaker 1: I felt like I lost. Man, I felt like I

924
00:48:48,760 --> 00:48:51,839
Speaker 1: have lost in so many ways. That's that's my point.

925
00:48:51,960 --> 00:48:53,719
Speaker 1: I mean, this is this is gonna sound dumb, but

926
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:55,719
Speaker 1: there's probably a woman out there, a woman or a

927
00:48:55,760 --> 00:48:58,000
Speaker 1: girl out there, who was gaming who had an experience

928
00:48:58,040 --> 00:48:59,480
Speaker 1: like the one that you just described, where it was

929
00:48:59,520 --> 00:49:02,520
Speaker 1: so bad at you thought, never again, that person could

930
00:49:02,560 --> 00:49:05,120
Speaker 1: have been a professional gamer. You don't know all of

931
00:49:05,120 --> 00:49:07,400
Speaker 1: the think of all of the talent, the promising talent

932
00:49:07,480 --> 00:49:10,560
Speaker 1: that we could be losing out on because we are

933
00:49:10,840 --> 00:49:14,359
Speaker 1: allowing them to be bullied and harassed out of gaming. Yeah.

934
00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:16,800
Speaker 1: And I mean even this like as dumb as it

935
00:49:16,800 --> 00:49:18,920
Speaker 1: it was. There was prize money involved. There was like

936
00:49:18,920 --> 00:49:22,120
Speaker 1: five prize so we needed women should be able to

937
00:49:22,160 --> 00:49:27,200
Speaker 1: get be for that money too. Oh man, here's another

938
00:49:27,320 --> 00:49:30,719
Speaker 1: quote from the study. Female initiated disruption of a male

939
00:49:30,880 --> 00:49:34,880
Speaker 1: hierarchy insights hostile behavior from poor performing males who stand

940
00:49:34,880 --> 00:49:38,120
Speaker 1: to lose the most status. These results suggest that it

941
00:49:38,239 --> 00:49:41,560
Speaker 1: is lower skilled, poor performing males that are significantly more

942
00:49:41,600 --> 00:49:45,600
Speaker 1: hostile towards females, and higher skilled focal players are more supportive.

943
00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:50,640
Speaker 1: So women threatened the hierarchy and dudes don't like it.

944
00:49:50,800 --> 00:49:53,080
Speaker 1: And if they don't threaten it, then the men are like, okay,

945
00:49:53,120 --> 00:49:56,200
Speaker 1: you're allowed to dig in here. Wow, I also love

946
00:49:56,520 --> 00:50:03,560
Speaker 1: poor performing male just as study race. Yeah. Um, the

947
00:50:03,600 --> 00:50:06,400
Speaker 1: researchers did not that this dynamic changes based on games,

948
00:50:06,400 --> 00:50:10,040
Speaker 1: So again, please we're painting with broad rushes, but there

949
00:50:10,040 --> 00:50:13,040
Speaker 1: are differences. There's certainly pockets that are not like this,

950
00:50:14,200 --> 00:50:16,400
Speaker 1: And a lot of accounts from female gamers lamented that

951
00:50:16,440 --> 00:50:18,800
Speaker 1: as a woman you're expected to be twice as good,

952
00:50:18,880 --> 00:50:20,560
Speaker 1: and if you wont it was seen as due to

953
00:50:20,680 --> 00:50:24,520
Speaker 1: someone else's failure or success. But if you lost, that

954
00:50:24,600 --> 00:50:26,520
Speaker 1: was because you're a silly woman and didn't know what

955
00:50:26,560 --> 00:50:29,480
Speaker 1: you're doing. Of course you are, That's what other reason

956
00:50:29,600 --> 00:50:31,560
Speaker 1: could it be. Yeah, when I won that tournament, it

957
00:50:31,600 --> 00:50:35,160
Speaker 1: was definitely like, oh my controller that she cheated. She

958
00:50:35,480 --> 00:50:38,719
Speaker 1: I don't know something wrong here. This couldn't happen and

959
00:50:38,880 --> 00:50:43,440
Speaker 1: not be something have Yeah, like some wild explanation. It

960
00:50:43,480 --> 00:50:45,319
Speaker 1: couldn't just be that you were better than them, you

961
00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:47,840
Speaker 1: were that good. It has to have been Oh my

962
00:50:48,080 --> 00:50:50,520
Speaker 1: house got struck by lightning and the server blinked and

963
00:50:50,560 --> 00:50:53,400
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. You know. Yeah, Well this was an

964
00:50:53,400 --> 00:50:55,399
Speaker 1: interesting case because we were all playing in the same room,

965
00:50:55,480 --> 00:50:57,560
Speaker 1: but somebody said he could hear a fire alarm and

966
00:50:57,600 --> 00:51:00,000
Speaker 1: it was distracting him, and I'm like, we're all here,

967
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,959
Speaker 1: anyone else, We're all here. It sounds like another piece

968
00:51:03,960 --> 00:51:08,840
Speaker 1: of reasoning from a poor performing male bird past burn.

969
00:51:09,000 --> 00:51:12,440
Speaker 1: Wherever you are not listening to this, I hope he's listening.

970
00:51:12,840 --> 00:51:16,520
Speaker 1: Oh God, maybe maybe he's changed. He was kind of

971
00:51:16,520 --> 00:51:19,520
Speaker 1: a decent fellow outside of that, so moderately performing now

972
00:51:19,640 --> 00:51:23,080
Speaker 1: moderately performing male. We can only hope regin. So we

973
00:51:23,160 --> 00:51:25,520
Speaker 1: have a little bit more to talk about, but we're

974
00:51:25,520 --> 00:51:27,399
Speaker 1: going to pause for one more quick break for word

975
00:51:27,400 --> 00:51:41,560
Speaker 1: from our sponsor, and we're back, Thank you sponsor. So

976
00:51:41,800 --> 00:51:45,720
Speaker 1: life Wire has an article called Xbox Live Survival Guide

977
00:51:45,719 --> 00:51:49,279
Speaker 1: for Female Gamers and it starts out with this tip.

978
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:52,480
Speaker 1: First off, guys, when there is a gal in the room,

979
00:51:52,520 --> 00:51:54,759
Speaker 1: just leave her alone. You don't need to ask her

980
00:51:54,800 --> 00:51:56,520
Speaker 1: and ask her what she looks like and to send

981
00:51:56,520 --> 00:51:59,200
Speaker 1: her weird pictures you can, and we will be banned

982
00:51:59,200 --> 00:52:01,600
Speaker 1: from Xbox Live if you harass people too much, So

983
00:52:01,719 --> 00:52:03,759
Speaker 1: just knock it off. Just because you can hide behind

984
00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:06,600
Speaker 1: the veil of anonymity doesn't mean you have the right

985
00:52:06,640 --> 00:52:09,920
Speaker 1: to ruin the game for other people. But then it continues.

986
00:52:10,239 --> 00:52:12,640
Speaker 1: Since most guys probably won't bother you to pay attention

987
00:52:12,640 --> 00:52:14,840
Speaker 1: to that paragraph, you ladies are going to have to

988
00:52:14,840 --> 00:52:17,239
Speaker 1: take charge of how you are treated online. In The

989
00:52:17,320 --> 00:52:19,640
Speaker 1: article continues with tips like play with friends, use the

990
00:52:19,640 --> 00:52:22,839
Speaker 1: player review feature, and not calling attention to yourself things

991
00:52:22,880 --> 00:52:24,560
Speaker 1: we shouldn't have to do. This reminds me of the

992
00:52:24,640 --> 00:52:30,719
Speaker 1: running thing again, Like, yeah, it's just something. Ah, it's

993
00:52:30,800 --> 00:52:34,759
Speaker 1: ridiculous that there's even a playbook for this, like how

994
00:52:34,840 --> 00:52:37,319
Speaker 1: to play as a woman versus how to play as

995
00:52:37,320 --> 00:52:40,320
Speaker 1: a man, but there is. Xbox Lives actual code of

996
00:52:40,360 --> 00:52:44,000
Speaker 1: Conduct does not mention sexism, but players are told not

997
00:52:44,080 --> 00:52:49,200
Speaker 1: to harass any players as always more accurate gender portrayals

998
00:52:49,320 --> 00:52:51,880
Speaker 1: I eat not sex objects made for the male gaze,

999
00:52:52,360 --> 00:52:54,200
Speaker 1: which it is totally cool to have a sexy lady,

1000
00:52:54,239 --> 00:52:56,960
Speaker 1: but she needs to be a character and not an object.

1001
00:52:57,520 --> 00:52:59,359
Speaker 1: And more women in the industry is a good place

1002
00:52:59,400 --> 00:53:02,799
Speaker 1: to start if we want to change this culture, and

1003
00:53:02,840 --> 00:53:05,560
Speaker 1: I think we do. I think we do, think we do.

1004
00:53:06,440 --> 00:53:09,239
Speaker 1: Um calling out harassers in the gaming community, both by

1005
00:53:09,239 --> 00:53:12,759
Speaker 1: creators and players is another step. So basically having a

1006
00:53:12,760 --> 00:53:15,480
Speaker 1: bit of a me to effect in gaming. Yes, I

1007
00:53:15,520 --> 00:53:18,120
Speaker 1: have this theory that there are certain industries that so

1008
00:53:18,160 --> 00:53:21,480
Speaker 1: far me too has been slow or not happen, but

1009
00:53:21,560 --> 00:53:23,400
Speaker 1: once they do, it's going to be a domino where

1010
00:53:23,719 --> 00:53:25,719
Speaker 1: it turns out it's just creeps and turtles the whole

1011
00:53:25,719 --> 00:53:28,759
Speaker 1: way down, Like who knew. I feel like video games,

1012
00:53:28,840 --> 00:53:33,120
Speaker 1: once there's a you know, a real high profile professional

1013
00:53:33,160 --> 00:53:34,600
Speaker 1: in the industry, I think it's going to be a

1014
00:53:34,680 --> 00:53:39,800
Speaker 1: real yeah, situation, I do too. I do think the

1015
00:53:39,880 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 1: sex objects saying sex objects do not warrant respect, and

1016
00:53:43,040 --> 00:53:45,720
Speaker 1: if this is a media is shaping the perception of players,

1017
00:53:45,800 --> 00:53:50,200
Speaker 1: is particularly young players, and all they see our representations

1018
00:53:50,200 --> 00:53:53,560
Speaker 1: of women as sex objects. In their eyes, women don't

1019
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:57,239
Speaker 1: deserve respects. Absolutely. Yeah, I think about the messages that

1020
00:53:57,280 --> 00:54:00,680
Speaker 1: you're passing down a younger generation with when that's the Yeah.

1021
00:54:00,880 --> 00:54:03,120
Speaker 1: Something I found really interesting was this idea that you

1022
00:54:03,120 --> 00:54:06,200
Speaker 1: could propose a tech solution to this issue, and that

1023
00:54:06,239 --> 00:54:09,840
Speaker 1: really revolves around creating a social stigma in these games

1024
00:54:09,880 --> 00:54:12,920
Speaker 1: around harassment. So one solution revolves auto muting. And so

1025
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:15,160
Speaker 1: if someone is muted ten percent more than average in

1026
00:54:15,160 --> 00:54:17,799
Speaker 1: a game, that person is automatically muted, and so you

1027
00:54:17,840 --> 00:54:20,400
Speaker 1: wanted to you could un mute them, but hopefully that

1028
00:54:20,400 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 1: would really drive home the point that hey, nobody wants

1029
00:54:23,040 --> 00:54:25,959
Speaker 1: to hear your harassment, nobody wants your sexism, and really

1030
00:54:25,960 --> 00:54:27,959
Speaker 1: sort of doing what I think is the more kind

1031
00:54:27,960 --> 00:54:32,680
Speaker 1: of difficult, challenging cultural work of creating an environment where

1032
00:54:32,719 --> 00:54:35,440
Speaker 1: there is stigma and shame attached to being a harasser.

1033
00:54:35,800 --> 00:54:38,879
Speaker 1: I think that steps like those are difficult because it's

1034
00:54:38,880 --> 00:54:42,200
Speaker 1: difficult to shape culture. It's difficult to shift culture, but

1035
00:54:42,480 --> 00:54:46,919
Speaker 1: I think that where we can normalize the attitude that

1036
00:54:47,120 --> 00:54:49,319
Speaker 1: this isn't cool and that you're not going to be

1037
00:54:49,320 --> 00:54:51,840
Speaker 1: seen as this like bad boy, edgy rebel, if you

1038
00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:53,200
Speaker 1: do this, you're gonna be seen as a loser and

1039
00:54:53,200 --> 00:54:54,839
Speaker 1: nobody's gonna want to hang out with you on the game.

1040
00:54:55,239 --> 00:54:57,839
Speaker 1: I think that that's really really important. Yeah, and I

1041
00:54:57,880 --> 00:55:02,040
Speaker 1: think video game researcher at University of Melbourne Robbie Fordyce

1042
00:55:02,239 --> 00:55:05,080
Speaker 1: would agree with you. Is when he was talking about

1043
00:55:05,160 --> 00:55:07,720
Speaker 1: online harassment in an interview I was reading, he said

1044
00:55:07,760 --> 00:55:11,520
Speaker 1: that it is indicative of something much bigger quote in

1045
00:55:11,600 --> 00:55:13,760
Speaker 1: terms of solving the problem. I don't know that games

1046
00:55:13,760 --> 00:55:16,200
Speaker 1: can do it. I wish it was possible, but gaming

1047
00:55:16,200 --> 00:55:18,839
Speaker 1: it is simply a hyper and intensified expression of a

1048
00:55:18,840 --> 00:55:22,840
Speaker 1: more general problem with toxic masculinity. So it is a

1049
00:55:22,840 --> 00:55:26,279
Speaker 1: big culture shift in conversation that we're going to have

1050
00:55:26,280 --> 00:55:28,840
Speaker 1: to continue to have and we're going to have to

1051
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:32,480
Speaker 1: keep pushing for a better, better world in gaming, but

1052
00:55:32,560 --> 00:55:34,919
Speaker 1: in general as well, because it is sort of all

1053
00:55:35,160 --> 00:55:39,640
Speaker 1: tied together. And wanted to leave on this uplifting call

1054
00:55:39,719 --> 00:55:43,560
Speaker 1: to action written over at Bustle, by Suzanne Salmon. Video

1055
00:55:43,640 --> 00:55:46,000
Speaker 1: games are for everyone, There for me, there for you,

1056
00:55:46,200 --> 00:55:48,440
Speaker 1: There for our little sisters and our daughters, to create,

1057
00:55:48,480 --> 00:55:51,480
Speaker 1: to play, and to critique. We cannot allow cruel, statistic

1058
00:55:51,520 --> 00:55:53,839
Speaker 1: people to take our joy away from us. We need

1059
00:55:53,880 --> 00:55:56,160
Speaker 1: to stand up to gamer Gate and keep being ourselves.

1060
00:55:56,200 --> 00:55:58,560
Speaker 1: But it starts with you and me. It starts with

1061
00:55:58,640 --> 00:56:01,640
Speaker 1: us refusing to shut up. There we go, and I

1062
00:56:01,680 --> 00:56:04,279
Speaker 1: want to end on an angry note, which is, hey,

1063
00:56:04,320 --> 00:56:08,480
Speaker 1: poor performing males, stop it just stop. Nobody wants to

1064
00:56:08,480 --> 00:56:11,200
Speaker 1: hear it, Nobody wants to see your dick. Stop it

1065
00:56:11,560 --> 00:56:16,560
Speaker 1: just stop. Everyone love everyone. I love that. I feel

1066
00:56:16,560 --> 00:56:19,440
Speaker 1: like we've given you a new phrase, the catchphrase. I'm

1067
00:56:19,480 --> 00:56:22,120
Speaker 1: already planning how I'm going to use poor performing males

1068
00:56:22,960 --> 00:56:25,640
Speaker 1: in my daily life, Like it looks like another poor

1069
00:56:25,680 --> 00:56:28,360
Speaker 1: performing male. Actually that should be a thing for the show,

1070
00:56:28,520 --> 00:56:32,760
Speaker 1: like hashtag poor performing mail. The author of the study

1071
00:56:32,840 --> 00:56:35,920
Speaker 1: is gonna think what did I create with this? If

1072
00:56:36,000 --> 00:56:38,399
Speaker 1: you see someone ha asking someone on Twitter, you can

1073
00:56:38,440 --> 00:56:42,040
Speaker 1: just say it looks like another hashtag poor performing mail.

1074
00:56:42,719 --> 00:56:45,840
Speaker 1: I really want to start this and I love it.

1075
00:56:45,960 --> 00:56:48,000
Speaker 1: It's of course, it's like very on brand for us

1076
00:56:48,080 --> 00:56:54,800
Speaker 1: that it's inspired by a gutcademic study perfect perfectly lines

1077
00:56:54,880 --> 00:56:57,799
Speaker 1: up with with everything we believe in over here. I'm

1078
00:56:57,840 --> 00:57:00,359
Speaker 1: going to try to find that guy that other poor

1079
00:57:00,400 --> 00:57:03,799
Speaker 1: performing mail. You should send him this episode. That'd be

1080
00:57:03,840 --> 00:57:06,359
Speaker 1: a good diss. Send him an email that just says

1081
00:57:06,760 --> 00:57:08,880
Speaker 1: I thought you'd like this, and then the link to

1082
00:57:08,880 --> 00:57:13,760
Speaker 1: the episode. But no other contacts. Oh man, that's good.

1083
00:57:13,280 --> 00:57:17,360
Speaker 1: That's a that's a nice like I am. I hold grudges.

1084
00:57:17,560 --> 00:57:20,720
Speaker 1: That's a nice like long come. We thought I forgot

1085
00:57:20,720 --> 00:57:22,680
Speaker 1: about this? Why I didn't? I did it? But I

1086
00:57:22,680 --> 00:57:26,640
Speaker 1: thought on national podcast mother, note to self, do not this,

1087
00:57:26,760 --> 00:57:29,960
Speaker 1: purge it off. Stay on our good side everyone. You

1088
00:57:30,040 --> 00:57:34,400
Speaker 1: know you're not wrong. Okay. So that brings us to

1089
00:57:34,400 --> 00:57:36,680
Speaker 1: the end of our our video game episode. Something tells

1090
00:57:36,720 --> 00:57:39,760
Speaker 1: me we will be returning to address other aspects of this,

1091
00:57:39,760 --> 00:57:42,240
Speaker 1: because there's a lot to talk about. But in the meantime,

1092
00:57:42,240 --> 00:57:47,560
Speaker 1: we're gonna read some listener mail. Sarah wrote, I wanted

1093
00:57:47,600 --> 00:57:49,919
Speaker 1: to recommend some books that may or may not count

1094
00:57:49,960 --> 00:57:52,800
Speaker 1: as published fan pick. The first is The Bloody Chamber

1095
00:57:52,800 --> 00:57:55,800
Speaker 1: by Angela Carter. It is a feminist reimagining of classic

1096
00:57:55,880 --> 00:57:59,480
Speaker 1: fairy tales that brings the latent sexual and violent undertones out,

1097
00:57:59,560 --> 00:58:02,280
Speaker 1: but it ever feels gratuitous. The other is my absolute

1098
00:58:02,320 --> 00:58:05,560
Speaker 1: favorite book, The Penelope ad by Margaret Atwood. This is

1099
00:58:05,600 --> 00:58:09,360
Speaker 1: centered around Penelope, Odysseus's wife from the Odyssey, and it's

1100
00:58:09,400 --> 00:58:11,960
Speaker 1: her side of the story. Another really great one is

1101
00:58:12,000 --> 00:58:14,880
Speaker 1: Grendel by John Gardner, and finally last one is Helen

1102
00:58:14,920 --> 00:58:18,000
Speaker 1: of Troy by Margaret George. This is the Trojan War

1103
00:58:18,120 --> 00:58:20,680
Speaker 1: from the point of view from the woman who quote

1104
00:58:20,800 --> 00:58:23,160
Speaker 1: started it, you know, because it had nothing to do

1105
00:58:23,280 --> 00:58:26,320
Speaker 1: with Agamemnon being an aggro asshole or the idea that

1106
00:58:26,640 --> 00:58:30,080
Speaker 1: Menelis was entitled to hell and like, dude, I get it,

1107
00:58:30,160 --> 00:58:32,400
Speaker 1: your wife left you. That sucks. Get the hell over

1108
00:58:32,440 --> 00:58:34,520
Speaker 1: it anyway, apologize for their aunt. I have so many

1109
00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:37,920
Speaker 1: feelings about toxic masculiney and misogyny and greekness. I hope

1110
00:58:37,960 --> 00:58:40,040
Speaker 1: you'll check out these books, and thanks so much for

1111
00:58:40,080 --> 00:58:43,360
Speaker 1: the great show. Well, thank you. I love book recommendations too,

1112
00:58:43,640 --> 00:58:49,160
Speaker 1: so very excited to check those out. Next letter, Sophia wrote, firstly,

1113
00:58:49,400 --> 00:58:51,760
Speaker 1: I want to say thank you for creating my favorite podcast,

1114
00:58:51,840 --> 00:58:53,680
Speaker 1: and I especially want to thank you for defining a

1115
00:58:53,720 --> 00:58:56,600
Speaker 1: concept that has really helped me see myself and other people,

1116
00:58:56,640 --> 00:58:59,200
Speaker 1: and a more forgiving light the problematic Dave. I tend

1117
00:58:59,280 --> 00:59:01,440
Speaker 1: to hold myself in very high regard, and I let

1118
00:59:01,440 --> 00:59:04,800
Speaker 1: my insecurities project onto people, being overly critical of them

1119
00:59:04,800 --> 00:59:06,840
Speaker 1: as a way to make me feel better about myself.

1120
00:59:06,880 --> 00:59:08,840
Speaker 1: That sounds very familiar to me because I do the

1121
00:59:08,880 --> 00:59:11,919
Speaker 1: same thing. The notion of a problematic faith has helped

1122
00:59:11,960 --> 00:59:14,320
Speaker 1: me realize that nobody's perfect, at least of all myself.

1123
00:59:14,560 --> 00:59:17,360
Speaker 1: In a way on my own problematic faith, I've caught

1124
00:59:17,400 --> 00:59:21,160
Speaker 1: myself saying incredibly classist and ablest things with no malicious intent.

1125
00:59:21,400 --> 00:59:23,560
Speaker 1: But I'm glad to have exceptionally woke friends that have

1126
00:59:23,600 --> 00:59:25,600
Speaker 1: called me in on it, and I am constantly trying

1127
00:59:25,600 --> 00:59:27,760
Speaker 1: to be more aware. Thanks to the problematic faith, I

1128
00:59:27,800 --> 00:59:30,520
Speaker 1: also see how the people around me are problematic and imperfect,

1129
00:59:30,760 --> 00:59:32,919
Speaker 1: but knowing this is okay and that they are still

1130
00:59:32,920 --> 00:59:34,920
Speaker 1: a good person has been a great eye opener to

1131
00:59:35,120 --> 00:59:37,320
Speaker 1: a person like me who likes to see the world

1132
00:59:37,320 --> 00:59:39,800
Speaker 1: in black and white. Having a term for the problematic

1133
00:59:39,840 --> 00:59:41,960
Speaker 1: faith really hits the nail on the head in my opinion,

1134
00:59:42,000 --> 00:59:44,240
Speaker 1: and as a daily reminder of all of our imperfection

1135
00:59:44,320 --> 00:59:48,240
Speaker 1: and humanity. Sophia, I love this I can completely relate

1136
00:59:48,280 --> 00:59:50,880
Speaker 1: to it. I have to say we did not coin

1137
00:59:50,920 --> 00:59:54,040
Speaker 1: the phrase problematic faith. I wish I did, but it's

1138
00:59:54,080 --> 00:59:56,560
Speaker 1: something that I really found eye opening, and so I'm

1139
00:59:56,560 --> 00:59:58,760
Speaker 1: glad that you found that eye opening as well. And

1140
00:59:58,800 --> 01:00:01,840
Speaker 1: I always say I'm my own problematic, fave. I am

1141
01:00:01,840 --> 01:00:04,000
Speaker 1: your girl is problematic. You know, we all say things

1142
01:00:04,000 --> 01:00:06,640
Speaker 1: and do things that we wish we hadn't and it's

1143
01:00:06,680 --> 01:00:09,760
Speaker 1: so much easier to look at the problematic behavior of others,

1144
01:00:10,280 --> 01:00:13,040
Speaker 1: And at least for myself, I find myself doing that

1145
01:00:13,080 --> 01:00:15,440
Speaker 1: as a way to not think about or deal with

1146
01:00:15,480 --> 01:00:19,360
Speaker 1: our parts my own problematic and so it is a

1147
01:00:19,440 --> 01:00:22,640
Speaker 1: useful concept. I'm glad that you found it useful as well. Yeah,

1148
01:00:22,680 --> 01:00:26,200
Speaker 1: I mean pretty much everything we talked about, like this episode,

1149
01:00:26,520 --> 01:00:29,560
Speaker 1: video game, it was problematic, fave. You know, it's again

1150
01:00:29,640 --> 01:00:32,480
Speaker 1: you can still like something. You can still like something

1151
01:00:32,520 --> 01:00:34,200
Speaker 1: and try to work to improve it. I would say

1152
01:00:34,360 --> 01:00:38,320
Speaker 1: that means you'll like it even more so. Thanks to

1153
01:00:38,400 --> 01:00:40,920
Speaker 1: both of them for emailing us that you two can

1154
01:00:41,000 --> 01:00:44,360
Speaker 1: email us at mom stuff and how stuff dot com.

1155
01:00:44,440 --> 01:00:47,560
Speaker 1: Where else can they find us on social media? They

1156
01:00:47,560 --> 01:00:49,440
Speaker 1: can find us on the social media. We are on

1157
01:00:49,520 --> 01:00:52,400
Speaker 1: Instagram at stuff I've ever told you, and on Twitter

1158
01:00:52,480 --> 01:00:55,480
Speaker 1: at mom Stuff podcast. But if it's harassment, just save

1159
01:00:55,520 --> 01:00:57,840
Speaker 1: it because we're gonna mute you never even know. It'll

1160
01:00:57,880 --> 01:01:00,400
Speaker 1: be up fart into the wind. Yes and thinks as

1161
01:01:00,400 --> 01:01:04,480
Speaker 1: always to our producer Kathleen Killian, we're waiting to her

1162
01:01:04,520 --> 01:01:12,160
Speaker 1: in the studio. Yeah. H