Are Women Tournaments Sexist?

[DasDestroyer]

when I play invoker I by myself usually cast 10 considerably flashy spells in a 11 second window

Sorry, I just couldn't walk past this. You can't invoke 8 extra spells in 11 seconds even if the cd is at its lowest, 2. You need at least 14 seconds

OT:
It's technically sexist, but I'm not sure that it's a bad thing in this case. The fact of the matter is there are (apparently) no female teams/teams with females that can compete on the level of other pro teams, but so as to not completely alienate the teams that do try, they give them their own little fun. I'm sure that if a team of females demonstrates their ability to compete with the highest-ranking teams, they won't be forced to only participate in women-only leagues.

 

[Chemical Alia]

Men are better in spatial coordination and have a better sense of direction (usually!). They excel in math and are great at interpreting three-dimensional objects. They have a better hand-eye coordination and more precise control of large muscle movement. They have poor peripheral vision but better sight in bright light and a better sense of perspective. Since they use one side of their brain more than the other, they tend to use the left side for verbal reasoning and the right for visual and emotional activities (if they are right handed).

Source: http://www.columbia.edu/itc/anthropology/v1007/jakabovics/mf2.html

Emphasis mine.

That theory does does sure seem interesting and relevant to a top down orthographic game played on a monitor that displays flat 2d images! This would also explain my shittiness at 3d modeling, what was I thinking with that pea brain of mine. I can't make heads or tails of what I see!

But anyway, it doesn't seem necessary, and it's not something I would choose to participate in unless it was a more casual setting just for fun (I tend to be competitive and I don't like to feel patronized) and to make women feel more welcome to playing the game. Don't really see what the big deal is, though.

You're taking offense where there is none to be had. Men and women are biologically different, although one gender isn't inherently superior to the other in a general sense.

The only thing I'm taking offense to is how incredibly stupid that explanation sounds, especially given how a game like Dota 2 has pretty much nothing whatsoever to do with spatial awareness.

And geez. I play video games with a bunch of friends, one of which someone who recently lost his actual ability to discern spatial depth, and it has no bearing at all on his ability to play Mario platformers or what have you. The TV screen doesn't even display real depth. 0:

What skills, then, would you say go into playing DotA2?

Based off my experience with the game: free time, basic mouse clicking, Mavis Beacon certification, the ability to strategize, possibly ADD.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I'm trying to understand where this...expectation of even representation stems from.


Women are already 40something% of all gamers, they play games enough as is. If this specific game is seeing such low numbers, but something like the Sims is dominated by female players, that's just a show of varied tastes.



People are allowed to have varied tastes, there's no preexisting equal representation which needs to be reclaimed in the world of competitive DotA or in any other spectrum of games and life in general. Disparity is the normal state of being, uneven representation is not a societal evil, it's just reality. Unevenness of race, ethnicity, sex, age, these will always be and have always been, that's how the world works.




I don't think reacting with sexist tournaments that treat a group different than another is a good way to respond to how the world just "is".

 

[Raika]

Yes. Period. The end. No further discussion is necessary.

 

[Username Redacted]

First off: good job Escapist on going from video game tournaments to rape in less than a page. Congratulations.

Secondly, I suppose that women only tournaments are sexist. Hell, any non-open event that selects it participants by trait(s) rather than skills (i.e. an event you have to qualify for or are invited to based on previous accomplishments) could probably have some -ist ending word attached too it.

That said with the exception of one situation I don't care. I don't care because when you select your participants based on traits (race, sex, sexual orientation, etc.) you aren't, likely, including all of the top players at whatever game it is you're holding your tournament for so I'm going to completely ignore the results of your event. I could win a 100m sprint if the participants where just me and a bunch of grade-school kids and everyone would be well within their rights to give zero fucks about my great victory over a sub-standard level of competition. Non-qualifier, non-invitational participant selective events are, to me, in that same boat.

Lastly I mentioned an exception earlier and this is more just something that irks me and it would be where the trait selective event is offering equal or near equal payouts as an open and/or more competitive event. In this case this is, to me, simply organizers not being fair to their more relevant supporters.

 

[Neferius]

What people seem to neglect is that all these studies that are being toted around, only come up with divergences of +/- a couple of percents shy of 50%.
So really, there's not that big a difference overall. Also, like others already posted, most of these are likely due to social climate as opposed to any significant biological differences.

 

[veloper]

The reason why the sexism card won't be played as often in this women-only scenario is because of a simple hypocricy: women are often seen a minority.
Not a true minority for their non-existent lack of numbers, but for a perceived a lack of strength or ability.

....did you just turn the fact that women are a minority into a sexist thing? They're a sociological minority because they have less power, privileges and social status. The reason for that is a history of sexism, but the fact that women are a minority is just that: a fact.

EDIT: OOPS, did not realize this was a 5 page thread. If this has already been addressed, please ignore.

The hypocrisy isn't in the definition of the word, it's in it's application towards to segregation: it's fine when the majority is seperated from the minority, but's it's bad somehow when the minority is seperated from the majority.

It amounts to the same thing.

When it's just about videogames I'm fine with it. People may choose who they want to play with.

 

[Tanakh]

I really don't understand this thread, separating woman and man due testosterone effects on the muscles is ok, but because the testosterone effects on the brain isn't?

Is it because the brain is fat? Because people refuse to accept we are just animals that have behaviours shaped largely by hormones?

 

[lowhat]

Joke answer:maybe they do that protect the women from getting bullied/raped/sexual harassed by the male players?

Ummm...You do know that the bullying and sexual harassment part DOES happen, right?

Kind of tasteless "joke" answer there.

I fail to understand why women don't trash talk back
You know, talking about small penis size and overcompensation
Mentioning him being mommas boy, whiny and annoying
Stuff like that- it can't be that hard to figure out ways to insult and humiliate back.
From my experience women are excellent at emotional violence, and trash talking isn't anything more than emotional violence.

Because that kind of talk doesn't change the fact that 91% of all rapes are inflicted upon women and only 1% is done by them. It doesn't change the fact that, in this society, a man has a better chance of getting a job when he applies.

You cannot compare a case of racism or sexism to general trashtalk, because being a 'momma's boy' isn't a structural problem in modern society that can be tracked back to the stone age. By enforcing the 'fun' in rape and sexual harrasement, you're enforcing stereotypes that not hurt us as a person, but our perceived inferiority to men.

And believe you me, when a guy start yelling that kind of shit at me, I always get the tendency to make neutering jokes, but, again, that would just enforce his idea that he is allowed to make jokes about it.

I don't know where you're getting your numbers from, because in my country(America), far more men are raped than women, by a wide margin.

 

[DevilWithaHalo]

What is the determining factor involved in acceptance to this tournament? Sex. Can you be denied acceptance in participation in the tournament based solely on your sex? Yes.

Well Johnny, looks like it's sexist.

Phew... that was tough. The remaining discussion is whether or not people think it's OK, 5 pages strong so far!

 

[Assassin Xaero]

By definition, it is. Does anyone really care? Probably not. Does anyone really see it as sexist? Again, probably not. If it was a "men's only", they would probably call it sexist. Just like all the black people only things, like the dating site I always saw commercials for. Only black people? Perfectly ok. Dating site for only white people? Racist bigots. Yet both are racist since they are excluding people due to their race.

 

[GoaThief]

This is going to sound very bad and I expect I'll pick up some flak for it but I've yet to see a female be the #1 player at any video game. Now I'm not saying they don't exist at all but even expanding it further into the very top tiers, I really struggle to name any females at all. Good, certainly... but never great. Why is this?
.

because not as many women play competitive games

So you think it's just a matter of numbers, but surely there should at least be a couple of women challenging at the top or thereabouts?

I hope it happens soon, I know some males do not like being beaten by women at all as if their manhood has been challenged in some manner. There's a few very competent females I know on Left 4 Dead, if only the game was still being carried by ESL.

 

[Vault101]

So you think it's just a matter of numbers, but surely there should at least be a couple of women challenging at the top or thereabouts?

I hope it happens soon, I know some males do not like being beaten by women at all as if their manhood has been challenged in some manner. There's a few very competent females I know on Left 4 Dead, if only the game was still being carried by ESL.

number of peopel who plays games is going to be more than the number at that level

theres not enough solid evidece to have a connection between ability and gender

 

[Trippy Turtle]

Being sexist is insulting or purposely offending someone based on gender. How the fuck is it a bad thing that there is a distinction between us?
Even if it was sexist does it matter? You are quite literally asking if you can try to take offense at this. People need to stop trying to take offense at everything and just deal with it if someone is deliberately insulting you.
Its like people are made of glass.

 

[GoaThief]

number of peopel who plays games is going to be more than the number at that level

I'm a little confused by this comment, could you elaborate a little please? From my perspective professional poker seems like a good comparison where men and women largely compete in mixed tournaments, leagues and ladders. Whilst there are less females than males overall there's still plenty playing at the top of the game, winning regularly.

theres not enough solid evidece to have a connection between ability and gender

In regards to video gaming I completely agree. It's the reason I asked, "Why?".

 

[Zyst]

when I play invoker I by myself usually cast 10 considerably flashy spells in a 11 second window

Sorry, I just couldn't walk past this. You can't invoke 8 extra spells in 11 seconds even if the cd is at its lowest, 2. You need at least 14 seconds

OT:
It's technically sexist, but I'm not sure that it's a bad thing in this case. The fact of the matter is there are (apparently) no female teams/teams with females that can compete on the level of other pro teams, but so as to not completely alienate the teams that do try, they give them their own little fun. I'm sure that if a team of females demonstrates their ability to compete with the highest-ranking teams, they won't be forced to only participate in women-only leagues.

That's what I meant by myself, I do that on WTF mode lol.

 

[Zyst]

snip

With my brother not really having ADD but holy shit, I can tell you that'd be nooo freaking good in DotA, I've died more than once when playing LoL because of him and when I start shouting and him he's like "sorry I was checking my facebook" which pisses me off extremely haha.

EDIT:

Being sexist is insulting or purposely offending someone based on gender. How the fuck is it a bad thing that there is a distinction between us?
Even if it was sexist does it matter? You are quite literally asking if you can try to take offense at this. People need to stop trying to take offense at everything and just deal with it if someone is deliberately insulting you.
Its like people are made of glass.

I'm not asking for permission, I am mad at this. It is a bad thing because it is condescending to the women who actually work hard at the game and are up at that skill level and it's sexist towards men (Gasp!) because the main tournaments are mixed gender and then there's a closed bracket for women.

It does matter, and this is a video game discussion forum, don't like video game related stuff being discussed and opinions going around? Well, no one's asking you to stay in the thread.