Excluding Women From E-Sports Does Not Legitimize It

[Lieju]

It's not needind specialised equipment. It's about the tournament dissolving men only tournaments but allowing women only brackets and everyone is ok with wopmen only brackets. That's not equality. That's a different kind of INequality from the previous kind.

Aaaand, you missed my point completely and we're just going in circles.

Why are you saying there is a need to provide 'safe spaces' for men? Why the mixed tournaments are not such for men?

 

[AJ_Lethal]

I'm lost on how that proves women are going to get hurt, "badly." Were Venus and Serena injured?

No, but it showed a performance chasm between the bottom 200 male tennis players and the top two female tennis players. But again, that depends on the sport. There are sports where women can be as competitive as men (like motorsports) since physical prowess is kinda irrelevant compared to skills.

Here's more insight on this subject (which came up due the whole Caster Semenya thing): http://www.sportsscientists.com/2010/04/let-male-and-female-compete-together/

 

[Lieju]

It's not needind specialised equipment. It's about the tournament dissolving men only tournaments but allowing women only brackets and everyone is ok with wopmen only brackets. That's not equality. That's a different kind of INequality from the previous kind.

Aaaand, you missed my point completely and we're just going in circles.

Why are you saying there is a need to provide 'safe spaces' for men? Why the mixed tournaments are not such for men?

If women are ok with women only tournaments then they need to ALSO be ok with simultaneous men only tournament. And if men only tournaments are dissolved but women only tournaments are kept in place that is not some cry for equality.

And I already made my case for why this isn't the case. You didn't respond to it, or answer my questions. Unless you do, and don't just repeat the same thing, this is pointless.

 

[LoneWolf83]

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Yeah I am generalising, we are trying to make rules for the entire human race basically so you kind of have to? Men are stronger than women in general, its a fact, get over it.

Yeah there may be some who are as strong as the average man but they will never be as strong as the top males. The woman in that link would not beat the men in the olympics so what is your point!! And Im sorry a mid table MMA fighter would destroy the even the best rated female fighters. It would be totally unfair.

And also maybe the men dont want to compete against women in sports where they are at disadvantage you ever consider that. So they shouldnt have to.

People like you are just illogical. You would encourage people to compete at a huge disadvantage and get hurt just for the sake of saying that we are all the same. Well we are'nt, men and women are different. You and the rest of the PC brigade key board warriors who probably don't even play sport should just fucking deal with it.

What you are saying is skill, strength,and ability have no importance, only their genitals are important. That be definition is discrimination. How is giving people equal opportunity illogical? IF they have the strength, stamina, skill and they want to do it. why prevent them? Because some guys might not like competing with wemen based on stupid outdated ideas (ideas that you are using), that is they're problem, not the problem with wemom.

Yeah there may be some who are as strong as the average man but they will never be as strong as the top males. The woman in that link would not beat the men in the olympics so what is your point!! And Im sorry a mid table MMA fighter would destroy the even the best rated female fighters. It would be totally unfair.

That is a baseless statement. YOu don't know that because wemon haven't been given the opportunity, it has never been tested thus it is baseless.

You have been using fallacious and demonstrably false arguments in support or a stupid idea, I've said more than once that wemen should be given equal opportunity, that if they have the strength, stamina and skill, they should not be prevented from playing professorial sports. You have been using the illogical one, that make you illogical.

 

[Eri]

The best female tennis players in the world couldn't even beat a man not even in the top 200. This also applies to all sports. There's a reason that the matches are separate.

I'm lost on how that proves women are going to get hurt, "badly." Were Venus and Serena injured?

Are you aware tennis is not a contact sport? Serious question.

In football (American ver.) there are already countless injuries. Women would literally be maimed/killed if they played with men that did not hold back.

 

[Deadcyde]

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I suppose toting esports as a whole; a "culture" of mysogynism because of a couple of examples. Specifically painting "male is the default" as adversarial as if it's intentionally sexist that video games are marketed to the safest known quantity.

did you even read the article? or the parts i quoted?

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Lets ignore the fact that the write of this so called article tarred all esports with this brush. Because clearly any sport that is electronic in nature specifically is biased towards females to the point of misogyny. Never mind that one of my friends plays on a professional LoL team comprised of both men and women or that I compete on a BF3 server that is run by an all female competitive team. So excuse me for thinking this article was a little generalizing over very few examples. Not only that, any self respecting group changed the rules as soon as they became aware it was upsetting people, not even a fight like you'd expect if they were actually misogynistic.

Oh and good work with the ad hominem and straw man. Never mind that my point was these "equality crusaders" don't care about gaming. Have no interest in taking part in gaming let alone treat it with the reverence that people who actually give a shit about gaming would. It's simply the idea, "oh but we might want to try gaming but it's so horrible that we can't" Bull. There is a niche for everyone in gaming, but that's not the point to them. It has to specifically cater to them or it's not good enough.

Do they care about a games story being good or the game play being solid so as not to disturb the suspension of disbelief? Do they care that the people most likely to play the game might not be them? Do they even care that this shit is fantasy and not reality? Nope cause equality!!11!!!one1!!1!

The difference between my generalization and "theirs"; is I know there's a niche for everyone, anyone who actually gave a shit about gaming would know that too. Look at any top 10 review list. Yet these so called equality crusaders assume all gamers/developers/publishers are misogynistic assholes because they aren't being specifically catered for, which apart from being impossible to prove simply isn't the case. Am I being adversarial about this? Yeah. Why? They want to take away something personal to me and they don't even have a fucking stake in it.

EDIT: just to make this abundantly clear, do i care that gaming is open to everyone? No, do i think it should all be tits and violences no womminz aloud? No.. But change for changes sake by ham fisted hate mongers who would rather see gaming watered down to some morass of shit just because they felt personally slighted that marcus fenix is a dude or that 12 year old gamers called them a ******? That i have an issue with. Unless you're actually invested in gaming, i don't think your opinion on it is valid. I'm looking at you Anita

 

[RaikuFA]

Because the only people that participate in this crap are neckbeards who think only men who started playing fighters, LoL or whatever the second they got cut from the umbilical cord should play.

I don't mean to attack your view, but I find your comment kind of offensive.

To my first point, why are we still taking groups of gamers and labeling them? I understand if back in the 90s when I talked about final fantasy that people viewed me as a nerd or a "neckbeard" but of all places this is a gaming site, why are we still calling people names for playing video games?

And as a second point... I've never heard this other view anywhere. The few E-sports personalities I know of don't seem to hold these sentiments. I've been watching Trump stream hearthstone for awhile now and it has improved my game greaty. He always answers questions and seems to be very encouraging to people in their play.

I've watched a lot of DOTA2, and while I don't follow the Chinese or SEA scene due largely to the timezone/language barrier, the western scene has always looked very welcoming to newer players.


I feel like a large part of your issue is how you think people are excluded from E-sports because they havn't been playing long enough. I don't think this is some prejudice against people who started too late, as it is simply a barrier of entry. I wouldn't expect to start playing basketball 5 years ago and join the NBA today, simply because 5 years isn't really enough time for someone to become good enough to play at a professional level. I would expect a large number of NBA players to have started playing basketball early in highschool, or even before that, because to do anything at a professional level you have to put in a lot of practice.

If I've misunderstood anything please let me know. It's just this thread feels like the old anti-gamer attitude I used to see being aimed at gamers by other gamers. And all the examples you used (while maybe true) I just havn't seen myself.

For your first point, I'll stop when one: I stop being labeled for my likes or being called a "tryhard" "scrub" or "newfag" whenever I lose and 2: people stop kicking others or reporting them for not playing how they want them to play.

For your second point, I don't watch that crap. It's all based off of my experiences from trying out these games. The closest thing I've ever seen that didn't directly involve me was LoL pros getting banned and the Cross Assault incident and people agreeing with Aris when it came to making sure newcomers weren't welcome at his arcade.

 

[Frankster]

My initial reflex was to think this is a very silly thing, if I can understand gender segregation in contact sports and areas where biological differences apply then I can accept it.
But in gaming where there no such barriers? It seemed silly.

But then I read other article about how the end result is few girls want to become progamers due to it being male dominated and the competitive scene+community being hostile to female gamers and now am not so sure, it seems segregation is needed to allow for female gamers to play without hassle and in turn get people used to the idea of a pro girl gamer without flipping out over it.

It reflects poorly on the progaming scene that this measure is even needed though :/ In a sane world this shouldn't need to happen anymore then gender segregated trains in japan.

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That's a really bad example to use there along with your choice of wording "born without a dick" since as far as I understand it Scarlett was born with one...

 

[Something Amyss]

Are you aware tennis is not a contact sport? Serious question.

So they didn't get hurt?

Still a serious question, by the way.

 

[Callate]

Thank you for this post regarding equality. Well said.

I would like to add that although the barriers might not be as big, they are significantly bigger than you're stating now. Having a network of high quality players to practice against is a very important part and high level players rely far less on random matchmaking and much more on studying an opponent and trying to create new strategies that opponents haven't studied yet.

Watching a high skill level player play is more valuable in games, because the decision making is much more complex, but that doesn't mean it doesn't require years of training to master the necessary skills.

I certainly agree that having a network of players to practice with is important in most games, though the nature of available Internet play and communication makes it easier to find such a network than players who have to meet in-person to learn their team dynamics. Lag is an issue in many games, of course. I also recognize that gaining the ability to make the sheer number of decisions a high-tier player is making per minute and adjustments and clicks they're making per second requires a far from trivial time investment.

I don't by any means mean to trivialize the work it takes to become a top-tier player. That said, I do think a person with a computer and a high-speed Internet connection has a better chance of achieving Thresh-level play through time and will than someone with a basketball and access to a court has of achieving Michael Jordan-level play. The equalizing nature of the exercise is part of the reason gender-sorted tournaments seem ridiculous in the first place.

 

[LoneWolf83]

All your nonsense liberal rhetoric. You dont watch MMA I assume you cant name any fighters. You are commenting on something you know nothing about. I watch it and I do know the women would lose. Its not outdated for man not to want to bash a womans face in. I even asked men and women who worked in my office should they play full contact mixed rugby who play the sport, they all said no. Actual people who play the sport on both sides. Not just an idealist who doesnt or doesnt want to accept basic biological facts that the averge man has about 20kg on an average woman. Head on back to tumblr you will like it there. More people who cant accept reality or deal with the world how it is.

You continue to use arguments you could not possibly know are true, you continue to use logical fallacies and now you result to name calling, all if in a futile attempt to argue against equal opportunity. I've said that if a woman is strong enough she should have the opportunity, here's the think about that, when given the opportunity, they prove they can do it, in the police, fire department, the military, wemen have proven they can be as strong as men and they can do the job, in fact they have to be stronger because, because of people like you they have to deal with more bullshit then the men. By your argument if a woman did have the strngth, stamina and skill to compete in MMA, she shouldn't be allowed because she is too weak, even though sh does have the strength. You argument is completely bankrupt and demonstrably false.

 

[VVThoughtBox]

How exactly does this affect me, the guy who doesn't watch sports and don't play sports games?

 

[Kevin McGechie]

So, feminists, why is it perfectly acceptable for women to have their own league that men are excluded from whereas should men have identical privilege the internet goes into meltdown over "sexism". Surely one, unisex competition would be apt considering neither sex has an inherent advantage over the other. While I do concede that we need more women to compete, this is not the way to encourage that.

 

[NoeL]

I suppose toting esports as a whole; a "culture" of mysogynism because of a couple of examples. Specifically painting "male is the default" as adversarial as if it's intentionally sexist that video games are marketed to the safest known quantity.

did you even read the article? or the parts i quoted?

Yes I did, and I didn't see where you were coming from. It's why I asked you. And even now, you haven't pointed out where she blames men for the marketing, or where she says all pro gamers are evil. I can't remember if she actually said there's a culture of misogynism or not, but personally I would argue there definitely is. Hell, just watch how many people fall over themselves to call Anita a **** at every opportunity they get - and for what? For critiquing games from a feminist perspective. And don't try and tell me these people are either a) few in number, or b) critiquing her content, because people made her the poster girl for online bullying well before she even put out her first video.

So, feminists, why is it perfectly acceptable for women to have their own league that men are excluded from whereas should men have identical privilege the internet goes into meltdown over "sexism".

So, Kevin McGechie, why do you not already know the answer to that question when it's clearly stated in the article you're responding to?

 

[Kevin McGechie]

It's not ok, it's clearly sexism. I would hope any rational female gamers would see this and boycott the female-only competition in favour of the competition that accepts people of all sexes/genders.

 

[Majinash]

For your first point, I'll stop when one: I stop being labeled for my likes or being called a "tryhard" "scrub" or "newfag" whenever I lose and 2: people stop kicking others or reporting them for not playing how they want them to play.

So your solution to name calling is "I'm going to call them names until they stop calling me names"? I think that isn't very productive.

For your second point, I don't watch that crap. It's all based off of my experiences from trying out these games. The closest thing I've ever seen that didn't directly involve me was LoL pros getting banned and the Cross Assault incident and people agreeing with Aris when it came to making sure newcomers weren't welcome at his arcade.

Of the 2 examples you gave. 1 is riot banning LoL pros for "toxic behavior" which is their attempt at fixing your problem 1. I don't see how that is a problem, it is a very powerful force in esports trying to make the culture less toxic and more accepting, exactly what people see to want in this thread.

Your second example seems to be a twitch TV reality TV show in which 1 guy makes a complete ass of himself. This is a good example of sexism, the guy seems to be completely out of touch with what should be acceptable behavior. So that is 1 guy, and of course any of the faceless nameless masses on the internet who seem to agree. This kind of behavior is unfortunately not unique to esports, and from what I could find on the internet (here on escapist and elsewhere) it seems the majority of the community didn't agree with the Aris guy.

I still don't understand why you would want esports to go away. Unless you are saying you want it all to go away because you don't like the games?