video games

Gaming

Im a transman (biologically female), and often times I get that awkward are you a girl or a guy. Most responses I get are just fine, people just going coolio, I got you. But I’ve had people invite me into parties to chat when we’re on the same team, and the second they realize I’m female, they kick me out and team kill me. This has happened way too often, and then guys complain that they can’t find gamer girls. I’ve found many girls I enjoy playing with. They are there. They don’t talk cause they just want to play the game and not be killed by a teammate, or hit on by some random creep on the internet.

Catherine

I am 13 years old, and absolutely love playing video games with my friends, and being in the team voice channel when I play competitive games. I always found it fun to meet new (nice and supportive) people while I’m playing, until I would run into the inevitable accounts of sexism. I have only once met another girl playing this game (Overwatch), or at least another girl who uses a mic to speak to their teammates. When the people I’m playing with hear my voice, and realize I am female, I either get instant friend requests (which happens almost every game), nothing happens, or someone makes a joke about how I can’t play. Someone once said, “Hey, girl. Bring that ass over here.” Another time it was “Get off your boyfriend’s computer.” The thing that bothers me the most about these comments is that I am discouraged from doing one of my favorite things, which is meeting new people and having fun playing Overwatch. I’m scared to use my mike because I’ve heard the comments that other women get. While watching female YouTubers playing Overwatch, they get constant sexist remarks and have to report people all of the time. All of my friends who play this game are male, and I have no one to relate to or talk to this about, because they don’t understand, or try to change the subject.

Anon, 33

I play on Xbox live to relax in the evenings but there is this one guy who is married and in his forties that keeps making sexual comments. He totally humiliated me tonight by joking that I would perform a sex act on another person in the party. I felt so embarrassed and stupid and degraded even though he seemed to think it was funny. He has previously circled around me female avatar saying ‘nice tits’, ‘nice ass’ and making noises of approval even though I’ve made it clear that I’m not happy with it. People seem to think it’s just banter but it’s really not okay.

Alecia

I was on a video game related website when an ad came up – an animation of a woman in a sexy dress firing a machine gun. The image didn’t bother me, but words can’t describe my disgust at the three captions in the ad: “Calm woman down” (in a large, bold font) “take away machine gun” “undress her”

Anon

I play fifa pro clubs in a team with male friends and while many of them treat me fine there are always certain groups of people who become extremely sexist making comments dismissing me as not able to play because I’m a girl despite me being just about the same skill level as my other teammates. When I told one person what team I support he said ‘or course you do you’re a girl’. His other friend said that he wasn’t being sexist he was just saying that all women are glory hunters when it comes to supporting football teams. The same friends frequently make negative comments about women and immediately blame me if the game doesn’t go their way despite not being that great players their selves. They also will only join clubs created by the male members unless their is a lot of male players in the club. I’ve found that on online gaming girls seem to be blamed immediately for failures or treated as is they won’t have any skill and therefore excluded from playing or leading clans and groups altogether.