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So I decided to do a bit of research on the role of women in eSports. I wanted to really think about good ways to get more girls interested in gaming and eSports, so in the end I wrote a survey (with a bit of help!), and submitted it to the Starcraft 2, League of Legends and DotA2 communities asking them to fill it out. It was by no means perfect, but I thought it was a good start and I could then expand outwards and perhaps re-do the survey based on the answers I was given!
I got a lot of good feedback about the survey itself which was nice, although I had a lot of conflicting feedback too. ‘It’s too short’, ‘it’s too long’, ‘I don’t think I was given enough space to write’, ‘why do you want me to write so much’ etc.
But in the end I gathered 478 responses, mostly from the DotA2 crowd.
Whilst I thought it might be entertaing, it ended up being a really sad look at the community. There were a lot of really nasty stories that folks submitted. I would like to go into more depth but it poses way too much data for just one post to cover and is a really sobering example of how bad some ladies have had it.
Not only this, there were a lot of male stories that stuck out even more. Tales of people taking their girlfriends to events in order to get them into the scene too and those girls being treated in such a manner that they never wanted to return, for example.
There were also some really bitter answers which demonstrate a far more horrid view of ladies than I would like to think some people possessed but this is the internet, and it was an anonymous form. I personally found some of the troll answers hilarious.
Anyway, here are my raw data findings:
The excel spreadsheet that Google Docs collected all the responses into. Whilst it is a huge form, you can set it in View -> List so that you sort the responses into groups. You can select all the female responses in one, or all people from a certain age group and much more.
And here is the Google Analytics page which has made some really nice pie charts. Again, due to the stories and longer responses, this page may seem quite convoluted and you cannot select different groups. Unlike the spreadsheet, it becomes harder to relate certain responses to different groups of people, but it is still nicer to look at and gives a good ‘overall’ view.
I tried to make some comparison graphs to show male and female responses but I ended up wanting to throw myself out the window because I hate Excel and it was just making me cross. Maybe when I have some more spare time. What do folks here think?
 
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Canada10349 Posts
Interesting. But hard to scroll through lol >.< can you highlight some results?
Whats with the title? Like their roll is different or something?
EDIT: just found the question: "What role do you think females take to the best?" -_- why do you have to ask people to generalize women?
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Gaming is the foundation of esports. What would make more women interested in gaming? More women developing games. I don't mean being hired to do so, but having a vision of their own and blazing trails by creating something new and unique. Think of someone like Richard Garriot (creator of Ultima series) burning floppy disks of his games at his mom's house and selling them in plastic bags. That kind of passion and vision touched the hearts of others and the fire spread. You can't force the fire into existence if that original spark isn't there.
So I'd like to see more women designing games that appeal to themselves and other women. That's what gaming started as and for the most part continues to be: men creating fantasy worlds they enjoy which appeal mostly to other men. Now with fast internet and computers, why aren't more women programming games to fulfill their own fantasies, which almost certainly will be shared by and inspire other women? In all these gender based critiques of gaming, where are the positive examples of games made for women by women? Those deserve attention, and would go a long way toward making gaming less male dominated.
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On April 19 2013 01:14 ComaDose wrote:
Interesting. But hard to scroll through lol >.< can you highlight some results?
Whats with the title? Like their roll is different or something?
EDIT: just found the question: "What role do you think females take to the best?" -_- why do you have to ask people to generalize women?
If you use the spreadsheet and click View -> List you can arrange the data by groups. So you could see all the men in a specific age category, or all the women who said they had a negative experience because they were girls.
I think it's interesting to see the people who were seen as good and bad representations of women in eSports and I enjoyed reading the stories about experiences people had had as well. I also liked to compare how many women answered one way to certain questions compared to the menfolk. For example most women thought that female characters were over sexualised AND felt men had better/more varied designs. Men, on the other hand, did not agree.
On April 19 2013 01:14 ComaDose wrote:
EDIT: just found the question: "What role do you think females take to the best?" -_- why do you have to ask people to generalize women?
That's a question I would like to change if I went back. I agree with you, it came out way worse than I intended it to. I was more interested to see if people thought there was a natural inclination. Like maybe if men were more likely to say women fit the role of 'host' the best, but the women thought they made better casters.
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Canada10349 Posts
oh that is pretty cool.
I like seeing the people that got shout outs.
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This is actually pretty interesting. I like going through the longer more well thought out responses. It's nice to know what other people's opinions are on females in esports or gaming in general. Personally I paid absolutely no mind to whether or not my opponent or teammate is a male or a female. All nerds die the same in my view.
But one of the enlightening things I read was the culture thing with the way male gamers tend to use sexual assualt type of jokes. Insulting each other is just how males get along, but it was very interesting how WRONG it was to use these types of jokes. I myself avoid them, but you know how when you're stomping your opponent to the ground you may use phrases like "I'm stomping this bitch" or "I fucked this bitch up" it not okay with a female just because you said bitch.
I found this out first hand at a party. After a couple of drinks and the party died down, I played Mortal Combat with a female player, and she was beating my ass (another sexual assualt type of phrase?). Somehow, I said something along the lines of "fuck, you bitch you kicking my ass" and one of the girls got up and got angry at me for calling her a bitch, where it'd be a normal thing for a male gamer. I was too drunk to even notice she got angry at the time, but luckily a friend of mine covered for me and said it was "a gamer term, relax". Ever since then I've been a lot more conscience about what I say when talking trash around woman.
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Gotta get more girls playing to get more girls into esports. I think it's like overall growth of esports, more players= more viewers.
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Once I was invited to a LAN party by this guy who was a B+ toss player on ICCUP a few years ago. It was almost a 2 hour drive away, and that I wouldn't need to bring my computer. So, I asked him about the time, and place, and then he asked me if I was a good cook. I was like yes, definitely. Then he asked me if I would be ok with just cooking and serving snacks to his friends, while they practiced, I was pretty shocked by this comment, and asked him if he was being serious about this, and he replied back, don't worry, I'll show you how to really muta micro after everyone has left, and you've finished cleaning up.
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Wow Nymphaceae that is awful. I am sorry that that happened to you. I've had similar experiences in the past but nothing that bad.
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On April 19 2013 05:46 Nymphaceae wrote:
Once I was invited to a LAN party by this guy who was a B+ toss player on ICCUP a few years ago. It was almost a 2 hour drive away, and that I wouldn't need to bring my computer. So, I asked him about the time, and place, and then he asked me if I was a good cook. I was like yes, definitely. Then he asked me if I would be ok with just cooking and serving snacks to his friends, while they practiced, I was pretty shocked by this comment, and asked him if he was being serious about this, and he replied back, don't worry, I'll show you how to really muta micro after everyone has left, and you've finished cleaning up.
That's pretty bad, I'm sorry to hear that but at least you were smart enough to say no (you didn't say so, but I'll assume since you are posting it).
Growing up with two older sisters I have always looked at women differently than my peers (I'm a male). A lot of guys in the gaming scene are probably virgins or lack positive experiences with women, so they think they can just treat women like objects. I've known plenty of guys with really fucked up perspectives on what girls are to them, trust me I like a fine body as much as anyone else but it is not just an object to me. I am all for girls to get involved in the gaming scene more, it will happen one day because I know girls like video games too, but things like the Frag Dolls don't help.
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On April 19 2013 04:51 Snuggles wrote:
This is actually pretty interesting. I like going through the longer more well thought out responses. It's nice to know what other people's opinions are on females in esports or gaming in general. Personally I paid absolutely no mind to whether or not my opponent or teammate is a male or a female. All nerds die the same in my view.
But one of the enlightening things I read was the culture thing with the way male gamers tend to use sexual assualt type of jokes. Insulting each other is just how males get along, but it was very interesting how WRONG it was to use these types of jokes. I myself avoid them, but you know how when you're stomping your opponent to the ground you may use phrases like "I'm stomping this bitch" or "I fucked this bitch up" it not okay with a female just because you said bitch.
I found this out first hand at a party. After a couple of drinks and the party died down, I played Mortal Combat with a female player, and she was beating my ass (another sexual assualt type of phrase?). Somehow, I said something along the lines of "fuck, you bitch you kicking my ass" and one of the girls got up and got angry at me for calling her a bitch, where it'd be a normal thing for a male gamer. I was too drunk to even notice she got angry at the time, but luckily a friend of mine covered for me and said it was "a gamer term, relax". Ever since then I've been a lot more conscience about what I say when talking trash around woman.
Interesting anecdote. I accidentally, jokingly called my boyfriend a bitch for probe harrassing when we were playing 1v1 the other day, and he was completely shocked at the use of the term. I apologised multiple times for it.
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Share some of the results in the post for those who don't want to scroll to endless excell pages I'd say.
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The goal of women in any sport, e included, should be to be competitive and win. The gap between girls and guys just seems huge, it's like the gap between foreigners and Koreans in terms of skill. It's pretty discouraging at times, but if there's a 20-to-1 ratio of men to women playing a particular game, then there are similar odds that professional players are more likely to be drawn from the more populated pool.
I think that shouldn't stop anyone from playing and being competitive if they choose to do so. However, a lot of women have bought into the idea that they should use their position to abuse the community by being attention whores. Not that I have anything against sexiness or cleavage or any of that shit, its just when women turn themselves into sex objects, it reflects very poorly on women in video games altogether, and that's where I draw the line. A lot of guys who are gamers (Notice I just say "a lot", I'm not being all angry feminist about it) have a very narrow view of how women are; brainless, emotionally fragile, stupid, giggly, peppy, and not even capable of engaging an intellectual concept, like high-level gaming. That pisses me off. Anyone propagating that negative stereotype is doing an incredible to disservice to the credibility of gaming in becoming a legitimate and mainstream sport.
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Northern Ireland23033 Posts
On April 19 2013 11:52 ninazerg wrote:
The goal of women in any sport, e included, should be to be competitive and win. The gap between girls and guys just seems huge, it's like the gap between foreigners and Koreans in terms of skill. It's pretty discouraging at times, but if there's a 20-to-1 ratio of men to women playing a particular game, then there are similar odds that professional players are more likely to be drawn from the more populated pool.
I think that shouldn't stop anyone from playing and being competitive if they choose to do so. However, a lot of women have bought into the idea that they should use their position to abuse the community by being attention whores. Not that I have anything against sexiness or cleavage or any of that shit, its just when women turn themselves into sex objects, it reflects very poorly on women in video games altogether, and that's where I draw the line. A lot of guys who are gamers (Notice I just say "a lot", I'm not being all angry feminist about it) have a very narrow view of how women are; brainless, emotionally fragile, stupid, giggly, peppy, and not even capable of engaging an intellectual concept, like high-level gaming. That pisses me off. Anyone propagating that negative stereotype is doing an incredible to disservice to the credibility of gaming in becoming a legitimate and mainstream sport.
I think women propogate the stereotype just as much as the guys do to be honest. If you (as a group, I realise women aren't homogenous obviously) want to be taken seriously on that level, go show them that that's what you can do. Show some sick micro, some knowledge of Starcraft and guys will respect that.
What I find guys judge all female gamers are by their experiences with the girls who think that it's attractive to be 'kooky' like every Zooey Deschanel-portrayed character, go around proclaiming themselves as gamer girls, be trash at said games and, eugh.
Sorry for the rant, I mean that's my experience in regards to girls I have met who have played games. The exceptions have been when I've randomly encountered girls online who have pretty sick gaming jobs, some of whom I clanned with subsequently or whatever.
The defining characteristic of the latter group is usually that their screenames aren't 'GamerGurl1337' or something, that they don't trade on being female as a gimmick to get an easier time and JUST PLAY THE GAMES.
That is not to say that guys don't have ridiculous attitudes to women, even on here. There's also a lot of resentment for women, even among the enlightened sometimes that is somewhat curious to me.
Perpetuating sexism also doesn't just mean 'for the times people are dicks to you'. There are certain figures in the SC2 community who get attention (some of which is borderline creepy) because they are hot. Yes it's a 'compliment' but it still reinforces the idea that women are there to look pretty and not engage their brains.
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On April 19 2013 13:01 Wombat_NI wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2013 11:52 ninazerg wrote:
The goal of women in any sport, e included, should be to be competitive and win. The gap between girls and guys just seems huge, it's like the gap between foreigners and Koreans in terms of skill. It's pretty discouraging at times, but if there's a 20-to-1 ratio of men to women playing a particular game, then there are similar odds that professional players are more likely to be drawn from the more populated pool.
I think that shouldn't stop anyone from playing and being competitive if they choose to do so. However, a lot of women have bought into the idea that they should use their position to abuse the community by being attention whores. Not that I have anything against sexiness or cleavage or any of that shit, its just when women turn themselves into sex objects, it reflects very poorly on women in video games altogether, and that's where I draw the line. A lot of guys who are gamers (Notice I just say "a lot", I'm not being all angry feminist about it) have a very narrow view of how women are; brainless, emotionally fragile, stupid, giggly, peppy, and not even capable of engaging an intellectual concept, like high-level gaming. That pisses me off. Anyone propagating that negative stereotype is doing an incredible to disservice to the credibility of gaming in becoming a legitimate and mainstream sport. I think women propogate the stereotype just as much as the guys do to be honest. If you (as a group, I realise women aren't homogenous obviously) want to be taken seriously on that level, go show them that that's what you can do. Show some sick micro, some knowledge of Starcraft and guys will respect that. What I find guys judge all female gamers are by their experiences with the girls who think that it's attractive to be 'kooky' like every Zooey Deschanel-portrayed character, go around proclaiming themselves as gamer girls, be trash at said games and, eugh. Sorry for the rant, I mean that's my experience in regards to girls I have met who have played games. The exceptions have been when I've randomly encountered girls online who have pretty sick gaming jobs, some of whom I clanned with subsequently or whatever. The defining characteristic of the latter group is usually that their screenames aren't 'GamerGurl1337' or something, that they don't trade on being female as a gimmick to get an easier time and JUST PLAY THE GAMES. That is not to say that guys don't have ridiculous attitudes to women, even on here. There's also a lot of resentment for women, even among the enlightened sometimes that is somewhat curious to me. Perpetuating sexism also doesn't just mean 'for the times people are dicks to you'. There are certain figures in the SC2 community who get attention (some of which is borderline creepy) because they are hot. Yes it's a 'compliment' but it still reinforces the idea that women are there to look pretty and not engage their brains.
Yeah, I touched on the fact that we do it to ourselves, and I'm against that. I've even talked to some of them about it, and they just go back to "It's not hurting anybody, so why do you care?" and get mad at me when I want to help them out, but alas, people do what works for them, and if being an attention whore gets you the self-satisfaction they want, then they're going to keep doing it. I especially hate when they can't play at all but are like "LOOK AT ME, I'M PLATINUM IN SC2, HELL YEAH GIRL POWER~~~~ :333333 <3 <3 <3" and it's like some disgusting display of celebrating wallowing in mediocrity.
Don't get me wrong; anyone who's been in Gold for awhile and ranked up to Platinum should be proud that they made that improvement. My point is more along the lines of that if someone sets themselves up to fail, says "LOL I SUCK", and doesn't make an effort to actually improve, then presents themselves as a "serious gamer" when they're just a casual gamer, then what's the point? They don't love the game as much as the attention whoring. They can kiss being a competitor goodbye, and should never be allowed to cast at major events. Gaming communities should always reward talent over gimmicks.
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Northern Ireland23033 Posts
I like the cut of your jib ninazerg. It's ridiculous that in a community where Korean Code S players are referred to as 'trash' frequently, a girl is canonised for the heady achievement of being in Platinum league. Tbh I don't mind, if people would just stop pretending that such things 'do no harm'. Now it may not be the biggest issue in society, but I don't get how people can't connect the dots.
As a man who values intelligence, it is actually sad to me that many girls I have met over the years actually think it's thought of as unattractive and unappealing to have views, to discuss things intelligently, indeed do anything other than just be hot and laugh at the jokes of guys.
Hell even my current partner is into all that shitty gossip magazine culture, and she's a smart and otherwise discerning creature.
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On April 19 2013 13:29 ninazerg wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2013 13:01 Wombat_NI wrote:On April 19 2013 11:52 ninazerg wrote:
The goal of women in any sport, e included, should be to be competitive and win. The gap between girls and guys just seems huge, it's like the gap between foreigners and Koreans in terms of skill. It's pretty discouraging at times, but if there's a 20-to-1 ratio of men to women playing a particular game, then there are similar odds that professional players are more likely to be drawn from the more populated pool.
I think that shouldn't stop anyone from playing and being competitive if they choose to do so. However, a lot of women have bought into the idea that they should use their position to abuse the community by being attention whores. Not that I have anything against sexiness or cleavage or any of that shit, its just when women turn themselves into sex objects, it reflects very poorly on women in video games altogether, and that's where I draw the line. A lot of guys who are gamers (Notice I just say "a lot", I'm not being all angry feminist about it) have a very narrow view of how women are; brainless, emotionally fragile, stupid, giggly, peppy, and not even capable of engaging an intellectual concept, like high-level gaming. That pisses me off. Anyone propagating that negative stereotype is doing an incredible to disservice to the credibility of gaming in becoming a legitimate and mainstream sport. I think women propogate the stereotype just as much as the guys do to be honest. If you (as a group, I realise women aren't homogenous obviously) want to be taken seriously on that level, go show them that that's what you can do. Show some sick micro, some knowledge of Starcraft and guys will respect that. What I find guys judge all female gamers are by their experiences with the girls who think that it's attractive to be 'kooky' like every Zooey Deschanel-portrayed character, go around proclaiming themselves as gamer girls, be trash at said games and, eugh. Sorry for the rant, I mean that's my experience in regards to girls I have met who have played games. The exceptions have been when I've randomly encountered girls online who have pretty sick gaming jobs, some of whom I clanned with subsequently or whatever. The defining characteristic of the latter group is usually that their screenames aren't 'GamerGurl1337' or something, that they don't trade on being female as a gimmick to get an easier time and JUST PLAY THE GAMES. That is not to say that guys don't have ridiculous attitudes to women, even on here. There's also a lot of resentment for women, even among the enlightened sometimes that is somewhat curious to me. Perpetuating sexism also doesn't just mean 'for the times people are dicks to you'. There are certain figures in the SC2 community who get attention (some of which is borderline creepy) because they are hot. Yes it's a 'compliment' but it still reinforces the idea that women are there to look pretty and not engage their brains. Yeah, I touched on the fact that we do it to ourselves, and I'm against that. I've even talked to some of them about it, and they just go back to "It's not hurting anybody, so why do you care?" and get mad at me when I want to help them out, but alas, people do what works for them, and if being an attention whore gets you the self-satisfaction they want, then they're going to keep doing it. I especially hate when they can't play at all but are like "LOOK AT ME, I'M PLATINUM IN SC2, HELL YEAH GIRL POWER~~~~ :333333 <3 <3 <3" and it's like some disgusting display of celebrating wallowing in mediocrity. Don't get me wrong; anyone who's been in Gold for awhile and ranked up to Platinum should be proud that they made that improvement. My point is more along the lines of that if someone sets themselves up to fail, says "LOL I SUCK", and doesn't make an effort to actually improve, then presents themselves as a "serious gamer" when they're just a casual gamer, then what's the point? They don't love the game as much as the attention whoring. They can kiss being a competitor goodbye, and should never be allowed to cast at major events. Gaming communities should always reward talent over gimmicks.
I thought gold was given to you if you just knew the hotkeys, and plat was given to you if you could use more than 2 control groups. XOXO <3@
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On April 19 2013 05:46 Nymphaceae wrote:
Once I was invited to a LAN party by this guy who was a B+ toss player on ICCUP a few years ago. It was almost a 2 hour drive away, and that I wouldn't need to bring my computer. So, I asked him about the time, and place, and then he asked me if I was a good cook. I was like yes, definitely. Then he asked me if I would be ok with just cooking and serving snacks to his friends, while they practiced, I was pretty shocked by this comment, and asked him if he was being serious about this, and he replied back, don't worry, I'll show you how to really muta micro after everyone has left, and you've finished cleaning up.
Man, you have the most fucked up experiences. Please write me a book + Show Spoiler +and a sandwich to! jkjk <3 I'd make u a sandwich anyday
I feel like being a girl goes both ways. You do get some benefits but a lot of crap comes at the same time. Its quite silly
Also technically platinum is average so i guess it isn't that bad.... but i get the jist of it.
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EPT
