“Having entered a domain that was once dominated by men, female gamers are being met by abuse.”
Fairfax
Instantly the article starts by segregating women and men. Almost implying that abuse started when women started playing games, and that is exclusive to gaming.
It’s not and has never been.
Abuse online is unfortunately almost as old as Internet itself. I’m not saying it’s right or that’s how it should be, but abuse online knows no gender.
Making this into another gender issue– us against them –women against men, will not ensure equality in our society.
Nor does it help when commentators write: “In reality women should be safe walking around by themselves anywhere at night too…”
Actually, men AND women should be safe walking around by themselves anywhere at night. It shouldn’t turn into a gender issue.
Abuse, assault, violence, etc directed at any person is not acceptable anytime. It shouldn’t matter if you are a man, woman, child, elderly, etc, it needs to be addressed regardless of gender and demographic.
Segregating an issue is counterproductive.
However, I guess that type of writing is far more exciting than writing about non-abuse online. Nothing like a bit of sensationalism to create more revenue with your online ads.
I think bullying in general has increased on the internet due to the anonymity that people have, although I wish it wasn’t so as I don’t much enjoy conversations that continue to be dominated by destructive abuse. As a female gamer/developer I have had issues in the past, (not just online but in real life too) and whenever I tried to defend myself I was told that ‘two wrongs don’t make a right,’ even though I’ve never abused a man for his gender. I agree with what you are trying to say in this article; I don’t like seeing this issue raised time and time again and always explored from one angle. I think it segregates us further and I’m noticing a lot of men complaining about women complaining who then continue to complain about men. All I want is to be treated fairly and to be able to get along with my male companions. I hate it when issues are always raised because you always get guys telling you about how life is also unequal towards them, but I actually totally agree with them a lot of the time.
Anonymity plays a part, but I think you can easily chalk it up to the fact that more people are online too. You don’t have the geeks online anymore, you have those who would abuse you in person, but because they can sit “safely” at home they become even more extreme.
Unfortunately, in general, online there is not much done with this issue. I’m not big on playing games online, but from what I’ve seen in forums, it is often excused they don’t always have the man-power to moderate everything. And if they enforce strict policies, many users, even those who behave nice, start whinging and claiming that it’s an attack on freedom of speech – not understanding hate speech is different from free speech.
And as you also point out, articles like this segregates the genders. Because it’s not that women should be able to handle it or that it doesn’t happen to men, it’s an issue which happens to most people online, regardless of gender, religion, age, etc, which is how it should be approached. Not picking one demographic and assuming that is the only demographic which has an issue with it.
But we need to not take offence when safe servers, etc are suggested. I don’t care about abuse as I dish it back tenfolds most often, but if I knew about some forum or gaming server where I didn’t have to worry about it, I would go there and see it as something positive. Same way that if someone tells me to avoid a certain area in a city, I’ll gladly take on that advise. Sure, it’s not perfect, because I should be able to do what I want, but life isn’t perfect, and if I can do things to make life better, sure, bring it.