Tag: feminism

USER FRANKENSTEIN2022: IT’S A MATCH!, Jasmine Oke

Contrary to popular belief, the big bad wolf is not only present in fairy tales and Little Red Riding Hood is not safe once she grows up – just look at the awful fate her grandmother suffered. It’s something I’ve learnt the hard way living in New York City: the city that never sleeps. It’s such a romantic notion, personifying a place and idealising the bustling nature of commodity it harbours. But no one takes into consideration what this lack of slumber really means – or rather, how fictitious it is. The city does sleep. Sure, the lights may never go out; the traffic may never come to a total standstill; the streets may never be completely void of life. But civilisation does sleep. It must in order to remain civilised. The glowing eyes of Broadway do not sleep and, as a result, I am wary of the walk back home before I even make it to the bar.

My name is Genevieve Thompson – daughter of Greg and Elisa Thompson, who can be reached at +1 (929) 478-0358. I’m on my way to meet a man I know as Daniel Montague, at The Dead Rabbit – a bar on the corner of Water and Broad Street in Lower Manhattan. My name is Genevieve, it’s 8pm, and already I’m being followed by a pack of wolves.

I keep my eyes trained on the way that my feet collide with the cement and focus on the audible crunch of the litter underfoot; anything to diminish the glowing eyes illuminating my path. Some of them shout confidently in their moonlit disguise, beads of saliva falling into their unkept beards or dripping down their stubbly chins. Others simply make comments under their breath – a soft growl that sends shivers every which way. The goosebumps rising on my skin aren’t a result of the brisk fall weather, but rather their tones which mock genuine admiration and concern.

‘Well, hello there darling. How are you tonight?’

‘Oh my, aren’t you beautiful?’

‘Can I help you out there at all, sweetheart?’

It’s impossible to even tell where each comment comes from, and instead they all mould into an aggressive shouting of the one word that dominates the hunt – SLUT.

*

The room is lowly lit as I step into The Dead Rabbit, boding well for the performance I have planned this evening. Without the spotlight on me, I’m given the opportunity to characterise myself as what they want me to be – the effervescent angel seeking a simple life. Yet at the same time, I’m expected to remain an enigma – giving just enough of myself away to leave them wanting more. Never too much. That is the most important part. Especially when it comes to me, whose very core houses so many opinions not appreciated by the silent but relentless majority.

The bartender smiles at me and looks me up and down as I take a seat at the bar – I pretend not to notice. I order an old fashioned, which earns an odd look from my new friend and the comment ‘but, isn’t that a man’s drink?’ from the wolf a few stools down. I smile politely and thank the bartender for the glass, rewarding the other with nothing but an inward roll of my eyes. This night is already off to a great start. Downing my glass, I watch the hands on the clock of the wall opposite marching ever so slowly and taunting me all the same.

*

Although I’ve only seen a carefully curated scrapbook of his life – friendly pictures and exaggerated biographical notes that would suggest one doesn’t have a single clue who they actually are – I know it’s him as soon as he walks under the low-lying arch of the entrance. I chose the venue; it was a risky move, and not somewhere I’d usually find myself, but I thought it would make me exude a carefree attitude. He looks right past me as his eyes scan the room – I knew he would. Not because he doesn’t recognise me or because his eyes have betrayed him, but as a part of that one-player game. He’s trying to make me feel insecure, as though my physical appearance doesn’t match up to what he saw and liked online. I know better, but I won’t let him know this – at least not yet.

‘Evie?’

I didn’t realise we knew each other well enough to already be using nicknames, but I’ll go along with it.

‘Hi! Dan?’

‘Hey, how are you?’

Is he asking because he genuinely wants to know, or is it merely a box that he’s ticking? Assuming the worst and in an attempt to remain on the same wavelength, I don’t give a genuine answer.

‘Great, thanks – and you?’

‘Good. A bit chilly outside – isn’t it?’

Oh god, we’re already onto the uncomfortable small talk. Of course, it’s fucking cold, it’s November for heaven’s sake. Have I not been enthusiastic enough? I should probably work on that.

‘Tell me about it! Shall we order a drink to warm up?’

Anything to distract me from the social awkwardness and total lack of connection. Anything to speed up this arduous process. I suppose I’m not really giving him a chance – he could be lovely; he could just be nervous. But unfortunately – for both him and me – I’ve been through this far too many times to not be sceptical. Not to mention, all I can think about is that dreaded walk home through the metropolitan wood.

‘So, I’m not gonna lie – you’re actually the oldest chick I’ve ever dated.’

I sit and ponder this. His profile definitely stated an age of twenty-seven. Interesting.

‘Oh, really? How come you did in fact match with me then – if you don’t mind me asking, of course?’ I mind asking. I am a whole two years younger than him, and suddenly I dread where this conversation is going.

‘Most chicks around my age want children – I’m not ready for that. But your profile said no children, can’t have them, huh?’

‘I just don’t want to…’ I don’t even get the chance to finish that thought.

‘Oh, strange, but cool. You’ll probably change your mind though, hey? Accidents happen too. You wouldn’t get an abortion, would you?’

*

I’ve known this man two hours, and already that’s more than enough. It’s clear we have different views on the world and I suddenly feel sick to my stomach. And, just like that, I feel his bare hand breaking the smooth flesh of my abdomen and digging deep within the depths of my soul. He doesn’t retract it until he has a firm grasp on my bleeding womb; untimely ripped. He pockets it, without any regard for its delicacy – as though it’s merely spare change that he’ll ultimately forget about and find in the bottom of his washing machine weeks, maybe even months, down the track. Stitching me back up with his piercing gaze, I sit in silence; mourning what is no longer mine to have or to control.

The conversation thankfully changes course, yet it doesn’t take any turn for the better. My modern Frankenstein is back to what he does best. I watch his gaze flicker from my lips to my breasts; I watch his eyebrows scrunch in disappointment; I watch as he mentally enlarges them by at least two cup sizes. For a moment, I think I even see his eyes glow. All in a minute’s work. If circumstances were different, I might have found it impressive. As I tuck my dirty blonde hair behind my ears, I see him turning it a few shades lighter – turning my skin a little more sun kissed. And as I speak, I see him searching his briefcase for a needle and thread – anything to stop the drone of words leaving my mouth. I am his monster – both before he has had his way with me and afterwards.

I can see him clear as day, subconsciously moulding me into his own creation; something that could never naturally exist. But there’s nothing I can do to prevent it. At that moment, I feel the weight of Anne, Maria, and Diana; of Zelda and Zora; Virginia and her Judith; of Edmonia and Artemisia – of the women that history neglected. The flames of their stories extinguish as the candle wax wanes. They are perched on my shoulder, floating around my head, clinging to my ear. I hear their whispers of consolation in anguish, and I hear their voices; a collective roar of feminine force. My skull holds the whirlwinds of absolute rage manifesting as a single tear on my cheek upon an otherwise poised demeanour. To compromise my composure would be interpreted through a funnel of innate femininity. Innate not in womanhood, but in the gaze we are met with.

‘Oh, what’s wrong?’ The man I barely know looks at me with a crooked brow.

‘Oh nothing, just a really long week.’ I’m struggling to not let my emotions get the better of me.

‘On your period, huh?’

It’s shock. That’s what this feeling is. I struggle to contain myself any longer, despite the fact that we are in a very public place that is filled to the brim with male customers. I imagine myself on the stake, their fiery wrath licking my hard skin as it curls around my wrists. The pain is there, a distant stinging sensation – the kind you can forget about when your mind is occupied. My mind is always occupied, and they don’t like it. But I don’t let it encompass me. Don’t let it devour me in one foul swoop. It means I’m still here, and I’m still me. I drown out their growls and protests, barely even able to make out their unshaven beards and bare feet behind the gates of my prison cell. I instead focus on the calming sounds and sensations of my own bare feet on the hot embers as I shift my weight from one foot to the other in discomfort. Judging by their behaviour you’d think I’ve got pit of snakes erupting from my skull, ferociously snapping on command and wounding my next victim. But in contrast, the hair on my head, although messy, is an ordinary dirty blonde. In fact, the base of my neck still hosts the ringlets of a young girl – innocent and unsuspecting.

‘Evie, you good?’

He hasn’t even taken notice of the pure anger and hatred brimming in my eyes, and the men at the tables surrounding us are looking on in amusement. I won’t flee. I’m not a damsel in distress. I can do this.

‘Yeah, all good. I think I should probably get going, though – it’s getting pretty late.’

‘Oh, so soon? At least let me walk you ho–’

‘Somehow, I think I would be safer without you.’

I don’t wait for a response; I don’t even look back to gauge his reaction. I walk out of the bar calmly and with confidence, back onto the uncivilised streets. Back to the rest of the wolves. The eyes are still there, glowing at me in the darkness in their threatening way. But they’re silent. They wouldn’t dare utter a single word, for they’d be met with the beast.

*

I make it back to my apartment safely, all twelve blocks alone. I change into my pyjamas, grab a tub of Ben and Jerry’s cookie dough ice cream and sit on the couch I have bought in a living room I pay for myself. Staring out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the dazzling lights and full moon, I smile to myself. I’m okay here, exactly as I am. It’ll be a long time before I go on another date with a man. And I realise that I am completely okay with that; with having myself – away from the faceless monsters whose glowing eyes have turned me into a beastly thing myself.

Jasmine Oke is an English and Creative Writing major previously published in both The Quarry and Grapeshot. Experimentation and the exploration of feminine identity are what excite her most about fiction but, when not reading or writing, Jasmine is also an avid consumer of period dramas, theatre, and live music.

No Woman’s Land, Teresa Peni

There were no spaces left to lay down on the grass, so quite a few ladies sunbathed on the rocks that circled the women’s sea pool, like lizards, like litter, like a colony of seals. Their luminous arses wreathed the giant sandstones.

I looked at them and thought, I was twenty-something, once. I debated taking up residence in the old handball court up the back corner, usually the reserve of saddle-bagged pensioners or hairy-lipped lesbians. Rocks or court?

The court was supposed to be a quiet space, there was a new sign—no music, no talking, no phones—what wasn’t specified but everyone knew, no clothes. One woman was already there, baking herself like an overcooked gingerbread. This snug, private corner was created by two adjoined concrete walls; this had once been a space for fit girlies to bounce balls around when it wasn’t the done thing do in public.

The woman slept. Thirty-ish, was my quick assessment. A sliver of shade cowered in the corner. I put my things there, as far away from her as possible.

Down the steep cliff steps to the sea pool; time for a swim, time to cool off and get a feel for the place. Time to fit in. The water was busy. There are too many people in the world already. One or two strokes were all I achieved before some Russian dame with her hair piled up nearly kicked me in the head. All shapes and colours, some of the women were swimming topless, others kept themselves discreet in shorts and singlets. A Muslim mother and daughter explored the rock pools in their burkinis. We all frog-kicked, floated, caressed the clean seawater, and avoided putting our feet down on urchins.

Talk, talk, talk, so many women, so many words. Beside me I heard Chinese interspersed with English: ‘Never again, I said!’

Crones exercised their flabby arms with aqua punches; ultra-slim teens minus any pockmarked cellulite slid their perfect thighs into our cool green world like elegant herons. They’d never drank alcohol, you could see it in their skin.  I took possession of the pool corner that poked out into the ocean, carved straight into the rock, and faced a blue horizon. Cleansing waves spilled over the edge, I let the frizzy foam spray all over my face. Like my husband’s gush. I thanked the sea for its Merlin healing tricks, Mother Earth for her massaging wetness.

Back up the cliff in the hot court now lazed three Arab women: a pair of sisters or maybe best friends, twinning, had arrived and spread out in the space between the lone lady and my sarong; two designer handbags bullied my beach bag, competing for the shade. Perched on their elbows in unison, their set of buttocks were lithe shiny olives intersected with G-strings. Why did women show their bottoms at the beach nowadays? I found it a bit off-putting. I remembered when going topless was all the rage, but we don’t really do that anymore, except down there in the Ladies’ Pool where men can’t particularly see us unless they’re kayaking past, hell-bent on a fitness mission. Everyone used to do it, didn’t they? Or was I remembering it that way because I was young back then, and that’s what we young people did. Getting your tits out in public had felt rebellious, even though it was okay by law; it was a political freedom. They’re just nipples, get over it! Blokes didn’t seem to mind at all, although it wasn’t something you did in front of your Dad. These days it’s a bit outrageous—my kids died of embarrassment and begged me to put my top back on at Cave Beach. Ahh, I see now—you do it with your friends. But now my friends were more inclined to cover up their post-baby bosoms, wracked with hard labour and gravity. I wondered if there was a link between the feminisms of the day and which body parts we exposed when sunbathing… perhaps there were also variations depending on one’s age.  I tried on a bummier costume in my mind.

The pair started chatting at full volume, waking the first woman from her sun trance.

‘You look like my friend Fatima,’ I couldn’t help but overhear. She was indeed a Fatima, but not the one from Bankstown. This nude Fatima kept her knees together enough to keep her secrets.

In my head I pointedly re-read the rules under the QUIET sign. It distinctly said, no loud talking. My jaw wobbled but I decided not to be a fussy old cow, in case they thought I was being a bit racist. Then, one of the sister-friends turned her phone volume up to torture me with some shitty dance-pop. I stuffed my earpods in and stripped my wet swimmers off, resigning myself to bronzing the parts of me that still looked Irish.

The summer holidays were over; I was free again. This trip to McIver’s Ladies Baths was to celebrate my kids going back to school. Nourish myself. I needed to un-tether from their universe. God this was lovely. It was so hot, the twins decided to go for a swim.

I finally gathered the courage to turn over, I needed to cook my other side. My pubes were sparse—it’s a fact of life they don’t tell you that happens after forty—balding. All those years of waxing etc and now I wish I had more lushness down there; it’d be ironic if Seventies-style bush became a thing again. Lying flat on my back, my tummy-fat roll stretched out in a less offensive way. Sweat dribbled down between the cracks. A big floppy hat covered my face to protect it from burning. I am a naked flower.

A timeless minute went by.

Sloshy wave sounds and cicada drone rolled through the heat.

Then, a little boy, maybe three or four years old, climbed the short fence separating the handball court from the grassy area where his mother sat, and perched himself up there, hovering right above my face. This was not how my day was meant to go, I had just dropped my son off at the school gates, I’d done my time. He was ruining the moment.

The Arab girls were back and cooed sweetly, giving him the attention he craved, ‘What’s your naaaame?’

Don’t encourage him.

He clung like a monkey to the fence, making toddler chirrups, settling in for more of their girl-love. A helicopter buzzed along the coast so I shifted my hat to hide my yoni from the sky.

‘Go see Mummy,’ I urged, ‘Bye bye.’

‘No, no, no,’ he shot back, and rearranged his penis, staring at my nipples as if it were lunchtime.

That. Was. It.

‘Excuse me, is this your son?’ I thrust my head over the fence to locate Mum. She was mid-conversation with a girlfriend, having a good old time. My boobs wobbled under my sarong as I spoke: ‘He’s staring at me and I don’t like it.’

He was probably only two, but I had not driven all the way across the city to this sanctuary for women, only to have a boy feel a throb. I didn’t care if he was just a kid. I registered the look of horror crawl over her face when she realised I was accusing her baby of being weird just now.

Words kept spilling out of me: ‘I have just dropped my child off for his first day of high school, so I don’t feel like babysitting,’ and promptly lay down again like a collapsing deckchair. I felt like crying.

All that mediation was obviously not working. I had failed some test. I remembered a meme from Instagram earlier in the day: It’s a lot easier to be angry at someone than it is to tell them you’re hurt. Your son is hurting me.

I miss my little boy.

The Arab sisters couldn’t believe it. There was a ‘discussion.’ They included Fatima. All three looked at me as if I’d levitated. I couldn’t hear what anyone was saying because (a) the language barrier, and (b) I’d jammed the earpods back into my boiling head. Instead, I caught the eye of the presumably elder sister and held up my hand—flat palm facing down to the ground, then twisting the wrist so my palm faced up again, then flickered it back and forth—palm down or palm up? Was that okay, what I just did?

She grimaced and gave me a weak thumbs-up.

You young ones, you’re people-pleasers, I thought.  But her eyes said, Wow, you just did that?

Yes. Yes, I did. He was annoying us all, admit it.

That was another thing about aging, you give different zero fucks.

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Games for Boys: The Myth that Women ‘Don’t Play’, Kaitie Andrews

The jaws of the dragon swing open and waves of blue flame envelop the dungeon. Black scales shine, and bones protrude through the leathery skin, rippling with each slight movement of muscle.

A colossal figure emerges from a stone archway and plunges a battle-axe into the gaping mouth of the shimmering beast. The Barbarian’s chainmail coats his muscular frame and blood seeps through cloth on his arms and legs. An Elven Ranger flings a careful arrow directly into the dragon’s icy blue eye, sending it reeling. The roar shakes every inch of the stone dungeon the party had just struggled through.

From the back of the room, a tiny man, with a lute, begins to strum, empowering the efforts of the attackers before him. The dragon bares his murky yellow teeth and claws at the Bard.

At the edge of the party a tall, slender Elven Sorcerer adorned in flowing robes of navy and gold lifts her wand. Cosmic energy flows through the dungeon as the rest of the party turns and waits for the Mage to unleash her devastating power.

The Sorcerer is elegant, proud, sexy; a fourteen-year-old girl’s fantasy avatar. My fantasy avatar, actually. A deep, too-dramatic backstory involving Fae ancestry weaves in and around my head as she speaks with words that are mine.

‘I cast Burning Hands on the drag –‘

My speech is cut off as the party collectively groans. I’m sitting at a makeshift table of books, which is covered with chips, dip, soft drinks and mobile phones. Halo and rock band posters adorn the walls, and I’m resting my head on an unmade bed. Crumpled clothes are spread across the floor like the autumn leaves outside. There is a d20 clutched in my hand as my body slowly begins to deflate.

‘You can’t use Burning Hands. You’ve already used your level 1 spell slots, remember?’ The skinny boy, with a shaved head sighs. ‘Seriously, how many times do we have to go through this?’

‘Leave her alone, she’s getting it,’ my friend the Bard, sitting to my left, gives me a thumbs up. I smile back at him and look down at my cantrips instead.

‘I’ve got this.’ I nod my head and pump my fists a little, hoping that I’m assuring the group.

This was my first Dungeons and Dragons campaign. We were at Matt’s house, our Dungeon Master. I’d only been invited because the Bard wanted to get in my pants. But I’d begged to go because the idea of a group of people sitting together and tapping into our imaginations was intoxicating. At the time, it seemed worth it to put up with the pimply bag of hormones waiting eagerly for his turn to play.

I wondered if, months after starting Dungeons and Dragons, when the friend who brought me along tried to plant a sloppy kiss on my neck and grope my breast that perhaps I’d gone too far in my quest to regain entry into this magical world. I tried not to let this ruin my love of the game, but suddenly every newbie mistake I made was no longer endearing in his eyes. I couldn’t shake the feeling that the seductive Sorcerer had become a liability to the party. I quit a few weeks later.

Growing up, I used to play Power Rangers with boys in my class amongst the grim concrete of our schoolyard. I would go to my next door neighbour, Steve’s house, and we would trade Pokemon cards. My friend Nick had a Nintendo 64 and sometimes Mum would let me go over after school to play Banjo Kazooie. These experiences and my sense of play and imagination were ruined so much earlier than my friends for one reason: If you’re a woman in a male-dominated space, whether it be in the corporate world, your home life or just in the hobbies you enjoy, there is a danger.

For years, I felt that sometimes I was reconciling my sense of personal safety just to be ‘one of the boys’ – innocent neighbourly visits as a young girl turned into late night walks to a friend’s place with a console with a group of guys I’d just met. Where were all the fellow women?

In 2014, The Internet Advertising Bureau published statistics that 52% of all UK gamers were women.[i]

I found this statistic only weeks after it was published. It was a hot topic on many online message boards, including Reddit. It rocked the minds of many young nerds, especially those used to the sausage fest that gaming discussions and events had become. Despite the pervasive and unavoidable belief that women are endangered in gaming culture – to some extent, they represent or are, approaching the majority.

Did the possibility of a more inclusive future of gaming where women wouldn’t have to feel at risk excite these guys? Nope – it terrified them.

Why? The myth, that women just ‘don’t play games’ or that it is a male-dominated hobby, seeps through every nook and cranny in gaming literature and representations in popular culture. Let’s be real – the first thing many people, myself included, think about, in relation to ‘Dungeons and Dragons,’ are losers who drink copious amounts of Mountain Dew and don’t have girlfriends.

The idea of girls playing Dungeons and Dragons is unheard of in popular media. I had little interest most of my teen years. The image of dweebs with no social skills sitting around playing fantasy games is not enticing to a young girl. Comic book stores? According to pop culture, always run by lonely, fat men. Not flattering portrayals of people who just have shared interests.

This perception has not gone unnoticed by its participants. Men who identify themselves as gamers have gone so long being referred to as losers that when a woman finds interest in the same area, she’s often met with hostility. What gives her the right to intrude on their safe space? Why is she allowed to openly declare she loves World of Warcraft when I’ve been ostracised for it? She hasn’t earned it.

This idea sounds silly, and rightly so. But it exists. And it’s expressed through misogyny. I have a lifetime of experiences to show for this silliness. When working at EB Games, I had a customer roll his eyes and ask, ‘Okay, well, can I talk to a male that works here?’ when I admitted I was unsure about Yu-Gi-Oh cards.

It runs much deeper than just my experience playing Dungeons and Dragons. The gaming industry, as a whole, is still obsessed with producing games for boys.

You wouldn’t be wrong if you assumed that gaming is dominated by male audiences. Most forms of gaming and geek culture in media have had a heavy focus on being a male past-time, or an activity for boys. The gender bias is obvious. In a 2009 study of the 150 most popular games across nine platforms, it was found that 81% of all characters were male and 80% were white.[ii] In 2013, Variety reported that only an estimated 12% of the video game industry workforce was made up of women.[iii]

The issues with the 18% of characters who are female have been well documented. There are gallons of ink spilt over the topic. There are endless examples of troubling female representation in games: outfits and posturing for women are especially notorious. Women, such as Rydia in Final Fantasy IV, are overtly sexualised and pitiful in terms of protection, whereas main male characters, such as Cecil and Kain, are given practical protection – armour. The women in Mortal Kombat are interesting to look at, with their large breasted and barely-clothed bodies, they are expected to engage in bloody combat with heavily armoured brutes. Games such as World of Warcraft, constantly parodied for their rarest and strongest female armour, also happen to be the most revealing.

Perhaps we are reaching the crux of the reason that we assume women don’t enjoy video games. The impracticality and over-sexualisation of female bodies entrenches the idea that women are objects to satisfy the male gaze. Who cares if her ‘boob plate’ armour actually directs a blade to her heart, as long as she looks good?

Sometimes, being a woman of note, in an industry that caters to men, is dangerous. Anita Sarkeesian, a feminist blogger, runs a channel on Youtube called Feminist Frequency, which dedicates approximately one forty-minute video a fortnight to examine the harmful representations of women in video games. She has examined topics from the clothes of characters to tropes such as ‘Damsel in Distress,’ which exists in movies just as often. Pretty standard critiques. Yet, the amount of vitriol she’s received from self-professed ‘gamers’ has been horrific. Amongst public death threats, coordinated brigades to ‘downvote’ her videos and Twitter abuse, Sarkeesian was forced to cancel a speech at Utah State University in 2014 due to an anonymous bomb threat called into the venue.[iv]

It goes much deeper than just the physical sexualisation of women. Cultural ideas and harmful tropes are plentiful in all facets of the game industry. Developers can conjure up elaborate fantasy worlds in realms where magic, advanced technology, and aliens exist but still, somehow, retain the barbaric gender roles of current society. The Mass Effect series includes several races of aliens, which come from various points in the Milky Way all conjoining in one place called “The Citadel”. One of these races, the Asari, are an all-female race who, implausibly, have almost identical body shapes to humans with blue skin and minor variances. And what are the Asari known as being, besides the diplomats of the galaxy with a weird mating pattern? Negatively and notoriously sexually active. And strippers. Seriously – Asari are the only species shown being strippers in the strip clubs on various planets. How is it, that in a culture we’d expect to be drastically different to our human norms, a race with feminised human bodies are considered the sexual objects of the entire galaxy?

Video games currently surpass television in terms of time spent in some populations, with approximately one in five adults playing every day or almost every day.[v] It wouldn’t be unfair to say that the troubling representation of women in these games could influence players’ impressions of social reality to some extent.

Deep investigations into the psyche of a regular video-game player aside, the most important thing that the industry can do at this point to encompass 52% of their player base is to reverse the toxic mindsets excluding women. I can’t emphasise my passion for representation enough. As a young woman who enjoys the hell out of seeing cool women represented without tiny outfits, and needlessly sexualised backstories, I want young girls experiencing this in their media as early as possible. Badass female protagonists have been kicking around in indie titles for years, and we are witnessing an emergence of critically acclaimed AAA titles such as The Last of Us, Beyond Two Souls and Life is Strange that feature interesting women who are grounded, who struggle with real problems and aren’t defined by their relationships to men. Despite the clear abundance of men in the gaming industry, amazing initiatives to encourage women to become involved in the industry are springing up. Macquarie University offers a ‘Women in Games’ panel once a year, and international groups such as WIGSIG (Women in Games Special Interest Group) in the IDGA are fighting the good fight.

But, overall, why is the game industry still stuck in the frustrating mindset that their audience is majority men? Why are 80% of these characters white and male? It all comes back to the ‘loser theory.’ Game developers know that ‘gamers’ have gone so long being perceived as non-powerful social outcasts. Young, white men want to be powerful white adults. So, fantasy is created out of these preconceived notions of gamer demographics. It’s a self-fulfilling cycle.

Gary Alan Fine wrote a book, ‘Shared Fantasy,’ that discusses role-playing games and the separation between reality and fantasy. It notes that, in Dungeons and Dragons campaigns, it was common behaviour that ‘non-player male characters who have not hurt the party are executed and female non-player characters raped for sport’.[vi] There’s a separation between the game world and real life – the ‘magic circle’ if you will. But ideas and values are capable of oozing through, venomous and sticky.

In the campaign in Matt’s room, when I was 16, and because I’m a girl, my character was allocated unique tasks by the rest of the party. The party stood in front of a merchant, snow beginning to pepper their skin. They had just defeated the monstrous beast in the dungeon, and upon emerging victorious were greeted with another pressing quest on the mountaintop. The mountain in question loomed behind the rickety stall, plastered with weapons, food, clothes and survival gear. The merchant, a Dragonkin with a thirst for gold, hisses at them. ‘That’s 20 gold for a coat, and that’s the cheapest thing I can give you.’

‘Surely we can get it cheaper than that,’ the Bard pleads. Beside him, the monstrous Barbarian scoffs.

‘Look, we don’t need this. Listen dude. We have an Elven girl here. She’s top of the line. She can get us a discount right?’

The Elven Sorcerer, who had been examining a glass pendant at the stall, froze. ‘Get a discount how, exactly?’

‘You know, give him a favour. Something to remember us by. I’m sure it’ll be better than any gold.’ The Barbarian winks.

The entire party starts guffawing. The Elven Sorcerer joins in before the Bard pushes her forward with glee.

‘Make it nice and wet!’ he laughs.

At the time, I thought it was funny. I just wanted to fit in and not ruin the fun. But a part of me knew my proud Elven Sorcerer would want no part of this.

I play Dungeons and Dragons with another group now – they’re awesome. We’re guys and girls playing a patchwork of genders with no boob plates allowed.

I’m in love with my imagination again.


 

Works Cited

[i] Internet Advertising Bureau 2014, More women now play video games than men, viewed 24 August 2016, http://iabuk.net/about/press/archive/more-women-now-play-video-games-than-men?_ga=1.227578909.1233071847.1411029683, para 5.

 

[ii] Williams, D et al. 2009, ‘The virtual census: representations of gender, race and age in video games’, New Media & Society, vol. 11, no. 5, pp. 815-834, pg 827.

 

[iii] Graser, M 2013 ‘Videogame Biz: Women Still Very Much in the Minority’, Variety, 1 October, viewed 28 August 2016, http://variety.com/2013/digital/features/womengamers1200683299-1200683299/, para 3.

 

[iv] Wingfield, N 2014 ‘Feminist Critics of Video Games Facing Threats in “GamerGate Campaign’, The New York Times, 15 October, viewed 28 August 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/16/technology/gamergate-women-video-game-threats-anita-sarkeesian.html, para 2.

 

[v] Williams, D et al. 2009, ‘The virtual census: representations of gender, race and age in video games’, New Media & Society, vol. 11, no. 5, pp. 815-834, pg 816.

 

[vi] Fine, G 2002, Shared Fantasy: Role Playing Games as Social Worlds, University of Chicago Press, pg 4.

 

 

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