My tutor, who I’m pretty sure is a girl, (and one of the most pure, undiluted types of cool I’ve met in many, many years) asked me an interesting question today. It went along the lines of “Why is it when I go into EB Games,” (shock! A GIRL who goes into video game stores!!!!1!!!111!1!!) “and there’s a guy at the counter, he always assumes I’m buying for my brother or boyfriend?” The fact is, this is indicative of a snotty, patronising attitude that many guys who play video games frequently (hardcore gamers) have toward females. It’s not even based on proof – just suspicion, gender-based stereotypes that need to be addressed. This is a sexist attitude, to say the least.
I believe it’s because for the cliche nerd – young, male, wears glasses, is into maths and science and grew up with a Nintendo controller in one hand and a Sega controller in the other (yes, I just referenced the Mana Bar’s cast bio for Misty, one of the lovely, young and attractive female bar staff) and painfully shy around, if not downright antagonistic towards, the opposite sex. Our cliche nerd doesn’t have an off button, and his behaviour towards the female species is offputting, as is his smell and pimply face. This nerd grows up – so to speak – and gets a job at EB Games. He deals with other males who are all as into gaming as he is – to put it one way, they only play on hardcore difficulty.
The thing is, they forget that once upon a time, they were a newbie too. Never mind that when they were 5, they were playing Sega, while girls – at least in his oppinion – were playing with Barbie dolls. When he was 15, he built his own PC. When girls his age were 15, they played with makeup and giggled a lot. But they also did something else, one would think – shopping. This involves a little known thing called Talking To People. Okay, so in reality, customer representatives’ biggest complaint, from what I’ve observed, is that customers are both stupid and rude. But the theory is, good customer-representative dealings involve civilised conversation. And this, is where our cliche nerd stereotype fails. Yes, I said ‘fails’. I’m such a geek.
Our stereotype hasn’t learned the idea that women are human beings too. Our stereotype thinks girls can’t seriously be buying games for themselves, because A) the market for girls’ games is… under-represented, to say the least; B) the social norm is that girls play with Barbie and shop for make-up as teenagers, go travelling for a bit, then find a man, settle down and procreate; C) any girl who doesn’t follow the norm does not exist, is not real, and cannot possibly walk into EB Games to buy a game for HERSELF, because she clearly doesn’t have an Xbox and D) couldn’t possibly have an skill at games. Further, E) she has to prove herself to gamer guys in order to be taken seriously (gee, that’s not a reflection of history!) I would like to point out that F) girls like this are pure awesome, and I want to more like them.
I’m sure it’s not EB Games’ fault, or agenda, to foster this kind of attitude. I’m sure management doesn’t care what chromosone you have. I for one would love to have a book-reading, game-playing, awesome girlfriend. I think this is my deal-breaker, even. Guys who work at a game store and patronise and condescend girls, let alone based on pre-concieved notions of gender inequality, need to sit in on a women’s issues class, get some understanding of how unfair that snobbish, elitist, macho bullshit attitude is, and maybe – here’s a thought – try making the experience better for girls so that they’ll actually come within a foot of this type of guy. Sure, I understand it’s a little humiliating to be beaten by a girl, sometimes. It may be so baffling, shocking and awesome to think that a girl could possibly be spending her hard-earned dollars on herself in the store YOU work in, that your instinct is to spurn this occurance, deny the possibility and talk down your nose at said girl who just wants to see what the fuss about Gears of War 3 is.
For anyone interested, here are some links.
http://www.manabar.com.au/theteam.php – this is probably a bit old, as I did not see either of them there, but as you can see, there are FEMALES on the page. That’s right. Proof that girls do game. (and what awesome girls at that!)
http://gamergirls.com/ – enough said.
PS: I recently talk a female friend to the Mana Bar, and showed her some video games, namely Mario Kart, Rock Band and Dead Rising 2. It was only for one hour, but this is the girl whom 6 hours with made all the miserable dates I’ve been on pale into the past. This outing was fun and educational.
…And she only beat me at Rock Band because I was rusty and only know Guitar Hero. If I’d been on top form I would have wiped the floor with her.
