Zhgarr
11-02-2007, 10:34 AM
I know, I know ... potentially dangerous topic. But you know, it's Friday... it was late last night and I feel like twiddling my thumbs at work and what other helps than reading gany and putting some oil on the fire? :tongue:
I just stumbled upon a discussion about this on a community site for women playing WoW (yeah I'm a long time member, more out of boredom than having a "need" to hook up with ladies specifically :P) causing people agreeing absolutely with this on one hand and others totally disagreeing with it. Here's an edited version of the article some guy wrote:
The Right Stuff (Women & Raiding) -by Ciderhelm
A lot of men are awful at WoW. So are a lot of women.
As you read through the following article you may have a gut reaction to either wholeheartedly agree or wholeheartedly disagree; I would hope that -- in either case -- you catch the nuance of my arguments. This is a gender issue that deals with problematic relationships in raiding guilds; as such, the article does not give as much credit as it should to the genuine friendships and solid couples that are the foundation of many guilds. Understand I do not intend for extremity.
You will find that I clarify twice that there is no realistic difference between men and women in gaming. I do not want to reinforce any view or tone that suggests this; as such, it becomes difficult to expand on the genuinely good aspects of both men and women and the non-gender issues that arise for everyone due to the context of this article.
Bit of background. I grew up Mormon; this meant I was raised in a semi-segregated setting, as many other large church organizations are. There was a Young Men's and Young Women's organization. While Sunday School was mutual, many of our other activities and weeknight get-togethers were based on age group and gender. In Boy Scouts, I would often head on long hikes where we'd head out, play Capture the Flag, fire slingshots at coyotes (this was a bad idea looking back at it), and generally handle all of the mischief that boys do. Through one 50-mile hike, we struggled together, and five of us nearly died on a glacier dropoff (which also marked the first and only time I've heard a Bishop swear). The Girl Scouts in our ward were also going on hikes and other activities -- but not with us. As I moved from this period of my life and graduated High School, I enlisted with the US Marine Corps -- which was so heavily segregated between men and women that women were only trained on the other side of the nation. The only woman I saw during boot camp was a female Drill Instructor (scared the hell out of me).
Some of you reading this are thinking about how old-fashioned I must be. That's fine, I'm not here to change your beliefs. I would suggest, though, that guys are all pretty well the same. We all want to have sex. Biologically, our body is not designed for ourselves, but for the next generation. If you doubt this, imagine the pain difference between getting punched in the shoulder and getting kicked in the primal nethers (or, for some of you, the motes).
In other words, the point of sexual separation is not about keeping us pious, but keeping us focused.
Now let's put this in the realm of World of Warcraft. In a raiding guild, an organization of dozens upon dozens of men, adding women into the mix causes certain reactions. Especially if she's single. Especially if she's talkative and has a nice voice. Especially if she's posted an attractive picture or video of herself.
For most men this produces no reaction either way. They are either married, dating, or simply level-headed enough to realize it's a worthless pursuit. If there is some attraction at any point, they carry themselves in a non-creepy way and keep private life out of guild business. However, the issues never rise from most-men, they rise from the lowest common denominator -- the guy who starts stalking this particular woman, or gets in a relationship that causes guild drama, or reacts irrationally elsewhere. Sometimes this moves to the point of multiple GM tickets, server transfers, and even phone number changes.
What Women Face
As clearly as I can say this: women are just as capable as men. There is no reasonable difference between them. Even if Warcraft were based on physical strength like other sports, women would probably be stronger than many men playing this game. Sad, huh? I do not want to categorize the two; this post isn't about actual differences, but perceived differences and very real, very common issues.
Here are my premises:
*Women are often not taken as seriously as men;
*Women are often not considered as good as men;
*Women are often seen as sex objects, even in a cohesive guild;
*Women have to work harder than men to be accepted and viewed as equals.
All of this is amplified by the anonymous nature of the Internet. For being the progressive, forward-looking future of our world, there is some irony at how rampant racism and sexism are by comparison to the 'real world.'
In an early Karazhan raid our guild completed shortly after the release of Burning Crusade, one very pronounced example of these stereotypes came up. One of the women in our guild, a Harvard student, quickly and correctly identified the Flame Wreath mechanic on the Shade of Aran. Don't move during Flame Wreath. She followed it up by noting that the Blizzard could not occur during a Flame Wreath -- another necessary observation for our guild, given we were doing this long before any guides were written.
She was completely dismissed. Instead, two of our DPS classes began having a shouting match with each other about the mechanic, not listening at all to the women. This led to confusion once we entered Aran's room, as the DPS'ers refused to follow the actual approach we were going with -- hers -- and wiped the raid.
As we came back and reformed in front of Aran's room for our next attempt, one of these men came up with a brilliant idea -- don't move during Flame Wreath. Blizzard doesn't occur during a Flame Wreath, after all! Disregarding the fact that the woman had already pointed this out exactly, and disregarding he was repeating it verbatim, he took credit and the others listened to him.
Some women may lack confidence or be afraid to make mistakes as a result of those sexist overtones. They, like everyone, want to be seen as equals, and be recognized based on merit. However, to become great players, all players must first make mistakes, and have friends and guild members who understand that those are mistakes everyone goes through, not mistakes caused by being women.
If you disagree with the above inequalities, you will probably disagree with the entirety of the following post.
Guild Leader's Perspective
Many women -- certainly not all -- either knowingly or unknowingly inject a large amount of drama into a guild. More often than not, bringing in a new, single female player is a gamble that winds up costing more than it gains.
Let's take the best of the bad scenarios. There is some mutual attraction or legitimate relationship built between a current member and the new female player. This can help the guild in the short-term because both players are working together to help gear each other up, farm gold, and perform other necessary functions; their effort always produces more than the sum of their individual efforts would have.
However, in the long-term, this often leads to a coupling of two people that is similar to cliques in a guild. Cliques are terrible things for an organization, where a small group of people acts totally independently of the guild for a long period of time, while simultaneously taking gear or loot from the guild. If you offend one person in the clique for any reason, no matter how rational or irrational, the others will leave the guild immediately. Further, the separation that they build makes them feel distant from the guild, and allows them to reinforce any bad feelings they have with each other. It's a quick, vitriolic spiral downwards that usually builds from unfounded gossip.
This is what happens with many couples. Though this can happen with either the guy or the girl in the relationship, often the guy will leave with the belief that he might actually get laid by this woman. Yeah, right. This is compounded by the fact that -- from a management perspective -- it becomes impossible to address very serious issues in gameplay with one person without running the risk of losing the other. You lose the ability to say, "your DPS isn't up to par with the others in your class," because that will often be quickly countered by the significant other in private tells, "how dare he single you out, when that other player is performing so badly!"
Another issue that stems from coupling and from established relationships is a difficulty in picking good leaders to advance in the guild. Three times in our guild we had major issues stemming from players who demanded their significant others have full access to Officer chat. This made us very uncomfortable, as we were unable to talk openly about many player issues. This, in turn, led to another problem -- one woman logged in her husband's Forum account, saw a criticism in a business-style memo where we listed DPS issues from our casters, and promptly began sulking and lashing out at us. Posts we thought were entirely private began funneling out to other members. Until we asked all three couples to leave the guild we could not use either Officer chat or our private Officer forums. This had left many of our Officers feeling devalued because there was not a clear communication between them and myself.
Some guys become attached to women to the point that they can't handle the inevitable rejection. They feel so ashamed by the whole ordeal that they feel the whole guild is looking down on them, when frankly, no one really cares. The woman, thoroughly disgusted, often acts completely blameless in the situation -- "but I didn't know when I sent him those dirty tells that he might take it the wrong way!"
As if this wasn't bad enough, there is a tendency among some women to try and flirt their way through the top. This is terrible because it tarnishes the legitimate business and personal relationships between leadership and other players.
I'm not going to say that we should have all-male guilds, and you'll realize this as you read farther. However, most raid guild leaders have thought it at some point. Nihilum even has a joking No Girls Allowed policy due to past drama.
The Right Stuff -- Profiles of Great Women
My guild was unique in that we had a lot of strong women from the very start. We had strong women in the guild in every kill from Lucifron to Kel'Thuzad, with all content in between. We recruited well and, while we made plenty of mistakes, we came out on top.
I'm going to name a large number of women who have impressed me. I was not on the best of personal terms with many of them, but it would be dishonest for me to not show respect for their work.
<I deleted this bit ... it's boring, needless and sounds like "I have gay/black/handicapped friends too!" - in my opinion
Conclusion
That's it. I've outlined the issues I faced as a male Guild Leader, as well as the complaints I've heard from women, and given the profiles of some of the many great gaming women I've met.
If you have issues with women as gamers, or have stereotypes, reconsider them, and understand that they are just as capable as men.
If you are a woman, understand that guilds have often had bad experiences with women, and while it's usually the fault of a male in the guild, it can leave otherwise accepting people with a little wariness. This isn't always sexism, it is just the reality of conflicts that occur when men and women start mixing together.
I understand I am subject to being absolutely wrong. It's true, I'm not a woman, and this is all from a guy's perspective. Please feel free to rant at me.
If you want the full article and for some reason want to read the long list of women that he considers good players, go ahead and visit: http://epicdolls.blogspot.com/2007_08_01_archive.html#2056957024106643560
I just stumbled upon a discussion about this on a community site for women playing WoW (yeah I'm a long time member, more out of boredom than having a "need" to hook up with ladies specifically :P) causing people agreeing absolutely with this on one hand and others totally disagreeing with it. Here's an edited version of the article some guy wrote:
The Right Stuff (Women & Raiding) -by Ciderhelm
A lot of men are awful at WoW. So are a lot of women.
As you read through the following article you may have a gut reaction to either wholeheartedly agree or wholeheartedly disagree; I would hope that -- in either case -- you catch the nuance of my arguments. This is a gender issue that deals with problematic relationships in raiding guilds; as such, the article does not give as much credit as it should to the genuine friendships and solid couples that are the foundation of many guilds. Understand I do not intend for extremity.
You will find that I clarify twice that there is no realistic difference between men and women in gaming. I do not want to reinforce any view or tone that suggests this; as such, it becomes difficult to expand on the genuinely good aspects of both men and women and the non-gender issues that arise for everyone due to the context of this article.
Bit of background. I grew up Mormon; this meant I was raised in a semi-segregated setting, as many other large church organizations are. There was a Young Men's and Young Women's organization. While Sunday School was mutual, many of our other activities and weeknight get-togethers were based on age group and gender. In Boy Scouts, I would often head on long hikes where we'd head out, play Capture the Flag, fire slingshots at coyotes (this was a bad idea looking back at it), and generally handle all of the mischief that boys do. Through one 50-mile hike, we struggled together, and five of us nearly died on a glacier dropoff (which also marked the first and only time I've heard a Bishop swear). The Girl Scouts in our ward were also going on hikes and other activities -- but not with us. As I moved from this period of my life and graduated High School, I enlisted with the US Marine Corps -- which was so heavily segregated between men and women that women were only trained on the other side of the nation. The only woman I saw during boot camp was a female Drill Instructor (scared the hell out of me).
Some of you reading this are thinking about how old-fashioned I must be. That's fine, I'm not here to change your beliefs. I would suggest, though, that guys are all pretty well the same. We all want to have sex. Biologically, our body is not designed for ourselves, but for the next generation. If you doubt this, imagine the pain difference between getting punched in the shoulder and getting kicked in the primal nethers (or, for some of you, the motes).
In other words, the point of sexual separation is not about keeping us pious, but keeping us focused.
Now let's put this in the realm of World of Warcraft. In a raiding guild, an organization of dozens upon dozens of men, adding women into the mix causes certain reactions. Especially if she's single. Especially if she's talkative and has a nice voice. Especially if she's posted an attractive picture or video of herself.
For most men this produces no reaction either way. They are either married, dating, or simply level-headed enough to realize it's a worthless pursuit. If there is some attraction at any point, they carry themselves in a non-creepy way and keep private life out of guild business. However, the issues never rise from most-men, they rise from the lowest common denominator -- the guy who starts stalking this particular woman, or gets in a relationship that causes guild drama, or reacts irrationally elsewhere. Sometimes this moves to the point of multiple GM tickets, server transfers, and even phone number changes.
What Women Face
As clearly as I can say this: women are just as capable as men. There is no reasonable difference between them. Even if Warcraft were based on physical strength like other sports, women would probably be stronger than many men playing this game. Sad, huh? I do not want to categorize the two; this post isn't about actual differences, but perceived differences and very real, very common issues.
Here are my premises:
*Women are often not taken as seriously as men;
*Women are often not considered as good as men;
*Women are often seen as sex objects, even in a cohesive guild;
*Women have to work harder than men to be accepted and viewed as equals.
All of this is amplified by the anonymous nature of the Internet. For being the progressive, forward-looking future of our world, there is some irony at how rampant racism and sexism are by comparison to the 'real world.'
In an early Karazhan raid our guild completed shortly after the release of Burning Crusade, one very pronounced example of these stereotypes came up. One of the women in our guild, a Harvard student, quickly and correctly identified the Flame Wreath mechanic on the Shade of Aran. Don't move during Flame Wreath. She followed it up by noting that the Blizzard could not occur during a Flame Wreath -- another necessary observation for our guild, given we were doing this long before any guides were written.
She was completely dismissed. Instead, two of our DPS classes began having a shouting match with each other about the mechanic, not listening at all to the women. This led to confusion once we entered Aran's room, as the DPS'ers refused to follow the actual approach we were going with -- hers -- and wiped the raid.
As we came back and reformed in front of Aran's room for our next attempt, one of these men came up with a brilliant idea -- don't move during Flame Wreath. Blizzard doesn't occur during a Flame Wreath, after all! Disregarding the fact that the woman had already pointed this out exactly, and disregarding he was repeating it verbatim, he took credit and the others listened to him.
Some women may lack confidence or be afraid to make mistakes as a result of those sexist overtones. They, like everyone, want to be seen as equals, and be recognized based on merit. However, to become great players, all players must first make mistakes, and have friends and guild members who understand that those are mistakes everyone goes through, not mistakes caused by being women.
If you disagree with the above inequalities, you will probably disagree with the entirety of the following post.
Guild Leader's Perspective
Many women -- certainly not all -- either knowingly or unknowingly inject a large amount of drama into a guild. More often than not, bringing in a new, single female player is a gamble that winds up costing more than it gains.
Let's take the best of the bad scenarios. There is some mutual attraction or legitimate relationship built between a current member and the new female player. This can help the guild in the short-term because both players are working together to help gear each other up, farm gold, and perform other necessary functions; their effort always produces more than the sum of their individual efforts would have.
However, in the long-term, this often leads to a coupling of two people that is similar to cliques in a guild. Cliques are terrible things for an organization, where a small group of people acts totally independently of the guild for a long period of time, while simultaneously taking gear or loot from the guild. If you offend one person in the clique for any reason, no matter how rational or irrational, the others will leave the guild immediately. Further, the separation that they build makes them feel distant from the guild, and allows them to reinforce any bad feelings they have with each other. It's a quick, vitriolic spiral downwards that usually builds from unfounded gossip.
This is what happens with many couples. Though this can happen with either the guy or the girl in the relationship, often the guy will leave with the belief that he might actually get laid by this woman. Yeah, right. This is compounded by the fact that -- from a management perspective -- it becomes impossible to address very serious issues in gameplay with one person without running the risk of losing the other. You lose the ability to say, "your DPS isn't up to par with the others in your class," because that will often be quickly countered by the significant other in private tells, "how dare he single you out, when that other player is performing so badly!"
Another issue that stems from coupling and from established relationships is a difficulty in picking good leaders to advance in the guild. Three times in our guild we had major issues stemming from players who demanded their significant others have full access to Officer chat. This made us very uncomfortable, as we were unable to talk openly about many player issues. This, in turn, led to another problem -- one woman logged in her husband's Forum account, saw a criticism in a business-style memo where we listed DPS issues from our casters, and promptly began sulking and lashing out at us. Posts we thought were entirely private began funneling out to other members. Until we asked all three couples to leave the guild we could not use either Officer chat or our private Officer forums. This had left many of our Officers feeling devalued because there was not a clear communication between them and myself.
Some guys become attached to women to the point that they can't handle the inevitable rejection. They feel so ashamed by the whole ordeal that they feel the whole guild is looking down on them, when frankly, no one really cares. The woman, thoroughly disgusted, often acts completely blameless in the situation -- "but I didn't know when I sent him those dirty tells that he might take it the wrong way!"
As if this wasn't bad enough, there is a tendency among some women to try and flirt their way through the top. This is terrible because it tarnishes the legitimate business and personal relationships between leadership and other players.
I'm not going to say that we should have all-male guilds, and you'll realize this as you read farther. However, most raid guild leaders have thought it at some point. Nihilum even has a joking No Girls Allowed policy due to past drama.
The Right Stuff -- Profiles of Great Women
My guild was unique in that we had a lot of strong women from the very start. We had strong women in the guild in every kill from Lucifron to Kel'Thuzad, with all content in between. We recruited well and, while we made plenty of mistakes, we came out on top.
I'm going to name a large number of women who have impressed me. I was not on the best of personal terms with many of them, but it would be dishonest for me to not show respect for their work.
<I deleted this bit ... it's boring, needless and sounds like "I have gay/black/handicapped friends too!" - in my opinion
Conclusion
That's it. I've outlined the issues I faced as a male Guild Leader, as well as the complaints I've heard from women, and given the profiles of some of the many great gaming women I've met.
If you have issues with women as gamers, or have stereotypes, reconsider them, and understand that they are just as capable as men.
If you are a woman, understand that guilds have often had bad experiences with women, and while it's usually the fault of a male in the guild, it can leave otherwise accepting people with a little wariness. This isn't always sexism, it is just the reality of conflicts that occur when men and women start mixing together.
I understand I am subject to being absolutely wrong. It's true, I'm not a woman, and this is all from a guy's perspective. Please feel free to rant at me.
If you want the full article and for some reason want to read the long list of women that he considers good players, go ahead and visit: http://epicdolls.blogspot.com/2007_08_01_archive.html#2056957024106643560