“Oh girls, they just want to have fun,” she sang Cyndi Lauper, but for online gamers who imprudently decide to reveal their gender with a female pseudonym, the game can turn out to be a gymnasium to avoid misogynistic jokes and sentimental approaches, more or less welcome.
The data of a recent research of a significant sample of 900 women between China, Germany and the United States, commissioned by Lenovo to Reach3 Insight, aimed at analyzing the behaviors of female gamers and their opinion on how the female gender is represented in video games, are alarming: 59% of female gamers hide their gender identity during online games to avoid being verbally harassed in game chats, receiving unwanted comments or approaches.
Women who play video games use the same titles as men. 88% of respondents favor competitive games, 75% of the action / survival genre and 66% of shooters. Of this sample, 77% received sexist comments at least once during an online game.
In most cases these are phrases related to their playing skills.
the analysis
Video games change so as not to end up like dinosaurs
by Lorenzo Fantoni
It might seem like a trivial matter, but if you remember the case that involved in 2016 Geguri, one of the strongest professional Overwatch gamers in the world, who was accused during a major tournament of being too skilled not to cheat, it is understood that the situation has not changed: you are not good enough as a woman or you cannot be so good because are you a woman.
There is no shortage of phenomena on the list gatekeeping (in this case the exclusion from games due to gender affiliation) which are 65%, while 50% of the interviewees report that they want to avoid paternalistic comments. Gallant approaches are inevitable: 44% of respondents said they received unwanted and insistent comments about their sentimental situation while playing online. It is evident that even today many gamers easily confuse Tinder with game chat.
videogame
2020, the year in which Italians discovered eSports
by Lorenzo Fantoni
To improve the situation, 71% of the women surveyed believe that the commitment by the major manufacturers to rethink is necessary the advertising campaigns of their most famous video games, making them less stereotyped and more inclusive. 61% would instead like to see video game companies committed to forming all-female eSports teams.
Waiting for the evolution of the times, at the moment it is obvious that if you are a gamer and you just want to have fun online, it is better to use a male pseudonym, at the neutral limit.
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