"You're a Fake Geek!" and Sexism among Geeks/Nerds/Etc (us)

[HeySeuss]

I was witness to a discussion between a friend and another party about roleplaying games and it struck me that geeks can be pretty sexist; the conversation was between someone who had played D&D a lot longer and someone who hadn't, but the latter party seemed to have trouble taking the former party seriously because they were a girl. It became, almost, a series of cliches like, "Oh! I'm shocked a girl likes that sort of thing" and other comments in that vein that question their authenticity.

It was like he couldn't accept that she was playing D&D longer, more often and knew way more about it than he did. It became an e-peen contest where the guy just couldn't accept that her geek e-peen was definitely way bigger. I was a bit flabbergasted by witnessing the entire discussion, and it's sort of been sitting there in the back of my head for a while.

So of course, I googled 'fake geek' and permutations of that and found a huge trove of memes and some articles in surprising places like CNN. Almost all of it was targeted at women. Some of the rebuttals were hilarious.

So I'm coffeed up and finally ready to ask the question: How do you separate the people with legit interests from the people you consider 'fakers' and how do you feel about sexism within communities like this one and similar, that cater to geek interests, and what has your personal experience of some of this been? How much of this 'fake geek' ranting is legitimate and how much of it is sexism? And, not that I need to say this, feel free to interject anything else you feel about the topic (while staying Fonz cool. )

Oh, and let's try to keep it Fonz cool. If you don't hit that 'post' button immediately upon finishing writing, it really is okay. You can take a minute and go, "Yeah, I could phrase that better." Also, try to stick to attacking the views and not the person.

[Gwazi Magnum]

*rolls eyes*

This sexism in geek culture really annoys me.
We're meant to be the outcasts who were judged and generalized and should best relate to what it feels like.
Not turning around and doing the same to others.

And being perfectly honest it was a girl who had introduced me to D&D also, so a girl playing D&D holds zero shock factor for me.

As for your questions:

-How do you separate people with legit interests from fakers?
On a case by case basis you really can't 95% of the time. Unless if they clearly know nothing about what they claim to like (and all they seem to do is gloat about liking it).
Even then that's a bit unfair though, cause with me for example I dress like my profile pic shows at college a good amount of the time (found I liked the look :P) but haven't been able to see much of the 4th Doctor/Tom Baker yet, so those who see the hat and scarf and ask me a ton on that doctor specifically might walk away thinking of me as a fake.

-How do I feel on sexism in these communities?
See the first part of my post.

-Personal Experience?
Just one time in a D&D group where we were all starting a second campaign, and a new player was joining. When that player learned one of the players as a girl he and his family went "OMG! A GIRL IN D&D!" while me and the rest of the group just rolled our eyes at the sexist reaction.

-How much of this fake geek stuff is legit?
Somewhat depends on the area, but I say the overwhelming majority of the time this is just sexism.
People unable to understand that someone who is a girl could be a geek and/or someone could be a geek but a new geek (or new to a certain geek thing) and their knowledge may be limited so far.

[Omega]

There are douchebags everywhere. You will never escape them regardless of community.

ironically the people who I have encountered who are very judgmental of people being real nerds are not very nerdy themselves and find many things, "too nerdy" for them. Hilariously some even claim things like D&D are not really nerdy things.

[Brovo]

Warning: This post contains vulgarities. This is normal of most of my posts involving gaming because that's where I tend to let loose with them, but I've attempted to curb them here to make it at least semi-family friendly.

Oookay, here we go. I'll try to depict this from the men's side of things just as a play on Devil's Advocacy because in all honesty I find this more of a grey issue and typically not all that big an issue, but, hey, here we go, time to dive head first and light the dynamite laid here tonight.

HeySeuss said -Twitter pic-

This isn't a really big deal, honestly. Guys do this to other guys as well. Gamers in general do this to other gamers. It's nostalgia-based bashing. ex: "Oh you love the new X-Com? Well I bet you haven't played the original which is waaayyy better and waaayyy harder." This statement isn't necessarily true, it's just pride-based bashing, dick waving competitions, elitism, the norm between one human being and another in an inherently competitive environment.

HeySeuss said I was witness to a discussion between a friend and another party about roleplaying games and it struck me that geeks can be pretty sexist;

Please let me interject with the following: Everyone can be pretty bigoted, and most everyone at some point in their lives is. Geeks are a culture, they're an identifier of certain behavioural patterns and hobbies. They're not, however, liable to affect a person's own sense of bigotry towards others, as that tends to be affected by other things, like their parents or other authority figures growing up, news outlets and what they choose to digest, etc.

Anyway, just figured I'd note that being a gamer or not is totally irrelevant of whether someone is bigoted or not, and tends to jump the shark into generalizations territory.

HeySeuss said the conversation was between someone who had played D&D a lot longer and someone who hadn't, but the latter party seemed to have trouble taking the former party seriously because they were a girl. It became, almost, a series of cliches like, "Oh! I'm shocked a girl likes that sort of thing" and other comments in that vein that question their authenticity.

There's something wrong with noting that it's unusual for a person of the female gender to partake in a hobby traditionally dominated by the male gender? That's not so much a comment questioning authenticity as it is a comment of pure surprise, and really, not that unsurprising given the circumstances of gaming culture and it's traditionally male-dominated, male-oriented outlook.

Now, this compatriot of yours might have gone on to slate other comments that are intentionally derogatory or otherwise due to her gender, but that specific excerpt isn't one of those things. At least, not to me.

HeySeuss said It was like he couldn't accept that she was playing D&D longer, more often and knew way more about it than he did. It became an e-peen contest where the guy just couldn't accept that her geek e-peen was definitely way bigger.

This is, again, very normal between prideful gamers, male or female is irrelevant. Login to League of Legends sometime and watch the debates about champion balance. It gets pretty insanely over the top about why +10 damage on X is bad or why Y AP ratio isn't high enough to do Z, genders virtually never come up in that.

A prideful person who cannot take someone else knowing more than they do will use any tool at their disposal to try and drag the other person down. Including discriminatory remarks, ranging from homophobic slurs to gender curses. This is prolific across all of society and won't change so long as there are immature people in the world who partake in competitive things, or whom have egos.

HeySeuss said I was a bit flabbergasted by witnessing the entire discussion, and it's sort of been sitting there in the back of my head for a while. So of course, I googled 'fake geek' and and found a huge trove of and some articles in surprising places like . Almost all of it was targeted at women.

This is a bit of a grey issue. It has a lot to do with one side not understanding the point of the other side, but it tends to break down into three things.

#1: Male-dominated culture has long since evaporated save for a few "strongholds" of boys only clubs, like fighting and gaming and race cars and so on. To some, these things are being "infiltrated" and corrupted by women, giving them no outlet to wield their traditionally male-oriented, males-only views. This, in my opinion, is sad, and sexist, and is a perfect example of escapism gone horrible wrong, but it is a thing, and it's worth noting.

#2: Because there are female gamers out there who do actually use their gender as an excuse for fucking everything. Again in League of Legends, a recent example was a top lane that claimed to be a girl gamer in the vein of Team Siren, who fed the enemy four kills in eight minutes (an achievement in that game if there ever was one for performing badly) and it was asked that she play more carefully. She then stated that she was being harassed in all chat and screamed her head off about how she was being discriminated against for being a woman. Even though nobody knew she was a woman on the other team because she had been screaming in team chat the whole time, not all chat.

Basically: Using their gender as a scapegoat, or to whore attention, as opposed to simply going "yes I have a wonderful subset of biological organs that differ from yours, let us kicketh some ass" and leaving it at that.

#3: Because reverse sexism. Specifically in examples of sexy girl gamers, some tend to kneejerk react badly towards that in proclaiming that it objectifies women, even if the women in question are handsomely paid and/or enjoy wearing skimpy costumes to things like Comicon or Animethon. "Booth babes not apply" is a great example from CNN actually. The whole "oh it's evil evil" because sexy women dressing in sexy costumes is inherently evil. Think about that for a minute. There's sexism, and then there's the kneejerk anti-sexism taken too far that decries women from wearing what they might actually want to wear.

tl;dr: You have sexists who don't want girls in a boys-only club, you have girl gamers who do actually use their gender as a defense mechanism for everything and to whore attention, and you have anti-sexists who see attractive women in gamer-paraphernalia as being objectively sexist and thus it shouldn't be a thing.

It's hilarious then that the majority of gamer culture really doesn't care so long as you can play the game. It shows in that most games don't ask for your gender. They just ask for a username, a password, give you a weapon, and tell you to go smash shit in the name of Demacia/Noxus/Irelia/Earth/Aliens/Zombies/etc.

HeySeuss said So I'm coffeed up and finally ready to ask the question: How do you separate the people with legit interests from the people you consider 'fakers' and how do you feel about sexism within communities like this one and similar, that cater to geek interests, and what has your personal experience of some of this been?

Hell of a lot of questions so I'll try to summarize.

#1: Ask any questions about gaming. That usually does it. Not that fakers bother me, more positive attention and open acceptance of gaming is a good thing, traditionalists be damned.

#2: The sexism is usually not that bad. The few cases it happens is usually more in jest and poor taste in humour, or in cases where the person seriously invited it upon themselves. There are, however, some cases where it goes way the hell too far and even I feel uncomfortable. Like how some gamers reacted towards the lead female writer for DA 2/ME 3. Yes, her writing was terrible. No, sending death threats about how you're going to kidnap her children to stop her stupidity from spreading in the gene pool was not anywhere near fucking remotely acceptable as a response. What the hell. Same goes with Anita Sarkeesian: I do not in any way agree with her points, I think it's just the usual stupidity dribbled from the mouth of someone who has no clue how the hell stories work, tropes function, and human beings behave, but I still wouldn't issue her a death threat, and I wouldn't try to get her censored either. She's allowed to be a driveling idiot: I don't have to listen to it if I don't want to, but hey, some people and their idiotic crusades to purge anything they don't like, eh?

#3: My personal experience has gone both ways. Being irritated by women who use their gender to defend poor behaviour or make a game no longer fun by trying to whore attention, and seeing some people be sexist, bigoted assholes... But to be honest? Not much worse than what I see in the real world around me. It just seems the gamer community tends to be more insulated to this sort of shit so when it happens, it explodes, versus in the real world where we're so inundated with this stuff that it turns more into a "oh it must be Tuesday" type of event as opposed to "oh my god not this shit again" type of event.

Frankly, there's more that could be done to curb sexism in gaming, but it's not an imminent threat nor is it causing women any serious harm or danger aside from the mentally deranged who would actually follow through with death threats. It shouldn't be tolerated when it happens, but at the same time, this sort of thing doesn't heal or get better over night. It'll take more time. As it stands though we're better than we've ever been in the fact that we even have a notable female demographic that is actually recognized for once.

HeySeuss said How much of this 'fake geek' ranting is legitimate and how much of it is sexism?

Eh'... 50/50? It does exist, it is a thing, but some of it is just poorly disguised sexism. I tend to view it more as a case by case basis thing rather than broad brush stroking it. Also, as above, there are multiple kinds of it floating around. Some of it hilariously well intentioned, but ultimately destructive (ex: anti-sexism that inherently turns into sexism).

HeySeuss said And, not that I need to say this, feel free to interject anything else you feel about the topic (while staying Fonz cool. ) Oh, and let's try to keep it Fonz cool. If you don't hit that 'post' button immediately upon finishing writing, it really is okay. You can take a minute and go, "Yeah, I could phrase that better." Also, try to stick to attacking the views and not the person.

That's fine. Honestly I think gaming is one of the greatest equalizers we've ever invented. So long as you stay anonymous, your gender, your race, your cultural background or political affiliations don't matter inside, say, Counter Strike. You could be running back to back with someone whom is your complete opposite in every way, shape, and form, and who in real life you would argue with non-stop on everything they believe or everything you believe, but in the game? You both have guns. You both have the same objective. You're both faceless heroes or villains attempting to stop the bomb from being planted, or attempting to slip the bomb past those clever counter terrorists.

It only becomes a problem when we specifically bring these identifiers out into the limelight: Like proclaiming your grand socialism socialist love of socialism, or proclaiming how republican you are and how everyone should be republican, or wielding your gender/race as part of your identity instead of just being a character trait...

There needs to be balance, but, overall?... Anyone can grab a controller, log into a game, and blow away virtual opponents (AI or human) with allies. Anyone can load Skyrim and be the Dovakiin, anyone can load up Counter Strike and try desperately to outwit the other team with their own team, anyone can play League of Legends and try to destroy the enemy's nexus before they can destroy yours... And your own background is totally irrelevant in this unless you bring it up.

-That- is the magic of gaming's great equalizer. -That- is one of the core reasons I love video games and happily identify myself as a gamer, and welcome anyone who wants to join the club.

Sexism will never be purely nullified, but it can still be reduced. Same goes for homophobia, racism, etc, and in my honest opinion as these things dwindle in real life and slowly infiltrate people's minds, it will reflect in gaming as well. Just like it did in the film industry: Still not perfect, but better than it was before. By miles and leagues.

[HeySeuss]

Brovo said Everyone can be pretty bigoted, and most everyone at some point in their lives is.

Hah, I'm pretty sure I can be accused of being naive on this one. I just always felt that 'more geeks, especially geek girls is a good thing' and I'm a little baffled as to why some people resent the 'intrusion,' since I most certainly do not. It's possible I'm the only one taken aback by this.

In retrospect, my outlook failed to take human nature into account and perhaps explains why I got taken by surprise with that conversation. But at the same time, I think it's nice for the Guild to have these conversations. Incidentally, that conversation -happened- on the Guild IRC. I'm just not naming names.

[Brovo]

HeySeuss said
Hah, I'm pretty sure I can be accused of being naive on this one. I just always felt that 'more geeks, especially geek girls is a good thing' and I'm a little baffled as to why some people resent the 'intrusion,' since I most certainly do not. It's possible I'm the only one taken aback by this.In retrospect, my outlook failed to take human nature into account and perhaps explains why I got taken by surprise with that conversation. But at the same time, I think it's nice for the Guild to have these conversations. Incidentally, that conversation -happened- on the Guild IRC. I'm just not naming names.

It's fine, I don't mind. I figured it came from the IRC. :p

And hey, it's still worth talking about sometimes. It's still worth asking what more can be done, what is presently an issue, how is it an issue, how can it be dissected and repaired, etc. Questions are good. Opinion-loaded questions are the fire starters, which is why I didn't mind answering this thread in great detail.

[Example of what I mean]

Honest Question: What do you think of sexism in gaming? Do you think it is a thing or not?

Loaded Question: Sexy characters are a sexist objectification of women, do you think so? If not, then explain how it isn't!

One question asks for a person to explain their beliefs. The other has already taken a side and is trying to start a fight. :p You went the honest questions route so I didn't mind.

[Dead Cruiser]

My personal experience with this matter is that the "fake geek girl" phenomenon crops up mostly in girls in their younger teens, purely as a means of self-expression and wanting to be seen as unique compared to their peers.

But I really don't have that much stake in this debate and I mostly wanted to post this because I think it's hilarious.

[HeySeuss]

Brovo said
You went the honest questions route so I didn't mind.

Loaded questions don't get good answers. I want to know if people think it's a problem. I know my mind on it, but I tend to think that anyone's mind can be changed. Also, I'm encouraging people to describe their experiences with this sort of thing. That may also change some minds. We shall see -- changing a mind on the internet can be the rarest of all gems.

[IRLGoat]

Aahhh, I think... there are many ways to slice this topic.

As a girl, I can confidently say sexism is alive and well in the geek community. The problem is most dudes seem to have the same beliefs. That it isn't really the most vital topic, or that it is "typically not all that big an issue". Being a male in a male-dominant community makes it hard for you to empathize on our part, so I can understand... sorta...

Claiming that is isn't a big deal because it can happen to guys as well is also kinda... dumb. Claiming that "anything can happen to anyone, it just happened to happen to a girl" doesn't make sense. Because it almost always happens to girls. I highly doubt many guys get "You're faking it!" before "Cool shirt, bro!". Nor will they have their interests questioned... in order to prove their legitimacy like they're some sort of super secret spy woman.

My personal experience in attempting to join a geek community have been generally very poor. We have several card/hobby shops in the city. I have attended events in the past for M:TG games and after participating in one at each card shop, I stopped going. I love Magic. I love playing it. But it was so immensely awkward, I couldn't stand to go. It felt like I was an outsider, interrupting their fun. There are either guys trying to impress me with their knowledge, guys constantly correcting me or treating me like I had never played the fucking game before. So I said screw that. I've been on Gaia Online since 2004, and have had a male avatar for the vast majority of that. People would take you and your writing more seriously if you were even guised as a male. I've been told on LoL that I wasn't a girl. Sometimes it's even the girls themselves. I tried to join a local anime/cosplay group and was essentially alienated from everyone. So I left that too.

My experience has taught me to hide my interests, or at least speak very little about them. Games have objectified and sexualized women to outrageous ends. And let's not get started on females playing online games.

Suureee, anyone can pick up a controller and play a game. It is the responsibility of other players to make a girl feel comfortable and welcome. Which is hard cause most nerds don't exactly have the most experience with girls and think being a "nice guy" makes them the cats pajamas.

Brovo said ...And your own background is totally irrelevant in this unless you bring it up.

Although there are several things you've mentioned that are silly for me to hear from a guy but I'm going to focus on this one. This is really... not a great way to look at this subject. You have now turned the blame from the sexist male community and pointed the finger at the girls who "silly enough" to mention they are girls. That's like saying, "You wanna receive not-hate online? Just pretend you're a young, healthy, rich, white male from the US! Simple as that!" This fosters a toxic community. And sure, we can say, "Well there will always be trolls online! Girls can't complain because males get hated on too!" But it's different hate. This hate makes us feel like our interests aren't justified, that we're not "legit" enough to play with the boys.

I've been pretty fortunate since I surround myself with 90% male friends and they're all A1 people. SO YES. I understand that "not all guys are jerks". We can stop reiterating that. It's the guys who are being condescending and disrespectful without even realizing they're doing it. I think the largest problem in the geek community is the disbelief that sexism is happening.

EDIT: OH RIGHT.

Brovo said ...or wielding your gender/race as part of your identity instead of just being a character trait...

Alllrriigghhhtt. I don't know about you or anyone you know, but my gender really is a part of my identity. Like really, really. Your identity is comprised of what you are. A trait is a distinguishing quality. I really doubt many girls would say, "I think my best quality is my vagina for making me a girl." I identify as a female Canadian geek. My traits and qualities make up my personality. Just a thought...

[Gwazi Magnum]

@IRLGoat
(Using phone so direct quotes is a huge hassle)

Gaming is one of the few areas that I agree that women are clearly getting the shorter end of the stick. At least in terms of community, I think most attacks on the games themselves are one-sided and largely unjustified.

Unlike most gender issues, the gaming community doesn't have much of a "Women may face X, but Men face Y". It really is a case of just women being discriminated against.

I agree with most of what you say. Con's, Online gaming, Magic Tournaments etc have a bit to work on in how they treat women as equals.

But I would like to note that for some guys the overly niceness may not be on purpose. These are generally male dominated areas. Many men in them barely interact with girls in their lives.

I think it's silly in the first place that a girl makes then act so much differently in the first place. But they aren't used to it. Trying to hard to be nice or adapt is bound to happen. Think of it like little kids being taught manners, they don't always mean to be rude or odd, they're trying not to. But it doesn't always come off the way they want it to.

[Cayden Black]

Although I can't write a whole synapse on this subject, I can state my opinion.

Sexism in any factor is wrong. Now I may believe some things men do better and some women do better but I can't name them off the top of my head and besides, thats more down to physical design than anything else.
As for geek level, well, I have a very dam geeky sister but she doesn't know anything about the games or sci fi I play and watch but I don't know anything really about her D&D games or Eragorn books (though she still begs me to read them). We are all geeks in our own way it just depends on the field of study you prefer. I like HALO, Gears and fantasy/sci fi. She has similar interests but not in Gears or HALO.

In short, we're all geeks, just accept you work in a different department!

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

Beware of Geeks bearing sub-cultures.

[ASTA]

Never knew this shit was this serious.

[Jorick]

HeySeuss said How do you separate the people with legit interests from the people you consider 'fakers' and how do you feel about sexism within communities like this one and similar, that cater to geek interests, and what has your personal experience of some of this been? How much of this 'fake geek' ranting is legitimate and how much of it is sexism? And, not that I need to say this, feel free to interject anything else you feel about the topic (while staying Fonz cool. )

Separating those with actual interest in a subject from fakers is rather easily done by having even a brief conversation about whatever the thing is they're espousing interest in. If they actually know things about it, cool, they truly do like the thing, good for them. If they only know shit from what they saw in a trailer or read in a summary of a plot, odds are fair that they're bullshitting and just claiming to like some popular thing to fit in, which is pretty common in a lot of subcultures. Some person may want to fit in with some group who likes 70s and 80s rock, so they might claim to be way into it even if they only have a passing acquaintance with it. Happens all the time. It's silly, but it's also part of human nature: you try to imitate those who you want to become closer to. This is true even of mannerisms, where if you're talking to someone you like you'll subconsciously imitate their speech patterns and movements. It's just one of those weird things wired into the human brain, and it's no surprise that it gets applied to hobbies and interests.

I've noticed a moderate amount of sexism in various geek communities, and it's generally a bad thing, but I don't find it to be shocking in any way. Geek subcultures have long been ostracized and mocked, and even now there's plenty of bias against gamers and other groups (like how sensationalist news reporter assholes will always make a big deal out of it if some guy who killed someone with a gun played Call of Duty or any of the various other shooter games, or if they listened to a lot of metal), though it seems to be dwindling due to the rise of casual gaming. For instance, two people in this thread so far (IRLGoat and Magic Magnum) have said things to the effect of gamers rarely interacting with girls. The general prevailing sentiment is that nerds of all kinds are socially awkward people who retreat into video games because they suck at or are afraid of interacting with people, with optional additions of this making them creepy or insinuations that they have some mental illness or are prime candidates to be the next mass murderer. Given that foundation, that geeks of all stripes have been shoved into this little undesirable corner, is it really surprising that there'd be some backlash from them when the mainstream folks want to break down the walls that previously penned them in and then act like everything is totally cool and they should just be accepted into the nerd corner? I, for one, am not surprised in the slightest.

Oh, and there's also something of a clash of cultures going on, which compounds the issues further. Geeks tend to be pretty passionate about whatever they're into (which some would say is a core defining characteristic of, if not the very definition of, being a geek), highly invested in video games or card games of sci-fi or whatever, which leads to a rather vitriolic community. Arguments are frequent and heated, insults flung just as often as greetings, and yet this doesn't really tend to cause major divides or drama, it's just a regular thing. Ever seen two Trekkies arguing about which series was the best, or which captain? That shit can get brutal, but then far more often than not those two people will still be totally cool with one another afterward. So you have some resentment and feelings of invasion, plus a vitriolic community, and what you get is tons and tons of this vitriol flung at those viewed as interlopers. This isn't just against women, but they're a really obvious target for the more simple minded fellows of geekdom because the prevailing view of geek subcultures is still that they're male-only realms, both inside and outside of those actual communities; society at large sees them as guy things, and since the various communities are still very much male dominated they are seen as guy things. Is it sexist? Absolutely. Is that bad? Sure. No equivocation is possible there. Yeah, similar stuff happens to guys, and yeah, geeks challenge each other to geek e-peen contests all the time, but it's an undeniable fact that females are more frequently targeted by this kind of thing. I simply feel that there are very obvious and understandable reasons for why things are the way they are now, as I explained above. Time and further exposure of female geeks being a thing is really the only way to make it go away, and since that's already happening I'm not overly worried about the future of sexism in geek subcultures.

Oh, and the fake geek thing. Yeah, a lot of it actually is legitimate. Geek stuff is being brought more and more into the mainstream (for instance, The Big Bang Theory is one of the most popular shows right now and it's all about geek shit), to the point where geekiness is even a desirable trait in some circumstances, so of course people will pretend toward it. This goes along with what I was saying about how people will pretend toward something in order to garner positive attention, like saying you're into a certain kind of music so some group will like you. I've seen plenty of instances of fake geek stupidity, such as people wearing glasses with no lenses and then talk about how they're such a geek, or how someone will say they studied for some test and then say something like "I'm such a nerd" in a positive joking manner, or how some will talk about how they played <insert major blockbuster video game here> and that they're a huge geek because of it. It's pretty common on the internet, probably because geek stuff is generally viewed more favorably online than in real life, but it's also a thing in real life. Now, as for how much of it is sexism, I dunno. It does tend to be mostly females who pull the fake geek thing so far as I have seen, so it can get rather muddled. Calling someone on their bullshit isn't sexist if it really is bullshit, regardless of the gender of the bullshitter being called out, so I wouldn't count any of those as being sexist. I'd guess over 75% of the erroneous "you're a fake geek" type claims, maybe even higher than 90%, are levied against women because of stupid partly sexist reasons, so take that baseless estimate for whatever it's worth.

For gamers in particular, there's an additional factor that I think makes for more sexism in general. There are, and have been for a long time, women who go and play games online and make a huge deal out of the fact that they're female in order to get attention. Many of them also use their gender to get special things, like in MMOs they'll convince guys to give them good gear just because they're a girl, or to get into a good guild/clan on various games, and some even go so far as to get guys to send them money or gifts IRL. There is an argument to be made that the guys who go for this are idiots who deserve no sympathy, but that doesn't change the fact that these people are using their gender to get special treatment. Y'know what special treatment based on a particular trait is called? Discrimination, particularly the second definition listed here. They're setting themselves aside as a special group that deserves special treatment, which reinforces sexist notions that those of one gender should be treated differently than those of another. This group of attention whoring girl gamers tend to be annoying as all hell, acting like their gender makes them some kind of special snowflake that deserves to be treated like royalty. Someone viewing that happening enough times might make the generalization that those who identify as girl gamers are all like this, which would lead to some rather sexist behavior in all likelihood. Again, this isn't a justification or way of pardoning it, just an explanation of why it's so prevalent. Another issue that furthers these negative generalizations is that many women who play games don't tend to quickly identify themselves as a female, because there's no point to do so unless they're trying to be an attention whore since your gender has nothing to do with the game you're playing, so whenever someone in a game says "I'm a girl" out of nowhere the odds lie heavily in the favor of them being the attention whoring type. It's really awkward and unfortunate.

IRLGoat said It is the responsibility of other players to make a girl feel comfortable and welcome.

Um, what? I'm sure you've seen how guys (and plenty of girls, to be fair) behave toward one another in online games, tons of trash talk, very few comforting welcomes to be had. This varies between game communities, but you play League of Legends so you've definitely been exposed to a high trash talk environment. There are arguments to be made for why this should never be the case, but the fact of the matter is that gaming communities can be pretty toxic to people of all kinds. Why exactly should girls be given special treatment to be made to feel comfortable and welcome rather than getting the same spew of negativity everyone else gets? That would be sexist and discriminatory. Furthermore, it is not anyone's responsibility to make sure other players feel comfortable and welcome, regardless of gender. Some games might have rules against being a dick, but nowhere in the terms of service or so forth will it say "you have a responsibility to make sure other players are having a good time." This responsibility simply does not exist, and I'm confused as to where you could have gotten this notion.

IRLGoat said I've been pretty fortunate since I surround myself with 90% male friends and they're all A1 people. SO YES. I understand that "not all guys are jerks". We can stop reiterating that. It's the guys who are being condescending and disrespectful without even realizing they're doing it. I think the largest problem in the geek community is the disbelief that sexism is happening.

Oh, yeah, there's a huge level of denial going on. It's unlikely for the problem to ever be solved without people acknowledging that it is a problem in the first place, so I agree that this is the largest problem in relation to sexism in geek communities.

[IRLGoat]

Jorick said Time and further exposure of female geeks being a thing is really the only way to make it go away, and since that's already happening I'm not overly worried about the future of sexism in geek subcultures.

Haha~ You'd be more worried if it were effecting your lifeeee. :/

Jorick said Why exactly should girls be given special treatment to be made to feel comfortable and welcome rather than getting the same spew of negativity everyone else gets?

I said 'players' because it is both to rude-ass ladies and gents who deter more girls from being a part of these great games. I take responsibility when playing online games to be a good teammate and fun to play with. Games are there to have fun. Sure, it's not set in stone that one must be kind to their fellow player, but neither is being nice to the member of an opposing football team or at a poker table. Typically when you act like an ass towards people in those events, you are removed. Since these games take place online this is pretty much impossible. I think LoL has been taking a turn for the better what with its tribunal and all. Maybe 'responsibility' is too strong a word, since chances are many trolls cannot muster enough balls or braincells to be kind and have fun. I believe girls do deserve a bit of special treatment(unless they're totes cray), since we already receive special treatment in the negative aspect. :/ But sure, since it's all about equality, despite males basically having the greenest grass, yes... we deserve nothing more than you... let me rephrase...

"It is the responsibility of players to make other players feel comfortable and welcome."

HAH, yeah what was I thinking? Imagine giving girls a break and giving them something special. Iiimmmagginnee.

[thinkertron2000]

Feminism is something that's super crazy important to me (I'm likely to loose an old High School friend over it), but I'm going to have to try to keep this brief, because most of the problems with geek culture are either written here, or understood by this community.

Jorrick, is I'm sure, a nice guy who means well, but dude? We're not asking you to treat women better than men, just that you stop treating them worse then men, or at least to stop using gendered words, like "slut", "whore", "bitch" and so on. Using these targets them AS WOMEN, rather than as just someone you don't like, and this is a super important distinction. It sends the message that they're not welcome because they are women, and that they shouldn't be playing these games, or reading those comics, or whatever your flavour of geek is.

Western culture is already extremely unfair to women, we don't need people taking away safe spaces for women.

[Jorick]

IRLGoat said
Haha~ You'd be more worried if it were effecting your lifeeee. :/

I said "not overly worried about the future" of it because it seems to be on the decline, which is really the most that can be hoped for. It's not the kind of thing that'll stop overnight, so slowly fading away is a good start.

I said 'players' because it is both to rude-ass ladies and gents who deter more girls from being a part of these great games. I take responsibility when playing online games to be a good teammate and fun to play with. Games are there to have . Sure, it's not set in stone that one must be kind to their fellow player, but neither is being nice to the member of an opposing football team or at a poker table. Typically when you act like an ass towards people in those events, you are removed. Since these games take place online this is pretty much impossible. I think LoL has been taking a turn for the better what with its tribunal and all. Maybe 'responsibility' is too strong a word, since chances are many trolls cannot muster enough balls or braincells to be kind and have fun. I believe girls do deserve a bit of special treatment(unless they're totes cray), since we already receive special treatment in the negative aspect. :/ But , since it's all about equality, despite males basically having the greenest grass, yes... we deserve nothing more than you... let me rephrase...

"It is the responsibility of players to make other players feel comfortable and welcome."

HAH, yeah what was I thinking? Imagine giving girls a break giving them something special. Iiimmmagginnee.

Well there we have a fundamental disagreement about what someone in an online game is responsible for. I'm of the opinion that the only responsibility someone has is to not be a douchebag, not that they must go on the opposite side of the spectrum and be friendly and nice and whatnot. Add nothing negative to the game or community, that's all the responsibility one can reasonably level at people playing any game. Anything more than that is just silly.

Also, yeah, despite your clear sarcasm, women don't deserve anything special just for having a particular set of genitalia. That's the other side of the sexism coin, the more popularly viewed side being that men don't deserve special or preferential treatment just because they have a penis. Going past equality and giving women special treatment would just be sexist in the opposite direction. It may sound reasonable, like you'd be redressing past grievances caused by anti-women sexism, but that sort of thing just perpetuates the problems rather than solving them. Look at racism for an example of that, how affirmative action programs in countries like the United States give some advantages to various minorities and aid in furthering racist sentiments in different ways (by which I mean racist people will get all up in arms about the entitlements and benefits other racial groups get, such as how a lot of colleges will let in a minority student with a certain GPA and SAT score but would deny a white student with those same stats), and how despite all those misguided efforts to fix things racism is still rampant. Giving some kind of preferential treatment to women would just give sexist idiots different reasons to bitch and continue to be sexist, and it would further drive home the negative idea of "people of this gender should be treated better/worse than people of that gender." Seriously, preferential treatment based on any physical trait is a horrible idea, no matter what the intent behind it is.

thinkertron2000 said
Jorrick, is I'm sure, a nice guy who means well, but dude? We're not asking you to treat women better than men, just that you stop treating them worse then men, or at least to stop using gendered words, like "slut", "whore", "bitch" and so on. Using these targets them AS WOMEN, rather than as just someone you don't like, and this is a super important distinction. It sends the message that they're not welcome because they are women, and that they shouldn't be playing these games, or reading those comics, or whatever your flavour of geek is.

Western culture is already extremely unfair to women, we don't need people taking away safe spaces for women.

I think that's the first time someone has ever said I'm a nice guy who means well.

On a more serious note, yeah, did you read my post? I totally agree on the equal treatment front. My comments about preferential treatment being a bad idea were all in direct response to IRLGoat's thing about other gamers being responsible for making girls feel comfortable and welcome, which would be preferential treatment. I'm totally on board the equality train. In fact, I'd say I'm far more focused on equality than many (maybe most) of those who identify themselves as feminists, particularly the activist types, because large segments of them are really anti-male or truly want superiority for women rather than equality or only want to fix up the things that are bad for women (like income inequality) while keeping the benefits they have (like absurdly preferential treatment in divorce and child custody matters). I'm the kind of person who wants to see income inequality go away and see men get a fair shake in divorce and child custody proceedings, because that's what equality would look like.

As for the gendered words, that's one of those things I don't go for because it's bullshit that passes the equality line into the realm of preferential treatment. If I'll call a guy some crude word then I will also use the word to insult a woman, because that's what equality is all about. Calling a guy a dick is all well and good, so calling a woman a cunt is fine too; on the same note, guys can be cunts and women can be dicks, so it's all fair play in my opinion, and I call guys cunts far more often than women because they act like cunts far more often than women. If someone is being a bitch I will call them a bitch regardless of their gender, because the word is not inextricably tied to one gender regardless of what the origins may have been (in the exact same way as calling people a dick or a cunt works for either gender). The only context in which I use the word whore is when talking about attention whores, because it's the best term for succinctly describing a certain behavior without resorting to erroneous use of names for various mental illnesses. I don't call people whores (in the promiscuity sense) or sluts unless it's blatant sarcasm because trying to insult someone for their sexual activity is stupid, doesn't matter what gender they are. That's true equality for you, women get the same as men, end of story. If they don't like it or feel like they're being personally targeted because I called them a bitch and they happen to have a vagina, that's unfortunate and all, but I'm not going to alter my speech patterns just to make them happy. That would be preferential treatment, after all, and I've already made my stance on that very clear.

Also, er, did you just imply that sexist stuff in geek areas is taking away safe spaces for women? If so, I find that strange because geek areas are clearly not safe spaces for women, due to the very sexism this thread is talking about. They're already pretty anti-female spaces, and they always have been, so there's no taking away of safe spaces going on there. Not sure if that was something like poor phrasing on your side or I'm just interpreting it incorrectly, but it seemed odd to me so I felt the need to point it out.

[Kestrel]

Really I think this can be summed up as "UR STEALIN' MAI IDENTITY IM NO ONE W/O MY GAMER-TAG!"

I really wanna call this problem 'American' and be done with it. I really do. Alas, it's not posted in spam. So...

So I'm coffeed up and finally ready to ask the question: How do you separate the people with legit interests from the people you consider 'fakers'

Basically the age-old question of "Are you really metal or just a poser?"

I listen to quite a bit of metal, but I don't identify as a metalhead, just a person who enjoys metal. I play quite a bit of video-games, but I don't neccesarily identify as a gamer. I think it's silly to say "We're the same label because we enjoy the same thing." I don't even like using labels, so posing to me is a genuinely retarded concept because you're giving form to your lack of identity by faking a lack of individuality. People are generally more than just a metalhead, or just a gamer. To identify as a single label is silly.

Generally though, I talk to people to see if we share interests. If someone calls their self metal and listens to nothing but Fallout Boy... Well, I'm going to switch the subject. We're not in the same music. I wouldn't call Fallout boy metal, but hey fuck enjoy whatever you enjoy. Same way, if someone wears a bioshock t-shirt, well let them. I have a t-shirt that says New York and I've never even been in New York. Who gives a fuck? I'm not stealing your New Yorker identity.

and how do you feel about sexism within communities like this one and similar, that cater to geek interests,

Retarded.

and what has your personal experience of some of this been?

Requesting 'fake girl-gamers' and asking girls for gamer credentials or them using their gender as a shield is something that is far past my MMO-time. I find it laughable from an outsider's perspective.

As far as my experience regarding treatment based on gender goes though... Exploitive to be honest. During the time I played MMO's as a teenager, I was quickly privy to the fact that if you could pull of the girl-act convincing enough (just say your parents don't want you to voice-chat with strangers) all you needed to do to get rich was to butter up with some random high level guys who stole their parents' credit card on a regular basis. Although the hilarious thing was that the higher level you got, people started guessing your gender by how custom/cute your outfit was. The moment I got to point X in my levelling career, a lot more people simply assumed me to be a guy. idk, for me it's been absolutely hilarious.

I've not been much of a hardcore raider (even as a teenager I told people I'd do whatever the fuck I wanted with my free time tyvm) but the times I did get in (with my non-golddigger, male characters) it's been sorta disturbing though how guys do a total 180 in their attitude (and also become far less competent players) when there's suddenly a girl in voice chat. Some guys act retarded over girls enjoying the same thing they do and it's very annoying, even for a dude, that everyone stops playing the game as they should just because suddenly everyone hears a higher pitched voice. I guess my most negative experience with sexism in that regard is not getting that piece of equipment I wanted because when this chick started talking we got wiped.

On the other hand you try telling someone, as a straight guy, that you enjoy Desperate Housewives and then go a week without uttering the sentence; "No, I'm not gay. Why would you ask that?" (really, try it. It's hard.)

I'd write more and reply to shit but time cuts me short. So to be continued... Maybe.

[Epikus]

You kidding? Geek/nerd/gamer gals are awesome! My geek/nerd/gamer brother is married to one (she understands much of the D&D mechanics better than I!), and I am engaged to one. Never have I considered gaming/nerddom/geekdom a male-only place. I think more gals ought to let that flag fly, and not be ashamed of what they're passionate about. :)

[Gwazi Magnum]

Jorick said For instance, two people in this thread so far (IRLGoat and Magic Magnum) have said things to the effect of gamers rarely interacting with girls.

Feeling the need to clarify here, cause re-reading my earlier post I think I did give across the wrong message.
I didn't mean for that to come across as an on average or all gamer's sort of comment. Just that it is noticeably more common in geek culture than outside it (at least in High School and before. College and later it seems even out).
Which honestly I think is really the result of 2 things.

1. Elementary & High School Culture (+How Parent's raise them) cause kids to equate sports, drinking etc. to be popular and cool. But games, anime etc. to be lame. So those who do like it get casted out, and as a result don't get as much interaction with the opposite sex.
1a. This being combined with how Culture still seems to raise women (Unconciously or not) to go after the cooler/alpha male, so naturally most women get lured away from the uncool geek culture.

2. It being highlighted as something as weird, odd and different it acts as a place of acceptance for those with a lack of success in average life. A place of understanding, reliability and ultimately an escape from the real world that shunned them.

James Portnow from Extra Credits did a good talk on how stuff like games can be compulsive for people like that.

They also have other episodes which address this issue, and the sexism that's apparent in geek culture, all of which I feel relate to the topic on hand if anyone has the time to watch them.

Jorick said I've seen plenty of instances of fake geek stupidity, such as people wearing glasses with no lenses and then talk about how they're such a geek, or how someone will say they studied for some test and then say something like "I'm such a nerd" in a positive joking manner, or how some will talk about how they played <insert major blockbuster video game here> and that they're a huge geek because of it.

Forgot about these cases...
Most these I just see as such horrible/bad attempts at being a Geek that I forget to even count them as attempts to be one.

With these cases in mind I change my percentage estimate of 95% to become around 50% or so.
It varies anywhere from 80%-20% though I'd say depending on the area.

Jorick said -Long bit on Girl's using their sex to get free shit-

Maybe it's just been my general play style and lack of caring if there's a girl around or not, but I've rarely noticed this in the game's I've played.
Though, at the same time I've never played an MMO to the point that I imagine these girls would pick me as a target for this kind of thing anyways.
If a girl got into a game like Kotor or Mass Effect though where I was really high leveled and started asking me for stuff... well first off I'd be shocked they found a way into a single player game. :P

But these are cases that I have at least heard much about.
Hell in one group I'm in on facebook called the Cult of Dusty I know of at least one girl who has bragged about doing this stuff for free games and such constantly.
And the behavior outright disgusts me, to be honest. It really worsens the case for girls trying to get involved in the community.

IRLGoat said Haha~ You'd be more worried if it were effecting your lifeeee. :/

I believe Jorick means more in terms of the fact that he's not worried about where it's going. Not in regards to it's current state.
But honestly, getting up in arms against the Gaming community demanding them to treat women better will get you nothing but a knee-jerk reaction making the situation worse.

The wheels to get women more accepted are already in motion, this kind of thing takes time though for everyone to adjust and get used to.
No group of people have been instantly accepted into something over night.

Getting mad at the community at a whole for it is only going to piss them off and slow down the process.
I mean just look at Anita and Feminist Frequency (most of her points being falsified not counting for this example).

Even if everything she said was true, all she's doing is getting gamer's to react badly to her and do stuff like make apps of her getting beat up.
If anything she's pissing people off at girls and gaming than she is helping people accept girls in gaming.

Granted, you can argue that no matter what people do to get equality there will be bad reactions.
This is true, that's part of the cycle to getting equality to happen, but once the gears have already been turned people are far better off by offering good solutions than they are simply complaining about it.

IRLGoat said I believe girls do deserve a bit of special treatment(unless they're totes cray), since we already receive special treatment in the negative aspect. :/

Now, like Jorick's already said.
This is only worsening it for you, not helping.
If women are being treated unfairly you want to fix/get rid of it by having that bad treatment go away and have them be treated equally.
If you give them special treatment instead, you not only allow the bad treatment to stay but also give the message that women aren't good enough to be treated normally and instead need to be treated with more sensitivity and care. Which I don't think anyone here wants or agree's with.

In another sense, imagine someone broke an arm.
Are you better off fixing the arm so it can work normally?
Or are you better off leaving it broken, but changing the environment around them to be broken arm friendly?

thinkertron2000 said at least to stop using gendered words, like "slut", "whore", "bitch" and so on. Using these targets them AS WOMEN, rather than as just someone you don't like,

And what about word's like dick?
Also I've seen some women curse words used on men, like bitch.
Hell that's more gender neutral at this point with how people use it.

Jorick said I think that's the first time someone has ever said I'm a nice guy who means well.

I agree, it is odd seeing someone say that of you. :/
Though, to be fair you have been coming off as less "I care nothing for your feelings and will just slam my opinion down hard on you lately".
But maybe that's just because I've known you for a while now and have gotten used to you. :P

Kestrel said On the other hand you try telling someone, as a straight guy, that you enjoy Desperate Housewives and then go a week without uttering the sentence; "No, I'm not gay. Why would you ask that?" (really, try it. It's hard.)

Oh yea...
I personally don't watch the show at all, but I've had people in High School think I'm gay simply cause of how I never seemed to alter my mood or go out of my way at all to be with a girl.
Thankfully though the school was largely homophobic, so I learned about by just having a casual conversation with some classmates and them passively saying I was gay just as if it was well known fact and I had to go "Woah there, you think I'm what now?".