Female Gamers in the Community Final

Video games and the communities revolving around video games have become extremely social in the past decade. With the beginning of VOiP and multiplayer based games, cultures and communities have grown and developed around specific games and game types. In the past, it was a group of neighborhood or school kids getting together to have a LAN party or play on the same console. Now there are tournaments that span continents and raids with a group you met from fifteen different countries. With this rise of interconnectivity, however, there has been something that many gamers have run into that, quite frankly, shocks them. This shock comes in the form of meeting a female gamer.

When I first met a female gamer, I honestly was for a loss of words. The idea of a girl playing Battlefield 2 was so foreign I did not believe it at all. The way she played the game and knew what she did was shocking. She was on the top of the leader boards. No one in the game could believe it. People were treating her as a god. The lines for the helicopters and jets did not exist for her. She cut the lines and queues for everything worth waiting for. Everyone was in awe that someone with breasts played video games like Battlefield.

This encounter with this warrior princess was four years ago. Now she and I are good friends. We talk and Skype as well as play games together. The funny thing is; she is normal. She has become a part of our gaming group, a group of about fifteen people who like the same things in games and real life. We even have two girls in the group. This has brought me to get out of the “Awe” factor and just see them as regular gamers. This, however, is not how the rest of the gaming community sees them.

The first way female gamers are seen in the same way most of us see them, including me. They are the gamers on the pedestal and above all the Trolling and trash-talk. They get the gold in WoW and the epics in Diablo given to them by randoms. It was funny to see this happen in the first couple of games I played with the group, but after it happened for about a month, it got old. Both girls like the free stuff but they are getting sick of the pubs trying to befriend them with gifts and gold just because they are females.

The second way our two girls are met in games is by the Epic Trollers. There are always those gamers who get online just to troll others. This usually happens in a lobby of a FPS when we are talking before the game starts. When they hear female voices, the trolling starts. They talk about how women should be in the kitchen and not online. They talk about how our girls are going to be awful in the game and how there is no way we are going to win. It seems to be worse when we have clan tags on and have a fill team. These trolls eventually change to calling us Try-Hards because our clan, females including, destroy the games with crazy scores. This takes the flak away from our girls and directs it towards all of us. We have gotten use to the trolling so we just laugh it off.

The thing is, both of these ways of treating female gamers should not happen. Most girl gamers like the attention of people but these two ways are not what they want. IronTigers and BearOfManyColours, our two female gamers’ user names, want to be recognized because they are good gamers, not because of what sex they are. We as a group have had many conversations about the topics. They want the gifts in MMOs because they did something nice, not because they are girls. They know that there is trolling in games, but they are puzzled and confused about why people troll because they are females. They want gamers to treat them as equals, not above the rest and not below. They want to be recognized and talked about because of their skills and teamwork on games. IronTigers has even stopped talking in games until she has proven her skills after a few rounds in game. She likes being treated normal in the game and likes to prove herself as a good fragger. That is all our girls want from the community. Nothing more and nothing less.

Cuevas, Lizzie. "9 Things Real Female Gamers Hate About Gaming." GamesRadar. n. d. Web. 14 Oct. 2011. about-gaming/>.

GamingAngel, . "Why Games Aren't Just For Guys." Gaming Angels. 15 Sep 2010. Web. 14 Oct. 2011. just-for-guys/>.

No Continues Episode 7: Girl Gamers. Dir. Machinima. Machinima, 2011. Film. .

Actress are Victims of "Hidden Rules"

If you are one of those who frequently pay attention to stars’ lives and news, you will notice that almost all of the pictures that were taken for female stars are sexy. Almost everyday, you will hear some scandals and “hidden rules”. “Hidden rules” in the film industry is something that happens behind the screen that people are too shy to speak out about, like “casting coach”. Casting couch is a sex trade between a man who has power or control and a woman who is willing to sell her body to the man in order to get an entry into an occupation. This phenomenon reflects part of how women are usually viewed and represented in society today: women are always consumed by men, and are so weak to create their own worlds by their own power by a male dominated society. Especially in the field of film industry where beauty and talent are the two factors emphasized: when women are uncertain of their talents, they tend to accept an easier way help them reach their goals and that satisfies a man’s desire.”

Casting couch is not a new topic any more; It is more of a world-wide around hidden rules that many women and men follow. In China, every time you open up a newspaper, there are always two or three news about some actresses’ scandals. In the link below, it tells us an event related to casting couch which caused a huge stir in China few years ago.
m.cn/china/2006-12/01/content_748377.htm>
I was angered while I was reading this real story. The main character, Zhang Yu, as shown in the image on the left, is the victim of casting couch of chinese film industry. As mentioned in the article, Zhang won all her roles through sleeping with the directors, assistant directors or men in charge of casting. She also revealed how chinese film industry really works: many actress gained roles for soap operas and movies in exchange of having sex with film makers. Obviously, Zhang is not the only one who suffers through her way of becoming famous in film industry. Being a female star is way more complicated than it seems to appear to us. Many female stars have to face tough situations in giving up pureness for popularity.

The two pictures below show two of the top actresses in chinese film industry nowadays. Instead of being graceful and elegant of what they used to appear in front of us, they both look cheap by sitting beside these old men. They have to lower herself from famous stars to being escorts. In the male dominated director field, many men have the power of both to destroy an actress’s dream or to build a perfect successful road to her. Those actresses have to sacrifice their youth and bodies to get passes on their ways of being super stars.
















Though there are some cases of reverse casting couch where men were asked to have sex with female directors in exchange of major roles in movies, many victims are still women. The reasons behind it are obvious. In our society now, men still play a dominant role. The idea that women are weaker and powerless is still planted in many generations minds. In film industry, we have casting couch; in other industries this hidden rule still exists. Therefore, to a broader extend of what casting couch indicates of how female are represented in society, females always tend to be less confident about their own abilities to succeed; women tend to rely on men to help them out because they consider men to be stronger and smarter. On the other side of the fence, men consider female as objects that they can enjoy and have control over.

Facing this problem, many women feel that they have no other alternative. However, in order to change where we have been placed in society now, we, as women, first need to believe ourselves that we can be successful and reach our goals based on our own intelligence. We have the same talent as men do. We should see ourselves with more pride and learn to refuse the men who to ask us for sex in exchange of our benefits. Because we are as intelligent as men are, we should tell the world that we are not the weak, powerless group that we were always perceived as. The future fate of women lies in the mindset of the current women in today’s society. If women continue to be submissive to men then women will forever be subjugated.

Work Cited:
Pictures:
"Pictures of Contemporary Famous Actress." New Document. North Forum, 06 May 2009. Web. 14 Oct. 2011. .

"Hidden Rules in Film Industry Is More Cruel than What It Seems To Be." 百灵网. BAI LING WEB, 25 Mar. 2009. Web. 14 Oct. 2011.

Women are affected by "hidden rules"

There is always a hidden rule in film industry, and that is “casting couch”. The victims of this hidden rule are most female. Casting couch is sex trade between a man who gets power or controls over things and a woman who is willing to sell her body to him in order to get an entry into an occupation. This phenomenon reflects part of how women are usually viewed and represented in society today: women are always consumed by men, and they are so weak to create their own worlds by their own power in this mostly men dominated society. Especially in the field of film industry where the beauty and talent are the two factors emphasized, “when women are uncertain of their talents, they tend to find an easier way to help them reach their goals and that is having a dirty relationship with the boss, the man.”

This idea is quoted in the video below where casting couch is discussed.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXHX-vvHMpw) Casting couch is not a new topic any more, It is more of a world-wide around hidden rules that many women and men follow. In china, every time when you open up a newspaper, there are always two or three news about some actresses’ dirty relationship with directors. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2006-12/01/content_748377.htm This link above tells us an event related to casting couch which caused a huge stir in china few years ago. I was angered while I was reading this real story. The main character, Zhang Yu, is the victim of casting couch in film industry. As mentioned in the article, Zhang won all her roles through sleeping with the directors, assistant directors or men in charge of casting. She also revealed how chinese film industry really works: many actress gained roles for soap operas and movies in exchange of having sex with film makers.

Though there are cases of reverse casting couch where men were asked to have sex with female directors in exchange of major roles in movies, most victims are still women. The reasons behind it are obvious. In our society now, men still play a dominant part. The idea of women are weaker and powerless are still planted in many generations minds. In film industry, we have casting couch; in other industries, this hidden rule still exist. Therefore, to a broader extend of what casting couch indicates of how female are represented in society, females always tend to have less confident about their own abilities to succeed; they tend to rely on men to help them out because they consider men to be stronger and smarter. In other side of the point, men consider female to be more of objects what they can enjoy and have control over.

Facing this position, many women feel they can not help it. However, in order to change what we are placed in society now, we, as women, first need to believe ourselves that we can be successful and reach our goals on our own. We get the same talent as men do. We should see ourselves with more pride and learn to refuse those men who likes to ask you for sex in exchange of your benefits. Because we are as intelligent as men are, we should tell the world that we are not the weak, powerless group that we were always perceived before any more.


My audience is all young females who are on their way of pursuing their dreams and working hard on reaching their life goals.

Female Gamers in the Community

Video games and the communities revolving around video games have become extremely social in the past decade. With the beginning of VOiP and multiplayer based games, cultures and communities have grown and developed around specific games and game types. In the past, it was a group of neighborhood or school kids getting together to have a LAN party or play on the same console. Now there are tournaments that span continents and raids with a group you met from fifteen different countries. With this rise of interconnectivity, however, there has been something that many gamers have run into that, quite frankly, shocks them. This shock comes in the form of meeting a female gamer.

When I first met a female gamer, I honestly was for a loss of words. The idea of a girl playing Battlefield 2 was so foreign I did not believe it at all. The way she played the game and knew what she did was shocking. She was on the top of the leader boards. No one in the game could believe it. People were treating her as a god. The lines for the helicopters and jets did not exist for her. She cut the lines and queues for everything worth waiting for. Everyone was in awe that someone with breasts played video games like Battlefield.

This encounter with this warrior princess was four years ago. Now she and I are good friends. We talk and Skype as well as play games together. The funny thing is; she is normal. She has become a part of our gaming group, a group of about fifteen people who like the same things in games and real life. We even have two girls in the group. This has brought me to get out of the “Awe” factor and just see them as regular gamers. This, however, is not how the rest of the gaming community sees them.

The first way female gamers are seen in the same way most of us see them, including me. They are the gamers on the pedestal and above all the Trolling and trash-talk. They get the gold in WoW and the epics in Diablo given to them by randoms. It was funny to see this happen in the first couple of games I played with the group, but after it happened for about a month, it got old. Both girls like the free stuff but they are getting sick of the pubs trying to befriend them with gifts and gold just because they are females.

The second way our two girls are met in games is by the Epic Trollers. There are always those gamers who get online just to troll others. This usually happens in a lobby of a FPS when we are talking before the game starts. When they hear female voices, the trolling starts. They talk about how women should be in the kitchen and not online. They talk about how our girls are going to be awful in the game and how there is no way we are going to win. It seems to be worse when we have clan tags on and have a fill team. These trolls eventually change to calling us Try-Hards because our clan, females including, destroy the games with crazy scores. This takes the flak away from our girls and directs it towards all of us. We have gotten use to the trolling so we just laugh it off.

The thing is, both of these ways of treating female gamers should not happen. Most girl gamers like the attention of people but these two ways are not what they want. IronTigers and BearOfManyColours, our two female gamers’ user names, want to be recognized because they are good gamers, not because of what sex they are. We as a group have had many conversations about the topics. They want the gifts in MMOs because they did something nice, not because they are girls. They know that there is trolling in games, but they are puzzled and confused about why people troll because they are females. They want gamers to treat them as equals, not above the rest and not below. They want to be recognized and talked about because of their skills and teamwork on games. IronTigers has even stopped talking in games until she has proven her skills after a few rounds in game. She likes being treated normal in the game and likes to prove herself as a good fragger. That is all our girls want from the community. Nothing more and nothing less.