@krullban said:
@gamer_152 said:
@krullban: The thing is, I think phrases like "There is some degree of sexism in every industry" gloss over the fact that not all industries have the same degree of sexism, and that video games in particular are a very male-dominated space. I'm not saying that the event itself was sexist, I'm not even sure sexism is the ideal word to use here, but the event did seem reflective of a problem within the industry that feels like it really shouldn't be a problem for any respected industry in the year 2013.
There was a reason none of the developers who spoke there were women; because there's a lack of women in the industry, and I don't think that's coincidence or comes from a place of complete equality and fairness. At the very least it's something we should think about thoroughly before dismissing. We have an industry where the vast majority of respected people in the within it are men, where almost all big games are aimed at men, and where women are not only in a minority in gaming community, but receive inexcusable abuse because of it. I don't think you have to dig very deep or clutch at straws to find the problems here.
More people than ever are calling out gender inequality in the industry, but that's because it's a topic that we need to look at seriously and has been largely ignored in the past, and I think it's important to keep bringing it up because there's an overwhelming number of people who want to give knee-jerk dismissals to these problems or even outright attack the people who try to highlight inequality to begin with. Whether people are tired of it or not, we need to discuss this like adults, and be aware that smaller issues with equality may be representative of larger ones. Thanks for discussing this with me civilly though, I've had a lot of arguments along these lines that haven't gone so well.
But I don't really agree that it's a problem that not as many women as men are in the industry. There are many industries that are dominated by one gender, and I don't necessarily think that's an issue of inequality, more so of an issue of how the different sexes think, and the career paths they choose to pursue. If a women wants to become a video game developer, I doubt there will be any higher up pulling them down and telling them they aren't allowed. It's just that not as many women even try or even want to get into the industry as men.
More and more women are getting into the industry, and there will likely be a change at some point where it's equal or close in terms of the numbers of developers. But as it stands right now, more men are in the industry, because more men have been interested in getting into the industry than women.
And I would argue that many of the other industries that are also male-dominated may have a problem too. I also don't think just because most people in a system choose one option over an other option, it means that they have anything near complete freedom or equality. Yeah, there's few to no situations where women have been outright told "You can't be game developer 'cause you're a woman" by a potential boss, but anyone who's familiar with how discrimination works, will tell you that it often works at a more subtle level than this, and I think often because the problems are slightly more subtle, they get ignored by people who aren't actively looking into this stuff and trying to gather in-depth opinions from both sides of the argument. We must also remember that this isn't just a numbers game, that while the number of women in the industry is a big problem, that there are also problems with the lack of higher-ups and well-known/respected devs who are female, and this is before we even start getting into how women are depicted in games, treated by games, or treated in the gaming community.
I feel a little like I'm repeating myself a little here, but I have to say this, if you're saying that there aren't barriers to women specifically getting into and working their way up through the industry then you start getting into the territory of telling those people in the industry, many of them women, that all those experiences of discrimination against women they saw or even went through first-hand were either imaginary or lies, and I think you get into some very dangerous territory if you start trying to do that without some very good reasoning.
I think we're a long way from seeing a time when numbers of men and women in the industry are going to equal out, but if you think there is going to be this change, ask yourself, what caused this sudden change in women's minds that they want to be part of the industry now? Why weren't they interested before? Either you have to say that there's some kind of big biological difference between the minds of men and women, and that somehow there is now happening a major biological change in women that is causing this shift, or you have to concede that it's due to social factors. That through some combination of discrimination in the industry, society gendering jobs, boys and girls being brought up differently, a decisively male culture surrounding games, or whatever else, that men are being pushed towards the industry and advancing in it, while women are not, and if you concede this to be true, how can you say that both genders have complete freedom and equality here?
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