Jim Sterling explains why we are sexist

This is certainly something...

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/8618-The-Wacky-Harassment-Blame-Parade?

Have you ever thought about your presence online, maybe you have considered that if you are like me, choosing not to participate in many of the more vulgar sides of gaming "conversation" on the likes of 4chan and reddit you could avoid being held accountable for the actions of a brazen and inflammatory few. Sadly in Jim Sterlings world that is not the case, a small number of people spread venom and hate on the internet and we must all pay for their sins. The global ecosystem of gaming demands that you take responsibility for something someone else says on reddit. Maybe you don't want to have anything to do with the conversation, maybe you simply want to mind your own business, but Jim has determined from the almighty soap box that you, me and everyone that frequents any gaming site is to blame.

I usually find Jim to be pretty spot on, but this is just ridiculous. We could spend the rest of our lives fighting the hatred spewed on certain message boards. But, somehow by choosing to take an alternate path of not getting involved we are lumped in with the same crew that sent death threats to the DA2 female writer. Now we are apparently responsible for a controversy surrounding Depression Quest that I wasn't even aware of. I am looking at this thing at face value, if his assertion is that I should feel responsible to justify and smack down users on these varying message boards for the hatred they spread, I completely disagree. No one here claims to speak for the gaming industry, even those at the height of involvement in the field would hesitate to say they hold any responsibility for what lunatics say on a message board. I personally want to see what this actually means, it's perfectly fine to stroke your ego in a video but lets see if Jim comes forward with any substantive ideas of how his grandiose war against inflammatory elements of the internet should play out.

Anybody else interested in watching the video only because they want to deny @wolfgame's accusatory tone?

@video_game_king: Well, i'm presenting the video for the purposes of discussion, I believe that is what we do here. If anyone watches the video and comes to a different conclusion or interpretation of what he had to say in his video that is perfectly fine. I don't quite get the ambiguous nature of your post. If I am bearing an accusatory tone that is only because I was summarizing the tone of the video. Anyone is freely welcome to disagree with me or bring new ideas and opinions to the topic, it's kinda how it works around here VGK.

Lumping everyone in the same boat is a bit much but I kind of agree that by ignoring the problem it does act as a form of condoning. You don't have to cry "Sexism!" at every slight, if only because you'd lose your voice by the end of the day, but if you see hate in your community then surely you should say something? If these people were screaming it in your actual, physical neighbourhood then you'd probably say something or call the cops. Same should go for this.

All that said, if you choose to stay silent no one should condemn you for that. It's a big fight and not one that's going to be easy to win so if you want to avoid it I can't blame you.

UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH

I hate this kind of argument. What are we supposed to do? There's no moderating force on the Internet, and there shouldn't be. Unless Sterling goes after specific people for posting hateful comments to people, isn't he just essentially throwing responsibility onto everyone else, which he says not to do in this video? Also, I hate to be an asshole (which I guess I am according to Sterling), but it's not my problem. I'm not a cop (I'd have to tell you if I was, of course). I don't make those kinds of comments. Other people's views/speech, as unappealing as they may be, are not mine, so I have no control over them. It absolutely sucks that people say those kinds of hateful things, but I can't stop them from doing it.

He ruined the Banderas!

Sterling know how to bait clicks I guess, that's about all he's good for.

I really like Jim Sterling, and I generally agree with his no nonsense approach to the sexism issue. But yeah, I don't totally agree with this argument.

In all honesty, if you want to end sexism/racism or any of that bullshit, stop talking about race and gender. Do whatever you can to not make those subjects pop up. If you're ignoring it like I am, we're doing the right thing (at least, I believe we are).

Just like if you want to end alcoholism, you stop talking about it.

I don't give a flying fuck about Zoe. I don't give a flying fuck about her game either. And it has nothing to do with her being a woman, quite the contrary, I wish more women would make games. But a video game about depression? I'm not interested, sorry.

Edit : I disagree with Sterling. His nosy voice also reminds me of the turtle like Bentley from Sly Cooper.

Likewise and it's because I honestly don't want to throw up my hands and cry "what am I to do about it?" but I honestly don't know what I could do about it. Each time I try to have any intelligent conversation where I happen to disagree with someone's viewpoint, it instantly starts to spiral down into a one sided shouting match until I opt out of the discussion entirely - and this is about mundane topics like games, sexism entirely removed from the picture. Lord only knows the amount of back and forth I spent discussing the Tomb Raider reboot with people that continuously labeled it as misogynistic or sexist because Lara was "too pretty" for her part. If I'm cowardly escaping responsibility by not engaging in heated sexism debates with enthused teens that excel in perseverance rather than intelligence, well so be it.

somehow I'm reminded of that comic of the whole cycle of violence to where a dog bites a mailman and the mail man shoots up a post office.

It's not that I'm shutting away from an entire conversation by not even attempting to read the issue, it's just it's so much better babysitting a baby niece and a dog then reading internet drama. It's not like I'm creating a cycle of negativity by turning off the computer and then socializing with people who matter

I really wish I could summon some measure of empathy to give a damn about this but I just can't. It's the same song and dance back and forth and back and forth. Someone is mean to someone else, people like Sterling jump on a soap box and tell everyone how wrong it is and how you should feel bad that someone was mean to someone else, and then it dies down and everyone forgets something happened yesterday.

Honestly I want to laugh. I never thought that in my wildest dreams I'd be chastised by Uncle Fester in a trench coat.

Wow, way to totally miss the point of his argument. At no point did he say people who do nothing about sexism in video games are sexist themselves; in fact he even went as far to say if you don't want to discuss that side of games, and only talk about the games themselves, that is perfectly acceptable.

His entire point in the video, if you actually bothered to listen to it, is that people who try to actively claim a distance from the problem of sexism are contributing to the problem itself. In the example he gives specifically, he is talking about the people who tried to shrug off the harassment towards Zoe Quinn by claiming it wasn't done by "real gamers" but by frustrated forum users. He is calling out the people who tried to claim gaming doesn't have a sexism problem by claiming people who are sexist are not true gamers.

All he is really saying is trying to claim gaming doesn't have a sexism problem is as damaging as the people who are causing the sexism problem. That's all, really. He never once says doing nothing makes you as bad as the people being sexist. All he is saying, is there is a problem of people trying to claim gaming does not have a sexism problem by coming up with vague and stupid parameters to section off the people being sexist. He just wants people to admit that gaming does have a few problems, one of them being sexist, that needs to get sorted out, and trying to claim gaming has no problems is a problem in it of itself.

Considering the Giant Bomb threads that were already about Depression Quest and the whole Mighty no. 9 thing(not to mention the near weekly threads like this for a long time now), I think this video is appropriate.

The problem generally isn't with some alien creatures giving us a bad name; it's issues within our own communities which are worthy of the most concern. And people get so upset about the idea of others being upset that they regularly post threads similar to this one suggesting that no one should be concerned at all and expressing concern is actually worse than silent acceptance. We are all together in making Giant Bomb or anywhere else what it is, and we can often do more to improve things and encourage the best in communities like this. And even if you don't want to actively encourage the better parts of the community, the least we can do is not encourage the worst parts of it.

And I think a certain distinction should be made here. If you just don't want to say anything or participate in threads on such topics, there can be an argument for that; there are plenty of threads to just discuss the mechanics of games. What he's criticizing here is those who actively discourage talking about it or just come in to suggest that these things are all non-issues that no one here or anywhere else should talk about. Those who, like often happens here, make threads angry that anyone might be unhappy about something they aren't personally unhappy about.

As we turn toward 2014, I hope we can all do more to improve things here on Giant Bomb. In general, the problems aren't just random anons or some alien commenters mucking things up; it's regular duders misguidedly perpetuating the worst parts of this community. That true here and in many gaming communities. I think Giant Bomb is pretty great, but I am confident it can be even better. :)

@truthtellah: Well said, Truthtellah. I agree completely.

It's definitely excessive but I think I agree with him to a certain point. I don't think it requires more than a "don't be stupid" or "you're being a bad person" to inspire others to take the reigns if you don't have the time. If someone is being terrible online it is much easier to make their views invalid than it is in real life. You don't need to change them, you need to speak up so others in the forum/comment section will also speak up and flood the hate out.

If someone says something bad and you challenge them 9 times out of 10 someone else will join you. It's especially easy when you're dealing with the blatant stuff.

I wish more forums and comment sections had a good way of minimizing specific peoples comments. I don't like the idea of unified heavy moderation because I think that some trolling is good but I would like to be able to make the website I am personally visiting more palatable.

You saying something about me, Earth boy? I'm ready to throw down.

Or... just stop taking alcohol? Or, yeah, not talking about it can help; it gets the beverage off the mind, I guess.

... Yeah.

@tru3_blu3 said:

I pretty much agree with this entirely.

@coafi: Thanks, Coafi. Unfortunately, suggesting that there might be any issues at all that we could do any more about seems like a relatively unpopular opinion, but I know there are Giant Bomb users that believe that as I do.

I think we face challenges amongst our users and with our moderation, and far too often, the response to concern is to forcefully suggest that having concerns is a greater threat than what someone might be concerned about.

Though, hey, we've got a whole new year ahead of us. It's a time for a little hope for what the new year can bring.

@tru3_blu3:

My point was that by refusing to discuss the problem, you deny that there's a problem in the first place, making said problem infinitely harder to solve.

I'm sure video game companies and fans do have some sexist problems, just like most other professions in the world. Women not getting hired due to their gender, not being put up for promotions, etc. undoubtedly happens sometimes. But actual internet harassment based on gender is a fundamentally different thing. To awkwardly quote myself from another thread:

Watch Jeff's most recent Jar time where he talks about this exact problem. He explores the complex idea I've been trying to wrap my mind around and get across for a while; these people doing horribly sexist things... probably don't even qualify as actual misogynists. So you sort of have to rule out the content of their harassment to even get a grip on the cause. They are screaming, "LOOK AT ME!!!", and since women and gender representation in games is getting a lot of media focus now, picking at that scab is the easiest way to assure some people will care. I honestly think the intention isn't to somehow keep female devs off Steam, it's to incite anger and provoke. If the lack of Black characters as heroes in games was getting articles on Kotaku and Polygon everyday, I bet we'd be seeing all of the same horrible hate, just directed at people of color instead.

Basically, conflating bullying and sexism is incorrect, and it will only confuse and misdirect any possible solutions.

So he's calling out imaginary people? Or people too young/stupid to have enough common sense? Basically he's just wasting everyone's time by creating some more clickbait content.

heh. No way, VGK! As I said, the problem isn't some alien creatures. Alien or human, we all have to help fight the real problems within our own communities. I appreciate you as an ally, brother!

And that point is easily made with the No True Scotsman fallacy. It doesn't actually matter whether they are 'true' gamers or not. There is no 'true' gamer. Of course this would make it hard to make the next point.

All he is really saying is trying to claim gaming doesn't have a sexism problem is as damaging as the people who are causing the sexism problem. That's all, really. He never once says doing nothing makes you as bad as the people being sexist. All he is saying, is there is a problem of people trying to claim gaming does not have a sexism problem by coming up with vague and stupid parameters to section off the people being sexist. He just wants people to admit that gaming does have a few problems, one of them being sexist, that needs to get sorted out, and trying to claim gaming has no problems is a problem in it of itself.

While there may be some arguing there is no sexism or harassment related to games whatsoever, that's not what any halfway intelligent person is arguing. What's being argued is that the games industry or gamers as a group are not uniquely sexist or more sexist than any other group. If 'gaming has a sexism problem', then it means you believe gamers are uniquely sexist on account of being gamers, otherwise it would be beneath special consideration.

When sexual harassment has been proven to have happened in a home, we hold the perpetrator guilty. When sexual harassment is proven to have happened in a hospital, we hold the perpetrator guilty. When sexual harassment is twittered as allegedly happened at a gaming con, we hold 'a culture of misogyny' and 'inherent sexism' guilty, and claim that others failing to do the same is what causes harassment to happen. Suggesting to hold the perpetrators accountable instead of an entire community is sexism in itself.

Being a gamer is your original sin, and only through good works and supporting popular causes can you stop being the sexist you are.

I've participated in a lot of these sexism conversations if only because I feel like reasonable people whose opinions align with mine are few and far between. Someone who disagrees with me might claim that's a sign I'm on the wrong side, though I'm of the mind that it's only because people favor compassion over reason these days. Not an objectively incorrect priority, to be fair, though you can certainly go too far with it. Anyways I'm sick of people trying to make me feel guilty on behalf of shit heads, and I'm sick of listening to the same criticisms informed by the same half baked logic. Somehow I don't think that's what these conversations were meant to accomplish. By incessantly bringing it up, they've squashed any desire I have to participate. Maybe this was the end goal though, annoy the opposition until they're silent. Then they are free to condemn any female character who shows a hint of sexuality or vulnerability, criticize games for not meeting their diversity quota, and be outraged by any occurrence of common real world gender roles, without anyone around to tell them how stupid this is.

I think that was more Jim's point. It certainly wasn't YOU'RE ALL MONSTERS!!!

That would require watching Jim Sterling though. :[

Seriously that guy is obnoxious even when he's making good points, which from the sound of it he isn't.

I'm with Sterling on this, and I don't think that means anyone in particular has to feel implicated (unless you suspect that you should feel implicated; I don't want to talk you out of a little self-reflection). But hell yes, I can't deny that there's a weird, hostile, sexist vibe going on with gamers in general.

Who cares if it's the majority of 'representative of the whole' or whatever other objective metric people are going to mistakenly try to use? It's a strong enough undercurrent that I notice it pretty frequently. Anything beyond that is academic. I notice it and I kinda hate it but there's really no point in arguing with 15 year olds.

Using paid-male-escort-mission footage from Killer is Dead when talking about cyberbullying, it's Jim alright.

Agreeing with this.

Oh yes, I'm sexist and a terrible person for what other members of my species say and do. I don't know how I sleep at night.

Fuck that bloated toad.

That doesn't exactly apply. By "stop talking about race and gender" he means you should judge people based on their character and not their physical attributes. You know, the same thing Dr. King was saying decades ago? @wolfgame we would all be better off if everyone gave less attention to pundits like Mr. Sterling.

People are just people, man.

I love how people get sooo defensive whenever someone brings up sexism, regardless of context.

Here's a good example ^

The comparison between a home or a hospital and the gamer community doesn't really work because there's no hospital forum where a nurse or doctor is getting a ton of anonymous attacks and insults from everyone else who works at the hospital. It's much easier to pinpoint the person at fault. I think the reason some people accuse gamers of having a culture of sexism is because attacks like this come from so many different places, it's not just one person or even one message board that's the problem.

I don't think Jim's saying all gamers are sexist unless they prove otherwise, I think he's making the point that people who say 'this isn't me, it's a small number of people causing the problem we shouldn't focus on it' aren't helping anything. I don't agree that gamers as a whole are sexist but I also don't agree that if we stop talking about it it'll go away or get better. I'll admit I've gotten a bit tired of the sexism in gaming subject, I think people are too quick to call it out and point fingers. I have zero interest in watching any of Anita Sarwhatsitspelled's videos and would be happy to not hear about her anymore but what happened to Zoe is disgusting and absolutely should be talked about and dealt with. I dunno how to be honest, those idiots are gonna continue to be idiots but I don't think ignoring it improves the situation.

Also that Morgan Freeman clip, he's talking about dealing with each other as people and judging one another by our character instead of race etc. He's not saying 'if there's a problem, don't talk about it.'

I was writing blogs decades ago? Man, that must've been weird.

I don't usually engage in the sexism/misogyny discussions. So, am I in trouble?

But gamers are not twitter, rededit or 4chan. That is just stupid if you connect everything that happens with women on the internet with the gaming community. if you really care what people on 4chan are saying about women then do so but don't bring this up as the issue with the gaming community. Same with Youtube comments. In our world there are a ton of stupid people and stuff like 4 chan and youtube comments or Twitter are a perfect place for these people. So yeah just ignore them because they are not worth my time and they should not be worth your time.

Also the whole thing that started this depression quest idiocy came from a depression and suicide message board in which they were upset not only" because she was a women but because she had a job, money and friends. And they argued that such a person does not really know what depression really is like. What do you want to do about that? "Fight" these people who are visiting a place where the first thing you see is a suicide help hotline?

Also if you really want to fight it does not help to pity vote a game just because someone got harassed on the internet.

edit: Also completely agree with Freeman here.

A lot of people here are misreading Jim's argument. You aren't a sexist asshole by not being involved in the sexism in games debate (or by not harassing others and sending them death threats by expressing their views or making a statement.) Jim states that in his video. He says it's OK if you just want to talk about games without reference to game politics. The problem comes from those who convince themselves and try to convince others that sexism in games is not an issue at all, and that the issue would just go away if you silence others from talking about it,. That view is stupid. Just because nobody in the 1990's complained about how sexist Duke Nukem was doesn't mean that it wasn't an issue in games. Just because the only ones spewing hate and vitriol on the Internet are some supposed subclass of humanity doesn't mean the hate and vitriol don't mean anything to those they're directed at.

Basically, don't tell people to shut up because it doesn't help, and it only makes everything worse. What would happen if everyone shut up about Obamacare, or the War in Afghanistan, or anything that matters more in the world than video games? Debate and argument, no matter how vitriolic and sad, eventually leads to progress on issues. Silencing debate and claiming that there is no issue is the work of totalitarianism.

Whether or not the idea of a "true gamer" is irrelevant to the discussion, and is simply misrepresenting the argument I was making. Like it or not, there are people who are trying to absolve games of a sexism problem by claiming anyone who is sexist must not be a part of the gaming community. If someone plays video games, even very casually, they are part of the gaming community (even if they don't frequent forums or conventions all the time).

Aren't you doing exactly what Jim Sterling is talking about? By attempting to section off people who try to claim gaming doesn't have a sexism problem, aren't you ignoring the problem rather than confronting it directly. Calling people who try to claim gaming doesn't have a sexism problem "unintelligent" and brushing your hands of the matter isn't helping anything.

Yes, gaming does have a sexism problem, and I'll go as far as to say it has more of a problem than most other forms of medium. But that doesn't mean I believe all gamers are sexist because they're gamers, despite how much you're trying to make it look like I do. All it means is I am willing to admit there are quite a few problems in the community, and burying your head in the sand isn't helping matters.

I would argue gaming does have a sexism problem fairly unique to itself, because, for the longest time, video games were seen as a male-exclusive hobby. Although female gamers have always existed, they didn't exist in any meaningful quantity until much, much later. This means video games were targeted towards young boys, and even to this day they are still seen as the dominant market.

It also doesn't help that games cost a lot of money to make, and not a lot of developers are willing to take a risk and make something that may not return as big a profit as they would like. Since, as I said, young boys are seen as the dominant market, including things in a game young boys like (hyper-sexualised women, action, explosions, etc...) is going to be seen as the safer option.

Gaming has a sexism problem whether you like it or not, and honestly I'm not sure how to solve it. It's become so ingrained in the community, it is often seen as just another part of it. It's going to take a lot of work to fix, and burying our heads in the sand is going in the wrong direction.

Also, I don't know about you, but when it comes to sexual harassment towards women, regardless of location or format, I often see a large amount of people trying to claim that it must be the woman's fault for some asinine reason. Victim shaming exists, and it happens all over the place.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand most people miss the point and decide to attack Jim and the video, probably without having watched it themselves. Well done guys, seriously.

The video isn't really that controversial and it makes some very similar points to the ones Patrick made in his TEDx speech.

1) Sexist/racist/generally shitty stuff going down on the internet and the subsequent reaction to such events breeds two behaviours that aren't really talked about that often.

2) Some people go out of their way to criticise the harassed person for not expecting to be treated like shit and for not having a thick skin. They also fail to criticise the harassers.

3) Some other people come into the debate solely to say something like "Stop blaming gamers/gaming culture, this is only a small set of people etc." without adding anything useful to the debate or trying to help in any meaningful way.

4) Don't be either of those guys/gals. You're not responsible for the harassment, but in some small way you're responsible for helping to stop it.

I can't really see anything wrong with what Jim said to be honest.

Bloated toad

The world is rarely as simple as Jim often likes to think it is.

I know, right? I actually found it to be a fairly well thought out argument myself. Unfortunately, too many people have a kneejerk reaction, and react with hostility as soon as one of the -isms is mentioned.

That's true for certain problems, but cultural ones are usually defeated through the cleansing of the mind, either through loss of memory of a subject or its perversion. A problem like global warming, for example, HAS to be countered with some form of action.