“Objects to be looked at”: Misogyny in Gaming Panel with the UW Women’s Center for “Love Your Body” Week

Panel Overview

This collaboration between the Games Institute and the UW Women’s Center highlighted a considerable range of issues with misogyny, homophobia, and racism in gaming. The panel, moderated by Gioia Myers, was planned for “love your body week” and discussed the policing of women and LGBTQ+ people’s bodies in both games and game spaces. The panelists, PhD Candidate Lindsay Meaning (English), Postdoctoral Researcher Dr Brianna Wiens (Communication Arts), Associate Professor Dr Shana MacDonald (Communication Arts), and Game Design and Development Instructor Dr Emma Vossen (UW Games Institute, GDD WLU) made connections between current events in games and historical and feminist events in media at large.

The event launched with a land acknowledgement and a short introduction of the Games Institute by Associate Director Agata Antkiewicz, and a brief talk by Dr Emma Vossen that contextualized the history of misogyny in gaming in 20 images. Dr Vossen started in 1903 discussing game designer Maggie Philips and how her anti-capitalist game, The Landlord’s Game, was stollen and turned into what we now know as Monopoly. Dr Vossen also discussed the women programmers of the ENIAC in the 1930s and ‘40s, the experiences of female Dungeons and Dragons players in the ‘70s and ‘80s, sexist advertising in the ‘90s and 2000s, Anita Sarkesian's Tropes vs Women in Video Games series (2012-2017), Zoe Quinn’s 2017 book about online harassment in games Crash Override, and the recent racist backlash towards Angrboda, a black female character in the upcoming game God of War Ragnarök.

Gioia Myers (The Women’s Centre) asked the panelists a variety of questions about topics such as representation, community, audience expectations, and online backlash. The panel also discussed issues with discrimination in the games industry and highlighted how these issues are closely tied to other sectors including, science, technology, film, comics, and more.

Dr MacDonald emphasized that the tropes of objectification that we see in games have long been present in other media, including film, and are now extremely present on social media, especially Instagram. Dr MacDonald argued that women in digital media at large are too often treated as “objects to be looked at” and games are no exception to this rule.

Why Take Games Seriously?

Poster of Angrboda from the video game God of War

The panelists started by individually discussing why they think it’s essential to look closely, and seriously, at games and games culture. Meaning argued that games are “cultural products” that “reflect and shape social attitudes particularly towards women and other marginalized groups” and are “imprinted with the ideals of the environment they are produced in.” Wiens discussed her research which examines, “systems of power” in digital culture, stating, “We should always be asking who benefits from this game? Who is harmed in this game? What are the effects of the game for both players and the larger culture?” Similarly, MacDonald highlights her research interest in how people who are marginalized “push back” in these restrictive cultures by creating their own “visual forms” such as feminist cinema, indie games, or by “being critical of the media we love” as Anita Sarkeesian puts it. Lastly, Dr Vossen emphasized that in games culture, because the norms around sexism and racism are so different, “we see what people are really thinking, and how people are really processing art and media and culture and industry.”

Harassment

Inevitably, the discussion turned to #Gamergate and the larger #Metoo movement. All panelists framed Gamergate, and all other negative reactions to progressive themes (especially queer characters) in games, as a backlash to inevitable progress in games culture. Dr Wiens connected the discussion back to her research on the negative perception of feminism in culture at large. She explained that these backlashes frequently come down to “a struggle to control media spaces, which dominate groups believe that they own, and are owed.”

Dr Vossen, who has written about and researched Gamergate, and connected events for almost ten years, highlighted how she now teaches Gamergate to her students as “a contextualized moment in games history.” Explaining that she doesn’t want to enforce the idea that Gamergate was “the most important event in games” but instead treat it as “a manifestation of something that existed before and still exists after.”

All panelists agreed that the “it’s just a joke” attitude towards harassment online and in games is both prominent and exhausting. Dr Wiens emphasized that both within and outside of games culture, saying that harassment is “just a joke” is a form of gaslighting and “maintaining the status quo.” Dr Vossen and Dr MacDonald agreed that harassment is terrible regardless of the perpetrator’s intentions; it’s the negative impact on the targets that is the real problem.

Representation

Next, Myers asked the panelists to discuss the controversies around representation in games, specifically focusing on complaints around ideas of “forced diversity” and tokenism in games culture.

Meaning started by discussing their research about the depiction of sex work and sex workers in games. She highlighted the differences between the representation of sex workers in the Assassin's Creed games where they have some agency and are “frequently big players in the politics” of the setting vs the Witcher games, where they are often nothing more than “resources for the players.” She further emphasized how sex workers often look “anachronistic” with the rest of the setting and costuming within games, wearing hot pants instead of dresses for example. Lastly Meaning pointed out how even when we have these non-sexualized female characters in games, like Aloy in Horizon Zero Dawn, the most popular Mods on steam are ones that put “sexy outfits” on Aloy, or that make Aloy “prettier” by thinning her features and removing her freckles, using these mods to adhere to conventional beauty standards and “put her back in her place.”

Vossen discussed the issues with representation in games and how players are often allowed to “opt-out” of more diverse content by picking a male avatar or avoiding queer romances, like in many Mass Effect or Dragon Age games. Essentially, much of the queer content in games can be avoided by not making certain decisions or interacting with certain characters. As a result, players can’t “opt-out” of queer content; there is a disproportionate backlash from straight gamers like we saw with the adverse reaction to queer romance and characters in The Last of Us.

Wiens pointed out that this backlash also reflects how many people “operate in the world” in which they ignore any people or experiences that are different from their own, making those characters, experiences, or struggles seem “forced” when they are encountered in media.

Meaning also mentioned how in some games, like Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, the storyline with a female player character (Cassandra) is widely considered much richer than that of the male player character (Alexios), which may “trick” people into playing a more complex and diverse story than they typically would.

STEM, Education, and the "Pipeline Problem"

Multiple members of the audience were curious about the “pipeline problem” (in which the path to STEM fields for women is visualized as a leaky pipeline) and how these tools and approaches and strategies used to “plug the holes” might relate to women getting into games.

Panelists all agreed that there is too much focus on getting more people into the industry and not enough on fixing the toxicity within the industry, arguing that more diversity alone will not fix the problems in place. As Wiens framed it, there is “a lot of talk about how do we get more people here and not a lot of talk about how do we support them when they are here to thrive.”

Vossen connected this back to her concerns as someone teaching future game developers. She argued her focus is less about getting more marginalized people through the “pipeline” and into the industry and instead about how to “properly prepare” her students for what they will encounter in the industry. She emphasized that alternative paths might be more worthwhile for those who “leak” out of the pipeline, and that the white men who already work in the industry need to figure out how to make the “end” of the pipeline less toxic. Too often, marginalized people are expected to fix the culture themselves when they join the industry.

Vossen highlighted the need for people in power to own up to the existence of these problems when asked about what can be done to create safer spaces in education. She explained there are huge issues with people in power denying the existence of any problem to keep up a particular image. Wiens supported this, drawing attention to the fact that people in positions of power in education or industry often “think they are the good guy” and not realizing the ways that “harms are being enacted.” Both Vossen and Weins agreed that sadly, these people are in power are frequently women, “white feminists” denying the existence of racism, sexism, homophobia, sexual harassment or assault in their program or company.

Resistance

The panel then turned to the question of resistance. How do we resist these conditions? How do we push back against those trying to push us out? How do we create despite the hostility? How do we create against the dominant culture?

Panelists had many suggestions, both big and small. They encouraged the audience to seek out games that are more tailored to their interests and recommended various games (listed and linked below). Dr Vossen emphasized that many people don’t know about great games like the Life is Strange series, and Wiens interjected, saying she credits Life is Strange for getting her into games. They all then emphatically agreed that there is also nothing wrong with playing more demanding games on “easy mode” or making them more accessible to you in any way you can. Meaning asserted, “don’t be ashamed, there is nothing wrong with it, it’s a great way to experience the game.”

Lastly, Vossen highlighted the work of independent women game designers such as Nina Freeman (Cibele) or Emily Flynn-Jones (Curses), who create games that focus on the experiences of young women and push back against the status quo.

Drawing of upper body of two girls back to back with crows flying around their heads with text Life is Strange: Remastered Collection

The event wrapped up with the audience asking panelists to discuss their personal experiences as gamers trying to survive games culture. Dr Wiens suggested that sometimes enacting agency might mean leaving games culture, but sometimes “enacting agency might be that we stay and speak back to the kind of harassment we are seeing happening.”

Dr MacDonald highlighted the extreme and positive difference between her first experiences playing Dungeons and Dragons in high school, “the only reason I was allowed to play is because I was someone’s girlfriend,” as opposed to now where she plays D&D with “really supportive people of all genders.” Dr MacDonald encouraged male members of the audience to make their spaces welcoming and accessible and encouraged marginalized people to “find their people, and hold tight, and make community.”

Panel Overview

Why Take Games Seriously?

Harassment

Representation

STEM, Education, and the "Pipeline Problem"

Resistance

Links

Games Recommended by Panelists

Organizations Recommended by Panelists

Books Recommended by Panelists

Departments Involved

Research Centres