Sick and Tired [TW: Racism, Rape, Homophobia]

Maybe it’s because I’ve been beyond stressed out lately. Maybe it’s because I haven’t slept much in the last week. Maybe it’s because I’m struggling to juggle a full-time job, a full course load, and still maintain some kind of social life.

Whatever the reason is, I am sick and tired of being a feminist. I’m tired of constantly defending myself, of trying to explain things. Like all of this:

I am tired of female politicians getting asked silly, vapid questions. As if who your favorite designer is has ANY impact on your ability to lead.

I know that feel, Hil.

I am tired of having to walk down the quad after class and listen to a group of fraternity brothers refer to people as “fags,” as if being LGBTQ is an insult.

I am tired of hearing my male friends complain about being “friendzoned.” I am tired of the idea that just because you are nice to a girl and give her a shoulder to lean on, she should automatically fall in love with you and/or enter into a sexual relationship with you.

Clearly your logic is perfect.

I’m sick and tired of listening to male politicians trying to make decisions about MY body. I’m tired of people like Paul Ryan, the VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE of the Republican Party, trying to argue that RAPE is a form of conception.

I’m tired of not being able to have a conversation about poverty in America without someone bringing up “welfare queens.” Just like Melissa Harris-Perry, I am sick of hearing that poor people are lazy, that they don’t work hard, that single mothers struggling to make ends meet just want to suck on the government tit.

I’m tired of telling people that I write and edit for a feminist blog and getting looks of disdain and dismissal. I’m tired of people assuming anything about me or my sexuality because I’m a feminist. I’m tired of being told that I make a big deal out of “stupid” things. I’m tired of being told to learn to take a joke. I’m tired of my very righteous anger being dismissed as the rantings of a silly young person who will calm down once she’s out of school.

Equality in Video Games: Yay or Nay?

Hi everyone! I am parklena, a new writer for the ShoutOut! blog this semester. As my bio will tell you, I am an English major and a Women’s Studies minor (although I’m told it is Gender Studies now). I know that many people, when asked what a feminist is, will reply someone who believes in gender equality. There are many talks about how there is still no gender equality in the world and that is why blogs like this exist. However, I did make an interesting observation while idly watching my roommate play her video games.

I recently got her Mass Effect, a game for the Xbox 360. In the game, the main character is Commander Shepard. The player is allowed to choose whether the player can choose to be female or male and the player goes through a series of missions in order to save the galaxy and whatnot. But that’s not what I found interesting. I came to the realization that no matter what gender you choose in the game, the outcome will still be the same. John or Jane Shepard, it does not matter – he/she will still save the world in the end (if you play it right, anyway). My friend, being female, chose to be female in the game and I observed the way they portray the female in the game. Now, I will say now that I have not seen the game played with the male character but I have seen video clips of him on Youtube so this is based mostly on my observation of the female character.

Girls Can’t Play Video Games

I wanted to take a break from criticizing (for the most part, but it’ll only be minor, I promise..) and focus, instead, on something rather positive I’ve seen happening. To be less vague, I enjoy playing a video game called Starcraft; it’s a competitive strategy game, but the details about it aren’t very important. What is important is that there is a lot of professional competition in tournaments that can range from a few hundred dollars to tens of thousands. While it is mostly dominated be geeky guys like myself, there has been a sudden surge in women competing at the professional level. Not just competing, but competing with men and being given contracts for the same teams as men. Not only do they receive a salary, but they basically have their cooking, cleaning, and other basic living needs taken care of in a team house where they live with their team mates. For any player, this sort of thing is a huge deal, and not an easy accomplishment.

While this isn’t necessarily a huge deal, I found it pretty cool to see an all female tournament, with women from all over the world traveling to China to compete. In the subsequent week or so, several female players were signed to professional teams, where they would live side by side with their male counterparts in “team houses.” Several of the players were also seen competing in several major tournaments as well. Despite my usual tendency to at least pretend I’m not an unbelievably huge nerd, I felt like all of this recent news was worth sharing.

Feminist Ops

So, I was at Wal-Mart the other day (promising start, right?) and I caught a glimpse of this as I was passing through the parking lot:

Needless to say, I was caught off guard at the very least.  As much as I was wondering if that kind of sticker is even legal, what was more heinous to consider was the group of little kids walking by who were talking about it.  My initial reaction was to post this and go on a rant about why this kind of icon is offensive and how no one should put something like that in a public place.  But, after giving this sticker much thought, it led me to another arena where this type of iconography is present: video games.

As I’ve mentioned before, Call of Duty has been my favorite form of procrastination for a few years.  But, last year’s release of Black Ops has led me to question a few things about the game series, and I’m not just talking about the increased presence of the sleazy “Halo” jump or the nerfed knife.  My qualm stems from the new ability to customize gamer icons.  For example, mine looks something like this:

I know, you all are so jealous….

 

But, my problem is not the option to customize these icons, it’s when the icons start looking more like this:

 

And this:

Video games and feminism: are they mutually exclusive?

As I sat today, watching a female friend play Call of Duty for the first time on her brand new XBox 360, she made a statement that made me think: “I’m just crappy at the moment, the other players don’t wanna play with me.” This got me thinking about women and the video gaming industry. I don’t know many women that kick butt at Halo or spend a minimum of six hours a day playing World of Warcraft. I thought about how women in and around the video game industry are portrayed. Also, that the “nerdy” aspect of gaming should be something that attracts women: we’re nerds about a lot of stuff! I found this video that really began to tie all of this together…

Earlier today, I decided to interview my brother on women and gaming. I would have loved to interview a female gamer, but I don’t know any! Now here I’m talking about serious gamers, or as he would call them, hardcore gamers. We talked about World of Warcraft, one the highest grossing video games ever made. It is a computer-based RPG that is notorious for having one of the higher female counts of gamers. Alex (name has been changed, of course) plays it every day. Here’s what he had to say: