Okay, this is dumb. I'm not for harassing, and I hate griefing enough that I intentionally avoid PVP scenarios in WoW. But honestly, my attitude on reading this is "boo-fuckin-hoo".
So, it just occurred to people that a virtual world game filled with a random assortment of people might actually contain assholes? This is news? Like any community, its going to have misfits and jerks. The easiest things to do are either
a) play on a role-playing server where such behaviour violates the "ethic" of the environment and can get the people booted (but bleh, who wants to play on an RP-server)
b) find like minded people (say, other women, friends, or just generally good people) and form a guild. Play with your guild. Playing with non-scum can greatly enhance your experience.
People are assholes in the real world. Why would it shock that this could carry over into virtual worlds where consequences are fewer. You don't have to belong to any specific demographics to play. You don't have to have passed a psych profile to play. Anyone can play. The anonymity of playing does promote a certain freedom in playing as an asshole as well. How can you predict who the assholes are where there's no obvious visual difference between a 40 year old school teacher playing and her 14 year old student?
If you can't deal with the tendancy of some minority of people to be jerks, playing online games is probably not for you.
You're right...this is an extreme case of taking offense at something most would simply ignore or shrug off. My post wasn't necessarily to state this woman was right in taking offense, which who can really say what is right and wrong when it comes to feelings, but to point out one of the many obstacles women feel they face when it comes to gaming. I suppose if I were more articulate and not as dog ass tired as I am tonight, I would feel the need to go into what I personally feel is lacking for women in the gaming world...another time maybe.
Comments
Okay, this is dumb. I'm not for harassing, and I hate griefing enough that I intentionally avoid PVP scenarios in WoW. But honestly, my attitude on reading this is "boo-fuckin-hoo".
So, it just occurred to people that a virtual world game filled with a random assortment of people might actually contain assholes? This is news? Like any community, its going to have misfits and jerks. The easiest things to do are either
a) play on a role-playing server where such behaviour violates the "ethic" of the environment and can get the people booted (but bleh, who wants to play on an RP-server)
b) find like minded people (say, other women, friends, or just generally good people) and form a guild. Play with your guild. Playing with non-scum can greatly enhance your experience.
People are assholes in the real world. Why would it shock that this could carry over into virtual worlds where consequences are fewer. You don't have to belong to any specific demographics to play. You don't have to have passed a psych profile to play. Anyone can play. The anonymity of playing does promote a certain freedom in playing as an asshole as well. How can you predict who the assholes are where there's no obvious visual difference between a 40 year old school teacher playing and her 14 year old student?
If you can't deal with the tendancy of some minority of people to be jerks, playing online games is probably not for you.
Posted by: The Black Goat with a dozen young | February 27, 2005 2:50 PM
You're right...this is an extreme case of taking offense at something most would simply ignore or shrug off. My post wasn't necessarily to state this woman was right in taking offense, which who can really say what is right and wrong when it comes to feelings, but to point out one of the many obstacles women feel they face when it comes to gaming. I suppose if I were more articulate and not as dog ass tired as I am tonight, I would feel the need to go into what I personally feel is lacking for women in the gaming world...another time maybe.
Posted by: Princess | February 28, 2005 8:59 PM