'Don't Date Geek Girls'

RedEyedAbyss

I've never met girls like that. I have however met guys like that. e.g. bronies.

Forzare

I honestly haven't really run into the "ZOMG I AM A GUY WHO WATCHES PONIES, I AM SO SPECIAL FOR BUCKING THE TREND, I'M BETTER THAN YOU AND ALSO LOOK AT ME" type of brony in months. Not since liking ponies was a new thing.

Unless you're counting YouTube comments, but expecting YouTube comments to not be fucking retarded is kind of like being angry at the sun for not being cold.

But before this turns into yet another brony derail that accomplishes nothing but getting everyone all riled up and goes nowhere, blah blah blah stupid people exist, sexist people exist on both sides, blah blah blah

And on the subject of the article, I generally agree with Malk.

RedEyedAbyss

In general, I've found that the whole self-aggrandizing mentality tends to be more perpetrated by Guys In Real Life (people on Tvtropes might remember the infamous Suke Sho). I've been on the Gamespot forums for a few years and I have never seen this. In fact, gender wasn't an issue a lot of the time, though I mostly stayed on the Wii board, so that might have something to do with it.

Forzare

Yeah, in my experience at least, I find that GIRLs tend to make a bigger deal out of it than girls.

Most of the time, with a real girl online, they'll say something after a while that makes me go "Wait a minute, you're a girl?" They don't (generally) make a big deal about it. Whereas a GIRL will just try too hard and act way way too girly.

Malkavian

I've met attractive women who shopped and worked at Gamestop. When I got Tales of Vesperia, the female at the counter actually stopped to chat about how great the game was. She didn't fangirl or anything but she was bubbly and friendly and it was a nice talk.

I feel the 'GURL GAMER' is by and large a strawman created to rationalize lingering sexism among male nerds. The obnoxious type might exist in some places, but I feel like it feels like an extension of the not-homophobic-homophobe. "I get that you're defying social norms, but do you have to be in my face about it?"

^From what I've heard from actual female gamers they try not to draw attention to it, if only to spare themselves 'show your tits lol'

Forzare

I feel the 'GURL GAMER' is by and large a strawman created to rationalize lingering sexism among male nerds. The obnoxious type might exist in some places, but I feel like it feels like an extension of the not-homophobic-homophobe. "I get that you're defying social norms, but do you have to be in my face about it?"

Yeah, I see it brought up a lot, but I can't say that I've ever even encountered one on the internet, let alone in real life.

RedEyedAbyss

I always did feel that the caricature was a mere straw-woman. It seems to exist on the "global warming denial" mentality of leaping on any possible minimal "evidence" they can find. Suddenly one girl that dares to point out her gender becomes exaggerated into self-aggrandisement and becomes representative of all female gamers.

This also reminds me of some of the derogatory comments against the Wii where "girl" or "woman" was used as part of the "dumb, unwashed masses." And then gamers wonder why their hobby has such a bad reputation.

I might also add that the guy comes off as a bigger douchebag in the comic. Hard to strawman the girl as claiming him to be an asshole sexist when she's right.

InsanityAddict

The only thing I ever encountered was a dudette who admitted to exploiting her gender in WoW for loot purposes and that might have been a joke.

Naas_Human

Which reminds me, IJBM: articles that use words misleadingly for a catchy title.

Yeah, the article was really "don't look for perfection" instead of "don't date geek girls".

Crimson

If it means anything I have met obnoxious girl gamers, but they weren't obnoxious because they were going all "that's right I'm a GIRL and I play VIDEO games", but rather they were all "I'm the most stereotypical Kingdom Hearts fangirl you can imagine!"

RedEyedAbyss

Yeah, but in that case, it's more obnoxious (franchise) fan. That's pretty typical.

Although I do remember that one time where someone complained that they were unnerved about girls getting off on Kingdom Hearts' dialogue. Naturally, I pointed out that guys get off on female character designs all the time.

LouieW

Forzare,
Yeah, I see it brought up a lot, but I can't say that I've ever even encountered one on the internet, let alone in real life.

Yep, I feel like it is actually more common to hear people complain about women talking about their gender a lot than for anyone actually to do that. I do however hear quite a bit about women who reveal their gender online getting harassed (especially while playing certain online games). I think there is a good parallel of that kind of treatment in a good portion of sports fandom as well (i.e. male dominated fandom that is not particularly receptive to female members) and I find it to be just as annoying there. I guess it goes to show that there are risks of revealing your gender online.

Abyss_Worm,
This also reminds me of some of the derogatory comments against the Wii where "girl" or "woman" was used as part of the "dumb, unwashed masses." And then gamers wonder why their hobby has such a bad reputation.

Aye, it seems like a pretty clear sign of elitism to me when people start talking about how appealing to more people is a bad thing. Also, assuming that whether you are a man or woman plays a significant role in what kinds of games you like seems to be mistaken to me. For example, if not all men like sports games or so-called "hardcore" titles, then it seems weird to me to assume that all women would not like them.

glennmagusharvey

I think the problem is less so that women aren't accepted into male-dominated activities, but that the men who dominate such activites make a much bigger deal about the gender of a woman who is involved in the activity than they ought to, making such participation rather awkward.

Ponicalica

«I've never met girls like that. I have however met guys like that. e.g. bronies.»

I actually don't remember very many bronies like that, although it probably helps that my main internet socialization is on #yf.  The main annoying brony trait I've seen is «being Saturn».