Female Gamers

Forty-eight percent of the gaming community is female. That is an eight percent increase since 2010. You would think that with such increase, the gaming community would not only tolerate females but embrace them as well. Instead, many females who pick up a controller (or rock a keyboard) are called "fake gamers". Flirtation is rampant; sexist comments are normal.

Why should females be so subjected? Because we are slowly invading an industry that has been, for the most part, targeted to males?

It would seem that even the people who make and distribute video games see females as a joke. Female armor is ridiculously scanty; it seems to be more for aesthetics than protection. Granted, certain games have provided unisex armor, such as Fallout (no one is picky about how you look when you are facing mutant hordes and synths), but there are few exceptions to the rule: if you are a girl and want to play as one, you might as well not bother to expect your armor not to be sexualized; in some cases that sexy armor does not even give you the same protection as an equal level male suit of armor.

If you need first hand material of what I am saying, go ahead and click this.

Sure, it sounds like just another troll site. But even trolling is founded on the most basic feelings of the troll and the community it represents.

If you should choose to play as a man, don't bother expecting all male gamers to respect you. You will still be hit on. There will still be instances of sexual harassment that make a woman so uncomfortable that she will leave her current game for another. It seems that civilization stops when you log in; or, in the very least, common human decency.

The truth of the matter is, there are too many stigmas about being a female gamer. If you play, you are fake. If you are not fake, then you are looking for attention and want to be saved by men in the game. And if THAT is not the case, then clearly you have no life at all so you aim for a boyfriend online.

This needs to stop. We do not allow such behavior in public, so why should it be tolerated online? The sooner we can erase the bullshit ideas that women do not belong in the market of gaming, the sooner we can encourage not only steady growth of female involvement but the entire industry itself. Women do not deserve to be treated this way, just for wanting to have fun outside of the stereotypical "girl games" like Sims.

If you search for the best YouTube gamers, your first search result shows the top twenty. There is only ONE female on that list, and she is at the very bottom of this list, seen here.

If female gamers were treated as equals, that list would look totally different, don't you think? It is time that we gave up stigmas in the gaming community and take advantage of our diversity to broaden not only our platforms but the games created themselves. It is time to encourage female children that not only can they do the same things the boys can do but that they can be just as good at it.

If you would like to follow women who are trying to give other women a real platform in gaming, please look into Not in the Kitchen Anymore; Female-Gamer.com; WomenGamers.com; LadyGamers.com. There is also multiple females only gaming groups on Facebook, including Gamer Goddesses, where you can reach out for help on anything from games to plain day-to-day life questions.