Today’s article was just a short one, and engaging in what makes everyone roll their eyes: seeing something happen on Reddit and writing an article about it.
To cut it short:
- Billie Eilish (famous singer) uploaded a picture of her old Nintendo DSi in gallery of images, to her Instagram account
- Someone shared that on Reddit
- Half of the comment section slid straight into shitty gamer dude Hell (the other half did not)
- Some man on Mastodon attacked me
- Post removed from Reddit when moderators spotted the comments
…this is a fast-forward of the oddness, but if you want to read over my ramble here, and see some shittiness, the link will help:
https://gardinerbryant.com/you-dont-look-like-a-gamer/
I see this shit all the time, and it is not only exhausting, but something no one should see (no matter their identity) should be subjected to. Anyway, read on if you’d like!
Gaming is one of those weird spaces; it mainstreamed in the smartphone era, with a lot of folks who previously mocked it embracing it.
It’s picked up the toxic manosphere infection as it transitioned (“casual gamers” Vs “real gamers” facilitated that boxing off). The onlyfans “egirl” revolution painted a skewed picture of girls as gamers in the worst possible way (doing it for attention to make money), and the manosphere has amplified this to the detriment of gamers everywhere.
Gaming also focuses a lot of moral outrage, and that hasn’t helped matters. It’s given some men a ghost to fight against (“the big bad feminist trying to ban waifus”), whereas the reality is far from that!
The reality is gaming is for everyone who wants to game; the best question to ask another gamer is what they’ve enjoyed playing (for the Ds, the Etrian Odyssey games are amazing!). Not every game is for every person, except for Super Smash on the GameCube, because that game was high art.