let me be your therapist

[alpas]

Близзард форсирует Real ID на своих форумах (каждый участник будет постить под реальным именем-фамилией). настоящее цунами творится в англоязычном интернете по этому поводу (частично см. в комментариях к моему посту на dirty по ссылке выше). есть масса дельных развёрнутых отзывов, почему это плохо. один особенно меня тронул. девушка пишет о том, каково девушкам в интернете вообще и в игровом сообществе в частности. привожу в оригинале, нет сил переводить, простите. очень живо и метко написано, выделяю из ката особенно удачный абзац:

Here's the shit a female gamer has to deal with:

* People assume that you're not actually a girl, and you're just playing a girl character so you get "free stuff" from guys. This is actually the least bothersome thing. (For the record, I never got "free stuff." I think to get free stuff you actually have to cyber someone, or at least make them think you might, and I had no interest in any of those things.)

* constant requests — some anonymous and some not, some crass and some just creepy — asking for pictures, and these will not let up, EVER. In my case, the requests did not let up after five years.

* If you do post a picture (I never did) people either go nuts over how hot you are and won't leave you alone — and the guys that perv on you treat you in a condescending way because hot=stupid; having to hear that shit addressed to other girls on Vent was really infuriating and uncomfortable — OR they make a point of constantly telling you how ugly you are and won't leave you alone. There is no middle ground. They either want to fuck you or deride you. And it actually doesn't matter how hot or how ugly you are, either; the hottest girls will get called ugly (and FAT, ALWAYS FAT), and the ugliest girls still have to deal with lonely guys who aren't superficial. Any time the girl posts something thereafter, people will comment on her appearance, even though it has nothing to do with whatever is being discussed.

* if you don't post a picture they all sit around and speculate, and some people inevitably decide that you're not posting a picture because you're ugly, and therefore they don't like you. It does not occur to a great many people that a girl might not want guys bothering them for any reason. If you try to defend yourself, you're an attention whore.

[…]

* I got daily messages from people I didn't know because they liked my forum posts. This was bothersome for a few reasons. Some of whom were just normal people being nice and it was only bothersome as a distraction, but a fraction of them were lonely guys excited to be talking to a girl. The latter would bother me constantly. Other women I played with also dealt with these kinds of guys.

* If you ask someone to leave you alone, you're a stuck up bitch. That means you always have to be nice to everyone. This was both unfair and character–building, because now I'm really good at talking to and disengaging from socially ill–adjusted people without hurting their feelings.

* You are automatically a therapist and guys come to you for advice. This isn't so bad when friends do it, but you also have to patiently listen to a lot of emotionally–fragile guys you don't know very well. If this were infrequent it wouldn't be so bad. When it's constant and it's using up leisure time that you wanted to spend actually playing the game, it's really draining.

* People assume that you're bad at the game; they assume that any gear you got was given to you because you're a girl, and that your entire guild just started carrying you through raid instances because they were driven senseless by your siren song. It doesn't matter if you're in one of the top guilds in the US and doing content where you really can't carry bad players through. They can believe you're a good healer, sometimes. If you're a damage–dealing class they can't believe you could possibly be as good as a guy until they see raid reports. They will never believe you can tank.

* Some people think anything you do or say is attention–whoring, even if you never wanted the attention. If a guy makes a joke in a forum post, he's a funny guy. If a girl makes a joke in a forum post, she's an attention whore. If a guy makes a good argument in a forum post, he's a smart guy. If a girl makes a good argument in a forum post, she's doing it for attention. She's ESPECIALLY an attention whore if people like her or agree with her.

* Similarly, people assume that the only reason anyone likes you is because they're one of your fanboys. So people don't genuinely think women or funny or make good arguments, they're just fanboys. If other girls like you, then it's because women form cliques — even if in the previous breath they were saying that women are all catty and hate each other.

* Even if people tend to assume you're male from your writing style, once they know your gender, some people tend to read everything in the shrillest way possible. You could literally copy and paste a guy's post and get an entirely different reaction.

* All of this applies to underage girls. I've played alongside 14, 15, 16 year old girls who would deal with all this horrible stuff every day. Often worse stuff really, since they didn't yet have the best handle on how to deal with it.

[…]

* For all of the above, it doesn't really matter much if you're married or in a long–term relationship. It doesn't stop anyone. The only real difference is that if you're married, people assume you're old and unattractive and probably controlling. (I stopped playing WoW when I was 24, and I'm about to turn 26.)

Comments

[shvarz.livejournal.com]

К сожалению, чистая правда. И не только в играх, но и на форумах. С другой стороны, пока женский пол шифруется, это будет продолжаться. С третьей стороны, насильно расшифровывать тоже нельзя.