Those who fly with me in Eve Online know that I'm the admin for a social channel called Women Gamers of Eve (WGOE). I came across this channel early in my game play in 2009 by a guy in game who thought it may be nice for me to be there. Why? Rex (who has since passed away in real life) thought that it may be nice to socialize with other women and get a break from the testosterone filled environment. He was right. Through the years I've gone from being a member to moderator to the person currently in charge of the channel. This channel started in 2003 as a way for other women to network in Eve. This has been true for MANY women with in Eve. The politics of who we fly with are left at the door yet we still discuss game mechanics.
Recently a post was made on women gamers ( http://themittani.com/features/no-penises-allowed-eves-exclusionary-spaces). This article was written by Eingang a member of WGoE. There is a coalition within Eve (CFC - Cluster Fuck Coalition) that has created their own channel in jabber for the women members of the coalition. Many of those women are also members of WGoE. There are many opinions as to why this channel was started ... for women with in that coalition to communicate with out worrying about security for operations to the coalition having a force of female spies. Regardless of WHY that channel was started there are some things stated in this article that are beyond disturbing to me. The article tries to appear well written and have a point but rambles on in directions that never come back to a point. My comments will be on this article - so bear with me.
The author, Eingang, starts to highlight the name of the channel "no penises allowed (NPA)" but makes no real point. Is it the name of the channel that is the issue? Or that it's for women only ? First let's look at the audience for this channel - women in the CFC. The CFC where vulgar language and off color remarks are not only a trade mark but one may even speculate are common vernacular for the membership. So, given that, a women's group can't use the word "penis"? Honestly, it's the actual biological name for the male genitalia so I'm really confused as to what the issue is here. No real point is made just rambling on to another paragraph. Hmm ok let's continue.
At this point some random statistics on gamers gender dynamics with no point or theories are made. I believe the author thinks that just randomly tossing out numbers puts some validity to the point being made, but what's the point? Ah there is none. So let me attempt to make one off the statistics that she has posted. Since 2006 the ration of men to women does not seem to have changed in Eve Online as compared to a game like World of Warcraft. There are many factors as to why this could be. One that comes to mind is the marketing that is done for World of Warcraft for expansions as well as the game in general by famous people as opposed to Eve Online. I have not seen a commercial on TV during prime time viewing for Eve Online while I have for World of Warcraft. Then there is the science fiction aspect of Eve Online. Space ships are not something all women are into. The content provided in something like World of Warcraft or Leauge of Legends or even Second Life is a bit more open to both genders. The very nature of Eve Online denotes an interest in space or space travel.
The author then moves on to discuss the culture of Eve Online with profanity, pornography, and sexual references in both text and voice coms but then moves on to a blog written about not using the term rape-cage. That paragraph could be developed into an article of it's own, yet again no real points made. Hmm ok let's keep moving on.
Next is the topic of transgendered women with in the Eve Online environment. Now by the heading of this section "Sexist, Discriminatory Cows" it's really unclear if the author is calling transgendered women cows or the women of WGoE cows. In either case, I find it hypocritical that a woman who is attempting to write about gamers just being players and it not being a sexist thing to referense other women - bio or transgendered - as cows. The author talks about the formation of a channel for Transgendered Gamers of Eve as well as pointing out a channel for GLB players is discrimination. Then this moves into some how being sexist cows practicing reverse discrimination. Wow.
At this point, I need to state that clearly the "person" writing this article is not only unable to write to make a clear point on their opinion, they clearly don't have any knowledge on social environments in and out of games. Maybe you should learn what the Suffrage movement is or who Harvey Milk is. The thing is dear author of this brilliant piece of illiteracy vomit there are groups of people that ARE discriminated against for their gender or sexual orientation in and out of a game on line. Channels for these groups / areas of interest aren't about exclusion it's about INclusion. I know of MANY women from WGoE who have become real life friends because of that channel. Women who have been going through a hard time in real life and didn't want to share that openly to other men - be it relationship or health reasons. I know of women in WGoE who were born of the male gender and went through gender reassignment surgery and have told me they LOVE WGoE - why because they are treated as women. I have friends in the gay, lesbian, bi-sexual channel that I know have received support there as well. The bottom line, is that people want to be accepted - blue / black / green / purple / fat / thin / tall / short whatever - people want a place they can go where they are accepted.
The reality of being a woman in Eve Online is you are in an environment where the average guy is what society would call a geek or nerd. Many of them act like they have never spoke to a woman before. Take that and now add people who are gay or lesbian and many of these "geek" types have no social competency to communicate in a non-offensive way. An example of this is using the word "fag" for everything or "gay". Most educated people, while they find it offensive, will just ignore those that use such vocabulary and move in circles where topics of conversation are more on their level.
The authors own words a SIG should be formed " mutual enjoyment of each other’s company" - however if you are a woman and enjoy the company of other women that's sexist. If you are gay, lesbian or bi-sexual you shouldn't enjoy the company of those as well you are sexist. I fail to see where this logic can work only some of the time and not all of the time, wait it's because it's not logic.
The author then moves on to say that she will hang out in WGoE, the very channel she's not in support of, in order to support those who are more keenly aware of the issues. While I am the admin of WGoE, I have to say that for that channel the author is entitled to her opinion and I will not remove her membership (altho it's been asked that I do). However, from my personal opinion, how can you write an article about how sexist it is to have such a channel and call us cows and then want to hang out with us?
Stop being a dumb cunt and hypocrit. You don't like the channel's existence and think it's sexist - close out of it. Simple. If you have a point to make then make it, but rambling on in what looks like an article but in reality has no relevance to anything just makes you look ill informed and bitter. It makes me think that you suffer from petty woman syndrome because you didn't come up with WGoE or the NPA channel. I didn't create WGoE - I put support in and was trusted with it, I take no credit for it other than I am the admin currently. If you want attention, write a good article that's informed or make your own you tube channel like plenty of others have to fulfill their attention needs. There are plenty of ways for you to create a name for yourself but calling other women in the game - in the social channel you say you want to hang out in - sexist cows makes you no better than the neck-beards.
TLDR: The author is a bitter attention seeking "woman" (or is that cow ? Cunt I think is better) who is jealous of other women in eve. Or it's dbrb in "disguise" - some may say that's the same thing. In either case, the article rambles in several directions and makes no point only to have the author contradict "her" self many times in it.
