Excluding Women From E-Sports Does Not Legitimize It

[maninahat]

tl;dr

It's, (from my understanding) a private thing; Meaning they can do whatever they damn well please. That said, if you're going to complain about this complain about the, for example purposes only, Boyscouts. That's stuff a girl could do, but they can't. Why? Because it's a private organization that along with women bans homosexuals.

You can believe what you want about it, but they don't need to change for you. You can make your own tournament if you want to put your own rules or lack there of on it.



Tl:dr: All I hear is "wah". They can do what they want. Make your own to set your own rules/regulations.

Poor show of trolling. Even your analogy is incorrect (there are such a thing as "girl scouts", the boy scouts eventually recognising there is no legitimate reason to prevent girls from joining in). Also, just because it is a private organisation that is free to make its own shitty rules, doesn't mean we can't criticise them for making shitty rules, and that we shouldn't encourage them to revoke the shitty rules.

 

[maninahat]

Ah yes.. traditional asian mysoginy at its best... that happens when you let a organisation from a culture thats still to this day traditionaly sexist run the show on an international level.

Also:

Women only tournaments are okay because... reasons... but male only tournaments are BS (*hinthint* both are BS). Equality much? Either we have limited tournaments or we have free for alls. You cant rip into people for having male only tournaments while at the same time standing there proclaiming that women only tournaments are fine. Makes you look like a hypocrit.

Female only tournaments are totally okay, as they are typically under-represented. Every tournament already is a male only tournament. If we are ever able to level the playing field enough, then I will wholeheartedly agree with you

Not trying to start an argument, I'm just asking because I don't know if you know something I don't. But are you saying that females don't perform at the same levels as men or just that the gender ratio is so steep that the likelihood of a woman winning is almost null.

If we were talking sports that depend on physiology, then the very best male athletes outperform the very best female athletes (that is to say, the World's fastest woman is nowhere near as fast as the World's fasted man etc). But computer and board games are cerebral and there isn't much to say that a woman can't compete at an equal level to men.

That being said, women aren't normally encouraged to take part in these cerebral sports; this results in a lack of interest, and we end up with fewer women overall competing at the top levels. By increasing the profile of female tournaments in gaming, you are essentially offering encouragement to girls to take part - that is to say, if a girl sees more women taking part in publicised sport, they are more inclined to think the sport is "for them too", and won't feel discouraged in taking part. The more girls that feel they can take part, the more that will. The more that will, the more champions you will see to rival the male champions.

 

[LoneWolf83]

This is fucking stupid. Fist of all, as Carly stated, it does nothing to legitimize e-sports as sports. Secondly, e-sports by deffinition are not sports.

a contest or game in which people do certain physical activities according to a specific set of rules and compete against each other
: sports in general
: a physical activity (such as hunting, fishing, running, swimming, etc.) that is done for enjoyment

Merriam Webster online dictionary [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sport]
A sport by definition is a physical activity and sitting at a computer or console is not physical activity.

Jeezus. And I think it's bad enough that real sports are gender-segregated, but at least those have the excuse of not wanting men and women together in the locker rooms. What the fuck is these people's excuse, seriously? No. I don't want to hear it. They're fucking assholes. Every last one of them, without qualification. If any of them object to me calling them a fucking asshole, they have two options: Demand this be changed, or quit. Period. I'm just... I want to hit people with something hard and loud right now.

No the reason physical sports like rugby and football are segregated is because men have a physical advantage over women in strength and speed???
I mean seriously don't even try and and call that segregation for the sake of it, it's common sense.

However when it comes to E-sports that goes out the window and the playing field is even so any segregation is bullshit.

There are plenty of wemen who can compete in sports just as well as men, why deny them the chance simply because they have vaginas instead of penises? It is segregation for the sake of outdated and dumb ideas. If a woman wants to compete in a sport and is physically capable of doing it why deny her the chance?

 

[Eri]

Are you happy now whiners? Now women get to compete with the men, meanwhile the men cannot compete in the women's events. Yay equality.

 

[CardinalPiggles]

Jeezus. And I think it's bad enough that real sports are gender-segregated, but at least those have the excuse of not wanting men and women together in the locker rooms. What the fuck is these people's excuse, seriously? No. I don't want to hear it. They're fucking assholes. Every last one of them, without qualification. If any of them object to me calling them a fucking asshole, they have two options: Demand this be changed, or quit. Period. I'm just... I want to hit people with something hard and loud right now.

No the reason physical sports like rugby and football are segregated is because men have a physical advantage over women in strength and speed???
I mean seriously don't even try and and call that segregation for the sake of it, it's common sense.

However when it comes to E-sports that goes out the window and the playing field is even so any segregation is bullshit.

I've always thought it unfair that women are forced into their own leagues. Why shouldn't a women be allowed to play sports with a man professionally if she wants to? If she can.

Because men still hold this primitive belief that women need to be protected for their own sake.

 

[Haukur Isleifsson]

I still think that it's worthy of discussion if some degree of separation between the genders could encourage more women to get into traditionally male hobbies/sports. Like Carly says in her article it can be very isolating to be in an extreme minority in a group. Could it not be that more women would be willing to try out things like e-sports if they would not have to experience that isolation? Not to mention the sense of alienation, unwanted attention and even sexual harassment that might come with it. Sure it would be best if those things simply didn't happen but until we can guarantee that is it not better that women only leagues, tournaments etc. get to be "safe places" from such things?

Perhaps it would be best if there existed both separate and mixed tournaments so that everyone could choose what ever they want.

 

[Sylocat]

E-Sports won't be a "legitimate" sport until its fans are getting in bar fights and starting riots over it.

 

[Peaceful Winter]

I don't know what bothers me the most , the fact that people keep calling this crap e-sports (video games are NOT sports DAMMIT) , or the fact that IeSF (and others like it) think it is wrong for men and women to participate in e-sports together , especially considering there is no physical contact (with other players) required to play the games.

 

[AJ_Lethal]

I've always thought it unfair that women are forced into their own leagues. Why shouldn't a women be allowed to play sports with a man professionally if she wants to? If she can.

Because men still hold this primitive belief that women need to be protected for their own sake.

Because in some sports the physical gap becomes a chasm due of physical/physiological differences 95% of the time. Like in the martial arts example on page 2. Simply enough, women (generally speaking) in theory have to work harder for catching up with men's physical strength or to develop enough skills to offset the difference in physique.

Of course, this is an area where research is throughly needed to find out if mixed leagues can be feasible in this day and age.

 

[Majinash]

Because the only people that participate in this crap are neckbeards who think only men who started playing fighters, LoL or whatever the second they got cut from the umbilical cord should play.

I don't mean to attack your view, but I find your comment kind of offensive.

To my first point, why are we still taking groups of gamers and labeling them? I understand if back in the 90s when I talked about final fantasy that people viewed me as a nerd or a "neckbeard" but of all places this is a gaming site, why are we still calling people names for playing video games?

And as a second point... I've never heard this other view anywhere. The few E-sports personalities I know of don't seem to hold these sentiments. I've been watching Trump stream hearthstone for awhile now and it has improved my game greaty. He always answers questions and seems to be very encouraging to people in their play.

I've watched a lot of DOTA2, and while I don't follow the Chinese or SEA scene due largely to the timezone/language barrier, the western scene has always looked very welcoming to newer players.


I feel like a large part of your issue is how you think people are excluded from E-sports because they havn't been playing long enough. I don't think this is some prejudice against people who started too late, as it is simply a barrier of entry. I wouldn't expect to start playing basketball 5 years ago and join the NBA today, simply because 5 years isn't really enough time for someone to become good enough to play at a professional level. I would expect a large number of NBA players to have started playing basketball early in highschool, or even before that, because to do anything at a professional level you have to put in a lot of practice.

If I've misunderstood anything please let me know. It's just this thread feels like the old anti-gamer attitude I used to see being aimed at gamers by other gamers. And all the examples you used (while maybe true) I just havn't seen myself.

 

[Voulan]

Are you happy now whiners? Now women get to compete with the men, meanwhile the men cannot compete in the women's events. Yay equality.

You mean the women's events that get created in response to events that are automatically made to be male-only because being a male-only competition is considered more legitimate because women are considered inferior in competitions for some unfathomable reason so they need to create their own just to get the chance to compete in the same competition that has no gendered difference whatsoever?

I'm just going to assume you're the only person upset by this.

 

[Callate]

Are you happy now whiners? Now women get to compete with the men, meanwhile the men cannot compete in the women's events. Yay equality.

You mean the women's events that get created in response to events that are automatically made to be male-only because being a male-only competition is considered more legitimate because women are considered inferior in competitions for some unfathomable reason so they need to create their own just to get the chance to compete in the same competition that has no gendered difference whatsoever?

I'm just going to assume you're the only person upset by this.

That's quite the run-on sentence. It's kind of hard to parse.

One of many ways in which "e-sports" are different from the real thing is that there's little barrier between a "top-tier" player and someone just getting started. David Beckham isn't about to come out on the field and play soccer at a local playground or college, but there's relatively little in most games to prevent someone from playing with or against someone "tournament level" outside of an organized tournament on the Internet.

In short, there aren't the same barriers to achieving "tournament level" play- or receiving tournament-level guidance- that there are in "real" sports for not directly and immediately playing in tournaments, with professional-level colleagues and coaching immediately on hand. Watching Martina Navratilova play tennis isn't going to make one a significantly better tennis player, no matter how closely one scrutinizes her game; watching a top player play Starcraft just might.

All this is leading up to saying that I can feel some sympathy with those who feel allowing female-only tournaments but not male-only tournaments is a double standard- it is, and presuming it's justified because of sexism is rather a lame argument. If and when male-only tournaments are no longer acceptable, the same should be true of female-only ones. It's just not reasonable to assume that women "need a protected space" while men do not, or that because some men behave badly all should be punished be exclusion. You don't create equality by nurturing double-standards. When there's bad behavior- harassment, discrimination- by all means, root it out by enforcing fair and universal rules. But there isn't some sort of weight of debt that means anyone should be obliged to play "catch up" until some mythical impartial third party decides that the situation has achieved parity.

Declaring that women have to be protected because men will always behave badly is sexist- and neither men nor women should accept such a stance out of hand, whether it's a man or a woman who states it.

 

[Voulan]

Are you happy now whiners? Now women get to compete with the men, meanwhile the men cannot compete in the women's events. Yay equality.

You mean the women's events that get created in response to events that are automatically made to be male-only because being a male-only competition is considered more legitimate because women are considered inferior in competitions for some unfathomable reason so they need to create their own just to get the chance to compete in the same competition that has no gendered difference whatsoever?

I'm just going to assume you're the only person upset by this.

That's quite the run-on sentence. It's kind of hard to parse.

One of many ways in which "e-sports" are different from the real thing is that there's little barrier between a "top-tier" player and someone just getting started. David Beckham isn't about to come out on the field and play soccer at a local playground or college, but there's relatively little in most games to prevent someone from playing with or against someone "tournament level" outside of an organized tournament on the Internet.

In short, there aren't the same barriers to achieving "tournament level" play- or receiving tournament-level guidance- that there are in "real" sports for not directly and immediately playing in tournaments, with professional-level colleagues and coaching immediately on hand. Watching Martina Navratilova play tennis isn't going to make one a significantly better tennis player, no matter how closely one scrutinizes her game; watching a top player play Starcraft just might.

All this is leading up to saying that I can feel some sympathy with those who feel allowing female-only tournaments but not male-only tournaments is a double standard- it is, and presuming it's justified because of sexism is rather a lame argument. If and when male-only tournaments are no longer acceptable, the same should be true of female-only ones. It's just not reasonable to assume that women "need a protected space" while men do not, or that because some men behave badly all should be punished be exclusion. You don't create equality by nurturing double-standards. When there's bad behavior- harassment, discrimination- by all means, root it out by enforcing fair and universal rules. But there isn't some sort of weight of debt that means anyone should be obliged to play "catch up" until some mythical impartial third party decides that the situation has achieved parity.

Declaring that women have to be protected because men will always behave badly is sexist- and neither men nor women should accept such a stance out of hand, whether it's a man or a woman who states it.

I made that a run-on comment because I wanted to illustrate how ridiculous I thought the criticism was.

You misunderstand what I was debating against. In this situation, the event was only ever designed to be male-only, so the response that this was a bad thing because women get their own events free of scrutiny wasn't the situation at all in this context. If it was the other way around it would be important to highlight. Basically they complained over nothing.

 

[verdant monkai]

Separating men and women is segregating men just as much as it is women. Get over yourselves.
Its not sexist. Women are still allowed to play they just need to play with other women.

Its stupid yes, but its not targeting women.

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

I hope they never exclude women from E-Sports. Just because you're born without a dick doesn't make you any lesser of a human being, regardless of societal and cultural norms.

And if they did that...

Spoiler: Then things like this will cease to exist

 

[MaximumTheHormone]

The chess solution seems like a pointless money sink honestly.
Those who are interested in the sport don't care about this side league and those women who take the sport seriously forgo it.
The league sticks out like a white elephant as no-one really takes it seriously and its sole purpose is as a 'safe place'.


This solution by the IeSF is also massively flawed.
permanent segregation is now cutting off the potential female games for matching against the current gold standard.
The overwhelming majority of the best players at the moment are males, and this will only get even more slanted under this model as the male up and comers match wits with the best, learning and developing in an elite environment while female up and comers will have, at best, mediocre or passable competition.

Maybe instead of permanent segregation have one single tournament dedicated to women in e-sports.
it dosen't need to even be female exclusive, just female focused and positive
Promote the hell out of female stars and talent and provide some decent role models and female stars.
It'd also help if the gaming press didn't harp on like a bunch of seals every time people try and act positively on the issue of womens representation.
The more exaggerated and inflammatory these pieces get the less interested gamers will take sites like the escapist seriously.
And they also hurt their main goal of getting more women in games by painting an image of a big scary monster at the door even before they come in, sometimes regardless of whether that scary monster actually existed or not.

 

[LoneWolf83]

I can't think of a nicer way to put this than, don't be naive. You put a few women on a rugby pitch with full grown men they are going to get hurt, badly. They are not as strong or as fast in general it is a biological fact.

That is demonstrably false. There are wemen physically as strong as men, there are wemen who are physically as strong as some top tear athletes. To say no woman can physically compete with a man (which is what your saying is false. The reason you never see these wemen is because they don't have the opportunities that men do they are kept out of sports thanks to stupid ides but in places they are not kept out (bouncing, movers, fire fighters, police, etc) there are wemen who proves them selves and are as strong asthe men.

Also it will fuck the pace of the game as men might be hesitant to go full contact with them, or the opposite target them on purpose because they are weaker.

Then they will loose and rightfuly so.

Even in olympic events men scores are way higher for events as they are bigger and stronger. You show me one female weightlifter who has a chance of placing in the top 10 with men?

http://www.buzzfeed.com/jtes/the-strongest-woman-in-america-lives-in-poverty

Like would you think it is a good idea to let a woman fight a man in MMA or boxing? She is at a huge disadvantage even if they are the same weight and then there are basically no women to fight heavy weights. Most men would want to fight a woman, I wouldnt.

There are women who are on par with MMA fighters and can fight them! The only reason you don't see them is because of stupid ideas that come from times when people thought crazy people were possessed by demons, that bleeding would cure diseases, and that storms and earthquakes were the will of God or the gods. And there's the thing; all I've advocated is equal opportunity. If they can do it, let them, if they are physically strong enough and want to do it, then let them, even if the vast majority of wemen can't, let the minority than that can, and want to do.

 

[Eri]

I can't think of a nicer way to put this than, don't be naive. You put a few women on a rugby pitch with full grown men they are going to get hurt, badly. They are not as strong or as fast in general it is a biological fact.

That is demonstrably false.

No. It is demonstrably true. In fact...

It was the 1998 Australian Open and the Williams sisters, Venus and Serena, had seen some of the male players practising. On the basis of what they saw, they were convinced that they could beat a man ranked around 200 in the world and wanted to set up a game. At the time I was ranked 203 so the men's tour manager mentioned the possibility of a challenge to me, thinking that I was the perfect candidate. I didn't take much persuading, it seemed like a fun thing to do.

...

Apparently, after the game, Serena and Venus immediately told the press they wanted to challenge a male player again. This time they revised the ranking of the man they wanted to face, to 350 in the world. I informed the journalist who told me this that in the next week I was set to lose a lot of ATP points and drop down to 350 in the rankings. I told him that if Venus and Serena waited just one week they could challenge me all over again!

http://observer.theguardian.com/osm/story/0,,543962,00.html

The best female tennis players in the world couldn't even beat a man not even in the top 200. This also applies to all sports. There's a reason that the matches are separate.

 

[Lieju]

Separating men and women is segregating men just as much as it is women. Get over yourselves.
Its not sexist. Women are still allowed to play they just need to play with other women.

Its stupid yes, but its not targeting women.

That is inherently an admission that these women who are attending the Finnish tournament don't want to compete in the actual tournament. only WOMEN can have their safe spaces. I have one thing to say to these kind of people, who want special rules when they enter a tournament like say...only wanting to compete with their own sex.

Leave the competition.
Go home.
And let someone else take your place, who is there to compete fairly.

Do men need their safe spaces, though? Are men taking part in these tournaments likely to be harassed for being male? Belittled? Assumed they're not competitors? That they only take part to impress boys? That they're trying to hijack the sport? That they're only succeeding because of their looks?

Ideally, there would be no need for 'safe spaces' for anyone. But is it fair then that women will have harder time simply for being women in the first place?

 

[Something Amyss]

The best female tennis players in the world couldn't even beat a man not even in the top 200. This also applies to all sports. There's a reason that the matches are separate.

I'm lost on how that proves women are going to get hurt, "badly." Were Venus and Serena injured?