Gaming can be a competitive hobby, but one that is done with banter and friendly jabs between teammates. Or that is the reality for male gamers anyway.
Female gamers face sexist remarks, hateful comments, and violent threats regularly when playing online multiplayer games.
Of course, not every guy is hateful towards women, but it is difficult to find a woman who hasn’t had at least one bad experience when playing multiplayer games.
Women are targeted in lobbies by their own teammates often as soon as they speak, the other players clocking the feminine voice and queuing the stream of hate. Sometimes, even the use of pink gun skins on games such as Valorant or feminine-looking gamer tags will provoke sexist abuse.
Brig spoke to competitive Valorant player, Ellie Graham, to gain an insight into what gaming culture looks like for female players.
Ellie has both witnessed and been subject to abuse online, yet she continues to play daily. When asked why, she said: “Because I like playing it, the honest answer is that it’s an addiction.”
She feels as though she must prove her capability to play before interacting with her teammates for fear of sexist comments. “I always wait until I have a lot of kills, or I have the highest kills in the lobby before I speak,” she said, “or else you get comments like ‘boosted’, ‘you’ve bought your account’, ‘you should be in the kitchen’.
“Sometimes even if you are playing well and you speak, [teammates] will just disconnect. Seriously.”
Ellie recounted some of the worst abuse that she had witnessed. She said: “I don’t really get it that bad, but when people find out you’re a girl your own teammates will sometimes kill you.
“My friends get it worse, being called ‘e-girl’ being screamed at down the mic. Violent sexual remarks are made. Someone once threatened to find where I live.”
Despite the common abuse that female gamers receive, both annoying abuse such as people leaving matches or more serious verbal threats, women often look passed this or find ways around it such as not speaking in-game just to enjoy their hobby – something they shouldn’t have to do just to stay safe.
Featured image credit: Riot Games
Fourth year student journalist studying Bachelor of Arts with Honours in Journalism Studies.
Words at Brig, The Daily Evergreen, Alloa Advertiser, Discovery Music Scotland, and The Mourning Paper.
