Girl Gamer Stereotypes...or lack thereof?

[dave_o]

I'm punk rock in a totally 70s way.

So is my (gamer) girlfriend, but she's more of a casual gamer, while I'm sorta more in the industry side of it. The RPG industry is amazing in that you can pretty much do your own thing (outside of WotC, etc.).

It's way cute, though, when she gets "campaign" and "adventure" mixed up. She'll be like "Hey babe, I wrote a campaign today!"

I just grin.

 

[Belen]

IME, the stereotypes seem to be changing, however ten years ago, things were far different than now. The older stereotype for a gamer girl was overweight, no cosmetics, bad hair, and bad fashion sense. In fact, I still deal with this stereotype with 90% of the female gamers that I have met in person.

However, ladies like Djeta are slipping into the arena in more numbers these days. Attractive, intelligent women that have grown up with computer games and a less stereotypical childhood. In fact, I heard just recently that there are more female gamers under the age of 18 than male.

Amazing.

If we take this as fact, then a lot of us will see a large number of female gamers enter the board communities in the next five or six years when these girls begin to hit college. Therefore, we will recruit more of these women to play in our games.

People who grew up in the late 80s and 90s just did not encounter the same stereotypes as earlier generations. Therefore, the women who started gaming recently do not think the same way we do. They did not grow up during the Christian crusade against DnD, geeks are now cool (chic computer programmers who make mad money), and I think that the younger women grew up with more of a sense of equality.

The fact that geek is cool also helps. More attractive young women are dating geeks and being introduced to the game. Some stick with the game when the relationships end.

(ok, trying not to sound obnoxious): Affluent geeks were bound to draw more women to them. Not to say that all women are drawn to money (my fiance is not, god knows why she loves me), but money and security have been traditional attractions for some women and if this helps out the hobby, the more power to them.

Ok, my rambling thoughts are over. In any event, I do think the entire gamer dynamic is changing. I know that I do not game with any of the stereotypes and have not since high school. I believe that our community IS changing and that those of us who gamed in the old days will see a radical shift.

Just some thoughts.

Dave

 

[Djeta Thernadier]

It's my impression that women are more likely to enjoy gaming when they're treated as gamers, not as novelties.

Absolutely.

 

[tensen]

a half-Japanese girl who couldn't stop laughing and made really twisted comments,

I've gamed with one of those. I wonder if it is a specific sub-category of gaming girl

 

[WizarDru]

Well, having just come from Shorecon this past weekend, I can attest that gamer girls are alive, well and as diverse as their male counterparts. I saw thin girls, heavier girls, costumed girls, girls in their early teens, mothers in their forties, wives, girlfriends and competitors all.

I saw girls who wore clothes designed to hide their figures and girls who were going out of their way to accentuate their figures. I saw LARPers, RPGAers, board gamers, CCGers and miniature players. I saw Red Dwarf fans and Weird Al fans. I saw anime, scifi and fantasy fiction fans.

In short, I saw GAMERS.

I have not run a game without a female player since....1981. There would be more of them, if so encouraged. The barrier to entry has always been one of access, not desire. The rise of the Internet has made it easier to discover environments like ENWorld, where gamers are welcomed, encouraged and sent forth into the world.

Other venues have also helped. The intersection of different hobbies, such as anime and computer games, have made RPGs more mainstream. Go to an anime convention, for example, and compare the relative level of testosterone. I certainly can't recall a gaming convention that offered a 'free hugs' day.

 

[Katowice]

We must be about the same age, because that's how I remember it. There still aren't as many gamer girls as guys, no matter what they look like, but that's neither good or bad in my opinion. As long as you're having a good time with your friends. My groups in high school and then college were almost always all-male.

In my particular neck of the Southeastern U.S. The Gamer Girl stereotype has changed quite a lot over the past two decades.

5 years ago, it was iconoclast-goth: colored hair, goth attire, etc.

About 10 years ago was almost identical of the "Lesbian Stereotype" of about 30 years ago: Overweight or unattractive, dressed down as unflatteringly as possible, wore flannel and jeans, etc.

About 15 years ago, it would have been: "A Girl who games? WHERE!?!?" You had better luck finding 7-leafed clovers.

But the fact is, it's none of them, and hasn't been for quite a while. It's more like all of them, PLUS businesswomen, firefighters, test pilots, accountants, soldiers, etc. I would be curious to know what the current femal-male demographic would be, because the gap seems to keep narrowing.

 

[Hackenslash]

Gamer Girls in the UK......Yeah Right !!!!

Hello All,

It seems to be that the majority of Gamer Girls are in the USA, when I was in College in Newcastle-upon-tyne,UK, we had some American students on some sort of exchange program from Trenton,NJ. Well we got together and played 2nd edition DnD and the group had 4 girls in it. I must say every single one of them was very pretty, especially one who I went out with for a while, and who would have thought that I would have met a girl at a DnD Session. Anyway back to the point, I have played DnD for 18 years and have always played mostly with guys. The few girls who joined the group would be "girlfriends" of existing players and would not stay for long, claiming thay they were not into it or it was boring or "weird" etc...etc...This was all in the UK where I was raised from the age of 8 yrs.(Born in the USA) When I got to college and started playing DnD with the American Students I was opened to a whole new world of roleplaying and girl gamers. This lasted throughout college but after college, that was it. No more girl gamers and no more great roleplaying.

Unfortunately this has been the case for several years and I have gamed with just guys, there are hardly any Girl Gamers in the UK, and the very few that do exist, normally play in the shadows of their boyfriends and are not really into it. Now this may be a generalisation and may not be correct, but it does reflect my opinion at this time. When I went to work in the USA a few years later, I hooked up with a DnD group that had Girl Gamers, who again were excellent roleplayers and very attractive too. So I do not think there is a stereotype Girl Gamer in the UK as there are not enough of them to justify a Stereotype, and I think that the Girl Gamer stereotype in the USA is probaly not what a lot of people think. Just my 2 cents...Cheers All

 

[seasong]

I can't even begin to find a common thread in the female roleplayers I know. I know a few who often wear makeup (some always), and I know a few who usually don't (some never). I know a few who wear whatever's handy, and a few who wear the best they can afford. Almost every female roleplayer I've known has been careful with their hair.

They've all been generally attractive and intelligent, but that's more of a common thread between the people I associate with in general, rather than gamer girls.

 

[leeann_the_lame]

In fact, I heard just recently that there are more female gamers under the age of 18 than male.

Actually, this isnot true. I saw this news article a few days ago with mis-leading titles like: "Video games now draw more women than boys". If you read the article closely, you'll discover the following percentages:


Boys (7-18) 21%
Girls(7-18) 12%
Men 18+ 38%
Women 18+ 26%

Thus, while the title is true (there are more *women* video gamers than *boy* video gamers), it gives a mis-leading impression. Of course, these numbers don't quite add up to 100% either...

 

[der_kluge]

I've only ever gamed with a handful of girls, but I've seen quite a few different kinds of girls. I've seen a handful of stereotypes:

gamer girlfriends. These wouldn't be gaming if their boyfriend hadn't ever gotten them into it. My wife falls into this category. Yes, she wears makeup.

Goths. These girls tend to play a lot of vampire, or other WW games. Though many make the transition to D&D over time, many of them started with WW games.

Bookish intellect. These are probably the majority, I would guess. I would wager that these fall into the "don't wear any makeup" crowd as well. They tend to absorb novels, particularly fantasy novels.

And then there are some that completely fall out of any category whatsoever. My friend played with some 50-year old woman once who loved to game. Definitely unusual. There was another girl that played with us. She was not much into wearing makeup, but I'm not sure I'd really call her an intellect. She worked 3rd shift at a photo processing plant.

Eh, what do I know....