D&D 5E Mearls' "Firing" tweet

[FrogReaver]

So what?

In my profession, I want people who have experience with one thing but I'm happy to take people who have experience in a different, but equally challenging thing - because they have proven that they grasp the big picture of large, complex engineering problems and that they can be trained.

This is the same type of situation. They hired someone to be a designer (a "look at the big picture, ask what-if questions, come up with an idea, and hand it off to the developers to turn it into game mechanics" type of role). WotC likely considers that she has proven experience doing that. It isn't for random people on the internet to second-guess their hiring practices. When a product with her name on it comes out, feel free to critique it.

Friend, This is the internet. Criticizing and second guessing anything, anybody and everything about them is precisely what we do.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Thread TLDR all.

Have we determined if Wotc hired the woman because her credentials or because she has the most credentials of any woman they could find?

No and we never will. Which leaves each of us to simply believe whatever we find most plausible.

A) Some will believe the worst: that political correctness was a factor, and/or that it's a snub of long-term, hard-core fans, etc.

B) Others will believe that MM & Co. chose who they thought would contribute the most, which may have included the desire to have more women on a team that develops products enjoyed by lots of women.

Where you stand says a lot about who you are.

I'm a B.

 

[Motorskills]

I'm on Team B.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I didn't fail to see that. I understand he has issues with people who do that. I was responding to your claim "it's white boys who play and so they want other white boys to play with them", and not his claims. He made no claims about race what so ever, for example, so I think it's pretty darn obvious my reply was to what you said, not Mike Mearls....even if my literally quoting you and using your language in reply didn't make it clear to begin with.

You said you didn’t see a correlation between the two behaviors Mearls cited, gatekeeping and sexism. So I gave an example of one that I feel is pretty obvious. An old school gorgnard type thinking the game is only for people like him. Look online and you’ll see people saying things like this all the time. “The game’s being dumbed down” or that it’s too “mainstream”.

Yes and no. He's saying people who gatekeep with rules, are also the people who are sexist to women, and that a primary tool they use to be sexist to women is that rules tool. And I am disputing the premise of "People who gatekeep with rules are also the same people who are sexist to women". I don't think there is any more overlap between those two sets of people than "People who role play a lot" for example. I just don't think there is a correlation, and I have yet to see anything other than anecdotes to back up the claim there is one.

All you’re ever going to get is anecdotes. No one’s going to perform a study and then publish their findings.

I didn't say i don't think some exist. I said I don't think the two are related. I don't think behavior A causes B, or is found more commonly along with B than other factors. Just because some people exhibit both A and B doesn't mean A and B usually run together. And I don't think anecdotes which were directly prompted by Mike Mearls and then self-selected to respond to him about that very topic are representative of a general connection between the two.

I don’t get how you cannot accept a correlation. A jerk tends to be a jerk in multiple ways, no?

So are you trying to defend gatekeepers against allegations of sexism, or sexists from allegations of gatekeeping? Because I don’t understand what you’re arguing for.

And if you have seen it, then why isn't it entirely possible sexism towards women in gaming isn't correlated to liking dense rules and lore

Here again you’re mixing things up. Lore and rules are not the bad behavior. They’re the cover for the bad behavior.

 

[FrogReaver]

No and we never will. Which leaves each of us to simply believe whatever we find most plausible.

A) Some will believe the worst: that political correctness was a factor, and/or that it's a snub of long-term, hard-core fans, etc.

B) Others will believe that MM & Co. chose who they thought would contribute the most, which may have included the desire to have more women on a team that develops products enjoyed by lots of women.

Where you stand says a lot about who you are.

I'm a B.

Here's what I think. WOTC hired whoever they thought would benefit them the most in a combination of marketing, design, legal etc. It definitely looks right and good to have more women on their team especially in an environment where tech companies are constantly coming under fire for their stats on women. I have no problem with that given todays environment. There's a lot of reasons to bump a woman to the top of the list even if her expertise in her direct area of hire may not be quite as impressive as someone elses. Anyways we can speculate endlessly on why, and maybe she was hired solely based on merit, but I honestly don't care either way because it's fine they hired whoever they felt would give their company the most success for whatever reasons those were.

The issue I have is a bit broader. It's that we have gotten to the point where diversity (something outside an employees control) is often touted as more important than meritocracy (the one thing they can control). That's the root cause of people questioning many women and minorities that get hired for high and important positions. If it makes such good business sense to hire such people (as I believe it does for the reasons I outlined above) then it opens up many doubts about whether it was actually because of merit or because of sex or race.

It's socio-political-legal push for diversity in the workplace that is causing the doubts about merit. I do believe in a diverse workplace, but even moreso I believe in a merit based workplace. Diversity is great but never at the expense of merit.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Mansplaining is a sexist and embarrassingly pathetic term used to try and silence male voices by feminists.

BTW on a side note Mearls is getting into crap from women who felt he insulted their intelligence by suggesting women can't handle rules complexity.

They have a point. Modern feminism is so mysgonistic and paternalistic, not just mysandrist.

I agree I suspect that's how he's using it. The assumption that's about keeping women out however seems flawed to me. The gatekeepers of D&D want to keep it small and insular as a generalization and often regardless of gender. I don't think it's actually linked to the issue he's trying to link it to, and I don't think he has a shred of evidence to support his assumption the two are connected.

Why do you doubt the multitude of people who have shared their experiences that directly support his “assumption”?

Complexity and lore are used as discriminatory gatekeeping tools. That is the specific thing Mearls spoke on in the tweet.

How the word used to be used doesn’t matter, other ways it is sometimes used in unrelated contexts doesn’t matter, it is quite clear that he was speaking of discriminatory practices toward women in the gaming community.

 

[FrogReaver]

One other thought. Mike should have highlighted her virtues instead of calling those questioning the hire sexists. It's almost like pulling the race card. It ends discussion without resolving anything.

 

[SkidAce]

Mearls was citing gatekeeping of the game....keeping it for the few....by using rules and lore as a barrier to newer folks, as a negative thing, and then observing that many who do that also seem to have a problem with women being involved in gaming.

Thats how I understood it also.

 

[SkidAce]

No, he lists gatekeeping and discrimination against women as two different behaviors, but points out that many who have the first also seem to have the second.

Exactly.

 

[LordEntrails]

The issue I have is a bit broader. It's that we have gotten to the point where diversity (something outside an employees control) is often touted as more important than meritocracy (the one thing they can control). That's the root cause of people questioning many women and minorities that get hired for high and important positions. If it makes such good business sense to hire such people (as I believe it does for the reasons I outlined above) then it opens up many doubts about whether it was actually because of merit or because of sex or race.

Nearly 2 decades ago I didn't get into the college of my first choice. The admissions officer told me it was because I wasn't a minority, I wasn't a woman, and I wasn't an athlete. It sucked. Things beyond my control kept me from something I wanted. Just like many woman and minorities have suffered from since the beginning of civilization.

But I'm also aware of a few of the benefits I have received not being a minority and not being a woman. Is that my fault? Nope. But I have benefited from the circumstances of my birth.

I wish people were not biased on such things. That merit was the only decision used when hiring, promoting, and relating to people. But it's not the world we live in. Hopefully we as a species will continue to evolve towards a more peaceful and verdant world, perhaps it the most important legacy we can leave for future generations.