-27 upvotes, 4 direct replies (showing 4)
View submission: R/Askmen discusses getting swarmed by women
I don’t disagree, it’s just… well it’d be stupid to claim that there wasn’t and isn’t hostility to women in gaming. But apart from that one of the main reasons given for the lack of women in gaming was gaming was very male focused. They had boobs and blood and swearing and edgyness for the sake of edgyness. The 2000s were the peak of the “dudebro” era of gaming. Since then there’s been a push for less violence, less sex, more diversity in characters.
None of which is bad. I myself was tired of the “late 20s early 30s stoic white guy with a buzz cut” of the 2010s. But I can kinda see the reverse in modern literature. Walk into a Barnes and noble and most of what they’re showing off are spicy romance novels (literal porn), celebrity memoirs, dark romance novels, cozy fantasy stories, supernatural romance novels. Like, there’s no hostility towards men but feel I can kinda relate to how female gamers felt seeing hypersexualized videogame covers, and ads about how if you don’t play duke nukem you like men. Every man I know who reads only reads books by authors that are long dead. Dune, LOTR, Conan. And just like how many men don’t miss dudebro gaming, maybe women too would also like literature that isn’t so girl booktok focused?
Comment by WritingNerdy at 27/01/2025 at 23:04 UTC
44 upvotes, 1 direct replies
What? I am so confused. Women haven’t been gaming for the past 20 years because there were boobs and blood in video games? Lol okay. Excuse me I’m gonna go replay Bayonetta.
Comment by Zyrin369 at 27/01/2025 at 23:05 UTC
20 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Isnt the issue more with the patriarchy though?
As a result of a lot of media that was aimed at men about how they cant have emotions and lovey dovey romance is bad etc which leads to said genere becoming more female focused in terms of readers, which then leads it to believing this is only stuff for women.
It only feels like its female dominated but thats only due to (like gaming I wouldn't be surprised if there are also men who enjoy these things) years of men being told how a man should feel.
Comment by wingerism at 28/01/2025 at 01:46 UTC
15 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I gotta push back here. There are genre's still dominated by fairly bog standard masculine coded fiction. Sci fi, absolutely has more male authors still, horror too. Fantasy did flip a while ago, and some genre's are very one sided towards women author wise, like YA Fantasy.
I think there is some validity to be concerned about differences in educational outcomes currently, but less so hobby spaces.
Comment by blueberryfirefly at 31/01/2025 at 03:49 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
they had boobs and blood and swearing and edginess for the sake of edginess
yeah i’m famously not into boobs (i’m queer), blood (i basically only watch horror movies), swearing (i’d make a sailor blush), or edginess (i was 15 and a shithead kid that thought the peak of euphoria was pissing people off). ur so right tho, women can never relate to that shit.