Transwoman Wins StarCraft II Tourney and $50,000

[Carolyn Marie]

I'm a bit surprised over the gender dispute involving her play. "Male advantage" in electronic game play?

http://www.avclub.com/article/how-a-transgender-foreign-hope-is-challenging-the-107511

Carolyn Marie

[Charlize]

Agreed Carolyn. It seems folks have a chance to vent about their ignorance. I like that she reads it the same way. They are simply stupid in their comments. It is a sport for younger players. I am a bit upset that even there acceptance is less than universal.

Cool kid....I wish the Queen of Blades well.

Hugs,

Charlie

[Guest Brenda Hailey]

Does this mean I have a distinct male advantage over all woman for merely thinking?

Are the detractors essentially admitting I am a better woman then they are by simply thinking I am ?

I think it highlights how truly deep the aversion to trans people really goes.

Brenda

[Guest Sarah_Maria]

Wow i had no idea that Scarlett was trans. Have to say even though i don't root for her (silly zerg players, protoss supremacy!) she's a really good player. It is kind of sad though that people think that mtf people have advantages over women. Especially in video games?? Like....i don't even.........what? But yeah she's a really entertaining player to watch. Her mutalisk/corrupter play is especially exciting. Err I'm a bit of a SC2 fan btw lol.

[Guest LizMarie]

Online gamers exhibit all manner of phobias. Homophobia, transphobia, plus general outright attacks against anyone who isn't part of the "in" crowd who are always looking to scapegoat someone else.

I witness this when I play Guild Wars 2. In that game we have an activity we call "champ trains" where large numbers of players bounce from really powerful monsters called "champs" (ArenaNet assigns them a "Champion" tag) because those mobs can drop really good virtual loot. Normally I have "map chat", the chat system that covers an entire map, tucked away in a separate tab so I don't have to see the endless garbage. But during champ trains, I have to keep map chat open in case objectives change or diversions occur due to random events in the game.

In map chat I've seen flame wars over religion, sexuality, transsexuality (not started by me!), dozens of topics, even over what chain makes the best burgers. A large portion of these players (not all, but a large number) are young males with high libidos, the protection of anonymity on the internet, and the opportunity to be part of the "in" crowd when someone makes the wrong statement in map chat. And when that mistake occurs, the feeding frenzy begins. If you try to stop it, you become a target as well.

Given that gaming forums provide similar levels of anonymity and that many such forums are administered by young males who share similar viewpoints, I am not at all surprised by the ugly statements and immediate jumps to attack Scarlett by some of the Starcaft community. What I find more interesting is that despite being openly trans, a large segment of the community are backing her and rooting for her. Ten years ago in the online gaming world that would almost certainly not have been the case.

So there's good and bad to take away from this. For now, I'll prefer to focus on the good but I'm very aware of the bad in the online gaming community.

[Guest Ashe_mc]

I'm a bit surprised over the gender dispute involving her play. "Male advantage" in electronic game play?

http://www.avclub.com/article/how-a-transgender-foreign-hope-is-challenging-the-107511

Carolyn Marie

welcome to the world of Tumblr

Agreed Carolyn. It seems folks have a chance to vent about their ignorance. I like that she reads it the same way. They are simply stupid in their comments. It is a sport for younger players. I am a bit upset that even there acceptance is less than universal.

Cool kid....I wish the Queen of Blades well.

Hugs,

Charlie

It's mostly people just trying to vent away their inadequacy at said games. It's a horrible phenomenon in gaming really. I'd say more than half of the players in any given lobby will be toxic and throw hate speech at people. its not really ignorance more than blind hate.

Online gamers exhibit all manner of phobias. Homophobia, transphobia, plus general outright attacks against anyone who isn't part of the "in" crowd who are always looking to scapegoat someone else.

I witness this when I play Guild Wars 2. In that game we have an activity we call "champ trains" where large numbers of players bounce from really powerful monsters called "champs" (ArenaNet assigns them a "Champion" tag) because those mobs can drop really good virtual loot. Normally I have "map chat", the chat system that covers an entire map, tucked away in a separate tab so I don't have to see the endless garbage. But during champ trains, I have to keep map chat open in case objectives change or diversions occur due to random events in the game.

In map chat I've seen flame wars over religion, sexuality, transsexuality (not started by me!), dozens of topics, even over what chain makes the best burgers. A large portion of these players (not all, but a large number) are young males with high libidos, the protection of anonymity on the internet, and the opportunity to be part of the "in" crowd when someone makes the wrong statement in map chat. And when that mistake occurs, the feeding frenzy begins. If you try to stop it, you become a target as well.

Given that gaming forums provide similar levels of anonymity and that many such forums are administered by young males who share similar viewpoints, I am not at all surprised by the ugly statements and immediate jumps to attack Scarlett by some of the Starcaft community. What I find more interesting is that despite being openly trans, a large segment of the community are backing her and rooting for her. Ten years ago in the online gaming world that would almost certainly not have been the case.

So there's good and bad to take away from this. For now, I'll prefer to focus on the good but I'm very aware of the bad in the online gaming community.

yeah it sucks. But sometimes you find a community/guild/clan that makes searching for them worth it. However you do find that lately more and more communities are lgbt friendly and supportive (they even go great lengths to "protect you" so to speak).

also tl;dr I once played against scarlet in a random match. NEVER AGAIN. it wasn't even fair