Well, I'm going to preface this with a disclaimer: I don't necessarily agree with the views I'm articulating, I'm just trying to accurately represent another gr

Well, I'm going to preface this with a disclaimer: I don't necessarily agree with the views I'm articulating, I'm just trying to accurately represent another group's stance, because I feel a lot of people strawman them in discussions. Continuing on.... > This isn't just about women in gaming, it's about making gaming more accessible in general. Shooter games where all you do is blast things in the face can be fun, and I loved the hell out of the most recent DOOM, but even given that I do enjoy other kinds of games. There's a need for variety. I think we can agree on that: the topic of GamerGate is industry behavior, which wasn't just responding to women in the market, but trying in a broader sense to present the medium as more mature (ie, actually being art) and accessible (ie, more segments of the general population are involved). The women joining are just one of the most visible new segments (...because of the traditionally low number of women...) that industry executives are trying to entice to join in. (Let me know if we don't agree here, but I think we at least both agree on those facts.) The GamerGate response is that the people traditionally associated with gaming are reacting to feeling "unhomed", from industry actions like that many major studios have publicly denounced what they like about gaming (...the unrealism of character portrayal and experience...) and called them sexist for their preferences, when just as many women seem to prefer unrealistic guys as guys prefer unrealistic women, ie, that the preference speaks to a widespread, deeper human escapism and lust for fantasy, rather than how they view the other gender. Given that a lot of gamers are traditionally from social groups which are bullied by other social groups, they're particularly sensitive to being called names just for engaging in a widespread, very normal fantasy. The GamerGate response is really the underlying fear of having their culture appropriated and no longer receiving things that cater to their tastes because mainstream culture became involved, and forced everything to conform to their mainstream value signaling and norms. (Such as no more sexy women in unrealistic armor, even though no one is complaining about unrealistically muscled men in unrealistic armor being main characters.) I'm personally sympathetic to both sides: opening the medium to a wider audience, having more sophisticated, mature games made, and exploring the medium as a form of art is very, very, VERY good for gaming and culture at large, but we should acknowledge that the gaming subculture was previously a refuge for traditionally low status, relatively powerless people, and should take care not to annihilate their subculture and safe space in the process. I think in many ways, both sides have refused to acknowledge that the other side has a valid point, and that what's really needed is a compromise. We can advance the medium without having to erase the more unrealistic, fantasy driven parts of it. Drawing seems to do fine as art even though there's drawn, highly unrealistic porn. Video games can similarly advance as a medium without having to erase the "undesirable" content.