There is this age old stigma that I have always hated. I came to hate it as a child, because I liked Barbies, dolls, and cuddly, stuffed toys. My uncle came over one day, saw my collection of stuffed animals and characters, and told my mother she was going to “turn me funny” if she let me continue having “this girly stuff”. Well, I grew up, I like to think I am quite funny sometimes, but I am not gay. It isn’t for lack of being exposed to the gay community, either. My home away from home in Fort Smith, Arkansas is a “gay” bar. It’s one of my favourite places to be (Kinkead’s, 1004 1/2 Garrison Avenue, should you be curious). The owner Rick Eubank and many of the staff and patrons have fed, clothed, and helped keep a roof over the heads of me and mine for a long time, when the going gets rough. I remain straight. That’s a story for another time, but it brings to bear this stigma. Gender roles and what genders are “allowed” to like, do, and what hobbies they can have.
Gender roles, as defined by Amy M. Blackstone in her 2003 contribution to the text Human Ecology: An Encyclopedia of Children, Families, Communities, and Environments, are: “based on the different expectations that individuals, groups, and societies have of individuals based on their sex and based on each society’s values and beliefs about gender.” I like to call it the G.I. Joe versus Barbie Rule.
Boys are allowed to play with the masculine, chisel-jawed, muscular war heroes, while girls play with the feminine, makeup’d, perfect-bodied party girls. That’s just how it is, right? I mean, them’s the rules. Not in my playbook, kids!
This whole thing is brought up because of a Facebook post a friend of mine from college posted. I’m going to add it here, her name blocked out to protect her anonymity.
Should we still wonder why, “There are never girls in the comic/gaming/card/video game store?” Not really.
As I write this, my wife sits on our bed, furiously battling something in Fallout 4 as a few soft curses float out of our bedroom area. She loves shooters and RPGs. She likes RPGs that let you shoot stuff best. If you asked her, and she can correct me here if I am wrong, she’d say her favourite games are the Dead Island series, and that, she IS buying the Dead Island Definitive Collection when it comes out, and she IS going to beat both games for the 437928364th time. Because they are remastered, they are good, and you discover something new every time you play. I don’t really replay games, unless those games are Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, the Pokémon franchise, the Legend of Zelda franchise, or Red Dead Redemption… Okay, so I do replay games, Brooke. I lied. Also, gender stereotypes PISS ME OFF. No, G.I. Joes are not “boy toys”! No, Barbies are not “girls toys”. No, tabletop gaming, Magic: The Gathering, and First Person Shooters aren’t just for guys! AM I LIVING IN THE NINE! TEEN! SIXTIES!!!! It makes me feel like I am going to have an aneurism, guys. It really frakking does. My wife is a gamer, I have a TON of female friends that are just as into tabletop games, TCGs, and comics as you are! This is not some elite club that only the boys can belong to, and I’m sick to death of hearing about this.
So, I am going to speak to a stereotype right now. This will likely cause me to lose all credibility, but, since I belong to this group, I think I’m allowed to address it. It’s like using a racial slur, it’s perfectly acceptable if you do it to your own group, right? WRONG!!!!!! This is a conundroquaglimma, and I probably shouldn’t point this at one group, but, it seems to ALWAYS be this group that is at fault in these situations. Howver it reflects on me, I am now going to address males between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five. Usually heterosexual. Usually uncaring about how a woman feels when walking into one of our geeked-out “man dens”:
Look, guys. MOST of you like girls. By “like girls”, I mean, sexually. As someone with which you wish to woo, court, and ultimately copulate (HOPEFULLY after mutual consent is given!!!!). If you would treat them as equals, not better or worse, but as true equals, THEY WILL COME AROUND MORE! If you talk to them, I guarantee they are more than the sum of their boobies and badonkadonks. They are actual living, breathing, sentient creatures that might like the same things you like, and, if you are decent and play your cards right, might share those things with you for a long time to come. Yes, and they might even make out with you sometimes, if that’s what you both want, but NEVER during good movies or television shows. Making out is for a time when Doctor Who, Game of Thrones, and Marvel/Star Wars/Kevin Smith movies are not on. Also, be quiet about it if you’re gonna do it in the movie theatre. Nothing ruins The Hateful Eight like the sound of someone sucking face two rows back… Maybe that was The Martian… No, that one was people scoffing at my group laughing so hard at the science jokes… I digress.
Ladies and gents, please just stop putting labels, especially gender labels, on everything. If your son wants to play with baby dolls, let him, it could teach him to be a better dad. If your daughter wants to play with Tonka Toys in the dirt, let her, she could learn that women are as viable as labourers as men! If a young woman wants to play Magic: The Gathering, let her, Card Shop Dude. That’s money in your pocket you just sexism’d your way out of, ya idjit!
It’s like we wanna slap these little guys on everything and put existence into a neat little box…
Existence doesn’t fit into a neat little box, folks. It is terrible, wonderful, scary, beautiful, chaos. Every human being, regardless of race, gender, education, creed, origin, subset, label, or hair color, is different. That is beautiful. So let it be, and stop trying to make others fit YOUR expectations of the world, mmmkay?
Featured photo credit goes to Emerald-Stock from deviantart.com (http://emerald-stock.deviantart.com/)
Correct citation for Amy M. Blackstone’s work:
Blackstone, Amy. 2003. “Gender Roles and Society.” Pp 335-338 in Human Ecology: An Encyclopedia of Children, Families, Communities, and Environments, edited by Julia R. Miller, Richard M. Lerner, and Lawrence B. Schiamberg. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. ISBN I-57607-852-3
Geektrospective 