Thread by @kenwongart

Hey my dudes! Please stop asking women for statistics and proof that gender bias exists. It sounds reasonable to politely ask for evidence... I used to think the same! Let me explain why it's a little more complicated than 'just asking questions'.

Us guys often have problems hearing that gender bias exists if we haven't experienced or observed it ourselves. This is in large part because so much of the world around us was designed to keep men like us in power.

I know that sounds like a huge conspiracy theory! But ask yourself, how many studies, reports and articles would it take to convince you? Here's a good starter, on how both men and women scientists are biased against female-sounding names on resumes: blogs.scientificamerican.com/unofficial-pro…

Here's an indication that women need to work at least twice as hard to receive the same recognition as men: economist.com/science-and-te…

Women are interrupted more in professional environments nextions.com/wp-content/upl…

Tokyo Medical University has been rigging applicants scores because it assumed women would drop out of work when they got pregnant qz.com/1346588/tokyo-…

Students in computer science were approaching 50% women until the mid-80s, when computers became advertised as a male hobby/interest. npr.org/sections/money…

All of the above studies (which took about 30 minutes of googling to find) support the idea that there's a lot of bias in the world that is hidden from us, that might take a bit of extra reading and researching and listening to uncover.

It's especially hidden from us if we're in a position of privilege (including being cis, straight, white and/or male). Here's Harvard Business Review on 'advantage blindness' also known as privilege blindness: hbr.org/2018/04/do-you…

A few years ago, I was not so different from the original enquirer. Feminism sounded like a hot mess of angry complaining women! If they could actually sit down and agree with each other, and show me some evidence and some straight answers, maybe I'd give them my time?

Then, *that* incident in the games industry in 2014. If you paid any attention (and if you need a recap, here's the book affirmpress.com.au/publishing/gam…) it was made clear that games in subtle and unsubtle, intentional and unintentional ways, treats women poorly.

So in the years since then I've followed a lot more women and other marginalised folks on Twitter. I read the articles they recommend. I go to their talks. I play the games they make.

And I can tell you... they're tired of answering our questions. They've been doing that for decades.

When you ask a woman for proof/statistics, you're asking her to repeat herself, to do research for you, to explain things she maybe lives through every day. And because of how Twitter works, there are probably a bunch of other dudes asking her the same.

Trying to learn things from Twitter discussion (or debate) is usually a very inefficient process, and is often one party demanding escalating amounts of 'proof' and/or emotional labour of another.

Here's what you can do instead:
1) Do your own research. Some terms: "gender wage gap" "women in games" "women in STEM"
2) Follow women and other people different from you on Twitter. Read/watch what's important to them.
3) Believe in the experiences of others

Of course, this doesn't mean you *can't ever* ask questions of women on Twitter. If you do have unanswered questions after research, ask in your own thread, or be sure that discourse is welcome in others' threads.

If you're looking for a starting point (as I once did), try @femfreq. I don't want to tag individuals here because that sometimes leads to bad things, but follow women CEOs, women in STEM, women in games. One of my favourite sources of perspective is @TeenVogue.

Since the original was about e-sports: here's an article answering the exact question: pcgamesn.com/counter-strike…

And here's some insight into how Korean gamers are bullying the game development community into rejecting feminism kotaku.com.au/2018/04/in-sou…

And here's how some players believe sexual harassment of women is part of e-sports venturebeat.com/community/2012…

And the various excuses men make about not hiring great female players in Overwatch League kotaku.com.au/2018/01/no-ove…

This thread has just been about women in games, but there are other axes of discrimination in games, including race, sexuality and ablism.

It might sound like I really hate on games and gamers. But I've seen the amazing effect games can have on people, and what wonderful things the community can do. I want to fight hard to make sure everyone can feel included in that.

if it wasn’t clear - people of all genders should have the same burden of proof in a scientific / academic context, which often isn’t the context of twitter discussions. muting notifications now so i can get back to gamedev and memes!