Women at Conventions

You probably don’t know this, but Women are more likely to dress up for a convention than men. They are part of every part of management for the convention, and given respected parts because of their skills. This is really impressive because women do not make up a large part of many conventions in general, and in many cases are told not to go.

Because of all the problems both online, and real world going on it became difficult to openly talk about how strange this was. I have started several articles, and not finished them out of fear that I would offend someone on the matter. Some of these people are dear friends, and some of the strangers out there scare me. It isn’t so much that the observations are odd, but that they go against most of what I have been told are facts that can not be denied. In other words, I was going against an entrenched narrative, and I write about videogame culture.

To get into this, we first need to know the given narrative, and how it works. Then, I will show my own observations from going through actual conventions and interviewing people. Then I will talk about the different concepts of how things might be working this way.

The given narrative is that videogames culture is a white boys club. Boys play videogames, and they do so in large numbers. It is starting to show some differences because many of these boys are now middle aged. As games have expanded, women have come into the gamer area, and have been rejected, or mistreated until recently. Now women are the majority of players, and the boys need to stop complaining.

This narrative has a lot of teeth to it. When I began my anthropological research, one of the places I frequented was a computer and console place in Kane’ohe. It was lined with computers for gaming, and a console room area. My boss at the arcade I worked at wanted to copy off the idea, because he thought it was the most profitable.

I would take my girlfriend at the time to it, but eventually she said she would prefer to not go there. It was a long bus ride to it, and wasn’t a place she enjoyed going to. Her reason was that it simply didn’t feel like a place she was allowed. To quote her, “It smells like man.”

There was evidence she was right. The place specifically promoted a ‘gamers’ area. The drinks were stereotypical for gamers, the room had dark walls, and graffiti. They were trying to have a grungy feel to it. The people who came were different ages, and most kids under 18 had to have a permission slip signed by their parents to be there. Even then, right after school, it was frequented strongly by boys. They ended up playing League of Legends, but some were really into FPS or GTA.

“This is where I go to be myself,” said many of the people I interviewed.

On the front desk was offerings to let girlfriends play for half off, or get in for free at certain times. Which meant that women were not a frequent thing, and were seen as a side part of the place. The woman who worked there did not play the games as much, but did not see the kids as dangerous. In fact, one person who got to be a problem was taken care of by the many people who went there for fun.

So it should be no shock to you that the owner believed that women did not game. He also believed that Mormons did not game either. The big gamer games were the Mature rated, manyl games, and he had proof of this because his most used games were what he describes. These were the games promoted to gamers, as games they should play.

In that same vein, many games are made with this in mind. The games about fatherhood all came out for the PS3 around the same time. Bioshock, Bioshock Infinity, The Walking Dead, and more all had a man trying to protect a woman, and frequently viewed the woman as a child. She needed his protection, and he was willing to do anything to do it. That sounds slightly sexist, but the reality is that the game makers were viewing it as a way to talk about fatherhood. You grew up being told to act gruff and hard, and suddenly this little girl wants to play. As the joke goes, it doesn’t matter how manly you are, if your daughter wants to have a tea party, you attend.

This was a change from the gruff, angry, and fairly psychotic character from other games. In fact, the games with the psychotic character have sold far better than the games about fatherhood. Don’t believe me? Grand Theft Auto V has a specific character that is literally killing people all the time, is considered one of the more beloved, and the game itself has sold to the majority of gamers who buy Playstation or Xbox consoles.

For those of you wondering, the population is about 30 to 40 million players worldwide. We can figure that out because the game sales numbers consistently point to this. The system sales do not actually equal that amount because of console failures. So no, the PS2 did not sell to 160 million people, it sould to around 35 million people, because the most frequently bought game is Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, and it sold 20 million. In fact, it is still selling. Every time I visit a Wal Mart, I see the game still for sale more than ten years after its release.

If we factor in the small groups of people who did not buy the game, it can equal to about double what the most sold game does. This doesn’t actually hold true for new systems though. The numbers are so frequently one sided that it becomes obvious only a specific type of person is buying a Playstation 4 or XBox One. The system sales are not matching up at all, but that is another discussion.

With this kind of information given,  the narrative shows a consistently male oriented hobby, with creators aiming for men. They don’t imagine women playing the games, and look for specific age groups as well. The attempts to show other points of view sell low.

When we go into conventions, the numbers show the same problems. Women make up one out of four or one out of eight depending on what game is being promoted at the time. They tend to be with a male partner, or be taking a child with them. These numbers are actually an improvement, because at one time there were zero women in attendance at a gaming convention. Those who were there, promoted games.

This gets into the bigger problems that are promoted, and thought about for gamers. A lot of the women online claiming to be female gamers, are actually porn. It becomes difficult for a gamer to even talk to a girl, because they are unsure if the person even cares. Gaming websites promoted scantily clad women promoting games as a major part of the convention circuit. They would have articles, and entire sections dedicated to these women.

Many women I have met outside of the convention circuit have said that they are scared to go in, because men treat them so badly. Many of them have cited harassment, and mistreatment from others as a good reason to not try. The claim that men will go out of their way to call a girl not a gamer, and that she is sort of leered at, or touch them inappropriately is a major concern at conventions, and there are major meetings on how to deal with that going on.

And then the numbers don’t add up. Women are more likely to spend time playing games than men. In questionnaire after questionnaire, women spend more time playing games, and make up a larger demographic than men.

These numbers are being promoted by women’s groups that things are not only changing, but that game creators are behind the times. Games should be promoting women, and that men should be relegated to side character. The success of the game Tomb Raider has shown that women can be popular, and sell well for companies.

The push for more inclusive games using this narrative has been strong. Friends throughout academia site numbers, and books all based on this idea, and how it works. If conventions were actually safe, then men wouldn’t be sexist, and it would have a strong female presence. Because it is not, the amount of women at the shows are very low.

There is actually a really big problem with the narrative, and it can be seen in the people working at conventions. It doesn’t matter which convention I have worked at, the major positions are filled by women in just about every area. Not only does this cover volunteers, but security, the building staff, and displays as well. In fact, when you look at staff, the numbers can flip completely. In some conventions I have worked at, the longest working members were female, and held very important positions. There are actually fewer men in charge of a convention, than you imagined.

It gets even weirder when we talk about Cosplay. Dressing as a character is a common thing no matter which convention you work at, but women are more likely to dress up than men. In fact there is a corollary where the higher the cosplay amount at the convention, the higher the percentage of women at the show. Women are more likely to go all out at shows than men.

When I saw this, I was sort of amazed, and began to ask questions. To my shock, most of the people involved at the convention were confused at why I was asking in the first place. To them, it was because the job was done best by that person.

Take for example the transportation chief at the NorthWest Pinball and Arcade Show. She is in charge of moving donated games to the show, and then back. She sets up the drop off area, and who gets what cargo truck for what area. Each driver is given an assistant who helps read the map, and moves games. Seeing as the show has over 400 games from around the Seattle, Tacoma, and even Northern area it is a really big task.

Before she took the position, moving games would be an all day, and into the morning ordeal. This was before they had as many games, but people would go home at 10 AM after the show closed, and possibly even longer. The first time she was in charge, she took it down to 4 AM. There were complaints that she was cramming games into trucks, but it got the job done.

Today, trucks will continue to move games until midnight, but more than likely be done by then. She has worked hard, and kept many fires from lighting up by sheer will alone. When her husband told me the story, he said it as matter of factly as he could, but you could sense the pride he had for her.

Stories like these go through every convention. Some women join because their husband needed help, others joined because they just wanted to. At the Portland Retro Gaming Expo, one of the most reliable members of the arcade crew is a fairly small woman who does the work simply because she likes videogames. Her husband gets a free ticket in because of it, but during set up, she happily tries to make deals with everyone for games she is interested in.

The same can be said for the volunteer organizers, the heads of the convention, and just about every booth. If you look, women are running the show.

When I ask about it, I get a weird stare. The women do the job so well, it’s obvious they should have the position. To them, I am asking why the giant white building the president lives in is called the White House. This is especially true if they are the ones who made the art they are selling.

To make it weirder, women are more likely to wear a costume than men. When I talk with women about conventions, many of them talk about what costume they would wear. I have met some who rushed some quick makeup onto themselves as they travelled by bus, and others who spent months on their costumes.

This doesn’t mean that men don’t wear costumes, just that women are more likely. I admit, it became really obvious as I took pictures of Costume Players, shortened to cosplayers, on who was more likely to be dressed up.

At Sakuracon in Seattle, I have been told that the male to female ratio is close to even. You are just as likely to find a guy, as you are to find a girl. What is more amazing is that it is normal to wear a costume, and weird if you don’t. I don’t have direct proof because the show is usually right before or right after Emerald City Comic Con, and I don’t have the money to do both.

Still, it is a sign that the higher the cosplayer amount, the higher the percentage of women there will be. Which goes against the narrative that women are not allowed into the shows, as well.

This leaves us with a lot of problems, because direct observation does not follow the conventional narrative. Basically, those who do not go to conventions, or do major geeky things claim one thing, and what appears to be happening is very different. The evidence for both is very strong, so the chances of one being false is not possible.

There is some problems with either narrative, so we need to discuss that first. The need to explain what a gamer is, and who is being promoted to is a major issue. The second is how many people are not gamers, but are playing games outside of the realm of the term. Then we need to realize how this compares to the rest of the world. Finally, we need to see the spin being used by either side to support their cause.

A gamer is not just a relative term, it is a self identification. Of the approximately 35 million people who own a videogame console, nearly all of them consider themselves to be a gamer. They are the core group that the companies promote to. There are sub groups such as sports gamers, old school gamers, PC Gamers, and others, but they all identify themselves as gamers.

These people will wear the T-Shirt proclaiming their love of games, or spend hours on end with a specific game to get the trophies. To them the game is the equivalent of a TV show or movie another group enjoys.

To give you an idea of how odd that number is, the approximate amount of gamers in the US alone is 155 million. In a research study done by the Entertainment Software Association, 155 million people play games regularly. In another study by the PEW Research Center found that 4 out of 10 people in the US owned a game console. The numbers did not differentiate between ethnic backgrounds or gender. There was a difference based on level of education, and income. The higher the income and education, the more likely you were to own a console.

Those numbers are from respected sources, so the approximate 35 million is either a wrong guess, or something else is going on. The answer is that the core amount is fairly accurate, there is just more people who do not identify themselves as a gamer.

To give you an idea, the Nintendo Wii sold more than 100 million systems, and from observation, it was not from breakdowns or a single person owning multiple Wiis. In other words, the people playing these games was more than the mainstream games that gamers identified themselves with. Not only that, 68% of the US own a smartphone, and likely game from that. The entire console gamer identification is a minority, not the majority.

Then we have a Polygon article acting as if this means that the number of console gamers has in fact increased. They are skewing the numbers to show that gamers are becoming more popular, and the things that gamers identify themselves as is becoming common.

Likewise, people promoting women in gaming use the same numbers as a way to show that women are now the majority of gamers. The statement is true, there are more women playing games than there ever has been, but they are not playing console games or identifying themselves as gamers. To them, the major reason to play is with friends and at parties, while gamers will look to play on their own, or against others online. This leads to odd headlines that 52% of women are gamers.

There has been a lot of studies on women in games, in fact Wikipedia has an entire page dedicated to the conversation. I would go into this deeper, but there is so much to cover that it would distract from the original point of the disparity at conventions. You can read up on it on your own, but it basically follows the information I just gave already.

This helps us understand why the narratives seem so odd at first. There are female gamers, and they do make up a larger amount. However, they do not fit into the narrative that self identified gamers use, nor the narrative being pushed by women’s groups on gaming.

With all of this information given, I then tried to speculate on why this was happening.

My first thoughts based on some of the information given was that women simply did not identify themselves as geeky enough to attend. Another factor is that of fear of attack by the male attendees. Then a good friend suggested that it may be that women think it is not grown up enough.

When I tallied what I could based on statistics, the answer seemed obvious. Men were being promoted to more, and the women gamers simply didn’t identify themselves as gamers. They didn’t go because they didn’t think what was there would interest them.

For example, as I was travelling from the Portland Retro Gaming Expo, I met tons of people that were interested in my T-Shirt and pass for the show. An older couple -they had great grand kids- I met began to ask questions about what I did. While chatting, and gaining some pretty cool insights, she asked if all the games were ‘shoot shoot bang bang’ types at the show. I told her the numbers, and how non gamer gamers outnumbers gamers. When I told her the low requirements to be a gamer she got excited.

“I’m a gamer! I play on my phone at least 2 hours a day,” she said, “but it’s really not like those games my grandkids play with guns and blowing things up. I mean I’m addicted but not to bang bang shoot shoot.”

I bet you can see why I remembered that conversation so well. Ask me about realism in gaming sometime, and I will give the response I gave them.

These two represented the majority of gamers. They did not identify themselves as gamers, or even think that games were a part of their life. If you told them the numbers they would realize it, but for the most part ignore gaming entirely.

If gaming, or geekdom is promoted to men more, than it would be obvious that women would not even realize that a convention was going on. It isn’t on their radar. Only someone who was very into the subject would realize there was a convention and they could attend. For women, that would mean a higher desire to dress up, or help out with the convention, because its already part of their life so much.

To make it even more difficult, the modern identity of gamer requires games that have a very different style. For the average identified gamer, a game must immerse, and cover them with story. The person playing it shuts out others, and tries to not move.

Something called flow begins to set into their minds, and they play with a blank stare and undistracted mind. This idea of flow, or the mind simply placing all of its concentration on that one thing is really big for modern gamers. When I worked at arcades, the gamers would enter flow easier and faster than those who wanted to play with their friends.

The reason for this set up was likely the CD Rom, and DVD boom in the 90’s and 00’s. It took a while to load a game, and then would require time to properly load other parts. This meant games like Crazy Taxi, or arcade games ported to the console took a hit. To make up for this game designers padded levels, and made it so a player would get into the story and atmosphere more. Games that took less load time, and were quick to play suffered because the average gamer at the time wanted a longer experience.

When the Wii was released, most gamers expected to play for long hours. They talked about immersion and perfect graphics to get into a game. They didn’t care how well they did, so long as it never interrupted their flow. The Wii, smartphones, and many others are designed to take up a little bit of your time, but let you go whenever you want. Load times were to a minimal, and the game just played for whenever you needed. Some have nicknamed this style the arcade style game, or classic style. This became one of the major reasons why people bought a Wii, they didn’t identify with someone that wanted to be completely immersed.

When we look at that, the ‘shoot shoot bang bang’ games that the older couple described were the immersive kind. They gripped the player in the game play, and did not let go. Although the phone took up just as much time as the other, the grandmother felt that she could put it down whenever she wanted to.

A convention is a large immersive experience for people that want to share the same ideas. If the games, or content being sold is only for a specific style, then the only people attending would be for that style. Also, if the games are different, there has to be a way to explain this to others. For a woman to identify herself with this style, she would need to move out of the norm to enjoy it.

When I talked about this with other fans, I got a strange response. Many women who identify with the conventions, do not go because they are being told not to. The fear is that men are out to get them. The possibility of a horrible person in their midst may be strong. In fact, a good reason why women don’t go to conventions is that too many men attend.

There are stories of women being molested, or worse at conventions. Some stories tell of fans that took the fantasy too far and attacked others. An author I read in highschool was scared to do conventions because of fans like that. She tried hard to explain that her books weren’t real, but fans still attacked each other.

There is some real truth to the idea that some of these men could be sexual predators. It has nothing to do with geekiness, and everything to do with the amount of people attending. If you have 60,000 people at a convention, and some random stat said 1 in 3000 is a sexual predator, then it is likely that there are 20 predators at the convention. The majority of men at the convention would never even dream of doing this, but the possibility of a very small amount overweighs the desire to attend.

Add to this that many groups promote the idea that conventions are against women, and you have a scared woman who does not want to attend. As said earlier these ideas being pushed don’t add up, but the push still works.

The fear of being in a place that, ‘smells like man’ along with accusations of sexism would make it difficult to feel safe at a convention. It isn’t for women to attend, all of the academic types say it is against women, therefore it isn’t for women.

So how does it work out that women seem to go more into it when they do attend? Most conventions I have attended have security forces, volunteers, and posters out to warn guests not to bother people in cosplay. Perhaps the cosplay is a way to warn off others, or to let on that they are part of the geek culture.

Men have been told that women are not into games, or geeky things. In fact, years of ostracization prove this to be true. For men, the possibility that a woman might actually want to talk about these things will cause the possibility of being attracted, or denial. Denial is simply because so many advertisements have faked women liking something, or even porn hidden as gamergirls. This has caused confusion among men, and their actions, or in actions around women make the convention that more difficult.

This would show why so many women make sure to bring their husband or boyfriend with them to the show. They do not want the attention, and they want to share the experience with someone they care about. Perhaps the women are dressing this way to show how into the geeky thing they are, to break down walls that others have built around the male attendees. Perhaps it is to attract the men, if it’s difficult to be a part of a denigrated geeky thing for men, then it is even harder for women. This means finding a significant other becomes harder for both involved.

None of this is true, but the idea that it is promoted like this helps clear some ideas. Those who do not attend are being told they should be scared. The men have built up walls because of so many people trying to trick them. Women dress up as a way to find someone to date, but also prove that they are geeky enough to attend.

After discussing this with some women, one of them pointed out something that really does hold well. The idea is that because videogames are promoted to men, it is seen as childish. For women that is a large insult, so they try to shy away from the idea. Those that do attend give in to their inner child, and thus are more likely to dress up.

Women are told that they mature faster than men. A common thing girls yell at boys is to grow up. Also, certain physical growths will happen sooner for females than males, so this is shown as a sign of women being more mature. This really isn’t as true as people tell others, the growths go back and forth, and begin to even out around 16-18, but no one really talks about that.

A common problem with videogames and other geeky things is that they are not grown up enough. The arguments about comics not receiving literary awards, videogames are not art says a famous movie reviewer, and other things has denigrated games to child stuff. Some game makers have attempted to make artsy games, but those are rarely popular. Comics tried to go dark, go deep, and finally gave up and made movies.

This is a difficult thing for self identified gamers to deal with. It gets even harder for women who want to get into games. They are being told that they are more mature than men, and that they do things sensibly without need for boys and their toys. Women are told to grow up, and be mature so much that it becomes difficult for them to admit to still enjoying things that are called childish.

To allow this the women that do attend shows give in to their childishness. They dress as characters they loved. They go and meet actors who represent characters from TV Shows, movies, and videogames and have a religious experience doing it.

In other cases, the women who run the show are so accepting of their own selves that the show does not take down their own feelings of them as a person. They do not have time for the childishness of someone dictating what they should like or dislike, and have work to do. The show is a part of their lives, and they want it to go well. Most often women like this gain the power within the convention because of how they view it.

Personally, I think this is the answer. For example, there are more men than women at conventions, but they are ok with themselves enough to not worry about that. Dressing up seems like a fun thing, and the chance to meet new friends. To do this you need a lot of confidence that it will work. There are people that say its a boys show, but these women are not afraid of this, nor of the boys stuff. They can identify with the fellow attendants, but don’t need to because they are doing this for themselves. In other words, to attend a convention as a woman, you have to be ok with yourself first.

I began noticing the disrepancy when I was attending PAX for the first time. There were way more men in the arcade. Then, when I interviewed people about it, I got two answers. One was that women were scared of the men attending the convention, and the other was confusion because the women in charge didn’t seem to bother anyone. I figured out that statistically there are a lot of women gamers who don’t identify with the promoted gamer ideal. There were women playing games, just not the shoot shoot bang bang types, or immersive kind. I was told by non attendees that they were scared to go in. Finally someone told me that maybe the women who attend were more ok with themselves than the average.

Although I think I should continue to look, the entire study seems to be point in a direction, and seems to be working out. I sort of understand why someone wouldn’t attend a convention. Some of them make you feel unworthy to be there. I walked through PAX as an anthropologist who has done tons of research, and I felt like I wasn’t a big enough gamer. I’ve met people with very strong opinions that actually scared me, and that is one of the reasons why I stalled writing this article. I felt like I might be denied somehow, or mistreated because of some odd reason.

In a way I am glad I waited. Because of the wait I talked to more people, and was able to get a better grasp on what was going on. A lot of good came from it, but I still have to admit that I did it out of fear. For most of us, the fear of rejection can be a very powerful thing. I guess we all need to be ok with ourselves to recognize when its ok to start working on things.