Edit: It has come to my attention that due to my life being made of pure stress, that I may have been too hard on Mr. Ryan. I, however, think that if the article is indeed tongue in cheek, he needs to take it further instead of just sounding like the assholes that I keep deleting from this blog.
Assholes like Paul Ryan, Associate Editor for Cheatplanet. That’s why.
I’m gonna regret this. http://www.gamesradar.com/f/why-its-hard-being-a-girl-gamer-explained-by-a-dude-/a-20090403103444111050 If you really want your head to explode, you just go ahead and click. I’m sitting here waiting for the throbbing vein over my left eye to calm down before I tackle his points.
Breathing. In… Out… In… Out…
Ok, I think I’m ready.
Point one: Videogame girls are hot and girl gamers are not. Do we really have to discuss this AGAIN? Seriously, I… Sorry, got to go visit my happy place. You know, the world full of articulate, confident male videogamers who don’t get all butthurt if you kick their ass at Soulcaliber or Halo.
Point two: I don’t even GET his thing about the controller. Apparently women are built differently on planet Paul Ryan… Oh, wait, they ARE. They’re all built like videogame girls. Right. As a girl who plays and has played all three incarnations of the Playstation, both incarnations of Xbox, the Wii, the DS (yes, it’s pink), and a plethora of game systems older than this junior troglodyte, I can safely say that I have never had any difficulties reaching the Y button, or any other button for that matter.
Point three: He actually sort of has a point here, and that’s dealing with the stupid bullshit women have to put up with on network gaming or Xbox live or any net gaming. However, dating you guys is probably the last thing on our minds if you act like this. Next.
Point four: And let’s hear it for his second actual point that doesn’t make me want to stab him repeatedly in the ear. Most games marketed at girls and women blow goats. Completely and utterly. Babysitting, pet grooming, shopping? Ugh, thanks no. I don’t like doing those things in real life, why on earth would I pay money to do them digitally.
Point five: And he’s lost me again. Ok, no gamer girl worth her salt is going to date anyone who can’t hold their own against her in Halo, Soulcaliber, or anything else. If he’s going to get his pretty pink princess panties in a wad because you fragged him, what else is he going to make your life hell over? Dump his ass. Better yet, don’t date him in the first place. I know several awesome guys who would worship the ground you walked on if you repeatedly fragged them in Halo.
Point six: Crying? Women are going to cry because they can’t balance on the Wii Fit? Really? You think this is…
Breathing. In… Out… In… Out…
I can’t really… I’m trying to restrain the profanity. I think I may be in danger of rupturing something. Next.
Point seven: Game shopping. Again, he has a point. It’s annoying as fuck when game store guys either rush over because they assume I don’t know what I’m doing in their store, or when they completely ignore me because I’m in there with the Geek Husband What Rules. Which is funny, because I do the most varied gaming. He’s pretty happy with his shooting Nazis games. I’m the one looking for interesting new stuff. And now that I have new glasses, I might be able to play first person shooters without getting nauseated again.
Point eight: Half a point. Yes, we hate the “armor” they give female videogame characters. I’ve covered this before. But it certainly isn’t because we find the armor male characters get to wear “intimidating.” I mean, seriously, the games still act like two postage stamps and some dental floss give you the same protection as full plate, so it’s not like the guys’ armor does any more. So, yes, half right, half completely stupid.
Point nine: The Pink DS. I have a pink DS. Not only do I have a pink DS on which I play my current games, and am desperately looking forward to playing Blood Bowl on, but the Mister frequently plays with my pink DS IN PUBLIC. His testicles don’t shrink up or fall off or anything. No one gives him shit either. Granted, he’s also 6’2″, 275lbs and has a shaved head, so that might have something to do with it. I specifically requested my pink DS because it goes with a bunch of my other stuff, like my pink dice, my pink GM-ing folder, my pink calculator and my pink mechanical pencils.
So out of nine points, he only looks like a complete assclown on 5.5 of them. Still, that’s an awful lot of misogynistic bullshit to wade through for three and a half paragraphs of actual content.
Seriously, guys, what makes it hard to be a girl gamer of any stripe (video, rpg, LARP) is the fact that guys like Mr. Ryan are out there telling us why we’re annoyed instead of listening to us when we tell them they’re being annoying gits.
Geek Girls Rule!!! 
I’m not familiar with the author of this piece, but the article really came off as tongue-in-cheek to me. It’s a bit too absurd for me to take it seriously.
You mean fragging your boyfriend isn’t foreplay? 😉 Halo I’m not so good at. Quake? I can hold my own, thank you very much.
Sounds like a guy who can’t get any, so he blames it on everyone else but him.
Dude’s an idiot, to be sure, but in my opinion mostly for writing a really stupid article. But unfortunately I think that he was spinning an article for comedy’s sake, so you’ve let him control the argument so far. There’s no refuting points that are that goddamn crazy, after all.
I like this blog. What if you did a little one off girl gamer guide that was serious and worthwhile?
In addendum to the previous comment…
Serious and worthwhile in comparison to everyone else’s load of great big donkey crap articles. Aw, hell, that ain’t gonna sound right no matter what I say…
You know, it might be tongue in cheek. If so, not far enough.
Granted, I might be over-senstive. We have a dying cat to contend with right now, so I’m a little extra touchy.
I too got the impression that he was trying to be funny — and/or trolling for a higher click count. It’s too dumb for me to spend time answering it, though. It’s really lunch truck or watercooler humour (provided the wimmen aren’t around at the time, or there’s only one and you feel up to picking on her.)
I have to give him point 2… only because the original Xbox controller (not the 360) was way to big. My male roommate had no problem with it… but us girls had to go buy the “normal” size controller so that we could play it.
OK – admittedly I can’t even read the article because they block all web sites that even mention gaming here. Still – I have to ask the other folks commenting here how does him saying what he said tongue in cheek make it OK? Really. If I make racist remarks tongue in cheek would that be OK?
Racist, sexist, and otherwise bigoted humor is not acceptable – but misogynistic humor is?
No, actually, it’s not OK and it needs to stop. If it was a joke then the guy needs to get the message that girl gamers are not amused by it.
So, uh, now that you may be able to play FPS games again, definitely try Left 4 Dead. 😀
I suck at video games. I’ve only started playing them since I moved to Canada (not quite 3 years ago) and my first shooter game was Battlefield 2 about 2 years ago. But I’ll betcha if he wants to play, I could snipe his ass. Digitally and literally.