Games Workshop and Sexism

[Melissia]

Hostile can mean, in its most benign grammatical form, "unfriendly", "unfavorable", "resisted", etc.

And yes, hostility and sexism from GW employees is hardly unheard of. I know women who've had GW employees ask, for example, if they're buying the models for their boyfriend. I've been ignored by some employees while I was attempting to buy models before, when the same employee would stop and drop everything they were doing to sell something to a guy.

[gcsmith]

Since when is asking if they are buying for a boyfriend hostile, unfriendly or mean.
I played the hobby for 6 years before seeing a female gamer.
No offense but your not common per se, so questions like that are hardly being offensive.

[Sir Biscuit]

To be fair, his original point, that women generally are less muscular than men, is true. (Or at least less overtly, if you still want to argue that.) I think the most telling fact about that is that women aren't winning weightlifting competitions. I know female weightlifters are out there, and I refuse to think that they're not winning because they're not trying hard enough.

Anyway, back on topic, enough of this bull**** "game is marketed towards boys". It's not. NO ONE at GW is sitting around thinking "how do we get BOYS to buy our product?". GW's product is marketed to people who enjoy wargames, and that's all that can really be said about it.

And one more thing. If you're one of those people out there saying that girls need something else to be brought into the hobby, because girls don't find conflict/war/violence/etc. exciting, then you need to stop being sexist. Excitement and adventure are not gender-dependent, and women can find the violence and oppression of the 41st millennium just as appealing and exciting as men do. We don't need to change a ******* thing to "appeal" to girls so we can bring them into the game.

If you want a real reason why gals don't participate, it's because they simply aren't exposed to it as much as boys are. I think that is going to change as time goes on, and indeed, it already seems like it is. I think the sneering game store employee saying "This game isn't for girls!" is a strawman at best. NO ONE is making any kind of active effort to keep girls out, they simply aren't exposed to it, and have no reason to seek it out.

Edit: Holy crap page and a half got posted before I finished typing this. Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn.

[JxKxR]

Hostile can mean, in its most benign grammatical form, "unfriendly", "unfavorable", "resisted", etc.

And yes, hostility and sexism from GW employees is hardly unheard of. I know women who've had GW employees ask, for example, if they're buying the models for their boyfriend.

I think you are jumping into your bad place when you hear this kind of question. Why does a girl have to be so offended when asked that? Could it not have been they were just wondering if the girl had a boyfriend?

[Entropic]

The Games Workshop employee mentioned in the OP was out of line, and GW can probably do a bit more to be sexually inclusive in its model line, but I don't think things are as bad as suggested in the OP, or that they should go to as great lengths to fix them.

I'm not completely familiar with IG fluff, but it would make perfect sense to me if they dragged off anyone who could hold a gun to boot camp, which would justify more female models. Space marines though seem like they should remain all male, and I think the OP is bending things to make the Sisters of Battle seem sexist. Although the OP takes exception to the idea that they're nuns (though clad in full body armor and carrying enough firepower to glass small nations), the background for the entire Imperium is that they're extremely religious (and violent), so this fits perfectly. The religous fanatics angle is one of the things I like about the fluff - I don't want to see that change.

Remember that the fluff is very grim dark. We're talking about cultures for whom racism and intolerance is their whole schtick. Does "Burn the heretic! Kill the mutant! Purge the unclean!" really suggest that they're equal opportunity employers? The 40k universe is filled to the brim with total jerks, and I rather like it that way.

tl;dr: Discipline the employees doing stuff wrong, add female models where it makes sense, but don't screw with the background just to shove them in.

You know who has the money by asking who is looking to spend:

"Do you need something or are you waiting for your friend?"

That it in itself could easily be taken as an insulting question. It can be very tricky phrasing statements that nobody will take offense to.

[BuFFo]

Anyway, back on topic, enough of this bull**** "game is marketed towards boys". It's not. NO ONE at GW is sitting around thinking "how do we get BOYS to buy our product?". GW's product is marketed to people who enjoy wargames, and that's all that can really be said about it.

The Demographic for GW products is males. It is in their yearly reports.

And one more thing. If you're one of those people out there saying that girls need something else to be brought into the hobby, because girls don't find conflict/war/violence/etc. exciting, then you need to stop being sexist. Excitement and adventure are not gender-dependent, and women can find the violence and oppression of the 41st millennium just as appealing and exciting as men do. We don't need to change a ******* thing to "appeal" to girls so we can bring them into the game.

Males are attracted to war and violence more so than women. It is in our nature.

If you want a real reason why gals don't participate, it's because they simply aren't exposed to it as much as boys are.

Because it is not MARKETED to 'gals'.

The second you see a Warhammer 40k advertisement in a Fashion Magazine, or Oprah's Magazine, or Vanity Fair, or Cosmo, come back to me.

[Aldramelech]

Ive read the whole post and while I think you've laid out your argument in a constructive and intelligent way I do feel it is flawed slightly.

You say that this 11 year old girl doesn't think that girls are allowed to play and then launch into your very lengthy post about sexism, unsuitable models, bad attitudes etc. etc. but the plain fact is that the little girl has never even been in the shop, so how is all of this making her feel "No Girls!". None of this has effected her, because she has never been exsposed to any of it.

The reason she might think that way is good old fashioned tradition and nothing to do with GW.

It is a fact, Girls traditionally play with fluffy toys, dolls etc. Boys play with models, guns, etc. THATS JUST LIFE.

Now I have an 11 year old (year 7, just for you Buffo! ) Daughter and I would be thrilled if she took an interest in the hobby, but she just doesn't care because it aint about cute animals, Sexy pop stars, make up or hair straightners, to her they are my "Boring old soldiers" and no amount of female models would change her mind because they too would be "boring old soldiers" (Although she seems to have formed a Dr. WHO fixation at the moment, so I haven't given up yet!)

I would like to see sensible female guard models and I too watched with interest that ebay sale, it would give some much needed variety, but I dont see it overturning 100s of years of conditioning and tradition.

[Melissia]

I think you are jumping into your bad place when you hear this kind of question. Why does a girl have to be so offended when asked that? Could it not have been they were just wondering if the girl had a boyfriend?

Because the question is assuming that I'm not into the hobby.

I am buying these models, this book, etc, for myself. The employee can go **** himself if he thinks otherwise.

[fuzzbuket]

after raeading this at some points i was shocked by the manner of the staffers @gw

i think the main problem is most of the GW staff (no offence intended to any ex staffers/current staffers) is that they have 0 socail skills

a wierd one is that when my mother was in GW last christmas purchasing 'legion' the staffer inquired if it was for her, and that women have a sence of:

nice shop with appropriately dressed staff and nice apperance and smell

to

OMDAKAFK[AOIFH{ALKFNPSAIUDGH{ THE SMELL< THE HORROR ,THE EMPLOYYES 0_0(lol joke)

-fuzz

[Melissia]

It is a fact, Girls traditionally play with fluffy toys, dolls etc. Boys play with models, guns, etc. THATS JUST LIFE.

Tradition can go suck an angry donkey dick.