What is a "Gamer": Defining Masculinity in Video Games

Despite the wide range of people that enjoy video games, the default “face” of a gamer has historically been the straight, white male. The fourth chapter of A. Salter and B. Blodgett’s book Toxic Geek Masculinity in Media explores the dangers of this microculture, primarily through their perceptions of and interactions with women. 

Penny Arcade comic denouncing criticism of Duke Nukem

Science fiction author John Scalzi’s 2012 piece aimed to address male privilege in the gaming community by equating identities to difficulty settings -- a straight, white male, as he describes, is playing life on easy mode. Marginalized groups are the truly “hardcore” players, as they aren’t born with the starting bonuses or privileges that the aforementioned male is. The backlash Scalzi received from the gaming community after publishing this piece is only a taste of the hostility many male gamers secrete when their position in the community is threatened or censured. Salter and Blodgett, in arguing the dangers of the traditionally hegemonic gaming community, provide many similar examples of male gamers lashing out at criticism, the most infamous being Gamergate. 

In 2014, the Gamergate movement was born out of the doxxing of game developer Zoey Quinn. Its proponents threatened and harassed Zoey and any woman who spoke out against them, causing many women to flee their homes due to serious safety concerns. Anita Sarkeesian was one of the women doxxed for bringing feminist views into gaming. Sarkeesian created a popular YouTube series titled Tropes vs. Women in Video Games, which aimed to explore the stereotypical “damsel in distress” role women are assigned in most games. Not only was she doxxed and threatened to a point where she had to relocate, but the game “Beat Up Anita Sarkeesian” was published online where, yes, the point of the game was to beat Sarkeesian’s face to the point of bruising and bleeding.

These are only a small portion of the events that defined Gamergate. While the driving force behind the movement appears to be a reaction to feminist conjecture entering the gaming sphere, links between Gamergate and the alt-right movement shouldn’t be ignored. The pervasiveness of white supremacist ideals in many deep gaming microcultures is what allowed for this movement to take root so quickly. 

Salter and Blodgett also examine the aspects within games themselves that create such defensiveness among many male players. Historically, video game rhetoric has put the straight, white male in the role of a hero. They claim that games preach a dangerous form of masculinity, despite their smokescreen of diversity among male playable characters. For example, Mario and Link represent different levels of masculinity in their physical appearances -- Mario being a stout, mustached plumber and Link being a long-haired, more feminine looking character. Despite their physicalities, Mario and Link share the same goal in the end: save the girl. The authors argue that this “white, male savior narrative” is harmful because it perpetuates the toxic misconception that these people are being marginalized by some outsider, when, in reality, they hold the majority of privilege in society. 

Duke Nukem

Another dichotomic pair of male characters Salter and Blodgett use to support their argument is Duke N
ukem and Leisure Suit Larry. Duke Nukem from the 1991 game of the same title, is hyper-masculine in appearance to an extreme level. His game offers no sense of irony in his masculinity. For example, some of his voice lines include “Nobody steals our chicks...and lives!” and “Shake it, baby,” directed at strippers he faces throughout the game. He follows up these words with actions that objectify women and glorify violence, so the character can’t even be dismissed as satirical. The game ended up being a representation of the white male’s self-identified struggles. Alternatively, Leisure Suit Larry is an entire game focused on the

Leisure Suit Larry

commodification of women. Larry’s goal throughout the game is to get laid, yet he still fails if the woman he has sex with is “sexually ‘flawed’ in some way that thwarts his conquest.” While Larry and Nukem
represent different physical levels of masculinity, the way their games preach dominance and superiority over women is almost exactly the same.

The authors also cite the dramatic overrepresentation of males in video games as another factor reinforcing toxic masculinity in the community. Even in places where gender representation should be theoretically balanced, such as virtual worlds with character creators, studies showed 86.09% of playable characters being men in 150 games in 2009. Coupled with the fact that males are more likely to perceive spaces as containing more women than are actually present, they often feel threatened by a rising female presence in video games.

Games are growing in diversity and accessibility as of 2021. However, the face of the game industry and the prominent figure behind the word “gamer” remains the straight, white male. As games and players continue to diversify, Salter and Blodgett argue that the hostility emerging from male spaces will keep existing as a response to the “gamer” identity disappearing.

Salter, A., & Blodgett, B. (2017). Come Get Some: Damsels in Distress and the Male Default Avatar in Video Games. In Toxic geek masculinity in media: Sexism, trolling, and identity policing. essay, Springer International Publishing.

Sterling, J. (2012, July 6). New Game invites players to beat up Anita Sarkeesian. Destructoid. Retrieved October 16, 2021, from https://www.destructoid.com/new-game-invites-players-to-beat-up-anita-sarkeesian/.

Stuart, K. (2014, December 3). Zoe Quinn: 'all Gamergate has done is ruin people's lives'. The Guardian. Retrieved October 16, 2021, from https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/03/zoe-quinn-gamergate-interview.