Jaded Gamer Diary shake off the scum

Just came across this Tumblr post and felt I needed to bring up some of the things on my mind about it.

tabletop-gaming-has-a-white-male-terrorism-problem

Nice title eh?  I'll agree it sounds a bit like clickbait right off the bat.  But it was shared over on G+ by somebodies whose opinion I respect (Lowell that would be you).  So I gave it a read and had to sit back and completely agree with her.  I even gave it a reblog over on my Tumblr page with a nice little bit of my opinion added in.  Here is what I said:

I count myself as a fortunate male gamer who fell into a group of gamers that included a good balance between male and females.  We fought, won and lost together at the game table.  There was a wonderful friendship among us, no veiled threats, no demeaning comments and everyone treated each other as an equal.  Most of my gaming time was spent among this group which had a long list of people involved over the years, some of the going and coming and returning.  Life would pull some away as others would find their way to us.

Once I started going out and trying to game with other folks did I ever encounter the dirtbags like those mentioned in this piece.  It made me uncomfortable to be there and usually I would walk away from those groups in short order.  Sometimes dropping a message to anyone who was there because they felt their was nothing else with some contact info for better groups. 

I don’t understand why treating somebody like shit because of their gender is even a thing among gamers.  Especially considering a large population of us come from various groups who have been targets for harassment ourselves.  For a while I even called myself a gamer who hates other gamers because of things like this. 

My advice to anyone wanting to change this.  Set up your own group and make it safe.  Enforce the fact that it’s safe.  Reward those who keep it this way.  Make an equal gaming table for those who believe in having fun together instead of at the expense of others.  Don’t be afraid to kick the asshats off to the side and tell them to get lost.  Stand together, work together, play together.  Make a damn difference.

My full out opinion right there.   Love it or hate it, doesn't matter much to me.

I would like to add in that I have the fortune of having a local game shop that strives to be family friendly and give everyone equal treatment.  One of the owners is a guy I've known for decades and wanted a game shop that he would feel comfortable for any of his four daughters to be at.  So he and his sister opened it up themselves. 

This shop would be K and A Games.

While the population of gamers in this area still tends to me mostly white males there is some diversity.  Especially in the area of having more female gamers than other places I have seen or seen at some other shops.  Now as for other ethic groups not so much, but then a lot of this has to do with the rural area where we live being made up of mainly Caucasian families.  There are some but just not many.

Also in this area is a small portion of gamers who claim they won't ever go to a game shop where they can't scream 'FUCK' as loud as they want.  Who view every female as nothing more than a potential bed mate or some one to be ridiculed and made fun of.  Homophobic and racist slurs spew from their mouths almost as if they use it like punctuation.  Harassing somebody until they leave or stop showing up is a badge of honor to them. 

Those fucks need to go. 

If you want a decent game group then don't let people like this in.  If you want to show your support of diversity among gamers then start at your own table, change things from the ground up.  You see one person being harassed by a group then get in between and ask them what their fucking problem is.  You see we need some people who can be assholes when it's necessary, when its standing up against those who are vile and useless to the hobby we love.

I may get up here on my soapbox and bitch a lot.  But I never bitch at or about somebody because of their gender or ethnic background.  I may raise some merry hell about a persons ideas or beliefs.   Tell them they are fucked in the head because of the way they think about something.  But I've never, and will never, complained about somebody simply because of the way they were born.  Those who do need to be shown the damned door.