The other day, at the Raid and Guild Leadership section of the World of Warcraft forums, I saw a post wherein someone was asking for help in how to deal with a girl in his guild.
Apparently this girl had developed a relationship with one of the members of his loot council, and it was causing bias in this member's decisions. Sadly for him, the affair ended badly, leaving him short four members, including two tanks. (But on the bright side, the people at the heart of the issue were among those who left.)
Among the comments in the thread, there were several who basically said that girls were bad news in a raid, frequently causing drama.
This isn't the first time I've seen this theme. I remember a friend applying to a guild, only to be perfunctorily turned down at her Vent interview because she was female. I have heard other rumors of guilds who consider themselves too serious to accept females in their guilds. I have seen it stated repeatedly on forums that if a guild wants to avoid drama, they should just not accept females. (On the flip side, I was once the only gal in a guild which probably shouldn't have accepted females and told the ladies they were doing them a favor. They tended to unconsciously drive women away. I met the previous token female. But I digress . . .)
Now, anecdotally, some of these people have a point. There are many stories of girls who flirted, pouted, and generally wanted to be carried or given favors, just because they were girls. When you have a group of people made up mostly of young, single men, and a girl gets into the mix, those young, single men may start competing for her notice. Even girls who may not start out wanting to flirt, giggle, and moan their way to popularity may find themselves flattered by the attention and start playing along. (Let's face it: for young men, it's all about the hunt. They don't necessarily want to keep the girl, but they want to catch her. This, by the way, is also why some may even try to gain the notice of married women . . . it's a game to them. Women would do well to recognize this and avoid the trap of allowing themselves to be blinded by attentions. Know where to draw the line.)
It's sad that a few attention-seeking or manipulative females go a long way toward ruining the female gamer name for the rest of us. However, I have seen more drama with some males than I have seen with females. Both genders may be capable of exercising their "charms" in hopes of favors or both may be capable of throwing all-out tantrums and causing issues. It's part of being human.
I thought about replying to the thread, but then realized I couldn't really contribute more constructive comments than had already been contributed. Personally, I think with a different loot system--one which is more objective--the relationship may not have ended up being an issue at all. But that was already said. /shrug
What I did want to say, but knew it wouldn't further the discussion constructively, was to assure the opening poster that not all females are like that. Aside from the myriad examples of female guild leaders I have read on the forums, I wanted to tell him we've had up to six female players in our raid and currently run five. Two are officers. Two are over the age of 35. (One is both--me--but I wouldn't have said that.) Girls who might want to use their femininity as something special to gain favors would find their efforts nipped in the bud. (First, they're not unique. Second, we can see right through them.)
Every so often, we have seen an application which virtually giggled, "I'm a girl." (You could almost see the eyelashes fluttering.) I think the ladies in the guild take a certain amount of pleasure in basically answering, "So am I. Is there a point?" ("We are not impressed.")
Perhaps the opening poster's real problem was that he had only one girl in the raid and none in a position of authority.
No comments:
Post a Comment