Sexism: A Skill Issue
We measured how much sexists suck.
This study is one of the most important of the modern age. It’s conclusions are so groundbreaking, and make so much sense, it’s incredible to me that it isn’t cited in every paper about gender. The study is: Insights into Sexism: Male Status and Performance Moderates Female-Directed Hostile and Amicable Behaviour.
The study aimed to measure sexism online, measured through the lens of Halo 3 competitive matchmaking. If you’ve never played Halo, or Halo 2, or Halo 3, or Halo: Reach, or Halo: ODST, or Halo 4, or Halo 5, or Halo: Infinite, or Halo: Anniversary, or Halo 2: Remastered, the premise is this: You are a super soldier, and you’ve got to kill aliens. In the multiplayer online version, which the study examined, your team of blue super soldiers has to kill their team of red super soldiers. Or you’re on the red team and have to kill the blue team.
In that era of gaming, voice chat was popular, and it was rude. The pre-game lobbies were full of terrible players rattling off sexist and racist slurs faster than an auctioneer on meth. I was not one of them; I was one of the people yelling at the racists that I would bury them alive and cover them with red ants and piss. You gotta fight fire with fire with these fucks.
Games nowadays are less likely to incorporate voice chat. Why? Because of all the shit birds screaming obscenities.
The study’s abstract mentions, “Although social constructionist theory argues that sexism is a response towards women entering a male dominated arena, this perspective doesn’t explain why only a subset of males behave in this way.”
And soon, they had their answer: the sexism was coming from low-skilled males who had much more to lose when women entered the arena. They already couldn’t beat the dudes, now there’s more competition who will likely dominate them? Creating a hostile environment keeps potential victors out of the competition.
In other words, sexism is a skill issue. Low value men, threatened by women, conspire to keep them out by being big bags of shit. It was an unusual strategy, but it worked, to some extent. Think about how many articles you’ve read where women discuss how hard it is to break into a man’s world. The weak men are the ones keeping them out. Not only that, the study found that the lower a player’s skill, the more extreme they were in their sexist views. High-skilled players were more positive toward women, and were more likely to welcome them to the team.
Now, this is one study, and the sample size isn’t the biggest. But studies doesn’t make the news by confirming what someone already discovered, so there’s not much incentive for institutions to do it. For now, we’ll have to accept their conclusions. It backs up my experience.
Next time you see someone being sexist or racist, remember they are low-skilled. Then tell them your fucked their mother on a bed made of ants.*
*The ants thing really threw them off their game. Low-skilled people are easily dazzled by a little creativity.
P.S. Sumo starts this weekend.
