Male-Only Video Game Tournament Sets Off Controversy

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Just great, another one of these controversies has popped up. :(

This year's games for men are Dota 2, StarCraft II, Hearthstone, and Ultra Street Fighter IV. For women, the line-up is StarCraft II and Tekken Tag Tournament 2. The IeSF has been separating tournaments by gender for at least a year now, according to their website. Their reasoning? "The decision to divide male and female competitions was made in accordance with international sports authorities, as part of our effort to promote e-Sports as a legitimate sports."
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Now, had it been announced as an all-female tournament... I bet all would have been well. Go figure.
 
I think they are creating their own controversy where none was needed ... the female gaming community is small but vocal and proficient ... their best bet would have been to allow a mixed competition and a female only one ... if women want to compete against men who cares ... if women want their own competition without men who cares there also ... a male only and female only doesn't make sense
 
The misogyny hits early in this thread.

What I really wonder is whether men and women have been shown to perform quantitatively different in games. If that is the case, then this makes sense.

Take for instance sports that require strength to compete at high levels, a male athlete's natural ability to typically bulk more than a female will always lead to an unfair advantage. I just don't know that games count.
 
Decibel said:
The misogyny hits early in this thread.

What I really wonder is whether men and women have been shown to perform quantitatively different in games. If that is the case, then this makes sense.

Take for instance sports that require strength to compete at high levels, a male athlete's natural ability to typically bulk more than a female will always lead to an unfair advantage. I just don't know that games count.
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I'd compare it to auto racing. Mixed gender competition with the same tools, different mental abilities. I see no reason for them to be separate and one would think their decision would double the overhead needed to manage the tournament.
 
There is a point to legitimizing it as a sport and they do have something for both sexes. We have things like the NBA and the WNBA where sexes are segregated. My guess is there is something wrong with the registration of the sport that requires it to be sex specific and to leap the hurdle to make it an official sport they may not have had another choice. I personally welcome co-ed gaming.

I don't know where the rules are for creating such a league but without knowing the details myself, I can't demonize them for doing so. Interesting read, I hope this sets the stage to help gaming and sports to move forward, not backwards. As something doesn't smell right and I bet it isn't all their fault.
 
The female only tournament makes sense since there are a limited number of female gamers and they deserve an opportunity to compete due to their smaller numbers ... however, if they feel the desire to compete in the broader tournament then they should certainly have that right and there is no need to restrict the main tournament to male only (it only raises controversy)
 
As someone mentioned before, sports dominated by strength/size such as football, basketball, etc, it makes sense to be segregated.

Video games? Don't really see it. And thinking about it, what about sports like tennis or golf? Do women traditionally perform marginally worse than men in those sports? Would be interesting to see the Williams sisters go against Nadal or someone similar.
 
kbrickley said:
The female only tournament makes sense since there are a limited number of female gamers and they deserve an opportunity to compete due to their smaller numbers ... however, if they feel the desire to compete in the broader tournament then they should certainly have that right and there is no need to restrict the main tournament to male only (it only raises controversy)
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With the small number, wouldn't it be better to roll them into the same tournament? Otherwise, such a small 'tournament' feels more like a sham.
 
Decibel said:
The misogyny hits early in this thread.

What I really wonder is whether men and women have been shown to perform quantitatively different in games. If that is the case, then this makes sense.

Take for instance sports that require strength to compete at high levels, a male athlete's natural ability to typically bulk more than a female will always lead to an unfair advantage. I just don't know that games count.
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And yet, there is separate men's and women's Chess leagues. In Chess' case, it's meant to encourage women to play and compete in a largely male-dominated realm. Sound familiar?
 
I'd rather play with girls.

Who wants to go to a sausage fest tournament.
 
TwistedAegis said:
With the small number, wouldn't it be better to roll them into the same tournament? Otherwise, such a small 'tournament' feels more like a sham.
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I agree, from what I have seen of the few professional gamers that are women they could easily take many of the males in these competitions ... as to the smaller tournament it might be a marketing thing to try and encourage more women participants ... but I agree that in general there should be a single league (or age based leagues as some of these games might have different performance requirements that favor the young) but a gender based split doesn't seem to have the same benefits
 
The reason why "legitimate" sports are separated by gender is because there is still the outdated thinking that females are always going to be less physically-adept than males, so it would not be fair to mix the two genders. In video gaming, one does not need to be physically-adept to play competitively. This separation of genders in a video gaming competition is archaic backward thinking. What needs to happen is to stop using the term "e-Sports." The word "sport" has a very specific connotation that commonly attaches physical exertion to competition. I have always hated the use of the term, anyway. It's such a '90s thing to attach the letter "e-" to something to signify an electronic version of a common process.
 
kbrickley said:
The female only tournament makes sense since there are a limited number of female gamers and they deserve an opportunity to compete due to their smaller numbers ... however, if they feel the desire to compete in the broader tournament then they should certainly have that right and there is no need to restrict the main tournament to male only (it only raises controversy)
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I don't quite understand what the demographic size has to do with the ability to compete?
 
Armenius said:
The reason why "legitimate" sports are separated by gender is because there is still the outdated thinking that females are always going to be less physically-adept than males, so it would not be fair to mix the two genders. In video gaming, one does not need to be physically-adept to play competitively. This separation of genders in a video gaming competition is archaic backward thinking. What needs to happen is to stop using the term "e-Sports." The word "sport" has a very specific connotation that commonly attaches physical exertion to competition. I have always hated the use of the term, anyway. It's such a '90s thing to attach the letter "e-" to something to signify an electronic version of a common process.
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There is nothing outdated about recognizing that men DOMINATE women physically. The differences between the genders are insurmountable in physical games. Men will win the vast majority of the time. Im surprised you dont understand that.
 
Anaerin said:
And yet, there is separate men's and women's Chess leagues. In Chess' case, it's meant to encourage women to play and compete in a largely male-dominated realm. Sound familiar?
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US Open 9 Ball tournaments are the same.
 
Is this controversial in Korea, the world, or the US?

Fun fact: the most successful female pro-gamer lately is transgender. Since the female pro-gamer pool is so small, they simply stand no chance in Korea where competition is fierce. They're better off in female-only tournament. I wish it wasn't like that but it is.

Saying this a someone who knows plenty of female gamers, including pros.
 
wolfofone said:
Now, had it been announced as an all-female tournament... I bet all would have been well. Go figure.
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Yup. Girl-power right? Fight the evil oppressive patriarchal society. Men are misogynist pigs for wanting to have an all-male gathering, am I right?
 
lilbabycat said:
I suggest you do some googling on human physiology, or perhaps go back to school all together.

Here's somewhere you can start: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_human_physiology#Strength.2C_power_and_muscle_mass
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Spire3660 said:
There is nothing outdated about recognizing that men DOMINATE women physically. The differences between the genders are insurmountable in physical games. Men will win the vast majority of the time. Im surprised you dont understand that.
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Wow...

Notice I also went on to say "always." Physical ability is not only limited to strength and muscle mass.
 
ChedWick said:
I don't quite understand what the demographic size has to do with the ability to compete?
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It is less about the ability to compete and more about growing the demographic ... as I said, I would prefer age based preferences much more than gender ... although I don't like competitions there are many in my generation that have been playing computer games since the 80's ... there can be a big difference in competing against gamers who are 17 vs 47 and there are probably many more people in their 40's interested in tournaments then there are female gamers

This is all about the money (which is why they want to become a professional esport) but if they really cared about gamers these are the tournament brackets they should have:

Amateur (under 18)
Professional (18-22)
Masters (23-29)
Pro Seniors (30-39)
Senior Masters (40+)
Female League

All except the Female league can be coed. That is how I would split it up. But they will not do it that way :cool:
 
kbrickley said:
This is all about the money (which is why they want to become a professional esport) but if they really cared about gamers these are the tournament brackets they should have:

Amateur (under 18)
Professional (18-22)
Masters (23-29)
Pro Seniors (30-39)
Senior Masters (40+)
Female League

All except the Female league can be coed. That is how I would split it up. But they will not do it that way :cool:
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Truth right here. Particularly in twitch games, I noticed a huge difference from when I was 16 to when I was 25. If anything, it should be Masters (Under 18) and go down from there. ;)
 
Honestly, damned if they do, damned if they don't. They would probably get complaints one way or another.

I'm all for equality but sometimes, certain crowds want it both ways.
 
Zepher said:
US Open 9 Ball tournaments are the same.
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There's nothing hotter than a woman with a pool cue, bent over the table lining up a shot :cool:

When it comes to e-sports (personally I don't get the point, they're just video games and attaching the word sport to a video game tournament/league doesn't change the fact that it's still a video game), I guess they are just following the model of traditional sports in an effort to appear legitimate. The Olympics still break things down by gender and for the most part you don't hear people whining about it. While I am sure there are plenty of cases where a woman can out-play a man, or vice versa ,to make the assumption that women and men can compete evenly in all scenarios is demonstrably false: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_metres

Given some time to demonstrate that there are no clear gender performance differences between men and women with respect to video gaming, I could see the need for two distinct leagues disappearing. Without that evidence, how would we know whether or not this is a fair competition? In the interim, if we are going to assume that e-sports are in fact sports, then there is nothing wrong with using the currently accepted model of separating sports by gender.
 
Armenius said:
Wow...

Notice I also went on to say "always." Physical ability is not only limited to strength and muscle mass.
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You're right, there are a lot of other things that make men better at physical competitions, hence why I said "physiology", not just strength+muscle mass. A lot of those differences are also why guys are better at videogames too, btw.

What advantage do you think women have or will have in the future?
 
There are lots of Female only tournaments in eSports and have been for years. No one has a problem with these, why is this any different? If someone thinks they have good reason for why what is good for the goose isn't good for the gander that isn't just as sexist, I would love to hear it.

I'm waiting..
 
*snerk* eSports

Besides it being an altogether silly premise to compete "professionally" in a video game, it's such a meaningless niche that gender-segregated divisions are pretty insignificant and no one is really going to notice. I don't think many people could manage to not giggle a little bit when they even hear that someone's trying to make something more than just a last resort way to kill time into a competitive thing.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
*snerk* eSports

Besides it being an altogether silly premise to compete "professionally" in a video game, it's such a meaningless niche that gender-segregated divisions are pretty insignificant and no one is really going to notice. I don't think many people could manage to not giggle a little bit when they even hear that someone's trying to make something more than just a last resort way to kill time into a competitive thing.
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Amazing display of ignorance there. Lots of gamers across numerous genre are making probably more income per year "playing games" then you do in your "real job". I find esports entertaining, but I think Football, Soccer and other like sports are boring and pointless, does that make them any less legitimate? Nope.
 
Armenius said:
The reason why "legitimate" sports are separated by gender is because there is still the outdated thinking that females are always going to be less physically-adept than males, so it would not be fair to mix the two genders. In video gaming, one does not need to be physically-adept to play competitively. This separation of genders in a video gaming competition is archaic backward thinking. What needs to happen is to stop using the term "e-Sports." The word "sport" has a very specific connotation that commonly attaches physical exertion to competition. I have always hated the use of the term, anyway. It's such a '90s thing to attach the letter "e-" to something to signify an electronic version of a common process.
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You need a biology lesson

In humans, males are physically far stronger and durable, at the cost of heavily increased caloric intake to maintain and reduced longevity, not only do human males die sooner, they heal from sickness slower

That's why you separate men and woman in sports

That said, why you need a male only game league? I dunno, but who cares, people are allowed to put together events however they want. If women are going to complain about this (And I believe they have a right to) then men should be freely allowed to go into female only establishments.

And good luck with that one......
 
That said, doing 5 seconds of google research shows there's tons and tons and tons of female only gaming events, and nobody bitched about them.
 
Decibel said:
Take for instance sports that require strength to compete at high levels, a male athlete's natural ability to typically bulk more than a female will always lead to an unfair advantage. I just don't know that games count.
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One could very easily argue that some "sports" don't requires strength or to be honest much of anything that would require gender segregation to make it fair. I mean there's shooting and archery in the Olympics for crying out loud, don't tell me that a man's natural stronger body has an advantage over women in these two "sports" yet they have both men and women events.
 
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