Thanks to a campaign carried out by Maybelline New Yorki online games they are still confirmed – unfortunately – as places populated by a fort sexism.
Online games and sexism, what has emerged
The social experiment, which is part of the project Brave Together by Maybelline, was performed thanks to a small group of online gamers: two women, Luminumn, PaladinAmber and two men, JoelBergs e DrewD0g.
In practice, the research has set itself the goal of understanding how much sexism there is in the world of online video games, letting the two male video games play female characters.
To make everything as realistic as possible, voice modulators have also been provided.
Before starting, however, the two influencers and gamers recounted their experience in the world of online gaming with voice chat. Subsequently JoelBergs and DrewD0g lent themselves to the experiment by arming themselves with a voice modulator.
The results obtained were shocking for the two. Mistaking them for two female players, the other players in the chat followed two paths: leaving the field or using the voice chat to verbally harass.
Several recorded insults, inappropriate comments, offensive, abuse and other insults carefully censored.
Maybelline has in fact recounted the social experiment in a video posted on Youtubehoping to be able to sensitize the world of online gaming on the subject.
Furthermore, according to a recent study, 83% of Australian gamers have “directly experienced abusive behaviour” during online gaming sessions. Therefore, the company has urged all gamers to “talk to each other and help each other when they are being harassed”.
That the world of online gaming is a repository of sexism is certainly nothing new. Several female gamers up Twitch they complain of constant harassment in chat, making it clear that the road is still all uphill.
The hope is that in the future things can change also thanks to gamers like JoelBergs and DrewD0g who lent themselves for the experiment, for a more inclusive and less sexist gaming world.