Decoding Dragons

Browsing the archives for the Geek Life category.

[TW] Way to miss the point, Geek Chic Cosmetics (updated)

Approximately 8 hours after I post this article originally, and following lengthy discussions on twitter, Geek Chic Cosmetics have posted this apology. Hopefully they will continue to learn from this experience!

On the continued theme of make-up and geeks, a few of my friends on twitter noticed that Geek Chic Cosmetics had a lip gloss with a ‘charming’ name, and emailed in to protest about the propagation of rape culture. Some engaged with the company over twitter, and then also sent emails in. They decided to respond in a very snide and dismissive manner. I am even less impressed with this response than I was with finding out the original name. I’ve not ordered anything from the company, as me wearing makeup is a pretty rare event.

Plus I don’t really see the point in wearing make-up that is pretty much the same as any other vegan make up out there, just with some ‘geek’ names and themes and extra costs through customs. However I am a talkative geek who happens to be a woman on the internets, and is otherwise relatively feminine in my tastes so seeing a company that aligns itself with ‘geek’ and ‘women’ behave this way is very much a facepalm moment.

Trying to please everyone

So what is a tiny 3 person operation to do? The same thing we do every night, Pinky. Try to please as many people as we can, as often as we can. It’s entirely possible that we have lost more potential happy customers to this accidental offense. While we don’t share the displeasure reported over the name of the item, we don’t have to in order to be sensitive and adjust, if it’s called for.

I’d like to point out that removing references to ‘joke rape’ from products marketed mainly to women is not about ‘pleasing everyone’. Leaving the reference in is hurtful to women. In some cases it might be an out and out trigger (which is not the same as finding a topic distasteful, so please don’t accuse people of pearl clutching.) Taking the bad pun out hurts no one. Leaving it in is somewhat alienating and dismissive. Disappointing a few customers who like a pun is not the same as being respectful of your customer base at large and the issues that face women everywhere.

Understanding rape culture

Finally, like we have to say it, the assertion that we condone rape or belong to the “rape culture” is absolutely untrue. We can’t address an issue that you don’t voice. Geek Chic Cosmetics is not a faceless, nameless, corporate entity. It’s a small business run by those three very human beings above. To reiterate our open door policy, email us first, give us a day before you unleash the hounds on us. We’re here for you.

You’re not faceless, but you’re reacting in a way that completely misunderstands the criticisms and issues surrounding rape culture.  By keeping such a name in the product line, Geek Chic Cosmetics is participating in rape culture – even though of course the individuals involved wouldn’t condone the trivialisation of rape. That casual parody and normalisation of rape is exactly what ‘rape culture’ is, just as beauty standards in the media make idealised bodies the new ‘normal’.

A lot of this stuff is internalised. I really wish companies would not underestimate this.

The privilege of politeness and professionalism

As a professional I am not obliged to put up with abuse from companies, but when a customer (potential or otherwise) is legitimately angry about something I’d probably be expected to suck it up and handle it as professional as possible at my end of things. If a contact is that angry about something, I’m not allow to be snarky or anything back.  We’d all appreciate it if all contact with us was civil manner, but asking for professionalism from non-professionals is a bit snide in a retail environment.

In an ideal world we wouldn’t react to things that matter to us with strong emotions. Oh wait. Rape and discussion of rape culture is likely to invoke strong emotions. Think about how it feels to be ‘accused’ of participating in rape culture; it shouldn’t be hard to extrapolate a little empathy for the feelings of your critics from that, should it? Casting a customer (potential or otherwise) who has a strong reaction to the marketing of one of your products as the straw-woman Angry Feminist Mob is a silencing tactic, plain and simple.

Plus, when it’s only one tweet, and not from the original tweeter/person who raised the query, it looks a little facetious ask for professionalism as part of a general public post that is supposedly addressing the concerns raised. You’re trivialising those who are made uncomfortable by the product name from the outset.

Don’t patronise your customers

Explaining the source of hentai and the original pun to your geek customers is just going to make you look like you’re patronising. If you want to engage with your customers, a little more research than a quote from cosplaydeviants would be good for starters. While I completely agree that equating the virtual and the real is not right, saying that the virtual exists in a vacuum is a little naive.

I’m well aware what the pun refers to, of the historical context. The context doesn’t obscure or render it neutral and harmless. Removing the name hurts no one – it’s not like the Geek Chic website will lose it’s multitude of fun, geeky, snarky comments that help to give the brand it’s personality by removing one name. And if it makes even 1 woman less uncomfortable, then that’s a good thing.

In conclusion

Marketing your geek products should be as much about managing your brand as ‘pleasing’ individual customers. Right now the picture is of an independent company that lacks sensitivity when dealing with complaints that touch on issues important to a core customer base. Reacting defensively to angry customers is inevitably a misstep, and kinda, yanno, looks like you’re defending your participation in rape culture out of ignorance. It is possible to respond better.

And inviting a vote with unmoderated comments? Oh dear. Some of the casual misogyny going on in that thread, in a space condoned by Geek Chic Cosmetics, is just as bad. So. Um. Trigger warning for the comments there. Internalised misogyny, how does it work.

Related links

Update

As of the evening of 9th April, GCC added the following edit to their original public response.

Edit: Hey guys! I just wanted to thank you all for your input. We are taking this issue very seriously, and considering all feedback. We’ve made mistakes, and we will learn from this in the future. We’re an ever-evolving company that deeply cares about the opinion of our customer. There is no way to please all people, but we’re taking it all in and figuring out where to go from here. Just remember – be excellent to each other. Lots of differing opinions on this subject, we welcome all views. We are listening.

 

 

[TW] Way to miss the point, Geek Chic Cosmetics (updated) was published on April 10th, 2012, with the tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , under the Analysis, Geek Life, Social Activism category. There are currently 12 comments on this article so far.

[MMOs] Relationships and MMOs

A couple of days weeks months ago, my co-host and friend posted about his hopes and expectations for SWTOR from the perspective of being part of a gaming couple with a history of playing MMOs. I used to have a similar perspective, and recent posts from Oestrus and Soph reminded me to dig out this post that has been languishing, half written, in my drafts for a good 3 months.

Back when I started playing WoW, my partner and I shared an account. I played my little holy priest during the day, and he’d play his druid on another server when he got home from work. Eventually it became clear that a second account would be needed. Despite the fact that his character was more progressed, I kept the original account. Ho hum.

I really liked that priest, okay?

This was back in the day before RAF, before the Burning Crusade. When the expansion finally hit, I started playing again and the two of us levelled a pair of draenei clothies together. Him pew-pewing on his mage, me initially playing healer. Our characters had an odd sibling relationship, RP wise. My new priest was far, far older and in reality I was the younger. The day I got to DPS for the first time ever in a dungeon was a Scarlet Monastery run, probably the Library. I loved it. I’d been ‘healing’ as shadow spec in order to challenge myself a bit, but actually getting to DPS? Magic. I remember the smile on his face as he saw me finally ‘get’ why he enjoyed DPS.

Those two characters ended up going all the way from goofing around in the Deadmines to raiding the Black Temple as part of one of the best raiding guilds on the server. I tended to stick with one character and he rolled a multitude of alts. Dynamics changed as I became the one employed and he had more free time. Differences of opinion over guild dynamics and officering developed. While I never approached anything tanking duo of You Yank it You Tank it with him, a pretty cool questing rhythm developed, and those two characters had ways of dealing with just about anything and everything. Having a mage around was handy for food, travel, and having a priest around was great for those moments when blink goes horribly wrong and you end up falling off a cliff. Not that my partner ever did that. *cough*

Wrath of the Lich King rolls around and we levelled together again. There was much grinning and fun as we boarded the boat to Northrend. I saw most of Northrend with him, but with the dynamic of our relationship changing and the unrest in the guild (as well as a death in my family), things were not the same. When Cataclysm happened I was buried deep in enthusiasm for the game, and the friends I’d made through Twitter and WoW Insider, and the partner was extremely dissatisfied with the game and the guild we were in.

Time passed.

Of course, I am no longer in a relationship with him. I won’t go into the details, it’s never easy when a long relationship ends, but I never expected it to impact on how I viewed World of Warcraft. In some ways it feels like I’m going through a messy break up with WoW, as the split with my ex was pretty amicable (it was time, as it were) and for reasons unrelated to gaming.

Unhealthy relationships

I have noticed, over the past couple of years, how often bloggers talk about WoW as if they were in a romantic relationship with the game. One phrase I see a lot in my reader is ‘Cheating on WoW’ in reference to trying out other MMOs. The language used to referring to a break in playing is often uncomfortably close to that of an unhealthy, addictive relationship – or even a casual one that is more about convenience and the short term fix than long term results.

When I initially started this post I was going to trace my relationship with the game and how it tied into my relationship with my ex-Fiancé.  Even though we’ve been broken up for going on 6 months or so, there are still characters I don’t log into because they give me extremely mixed feelings – memories of both happy and sad moments. Levelling through Outland is particularly hard for me because that was the expansion we actually played ‘together’ all the way. My characters tend to stall in Nagrand, and sit there looking lonely. And in many ways levelling through the old content of TBC and Wrath is a reminder of the all the guild ups and downs I had with a guild called Athanatoi. The momentous highs of server first Illidari Council, the frustration and impetus as our GMs slowly ran the guild into the ground, and all the officers burned out one by one.

The joy of rediscovering the game in Trial of the Crusader, of all places, where I started raiding as an Elemental shaman. Realising I still loved playing and that my new guild was awesome. Getting to play with Catulla of Flavor Text. The sadness I felt at any in guild bickering. These are things I wonder if I’ll ever get back because I can’t seem to find a social guild where I fit, or a regular rhythm of play that really allows me to connect with SWTOR or Rift in the way that I used to in WoW.

The Dating Game

So I have brief flings with other MMOs, I take them out and have fun when it’s convenient for me, and I pack them all away, with the lack of emotional investment, when they’ve become too mundane to sparkle once the initial lust has fallen off. It’s not so much cheating on WoW, but the casual drifting between games to find that virtual ‘home’, that place of safety that I once had. However in games, as in relationships, ‘safe’ doesn’t make ‘enduring’ any more than the initial sparkle of lust did.

I won’t deny that I enjoy the freedom of my newly solo experience, and in many ways I’m not alone in game – there is always twitter. Twitter and the blogosphere is my guild chat and forum, respectively. Yet the connections made there range from fleeting to lifetime friendship, but there is none of that sense of close knit community. This is another parallel with the ‘dating game’.  You try your best to make the most of what the game offers you, but relationships with other players and guilds only give out as much as you give – and managing expectations in relationships (mmo or dating) is one of those difficult things that takes time to achieve.

Managing Expectations

This is one of those phrases that gets thrown around the online dating world a lot. ‘Expecting’ something can be a self-fulfilling prophecy because you sub-conciously act as if a particular thing is pre-determined. Or you expect the unreasonable. Or you don’t expect enough. You can’t go into a guild or a game with no-expectations, because at the end of the day you want the game (or relationship) to be a part of your life and for that to occur successfully certain criteria/needs/wants have to be fulfilled. It’s just sometimes an MMO or a relationship fits in ways that you don’t expect.

I guess what I am saying is that you can’t expect that shiny guild to be perfect on the inside. You can’t expect everyone else to jump to fill your needs and wants. You can’t expect that woman you’ve just met to be a perfect match. Relationships with people and games are so tied up in compromise that if you don’t compromise, you end up never playing at all.

 

[MMOs] Relationships and MMOs was published on March 16th, 2012, with the tags , , , , , , , , , , under the Games, Geek Life category. There are currently 5 comments on this article so far.

Basement-dweller

This is a rather rambly post, not a polemic.

Classism. It’s a word with a long history, but something I read in a WoW community elsewhere kind of gave me a little light bulb moment.

If you want to put someone down in WoW, do it based on their actions and behaviour, not on guesses about their living situations. ‘Basement-dweller’ as an insult takes on a new meaning when more people than ever before are unable to pay the rent due to unemployment. Folk who can move back in with their parents are the lucky ones – pooling resources in this economy is a sensible course of action even if you have been able to find work. If it was more practical, travel wise, I’d rather move in with my parents than apply for housing benefit.

Being single, or have a lower paid job doesn’t make an individual less worthy of respect. Saying thoughtless and horrible things, and ninjaing crap and being generally inconsiderate is what deserves our derision as players. While ‘basement-dweller’ is the traditional insult reserved for the stereotyped geek, today it just kinda smacks of classism.  I’m not going to tell you that ‘basement-dweller’ is anywhere NEAR the level of ableist, racist or sexist slurs, but the attitude that drives the insult is worth thinking about.

(And if you like using similar phrases, no need to post to defend yourself, because I really don’t care.)

I ended up living with my parents for a while a few years ago, after suffering a breakdown. I wasn’t capable of living on my own. I had no money (I had debts) and no where else to go, because my partner had lost his job and we were facing time apart anyway. Once you’re stuck in a hole of unemployment, especially due to a mental health issue, it is desperately hard to dig yourself out again. I was playing WoW at the time. I owned a computer from when I did have some money, and my £9-a-month sub was cheaper than going out. For a long time, WoW was my only social outlet.  Those few pounds a month were much cheaper than travelling to town to see a friend, and didn’t trigger my social anxiety (which was severe at the time.) Living with my parents was my only choice. I will admit that ‘living with parents’ as an insult did sting a bit then. I was young, I was supposed to be starting a family and paying a mortgage. Instead I was working my slow way towards functionality. I know better now.

I guess this is part of the reason that ‘no-lifer’ as an insult thrown at a raider so annoys me, but then it’s a pretty nonsensical insult all round. I know it’s part of the eternal cut-and-thrust that is the casual v hardcore debate, but really?

I was extremely lucky that I did have my parents, and my partner, to make sure I was safe. Some people don’t have that option. There are many reasons for one to be a ‘basement-dweller’, but it isn’t a true measure of self-worth. I should remember that.

Basement-dweller was published on March 29th, 2011, with the tags , , , , , , under the Analysis, Geek Life category. There are currently 20 comments on this article so far.