Thursday, October 13, 2011

"A game for real men"

I recently saw this on the side of a page on Facebook.  It's in Dutch because I live in Holland, and it means "[a] game for real men." I'm sure this is true because it's on the internet, it's in an ad, and of course most certainly because a group of game designers, software engineers, and online marketing people have a deep and nuanced view of what the essence of masculinity is, gender roles & performance, and how to best create games not just for men, but "real" mean.  I've bought into some of this kind of silliness (or should I outright call it crap) and it's just not a helpful kind of thing for the most part. I'm tired of this kind of thing, even if it's a silly ad for a silly game. Let me decide what I think a man is, who I am, and who I want to be. I don't need artificial distinctions between "real" mean and faux men. It just doesn't serve me well, and I question whether it serves anyone at all.

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