Sexy schoolgirls caught between a rock and a (Micro)hard place

Microsoft versus Sony, Battlefield versus Call of Duty and Forza versus Gran Turismo. These are some of the rivalries that can get people talking about console wars. “Game On or Game Over” is your place to get inside the minds of Nicholas and Andy as they seek to find the true meaning of gaming and tackle some of gaming’s most controversial subjects. Both are award winning authors – although the awards haven’t been mailed or created yet — but trust them. Would they lie to you?

Nicholas: The gaming industry is a lot like the ‘The Bold & The Beautiful’. No, I don’t mean that it’s watched religiously by grandparents and stay-at-home mums at 4:30PM each afternoon. What I mean is that it’s always rife with scandal and drama. Gaming personalities are sleeping with each other and power struggles are constant as they try to take control of Forrester Enterprises.

OK, while the last sentence isn’t true, the one before it certainly holds true, and this week I wanted to discuss the latest controversy that’s being discussed right now. Microsoft’s GDC after-party.

For those who aren’t aware, Microsoft came under a bit of heat (interestingly, sparked from the tweets of an individual who wasn’t actually at the event) following their GDC after-party a few weeks ago, when the party had a few dancers dressed as ‘sexy schoolgirls’. The chatter online prompted Phil Spencer to release a statement condemning the entertainment hired for the party, citing that it doesn’t reflect the Team Xbox values.

So to kick things off this week I wanted to ask if you’ve read anything regarding this, and furthermore, what are your opinions of the situation to begin with as a whole?

Andy: It does seem like there is always something that riles people up doesn’t it? It’s almost like the game industry looks around and literally says, “Hey we need something negative to talk about” and boom, a news/gossip story comes to light. I can’t say I’m completely in the dark on this, I did see the statement from Phil Spencer and had to backtrack from there to fill in the pieces. My initial thought when reading the press release was, “what the hell happened?”

I have two schools of thought after reading the nickel version of what happened. First, can people stop being offended by things that they are not a part of. If you were not at the party, and weren’t in the presence of the dancers then in my opinion you don’t have much (if anything) to complain about. That’s one of my biggest complaints about today’s society is how it seems that people go out of their way to be offended by everything. At this rate everything should be painted white, have no logos on anything, no words, we should all wear the same thing, have no traditions and make sure everything across the board is the same so we don’t offend anyone.

My second thought is whoever gave the go-ahead for the dancers is an idiot. Flat out that decision should never have been made. Not because it may offend someone, but because the game industry needs to be better than that. Dancing girls, or guys, have no place at shows like that or after parties. I remember when conventions were filled with ‘booth babes’ and while there was no direct edict from anyone I thought the industry as a whole was past that stage. Yet, here we are again. I don’t think this is a Microsoft problem, though some will no doubt try to spin it that way. I’m certain Phil Spencer didn’t initial that box, and it was a severe lapse of judgement.

So the logical question is ‘why’. Why does someone think this is a good idea? Why was this allowed? Those were my initial questions and the first thing that came to mind was it’s the culture of the industry. Granted it’s a culture many have worked to chip away at. Yet, it’s the very culture of the dude-bro, college frat party, loud music, lots of booze, always looking to one up/impress someone. So, while it’s easy to focus on this latest instance and point fingers at one or two people. Do you think it’s worth looking at the entire forest to address the problem rather than one or two trees?

Nicholas: I think you raise some valid points there, and I’m glad you brought them up. First and foremost, I completely agree with you about how ridiculous it was, that someone who wasn’t even attending the party had the audacity to claim that she was going to submit a complaint to Microsoft about it. How anyone can’t see that as an absolute joke is beyond me, and it’s a perfect example of this poor cry-baby culture that the internet fosters so often.

Moving on, look, as much as I’d like to disagree, you’re right about the dancers being poor taste for a gaming event. The booth babes was a perfect situation to cite, and I think it ties in quite well to what we’re discussing here. Whenever I’m at a gaming expo or conference and I see booth babes at the stalls for major gaming peripheral brands, I can’t help but feel it’s pointless and completely unnecessary. Gaming as a whole does need to get past that. Not because it’s sexist. Not because it’s misogynist. Purely for the fact that, whether it’s male or female models, it just doesn’t belong.

So to answer your questions on ‘why’, well, I guess it’s that mindset that some organisers have that it’s  a party, and dancers are party of that atmosphere. You’ll go to some nightclubs and you’ll have flashing lights, loud music, drinks and, on the occasion, go-go dancers. What I suspect is that whoever was putting together this event had the same idea in mind. I tend to steer clear of calling it ‘dude-bro’ culture because it’s a stereotype that these kind of parties are only enjoyed by men though.

I’d like to flip this around though. So far we’re looking at this as a gaming conference because it was on the night of GDC and because it’s being hosted by Microsoft – but should that be the case? If this was just another party, like something you’d get at a nightclub, would we be having this conversation? Should we treat this as a gaming event, or a party that just happens to be thrown by a gaming company? Is there a reason why they can’t be different things?

Andy: I don’t think you can really separate the two to be quite honest. Anytime a company, it doesn’t matter what type of company it is, holds any type of event their name is attached to that event. When their name is attached to the event there are certain expectations that come with it. Yes we know these after parties have loud music and booze but I think there still has to be some, and I use that term loosely, some modicum of rules and standards. When you break it all down, Microsoft is a publicly traded company and as such they don’t want anything to tarnish their name.

The thing that makes this a truly glaring example of someone being a dumbass is that just that afternoon at GDC Microsoft hosted a ‘Women in Gaming’ luncheon with the theme being ‘Share your journey’. Just the degrees of irony there are mind boggling. It’s easy to assume that the people organizing the luncheon and the people who organized the after party are two totally different people/groups, but there has to be someone with an internal filter that thinks “Hmmm maybe this is a bad idea.”

I think a great real-life example of your question is this. Say a professional sports team wins a championship. They want to celebrate so after the game when they’ve met their media obligations they go to a club. Loud music, dancers, booze etc. That’s OK because it’s them deciding to go there. Now, flip that around and have the exact same thing but now it’s a team organized party. I guarantee you that those two parties would be vastly different. Neither of them are wrong, but when one is sponsored  there are just things you can’t do.

Microsoft is a big company, and I think we can agree that this party wasn’t explicitly approved by Phil Spencer can’t we? Microsoft has done a lot of work to promote diversity in gaming, through panels at conferences, creating dialogue via social media, main characters in games, people they hire to leadership positions etc. Yet I’ve seen posts and comments that this GDC after party set the Microsoft back 10 years and it’s “proof” that they don’t get it. That’s just unfair to over generalize this one party from one night and shovel everything else under the rug isn’t it?

Nicholas: Oh without a question. Sure, I can understand that some people were turned off by this event that Microsoft held, but to suggest that the company as a whole doesn’t “get it”, or that they’ve set the company back 10 years despite all the work they’ve done, no, I’m not going to pay that. People have a habit of over-generalising the impact of (what I consider) insignificant situations like this and like to suggest the worst scenarios possible – this is one such example. Microsoft haven’t been set back 10 years and nor is this a bad reflection of the company. This is one event, that people are going to forget about by the end of next week, and that’s the end we’ll hear of it. No-one’s going to be saying, “damn, Microsoft really has a long way to go with closing the gender gap/promoting equality.”

There’s a point that I wanted to delve into deeper though, and it’s about a party being a party, and then how individuals then choose to react to the environment where in. So above the both of us agreed that things like ‘booth babes’ shouldn’t exist at expos because they come across as tacky, but is that because we have this view that gaming is meant to be family-friendly and wholesome, or is it purely off the fact that using scantily-clad women (or men – although let’s be honest, that’s never happening) for means of promotion is tasteless and inappropriate? If I see the same kind of thing at a racing event where models are pedalling car products and new cars, is there any reason why one situation would seem more appropriate than the other? With the majority of gamers now being adults, should we be thinking that gaming needs to be more ‘adult’ too? If a company is hosting a party, and that party is going to involve heavy drinking, loud music and socialising, are dancers really that far off the rest of the theme of the night?

A point that was raised by a friend in PR was, that if someone who attended the event found it distasteful or wasn’t enjoying their time, then they should have either shared those opinions with the company privately (and not aired it like dirty laundry for the world to see), or quite simply left. For all we know the organiser(s) put a lot of time into making what they assumed would be a really fun event, but now their hard work is being slammed publicly because one individual with a Twitter following decided to jump on their soap box. In addition to the questions above I’d like to ask you, is the way this entire ‘fiasco’ was handled completely out of line for that individual(s) that were against the dancers to begin with?

Andy: Man, there are a lot of good points you just brought up that I want to touch on. First, you’re spot on when you bring up booth babes and then talk about car races or other events like that and you still see women in tight clothes, sitting on hoods, handing out trophies. Where is the outrage for that? I’ve never thought about that before, but it shouldn’t be a double standard where there is outrage when a video game company does it but it’s OK when Chevrolet or Holden do it. Second, I don’t think booth babes went by the wayside because gaming is family-friendly, I mean look at games like Grand Theft Auto, Assassin’s Creed or Fallout. Those would never be considered wholesome family games. I think booth babes aren’t needed because video games don’t need that as a “hook” to get people to look. We’ve simply moved past it I think.

The last thing I want to touch on that you brought up is how people in today’s society, not just the gaming sector, go out of their way to make a big deal about things. It’s no longer enough to quietly bring something up to someone face to face behind a closed door. Now, you have to take pictures (or video), post it to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and wherever else you can and proclaim as loud as you can about how wronged, offended, humiliated or disgusted you are with something. Then once the mob has their pitchforks lit and their axes in-hand you circle back to jump onto the bandwagon and ride it down the hill with your new friends. All in the name of the like-minded cause.

Gone are the days of quietly asking to speak to a manager or pulling someone aside so as not to put them on the defensive in front of a bunch of people. Gone are the days of politely talking to someone about how you perceive a situation and to see the reasons behind what they did, or are doing. Now, we simply go from “I don’t like <insert whatever it is>” to “this is a grave injustice and if it doesn’t follow my beliefs then It has to change” and, “until it’s how I want it I’m going to scream as loud as I can!” Look no further than the internet, I see an article I don’t agree with… I scroll right by it. Others, they see the same article and copy and paste the link and rally the mob to get it to be how they want it to be.

I initially wanted to use the word entitled, but I don’t think that’s the right word. I think it’s more just self-centred thinking. So that’s a long way of saying yes I think it was mishandled – by everyone. Those who organized the party and those who loudly complained and wanted to boycott Microsoft. That leads me right into my next question, one I won’t hold against you if you don’t have an answer for it, what is it about the gaming industry that for all intents and purposes takes seemingly intelligent people and turns them into lunatics that have to make a big deal about everything? Is there something in the water that I just haven’t drank yet? I mean really, what’s going on here?

Nicholas: There’s a saying that I think would be very appropriate to mention before I answer your question. The squeaky wheel gets the oil. I think it’s an important statement to reflect on. When it comes to the internet, the most vocal people receive the most attention, and while they might represent the absolute minority of the internet’s millions of users, they appear to us as the majority. Herein lies the problem.

I don’t necessarily think that the internet has a habit of turning intelligent and mature people into lunatics, I think the internet just has a habit of showcasing the biggest crazies. This is purely by design too. The internet is a stage with a microphone, except, unlike a real stage with a finite amount of space and a single microphone, the internet lets everyone have their own platform and their own microphone. It’s not like we can limit who can voice their opinion, so we’re stuck listening to everyone – and as it is with any group, you’re bound to have some less-than-mature individuals in a group of normal people.

All that said though, you mentioned the whole pack mentality above, and I think that’s got a lot to do with it. Unless they’re psychotic, most times you’re able to speak with people civilly in person about most topics, but when it comes to the internet, those same people can quickly jump on a high-horse, and I think it’s due to that fact that everyone’s watching. Especially when you’ve amassed quite a following, it only takes a single period before your response on Twitter to get 100s of people joining in on your argument. People crave that feeling of being right, and if they can get 10+ people to tell them they’re correct, even better for them.

So I guess to answer your question, it’s a combination of a) everyone having a say and b) wanting others to validate their opinions that leads to this sh*t-storm that we see all too often whenever a controversial topic is discussed. Now back to you, and as we approach the end of this week’s article. I wanted to ask you – do you ever see any of what we’ve discussed changing? This culture of naming-and-shaming or vocally complaining so that the rest of the internet sees and agrees with you, will that continue on for as long as you can see?

Andy: The optimist in me is going to say yes, I think it will get better. Much like anything else there’s a growing period and I think we are just in that day in age where it’s “cool” to rally the hive-mind and seek to destroy things. We see it almost every day, someone makes a mistake and people are calling for them to be fired. Be damned about their family, living situation or anything else. If they wronged “me” they must suffer the wrath. We’ve seen several examples of that in the past three or four years in gaming.

Personally, I’ve never understood that type of reaction. It’s ironic when you think about it, the term ‘social media’ is almost a misnomer for where we are right now. It’s anything but social, easy going and fun. Sure you can carve out a few friends and acquaintances but most of the time will be spent blocking, deleting and scrolling on by. There will be growing pains, we’re seeing some of them right now, but like I said earlier the industry is filled with a lot of good, smart and caring people. There’s too much good in the industry for the vocal minority to win the day. Sure they may win a skirmish or two, even get someone suspended or fired, but at the end of the day we’re all in this together.

Yes people will make mistakes, post something they should have thought a bit longer on or made a decision that benefits a few versus the many. That’s OK, learn from it, deal with it like adults and move on. I want to keep playing games and having fun after all that’s why we do this right? We need to get past the “us versus them” mentality and think broader and more substantial. We really are all in this together, it’s more fun if around every corner is something new not a mob waiting for a battle.

Tune in next time for the next instalment of Game On or Game Over. If you have any ideas for our next article, feel free to contact Andy or Nicholas on Twitter.