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I first started playing World of Warcraft a few years ago as a person who was naive and unaccustomed to the world of online gaming. I entered a whole new world of tauren and trolls and sexism. The game begins with the exercise of picking your character. From this opening screen, you have the ability to decide upon the race, gender, and physical features of your new online persona. After much deliberation I decided to become a female tauren, a character that resembles a cow more than any thing else. Other options open to me were sexy elves, stubby gnomes, and some rather disturbing undead characters.

I cheerfully entered this new world and happened to have my first conversation with another female character. She advised me to never tell anyone that I was a woman in real life. Thinking that she was only exaggerating, I made the mistake of tell a few characters every now and then and was subsequently subjected to harassing comments, questions of my ability, and condescending remarks. I ended up with guild members who focused more on hitting on me than grouping with me for instances. I quickly learned to hide my sex while playing online.

It is no secret that Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games are the realm of male gamers. Adding females to this world can tend to skew the balance for many of the more immature players. Female gamers who do reveal their true gender are often harassed to no end by other players trying to figure out if they are truly female, discover their possible level of attractiveness, and try to arrange meetings with them in the real world. One the other hand, some players will actually stop playing with you if they discovered your true sex because they feel that females are inferior players when compared to their male counterparts. Many players assume that there are virtually no women playing and talk freely about their "nagging wife" or their "bitch of a girlfriend." Other sexist comments abound in an attempt to draw women into public arguments.

After acknowledging the level of sexism that is inherent in this gaming atmosphere, it is no wonder that women have begun to form guilds based on gender. Female only guilds guarantee that their members can find people to play with that won't be unfairly judging them based on gender and can provide a supportive community where women can voice their issues and frustrations that stem from the sexist behavior of other players. The members of an all female guild do not have to worry about other members showing off or displaying risky behavior in an effort to impress and are not continually barraged with age/sex/location type messages from their teammates.

Gamers play video games to take a break from the real world. No one should have to deal with such blatant sexual discrimination and harassment in Azeroth.

Learn more about this author, Joan Huston.
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