Sexism isn't keeping women out of industry, says EA exec

@theKSMM @Spokker What is Xbox Live meant to emulate, a fancy dinner reception or a pub? In any case, the tools are available to create your own private games and Microsoft can certainly develop tools to allow players to customize their game sessions even more. I would suggest using those underground, pro and whatever settings to help regulate what kind of environment you wish to play in. As far as I can tell, the settings don't do anything.

"And frankly, I think it's very cowardly to use the anonymity of the Internet to say things that you would never say to someone's face."

Consider the context. We're shooting each other in a video game and blowing each other's heads off, but don't dare say any dirty words.

@theKSMM @Spokker Well I guess you have never been to a place where being a white male is not the vanilla flavor. I have seen Asian children making fun of white peoples big eyes, so yeah you can get ridiculed for being a white guy, you just need to change the environment to one where the norm is something else. You should know that some people insult each other while competing that happens very often even in big time sports, so competitive games will never be all nice. Oh and sorry being a normal person and not calling people very offensive names because you are a polite person has nothing to do with being a woman.

@Spokker I think you make a fair point in your first two paragraphs. But I think getting ragged on by your friends is something completely different from having a stranger call you names because you dared to log on and try to play a game. And frankly, I think it's very cowardly to use the anonymity of the Internet to say things that you would never say to someone's face.

@finaleve @Spokker Never underestimate the power of indoctrination or socialization. These are where the majority of the "gender role" is taught to a child. What you have described one of the earlier phases, where children learn what is "appropriate" to play with and begin to develop gender associations between items, toys, and other things that are taught to them. Socialization is unavoidable. However, we can (and have over the course of history) change what children consider acceptable in their gender role.

@theKSMM @Spokker Actually, recent investigationds - at least in Sweden, shows that girls are better than boys in general except maths, in which there is no longer a noticable difference. Before boys where better at maths physics, but not anymore.

The only "subject" that boys perform better at is Physical Education (sports).

Regardning most maths teachers being male, that is sort of true. In the grades 1-6 most teachers are female overall. 7-9 it is pretty equal, but a few more men. 10-12 grade there is a majority of male teachers overall, not just maths and physics. (This is Sweden so might not be true for your country).

So do we come out of the womb a blank slate, to be molded into whatever the toy companies want us to be? This seems like a grim assessment of the world to me. In some sense, you're saying that supply is driving demand when it comes to children's toys.

"but do not own actual guns for obvious reasons"

What reasons? Do you truly not enjoy real firearms, or has your state or county government and the media conditioned you to be afraid of them?

@finaleve @Spokker I do really think that most men do know that a woman can excel at any science, and they actually do and although girls don't chose to study engineering often the ones that do chose do just as well as a male would. The only reason why there are few of them is that most women are not interested in science and that is a choice made by them. And why is this a bad thing? If a woman becomes a great vet because she is passionate about it, why should we tell her that it is a bad thing an talk about how she could have been a software designer. All in all we should be talking about changing the education system in a way that would allow young people to find their passions and give them the tools needed to reach their dreams. And i don't believe anyone who has problems with basic math could ever become a programmer. So what i am saying is that no person in their right minds actually thinks that a women just by being women are bad at math or science, it's just that a lot more boys find a way of expressing them selves through science then girls do. And I really do believe that toy cars have very little to do with it. Plus answer this are the both of you in the gaming industry? And if no then why are you not?

@theKSMM @Spokker It should be noted that I never said girls cannot be good programmers.

@Spokker Everyone is telling them this. When you go to a toy store, what do you see? The boy's section is full of race cars, action figures, and guns (another topic for another day). What do you see in the girl's section? Dolls that consist of "dressing up" to look pretty, babies that poop so you can change it's diaper, cooking sets like easy-bake oven (from the commercials I've seen, all contained girls and a mom, no boys or a dad anywhere using it).

That alone tells what the world perceives women. Women who love to dress fashionably, take care of babies, and cook. The 3 basics needed for a man to love a women back in the 60s.

Sure, boys can get the cooking sets and dress up their action figures and so on and so forth, but that mentality latches on the a majority, mainly due to parents teaching their kids and media "conditioning" (a more appropriate words can not be found currently) kids to think this is how the world works.

Fun fact, while I do enjoy action figures (most video game related) and guns (Time Crisis is my favorite game but do not own actual guns for obvious reasons), I hate cars. Don't know anything about them and never cared when I was in school. I also like to cook and took cooking classes.

@Spokker I agree that there are inherent differences between genders, and I think we do better when we don't try to gloss over those. I just don't think girls can't be good programmers is one of those. And I say again, without knowing whether more girls would choose to be programmers, we should at least make sure they all know that it's an option for them.

@theKSMM @Spokker I think men are biologically predisposed to being more passionate, and this manifests itself in positive and negative ways.

I think that men are more likely to become hyper-focused on one thing, whether it is a career or a hobby. They can be ruthless businessmen who do anything it takes to get to the top. Or they start a hobby and learn everything about it.

In a similar vein, men are more likely than women to engage in criminal activity, become enraged and fight. I think it all comes down to passion, drive and focus.

It's a chicken and egg problem. You say culture drives the different behavior seen in the sexes, but then again, why couldn't it be that culture is informed and maintained by the chemicals secreted in our junk?

@Spokker In education generally, you're right. The school system is generally easier to navigate for girls than boys.

But when it comes to science and math, I suspect that we're doing something that makes girls think "That's not for me" or "I don't belong there." I'm not saying it's intentional or malicious, but I truly believe it's happening somehow. I don't accept that girls are just genetically predisposed to being bad at STEM subjects.

And even if the teachers are women (though most of my science and math teachers were men, frankly) they can be part of the problem too. "Don't worry, I'm not good at math either." How many grown women do you know who almost brag at having no technical acumen whatsoever? Why is that acceptable?

Anyways, I'm not blaming EA or anyone else. But I do think there's a real issue there, and as we head into an increasingly technological future, it might be really good for us all to address it.

@theKSMM Who is telling them this? All of the elementary school teachers are women. If anything, at that age, it's the boys who are left behind as their innate and natural behavior is labeled as mental illness and they are forced to take medication.

@Link3301 @hangman000 @sheikweight **FACEPALM** You simply have No Hope in Understanding JOKES. See what happens when you Live ONLINE. All your life?

@RealFabioSooner @tgwolf @johnrayjr I am fine with whoever shows up to the party. No organization or industry or anything of the sort should be ashamed of its raw demographic numbers. Disparity is not necessarily evidence of discrimination.