Representation & Your Message

[Ron Edwards]

Ben and Gareth, back off from one another. This isn't a place for snippy back-and-forth, especially not with one-line retorts.

Everyone, please focus on the thread topic. Your role here is to provide insight, not to figure out who's winning some kind of competitive exchange.

Best,
Ron

[Ben O'Neal]

Ahh, so as I suspected, I was not misinterpreting you.

Which of those papers carried out a systematic study of female roleplayers such that you can assert with confidence you know what the issue is here? I mean, how do you know its this particular issue and not some other issue. Please cite.

You know damn well that there are no published studies on ANY roleplayers, let alone female perceptions of them. And you know as well as I the reason: roleplaying numbers simply aren't even 1/10th the size they'd need to be to warrant researchers investigating them and perceptions of others about them. The inferences I make are drawing from studies about comparable phenomena that are quite plausibly applicable to roleplayers due to their consistency across a wide range of other contexts. If there were any studies specifically dealing with female/minority perceptions of roleplayers, then this "debate" would be moot already.

This tells you that people may not honestly explicate their thinking; how does this support the specific claim you have made?

No, machiavallian intelligence and theory of mind are not only dealing with cheat detection, but also with all other kinds of knowledge we can infer about others. Theory of mind is perhaps the better term here, because it hints at what it means: I know how I think, so I can assume that you will think in somewhat similar ways. As we grow older our knowledge base about how other people behave in response to similar stimuli to that which we have been exposed increases and we become more accurate at predicting the likely thought processes behind the behaviour. As we put this knowledge into practice, we can determine its accuracy, by seeing if our predictions of other's behaviour based on our ever-expanding theory of mind actually matches their behaviour.

But why am I trying to give you a lesson here? You should already know this, even if you haven't attached the definitional label of "theory of mind". And what this means is that if, as others have said on this thread, people are reluctant to admit that their personal beliefs are anything but true representations of reality, then we can logically infer the consequences I have already spelled out in past posts.

Actually engaging with the situation. I suggest you have merely constructed a rationalisation as why you shouldn't, along the same lines as your own argument.

Ummm, I just re-read MJ's point that I was referring to, and re-read my response, and I fail to see how anyone could have addressed it more explicitly. Please, expand upon "engaging with the situation", using the exact point you are referring to so I can see what the hell you are talking about.

Well, if I can show you have not the slightest evidential basis for your claim, as you admit, yes I can and have dismissed it.

But you haven't "shown" anything. You've only said "prove it" like some defiant child who refuses to accept a proposition. Here's how arguments usually go down: I say "if A then B, A=true, therefore B". You say "but A=not-true, because X", and then we repeat. Any argument that looks like this: "If A then B, A=true, therefore B", "prove it", is not an argument, and cannot go anywhere. I don't mean to sound patronizing, but really, I think this needs to be spelled out and kept in mind at all times.

More specifically though, you should realise that it is actually impossible for you to show that I don't have the "slightest evidential basis" for my claim, because I already have presented significantly more than the slightest. In fact, what you are explicitly asking for, is the exact opposite, namely absolute irrefutable methodological proof using the exact social group (females) in relation to the exact activity (roleplaying). And just because I can't give you that (and no-one else can either, even against what I claim), does not mean that what I say is not true.

Not at all; I don't call for supporting evidence for every statement by any means. But I think your analysis is completely arse-backwards and am trying to determine if you have any reason for advancing this claim other than you find it comforting.

Uhuh. Well given that I've already given reasons and none of them include that "I find it comforting", I highly doubt that anything short of sending you a journal subscription to "The Journal of Gaming Psychology and Perceptions Of" will suffice to ease your concerns.

I shall do so right away; I'm very intrigued to discover so much rigorous academic work has been carried out on the psychology of female roleplayers.

I'm no stranger to sarcasm, and I've already addressed this.

I have uni early tomorrow, and my computer just started going wacky on me with some virus it can't access (how does it know there's a virus if it can't access it??). I don't even know if this will submit when I hit the button, but I hope so cos it's a long damn post. But tomorrow I will dive into the uni's online journal database and grab a handful of references dealing with relevant issues to this topic. I don't know what good it'll do, because without access to the journals you're left looking at a name and a title, but I'm sure it'll at least do something to ease your concerns despite the emptiness of the task (like giving you a present which is just an empty box, and you being satisfied because at least it looks like a present).

-Ben

[Ben O'Neal]

Ooops, sorry, X posted with Ron. My bad. Let's just say I'll wait a few days before posting here again to make up for it.

-Ben

[Doctor Xero]

You know damn well that there are no published studies on ANY roleplayers, let alone female perceptions of them.

Actually, there are published studies on roleplaying -- just not many, mostly articles in obscure academic journals and a couple of books.  I don't recall if any of them focus on female roleplayers though.  I'll see if I can find the few passages I recall reading on women in gaming, but it was a number of years ago, and the hobby has changed since the days before 3E and White Wolf.

Doctor Xero

[John Kim]

Which of those papers carried out a systematic study of female roleplayers such that you can assert with confidence you know what the issue is here? I mean, how do you know its this particular issue and not some other issue. Please cite.

You know damn well that there are no published studies on ANY roleplayers, let alone female perceptions of them. And you know as well as I the reason: roleplaying numbers simply aren't even 1/10th the size they'd need to be to warrant researchers investigating them and perceptions of others about them.

I have a list of psychological studies which have been done concerning RPGs.  There are a fair number of them, but none of them are particularly large or definitive.  Also, none of them particularly address gender issues.  cf.
http://www.darkshire.net/~jhkim/rpg/whatis/psychology.html

I'm currently reading a notable study, namely the book by Gary Alan Fine, "Shared Fantasy: Roleplaying Games as Social Worlds"  (University of Chicago Press. 1983. ISBN: 0226249433).  

But frankly, I don't think any such study is ever going to be the "final word" on the subject.  There are just too many variables, and RPGs as well as outside perceptions of them are too diverse to get any kind of final word on.  So I suggest

[Doctor Xero]

I'm currently reading a notable study, namely the book by Gary Alan Fine, "Shared Fantasy: Roleplaying Games as Social Worlds"  (University of Chicago Press. 1983. ISBN: 0226249433).

Still the definitive book-length study after all these years -- magnificent, isn't it, in its own way? < smile>

But frankly, I don't think any such study is ever going to be the "final word" on the subject.  There are just too many variables, and RPGs as well as outside perceptions of them are too diverse to get any kind of final word on.

I concur.  I think that roleplaying gaming is as broad as dance, and just as a study of early 20th century swing dance will not necessarily transfer overmuch to late 20th century acid jazz dance, so a study of one subset of gaming culture may not transfer that much to another.

Doctor Xero

[Jonathan Walton]

Hey Guys,

I think this thread has degenerated beyond my ability to resurrect it and bring it back to the topics I was originally interested in.  I was just really busy for a few days and haven't had time to post or help respond to some of the important stuff you all were bringing up.  My fault.  Apologies.  I'm about to start a new thread in Indie Game Design that will be a different way of getting at these issues, hopefully one that will be less easy to divert into dangerous territory.

It actually bothers me quite a bit that the gender issue is so touchy for people, such that it always becomes the focus of attention, even when it's only part of the picture.  Makes me wonder about Rebecca Borgstrom publishing all her early work as "R. Sean."  Was that decision influenced by a desire to avoid the whole issue?  Maybe she just didn't want people noticing her gender.  It always ends up becoming personal, even when it's a bunch of guys talking about it (maybe even especially in those cases).

Anyway, thanks for some provocative thoughts.  I'm done with this thread, though, I think, and will try to pursue these issues in other ways.