"The video-game industry has a dress code - driven by a lack of diversity"

People at work like to dress alike. There is nothing inherently wrong with it, many people just want to fit in with their peers. The only way this could be changed would be to set a mandatory dress code (which almost everyone I know universally hates).

No one is forcing anyone to wear anything. If wearing something different makes people feel uncomfortable I don't know what to say.
 
Okay, I'm not getting her point so I guess I'll drum up my own.

If an environment calls for an open dress code, then it should enforce said rule upon all, no matter who you are.

You wanna wear skinny jeans? Go for it! Got a sick dress yesterday? Put that shit on and feel good about yourself.

For women, it might be harder for them to wear something more official if everyone isn't in the gaming field because it's predominately male. An army of plaid shirts might make you feel uncomfortable if you aren't joining in the parade with them, depending on your outlook on things. There's nobody at fault here, until they start policing what you should and shouldn't be doing on a singular level.

However, certain places still have rules. An open dress code doesn't mean you get to come in wearing a one piece thong, flapping your junk on tables. If you are on camera, there might be a certain image that the company might want to convey.

That in itself is easily pushed and used as a sexist vehicle. You can make a woman feel like shit for either forcing her to dress in such a ridiculous manner that it undermines her self esteem, or make her dress down, achieving the same thing. So, don't do that.

But any place judging you for wearing a dress when it's open policy anyway is probably shitty and does other shitty things. Hopefully that's not indicative of a whole, because it's already hard enough for females to get the damn job, much less walk around in the office like a real person.
 
She is saying if she acts/dresses as she would, she would stand out for doing so, for being herself

There's a word for that. It's diversity. Diversity means people stand out from one another. If she was being mocked or pressured to dress a certain way, that frustration would be well founded. But my reading didn't come across that way. This was someone giving narrative to their own inward discomfort because she didn't look like everyone else.
 
Somehow I think it's partially personal perception and partially wanting to fit in. It probably happens more at certain company than others. Don't really think dress code is the right phrase for this though. It's not enforced but it can feel like it's an unwritten rule.

If she wants to dress nice, it's fine. I dress nicely for work and do not wear just regular t-shirt and jeans. (At least I think so.. my fashion sense is not great.) Being female in game industry already kind of stands out especially as someone who is a dev/programmer and not admin or artist. Wanting to fit in in that sense I can totally see.

About the being in front of camera and how women dress, that's difficult in a sense. Guys view ladies differently than ladies view ladies. There is a line between dressing nice and dressing revealing too. I don't want to say sexy because women can dress modest and look sexy still. It's really the dressing revealing to be sexy that is likely more of a problem for cameras. These days, it's hard to find truly modest clothes that look nice. I find a lot of clothes are trying to push that line of being revealing but not too revealing. Just show enough cleavage but not so much it's called sleazy etc. The truth is dress revealing isn't good for a woman's career regardless of industry. I didn't know how I dress really affected how guys view me until I start realizing what my husband truly think of my wardrobe. (Note: I'm not saying she is necessary dressing revealing. I only read the OP and her clothes are not described in detail. This above paragraph is a general statement.)

Anyway, my point is, it is unfortunate but yes women do need to watch what they wear. BUT this applies to all situations, even going out to eat with friends. A guy passing by on the street can very well disrespect a woman due to how she dresses just as much as a male coworker in an office. Yes, it can be quite sexist but no, it's not something only in the game industry due to dress code.
 
I dunno kinda sounds like a lot of bars. The guys wear tshirt/button down/polo and jeans combo and women wear dresses. I always feel like women are slightly more dressed up than men but they also have more options in what to wear
 
I don't really see much of a point to this rambling article. What's the result? What are we supposed to take away from it? That she now dresses however she wants to dress? Wow.

Exactly. I know i'm about to get some hate for saying this, but this completely sounds like a personal problem, not a business one. I know plenty of women, who, put in the same situation would rock a dress and love standing out.

There doesn't seem to be any active oppression here. She has the ability to dress how she wants, but she doesn't feel comfortable dressing how she wants because other people are dressing how they want, and they happen to want to dress similar/more casual than she is so the end result is that everyone else needs to up their game so that she can feel comfortable dressing how she wants? If not, she'll just dress how she wants anyway.
 
Her issue is less with people in plain clothes but more the fact that everyone is in plain clothes because everyone has the same taste. There's no diversity. They are all twenty something white men and that's why they all look the same.

Clothes reflect a lot of what a person so, in the same vein, it also reflects the lack of diversity within the industry. And everyone that is different will standout and feel uncomfortable.
 
While I am deeply sympathetic to her concerns, this:

Somehow, internet commenters started to have an influence – they made me think that my body wasn’t something that belonged to me, but to those who looked at me.
Is just part of being an entertainer of any kind, and I include broadcasts/podcasts in that. Male or female, you are selling your looks just as much as you are the product. Heck, look at how "creative" many Twitch streamers are just in an effort to get that $2.50 a month from a subscriber. If you want people to pay you for entertainment, a part of you is no longer your own.
 
She has the ability to dress how she wants, but she doesn't feel comfortable dressing how she wants because other people are dressing how they want, and they happen to want to dress similar/more casual than she is so the end result is that everyone else needs to up their game so that she can feel comfortable dressing how she wants? If not, she'll just dress how she wants anyway.

I don't think this is an unfair description. Does anyone have some clarification that would help get a little closer to her outlook that this misses? The strongest signal "against" her in what she described seemed to be a co-worker saying an event was casual, and that others dressed as they wanted.
 
Her issue is less with people in plain clothes but more the fact that everyone is in plain clothes because everyone has the same taste. There's no diversity. They are all twenty something white men and that's why they all look the same.

Clothes reflect a lot of what a person so, in the same vein, it also reflects the lack of diversity within the industry. And everyone that is different will standout and feel uncomfortable.

Yeah that's her issue, we are just saying that she is grasping here. If a bunch of people all wear suits to a meeting, does that mean that everyone will agree? If that was the case, congress would function very differently.

Maybe i'm being naive, but I honestly do not think that there is really that big of a correlation between two guys wearing plaid shirt+jeans and two guys making the same video game year after year with no creative changes.

EDIT: 2 months ago, we had a company wide IT meeting. A female co-worker and I counted how many guys were in shortsleeves button ups and jeans. It was easily 90% of them. However everyone had very different ideas for their own respective departments. I just think they are comfortable in those clothes. Unless there is some study to say otherwise, I just cant agree with the bolded.
 
Her issue is less with people in plain clothes but more the fact that everyone is in plain clothes because everyone has the same taste. There's no diversity. They are all twenty something white men and that's why they all look the same.

Clothes reflect a lot of what a person so, in the same vein, it also reflects the lack of diversity within the industry. And everyone that is different will standout and feel uncomfortable.
I wanted to say this but I didn't know how to phrase it without stereotyping people.
 
It's the dress code for like a hundred industries. It used to be cargo shorts and a black t-shirt.. She's right about the lack of diversity though, but it's getting better.
 
There's a word for that. It's diversity. Diversity means people stand out from one another. If she was being mocked or pressured to dress a certain way, that frustration would be well founded. But my reading didn't come across that way. This was someone giving narrative to their own inward discomfort because she didn't look like everyone else.

That's not diversity, you are saying a room with 100 people, 99 in blue shirts, and 1 in a red shirt, is diverse

That is not diverse, diversity would be lots of people in lots of different shirts
 
Just for yooooouuuuu

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Those men *hmph*

EDIT: It really is just a perfect picture for anyone that wants to pick on gaming as a hobby. I love it.

If I were to act like these fellows, I would never make a sale. Oddly enough, being active with your hands shows your customers or audience that you are confident and might know what you are talking about. They look so scared up there. Moving my hands has become so ingrained in me. I even do it constantly during casual convos.
 
I wanted to say this but I didn't know how to phrase it without stereotyping people.

Claiming to know someone's tastes just by the clothes they happened to slip on that morning is entirely too judgmental and kind of mean.


What's going on here is more just a case of people who dress lazily. They buy easily accessible clothes and dress like the peope they see every day. It doesn't really say anything about the condition of the industry (which I'm sure is rife with its own issues, but this isn't one of them).

The condition of the industry being so samey is more about risk aversion, fear, and cowardice than anything else. Most artists at any studio would love to do something completely crazy and wild with every game they make, but the studio is too big and the price is too high for unsafe ideas to get approval and funding.

Ironically, it's more often the ones IN suits that are causing the industry to produce samey products more than the people actually putting the game together.
 
I'm not really buying it. Most people dress alike and just aren't that eye-catching and different in the first place, that's why they are "most people".

I worked in the clothing business for 10 years and from experience I can assure you that the way you dress has nothing to do with who you are, and that many people who focus on looking so different and wonderful aren't really very interesting when you get to know them.

What's going on here is more just a case of people who dress lazily. They buy easily accessible clothes and dress like the peope they see every day. It doesn't really say anything about the condition of the industry (which I'm sure is rife with its own issues, but this isn't one of them).
 
That's not diversity, you are saying a room with 100 people, 99 in blue shirts, and 1 in a red shirt, is diverse

That is not diverse, diversity would be lots of people in lots of different shirts

This isn't about diversity though. That's just a smokescreen to disguise the real issue. There are plenty of people who would be 100% fine being the 1 out of 100 who stands out in a red shirt. EDIT: Hell i'll go 1 step further. Plenty of people would do anything to stand out like that in their perspective fields. 99 blue shirts would be a blessing to them.

This is, in my opinion, as simple as the person who is like, "i wanna wear X to work tomorrow, but I wont do it unless you guys do it too"

I'm sorry but this seems largely personal. Attributing the lack of diversity in the gaming industry to your inability to feel comfortable standing out is just too much a stretch for me.
 
That's not diversity, you are saying a room with 100 people, 99 in blue shirts, and 1 in a red shirt, is diverse

That is not diverse, diversity would be lots of people in lots of different shirts

I didn't mean in the sense of 99-of-the-same-and-one-different, I just mean she was uncomfortable standing out, when that's the nature of diversity. That's what it represents: being different because the person wants to be different. If the behavior from others were unwelcoming or hostile, that would change the nature of the whole situation.
 
I'll bet the kool-aid at the 2K offices tastes great!

Heh, reminds me of a tradition we had in our team. After three of us went to the office wearing shirts of the same colour, we thought "hey that's funny, let's all wear purple shirts on Tuesdays from now on !". Which we did for several years, except for the only woman of the team, who made sure never to wear purple on Tuesdays. :P
 
This isn't about diversity though. That's just a smokescreen to disguise the real issue. There are plenty of people who would be 100% fine being the 1 out of 100 who stands out in a red shirt.

This is, in my opinion, as simple as the person who is like, "i wanna wear X to work tomorrow, but I wont do it unless you guys do it too"

I'm sorry but this seems largely personal. Attributing the lack of diversity in the gaming industry to your inability to feel comfortable standing out is just too much a stretch for me.

This is incredibly naive. Being professional or even being casual in a professional environment comes with a lot of pressure to maintain status quo. This isn't high school. Wearing that red dress to prom isn't breaking down social norms. It's potentially embarrassing yourself and hurting people's perception of you in an environment that could replace you instantly if need be.

It takes a lot of courage and risk to try to dismantle a perception like she is doing, in an industry that already treats her like she shouldn't be there, and where how she dresses could validate that sexism.
 
Yeah that's her issue, we are just saying that she is grasping here. If a bunch of people all wear suits to a meeting, does that mean that everyone will agree? If that was the case, congress would function very differently.

Maybe i'm being naive, but I honestly do not think that there is really that big of a correlation between two guys wearing plaid shirt+jeans and two guys making the same video game year after year with no creative changes.

EDIT: 2 months ago, we had a company wide IT meeting. A female co-worker and I counted how many guys were in shortsleeves button ups and jeans. It was easily 90% of them. However everyone had very different ideas for their own respective departments. I just think they are comfortable in those clothes. Unless there is some study to say otherwise, I just cant agree with the bolded.

Yeah this is what confuses me too. If this was the fashion industry and you wanted to make a correlation between people's tastes and their professional output, I could see a possible case.



I also am not sure about some of the posts I've seen in this thread where people have asserted that dressing down somehow turns off their ability to be creative/productive or vice versa. I don't think your skills are dependant on you putting on a Led Zeppelin t-shirt or a suit.
 
This isn't about diversity though. That's just a smokescreen to disguise the real issue. There are plenty of people who would be 100% fine being the 1 out of 100 who stands out in a red shirt. EDIT: Hell i'll go 1 step further. Plenty of people would do anything to stand out like that in their perspective fields. 99 blue shirts would be a blessing to them.

This is, in my opinion, as simple as the person who is like, "i wanna wear X to work tomorrow, but I wont do it unless you guys do it too"

I'm sorry but this seems largely personal. Attributing the lack of diversity in the gaming industry to your inability to feel comfortable standing out is just too much a stretch for me.

Standing out is good if you're not looked down upon for standing out, women in the games industry generally get treated pretty poorer for simply being women

And the article is not about how anyone dresses, nor does it demand or imply there should be a change in how people dress, she is using it to highlight the fact that gaming is a boys club, and would benefit from having more women working in the industry
 
There doesn't seem to be any active oppression here. She has the ability to dress how she wants, but she doesn't feel comfortable dressing how she wants because other people are dressing how they want, and they happen to want to dress similar/more casual than she is so the end result is that everyone else needs to up their game so that she can feel comfortable dressing how she wants? If not, she'll just dress how she wants anyway.

I think - and I might be misinterpreting it - the notion is that it's a sign of lack of diversity that the gaming industry is disproportionately populated by the sort of people who want to dress casually. Which, if I remap it onto myself, might indicate that there's a bit of a tendency for developers to be a bit introverted and quiet, uncomfortable with standing out.

That is, arguably, a lack of diversity.

However, I would also argue that said developers feel that other potential fields of work would intimidate them for precisely the opposite reason. I'm not comfortable in a suit, I'm quite fortunate that my current employer (software development but not games) also has a relaxed attitude to casual dress.

So, in short: I think it's fair to say that there is a lack of diversity here. But I think it's also fair to ask why it's here, and not prevalent in so many other areas of work. Why are people less comfortable in suits gravitating to software development?
 
This is incredibly naive. Being professional or even being casual in a professional environment comes with a lot of pressure to maintain status quo. This isn't high school. Wearing that red dress to prom isn't breaking down social norms. It's potentially embarrassing yourself and hurting people's perception of you in an environment that could replace you instantly if need be.

It takes a lot of courage and risk to try to dismantle a perception like she is doing, in an industry that already treats her like she shouldn't be there, and where how she dresses could validate that sexism.

Reading the article, the only person that said anything to her was her female friend that said it might be too flashy.

She never said anything about being harassed by men (aside from internet commenters)
She never said anything about anyone telling her to change
She never said anything about anyone basing her professionalism on her clothes

She felt awkward and changed her clothes to more boyish clothes.
She spoke to inspirational women and changed back to dresses.

Where is the sexism? Where is even the implied sexism? She is wearing what she wants now. Does that mean that sexism is still there or that it just doesn't bother her as much anymore? The sexism I see in the article is internet commentators are sexist towards women in general. I don't think this is only in the gaming industry. I think this is all women.

Honestly.. this sounds like a personal journey from being uncomfortable being herself to being comfortable.

Quote from the article: "I now happily wear my floral A-line dress to video game events, and yes, I do stand out, but that’s fine. In an industry that lacks it, difference is a good thing to have."
 
There is a massive problem with diversity in the tech industry in general, in software development in particular, and in games development perhaps most acutely. The treatment of women in these industries, by these industries, should be a constant source of concern and frustration for anyone with even the slightest investment in them.

But this article might be the dumbest, most surface level, superficial and pointless take on the problem I have ever seen.

Many industries have actual dress codes, and they don't seem to implode or suffer from nearly the same sort of issues. It's almost as if The Clothes Don't Make The Person, and You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover or something.
 
There is a massive problem with diversity in the tech industry in general, in software development in particular, and in games development perhaps most acutely. The treatment of women in these industries, by these industries, should be a constant source of concern and frustration for anyone with even the slightest investment in them.

But this article might be the dumbest, most surface level, superficial and pointless take on the problem I have ever seen.

Many industries have actual dress codes, and they don't seem to implode or suffer from nearly the same sort of issues. It's almost as if The Clothes Don't Make The Person, and You Can't Judge A Book By Its Cover or something.

Having spent a year working at a bank where I was expected to dress pretty for guests, I can say that I grew to hate those clothes. They were not me, I did not feel comfortable in them, and I kind of felt depressed working there more than any games job I've had since where I was allowed to wear any lazy thing I wanted. (or rather, didn't care about.)
 
Unless you are designing your own clothes, dressing differently from other people is in no way indicative of creativity. Jerry Garcia, one of the most talented and creative musician of the 20th century wore a black t-shirt and jeans on stage every night.
 
It's almost like that guy that claimed video games are still considered geeky because devs wear casual clothes when they present games at E3. Like what?
 
Honestly.. this sounds like a personal journey from being uncomfortable being herself to being comfortable.

This. 100% this. It's the sort of thing that would usually go to die on somebody's Tumblr, but because she has an outlet with readers it went there instead.

The fact that she thinks she stands out at a "games event" by wearing an A-line dress is pretty funny. With her whole year of experience, I'm assuming that she hasn't been to many gaming events. Most of the people I meet at events for press reasons are women in games PR who wear dresses, all of whom I first met at the UK's largest gaming event. Some of which I first met over a decade ago, and they were wearing dresses then! She may "stand out" as part of a development team (who are usually all attending wearing t-shirts with their company or game name on them) but that's about it.

The reason that they women in dresses stood out at the last big UK event is that there were 40,000 gamers in attendance, a lot of whom dressed similarly. Was nothing to do with people actually working in games.
 
I think - and I might be misinterpreting it - the notion is that it's a sign of lack of diversity that the gaming industry is disproportionately populated by the sort of people who want to dress casually. Which, if I remap it onto myself, might indicate that there's a bit of a tendency for developers to be a bit introverted and quiet, uncomfortable with standing out.

That is, arguably, a lack of diversity.

However, I would also argue that said developers feel that other potential fields of work would intimidate them for precisely the opposite reason. I'm not comfortable in a suit, I'm quite fortunate that my current employer (software development but not games) also has a relaxed attitude to casual dress.

So, in short: I think it's fair to say that there is a lack of diversity here. But I think it's also fair to ask why it's here, and not prevalent in so many other areas of work. Why are people less comfortable in suits gravitating to software development?
Pretty much this. I'd even hypothesize that the fact author likes wearing her fancy dress may be correlated to the fact she does game journalism as opposed to game development.

The whole concept of wearing something that's physically not-so-comfortable but looks impressive and claiming it's casual is very, very alien to me.
 
I hope gaming slowly starts to evolve into a more inclusive place for women

As do I, friend.

I don't think a conscious change in wardrobe is going to spark that cultural shift. I think trifling articles like this set the conversation back, not forward. Wardrobe is not a metric of creativity. It can be an outlet, but it's not inherently indicative of anything other than "this is what I put on this morning".
 
I work in IT, so you can expect almost the same pattern, everybody wears jeans, polos/tshirts. There's one guy who always wears a suit, always, everyday! I don't know if it's the same suit, but he wears it everyday.

Everybody here (myself included) see him like some kind of wierdo, so I kinda understand her point of view, on the other hand, fuck everybody and dress like you want.
 
Reading the article, the only person that said anything to her was her female friend that said it might be too flashy.

She never said anything about being harassed by men
She never said anything about anyone telling her to change
She never said anything about anyone basing her professionalism on her clothes

She felt awkward and changed her clothes to more boyish clothes.
She spoke to inspirational women and changed back to dresses.

Where is the sexism? Where is even the implied sexism? She is wearing what she wants now. Does that mean that sexism is still there or that it just doesn't bother her as much anymore?

Honestly.. this sounds like a personal journey from being uncomfortable being herself to being comfortable.

There doesn't need to be men twirling their mustaches or acting badly for there to be cultural issues in the industry that push women away or makes them feel unconformable. That culture is informed by that fact that it's dominated not just by young men but certain types of young men. How you are "supposed" to dress is just one way that culture manifests itself and is largely influenced by men.

That "dress code" therefore ends up making women who want to dress in a a way many women dress feel unwelcome or out of place. The dress code becomes another problem on top of many other problems that that women trying to enter the industry face. That fact that she or anyone else ended up wearing whatever they wanted doesn't change the fact that these expectations about how a women should dress or act in the industry still exist.

She says this:

As a woman who often appears in front of camera I was particularly self-conscious of choosing anything that could be considered “sexy”. I was once told by a seasoned industry professional that they were reluctant to let myself and a female colleague stream video together as they didn’t want to look like they were “selling sex”.

This seems to be a case of a woman being treated differently because of her gender and this dress issue is just how the author went about to call out this problem. Sure, she is just venting her feelings and it's not the biggest issue in the world but we should have empathy when women in gaming complain that they feel singled out for how they look. I'm sure she's not the only women who feels the way she does. It's nuts that she was encouraged not to appear with another women on camera.

We shouldn't be dismissing this a "a personal issue" but making sure the gaming industry's culture isn't making it an unwelcome place for the next Kim Swift or Amy Henning.
 
They are all twenty something white men and that's why they all look the same.
So only white men in their twenties prefer to dress casually? And why is every white male looking the same according to you? This white male thing sure is getting out of hand

What the **** has your skin color to do with any of this?!
 
Go work at a top-tier law firm in NYC and see what happens if you show up in a t-shirt and jeans instead of an expensive suit. I work in an office with a business-casual dress code, and I still get snarky comments from my boss sometimes if my khakis are slightly too short, or my hair has grown past my ears. Employers tend to equate conformity with professionalism regardless of your race or gender.

It's kind of funny that this issue has arisen because tech companies tend to be more lax with official dress codes than most corporations, yet the employees have internalized the desire to conform that is explicitly demanded for most of the white-collar workforce.
 
Men's fashion is typically always more limited in the modern era. Look at an awards show. Men wear black suits and ties. Maybe a different color suit like beige or dark blue. Women seem to be able to pull off more. Working at a hospital right now the scrubs men wear are blue, green, black gray. While women typically have some pattern or design. Snoopy or minions or Mickey Mouse.

I wonder why that is?
 
I work in a place that requires dress wear. When it's hot out and the AC isn't working I'd love to wear shorts, but that would be greatly looked down upon. It's one of the only perks women get at a workplace with all the other shit they have to deal with, you can dress how you like. It's hot out? Sundress or summer skirt. Feeling lazy? Sweatpants are fine. Meanwhile for a guy wearing jeans and a tshirt is seen as a mortal sin. This obviously has its origin in the professional workplace and dress being male dominated for so long.
 
but this fine lady isn't in the gaming industry.

She is in the joke journalism industry that reports on video game pr events.

So game journalism isn't part of the industry now? Your opinion on game journalism as a whole doesn't change a thing.
 
Everything is a problem.

It certainly seems that way. I understand that she felt uncomfortable being more dressed up or "girly" but I don't think anyone prevented her from doing that, and I don't know how negatively she would be viewed.

My own preferences is I find a well dressed woman to be very sexy, but I don't view her as a sex object nor do I think she went out of her way to come across like that...if that makes any sense.
 
I don't think it was a 'call to action' or anything of the sort. It was just an observation. The problem wasn't that it was too casual, the problem was that it was "wear what you like", but in fact if you do, you stand out. So this person ended up perpetuating this culture that wasn't hers. All while the games industry is talking about incluiveness.

It was after time & support that she felt comfotable enough to be herself and not just settle into the 'sameness', and in doing so she thinks that it frees her to be more creative and open.

This makes sense. It's not a 'feminist' argument at it's core, it's just that conforming to the status quo isn't going to bring diveristy of culure (not gender specifically) into the industry.

If the writer was a guy who loved vintage 3 piece suits, but was feeling pressured to dress dowm to fit in I think you will see the parallels with the article.
 
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