Gender Separation using Video Games

A pattern is well known in the video gaming community that seems to hold a lot of controversy. This pattern is that there is a vast majority of male video game players than females. Now what makes this interesting is the "why" behind it. Why is it that males were drawn to video games first and that females insist on not playing?

Attached is a picture of a typical male gamer playing a game, and the reason I chose this picture is because I expect a lot of people know someone like this. A male gamer that is glued to the computer/TV screen for hours.

The explanation for this majority that I am going to present is strictly my observation and hypothesis. I deduce that because males were the gained the majority of playing video games avidly, females saw no reason to share a favorite hobby with males. This boils down to the features our society deems masculine and feminine. In our society it is not difficult to see the power of opposites. A few examples are how masculine is accompanied by strong, independent, and logical where feminine is accompanies by weak, dependent, and emotional.

Knowing that this pattern of opposites is already in our society it is not a stretch to see that when video games crept into the masculine category, females were expected not to enjoy them. The way our society views masculinity and femininity has contributed much to the reason the video game community was created with the vast majority of its members being male.

What is even more interesting than the previous hypothesis is that females are now in a close race with males for the majority in the video gaming community. Washington Post did a study that suggested females held a strong 48% whereas males held 52% in 2013. This could be explained by females realizing that enjoying video games does not have to strictly be a male pastime, and have eventually pulled the majority towards their direction.