Get Out of My Hobby

Video games have always been a controversial subject for toxic masculinity and how it plays a role in encouraging toxic behaviors. I'm a female and I have been playing video games for most of my life, and many girls like me do not have issues with rage during video games as much as men seem to. Currently, I prefer to play games that do not require the internet because of the amount of abuse that I tend to get when I do play with others online. 

The population of online gamers is predominately male, and no matter how well or badly I do in the game, there is no winning for a "gamer girl." If I win the game, I'm a "Whore" and I must have cheated. If I lose, then its obvious that I'm a girl because I lost and I'm not supposed to be good at playing games. There have been many who will also attempt to give me pointers about how to play the game, because they assume I don't know anything about the game even before starting it. 

I do get the occasional other girl who I get to play with and it is refreshing since I tend to not get verbally abused by them. That's not to say that there isn't a single decent guy who plays video games without lashing out, it is just very RARE. Ultimately, I don't think that the video game itself has much to do with these toxic behaviors towards women who game, as much as it is the community who enforces the belief that women shouldn't play video games because it is a man's hobby.