Clarifications, apologies, and game
Yesterday’s article was off the deep end, even for me; I’ve since pulled it, and I regret posting it for much of its content. I let it get way too personal, so to my wife I will say that I am sorry. And to the rest of you, I hope you can let this one slide at some point.
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa, as they say.
That said, there are two points I think are worth preserving from the article which I’d like to restate and/or clarify slightly.
The first is the statement from Vox that began the article:
I have to admit, I’ve never understood how women, who apparently spend considerably more time in front of the television on average than men, can possibly complain about the male preference for electronic games. Let’s face it, you had better be one scintillating conversationalist and/or contortionist if you seriously expect to compete with CoD [or Mass Effect - ed.]. Now, I do occasionally fear for the fate of the human race when talking to younger gamers who genuinely don’t seem to understand that real flesh-and-blood women could at least occasionally be preferable to porn and PS/3; at least back in the Golden Age, game geeks realized that they were compensating for missing out on something.
The key point here is interestingness, and in particular the relative interestingness of different activities, as seen from the male perspective. And note the categories of activity Vox selects: conversation (which many men apparently don’t particularly care for), and sex (which men are apparently obsessed with). In other words, Vox’s basic point is that for most guys, unless they are complete non-gamers, a good round of Call of Duty (or Mass Effect, as the case may be) is almost infinitely more enjoyable than a conversation, and also often substantially more enjoyable than Sex, especially fairly vanilla, single-position sex.
And yes, we can insert the usual “not all cases” qualifiers here, but in general the point stands. Is there a problem with the situation thus far described? Yeah, there is…there are at least two, in fact. One with the man, one with the woman, assuming the paradigm outlined in Item 1.
The problem with the man in that scenario is that the woman, his spouse, does have a reasonable expectation of getting to spend some time with her spouse, though it is probably good, at this point, to note the distinction between a reasonable expectation and an outright entitlement (and also the difference between attempting to have that expectation fulfilled and acting entitled.)
The problem with the woman in the scenario is her relative interestingness; the game is more interesting, more engaging, more thought-provoking, and perhaps more interactive and/or rewarding to interact with than she is. And here’s the kicker: that is not the game’s fault, nor is it the man’s fault.
Here’s a really-not-so-secret secret: guys do actually like conversation, as long as it’s spontaneous and engaging. The problem many guys encounter is that the conversations they have with their spouses that are spontaneous are not engaging, nor are the conversations which are about engaging topics particularly spontaneous. Funnily, the same basic considerations and concerns apply to sex; the spontaneous stuff isn’t typically that steamy (shall we say), and the steamy stuff isn’t typically all that spontaneous. Guys, not surprisingly, like sex when it is both spontaneous and steamy.
(And yes, the reciprocal situation — female gamer, male non-gamer — can probably safely be assumed to conform to this general paradigm as well. I will state that for the benefit of certain people I am fairly sure are going to be reading this, though I shouldn’t have to, because it really is a fairly obvious concept.)
The point, then, is: be more interesting than the game. Whether on the couch, around the dinner table, or in bed, be the more engaging and enjoyable activity. Otherwise, don’t be surprised if the game is the preferred passtime; it has more to offer.
The second thing I want to draw out of the original article is the note to any family or friends which ended said article: I won’t say what I really desperately want to say to some of you, because the rest of you — who don’t do what I’m about to go off about — don’t deserve to hear the invective that I want to pour out on the others.
So let me just say: if you’re reading this article, and if you have a ConcernTM that you just absolutely feel the need to call someone close to me about, please resist the temptation to pick up the damn phone. Man up (or woman up) and leave your ConcernTM in a damn comment, or else keep your ConcernTM to yourself. If you can’t say what you want to say about me in a public forum, such as this, then don’t bloody-well say it; it’s just not that damn important.
And be thou advised: if it is at all brought to my attention that you didn’t leave your ConcernTM in a comment, and that you did instead phone your ConcernTM in, guess what? That’s bloggable. Yes, I will respect your anonymity, but the subject matter discussed will itself be bloggable. Nobody else will know who you are when they read the article…but you will know.
There are apparently a damn lot of you, so have some balls/ovaries and speak the hell up already. If leaving a comment isn’t your thing, send me a damn email; my iPhone is always on, and always on me. If you don’t want what you send me via email to appear on the blog, tell me as much in the subject line or message body, and that’s that.
Hell, you can even call me, on my iPhone, which is (again) always on and always on me, and which is, in fact, a phone. +1 (780)238-3993…same as it’s been for six years now.
In short: there’s any number of ways you can articulate your ConcernTM about me to me, rather than to third parties. Do this…or just shut up about it already. Because whatever you think you’re accomplishing by calling someone else about it…you aren’t actually accomplishing at all.
