PopagandaVideo Games and Identity

Video games are a huge piece of our pop culture industry. People who don’t play games maybe think that they’re a weird, dorky niche that only a few people play. But that’s exactly the opposite of true. Globally, video games are a $91 billion industry. Fifty-nine percent of people in the United States play video games—that’s 186 million people, more Americans than have cable TV. We don’t call someone a TV-er or a movie-er, but for some reason, playing video games still gets you pegged as a “gamer.”

On this episode, we talk with Sam Riedel about the fragile masculinity behind Gamergate and how playing video games growing up made her think differently about gender. Then, scholar Saud Al-Zaid walks us through representation of Arab identity in massively popular first-person-shooter games and explains the surprising connections between video games and the U.S. military. 

FULL SHOW 

REFLECTING ON GAMERGATE

REAL WARS, FICTIONAL VIDEO GAMES

SPONSOR 

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SHOUT-OUTS 

• Read Sam Riedel’s article about the fallout from Gamergate, “No Girls Allowed.” 

• Rad artist Sammus let us use her song “Power Up” in this episode. Her music draws beats and inspiration from video game soundtracks. Check out her newest tracks. Other music on this episode comes courtesy of Soundcloud users 8-Bit Songs and Chiptune Mikey.

• Big thanks to Lorenzo of Berlin’s A MAZE indie video game festival for connecting us with Saud Al-Zaid.