Last week Friday the Cape Legion of Adventuring Warriors (CLAWs) teamed up with Her Campus UCT to have a womxn’s evening. The event, which was hosted in the Kramer building on UCT middle campus, invited womxn to come and participate with board games, table-top RPG’s and a LARP (definitions are at the end of the article).
This event was highly important to host because the reality is, it isn’t that easy to be a girl in nerdy spaces. Whilst CLAWs has existed for thirty years and womxn have always been a part of the running of an organisation of the society, the wider environment of the activities we participate in has been historically male-dominated. In fact, some of the older RPG systems and several of our boardgames only have male pronouns in their rules. Dungeons and Dragons first edition required female characters to have a handicap on their strength score and a boost to their charisma score.
Whilst I now feel comfortable in the social space, I did not always. I used to feel that because I was a girl I needed to know all the rules of every table-top RPG because if I didn’t, someone would lean over my shoulder constantly during a game and make decisions for my character, or count my dice for me. I have had people ask me if my brothers or boyfriend introduced me to the things that I liked. Whilst I loved these activities and hobbies a part of me felt like I was constantly trying to know more than everyone else so that nobody could ever discredit me as a ‘real fan’. Then when I knew almost everything about the games I was playing, when I was a well-established table-top role-player, I started to feel commodified as though people wanted to have ownership over a ‘nerdy girl’. I would leave nerdy spaces feeling as though they had been hostile whilst my male friends would convince me that everyone had been friendly and that I was just imagining the things that made me feel uncomfortable and I would agree. It was only when I invited my female friends to join games and when I met other girls who participated in CLAWs that I was able to stand behind my experiences.
Nobody should ever feel as though they can’t participate in something they are interested in because of their race or gender. The concept of the ‘fake fan’ shouldn’t exist. Some fans know every detail of the media they love, some know most of the details and some are just starting to participate in it. At the beginning, everyone was the third kind of fan and nobody was ever born knowing all the rules to a complicated game. Nobody should ever be pushed to play a seductive character because they are a womxn and female players should stop writing female characters with preconceived constraints in mind.
We don’t want anyone to feel ostracised, intimidated or interrogated just for wanting to enjoy fantasy, sci-fi and games. As heads of CLAWs this year, the committee has put a lot of effort into making womxn feel more comfortable in our space. Our efforts have been successful and we have a much more diverse and participatory society this year. Similarly, the womxn’s evening was a great success. There was a whole crate of board games which attendees got to play with their friends. Three table-top role-playing games were run by womxn with several first-time players. I had the pleasure of running a Dungeons and Dragons module based on the Rat Queens comic books for four womxn who were more than happy to play the Rat Queens. Finally, we hosted a LARP called Hungover in Hyades. The LARP was set in the distant future on a malfunctioning space-ship which a group of party-goers found themselves stuck on after a wild night. Once again, several first-time players joined us to enjoy the themed food, drama and fun of the LARP.
It was wonderful to meet all the womxn I met that night and to see the womxn who I already knew having fun at this event. I hope everyone enjoyed themselves. I truly believe that whilst this evening was a great success, the greater success will be to see female participation continue to be strong in our events in the future, so that if you missed the womxn’s evening, if you want to join us again or if you are now someone who participated in our meet-ups frequently, we appreciate you. Enjoy your imagination.
Quick definitions for clarity
-
Table-top RPGs (role-playing games): Games in which players sit around a table and interact with a fantasy world as a character. Players can create their characters or use progenerated characters. A GM (game master) is responsible for narrating the world and play all the non-player characters that the players might run into. Players narrate their character’s actions or speak as their characters and dice are used when there is a probability that they might not succeed. It is sort of like being the main character in a novel. Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder and Shadowrun are popular table-top RPG systems.
-
LARPs (Live Action Role-Plays): Role-playing games but in these games, players physically portray their characters. Players usually dress-up as their characters and then interact with other characters in a fictional setting. There are usually fewer rules involved. A GM is there to assist when things go wrong or when characters want to do things to each other’s players that they would not want or be able to do e.g. kill each other. The LARPs CLAWs that run, are theatre LARPs and players are given their characters as all of the characters have closely interwoven backstories to maximise drama.
-
Boardgames: I am sure everyone has encountered these before. The only thing to specify is the CLAWs does not own scrabble or monopoly but rather many more obscure fantasy and sci-fi games alongside some recent popular favourites e.g. Exploding Kittens, Cards Against Humanity, FLUXX.