We Hunted The Mammoth
So you’ve heard about the whole GameStop thing, right? The denizens of a stock trading subreddit have collectively levitated the stock price of troubled game retailer GameStop up roughly a kajillion percent since last fall, screwing over several hedge funds that were betting on the company’s stock going down the toilet. (You can get all the gory details of what’s going on here.)
How did anyone ever come to think that the gaming world is hostile to women? This GameStop training video from 2009 shows just how welcoming the video game retailer has been to “one of the world’s most fascinating creatures.” Yes, we’re talking about the enigma that is the human female.
In the video, an expert in “womanly studies” attempts to explain to GameStop staffers how to understand “a segment of the species that remains a mystery to over fifty percent of the population today,” analyzing staged interactions between male staffers and some of these mysterious females.
In addition to the weird sexism of the video, which manages to be patronizing to women and men alike, the video features some amazing graphics (relying heavily on stock photos of these mysterious “women”), brilliant acting, and extras who are supposed to be standing frozen in the background but can’t help compulsively blinking.
The worst part of this video is that despite its cringeworthiness it probably did help some male GameStop staffers deal with women in a slightly less patronizing way.
H/T — Polygon