It's easy to tell someone to give everyone a shot at understanding when you're not on the receiving end of it all the time. She had this happen multiple times, so she rightly assumed what anyone would: These PR reps assumed she couldn't play their games because she was a woman.
Yes and they are right most of the time. Not because women cannot play those games, just because the majority of the women that are sent there do not.
As a foreign developer, I'm on the receiving end of that type of attitude all the time when there is talk about business, marketing, local trivia ... or most generally about a project they never thought I had heard before.
People make assumption, you can set things straight in the first seconds of the discussion. So I say in this case, grow up: they don't know you, swallow your pride and just tell them you mean business.
What would be more worrying is if their attitude do not change immediately after that. That is still a day-to-day problem for women in anything IT related, but I would except big show like the E3 to be quite smooth about that.
What about these PR reps, what if all the other girls they say that day weren't really experienced players of shoot-em-up games, how were they supposed to know she was different right away? Doesn't your comment apply equally to say she assumed things?
What do you mean by calling shenanigans? Blaming the PR people?
The thing is, the guys didn't get the same treatment... but my point was simply that the PR people were exposed to a certain pattern (someone is a girl => they aren't that experienced playing shoot em up video games) and it was repeatedly reinforced through subtle social feedback, that expecting them to just be good at the game was not producing great results for them or for your brand. And since the PR person wants to do their job and give a good impression of the game, they would just assume this girl was like the others, and offer to show her the best parts about the demo, so that she can write about them.
They aren't poor, I am asking why she is surprised given that they were very likely to do that, and indeed most of them in her story did do that.
What is the alternative? I am not calling them poor, but you are calling them deluded. And I am deluded. Basically we all believe a myth.
What is more likely is that there is an underlying reason for the PR people and others to believe it. It is the reason that should be analyzed and addressed, not the people who are the product of it.
> What is more likely is that there is an underlying reason for the PR people and others to believe it.
You're making the same mistake that the PR guy made (Obviously women don't play games, therefore it's an understandable mistake). Stop doing that, would be a really good start.
I don't think this is right. If most of the women who come by tell the PR guys that they don't play, then the PR guys are right most of the time when they assume that women don't play.
Most of the time when the IT guy makes sexual jokes, the girl laughs, so how was he supposed to know that this one time the girl was going to be offended?
Here's another simple "rule of thumb": Would she have gotten the same treatment after applying OP's suggestions (saying "No, thanks, I'll drive!") ? If not, then I feel that finally calling shenaningans is the right response.
And, again, quid bono ? She certainly did, a bunch of people who would never ever read her column now just gave her a bunch of pageviews.
She probably would, at the next booth. And the next, and the next[1]. At what point are you going to stop blaming her for other people's idiocy?
btw, it's "Cui bono" - the literal translation being "who benefits"?
[1] - Actually, it did, if you read the article:
It happened during one of my first appointments of the
show, a half hour I’d booked to check out the sequel to a
well-known military shooter franchise.
..later..
It continued to happen through the next few days of E3.
Upon checking into a booth, I would often be asked by the
PR rep whether I wanted someone to play my “hands-on” demo
for me. During booth tours, I would more often than not be
guided towards the Facebook games.
