Hello and good luck, my friends. This week I'm going to talk about girly stuff. I'm going to ponder some of the reasons why Magic-playing women are so rare, suggest how you can avoid being the Creepy Guy, answer some questions from readers, and say a few words on the role of women in the judge program. And if that's not enough to keep you reading, I'll also reveal who is the hottest guy in Magic and throw in some Jane Austen references. Let's get to it!

"I cannot boast of knowing more than half a dozen, in the whole range of my acquaintance..."
Female Magic players are rare, but not as rare as some people think. According to Elaine Chase (Ask Wizards, October 2002), approximately 10 to 15 % of Magic players are female. On the tournament scene, the percentage is much lower than that. Most of the time I'm the only woman in the room, and I can't remember meeting more than five female Finnish Magic players in all my years of judging and playing. Why are there not more women playing?

I'm sure you can come up with several reasons, all true for some but not all women. Some might say that women are not interested in fantasy (as in swords and sorcery). That is not true; plenty of women love The Lord of the Rings, and plenty of men are not interested in such things. Some might say that women are not gamers in general, but I see plenty of women buying games with their boyfriends or husbands. The Finnish gaming community is, in my experience, pretty close to a 60/40 division between men and women on average, but some subcommunities (like the larp community, for example) have a higher percentage of women than others. Like Chase points out, women tend to like the social side of gaming more than the competitive side. Women in general seem to prefer different types of games than men. That is not to say that women can't be competitive (if you need examples of competitive women, just look at professional sports), but that the competitive side of Magic is less appealing to women in general.

Most women you meet at Magic events are there with their boyfriends or husbands. If they play instead of just watching, it is quite likely learned from their boyfriend/husband. Who did the boyfriend learn from? A male friend, most likely. Gaming is something guys do with their guy friends. Gaming is not something most girls do with their girl friends. Most little girls don't think, "Cool! when they see a huge dragon or a zombie with wrecking balls for hands—they'll say, "Boys are soooooo dumb!" Then you have a gaming store full of guys, and it's not so easy for a lone girl to feel comfortable about walking in and joining the fun. We all enjoy spending time with people who are similar to us. A guy might think that aerobics would be great excercise for him, but won't join a class because he'd be the only guy in the room. He'd get more attention than he really wants, and other guys might make fun of him.

I'm quite used to being the only woman in the room, having grown up with four younger brothers in a neighbourhood with few girls of my own age. I started playing roleplaying games with my brothers and friends when I was in my early teens, and I've judged Magic events since 1999. I'm the only woman at my workplace, which is staffed entirely by gamer geeks. Yet I still sometimes have moments where I feel like I don't belong. A bunch of socially awkward gamer guys can make a female Magic player feel rather uncomfortable.

A female player will get stared at. There will be comments about her playing skill—she's supposed to be an easy win and anyone who loses to her is ridiculed. She'll be automatically assumed to be a newbie, and treated with a patronizing attitude. Whether this makes a woman uncomfortable or angry depends on the person.? I have been spared from this attitude to some degree because I never played much (in tournaments), but just read this classic rant by Michelle Bush (I think attitudes have changed slightly for the better in the last six years). I know I just said that most women came to the game through their significant others, but it is sexist to assume that this is always the case.

Consider this: I am judging a tournament. I am wearing the stripes. I am answering questions and making rulings. Yet still, some players will ask me "...so, do you play Magic?" Do they think that it's likely that WotC just picked me off the street (no, don't even think about that joke) and made me judge a Grand Prix? Do they think it's even remotely possible that the answer might be "no"? Would they ask a male colleague that same question? The most common question I get from GP players is "How long have you played Magic?" It might sound like perfectly innocent small talk, but when you hear that several times a day, always as the first question from a complete stranger, I begin to think that unfair assumptions are being made.

"Oh!" cried Elizabeth, "I have been rather too much used to the game to be soon overcome by a gentleman's hints."
I don't mind it when players want to talk to me. I like to hear that players are enjoying the event, and I also like to hear if there's a problem that we should be fixing. I can do small talk if you'll listen patiently while I complain about my sore feet. What I don't want to hear is lame pick-up lines. I'm there to work. I'm also very unavailable, and I have been that way for most of my international judging career. It's time to share the story that was the starting point for this whole article.

On day 1 of Torino, I was sitting down to rest my feet when Random Italian Guy came over to talk to me. We had a fairly boring conversation about me, Finland and my work (including the dreaded "how long have you played" question). Eventually I had to get back to work, so I excused myself and wished the guy a good tournament. Soon afterwards my fellow judges Oli Bird and Frank Wareman told me that this guy had been talking to them for a long time, asking about the judges' working schedule, our hotel, and implying that he wanted to "score" with a female judge. Oli and Frank had told the Creepy Italian Guy that all female judges at this GP are married (which was true), which didn't seem to bother him at all. Needless to say, I was totally creeped out. Luckily, the guy was wearing very?bright-coloured shirts, so it was easy to avoid him for the rest of the weekend.

This might not sound like a very serious incident, and certainly I wasn't traumatized for life, but it was the first time I truly felt uncomfortable at an event because of something that a player said or did—because it was directed at me specifically. There was a guy (not the same one) who was wearing a T-shirt that had a badly photoshopped picture of a topless Serra Angel on it, and I found that inappropriate but amusing.

That brings me to another reason why women might not get interested in Magic (again, this is only true for some women): the art and flavor are too male-oriented. With males being the main customer base, the art and flavor are obviously designed with them in mind. When they decided that "Angel" means "a winged chick with huge breasts", they were not thinking "Yay! Positive role models for young women!" Every set has to have a flying babe, and female characters must wear tight clothing and show cleavage even when wearing armor. Many of the advertising campaigns are obviously designed to draw in teenage males, because I don't know many women who would get distracted by the way Garza Zol dresses (unless that dress is a Versace on sale, HA!).

Where are all the hot guys? We have Gerrard, whose beard and silly white-shirt-and-vest thing are not doing anything for me, some old wizard dudes, and I don't know, those guys on red instants and sorceries that boost your creature with some drawback—you know, bulging muscles and crazy eyes and raaaarrrr. Then we have some elves, if you swing that way. There's Kamahl, who is kind of appealing if you like bald guys with strong jawlines. But then he had to turn into a Druid and let his hair grow...but I digress.

The secondary materials (non-WotC websites and magazines) are also clearly targeted towards males. I love to hate Inquest magazine for their juvenile humor and silly articles about the "hottest babes in computer games" (meaning game characters, not people who play games). It's just so clear that I'm not the intended reader (yet I keep reading it, because someone always puts a copy in our office "library"). Similarly, I feel somewhat excluded when authors on this very site put gratuitous cheesecake links in their articles. It has nothing to do with Magic, and it's not for me.

I'm not calling for huge changes in Magic art or Magic-related media. Every time I see a copy of Heavy Metal magazine in our office library, I remember that things could be a lot worse. Compared to that quality fantasy publication, the female characters of Magic are all quite sensibly dressed and the attitude towards them is enlightened. Female characters are allowed to kick ass and not just be damsels in scantily-clad distress.

I assume that most of you are normal, intelligent people who don't have to be told that women are also capable of playing Magic, and who can look a woman in the eye while talking to her. I'm also assuming that most of you wouldn't mind seeing more women participating in Magic tournaments. You can't exactly go out and recruit girls (well, you could, but more on that later), but you can make the ones that show up feel more comfortable, so they will come back. How do you do this? By treating them exactly the same as any other player (shocking, I know).

Do you assume that every player who you haven't met before is a clueless newbie? Do you ask them about their girlfriend? Do you ask how long they have been playing? Then don't do those things to female players. Ask them about their deck, where they're from, what their record or rating is... talk to them about Magic. Don't immediately remind them that they're the freak among geeks. If you really would like to know this person better and spend time with them, at least save those questions for later. But please remember that a woman who comes to a Magic tournament probably came there to play Magic (just like you), not to look for guys they might date. So don't ask for their phone number right away. The ones who do want the attention will probably have no problems communicating this.

"I know little of the game at present," said he, "but I shall be glad to improve myself..."
But how about recruiting more female players? Maybe you're wishing you could have romantic candlelit playtesting sessions with your girlfriend, but she doesn't want to learn the game. How do you make her a Magic player? This was one of the questions I received from readers. My answer is this: start simple, like with any newbie. You shouldn't use tournament-level Standard decks to introduce a new player to the game. You shouldn't use limited decks, even. Make a deck a two-color deck with cards from the basic set—mostly creatures, some simple spells. When you have been playing for years, it's easy to forget how complicated Magic really is. If you're only learning the game to please someone else, you won't learn as fast as when you're really excited about it. Some people will just look at some cards and realize that it's the game they've always wanted to play, others will take a little convincing (and some will never get it).

For people who already know how to play but don't have the time to get involved and build decks, you can do the hard work for them by putting together a few casual decks, so you can have quick games without a lot of preparation time. Or start with a precon, add some boosters every now and then, get them addicted and eventually drag them to a prerelease. Scientific fact: these tips will work equally well with both sexes. Just use pink sleeves for girls and blue sleeves for boys.

Should WotC and tournament organizers in general do something to encourage women to participate in organized play? Yes and no. There used to be a Standard format women-only side event tournament at every Pro Tour (I'm not sure if recent Pro Tours have had one). It was called the Femvitational. Because it's like the Invitational but only females are invited, get it? And instead of their own card, the winner gets boosters and "possible sponsorship to a Pro Tour". Now, it's not a horrible idea to have a women only tournament, but is it absolutely necessary to give it a name that sounds like something I would be a bit embarrassed to buy in a pharmacy? I don't think the Femvitationals were ever very big. I participated in one at PT Venice because they had only seven players. I played that event while wearing my stripes, but that's a story for another time. The problem with the Femvitational is that the more experienced female players will often prefer to participate in another event (like a PTQ) instead.

I have been asked several times whether my gender is a disadvantage when I'm judging—whether players refuse to believe me because I'm a woman. In the early days of my judging career, I did have an authority problem, but it had more to do with my insufficient rules knowledge. I'd hesitate when answering a question and ask other judges for help. Once my rules knowledge improved, it took me a while to convince the players that I didn't need backup. That was years ago; now the Finnish players know me and respect me, and they appreciate the fact that I will always double check if I'm not absolutely sure of my answer. I don't have any problems at International events either. I think most players know that I wouldn't be there if I wasn't good enough. My rulings get appealed sometimes just like everyone else's, and I've never had the feeling that it was because I have breasts.

I don't think that my gender has ever been a significant obstacle on my judging career. It has never become an issue in any overt way. When WotC sponsors me to an event, I share a room with my husband if he's also sponsored, and if he's not there, I often have my own single room if no other female judges or staff members are present. I probably miss out on some social aspects [feel free to insert snoring roommate anecdotes here] of the GP/PT judging experience by not having a roommate, but that's something I can live with.

Of course, I can't say whether my gender has influenced the decisions made by senior judges, but for the most part, I feel that I have been treated as an equal. That is all that I expect. There have been a few cases where I was told to sit down and let the big guys handle the physical work, like carrying a box of basic land from one end of the room to another. I am prepared to do my share of the physical work, so I do not expect such chivalry, but I'm also not going to argue with a guy who likes lugging boxes around.

I was asked if I've ever seen inappropriate behaviour from my fellow judges, or whether male judges ever hit on female judges. I want to say that most of my brothers in stripes are nice guys and perfect gentlemen, but unfortunately I've met a couple of judges who have made slightly inappropriate comments in my presence. I will not reveal what exactly was said because it's likely that the individuals in question may read this article, and I don't want to make a big issue out of something relatively minor. As for getting hit on by male judges, most judges I work with know that I'm married. I can't, however, speak for my female colleagues on this subject.

I think the judge program can only benefit from the presence of female judges. Becoming a judge is a good way to get involved in organized play for someone who doesn't actually like competition that much.

Magic is for everyone. Let us try and treat all Magical minorities with respect. Ladies, don't let ignorant comments bother you, and if you haven't yet participated in a tournament, don't be afraid to try one. You'll meet plenty of nice and intelligent folks who share your cardboard addiction. Gentlemen, do not make unfair assumptions about female players. And don't wear that topless Serra t-shirt.

Thank you for reading.

Next week: it's the Flamedash Summer Tour 2006! By the time you read this week's article, I will be on my way to southern Sweden for Grand Prix Malmö. Two weeks after that, I will be judging at the Finnish Nationals, and a week after that, I'm going to be facing the chaos at Ropecon, the biggest Finnish gaming event of the year. I hope to have some good stories to share from these events.