When we asked members of IRIS over on the boards to tell us what the site has meant to them, I started to think back on my time spent here in the past year and what effect it has had on me. I first wandered over to IRIS from a link posted on Kotaku, of all places, sometime in March or April of 2007. I’d been reading Kotaku daily for about half a year or so at that point, and was regularly dismayed by the extreme amounts of sexism (not to mention racism, homophobia, ableism, etc.) spewed forth by both the commenters and editorial staff at the site. I wanted to keep up to date on games and talk to other people about them, but trying to wade through the misogyny at Kotaku was an exercise in futility and the prospect of trying to engage with some of the offensive things was disheartening. Better to keep my mouth shut and head down and not make waves where someone like me, a mixed queer feminist, wasn’t wanted. Finding IRIS in the midst of all this, a safe haven in the middle of the dominant and overwhelmingly sexist mainstream gaming culture was like a breath of fresh air. Cliché, I know, but how else can I describe it? It was such a relief to find other gamers, gamers who loved the hobby but were sick of the culture surrounding their hobby, gamers who were critical of the games that they loved even while playing them. Finally, other gamers that I could relate to. Finally, other gamers who understood. IRIS instantly felt like home to me.
Since my initial introduction to IRIS over a year ago, I’ve experienced significant growth in my understanding of the way oppression operates not only in games and gaming culture, but in other areas of life as well. Meeting the other progressives at IRIS and poking around through the directory opened my eyes up to a plethora of feminist blogs, sites and communities online that I hadn’t even known existed. If I had thought to look for these sorts of things before I might have found them prior my introduction to IRIS, but you know it just hadn’t occurred to me to do so until IRIS first put the combination of feminism, games and the internet together. Reading all of the brilliant things that were being said in critique of pop culture on the internet has helped me hone my own ability to articulate my feminism and the way I experience the world. I continue to learn every day from the work of online progressives, to whom I will always be indebted. I can only hope that the work that I do through IRIS/Cerise may have a similar impact on other women and/or feminist gamers out there, looking for community in a hostile culture. This desire to make a difference for others, the way IRIS and the rest of the feminist blogosphere have done for me, is what motivates my continued contributions to this magazine and this site.
Without veering too far into TMI, I would be remiss if I neglected to mention the other significant effect that IRIS has had on my life: I met my partner (going on six months!) through the IRIS Network last year. If for no other reason than that fact alone, IRIS will always be a special place for me. <3
Site Administrator
tekanji