Transgender and Marginalized gamers want to prove that gaming is for everyone.

Representation and inclusion in esports and gaming has been a focus of a lot of video game developers and industry groups like Women In Games and the*gameHERs. And while many of these groups are not just fighting for women but also marginalized genders, some recent events in the social world of gaming have proved that there is still a long way to go when it comes to inclusion for the transgendered community.

On September 12^th, 2023 on X, formerly known as Twitter, a user named MagickMoonshot was talking about a women’s scrims event for the game Halo that she was hosting in her private Discord. Scrims are made to be a no-frills tournament for people to play together, sometimes for fun, sometimes to practice in a tournament setting. What she thought was a simple post about who would be allowed to participate ended up turning the esports community on its head. The post read “I am building out channels in my Discord for the Ladies’ scrims on Saturday. I love and value all people, and as a Christian, I believe God created people in His image as male and female. (Genesis 5:1-2) Therefore, I will not be allowing trans players to participate.”

The post garnered 4.5 million interactions, and the majority of the comments were not the positive responses that she was expecting. Many called her out on her views, some agreeing that she can set the rules she wanted to but that the post could have been worded differently so it wouldn’t have been focused solely on transgender women, and many tagged her sponsors and teams, asking if they stood with her opinions. She lost all of her sponsorships and was removed from both of the organizations she represented. But in the middle of all of these responses was what some looked at as shocking, considering the normal toxic nature of the gaming community, with men, women, and marginalized genders commenting with “gaming is for everyone” or “Halo is for everyone.”

While it’s great to see that gamers of all genders are beginning to come together to embrace diversity, there’s still quite a way to go. TechRadar (UK) reported in June that there’s been a few instances of representation, including two female characters in Rainbow Six Siege being voiced by two transgender actresses, as well as one of the creators of the game Celeste confirming that the main character, Madeline, is transgender.

However, many who are transgender realized their true selves because of gaming, thanks to character creation in a multitude of games, reports The Guardian in 2021. Janessa Jane, a transgender female content creator, is an testament to this. “Before I even realized that I had gender dysphoria and was transgender, whenever I would create characters in games, I would always lean towards female,” Jane said with a smile.

Jane, who goes by LadyJanessa in her content, found that she never had to deal with the type of toxicity that female gamers tend to go through before she came out. “It was about 50-60 raids a week I was teaching in Destiny 2,” said Jane. “When I hadn’t come out yet, people were more inclined to listen to me. Then I noticed when I came out as transgender and changed my name, all of a sudden sometimes what I was saying to some people didn’t seem as valid.”

For Lucas Thompson, who goes by MotivatedLucas in his content, his journey as a female gamer was similar to Jane’s, but before he came out as male. “It was not a good idea to speak,” Thompson says, “because they moment that they hear your voice, it was very sexual, a lot of sexual harassment comments. Or they just say that you’re bad at the game and shouldn’t be playing.” Thompson says that before he started to identify as male, he was playing Rainbow Six Siege, a game that prioritizes communication and depending on your teammates to stay alive. He says the moment he would speak as a female, teammates would immediately assume he was bad, then team kill him in the game. The male players would rather sacrifice being down a teammate than play with a female teammate. Since transitioning, he’s found that his issues are marginally less, other than some people just not understanding the transgender community.

Between both Jane and Thompson, their communities have been accepting of their true selves. Sometimes they’ll run into bad apples, but for the most part they’ve found people who love them for who they are. But when it came to the post made by MagickMoonshot, Jane and Thompson had different thoughts as people who live with these types of comments day in and day out.

“I’m someone who religiously searches the opposite of what I think,” says Jane, “because it changes your search results, so you actually get stuff that you don’t agree with, but it helps you see something from a different perspective.” Jane says that she took the time to do some research on who she (MagickMoonshot) is, and whether or not what she said could be taken in a hostile way.

Thompson, however, says that the post was discrimination. “I thought that it was a way for them to come out and bully and exclude people,” Thompson said. “Just because we’re not cis, does not mean we’re any less male or female.” As a Christian himself, Thompson also expresses his frustration with people who use their faith to discriminate. He mentions that his new church is very accepting of who he is, and even his grandmother has started to attend this church and has changed her perspective on who he is. “If people in their 70’s can change, so can people like that, whether they’re in the gaming community or not.”

The hate and backlash is going to unfortunately be apart gaming and there’s not a lot that can be done, currently, to curb it from happening at all. However, she does have advice to anyone in the transgender community who might be afraid to take that next step into esports or content creation; “Use the opportunity to connect and not feel alone yourself and help someone else not feel alone. You can create a community based on connection and positivity.”

Thompson has some more straight-forward advice to those who are questioning going live or playing at a high level due to the hateful comments; “Ignore them. In the end the only thing that matters is you, and the only person who should be judging you is you. And if you’re happy with who you are, screw what everybody else has to say because their opinion doesn’t matter.”

It might be a long time before significant changes are made to the gaming community to allow a safe space for marginalized genders in all games. But if developers keep including characters that people can model themselves after, or that members of the trans community like LadyJanessa and MotivatedLucas keep making their positive content, then one day, gaming can really truly be for everyone.