Today's thoughts

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- Guude some what recently commented on a "new" downvoted Reddit thread asking about Etho going to Minecon with something akin to, "He's not going, not even in secret. Just accept it." It got me wondering--why do you think he's content to defend Etho's decision not to go to Minecon, but has been harboring on Beef to attend for months, even going so far as to threaten to buy him a Minecon ticket? True Nancy Drew union, or is there some deep dark secret Etho's hiding from us all?

- While catting with mindcrack_love earlier, we came to the topic of religion. It's somewhat well-known Guude is a non-believer and BDubs is a believer, but I couldn't immediately produce videos to prove either. Can any of you recall times Guude's gone on about religion, or anything BDubs has said? (I remember Guude once saying he couldn't make an event because he had to go to church.) And while on the topic, does their religious stance translate into your interpretations of their Minecraft characters, and if so, how? Given Pakratt's display of Christian symbolism in his skin and builds, I personally feel like there must be some sort of religion in Minecraftia, even if it's a one-man religion, but I'm atheist myself and I've never really thought about it. I figure it might be an interesting topic...

- What does everyone think of the idea of women eventually joining Mindcrack? In general I really would love to see some women on the server because I want to see more females represented in gaming, and as much as I love the slash, it makes me sad to see such an awesome community full of only men. On the other hand, I really do worry that it might somehow change the way the guys play or act. I'm guessing Guude won't let anyone on that doesn't fit, so it's probably an unfounded fear, but I do find myself still sometimes worrying about it. Is that horrible of me? I feel like such a hypocrite, but other than occasionally popping into a Sixelona stream, I don't watch any women LPers. (Some of it is the culture that crops up around them. I can't stand all the fanboys mindlessly fawning over the fact that ZOMG GURLS and their disgusting/embarrassing comments. That's something I'd really hate seeing brought over to Mindcrack. I'd want a female gamer who was popular because she's entertaining, not because she's female.) Perhaps this doesn't really fit the vibe of the community, so feel free to ignore.

Comments

[mindcrack_love]

* I've gotten this feeling lately that Guude's relationship with Etho is one of wanting to protect him from the world, while his with Beef is more about challenging him to do awesome things. I'm pretty sure yesterday's Vinyl Fantasy is the first time Guude has ever censored anyone on his channel - and I'm pretty sure he did it because he knew Etho was uncomfortable with people hearing him swear. I don't know why that disconnect exists, but I feel like it does, you know?

* Other than the video of Bdubs performing at a worship service in 2008 that I linked to on my journal, I haven't heard much of anything overt about his religiousness. I think that religion in Minecraftia can exist, though it's probably generally not organized and kept very private.

* There aren't many women LPers in general! (They do exist, though.) I have no idea why that is. I come from a fandom where the gender divide (really more of a sex divide) is enforced due to notions of fairness and capability due to hormones due to the physical labor involved, so I've gotten used to fandoms made up entirely of men, as horrible as that sounds. And even there it's difficult to escape ZOMG GURLS BOOBS LESBIANS WOO type douchery, even though those women are strong and powerful and technical just like the men. (There's also some weird cultural divides going on about how women who play sports are perceived in the US versus Europe thanks to Title IX, but that's its own can of worms I'm not going to open.)

I would hope that none of the guys on the server would magically change their behavior if a lady enters the room, but there's only one way to find out.

AND SPEAKING OF LADIES AND RELIGION AND MINDCRACK, some questions about the ladies actually involved in the Mindcrackers' lives!

* Why do you think we know so little about Guude's wife but know so much about the rest of his life?

* What do you think of the wives and girlfriends we do know about? Does anyone else find it strange that (other than for Andrea's past in World of Warcraft) they seem to tend not to be gamers despite the men in their lives playing games very seriously? Would you watch something like, say, Bdubs and Nicole working through a Vechs map together?

* Pardon a believer's ignorance, but what's the difference between just dating long-term and marriage for a nonbeliever/atheist/secular person, ignoring the economic factors? Pause is both definitely atheistic and definitely planning on marrying Andrea eventually "once they feel ready", and Guude is married and definitely not religious. Most of the people in my life who are in that group are either asexual/aromantic or reject the concept of marriage, so I don't really have much insight into that. For me as a believer (and as a member of an organized religion) marriage is a spiritual thing, so care to shed a little light on things for me?

EDIT, ALERT ALERT: Here's Pauseypoo talking about how sexy Millbee, Beef, and Guude are, and describing himself as "the flirt of the server".

[damnreddit]

I feel like women doing LPs are always going to have a raw deal. There's two stereotypical ways that the average teenage boy can relate to an entertainer on the Tubes -- want to be them, or want to fuck them. Teenage boys do not want to be women, you know? A female LPer is just never going to attract that kind of devoted audience purely off of people who are impressed by what she does and wish they could do it too. Even if the admiration is there I feel it will be kept at a distance. So what's left? Pretty much just sex. And then she'll be blamed for playing up her sex appeal. Damned if she does and ignored if she doesn't.

I would love to see a woman (or five) on Mindcrack and don't think it would be likely to screw up the dynamic of the server. There are plenty of smart-ass, capable women in the world, and at least some of them must have Minecraft LPs. If Guude meets someone suitable at a con, or one of the others knows someone he'd like to promote, or someone from the fanserver is interested, I think they should just do it. It should be someone with a thick skin though. Almost by definition, whoever it is would have a small channel, and I would expect a fair amount of "why does she deserve this shot when X, Y, Z does not/she only got on because she's female" bullshit to go down.

Etho and Minecon: Doc said on yesterday's Mindcrack that Etho's not going because he doesn't like crowds. The server as a whole seems to be very respectful of what he wants in terms of things like this and don't give him grief about it like they might with someone else. As to why? I really have no idea.

Lack of religion and marriage: I feel like marriage means something in society that's independent of religion and spirituality. There are obviously plenty of people who feel like the two things are not separable, among both atheists and believers, but I've never felt that way myself. For me, if I want to make a commitment to spend the rest of my life with someone, then I want to be married. Don't tell me I'm not because it didn't happen in a church.

[crystalllized]

Girls: All the guys on the Mindcrack server strike me as incredibly respectful of women, and I get the feeling Guude would not tolerate them if they weren't. Their subscribers, however, are not respectful of anything, not even the other guys on the server. As a female, I am aware of the kind of hate girls can get on the Internet, but there are plenty of people who are respectful, and I don't think Guude would even allow the hate to stop him from adding a girl if he thought she was the right fit for the server. HermitCraft recently welcomed Aureylian, and even after joining that server she still has just over 5k subscribers! I've seen more than a few comments about ZombieCleo - she is the only remaining member of TTR not on Mindcrack or HermitCraft (though it would balance better if she joined HermitCraft, so the team is split halfsies) and even not being on a server she's close to 7k. If there's any female who probably 'deserves' to join the server, it's her. But it's also Guude's server and we know he's good friends with Eepblah, so who knows? I could definitely see him adding a girl and then spending three episodes ranting about respect for women.

Etho: I think maybe the other guys are concerned that with Etho's huge amount of subscribers, many of whom are so volatile, that he might get overwhelmed and do things he doesn't want, so they want to help make sure he doesn't get forced into anything. It's nice of them, but I could see Etho getting annoyed at the protection after a while. Etho doesn't need protection - he's one of the cleverest people on the server and he can definitely take care of himself. I'd love to see him prank all the guys for trying to look out for him, maybe letting tons of mobs into their houses? "Don't protect me if you can't even protect yourselves! Haha!"

Religion: no idea. I'm the kind of person who describes themselves as 'spiritual but not religious' and getting married, for me, would be more about the commitment and the promise and saying, yes, I want to be with this person forever and not break up, and I want everyone to know about that commitment. Also, the legal benefits would be awesome for having children and making a life together. I don't really see marriage as a spiritual thing at all for me.

[isi]

Augh, so much interesting discussion on so many interesting topics! I wish I could respond to it all, but I've had a bad day and I don't think I'm up to it. But I'll try to give a quick summary of my thoughts:

Girls: I'd love there to be female players on the server! I just hate that it's such a sticky subject, because it means people still make distinctions between gender, as if that has anything to do with how good a player is or how entertaining they are to watch. But I think on some level, probably not even a conscious one, that is true with how many viewers perceive LPers, and they'll be more critical of a female LPer simply because she's female and therefore "different." So, I feel for whoever turns out to be the first girl on the server, but I hate that I have to.

Religion: I guess I never really thought much about it. Everyone knows Pakratt's openly Christian, but that doesn't really affect his playstyle or anything that I've noticed. There was that one time he ranted about the state of the "Christian rock" music genre, but otherwise I don't notice him talk about it much.

Minecon: I wanted to come up with a crack theory for you, but I'm just not up to it right now.

[bookworm2692]

To tell you the truth, I didn't realise that some of them were religious, and others weren't. I didn't even think "is so and so religious?" It doesn't matter to me