Sex And Games, and Real People
Way back in the dark ages, when computer games were something that came on floppy disks that mostly weren’t actually floppy, it was not unheard of for a man to spend too much time playing his computer games, nor for his woman to complain about the amount of his time and attention she didn’t enjoy because of it. (Sometimes the gender arrow pointed the other way, but numerically, not often.)
Then came the internet, and massively addictive massively multiplayer online games, and the situation only got worse. As early as the late 1990s, the “EverQuest widow” phenomenon was getting widely remarked upon. Once World of Warcraft exploded on the MMORPG scene and increased the U.S. MMORPG playerbase to many millions, the “problem” became a widely-understood social phenomenon. (The gendered nature of “the problem” also diminished a little more.)
In geek male circles, it was common and easy to say “Dude, you’ve got an actual live girl in your house, and she’s mad at you because you’re playing with us and not with her? What’s wrong with you? LOG THE HELL OFF!”
But in practice, that doesn’t always happen. My own gaming policy has always been to attempt to prioritize “real life people” above my games. Phone rings? Answer it. Relative wants a hand? Log off and give it. The Nymph walks into the room to show me the panties she bought? Give her my full attention; the raid (the fleet, the gang, the quest, the mobs, the squad, the enemies, the targets, the loot) they are eternal, they will always be there when I get back. The panties? They are gonna walk out of the room, and it won’t take them very long, either.
But, it’s not always that simple.
Early on, it became clear to me that the type of game mattered. Shooting games weren’t quite as bad, because (although addictive) it’s a lot easier to drop in and out of fast-paced shooting games where deaths and respawns are common and mostly painless. But the immersive multiplayer games where you accumulate stuff, and getting the best stuff requires coordination between many different players? The people in those games are also “real life people”, and some of them become your friends, and you make commitments to them just as you would your meatspace friends, and those commitments have power. And that’s very very hard to explain to someone in your life who thinks you spend too much time “typing at that silly box” and cannot comprehend that it can take thirty seconds, or twenty minutes, to resolve in-game affairs to the point where you can safely avert your eyes from the screen.
Obviously living with a gamer helps, although sometime it just means it’s you who’s getting the “not tonight, I promised Malathion_69 that I’d help camp for dragon armor” treatment.
I eventually, and fairly recently, realized that the “I prioritize the real people in my life over my computer games” rule-of-thumb (perhaps call it an aspiration, as it’s not always an easy rule to follow) was a little bit broken. My gaming buddies, after all, are people too, and it’s rude, socially broken, possibly even a teeny bit sociopathic, to tell anyone, by word or deed, “you’re always my lowest priority.”
That said, what’s the real challenge? As always, we need to meet our social obligations, and when you share a house and a life and a bed with someone, they have a legitimate claim to a high-priority interrupt on whatever it is you do to fill your idle hours. But “high-priority” is not the same as “absolute”, nor is it the same as “immediate”. An enlightened balance is the ideal, and how Buddhist does that sound?
I was reminded of my developing thinking on this subject by a sad memory AAG recounts:
Wrapped in a blanket to keep off the cold and armed with tea, I’d take to the porch with a book and a tiny reading light. It was a lovely retreat, and most days I was at least moderately content to spend a few hours out there reading while my husband worked or played computer games.
But on the chilliest Friday something was different. Was it hormones? An extra-hard dose of child-inspired loneliness? Too long since our last attempt at sex? I don’t know, but on that Friday night I needed the comfort and warmth of the man who I’d hoped would be my partner forever. I suggested it to him as he headed off to his work and computer. “Can we have some time alone this weekend? Maybe tonight? Or tomorrow?” I asked, attempting the lowest-pressure sell possible.
“I’m not going to have the time,” he answered. “I really need to finish that project for work, and I need to organize everyone’s fantasy football picks by Monday. Maybe early next week?”
And then he scooted off, leaving me with book and tea on the desk.
It was the first of many moments of clarity I experienced over the state of our relationship. I cried, book and tea forgotten…
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Shorter URL for sharing: https://www.erosblog.com/?p=2358
As a married female gamer, I’ve seen what is referred to as ‘wife aggro’ from the people I play with online. It means “my wife is angry I’m playing, I have to leave now”. And while it’s understandable to a point, I have to wonder what that wife’s problem with the game is that she can’t give her husband ten minutes to finish the quest first.
I suppose perhaps it’s odd – I’ve vowed to not be that wife, and yet I still have a happy marriage with lots of sex. Go figure.
Well said. Sometimes it’s too easy to take the ones you love for granted. Why is that?
Well put in this article. We do develop long-term relationships with some of the people we play with on-line. I view it as equivalent to some of the historical relationships that you see between authors or other thinkers, who often have exchanged letters over time spans of decades.
This article, I think, brings up the right idea – that life is a balancing act of deciding where to spend your time. The spouse who is not getting enough attention because of gaming is just as right to be pissed off as in the classical case of too much overtime spent at the office.
To Raine, above: It’s something that you have to discuss with your partner. Non-gaming spouses may just not be familiar with the requirements of the game, and might well be willing to wait a minute, if that were explained. Like many other things in a relationship, discussion is key.
Would that same spouse call their SO while the SO was out playing golf? Or fishing? Or out in the backyard woodworking shop? And demand that the SO came home/pay attention immediately? If so, then the answer IMO is that they are probably trying to be too controlling.
The flip side of this is isolation. When a person needs attention on an on-demand basis, the other person may find themselves increasingly isolated from their friends, their hobbies, and society.
While it may only be a on-line game that’s being interrupted, it may be a game because leaving the house ceased to be an option long ago. Someone needs to watch the children when the spouse is away and, if when the spouse is home they need attention or support, going out with friends once a week stops happening. It stops happening quickly if the needs of the spouse makes it unpleasant for everyone involved. (“I’m lonely.” “I’m at the theater with everyone.” “When will you be home?”)
While there may be a problem in “failing to acknowledge and respect the very high priority one also owes to one’s romantic partner.” there’s also a problem in “failing to acknowledge and respect the very high priority one’s romantic partner owes to themselves”.
My experience is that many of the people who play games like World of Warcraft are playing it because it’s the only social action they can get. For parents of autistic children it’s a godsend. For people who care taking care of their invalid parents it’s a way to socially interact while being available. And likewise it’s a haven to those people who have been cut off from society by the needs or behaviors of their spouse.
Is it healthy for a relationship to be so one-sided that the only social interaction someone can get is through an on-line game? No. It’s not. But for some people it’s the result of doing their best to fulfill the vows that were made.
And eventually, if the relationship won’t change or end, even that social interaction will go away.
My partner and I play Age of Conan avidly. It’s definitely the sexiest mainstream online game anyone has made yet.
Over years of playing games like this, we’ve evolved a theory about something we call “time jealousy.” It affects people who play together in-game and definitely affects spouses and significant others. People who don’t play online games will never understand the sense of courtesy and obligation one can feel toward an on screen playmate, even if there’s no “cyber intimacy” involved.
Raine #1, I haven’t just heard about “wife aggro”, I’ve actually heard, over my headphones, as a wife came unglued somewhere “out there” faster than the gamer I was playing with could stop talking in our coms channel and let go of his push-to-talk button. It weren’t pretty.
Ken, it’s sadly true that “I’d much rather play with you than play this silly game” doesn’t always fall on receptive ears. Sometimes people play games to escape from the real world around them. This is often resented by the people whose company they are escaping from, naturally enough; but sometimes the escape is from a life of domestic distance and rejection.
Being a gamer and in love with another gamer, we don’t have this problem (yet?). However, I play with many folks whose spouses/SOs are less than accepting. It makes me sad that the non-gaming spouse/SO can’t see how great it is to have their loved one at home with them, though admittedly otherwise engaged, instead of out carousing around getting into who-knows-what kind of mischief.
Balance is almost always the key, though, as you have aptly stated. It’s not healthy for the person out of balance nor the relationship that is being ignored to go overboard in any area (work or play).
Thanks for the post.
I may be talking a bit over my head but this topic seems to take on something of a spiritual tone for me. Now wait… I don’t mean Religious practical as far as something evoked from our distant past. Once (and this is the over-the-head bit, bare with me) metaphysics and spirituality were the tools that searching minds used to try to, umm, for lack of a better phrase, understand themselves(the world, why beer grows on you) and create their identities, define their existence… so on, yeah?
Well, fast forward to us. We still feel the same needs as before. We just have to find new ways to make them happen. Balance, happiness, hell… entertainment and RL stuff.
Downside of modern life: Information overload, we have so much stuff that we can lose ourselves… even that metaphysical kinda stuff I was talking about before. Media and all its + and -‘s. Wow.
Upside: We get to make it up as we go along. And luckily, most of us are in places where it’s safe to have conversations about interpretations.
My point… For me, finding inner peace and finding people to spend my life with are the same thing. It’s all wrapped up in this squishy ball that I keep hidden and share only with people I really like. As far as ‘cyber-intimacy’, it is valid and it’s something that we are sooo lucky to be just starting to figure out. We’re cursed, we live in interesting times.
But… it only makes sense to take some time to level the RL character. Would we be losing a sense of our humanity if we started to exist solely in avatar form?
Done… end of novel. OMG, sorry bout the ellipses.