Maybelline New York, one of the largest makeup companies in Australia, is launching a campaign to highlight and push back against sexism in online gaming spaces. The campaign is called Through Their Eyes, and its goal is to draw attention to the issues that woman-identifying gamers have faced.

Over the past few years, Maybelline New York has had an increasing number of gaming partnerships and events. Their gaming marketing strategy, which also appeals to members of the LGBTQ community, reflects the diverse groups of people that use makeup. Through Their Eyes comes before Maybelline New York's Eyes Up Cup gaming event, an all-woman battle royale.

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The Through Their Eyes campaign involved a social experiment where two popular male gamers, Joel “JoelBergs” Bergs and Drew “DrewD0g” Warne, played a first-person shooter and used voice modification to make their voices sound female. Almost immediately, the two gamers began to face harassment. Other players told them to shut up and go back to the kitchen, used extremely explicit and objectifying language, and told them they wanted to have sex with them. They also had gamers drop out of online matches or ignore them completely.

One of the most striking parts of the campaign video was the laughter that came from the other players after players made sexist, demeaning comments. No one spoke up or was held accountable. Instead, the two gamers who were the subject of the abuse were left to sit and try to keep playing, the unsettled expressions on their faces growing more and more pronounced as the social experiment went on. Change will not happen until people of all genders start working together to call out sexist behavior in gaming, so there are no longer people laughing or listening quietly in the background.

The gaming community has become more accepting of women, members of the LGBTQ community, and minorities, but discrimination is still a widespread issue. Some gaming spaces are more toxic than others, with sexism ranging from being as overt as in the Maybelline campaign to it being more subtle in other cases. There is still a lot of work to be done, and spreading awareness is an important part of that work. There are also new games for players to choose from that promote acceptance of all people, like Hades, the Ancient Greek-themed rogue-like with well-rounded female characters and LGBTQ relationships.

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Source: Games Hub