Have you ever pretended to be a man online? For what reason? Did you learn anything interesting or experience something unexpected as a result?
Have you ever pretended to be a man online? For what reason? Did you learn anything interesting or experience something unexpected as a result?
r/AskWomen
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I used to pretend to be a boy in online games for attention, nothing really happened but it was fun
I was arguing on reddit with a man who didn’t believe that men dismiss women’s lived experiences, then I used a different account to say the same things but “speaking as a man..” and then the guy stopped arguing back.
No.
When I was a young teenager, I hated being a girl. So I went by a man’s name. It’s messed up how much better I was treated back then.
Yep.
It’s wild how differently you are treated when people treat being male as default.
I’ve made comments implying that I was a man responding to Reddit post. I’ve made the same comments as a woman, been downvoted and called emotional.
And that one time I went live, I was threatened to be raped because I beat some asshole in COD. Die mad.
It turns out that participating a website dominated by men who are determine to make sure you know so…is a toxic, misogynistic place. Admins don’t give a fuck.
In MY experience, The Men on the internet are keyboard warrior chomping at the bit to complain about women, especially anyone they deem unworthy of the sexual interest. It’s fucking crazy how they behave when they think they’re among their disgusting little friends.
I have with online multiplayer games. The outright hostility I face when playing as a woman is terrible.
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As someone who has a hobby in online communities, yes. Usually a male profile, avatar in games or something subtle. Usually it helps avoid attention and I can play peacefully. But do I keep up the act when talked to? No not till they ask.
As for what I learned it’s just that. Unless you’re actively talking while having a masculine profile, people don’t go out of their way to talk to you.
Whenever I have my usual feminine profile picture or voice chat, then I have a lot of issues keeping up with social demand.
No but until I put a picture as my avatar, and only do I experience this on Reddit, did everyone think I’m a dude. 😂
I guess I fight like one.
I don’t pretend but i have multiple male -dominated hobbies. The number of responses in online communities that start with “brother”… Insert eye roll. If I’m feeling snarky I’ll start my responses with “sister” or “girl.” But i stopped apologizing. If men can ask about the position of their testicles on bike seats, I can ask questions about vulva in the same community.
I have a unisex first name. Interviews are always interesting because I can almost immediately tell if they were expecting a boy
My burner account has the avatar dressed like a man and people argue with me a lot less, but call me gay a lot more
Yeah when I was a kid to used to pretend to be a boy online because I wanted to be a boy. I made all my avatars male and went by a male name.
I have a dark past playing league of legends so… yes
All the time lol I have other accounts where some think I’m a guy while others it’s just neutral whatever you gender me.
I had a bad experience when I was open as a woman before. This account is the only one I’m using now I’m still easing into it.
Hmmm well the jokes get crass? I don’t think there’s anything unexpected so far… just felt more welcoming ig?
I don’t deliberately pretend to be a man online so much as I’ve simply been mistaken for one many times.
I play a lot of video games and join a lot of gaming communities to find people to play with. While communication remains text based I will often get called “bro” a lot or “he’s just jumping in queue now” kind of mentions at me that I don’t correct.
While they think I’m a guy I am viewed as a competent player. When they discover I’m a woman (typically if we move to voice chat) It usually becomes:
This isnt always the case, though. I have a good group of gamer buddies I’ve met online that dont care what gender i am outside of occasionally getting targeted for relationship advice.
Yes. I have a gender neutral name and am often assumed to be the default male. I usually let them keep thinking that, especially in professional contexts. Its amazing how my perceived IQ jumps when I am assumed to be male. In many spaces I choose the male avatar because I don’t want to deal with harassment.
I have learned that sexism in the workplace is real and not my imagination.
I did once on moviestar planet
My character avatar was still a girl, but when I told people I was a man they would stop mid bully and go talk to someone else lmao
Some people assume I’m a man and sometimes I don’t correct them. (Happens a lot on here and pretty often at work) I very clearly look like a woman but I have a gender neutral name, communicate directly, and work in a male dominated field, so I think that’s why it happens.
Way back in the 2000’s pre-myspace when you only had AOL chat rooms I pretended to be a cute boy for who knows why. I made some female friends and in a weird way it made me a little happy to be a positive “male” friend in their life? I was probably 12 or 13 and boys that age can be so mean and immature, and I think I wanted to be the kind of boy I wanted to interact with – someone nice and cool. It’s so weird to think about now lol
nope but i changed my first name a year or so into my career for personal reasons. it is more unisex and i noticed that i got a lot more responses to applications and cold emails than i did before.
I play a lot of online games. As soon as someone starts being creepy, I tell them I’m a dude irl and it instantly stops.
Yeah I have had a lot of secondary accounts all over the Internet with a male or just ambiguously masculine persona. Those personas got a lot fewer dickwads arguing with me for the sake of “debate” or and also had a lot fewer people asking me inappropriate or off topic things.
I was more automatically treated as an intelligent person, I was more automatically assumed to be well educated and successful, I found more frequently that my opinions were met with positivity rather than negativity.
When I complained online about a situation I was hurting from I’d get more sympathy and actually helpful advice instead of “get over it” or “it’s not that bad, at least you’re not ….”.
I usually put up neutral names and profiles. There are no advantages to be perceived as a woman online
Yes, I did all the time growing up online in the late 90s and early 00s, the pre-social media internet days, from ages 11 to around 16. I was shocked to learn most men hate women by default, truly did not expect it at that age
The first bricks of foundation had already been laid to create the communities that would eventually become the incel and red pill movements, but I didn’t understand it at all yet.
Not sure this counts but I changed my name to a man’s name on DoorDash and suddenly I had little to no issues with my orders. Prior to that almost every time either my drinks would be spilled, my food would be missing or I’d get inappropriate messages from drivers, etc. after changing it suddenly I got so much respect. Update messages on how the order was going, everything handled with care, nothing missing. I tip the same amount as prior and nothing else changed other than having a man’s name and suddenly my orders were perfect with the same drivers.
I used to pretend to be a boy on animal jam and club penguin to go on little dates with girls lmao
I used to play in a dnd based online community and I was tired of the constant sexual approaches, so I decided to do a double roleplay.
Not only a male character, but a male persona as the player.
I pretended to be “Luca from Ladispoli” (it was an Italian community) for all the out-of-game communication.
I started receiving sexual advances from women and a gay guy “fell in love” with me, so I ended up having to tell him the truth and I stopped playing.
I just wanted to play dnd!
Only with scammers.
Never intentionally, but sometimes dudes on here will assume I am also a dude and I don’t correct them, because correcting them would likely lead to some form of harassment. And also because sometimes we’re discussing a subject that’s technical, nerdy, etc. and many men are likelier to respect and absorb what I’m saying if they think I’m also a man.
Pretended to be an old man. Lured in romance scammers on Facebook and had them chatting with bots for days. I had a lot of free time during covid.
Ended up messing with one personally cause they seemed to have some morality and showed empathy. Very rare amongst scammers, they usually follow a script. I eventually found out it was a 13 year old boy from Nigeria. I videochatted with him as my self and he opened up to me about how he’s been having virtual sex with men online since he was 10. This little boy had seen more dicks and learned vulgar things than I have as a grown woman.
Money was going to his boss. Boss paid for his internet and phone, gave him a little money for groceries. But not nearly as much as what he was getting from scamming. He was getting about 10% of what he scammed, aside from phone/internet payment. He also had to pay for the script he used.
Anyway, Nigeria is fucked. He couldn’t go the authorities. I’ve had long conversations with him about ways to get out of it and live a better life. He did great in school, found an honest job and has been producing music. He’s practically become my little brother. He didn’t want to do what he was doing, he really just needed some type of support system.
Makes me sad to think how many young kids are being pimped out as scammers and having e-sex with weirdos on Facebook. They become so desensitized to it.
Never intentionally. But one email address that I use is a shared account with my fiancé. (We each have our own personal emails as well.)
It happens a lot that somebody sends an email to that shared account, asking him to pass along a question or a message to me. I always answer directly, and make sure to include my (obviously female) name in the response. It never fails that they still respond to him with a follow-up, with another request to pass it along to me.
I know it’s a first-world problem but it drives me nuts.
I played online games when I was in my 20s, and most of the time I pretended to be a man. I didn’t put any effort into it, but if someone asked my name on chat, I would just say a man’s name and try not to involve in deep convos.
Can’t pretend to be a man, if you are assumed to be one by default
If you ever play online videos games. Especially competitive ones…
Yeah I still do when I play WoW, it’s really easy when most guys on that game play female characters, and the running joke is “girls don’t play wow” the only time I catch any sort of aggression is when I do something wrong in game. Otherwise it’s great.
I used to be really into online gaming. But before I tried it my husband was trying to convince me to make a character on his account and try it, and I resisted for awhile but eventually gave in and fell in love. But when he went to make me my own account I didn’t want to give up my character that I loved, so he took my account and I took his. So basically, while we were playing with other people online, I had a female character, but my username was a man’s name. So even though I told everyone I was a girl literally NO ONE believed me. I guess a lot of guys pretend to be girls in MMOs. The only thing I learned is that people took me seriously, they loved me and listened to my ideas seriously. I was a leader in the groups I played in. I didn’t experience anything of what people say girls are treated like in online games. People loved me and seemed to at times even worship the ground I walked on. I do wonder if I would have had the same reception if my username was a female name. I’ll never know though.
I used to be really into online gaming. But before I tried it my husband was trying to convince me to make a character on his account and try it, and I resisted for awhile but eventually gave in and fell in love. But when he went to make me my own account I didn’t want to give up my character that I loved, so he took my account and I took his. So basically, while we were playing with other people online, I had a female character, but my username was a man’s name. So even though I told everyone I was a girl literally NO ONE believed me. I guess a lot of guys pretend to be girls in MMOs. The only thing I learned is that people took me seriously, they loved me and listened to my ideas seriously. I was a leader in the groups I played in. I didn’t experience anything of what people say girls are treated like in online games. People loved me and seemed to at times even worship the ground I walked on. I do wonder if I would have had the same reception if my username was a female name. Some knew I was a girl and were still kind, but at least 90-95% of the people I played with were convinced I was a male and I just let them think that. It was easier that way.
Men understand estimate women all the time
Yep. When gaming. I’m treated MUCH differently. Men are less eager to help me, more positive assumptions are made about my skill and knowledge, and I’m not as easily dismissed when adding to the convo. It’s truly shitty, but it’s the truth.
I don’t pretend, but people on Reddit often assume I’m a dude for some reason.
I don’t have to be online. I can do it over the phone with my deeper than normal voice. Had an argument about a maintenance package I purchased for my sports car. Got a little pissed talking to the salesman. Told him I was bringing the car and paperwork to the dealership to sort it out. When I got there I asked for him. He stated my “husband sounded angry”, I said yes and didn’t want to go back to that. It was sorted out 10 minutes later.