The "office gray" boxes that have taken up residence on desks and in cubicles across the nation appear as non-gendered as their brethren Xerox and fax machines. These computers, which have become both commonplace and the predominant mean of doing business in modern times, represent access to the conduits of power for society. Society has managed to make these seemingly innocuous and otherwise-neuter machines masculine implements. In recent years, the number of female computer science majors at the most universities has decreased significantly, while women have remained a minority in both technological and computer fields. The United States and the world is rapidly becoming a technocracy, where computers represent power, and power is granted to those who control them. With these two events occurring in conjunction, the current power gap between men and women, which has been slowly eroding over the last half-century, may return to a substantial size.

From early childhood video games and school room behavior to college computer labs and on the Internet, a message is being sent that computers are strictly masculine, and, in some cases, women are actively harassed and driven away from such technology. The roots of computers as a masculine object must be explored, so that this potential socio-technical stratification between men and women can be confronted before it becomes a serious threat to an equal society.

Before children begin school and are introduced to computers as learning tools, parents have often already exposed them to this medium through entertainment, education, and edutainment software. One common, first encounter with computer technology is console systems, produced by companies like Sega, Sony, and Nintendo. Research has shown that 58% of console game players are under age 18 and that the core markets are teen and preteen boys. (IDSA) These first experiences with computers have the possibility of impacting future opinions of not only the specific system but also of technology in general.

The companies that design most games are predominantly male. Naturally, designers are going to design software that they would enjoy using, thus a male designers will probably produce a game that would appeal to their preferences, which are likely to correspond to those of other men. Only occasionally has a game designed for the mass-market by male designers found a market among women.

Although stereotyping is generally negative, in the design of games it is often agreed upon that the explicitly "homicide-oriented" nature of most games does not appeal to women or girls. (Herz 172) Also the linearity of most games, forcing players to rely on twitch reflexes to power their way to the game’s objective, is equally undesirable to female users. (Herz 173-4) The less violent nature and a player’s ability to retreat but still make progress may explain the success of games such as ‘Pac Man’, ‘Centipede’, ‘Q*Bert’, and ‘Frogger’ among women. (Herz 171) More recently ‘Tetris’ and ‘Myst’ have become some of the best-selling games of all times because of the appeal across gender. (Brown) Designers must take into account the way girls (and women) play in order to create more consistent hits among female players. J.C. Herz claims that violence and competitiveness are not the problems in games, but girls are far more interested in creating their own "narrative" as opposed to acting out one that is commercially provided for them. (Brown)

Recently, a few designers have begun the effort to involve women and girls in gaming, by designing games solely targeting girls. Interactive versions of the "Baby Sitter’s Club" book series, the highly successful "Barbie Fashion Designer," and the moderately successful "MacKenzie and Co." are all current attempts to bring girls into the video game market. However, these pink-boxed software titles are doing nothing more than reinforcing gender stereotypes by selling virtual make-up, fashion, and diaries to girls. (Brown) Girls rapidly outgrow these products as they approach adolescence. These games also represent a risk for video game publishers since "[g]irls will occasionally play a boy game, but boys won't play girl games," according to J.C. Herz. (Brown) Thus by creating overly "girl-friendly" games publishers sacrifice the market that currently purchases most video games, on the chance that they might tap a historically sluggish market.

Other game designers have tried to tap the female market by replacing the traditionally "male" characters in games with "female" leads. While some hail Lara Croft (Tomb Raider), Chun-Li (Street Fighter 2), and Sonja Blade (Mortal Kombat) as strong role models for young women, others see the characters in a more dubious light. (PSM 70) With over-amplified breasts, long legs, and deliberately flirtatious "attitudes," these characters have become pin-ups for Electronic Gaming Monthly and other industry magazines. Instead of creating believable female characters, they merely feed off the same macho attitudes that drive women away from computers. Obviously, merely replacing male with female leads does not necessarily create a game that will appeal to women.

"By the age of three children are sex-typing games. Little girls will say, ‘Oh no, that’s a boy toy.’ At three they start to do this with household objects like brooms and hammers. These gender stereotypes are pretty fixed, and we know that you can get gender stereotyping for objects, professions, and traits – they can do all that by the age of five," - Justine Cassell, cognitive psychologist at MIT’s media lab. (Herz 175)

With a gaming industry spending a majority of its resources on developing games for and targeting the male market, children exposed to such marketing naturally may insist that computers are "boy toys." Nola Alloway, author of "Construction of Gender in Early Childhood," reports witnessing three-year-old boys forcibly and verbally driving girls away from terminals. (Spender 167) Dale Spender, author of "Nattering on the Net," reports similar violence committed by fifteen-year-old boys against girls, in a classroom setting, even when there were enough terminals for everyone to use. (Spender 177) Even a grown woman, Margaret Morse who authored "Virtually Female", a chapter for Processed Lives, relates an incident in which a child tried to nudge her out of a chair while she played with a computer at the San Francisco Exploratorium. (Terry 26)

In one of these cases, the teacher of the fifteen-year-olds did not punish the male students for their actions, but he dismissed it saying that girls only caused problems when they were at the keyboard. (Spender 178) Was this just the action of a solitary, ignorant teacher? While the severity of this teacher’s opinion may be shocking, the belief that women do not belong near computers seems to pervade the education community. "Information Technology and Gender", a paper published by Cole, Conlon, Jackson & Welch, reported that 60% of teachers felt technical subjects were important for male students while only 25.7% felt similarly regarding female students. (Spender 179) The accepted behavior of students and attitudes of teachers in the primary education environment creates an unfriendly atmosphere, which merely reinforces the view that the computer is masculine object.

At the university level, computer labs, the sole place many students can access computer technologies on campus, offer a venue for the continued childish behavior witnessed at both the primary and secondary levels of education. Lynda Davies, author of "The Gendered Language of Technology," reports that, during the day, computer labs are used primarily by males who exchange graphic but "friendly" barbs across the room. This behavior creates a "boys’ club" environment. Most women avoid such exchanges and sit quietly amidst the chaos, remaining chatty and smiling in the environment, or just avoid the computer labs altogether. (Spender 182) Thus the male users of the computer lab effectively drive away or exclude women from the "computer culture" verbally, as opposed to the physical means witnessed in earlier education. This behavior has been dubbed "turf-grabbing" and "boundary marking" by some.

Davies also describes a far more violent and demeaning aspect of computer labs for women. "Late on a Saturday night the technical staff (engrossed in arousing activities) can be found at the other end of the lab from the student engaging in the explicit delights of oral sex with a disembodied ‘female’ partner by e-mail interaction." (Spender 182) Some students at Virginia Tech remember similar scenes a few years back, with digital images of nude women as backgrounds, and other sexually explicit exploits occurring in such a setting. Similar conditions in the workplace have been judged by the courts to contribute to a hostile working environment; these virtual pin-ups create a hostile atmosphere that may scare women from the computer experience that is available there.

Out of this misogynist atmosphere stems a culture that worships the biggest, fastest, and newest. Johnny Wilson, in his GameSpot (an on0line gaming magazine) column entitled "The Hot Rod Syndrome," relates the tale of a computer industry CEO who placed his sports car in the shop to modify it to gain an extra 30 horsepower, despite the fact that the car was already sufficiently powerful. (Wilson) This is not unique in the computer industry, where Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle, attempts to buy Soviet MiG jets complete with weapons, and Microsoft’s Bill Gates owns a car so expensive it has not been crash tested in the United States and cannot be driven. Some people have even dubbed this the "my ____’s bigger than yours" syndrome. Conversations about computers often take a tone similar to that of discussing cars, power tools, and other "boy toys." Computer culture embraces this concept, which may be a naturally legacy for males. "[O]ur genetic software is programmed to make us compete in a dominance struggle with other males in order to obtain as much resources as possible," according to William A. Spriggs, author of "Evolutionary Psychology and the Male Gender." (Spriggs) It just happens that cars, planes, and computers have become the modern resources men employ in this struggle. With this genetically-inspired, masculine competition, it is easy to see how women can be excluded from the culture that surrounds computers and technology itself.

News media often focus on the positive and utopian aspects of the Internet. While some claim that it is a medium where people can be judged on the basis of their ideas as opposed to gender, race, or other superficial characteristic, the net is not a place where all people are created equal. Many of society’s ills will not completely disappear as we form virtual communities, but will themselves be digitized and find new homes in cyberspace.

Recently several reports of on-line harassment have surfaced. Writer Jayne Hitchcock recently became a victim of such harassment when bogus ads were placed on Usenet supplying her home address and phone number, and inviting people to share their sexual experiences with her for a book she was allegedly writing. (Ninan) In many cases, people with feminine-sounding online identities often receive excessive numbers of e-mails, requests for chat, and other annoyances. (Truong) Some suggest using gender-neutral identities on the web to avoid such harassment, but if women receive the message that they are welcome on the Internet only as gender-neutral beings, they may never get on-line, fearing it like a dark alley.

Even when not the specific target of harassment, women in general are often the target of widespread harassment and the creation of hostile online environments. A highly publicized incident at Cornell University, where a widely circulated e-mail message originated entitled "75 Reasons Why Women Should Not Be Given the Freedom of Speech," which listed 75 off-color, threatening, and anti-female statements. Mass media are quick to pick up the "sexy" story of Internet pornography, portraying the Internet as solely a giant red-light district. With the objectification of women at such sites being fairly standard, many women often steer clear of the Internet and World Wide Web, based upon these highly publicized reports.

The same anonymity that offers the hope of truly unbiased virtual communities is also conjectured to be the cause of the harassment that takes place online. (Bell) In addition, the disproportionately large number of men who use the Internet (some reporting up to 94% of the Internet being male) (Spender 168) creates an environment that is ripe for this kind of indiscretion and violence against women. The creation of organizations or groups such as Women Halting Online Abuse (WHOA!), offers hope against an Internet where all users are either male or gender-neutral.

A concept as all-pervasive and blatantly wrong as computers as masculine objects does not spring from a single seed. Instead, it is the product of a society and culture that reinforce such an idea at many different stages. Gaming may mark the first exposure to this gender stratification, but it is carried throughout a lifetime. From elementary school computer centers to the Internet, the tool that is intended to broaden our options and offer new avenues of communication may in fact be limiting more than half of society. The "innocuous" little "office gray" boxes that inhabit desktops and cubicles have become an icon of often-hostile environments and culture and a contributor to the possible re-emergence of vast power gap between men and women.