Rock Band might not save a marriage, but it will certainly turn the eventual divorce up to 11
In the Friday Open thread, Kelly linked this Salon Article by Rachel Shukert about how Rock Band saved a troubled marriage (awwww).
The article is a hyperbolic little tale of love, marriage, boredom, frustration, and redemption at the hands of a video game. And while there is a granule of truth to Shurkert’s assertion that the daily grind of living together can lead to “fake-hate” which, if not properly exorcised can devolve into actual hate, which leads to divorce — the article totters on a bad premise. Shukert describes the precarious moment in which fake-hate threatened to lead to real hate.
Ten years later, I am slumped at my computer, reading an Internet recap of a 2-year-old episode of “Top Chef” that I have seen six times. I have not put on hard pants — that is, pants with a zipper or pockets — for four days. The man I married is on the couch in the living room, his eyes glassy as he diddles the control on the Xbox, blowing to smithereens shadowy figures lurching across the screen. We haven’t spoken in several hours.
“Ben?” I say. No answer. “Ben? Ben?” I repeat his name over and over again, with increasing desperation, finally culminating in a single, furious shriek. “BEEEEEENNN!”
We live in a two-room apartment. Next door, the neighbor bangs on the shared kitchen wall, the pounding muffled by drywall. “Quiet!”
Finally, Ben looks up. “Sorry, baby. It’s the noise-canceling headphones.”
Ah yes, the noise-canceling headphones. You could lock Rush Limbaugh, Phyllis Schlafly and Mullah Omar in a room together with a stack of Hustlers and 10 ounces of meth, and they couldn’t come up with anything more misogynist. I storm back to my desk and type the phrases “my husband” “addicted” “video games” “HELP” into the search engine. Hundreds of links appear.
I’ve decided to feel bad for Shukert — not because she’s obviously looking to her husband to fulfill all of her social needs and doesn’t know how to call up a girlfriend when she’s feeling lonely and certainly not because her husband’s attempt to keep the apartment from booming with constant gunfire sounds from Call of Duty 3 could be so willfully twisted into a bad thing — but because she’s obviously trying to build a career for herself as a professional writer and she’s been charged with writing a stereotype-laden “life interest” piece about how video games are oh-so-infuriating in a marriage, but with a twist! I can hear her editor now: “Make it kooky and snappy!”
Then, over Christmas, her husband lugs home a copy of Rock Band for the two of them to play “together.” From her description, it was very much a last-ditch effort on his part.
“I thought we should have something to do, while we’re stuck at home with no one else around,” he said.
“Together?”
“Yeah.” He forced a tight smile. “You’ll like it.”
The problem is “togetherness.” She wants more of it, he wants to be able to play video games. So he buys a game that they can hopefully play “together.” Wonder of wonder, she likes it! The marriage is saved!
… Except, probably not. Hopefully, when things go south again (and they will), we will be spared the precious metaphores and narrative overstatements describing the inevitable divorce.
There are a lot of problems with the article: first and most glaringly, they feed into the belief that videogames are monolithic: that a husband who plays XBox is going to be just as happy playing Rock Band as he is playing Call of Duty. This isn’t necessarily the case–videogames lend themselves to individualized tastes just like any other form of entertainment. As a slow and deliberate reader who will sometimes take months to complete a book (even one I like–we won’t get into another Ayn Rand discussion here), I always chafe when a well-meaning friend or family member thrusts a book into my hands with the demands that I read it (particularly if it’s genre fiction). While close friendships or family harmony will compell me to make a good-faith effort to read whatever historical bodice-ripper monstrosity of plot holes and bad metaphores I’ve been commissioned to read–it would become very difficult as a long-term plan and would necessitate a careful talk about personal predilections and available time. Even though Shukert loves Rock Band to death and is happy to play it forever and ever for the rest of her life (like Tetris!), that doesn’t mean her husband is ready to give up Call of Duty or Gears of War, and that promises to be a harsh wake-up call to her.
Another problem with the premise of this article is the unsettling object lesson that it was up to Shukert to take an interest in what her husband was doing in order to save the marriage. Admittedly, this comes with a serious mitigation as the fake-hate devolution into real hate appeared to be happening entirely in the brain of the wife; but then, there’s only so much you can learn about the nuances of marital dynamic within a 1,000 word essay. Nonetheless, it’s a frustrating theme that I see in all of these “video games and the troubled marriage” lifestyle articles: That if only the wife could learn to love the video games like the husband loves the video games, then the marriage would be saved (yeah, I’ve written about this before). And here’s the thing: video games can be as much of a symptom of a bad marriage as staying out all night with friends at the bar. If one partner (man or woman) finds themselves being stifled by a bad union, they will look for a means of escape. It might be working long hours at the office, it might be playing Silent Hill 3. The point of the isolating activity is that it is time away from the spouse. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, although obviously it could easily become one when it becomes self-destructive, or in the event that the other spouse does not want to be “gotten away from.” In any event, the problem of a spouse sequestering themselves with videogames is not necessarily solved by the other spouse plonking down and trying to co-op. It might make things a lot worse.
Ultimately, this is what bothers me about articles about relationships and ____ (where, in this case, the blank is filled in with “video games”), in attempting to create concise little essays about something as complex and nuanced as a long-term monogamous relationship, the writer will invariably write some little bit of Cosmo-worthy pablum in which the complexity and nuance is replaced by something quirky and quote-worthy, like video games. It bothers me more in this case because it’s hitting so many popular stereotypes about gaming in a household — where the husband or boyfriend is an obsessed man-child neglecting his wife and household duties — and the wife is a shrill luddite nag who believes that the solution to a rocky relationship is to spend more time together — and the problem is some third-party that can be easily “othered” to avoid actually examining one’s own failings. But ultimately, I imagine that blaming your marital woes on Rainbow 6 is about as fulfilling as screaming at a spouse wearing noise-cancelling headphones… there isn’t much to be accomplished by yelling at something that can’t hear you and won’t respond.
May 27th, 2008 at 12:54 pm
Wait a minute. You mean women sometimes choose to co-habitate with men other than their sons? How can I become eligible for this program?
May 27th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Bwanananananana! What? What’s that honey? You’re taking the kids where? One sec SOLO TIME BWEEEEEOOOOOOOOW. Divorce Papers? Sign what? Can it wait, this is the hard part!
May 27th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Er, how are noise canceling headphones misogynist? Isn’t it kind of nice of him to use them?
Agreed, this essay is missing a lot of the point. Also, in my experience, sometimes when you and your partner are both kind of ignoring one another, it can be because both of you are feeling a bit lonely and trying to distract yourselves from the boredom/loneliness. It’s at least worthwhile to ask your partner to do something before jumping right into the yelling and accusations.
May 27th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
When reading the part about how shes trying to speak to her husband but cant get through to him, I really didnt see the “misogyny” is his reply about the “noise cancelling headphones”? Did I miss something?
May 27th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
The headphones comment and the “it’s like Guitar Hero for people with social skills!” one both left me scratching my head. I think they’re supposed to be jokes?
May 27th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
I have the good fortune to share an interest with my boyfriend. We both love games, and while there’s a big overlap, we like different kinds of games. After I beat GTAIV, I sat and watched him play through it, doing my best to withhold advice and let him experience it for himself until he asked me what to do. I’ve spent hours leveling characters for him in RPGs, hunting lizards in SotC (and perfecting my bow and arrow skills so that I could shoot off their tails without killing them) while he handled the giants.
We don’t always play together, and we also don’t always play games. Sometimes we read books together, go see movies, and talk politics. Sometimes I have to try harder to get him interested in stuff that he’s not necessarily into (like Halo) but the reason our relationship works is that he’s willing to listen to me, and I’m willing to listen to him. What the author of that article fails to understand is that communication and compromise are what’s missing. No amount of time spent together is going to solve that. I almost feel sorry for her.
May 27th, 2008 at 4:30 pm
I think she thought that her husband regarded her as “noise” to be canceled. Kind of a stretch there. I interpret noise canceling headphones as dangerous more than anything. Your two main senses are otherwise engaged; what’s to prevent, say, a tiger pouncing you and carrying you off into the jungle?
May 27th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
[...] I’m with Mighty Ponygirl: This article by Rachel Shukert about how Rock Band saved her marriage was a nightmare. I enjoy writers willing to hang out all their personality flaws for the world to see, but it’s also amazing to me how some of them can describe themselves so well and not realize that these are the sort of soul-destroying personality flaws that will cause them massive problems. Shukert realizes, to a degree, that she’s a nagging, clingy mess, but she doesn’t seem to realize that this is something that is a major problem that can’t be fixed with a video game. [...]
May 27th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
The “my husband thinks I’m noise to be canceled” thing occurred to me too… but then I took a moment and thought: they live in New York City, where there’s a lot of fucking noise. Not to mention, she said at the beginning of the article that he used to be a drummer in a band. So it’s not like noise canceling headphones are some whole new concept for this guy. I mean, usually, when I have a completely unreasonable paranoid fantasy about my husband not appreciating me, I take a minute to collect myself and see things from his side. I don’t write a friggin’ essay about it for Salon.
Also: crocodile-filled moats tend to keep out tigers pretty well, in my experience.
May 27th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
“…they will look for a means of escape. It might be working long hours at the office, it might be playing Silent Hill 3.”
If your marriage has reached the point where escorting a cripple through horrific dreamscapes is an improvement, you might as well get divorced now.
Sorry, love that series, hated that game. There’s a better joke to be made in there about doing everything a second time with a useless partner whose only purpose is to get injured, but I’m not up to it.
May 27th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Sounds like the husband routinely uses the noise-cancelling headphones as a way of ignoring his wife, hence the ‘misogyny’.
May 27th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
I thought using noise-canceling headphones while playing a loud game was being polite, as well. But that’s assuming they cancel noise both ways, so she wouldn’t have to hear the sounds of guns and death. She could tap him on the shoulder if she wanted his attention?
Thinking about it more, I think a lot of it was exaggerated to be funny. But there are still problems, as noted by everyone.
On a brighter note… my favorite part of Rock Band articles is the band names (especially Amanda’s! lulz!). My band usually ends up being named AAAA…(continue until I figure out you press start to continue and not the green button).
May 27th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
Thanks for getting at some of the stuff that was bugging me about this article.
I think the thing that really got to me about this …
(besides the “misogynist” noise-cancelling headphones, which, what? For my birthday, my boyfriend bought me some great earbuds that shut out the world - at my request; who knew I was knuckling under to the patriarchy?)
… was that they live in a two-room apartment, she’s screaming at him at a volume that causes the neighbor to pound on the wall, and … why? Because she’s bored and he hasn’t paid attention to her in the last couple hours or so.
Maybe she should get a dog.
May 27th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
P.S. My Rock Band name (well, the name I came up with along with some friends who actually own the game) is Guinea Pig Factory, with every possible umlaut, tilde and other un-American character used. (I think the “i” is actually an upside-down exclamation point.) Most of the time, the unusual letters show up as question marks, which feels a little sloppy to me.
May 27th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
If people are listing the fictional names they use for Rock Band or Guitar Hero, I always go with “Odin’s Spaghetti-Os,” or sometimes “The Neck Romancers”
May 28th, 2008 at 6:39 am
I have to agree with MP on this article - if the problem is that you’re trying to impose yourself on your partner’s me-time, you need to take a look at yourself. If the problem is that your partner is trying to escape you physically or virtually every chance they get, you need to take a look at your relationship. Either way, show some bloody self-respect. How is playing a bit of Rock Band together in this situation anything other than an Elastoplast over a sucking chest wound?
Which isn’t to say that Rock Band isn’t ace if played with people who actually, y’know, like each other. We’ve found it less a game, more a family in-joke generator. I knew it’d be something that the whole household would have some interest in and we could all play together, I didn’t realise it’d be on the XBox constantly for five days with barely a break for meals. Or that my wife would enjoy hitting things with sticks quite as much.
We are The Red Winkiez, by the way. We are all childish enough to find this funny.
May 28th, 2008 at 8:04 am
Oh, totally–I know lots of couples who have bonded over games like GH and RB… it does actually have the ability to strengthen a relationship through shared time together playing (which is absolutely a healthy thing) — but it shouldn’t be to the exclusion of individualized interests. There was actually an story on NPR a few weeks back that angrymob was telling me about that described how much more likely you were to divorce if you didn’t have friends or interests outside of the marriage.
It’s a pretty sucky situation, especially for women. We’re fed a pretty steady diet of “love is the most important thing” and “there’s someone out there perfect for you,” not to mention the casual assumption that maintaining the marriage emotionally is our responsibility (as articles like this tend to suggest), so it’s a pretty easy trap to fall into.
Angrymob and I are The New Justice Team, and my friend Matt and I are The Fun. (I asked him what our band name should be and he said “something fun.”)
May 28th, 2008 at 8:47 am
[...] don’t take my word for it: mightyponygirl, as usual, has plenty of smart things to say at the intersection of feminism and gaming. Leigh [...]
May 28th, 2008 at 8:53 am
When I read these things I always feel really lucky that my boyfriend and I can play and enjoy video games together–even single-player games; we’ve actually been tag-teaming Metal Gear Solid lately–but we also make time to go to movies and do other stuff together. We’re both game-obsessed, but there’s a balance.
And OMG, I love the band names! In Guitar Hero we were the Mad Ducks, but I messed up entering it when I got Rock Band, so there we’re just Mad Duck >.>;
May 28th, 2008 at 9:52 am
It’s the “I haven’t put on real pants in four days” comment that I keep coming back to. Like, she paints a picture of a couple of people who are bored and disconnected and not really doing anything about it. It’s so obvious that what they need is communication, not just a Rock Band-aid. (Oh, the pun, it burns. I apologize.)
I mean, Mr. Orange and I do play plenty of games (my personal faves are X-Men Legends and Ultimate Alliance, both great for multiplayer) but if we were in a crisis point of communication problems, video games “saving our marriage” would be pretty much the last thing I’d think of. I’d like to think we’d try, you know, talking, or going to counseling first.
May 28th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
I think she thought that her husband regarded her as “noise” to be canceled. Kind of a stretch there. I interpret noise canceling headphones as dangerous more than anything. Your two main senses are otherwise engaged; what’s to prevent, say, a tiger pouncing you and carrying you off into the jungle?
I guess that makes sense… if you ignore how noise canceling headphones work. She can’t honestly expect the headphones to differentiate between her voice and the surrounding sounds. Can she?
And indeed, it is very important to remain ever vigilant against the threat of wild cats. You need all five senses for that.
May 28th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
I wouldn’t assume that she’s wrong about not being appreciated. I know, we all love video games, but there *are* guys who think the purpose of females is to do the housework and sleep with you when your server’s down.
May 29th, 2008 at 4:07 am
“I wouldn’t assume that she’s wrong about not being appreciated.”
I wouldnt assume shes right about it either. Sometimes people just ignore others, whether its your husband, wife, friend or window cleaner. There is nothing misogynist about it.
May 29th, 2008 at 8:10 am
I think the problem is that the article is so poorly-written — she’s relying so heavily on hyperbole to be “cute” and “funny” that there aren’t a lot of cues that she’s a mature, mentally healthy adult. To toss off that you’re coming across as clingy and needy shows at least a degree of self-awareness, but that’s the only indication we have.
I think there’s definitely room for both approaches to be true: that he bought the noise canceling headphones as a way of keeping the apartment quiet so that she could work while he gamed, and he’s not being a particularly good husband with regards to the marriage. Fortunately, her problems will be solved when he’s devoured by a tiger.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Taking as given that the whole article is a waste of space, I have some questions on the topic that DOES seems to fascinate everyone - the headphone scene, and the way I interpret it; then my conclusions.
Wearing some kind of headphones rather than blasting the noise everywhere makes sense
But:
I believe that noise-cancelling ones block (or counter) noises for the person wearing them. Is that right ?
So he doesn’t need THAT kind of headphone for anyone else’s benefit, right ?
But:
If the game is noisy, as others have indicated, it’s unlikely he needs them to be able to hear the game sounds over outside noise, right ?
And: since the neighbor’s reaction to her shout indicates there’s not so much outside noise as to block the noise she’s making by yelling, or enough that her noise is simply incidental.
But:
Her description is that hubby did not respond to her yelling, but did react to the less loud pounding (muffled by drywall), although that’s not clear. Is that jibe with anyone else’s take on it ? No ? Okay.
She doesn’t explicitly say so, so maybe she’s leaving out that this is a pattern she’s now sensitive to. Her reaction is such that I have to believe she feels that he’s not content just to ignore her by playing this game, but also is actively trying to keep her from being able to easily get his attention. Otherwise, he could just buy cheaper headphones that don’t do that.
So, I don’t know that it’s misogynistic, but I think, in her place, most folks would feel rejected, or disrespected, and think he was being rude. I would talk to my husband [after he finished the game] and he would change something, because he’s a polite person, mostly; and because I’m not an unwanted distraction, I’m his beloved, and it’s not a difficult fix. Just like if I’m watching TV and he wants me, I push record and turn it off.
What is it Dan Savage says ? DT..whatever. I vote Get out, while you’re still young. He’s just not that into you.
June 2nd, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Kay:
I deeply suspect the reason for the noise-canceling heaphones has more to do with his history as a drummer in a successful rock band than anything else: When you’re recording in a studio, you have noise-canceling headphones so that you can concentrate on what you’re doing. If you use a piece of equipment professionally, you’re more likely to try to gravitate towards that equipment in your personal life: I don’t know many professional photographers who use disposable cameras.
But, that’s not to say that he didn’t have a less noble thought in mind when he purchased the headphones. In fact, if she does normally start screaming for him at the top of her lungs just because he hasn’t stopped in to say hi in a couple of hours, I wouldn’t at all be surprised if he picked them up in order to tune her out.
Is it passive-aggressive and indicative of a marriage that’s in trouble? Hell yes.
But it is not misogynistic, certainly not on the level of “Rush Limbaugh, Phyllis Schlafly and Mullah Omar.” Headphones are worn on the ears, not on the penis, and both men and women can make use of them as they like. I know she was trying to be funny by using hyperbole, but it rubbed me the wrong way, and it wasn’t that funny to boot.