Pokimane asked her audience if they remember how men in video games were less hostile towards female gamers about 10 years ago. Instead of answers, however, the streamer received backlash.
The topic of women in video games has been discussed a lot already and that is likely not stopping any time soon. The reason for that is rather simple: To this day, when women talk in voice chat in a video game, they often get harassed by people who think they shouldn't be there. Most female gamers have probably experienced comments like "Go back to the kitchen and make me a sandwich" or "I didn't know dishwashers could talk" (which might be one of the worst ones I personally got). Now, Pokimane shares that she feels the climate in the community got worse over the last few years and people seem to disagree passionately.
"At One Point It Didn't Feel So Bad"
Pokimane recently shared a TikTok in which she explains that she feels like male gamers used to be a lot nicer to women in their game lobbies, almost treating them like "unicorns", the streamer says. She also asks if her followers remember that time, since she feels like that has changed a lot over the years.
After that, she took the question to her stream and asked her chat if they also remember that time, curious to find out if that was an experience that more people had. A clip from said stream then immediately went viral on Twitter and Reddit, where she stated that "at one point it didn't feel so bad".
Pokimane talks about being a female streamer now vs 10-15 years ago
— bloom (@bloomjpg) March 15, 2026
"If you were a girl gaming online, people were actually so nice to you.. They treated you so well, they'd gift you free stuff.. It makes me sad" pic.twitter.com/c45VopEfpH
Many users called Pokimane out for having a very privileged, "delusional" view on this topic, given that people might have treated her specifically differently because she is a streamer. One person mentions that people they know have had horrifying experiences with men online because of their gender:
"I had girlfriends who were stalked by guys online over RuneScape. The cherry on top is that nobody cared [...] Delusional take."
In the original clip from her stream, however, her chat is flooded with people agreeing with her. While there were some people sharing how their experience was not positive at all back in the day, many others agree that it used to be a lot better. It is also worth mentioning that both 15 years ago and now, communities of different games are not all the same. If one person has a good experience with other players playing one thing, that doesn't mean that experience is indicative of the gaming community as a whole.
Unique Experience Or A Trend You Can Track Back?
While people have been discussing whether women have it easier on Twitch for many, many years, this simple clip seems to have started a bigger conversation about the topic of women in gaming on social media, and how many believe it actually has gotten a lot better. Commentary streamer Destiny, for example, reacted to the clip by saying:
"Gaming for women 10-15 years ago online was literally impossible without a slew of disgusting comments nonstop. Gamergate was literally 10 years ago."
In March of 2025, CNN published an article about how Gamergate, a big online uprising against women in video games, might have foreshadowed what the internet has now become. Between rage bait and hateful comments or "jokes", social media is filled with a lot of negativity and the algorithms seem to reward it. It is fair to raise the question of how Gamergate could have happened if everyone was nicer back then, but it seems that things are a little more complicated than that.
It is undeniable that social media has gone through a lot of changes over the last years and Gamergate was one of the first signs of that. CNN states that people who participated in it "were able to weaponize social media precisely because of how those platforms were designed" and we can only imagine how much of that carried into social media and the gaming community as we know it today.
But what are your thoughts? Has the gaming community gotten more toxic over the last 10-15 years? Let us know in the comments!