Is Belle Delphine proof gaming culture can't escape its hyper-sexualised past?

Belle Delphine, an increasingly infamous cosplay model, started selling her bath water this month - Instagram @belle.delphine
Belle Delphine, an increasingly infamous cosplay model, started selling her bath water this month - Instagram @belle.delphine

Internet star Belle Delphine’s account has been removed from Instagram for ‘violating community guidelines’, following numerous reports of nudity and pornography. Here, we look at gamer girl culture and its sexualised history

On July 1st, Instagram model Belle Delphine posted a photo of herself holding a small jar labelled with an illustrated Xbox controller. The carefully composed selfie went out to her four-million-plus Instagram followers and, with it, the caption: “I am now selling my bath water for all you thirsty gamer boys”.

Insert thirst emoji, quite literally, and the unexpected arrival of Gamer Girl Bath Water.

For the nineteen-year-old, selling erotically-promoted jars of bath water is a savvy strategy. She built her following by sharing photos of herself dressed up as some of the internet's favourite fantasy and gaming characters ['cosplaying']. At $30 (£24) a pop, she is quite literally making money flogging dirty water to horny fans.

Delphine is a hustler – in every sense of the word – but my worry, despite applauding her ingenuity, is the decision to market her bath dregs as those of a ‘Gamer Girl’.

Women have been marginalized and sexualized in gaming culture for years, despite making up over half the gaming population, and I fear these stunts feed the atmosphere of misogyny most female gamers have battled their entire lives.

It’s been a losing game, in my experience. One more concerning than conventions of Princesses who need to be saved or female protagonists, like Lara Croft, who only gain cultural relevance through rumours of cheat codes which strip them naked.

The wider culture has forced me to do everything from switching my microphone off and playing as male characters to avoid sexual harassment in MMOs to hiding from any social affiliation to video games altogether. As GamerGate –the online harrasment campaign which targeted women in gaming from 2013 – taught many women, misogynistic terrorism is only ever a few clicks away.

By peddling sexed-up ‘Gamer Girl’ products, the hobby-gender affiliation can only find itself thrust into a trap of hyper-sexualisation once again. However satirical the stunt itself may be.

But does that make this teenager’s viral success proof gaming culture can’t escape its hyper-sexualised reputation? Is this really the only women and girls can get a look in?

Aoife Wilson, Head of Video at Eurogamer, doesn’t think so. “I think Belle is an incredibly savvy businesswoman. She gained a huge online following through her love of cosplay and her ability to replicate real-life Ahegao faces,” she says, referring to a Japanese term used to describe sexual facial expressions of fictional characters in pornographic manga and anime.

“She's kept that momentum going by engaging with her followers and trying new things, always skirting the line between sexy and surreal. She absolutely knows her audience. She took a comment that's been posted to literally every visible woman in gaming at one point or another - ‘I'd love to drink her bath water’ - and she monetised it while enjoying international media coverage in the process.”

So a case of playing the gamers at their own game you may think? It’s a formula Delphine has arguably perfected. Since launching her Instagram last year, she has done little more than troll her followers. Just three weeks ago, she posted a photo on Instagram with the captioned promise that she would open a PornHub account if it received one million ‘likes’.

True to her word, the photo exceeded one million likes and she created a PornHub account. Albeit with suggestively titled, non-pornographic videos.

“So many games historically have packaged up scantily-clad bodies and sold them to gamers,” says Wilson. “What Belle is doing is taking that power back and making it into something that can directly serve her.”

And serve her it certainly has. The initial run of bath water sold out in two days and, to the inevitable delight of one “EXTRA thirsty” fan, Delphine released one plunge-pool sized tub of Extreme Gamer Girl Bath Water, including a video of her bathing in it.

Despite its $10,000 (£7,970) price tag, it reportedly sold out.

 Round two: Belle Delphine responded to her initial sell-out run of bath water by offering $10,000 Extreme Gamer Girl Bath Water - Credit: Instagram @belle.delphine
Round two: Belle Delphine responded to her initial sell-out run of bath water by offering $10,000 Extreme Gamer Girl Bath Water Credit: Instagram @belle.delphine

Whether it helps the rest of us remains to be seen.

“The addage that sex sells has always been part of media - and that includes video games,” says Leah Jewer, co-founder of popular video game blog Girls on Games.

“I feel that if a woman is comfortable in presenting herself in a way that could lead to her being objectified to gain popularity, then that is​​ her business,” she says. “It is her prerogative. But I do think there is a responsibility to make it clear that it is not the only way to gain popularity and to make sure that the youth are aware of that.”

At the crux of the issue, that is precisely where Delphine falls short for the gamers who have waited a lifetime to see big-breasted tomb raiders swapped for female protagonists like Aloy of Horizon Zero Dawn.

As one of the most visible representations young boys and girls see of women who game, Delphine embodies the stereotype; the half-naked lolita who plays (at least in photos) with pink controllers so boys want to, ahem, play with her.

For the majority of female gamers and women who work in the industry, it’s a typecast they’ve not only escaped but are trying to obliterate. A recent study by the Entertainment Software Association found adult women occupy the gaming industry’s largest demographic; women over 18 make up a whopping 36% of gamers while adult men make up 35% – as a sexually sidelined majority, representation matters more than anything. For women to truly escape gaming’s gendered grip, we need to raise more non-fetishized Gamer Girls to the top.

Belle Delphine is proof there is still quite a way to go.