Yes, it seems clear that a component of Gamer Culture is casual bigotry. It has been changing but that mostly means spaces have become more inclusive and new people are more inclusive. The pre-existing people didn't stop existing they just sort of got shoved out of places that started having standards around behavior.
An aspect of the Greater Internet Fuckwad theory is also the level of exposure behavior gets in an online context - so very many more people are present in a way that invites sharing and comment that just doesn't exist in a grocery store. Think about how unusual it would be for me to reply in depth to an offhand comment like this (that was not directed to me) at a bar. Or how many people you might socialize with in a tf2 or l4d lobby over the course of an hour compared to in a grocery.
There is also a component of self selection when it comes to the spaces you are comparing against; you probably wouldn't want to go to bars and groceries where that behavior was present well before you actually got to live examples.
In my experience individual communities can also have very different feels. For example I used to play League of Legends and eventually switched to Dota2 because it felt very consistent that at least one person would behave in an awful fashion in the league lobbies. Whereas when playing Dota that sort of behavior was the exception.
An aspect of the Greater Internet Fuckwad theory is also the level of exposure behavior gets in an online context - so very many more people are present in a way that invites sharing and comment that just doesn't exist in a grocery store. Think about how unusual it would be for me to reply in depth to an offhand comment like this (that was not directed to me) at a bar. Or how many people you might socialize with in a tf2 or l4d lobby over the course of an hour compared to in a grocery.
There is also a component of self selection when it comes to the spaces you are comparing against; you probably wouldn't want to go to bars and groceries where that behavior was present well before you actually got to live examples.
In my experience individual communities can also have very different feels. For example I used to play League of Legends and eventually switched to Dota2 because it felt very consistent that at least one person would behave in an awful fashion in the league lobbies. Whereas when playing Dota that sort of behavior was the exception.