Amira Virgil Keeps on Challenging Gaming’s Racism

By Nadira Jamerson | Word In Black Amira Virgil is a gaming content creator and community organizer. Photo courtesy of Amira Virgil. Illustration by Nadira Jamerson/Word In Black. (WIB) – Jerry Lawson and Ed Smith, Black pioneers in the gaming industry, revolutionized home gaming in the 1970s. Lawson made video games playable at home, while Smith reimagined at-home consoles to be more user-friendly. Never heard of them? That’s no surprise. The gaming industry has a long history of ignoring the contributions of Black game developers and Black gamers.& “We get treated like we don’t exist. Everything from the creation of games to products, we’re not thought of, or we’re an afterthought,”& Amira Virgil, a 30-year-old gaming content creator and community organizer, tells Word In Black. “When it comes to our content, a lot of Black people get ignored.” Virgil has been in the gaming world since she first started playing at age 4. At 22, she officially joined the gaming industry by creating Black-focused gaming content on YouTube.& It doesn’t matter what game you play. This is a general, industry-wide issue. AMIRA VIRGIL, GAMING CONTENT CREATOR AND COMMUNITY ORGANIZER Black Americans are the& second largest racial or ethnic demographic& of...