There is a movement afoot in the universe that insists that #gamergate is ALL FOR THE DEVELOPERS. All for me and my ilk! Protecting our freedom of speech! Trying to save the games! Which is a pretty ballsy stance, considering the movement was born in the relentless and ongoing harassment and attempt to silence a game developer. Still, here’s a sample of people telling me that this is all to SAVE MY ARTISTIC FREEDOM!
@ZenOfDesign @MSamenfink @sanc @femfreq Im not freaking out Im complaining that some people think they can pressure devs/industry to make’em
— Steel Thunder (@SteelThunder13) September 12, 2014
@ZenOfDesign yes. but each year, from what I’ve noticed, is that all the violence is getting scaled back, which limits artistic freedom. 1/2
— HunterGriff (@squareandweird) September 13, 2014
@RicChivo@ZenOfDesign and consider one person with 20 thousand followers can change a game that only that one person actually cares about
— Eliah Ryan (@Eliah_R) September 12, 2014
@therealescotia @DanielVavra @Eliah_R @ZenOfDesign The anti-#GamerGate side wants the type of games they want to the exclusion of all else.
— Hans Schumacher (@LunarArchivist) September 13, 2014
This is freakin’ ADORABLE. Really. I mean, it’s really precious. Now please stop it. Because it’s embarrassingly misguided about how the industry ACTUALLY works. We really don’t need your help here. And if it looks like this, we’d rather not have it.
So please stop using the artistic freedom of devs as the reason for your crusade. Why?
1. Many devs resent being associated with #gamergate because of it’s unquestionably foul roots.
And I’m one of them. Many devs, particularly female devs, find #GamerGate to be the fruit of a poisonous tree, that tree being the violent and often terrifying crusade against some developers, journalists and academics, the majority of whom happen to be women. You push away devs when you claim to speak for them all as long as the cause bears this name.
2. No one is trying to take away your games.
The most important thing for games is that it is recognized as speech and as an art form, so that it maintains legal protection in the form of freedom of speech. As long as we are not talking about censorship of game creators (and most academics reject censorship, they value speech), then I can make whatever kind of game I want, and people are allowed to have and voice whatever opinions they want about it.
3. It is an attempt to silence a different world view.
I keep hearing the word ‘corruption’ used to describe media outlets and reporters who have progressive (‘SJW’) views on games and game development. It’s not corruption. It’s a different point of view. Lord knows, we have shittons of web sites out there that just cut and paste whatever canned talking points a developer hands out at E3 with appropriate uses of the word ‘Awesome’ and ‘Extreme’ sprinkled in for good measure. None of this really makes the games industry better, or the artists creating it challenge themselves or their work more.
4. We can speak for ourselves – with our games.
I know, some developers like to pout that they can’t say whatever they want without earning the ire of the SJW police. What a joke. WE HAVE THE LOUDEST VOICES IN THE ROOM. And that’s the game itself. Anita Sarkeesian earned $150K from almost 7000 people. This is an impressive amount of money, the highest I’ve seen for a project like this, and debunks the idea that only a tiny fringe is interested in her cause. That being said, Destiny cost hundreds of millions of dollars to make and market, and has reached hundreds of thousands, if not millions of players. Same for GTA 5. We have the megaphone.
Now, it’s true that individual developers might not necessarily be well-advised to go off and spout off whatever opinion that comes to mind. However, this is usually less about reasons of press than it is about employment. During GamerGate, I’ve seen more than one ‘aspiring game dev’ make what can only be described as career-limiting comments about women, the industry, or other devs in their twitter feed. It turns out, it’s no fun to work in the pressure cooker that is the games industry when you work with an asshole.
5. The media is a relatively unimportant voice in the modern creation process.
A developer has a million voices guiding him through video game creation. His boss. His bosses boss. His teammates, who want to just make a WoW/LoL/Clash of Clans clone. The producer and project manager trying to get it out the door. The marketing guy who wants to sneak ‘farmville’ into the game. The publisher who will withhold paychecks to the developer if ludicrous demands aren’t met. The license holder, who very often doesn’t seem to know his own license. The home office who ignores the game for months at a time only to turn the Eye of Sauron on you at the worst possible time. The MTX department, who wants to pick up the customer and shake him for loose change. The ESRB, whose attitudes on decapitations seem to change from game to game. The Apple/Sony/Xbox certification process. Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
Sure, we listen to outside voices. The fans! In today’s Internet, companies can and do build forums where they can build very direct relationships with their fans, and get a very real sense of what is important to the actual community building their game. The press might report a point of view ragging on our game, but if our playerbase doesn’t care, most of the time, we don’t either. Sure, the press mentioned same-gender romances as missing on SWTOR, but they moved on pretty much immediately to other games and stories. The reason we added them was because the community literally kept a thread alive on the topic for – geez, a year?
Oh, also, the fans were right.
That’s not to say that we don’t care about the press entirely! We care hugely! About the Metacritic score! This is the single most important page of media a game has after launch day, and which aggregates game scores from across the spectrum. Purists will be pleased to know that having incredible violence, possible hooker beatings and gratuitious boobage doesn’t seem to keep great games from getting great scores. What matters is making a great game.
6. Sex and Violence isn’t going anywhere.
Media criticism of Television and Film has existed for literally decades. Has it disappeared? No! In fact, these genres push the boundaries farther than ever before! Dirty not-so-secret secret: sex sells, and there will always be artists willing to reach for those audiences, many trying desperately outdo anyone whose come before (note: your hostile liberal SJW media gave Dragon’s Crown a respectable 82). These people may alienate a potential audience, but especially if you’re a small indy, you may have to pick and narrowly focus on one audience anyway! (Small budget teams can’t please everyone)
And controversy sells! The Witcher is a great series, but it would have had trouble getting any attention from the press if not for the ‘collecting bedmates‘ minigame in the first installment. Lesbian sex got Mass Effect onto Fox News – you think a few people didn’t pick up boxes when that happened? GTA has always embraced controversy. They’ve only turned that into being one of the biggest game franchises in the world.
7. It’s insulting to the artists.
Do you think Will Wright needs protecting? Sid Meier? David Jaffe? Raph Koster? No. They need input. And they should have the freedom to take input from wherever the hell they want. If we don’t get input, we make the same derivative crap over and over again. Do you think you’re qualified where to tell these people where they should seek this input?
And criticism is fine. Criticism is CONSTANT in the games industry, from every friggin’ direction you can imagine. In fact, if you want to break into the games industry, my primary advice to you is (a) make stuff and (b) get criticized. Junior designers assume that they’re always right. The ones that become senior designers learn to absorb and synthesize many points of view. Sometimes this means taking someone like Anita Sarkeesian to heart. Sometimes it means saying “We’re making the interactive Porky’s experience here, everything she says is irrelevant here.”
I’m a free speech zealot. I believe fiercely that writers, authors, film makers, politicians and journalists should be given a lot of rope to create their art and speak their minds. But I must say, as long as the government isn’t involved censoring the creation and distribution of my games, my artistic freedom is just fine, thank you. Don’t worry about me. Instead, spend that energy worrying about people who would have the audacity to silence disparate world views with harassment and threats of violence, all in the name of free speech. All in the name of saving MY free speech.
Nobody is trying to silence me. If they tried, they’d likely fail. I have 20 years experience, confidence in my craft, a large multinational company at my back, and about 20 years experience writing and speaking about game design. But there are a lot of people who are trying to silence critics, academics and journalists with more progressive (“SJW”) views on games, because they aren’t ‘real’ gamers, or because what they want would ‘ruin’ games. Meanwhile, increases in raw hardware power means that awesome boob physics is more realistic and impressive than ever before.
More diverse voices will lead to better, more diverse and more interesting games. And at the end of the day, isn’t that all any of us really cares about?
No, there’s more to care about.
There’s attention, and volume.
There’s the passage of time, and recognition of change.
There’s ignorance, and indolence.
Most people who care about games still don’t know how they’re made. Most people usually don’t care, except in very limited and situational circumstances when they find motivation to find out.
The notion among people who are not game developers about what video games are for, what they mean and why they exist has not kept pace with the changes in the market. People who say they love games should care more about what all these things mean.
You are not being offered protection for your art. That would imply that the people in that Twitter thread are treating you as an artist, which implies treating you as a person with humanity.
Respect for the humanity of those who make video games, even the ones that you don’t like and might even challenge or threaten what you think and believe — that’s what’s missing. That’s what you get when your art form gets really big before your role as an artist is well understood.
Without respect for humanity, we’ve got a whole lot of noise and indolence masquerading as fury about stuff that ultimately does not matter without the human factor.
It’s too easy to tell someone else that they wish they’d die horribly on the Internet, and invoke a response. It’s too hard to recognize that to die, you have to have lived a life that mattered to someone.
That ought to matter a lot more than what video games get made next.
Thank you. Criticism doesn’t mean that we force developers to change their games. It’s just us helping them look at it from different viewpoints. We can suggest but we cannot and should not force them to change anything.
This creates an environment were people feel that they are being heard. I don’t know why GamerGate wants to take that away from us.
But here is the problem. Scores and ratings can influence exactly this. Lets take the newest example: Dead Rising 3. Gamespot PC Review: 3/10 because the reviewer thinks it is racist and sexist. Yes these are the reasons for this score. Reasons like 30 FPS cap or other performance difficulties were fine according to him.
2. Funny things to note here:
1. The Xbox One Version back at launch got a 7/10 from a different reviewer on the same site.
2. This 3/10 score is reflected in the Metacritic score especially because Gamespot is a HUGE gamingsite which again is a very important tool in this industry to see the overall critics reception of a game. While other reviewers normally reviewed the game and came to a almost same score. This 3/10 is hurting the average score very very badly. And this will lead to less sales because of the bad reception the game got.
Less sales mean less chances to get a Sequel therefore the people people responsible for this game in that case CAPCOM will not produce a Sequel anymore.
Opinions and criticism is fine put all most people want is to do all this criticism in Editorials which have nothing to do with the score. Review the game for what it is and leave your personal political opinion out of it.
Another great example was one Preview of Castlevania 2 in which one harmless Vampire bites woman scene was compared to a game called Rapelay in which you literally do what the title says. And you are presented even as the Hero of the game. This has nothing to do with opinions anymore. This is click bait and the only intention is to remove the scene. Which was even stated in the Preview.
That is why Movie and Book Critics are so different. For example Game of Thrones a very violent and sexual series which a lot of very heavy events and topics. This criticism is handled very differently than people would do it in this industry. In this industry you just need to release a trailer or show a character without any context and many many so called Game Journalists shouting misogyny, sexist and other very heavy stuff.
Best examples were the Tomb Raider Trailer and the introduction of Quiet a skimpy dressed female Soldier in MGSV who can not speak anymore. Both of these were called misogynistic wetdtream for women hater.
Yes you are free to criticize. You are free to not like things. But the moment you use words like these you are judging things. Even without knowing anything about the characters or the game itself. And that should not happen.
When we get to the quality level of Movie and TV criticism most people will not say anything. But we are far far away from that. And that is why so many gamer are annoyed.
I am sorry for the grammar error but English is not my native Language and its getting pretty late here. In fact it is 10:33 in the Morning and I was up until now XD
So even if this is a bit confusing please try to understand what I wanted to say. Thank you^^
I probably have played more DR3 on my XBone than any other game, and find a review of 30 to be a pretty steep drop from the game that I played, which I would have probably rated about a 75. Metacritic gives it a 71. The whole value of Metacritic is that it takes ALL the feedback and bundles it together. It both dilutes people who like and people who hate incessantly. In fact, the real problem with Metacritic has been that certain sites get counted multiple times.
Anyway, Gamespot has plenty of high-ranking reviews for plenty of games with sex and violence – this review gives plenty of other reasons for a poor review: poor navigation, uninspired landscapes, imprecise controls. Glomming on to one element of the review you don’t like is pretty dishonest.
Also, the idea that Game of Thrones (a series I adore, by the way) hasn’t had plenty of discussion, very passionate sometimes I might add, about how women are depicted is laughably absurd. It’s probably the single most criticized show on TV right now (well, it and Two and a Half Men). That doesn’t even necessarily mean the critics don’t like the show!
Would you mind terribly if I asked you to respond to my comments I directed at you? Should be two.
I’d appreciate if we could have a reasoned discussion about this, without your condescending tone from earlier. I’m also open to direct contact through instant messaging, because these comment threads hit a limit rather early.
No worries, I was just getting into a flamewar on Twitter and reading how I’m a horrible marxist SJW on Reddit, so I got distracted.
The problem is that this review was posted during the start of #GamerGate and the score was as low because of these issue. All the things you mentioned were just thrown in randomly while the whole article was talking about this “hot issue”. It clearly was a clickbait article. And again this can lead to “censorship” in a way that we will not get anymore sequels because of a bad reception. It was clearly reviews by someone who would not like anything like it. And that is another problem with Games Journalism. I remember some GT5 review which was given a 6/10 because the Women who reviewed it had no idea about cars and racing and literally said that it is stupid to drive around circles. This should not be in reviews just like your personal view of a controversial topic. If you do it do it as second opinion or editorial but not as the Main review.
As for GOT. Yes it is very controversial but it is handled with much more care than games are being handled with in the moment. For example they discuss an actually rape scene which is always a controversial topic. In games normal vampire bites Girl scenes are getting compared to rape. It was a click bait to over dramatize this scene. And there are several of these examples in these last few months or years.
Here’s the review.
http://www.gamespot.com/reviews/dead-rising-3-apocalypse-edition-review/1900-6415861/
Of twelve paragraphs, only the last two address any ‘social’ issues as well. The reviewer gives plenty of reasons other than that why he didn’t like the game.
GTA has a 97% on Metacritic. It’s one of the best reviewed games ever. Who cares if one person has a disparate opinion?
http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-360/grand-theft-auto-v
I fully agree that most game reviews are not very well written, and there is not a base of criticism for games that is adequately comparable to what exists for pretty much every other entertainment medium.
That’s a measure of the medium’s maturity. Games have only recently passed from its childhood to its awkward adolescence, and one of those points is, noticing that GIRLS EXIST. They’re different, they react differently than boys do, and so they’re strange.
Your annoyance is noted. I don’t fault anyone for being impatient with the state of things.
Write better reviews. Or make better games. Those are your choices. Otherwise, it’s other people who are in charge.
“noticing that GIRLS EXIST. They’re different, they react differently than boys do, and so they’re strange.”
Oh, what a crock. I’m a gal who’s been gaming for over two decades. SOME individuals are a bit apprehensive of women in gaming and games development, but they are the ABSOLUTE MINORITY, not the majority. Again, gamergate is NOT about gender. Stop trying to claim it is.
“Write better reviews. Or make better games. Those are your choices. Otherwise, it’s other people who are in charge.”
That’s not how a consumer market works. We vote with our wallets. WE drive the change, and it’s working.
“Oh, what a crock. I’m a gal who’s been gaming for over two decades. SOME individuals are a bit apprehensive of women in gaming and games development, but they are the ABSOLUTE MINORITY, not the majority.”
But it hurts when a minority says hurtful things, doesn’t it? Is gender not at all relevant to any part of the discussion here? Damion cited it in his original post.
Please don’t dismiss my comments as “a crock”.
“That’s not how a consumer market works. We vote with our wallets. WE drive the change, and it’s working.”
Consumer markets work better with consumer literacy. Many people love games. Few know or care how they’re made. That’s a problem that other media don’t have.
Defining what “we” is in this case is next to impossible, given how different games are and what sort of people plays them, and why.
Also, Damion’s post was about how he rejected the “offers” by Twitter-ers to protect his artistic freedom. Your response is a curious one. Is this about how his artistic freedom really is in jeopardy, or not?
“Many people love games. Few know or care how they’re made. That’s a problem that other media don’t have.”
I contend that few people know how movies and television get made or even how books get written and published.
So, let me get this straight – people are free to dislike things you like, as long as they shut their mouth about it?
Here’s what frustrates me. People are very vocally judging others (SJW! You are what’s wrong with the world!) – and their main complaint is that other people also have vocal opinions. It is the fine for GamerGaters to say whatever they want, apparently, but no one else.
Isn’t the movement about preventing censorship? But isn’t that also exactly what your goal ultimately is? Censorship of those you disagree with? “You can be free to not like things, but the moment you use words you are judging things…and that should not happen.” Okay. No words. Free speech for your group, but no one else. Got it. Real admirable. This is why everyone from the outside finds it ridiculous.
Another kneejerk post from someone who clearly doesn’t understand the situation. I’m disappointed in you for this rant, and for being so blatantly dishonest about the whole situation.
You heard it here first, kids. My 20 years of experience making games and defending their artistic expression doesn’t understand the principles of creative freedom! Wake up, sheeple!
Right. That’s not what Dia is talking about. No-one is questioning your understanding of creative freedom or artistic license. But do you know what those things are? Not the issue.
Ths “movement” (read: consumer revolt) centers around a fairly rampant lack of defined and declared standards of ethical conduct, recusal, disclosure and transparency in the gaming press.
Not for your sake, mind you, but for ours, for gamers.
The fact that you’ve made a post that completely ignores this indicates your lack of understanding of the situation, as noted.
Nice dismissive reply, though.
Are you serious? No one commented on your 20 years of experience (bullshit argument anyways), but the fact that you have a fundamental lack of understanding what GamerGate is about.
Nice way to spin that comment, because that’s not what I said at all. Let’s try again, shall we? And this time, try to actually be objective.
You’re being dishonest about the gamergate movement, possibly intentionally, though most likely through ignorance. AND you had the gall to invoke the name of devs who have actually come out IN SUPPORT OF gamergate. But that’s neither here nor there.
This isn’t a movement which is primarily about creative freedom. No one doubts that MOST developers are going to continue making the games they want regardless of how much some pissants whine about perceived “misogyny”. You and I both know that Rockstar, as an example, won’t give a shit what anyone says; they STRIVE off of controversy.
No, gamergate is, at its core, about integrity. Specifically in the realm of games journalism. Now, has games journalism been pretty bad for a long time? Absolutely, any cursory glance through IGN’s history can tell you that. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t care, especially when 10+ articles were written on the same day, declaring that all gamers are scum, and that “gamers” as a culture are dead.
Funny how when journalists are trying to farm ad revenue and clicks, games are awesome, and so are gamers! Oh sure, whenever it’s time for E3 or the holiday season, we continually hear about how 48% of gamers are female, how the average gamer is 31 years old and has been gaming for about 14 years. When it’s time to push games, we always hear about how awesome and inclusive video game culture is, and how it’s so cool that this new age of tech and fun is bringing people together…
…But when someone calls out blatant cronyism and corruption, the tune changes. Suddenly gamers are 100% male, 100% misogynist, and want to see all women pushed out of the industry. Suddenly, when we get tired of the bullshit we’re being fed — not to mention sick of the obvious nepotism and collusion in the journalism sphere — suddenly, we’re the “enemy”, we’re “dead”. Isn’t that interesting?
So no, stop trying to spin this like it’s all about you and your “creative freedom”. In part, maybe. Because in the past, games journalism kind of had an important role in getting the word out. But now we have the internet, and youtubers, and people who actually care about games rather than just their paychecks. All of a sudden, these journalists start to spin things in a new direction to make themselves relevant again, screaming and crying that something is “rotten” in the state of gaming.
Criticism is a great thing, it can only help people to improve, even if it isn’t always responded to. I’m not against criticism. I’m against being shit on as a gamer by press. These are people who we as gamers once lifted up to high standards to have OUR best interests in mind, and who WE once trusted to speak with all of our voices, not just a few, and certainly not to push a narrative of their own design while trying to cover up some dodgy practices.
Damion, I don’t know you personally and I have nothing against you. If you took my post as hostile, then I’m sorry that you missed its intent. I’m trying to point you to the discussion pro-gamergate people are trying to have, but posts like yours are only dragging the focus away. The sights should be set on rooting out shoddy journalism.
You’re absolutely right when you say that games media doesn’t really impact development, that it’s the gamers’ opinions who really matter. But we can’t always speak to you guys directly like I am now. Sometimes, when it comes to big-name publishers/developers like EA, Activision, Konami or Capcom, all we get is a PR-bobblehead, or maybe a forum post pointing out what we do and don’t like. Games journos actually DO get to go to things like E3 and other events, they get exclusive interviews with developers, and they have the DIRECT opportunity to ask you the kind of things that, as a consumer, I normally see fall on deaf ears. So excuse me for wanting that potential voice in the industry to at least TRY to be objective and have our best interests at heart.
Thanks for your time.
I was about to reply, but Dia is saying it loud and clear: I want to not be shit on by feminists, games media and mainstream media for being a gamer.
To me, Dia, yours seems like the the misinformed rant.
Nevermind this is a matter of opinions and I feel it’s pretty unfair of you to accuse of being “blatantly dishonest”.
It’s odd to me how you can speak about what Gamergate is objectively supposed to be, as it was a more of a planned movement rather than the conflicted phenomenon it is. There’s an array of problems branching from Gamersgate, one of them is journalistic integrity and yes, another one is misogyny and and gender discrimination, which is a problem that has been escalating since a while ago and not something that’s suddenly a problem to cover anything as you suggest.
It’s just unfortunate that the two issues overlapped in this scandal.
To me, Dia, yours seems like the the misinformed rant.
Nevermind this is a matter of opinions and I feel it’s pretty unfair of you to accuse Damion of being “blatantly dishonest”.
It’s odd to me how you can speak about what Gamergate is objectively supposed to be, as if it was more of a planned movement rather than the conflicted phenomenon it is. There’s an array of problems branching from Gamersgate, one of them is journalistic integrity and yes, another one is misogyny and and gender discrimination, which is a problem that has been escalating since a while ago and not something that’s suddenly a problem to cover anything as you suggest.
It’s just unfortunate that the two issues overlapped in this scandal. But I don’t think you’re being objective at all.
As a developer I believe that’s what being tackled here is as important as journalism integrity so from my perspective you’re spinning things too.
“It’s odd to me how you can speak about what Gamergate is objectively supposed to be, as if it was more of a planned movement rather than the conflicted phenomenon it is.”
So would you say that the movement for equal rights for the LGBT community (which I am a part of) is a “pre-planned movement”? Not originally, no. All big movements are borne out of controversy, and many DO end up taking on objective goals.
That’s exactly what gamergate has done.
“There’s an array of problems branching from Gamersgate, one of them is journalistic integrity and yes, another one is misogyny and and gender discrimination,”
I would agree on the first half, but not on the second.
Gaming culture has always been the most inclusive community I’ve ever had the pleasure to be a part of, and I say this as a lesbian! Are there assholes in the gaming community? Sure! There’s assholes everywhere, but a very select minority of jerks are not going to change the community as a whole. I love my gamer brothers and sisters, and I will always speak out against those few who act the fool.
We’re not horrible monsters. We’re people, from all walks of life. And yet these dozen or so journalists would suddenly call ALL gamers “white male misogynerds”. I’m sure you can imagine why I’d have a problem with that, especially that every time some new evidence is brought up of their shady collusion, they bear down and try to stamp us out again with smear articles.
Oh and let’s not forget the recent allegations of RACKETEERING going on in the idie game scene. “They’re not trying to cover up anything!” That’s priceless.
In less words, to quote Eric Kain:
“#GamerGate isn’t about conspiracies. It isn’t about scandal and corruption. It isn’t about feminists or misogynists. It isn’t about any of these things, and it’s about all of them all at once.”
You’re misrepresenting that article. Continue the quote. ->
“In the end, it’s about gamers upset with the status quo and demanding something better. It’s about a group of consumers and enthusiasts not simply feeling that their identity is threatened, but believing that they’re being poorly represented by an industry and press that grow more and more cliquish and remote every year. And it’s about the ad hoc, messy series of uncoordinated events that got us here.
Perhaps none of this is the answer. Perhaps the only answer is to encourage honest debate between people who truly care about video games. A conversation is a powerful thing.”
And that’s what it’s all about. The status quo of games media is horrible, and NEEDS to change. That’s all we want. I never claimed it was about conspiracies, you put those words in my mouth.
I and many others want transparency, and to root out the blatant nepotism in the games journo sphere.
Most of all I want them to stop shitting on gamers to cover up their shoddy practices.
Just ignore that spineless blob of jello, he’s another coward afraid of Anita and her necromorph squad.
Anyone who doesn’t dismiss Anita Sarkeesian as Jack Thompson 2.0 is either retarded or afraid of her.
Anita be praised.
No, I want to have legitimate discussion, and I want to do it WITHOUT senseless ad hominem and harassment.
Please be more considerate of this in the future.
It’s interesting you bring up Youtubers when some also went through recent scandals that many accuse journalists to have done to some degree. I also don’t know how any of them could be considered anywhere equal to a journalist or even give you decent interviews from any of the big 3. Angry Joe or Spoony perhaps, they work incredibly hard for their fans to do that but they’re not for GamerGate either.
In Spoony’s case, people didn’t completely outright attack him but instead went for his girlfriend with the notion that she made him into a feminist.
Discussion on inclusiveness is good but I don’t think we’re quite there yet. We have seen more women and young girls starting to get into games but we still see them being pushed out with so many men labeling them as “fake gamer girls”. Even now there is this notion that the criticism from women like Anita, Jenn Frank, Mattie Brice and many more are coming from the outside and that they have never played a game in their life. Two have now quit the industry and it’s deeply sad to see this happen when they actually deeply love games and have played them their whole lives. There are gatekeepers abound in this sub-culture who seem to want to protect a billion dollar industry from women and criticism and I find that to be very dumb. You yourself may not think this way but much of the company you keep in GamerGate more than likely do.
I believe there are many worthy criticisms to discuss and ethical problems in journalism and the industry as a whole. Like how freelance writers are barely paid, EA helping to sell real guns and funding of armed weapons, embargos that force the review to be published the day the game is out so the company can get your money from pre-orders on a crappy game (Aliens: Colonial Marines). The industry’s top down structure, lost jobs over a middling review (Jeff Gerstmman), and the eternal hype machine. The dumb scoring system on reviews, the poor critiquing, Metacritic as a whole, etc. etc.
Or just recently when Crytek didn’t pay their staff.
There’s just so much to cover. So many real problems to discuss that are not being discussed because GamerGate wants to yell over everyone else they don’t agree with. And they’re not very coherent either.
GamerGate just really does not have place in the discussion with how it was born from a conspiracy theory about a woman in her personal life that amounted to he said, she said. The pictures I often see for these “plans” of discussion or attack from GamerGate never speak of ethics. Maybe a sentence or two but a vast majority of the picture is talking about Zoe Quinn. Another picture I saw pretty much said “Harassment is bad because it gives them ammunition against us and harms our cause”. That does not sound like it’s for a good cause. At all.
The talk of ethics from GamerGate largely amounts to noise because they never bring up anything remotely close to the core of what is wrong. There’s no discussion, just attacks and defensive responses.
Many seem to follow Breitbart and many familiar faces I’ve seen who have known to be exploitative and are pretty much using everyone in them. For example, Breitbart, has no journalistic integrity or ethics. Wikipedia will never use them as a source of news because of their notoriety and illegitimacy as a proper source. The journalist from that site has made a lot of terrible articles during his time and believe poor people have a “crime gene”, he also keeps a list of friends and ranks them by beauty and IQ. He’s an incredibly shallow and attention seeking person using the people in GamerGate for his own gains. We could also talk about how he has never played a video game before and only played his first one a couple of days ago. If there is anyone from the outside who has been silencing and talking crap to others it’s him and the people GamerGate have been looking up to.
So, there’s no misogyny going on here, and no one’s being harassed?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyscI9wZ8Bk&feature=youtu.be&a
^Here’s one woman talking about the harassment she received because of #gamergate
Don’t ignore it, follow that link now
Listen and Believe
So, misogyny is happening and it matters to you. Thank you for acknowledging that females get shit on, and it is a problem.
You seem to be building on a weak foundation here. See, you can’t talk about criticism being a good thing when a very vocal portion of your “movement” harasses critics for pointing to content they find politically unacceptable.
Criticism of any medium is, by nature, fairly subjective, outside of a very finite amount of technical details. That’s the point. People find the critics they prefer, and follow those people, and it can almost be like throwing their weight behind a reviewer.
If you need a good example of this, look at the Guise of the Werewolf vs. TotalBiscuit debacle from a while back. Different opinions in criticism give people with varying life experience and opinions a voice. Nobody would make death threats towards a feminist reviewer if nobody read her opinions and agreed with them (unless they were just a misogynist prick, in which case I invite them to come pay me a visit for defending the women).
See, until people calling for “Journalistic Integrity” and all that other stuff can disassociate themselves from the idiots spewing vitriol, the sockpuppets claiming minority status, and all the other 4chan/reddit style hate, nobody in their right mind will lend the “movement” any credence.
Think of it like this. If you see the Westboro Baptist Church picketing a Military funeral, do you turn around and think “Man, I should go to the Baptist charity event down the road today!”?
If you’d like a breakdown of what parts of a video game review are actually objective, and which are subjective, I’d be happy to oblige, although if you’re really looking for a dialogue and willing to listen, you’d probably vomit in your mouth when you found out.
Congratulations, you’ve just described, word-for-word, the Israeli policy of not holding peace talks with the Palestinian Authority, because some minor percentage of their population engage in terrorism.
We live in a free society, and on the internet, we live in a (mostly) unmoderated and anonymous society. If you actually ventured into one of those 4chan or Reddit threads, you’d see that any attempts to harass, badger or otherwise attack an individual are heavily discouraged. Anyone suggesting such a thing is met with a simple and immediate “f*ck off” and occasionally “f*ck off, shill” for variety. The bottom line is that there is no way, physically, to disassociate the “lunatic fringe” from the core group. We are a nameless, diverse, and opinionated collection of individuals. No-one speaks for the group, no-one polices it, but itself. Saying that “4chan did this” or “Reddit did that” is a sign of ignorance. That will never change, and you should never want it to change.
Refusing to open discussion with the 99% who wish to talk, to insult them, to bundle them in one neat package and dismiss them all as intolerant misogynists – when the only people that has ever raised the issue of gender has been on the other side – reflects much more poorly on you than it does on us.
Has there been harassment campaigns against certain individuals in the last month? Absolutely, and they are completely deplorable. Is there sexism and exclusion and male-favoritism in gaming? Probably. There is certainly evidence to support it.
Those are both very serious issues. But they are not THIS issue.
For a month, we’ve screamed “ethics” and “transparency” and “disclosure;” and you’ve screamed nothing but “misogyny.” We keep screaming apples, and you’re shouting back oranges.
I’ve never attacked anyone, I’ve never so much as breathed a word of aggression. I just want to know that the review I read on the gaming press doesn’t come with someone’s personal baggage attached. I want my gaming media honest, ethical, and transparent. Surely we can agree those are desirable qualities.
Why, in the name of hell, are you against them?
“a very vocal portion of your “movement” harasses critics for pointing to content they find politically unacceptable.”
I’d appreciate if you gave me some examples please, instead of being vague.
And it’s important to point out that the MAJORITY of the anti-GG side are outright silencing women and other minorities who support gamergate. That right there is far more horrible than a couple unsavory individual comments. Seriously, if you looked through the gamergate and notyourshield tags on twitter, there’s a massive amount of good people that support gamergate, from ALL walks of life.
“Criticism of any medium is, by nature, fairly subjective, outside of a very finite amount of technical details.”
I would agree with this statement if we were talking about opinion pieces, but we’re not. When we’re talking about reviewing media — be it TV, movies, books or video games — a certain amount of objectivity is mandatory. There ARE things that will determine whether a game is good or bad, and they’re not just subjective matters. Controls and general playability, for example — a game could have all the good story and amazing voice acting you could throw at it, but if it plays like Superman 64, no one’s going to care because it’s just so BAD to try and play.
Other elements are covered under this objective review stance as well, such as graphics: they weren’t as important in the early days of gaming because our capabilities were very low. Nowadays however, modern games are held to a certain standard when it comes to looking good. And it doesn’t have to be super-HD-megapolygon graphics, it can be sprite art too. But quality absolutely matters. To say that objectivity doesn’t matter is just asinine. We think objectively about many things in our lives, and media is no different.
“See, until people calling for “Journalistic Integrity” and all that other stuff can disassociate themselves from the idiots spewing vitriol, the sockpuppets claiming minority status, and all the other 4chan/reddit style hate, nobody in their right mind will lend the “movement” any credence.”
You’re generalizing again, associating every individual with this type of behavior. That’s dishonest and not conducive to discussion. And as I said before, to claim that all the minorities coming out in support of gamergate are “sock puppets” is just offensive. I’m gay, and I support gamergate. My brother is trans* and he supports them as well. To claim we — and all the other very real people — don’t exist, simply because we don’t fit your narrative, is a abhorrent thing for you to say. You and the others that hold this viewpoint are telling us that either we don’t exist, or we “don’t know what we want”. That’s FAR more damaging than a handful of misogynist comments from outliers.
You and the folks that hold your viewpoint are far more like the Westboro Baptist Church in my eyes, for holding the exclusive and silencing viewpoints you do.
TotalBiscuit? You mean the gross nerd and YOUTUBER eeeewwww?
Here’s my take on “Gamergate”:
Self-professed “social justice warrior” gets outed by jilted lover as a hypocrite and allegedly shitty human being; implications follow that her “success” may be (at least in part) due to nepotism. The integrity of game “journalism” is challenged.
Hypocrite and sympathizers alike are then trashed (via social media, oh noes) by all the usual trolls, which (conveniently) re-spins any reasonable discussion into a mortal battle between “progressive thinkers” and “misogynists”.
Aforementioned hypocrite (now martyrized) and her ilk capitalize on the drama and are above criticism (unless you’re part of the “patriarchy” and “anti-vagina”). Normal people shy away from the subject altogether due to its toxicity.
The bait was great! Nice post Dia.
I want to reply to your second post but this chat doesn’t let me.
You talk about the Anti-GamerGate people silencing other women and minorities but I think you should know that GamerGate has really only gone after women and minorities in this industry. I mentioned Mattie Brice in my last post, she’s a woman of color that GamerGate has pushed out of the industry when she was barely part of the conversation. She was not really in the mainstream or enthusiast press. The power comes from the top down but GamerGate is only fighting from the bottom up and going after the easiest targets who have have nothing to do with what’s going on. My own friends are thinking about leaving the industry because of GamerGate. They feel they have no place because they are attacked daily for opinions and ideas about the games they want to make. You want a new full on first person mech shooter that’s reminiscent to the PS2 days? Tough luck! That may not be happening now.
GamerGate are running out indies, they’re not talking about the terrible problems the industry does have. It’s all me, me, me.
Not Your Shield is the stupidest movement ever to prevent any sort of criticism on GamerGate. Feminism is self critical and they do this so everyone can be equal and they want everything to be inclusive. If they were not self critical then it probably would be a hate movement. GamerGate is not self critical about anything and just immediately attack everyone and comes off more like a hate movement. Not Your Shield is fighting inclusiveness and are on the wrong side of the debate.
No one ever said gamers were dead, learn some nuance and don’t deal in absolutes. Journalists want to grow and make editorials and other things that may not cater to the normal gamer but they still will make content that gamers will like on a daily basis. GamerGate doesn’t want things to grow, no, this is about maintaining the status quo.
This is a great speech from Alex Lifschitz, a AAA producer that shares some of the things Damion brought up in his article. http://youtu.be/HSNFZYvgVY4
The speech was done before GamerGate was even a thing.
All anyone can do is generalize GamerGate because the majority are doing this for different reasons than you are and nearly all of them for the wrong reasons. How does anyone separate the good people who associate with it when it was born from the most despicable lies? You’re associating yourself with conspiracy theorists who have no idea what they’re talking about, so any form meaningful discussion is thrown out the window. You’re associating yourself with extremists who have no idea how the industry operates and ignoring the real problems.
Look at Goodgamers(dot)US, this is GamerGate’s so called answer to games journalism and it’s just regurgitation of PR. They also try to be objective but can’t even pull it off, it just goes back to having subjective view points. It’s more meant to be a comfort a zone like back in the days of Nintendo Power. That’s not fixing ethical problems like this so called talk of corruption, it’s making it worse. You can’t have this both ways.
“Suddenly gamers are 100% male, 100% misogynist.”
Literally nobody has ever said this, except when building a straw man to tear down.
(1) Nope, I’m just talking about a different part of gamergate, that which insists that they are protecting the artistic expression of developers. I have opinions about the press as well (largely, you don’t know how good you have it right now if you don’t remember what the game media was 15 years ago), but that’s not what this article was about. I see the creative freedom angle OVER AND OVER again, with the four tweets above being just a subset.
(2) I’m disagreeing with those devs. We’re allowed to do that. Hell, my entire design team often gets into a room and disagrees over shit professionally 10 times before lunch, then we disagree on where to go for lunch.
(3) Here’s what happened. A whole bunch of nasty shit was written on 4Chan and Reddit about Anita and Zoe. A whole bunch of journalists said ‘whoa, this is really fucked up and toxic, it has to stop’. They wrote it, and their ideas fed off of each other, and the ‘gamers are dead’ narrative came out at the same time. Then everyone lost their shit because they assumed it was about them, and not about a handful of troglodytes on 4Chan and Reddit.
People now from #GamerGate are swearing up and down that it’s not about Zoe and Anita, and they’ve moved on. But Zoe and Anita are still facing constant harassment by this fringe. This is utterly not disputable. While this is going on, I care relatively little about your cause.
(4) I’ve also disavowed the shitty ‘Gamers are Dead’ narrative elsewhere, check my blog’s history.
(5) Here’s the thing. Polygon is just a website. Kotaku too. The Escapist as well. They get paid based on whether they have an audience – from advertising. If they kill their audiences (which may well happen as a result of GG), publishers will choose other places to make their marketing spend. Period. If you don’t like a news source’s angle on things, go to another.
(6) Websites pushing progressive or SJW points of view are not corrupt – at least because of that. It’s just another point of view. Every time I see this, I lose less respect for the people pushing this angle. Also, I happen to think that it’s good to have LOTS of points of view – and we get that. IGN, Polygon, Escapist, Gamespot, Gamasutra & Massively all have different brand identities, different audiences and different topics of importance. That’s not a bug, that’s a feature. If they all had the same stuff, they’d all be the same magazine, and probably only one or two would survive.
At any rate, I realize I’m minimizing the purported concerns of #Gamergate, but here’s the point – in my eyes, they are born from chaos and massively overblown. There are very, VERY real issues in the games press that merit discussion. As long as its attached to toxicity, most devs will opt to keep their distance, even if they want to take one side or the other.
See, the arrogant, condescending tone and misrepresentation of gamers in this drivel is exactly why gamergate exists. You may think your artistic freedom is fine. the artist at Larian who was asked to change the female armor doesn’t agree. Neither does Danial Vavra.
From Vavra’s post, it sounds like he wasn’t actually stifled, and made the game he wanted to make anyway. It’s just that when you crowdsource a project, you have to play the democracy game, which means having to field a whole lot of feedback.
If you play the democracy game, either you win or no one pays attention to you.
Who asked the artist at Larian to change the female armor? Gamers did; investors did. The gamer investors who backed the project on Kickstarter made that request. Artists are free to make whatever art they want, but when they are exchanging art for money, their art is necessary judged, filtered, and influenced by the buyers in that market.
Mr. Schubert, I’m very glad that you have not been pressured, that you have artistic freedom and that you are doing well in your job. However, there are many public examples like that of Paul Hubens a fellow developer, who *are* being harassed. What about Daniel Vavra, who has been openly attacked for being #Gamergate? (Though he told his attackers to take a hike). What about Wolf Wozniack? He was harassed by Zoe Quinn herself and when he went public with it, he was Savaged. No one reported it. The Escapist did not run a big article on his harassment as they did with Quinn. That’s a double standard. These are but two examples, many, many more can be given. Sadly some are anonymous, but with the public ones we do know about it lends more credence to those.
You say ‘no one is trying to take away your game’ and ‘it is an attempt to silence a different world view’. Both these statements are not true. I have met hundreds of people in #Gamergate who have no problem with, or indeed do, want more diversity in games. What we object to, is having a particular ideological agenda, shoved down our throats in an underhanded manner. From this article-
http://pastebin.com/LAmZNVKn This is an overview.
http://pastebin.com/X46rkJJu This is one of their meetings. If you speak Academese, the plans for the industry that you love are not good.
Which is about a DiGRA conference in which many influential people in the games industry attended, this was said-
“So yeah. Over on The Twitters we (as in yours truly, +Ian Miles Cheong, +Brendan Keogh, +Rowan Kaiser, +Mattie Brice and +Annie Dennisdóttir Wright) started discussing our various attempts to undermine the heteronormative hegemony. And now we continue it where we don’t have wordcaps.”
Undermine.
Not ‘introduce openly’, not even ‘educate’. Undermine. There is a lot of other evidence of this same kind of tactic being used. It is not honest, open nor ethical.
No one is trying to take away our games? Then what about this quote from the same conference-
“Adrienne: Why do we see such tension between academics and game designers? less of an issue with indies, but there are always some people in industry that have similar questions until industrial logic takes over later and how can we better intervene in industrial logics to disturb that process. How can academics bridge the gap to the industry audience to help them do different work? How can we disrupt the capitalist norms that facilitate this?”
*disrupt the capitalist norms* Essentially, attack game makers and disrupt their business. That does not sound like a change for the better.
Though many people were initially very angry at Quinn, it was because they thought she had used sex to gain favor for her game. Of course people were angry and said stupid things. However, discoveries were made about problems in the games industry and those of us, who are *most* Gamergaters, wanted to find the truth and in so doing, moved far beyond the issue with Quinn. Tell me, the academic proof I gave you above, is that invalidated because angry people were unfair in their treatment of Quin? And because the people who are corrupt are afraid of having more found out, THEY are the ones who continually try and bring her to the forefront of the problem.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Hollywood/2014/09/09/GamerGate-Why-Gaming-Journalists-Keep-Dragging-Zoe-Quinns-Sex-Life-into-the-Spotlight
Most of us have long since moved on.
Yet #notyourshield was specifically created because the media kept insisting that it was us CisMales who were Big Bad Ogres that hated women. When people of different Races/Genders/Orientations/Etc… came forward, the media immediately said they were lying. That it was a 4chan conspiracy. Then when huge amounts of videos and other proof of identity was offered, these people were called “Weaponized Minorities”, “Uncle Toms” or “Dupes”. The media’s behavior has been irrational, unfair and ill-researched.
Most Gamergaters that I know, just want open, ethical, honest Journalism where all biases and connections are revealed and yes indeed, so you can make your games based on your own understanding of the world. However, the “Other Side” does not see it that way-
“September 8, 2014
This is a culture war. The right side is winning, at great cost. At great personal costs to people like Anita Sarkeesian, Leigh Alexander, Zoe Quinn and even Jennifer Lawrence, and countless others who are on the frontlines of creating new worlds for women, for girls, for everyone who believes that stories matter and there are too many still untold. We are winning. We are winning because we are more resourceful, more compassionate, more culturally aware. We’re winning because we know what it’s like to fight through adversity, through shame and pain and constant reminders of our own worthlessness, and come up punching. We know we’re winning because the terrified rage of a million mouthbreathing manchild misogynists is thick as nerve gas in the air right now.
Us Social Justice Warriors – this is me, stealing that word in order to use it against my enemies- are winning the culture war by tearing up the rulebook, and there’s nothing the sad, mad little boys who hate women and queers and people of colour can do about it. Nothing, at least, that doesn’t sabotage their strategy, because they can win their game from day to day, but they’re losing the war. They can punish me for writing this, and I’m sure they will, but that will only prove my point. I’m not afraid anymore.
Every time they make an example of one of us, ten more stand up in outrage to hold her up or take her place.
We are stronger, smarter and more numerous than anyone imagined, and we are not to be fucked with.
Excerpt from WHY WE’RE WINNING: SOCIAL JUSTICE WARRIORS AND THE NEW CULTURE WAR by Laurie Penny (via femfreq)”
http://floerian.tumblr.com/
*I* don’t want to oppress anyone, the vast majority of people with #Gamergate do not. We WANT more neat ideas in the industry! But what we do not want is a Radical Political Agenda sneaked in and forced upon people. ‘Their Way or the Highway’.
I wish that you would please look into this with an open mind. Even though he is a conservative and most of us were suspicious, Milo Yianopolous has shockingly investigated it, not caring one way or the other as he had no interest in games and found that for the most part, we were right.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Hollywood/2014/09/09/An-open-letter-to-the-video-gaming-community-from-a-self-confessed-right-wing-bastard
And lastly, one of your peers, Brad Wardell, while not agreeing (perhaps because he is unaware of the conference info I sent you) with us fully, still agrees that there are Serious, Serious problems in the industry and in the Media’s portrayal of regular gamers-
http://www.littletinyfrogs.com/article/457616/Gamergate_and_the_RPS_response
Please go through this information and consider it carefully. Do not dismiss it because of the actions of a few childish people. We all want you to be able to work in a creative, stimulating, exciting environment. But there are people who only want ‘Their Way or the Highway’, and it is not us.
Thank you for your time,
Kyle
I’d like to remind you that Breitbart is an illegitimate source that not even Wikiepdia will use. I think that should say a lot about the sources you use.
Well Wikipedia isn’t exactly unbiased itself. Hell, they’re still pretending the issue is because “Gamers are misogynistic and Zoe Quinn is a victim.” Totally didn’t INVITE hatred by attacking wizardchan before, or y’know, using the casting couch to get publicity.
Despite the fact that it’s pretty much out in the open that Quinn and Sarkeesian are both professional victims that only used this entire fiasco to line their pockets. (See numerous twitter posts, Hell, go to #GamerGate and just read through for a good twenty minutes. I’m sure you’ll find more than a few screen-caps of their antics.)
Remember, those are the people that are denying the right to criticize. They’re disabling comments on their videos (that preach a bias heavy and manipulative view of the subject.) They’ve been doxxing us. Getting us fired. (See Ninouh90, creator of #NotYourShield) Their entire goal was to paint themselves as victims at the hands of the ever present patriarchy and misogyny that THEY painted gamers as. They’ve manipulated the reporting. They’ve ignored the facts, and they’re actively trying to destroy us. Hell, they tore Christian Hoff Summers to pieces because she didn’t fall in line with their “progressive” ideology. And she’s a feminist! The only difference being that she actually looked at the data, and didn’t jump on the “girl-power” bandwagon.
It isn’t misogynistic to enjoy a video game. Gaming has never been linked causatively to violence or sexism, directly the opposite of what AS has been preaching in her comment locked videos. (Remember, correlation does NOT equal causation.)
I’m a gamer. I’ve been one my entire life. Hell, I was practically born with an NES controller in my hand. I’m also an egalitarian. I think that in terms of human rights and social ability men and women are equivalent. Same for all races, non-binary genders, or martians for all I care. Men and women in my beliefs are equal. I don’t owe a woman anything based solely on her status as a woman, and neither does she owe me anything. I will not blame the culture for the actions of the individual. We take responsibility for our OWN actions, and no one else’s.
The sheer notion that the media talking about this issue insist on focusing on Anita Sarkeesian and Zoey Quinn as victims just perpetuates the idea that “women are under attack” and has been seeking to remove any responsibilty for this situation from them. ZQ is in hot water because she used sexual favors to garner media preference for her game (Unlike NUMEROUS other female developers that produced legitimate games.) Not to mention that she attempted to spin the death of Robin Williams to fund her game. The point is that ZQ is a professional victim and is using this entire “scandal” to try and dupe white knights, SJW’s, and other good, honest people into giving her money all in the name of “equality” that SHE doesn’t represent. There were many devs before, and there will hopefully be many AFTER her that create meaningful, high-quality experiences without abusing the benevolence of honest people.
Anita Sarkeesian on the other hand, is trying to spin a bias heavy understanding of gamer culture. One that paints women as victims of aggressive misogyny and sexism. Despite the fact, we in the gaming culture (or rather, my small circle.) have been trying to encourage more women to get into the medium. Meanwhile, AS is preaching something that would just do more to DISCOURAGE women from getting into the medium. She’s been linked to pyramid schemes, and her entire monetary exists is subsisting on encouraging the idea that “women are under attack.” Hell, she raised 160k to fund FemFreq, yet she’s only made two low-quality videos projecting a heavy bias and using footage STOLEN from various LetsPlays on Youtube. Does she really seem like the kind of person who maintains the educated understanding to present the idea of gaming to an outsider? At least Christina Summers actually looked at the culture with respect and did her own research.
I’m sorry if I’ve been a bit…antagonistic in my tone, but I have to get across that this is an open game of manipulation and abuse of the sentiments of the public to demonize a culture. It’s using the ideas of feminism to deflect a legitimate problem in the gaming sphere of journalism, and even in mainstream journalism. I’m not gonna just sit back and spout the party’s line about “Women are being disadvantaged” because that’s bullshit. Basic sociology says so. Inequality is widespread and nobody is immune to it.
Hell, tell me what side you’re on when our opposition “Anti-GamerGate” has literally started using the hashtag “KillAllNerds.” I’ll never admit to being perfect, but I don’t want my opposition killed, no matter how holier-than-thou or xenophobic their ideas are.
“Totally didn’t INVITE hatred by attacking wizardchan before, or y’know, using the casting couch to get publicity.”
Ah yes, the old “the victim had it coming” defense. Nothing wrong with that at all.
“Despite the fact that it’s pretty much out in the open that Quinn and Sarkeesian are both professional victims that only used this entire fiasco to line their pockets.”
In the minds of the conspiracy-minded, sure. There has been absolutely no concrete evidence to support this (and no, the ramblings in the #GG tag don’t count). As opposed to Milo and CHS, who ARE getting into it for their own benefits.
“Remember, those are the people that are denying the right to criticize.”
A.) No they haven’t. B.) There is no such right. I can ban you from my forums for whatever. I can disable comments on my video for whatever. You are free to make your own site/blog/video criticizing mine, but that does not mean I need to let you stand on my front yard and yell in my windows.
“They’ve been doxxing us. Getting us fired.”
Evidence plz. Considering some of GG’s most fervent supporters come from false-flag central /pol/, what evidence do you have that this is from the anti-GG crowd? Who has been fired over supporting GG (and not, say, for being blatantly hateful)?
Meanwhile, GG has been ACTUALLY threatening peoples’ livelihood with doxxing and trying to get writers fired (see: Jenn Frank, Nathan Grayson, all of Polygon).
“Hell, they tore Christian Hoff Summers to pieces because she didn’t fall in line with their “progressive” ideology. And she’s a feminist! The only difference being that she actually looked at the data, and didn’t jump on the “girl-power” bandwagon.”
A.) CHS is not a feminist. She’s a right-wing mouthpiece who claims to be a feminist because it’s always good to have someone who claims your “rival” political label agreeing with your viewpoints. Politically speaking, she’s much closer to the MRA camp than the feminist one. It’s like if you call yourself a libertarian but then only speak about the benefits of a centrally planned economy.
B.) Her “data” was completely irrelevant to her video. The question she tried to answer was “are video games sexist,” and all her data was irrelevant stuff about the genders of the players. She also, whether accidentally or intentionally, misconstrues almost all of the arguments being made by Anita et al.
more to come.
“It isn’t misogynistic to enjoy a video game. Gaming has never been linked causatively to violence or sexism, directly the opposite of what AS has been preaching in her comment locked videos. (Remember, correlation does NOT equal causation.)”
Nobody has said it is. Anita has never even made the claim you’re arguing here, that gaming causes violence/sexism. She explicitly begins every video by saying it is not wrong to enjoy these games, just that it’s important to be aware of their problematic elements. You, like CHS, are either misunderstanding Anita’s arguments or deliberately misconstruing them.
“I’m a gamer. I’ve been one my entire life. Hell, I was practically born with an NES controller in my hand.”
Great, me too.
” I’m also an egalitarian. I think that in terms of human rights and social ability men and women are equivalent. Same for all races, non-binary genders, or martians for all I care. Men and women in my beliefs are equal. I don’t owe a woman anything based solely on her status as a woman, and neither does she owe me anything. I will not blame the culture for the actions of the individual. We take responsibility for our OWN actions, and no one else’s.”
Egalitarians, aka people who want cookies for being “pro equality” but don’t want to do the hard work or face the reality that equality might mean losing their own privileges.
No, you don’t owe a woman anything for her being a woman, but that does not give you the right to ignore the fact that there are many, many obstacles women face that men do not; it does not give you the right to ignore that society treats masculinity and “maleness” as much more valuable than femininity.
“The sheer notion that the media talking about this issue insist on focusing on Anita Sarkeesian and Zoey Quinn as victims just perpetuates the idea that “women are under attack”
If you don’t want AS and ZQ to be seen as victims, maybe they shouldn’t have been victimized by widespread harassment that caused at least one of them to call the FBI. Which, by the way, has been proven.
“Q is in hot water because she used sexual favors to garner media preference for her game (Unlike NUMEROUS other female developers that produced legitimate games.) Not to mention that she attempted to spin the death of Robin Williams to fund her game. ”
She did neither of those things. Only one of the ‘five guys’ was a journalist, and he never wrote about her game. And if you actually read the goddamn Depression Quest post and come away thinking “totally abusing Robin Williams’ death here for her own profit” you must be illiterate. The launch had been scheduled ahead of time, a massive event relevant to the game’s subject happened, she addressed it in the news post. Pretty simple.
“The point is that ZQ is a professional victim”
*game developer.
“Anita Sarkeesian on the other hand, is trying to spin a bias heavy understanding of gamer culture. One that paints women as victims of aggressive misogyny and sexism”
No, she’s calling out misogyny and sexism in games and gamer culture that already exists.
“Despite the fact, we in the gaming culture (or rather, my small circle.) have been trying to encourage more women to get into the medium. Meanwhile, AS is preaching something that would just do more to DISCOURAGE women from getting into the medium. ”
Yes, because raising awareness of problems so that they can be solved is way better than not talking about them whatsoever. Do you blame the doctor who tells you that you have the flu for making you sick, too?
“Hell, she raised 160k to fund FemFreq, yet she’s only made two low-quality videos projecting a heavy bias and using footage STOLEN from various LetsPlays on Youtube. Does she really seem like the kind of person who maintains the educated understanding to present the idea of gaming to an outsider? At least Christina Summers actually looked at the culture with respect and did her own research.”
This is blatantly false. She’s done what, five videos now? All almost half an hour long?
Anita Sarkeesian’s videos have been ten times as informative and intellectual as CHS’ drivel. Quoting statistics doesn’t automatically mean you win, if the statistics don’t actually help your argument.
” I’m not gonna just sit back and spout the party’s line about “Women are being disadvantaged” because that’s bullshit. Basic sociology says so. Inequality is widespread and nobody is immune to it.”
Women are disadvantaged compared to men. Blacks are disadvantaged compared to white people. Gays are disadvantaged compared to straights. Did you even TAKE basic sociology?
“Hell, tell me what side you’re on when our opposition “Anti-GamerGate” has literally started using the hashtag “KillAllNerds.” I’ll never admit to being perfect, but I don’t want my opposition killed, no matter how holier-than-thou or xenophobic their ideas are.”
Do you understand the concept of sarcasm?
This post resumes exactly why Gamergate is a gigantic clusterfuck of rambling.
Thanks for resuming it in a few paragraph.
More Marxism Bullshit. An artist or developer should not have to change or “reconsider” his view point on his art work.
Some don’t give a shit about your “criticism” and that is something that #gamergate stands for.
We have received plenty of support from anondev outlets telling us to keep going and fight the fight. Believe all you want, but I wont be joining the think thank.
#gamergate will keep on going strong…and it going to succeed because they have the truth to back them up. And you and all these Marxism and Evangelist practices should fear them…be scared…because they are going to take the industry back to where it belongs.
In the consumers hands.
“An artist or developer should not have to change or “reconsider” his view point on his art work.”
Why not? Do you believe that creative people who work for a living don’t ever compromise or take direction?
Why don’t you trust artists and developers with their own art? We can handle criticism and incorporate feedback just fine.
A white supremacist should not have to change or “reconsider” his view point on race.
It’s true. He’s entirely free to keeping spouting whatever drivel he wants.
But when society moves on and leaves his bullshit behind, his complaints that nobody is listening anymore mean exactly nothing.
Also, as an addition to my other reply which I’m assuming you’ve either yet to read or have ignored…
There’s a reason why YOU don’t have a reason to be worried about the media outing YOU and stifling YOUR creative freedom, and that’s because most of *your* ideologies fit in line with the loud, radical detractors in games media. Not to mention the fact that you’re part of a massive studio that has great lawyers, PR agents, and so on.
What about people like Varva, or Jaffe, or even the other loads of small-time folks, some of whom we might never even hear about because they don’t toe the line like you? Devs who have openly spoken up in support of Gamergate, who have come out to the community, literally telling us that this IS a prevailing problem in games media? Is THEIR creative freedom not important, or is it just not important to you because you have yours intact?
We’ve actually SEEN cases where people are shamed out of the industry, or shamed into changing things away from their initial vision, for not conforming. Here’s some extra reading for you, as an example of this problem. http://orogion.deviantart.com/journal/Save-the-Boob-plate-380891149
And I do implore you to actually read through my other comment in its entirety, because there are lots of finer details that you’ve glossed over in your main post, not to mention some misrepresentation of the movement.
I’ll restate one of my points from there, though: This isn’t JUST about creative freedom. Not even primarily, for that matter. It’s about integrity — the quality which most of the mainstream games media is sorely lacking. The worst part about this is that there is NO opportunity for open discussion from the sites involved; they respond to criticism with a snarky news post, or another article talking about how shitty all gamers are. And then they close down the comment sections of every one of those articles, so no one has an opportunity to make any kind of reasoned argument. You can’t sit there and tell me that this disgusting amount of misrepresentation and censorship on their part is right.
Of course not. They’re not doing it because they think they’re right. They’re not proving that we’re “neckbeard misogynerds” by silencing gamers. They’re afraid of what we’ll say, because they know they’re wrong.
You did a fine job of summarizing most if not all of the problems that #gamergate is trying to solve. Just wanted to mention that.
Shhh. Shhh, it’s okay. It’s okay. Shhh.
What a load! In one comment, you say this isn’t about protecting the expression of devs, and in the next breath you go on to talk about the devs who need to be protected! Your main comment does get at the heart of what is going on with GamerGate. It isn’t about protect devs. It isn’t about integrity in games journalism. It is about massaging the egos of “gamers” who are afraid people are forming negative opinions about them based on the games they play, and the people they are most afraid of are the games journalists they always felt like had their backs in the past.
It’s not about protecting big-name devs, as I clearly stated. Their positions are fairly cemented in the industry and aren’t going to change. Please don’t twist my words again. 🙂
Dia, thank you for responding to Zenofdesign’s arguments with ARGUMENT instead of vitriol/namecalling. I am very interested to see zeonofdesign’s rebuttal.
“The worst part about this is that there is NO opportunity for open discussion from the sites involved; they respond to criticism with a snarky news post, or another article talking about how shitty all gamers are. And then they close down the comment sections of every one of those articles, so no one has an opportunity to make any kind of reasoned argument. You can’t sit there and tell me that this disgusting amount of misrepresentation and censorship on their part is right.
Of course not. They’re not doing it because they think they’re right. They’re not proving that we’re “neckbeard misogynerds” by silencing gamers. They’re afraid of what we’ll say, because they know they’re wrong.”
So in the end, there should just always be a comment section, or some other easy/convenient way for absolutely anyone to make comments?
Did you see PewDiePie’s video about how useful he thinks comments are? Do you know that often, it’s someone’s job to moderate user comments?
Do you have your own blog to make these points?
“So in the end, there should just always be a comment section, or some other easy/convenient way for absolutely anyone to make comments?”
It’s not about ease or convenience, it’s about fairness. These articles basically put all gamers everywhere on the hotseat and call them all sorts of terrible things, but don’t give any chance to respond to the faulty allegations.
“Do you have your own blog to make these points?”
I don’t blog, because most blogging is toxic by nature and allows very little opportunity for real discussion. I prefer venues where individuals can actually respond to baseless accusations and offer legitimate criticism. Having a blog with a comment section isn’t so bad, though.
And to address your other comment: “So, there’s no misogyny going on here, and no one’s being harassed?”
I never actually said that, did I? What I said was that the movement (Gamergate) is about rooting out corruption and collusion in games media, and that still holds true.
Now, ARE there individuals who have taken things too far? Of course, that’s been happening on both sides. But to call foul of a group just because of a few dingbats is inane and unfair.
If people actually looked through social media like twitter and saw all the positive, inclusive and supportive things going on in the gamergate and notyourshield tags, they might better understand what it is we’re trying to accomplish. Compare that to the anti-GG side, where the *majority* of the statements made are generalizations about how horrible gamers are, and how anyone that supports gamergate who isn’t a heterosexual white male is either a sock puppet account (i.e. fake) or has “internalized misogyny/racism”.
Seriously, go look at “that side”. They claim to support women and other minority groups in gaming, but every time a women or other marginalized minority comes out in support of gamergate, suddenly they don’t exist, or they “don’t really know what they want”. THAT right there — the claim that these people can’t speak for themselves and should just be silent while the “noble” anti-GG people fight for them — is more horrible than a handful of misogynist comments.
*Woman
And they’ve done this to me, specifically. I’m gay, and I support gamergate. As I stated in another comment, my brother is trans* and he supports it as well.
We don’t want you assholes speaking for us. That’s the whole point of the #notyourshield movement. Don’t hide behind us because your argument has no legs.
You really should just go get your own blog if you want to have your own voice in the matter.
That link you posted makes me sad. Often when I discuss this issue with other gamers, the design change for Divinity: Original Sin is pointed to as an example of game devs responding to the concerns of their fans. Every other article and forum thread I can find on the topic of the altered armor suggests that the changes came in response to concerns of Kickstarter backers, which is not an unreasonable thing to do when you rely directly on your fans for funding the creation process. Many other aspects of the game were altered based on Kickstarter feedback, as well.
It seems like what you (and, apparently, the artist for Divinity) see as an organized feminist campaign, I see as fans expressing the desire for the games they play to acknowledge them as players. This exact process of game devs responding to fan feedback plays out with every aspect of games, from combat to inventory, but it’s only seen as infringing on “artistic integrity” in cases like this.
This is what confuses me about the attitude that you and this artist have–that you see feminism as some outside force that is descending on game devs to force them to change. When it is largely–and has always been–nothing more than the voices of gamers who happen to also be female. We buy the games too. Game devs make the choice to listen or not listen to our feedback, just as they make the choice to listen or not listen to any of their fan feedback.
Actually, I never claimed that this was “organized feminist campaign” at all. After all, I *am* a feminist, but I don’t subscribe to this new-age third wave version where everything is sexism and everyone’s a victim and needs to be protected, because that actually kills MY OWN agency.
But that’s neither here nor there. The article I linked was maybe not the best example, and I’m sure I could drum up more, given time. But on social media and other non-shill games media sites (something like gamesnosh or techraptor perhaps), there are developers coming out in support of gamergate, saying there IS something rotten in mainstream games journalism and how they use their sites to push their agendas.
This isn’t about gender, this isn’t even about social justice. At its core, as I said above, gamergate is about wanting transparency and integrity in games media, across the board. And them not shitting on legitimate dissenting voices would be nice too.
“But that’s neither here nor there. The article I linked was maybe not the best example, and I’m sure I could drum up more, given time. But on social media and other non-shill games media sites (something like gamesnosh or techraptor perhaps), there are developers coming out in support of gamergate, saying there IS something rotten in mainstream games journalism and how they use their sites to push their agendas.
This isn’t about gender, this isn’t even about social justice. At its core, as I said above, gamergate is about wanting transparency and integrity in games media, across the board. And them not shitting on legitimate dissenting voices would be nice too.”
See, I think that is an important conversation to have, but that is not the conversation I see happening with #gamergate. I think corporate meddling has much more influence on games journalism than so-called social justice warriors ever will.
“I think that is an important conversation to have, but that is not the conversation I see happening with #gamergate.”
Then you haven’t been looking hard enough. Every day, I and untold numbers of other gamergate supporters have said time and time again that this discussion is about JOURNALISM and INTEGRITY. It’s certain folks on the anti-GG side that keep dragging things back into the “gender war” narrative.
I mean for shit’s sake, I’m a gal, and I’m not stupid. I know this isn’t a gender war, it’s a battle to fight journalistic corruption.
I look through the #gamergate tag and mostly see vague references to fighting “SJWs.” If this is really about journalism, then at best it’s misguided and going after the wrong villain.
(1) Wait, what’s my ideology? I’m pro-boobplate. I think that the devs that make Call of Duty should focus on men, and doubt seriously that people who make soap operas spend a lot of time how to reach women. I fought to get the widest possible arrays of Bikinis in Star Wars the Old Republic. I’m a vociferous defender of Penny Arcade, and was throughout Dickwolvesgate. And I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve sent out Escapist, Kotaku or Polygon stories to my coworkers with some variant of “Hey, can you BELIEVE THIS SHIT?” Clearly, CLEARLY, I am an SJW android. Or alternatively, I’m capable of free thought and value free speech.
(2) I can’t help it if some developers are too candy-assed to be able to defend their point of view, or shrug off idiots who want to try to put black people in their icelandic historical simulator. I can tell you that most developers have had NO PROBLEM WHATSOEVER continuing to get boobplate and violence into their games, given that our AAA landscape still has oodles of it. If your fans don’t listen, who gives a fuck?
(3) I find the Divinity thing to be a red herring. Maybe I didn’t look hard enough, but I found ZERO reports in the press complaining about the concept art. I found PLENTY of comments on message boards complaining about it. And so the artist complains that his boss, who is responsible for being sure that his crowdsourced money results in the team getting paychecks, pressured him into making it more palatable to that crowd. So fucking what. I’ve had bosses tell artists to both increase boob size and decrease them. I’ve been the guy who has demanded outfits become more protective looking, and also the guy who demands that outfits look skimpier. I’ve made countless changes to games I don’t agree with based on what seems like utter bullshit. This is called ‘working in the games industry’.
(4) I can talk about integrity other time, but clearly that aspect of #gamergate was not the topic of this post. I can tell you that it is Standard Operating Procedure in the games industry, both devs and press, to ban, delete and close threads when a thread becomes too toxic. Go onto the WoW forums and call someone a cuntburger, see how long your account lasts. There are plenty of places in the industry to have unmitigated discussions, 4chan and reddit among them.
“4) I can talk about integrity other time, but clearly that aspect of #gamergate was not the topic of this post. I can tell you that it is Standard Operating Procedure in the games industry, both devs and press, to ban, delete and close threads when a thread becomes too toxic. Go onto the WoW forums and call someone a cuntburger, see how long your account lasts. There are plenty of places in the industry to have unmitigated discussions, 4chan and reddit among them.”
No, it clearly wasn’t the topic of this post; what we’ve been trying to say is that it should’ve been. You keep answering the wrong question. You keep debating that which is not for debate. Everyone I’ve ever seen in the #GG movement has been against the harassment of Quinn and Sarkeesian, the calls have always been to make them irrelevant in this. Because they are, TO THIS TOPIC. The topic of integrity and transparency in journalism!
Look at this comments section, it has people discussing. So, it CAN be done, huh? The problem is that we’re discussing the wrong things. The thing is… We’ve already agreed.
(1) #GamerGate agrees hat harassment is wrong and foul and should be handled with a maximum of harshness.
(2) The “SJWs” (a term I hate) would agree that ethical journalism is a positive thing, if they ever got around to seeing past their party line.
WE’VE ALREADY AGREED.
As for moderation:
It seems a bit ironic that, for the most part, these opinion pieces in the gaming press seem to want to foster discussion, and then stifle it – not when it becomes toxic, as you put it – but rather when it simply starts tilting in opposition to the website’s social agendas. That is the kind of censorship these sites employ; and we’ve seen it full-force this past month. And if you venture into The Escapist’s forums, you’ll see lengthy, opinionated and even heated discussion, that manages to not spiral out of control. I’ll be honest, this isn’t a big point for me, personally, as you’ve said it, thee are plenty of places to discuss such things. Although, you should note that at the onset of the current campaign, even those were being unfairly censored.
As an aside, the WoW forums have badword filtering, so nothing would happen to the account in question. The word would simply be censored 😛
“Everyone I’ve ever seen in the #GG movement has been against the harassment of Quinn and Sarkeesian”
Then you are clearly not seeing the same subset of people in the #GG movement that Damion and I see.
To add to this: the first time I engaged with someone from GG in a real capacity, they called me a “retarded cunt” and told me to kill myself. Certainly this isn’t indicative of all people in this argument but it affected my initial impression considerably.
People are here now to tell Mr. Schubert what he should be talking about. During a piece about people fearing the censorship of developers. There’s a very strange double standard in that. “You’re not talking about what we want you to be talking about” is the basic tenure of many responses.
I get it. Those folks feel misrepresented. But Mr. Schubert’s comments are informed by the feedback he’s received from people supporting that GamerGate cause. Like it or not, the tag isn’t just being used to talk integrity. I never was. From the start, the discussion has been tainted.
Hey there, since you talk about #GamerGate I will respond to your points.
1. Then many of you devs are simply flat out wrong and need to start look at the facts. The poisonous tree was the barriage of anti-gamer articles the 28th of august saying “gamers are over gamers are dead and games should not be about fun”. Before that it was the attepts to censor the internet and having Matthews video DMCA:d
2. Wrong, they absolutely are trying to take away our games. However that is just semantics. They are trying to control the content of the games at industry level which is the exact same thing as replacing the games we like with games THEY think we should have. When gamers hated this idea media published 10 articles with the message if gamers dont like it the industry need to replace them as well.
Gamers response was #GamerGate, SJW tried accusing gamers of being just angry white boys and then you got #notyourshield where minority gamers responded. Some even having to prove this with pictures.
3. We are not silencing these people, they are trying to silence us. We have our culture: Its called “Gamer culture” (which is a part of nerd culture). They have their culture it is called “Academia culture” and “Media culture”. Academia and media are non-gamers. They share their own values. Not the values of gamers. Stop pretend this is new exciting stuff. This is games media getting the same old crap that alredy was everywhere else.
4. Clearly devs like you cant defend yourself against these media people. For example you yourself have been tricked by the exposure Anita Sarkeesian got by media. Yes she got 160.000 dollars but you are still wrong. The amount does not debunk the idea only the fringe of GAMING is interested in her message. Media people themeselves said the vast majority of gamers hated the message. It clearly was NON-GAMERS giving money to Sarkeesian and mostly because she was victim and a woman. It doesnt have shit to do with gaming.
Also we already know there is a blacklist. How the heck can you people argue you are free while under threat of blacklist?
5. Judging from your comment about the money Sarkeesian got you dont even know who the fans are. You cant listen to the fans cause you devs clearly dont even know the difference between listening to fans and listentin to whowever has money and power regardless of their interest being celebrity, media, academia or actual GAMES. If they are mainly media, they are fans of media, not of games. We dont care how much money NON-GAMERS throw at other NON-GAMERS and neither should you devs do cause they are not the ones paying YOUR work.
6. Yes Television and Movies have media criticism, however we do not talk about TV or Movies, we talk about videogames – not the same thing. You are simply talking about the values NON-GAMERS have. Things that GAMERS are not interested in. Simply put. The SJW_media people want games to be much more similar to Television and movies. The vast majority of gamers who pay for gaming dont want this change at all and we WILL boycott the media sites who try to force it down our throats.
Controversy sells is no excuse. Even failed attempts to push the agenda ARE attempts to push the agenda. Even failed attempts to paint gamers in bad light ARE attempts to paint gamers in bad light. Failing with the goal is no excuse for the action.
7. That is just your pride and ego speaking. The fact is that you are already self-censoring. You already have a blacklist. You already have dev people who only can talk anonymous cause their bosses are afraid of the people with the media power. I dont know who you are but let me tell you something. Compared to Dragon Age 1, Dragon Age 2 is crap, absolute crap and that means every single person who played Dragon Age 1 can see how you make worse games cause you are listeing more and more to people who not only are idiots, they are also clearly NON-GAMERS.
Try listeing to gamers for a change. I know they dont have 160.000 dollars each but together they generate significantly more than AS does. Also she doesnt even buy your games. She just uses other peoples “lets play” videos. She is not your customer. Gamers are!
Which games do you play?
Have you made any games you’d like someone else to play?
Do you believe TV and movies don’t get accused of sexism or racism?
Do you think criticism is a form of censorship?
“You are simply talking about the values NON-GAMERS have. Things that GAMERS are not interested in. Simply put. The SJW_media people want games to be much more similar to Television and movies. The vast majority of gamers who pay for gaming dont want this change at all and we WILL boycott the media sites who try to force it down our throats.”
You do not speak for all gamers. There are many of us who want to see changes in the culture of video games, and we still buy and play games. You can enjoy a medium and still engage in criticism of it.
The anti-gamer articles came about entirely because of the online lynch mob that threw itself at Zoe and Anita. Zoe and Anita are STILL under a ridiculous level of scrutiny and abuse. It’s fucking absurd to pretend otherwise.
As for the rest of your post, you’re the one saying that these people who play games but NOT LIKE YOU are NOT REAL GAMERS and SHOULD BE SILENCED. Real games aren’t going anywhere. Relax.
But the “lynch mob” derived from their dealings with the press that allowed them personal gains. It was NOT ever about them being women. This all came about mainly because AS has done nothing but bad mouth gamers as 13 year old misogynist and ZQ was found out to be sleeping with people that helped her game win awards. Women have been in the gaming business forever, why only now are these two receiving shit? Think about it
AS does not badmouth gamers. She catalogs trends in games regarding women. Complaints about ZQ have largely been disproven.
At any rate, both have had a river of shit rain down on them that is fucking massively out of scale with anything they said or did.
http://www.wikihow.com/Stop-Taking-Things-Personally
You have no idea what you’re talking about, Dia. Censorship is when a government forces someone to cease expressing herself. When a website shuts off comments that’s called community moderation and guess what – you can just go to another site or, *le gasp* start your own and start being part of your “solution” rather than whining that the world doesn’t cater solely to you.
You say we’ve seen cases where game devs were pressured into doing things. Gosh, you mean like how the gamergate idiot-mob pressured Phil Fish? Or are you referring to the internal pressures Damion references above? (It is a rare game that doesn’t have many stakeholders today.) Or are you talking about the market pressures to which all game devs that develop commercially ate subject?
I’m left wondering what dream world you live in where game devs make the games they want to make rather than the games that management believes will sell? And how exactly a bunch of almost powerless games journalists even cones close to stacking up against that commercial pressure?
Nevermind though, right? Why listen to those of us who actually make games when you can wallow in ignorance and scream a lot about how you’re doing this to help devs.
It’s very telling how no one has responded to any of my points WITHOUT engaging in ad homimem attacks yet.
You claim to speak for me and other minorities and yet here you are, doing nothing but insulting me. This is yet again the reason I will always support gamergate. Even at its lowest moment, gamergate was NEVER as sexist, misogynistic or racist as the anti-gamergate folks have been to me and other minorities who simply want to have our voices heard on these issues.
Dia, this was your first post on this site:
“Another kneejerk post from someone who clearly doesn’t understand the situation. I’m disappointed in you for this rant, and for being so blatantly dishonest about the whole situation.”
Did you mean this not to be insulting to Damion?
It’s up to Damion if he wants to take offense, but I would certainly consider this to be dismissive, and “blatantly dishonest” implies that the purpose of this blog is so Damion can lie to people, instead of presenting an opinion.
How about addressing Mihaly’s points? How do you think games get made?
I’d just like to say to Dia, who posted above, that he or she left a very powerful argument. Very convincing.
Thanks.
It doesn’t want to seem to allow excessive direct replying, so I’m answering here. Sarkeesian and Quinn ring a bell with you? If you think that rape and death threats are appropriate “opinions” to hold about their opinion, then we’re done here, because you actually make me sick.
You point to anti-GamerGate people “silencing” minorities. In what world do I do that? I even let sock puppets pretend to have an opinion, although I deride the people who would pretend to be minorities, which there IS evidence of.
You say you need to be objective when reviewing games, but you’re ignoring the fact that a truly objective review tells you basically nothing. “It runs on XP and newer Windows OS, up to 1920×1080 Resolution, and is in the genre known as ‘MMO’.”
You seriously can’t do more than benchmark it on hardware, tell people what genre it is, and provide observations that do essentially nothing to help people formulate an opinion without providing an opinion of your own.
You’re mistaking “detachment” for “objectivity”, and I’d contend that anyone who can provide a truly detached review can’t speak properly to fans anyways.
When you say I called “all” minorities in favor of GamerGate sockpuppets, you blatantly lie about my words. I left open the distinct possibility it’s a vocal minority, but if you honestly believe there’s zero, you’re either delusional, or one yourself.
In either of those cases, you’re not worth trying to persuade, so have fun convincing yourself you’re doing the right thing. (Both Sock Puppets and Delusional people are very good at this, so either option works well.)
Any evidence to back that assertion up? As far as I can tell, they claim to have been subjected to such harassment, but the only records I’ve seen of that are from some suspciously timed screen grab, you know the one where there was no search in the search field and was taken a few seconds after the last threat.
Botton line here is that Anita is a professional troll that’s been slamming men as a profession for years now. Zoe, herself isn’t any better, there’s ample evidence of a series incestuous relationships with people that were judging her or in the press at large.
As far as rape threats and death threats, I keep seeing people like you claiming that the GG people are horrible people that are standing up for people making threats, but oddly enough, I see far more people making the assertion than actually making the threat and in most cases those “threats” are pretty tame. Especially considering that Anita and Zoe are clearly trolling and being paid to do so.
I’m not a fan of Anita’s videos, but I think she has more purpose to her commentary than antagonism. If you thought antagonism was the only reason she ever had to make a video, then I understand why you would call her a troll.
If you’re asserting that the two women you cite have not actually been harassed at all, and no criminal action was taken by anyone, then good luck with that statement, because “the other side is saying nastier things” really doesn’t hold water.
When it’s a whole lot of people generally angry about a great morass of things, specific and otherwise, and the trigger is less than a few months old, any accusations about this or that side or generalization about people on the other side of the Internet is not going to be productive. If you genuinely take offense to being “lumped” by people who don’t know you personally, all I can say is sorry, this is the Internet. Either you back up your own words with responsible deeds and identity, or you have no cache with anyone. Those are the only two choices.
I’m saying that it’s weak to deliberately antagonize people and then try and pretend to be a victim. Yes, people shouldn’t be threatening to rape and kill, but let’s not pretend like they haven’t been profitting off those threats and deliberately fanning the flames either. Both of them have been deliberately stirring the pot and making money directly off the resulting chaos.
So, you’ll excuse me for being skeptical that they’re really afraid for their lives. Anita in particular inserted herself into the GG firestorm on purpose. Nobody was targetting her or even mentioning her until she inserterd herself.
Zoe was out of the crosshairs and has been putting a lot of effort into getting back into the limelight for reasons I can’t fathom.
I have a really hard time buying the notion that they’re deliberately putting themselves into the crossfire if they’re that scared.
John, if that is your real name, you have no credibility here. There’s ample reason to question the validity and the motives of Zoe and Anita, they both were out and have sought to profit from the chaos.
“Yes, people shouldn’t be threatening to rape and kill, but let’s not pretend like they haven’t been profitting off those threats and deliberately fanning the flames either. ”
I will acknowledge that being a firebrand has been part of Anita’s agenda from the very beginning, and saying provocative things is part of that. But no one asks to be threatened with bodily harm, so that’s a non-starter with me.
Also, I don’t think she’s making that much money anyway. She’s an academic. She’s got lots of notoriety and one successful crowdsourced campaign, sure.
“I have a really hard time buying the notion that they’re deliberately putting themselves into the crossfire if they’re that scared.”
They have every reason to be scared, and I believe they are. But being brave is about facing what scares you and declaring that you aren’t going to be ruled by your fears. I think Anita and Zoe are brave.
“John, if that is your real name, you have no credibility here.”
OK.
Click on almost any tweet by Anita and you see the harassment. In fact, that is what I have been doing for the past week–clicking on each of her tweets as she posts them, and seeing how many replies are insults and harassment. They are constant and easy to see.
“Sarkeesian and Quinn ring a bell with you?”
The legitimacy of those claims has been dubious as best. No doubt they’ve faced some harassment, but after Anita lied about making a police report (proven, btw), and re-distributed child porn instead of reporting it and NOT retweeting it, I can’t just take her statements at face value anymore. “Trust but verify.”
“If you think that rape and death threats are appropriate “opinions” to hold about their opinion”
No one ever said they were, and if you would actually calm down and look at the movement, you’ll see an overwhelming majority of pro-gamergate people denouncing these actions. We don’t support harassment or threats like the ones you described, but legitimate criticism of their viewpoints are NOT harassment.
” I even let sock puppets pretend to have an opinion”
Oh well I’m so glad that you allow us lil folk to do that, massuh. May I have some watuh please?
Seriously, look at your statements. Because I have a different opinion, I’m a “sock puppet”? I bet you’d claim a person of color was a sock puppet too because they don’t fit in with your shitty narrative. There are people who made sockpuppet accounts to add more minority voices to the gamergate side of things, but the number is so infinitesimally small that it’s not a cause for generalizing ALL of us real minorities. And again, we on the pro-gamergate side of things DO call these people out. We don’t want fake or token support, that only hurts the cause.
“You say you need to be objective when reviewing games”
I said that a CERTAIN AMOUNT OF OBJECTIVITY is required, and that IS true. Please don’t go misrepresenting me again like you’ve been doing the whole time.
“When you say I called “all” minorities in favor of GamerGate sockpuppets, you blatantly lie about my words.”
Actually, you’re twisting MY words yet again. What I said was that calling all minority supporters of gamergate “sock puppets” is offensive and a million times worse than a small handful of “misogynist” comments.
“I left open the distinct possibility it’s a vocal minority,”
You actually didn’t, your statement was VERY general and telling of your attitude.
“if you honestly believe there’s zero [sockpuppets]”
I never said that, did I? Again with the misrepresentation. Jeez, you’re far more guilty of this than I am. Again, I said that decrying all minority voices as sockpuppets is just plain disrespectful. There ARE people on the anti-GG side of the argument who do believe that people like I and my brother, and many other minorities, don’t exist. They keep pushing this “gamergate supporters are all hetero white male misogynists” rhetoric, and it’s horribly dishonest and offensive. These people can’t POSSIBLY IMAGINE why people like me are sick of their bullshit and are sick of being used as their shield or poster child. The anti-gamergate side is FAR more exclusive, racist and misogynist than gamergate EVER was even in its worst moments.
Don’t claim to speak for us and then shut us down, telling us we don’t exist or that we have “internalized racism/misogyny”. I don’t want people like you speaking for me. I have my OWN voice, with my OWN opinions, and I’m not alone.
If you didn’t want to get lumped in with 4chan sock puppets, why would you continue to use #notyourshield after it was adequately revealed to have its origins in sock puppetry?
I don’t know anything about you other than what you claim. You’re not even using a name. That’s your prerogative. But if you want a voice, you really ought to have the strength of character to back it up with more than personae. That’s the best remedy to what seems to bother you about people taking what you say you believe out of context.
This is Damion’s blog. If your reasons for not having a blog is because blogs get toxic, then you are abdicating your own responsibility to speak for yourself. If you want to speak alone, then stand up and be counted.
Or don’t.
“If you didn’t want to get lumped in with 4chan sock puppets, why would you continue to use #notyourshield after it was adequately revealed to have its origins in sock puppetry?”
This actually isn’t true. The #notyourshield tag was started by a black gamer in response to some anti-GG folks using minorities as a podium for their discussions. The only thing 4chan ever did was comment that the hashtag was doing well, they didn’t even know who the fuck made it at first. The man who started it came forward and went back through his own history to show that it was him, not 4chan, that made the tag.
You’re probably speaking about those PUBLIC IRC CHAT LOGS where specific responses were cherry-picked to fit the anti-GG narrative. If you actually viewed them in their entirety, you would see that they were misrepresented, as usual. And the full logs are public too, so there’s no excuse!
“You’re not even using a name. That’s your prerogative.”
Damn right it is, because I’ve already been harassed and derided on twitter by ant-gamergate folks for supporting the movement. I’ve been called a “woman-hating faggot” and “queerbro” by the very people who claim to supposedly have MY best interests at heart. So excuse me if I continue to push for support of gamergate and notyourshield, because the other side is far more racist, sexist and hateful than gamergate EVER has been.
“But if you want a voice, you really ought to have the strength of character to back it up with more than personae.”
Nein, Herr Kommissar, I will not show you my papers. And if you don’t mind, tell the Führer as well.
I and many other minority voices will not stand by and be used as stepping stones for the anti-GG people. They claim that us asking for proof of harassment and pointing out glaring lies is “hateful”, and then they turn around and demand that WE prove our identity, as you just did.
You really think we want to give out that kind of information? Fuck no, because most of the anti-GG crowd will take our personal information and run with it. Just look at the ZQ/Anita supporters who JUST THE OTHER DAY doxxed and harassed a transgender teen. Not to mention the death threats made against a 12-year old boy for speaking up and saying that their behavior was not okay. And then the anti-GG folks had the AUDACITY to claim that THOSE death threats were not credible. I suppose it’s only credible when it happens to your precious statues, isn’t it?
“The #notyourshield tag was started by a black gamer in response to some anti-GG folks using minorities as a podium for their discussions. The only thing 4chan ever did was comment that the hashtag was doing well, they didn’t even know who the fuck made it at first.”
Citation?
It has since been proven that Anita Sarkeesian is actually dealing with the FBI, yet people continue to pass around that false story about her not contacting the police.
Sadly, pointing this out is a losing battle.
People STILL believe Zoe Quinn slept with a journalist for reviews, even though every party involved – including the ex-boyfriend – say this isn’t true, and alleged review is yet to be unearthed.
It will come up again and again ad nauseum, a handy little soundbyte. The detractors are like a dog with a bone, they don’t care about the truth, only what will best smear the ‘enemy’.
The only way they can look good is to make everyone else look worse.
Re: Anita faking it. Not proven:
https://plus.google.com/app/basic/stream/z12lzzpzjzbnwhn2w22gefcbxsftcp0cr?cbp=14pypk8i93iy3&sview=27&cid=5&soc-app=115&soc-platform=1&spath=/app/basic/%2BDavidHillJr/posts&sparm=cbp%3D6dkhqz3m8pu9%26sview%3D1%26cid%3D5%26soc-app%3D115%26soc-platform%3D1%26spath%3D/app/basic/stream/z13fftyjopfahdvz504cdldh0zr1j52o12w
I assume you’re going to apologize to her now.
So to summarize, Dia comes with actual arguments, you imply he’s delusional, that he makes you sick, and then bring up horrible horrible people and scream rape threats. Did Dia give rape and death threats to these two people you suddenly brought into the conversation? Do you have any proof of that? If they were given rape and death threats, by some other people, not actually part of this discussion, does that make them immune from basic standards of conduct? If these people were given death and rape threats, by people not currently present in this discussion, does that make you immune to criticism?
If people holding another viewpoint than you makes you sick, maybe you should not engage others in conversation. If the only way you can conduct discourse is by insulting people, then consider your own attitude.
Is it the fact that Dia is not agreeing with you that makes you sick, or is it the fact that he’s gay?
Are you a homophobe?
Is being implied to be a homophobe pleasant? What about when you imply other people are delusional and tell them they make you sick. Is that an okay debate tactic with you? Assume others are horrible people?
Are you worth trying to persuade?
Did Dia ever say that you make him sick?
But you don’t have to listen to me. I’m probably a delusional sock puppet who defends rape threats. You can see this by all the rape threats I have defended in this post.
“or is it the fact that he’s gay?”
I’m a she! D:
But see, I don’t hate you for this because I do the same thing. ♥
Magnus: “If people holding another viewpoint than you makes you sick, maybe you should not engage others in conversation. If the only way you can conduct discourse is by insulting people, then consider your own attitude.”
If you direct that to Damion, I’d point out that it’s his blog. If you want to take offense, you should outright tell him that he’s being offensive.
If you meant someone else, then my advice is not to bang the “you don’t have to listen to me” drum too hard. Either your words have weight or they don’t.
You should take your own advice, apart from the SJW crowd, nobody’s taking you seriously.
The history of Zoe and Anita is well documented, but you seem to think that there’s this vast conspiracy of people who are forcing them to continually post more inflammatory things to stir up a response.
If they’d stop posting things about this, I’m sure people would lose interest before too long.
Anita has no credibility with anybody lacking a uterus. She’s a third-wave feminist and a man hater. If you’re not familiar with her work, I’d recommend looking at it. It’s poorly researched “feminist” cliche that appeals only to people who don’t have any exposure to actual feminism.
“Anita has no credibility with anybody lacking a uterus.”
I don’t think that’s true.
“She’s a third-wave feminist and a man hater.”
I don’t think she says she hates men.
“It’s poorly researched “feminist” cliche that appeals only to people who don’t have any exposure to actual feminism.”
Feminism ought to mean, equal pay for equal work, equal protection under the law, and equal opportunity. But a feminist point of view can also be used as a mental exercise to show how male and female gender roles are treated differently in media.
Such as, voiceless bikini girls being used by Mike’s Hard Lemonade to suggest that their drink is OK for guys to drink. In a commercial where only the guys speak.
There are messages that guys will get, and there are messages that “girls” will get. Anita made a video pointing that out. I didn’t particularly like the suggestion that I’m uncouth, but I had no problem with her pointing it out.
If you disagree with that or any other video she’s made, that’s fine. But if you’re implying that she deserves threats of harm because she makes videos people don’t have to watch, or disagrees with your notion about what feminism is, then we have a problem.
(Again, I’m not actually a fan of Anita’s. I just didn’t rage so hard about her existing.)
Oh…you work for BioWare, champion SJW developer. That explains everything.
This fevered and recent hysteria to discover MISOGYNY!!!1! in any and every place one can possibly infer it is truly and utterly nonsensical, and you all know it. It’s much easier to stamp people with a big red M, while simultaneously harassing the very people you claim are harassers (and on a much larger scale I might add, as “we” aren’t in cahoots with The New Yorker, Kotaku, Polygon etc. who seem to be running the same article) and walk away than to bother with a discussion or research or skepticism or any kind of rational thought at all, really. Cowardly, lazy, unintellectual and illogical.
Does a misogynist float when you throw them in the water?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yp_l5ntikaU
But that isn’t what this is really about, is it? Boogie, the Youtube personality, has explicitly stated on his Tumblr that he has been “warned” to stop supporting #gamergate by other industry people.
So we get it, you want to stay in the good graces of your peers. That’s fine, but if you are going to drink the Kool-Aid, kindly don’t start a “conversation” you never meant to have in the first place.
OK, what did you want to talk about?
What do you want to change, and what form should that change take?
If you’re talking about this post, Boogie said it wasn’t just “industry people” who provided him that advice. It was his friends and peers. It’s his choice, but we also know who he is, because his personae are known.
http://boogie2988.tumblr.com/post/97472605118/about-that-big-internet-drama-involving-gamers
Who are you, again?
Who I am, as your childish question snarkily implies, is of no importance. People are being banned and silenced all across the internet simply for not supporting certain people and their pushy ideologies:
http://imgur.com/a/fTKFH
If this is the kind of behavior you are the champion of, I urge you to read a history book to see what other kinds of groups used such subversive and underhanded tactics, and then get back to me about who is “being harassed”.
Sites have an authority defined in their terms of use about what commentary they will allow. This is nothing new at all.
I support free speech, and robust moderation. Those only seem contradictory to those who have never had to moderate an open forum on the Internet.
If you have a problem with The Verge’s policies on moderation, they’re the one you should complain to.
Haha. Was that the best you could come up with? Well, it furthers my point I suppose.
Apparently, you’ve never had to manage a message board before when an issue has gone batshit crazy.
Thank you posting this, i suggest all game devs banding and making it a public statement, this grow up to be a mess, because big gaming websites and developers tried to sweep this issue under the rug, and pretend it never happened
They really are adorable, aren’t they?
@John Henderson, RE: “You really should just go get your own blog if you want to have your own voice in the matter.”
Are you saying my voice doesn’t matter because it’s not in a blog? Or are you saying that it would be more widely received?
As I pointed out before, blogs by nature are toxic to real discussion. You can’t have the same kind of back and forth debate you can have at the pulpit, or even on a public forum, where everyone has an equal voice.
With a blog the owner is its dictator. THEY decide how the discussion progresses. THEY decide which comments to allow or to delete. In the case of sites like tumblr, they can even BLOCK OUT dissenting opinions if they just want to shove their fingers in their ears like little children.
So no, I won’t make a blog because it would hamper true debate. And I commend Damion for letting these comments stand where they are. Because even though he hasn’t bothered to respond to real criticism, he hasn’t taken the stance of censorship and gagging to push an agenda.
I’m pointing out that your voice being unique and not being lumped in with others, as you have stated, matters to you. By abdicating the channel, that being, posting on other parts of the Internet that you don’t control, you’re giving up control over your own voice.
Having a blog would solve that. You should get a blog. Your reasoning reads thin to me, and you sound remarkably dismissive about the nature of moderation on the Internet. Dissent is not the only reason someone moderates someone else’s comments.
If you had a blog, you would understand that better. You should get a blog.
“Dissent is not the only reason someone moderates someone else’s comments”
No, but in this particular movement, censorship has been used almost exclusively to shut down any criticism of the lack of integrity in games journalism. Any voice that says “hey, this isn’t right, you can’t put us all in a hat” is silenced and marginalized.
Forgive the cliché, but… When you tear out someone’s tongue, you’re not proving them a liar. You’re only telling the world you fear what they may say.
“Forgive the cliché, but… When you tear out someone’s tongue, you’re not proving them a liar. You’re only telling the world you fear what they may say.”
Except that as this exchange proves, there is no way to tear out someone’s tongue. But you can compare them to Nazis (as you did me) and rail (and I don’t use that term lightly) that you’re being marginalized about what you supposedly believe.
Do you particularly care what anyone else believes? If so, why?
“Except that as this exchange proves, there is no way to tear out someone’s tongue.”
This exchange no, because it’s open and public. But I’m speaking about the games media sites who actively censor dissenting opinions, or shut down comments entirely, no matter how valid our gripes are about their lack of journalistic integrity.
“Do you particularly care what anyone else believes? If so, why?”
I care when people on your side of the argument claim I’m nothing but a cis white misogynerd sock puppet, when in reality I’m a woman with my OWN voice who can speak for herself.
Dia, I don’t know anything about you other than you hold fast to the idea that there are two sides to #gamergate and that it’s very important to have a particular side.
I disagree. I care when people are being threatened and harassed with bodily harm and denial of their livelihoods over a position they take about something ultimately without much consequence, that being what video games people like to play.
If you’re offended, then you should take offense and rise above the noise to make your point. But if the objective is to change something that you think is wrong, then eventually, someone is going to have to own up to what they said.
Anita and Zoe did. Look what happened to them. Why would anyone want to express an opinion and put their name to it, ever again?
I’m engaging in 3 flamewars in 3 different locations, so sorry for not responding immediately.
I disagree strongly that blogs are toxic to real discussion. I’m finding that the real toxicity is in sites like Twitter, 4chan & Reddit, where brevity is valued (and sometimes enforced). People oversimplify issues for the medium, and things devolve quickly into bullshit talking points (on both sides).
As for ‘commending me’ for letting things stand, I assure you, you’re one of the lucky ones. About a third of the comments I deleted, because they didn’t further the debate and devolved into direct attacks. I’m unapologetic about that. One of the responsibilities of any online culture is managing the culture you want to foster.
One’s right to free speech does not mean that another free citizen has to hand you the microphone.
I apologize for taking this out of context, but this is frankly baffling to me.
“You can’t have the same kind of back and forth debate you can have at the pulpit, or even on a public forum, where everyone has an equal voice.”
Have you ever been to a city council meeting? What pulpits have you been privy to, where debate happens between the speaker and the audience? This is not my experience at all.
“Have you ever been to a city council meeting?”
Quite a few, in fact.
And you’re taking this horribly out of context. I was using pulpit in the metaphorical sense. Though my point still stands: even a presidential debate is a discussion between two people.
A blog is a one-sided rant, where the user talks AT their audience like children, not TO them like adults.
“A blog is a one-sided rant, where the user talks AT their audience like children, not TO them like adults.”
So what’s the alternative? Comments threads? What on the Internet other than a real-time discussion medium like IRC is available?
In a presidential debate, we know quite a lot about all the people involved, and each takes a political risk saying anything at all. Most importantly, they must take responsibility for being the person who says what they say.
I’ve been to city council meetings before, too! But you don’t have anything other than my word to back that up.
“So what’s the alternative? Comments threads? What on the Internet other than a real-time discussion medium like IRC is available?”
IRC is great. Comment threads are also great, much like what we’re doing now. It allows for back-and-forth communication of ideas and opinions, and doesn’t give one side an opportunity to shut out the other. It’s great!
“In a presidential debate, we know quite a lot about all the people involved, and each takes a political risk saying anything at all. Most importantly, they must take responsibility for being the person who says what they say.”
This is true, but people have also put their social lives and reputations on the line by supporting gamergate. There ARE people who attach their names and faces to these discussions and I applaud them for it, because the other side is oftentimes disgusting, and we need good, powerful voices to speak out against the derision.
Do you think Anita Sarkeesian is a powerful voice?
I still don’t know anything about you, but I want to respect your humanity, except that I have no reason to believe anything you say is true. If you think this was a valuable exchange, then that’s fine, but I only started posting here because you came swinging out of the gate based on an implied side of #gamergate and declared that everything Damion said was invalid, and the REAL argument was about something else entirely.
You’re entitled to your opinion. The ones who really have put their identities on the line are the ones whose positions matter to me.
Look, us pro-#GG people have to understand what we look like from the outside. If we’re going to convince anyone that our claims have merit, we’re going to have to accept that the burden of proof is on us.
Anti-#GG people, if we split up the hashtag, we lose all visibility. In the Internet age, visibility and credibility are basically the same. If we purged our allies for lack of ideological purity, we would never have the force we need to actually make this something worth commenting on.
I know many of you think that because this all started with a dev’s dirty laundry list, nothing good can come of it. We don’t have a choice–splitting the hashtag dooms us.
That we can’t call out the shady journalism practice of promoting games of people you are friends with without disclosure without being slandered is why we’re sticking together under this tag.
Nowhere else would evidence of Patricia Hernandez’ biased press in favor of Anna Anthropy be taken seriously because criticizing a woman in this industry = misogyny now. http://www.gamerheadlines.com/2014/08/polygon-and-kotaku-scalded-over-further-undisclosed-conflict-of-interest-articles/
So I’m just going to post a few links which I will ask you to read that give timelines of events and if you want to go further or not, that’s cool.
Taylor Whaley’s timeline of events within #GamerGate
http://cdn.knightlab.com/libs/timeline/latest/embed/index.html?source=0AluMP_VX-eehdFV1X2JxQXNzZ3gzaE45VG85WDl3R0E
jwcaine’s timeline that examines the claims of 4chan origin
https://medium.com/@cainejw/a-narrative-of-gamergate-and-examination-of-claims-of-collusion-with-4chan-5cf6c1a52a60
Origin of #NotYourShield :https://twitter.com/hashtag/notyourshield appears on Sep 2 by user @Ninouh90
We’re doing everything we can to call out harassment, shame trolls, and keep things on the up and up. If we move hashtags, the bad people will just follow us.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOoJuRYIRjM this guy gets slandered by trolls for supporting gamer gate. I’d have more evidence to show the symmetry of bad people and harassment, but it looks like gamergateharassment.tumblr.com has been replaced by an ad for body building stuff (I’d laugh, but…).
What does GamerGate want? It wants stuff like The Escapist’s revised ethics policy.
The movement is varied politically, socially, economically, racially; which is what NYS was about (erasing us as all hetero cis white males so our arguments can be dismissed by privilege alone–[what kind of logic is that?]).
I don’t like tribalism, I don’t like us vs. them mentalities. I just want a press that takes itself seriously enough to admit its biases so we as consumers of media can trust what they say.
Criticism is not censorship. Censorship of criticism is censorship. I am all for critiques of games on all axes of interpretation. But when you can’t critique a critic without getting demonized (not criticized, but demonized), it doesn’t feel at all like fair play.
What happened with The Fine Young Capitalists was basically a boycott-by-libel regarding their (progressive and inclusive) trans policy which was misconstrued. This is why 4chan funded them.
http://apgnation.com/archives/2014/09/09/6977/truth-gaming-interview-fine-young-capitalists
I really wish this could go forward without shitslinging, but all we can do is make the most of the momentum we have.
For me personally, I define a game as “an activity which gives the player entretainement within a set of rules & direct action by the player”
yeah I don’t approve “videro gamos are art” except when they are still fun, for example, an artistic game would be The Company of Myself, because it feeds thought and is still fun
I don’t know what to say after this part, possibly examples of artistic non-games masquerading as games, but I only remember one and I don’t know it’s name
This can be summed into a single statement: literally, this is nothing more than a bunch of straw-mans made by another hypocrite. You want some change? Be it.
There is nothing critique about Anita Sarkeezian’s video series. It’s just misanthropism powdered up and packaged in a bright-red box. There are real feminists, and there are real feminist critiques about video games, but Anita Sarkeezian & Zoey Quinn are not the feminists you’re looking for, assuming you’re sincerely in support of feminism and not in support of misanthropy.
Nevermind that Zoey Quinn never designed a game (and hell with that 2400 list of so-called ‘game creators’? if more than half of them even remotely qualify as game creators, then just with my game design document alone I already qualify as a game developer), and never mind that Anita Sarkeezian never has been a gamer. Nevermind that you’re requesting us to believe proven liars.
But hey, if you want to destroy your own credibility and the credibility of Feminism. If you’re really a misogynist in disguise, well do support AS/ZQ and keep doing what you do best. Because by continuing to claim such opinions as actual critique, the only thing you’re doing is making yourself a self-righteous obliviated misogynist like the privileged white male you are so far.
Who the hell talks like that?
Reads like someone tried to drunk-text the contents of a thesaurus.
When you start a debate with “the end justifies the means” method, as Sarkesian is doing, you deserve that artists and others go away of your “crusade”, now you can apologize and try to “explain” better your “intentions” point by point… ha!
But the point is that even if the supposed intention was good, path to hell is full of good intentions, there are several strong poisons in your agenda, poisons as fear of sexuality, something I dont consider mature, more coming from societies that get more scared from “Hannah Montana becomes a bad girl” than people own guns all over, a society that gets scared from a tit accidentally goes out on TV, a society that also tried to comdemn videogames violence, meanwhile looks to other place with their real street violence ratio…
And you tried other countries to get you as an example? of what? and example of “Oh my God the Children! are looking this or that” meanwhile you care more about TV or Videogame content that about what is really happening in the world?
You are kidding… with people like Sarkesian? That considers that Western Games like Red Dead Redepmtion are sexist? So in her opinion probably we should change prostitutes in “Taxi Driver” movie for “Women Scientists” right? What about when men are stupid in movies or videogames? There are many examples, it is this offensive? Sarkesian even dared to blame Bioshock, she even cared about the promotion of a feminine figure as Ayn Rand, a philosopher, a thinker, a WOMAN, that Bioshock did?
In fact you people in the top of these you didnt pay a shit about any activism… These are the seeds of a very awful marketing campaign to open this videogame market to the more than necessery to have company grow ratios every year, femenine pockets, because many of you cannot beat the big one companies, because you need to expand your marketshare to women, you have new products for them. This happened in the past, you got the “woman smoking” thing as a “women´s liberation” as the best example ever… you people are pushing this to open the market, and you are being awful, mischiveous, greedy, manipulative and liars… so, it is strange that some people dont want to join your “crusade”?
Good for them, you deserve it.
I just want to commend Damion for not only tolerating this tragicomedy of a comment thread on his personal web site, but even taking the time to engage with his detractors.
http://www.littletinyfrogs.com/article/457741/GamerGatethe_free_ride_is_over
… the bulk of the “anti-#GamerGate” crowd, are perfectly comfortable with harassment and abuse as long as it’s the right people doing the harassment and abuse: Themselves…
Clearly, Anita and Zoe are merely faking it and/or asking for it.
Not unlike real rape ‘victims’, ya know.
One thing to note about the mass of shit they get is that for some person it’s actually the leverage they got for their messages is swinging both ways. So their message reaching thousands of people means that for every single message people recieve as being idotic, they’ll most likely get dozens of idotic answers.
Conflating mean things said on teh interwebs (even alleged death threats) with ‘real’ rape is shamefully cavalier, if not outright insulting. Honestly, Damion, you might as well relay to a Holocaust survivor being called a “poopy head” on Twitter is akin to a night in Auschwitz.
Secondly, can we stop behaving as though rape victimization is gender-exclusive? Kinda getting tired of feminists bandying it about as though they have a monopoly on it.
Statistically, women are more likely to get raped then men. In related news, the sky is blue.
You should have ended the post with #NotYourShield. Good stuff.
Drinking game
Go through the comments, and take a shot every time that, after someone asks a specific question which demands a clear answer, or makes a point with explicit evidence to contradict GG rhetoric, the thread mysteriously ends with no further replies from ‘Dia’. even though they were actively responding both before and after it was posted. You should be wasted by the time you get back here.
For whats its worth I do see as a issue that has many different viewpoints. Trying to ignore that isnt going to make them go away.
We need to start dealing with them so some resolution can come with this.
Too much fingerpointing will keep making this thing go worse.
Trying to make it a one side story did not go very well did it?
Right. That’s why you see a rush of people charging off to engage with GGers and tell them how right they are.
Wait. Hasn’t happened. Isn’t going to happen, either.
Why would a journalist seek to engage with people whose response to a well-known and famous gaming personality saying “GG scares me,” is to promptly justify her fear?
Here’s the funny thing: Journalists *do* have ethics. And the ethics of GG’s loudest voices are utterly repulsive. You’ll see discussions of GG as a social phenomenon, as an uprising, as a political backlash, yes — but equal airtime and consideration of viewpoints?
Talk to Milo. You know, the guy who wrote screed after screed declaring that gamers were immature children directly responsible for the pussification of America until he found GG and realized he could use it to boost his own star power.
Do you know what it’s called when someone doesn’t want to listen to you and asked you to stop bothering them, but you keep trying to force them to listen to you anyway?
It’s called harassment.
Journalists and developers don’t owe you their time. They shut down GG threads on their forums because those threads were filled with harassment, invasion of privacy, misogyny, trolling, and stupidity. Of course they’re going to shut that crap down–why should they pay the server bills and spend valuable employee time moderating threads filled with offensive, potentially criminal nonsense?
The rest of us don’t owe you our time. We know that GG started with misogyny and harassment. That’s all I need to know. I’m not obligated to give you a chance to redeem your stupid hashtag–if you want people to take you seriously and start listening to what you have to say, drop the hashtag of that disgusting hate campaign.
The GamerGate solution to threats is “ignore the trolls”. When
the fuck did we start to consider violent threats “trolling”. Trolling is making offensive, disingenuous arguments just to piss people off. Using #notyourshield as a shield is trolling. Asking “Can we play games now?” when you are the biggest distraction from games that gaming has seen since Columbine is trolling. Making donations “to cure butthurt” is trolling. If ignoring the trolls worked then GamerGate would have gone away long ago.
Consumatopia,
That’s why I drew a distinction between “ignoring” and “shunning.” Ignoring implies that someone is still in the room, still making noise, still disrupting things.
Shunning means you’re locked out of the building.
The gaming press talked about GG again, briefly, in the context of explicit damnation. And that’s been about it. That’s how it’s going to be. By some estimates maybe that’s paying attention and by some it isn’t, but there’s not going to be any calm exchange of views on this.