Couldn't find a thread on this, so: http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkai...look-at-the-controversy-sweeping-video-games/
#GamerGate
Any thoughts?
#GamerGate
Any thoughts?
#GamerGate
- Thread starter Liosse de Velishaf
- Start date
I saw a video of this a couple weeks back. It was a half-hour whinefest that I just couldn't give a damn about. Maybe this got more complicated since then but at the time, it was simple. Someone wanted to get back at their ex who slept on them by posting in some lame manifesto or whatever that listed the exploits. Unsubstantiated would be something close to what the claims skirted so I never bothered with it.
This is the perfect time for that Dark Knight Joker "And Here We Go" Gif, since I have a feeling this is gonna get intense, to put it mildly, if we have any devoted, enthusiastic gamers on here.
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I haven't been touching GamerGate with a 10 foot touching pole, because the whole thing is just...really ugly.
I guess this is our indication that video games have hit the mainstream? They now officially have enough drama that people who don't play games are supposed to care who's fucking whom?
(I play games, but I don't care, gamers or not)
(I play games, but I don't care, gamers or not)
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I think there's some interesting stuff, if only because it really points to the level of dysfunctionality within the whole video game journalism scene. Right now, I'd say most video game journalism has less in common with journalism, and more in common with being PR for the major game publishers.
The Zoe Quinn issue as I understand it is merely the tip of the iceberg. It's moved on to some reasonable arguments about disclosing possible conflicts of interest into a huge flamewar between feminists who comment on gaming culture and a population of gamers who don't like feminists commenting on some issues in gaming culture. Including some apparently faked death threats?
It's sort of hard to find the truth under all the invective-hurling. I was kind of hoping the very intelligent folks here at AW could help me figure it out.
Part of it is very similar to the gender discussions/debates/arguments/flamewars that the spec fic and scpetic communities had in the last few years.
It's sort of hard to find the truth under all the invective-hurling. I was kind of hoping the very intelligent folks here at AW could help me figure it out.
Part of it is very similar to the gender discussions/debates/arguments/flamewars that the spec fic and scpetic communities had in the last few years.
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[ETA: Trigger warning for some of the posts on WHTM, include the ones linked to below.]
We Hunted the Mammoth has a series of posts on the lousiness that is 'GamerGate'.
You can find them here.
Here's the first of them: Do you still think that #GamerGate is a spontaneous movement against industry corruption? Zoe Quinn has some screenshots to show you.
We Hunted the Mammoth has a series of posts on the lousiness that is 'GamerGate'.
You can find them here.
Here's the first of them: Do you still think that #GamerGate is a spontaneous movement against industry corruption? Zoe Quinn has some screenshots to show you.
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The actual timeline of events doesn't support Quinn's conclusions from those screencaps. Most notably, it shows that the #NotYourShield tag predates any mention in the chat.
After all, Quinn's screencaps in context tell a completely different story. Long story short, she portrayed the more extreme people as being representative of the group as a whole while in reality those people were being condemned or ignored by others, and by taking chunks of posts out of context made it look like others were agreeing with those people.
After all, Quinn's screencaps in context tell a completely different story. Long story short, she portrayed the more extreme people as being representative of the group as a whole while in reality those people were being condemned or ignored by others, and by taking chunks of posts out of context made it look like others were agreeing with those people.
If I didn't know anything about an issue that both sides were equally strident and passionate about, I'd assume the side issuing rape threats were the wrong ones.
+2 because, even if they're not the wrong ones...they're the wrong ones.
That assumption would require two further assumptions, though:
a.) That everyone on one side is making threats, or that those who are making threats automatically negate the rationally-expressed opinions of many people.
b.) That only people on one side have displayed rotten behaviour.
No it wouldn't. It would just mean that the side issuing rape threats is not the right side unless and until those threats are repudiated. Because rape threats.
How about this. She isn't interested in him anymore, time for him to pull up his big boy pants, shut up, grow up, and MOVE ON.
If a woman were to do this she'd be called a crazy, stalking, psycho bitch and it wouldn't be any wonder why he left.
If a woman were to do this she'd be called a crazy, stalking, psycho bitch and it wouldn't be any wonder why he left.
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That's a good way to win, then. Pretend you're on the opposite "side" and make a rape threat.
From what I can glean, there are a lot of "sides" involved in all of this. Few seem to be giving a good accounting of themselves.
From what I can glean, there are a lot of "sides" involved in all of this. Few seem to be giving a good accounting of themselves.
I hate #GamerGate, but what's really bothering me -- looking at this thread -- is that Zoe Quinn is a video game developer. A talented one. And yet look how often she's just "an ex". 
This was a petty, vengeful act by a talented game developer's ex-boyfriend. And god, I hate how much of the focus on on the jilted ex instead of the lady in the centre of all of this.
This was a petty, vengeful act by a talented game developer's ex-boyfriend. And god, I hate how much of the focus on on the jilted ex instead of the lady in the centre of all of this.
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This almost exactly mirrors a claim made about moderate muslims in terrorism discussions.
And it yields the same response: You don't know that they haven't.
Well - you do, because moderate muslims do repudiate terrorist actions. Including terrorist actions carried out by faux-Islamic islamicists.
so - yes. That's my point.
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Sorry, but no.
The problem is, such repudiation is held to varying standards. Some say they do it--repudiate terrorist actions--enough, some say they don't even come close. What's the standard here?
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What you have not heard may or may not exist. That was my point. People still make that accusation of moderate muslims. So *you* may know in that instance.
In this case? Maybe they have, but they haven't made you a witness to it. You don't know. And, okay, neither do I.
It's not up to gamers in general to repudiate the rape threats. It's the little shits involved in GamerGate that need to repudiate it.