#GAMERGATE: The Threadening [Read the OP] -- #StopGamerGate2014

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Firestorm said:
https://twitter.com/femfreq/status/522625684099710976

Front page of New York Times. GamerGate has damaged the word gamer beyond repair.
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Gamers. We done fucked up. Changing the nature of the culture can only be a good thing. I hope this changes something and more people join in or come back instead of the worst case scenario where people just see the medium as worthless. It's been sad to see some people be proud that their kids don't play games Twitter.
 
Good.
I hope the article is both illuminating and galvanizing for people who want inclusion and safety from harassment.
 
gaboumafou said:
Still, I once heard a game producer use this exact reasoning to explain why he was against hiring women.
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I can't help but think this is far from the norm, thus sounds like the coach in Mean Girls taking everyone not to have sex because they'll get pregnant and sure.

jim-jam bongs said:
Am I the only person who gets put off when people use the noun form of "female" in these discussions? Why is it always "a female" or "females"? It makes it sound like some kind of animal on a nature documentary.
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Maybe it's a regional thing, but I've used the nouns "male" and "female" for as long as I can remember, and I can think of many other portions that do as well. I'm trying to think of why that is and what I use to determine whether to use man/woman or male/female, I use both, but I couldn't tell you, just a long time speech pattern.


Devolution said:
Makes more sense if people keep their pairs together what ever they are. When it's men and females it's just what.
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Can't imagine why someone would do that, just sounds so awkward.

ShockingAlberto said:
There's likely no consensus on this, just have to get a feel for the situation and/or whatever the person you're talking to prefers. I know some people that just hate being called "girls," they feel it's demeaning when you wouldn't call a man "boy." Some don't care. Some women are against being grouped in mixed-genders as "guys" like "Hey, guys, wanna go eat?"

I don't think it's possible to never make a mistake when addressing genders, just be contrite if someone has preferences.
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My preference is just to call everyone guy or dude (don't ask me why the word is stuck with someone who can barely call themselves a 90s kid (born 1994)), and thankfully I haven't ran into problems except from randos on Tumblr that find my blog thorough chains of reblogs, sho I don't usually care about them. I like to imagine that if my word choice bothered someone in real life I'd make an effort to use their preferred term, but it's never really come up.

But seriously, does this spark dude actually know how pregnancy works? If his only exposure to it is southern sex ed I guess I could give him a pass. Even in South Florida my sex ed was little more than watching the Miracle of Life, seeing pictures of penises with various STIs, being Todd that abstinence is the way to go so you don't get STIs, and that lamb skin condoms do Jack shit.

Thank God I had the internet.
 
chaobreaker said:
Same. But on the other hand, it's easy way to detect if the guy who wrote it has a problem with women. Like a dog whistle term.
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How is saying "female" any more derogatory than woman?

Honestly, I use them interchangably depending on which of the two sounds better for a given sentence. I don't really think about it because it's completely unimportant in the greater scheme of things.
 
Pastry said:
This is most likely the article that will be on the NYT front page: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/10/1...-threats-anita-sarkeesian.html?_r=0&referrer=

It blows my mind that there are people that #GG is actually about ethics. Anyone that thinks #GG will somehow help gamers is clueless, this is setting the hobby back years.
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At this point I don't even know what #GG is about anymore. It's like Occupy Wall Street. Whatever idea or purpose they had is completely lost.

I am seeing more & more people I know become victims of #GG. A friend of mine - who is a professional cosplayer - received a death threat today on FB. All she did was post about a comic strip run by a group of women.
 
Firestorm said:
https://twitter.com/femfreq/status/522625684099710976

Front page of New York Times. GamerGate has damaged the word gamer beyond repair.
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Just showed up to post this very same thing. That's for sharing, Firestorm.

We all remember Leigh Alexander's description of gamers:

It’s young men queuing with plush mushroom hats and backpacks and jutting promo poster rolls. Queuing passionately for hours, at events around the world, to see the things that marketers want them to see. To find out whether they should buy things or not. They don’t know how to dress or behave. Television cameras pan across these listless queues, and often catch the expressions of people who don’t quite know why they themselves are standing there.
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That is all everyone outside of gaming will thing of us now.
 
Yokai said:
How is saying "female" any more derogatory than woman?

Honestly, I use them interchangably depending on which of the two sounds better for a given sentence. I don't really think about it because it's completely unimportant in the greater scheme of things.
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It's not inherently derogatory but I found that people online who use "females" in place of "women" have a history of misogynistic tendencies. I browse reddit a lot and seen it being used my red pillers, MRAs, and the like. To me it sounds like a way to dehumanize the opposite sex, like how Devolution demonstrated a couple of posts ago.
 
Anjin M said:
Just showed up to post this very same thing. That's for sharing, Firestorm.

We all remember Leigh Alexander's description of gamers:



That is all everyone outside of gaming will thing of us now.
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Leigh's article was about how that stereotype is dated and useless going forward, though there are still crummy people who live up to it and even cling to certain parts of it. She wasn't saying ALL PEOPLE WHO PLAY VIDEO GAMES ARE THIS.

NYT aren't going to condemn everyone who plays games, they're going to condemn the fuckers who think they need to "defend" their hobby by making death threats and harassing people.
 
Yokai said:
How is saying "female" any more derogatory than woman?

Honestly, I use them interchangably depending on which of the two sounds better for a given sentence. I don't really think about it because it's completely unimportant in the greater scheme of things.
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Its just common with a certain type of misogynist attitude. "Female" is more often used by zoologists to describe animals than by normal people to describe women, so there is this subtext of implying women are controlled by base or biological impulse (irrational) or being beneath the stature or intelligence of a man, and these same guys don't call men "males" in the same way.
 
Orayn said:
Leigh's article was about how that stereotype is dated and useless going forward, though there are still crummy people who live up to it and even cling to certain parts of it. She wasn't saying ALL PEOPLE WHO PLAY VIDEO GAMES ARE THIS.

NYT aren't going to condemn everyone who plays games, they're going to condemn the fuckers who think they need to "defend" their hobby by making death threats and harassing people.
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Of course she isn't. But that's what GG wants to fight. And they are screwing up badly.
 
LaserBuddha said:
Its just common with a certain type of misogynist attitude. "Female" is more often used by zoologists to describe animals than by normal people to describe women, so there is this subtext of implying women are controlled by base or biological impulse (irrational) or being beneath the stature or intelligence of a man, and these same guys don't call men "males" in the same way.
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This was the basis of my thinking, though I must admit I find the differing perspectives enlightening. I guess I've heard to many men who will say things like "guys are like this but females are more like that".
 
Orayn said:
Leigh's article was about how that stereotype is dated and useless going forward, though there are still crummy people who live up to it and even cling to certain parts of it. She wasn't saying ALL PEOPLE WHO PLAY VIDEO GAMES ARE THIS.
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I just re-read the first 3 paragraphs of her article. You have to admit it was pretty incendiary on her part. First paragraph is about gaming culture, second I believe she defines gaming culture, and the third paragraph is just belittling. While I don't think she was talking about all people who play video games, it was definitely targeted.
 
The #gamergate hashtag is just getting weird now

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RiccochetJ said:
I just re-read the first 3 paragraphs of her article. You have to admit it was pretty incendiary on her part. First paragraph is about gaming culture, second I believe she defines gaming culture, and the third paragraph is just belittling. While I don't think she was talking about all people who play video games, it was definitely targeted.
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It's not defining or describing culture so much as what the outside world sees gaming culture as.

Did you read the next few paragraphs?
This is what the rest of the world knows about your industry -- this, and headlines about billion-dollar war simulators or those junkies with the touchscreen candies. That’s it. You should absolutely be better than this.

You don’t want to ‘be divisive?’ Who’s being divided, except for people who are okay with an infantilized cultural desert of shitty behavior and people who aren’t? What is there to ‘debate’?

Right, let’s say it’s a vocal minority that’s not representative of most people. Most people, from indies to industry leaders, are mortified, furious, disheartened at the direction industry conversation has taken in the past few weeks. It’s not like there are reputable outlets publishing rational articles in favor of the trolls’ ‘side’. Don’t give press to the harassers. Don’t blame an entire industry for a few bad apples.

Yet disclaiming liability is clearly no help. Game websites with huge community hubs whose fans are often associated with blunt Twitter hate mobs sort of shrug, they say things like ‘we delete the really bad stuff, what else can we do’ and ‘those people don’t represent our community’ -- but actually, those people do represent your community. That’s what your community is known for, whether you like it or not.
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She's saying we are known for the few bad apples because we do nothing to discourage them. We tolerate them in our community and allow them to prosper. We tell people who don't wanna put up with the crap to go to a different a server if they don't like it. Or "trolls gonna troll." By not doing anything about them, they become the default, and those of us who don't like them have to alter our behavior around them. They become our voice because we are silent.
 
Pastry said:
This is most likely the article that will be on the NYT front page: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/10/1...-threats-anita-sarkeesian.html?_r=0&referrer=

It blows my mind that there are people that #GG is actually about ethics. Anyone that thinks #GG will somehow help gamers is clueless, this is setting the hobby back years.
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Didn't get a chance to read the article until now, but wow, good stuff. It's very much targeted at GG and their reactionary garbage, so people who were afraid they would turn this into a more generalized thing can rest easy.

I don't know how GG is going to keep denying involvement and acting like they're trying to stop harassment. It's like... "Just because we light random buildings on fire doesn't mean we want to burn people to death. We are anti-homicide. #NotAllArsonists"
 
RiccochetJ said:
I just re-read the first 3 paragraphs of her article. You have to admit it was pretty incendiary on her part. First paragraph is about gaming culture, second I believe she defines gaming culture, and the third paragraph is just belittling. While I don't think she was talking about all people who play video games, it was definitely targeted.
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Speaking personally, I don't think the article is gonna bother any "gamer" who truly knows they aren't one of the ones being described. Our reaction is at worst "fuck i wish these assholes werent out there making my hobby look bad" while agreeing with the article's plan of action and sentiment about these assholes.
 
RiccochetJ said:
I just re-read the first 3 paragraphs of her article. You have to admit it was pretty incendiary on her part. First paragraph is about gaming culture, second I believe she defines gaming culture, and the third paragraph is just belittling. While I don't think she was talking about all people who play video games, it was definitely targeted.
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Why would she belittle a culture she is a part of?

CurlyW said:
Okay.

B0CMIFlIgAEqqJV.jpg
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I don't even
 
I really hope they do that, and tape it. I would love to see anyone try to explain Gamergate to seniors (not just old people, but like the type of reliable voter seniors they're talking about), because it would be incredibly entertaining.
 
CurlyW said:
B0CMIFlIgAEqqJV.jpg
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How are people supposed to show examples of this "consumer revolt" and "corruption in gaming journalism" when even members of the movement are unable to explain or justify those basic concepts as they shout out in angst?
Edit: No, seriously, I'm curious. There's nothing they actually care to say they stand for or agenda they'd like completed other than "I don't like you". You can't make a logical argument of "'cuz".
 
I love to hear mainstream is starting to pick this up. I hope it can increase more support for Anita and Zoe and shame anyone supporting GG.

That senior thing is just so dumb I can't.
 
ShockingAlberto said:
Jack Thompson was a ridiculous figure pushing an agenda for crazy reasons. This is easily observable. The problem is that Gamergaters have told themselves and convinced themselves and brainwashed themselves in to believing the same of pro-diversity advocates. I am trying to figure out what someone could tell me in 2004 that would have gotten me to rethink my views on a movement I thought was for the best and, for the life of me, I am not sure there is anything beyond growing up.
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Pretty much.
It's really hard to ignore all this bullshit, but at this point it's even harder to come up with a solution that doesn't result in fanning the flames even more.
 
FF Seraphim said:
Depends on how it will affect their sales really.
Just do a game theory simulation to see if they do anything.
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I don't subscribe to that... AAA publishers have, on numerous occassions, declared the importance of positive public perception regardless of sales. These things affect shareholder confidence to some degree.

As much as we like to hyperbole their moneygrubbing ways, no industy can let PR run away from them for extended periods of time (you hear that, Ubisoft?)
 
Corpekata said:
I really hope they do that, and tape it. I would love to see anyone try to explain Gamergate to seniors (not just old people, but like the type of reliable voter seniors they're talking about), because it would be incredibly entertaining.
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They might have a demographic there that would react more favorably to the tabloid/slut shaming angle that is the cornerstone of the movement.
 
Galactic Fork said:
It's not defining or describing culture so much as what the outside world sees gaming culture as.

Did you read the next few paragraphs?


She's saying we are known for the few bad apples because we do nothing to discourage them. We tolerate them in our community and allow them to prosper. We tell people who don't wanna put up with the crap to go to a different a server if they don't like it. Or "trolls gonna troll." By not doing anything about them, they become the default, and those of us who don't like them have to alter our behavior around them. They become our voice because we are silent.
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Yes I did. She didn't say 'thinks about your industry', she said 'knows about your industry'. Those are two very different sentences. Those two sentences can lead to vastly different interpretations.

And those interpretations get skewed further when she goes on to say:

Suddenly a generation of lonely basement kids had marketers whispering in their ears that they were the most important commercial demographic of all time. Suddenly they started wearing shiny blouses and pinning bikini babes onto everything they made, started making games that sold the promise of high-octane masculinity to kids just like them.
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Some parts of her article I have no idea about her intended voice, but in other places, it's pretty blatant.
 
BrassDragon said:
I don't subscribe to that... AAA publishers have, on numerous occassions, declared the importance of positive public perception regardless of sales. These things affect shareholder confidence to some degree.

As much as we like to hyperbole their moneygrubbing ways, no industy can let PR run away from them for extended periods of time (you hear that, Ubisoft?)
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I would like to believe this.... but lets see how AC: Unity sells first...
 
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