Worth Reading: 09/15/2014

@juggaloacidman: That's what implying means. Which is what I've been saying. Imply means it wasn't explicitly said, but inferred.

You should try reading some of the articles that Partick has been linking in the past few weeks, as well as maybe those I posted below (They're my favourites) by cooler heads in this whole thing than angry twitter users.

I guarantee you'll come out with a different perspective of that "side".

That seems to just be picking on semantics to justify mocking someone making a point you disagree with.

You may argue that looking at leaked nude photos of women is not related to the wide reaching impact of misogyny in society, but if you just jump toward an incredulous "Christ on a cracker!" without actually addressing his point, you're only devolving actual discussion. As someone who regularly claims a proud interest in civil discussion, responding to a comment like that only undermines any chance of us being able to talk about this.

Also, on the topic, I think it's reasonable for someone to look at history and see how uneven "unconsenting sexual objectification" has been. We live in a world where women in many past and, sadly, current cultures are still regarded as similar to a man's property. Unconsenting sexual objectification has long had an overwhelming tie to women. As I am all too aware, it does not solely impact women, but we would be misguided to ignore the legacy of sexual objectification which has disproportionately hurt women in male-dominated societies.

I don't believe every man who looks at a leaked nude photo somehow hates women, but I do believe entitlement toward women's bodies is a contributing factor to what is seen as appropriate for many men to do. If a woman didn't consent to a man seeing her nude body and they sought out seeing it against her will, that is certainly an invasion of her privacy, and even if you may dislike or disagree with the disproportionally female aspect of this issue, I believe you can acknowledge the inherent affront to a woman's privacy which permeates sharing and viewing leaked nude photos of them.

Since this is an argument about semantics, I think definitions are appropriate. Wikipedia states: 'Misogyny can be manifested in numerous ways, including sexual discrimination, denigration of women, violence against women, and sexual objectification of women'

I don't think it's really that much of a stretch, seeing as it's included in the definition. I can see the value in arguing that using it in this sense dilutes the language, but that doesn't make it any less true.

Oh, and yes by this definition leaked male nudes are misandrist.

It feels like the Indie scene is just a huge clique in high school that throws around the victim card and blows everything way out of proportion when they get some bitchy tweet. If you're going to paint yourself in a controversial light, don't hide behind "misogyny" and other buzz words when faced with criticism while trying to censor others' games because it's offensive to you. I just want to play good games that aren't bullied into being politically correct.

@truthtellah: I recognize the history of how sexual objectification has skewed toward affecting women, but what I'm frustrated by is the appeal to that sort of generality that doesn't directly relate to these specific incidents. I know it's sort of pedantic to reference logical fallacies, but it reeks of affirming the consequent. Person A is a misogynist who looks at naked pictures of woman, Person B looks at naked pictures of woman, therefore Person B is engaging in misogynistic behavior. There's no direct connection there, even though everything you are saying about the history of sexual objectification is true. That's what I'm frustrated by in the implication.

Yes, of course, it is a horrendous invasion of privacy to leak someone's naked pictures, woman or man. People should never do that. I don't understand why you suddenly think I'm disregarding the disproportionately female victimization of this, though. I recognize it exists, has existed, and is horrific. What I disagree with is the notion that because it has been done for sexist reasons in the past, every instance of it in the future is then sexist. Nothing I ever said denied the existence of very nasty objectification.

"We live in a world where women in many past and, sadly, current cultures are still regarded as similar to a man's property" is completely true. But it's also a just a general factoid. Why is it relevant to a discussion about the leaking of Jennifer Lawrence's nudes that women are considered man's property in Saudi Arabia? The relevance is tenuous, and the only effect it could have on the conversation is to imply that's obviously how people who leaked or looked at the nudes must think. It would be more productive to have conversations about the merits of each individual controversy. In the case of Zoe Quinn, the act was indeed largely motivated by hate, from the perpetrators to the observers. But that's not a hard and fast rule.

I recognize what I'm arguing is very legalistic, but I often get frustrated by absolutist language, particularly when the accusations are so serious.

Either way, I apologize for opening the topic too dismissively.

See, you can disagree with these people and what they want out of games, I'm gonna pretty vehemently disagree with you but whatever, it's an opinion.

But what you're doing here? Belittling people's real, serious suffering? Minimising the serious problem of misogyny and bigotry as 'buzz words'? Completely misunderstanding or intentionally misusing the word and entire meaning of censorship? Oh and gross victim blaming?

That stuff is straight up shitty, and you're going to get called out on it.

@marokai: I think people's intended points matter more than being overly legalistic in a conversation with them, and I don't think many would disagree that sexual objectification is not always misogynistic. It is overwhelmingly misogynistic, but that doesn't mean it only impacts women. It was wrong for people to gawk at the baseball player in the recent leak, as well. He never consented to those images being shared. Most people are simply saying that the fact that it impacts men and women doesn't undo that sexual objectification is still primarily hurtful toward women and their place in society.

It's important for us to try to understand what people really mean instead of simply dismissing them over legalities, because no one will ever speak perfectly and we all do speak somewhat differently. The least we can do when trying to have a civil conversation is try our best to understand what someone really means over just how we see what they said.

Also, I only brought up women's treatment as property in many cultures as a connection to the enduring legacy of sexual objectification of women in the world. When women are viewed as objects(property), it's only natural that they may be represented and treated as such in many ways. Sexual objectification of women has a long and unfortunate history tied to women as property, and, as you acknowledged, it's something we still struggle with today. That was the point I was attempting to make with bringing it up.

Thanks for your apology; though, I believe it is most due toward @officermeatbeef.

The reason I use legitimate is because there have been times in the past where people on twitter think they're being attacked when they aren't. For example, I was on the night when Jenn quickly wrote her rolodex piece that got so much praise. The problem that was lost on people was that she was arguing a straw man and completely missed the point of what was being said about hiring based on merit. I told her it was a good piece, but that she missed the point. Her response was to ask why I was attacking her.

The same thing happened when people legitimately criticized Samantha Allen for her op-ed where she basically called out Nintendo for being homophobes. No doubt that she was also being harassed and threatens, and she shouldn't have been. She should not have been immune from criticism, but instead, those that criticised were also accused of harassment.

This isn't a legitimate rape thing like that politician said, because rape is rape. It's a matter of even calling critiques harassment simply because you don't like criticism.

And this is where we're going to disagree. I understand that some feminists want to redefine misogyny and lump everything in there, but it does have a definition. Sexist and misogyny aren't synomyms and interchangeable. There is a relationship where misogyny is sexist, but sexist doesn't always equate to misogyny.

Sexual objectification of either gender is not inherently sexist or misogyny/misandry. We are sexual creatures. There is nothing wrong with finding someone attractive or lusting after them, which may include wanting to see them naked. It's a matter of whether you cross some line and victimize them, as was the case here. I will agree that seeing private photos of them nude is a lack of respect, but it isn't misogyny. I feel your thought that people wouldn't care if they weren't women is a bit of a straw man. I'm sure some people would still care if these were pictures of Hugh Jackman, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, or some other male celebrity. Hell, people cared about Anthony Weiner, and he was an idiot who put his own photos out there.

My current issue with the coverage Gamergate is getting is that there appears to be a massive double standard in the way the gaming media is reporting it. They are quick to denounce internet harassment and attacks, rightly so, but as far as I have seen this has only been directed at the Gamergate crowd. There has been a lot of harassment and worse going both ways and to address only a single side of it is intellectually dishonest and actively harmful to the stated goal of stopping internet harassment.

Lots of game developers and media members have been massive assholes to their fans and readers over the last month. Gamers have been called terrible names and terrible stereotypes like the fat gamer who lives in his parents basement have frequently been invoked, gamers have been publicly compared to groups like ISIS, people who criticized Zoe Quinn over twitter have had their real names and addresses and social security numbers tweeted by Quinn's supporters with no denouncement from her or the media, false DMCA claims have been filed in an effort to suppress criticism, women who have come out in support of Gamergate have been labeled gender traitors for not falling into line, female indie developers have anonymously written that they are afraid to publicly support Gamergate for fear of being socially ostracized by the indie scene and loosing their careers, anyone and everyone who criticizes the gaming media for its ethical standards is being labeled a misogynist, and the list goes on and on.

The point I am trying to make is that there are horrible people on both sides of the debate but I only see the gaming media calling out one side for their bullshit. I may very well be wrong and would happily welcome proof that shows I am wrong, but if it is out there I have not seen it and it is certainly not as wide spread as it should be. The message that internet harassment is terrible and needs to stop absolutely needs to be spread, but only going after one faction and ignoring another is never going to stop this. By ignoring the terrible actions of a very vocal group with access to a large audience the gaming media is enabling them to continue being terrible people in the future. All the guilty deserve to be punished and it is past time that the gaming media start holding their friends, colleagues and business associates to the same standards that they are trying to hold their readers and community members. Letting them get away with their terrible actions only perpetuates the problem of internet harassment.

You could argue that they felt unable to speak up about the issues they had with Zoe and the press for fear of even greater negative social media commentary and having even less chance at getting press attention until the events that happened, happened. That seems to be their story anyway. Only they truly know why they chose that time to speak up about it.

It doesn't really matter what the company does, so much as it matters that they have a verifiable reputation. It means there are people to hold to account, and a paper trail to follow should something go wrong. Usually, with a scam, you'll see nothing but front companies and misdirection. That isn't the case here. It is for the backers to decide if them not having a full game development team assembled and ready to go is a problem or not.

Their trans policy was changed, you're right. Though I've not seen any direct quotes of exactly what it was. I'm not entirely sure it was even published to begin with, because old archive versions of their site don't have any such policy -- though they only date back to August, and I believe the initial issue with them and Zoe was in March (IIRC?) Personally, I'm inclined to believe what I can actually find rather than hearsay.

I chose not to mention Zoe by name in my prior post to make the point that it's not about her at all. Zoe can say what she likes on Twitter about TFYC or anything else. The problem is with games media and their bias reporting, or sometimes their bias non-reporting as is the case here. They shouldn't be determining what is newsworthy based on a cursory glance of the tweets of the people they know and like in the industry; They should think for themselves. People, like Zoe, who have a name and are well liked do have power and influence over the media; It's the media not knowing how to behave and handle their professional and personal connections with people like that that is the reason they have the power they do though. The media is entirely to blame.

Unfortunately, the selective reporting and coverage based around cliques has become all too apparent over the last month. Just yesterday Brad Wardell recounted on his blog a story of how Kotaku founder Matt Gallant tried to smear him in 2010 by claiming his first book was racist, and proceeded to stalk and harass him on the QuarterToThree forums, leading to Gallant being banned. He points out that 'founder of Kotaku harasses and smears prominent game developer and businessman' is quite a newsworthy story -- especially if you take the benchmark of the false allegations made against Wardell as being newsworthy. But hey, I guess Brad Wardell isn't part of the clique, so who cares? And besides, it might reflect poorly on Kotaku, so better not say anything.

If you are willing to break it into two distinct "sides" (which I'm somewhat uncomfortable with, but let's roll with it) then don't makes the mistake of equating them completely.

People have been faced with this argument hundreds of times over the past month, and I'd wager are sick of dealing with it. The answer from the start has been, and continues to be "Yes that's terrible and nobody in their right mind condones it, but it's also muddying the issues."

The two "sides" are not equivalent.

In one hand we have a small segment of a loose arrangement of people who are handling their very, very reasonable anger very, very poorly. I haven't seen any trustworthy sources on most of the things you claim are coming from this "side". Articles which condemn the harassment (and very much do not lump in 'all gamers' as many will claim) aside.

In the other, we have an entire movement that sprung from a disgusting invasion of privacy and a 4-week misogynistic witch hunt targeting at first a single woman and her supporters, and spreading to virtually any progressive voice in the industry. This movement, along the way, has managed to convince a lot of people that it's really about journalistic integrity.

So far as I know, only one "side" is composed largely of marginalised members of the industry. So far as I know, only one "side" contains people who have been driven from their homes and are currently dealing with Law Enforcement Agencies. So far as I know, only one side contains people whose professional lives have been systematically targeted and in some cases destroyed. So far as I know, nobody on that side has ever actively condoned or amplified any sort of abuse.

Feel free to present me with evidence to the contrary. I, and any other reasonable person is going to look at it and say "That's pretty terrible! But it's also not the basis of an entire movement."

That is the difference. That is why the coverage between them is very very different.

Have you seen the tweets in question?

If this sort of tone, language, repetitive sarcastic insults, accusations and misrepresentation was being directed by TFYC at Zoe Quinn, I don't think you would call it reasonable.

Beyond this, I don't see why people are so hung up on Zoe Quinn--and you can explain it away as a good person who let her passion for the issue cloud her judgement, which I would accept--but this clearly shouldn't be something that should be defended as reasonable questions about transparency.

The facts are the participants were to see 8% of the profits, never had to do any programming--the concept was to provide ideas for games, not learn to make games--and I think I read that the participants also would retain ownership of the IP. The rest of the money left over would go to charity. I believe this was all very clear from the start, and if it wasn't, the proper response would have been to reach out privately and ask some questions, not to start making hurtful accusations over twitter.

And if you're going to throw around the word "scam" because you can't prove what someone is going to do with all of the money, I find that somewhat hypocritical based on reactions when people do the exact same thing with Anita Sarkeesian. It's not right to make assumptions concerning her intentions, and to suggest that "she's only doing this for the money" so why do you feel that it's acceptable here?

Either way, I'm glad to hear that you intend to look for some solid sources on what TFYC campaign originally said about their transgender policy, because that's a very important factor in how all of this went down, and it would make Quinn look a lot more justifiably upset if it was really that bad. I've also heard that some people behind the website design are French Canadian, and English is their second language, but I've never attempted to verify that information. If true, that could help explain the confusion and poor wording. I'd like to know what it originally said as well.

But please reconsider making negative assumptions about other people's intentions and character, and I'll try to avoid doing the same.

Wikipedia is not simply a dictionary. If you were looking simply for the definition, it's in the first sentence, which matches the definition in other online dictionaries. What you're quoting isn't included in the definition, it's additional information describing what may be misogynistic, not what is misogynistic, from cited sources - not dictionaries. It basically means, you may hate women, and one way you are expressing that hatred is through sexually objectifying them, but just because you sexually objectify a woman, doesn't mean you hate them.

So when I said it didn't make sense to lump Jennifer Lawrence in with these other cases that have had harassment and threats that are misogynistic, it's because there's no factual evidence that proves this to be the case. It wasn't one lone person who stole the photos, so it may be that some of them may be misogynistic and their specific theft was an act of misogynism. It's more likely that these are acts of criminals who simply wanted to hack into celebrity accounts, and when they found nude selfies, decided to share them with other creeps. From what I read, the reddit leaker is asexual and didn't leak them because he hates women. That doesn't absolve him from the fact that he did something deplorable, it just means that it wasn't necessarily because misogyny.

The whole TFYC episode and the confusion that exists about it to this date is emblematic of how poorly the games press handled the whole controversy. For the record, I have no idea which side was "in the right" about it. It may well be that all of Quinn's accusations were true, but I have no way of knowing this because (to the best of my knowledge) no ostensibly impartial journalists were there to investigate the whole thing and sort it all out. This wasn't like the tabloidy aspects of the controversy, it was clearly newsworthy one way or the other and it was the presses duty (not some activist developer) to make it known whether this was a scam or if a legitimate organization was hosed by a hothead. But no, there was nothing. To an outside observer it seems like TFYC got screwed simply because they happened to get on the wrong side of someone right as they were about to be martyred.

And really, the same goes for the rest of this scandal. Without any real coverage to speak of either to confirm or debunk the many accusations that were flying around anyone curious about the whole scandal had to go to forums, social media, and (god forbid) 4Chan if they wanted to learn what all the fuss is about, where they were more than likely given mis-information rather than the actual facts that journalists would have been able to uncover if they weren't sitting on a high horse instead of doing their jobs and getting whatever the truth was on the record. What's more, their silence only played into the various conspiracy theories and more than likely added a whole lot of fuel to the fire they thought they were extinguishing.

I had seen some of what was presented there. I would appreciate the information having come from a source that doesn't misrepresent facts of its own and presented both sides of the conversation.

Nevertheless, what I see in the MSPaint compiled picture there is a female developer who when she wanted to make games, took a free class and did it, and is now doing it full time. She's pretty passionate about wanting more diversity in the industry and a proposal that essentially reads "one of a set of women will probably get some amount of proceeds for an idea we work on for them." sort of cheapens that aim.

Additionally, while I can't seem to find much solid info or corroboration for what my impression of their policy was at the time, but I can also see simply the idea that there needs to be a system in place to prevent men from lying about being women (a harmfully common accusation lobbed at trans people all the time) rubbing someone passionate the wrong way.

With all that said, all that image and anything proves is that Zoe felt it was an exploitative project, and voiced as much on twitter. Maybe laughing at the fact that their website crashed is poor form? But it's not like the project had 'collapsed' at that point (and in fact, despite whatever happened, they've managed to turn it around into a successful campaign with Gamergate's mascot flying prominently on the page), there's no evidence she had any part in any kind of personal information being spread around, any coordinated assault on their site, any kind of ban they may have received on twitter, any kind of gag order from journalists about the issue.

However, that's exactly what their representative on reddit went on to accuse her of (and more) in a very early thread about her alleged journalistic indiscretions. Can't confirm the location of that particular comment for you, but I saw it myself at the time. It seems to have been deleted since, possibly in one of the big reddit moderation purges.

At this point I'll pretty gladly revise my stance on the probability of this all being a Scam or something of the sort, having dug through a lot of primary sources looking for stuff. There are still plenty of questions I have about the project, but digging a lot deeper it really just seems more misguided than anything, at its inception at least.

However, these people have gone on to align themselves pretty firmly with the Gamergate movement as a whole and the 4chan sub-board /v/ in particular. Their case has repeatedly been used as a flimsy excuse to harass Quinn, thanks to the post linked up there and others like it, spreading what they have gone on to confirm is misinformation about her, in at the very best a vengeful little stunt, but in my opinion, a pretty concerted effort to curry sympathy and favour with the straight up most toxic elements of this movement.

I continue to be unsurprised that it didn't see a lot of press coverage, but not out of some kind of sinister sway a lone indie developer supposedly has over huge swathes of the gaming press. It's really just a messy situation to start with, and they come away from almost every situation in a pretty bad light, and it only gets a little better the deeper you dig.

Typos...typos everywhere!

I'm honestly impressed by how little some people understand about journalism while they campaign for more "ethics" in it. Jenn Frank wrote an opinion piece (which is inherently biased because it is an opinion piece) about a friend of hers being mercilessly attacked for, let's say. illegitimate reasons. She included a disclaimer making clear her friendship with the person in question, which The Guardian's editorial team decided to leave out because it is a reputable publication which understands why that wouldn't be necessary.

Clearly, some of you don't understand how copy editing works. At a large publication like The Guardian, the draft Jenn sent in and the final published piece probably have some differences because multiple professionals combed through it and edited for grammar, redundancy, and other unnecessary things, like her disclaimer.

So, congratulations to those who thought they had uncovered a grand conspiracy because a freelance writer penned a biased opinion piece (probably while drinking wet water) about someone she knows. A freelance writer who, if you followed her on Twitter, you'd know has a predisposition to be friendly towards just about everyone. Because a bunch of internet people don't understand journalism, they hounded one of our best writers until she left the industry. Awesome.

Tell me, who is being "silenced" here?

good call on that guy who said apple is for everyone. That statement, if true, would be incredibly creepy and depressing. Fortunately its only a figment of his 'tapped' imagination.

Liking these articles, keep up the good work.

@yelix: You are giving what's left of the Guardian's editing team way too much credit.There's a reason the paper's earned the grauniad nickname.

But there's proof on twitter showing how Leigh and Zoe bully people into agreeing with them. Blindly trusting someone that says they're being ferociously harassed with absolutely no proof isn't smart. You're letting kids who throw temper tantrums in a toy store win, so next time they go to that toy store, they know exactly what to do to get what they want.

Have you never had to deal with these kinds of people in real life? Look at what you're doing. "Gross victim blaming." "Minimising the serious problem of misogyny and bigotry." Sure, you can "call me out on it," but you can't bully me into believing every game should be a hugbox of transgendered people with a variation of every race.

There's 2 things that annoy me most about Youtube video titles: ALL CAPS and vague statements, and Patrick has both of those in there. Good thing those 2 things put me off so much that I refuse to watch such videos and the (probable) garbage within.

And once more, Leigh Alexander reaches and grasps at whatever straws she can to try and come off as deep and philosophical, but ultimately just argues semantics for a paycheck. It was an article that went absolutely nowhere and was written like a blog post at best.

I only really follow GiantBomb, so any time there's a blow up like this, I feel gratefully out of the loop. If only everyone could see how odd it looks from the outside.

Totalbiscuit made a great point about comments in that video.

"Gamergate" or whatever the fuck it's called is a prime example that video games are children's toys for children and will be so eternally. Who actually gives a flying fuck about any of this. I feel like I'm slowly dying, wasting precious seconds of my life everytime I see it brought up.

How the photos got out there in the first place is irrelevant -- I believe that looking at the photos with the intent of sexual gratification is in itself a misogynistic act. If Wikipedia doesn't work, here's what Google says: 'dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women.' The last bit is the key. It's not outright hatred or mistrust that we're talking about here, it's the idea that it's okay to look at the pictures in the first place. It's not -- it's morally repugnant. Looking at the pictures is against the express wishes of the people involved, which I believe is inherently misogynistic because their preference matters less than whoever-is-looking's curiosity or desire to see them. It's a reduction of them to a sexual object. I'm not trying to high horse it here, I looked at the pictures too -- but admit that to do so isn't really a defensible action.

Also, we're digressing pretty far here -- tangent on a tangent. I'm happy to take it into private comments if anyone wants.

You have politicized video games. You have managed to take the enjoyment of escapism and managed to vilify it. You should all be ashamed of yourselves.

@nmarebfly: The last bit doesn't prove what you are arguing here, as much as you'd like it to. The key part is the "ingrained." It is basically the same as the first two parts.

You are partially arguing a straw man here. No one has claimed that it was okay to do any of the following: hack a person's account; post pictures or videos that were obtained as a result of theft of said person online; view pictures or videos of that person, even if you were not the one who originally stole them. We can agree that all of them are terrible things. We will never agree whether it is or isn't misogynistic. We can end it there, since we won't be changing the other person's opinion.

And this absolutely goes both ways, IMO. It now includes the handful of republican bloggers who have latched onto the growing social justice movement in gaming journalism, when before they couldn't have cared less about games. They're only making a politicized movement even worse, and even more politicized, all the way to the point where the entire controversy has been described as "right-wing."

It's funny to see game journalists these days uniting to promote the idea of telling game developers that what they do is offensive. Journalists don't even distance themselves from people who are especially rude to developers and misrepresent their games. In the past, when the same requests and misrepresentations were being made by republicans for a different reason, they would be shouted down almost unanimously by pretty much ALL video gaming fans and ALL video game press.

Remember this?

Now compare that to this video and you'll see some striking similarities. The video in the link does contain some in-game nudity, so don't view the whole thing at work. Also note that I don't support everything said in that entire video, but it's the best example of the kind of misrepresentation that I'm talking about, especially the part that I linked to.

That kind of misrepresentation is what the entire gaming world ripped Jack Thompson a new one for. Yet here they don't only claim the lies as truth, they seem to actively deny anything that speaks out against them any attention.

Did any publication out there mention KiteTale's "More than a damsen in a dress" video? I actually didn't know of its existence until the recent controvesry even though has been up for a year now.

@patrickklepek:

Nah, lessons are expensive. Just play The Golf Club until the caddy becomes less sarcastic. This is the advice of a man who's just realised he's been walking past an 18-hole course for the past eighteen months.

All of the people supporting #gamergate are pretty awful and I will continue to view them as garbage until they prove otherwise, which they won't.

What I find ironic about people complaining about the discussion of social/political issues in games is that for a long time, gamers complained that video games weren't taken seriously as being meaningful. They were upset that a person who consumes movies and books could be considered being cultured, but people who played video games were only wasting their own time.

So when people actually try to have serious discussions about the content in video games, now they ask why everybody is taking video games so seriously? Now video games are just supposed to be escapism? Now it's just for entertainment? Now when gamers find their favorite games being criticized, they pull up vast conspiracies like GamerGate in response?

This is about wanting to have your cake and eat it too- gamers want to be able to say their hobby is meaningful to people who question the value of the hobby, but then say it's just escapism to the people who criticize the content.

It seems to me that gamers never really wanted their hobby to be examined for meaning like they claim. They just wanted the time they spent with video games to be externally validated.

Be careful what you wish for, I guess.

@juno500 said:

You're assuming that because a large group of gamers said one thing, and now a large group of gamers is saying something to the contrary, that those two large groups of gamers are in fact the same people. Common sense says they probably aren't. Gamers are not a hivemind.

These past few weeks say otherwise to me.

I think this whole gamergate thing has been beyond silly and generally like Anitas videos and understand the point and concept of in-depth criticism but one point I still haven't seen addressed is that there is at least one pretty massive disconnect between the audience and the games media.

Politically a great portion of the audience is completely at odds with the east/west coast media. Like most adults I hate the phrase "liberal media" but the fact is that the people who tend to report on events tend to be more liberal than the average of the country due to occupation, location, and association.

Politics (the act of dealing with others) is inseparable from any aspect of life and it can be annoying to be preached to even when the speaker doesn't know they are engaging in political speech. This site doesn't tend to suffer from that (and thank you) and the personalities work hard to keep that in check. I think the originating and current geographical diversity of the staff has helped to keep the politics to a minimum.

Some of the GamersGate annoyance is also that many gamers don't feel their opinions are being reflected by the personalities.

@stick100: Considering the main political opinion of those involved with gamergate is that misogyny is good and women shouldn't have a space in video games or games journalism I'm glad they don't have their opinions reflected widely in games journalism.

Pretty narrow minded to actually believe GG supports misogyny when a lot of people that support it are women and minorities. But the other side has explicitly said that white men are scum of the Earth that needs to die (sounds like death threats with social justice logic), and gamers are disgusting and vile people. It's blatant hypocrisy.

Samantha Allen even wrote a blog on it. From what I heard she removed it by now though. Here's an excerpt:

"i’m a misandrist. that means i hate men. i’m not a cute misandrist. i don’t have a fridge magnet that says, “boys are stupid, throw rocks at them.” my loathing cannot be contained by a fridge magnet."

Interestingly this actually goes against things that Leigh Alexander said. You'd think that these two would be on the same wave length in every regard. Here's Leigh's statement:

"there is no such thing as misandry just like there is no such thing as racism against white people"

Who to believe?!

@LunarJetman: They're two different people. Why would you expect them to have the exact same opinion on everything?

That was a failed attempt at a funny to make the quotes a bit less sad.