Commentary on GB Hiring

Not sure that I fully agree with the part I bolded. Not so much with the "more diversity stance = more exciting" stance, but more so with this idea that race and gender are the only two factors in determine a person's worth in perspective. You can have a very different perspective from somebody just from living on the other side of the planet, and still share the same skin color, gender, or sexual orientation. Now before you, or anyone else, jumps on me for using the word "only" in relation to the factors of perspective, I have seen people in this thread argue for diversity, as well as point out that losing Vinny to the east coast was a blow because he was the only parent on staff. So it's not everyone who places the weight of diversity squarely on the shoulders of gender and skin color, but it does seem to be the most important factors of the people who are arguing for more diversity.

So it makes me wonder, why is it that we're placing so much importantance on skin color and gender as the basis for what qualifies as diverse. Obviously, every staff member with giant bomb share two traits, those being white and male. I pose this question to you or anyone else who would like to respond. Do we weigh gender and skin color as more important because they're both traits that are easy to tell from looking at a person (usually, but not always)? When searching for a more diverse staff, are we picking criteria that is the most obvious or convenient? One could argue that these two traits are marginalized or discriminated against in the industry, so we should counteract that by focusing on including more perspective from those groups of people. It's an argument I could entertain, as I think it has some merit, but I'm not convinced that being of any gender or skin color makes you a more interesting person by default. That's just my opinion, as it is just your opinion that hiring two white men was a boring decision. We weigh value differently, and that, in my view, is where the subjectivity lies.

Well, in terms of a warped crusade, I would say that many of the same women who complained about the hires also complained about Giant Bomb's panel lineup not having enough women, despite the fact they had more women and "non white dudes" than ever. They went so far as to promote the idea that Giant Bomb should be boycotted by developers and other members of the press because apparently having like a half dozen women on their shows meant that the site doesn't respect women or whatever.

This didn't just begin with the comments on the hires. It's been an ongoing thing with certain folks that I think were aptly described earlier as "professional shit stirrers". They don't seem to want to talk. They want to belittle. They want to shame. They want to be outraged. Doesn't justify threatening them with death or rape or whatever other horrible stuff the bowels of the internet decided to shit out on them at all though of course.

See, I want to really hold this up as an example. I state that when I see people discriminated against for their sex, race or orientation (or anything else like age, marital status, religion, etc) it makes me upset, and when I'm discriminated against, it hurts me as much as it would hurt anyone else. I am stating publicly that I am not invulnerable, I can be discriminated against, I recognize how negative it is, and I don't want discrimination.

However, what this really means is that I'm uncomfortable with seeing a minority in a position of authority. By expressing my distaste for discrimination and asking for it not to be applied to me, I am told that I'm being actively bigoted.

This is all because of what they believe about me, based on what they believe about my ethnicity, my assigned sex, or my perceived orientation. But that doesn't get called 'discrimination' or 'bigotry' for some reason.

The playing field is not equal, you're right. Class affects the way people live, the way they grow, the education receive and the possibility of them reaching their potential and becoming happy, actualized people. A lot of white people are upper middle class, who are raised in an environment that gives them the privileges necessary to compete in a brutal world. Some white people are not. However, I'm told constantly how crucial it is to treat white people with more scrutiny and hold them to a different standard than people who happen to have been born with any other skin color that we don't yet culturally associate as "white", because after all, a lot of white people are upper middle class.

If I move to China, I would immediately become a minority. Do you feel Chinese businesses have an ethical obligation to hire whites? If I move to China and I apply for a job with a similarly skilled native Chinese person, would me not receiving the position qualify as 'exclusion'?

though this controversy has certainly brought a few new people dont believe its only them. some of the worst things that have been said in these threads have been from users here for years with 1000s of posts. i dont think they are representative of the community or there are tons of them but they exist.

I'm sure it's been mentioned plenty but insulting, threatening or trying to get a rise out of strangers via Twitter is terrible, cowardly behavior. Even just engaging to start a dialogue with good intentions is probably wishful thinking at best for that medium. There's just so many thoughts you can fit into that character limit, so much can be misinterpreted, generalizations run rampant and the desire to come out on top with a concise quip overrides human decency time and time again.

I saw some really rude stuff posted yesterday, both directed at the community I've enjoyed since day 1 and those making the criticisms. Made me sad to see intelligent folks disrespect what Jeff and co. have built over the years, made me angrier seeing not so intelligent folks crawl out of the woodwork to make them feel hurt or scared for voicing their opinion. Any discussion over hiring practices to me are secondary to fans of this site acting like reasonable people on the internet, especially when someone says things you don't like hearing. Less anonymous confrontation, more backing away from the keyboard and letting it go.

What are you talking about?

Seriously, please stop assuming all white people are alike and all black people are alike. How is a black guy going to know if the portrayal of Franklin and Lamar is accurate unless he grew up on the fucking streets?

This is a legitimately racist viewpoint you're expressing here.

@jonyjc: This was a conversation waiting to happen, Giant Bomb has just become the poster child for said conversation. It's just part and parcel of this industry finally growing up.

Man, and I thought this whole thing would be about how divisive people would have been about Dan specifically. It's entirely fair to point out that it looks bad in 2014 to hire two more white guys in a staff that is for all intents and purposes is almost all white guys (I'm going to include Alexis in here because he's as much GB as anyone else). For a while before this whole thing I was the one making a few suggestions here about "what if GB hired a woman?" but yeah I was simultaneously impressed the community took it farther than I would have and somewhat saddened by where we're left as a result.

For anyone hiring for anything, one always has to be mindful that even if we (might) know we're not doing it, the end result may suggest so anyway. Whether it's personal social networks, inadvertent naming biases, and a number of other factors, humans left up to their own devices tend to go toward rather than against bias. To suggest Jeff and co. are human and therefore fallible is a worthy concern. As a person who loves and respects their work and who they are, I choose to believe Jeff and co., especially with Patrick on board, were smart enough about it and brought it up internally. If they truly didn't I cannot say and this is ultimately a matter of trust. Secondly, while the ratio at GameSpot is itself not wholly perfect/representative, we can assume CBSi corporate policy was not the main factor given how many people of not-straight-white-dude situation there are at GS for instance. There also a lot of straight white dudes but it's less a question of if and more of when both from a perspective of ratio past a certain size and also clearly that a lot of the community values it.

Certainly a somewhat concerning amount don't but I can see some of that being from people not wanting the motivations or legitimacy of the new hires and/or Jeff and co. undermined or disrespected. It's natural that we kind of want it both ways and given where we're at I'm surprised more people haven't been saying as much. Still, there is and has been an undercurrent of either misunderstanding, ignorance, or outright resentment from certain members of this community and many external to it whose views, values, and conduct run in conflict with the values concerning gender, social issues, the idea of social justice, and where we are as a culture and society on the internet. And it need not be everyone wholly agrees or is associated with the latter but it's the former's active opposition to it that is arguably doing the most damage at any given time. Would it be nice if GB hired non-white dudes? Absolutely. It was the case before and it is the case now but what is a matter of preference and outreach pales in comparison to the consequences wrought by individuals taking to harassment and to a lesser degree doing little to understand the issues at hand.

One of these is a reasonably stated opinion, even if you disagree with it.

The other one is telling someone to die in a fire.

They are meaningfully different and saying "neither of them have a leg to stand on" is creating a false equivalency between the two actions/statements. One is definitely, unequivocally more wrong, and unacceptable, than the other, is it not?

I also don't think GB has ever shied away from having guest with unique opinions. I've never met anyone like Dave Lang or Karen Snider, those people be crazy unique.

@hailinel: I'll agree with that. It would send a good message to women and hopefully offer a friendly face. I don't think they did anything wrong by making the choices they made though, but yes, it would be a great move to have a female on staff at some point.

I'm not holding onto Carrie as a savior or something. I just miss her voice in games journalism the same way I miss like, Shane Bettenhausen's or Jennifer Tsao's.

How about Morgan Webb? I know not many people think highly of her (for whatever reason) but she could be a good fit. She knows her shit, has a very entertaining personality, and is comfortable in front of a camera.

similarly, getting angry at samantha allen and trying to shut her down for lashing out (in a completely harmless way) is totally unnecessary. i've seen too many GB fans who are just like "ohhh if only she was nicer about it! anyway now she's completely discredited what a crazy feminist"

she was getting harassed! in a way that is pretty unique to the way that dudes in the gaming community love to harass women who try enter the space. people read her post about misandry, comparing it to elliot rodgers?? (that was specifically in a neogaf thread, but they're still giant bomb fans.) women like samantha allen, who passionately care about their gender's representation in the games community have a right to be angry. yes it is a little scary or something to hear someone declare "i hate men", and compare it to rampant violent misogyny, but allen's position is based in fact, history, and experience. women have a right to be angry at the privileged gender who has spent centuries enacting various forms of oppression and violence on them.

and then when you ask? that she just be nicer about it? i'm just like wtf. what do you want from girls who play video games? anita sarkeesian, who is arguably one of the more soft-spoken, intellectually palatable, and traditionally attractive video game feminists out there received the EXACT SAME TYPE OF REACTION as allen. you act in a way that's difficult to misinterpret? you get harassed? you get annoyed and try to use your passion and aggression to change people's minds? you get harassed and told to calm down. it's bad!!!! stop!!!!

@make_me_mad: I agree it's important for everyone to keep in mind that we have no insight into the actual hiring process.

It's also important to make clear that holding the opinion "Giant Bomb should try to be more diverse" doesn't indicate a problem with the people who WERE hired. It's an unrelated statement.

IMO having more diversity would be BETTER, but that doesn't mean that the choice GB made was BAD, just less good.

@nux said:

In the end, GB can't hire anyone who doesn't apply. I have no idea whether Morgan did or not, but I thought Tara Long (for example) could've been a great editorial addition too, but likewise, I have no idea whether she even applied.

But yes, as someone else mentioned, new voices entirely would be great too, as long as they fit the bill in terms of being comfortable on-camera for extended periods of time, speaking off the cuff, etc.

I would kind of keep the 'shut the hell up' part.

I think Rorie, and other people here, believe that some result can come out of this discussion. As if someone here reading a post will suddenly think "Hmmm you know.. That person is right." and have a change of opinion. People have been arguing over politics or religion for centuries. So I find this more than likely going no where. At some point things will change naturally, probably within the next decade or two because I think only within the past 10 years have video games become more widespread and not so much the "expensive nerdy boy" thing. Give these other demographics the time to grow up and move into the industry. Also consider all the YouTube people are very young. Today they might be running their own video game channel for 5 years, and in another 5 years they might get picked up for more video content and personality driven sites.

As others have said, the fact that this conversation boils over to this degree when the new hires are announced does show that Dan and Jason are not appreciated by a certain portion of people. If they were, even more people than there are now would just be welcoming them and moving on. Instead it's a bunch of "Dammit this was our chance! We could have done something! But instead you got two generic white men! Uggggghhh"

Now this conversation is just dragging down the site. I'm guessing that Rorie, and other GB Staff, are stressed out and upset by all of this and that isn't helping them do their job which is producing video game content. To be a bit more clear than I was yesterday-- I'm not saying don't have the conversation, I'm asking that people not drag down the fun energy and excitement of the new hires with this stuff.

@nux: I haven't seen much on Morgan Webb, but I liked her.

@w1n5t0n: Oh yeah I totally agree, I'm more addressing that to people who are concerned with a particular subset of unique.

@seikenfreak: It already went places. And you're wrong, things don't happen 'naturally' when you ignore them. This discussion will eventually lead to change. Not overnight, but it has to happen.

A black person would have an inherently more valuable perspective on how a black person is characterized in a video game.

A doctor would have an inherently more valuable perspective on how a complicated surgery is represented in a video game.

It's not a racist statement, but thanks anyway.

I don't think Allen and her pals have a right to repeatedly make ignorant, hateful, over the top comments and not expect to get criticized for it. Criticism, of course, not including hate speech the likes of which is all too common on the Internet.

I do believe that folks who look at Giant Bomb panels with a half dozen women and take it as proof that the site should be boycotted are not approaching the issue in a constructive way. They are out to be angry and likely to make a name for themselves by lashing out at someone/something more popular than they are. What I would hope for is that folks who routinely complain about how badly certain parts of the Internet treat them not fall back on many of those same kinds of behavior whenever they feel like it. It's hypocritical.

@zevvion: Same here. Ever since G4 went under she kinda disappeared. I think she might be an actress now but I'm not really certain. It would be nice to see her join the games world again.

More diversity is better than less diversity. Giant bomb would suck if it were 8 Jeffs. However you don't want diversity at the expense of the qualifications and fit for the job. At least one of the new guys is going to be a full timer on the Bombcast which is Giant Bomb's flag ship product. Who would have been a better fit than Dan and why? How does their race, gender, or sexual preference improve the show to me the listener?

Let me go ask my black friend. "Hey whats it like to be in a street gang and have to kill people" oh wait I got punched in the face.

That is not even close to the same thing. A doctor went to school to get a medical degree. Giving him actual knowledge about surgery. A black person isn't by definition grown up on the streets as Franklin and Lamar were. Any person growing up around people akin to Franklin and Lamar would have inherently more valuable perspective on that stuff than the mere fact of being black. Yes, you are being totally racist, even if unintentionally.

And, I'll admit after I read THIS was was slightly disappointed at GB. Even if none of our community was attacking these people, even if the process of hires was fair...

Well, sorry, I do feel like a moment was lost in not putting 'diversity' higher on the list of what they wanted. There are many ways to judge who to hire and what an employer can use. I think you can do something correctly, intelligently and honestly and still come out with a result that is not the best.

Do I think the people who hired two more white men did something wrong? No, not wrong, just disappointing in that there does seem to be factors at work that were not intentional but there. When you have an office has been (and is) 'cis white males' to not to stop and say, "Wait...why are we considering two more cis white males? What mechanism are we missing or not evaluating?" seems appropriate. There were several threads on folks GB could hire over the last year to add diversity, yet not a tickle of "Lets think about that?"came from that exercise...really?

That's quite the leap of logic you're making there.

I am what people would consider a privileged white guy. I can't really change that, because I am white, and I have to admit that I have been pretty fortunate in life, all things considered. Seeing discrimination makes me upset, but while there may be a certain amount of discrimination against white men, it's not nearly in any way comparable to the discrimination that other groups suffer now or have suffered in the past. When people see Giant Bomb, a site that was already comprised entirely of white men in the very exclusive club that is the game journalism establishment, hire two more white men that are well-established in the field, that's disappointing.

I don't consider it racist or sexist in any way that they went with Dan and Jason. However, I am disappointed that they went to the rolodexed establishment rather than any of the numerous other voices that put in their applications, whether their experience came from smaller game websites, Youtube, or what have you. As TruthTellah suggested in another thread, hiring a young lady with an active interest in Nintendo would have really shaken things up, which is something I think Giant Bomb really needs. More diverse voices. Whether that be a woman that likes Nintendo or a black guy that has an encyclopedic knowledge of JRPGs, it doesn't really matter. I just wanted to see someone honestly, truly new. Expressing such a desire doesn't make me bigoted toward my own race or gender because that is a patently ridiculous notion.

Dude. Are you joking? So black people are just born with knowledge of what it's like to grow up on the streets and be in gangs? You're joking?

Hi everyone, I can't be only one who finds this all a bit silly.

Now I am a white male, and I am happy about who Giant Bomb hired, BECAUSE and only because I like Dan and Jason from their time over at GameInformer. And to be honest I prefer those two over a lot of other people because I like them, not because they are white males. In the end I don't give shit about someones gender or color or anything like that, as long as they are entertaining, likable people - that is all that matters to me.

And as such I feel that those two are the right hires, and I feel like the whole talk about wanting or forcing a female or black person into the staff because diversity equals better somehow, is a bit misguided as it should be about the personalities - not the diversity.

And on a side note, I can't really name that many non-white males or many females of any color, in the video game journalism field, compared to how many white males I can name.

this argument needs to stop being brought up. no one has said this in this thread. or any of them.

@brodehouse:

so you don't want to be told that your opinions make you come off as discriminatory, maybe you should examine why you have those opinions, and why someone may so easily interpret them as such.

if you're a white male, it's very difficult to find a place that is actively discriminating against you. seeking diversity so that a place's percentage of employed women or people of color raises from 0% to 10% doesn't equate with discrimination against white males.

as many others have said, yes if we all lived in a perfect world where everyone was the same, and, for example, we all loved professional wrestling, hated yoshi, and played video games, then none of this stuff would matter! seeking people out just because they look different would be bad because we're all the same!

however that's not the world we live in.

privilege is layered. yes, class is an element of privilege. so are race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, etc...

in most of the western world, you are never discriminated against because you're white, male, or straight. yes, you most likely will have comparably less access to resources to advance yourself if your part of a lower class. not all straight white males have the best life in the world, but, oftentimes, their situations aren't hurt because of the fact that they, are straight, male, or white.

your claims of discrimination when white males aren't viewed as the ideal in the hiring process can easily be interpreted as misguided because, at the moment, the games industry is run by the same straight white males that run almost every other industry.

not viewing this as even the slightest problem, and viewing any potential solution to it as infringing upon your rights is a bit scary! you think you're being excluded if a place like giant bomb seeks out a woman or person of color before they consider white male candidates? think about how a woman trying to work for a software company must feel, and the kind of adversity they deal with, and maybe re-examine what your definition of meaningful discrimination.

This is only tangentially related but I wanted to get this off my mind. There's this one person who does stuff on different site/s (?) and is on Twitter who practically lambasted GB way before this thing blew up by criticizing the lack of diversity in the GB panels (others as well), the after hours shows and now the hires (since everyone on staff was already white and cisgendered men and basically said that since this was an open hire you should hire someone from "our community" as well) and just keeps talking shit about it (in the snarkiest, most passive aggressive manner). It really got under my skin with how narrow minded the approach was (plus organizing a boycott too was another thing that really took the cake since that's not the best solution). Not gonna mention the name but I'm sure some users know who I'm talking about. That kind of criticism of starting a house fire that spreads to the entire neighborhood all because GB didn't make an effort to diversify.

Really, being snarky and angry about it constantly isn't gonna bring about changes faster and I don't even know if said person realizes this... -_- Just putting it out there. Also just a suggestion if any duder wants to reply to this, just PM me if you wanna talk about it and not reply in this thread. I just wanted to put this out here and not add another reply chain or comment pyramid. :D

It really isn't Giant Bombs job to make sure every single different voice out there is represented.

@giantlizardking - You are right on target with this sentence.

These things, I believe:

White privilege exists.
Male privilege exists.
Women are underrepresented in video games.
Minorities are underrepresented in video games.
It would be really cool to have a more ethnically/racially/sexually diverse GB staff.
It is not GB’s job to make sure every single different voice out there is represented.

Some people out there made the choice to consider this hiring move a watershed moment in the overall history of women/trans/minorities in video games. That was their choice. They set up pre-conditions on an event over which they had zero control and made the completely irrational decision to base their own outlook on that event's outcome.

Samantha Allen edged damned close to self-awareness when she Tweeted that she was angriest with herself for believing that GB was going to hire someone non-white/non-male. She should be angry with herself for that, because she actively set herself up for disappointment and set up an event in which a disappointment of her own creation would be used by her as a weapon to impugn other people.

Then a tidal flood of ungodly human waste and stupidity drenched her (for the time being). Hopefully these people are being banned/suspended and actively shamed for their terrible terribleness.

At the end of that, however, still remains this truth: It is not GB’s job to make sure every single different voice out there is represented.

If you think it is the job of other human beings to make the world what you want it to be you are not only going to be disappointed, you are a narcissistic fool.

@johnham: I'm all for diversity, and I agree there's very little of it on staff a lot of the time... but I dunno. To me the first place I go when I think of making the site more diverse would be getting people in who like the stuff coming out of Japan a little more; someone who's not just gonna shit down the throat of anyone who fondly remembers a kingdom hearts game. Maybe someone who doesn't have some weird deep-seated grudge against stealth games. Someone who'll argue on the Bombcasts and keep things interesting, you know? And when I think of that person I have no goddamn idea what they look like or what they're supposed to look like. I can't say that having minorities or women would make them better without knowing the people, and I don't know very many people. It's why I wish they would have gone for someone new, instead of going "Hey that guy who's been doing this for years is free. Let's get him."

So in a way I agree, in that I think it'd be cool to get someone new and unknown in and let them really start making themselves known; that in and of itself might be great for the site, and might lead to some more recognition for other people trying to get their foot in the door. But... I dunno. I'm not a staff member, I have no real insight into what they're looking for when they're hiring, the best I can do is say "It would have been cool if they'd done something more interesting." I don't know if it would have been good or not. I don't know if Dan Ryckert won't be bad. He might be fantastic. A lot of applicants might have been fantastic. Some of them might have been way the hell funnier than the Giant Bomb guys, or more insightful than Patrick. Until someone gives them a shot we can't know, and it's relatively apparent that they aren't gonna get that shot on Giant Bomb.

But... I dunno, to me that's where it all goes back to. When I want to see something new and interesting from the site, I don't have a notion that it needs to be a person with a certain race or gender or orientation... and maybe that's bad of me, apparently? I don't know. To be honest, I don't honestly care that much what the person they hire looks like, how they identify, I'd just want someone who's gonna bring something cool and interesting to the dynamic. Or, maybe it's less that I don't care, and more that... I guess I just don't think ahead enough to expect something? It's hard to explain, but I just didn't think about that kind of thing. I was just hoping for someone who wasn't going to be "Jeff 2.0". Or worse, "Brad 2.0".

But saying all of this is just gonna sound like I'm making the same "Hire for the person, not a checkbox" thing, isn't it? That's not what I'm trying to say, rest assured. I'm just saying that I'm real upset we're probably never gonna get to see a bunch of the cool shit that might have come out of those people applying for the jobs. Or maybe they were all terrible. Pessimism is a hell of a thing. I mean, after all this I'm still just upset that we use 'masculine' and 'feminine' to describe anything, because I'm a guy with way too much body hair who likes to curl up under a blanket and read sappy romance novels on the internet and listen to sad music. I'm gonna go hit my punching bag some more and try not to think too hard about stuff.

"Any person growing up around people akin to Franklin and Lamar would have inherently more valuable perspective on that stuff than the mere fact of being black."

I agree with this; a person who experienced the exact same things as those characters would have an even better perspective than someone who is "merely" black.

That doesn't change the fact that a black person living in the US automatically has some small degree of shared (virtual) experience with those characters and is thus better suited to commentary than a white person would be, assuming everything else is equal.

But before everyone gets hung up on calling me a racist, I want to bring this back around to the original source of the comment; does anyone here really think that there's literally zero unique perspective on games that a minority could bring to the table? Seriously?

@gaspower: I think soliciting PMs so you can talk shit about someone in private is maybe the worst way to contribute to this discussion.

From what I've heard/seen on his twitter Dan really likes Nintendo stuff more than the other guys, so it sounds like someone got their wish. (unless they would only want to see someone talk about Nintendo stuff if they were female)

@johnham: If I may use your phrasing: if everything else is equal, then yes, absolutely: the mere fact of being a minority will not bring a unique perspective to the table.

@whatisdelicious: I think the point @johnham is trying to make is that in this case, someone belonging to a minority would have an inherently more affected opinion that someone not belonging to that minority. Let's take the Tomodachi Life debacle for example. The guys talked about it a bit on the Bombcast. They're able to broach these topics in a very sensitive manner, which is great. But by doing that, they're commenting from the sidelines. A gay man/woman would inherently have a different opinion as Nintendo's choice is something that more directly affects people from that group.

what exactly did "allen and her pals" say that was so out there? yeh i can understand not liking leigh alexander's comments about GB, but what exactly was so inflammatory about it? when leigh alexander tweets something bad about a video game website that she's received a lot of flak from in the past, that's all it is: a tweet about a video game website.

samantha and leigh and cara didn't really get criticized for anything they said. no one asked "interesting, why would you interpret the video gaming community as so exclusive?" (mostly because you can just google the answer to that question if you're really interested and most everyone who replied probably wasn't really interested.

instead, they were met with slurs, hate, and tired old adages about "well clearly they hired the most qualified candidate", a very common phrase used to shut down conversations about diversity in the workplace.

most of the "criticism" i saw was tone-policing crap, trying to use their own anger about another missed opportunity in the games industry against them.

they have a right to be angry and criticize. and, if someone had presented a worthy argument, i'm sure they would have engaged. but no like i said, it was the same shit people have been saying for years to shut video game women down.

@conmulligan: No, no, I'm not soliciting PMs to talk shit about an individual but rather just discuss it with them if they want to. Did it come off as me wanting to talk shit about someone? I was just venting my frustration about how its being handled by people, that's pretty much it.

But would she have the interest in doing so? Don't get me wrong, it would be cool to see here at GB, but it's not really enough to just rattle off names of established women in the field. We could be here all day doing that and it wouldn't really solve anything. We'd just be engaging in the same fruitless behavior that occurs every time a thread on Giant Bomb starts up where the subject line is "Giant Bomb should hire [X]!"

"Hey new hire, you're black and there's a black guy in this game. How do YOU think they did?" Ya that would be racist. Jeff has more perspective on "the streets" than most black guys I know anyways lol.

@gaspower: Oh, fair enough.

I'm really glad GB got some new people in the door. I'm a little bummed that they are rather established voices given the open call for CVs. But the sniper elite 3 quick look pretty much sold me on the game, so GG Dan you're doing just fine.

Let's work through this:

IF: Dan and Jason are the most qualified people for the job based on skill set (Jeff's Position)

AND : Giant Bomb would be better if it had hired somebody who would have made it more diverse other than the people who they hired (the position of @johnham ).

Then: Giant bomb would be better if it hired somebody whose qualifications are inferior yet contribute more to diversity.

I never said somebody explicitly made that claim, but that is the point that is implicitly made.

@zevvion: By not bringing down Giant Bomb new hires with the discussion doesn't mean it's not being discussed. The conversation will always be happening someplace. The whole industry has been aware of this issue for years. This thread on the GB forums isn't some eye opening thing for people.

Just don't drag down the positive energy and excitement of having Dan and Jason join the crew.

There is no such thing as white privilege or male privilege.

There are rich white people and poor white people. Same as any race. You are much more likely to be born into a rich family and get accepted into college if you are Asian-American, so why don't people call it "Asian privilege"? Men and women face problems in society, I don't think one has an easier time over another