Star Spangled Beasters and Supporting the Bombcrew

Hi everyone. I don't normally post on the forums—maybe a handful of times in the nine or so years I've watched and supported Giant Bomb—but I really feel like I need to speak up about this. First and foremost, I come to this site to enjoy video games and the amazing Giant Bomb crew. I personally see video games as an escape from the trials and tribulations of everyday life, and by extension I view this site as a haven where I can leave politics at the door.

I'm always excited whenever the Bombcrew comes up with a new series because it keeps the site fresh and interesting, especially when said features incorporate holidays and whatnot. So when I saw Abby's announcement that Star Spangled Beasters was canceled, naturally I was surprised. It was a neat idea and we get to see Abby and Dan dressed in silly costumes while playing games. Sounds like a win any way you look at it, right? Well I guess some people just aren't content to enjoy what is clearly meant to be a light-hearted feature and posted some not so nice stuff in the comments of the LA Noire video.

Obviously there are people from all walks of life and political views to match on this site. That's fair enough. Do I always agree with everything the members Giant Bomb crew say from a political standpoint? No. You're allowed to believe what you want. But one of my pet peeves are people who are so self-serious and so ready to pick a fight at the drop of a hat that any little thing sets them off. This goes for people on all sides of the political spectrum. They're like a giant wet blanket and they ruin what should be good, light-hearted fun.

So I guess the point of this post is three-fold:

1) Chill out, y'all. This is supposed to be a site where we can enjoy video games irrespective of politics. Please stop trying to turn everything into a political debate. There's obviously no connection to Giant Bomb video features and current world events.

2) Big shoutout to Abby and Dan for making a cool new feature, and just for being awesome in general. You're damn great people and I know there are plenty of people who feel the same way I do about you.

3) Please continue Star Spangled Beasters. Don't give up on the series just because some people want to throw a tantrum in the comments.

I respect both the light-hearted silliness of the videos, as well as the realization that, even if obviously unintended, the resulting division was against the spirit of the video and the site as a whole and the best way to deal with it was not to continue the videos. Fair enough. We have lots of other video content to watch and this'll be replaced with something less divisive in the future. Thanks Abby and Dan for making cool stuff.

I think it's very clear that they meant no harm and that should be apparent to most people on this website.

But the climate is not good for a feature like that. Viewers have made that clear, they've realized that themselves, and they're making the correct decision by reading the room and cancelling something they planned a while back when everything was at least slightly less on fire.

There's no need to advocate that they continue it, there is no way they could at this point after having the discussion anyway.

@lemmox: Well regardless of the reason you think it is if you are interested in supporting the crew then do so by respecting their decision to have a talk about a feature and cancel it if they feel it isn't right.

Just my two cents before this is gonna get locked in a minute:

Nothing wrong with critisiscm and discussion, but we don't really have to force either, and this is a forced one.

It's still okay to be patriotic, it's also okay to right now, not be (or never be at all). What's important is to respect other people's points of view.

So if this series is done now, so be it, but I hope it's not out of a weird sense of obligation to one group of people. There shouldn't be any obligation, freedom of speech and all that.

Anyway just keep calm and move on everyone.

I hope this thread remains unlocked. I feel it's both necessary and healthy for the community to be able to discuss this as a sort of open discussion on the nature of the site.

@bladeofcreation: I would agree but there is no way it will remain civil enough to avoid being burned away.

@efesell: what does this comment even mean?

How could I *not* respect their decision? I lack the ability to upload content to their site so I'm unable to change the outcome.

But if by "respect their decision" you mean "refrain from criticizing the misplaced outrage which made them feel like they had to do this", then no thank you.

@efesell: Indeed. I don't envy the mods, that's for sure.

I miss it already.

People posted reasonable criticism in the comments, and then others threw a tantrum whining about it and mocking them. So, honestly, the ones who needed to chill out were those that couldn’t take others being critical. And I’m more than a little disappointed to see that some of them were mocking criticism 2 weeks ago too and yet were allowed to do it again today.

I don’t think any of GB wants you to leave politics at the door either.

@cannoli: To your third point, people did more than "throw a tantrum."

@lemmox: Not all of the comments were absurd overreaction simply because the games have something to do with America. Many people DID articulate why it made them uncomfortable. You may not agree with them. That doesn't mean people didn't state their reasons.

I personally wasn’t offended by this feature, but I also completely understand why people would have been. And I’m behind Giant Bomb with whatever they choose, whether that means pulling the feature or continuing it.

I will say that at times in the past I have cringed at Dan’s naive and very Dan-like sense of Rocky IV patriotism, and I hope the decision to pull the feature because of the current climate serves as yet another genuine learning opportunity for him.

Finally, I really liked the content of this feature. I really enjoyed them simply going through Oregon Trail, a game we all played, and hearing their thoughts and decision making. I also really enjoyed the conversation they had during this episode, learning about Dan’s experience with the game and so on. I would love it if they could re-skin this feature as something else but continue the lineup of games they would have used, because that’s the part I was really liking about all this.

Also quite aside from the criticism it may also just be real hard right now to dress up and be all jokey pro America without resulting in an awkward video.

Might have just been a moment of preparing for the schedule and stopping to say 'Can we just not.'

Like, to be clear, the first page of comments had someone going “salty QQ comment tears!” with a picture of Ben, and that tone was frequent throughout. People constantly came in to complain about the comments in general... but they were complaining about people respectfully writing criticism, not those who were mocking/insulting them.

If you want a community that can discuss things respectfully, you have to start with the “it’s not ok to outright mock people for actually being critical of something”. Especially since people then started leaning into stuff like “this is what’s turning people conservative!” etc.

@lemmox: I mean I would start with the notion that there isn't a single thing constructive about that statement.

Just ask yourself: Who are the people policing language, the types of imagery and art they deem acceptable to be shown?

Videogames.

I've got some advice for everyone who feels upset, one way or another.

Take a deep breath and count to ten.

Have a snack.

Go for a walk or something.

If you still feel the burning desire to comment, go ahead. But at least have a little perspective.

As for me, I understand GB cancelling the feature. Obviously, if something generates this much controversy it makes sense to just shut it down. It's just a shame that it had to come to this at all, especially since the series is so divorced from any of this crap.

Seeing a lot of people speaking up about something tends to make it seem like there's more of an outrage than there really is. I think it's important to see people's individual criticisms for what they are instead of lumping everyone into one ball of "crazies" or whatever.

Also, on the topic of "chilling out", let's not pretend this feature was some huge loss. GBE will find other reasons to play games and everything will be just fine.

@lemmox: There’s no point in engaging with most of this argument but I will again say: people were not “outraged”. They made reasonable criticism. Criticism you may disagree with, but it was worded reasonably.

Then people immediately (and pre-emptively, even!) flipped out complaining about the “outrage”, the “salt”, etc. and mocking anyone critical. If we want to talk about hair-triggers, apparently seeing someone being slightly critical sets people off into whining fits. Even if they were somehow overly critical (which most if not all of those critical weren’t), people insulting anyone who’s slightly critical makes me feel way more unwelcome than someone being overly critical.

I wasn't offended... but, I also didn't give any thought to this feature while watching it at, like, 2 in the morning while browsing YouTube.

After considering the iconography vs. what has been going on for the past couple of weeks (and couple of years, and couple of decades, and couple of centuries), I can see how even a tongue in cheek usage of Americana is a bad look. I don't blame Abby and Dan for pulling the plug on it.

The problem with topics like that is that they quickly devolve into things like "people are too sensitive." Just like it's happening right now.

I liked the first video (haven't watched the second one yet). I also understand why the feature would make people uneasy/think it was ill-advised. I thought the problem was more with the "packaging" rather than the video. During the actual gameplay, I didn't feel they even talked about the US that much.

At the end of the day, the US has been in such a sad(der) state of affairs in the last couple of weeks that I get why they chose to cancel it.

For some people, it can be impossible to push current goings-on of the world out their mind and enjoy something without those events coloring their feelings. Nothing exists in a vacuum and even content created with the best intentions in mind can seem a bit iffy when you view it through the lens of recent events. Games, like all media, are a form of escapism, but everyone does not have an equal capacity to escape the uncomfortable thoughts plaguing their brains. Obviously, not all of these people make a huge fuss about it and start fights online either, which is the wrong course of action in all but the most extreme of cases. Stepping away from content that doesn't sit well with you is perfectly acceptable. It's all up to the individual, as always.

However, I completely agree with GB's decision to stop the feature if they feel it was poorly timed. Despite their original intent, these videos obviously seem a bit tone-deaf to recent events in the US. If Abby and Dan no longer feel comfortable with doing these videos, they are obviously in the right to stop making them. People may complain and yell about censorship and politics but it's easy to see why GB might be uneasy with continuing this series.

Being patriotic means loving and supporting your country. Loving and supporting your country can very well mean telling the people currently in charge “hey, assholes, stop doing the horrible things you are doing” and working to make them do so.

Everyone should be patriotic. Seriously. The opposite is apathy and ignorance and that’s how we got into this mess in the first place.

@lemmox: I think if you wanted to start that as an actual dialogue then that's different, there IS constructive criticism in that direction sure.

That was not the tone of the discourse that I was able to see before leaving the comments sections because I wasn't feeling shitty enough about myself at the time to continue reading it.

@efesell: Then you should have kept reading (or maybe I should have stopped), because the complaints about this series went from 0 to "crazy" real fast. At one point Austin Walker got co-opted because it was assumed he would have been inherently against this series, without any proof to support that.

After reading the entirety of both threads, I can't say I saw anything approaching a dialogue - nor well-crafted criticism.

Frankly, I'm disappointed about the decision to cancel. I guess I can understand where the criticism is coming from (although I think it's ridiculously over the top) but the correct response is not to call for features to be banned. If people don't like the very mild patriotism on show, they simply shouldn't watch this feature. I do find it ironic given the week's events that have clearly informed opinions that people seem to have forgotten that one of the other hallmarks of totalitarianism is shutting down viewpoints that you don't like.

Still, I'm not going to say I cared enough about the feature to say anything else.

I respect the hell out of Abby and don't think either of them had any negative intention.

But I do think it was the right thing to do considering what is happening and how it might be looked at by people on the outside as very tone deaf. Plus if they are not feeling something I dont want them to do it.

I know some feel its an over exaggeration but not every one can just detach like that. I feel the "chill out" stuff comes off as slightly insensitive to how others might feel.

I understand their decision and understand how some people might have been turned off, but once again it's the few morons and trolls that shout the loudest that ruins things for everyone. I hate the internet most of the time.

I know "Don't like it? Don't watch it." feels simplified and reductive to some people but holy shit maybe take a step back and follow that advice once in a while. Unless you just want to pick an online fight then in that case you can kiss every inch of my ass.

@giantmidget999 said:

Sergeant Slaughter needs to learn a thing or two about the flag code!

Look, here's the bottom line for me: I think Giant Bomb did the right thing by pulling the series, it was upsetting to some people and who wants to upset anyone?

But... as an American, the notion that any display of American patriotism is now considered offensive (just because of the actions of one dipshit who currently resides in the White House), I very much take exception to this. Now more than ever, it's important to celebrate the ideals upon which the United States were founded, precisely to remind us that we need to be better as a country.

It's easy to roll your eyes and say "what good are those ideals, if America never lives up to them?" And it's easy to allow one's point of view about the current administration to color one's perceptions of American patriotism. But the enlightenment-era ideals that America was founded on have always been far more aspirational than descriptive. America is always falling short of its ideals in one way or another, but that only makes them all the more important to celebrate, to give our nation something to strive for.

There's no question these are dark times for America. But if the world won't allow Americans to celebrate what good there still is in this country, if Americans are going to be guilt-tripped for celebrating the ideals upon which our country was founded, then we're really in trouble. Because the day that American patriotism is only left to those people who carry out evil in America's name, that's the day that all is truly lost.

It's easier to be ironically "rah rah America" when there isn't a racist shithead tearing your country apart. So I can understand why they pulled the feature. People have a right to be angry these days because our president is incarcerating families and separating children from their parents and alienating all our allies by engaging in trade wars against them. This feature isn't a tacit endorsement of those things, but I can see why it would provoke a huge response.

I'll chime in and say that I support the right for Giant Bomb to make decisions regarding their features. All though I think that the "Star Spangled Beasters" should have been allowed to continue, hopefully Abby and Dan remain open to trying new approaches to video features on this site, and hopefully they realise that criticism of their content is NOT criticism of their persons.

The comments on those videos were locked because they devolved into personal attacks and trolling almost from the get-go; that doesn't mean "go make a forum thread to talk about it some more." At this point if you'd like to bring up the feature or its cancellation I'd recommend sending the staff members involved a PM.