Thoughts on #GamerGate

Gamergate, it's all over the news, the twitter and everywhere else. Some people claim it's about ending the misogyny and race in the video game industry, some claim that it's about harassing innocent women, in reality, nobody can tell anymore.

Gamergate isn't one individual incident, it's several incidents that aren't related. Let's start with the first. Zoe Quinn developed the game Depression Quest about her bouts with depression. The game wasn't meant to be entertaining but educational about the struggles with depression. Many critics found the game enjoyable for that reason. Zoe broke up with her boyfriend Eron Gjoni. He posted a blog post about how she had cheated on him with an editor from Kotaku to get better scores. This led to her being harassed and receiving death threats. This sparked the rumor that women were sleeping with editors for better scores. This set off the hate at Reddit and 4chan. They continued the harassment even after Gjoni admitted that he made up the claims in a moment of rage.

The next incident was the harassment of feminist gaming activist Anita Sarkeesian. Sarkeesian's goal was to remove the misogyny in gaming. I completely agree with her. I don't agree with her methods. She fabricates statements and doesn't stick to her issue. Sarkeesian stopped aiming at misogyny in games and started aiming at violence. This would be fine except she made statements such as "The Hitman games reward players for killing civilians." But this isn't true. That game penalizes people for killing civilians sometimes with a mission failure. Misogyny in games is real. All she had to do was point out Bayonetta fights ninjas with her breast practically hanging out. She was receiving death threats prior to gamergate but this amplified the number.

Gamergate also formed the #NotYourShield campaign. This was started by other minorities in the gaming community, journalist and developers as well. They wanted to show that not all gamers stood behind the harassment that these women were receiving. Stating that misogyny wasn't the only issue in gaming. How did people respond to this? They didn't. People responded by stating that these were just fake accounts created by Reddit and 4Chan to make the movement seem less misogynist and racist. Reddit and 4Chan responded with "Lol black people don't play video games." The hashtag is still going strong but has received almost no coverage with both sides writing it off as propaganda by the other side.

At the end of the day the only innocent party in all of this is Zoe Quinn. Just hear me out on this one. She did absolutely nothing. She made a game and had rumors spread about her by a bitter ex who later admitted they were fake. Anita Sarkeesian had a point. Video games are misogynist, for the same reason that they don't have much racial diversity, development lacks women and racial minorities. Her problem is she jumped to the "video games are killing people," lie train and made up fictional information to sell her "documentaries."Should she have received threats? No, but she is not the innocent civilian she paints herself as.

There's no actual structure or organization behind gamergate. Just a large amount of angry white men on 4Chan and Reddit attacking women. Why did I say white men? Because they stood by the fact that "black people don't play video games" and brushed us off as fake profiles to forward an agenda.

In fact the entire #Gamergate situation is stupid. You have to be stupid to think that there isn't misogyny in video games. Laura Croft was nothing but eye candy until her most recent game. That's over a decade of not being taking serious. There's rarely a lead in a game that isn't a white male. You also have to be stupid to send threats of rape and murder to women, just because you don't like them. Then you think police won't track you down. Calling for an end to the term "gamer" is also stupid.

I'll tell you what I've learned from gamergate. 4Chan is the pit that spawns evil based on wild accusations and lack of morals, decency or integrity, Reddit is the fan that blows it around. There is indeed a lack of racial diversity in both character personality and race in general. There is indeed misogyny, it makes no sense to be in a military shooter with your breast practically falling out. If you didn't know these facts before hand you are dumb. Brushing them off because you aren't a minority is also dumb. Focusing on people who will eventually be found and go to jail for making these threats instead of "How can we make video games more welcoming to everyone" is also dumb. Gamergate is dumb.

You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He's also playing Pokemon Liquid Crystal on YouTube
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