Over 1,800 Gaming Professionals Condemn Hate Speech in Open Letter

[kuolonen]

I spy with my little eye, companies called EA and Ubisoft. The two devils of gaming. And in any sane world this comment section should be full of comments talking about how we basically have Hitler and Stalin denouncing littering of streets. But no, we talk about the real problems with industry here. Like how we should tell people that making death threats are bad. God damn it.

Any sane person knows that that is wrong to do. Any person who does it regardless will not give a flying F*** no matter who tells him it is bad.

Man it must be party time in EA and Ubisoft right know!
*EA worker 1*:"Man, look at these dimwits arguing! What all stuff can we fly under the radar during this shitstorm?"
*EA worker 2*:"Well, we could make EA access a mandatory subscription to play any of our game?"
*EA worker 1*:"Ooh, I like that, nobody wont event notice if we can time it right with yet another "scandal".".

 

[Six Ways]

Spoiler

Frankly, the sheer volume of the stuff you refer to is a big part of why it looks exactly like conspiracy theorists doing their thang. The more of this stuff piles up, the more tenuous the links look and the more it resembles a chaotic assortment of newspaper cuttings plastered on a wall, scribbled on with red pen and webbed together with map pins and string.

The sheer volume isn't really a problem, to my eyes, as the connections being made (some of which are tenuous, I and those making them will and do readily admit it) aren't usually stretches of the imagination and, as I said in brackets, the far out ones are labeled as such or generally dog piled on for being that way. A driving ideal behind it seems to be "only bring forth and bank on what can be reasonably interpreted as evidence, back up your conclusions, and admit when you're wrong."

The idea seems to be to gather tidbits and context in order to cast as deep of a shadow of doubt as possible. To these people's credit, the saddest part about this whole thing is that they're not really having to try very hard in order to do it.

There are certainly actual facts in there, and genuine concern. But as much as you personally might not take it as a conspiracy, in reality these are very small, innocent connections which only look sinister because they're being framed in the conspiracy narrative that GamerGate is formed around.

And I think a lot of it on 'our' side is refusal to engage with that narrative (which is again, based on conspiracy and born of sexism, even if that's not the only driving force now*), which can easily come off as a blanket dismissal of all concerns. Which I would say it's not, using the very Kotaku example you've given there.

*The reason I claim sexism is still a driving force is that a lot of this is going hand-in-hand with 'Get SJWs out of our hobby!', suggesting that at the very least, the sexist contingent of the community is using it as vindication and a platform for that agenda. For many, it's not about gender, but I have no doubt that it secretly is for a sizeable fraction, be it minority or majority.

I'm glad that you can see there's at least some merit in what's being brought forth, but we just disagree on our interpretation of what is "innocent."

Journalists were and are reporting, positively, on the work of or in defense of friends, partners, and people they financially support without disclosing the information in their articles. Simply recusing themselves and handing it off to a peer or disclosing would have resolved that issue, but...no.

Frankly, this article by Erik Kain over at Forbes does a good job of outlining the problems involved here while being pretty even-handed, and still sort of falling on the non-gamergate side of things:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2014/09/04/gamergate-a-closer-look-at-the-controversy-sweeping-video-games/

The primary problem is a fundamental lack of trust, which has been damaged even more during this debacle, and it's allowing for all sorts of ideologues to throw their hats into the ring and be taken seriously...well, more than there were to begin with anyway.

It's a bit of a cluster fuck in general.

Well - the main thing I'll say is, that was an excellent article. Probably the best I've seen on this whole thing. And yes, it's right about this being a culmination of a series of events and a general erosion of trust between gamers and the press. Which, again, is not to say it's simple - it's driven by a lot of factors, and I still strongly feel than sexism is one of the major ones. At the very least, that this would be far smaller without that factor.

Beyond that, I guess we're separated by how serious and/or important we feel the various parts of this to be, which seems to bring us down on opposite sides of the line. So... I guess I'll leave it there?

 

[ScorpionWasp]

I think what fuels the hostility to (specific) women in the gaming industry is not the fact they're women as everyone would like you to conveniently believe, but the fact that the bar is lowered for them. I'm sorry for the frankness, but this point needs to be made. Deep down, we all know that had Depression Quest been made by a guy, it would have vanished into the halls of oblivion and never been a thing. And yet, not only is its creator showered with coverage and acclaim and sponsors paying her a monthly salary just for existing, and sufficient influence to sink a game jam with losses in the hundreds of thousands of dollars over some perceived slight by staff; we are forced to accept the narrative that (up until this point, keep in mind) she's actually oppressed because random trolls say mean things to her online. Deep down, we all know no guy would get to raise $160,000+ to make a series of Youtube videos about one cultural aspect of games or another. But poor darling, having to endure all of the verbal abuse we had to endure in silence in one weekend of gaming on Battlenet, Xbox Live or Dota 2.

And the worst part of it all, is that you aren't "allowed" to point any of that out. Nobody is going to debate your points, nobody is going to try and dispute them with facts and evidence. What they are going to do, is call you a sexist woman-hater. The supreme irony here, is that the people who have a problem with preferential treatment being offered others solely on the basis of what chromosome they happen to have been born with are sexists, and the people who have no problem with that are not.

I don't think the resentment (yes, that's the right word) towards women in gaming is going to go away until men and women start being treated equally, *truly* equally. If there was an unspoken rule determining every game made by an Asian receives an automatic 10, you bet we'd be seeing hostility against Asians instead. It offends people's sense of meritocracy. But what do I know, clearly I'm just a misogynist.

PS: I'm still waiting for a project that will allow my privileged kind to come up with game ideas and have programmers and artists do all the hard work for them while they sit back and get 8% of the profits.

 

[Colour Scientist]

snip

That you Boudica?

How do you always spot this? XD


Do you have Boudica radar or something? Do your Boudica senses get all tingly whenever you see a suspect alt-account?

I'm always really oblivious to this kind of thing. She could come back with the name Boudico or Boudica2 and I probably still wouldn't cop that it's the same person.

 

[Six Ways]

Deep down, we all know no guy would get to raise $160,000+ to make a series of Youtube videos about one cultural aspect of games or another.

The only reason she got all that money and attention was because of the huge amount of misogyny she received merely for being a woman, talking about feminism in videogames. The hatred happened before 'the bar was lowered'. You've got cause and effect the wrong way round.

The way I see it, this is what happens the vast majority of the time with these things. The 'bar being lowered' is a response to misogyny, not the other way round.

 

[anthony87]

snip

That you Boudica?

How do you always spot this? XD


Do you have Boudica radar or something? Do your Boudica senses get all tingly whenever you see a suspect alt-account?

I'm always really oblivious to this kind of thing. She could come back with the name Boudico or Boudica2 and I probably still wouldn't cop that it's the same person.

It's the posting style. Not talking about the topic at hand, cherry picking like some obsessive compulsive harvester, constantly referencing things (In this case dictionaries). It all just kinda stands out to me.

Either that or I'm actually just a massive creep ^_^

 

[Eve Charm]

Deep down, we all know no guy would get to raise $160,000+ to make a series of Youtube videos about one cultural aspect of games or another.

The only reason she got all that money and attention was because of the huge amount of misogyny she received merely for being a woman, talking about feminism in videogames. The hatred happened before 'the bar was lowered'. You've got cause and effect the wrong way round.

The way I see it, this is what happens the vast majority of the time with these things. The 'bar being lowered' is a response to misogyny, not the other way round.

merely for being a woman, Nope! You don't have to be a Woman, or even a Feminist to be hated by the internet when you start contending and insulting people's hobbies on the internet. Being a woman merely meant people could use insults about her being a woman in the ways of bashing and attacking her character. Jack Thompson, a male, Received the same hatred and threats ((Even the sexual ones)) For talking out about GTA and gaming violence. It doesn't matter what gender, sexuality or race you are when you kick the hornets nest, your going to get the same reaction.

 

[Six Ways]

Deep down, we all know no guy would get to raise $160,000+ to make a series of Youtube videos about one cultural aspect of games or another.

The only reason she got all that money and attention was because of the huge amount of misogyny she received merely for being a woman, talking about feminism in videogames. The hatred happened before 'the bar was lowered'. You've got cause and effect the wrong way round.

The way I see it, this is what happens the vast majority of the time with these things. The 'bar being lowered' is a response to misogyny, not the other way round.

merely for being a woman, Nope! You don't have to be a Woman, or even a Feminist to be hated by the internet when you start contending and insulting people's hobbies on the internet. Being a woman merely meant people could use insults about her being a woman in the ways of bashing and attacking her character. Jack Thompson, a male, Received the same hatred and threats ((Even the sexual ones)) For talking out about GTA and gaming violence. It doesn't matter what gender, sexuality or race you are when you kick the hornets nest, your going to get the same reaction.

I really wish people would stop comparing Anita Sarkeesian to Jack Thompson. There should be a videogames version of Godwin's Law for that guy.

The reason Jack Thompson got so much hate was because he was literally trying to destroy videogames. He was openly calling for actual censorship. He cannot be used as an example of 'haters gonna hate any old thing', because he was not 'any old thing'.

If a white male had run the same kickstarter as Sarkeesian, he would not have been treated like Sarkeesian was treated.

 

[Darkmantle]

Deep down, we all know no guy would get to raise $160,000+ to make a series of Youtube videos about one cultural aspect of games or another.

The only reason she got all that money and attention was because of the huge amount of misogyny she received merely for being a woman, talking about feminism in videogames. The hatred happened before 'the bar was lowered'. You've got cause and effect the wrong way round.

The way I see it, this is what happens the vast majority of the time with these things. The 'bar being lowered' is a response to misogyny, not the other way round.

merely for being a woman, Nope! You don't have to be a Woman, or even a Feminist to be hated by the internet when you start contending and insulting people's hobbies on the internet. Being a woman merely meant people could use insults about her being a woman in the ways of bashing and attacking her character. Jack Thompson, a male, Received the same hatred and threats ((Even the sexual ones)) For talking out about GTA and gaming violence. It doesn't matter what gender, sexuality or race you are when you kick the hornets nest, your going to get the same reaction.

I really wish people would stop comparing Anita Sarkeesian to Jack Thompson. There should be a videogames version of Godwin's Law for that guy.

The reason Jack Thompson got so much hate was because he was literally trying to destroy videogames. He was openly calling for actual censorship. He cannot be used as an example of 'haters gonna hate any old thing', because he was not 'any old thing'.

If a white male had run the same kickstarter as Sarkeesian, he would not have been treated like Sarkeesian was treated.

Yes he can be used as an example. All the things that Anita says proves how misogynistic the gamer community is for doing to her, were done to Jack Thompson. Put in a video game to get beat up, check. Harassed, check. Threatened, sexual and death variety, check.

So when it happens to Jack it's because he's a Dbag, but when it happens to Anita it's proof of sexism, yeah, that's some double standards right there.


But more on the substance, how is Anita not Similar to Jack? Her contention is that broad swaths of story-telling devices are inherently evil and sexist, and should never be used, and anyone who uses them hates women (that's what misogynist means after all). Can you tell me that in her perfect world, games would be made that have those "tropes"? It may not be government censorship, but she wants the community and developers to censer themselves, it's shaming censorship.

And more to the point, her whole argument is based on her belief that what you do in a video game, affects what you do in real life. How is that at all different from what Jack believes? He thinks video game violence causes real violence, she thinks video game "sexism" causes real sexism.

In my view, either she is wrong and video games dont affect you that way, or she is right and Jack Thompson is unfairly maligned.

 

[Something Amyss]

But more on the substance, how is Anita not Similar to Jack? Her contention is that broad swaths of story-telling devices are inherently evil1 and sexist, and should never be used2, and anyone who uses them hates women2 (that's what misogynist means after all).

That's three tings wrong in a single sentence. None of these are claims by Anita. Also, you may want to look up the concept of misogyny again, because it doesn't mandate hating women.

If you insert these things that Anita didn't said into the argument and ignore that misogyny covers a broad range of things, yes, she's just like Jack Thompson. But we're not really talking about Anita Sarkeesian anymore.

 

[Darkmantle]

But more on the substance, how is Anita not Similar to Jack? Her contention is that broad swaths of story-telling devices are inherently evil1 and sexist, and should never be used2, and anyone who uses them hates women2 (that's what misogynist means after all).

That's three tings wrong in a single sentence. None of these are claims by Anita. Also, you may want to look up the concept of misogyny again, because it doesn't mandate hating women.

If you insert these things that Anita didn't said into the argument and ignore that misogyny covers a broad range of things, yes, she's just like Jack Thompson. But we're not really talking about Anita Sarkeesian anymore.

"Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women or girls"
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misogyny

"Misogyny definition, hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women. "
dictionary.reference.com/browse/misogyny

"Dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women"
www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/misogyny

oh and the oxford dictionary link has the origin of the word too.
"mid 17th century: from Greek misos 'hatred' + gunē 'woman'."

Misogyny is the hatred of women, plan and simple. Many times in her own videos she defines these tropes as deeply misogynistic. She is very nearly explicit in saying that the people who use those tropes are misogynists themselves, I believe the way she phrases it is something like "steeped in the culture of misogyny".

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

PS: as I said to another user earlier in the thread, I love how internet activism loves to change the definitions of words like racism and misogyny, then blame everyone else for not knowing the new made up definitions. Little pet peeve of mine

 

[Six Ways]

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Except, you know, for her repeated and explicit statements to the exact contrary.

 

[Darkmantle]

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Except, you know, for her repeated and explicit statements to the exact contrary.

She has no trouble calling all manner of people misogynists. I fail to see where she has said the exact opposite.

 

[ScorpionWasp]

Bottom line, if someone offered me $160,000, fame, influence, to endure the impotent online rage of anonymous people making puerile remarks about my genitals and shit like that, and to make a relatively inexpensive (for reference, look at the quality and volume of content someone like James Rolfe (A.K.A Angry Videogame Nerd) produces entirely *for free*) videos, I'd need approximately 0.2 seconds to say "yes, oh yes, please oppress me like that!"

 

[Six Ways]

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Except, you know, for her repeated and explicit statements to the exact contrary.

She has no trouble calling all manner of people misogynists. I fail to see where she has said the exact opposite.

In, like, every video.

 

[Something Amyss]

"Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women or girls"
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misogyny

"Misogyny definition, hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women. "
dictionary.reference.com/browse/misogyny

"Dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women"
www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/misogyny

oh and the oxford dictionary link has the origin of the word too.
"mid 17th century: from Greek misos 'hatred' + gunē 'woman'."

Point of interest: when your own sources explain how you're wrong, it's probably a good time to abandon the argument. Your own definitions mention things other than hatred. Sorry, that's all I need to say.

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Only if you force the meaning of the word. Since that's dishonest, there's not much more to add here, either.

PS: as I said to another user earlier in the thread, I love how internet activism loves to change the definitions of words like racism and misogyny, then blame everyone else for not knowing the new made up definitions. Little pet peeve of mine

Except these uses predate the internet, so that's another false narrative.

Are you praytell annoyed by anything true?

 

[Eve Charm]

So 1800+ devs sign an open letter to stand up against harassment and hatred in the gaming community and not one of them come out to speak on either side about the Ton of speech coming on both sides. 1 week ago and no one says a thing, steps up on either side to stop the obvious harassment and hatred out there.

 

[Darkmantle]

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Except, you know, for her repeated and explicit statements to the exact contrary.

She has no trouble calling all manner of people misogynists. I fail to see where she has said the exact opposite.

In, like, every video.

If that is true tell me where. You are not contributing to the discussion by being obtuse and smug about it.

 

[Darkmantle]

"Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women or girls"
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misogyny

"Misogyny definition, hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women. "
dictionary.reference.com/browse/misogyny

"Dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women"
www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/misogyny

oh and the oxford dictionary link has the origin of the word too.
"mid 17th century: from Greek misos 'hatred' + gunē 'woman'."

Point of interest: when your own sources explain how you're wrong, it's probably a good time to abandon the argument. Your own definitions mention things other than hatred. Sorry, that's all I need to say.

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Only if you force the meaning of the word. Since that's dishonest, there's not much more to add here, either.

PS: as I said to another user earlier in the thread, I love how internet activism loves to change the definitions of words like racism and misogyny, then blame everyone else for not knowing the new made up definitions. Little pet peeve of mine

Except these uses predate the internet, so that's another false narrative.

Are you praytell annoyed by anything true?

I think you are getting to hung up on synonyms. If you are really going to split hairs between hatred and extreme dislike, it shows me that you have already chosen a side and will do whatever mental gymnastics necessary to support it.

And not changing definitions? I've had lots of internet activists tell me that you can't be racist against white people. well here is the definition of Racism:

"the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races."

tell me how that precludes white people, without changing the definition?

 

[Six Ways]

Her claim is clearly that the people making games hate women, and that playing the games makes you hate women too.

Except, you know, for her repeated and explicit statements to the exact contrary.

She has no trouble calling all manner of people misogynists. I fail to see where she has said the exact opposite.

In, like, every video.

If that is true tell me where. You are not contributing to the discussion by being obtuse and smug about it.

Pretty much every video. If you haven't heard her say it, then you haven't actually listened to her points. And if you haven't properly watched her videos, it's not my job to explain every detail to you of the videos you are arguing about.

Example. If you say "I have seen every Monet painting, and I dislike that he only ever uses cubism", all I'm going to bother saying to you is "Monet is not a cubist painter, he is an impressionist painter". I'm not going to bother proving to you that all his paintings are impressionist.

I think you are getting to hung up on synonyms. If you are really going to split hairs between hatred and extreme dislike...

Or, as those definitions say, 'mistrust', 'contempt', 'ingrained prejudice against' and 'dislike' (note the lack of 'extreme'). The point remains - your own sources show you up.

And arguably, you could be said to be getting hung up on it yourself, since that was not the thrust of Zachary's initial post - just an addendum. You haven't really answered the main points - that you said three factually incorrect things to support your position. Regardless of the definition of misogyny, Sarkeesian never says that using these tropes makes one a misogynist.