Mr F. said:
You know, I originally wasn't going to respond to this, as I thought it would just be a waste of everyone's time. But I thought it over, and even if it lands me into a ton of arguments, I figure it can't possibly get any worse than I think it will.
Let's ignore your points about "FOR FUCK"S SAKE!" or "What the fuck is wrong with you people?" (BTW, no joke, I'm honored that you pull that one out during my post) We'll get to them later, but for now let's concentrate on some other things for a moment:
1)The apology: was Yahtzee acting out of his own accord when he made the apology? Yes. Did he have every right to make that apology? Yes. Was the apology necessary? No, it wasn't. And really, that's why me and several others made fun of it, because it was no worse than any of his other material. We didn't do it because we felt that his publishers were pushing the matter, we didn't do it because we felt that Yahtzee's freedom of speech was being trampled over, we didn't do it because we think Yahtzee's job is being held hostage so he has to apologize, we did it because, in the end, it was silly in that he apologized in the first place.
2)Content creator: this is about him being the content creator and having the power to change his videos, and incidentally, his "other" apology. This is also the part that, for me personally, I made fun of, because looking back at what he replaced it with, it wasn't a case that the line fit better, or that the dialogue was more snappy as a result, or that everything flowed better now. There's a difference between him changing something because he feels it makes for a more well-rounded and better experience, and him changing something because people raised a fit about it. Yes generally speaking, people raising a fit usually indicates where the problem lies, but this wasn't an issue of style, this was an issue of subject, and as it has been mentioned before when we are talking about a man who is quite well known to have no subject that is off limits, this just comes across as an arbitrary line that shouldn't be crossed.
3) Bullying: so we're bullying Yahtzee? Us, making a simple, one-off joke? Have any of us threatened him? Made him feel inadequate about himself? Gone to lengths to torment him? No, we made a simple joke. Christ, if that makes us bullies than I guess the whole of comedy is nothing more than just juvenile bullying huh? Now, that isn't fair for me to say, I know, but realistically what is it about what we've done that made us bullies huh? Because if that's all you got, you have a really flimsy argument going on.
4)Trans have it worse than straight: was this ever a point of discussion? No, honestly, when did any of us say "Fuck them trans, straight people all the way, biatch!" or anything similar to that affect? Further, why do you bother bringing it up in the first place? This is The Escapist, do you know how many topics we've had pertaining to transgenderism? The amount of terms we've learned because these threads happen over, and over, and over, and over again? Do you honestly think that what you're bringing to the table is something that none of us have heard before, and therefore that's why we all made the jokes we did? You know, had you not brought up the issues of white knighting, e-penis, or enlightenment, I wouldn't even bother thinking of them now. But seeing as how you brought them up yourself, all I can say is that you're not helping your case by making a point of that.
5) We're attacking the trans community: do you honestly think that when Yahtzee said "I'm not gay, I just suck off pre-op transsexuals" that we were all rubbing our hands together in glee? Do you think we all looked at that and went "Good, good. The trans must be ostracized for their wicked ways!" because we are all secretly transphobic? Do you think that's why we joked, because we were angry that he took away what we perceived as a necessary attack on the trans community? As we've said, time and time again, it has nothing to do with the subject itself that made us joke, but rather that he changed it at all. It wouldn't matter if it were a joke about gay people, straight people, men, women, children, the elderly, black people, white people, South Americans, Russians, the French, Japanese people, the rich, the poor, the middle class, the religious, the non-religious, capitalists, socialists, communists, fascists, anarchists, terrorists, the military, masochists, sadists, pedophiles, holocaust victims, or even mole people, it was the fact that he changed it at all that made us make jokes. NOT. THE. FACT. THAT. THE. JOKE. WAS. ABOUT. TRANS. PEOPLE.
6) I saved this one for last, because of your ever amazing way of ending the post with "You all disgust me" in connection with things such as "FOR FUCK'S SAKE" "What the fuck is wrong with you people" and "Are you fucking serious" I have to ask a very, very important question: what do you hope to gain out of all of this? Try to make us feel ashamed of ourselves and change our minds? Because honestly all you're doing is making me think of how juvenile you must be to resort to that tactic, especially since it wasn't like you just grouped us all together and made one broad statement for all of us, but because you took the time to post a new one after every quote. And honestly, if I start to think someone is juvenile, all I can than think is that they aren't really interested in trying to understand or start a dialogue, rather they're just interested in making a point, trying to make people feel ashamed, and leave it at that as the sole arbiter of this discussion. All it does for your argument is that it puts it into a position to be dismissed, because clearly if you're going into this discussion with an attitude of "Fuck it, I'm right, and everyone else is just throwing around horse shit" guess what, we aren't going to take your argument seriously. We won't see it as an appeal for us to reconsider our position, or open ourselves up to discussion, we will simply see it as someone who's trying to make it a point of coming across as being offended and using such a point to establish an arbitrary measurement of who's right and who's wrong.
So in the end, consider this: when you were making your post, for what purpose was it for? Was it to simply call people out in an attempt to make them feel ashamed? If that's the case, then your post doesn't really hold merit as a legitimate argument if that was the extent of it's goal. Was it to change people's minds and have them reconsider their opinions? If that's the case, your post failed to make that appeal and merely left us wondering why you bothered in the first place. Is your post in fact meant to be a cleverly disguised troll? If that's the case, congratulations sir, as you're clearly working at a level I've rarely encountered.
