Women's Issues

I wouldn't limit that to feminists, but they really should know better.

Why can't someone be a feminist while also believing that pre- or extra-marital sex is immoral?

@ GamerGate: I'll start believing that it is only about journalism integrity when people stop involving Sarkeesian in it.

Doesn't see why not. The early modern feminists of the 1800s w'd of all most certainly frown at it.

The slut-shaming that prompted my comment was actually nothing about extramarital or premarital sex. It was about twerking, of all things. Acting like it's inherently degrading.

edited 17th Sep '14 9:30:42 PM by Sixthhokage1

It seems to me that if gamers really are concerned about the integrity of games journalism then Zoe Quinn's a pretty crap target. Her alleged misconduct of sleeping with journalists in exchange for good coverage (addendum: can someone link to a pro-Quinn article supposedly written in exchange for sex?) would seem to testify to how little clout she actually had with them. You aren't going to see Gabe Newell or Andrew Wilson sleeping with hacks in exchange for positive coverage - because they don't need to.

I'd be a lot less suspicious of GG if it wasn't for the constant ranting about SJWs and their "social-control agenda" and the fact that Quinn was already a target for that contingent. The fact that the gamer community tends to be sophomoric and ridiculous at the best of times didn't help.

edited 18th Sep '14 1:10:15 AM by Achaemenid

Yeah people who want to make legit points about corruption within games journalism would be best served to follow the example of TB, who even when getting involved in the whole mess made the focus on the journalists who fail to disclose personal relationships they had with a dev and/or gave good reviews based purely on having a close personal relationship with the dev.

Now he got death threats for that anyway... but in this kind of discussion you're pretty much guaranteed death threats, you might as well get them while doing the right thing at least.

This provides a decent-ish rundown of what's wrong with the GamerGate campaign.

I've hesitated from linking to it, because of the whole "IT'S A CONSPIRACY WAAH POLEMICISTS IN MI VIDJA GAMEZ" atmosphere, but David Futrelle at We Hunted the Mammoth has been trawling through all 3756 pages of the "burgersandfries" IRC logs. It makes for interesting reading.

edited 18th Sep '14 3:57:57 AM by Achaemenid

Bunch of people on the internet acuse a woman of having sex for reviews no one can link.

The sextrade of her supposed for-profit sex banter elevated to levels that might be describing Dante's layer for nymphomaniacs applies to a single game she is not charging anything for and you can download for free.

There is nothing involving journalism here. If people are stupid enough to base purchases only on reviews anyways, scapegoating the "evil, corrupt journalists" is simply a way to blame someone else for any dissapointment in a purchase. The market is too varied and judged by other factors far from just a metacritic ranking for this to possibly have a significant aspect on the gamer population. It's not about videogame journalism, it's bored people trying, desperately, to find someone to blame for something so completely irrelevant that the subject they have been trying to reach is now as pointless and invalid as it is powered by sheer vitriolic hatred for its own sake.

It's the fear of delusionally empowered customers which form a vocal minority in the gaming market, that cry out for blood on things they clearly haven't even touched. I can't find a single disparaging comment about the videogame she made. I mean, not a single person bothers to download the game, rate it an criticize it fairly. If it was a shitty game, it's fine to call her out on it. No one speaks out against the supposed reviews she got, all they speak about is that she got reviews.

It's not about videogames. It's just violence for its own sake. The misoginy part that comes into play is that a largely male sector found a quarrel with a female victim and the perpetrators' manner to get at her is by rampant misoginy (the default to intimidate women). This reflects badly upon women who want to get into the industry of videogame development, a sorely needed aspect. But it's not about misoginy alone, or gaming journalism alone, or X against Y alone, or an idealistic, revolutionary thought sprouting from the dark tendrils of a scheisskrieg of police involvement magnitude.

It's just a blight on the internet and we're better off when it dies down.

Gamer Gate is like the MRA movement: maybe there are some people there who have something genuinely insightful to say that has nothing to do with bashing women, and are there to address real issues, but the movement as a whole is so bloated with juvenile misogyny that their voices are quickly drowned out in the ocean of hate. Those people would be better off distancing themselves from the movement and striking out on their own, as many pro-men activists have been doing with the MRA movement.

People within Gamer Gate who are more concerned about actual journalist integrity issues need to come to the same realization that so many people within the MRA movement have come to regarding the issues they're trying to represent: it doesn't matter if you join the KKK because you're trying to combat a real, serious issue; so long as you're wearing that white hood, nobody's going to hear anything but hate rhetoric coming out of your mouth.

edited 18th Sep '14 7:54:58 AM by TobiasDrake

They do, the people on her side have launched harassment campaigns against people for saying it's not a good game. Which brings up my main point, this isn't actually a fight between two sides it's a bunch of small groups of people who keep getting lumped into an "us" or "them" pile despite things being more complicated than that.

If we divide the 'sides' into only two then we've got horrible people throwing death threats on both, but in actuality it's not just two 'sides'. There are reasonable people making reasoned statements about the games industry, there are people being asked questions and answering honestly without the full context, there are hatful squid-fucks out there tying to dox and harass, there are folks who like the game, folks who don't like the game, folks who think the harassment she has been getting is wrong, folks who are so wrapped up in their own moral outrage that they are sending death threats of their own, people who feel everyone has to be "with us or against us" and will scream at anyone who doesn't agree with them exactly.

There are a lot more than two groups at play here, and that's worthy of acknowledgment.

edited 18th Sep '14 8:27:03 AM by SilasW

Except the people who started Gamer Gate and perpetuated the entire campaign specifically separated it into a two-side fight. "SJ Ws" and themselves. Also, based on the information provided, they specifically absorbed any assets they could find to their cause, and mislead their supporters with doctored and false information.

Even if there are individual parties that are involved without any clue as to the bigger hands at play, those bigger hands were still manipulating everything from behind the scenes.

Very true, but the self declared SJ Ws who launch harassment campaigns against people for saying they don't like the game are contributing to the "with us or against us" idea the same as the Gamers Gate folk.

It's just too much wrong bundled up in a haggis of rotten "fucked up" to go with a side of fuckall to any decency.

While behavior of anyone making death threats and the like on behalf of Zoe Quinn is also unacceptable, I find myself less able to get offended by it than those that started this debacle in the first place.

Frankly, if you walk into a bar and start wailing on someone, and then around the fourth or fifth punch, he kicks you in the balls, my only response to that is that you shouldn't have started wailing on him in the first place. Is it morally right to hit you? Eh, probably not, but goddamn did you deserve it.

It's disingenuous to cry foul for someone hitting you while you're still holding the knife.

edited 18th Sep '14 9:12:32 AM by TobiasDrake

Tobias, that was a wonderful analogy.

Most of the people defending Zoe don't see themselves as SJ Ws. They see themselves as decent human being offended by someone getting death and rape threats because their ex was a douchebag and spread a bunch of lies about them. Is well reasoned stuff getting slammed with the crazy? Yes. But when you're surrounded by crazy, it's easy to have the reasonable start to blur with the wtf?

I dunno about that. At least I can appreciate a Groin Attack as a practical maneuver. Making death threats from behind an internet persona is something else.

edited 18th Sep '14 9:19:58 AM by probablyinsane

The problem if fighting fire with fire is that it will only make...more fire.

This fire began with incendiary garbage in the dankiest alley of the most dingy city of Filthsville, and it's the place where not even the most drunken hobo would take a piss. Why feed it.

You know why while there were some African Americans who would stand passively while being firehosed and having dogs sic'ed on them, there were Black Panthers beating the crap out of a corrupt cop.

I don't approve of the IRA doing car bombings but I can understand why there were those who felt pushed into that situation.

Unless you fully appreciate and understand your oppositions frustration you cannot change their mind or their methods.

Women are getting sick of being attacked. Women are sick of harassment. Male allies are tired of being lumped in with bigots and people are sick of the lack of accountability and the free hate of the internet with little to no moderation.

Doesn't make it right per se, but I can see why others don't feel like they have a choice.

But what does giving out to frustration accomplish? How much do you achieve by letting it out? Will the opposition, or the victims, be helped at all by fanning the flames?

I can understand it, too. But. Before acting. Will this sort of thing have a negative consequence?

Of course it does.

But again, lasting and complete solutions are only obtained by understanding what lead to them loosing their cool and realizing that for the victim to respond with such a dramatic show of force, shit has hit the fan.

The Irish people didn't just magically wake up one morning and decide to go kill the British anymore than the Black Panthers just popped out of no where.

This is decades if not centuries of bigotry and the oppressive control that comes from it finally erupting. Humans have their breaking point where they can only take so much then they have to lash out. They can't control it. People are tired of being victims so the natural defense mechanism for that is to fight back, and fight dirty if need be.

They tried being nice and respectful. We all see how that works.

Women with PTSD more susceptible for food addictions.

As capable as humanity is of violence, it is also capable, however, of more rational thought. For the existence of the rioters and violent murders of india there is the possibility of Gandhi and followers, for all the Black Panthers there is also Luther King and his followers.

Their example and many others stand testament that things can be achieved without resorting to the all too natural response of rage. Impulse control is a virtue, succumbing to it might be "natural", but not irreprehensible.

edited 18th Sep '14 9:41:11 AM by Aszur

Only if you loose.

If you win, you're a revolutionary.