Gamergate - Charlier Brooker
Moomintroll
Member Posts: 1,498
in Off-Topic
Hurray, Charlie Brooker etc.
..now, in 2014, women have been forced into hiding – for voicing an opinion about videogames. That’s a sentence that should only ever appear in the opening chapter of an implausible dystopian sci-fi novel, moments before you toss it in the bin.
Full Article http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/20/gamergate-internet-toughest-game-woman-enemies
..now, in 2014, women have been forced into hiding – for voicing an opinion about videogames. That’s a sentence that should only ever appear in the opening chapter of an implausible dystopian sci-fi novel, moments before you toss it in the bin.
Full Article http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/20/gamergate-internet-toughest-game-woman-enemies
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Comments
Too much in the brackets? Still easier to grasp then the bonkers logic I've noticed without looking actively.
Edit: Holy crap, you forget one little / in the code and suddenly it looks like you're super agitated. Sorry for that, folks.
"You know those games where you get to choose your character class at the start, weighing up the pros and cons of picking a Warrior over an Archmage, or what have you? Never, ever choose “woman” on your first playthrough of The Internet, because you’ll face an immediate difficulty spike. Suddenly it’s a stealth game with nowhere to hide, one with hundreds of respawning enemies waiting to attack you the moment you make a noise or stand out in any way whatsoever... "
Is he mocking women or defending them? Or is he just talking bullshit? Anyone that plays MMOs knows it's a free for all. You'll get killed or harassed whether you're a Hulk Hogan, Cinderalla, or a tiny pink haired gnome.
Quote continued...
"The enemy AI is sophisticated and unpredictable; it studies your weaknesses and moves to exploit them. Instead of shitting fireballs at you, your foes bombard you with unrelenting abuse."
By "enemy AI" he means men. So all you men out there are exploting and abusing women... Seriously, that's what he's saying.
Quote continued...
"Reach the higher difficulty stages without dying (by your own hand) and this could graduate to blood-curdling death threats."
Big deal. People get death threats all the time on the internet. Ever played an online game with voice chat enabled? Teens will threaten to murder you, eat your dog, and burn your stamp collection in real life. They'll threaten to "track you down" or "trace your IP". Recently a gold farmer threatened to cut my throat because I killed him twice in a game... And this is the soft stuff, you should play some of the free online games where there's no moderators around to ban the freaks, or visit a news/media/gore website like LiveLeak and read some comments. But even the LiveLeak threats are always empty and mean nothing... Welcome to the internet, where people make empty threats over the tiniest things.
The whole GamerGate thing is a load of rubbish. A romantic couple made a game, it sucked. They broke up, he took it badly and started making creepy phonecalls... And somehow this has turned into a war on female gamers and forced them all into hiding? Am I missing something here? Because I know plenty of females gamers and none of them are "hiding" or being treated badly by other players.
Can't believe I'm wasting my day off on this rubbish.
and its sad that a legitimate issue in gaming, the corruption of games journalism is being obscured by a bunch of pricks who have no grasp on reality
Sure women get "harassed" for being women in certain parts of the gaming culture... By people trying to flirt with people they most likely will never meet outside of that one match they both happen to land in...
And on the subject of death threats from gamers... Most gamers won't care enough to carry them out, they're too busy playing games to do so...
And besides, women were never a topic of gamergate, why does every goddamn person opposing it keep dragging that subject into it?! It's about the rotting reanimated corpse of gaming journalism!
I think if 80% of your movement is using that movement to actively persecute a group of people based entirely on their gender, you need to take a closer look at what your movement is really about.
IE arguing 'everyone gets harassed', completely and utterly ignoring the scale. Shoddy, groundless reviws for games have been around for ages, plenty of solid games were panned, and awful ones praised. Whats new suddenly? A whiney ex boyfriend.
http://www.bustle.com/articles/47865-readergate-hashtag-satirizes-gamergate-and-its-so-on-point-its-scary
The tweet about Mary Shelly (author of Frankenstein) especially made me giggle.
Literature has benefitted from critical analysis, so will gaming.
I remember reading the comments underneath Gamespot's review of GTA5. It was horrendous. It managed to convince me that there was something very toxic in certain gamer demographics. Of course people are individuals and only responsible for themselves; but when it becomes such a tidal wave of abuse, and also a movement, there's something collectively wrong.
The worst part is that it can't even be brought up without people going off the deep end. People get supremely offended by the mere presence of articles discussing these topics: which is hugely ironic, since they are the same people complaining about the sensitivity of the "PC brigade".
The misogyny/homophobia/racism is why I keep voice chat turned permanently off for multiplayer games. It's too depressing to listen to.
This is a problem, it needs to continue to be talked about and brought to the for front, the harrassment needs to be addressed and people, regaurdless of gender, need to stand up every chance it occurs and make it clear its no longer acceptable behavior to harrass some one because they arent the same, race, gender, age, or sexual preference you are.
People are trying to relax, not be humiliated for your amusement. This is not "boys being boys", this is not an invasion of "your" game, this is plain and simple harrassment and its hurtful, hateful, and outright embarrasing to the human race. There is nothing you can say contray to this to make their behavior ok or call it something different to downplay it. It is harrassment. If you think "video games are a place for guys to and relax and say whatever" thats fantastic... as long as youre not online or in a public lobby. The keyword is "public". Its the same as being at the mall, in a store, on a bus or a train or a plane, a bar whatever. You behave how you would "in public". Do you run around verbaly abusing men/women/anyone in public? Are you going to say it to their face with everyone watching or listening in a crowded place? No? Then what makes it ok to say online "in public"?
This behavior is just short of an epidemic, down playing the severity of the harrassmemt only serves to show your ignorance or trying to provide an excuess for the behavior to continue.
I dont normally speak in extreemes or absolutes (the sith do that) but this is a topic(not here, but else where) that needs some serious common sense and empathy injected in it. I understand people hate change but its no excuess, just because others are still doing it, to do whatever you want and it doesnt make it ok.
I may have been misremembering the 4:1 ratio, but the disparity is definitely significant.
*Anduin shakes his fist at the sky for the continuing injustices against pink hairy gnomes...*
Also, even if the threats will more than likely not be carried out (atleast certainly not all), it is still a threat. Even if a threat never manifest into a physical action it still leaves psychological marks and fear, which is the whole point of threatening someone.
I get that your post might have been a little tongue-in-cheek, but spare us the time and just keep your tongue in check, ur badly veiled lack of empathy doesn't really do anyone any good.
The more people post online about how they've gotten death threats, the less scared and more "amused" they seem about it for me, like them going "oh no, I got a deaht threat... whatever shall I do? lol."
Seiously. Who. Cares? Everyone is arguing over a form of entertainment that involves pressing buttons to control the actions of cartoon characters. Millions of real, serious issues in the world and people get their panties all up in a bunch over entertainment. Sheesh.
Gaming media, though, I hate. So many times I've seen it revealed there were payed reviews (most recently Shadow of Mordor, although at least it was good and didn't need that). I also still remember chabott being in Mass Effect 3 yet IGN still thinks they can make a review! I think they should not have been allowed to do that, and of course it was a high rating...