I've been putting this one off, but I think there's sufficient mass for another update on what GG has been up to.
First off, on entities (and men) in tech condemning Gamergate,
Blizzard's CEO, Michael Morhaime, did so at the start of Blizzcon on November 7. It was fairly gentle as condemnations go, but still. For some further context on Blizzard: Blizzard is the company behind World of Warcraft, whose playerbase is now like 60% women, because Blizzard actually punishes harassment on WoW servers. Because they were smart and realised that letting dudebros drive women away was leaving money on the table. (And that's what Gamergate is angry about
: women's money is green and game developers are starting to look for ways to get women to buy their products. Which involves putting the interests of women ahead of the interests of toxic little boys who want to keep "cooties" out of what they mistakenly believe to be their treehouse.)
Some more good news: one of Gamergate's early successes, such as they were, that wasn't harassing women out of vidya was getting companies like Intel to stop advertising on sites they don't like. Like getting Intel to stop advertising on Gamasutra. So what's the good news?
Intel reversed its decision and is advertising on Gamasutra again. So not only is Gamergate stalling out, but it's actively losing ground it once held.
Video game critic and cultural commentator Jim Sterling of the Jimquisition left The Escapist (an online entertainment magazine, mostly about video gaming) to go independent. I don't think he actually declared a specific reason aside from getting enough support on his Patreon to be able to safely go independent, but I wonder how much of it has to do with the fact that
Alexander Marcis, general manager of the Escapist, gave preferential coverage to Gamergate by actually getting his sources for an article on Gamergate from 4chan. The writers Alexander Marcis invited to comment included Slade Villena, a guy who previously had actively advocated for "black hat" (criminal) tactics against Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkeesian, and
James Desborough, whose Gor RPG (about a massively misogynistic setting in which women are sex slaves, I wish I were making this up) Alexander Marcis was financially backing at the time (I actually saw that kickstarter and promptly donated all of my NOPE).
Because it was never about ethics in gaming journalism. Jim Sterling, on the other hand, has ended up on the anti-GG side by virtue of
people accusing him of being a "social justice warrior" because he's stated that better representation of women and minorities in video games is both morally and financially the correct course of action. (His response to this accusation was to ask if he's allowed to be a social justice bard. Thank God for him.)
Now for some half-assed "bad news" that doesn't actually seem to mean anything positive for Gamergate:
Gamergate lost Milo, but
it picked up a new sad excuse for a champion, who, as David Futrelle says, looks like a wax replica of Patrick Bateman and thinks gamers are a bunch of dateless nerds (and Gamergaters don't seem to be disagreeing with him very hard on this point).
Roosh V (who one of my friends nicknamed LR1, for "Literally Rapist 1")
started a "gaming site" for Gamergaters called Reaxxion (presumably a reference to "neoreactionary"). Of course, he openly declares that his stake in this is 'protecting the interests of heterosexual Western males,' but that gay men and 'attractive women' are still allowed. One of the first articles up on the site ended with the note that in further columns it would explore how video games are a fundamentally male activity. I'm not even kidding. I wish I were.
Remember that thing with Matt Taylor's shirt covered in half-naked ladies?
Gamergate is jumping on that because the #Gamergate hashtag is losing steam, and of course they're talking about how this is the exact thing they've been fighting all along. (Because it was never about ethics in gaming journalism.)
The guys making The Sarkeesian Effect, who are, of course, Gamergaters,
decided to bring on Jack Fucking Thompson as a source. I'm old enough to remember when Jack Thompson was
actually trying to destroy video games, and so I always found the comparisons of Anita Sarkeesian to Jack Thompson to be ridiculous and disingenuous. But now, Gamergate has passed comparing Anita Sarkeesian to Jack Thompson and actually progressed to inviting Jack Thompson--who not only actually
did seek to destroy video games, but also got disbarred for severe ethics violations--in to call Anita Sarkeesian a "censor." (Because it was always about attacking feminism, and not about ethics of any kind, or even really about video games, particularly for the open misogynists behind The Sarkeesian Effect.)
Now, this next one is a fair bit heavier--trigger warning, definitely a trigger warning for this link. Remember how I mentioned in an earlier post that /r/KotakuInAction actually had to drop several moderators from its board for their extremely inconvenient connections, like that one moderator they happened to share with /r/PhilosophyOfRape? I didn't go into more detail on that board at the time, but
if you actually want the messy details, here they are, from The Mary Sue. Again, TRIGGER WARNING.
Here, wash that out of your brain. Have a nice picture of
Vivian James being liberated from being Gamergate's mascot and getting some good pro-woman games and even a new hoodie so she doesn't have to wear a dogwhistle rape joke.
Now. Lastly, some shitlord told Brianna Wu that "respects is earn." You know, that thing where dudebros claim that it's OK to disrespect women because women haven't "earned respect" but men supposedly have. The way this guy butchered the phrase, however, invited a
delightful new meme. Enjoy!
PS: on women in STEM fields, and computer science and vidya specifically,
god dammit Mattel