Community Piece: The Humanity of #GamerGate – 10/15/2014
By Lo-Ping - Wed Oct 15, 10:52 am
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The author of the following piece has requested to remain anonymous.
I am a 36-year-old father of a twelve-year-old boy.
My first console was a Sega master system I got when I was about 10 years old. I was considered a nerd even then. I really gravitated towards games when a bully literally punched out several of my teeth and I became housebound due to fear. I was clinically diagnosed with PTSD due to that.
My favorite escape at that point was video games. I care deeply about games. Much of my life has been spent playing games of all kinds. It grew out of my culture (nerd culture). I care because it is my escape. It allows me to experience things I would never experience in real life. It is my social connection. Without games I would have few friends. I bond with my son playing games.
I am here because I see a hateful exclusive subculture trying to change what games are trying to remove the individual artistic expression game developers have. I have decided that I want to develop games and the corrupt journalism prevents new and interesting game developers from getting started.
I see a movement stereotyping people based on their hobby. They call us “misogynerds”, racists, sexist, neckbeard basement dweller man babies. I can take the insults, but my son should not even have to hear them.
As a soon-to-be new game developer, I am concerned that a certain clique is going to take over completely and lock out new developers from the industry because they hold a differing view to the dominant clique. This cannot be allowed to stand.
The author of the following piece has requested to remain anonymous.
Alright where do I begin. I’ll start with my background. I’m multi-ethnic; part black, part Native American, and white. My mother raised me alone while going to school and working full-time. I’m also dyslexic and mildly autistic. It took two years before I could read and write.
There really wasn’t a why I started playing video games I’ve been playing since I was 4-5. Granted it helped me getting through bullying I’ve gotten through the entirety of my time in school. But the reason I care about video games is the memories I have of my mother playing Kingdom Hearts and Metal Gear Solid with me. Also they help me relax, have some fun with friends.
I support #GamerGate because I see gamers being treated like shit by the media. Even though I do not go to any of the sites that do this. It would go against everything I stand for to not support this movement.
Sockpuppet Noir
I am a Psychologist from México. If you´re familiar with the news you should know we deal with a lot of shit, from rape to murder on a daily basis. I have worked in social services and have experience with victims of all kinds, from incest to suicide to attempted murder. México is not a friendly place for people with humanitarian causes.
Since I was 5, I have been a gamer. I used to play Double Dragon and Shinobi in the arcades. My first console was the NES and my first game was Megaman 2. I´m pretty attached to my hobby since it basically taught me how to speak English and French. The best games for this are RPGs, which are one of my favorite genres. My top 3 include Skies of Arcadia, Legend of Mana and The Chrono Series (I can´t pick one, sorry), although I´m finding a sweet spot for the Shin Megami Tensei series.
What pulled me into #GamerGate was not the Zoe Quinn scandal with the five guys, but the Wizards issue before that. Adding salt to the wound was the narrative pushed by gaming media about the victimization, objectification and powerless portrayal of women waiting to be rescued by social justice and feminism.I found myself confused that a self-proclaimed “depressive” would antagonize the people at Wizardchan and 4chan in such a disdainful, snarky and active way, especially when the harassment turned to her personal advantage. Depressive victims rarely face their aggressors as many saw with the Wizards who wished to remain alone and far from trouble, yet I kept looking at Mrs. Quinn´s name on twitter constantly changing, you could say being defiant to her opposition. So I got hooked into this Issue.
What I found in gaming was what you would see in Mexican politics: A privileged circle colluding with each other, evading taxes through “charity” services while amassing money for “events” and other things we´re very familiar with here, while buying opinions and injecting politics into entertainment media. The fact that #GamerGate keeps being slammed into “wing politics” and “social conflict” just makes me realize how people from different countries have the same tactics when related to corruption.
For me, what is totally fascinating is how #GamerGate has prevailed so long without a leader. This implies that the revolt cannot be threatened nor bought off because it has an ethereal presence. Give yourselves a pat in the shoulder for that.
What is really horrifying is how the Social Justice movement seems to me as a bunch of rich white kids pulling a Trojan Horse into society, dressing themselves as champions of virtue, who actually know jack-shit about social issues or how do they work; I’ve worked with men on the street, destroyed by women who abuse the legal system through false victimization. I also have told a single mother that “life goes on” after she lost her son to the cartel wars.
Those are social issues.
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