Anita Sarkeesian cancels Utah campus appearance after threats of a "Montreal-style massacre"

With a choice to accept a risk and show up anyway in defiance to the threat, of which they should be made aware. Optimally with live streaming, to give the ones who choose otherwise to watch from guaranteed safety in real time.

Nope. The whole ordeal began with the Zoe Quinn clusterfuck, and a few shitty nerds in 4chanā€™s /pol and /v organised some attacks. The ā€œethicsā€ narrative is, and always has been, a smokescreen. Same with the notyourshield bullshit. Manufactured, pushed into popular culture. Remember the bikini bridge? Same thing.

Itā€™s sad that the fact that integrity in journalism has been talked about for YEARS, but these little shits never came out of their holes. As soon as they find out that a woman maybe slept with more than one man, they went ballistic.

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http://lmgtfy.com/?q=mass+shooting+prevent

Oh, I donā€™t have to google, I believe you.

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And not just your own. The attendees and even people at other locations on the campus were threatened.

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Kind of the other way around. It was BEGUN by an angry ex-boyfriend who wanted to humiliate his lover. Some tangent of that humiliation was baseless accusation of selling sex for good reviews. That metastasized into ā€œconcerns about the integrity of games journalismā€ which is really just a smokescreen for misogynists to frighten women into running from their homes and not speaking in public. It remains largely about those nutcases, but some of those nutcases are clever enough to try and fake out credulous journalists by weaving their lies about games journalism integrity (which might be a legit little corner concern of some tiny relevance, but is hardly what the flag-bearers are ā€œaboutā€)

That you see it the other way around is proof that their smokescreen tactic isnā€™t ineffective.

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It was originally about going after females, incidentally part of the games industry, and trying to destroy them. This is rather well documented now, including the transcripts of those that organised it beforehand

Maybe someone also wants to talk about journalism and integrity in the games industry?
Maybe someone also wants to talk about the integrity of X Factor voting?

Either way, they are both rather trivial and in no way related to what GamerTaint is.

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No, itĀ“s proof that I havenĀ“t concerned myself with Gamergate beyond reading boingboing posts.

If you and other posters are to be believed, it was really just a smoke screen to begin with. The fact that nobody involved in it seems to be abandoning ship now that it has obviously been implicated in all kinds of morally reprehensible and even criminal activity would lead me to believe that you are right.

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My point was that private property means you get decide who is allowed on that property, and under what conditions. One of those conditions can be that you not be in possession of any weapons, even if you have a concealed carry permit.

If someone asks that you undergo a search for concealed firearms before allowing you onto their property, thatā€™s their business - after all, you donā€™t have a right to enter the property without permission, and how permission is granted isnā€™t legislated.

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That was uncalled for Falcor.

Depends on the risk assessment. I gamble with it every commute to work.

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Someone threatened her into silence?

Wait a minute.

Isnā€™t this what sheā€™s been doing to some degree? Telling misogynists and racists to be silent?

Thereā€™s a freedom of expression her entire group demands for themselves but not for others.

GamerGate is partially about that freedom. Even if it protects misogyny and racism.

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Simply, no.

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Come on dude, youĀ“re equating telling someone to be silent with threatening mass murder? DonĀ“t insult your own intelligence.

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at this point iā€™m not sure it is possible to malign whatever passes for ā€œgamergate.ā€

i understand that itā€™s possible to defend points of view one might find repugnant but, really, if you want to disavow threats of violence itā€™s time to disavow the whole ā€œ#ggā€ scene and find a new springboard for discussing whatever is left when you strip away the misogyny and threats of violence.

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I donā€™t always get it either, but itā€™s their sandbox. They can enforce whatever rules they want.

Yes, these poor people are having their freedom to issue rape & death threats abrogated by the mean olā€™ feminists. How will democracy survive?

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Iā€™m sorry, where exactly has this happened?

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OK. I am not an expert on this, but what exactly do you mean? According to Wikipedia, ā€œGamergateā€ is a controversy, and controversies have people on both sides. The controversy obviously exists. I am not sure that I fully understand your point.

According to Wikipedia: ā€œGamergate is a controversy in video game culture which began in August 2014. It concerns ingrained issues of sexism and misogyny in the gaming community, as well as journalistic ethics in the online gaming press, particularly conflicts of interest between video game journalists and developers.ā€

Letā€™s look at these individually:

Sexism and Misogyny
Perhaps. IMHO: sexism, yes. Misogyny: perhaps not.
I remember playing Duke Nukem 3d. Kill the bad guys. Walk up to strippers and shake a fist full of dollars at them. Yes, this is very sexist. I am also a casual RPG fan, and it is not uncommon to male fighters shown with full-body armor, but females only get a metal bikini. This is also very sexist. But, at the same time, this is similar to the kinds of sexism that you find in comic books and movies. Not excusing it, but just pointing out that it is pervasive. To single out gaming in this regard seems phony.

As to choice of costume, some of this is also perpetuated and/or exploited by women themselves ā€“ not a lot of women, but some. You only have to look at the on-stage antics and costume choices for people like: Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus, Beyonce, and many others.

Video games often portray women as being weak and needing rescuing (Princess Peach). There is some truth in this, as evidenced by the fact that my wife sometimes need me to be the chief ā€œspider squisherā€ in the house.

Add these ingredients to the fact that the majority of people who will drop $40 or more on a game are male, and you have the ingredients to make a sexism-fueled market.

Now, as to ā€œmisogyny,ā€ I guess that is how you define it. Mario always wanted to RESCUE Princess Peach, and he never slapped her around afterwards. I have not actually seen much real, intentional misogyny in the games that I have played. Maybe some of the actual misogyny in real life over this controversy comes from guys thinking ā€œThis is a guyā€™s club, so I donā€™t want some woman putting flowered wallpaper up and tearing down the centerfolds.ā€ I can also see how somebody could have this point of view. If a guy wants to see the female warrior wear little clothes, I guess that really does not hurt anybody. Video games are art, not real life. I do not recall anybody trying to get Vargas to change his art.

Journalistic Ethics
I could maybe also see a point here. If there IS a relationship between a reviewer and the item being reviewed, then it needs to be clearly disclosed. On the other hand, who counts as a ā€œJournalist?ā€ My wife runs a web-based business, and she is writing a book. Does this mean that I am not allowed to say that my wifeā€™s business is awesome or that her book is quite good? I guess it depends on how you position yourself. I guess if you claim to be an impartial journalist, you had better be. But every web site and magazine out there needs advertisers. Do you run the bad review and risk pissing off an advertiser? This is an age-old discussion that has been around for decades, and is not even limited to gaming.

Summary? Hell, I donā€™t know. I was just rambling.

@ghostly1 have you been involved with the feminist movement? I have. Iā€™ve dated, in a serious fashion, some feminist activists.

I operate a shop in a big university district of Chicago. Iā€™ve seen their protests and demands.

If GamerGateā€™s few threateners of violence are bad, then I seem feminismā€™s massive demands of social justice via the law as worse.

Attacking one individual is evil.

Attacking all individualsā€™ basic freedom is evil.

Evil is evil, regardless of which side is spreading the seeds of it.

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