Yes, this, exactly.
I’ve had some online conversations with “gamergate” supporters who at first just seemed to be useful idiots, but it became clear that they were really motivated by misogyny. Any real useful idiots have to be amazingly ignorant to take that position, not just of what’s going on in this “movement,” but the whole gaming culture and its history and relationship to the gaming press. I.e. “Someone told me it was about ethics in journalism or something. I’m for ethics!” Anyone who can talk about the issues with any specificity doesn’t even have the defense of being a “useful idiot.”
3 Likes
Unfortunately I’m from the Great White North side of the Pond, and we haven’t had milk deliveries for well nigh 4 decades now. I also miss the POM (Pride of Montreal) bakery truck delivering the bread…
The same people who decry painting all of one religion/nationality as terrorists are ready to paint all male gamers as dangerous, potentially violent, gamergate misogynists.
It’s telling the Ms. Day crossed the street to avoid a couple of guys who are FAR, FAR more likely to talk about their game characters than anyone about her character.
Evidence please.
(i’m not supporting those who treat all men as mysogynists, but they typically are a group with little connection to racists)
My anecdotal experience is the same. All the leftists I’ve seen who know about GG have an almost universally negative opinion of it. And the fact that on twitter I see gaters tossing about the old right wing conspiracy theory of “Cultural Marxism” suggests what leftists might support GG have very little influence on it.
4 Likes
Just because there are RomComs doesn’t mean there’s no more hard core porn.
Just because there are children’s books doesn’t mean there’s no more steamy romance novels.
Just because there’s a growing market for games that depict women respectfully doesn’t mean there won’t be games that still have a heterosexual adolescent male view of women (if you like that sort of thing).
4 Likes
I don’t think it makes sense to think of this as a left vs. right issue. Left and Right aren’t really very homogenous, even if both have some extremely homogenous followers who like to take up a lot of space on forums.
You know, there is a part of me that thinks that this labeling isn’t helpful and is actually part of the problem in getting us to a place where we can address and fix our collective problems. And part of the reason why people like Goldwater (as @anon73430903 indicates above, though I think he’s talking about the British context, not the American one) co-opted the term as part of their campaign strategy. Lisa McGirr talked about how in SoCal, conservatives embrace Goldwaters libertarian language because of things like integration and tax hikes. If you say you don’t want to pay federal taxes or allow people of color in your store because it’s authoritarian for the state to FORCE you to associate with people or pay taxes, then it sounds less racist (not really, but at least you have that fig leaf - look at Rand Paul’s statements to that effect).
But, honestly, if we spend all our time hashing out how we identify ourselves, instead of addressing issues directly, we’re not going to get anywhere… at the same time, sometimes identity politics matter. Problems that go alogn with the construction of race or gender still matter, as we can clearly see from this gamergate stuff.
I keep thinking we need to get out of the enlightenment finally, and figure out new ways to tackle these problems… not that I have any solutions, just a notion that we’re not really being effective.
I’d love to talk more about this stuff and we could do that if you guys want in a new thread (I fear the @falcor!)…
3 Likes
3 Likes
whoosh
That was the sound of the point of Ms Day’s post flying directly over your head.
4 Likes
I disagree. The misogyny, anti-feminism, vilification of “SJWs”, allegations of “corruption” primarily directed at those attempting to bring a more serious kind of social criticism to gaming, and that the hastag was started by Adam Baldwin and promoted by Breitbart, means that GG does map rather well onto left/right. GG is a reflection of larger issues that plague society at large, so it’s no surprise that the battle lines are drawn the same way. It is very useful to analyze GG from a political perspective, because it has sprung from a growing political polarization in gaming as gamers have become more diverse.
1 Like
ACTUALLY [puts on historian hat]… one of the things I’m trying to do in my work is to show how over the course of the 20th century, identity started to get more tied into mass consumerism (in my case, this is through music and is carried on the back of the cultural cold war being carried out by the US government)… you see this in youth cultures especially. Check out Jon Savage’s book Teenage, where he talks about the evolution of adolescence into a consumer oriented identity, something distinct in history. Lizbeth Cohen’s book is an interesting look at this stuff, too - A Consumers Republic or her book Making a New Deal speaks to this as well, where she argues that you can’t get a solid working class movement, untili you get consumerism, which creates a shared language and identity for workers to share, where as before they were stymied by their mutually exclusive ethnic identities.
For some, a consumer identity has been empowering in a weird way, in part because if you have a company who is specifically catering to you, you feel a sense of validation as a consumer… in a capitalist society we count value in part by economic activities, what you make, what you buy, etc, and so that ends up getting tied up with not just what you make, but how you display your social status in society by what you buy. Interestingly, when people try to opt-out of that, you get people just making it into a niche market (so, this goes along with various oppositional youth subcultures, hippies, punks, etc).
11 Likes
I will buy and read this book. You write it.
6 Likes
It better have colour, distorted-reality illustrations.
Say what, now?
1 Like
To echo Ms. Day’s fears:
I am (was, new job) a 20+ year vet of the game industry. I am no one: working on ports of ports, ass end of coin-op. I have never been stalked, and no one has ever considered anything I did important.
Before GG, I had followed the independent scene with some interest (as I have with music, film, etc), probably because it’s because it’s where I wish I was instead of where I was. Anyway, seeing some of the occasional trouble that Ms. Alexander and Ms. Quinn had experienced, I had shared tweets of support with them. Maybe 2 or 3 total. Months, if not a year or so before GG.
Flash forward to GG, and all the sudden, someone has tried to subscribe my gmail to random “radical” accounts, targeted around where I live, culminating in someone pretending to be me and contacting the KKK.
Now, I didn’t get 99% of what those women did, but I’m NO ONE. I sent a few tweets of support their way when they were bummed, industry to industry person. I’ve never met any of them in person. Yet, apparently (I’m assuming, because I’ve never been targeted before, and I don’t have angry exes, and whatever lesson I was trying to be taught didn’t actually come with an M to RTF), I was caught briefly in the crossfire. And that’s me. Can’t imagine what Robin Hunicke or Jenova Chen are dealing with right now, much less someone even more public like Ms Day. And for what, to get in a screaming match with PA’s living breathing Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory?
Sorry, gaming, 20+ years of anonymous contribution and 80+ hour work weeks was enough, I didn’t sign up for irrational gamerrage.
14 Likes
I’m trying, believe me! It’s a dissertation first, a book later (if some academic press sees fit to accept the project, of course…). Wanna fund my research if I don’t get a dissertation fellowship (JK)?
I keep thinking I should start my own website to have more of a public/virtual presence to publicize my work (though you dont’ want some tenured asshole to come along and swoop in and steal your ideas, either)… several of my colleagues have done this, but they are also all more engaged in the social networking world, which I’m not really… I think this might be the only website I actually regularly post on…
5 Likes
A friend of mine thinks I should do maps of how the market for records changes over the course of the time period, which might be cool… pulling info from like the International Federation of Phonographics industry folks or something (which isn’t always super accurate, but it reflects the reality of the industry, at least).
Just don’t mention Gamergate on it.
3 Likes
