What ?
Ah, I understand.
It seems youâre saying these are the two most troublesome groups in the bigger category of supporters.
My impression is that these two groups, while they are the most vocal, donât represent the majority.
In terms of the make-up of âgamergateâ supporters, yeah, those two groups do represent the make-up of the majority. Itâs possible thereâs some âuseful idiotsâ in there who are ignorant of what itâs about, but my personal experience is that they eventually reveal themselves to be in one of the two categories, whatever their initial explanation for their support of the âmovement.â Itâs more a matter of degree with the supporters (i.e. just how sexist or reactionary they are).
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I think that it makes sense that youâve had more interactions with the vocal misogynistic supporters. Itâd be hard to have an interaction with the unvocal misogynistic and the unvocal ethics-concerned supporters. I think the vocal ethics-concerned supporters are always going to be harder to notice because they have a less vivid message than the vocal misogynistic. (Let alone that now itâs become an in-joke to make fun of the vocal ethics-concerned supporters, because, hey âactually, itâs about ethics in journalism.â ba-dum, tsh.)
In my experience, most of the folks Iâve talked to who are glad that this fiasco has happened, arenât making death threats, arenât DDOS websites, or doxxing users. Most of them donât like Anita or Zoe, but it seems that that judgement call isnât made because of their anatomy, but because of their conduct. Itâs possible to dislike (some) women without being a misogynist and hating (all) women.
Oh, Iâm sure theyâre just fine with women who know their place and donât challenge them or have opinions of their own. Itâs just the uppity, shrill ones they donât like. Oh no, thatâs not misogyny.
What do these (allegedly) non-misogynistic people think of Adam Baldwin, Milo Yiannopoulos or Mike Cernovich, and their conduct? Why do they (apparently) continue to ally themselves with these people in order to (non-vocally) fight the (clearly, vitally important, right now) good fight for ethics in games journalism (with particular concern for the coverage of independent and feminist games and games developers).
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Looks like an interesting rabbithole. If I donât come up for air in three days, please notify my next of kin.
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Always remembering of course, it is the most ludicrous strand of journalism in the observable universe the ethics of which to be alarmed by compared to the cavalcade of bullshit and fuckery we are exposed to every fucking day.
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This Engineering Which Is Not One: Encountering Irigaray in Heat and Mass Transfer
(Yes, itâs post-Sokal)
Its also possible to disagree with someone without disliking them.
(I was tempted to write that a misogynist could easily confuse the two, but I didnât want you to think Iâm referring to you, so here it is, as an aside)
But really, one of several points of the article was precisely that anybody who is for âgaming journalismâ is clearly doing his cause a disservice by continuing to use the GG tag. I donât know on which side you fall here but it seems to me that anybody who is against violence, is pro âethicsâ and silently following a mob that is vocally doing something else is⌠well⌠not the smartest person ever.
Hopefully these silent people will be vocal about what they believe soon, I mean, if they already realize they are not being heard, then what are they really achieving? Just propping up the bigots.
Textbook âuseful idiotâ
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I havenât had any interactions with the vocal misogynistic supporters - Iâve only had interactions with people who claim theyâre only interested in the ethics in journalism issue. And yet, when I pressed them on exactly what ethical issues they were interested in, the truth was revealed. The whole âitâs about ethics in journalismâ line has became an internet joke because it is. Gamergate is a hate group. It was never interested in ethics, theyâve ignored the actual ethical issues (and even attacked those who are actually concerned with the real ethical issues) and invented bogus issues in order to attack women. Even if we leave aside the harassment and threats, thereâs no legit ethical issues at the heart of gg. Anyone claiming support for gg because of âethicsâ is like someone claiming support for the KKK because of civil rights. If one is actually interested in journalistic ethics, you donât ride under the gg banner.
And, ding, ding, ding, we have a winner. Because the âconductâ Anita and Zoe and the other female targets of gg is fucking blameless - at least on any matter thatâs anyone elseâs damn business, and certainly in relation to journalistic ethics. The targets are being picked because of reactionary/misogynistic agendas of the attackers, not because of the âconductâ of the women in question. Given the facts, to even bring up the idea of âethics in journalismâ in relation to these women indicates someone with a severe problem with women. So, #yesallgamergaters
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The data suggests otherwise. Not only on Twitter but elsewhere. The data suggests that gamergate focuses more on cultural issues than on issues of journalistic ethics.
What I hate the most about responding to this endlessly repeated claim is the more I link to my own shit, the more I look like a shameless self-promoter.
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But you are actually contributing to, rather than profiteering from, the discussion. For example, unlike t-shirt promoters who shall remain nameless. 
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The inability for people to be critical of their own work is amazing.
While I donât doubt your findings about twitter or youtube comments, I donât feel the conclusions youâve reached are infalliable. It sounds similar to those presidential polls conducted by telephone around the 1940s. The polls reported one president to be the popular vote, but really that presidential candidate was the popular vote of those citizens with a phone line.
Again, while an uncountable number of supporters may be unvocal, of the ones that are vocal we could roughly split them into those two camps, those concerned with âcultural issuesâ and âjournalistic issues.â Those vocal âcultural issueâ supporters are inciting an awful lot of earned backlash. I would imagine this might perpetuate them continuing the misogynistic rhetorical conversation. Meanwhile, the supporters of the âjournalistic issuesâ are being grouped in with the misogynists and are not being addressed and are not receiving any screen time. They might want to continue the conversation, but everyone else is in the next room watching the antics of immature misogynists flexing their big ole internet muscles, 140 characters at a time.
This is all hypothetical and first hinges on the assumption that the mediums of Twitter and Youtube comments to be one of the best places to have that type of ethical conversation. From what Iâve seen, Twitter almost seems like the most appropriate place to fling short quippy slurs back and forth. Let alone that YouTube comments are infamously known for their difficult and low level of discourse.
While I will believe that the majority of twitter users talking about Gamersgate are brutes, I wonât pin that sort of ad hominem attack on the whole group, discrediting every idea it might create. Even if it isnât actually about ethics in journalism, and the questions being brought about ethics in journalism are really so thin, outdated, malinformed, and rude, it still might be worth considering what other ethical questions might be worth asking if someone really did use sex to gain publicity for their game.
It might even be more productive than the current alternative of bashing immature and ignorant twitterians. While 4chan hasnât figured everything out, they do have a mantra about the shitposting they want to discourage. Report, Sage, Hide. This is to not bump up a spam thread so that it will age until the point it is auto-pruned for inactivity. These trolls and loudmouths want attention and want screen time, when they are ignored, they tend to go away.
Iâm really not trying to pick any side, but I am tired of hearing about the virtues of only one side, while the other side is mocked.
Itâd seem Anita might be ripe for being mocked once in a while, too. When I saw her comment about toxic masculinity last week, I laughed outright. That kind of political ambulance chasing alone is really pretty funny in a dark sad sort of way.
That one, of course. Seems rather unlikely that Kickstarter would let her return any âoverageâ given the fact that they take 5%. I guess one could make the argument that Kickstarter is the money-grubbing asshole.
Small correctionâŚ
Giving someone a positive review of their product in exchange for sex is transparently unethical and everyone knows that. WHAT QUESTIONS?!? There is absolutely noting to discuss and the only reason to talk about it is to cast aspersions on Zoe Quinn. If you actually do need to genuinely ask questions about the ethics of that, then you have never encountered ethics of any sort in your entire life and you are in a poor position to discuss them. Read a few books about ethics so that you understand the basic ideas that 99.9% of the rest of the population got by just being socialized and then maybe start a conversation.
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Name one. Just one idea created by they ârational middleâ you claim exists.
Just. One.
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So this is a new tactic I havenât seen before. What youâre suggesting is that a majority of gaters are not talking about this issue on twitter, youtube, or in the KotakuInAction subreddit, that theyâre talking about this, what, face-to-face, over the phone, through various non-public channels? What youâre in essence saying is that we canât really know what the composition of gamergate is, without, I guess, getting Gallup to do a poll over the phone in order to reach this alleged silent majority. At the same time, however, you suggest that you know what the composition of gamergate is:
How do you know thereâs a silent majority? Have you conducted such a poll yourself? Has someone else? We know that there are tens of thousands of accounts involved in the discussion, just on twitter alone, so either you have talked to thousands of people face-to-face, conducted a phone poll, etc. about this issue or you canât know what the composition of gamergate is yourself. You canât say that itâs impossible to determine the composition of gamergate and at the same time claim that you have determined the composition of gamergate.
Whereâs your data? Where are the numbers? Or is this another one of those anti-science âmy anecdotal experience carries more weight than any objective numbers ever possibly couldâ assertions?
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Itâs also possible to dislike some black people without being racist- But if you dislike that person because theyâre known to speak about race, that whole âwithout being racistâ part kind of goes out the window.
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Complete derailing tangent here, butâŚ
Does that potâŚhave anâŚaudio input jack?
I just⌠I think it does, and I canât stop obsessing over it. Just⌠What?
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