Gamergate - Thoughts of a developer.
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- Опубликовано: 25 окт 2024
- Part Four of my Sexism in Video Games series.
This time I share some of my thoughts about the polarizing topic of GAMERGATE!
(Spoiler: The kerfuffle was mostly the fault of the gaming press!)
References:
The Zoe Post: thezoepost.wor...
Liana Kerzner’s Essay: • Why Feminist Frequency...
Dr. Christina Sommers’ Video on Intersectionality: • Intersectional Feminis...
Feminist Frequency’s RUclips Site: / feministfrequency
Comedy Central’s Colbert/Sarkeesian Interview: • The Colbert Report - G...
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Thank you. I've been hearing about this for years and never really understood what on earth happened until now.
Gopher Love your vids
I love your vids and Jack and Richard.
Thanks for the shout out. It probably isn't surprising that in my experience, publishers don't roll out the red carpet, at least for me. Access is harder and harder to come by, and some major publishers don't even return my phone calls or emails. Others just refuse access outright. It seems that the philosophy is no press is better than informed press.
Developer support of ethical games writers is so important, because otherwise we get crushed from both sides - by publishers who want to maintain status quo, and by the big gaming sites who don't want competition... nor do they want to actually pay alternative voices.
It's very sad that the idea of intersectionality has become synonymous with identity politics, because it was supposed to be about an individualized look at the world. In my Gamer's Guide to Feminism I joke that this is because of the "Dworkside" - the dark side of feminism popularized by people like Andrea Dworkin.
Needless to say it's been a rough few years. Many people don't distinguish between their opinions of feminism and the treatment of people who bear that label, but don't subscribe to the doctrinaire elements that come with the stereotype. Saying anything positive about someone like me is guaranteed to get you grief. Making this video took guts on many levels, so I just wanted to say thank you.
Hi LK! Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment.
You make a very good point here: things aren't all rosy for the press either precisely because of the interest of the PR teams and the publisher to make sure that their games get positive coverage. Writers and reporters who don't pen glowing articles about a game are subsequently passed over the next time there's a release or event. I can see how it would be frustratingly difficult to maintain your integrity. Publishers want big megaphones, not thoughtful critiques.
And, you're right. A few folks have warned me that your position isn't in precise alignment with (what they perceive to be) mine and so I may not want to be saying positive things about you. The thing is, I feel it is healthy for people to have differing viewpoints, provided they are willing to discuss them openly and honestly. Respectfully exploring counter positions is how we learn. And, in some cases, also how we heal.
So, if you'd like to have an open dialogue on this GamerGate topic - or anything else it touches on (journalism ethics, feminism, sexism, cosplay cafeteria food fights, etc) - I would like that.
May I ask what your distinction is between intersectionality and identity politics, especially regarding video games?
I hope it's obvious, but just in case: I'm not looking for a fight or argument, only to understand a position I'm ignorant of.
One thing Gamer Gate did is show the scumbag devs their true colors. Tim Schafer rode the Anti-GG train going as far to say how his game is very inclusive when it was just garbage that he screwed over back with by making pay twice for it. Then his GDC event where he essentially came out and say "Hey women and minorities that don't do what we tell you to. You don't exists to us." to a cheer crowd who's on diversity was the neon hipster hair dye. Then you have ones like AngryJoe trying to keep good graces with the Journos by saying their "Gamers are dead" articles weren't a bad thing.
All ways find it interesting how they go with Straight MALLLLLEEEE!. So males who would be sexually interested in females, are going to shit on someone they may one day like to hook up with and date. that would make about as much sense as the other way around. Men tend to like women and women tend to like men. For most people are straight and you want to date the other gender, one sure fire one to never get a date ever again by the other gender is to say how to hate every single one of them just for being that gender. Also even if we go with they are right people are trying to keep women out of gaming. How would the common gamer do so? Call us mean names online. There are mute and block features for that. Even then that is only online games, you still have single player and last i check there is nothing stopping a female from buying a game on places like steam, gog or others. IN game making you have had females working in gaming for a long long time. Like Roberta Williams one of the great minds behind king's quest. Women are all ready gaming creating and making games, how the heck is the commoner gamer going to drive them out and get them fired? That and companies tend to care a fair bit about money, it allows them to keep going and stay in business. I doubt they are going to say no to someone who wants to buy their game or the store which is selling the game is going to stop someone and say no you can't buy this due to being female. that would just be bad business.
Forest elfranger Except Roberta Williams isn't real because she didn't take sad selfies of herself and cry about how much of a victim she was. At least to these hipster ideologues.
and even if say Companies were to say "we are selling our games to male buyers!' it would be like the old days when kids could not buy porn magazines from the store and they would ask their older siblings or friends to do it :)
who's to stop your boyfriend from buying you that one game you were wishing for since you saw the trailer :)
Loopholes exist in any prohibition, the gendered feminists's theory is flawed by design :)
I don't know what you are trying to say
read all the comments, they are all one giant discussion, and you need to read all in order to understand everyone's arguments, happy reading :)
I have not heard from any male gamers who were bothered by more women or minorities getting into gaming.
***** Exactly. I think that the progressives often confuse women and minorities playing games because they want to with people pushing for them to get into it for ideological reasons.
Obviously. I don't know of any hobby that becomes less fun if you can share it with your girlfriend/wife. Who _wouldn't_ wish that their spouse/love interest enjoyed their favorite pass time?
once in a while i'll hear something that amounts to genuine sexism, but my impression is when it does happen it's probably the only kid you've met growing up who actually is insecure or has a superiority complex towards women. or the parents who don't let their daughter play games but lets their son play them. every other time it's just been dicks being dicks.
in short, it's like 1 in 10,000 that we'll encounter that person. they do exist but the question is just how many are out there.
Likewise, even in the comments sections of videos for things, i never even see comments there about that sort of thing, the only thing coming to mind close to that honestly is the 'iron man' and 'thor' change in comics, but thats not game related.
The most recent thing I can think of that some gamers took issue with was that you could have gay relationships in dragon age inquisition. However it was so minor and overwhelming majority of people didn't care or were in favor of the game being open.
In my experience gamers are some of the most inclusive group of people. it doesn't matter what you look like, your orientation or beliefs. When you're playing a game people want to play with other people who have the same interests in the game they are playing.
The thing is, the games press didn't want to portray the games industry as a large inclusive tent with room for all because their ideological imperative demands they make sure there is only a place at the table for them and theirs and that all others must be kicked out and left out in the cold.
Thing is, theres also no money to make as a gatekeeper when the gates are wide open.
Riptors that was an awesome analogy I had two dumb that up.
Love your videos, new format is great. Videos about game dev would be very interesting considering your experience.
Overall, I think you understand the situation very well (or at least as well enough given the cluster F*$& that started it). But I think, at least from a consumer perspective, you are missing a few pieces of the puzzle that led to #GamerGate.
1) The Gamer's distrust of the media started long before Aug. 2014. We've long known that the Press was just a LITTLE too close to publishers for unbiased journalism. I mean, it's hard not to see a conflict of interest when you have a gaming site advertise a game very heavily and then low and behold said game has gotten glowing reviews. However, this distrust only has gotten worse when Anita Sarkeesian started her project. No matter what the gaming public thought of her videos, no matter how inaccurate or how disingenuous her interpretation of the game in question, the gaming press will jump to her defense and call her videos "insightful," "thought provoking," and "to be used in future game development."
Gamer's distrust of the media was an ongoing concern, that just peaked with Quinn.
2) Before the "Gamers are Dead" Articles, there was massive censorship going on around the Zoe Post. Videos talking about the Zoe Post, Threads on Forums about Zoe Quinn, comments on RUclips, twitter, facebook, Reddit, 4chan, you name it where all being deleted as fast as they where being made. Even if before most people didn't care about Ms. Quinn's actions, the sheer fact that it was something you couldn't talk about ANYWHERE caused even more distrust from gamers. In fact, the name "#GamerGate" was coined by Adam Baldwin when he tweeted out a video talking about the Zoe Post. When that video was censored, #GamerGate became the rallying cry for all gamers pissed off about this obvious case of corruption.
And finally 3) In addition to Zoe Quinn's actions and the media's censorship and declaration of war, what really started to fuel #GamerGate to this day is the lying and dishonesty that the gaming press has perpetuated. "#GamerGate is a harassment movement" we have never harassed anyone. "#GamerGate is made up of white male gamers" we have people of all different race and gender. "#GamerGate is driving women out of gaming" people who are Anti-#GamerGate are doing that. And it goes on and on.
In fact the reason why I became deep into #GamerGate is because of Fire Emblem Fates. That game was the follow-up to one of my favorite games on the 3DS and is part of one of my favorite video game franchises, but Nintendo of America's hack job when it came to localizing Fates made it one of the most unplayable messes from a story and character stand point. Huge sections of dialogue have been removed, character's personalities have been completely changed, and SEVERAL scenes has had their lines completely changed so that what used to be a romantic moment where two characters fall in love has been changed to just "Let's be friends." However, the gaming press, instead of reporting on the issues several gamers have had with the game, chose to say that we are all entitled little creeps who just want to "touch" little girl characters in our perverted and homophobic Japanese game, and that all the changes made to Fates was not "censorship" but rather just normal "localization" and that the game was far better without such problematic content.
As you said, it is a mess of a situation. But I hope this helped clear up somethings from a Gamer's perspective.
Thank you for taking the time to write this. You have some good insights here that help me to better understand the full situation!
No problem. Thanks for responding. It helps to know that someone actually read that wall of text.
It saved me writing it! XD. Excellent summary.
Honestly I dont think i would have even heard about ZQ had there not been the mass censorship across social media.... which revealed more links to collusion, which in turn only confirmed people's long-held suspicions.
Well done. This gives a solid background to the controversy.
Fire Emblem Fates' controversy existed because of the horrendous, tone-deaf writing/portrayal in the original Japanese version. The story and characters were always a huge trainwreck in Japanese (in fact, they're much, much worse) ever since the development team got divided over how they're handling the game and skinship mechanic really shows that. Believe it or not, the Japanese don't like skinship and they bitch at the amount of fanservice the game has. I'm actually glad they remove skinship because it comes across as creepy (and time-consuming) and tells the developers that we do not want the games to pander to a small, niche audience who're only there for shipping, not for the gameplay and characterizations. Fate's handling of the children characters enraged me to no end. They have no involvement in the plot and they only exist for fanservice. I'll agree that Treehouse's localization for Fates was iffy but it's not because of censorship, but because of bad writing. Otherwise, I agree with the rest before you mentioned Fates.
Thank you, Troy, for this video. As a Spanish gamer who heard of Gamergate but never quite understood what it was really about, this video has been tremendously insightful. I also believe there is a great measure of political wisdom in your overall message; it is particularly nice to see that this wisdom comes from analyzing this most beloved medium of ours and consumer relations within it. On a side note, I can't help seeing a strong parallelism between the 'revolt of gamers' you talk about and what I think might be today's revolt against Leftist discourse hegemony -a revolt which, partially, has been expressed through Trump's victory. But, politics aside, and going back to the beginning, thank you again; please, keep up the good work.
Thank you, Alberto!
Sounds like a fair analysis, although IIRC there were plenty of rumblings long before GG kicked off. That is why it blew up so swiftly, media was playing with matches at the gas station.
I give two shits what the press thinks about games anymore. Games I am unsure of. I look for youtube walkthrough/reviews from ppl I respect. Then form a opinion.
Both formats are fine for me, the first one is easier to display information but this one is like you said better for the "Personal Touch".
It´s like you said GG was mostly created by the press, by this Internet Wide Censoring of the Zoe Post. A simple "Yeah ok Nathan fucked up he won´t do it again / we fired him" whatever would have kinda immediately solved the problem but like you said the press was so full of themself they thought they could dominate the discussion o.-
About Identity politics in Games:
I personally don´t care who makes my games, I don´t care about their Gender, Sexal Preferences, Identy whatever. I only care if the game is good or not. The mere thought of checking if a game that I like MAY be done by a woman and thus I won´t buy it is so alien to me that´s .. I don´t know o.- Silly people.
And yeah GG was about to happen sooner or later, the feet kissing of the press in regards to Saint Anita and what she says with absolutely no rebuttals or whatever really put petrol on the fire (imo). So yeah, we just needed something to lit the fuse o.-
Same here. I barely check credits as is, I'm sure as hell not gonna look into them just to see whether a game I want to play was made by a woman or minority. I mean, I could understand wanting to dismiss a game because the company brand that's plainly displayed on the front cover is one that's had a notorious history of shipping out uncompleted trash and just pissing all over its consumer base (such as EA), but the idea of someone taking the effort to look up info not so readily available on the box just to go "Nope, this game's directed by a woman, not playing it!" is just asinine. As I stated in my post, this bullshit narrative of the basement-dwelling, woman-hating gamer or this supposed idea of gaming having always been a "boys' club" just came right the fuck out of nowhere around the time Anita started peddling out her garbage.
Exactly. I was raiding in Everquest 17 years ago alongside openly Gay People. My Raid lead was living in the US but roots from china, his wife was mostly doing the guild leading things, fought alongside women, minorities etc and noone gave a flying fuck as long as you were fun to have around and could hit your buttons accordingly o.-
your avatar pic made me smile, is vary adorable. xD thanks for that.
Holy shit!
4977 videos and you only got 1k subs?
What is life?
You've clearly done a lot of homework and have thought a lot about this issue.
I hadn't thought of gamergate as a "rejection of identity politics". Gamergate has always bugged me at my core, and it easily makes sense now.
Great Video!!! Thanks for standing up in the face of this madness. I particularly like you reference to Dr. king's quote. Incredibly relevant.Gender identity politics suck!!!
As an academic researcher into human cognition in the digital age, I'd like to point out that there are several studies pointing out to some rather POSITIVE cognitive impacts of playing videogames, particularly regarding things such as general intelligence, visualspatial thinking, logical-numerical thinking, and so forth. I, myself, have conducted a fairly large study (sample size of 1,280) based on MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft, with similar results (published in 'Computers in Human Behavior' in 2010). I am also am currently analyzing data on a study regarding the impacts of videogames on the academic life and professional attitudes of undergraduates majoring in Management at one of the top 10 universities in Brazil (n=347), with preliminary results also suggesting positive effects.
By the way, the positive impacts of videogames seem to be present in both males and females.
Just thought that this aspect of the issue should also be considered in the discussions.
Bruno Campello de Souza, D.Sc.
Thank you for the note! This is great information!
Thank you for the excelent vídeos with well-thought arguments and relevant information.
Does the evidence show that smart people are drawn to MMOs or than playing MMOs makes people smarter?
In my own study, an analysis based on the interaction between the weekly amount of play and for how long one has been a player suggests that the causal direction is from playing to intelligence rather than the opposite.
www.researchgate.net/publication/220495223_MMORPGS_and_cognitive_performance_A_study_with_1280_Brazilian_high_school_students
Other studies in the literature seem to also support this interpretation.
Just a correction.... The causal interpretation came from a logit regression with multiple variables and not the interaction between the weekly amount of play and for how long one has been a player. The latter was actually from a different study of mine regarding Hyperculture ("culture of the Digital Age").
Sorry for the mix up.
I just found your videos and watched your Feminist Frequency and this video. Amazing videos and appreciate your perspective. As a fellow developer (gameplay engineer), I couldn't agree more with your stances on these two points. I'm so glad to see a developer with your credits and history diving into these topics and articulating them in such an excellent manner. Thank you.
Pretty decent overview. When I first heard of the Zoe Post I read it, but didn't pay it much thought because it wasn't really any of my business. I only starting paying more attention when people figured out who some of the 5 people were (and their positions within the game industry), Mundane Matt's video got DMCA'd and the comment graveyard thread appeared on /r/gaming. For me, it was the suppression of discussion that really made me take notice and the procession of "Gamer's Are Dead" articles pushed me into the pro camp. The whole affair has really made me take a more skeptical approach to all media.
That said, while I read KiA frequently and donated to some of the charitable efforts surrounding GamerGate, I didn't join the emailing campaigns as it's my opinion that these "journalists" have every to publish their crap, IMO the best way to combat crap speech is with more/better speech. I just stopped visiting their sites.
Amazing video, probably the best summary of the GG movement.
Oh and to answer your last question. I do like this format, it's much more natural.
Game Journos weren't the cool kids they're the hipsters who think they're the cool kids. Other than that spot on.
The format doesn’t matter much for me, I’m more interested in what you say then how you present
them (you do look sharp thoug) and props for the Futurama reference.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the “no mans sky” case. Recently they came out with a update and Mister Metukor (internet aristocrat during GG) make a mocking segment to remind people of the former deception if not out right lies. And a indi developer Dino came out and “white knighted” Shear Murray. This lead up to a small stream, where Dino proclaimed that making a game is a process that cannot be compared to the process of making any other product, and in my opinion implying that we should give developers a lot of leeway. Besides the crashed, a lot of the thins I see people unhappy with was things Shear Murray heavily implied would be in the game, and not a marketing team.
You seem like a guy who is willing to look at both sides so I would like your thoughts. How did no mans sky handle production? And is game deving relly that special? As Dino says.
with regards to format i like both styles and think a mix of them is a great way to present ideas.
on #gamergate, i have to say that at the time i couldn't believe how unfair, unethical, and arrogant those people in the games media were. frankly, i was a little stunned over how badly they handled the whole thing. there's no way i could have imagined that any press that focused on a particular hobby would treat it's own audience in such a manner. the worse thing was that the games press seemed to double and then triple down on this treatment as things escalated. it was clear from their behavior that to them the games press was about the journalists and what they thought rather than being about gamers and the hobby, which is unfortunate.
ironically, i wouldn't have heard of any of this if the games press hadn't released all those articles about how gamers were dead. i wasn't a big channer or even youtuber at the time so i wan't aware of the "five guys" story going around on those sites, but seeing so many articles stating something that i knew to be untrue- that gamers didn't want women in the hobby- as absolute fact was a very clear signal that something shady was going on.
Me too. I was dimly aware that the Zoe Quinn/Eron Gjoni lovers quarrel had pulled in more combatants, but it still felt like a scandal in the corner that would play itself out to me - right up until the press decided to pick sides and denounce anyone who disagreed with them.
In pushing the notion that gamers are angry bigots, the gaming press sure seemed angry and bigoted to me.
Censorship and The Streisand Effect played a very big role too in the beginning, and really getting gamers ramped up to archive everything and make sure nothing slipped through the cracks. Gamers are built to win as they do so many times when playing games and can get in it for the long haul, so they kept archiving and archiving and archiving to call out censorship and provide citations for their points. Sadly a number of people casually into certain hobbies like some celebrities or nerd idols took the bait of the narrative the mainstream press was running with and weren't aware of a number of things happening beyond what was being reported in the press, not everyone had the time or inclination to be involved and look into things further to at least know what was happening then form an opinion on it.
Especially on Wikipedia where so many people were being mislead since the early goings of GamerGate and the GamerGate entry on there, though that's also something that could be done in a different video as well of collusion to conceal things and present things to support primarily one viewpoint. Not to mention the debate of what's considered 'A reliable source', which could also have relation to the media and gaming press in general what with the rise of blogs, independent news, and RUclipsrs.
Early on we hated the fact that not only was there a narrative going on with the media and how things were being reported as mostly one sided, but also the rampant attempts at censorship whether in the media or elsewhere like bogus DMCA claims, biased editing of the Wikipedia entry, etc. We didn't like the truth of one thing or another being hidden, and so gamers pushed back while the media and certain folks started crying foul and misogyny to try shifting focus away from the core GamerGate issues.
thank you for this. I don't know why this issue has become such a hotbutton topic. I have literally lost friends because I dared to say 'gamergate isn't a movement about harassment.' In the area I live any discussion at all about this that isn't in full agreement with the media narrative is tantamount to heresy. Hell, even here I'm a little frightened to talk about it for fear of being called sexist or whatnot. I've kept more or less to myself about it in public because I'm afraid it will impact my future career. I've already had one person try to get me kicked out of college for this.
where do you live? San Fran, Seattle, Portland, Austin? It's not like that in the burbs in PA.
Did these friends of yours claim to be tolerant? If so, I would've told them "If you're tolerant like you say you are, you'll tolerate the fact that I think differently. If you won't tolerate the fact that I think differently, then either you're just an intolerant liar or you legitimately think you're tolerant but the reality is you're actually intolerant."
Mostly people were good, but I lost a couple developer friends via Facebook for trying to have an open discussion about this - so I feel your pain.
I like this new format, though the other can be useful for some things. Cutting away to clips and things like that is more organic in the original format while this one is a bit more like a conversation.
Anyway, thanks for the video! Love your content so far.
The new format works well, I also think you pull off the blazer quite well. :)
Thank you!
Feminism is not about equal rights. The clue is in the title.
perliva it was originally, but it isn’t now
@@Press_START360 it never was about equality it was just for women
Really appreciate your explanation of the situation. Very fair-handed and polite where applicable, such as lauding the creation of Depression Quest.
I also like your background music. It swells in volume sometimes and that creates a certain dynamic in the story that's actually pretty fun.
Congratulations on all the channel growth. Love the video, I like the inquisitive face stills of the original format, but this is refreshing.
Sargon's older brother calmly explaining how we got here. Love it.
Hey, thanks again for your words on the topic.
You're welcome. Thanks for spending some time listening to me ramble on!
11:23 - Notice how the guy that yells FOOD FIGHT ...
RUNS LIKE HELL !!!
lol
The cafeteria analogy with the cool kids standing up and blaming everyone is particularly apt. It was really impossible to have any serious discussion about harassment/sexism in gaming or the dubious relationship between the press and publishers. At least for as long as the press insisted on this "hey it's all our audience's fault" narrative.
Like you point out it is so incredibly weird for them to have thought that this was a good idea. That it might actually work. To not recognise that it didn't work or to not figure out why it didn't work.
I mean they've kept at it to the point that I have trouble believing they actually think there is an harassment/sexism problem.
It seems more like they know they exagerated the situation. They just wanted people to make noise and then tell everybody else it's not because of something they did but because of harasment/sexism in gaming. Perhaps because they thought they could use that to grab political power for themselves.
Which, if true, clearly blew up in their faces and has now put arguably put people in political power we also don't want there.
But for sure we don't want identity politics in power. We know they are looking to blame everyone for everything and that is no way to live.
I really do not understand why the press didn't take the approach Troy is taking. He's not even the first dev to try. But it's notable that it's never the press who tries. They just seem content to let the existing narrative stand. Every time they mention GG it's the same old one sided explanation which doesn't acknowledge the virtue signalling clusterfuck that caused it.
It's not even that I'd like them to suddenly say there is no harassment... just acknowledge that sexism probably didn't have as much to do with the controversy as them blaming all gamers for it.
I'd not have been surprised if the harassment of Feminist Frequency's would have reduced significantly if they had simply stopped stoking the fire.
And today a PinkNews article lambasting Troy brought me here, not regretful at all to see such high quality discussion
This was a very insightful view on Gamer Gate. Thank you for your thoughts on it.
I have only listened to a few videos of Troy's. However, I have noticed a theme. This guy has a great taste in music and has great timing for it. As a former band nerd and music lover overall, I appreciate it.😋
This is the first video I watch from your channel. I really liked it. You explained GamerGate in a nutshell and you correctly point out how identity politics is a pseudo-religion. I expect more great content. Subscribed!
I like this format. This is the first video of yours I found and I am already subscribing. This was a great look into Gamergate and I enjoyed your perspective. I look forward to more videos and discussions.
Great informative video, thank you!
When anybody asks me what GG was about, I'll send them this video.
Its level headed, to the point, short and you quote my favorite astro physicist.
Thank you so much for the video and support of Gamergate! Your points are excellent, and the school food-fight analogy is accurate as hell. Please keep up the good work.
I feel your grasp on the timeline is a bit off. Journalists were getting to be arrogant in 2014 when GG started, definitely, but respected? That's a pretty laughable notion. In 2012, when Anita Sarkeesian's bullshit started up, maybe you could get away with saying that, maybe. Though, even back then, places like Kotaku were largely being seen as a complete joke. Like you say in the video, GamerGate was just a long time coming, because that tension between gamers and the press had been building like crazy throughout the years before it happened.
A lot of people might cite the Kane & Lynch review scandal from 2007, in which a reviewer was fired from GameSpot for giving the game in question a 6/10 while it was being heavily advertised on the site. Some might cite some incidents from even earlier. However, I think the aforementioned stuff with Anita Sarkeesian in 2012 was where things really started to go sour. You probably know the whole story by now, but the gaming press as a whole just leapt to her defense when she cried about harassment over her Kickstarter, which then went on to earn almost 30 times its initial goal as a direct result of all that pity press. She starts making her series, it's underwhelming, and when a lot of people are making valid points about how she's wrong on several issues (and most likely a con-artist), they all get dismissed and get grouped together with the same people making flames and rape threats against her (which may or may not have been all that serious in the first place). The gaming press just treated her like this holy saint who can do no wrong. If you so much as question her, your voice goes unheard because you're not disagreeing with her on grounds of her arguments being highly flawed, but rather because she's a woman with an opinion in the gaming industry and you can't stand the idea of her trampling into your boys' club safe space (which is itself another ridiculous accusation that only started to come about around this time).
Amusingly, there were other SJW controversies cropping up around this time, such as Elevatorgate and Donglegate, and they all seem to work on a similar premise: women are soooooo disenfranchised in tech and evil, sexist men are what's keeping them out, even though SEVERAL successful women who got where they are without feeling the need to construct a victim narrative over their insecurities about guys making jokes between each other or asking them out for coffee. And following on from the Sarkeesian brown-nosing, gaming journalists were writing less and less about gaming, and more and more about their personal politics, a lot of which involved identity politics. We all hate Dante's redesign from the Devil May Cry reboot because we're entitled. Being white and male is the easiest difficulty setting. Liking the Sorceress from Dragon's Crown makes you a pedophile. They were even docking points from game reviews on the basis that having a white male protagonist is so last decade, apparently. Needless to say, we weren't pleased, and it's not as if these journalists were merely pointing out an inconvenient truth that we refused to accept, either. They were talking down to us while pushing their bullshit opinions, attempting to indoctrinate us into their flawed ideologies, and act as if our voices don't matter due to the color of our skin and what genitalia we were born with (or, for those who are part of the "right" demographics, they apparently don't exist because ALL gamers are just white, basement-dwelling males), and all we wanted to do was to read up on our hobby.
Really, what most surprises me about GamerGate is that it never happened a lot sooner than it did. However, I guess what really separated the Quinnspiracy from all those earlier controversies is that we the gaming audience actually had dirt on the journalists that time. It was long suspected that this sudden push for identity politics from the gaming journalists was the result of people like Anita Sarkeesian currying favor with them, but there wasn't any hard evidence that this was the case. This all changed with the Zoe Post. Now we had Eron Gjonni pointing to several things that added up perfectly, video evidence that the chat logs were in fact real, and even a quote from Zoe herself that she was involved in all of this (and that she worried about how this would "damage the image of feminism" if it broke out). However, in spite of that, the gaming press did everything in their power to not only act as if it never happened, but also prevent us from even having a discussion about it. Suddenly shadow bans and thread deletions were happening everywhere, including 4chan. Even if you didn't think the Zoe Post was all that trustworthy, with all this going on, you don't have to be a genius to figure that something fishy's going on. Needless to say, the journalists dug their own grave by responding to this controversy in the worst possible way, or so I'd say if they didn't immediately follow that with an even worse response by posting those "Gamers are dead" articles on the same day. And the sad thing is that, for the most part, none of these journalists ever learned from this. They still act as if they're at the top of the food chain in the gaming community, maintaining their complacency as their sites just collapse around them. Far more decent people are living on the streets, so I sincerely hope that these scumbags soon find themselves out of these jobs that they clearly don't deserve.
Thanks for taking the time to write this. You have some good information and valid perspectives here.
Many others in the comments share your viewpoint. I may have overestimated the respect levels regarding the press prior to GamerGate. Clearly, many of the more informed people within the gaming community were suspicious and concerned or else things wouldn't have exploded like they did.
That's part of why I enjoy this dialogue. It helps me to get a better picture of things and improves my understanding. I appreciate it!
Thank you for the reply. For me personally, if you don't mind me going in depth for a bit, I was following MovieBob pretty closely for a while. As a person who primarily plays Japanese games (which, needless to say, completely dominated the industry at one time), I sympathized with his disdain over how much the mainstream was getting flooded in a sea of Call of Duty or GTA clones. I didn't even mind too much when the guy started adding a storyline to his videos, 'cause I still thought a lot of his views were pretty on-point. I only really started to question him after Anita Sarkeesian made her first Tropes vs. Women in Video Games episode, and he put out a video defending it..... by basically pointing fingers at his entire audience, laughing at how wrong we were for putting her down ('cause apparently we're the ones who sent her all those supposed rape threats), and downplaying how much of a threat she is with comments like "This is what you were afraid of? A woman in a flannel shirt?" It was also around this time that he started bringing up this accusation that FPS fans just wanna play some "9/11 revenge simulators" out of nowhere and repeatedly shoehorning that point into videos where it just didn't belong.... I mean, Jesus, I'm no fan of FPSes, but even I couldn't let such a ridiculous accusation fly.
There were so many responses in his blog's comments calling him out on all of this, making valid point after valid point about how he and Anita Sarkeesian are wrong on several issues. Rather than actually respond to such criticism and make some kind of counter-argument, he just upped the ante and further pushed this notion that "we all hate girls" in his videos and talked down to the collective identity of "gamers" every chance he got (because by his logic, some RUclips video of a kid screaming at his mother to get him chocolate milk while on voicechat exists, so we're all guilty of such atrocious behavior and need to be told to stop). I never read much of Kotaku in the first place, but I'd say I went from being rather passive about their existence to being outright contemptuous of them when they started the Dragon's Crown controversy around this time. The whole thing was bullshit for a lot of reasons: Jason Schreier is apparently seeing a busty Japanese-designed woman for the first time in his life (like those are so hard to find), accuses the game's creator of having the mentality of a 13-year-old (seemingly unaware that he was the same man who created previous masterpieces like Odin's Sphere and Muramasa, a man who has far more artistic credibility than dumbass Schreier will ever have, and whose games are some of the more egalitarian ones I've ever seen), and the real kicker is that he did this a couple months before the game was released, even though the Sorceress character was already seen and known about for two years prior when the game was first announced.
But as I'd soon learn, Jason Schreier just illustrated part of a bigger problem with journalists in general: they're mostly pretentious hacks who want to look smart, and assume they're doing so by sticking up for women's rights and prattling on about other social issues (even in light of the people they're "defending" shouting to stop speaking for them) instead of doing their damn job. But I guess when their job involves a bunch of peons' playthings, you can't look very intellectual unless you talk as if you actively disdain them (Polygon's Collin Campbell's sorry excuse for a Rock Band 4 preview article was probably the worst case of this, in which he was flown in to get a first glimpse at the game, and he instead spends the article whining about how gaming and rock music is so beneath him and that talking about Filipino politics with fellow wannabe intellectuals was the highlight of his night.... and the asshole still had a job afterwards). But I digress. MovieBob continued to make a fool of himself, and I kept giving him chances, but then GamerGate broke out. When it became all too known that social justice is nothing but a cult of shills and con-artists guilty of underhanded dealings in the game industry, I really hoped that Bob would just come out and admit he was wrong, but of course, he didn't. He stuck by the SJWs, and further condemned gamers (even supporting a proposed blackout of Steam to "put them in their place", and still having the audacity to claim that he doesn't support censorship), and it was at that point that I just said "Fuck this guy!" and left. I've never gone back to his blog since.
Not only do I agree with a lot of what you say, but as a classical musician, the fact that I can hear things like Beethoven 6 and Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream in the background greatly pleases me! I realize most of it is easy fair use material, however, I personally believe that European Classical Music is among the highest forms of intellectual stimulation and a pinnacle of human civilization! Please continue to include it in the background of your videos! You make excellent choices in your selections of works!
the way you described how things work with PR and the press....sounds a lot like that south park episode about that restaurant review website and all the people using it getting the power going to their heads with their ability thru a review to shut down places.
and gamergate became essentially the revolt against that royalty mindset that the press obtained. because the whole aspect of the press writer, sleeping with zoe or not, its upsetting when they dont preface the review with "this is my friend and i might be a bit biased in this review". i mean if the writer had done that nobody would have cared, because a 35 year old gamer like myself remembers relying heavily on video game magazines to see which game i was going to beg my parents to buy me.
to see reviewers collude and push a game thats pure crap just because its their friend or someone they got some tail with......i cant trust their reviews anymore.
I like the format.
when the whole zoe post thing went down i chalked it up to yet another internet tempest in a tea cup type of deal. What got me to take a closer look at the whole deal was the comment graveyard on reddit about a Twitlonger Totalbiscut had made about Zoe Quin possibly misusing the dmca to silence someone on RUclips. After that it was an interesting rabbit hole to plum the depths of.
I think this format suits you very well. You're a sympathetic, laid-back guy and seeing you in person makes it possible, to better understand how you feel about the topics you're talking about. Especially making jokes works better if you see a persons face. So it would be great if you continue this format.
Greetings from Germany! :)
Thank you for the feedback! My early videos were pretty clunky and stiff, but I think I'm getting a bit better at being relaxed on camera - so I'll keep it up!
I love how you are quick to admit your mistakes and you are respectful of those who you disagree with. Subscribing out of good faith for more videos like this!
Glad you brought your voice out to this! Either format works for me. The first was more visually engaging, but this one works for being able to just listen to and not have to worry about what's on screen, which is great for continuing to game while you listen! I do have some issues with one of the people you mentioned in this video as there is a lot more to them and their actual position than you may realize, but your points were spot on and well articulated. I won't get into the who, as I have already made my points on them public in various places in the past, and don't want to be accused of going on the offensive again.
I'm enjoying the new format.
As for the video, I'd say you did really well at detailing what #GamerGate is. You really hit the nail on the head when you said that it's a revolt against identity politics. From my observations within the revolt, it could be broken down into two primary facets:
Ethics Only:
Sargon of Akkad is a fairly good example of the "ethics only" camp, who wanted to separate the two wars...rather than conflate the issue. This faction sought to address the broken tool, games journalism, and worked to avoid mixing it with the developing culture war. They believed that the culture war was much shakier ground that could result in us losing BOTH battles. So, instead, they wanted to focus on ethics in games journalism because it was a sure win, whereas the culture war was still up in the air...
Attack SJW:
The second faction didn't agree with the notion of keeping the two issues separate because what corrupted the tool was the religion of identity politics, as you've described. The third ideological incursion had infiltrated the industry and rooted themselves deep within the media...so they believed that it wasn't enough to simply fix the tool because the unchallenged ideology working to undermine the foundation of our egalitarian community would simply learn from their mistakes and try again. The Internet Aristocrat, now Mister Metokur after his...break...from everything was a good example of this facet, even if he doesn't consider himself part of the revolt anymore.
While I could be very wrong on this part, it seemed like Leftists normally fell into the first camp while those on the Right frequented the second. Both of these camps worked together really well up until we began nominating representatives for the SPJ panel. That's when I began to notice VERY tiny Twitter accounts stirring the pot between both sides...causing strife. I can only assume this was the work of our opposition seeking to drive a wedge, or third party trolls seeking to cause chaos.
What I liked most about #GamerGate is that it was so ideologically diverse, on our side of the fence...and getting along. What the regressive-left didn't seem to count on was the gaming community not only fighting back...but finally pushing beyond the boundaries of gaming and into politics. This third ideological incursion seemed to be the last straw for a LOT of people...and I think that the majority are starting to realize that if we want these attacks to end...we need to stop them at their source.
As for pseudo feminism, it's abhorrent that this ideology consumed the movement and now uses it as a shield to suppress dissenting opinions. They did the same to the anti-police brutality movement in the form of BLM, and have sought to spread to every subgroup they can in an attempt to continue the cultural engineering. Thankfully, it seems that their defeat in gaming was only the first of many, many, loses.
Granted, those are just my thoughts. Small fish in a big pond. :P
This is a good analysis. I didn't say include anything in my video about the ethics in journalism angle (although I did record some of that, but then cut it out because it was too unfocused and the video was long enough already). From my perspective, the ethics part is valid, but it seems to be subsumed within the larger context of resisting the ideology those key press members were advancing.
Then again, I'm being rapidly educated here by many who know more anout this issue (like yourself!) to see that there were many more ethical breaches going on than I thought.
Troy Leavitt Anything that ideology touches is corrupt beyond measure. I'm more than sure that there's ethical breaches of significant magnitude that we've yet to find out about. That said, I don't think the exclusion really detracted too much, at least not at this point in the war. You're pretty much giving a good introduction to a very complicated event...a deep rabbit hole, to say the least.
With that said...
www.deepfreeze.it/
The event at SPJ Airplay attempted to cover both angles. The ethical angle was established in the first half of the day-long panel. It was made concrete that the Gaming Press had acted unethically on many numerous accounts.
The second half of the event, the pro-GG panelists attempted to solidify that the underlying reason for these ethical breaches was based on the ideology of the press, but the moderator kept stepping around that issue (almost like it was an elephant in the room.) Ultimately, that part of the panel was interrupted by a bomb threat.
*****
Indeed! I think the SPJ event went much better than expected.
First of all. Thank you for this well reasoned and rational take on gamer gate, I learned a lot.
Second, while this format is good, I really like the slide format, but you do you as the kids say.
I wish you well and will keep watching your videos!
Nice. I was unaware of the whole 'gamergate' thing until a gaming site i read brought it up (along with Anita Sarkeesian's Tropes vs Women). I delved into items on the net to catch up on the whole thing and came to the conclusion you talked about, that it was created by the gaming press themselves. I have shared your first vid responding to Anita Sarkeesian's vids to the same gaming site (as i stated elsewhere that i would do so) and have recommended them to give time and space to it in the same way they gave time and space to Anita's vid. Great to hear your take on things, subbed.
Excellent! Thank you for the kind words, the sub, and the share!
LOL good use of AIDS Skrillex. Great video series, it really is refreshing and heartening to see a seasoned developer speak out about this, FINALLY! I used to listen to Feminist Frequency, and the identity politics of my girlfriend at the time kind of badgered me into getting deeper and deeper. We're not together anymore, and I have slowly found my senses again after seeing more and more info like this break through the smokescreen of misinformation.
Just stumbled on this... did you just say you helped work on Critical Depth??? My brother and I played that game like crazy as kids. We absolutely loved it!
Yes, I worked on that one. One of my main contributions was that I wrote all the character and story transitions. Glad you enjoyed it!
I will say I tended to play as the CIA, and I thought their ending was fantastic - having bitten off more than they could chew and finding their efforts to have been ill-conceived.
A great new format! Even intersect more graphics and elements of what you're discussing :) Keep up the good work! ^_^ x
I think that is the clearest explanation of GG I have heard - thank you.
And I like this format but the other one is good too - subbed.
I think this format works best for giving an overview of something - as here, the other if there is a lot of info to pass on.
Hi Troy,
Thank you for making these videos, you just earned yourself a new subscriber to your channel.
We need more videos like these. We must all speak out against the Identity Politics religion, but most of all we need intelligent, clear headed, well informed and well spoken voices like yours, as others may not have the same reach or impact.
Greetings from South America.
I really enjoyed this video. It's concise, informative and offers some good information on ye olde glorious GamerGate.
As for the format, I think a mix might suit you well, sir. Have bits of face-time interspersed with more cuts of other videos, images to help illustrate or back up points being made, so on and so forth. Having a face to look at is helpful for paying attention for some, and at times our expressions can help us illustrate a point that our voice might otherwise not emphasize. This is especially important when discussing GamerGate, as so much of the information about the movement is found in twitter posts and the like, or archived images. And, as always, cite those sources.
Just found this video. Glad I did, and glad I subbed. By the way, you mentioned something about the music industry in this vid, and gave an analogy about it being a possibility. I'd like to point out that that actually did happen. It's called Metalgate, and it's currently happening. The gentleman that produced the metal documentary "A Headbanger's Journey" is actually a huge leader of this movement, and has several RUclips videos up with women who claim to be "metalheads" who are complaining about not only the culture, but also about the content that artists put into their music. It's kind of frighting considering they're talking about the censorship of free speech, and very reminiscent of the move to ban metal from general public that kicked off in the 80's.
Wow! I was not aware of this. Thanks for the note. And isn't it amazing that it is also a "Gate"? MetalGate! Crazy!
I agree a lot with what you say. I've been on the press side, and it doesn't take long before it goes to your head, especially when you're young. I was 19 when I started to write articles and I was invited two to three times a month to see what the editors had to show, I've seen some games months before they were announced, I've talked to many developpers. You go from the underdog no one listens to, to the guy whose opinion on his favourite subject matters.
It took me litterally two hours to come home with several bags of gifts and goodies, thing that never happened before. I was even proposed to take some courses with a world champion, just to promote a game.
With all I know now, I think there should be a rule of ethics : you can't accept gifts if you're writing on a subject. Or if the PR insist, you have to give them to your readers and notify it to the PR and to your readers, so they know what's going on.
I like either format. and I agree with you completely that gamergate is the result of the press blaming all gamers for something someone else did. especially since many of the same sites said doing that to muslims for their acts of terrorism was bigoted and evil. so to do it for gamers over mean tweets, after saying doing it to muslims over actual murder is wrong, really pissed people off
it's good to hear the views of someone who has/does work in the gaming industry. keep up the good work.
seeing your face was a nice addition, like a couple people said, I think it adds a lot of legitimacy to your content and is more engaging.
Although, I think this video was lacking in visual support compared to the other parts in this series, granted it might have been the subject but it made the video heavier in my opinion.
with that said, I love what you are doing and even though you talk about old issues, you bring a very fresh and well thought out analysis on the subjects being discussed. Cheers!
EDIT
ps: I'd look into buying a better microphone, the audio quality is very ordinary.
Your analogy and arguments are quite refreshing, thank you for condensing gamer-gate into the format you did. Comparing identity politics (SJW) as a religion is a different way of looking at it, but it's far easier to understand that way because if you aren't with them you are against them and "sacrilegious/bigot/hate speech". I agree that most people would rather to be judged on the content of their character, and the things they do versus their skin color, gender, or what they say.
It's so interesting to hear someone with so much experience in the industry talk about this.
I gotta admit, it was about DAMN time a developer with real experience on MAINSTREAM to talk about this.
Having said that, I do totally agree on a more direct contact between developers and consumers, it is the best kind of market place that comes to mind.
I love the comparison to the lunch hall. I guess people like me would be on the packed lunch table with the kids who eat glue.
Save some glue for me! Elmer's is good eatin'!
Definitely like the new format.
Just thought you should notice even though this is super old that what came to mind when you were describing the press @5:37, "captains of industry" came to mind here. I know it's minutiae but just seemed like something worth pointing out given your preface. You've probably already got that like 50 times already, but as far as I can tell that's the only thing I could find worth improving about this video.
just my two copper discs.
Thank you so much, I've been looking for a video like this for a long time, something to explain what happened all those years ago, explained everything thoroughly, I appreciate your new speaking voice too :D
I like it that you try to take the historical approach, very informative.
Thank you for your point of view on the situation. It was very insightful and raised a few more questions to be researched....
But I too vote for the T-shirt slogan!
As a stereotypical older mom, sitting in front of her gaming rig, setting up the day's missions for her fleets before heading off to a stereotypical mom job of teaching martial arts, I found your program very enjoyable and balanced - a pleasant and welcome change from having speakers explain that I'm oppressed and underrepresented. Thanks!
I like this channel more after every video I watch.
Thanks for your comments on GamerGate, Troy. It's difficult to get an honest discussion from anyone - both GG and not GG.
Great video, thank you for taking onboard people's feedback. Also, Liana's doing interviews with industry people. You might wanna get in on that and get some cross-promotion going on. :)
This day, you've earned me as a follower dude. Damn good work.
I love this format! I'm a fan of more casual discussion over structured death by powerpoint.
I recently graduated college with a degree in simulation and game development. Essential, they teach you how to use Photoshop for 2D art, Maya for animation, as well as programming such as C++, C#, and GML (which I professed in). I did have to take two English courses though, one being a basic paragraph understanding class, essentially read this short-one page story and make a 250 work paper out of it. The other was a short of journalistic class, the first thing my instructor taught us was first, find a target audience, second, Never insult them. Doing it is counter intuitive and moronic.
Honestly I was one of the people that knew about the "Zoe Post" before it really blew up. Most people were just asking simply " could she have gotten special press by sleeping with this person who reviewed her game" We all thought it was a simple question about ethics. We thought that if the guy was suppose to do a story about her, he would inform his boss that he was having or had relations with her and that it might be in the companies best interest the pass the assignment to someone without a personal bias. Then came the "Gamers are Dead" articles. Several articles with the same heading and the same outline released over a few hours raised more than a few eyebrows. Not only that but the fact that they say things so outlandish like "Gamers dont have to be your target audience" was just outlandish. My train of thought was "Ok, then who else is going to read about these articles on this website dedicated to games? Stay at home moms? Basketball fans? To me that was when it really blew up, and now everyone I talk to doesn't trust mainstream media, instead if they want honest details, they will go to the consumer reviews on metacritic and see what people who actually bought the game think about it
Agree basically 100% with your perspective on Gamer Gate, and the religion of identity politics. Great video. I propose to you for your consideration that there is a direct parallel with Gamer Gate and the recent US election Democratic primaries. The mainstream press in both cases were incredibly corrupt and biased. HRC and the DNC were the equivalent of Zoey Quinn and her defenders. Just as the press and Quin defenders demonized their core base of gamers, so did HRC and the DNC demonize the traditional Democrat base of left-wing progressives, attacking them in the same way, e.g. calling them Bernie Bros, despite them being widely diverse people who just wanted to be represented honestly again (rather than corporate interests). And again, in both cases, the dogma behind most of it was Identity Politics. Even the futile backlash against Trump is just more of the flailing death throes of Identity Politics. Anyway, just thought I'd point out the parallels there.
just stumbled upon this channel.
And so far, I really enjoy and appreciate your positions on these topics.
Just adding my two cents.
I am a feminist in that I believe that men and women should have equal right, the classic definition. Modern feminists, I have contempt for, because nothing is ever good enough for them. It's not a cause any more. It's a job, and if they ever are satisfied in anyway, they are out of a job.
Anita Sarkeesian is not a feminist. She's a con artist. Feminism is her con. It's how she gets saps to give her money, so she can tell them how much they oppress her and her ilk just by being white and/or male.
Pretty good assessment. Nothing will ever be good enough for people like Anita.
Feminine women = Fighting fuck toys
Masculine women = Miss male
Get rid of the extremes = Female characters aren't diverse enough
Just chanced upon your channel, am really loving your vids. Keep em coming!!!
Cheers for the synopsis, I never quite understood what Gamergate was about.
Sadly there has been a push against Metal from a segment of the music press. Carbon copy of what happened in games, except Metal fans give less of a fuck, and go do what they want no matter who says it's bad. Then again, they are used to that since the 80s and the PMRC.
Such a prescient tag, just as SO many aspects of culture skew to a religious extreme- since human clicks Make traffic & "if it bleeds, it Leads" logic. Glad to have found, shared your insights w/ fellow gamers.
Thank you for watching and for your comment!
I never heard of you before Troy but you got a new sub! I went to college to game design and was lucky enough to actually get a job in QA within a year of graduation. I was fired 6 months later for a 1 on 1 conversation I had 4 months in during lunch, out of the office, and it was because it wasn't politically correct. I now sell insurance and feel like I could only do indie dev and it's not worth the learning curve to the risk and work load. PC culture is killing culture
Great to have you aboard! Sorry to hear that you've been forced out of the industry, but I also have hope that development is changing for the better as the marketplace grows. I hope that you might one day be able to find your way back. We need talented developers!
You look a bit like a young George Lucas. Great video btw.
As I understood it, the identity politics was pushed to deflect from the true issue of cronyism within the gaming media with game devs etc. Which kicked off thanks to the Quinn debacle. As such, the use of identity politics to quell desent or detractors spun off its own thing, namely things like the I'm not your shield/I'm not your Asian sidekick which contradicted the media narrative.
Mind, I am quite of the mind that Anita and her mob are a movement to undermine a number of serious and quite real issues. As a result of her approach, and others of her ilk too, Feminism has been warped in the perception of it and the ideal (which happens a lot to many movements sure, and egalitarian is certainly the better view point) became toxic. Ironically, the Anita involved movement which has shades of the conservative straight white male group they tar all males as has also possibly pushed a number of folk into the egalitarian space where they weren't before or didn't even think about it before.
All this stirred up by an increasingly irrelevant subsection of the media and media at large in one of those "It seemed like a good idea at the time" moments. This has been further shown over the time since through their elitist attitudes and projecting views of entitlement. Recently following the announcement about the Diablo mobile game (down the line from the idea of a mobile game by the company set as a joke to frame their ideology towards mobile gaming v PC gaming), the same section within the media once again have attacked gamers. Labelling them entitled etc.
It is as if they really haven't learnt their lessons from Gamergate, or even from consumer movements such as forcing changes in things like Loot boxes and Microtransactions in some circles. Also, given the severe hit to their credibility over the recent years through Gamergate and the like, I would love to know who thought attacking gamers (the very real lifeblood for their industry) yet again was in anyway a good idea.
All of this as a result of some lass cheating on her lad with folk for beneficial treatment (which is tantamount to prostitution and empowering "male lead sexism", or as I'd expect it to be viewed by the likes of Anita).
If ever there was a cautionary tale to make anyone think before they act because it could, and at times will, cascade into a shitstorm of epic proportions, this is it.
Youre doing great and important work.
it says a lot about you as a person and the character of yourself and your position how some people ignore/block opinions, and deny feedback and discussion, while others welcome it and are open to the idea of being mistaken.
i like seeing your face, beard suits you
Thank you!
Thanks for doing these videos. It's great hearing from an industry insider what their perspective is.
One of the major concerns for many Gamers who participated in the revolt was the creative freedom of developers. We've seen developers fold under the social pressure of identity politics again and again for fear of being "offensive." And we've seen some developers push back. What do you think is the current atmosphere like for big developers now?
Also, what is the current state of Publishers and the Gaming Press? It seems that overall, Publishers have withdrawn a lot of support and shifted towards RUclips.
Do you have any advice for Gamers on how they can help developers? Most of it has been simply just pushing back on ideological critics of the games industry (both inside the Gaming press and outside.)
I like the new format with you on camera better. You can still throw in the occasional full screen slide to make a point (or joke.)
Love the new format . Keep up the good work bro 😊
I'm very late discovering your content, but it's great and very refreshing coming from a fellow game dev. I work in game developement myself at a small studio in Oakland and I'm fairly certain I don't have to tell you that the narrative around these things in our industry, especially in this area, has been pretty one-sided.
please don't stop making these videos
12:54 to 13:02 the most beautiful line I have heard in over 2 years
12:50 awesome explanation! Of gamergate! The explanation of the "Religion of Identity Politics" also captures why Trump won also. The comparison with original sin is especially refreshing to hear.
Those are some sage-like observations you had there! Excellent video!
To me gamergate was about protecting the rights of artists and creators to create their art in the way they see fit it regardless of if it may contain material that may potentially be considered "offensive" by the sort of philistines who want nothing more than to silence and censor anything they don't like.
I was a little kid in the early 80's when the PMRC congressional hearings happened and didn't read up on it until I was in high school in the late 90's but when I did I was absolutely disgusted by the prevailing "won't somebody please think of the children" attitude in the media of the time , especially the famous "Filthy 15" list of 15 "highly offensive songs", but what disgusted me even more was the way the PMRC was allowed to impose censorship upon the music industry ("the tipper sticker" that we still see on CD's to this day).
The worst part of it is that not a single one of those moralizing finger wagging clowns had the talent to even play a basic C chord on a guitar let alone compose a hook riff or even read music yet they were somehow allowed to dictate unto others how they should be creative and if your music didn't meet their entirely arbitrary "standards" for what constituted "offensive speech".
awesome to get a developers perspective on this whole thing, just started watching this video(playing them in order), and per your request, there is one factual error you had in part 3.
true nearly every game aims for equality and balance, there is 2 games i can think of off the top of my head that specifically have stat differences between genders(but still retaining balance between the two).
dragonball xenoverse 1 and 2. the base stats are different between genders of each selectable race, with males having more hp's, higher melee damagen and slower movement. females being faster, lower melee damage and higher ki blast damage overall.
there are also some stat differences between each race as well, but this is based on the narrative of the story of dragonball, and thus not specifically created for the game.
i know its just 2 that i know of that has these kinds of differences, and i agree that anita tends to cherry pick the heck out of things, but i just thought i had to point out that not ALL games shoot for perfect equality between genders.
this version is good too sir. And thank you for the information about Gamergate. It would be nice to watch more videos like this. Thank you
i would like to disagree with the statement 'during 2014 the consumer revered the press'. we only need to look at doritogate, the kayne and lynch story. (regard of these outrages make sense or not, they show that many people were not too happy with the press even before) i think the most telling thing was the shiism of oppinion about sarkeesian between gamers and press, also a smaller thing would be tentacle bento getting banned from kickstarter. however i do agree that they stil thought the press is good for at least someting. and i also agree that developers overvalued the influence the press had over the consumer (excluding youtube)
It is obvious to me since doing a even just a bit of research, that Anita Sarkeesian's agenda is rather insidious. I've been a hardcore gamer for nearly 30 years, and the fact that Ms Sarkeesian continues to find a platform for her agenda worries me a great deal.
Aaron King lol what the fuck is her "agenda"
To explore what she perceives as sexism in video games through a lens of 3rd wave feminist critique. That is her agenda. I doubt even she would disagree with statement. Now, I can't speak for anyone but myself. But my problem with her agenda is she is coming into a research project with a large bias already rather than a neutrality, look at the data, draw conclusions from data type approach. Much like the Soviet scientist the video author referenced in his first video.
A classic example of this type of bias can be examined by looking at two types of thinking in science during history:
1) Ancient Greek philosophers, in their exploration of the natural world, used "common sense" very often in order to arrive at conclusions. The classic example being the firmly held belief by the ancient Greeks that the heavier an object is, the faster it will fall.
2) Galileo, one of the first scientists to use something approaching a more modern scientific approach, does experimentation and discovers that no, an object's weight does not in fact affect its' falling speed, but it is a host of factors that affect falling speed including but not limited to size, shape, etc.
The first example is more like with Sarkeesian is doing: starting with a preformed assumption and then confirming it. The second example is more of a sciency, research based approach.
For example: a typical pre-3rd wave definition of sexism would be discrimination based on gender (with the understanding that it happened more often against women because of historical context).
Her definition is that sexism can only go one direction as it is more about power and privilege. That a man cannot be discriminated against, since he is from the subgroup that traditionally holds the reins of power.
The second definition is problematic as it is full of judgements. It also takes an absolutist approach; stating something can never happen (an incredibly unscientific approach to take before a research project, to just assume something can never happen. Hence why scientists will use the word theory even if they are 99% sure it is true.)
So then, her agenda seems to be confirming what she already believes to be true. A more accurate study would have examined multiple other studies and data; looked at counter arguments, examined why issues exist if they exist at all, point out outliers to the data and why they are outliers, etc.
Again, I can only speak for myself as a lifelong gamer, but also as someone with a background in social sciences (in my case, history). Back when I was studying history in college we'd see this quite a bit in the other fields that brushed up against ours (sociology, women's studies, etc.); the argumentation and studies that started with an already preformed bias towards what their conclusions would be.
This is not a new concept either; philosophers wrote about this in the 1800's (Geneology of Morals, everyone sees through a lens based on their own experiences and background). Anita is no more immune to this then anyone else; her background as a white, upper middle class woman with a liberal arts education will of course color her opinions. Thus making the need when conducting research to use, as much as is possible, a scientific approach to the data important. However, she fails to do this, instead drawing conclusions from casual observations and papers that only back her position.
Great video, and excellent coverage on #GG.
But as someone mentioned, public distrust to the gaming media was already a well developed thing before this. See past examples of journalists and gamers being completely out of touch such as:
Jeff Gerstmann being fired for his (negative) Kane & Lynch review,
The Geoff Keighley incident (aka DoritosGate),
Sim City being released to impressive reviews yet the game was completely unplayable,
Repeated admissions by former IGN employees stating ratings were skewed for PR - see the all time popular IGN-Mass Effect review score gif.
I think you're right and many were mistrustful of the press (with good reason!) before this all blew up.
GG biggest flaw was that it was leaderless and disorganized, allot of the hate and harrassement Zoe received came from her ex-boyfriend and his online goons not real genguine GG.
Jokester30 and possibly a lot of "cry wolf" harassment.
Pretty good summary of what happened.
Great video again Troy, thanks. I quite liked the format of both video types to be honest so maybe a mix of the two might be good. Just go with what you like cos you are naturally gonna make changes and improvements the longer you keep doing this anyway.
I agree with your points too, hopefully the press is going to die away somewhat in gaming much like it is in news and politics. People don't trust them and also don't need them, the internet will set us free!
Also, I would love to hear your thoughts on getting into the industry. But please keep the contrarian videos coming, it's a refreshing change compared to others in the industry.
One little gripe, if I may, I found the music just a tad distracting.
Keep up the great work Troy, I'm glad I found your channel!
Thanks for the feedback! Honestly, I include the music as a way to try and lighten things up. I feel like my videos are pretty clumsy as I'm pretty new to video production and editing, so I figure I can at least try to poke fun at myself by including some music bits.
But, yeah, maybe it is distracting.
Troy Leavitt I think it just gets a bit loud at times is all, maybe certain music has connotations too. Better to use something simple and repetitive that's kinda quiet in the background. Shoe0nHead does something like that.
ShoeOnHead has some of the best comedic editing of anyone I've ever seen! I love her videos!
Troy Leavitt Agreed!