Senate Misogyny, Entitlement, and Pop Culture

I just found out about it today. It's the craziest thing I've read in a while. I couldn't possibly care less about video games, so I wouldn't have found out about it today either if JM hadn't linked to the article.

 

Pretty much, thanks.

Same here, but I play games, just don't frequent gamer forums.

 

The story hasn't been limited to the "gamer" world for a while anyway.

 

If you don't read certain sections of the media, it's quite easy to not know of it. I tend to skim the headlines on the Guardian, look over CiF and that's it.

 

Al Jazeera and Forbes had some good articles at the start of it
http://stream.aljazeera.com/story/201409032102-0024126
http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkai...look-at-the-controversy-sweeping-video-games/

 

i heard about it before today plenty but i still havent brought myself to pick through what the **** its all about, tbqh

 

Nerds hating women. Really, except for maybe the psycho ex angle it blends together with other incidents.

 

i mean, yes, i was aware of that much

 

The whole #GamerGate attempt to reframe the Zoe Quinn thing as part of a community movement for better games journalism is absolute garbage.

In 2007 when GameSpot fired Jeff Gerstmann amid rumours that they were pressured into it by Eidos as he didn't give Kane & Lynch a high enough score, the collective response of the internet was 'well we always knew GameSpot was corrupt'.

In 2012 when Gerstmann's new website, Giant Bomb, was bought by the same media group that owns GameSpot he gave a full interview to GameSpot on his sacking, and confirmed that it was the Kane & Lynch review that prompted his sacking. It turns out that the Kane & Lynch thing was not an isolated incident and was actually the straw the broke the camels back - he'd regularly been reprimanded for not inflating the scores of high profile games (that bought a lot of ad space with GameSpot), and also for not ensuring that those working under him were giving high profile games a high enough score. No one seemed to care.

Earlier this year Steve Hogarty, formerly of PC Zone, reveals that EA had him blacklisted from their press events and attempted to have him fired after he gave a scathing review to a Sims 2 expansion pack. Everyone thought that it was funny.

Earlier this year it emerges that several prominent Battlefield community Youtubers (eg LevelCap, JackFrags etc) were paid by EA's marketing division to put out videos about how amazing Battlefield 4 was during the launch of the game. The conditions for this were that the title of the video had to have "Battlefield 4" in it, and the videos were not allowed to discuss anything negative about the game, which at launch was a bug ridden unbalance piece of crap. Not only were they paid handsomely, but they were given behind the scenes access to a bunch of the DLC, which massively boosted their channel views. No where was it mentioned (video, description, twitter, reddit) at the time that these people were participating in paid promotional work on behalf of EA. Result: two days of community turmoil, and then everything is fine after the Youtubers decide that in the future they will mention in the video descriptions whether they're being paid by EAs marketing division for that particular video.

Zoe Quinn has sexual relations with some people. One of these people, Nathan Grayson, works for Kotaku, and had written about her game Depression Quest while they were strictly professional acquaintances, and has not written about it since. The internet insists that she traded sex for good reviews and advancement, despite the fact that none of these sex boosted reviews exist, anywhere (seriously) (not only was Grayson's piece from before he began a sexual relationship with Quinn, it also wasn't a review). Apparently this is the very epitome of what is wrong with gaming journalism today and has produced a massive internet movement of people who bother Zoe Quinn by engaging in innocent japes such as sinister phone calls to her and her parents, posting her address and her parents address online, attacking anyone who stands up for her (eg Phil Fish), and threatening and planning actual violence. Whenever Zoe Quinn complains of any of these things that corner of the internet says she's making it up to get sympathy (seriously, I read a thing the other day that suggested that she was planning to have herself beaten up).

The thing that gets me about this is that even if we assume for the purposes of this exercise that she did trade sex for better reviews, there's so much wrong with gaming journalism that even if she did everything she's purported to have done, and it's all as terrible as certain sections of the internet seems to be making it out to be, the way the #GamerGate thing has continued to focus on her has completely undermined the attempt to reframe the thing as being definitely about how bent the games journalism business is, and not how much certain sections of the internet dislike Anita Sarkesian et al.


Side rant:
So what is actually wrong with the games journalism business?

First, #GamerGate is basically a fictional movement. There have been three stages to it - 1.Harass Zoe Quinn in various ways. 2. Shout that it's definitely for the benefit of the games journalism industry, claim some kind of amazing moral victory for transparency when Kotaku and RPS do op eds saying yes some of our people know Zoe through work, she's an alright person. 3. Continue to discuss how bad Zoe Quinn is.

The #GamerGate movement has undermined itself by basically neglecting to address the fact that quid pro quo is rampant at the top end of the industry. Follow my logic, if you will

Games journalism is a job. People that do jobs like to get paid. How do you get paid for games journalism in 2014 (or any time in the last decade)? Sell advertising on your website (or youtube channel), then get as many clicks on your website as possible. You get paid a certain amount per individual view. More views, more money.

How do you get page clicks? You need to make people want to view the content that you're putting out, so they then come to your website.

How do I make people want to view my content? Two ways. 1) your content is of a high quality, and you develop something of a reputation or following. 2) your content is exclusive and can't be found anywhere else, or in very few other places.

How do I get exclusive content? Buddy up to the big publishers. They'll invite you along to behind the scenes press days, give you exclusive passes to convention events, let you try the pre release builds of their games, and you'll get a copy of their games weeks in advance of release ("review code") so your website's review can be among the first on the internet for that game, which means that anyone looking for an early review is more likely to head to your site (= page clicks = money for you)! Sometimes, you even get plied with goodie bags, generously known as "press kits" but often containing novelties.

Who controls whether I get invited by the big publishers to their press events, or get goodies, or early review code? It's the big publishers themselves who regulate early access to their own games.

So if I'm not positive about how great every EA/Ubi/Activision game looks, I might not be invited back? And if I don't generously score releases sent to me by big studios, they might not continue to send me review code? The publishers probably wouldn't say as much, but then look at the list of examples at the start of the post about what happened when people 'rocked the boat', so to speak.

But without exclusive content and review code the amount of people looking at my website drops dramatically! Unless you're a particularly talented writer, or cater to a strong niche, or both, then yes.

If less people are looking at my website then I get less money... Also correct.

So basically you're telling me that by giving early access to their games to select parties the big publishers are more or less at the driving wheels of contemporary games journalism, because the writers know that if they rock the boat they'll lose their access, and if they lose their access it means that they lose money? Yes. This is basically the big problem with games journalism. The publishers themselves select who to give exclusive content to, and the people who have the exclusive content are the ones that make all the money, so it stands to reason that the publishers are not going to give exclusive content to anyone who isn't going to speak about it glowingly.

And what does this have to do with Zoe Quinn? How does she play in? I've heard she's what is wrong with games journalism. ****ed if I know.

 

Funny you should bring up Anita Sarkesian. She apparently got a lot of degratory stuff and threats thrown at her when she put up her latest YouTube in the middle of all this mess. So much so that she apparently felt she was no longer safe in her home and left for a time to a 'safer' place.

Source.

And there was apparently a bomb threat at a gamer awards show because she was going to be there.

 

sharkymcshark that's a lot of words to say "manchildren are terrible"

 

Except it's not 'guys hating women' is it? Guys hating women does nothing, it's a crappy attitude to be sure but that's it.

No, this is:

• People engaging in identity theft attempts
• Harassment
• Sending death / bomb threats

It's no longer about misogyny, it's about willingness to commit criminal acts because they think they can get away with it. (These have to qualify as criminal acts, don't they?)

 

...and also misogyny

 

Yeah, it's also misogyny.

 

yeah also misogyny

 

I think there's more going wrong than just that.

You could perhaps convince these individuals they should not hate women, but that would probably not stop them committing similar acts in the future because they want what they want and see nothing wrong in going after by means legal and illegal, they don't even recognise the distinction between the two.

Also a total lack of any sense of proportion - "Someone criticises me! They must die!"

 

im not even sure what you're on about but we dont have to choose between misogyny and "zomg that's (maybe) against the law" in terms of what we analyze in this scenario. since this thread is explicitely focused on misogyny, and that element is clearly present (without even needing to attempt to divine the motives of any individuals involved) that's probably the element this thread will choose to pursue

 

well, since it's their misogynistic mindsets that leads to them committing these criminal acts, i think it's pretty safe to say that misogyny has something to do with it.

(i've tried to get this sentence right like 20 times now but i just can't wrap my hungover brain around it. **** it)

 

Considering #GamerGate started because Zoe Quinn's ex - boyfriend was the one who decided to make initial allegations that she slept with reporters for favors, and both she and Anita Sarkesian have both been called every gendered slur on the book and have gotten rape threats, I'd say misogyny also plays a role in this too.

 

All I'm saying is take away the misogyny and they'd still be screwed-up psychopathic individuals.

BUT I confess I don't get the motivation that goes: I hate women therefore I'll steal their identity, send lots of nasty messages and threats to their friends and family and get away with it.

Talking of which, how has that ex-boyfriend got away with it? He must be guilty of something legally enforceable.

 

Maybe that's the best way to present it Merk - I'm seeing the misogyny as an additional factor on top of already present, very extensive and very embedded severe personality aspects.

 

that's fine. this is a thread about misogyny tho so i dont think its surprising or unfortunate that we choose to talk about the misogyny aspect and not the psychological effects of playing a lot of video games and posting on the internet too much (****)

 

10 stupid arguments used to defend comic book sexism

Make sure to read the comments too.

 

Except I'd see them as potentially linked unless you think people just wake up one morning as misogynists? Logically, it has to come from somewhere so identifying how it originates and why would surely be a worthwhile undertaking for this thread? ...Not that it's up to me, anyone trying to control thread direction is on a damn fool crusade.....

No, don't read the comments unless you want your brain to melt!

More seriously, that does remind me why I liked Authority so much, Jenny Sparks:



EDIT: Been browsing the older parts of the thread and had to answer LOH:

Nope. We looked at what was involved, concluded it was too much hassle!