Up ‘til now, I had resolved to keep
my silence on #GamerGate. This was
primarily because I am really nothing more than a casual gamer (with exception
for Pokemon and Civilization, and a handful of gems like Portal and Gone Home), and therefore felt that I did not have the necessary depth of
familiarity with the video games industry.
I had followed the general trends of events via several online presences
whose intellectual and professional integrity I have nothing but the highest
regard for, and noted more and more that not a single one of them had anything
positive to say about it. And over the
past few weeks, with more and more tales of fear and threats surfacing almost
daily, I began to feel that a turning point had been reached; #GamerGate is no
longer a video games problem. What’s
more, it never was one to begin with- it’s a cultural problem. And we need everyone to speak out against
it.
I will not do a full recap of
events, since that would take far more time than I currently have at my
disposal. For some different
perspectives on this whole circus, many of which include links to further
sources if you really want to wade into the swamp, I recommend taking a look at
MovieBob’s most recent post on the subject, as well as a much-quoted response to the many defenses of the movement, a TIME article about
the greater importance of this step in the development of video games, and the rebuttal to the movement posted by Todd in the Shadows to blog page for
Nostalgia Chic’s website.
If you are reading this and are as
of yet unaware of the general course of events over the past few months, please
read the above links before continuing.
I am not concerned so much with how #GamerGate began, although that was
sickening enough. My worries center
around where it is now, and the troubling signs I see in the near future.
As far as some have tried (some
earnestly, some halfheartedly, some cynically) to turn #GamerGate from an
attack on a single woman’s personal character into a general “reform movement”
for gaming journalism, the primary problem with #GamerGate is this; it was and
is too divided and too scattered to ever be effective in this regard. In broad terms, the entire population of
people (I won’t even bother using the term “gamers” here) who claim or have
claimed support of any kind for #GamerGate or its appropriation of the #NotYourShield
hashtag can be sifted into two general groups.
The far larger of the group is, most likely, people who are not bad
people, who likely do not contribute to the waves of hate and threats that have
sullied countless online forums, and who actually do believe that earnest
efforts to reform the gaming industry are needed. That said, actual statistics proving or
disproving this are impossible to obtain, so in terms of the numbers on each
side it is entirely possible that the reverse is true, and the second category
of #GamerGaters are truly the majority of the movement. Unless proof to that end is ever forthcoming,
however, I will give humanity the benefit of the doubt, and assume that that is
not the case. I sure hope it isn’t.
The second group- the group that essentially
started the movement and have been holding the reigns ever since- consists of a
probably small, yet highly organized, group of racists, sexists, misogynists,
trolls, ignoramuses, and small-minded, frightened man-children. It is a group that senses the cultural and
demographic shifts pushing them to minority, side-show status within an
industry they have hitherto dominated.
It is a group that realizes that the true of future of games, like the
true future of humanity, lies in plurality, in increasing diversity, where all
stories of all kinds have the potential to find their way into games that reach
the levels of high art achieved by other storytelling mediums like poetry,
books, film, music, dance, and so on.
And it realizes that that journey into the realm of genuine art can only
come about with the changing and, in many cases, elimination of many of the
less-savory aspects of past and current gaming culture under the harsh light of
public scrutiny. And it fears this, more
than it can put into words.
So they waited for the right
opportunity to strike. And when Zoe
Quinn’s butthurt ex, whose name, if there is any justice in the world, will be
lost to history, let loose his libelous diarrhea of adolescent rage, they saw
their chance, and began striking out.
Not against any actual sources of questionable journalistic practices in
gaming that do exist and should be dealt with, but rather against token developers
and online personas who had been directly challenging for years their cherished
worldview that there was nothing wrong whatsoever with the gaming environment
they know and love today. These people
have acted with intent to emotionally harm, and quite possibly, with intent to
physically harm as well. Reform was
never something to be taken seriously.
It was merely there to be used as a shield.
It pains me to use the word “they”
in contexts like this, since it can easily lead one to exactly the kind of
mental segregation of humanity I am so often railing against. However, it is necessary now, as it sometimes
is, to draw a distinction between those people directly (or even passively)
involving themselves in the torrents of abuse, and those who have made genuine,
albeit hopeless, efforts to rechannel the movements into something
constructive. We must be conscious about
our use of the term, but in this case, it is necessary.
The result of all this- of the
horridly graphic threats, the crashing of websites that refuse to bow down, the
leaking of personal information of those who criticize them, and the cowing of
others through implied threats of the same- has and can only be
destructive. It is a hindrance to the
needed task of addressing real issues with modern video gaming. It is driving creative, intellectual, and
passionate people from the world of game design. In a word, it is depriving this medium of
exactly the sort of figures it needs to mature.
And it needs to stop NOW. In
fact, all you really need to do to fully understand what really drives this
sludge is to note that the figures most often attacked and threatened in the
most graphic ways….are all women.
Without exception. That tells you
everything you need to know.
Why care about this, if, as admitted
above, I do no really consider myself part of any particular gaming
community? Simple- because I am a lover
of film.
“And what the hell does that have to
do with any of this?” you surely ask.
How can film, a form of entertainment over a century old and an
indelible part of larger human culture, be compared with the new technology of
video games? Again, the answer is
simple- film went through the exact same issues with sexism, racism, and
general tolerance for diversity that video games are currently going
through. In fact, film is still going
through it, because up until just recently the world of cinema has been blowing
it big time when it comes to supporting genuine plurality. And even now, the explosion of diversity in
film we are seeing is being driven more by the levelling power of the internet
than by any genuine, organized change effort.
We have had 86 Academy Awards thus far, which can roughly be used to
date the existence of the film industry as it exists today, and only within the
last 5 years have we seen a lone woman, a lone Hispanic, and a lone Asian (the
latter two being men) win the Best Director trophy, and only this year did we
finally see a film made by a black man win Best Picture. Only within the past two years have box-office
numbers statistically contradicted the assertions of big studios that
action/big-budget fare starring women can’t ever be generally popular and make
money. You know that Avengers 2 trailer everyone is
gushing fire about? How many seconds or
footage are devoted to female/non-white characters? 5?
Maybe 7.5? One of the most
influential films ever made is Birth of a
Nation, a morally offensive love letter to the KKK.
Yes sir, film has been humiliating
itself big time for DECADES, if not longer.
And with all the benefits of hindsight we now have, video games are in a
position to learn from the errors in the development of film as a medium. The drivers of the industry can learn from
the history of film and avoid many of the pitfalls that has led to cinema in
general being shockingly regressive far too long into the 21st
century. That is, IF they can
effectively push away and ignore the rants and tantrums of the petulant
children claiming the shield of not being anyone’s shield. This will be a turning point in the
developing of video games either way.
It’s only a question of whether or not the turn will be positive or
negative.
The real reason, however, why it is
critical that EVERYONE understand what is happening with #GamerGate is that the
real reasons why it exists, and the true forces pushing it to its horrifying
extremes, are exactly same the same forces we see driving the Tea Party and the
related partisanship that has paralyzed our government for the past 4
years. While latent racism and
conservative/social reactionism were not necessarily the initial cause of the Tea
Party, they were very much what kicked
it into high gear once a black man (GASP!) won the Presidency and was able to
push through the first piece of truly significant social legislation since
Johnson’s Great Society initiative.
This, combined with the general fear within older, white, Christian
voters that they are finally losing their very, very long vicegrip on American
society, is what has allowed the demagogues of the movement to seize control
over an entire party, pummeling its veteran leadership into acquiescing to
their demands and exiling them from party leadership when they fail to comply,
or simply for uttering the word “compromise.”
There is no other explanation able to bear scrutiny as to why Obama was
the first President EVER to have his citizenship called into question, and why
to this day a depressingly large percentage of Republican voters believe that
he is either a Muslim, or the Antichrist, or both (I swear to God, I am not making this up).
With the Tea Party, we see this same
basic dynamic- a tiny minority wholly unrepresentative of American society, terrified
of seeing its influence inevitably waning, motivated by racism, sexism,
xenophobia, and general fear of any form of change perceived as directly
harmful to their interests, that has seized control of public means of discussion
to bully as many as they can into either open support or silent assent. A movement that employs language and ideas
general and open enough to mask their real intentions and confer legitimacy on
campaigns of harassment and cruelty (including, in the Tea Party’s case, vague
arguments about deficits, the need to preserve tradition, and opaque claims
that government in general is “bad”). A
movement that claims it wants “reform,” yet is unwilling (or unable) to provide
any actual specifics about what it wants and how it wants to achieve them. A movement that demonizes any critique or
opposition to its maddeningly unclear goals, and kicks out any within its ranks
that dares to disagree.
It is this movement that is
primarily to blame for the radicalization of the Republican Party and the
creation of a system more gridlocked and unproductive than any other Congress since
before the Civil War. It is the forces
behind this movement that push against efforts to change cultures within
sports, the military, universities, and others that encourage or passively
accept sexual violence and harassment again women. It is these forces that claim slavery was in
the past, and is therefore no longer relevant in terms of why racial and
economic disparity in the US is so high.
These are the forces continuing to seek ways to deny health coverage to
the poor, who push for “voter reform laws” that, curiously, overwhelmingly
restrict the ability of overwhelmingly Democratic groups to vote. That claim that global warming, the greatest
threat to humanity in history, does not exist.
But I digress. Coming back to #GamerGate- the end result of
the past few months is that the cultural development of video games has been
substantially set back. How far back, no
one can say. And as of right now, like
with the Tea Party’s disgustingly outsized influence on our public debate, there
is no effective counterweight to this.
All the people, including some dear friends of mine, that would like to
have an actual conversation about how to improve gaming journalism have been
thoroughly used and drowned out. There
is no real debate going on, just shady and half-formed accusations. No steps have been taken or even brought forward
about how to make actual, real improvement in how games are reported on.
What HAS happened is that websites
and corporations have been virtually pummeled into submission and silence for
doing or saying something- anything, really- that the organized #GamerGaters
didn’t like. What HAS happened is that,
instead of inspiring the kind of open, spirited, and yes, painful and uncomfortable
discussions that are essential for any change of positive consequence to occur,
a climate of fear, anger, and mistrust has suffocated any attempt at real
conversation. The case of Felicia Day,
one of the most positive and outspoken voices for games as a force for good, is
as clear an example of this as anyone could provide; instead of voicing her own
ideas about improving gaming journalism, she kept silent for months, out of
fear. And when she finally did speak, openly
expressing her worries about where the movement is headed, she was punished, literally within minutes (on that note, if you haven’t, read Day’s silence-breaking post. It is incredible,
and brave, and wonderful).
What HAS happened is that women and their families have felt compelled
to flee their homes, fearing for their very lives.
This means that #GamerGate as a
social movement, as a reform movement, as a movement any different from a
terrorism campaign (see this video as to why the use of the word “terrorism,”
in this instance, is not without merit) is an utter failure, because
from day one, the people pushing it the most were people who never cared one
whit for tackling actual problems within the industry. This is no different from the verbal assault
that was rained down upon a female critic at a movie website for daring to
spoil Guardians of the Galaxy’s perfect 100% rating on Rotten Tomato (which
prompted a pitch-perfect response from the site’s editor). This is no different from the leeches that
obtained celebrity nude photos and launched The Fappening, or the gremlins that
tortured Robin Williams’ daughter with photoshopped images of her dead
dad. The exact same forces have been at
work here from day one, the same forces of cultural and social reactionism that
drive dreck like the Tea Party and give Fox News a reason for existing. And with #Gamergate, they have been allowed
to spread even further. Which is,
finally, why I am arguing that this is a cultural problem. Not a gaming one. It is a cultural problem, and we must all be
part of the solution. Because there is
no excuse- NONE- for us not to be outraged into action by opening up the news
and reading about another woman fleeing for her very life, simply because she
opened her mouth and spoke her mind.
There is NEVER an excuse for that to happen. I don’t care if there ever WAS a conspiracy
to hijack the gaming industry (more spoilers- there wasn’t, there isn’t, and
there never will be).
#GamerGate must be abandoned. All decent-minded people who actually do want
to improve things within gaming must truly come together, get organized, form
vetted, dependable leadership, and provide a narrative and a course of action
other than what the wretches and misogynists have offered us thus far. The hashtags have to be abandoned, and new
hashtags, new monikers, new mottos and new rallying cries found, because
#GamerGate and #NotYourShield are tainted beyond all salvation. The vultures have come home to roost, and
they are not leaving until every bone has been picked dry. We have to admit, collectively, that #GamerGate
is a failure, and start anew. Otherwise,
the same corrosive forces paralyzing our political system and stratifying our
society will poison the bright future of games as the next great storytelling
medium. And I don’t want to see that
happen.
-Noah
Franc
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