No greater friend, no worse enemy.
That is one of the sayings when it comes to United States
Marines: we are so loyal to those we care about that we will bend over
backwards and then some in order to help them out; at the same time, we’ll do
everything in our power (legally and otherwise) to “destroy” a perceived
enemy. It’s been a saying that I
remember hearing for over a decade, and General James “Maddog” Mattis, possibly
the greatest general the Marine Corps has had since Lieutenant General Lewis “Chesty”
Puller, both of whom take a larger-than-life presence in Marine Corps
history/lore, quoted it when speaking to Marines and sailors in Iraq. We are truly the most steadfast and true
friends you can ever have, and many times that goes for our sister services as
well.
As a gamer, I obviously have female guildmates and the like
that I play with, and am thus also protective of. As I stated in my last posting, I recognize
and understand the hardships that female gamers go through. It’s simply part of the fact that over 80% of
the playerbase in almost every game is male, and also socially-awkward. When a being with tits shows up on Ventrilo,
you can hear the collective boners popping up, and you pray to whatever deity
you worship that nothing else pops into your head. My guild master in Rift is a woman, and she’s
someone every person in the guild would kill
a motherfucker to protect her. It’s not
because she’s a woman, it’s because she’s someone who gives a shit about all of
us. Sure, being viewed as a sister and
thus everyone wanting to be a big brother certainly helps her as well, but she’s
got a husband so no one is under any impression they have a chance. Simply put, we’re protective and that’s that.
The problem now is that you have those same subsects of
humanity that are using someone’s gender against them. I only became aware of this today when I saw
an article on “gamers” who dox’d Felicia Day (“DOX”ing” someone means you
release their personal details—such as address and telephone number—on the
internet for anyone to find), and was only marginally aware of what is being
dubbed “Gamergate” prior to this.
For those who don’t know, “Gamergate” revolves around two
camps of the gaming community and is largely based around perceptions of
misogyny and sexism in the gaming community, as well (and to a lesser extent
now) as journalistic integrity and ethics when it comes to people who review
video games as a whole. It started in
August 2014 when an ex-boyfriend of Zoe Quinn, an “indie game designer” posted
that she had had romantic relations with a Kotaku journalist, and the
perception was that because of this it had an influence that was easily a
conflict of interest. Now, it came out that
the allegations were unfounded, but the damage was done and Ms. Quinn found
herself inundated with a deluge of harassing e-mails and the like, threatening
violence and rape against her.
Once again, this is not a political piece, and I don’t want
people to view it as such. But this is
what has been happening with a social media network generation that knows “everything”
and can help propagate the lies without doing any fact-checking. And while many of us may not be willing to
(or even expected to) actually check the facts, it is still preferential to the
alternative, such as rioting in the streets because a white officer shot a
black man and everyone’s claiming it was an execution, only to have the
evidence of the case come out over months that that narrative was unfounded and
patently untrue.
The rampant misogyny and sexism would be fine if it was just
words and jokes. But the problem is this
vociferous fringe group has gone beyond that, issuing threats of rape and
murder against female journalists and gamers who they believe are stepping “out
of line” with their viewpoints. Felicia
Day was one such person to be subjected to this type of vitriol, and it runs
counter to everything that the majority of gamers actually believe. We are not here to denigrate women—the game
companies do that well enough with the female avatars running around in plate
string bikinis. Sure, we all say sexist and misogynistic jokes
and what-not, and we might say stupid shit but the vast majority of us do not
mean it. This subsect, while they may think what they write, will never act on
it. Here’s why.
I’ll go back to my opening statement. Marines (and most servicemembers) are the
best friends you can have. If you’re in
a pickle, we’ll do our best to help you.
More to the point, we’re stupidly protective of our female friends and
relatives. I have been present when my
friend Erica wanted to move out of her abusive boyfriend’s house. She was afraid he’d beat the everloving
manshit out of her, and probably hurt her daughter as well. She asked me to come along to help her move
her shit out, and I did. I didn’t say
anything. I simply followed her, helped
her move, and that was it. Sure, he said
shit, but he wasn’t actually going to follow through while someone was
there. One, it’s a witness. Two, he’s never had to actually fight for his
life (and yes, he would have been doing that had he acted). And my friends know that if shit happens and
it can be validated, I have a network of servicemembers through the United
States and Canada, as well as friends in Israel, England, and Ireland whom I
can turn to in order to make a point. If
you fuck with me or mine, I fuck with you.
And while we may bend the rules a bit, it will never be to the point
that they won’t find your body, and if you press charges, you’d be surprised
how many juries clear us on all charges because we’re veterans, and because you’re
a fucking cunt and we have evidence of it.
But this vitriol is aimed at women, and has been. Feminist Anita Sarkeesian canceled a speech
at the University of Utah after receiving death threats from the fringe group
of gamers, and Utah’s concealed carry laws meant that the campus couldn’t
guarantee her safety. Felicia Day had
threats of rape and murder launched against her. Yet when former NFL star Chris Kluwe called
these same people “basement-dwelling, cheetos-huffing [sic], poopsock-smelling
douchepistols” nothing happened to him, despite him being a much softer target
in terms of publicity and the like. It is
stupidly easy to find his information, after all.
Women are simply seen as much safer targets to take out
criticism and anger on. They’re not as
likely to actually find out where you live, come to your home and murder you in
your sleep. As such, these people (and I
am using that term very loosely here) feel that they are in a much safer place
with regards to being able to act like badasses. Making a bunch of threats you will never be
expected to carry out makes one a man on the internet, and the community
understands that even if they also ridicule you.
Sure, you have instances of gamers being dox’d, along with
the name, work location, and school locations of children. You have the threats of violence against your
family if you don’t do what they want.
This happened a few years ago in EvE Online, when a group of Russian
players decided to release that information to the public, with the very real
and clear threat against the families of the players part of Goonswarm Federation, the player-run
alliance made up of Something Awful forums denizens after there had been talks of
invading and capturing space owned by said Russians. But this is by-and-large not the norm,
because people understand this is a game, and even the most sane, hardcore
gamer will tell you that much. It is
legitimately not worth going to prison because you don’t like what someone
says.
I have plenty of disagreements with gamers and game
companies. I’ve voiced them, and been
quite vociferous. I have submitted a
letter of no confidence that was signed by players against the CEO of CCP
Games, even if it was several years ago.
I have not, however, threatened to hunt down someone I have had problems
with and threaten to kill him and his family.
I’ve seen those threats made in-game, and the companies tend to react
accordingly (enjoy your ban).
And what’s more, this fringe group has received more
publicity from other media outlets simply because of how outrageous they have
acted, and because of that its cast a net of complete and utter inability for
people to differentiate between the “good guys” in the movement and the “bad
guys”. Now given, this stems more from
the media enjoying sensationalized stories of people acting like cunts, because
it sells papers. But what started out as
a decent movement—fighting against the corruption or biased “reporting” of
media outlets is something we should all want, whether we care about the news
or not—has become synonymous with a rape culture and the stereotypical gamer:
the type that hides in mommy’s basement, unwilling to leave and run their own
lives (as Mr. Kluwe pointed out).
Is it important to distinguish between the two camps? Absolutely.
But it’s really not going to happen in the media because it does sell
copies. Period. Ratings go up. Sold copies go up. In either situation the bottom line is
affected positively, and that means that Gamergate has a negative stigma
associated with it. The group of
journalists that want to demonize something like this will just lump the fringe
group in with the main one; the group that wants to protect and point out their
grievances will not be heard, and so it’s now important to belittle and shame
that fringe group.
Unfortunately, I don’t think it’ll work: you have to have a
sense of shame in order to feel it.
These are the people you bring behind a bar and put a bullet in their
head, because they offer nothing of value to the movement, and really nothing of
value to humanity as a whole.
Am I afraid of being DOX’d and having someone show up in my
house to kill me? No. I know they’re cowards, but more to the point
I have on me at all times a FN57 pistol, which has a notch in the
handgrip. It’s killed before and it’ll
do so again if I need it to. But as I
said, they’re cowards, and it won’t come to that point. Plus I have a penis, so that automatically
protects me from them.
No comments:
Post a Comment