Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women • Hacker News Board

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#31

Post by imanaccount247 » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 3:52 AM UTC

throwawayGG wrote: post #27

imanaccount247 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I've seen this statement quite a lot, where exactly are people getting this idea from? #gamergate was started by Adam Baldwin, specifically to address corruption in games journalism and the collusion of media outlets in trying to silence discussion of it. The roots of it go back to /v/ having been co…

Adam Baldwin also linked hashtag #GamerGate to the anti-feminism movement[1] when "when tweeting links to pre-existing misogynistic corruption conspiracy theory videos surrounding Quinn and Sarkeesian". Maybe it meant something else for a week or two. But it's been associated with this for much longer than anything else. [1] https://twitter.com/AdamBaldwin/status/504801169638567936 [2] http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2…

I'm confused. How does this address the claim that was made? The claim was that #gamergate was created to attack someone, and that therefore some other hashtag needs to be created for games journalism corruption. Now you are agreeing that it really was about corruption, but that it got associated with "misogyny" so that retroactively makes it not about corruption? Could you give a time for the misogyny in those videos? They are pretty long and neither had any in the first few minutes or at any of the random times I skipped to.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#32

Post by PhasmaFelis » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 3:54 AM UTC

imanaccount247 wrote: post #21

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's great that you're interested in promoting journalistic integrity, and not in attacking women. Why, then, don't you start a movement that can credibly claim to support those goals, instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I would love to see someone do this. Corruption in games journalism is a real problem. But it's not a problem that I'…

>instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I've seen this statement quite a lot, where exactly are people getting this idea from? #gamergate was started by Adam Baldwin, specifically to address corruption in games journalism and the collusion of media outlets in trying to silence discussion of it. The roots of it go back to /v/ having been co…

> I've seen this statement quite a lot, where exactly are people getting this idea from? #gamergate was started by Adam Baldwin, specifically to address corruption in games journalism and the collusion of media outlets in trying to silence discussion of it.

The specific instance of "corruption" that touched it off was Zoe Quinn allegedly trading sex for good reviews, which was 100% bullshit.

But let's assume you're right and I'm wrong, then. Why cling to a name that is--perhaps wrongfully--heavily associated with vicious misogyny in the public perception? At best, that's terrible PR. Even the most polite and level-headed Gamergate fans seem to spend far more energy defending the Gamergate name than they do attacking actual corruption. It makes you look like you care more about a snappy name than about getting your message heard; frankly, it makes you look like dupes for a small group of misogynistic trolls.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#33

Post by gojomo » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 3:54 AM UTC

uptown wrote: post #9

The way Twitter handles these types of incidents needs to change as well: https://twitter.com/StuHorvath/status/520750049702473729

Are you certain? What exactly do you propose Twitter do?

Twitter is not a real-space police force and in many cases does not have true-identity information.

It's possible that a faster move against threat-originators, through action like a ban on their Twitter account, would do one or both of (1) escalating their misguided anger; or (2) limiting evidence-gathering by real authorities.

Also, note that new Twitter sign-ups are very easy. That's a policy which overall provides benefits to Twitter and many Twitter users, especially newbies. But it means that it's trivial for griefers to circumvent simplistic account bans. So it may be better that they keep abusing via the one account, which collects evidence and can be blocked/muted by reputation, than they burn through the namespace with short-lived throwaway accounts.

It's a bit like managing antibiotic resistance with bacterial diseases. Sure, if you have a killer formula, deploy it and fix the problem. But if all you've got are incremental amelioration and escalation mechanisms, you need to use those very carefully to avoid training-up even worse malevolence. Practice game theory, not knee-jerk symbolism.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#34

Post by brandonmenc » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 3:59 AM UTC

This sort of thing makes me glad I quit playing video games 20 years ago. What an absolutely toxic scene.

Games were an escape, but I feel that's been ruined because you have to deal with so many real people, both in-game and in the "community." I wonder how many other people avoid getting (back) into games because of that.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#35

Post by gojomo » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:00 AM UTC

The out-group homogeneity bias, it runs deep in everyone loudly discussing these issues:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Out-group_homogeneity

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#36

Post by uvTwitch » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:01 AM UTC

acdha wrote: post #26

uvTwitch wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This narrative you're pushing here is a very hard sell considering this is one of their most prominent banners: http://www.nichegamer.net/media/2014/09/gamergate.jpg Being the interenet, there are naturally aggressive and violent people who will throw harassment around. With regard to this issue, it is downright false to claim that they originate from, or are encouraged by, any one camp, as there are examples of hara…

Here's the problem: #gamergate started as part of a harassment campaign against Zoe Quinn, closely following a round of attacks on Anita Sarkeesian[1] by many of the same people. The journalism bit was a valid issue latter adopted as a shield against criticism from the attacks at those women, several journalists and anyone else who spoke up against the abuse. Then they jumped in bed with the Breitbart crew, who were…

That's one way to tell the story. Here's another:

Zoe's disgruntled ex-partner decided to publicly air a lot of dirty laundry after he'd discovered she'd been unfaithful to him. This is childish behavior, but the thing that caught people's attention was his claim that she'd intentionally slept with the editors of gaming publications to receive positive coverage, which turned out to be true.

Caught with their pants down, instead of doing the decent thing and apologizing, the editors in question rallied their friends, and published articles decrying gamers as woman-hating children, and declaring that they were 'dead' and 'over' - essentially, insulting their audience for daring to accuse them of poor ethics.

This was understandably offensive to previously loyal readers, being attacked because of their hobbies, and so the movement was born - coined #gamergate by Adam Baldwin, but helmed by none.

Images like that banner were created as a response to the repeated attempts to discredit the movement as nothing more than a woman-hatting harassment campaign, as was the sister hashtag #notyourshield, in which plenty of minorities of all genders showed their support, and disproved the claims that it was just a bunch of hateful white men.

re: your links. Gawker Media are well known as having a vested interest in painting gamergate as a hate movement; their site Kotaku plays host to one of the accused PR-for-sex journalists, they have posted numerous attack pieces, and in return have had several of their sponsors pull out due to gamergater's emails. They are desperate to paint gamergate as a hate campaign, because they badly want it to go away and stop hurting their revenue.

Gamergaters generally want people to stop focusing on women's sex lives, and pay more attention to the actions and lack of integrity of the journalists involved.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#37

Post by Gigablah » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:02 AM UTC

throwawayGG wrote: post #22

ps4fanboy wrote: post #19

This is no different than fringe radical feminists attacking people on the internet, I dont have a link but there was an incident of a grown woman doxing a 13 year old kid. If that doesnt make all feminists bad then this shouldnt make all gamers bad at least apply consistent logic and standards.

I think you might lack a little perspective here. Radical feminists attacking people is NOT the same as someone threatening to go to a persons house, rape and kill them, and then proving they know where the person lives. "ps4fanboy". Hmm.

"throwaway". Hmm.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#38

Post by BryantD » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:02 AM UTC

imanaccount247 wrote: post #21

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's great that you're interested in promoting journalistic integrity, and not in attacking women. Why, then, don't you start a movement that can credibly claim to support those goals, instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I would love to see someone do this. Corruption in games journalism is a real problem. But it's not a problem that I'…

>instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I've seen this statement quite a lot, where exactly are people getting this idea from? #gamergate was started by Adam Baldwin, specifically to address corruption in games journalism and the collusion of media outlets in trying to silence discussion of it. The roots of it go back to /v/ having been co…

Let's be clear about why Adam Baldwin is doing this: he's interested in spreading his brand of conservative thought.

"EveryJoe: I recently saw a tweet came down my stream: 'Ever since GamerGate started, I’ve been forced to completely reconsider what it means to be a left-leaning liberal.' So it’s causing second thoughts.

"Adam: Yeah, second thoughts are best! There was a famous former Marxist who met with Ronald Reagan. Reagan shook his hand and said to him, 'You know, I had second thoughts before you did.'"

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#39

Post by Gigablah » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:05 AM UTC

brandonmenc wrote: post #34

This sort of thing makes me glad I quit playing video games 20 years ago. What an absolutely toxic scene. Games were an escape, but I feel that's been ruined because you have to deal with so many real people, both in-game and in the "community." I wonder how many other people avoid getting (back) into games because of that.

That's a surprise, because I'm able to enjoy my video games without feeling any connection to the "scene" whatsoever.

Re: Game developer Brianna Wu leaves home after death threats for supporting women

#40

Post by imanaccount247 » Sun, Oct 12, 2014, 4:09 AM UTC

BryantD wrote: post #38

imanaccount247 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>instead of rallying behind one that was created to attack one woman for completely made-up crimes against journalism? I've seen this statement quite a lot, where exactly are people getting this idea from? #gamergate was started by Adam Baldwin, specifically to address corruption in games journalism and the collusion of media outlets in trying to silence discussion of it. The roots of it go back to /v/ having been co…

Let's be clear about why Adam Baldwin is doing this: he's interested in spreading his brand of conservative thought. "EveryJoe: I recently saw a tweet came down my stream: 'Ever since GamerGate started, I’ve been forced to completely reconsider what it means to be a left-leaning liberal.' So it’s causing second thoughts. "Adam: Yeah, second thoughts are best! There was a famous former Marxist who met with Ronald Reag…

So, it is a problem that Adam Baldwin is "conservative" shares his opinions? You must realize most of the people attacking #gamergate and gamers are doing so to spread their "brand of liberal thought" too. Yeah, people have different opinions and different politics. For example, I disagree that people having different opinions is a problem.