Gamergate Myths: Corruption, Collusion and Professional Victimhood.
One of the longstanding threads held by #gamergate is that by having a series of separate websites post op-ed articles with similar content constitutes a clear case of collusion and corruption. The most cited/villified of these was an article by Leigh Alexander. This was only compounded by the discovery of GameJournoPros, a private Google group set up to allow industry members to compare notes behind the scenes. This is the basis of what allowed #gamergate to fully embrace and run with the “ethics in game journalism” mantra and move away from it’s origins of simply being a cover to attack Zoe Quinn.
As someone who works in the film industry as a post-production specialist, I never held to the “clearly corruption” argument as I’m incredibly well aware that everyone in my field knows everyone. Now, yes, that is hyperbole to a degree, but the times when an editing or colour project crosses my desk and I don’t already know several people who worked on it… well, those times are rare. Working in any sort of specialized industry like this means making as many contacts as possible, forming worthwhile relationships and constantly growing your pool of people to draw from. It’s called networking boys and girls, and if you want to have a career that lasts beyond the contract you already have, you’re doing it. Now, to be honest, I don’t work in journalism, that’s just not my field, but I had no reason to believe it operated any differently.
And then I found out. Let me lead you through a chain of events that led to a day of media absurdness and gave me much insight into the world of journalism as a whole.
THE DOX (8:00PM, Saturday)
I’m alerted that I’m doxed on 8chan’s /baphomet board, seemingly for following someone on Twitter they tried to dox but couldn’t. New experience time I guess. Sure I’ve been vocal about #gamergate, but I’m certainly not a key figure and outside of some of the more in depth conversations I’ve had with supporters and opponents alike, most people are blissfully unaware who I am.
SWATting (12:20PM, Saturday)
Two uniformed officers arrive at my door responding to an anonymous tip placed to Crimestoppers via the web that I have guns and pipe bombs in my house.
Now, for people who think there’s any effectiveness in this, when the police receive a report like this the first thing they do is their research on me. Criminal history? None. Outstanding warrants? None. History of calls to same address? None. They don’t just roll out the SWAT team on an anonymous tip, but they do still have to follow it up on the pretense that it’s legitimate.
Also make no mistake, this sort of prank is not a prank at all. Because the genuine intent is not inconvenience, it’s to create enough confusion and misinformation that results in someone accidentally getting hurt or killed. That’s how I view it, and that’s how the police view it.
It took all of 30 seconds to de-escalate the situation and as soon as I mentioned being doxed, their involvement turned from cautiously investigating potential explosives to supporting the victim of an online harassment campaign. I’ll say this again — the cops were frickin’ awesome and I can’t think of a way they could have handled it better.
Day of rest: (Sunday)
I already had a fun full day planned for Sunday with a friend. Spa. High tea. Finally saw Birdman. I just wanted to relax and forget this crap.
The email: (Monday 1:30pm)
So this story is really bugging me now. Everyone I talk to, I can practically watch their eyes roll away. Everyone views it as a semi-harmless prank and in the meantime I’m hearing from others on Twitter who experienced the same that weekend. Part of the problem is there’s a lot of language and structure to unpack for people who don’t know about the chans, and that’s by design. This confusion provides a level of cover for them to operate this way. By now I’m genuinely thinking it’s important to get this story out and educate people to the reality of what goes on not as a cautionary don’t-let-this-happen-to-you story, but to shine a light on this dark corner of the internet because if there’s one thing I know, bullies hate daylight.
I figure this story has as good a chance as being covered as any. Online harassment. Doxing. SWATting. I think it sounds “sexy” in the journalistic sense, and if I’m going to make a thing of it, it’s now or never. So I send out a pair of emails, one to the Vancouver Province and one to Vancouver Sun, the two prominent print newspapers in town. (also both owned by the same entity, which for some reason is also not collusion)
Vancouver Province: (1:50pm, Monday)
It takes roughly 20 minutes for Nick Eaglnd from the Vancouver Province to call me back. We do a quick interview over the phone and he wants to arrange for a photographer to get a photo of me as quick as possible in attempts to make deadline for next day’s newspaper.
Secondary Confirmation: (9:00am, Tuesday)
The Province doesn’t make their deadline, because surprise… they actually require confirmation of the facts by the police before they can publish a story like this, and the officer in charge had already gone home Monday afternoon. This is how I know when people come to my Twitter to tell me I made the whole thing up (happens more than you think), it isn’t just provably wrong, it’s disingenuously dismissive and cowardly.
There’s this continuing narrative that #gamergate loves to perpetrate that all of the instances like what occurred to me, and what occurs much more frequently to women like Anita Sarkeesian, Zoe Quinn, Brianna Wu and Randi Harper, are all completely made up incidents for publicity. This of course is complete nonsense. Despite what anyone thinks of mainstream press, they do not report on these incidents without confirmation from a secondary non-biased source — often times that being law enforcement. So when you read that police were called to my house on false allegations, you know it’s true and that fact is not nor will it ever be up for debate.
This is usually the point where someone will say “you probably called the police on yourself,” as that’s a common retort against the above mentioned women. Also provably false. The police aren’t doing their jobs with TRS-80 computers hooked up to a 300baud modem. They were surprisingly savvy and in the know about this, and they follow up to find perpetrators of these false claims. Can you see that proof? No you can’t. I can’t even see it. Feel free to call the police and verify for yourself.
So I can tell you from experience that this “professional victim” crap is 100% bullshit from people who will dismiss every fact they’re faced with because it doesn’t fit their already set in stone narrative. Of this I am now certain and can speak with authority.
Moving on.
10:30am, Tuesday
Nick from the Province lets me know he got confirmation and shares copy of the story with me. I request a few changes to protect certain people and it goes up on the web and will be in Wednesday’s paper. Nick also wants to do a Skype interview for the web and we schedule for 1pm. The article goes live on theprovince.com. I hate the photo and see that I really need a haircut.
11:00am, Tuesday
Nick emails me to ask if it’s okay to give my phone number to CBC News who are interested in the story. It’s been live on the web for a total of 30 minutes by this point. I say sure.
12:30pm, Tuesday
A segment producer from CBC Radio calls me and wants to know if I would be willing to come into the studio the following day and do a longer on-air interview at 5:10pm. I agree.
1:00pm, Tuesday
I do my Skype interview with Nick from the Province. It shows up linked to the article on the Province at about 3:00pm.
6:00pm, Tuesday
Susanna da Silva from CBC calls wanting to know if they can come over to my home the next day and do a segment promising it won’t take much time. I mention that I’m already going to be doing a CBC Radio interview that day. “I swear, we share the same newsroom but sometimes you’d never know it,” she jokes. I agree to the in-home segment. At this point the story has been live on the web for 7 hours and has yet to be printed.
WEDNESDAY:
10:00am, Wednesday
I get called by a segment producer from CTV who’s picked up the story. They want to send out a crew to do a segment as well. I mention that I’m already doing a segment at 1pm with CBC and they ask if they can come by at 11:30. I say yes.
11:00am, Wednesday
CBC calling again. In addition to the in-home segment and the CBC radio interview, they want to know if I can come in 20 minutes earlier and record a studio interview with Andrew Chang for local 6pm news. I agree.
11:30am, Wednesday
Maria Weisgarber from CTV shows up with a cameraman to do a segment about me. They’ve already corroborated it with the RCMP just like The Province did. In total, they’re in and out of my house in about 20 minutes.
1:00PM, Wednesday
Susanna de Silva from CBC arrives with her cameraman. While setting up Susanna lets me know she used to have an apartment in the same building as the Province’s Nick Eagland, that they’re old friends and that’s how she got the story. I mention that CTV had just left so they didn’t have an exclusive. Susanna asks who interviewed me. When I say it was Maria, she responds in a way you reserve for close friends whose work you respect. They take longer wanting to get more insert shots, but still only about 40 mintues.
2:20PM, Wednesday
Jordan from Global News calling. That’s it. That’s all of them now. There is not a single news outlet left in Vancouver that can interview me short of CityTV and I doubt they’ll be sending anyone out. Global wants to know if they can interview me for a segment. It’s getting late, I have to leave in an hour to get down to CBC Studios, so I decline. He’s insistant and asks if I can possibly meet a camera crew on the street outside CBC 10 minutes before I’m supposed to go in for two other interviews there. Reluctantly I agree.
Strangely I’m relieved. There’s no other media outlets that could call me at this point. That leaves me 30 minutes to get some actual work done today before I leave for the studio.
3:50PM, Wednesday
I meet Brett, a camera operator for Global News. We set up directly outside of CBC Studios. There’s no reporter, he’s just going to feed me some pre-written questions on a story he knows little about and they’ll edit it into a story. While I’m standing just inside the property line for CBC studios, Brett informs me he can’t go on their property and even points to the cement pylons that set the line of demarkation. Everyone sees Global is interviewing me outside of CBC. No one cares. This is how news happens and it’s all inside the rules that have been created.
4:05PM, Wednesday
I’m met at security by a woman who is essentially going to handle me. She asks in that routine kind of way if it’s been crazy day. It’s hard not to agree. I mention popping off the Global interview and now here I am at CBC Studios to do two more of these. “Three more,” she corrects me. “We’re hoping you can hang out to do one more after the radio interview. We want to add it to the National broadcast.” Oy. Why not. I agree.
When I mention I do post production and which shows I work on, my handler announces she’s good friends with one of the camera guys who shoots on a show I do online editing for. Everyone knows everyone in this industry.
4:20PM, Wednesday
I’m quickly taken to the local News at 6 studio, which, god damn if it isn’t fairly impressive looking in person. Very slick. And sitting behind that desk? It genuinely feels cool, make no mistake about it. I meet Andrew Chang, and we briefly discuss the story while a woman pancakes makeup on me and one of the cam ops runs a lav on me. This is where being part of the film industry pays off, I’m familiar with a lot of this procedure, just not in a news broadcast setting. This is a pre-show tape interview. I’ll be doing the radio interview while the actual broadcast for this show is going on, so we’re taping now.
4:45PM, Wednesday
I get a quick around the world tour of CBC studios which encompasses an entire city block and is quite impressive. I’m stuck in a waiting area for the next 20 minutes until CBC Radio is ready for me to come in. I’ll be popping into the middle of a live broadcast.
I have a chance to send out a few tweets about the experience and check my mail. Lots of support from people. My mentions also become flooded with #gamergate supporters who want to automatically piss all over CBC as being journalistically corrupt.
I want to address that. Take a look around, because this is a room of people who work their asses off and move with incredible speed and precision to get information out to people. Sure there’s problems with the system, especially on the TV side. There’s a certain level of sensationalism that they have to aspire to if they want to maintain their viewership, but the motive is always about informing the public. That’s why they do it, and that’s why I did it too. This is how you change the world, by being part of it. By being active and putting something out there. By creating. By building. You don’t do it by picking a target and burning it to the ground. They have a word for that, and I used it in every single one of my interviews.
I have a few seconds to chat with an editor from Xtra, a local LGBT newspaper, who was there to talk about having to shut down the print side of their operation. He heard some details of my story and wanted to tell me he’s thinks I’m being brave standing up. I use my line about how bullies and cockroaches don’t like daylight. “No, they don’t,” he confirms from experience. “No, they sure don’t.” His affirmation reminds me I’m on the right path.
5:05pm, Wednesday
A new handler shows up to take me into the CBC Radio studio. They’re live in the middle of a broadcast and I’m silently seated in front of my mic while I wait for them to finish with weather and traffic.
Stephen Quinn interviews me for a good 10 minutes and really gives me a chance to expound on some of the details concerning my incident. I’m really happy with this interview and feel I nailed it. By comparison, the rest of the interviews have amounted to only about 3 minutes of content that they’ll cut down even more. But after doing this many interviews, you figure out what the talking points are and you hit him for impact. I was well aware that my story was allowed to trend because of the “sexy” sensationalistic elements that are intwined. “Woman terrorised by cyber-bullies” makes for a grabbing headline, but I was determined to play against that narrative and instead provide context and education for the audience coupled with a call to stand up to bullies like this. I feel I achieved that here. Afterward, the handler almost looks stunned when she says, “You’re really good at this.” I like radio.
5:20pm, Wednesday
I’m quickly grabbed by another handler whose name I’ve already forgotten and taken to a meeting room where they mic me yet again and the same woman shows up to put more makeup on me. I imagine this is how A-list stars feel during press junkets. “Feel free to use all of it,” I half-joke with the makeup artist.
I barely have time for a drink of water before I’m shuttled down the stairs and stood in front of a monitor to do The National with Ian Hanomansing. I have 20 seconds to get ready and we’re live.
“We all know gamergate is about attacking women in gaming…” he breaks into his segment with. Ian started in harsher than any of the other journalists, harsher than I would have been, but also not wrong. Whether you agree with him or not, the only newsworthy element of gamergate is the shit that happens to people like me. Conspiracy maps and who may have slept with someone else over a free game, and who said what on Gawker — none of this matters to anyone outside the spheres of 8chan, Reddit and Twitter, nor should it. But women targeted by bitchy gamers using police resources… well that has more weight. This made me wonder if maybe I should have been more aggressive in all my previous interviews, but no, I’m quite happy and feel I was completely fair in everything I said.
The whole time I can see what’s being broadcast on the screen behind the camera crew and I really wish I had gotten a haircut sooner. I like radio better.
5:40pm, Wednesday
I exit the CBC building and realize that the media circus is finally over and also that I haven’t eaten anything yet. I’m getting more Tweets, Facebook messages and emails than I can possibly respond to. Everyone whose opinion matters in my life tells me they’re proud of my courage and support me. I receive an outpouring of support from local Vancouver game devs who want me to know how much they oppose #gamergate and are there for me. I receive emails from other previous victims of similar bullying attacks that want me to know they are available if I need their support. Despite the shitheels that are calling me out on Twitter as the death of free speech, I’m left feeling pretty damn good about people in the world.
So, what have we learned:
In a span of 48 hours, I watched one email I sent snowball into a media frenzy that had me doing eight interviews for four different news outlets, spanning print, digital, television and radio, going out locally, nationally and globally on the web, and this is not counting the independent online journals that wanted to do articles as well.
48 hours. And half of them were shot, edited and aired in the less time than it would take to watch a movie.
This is how journalism moves. It is fast and precise, moving with the white hot heat of a sniper’s bullet. The only reason any of this holds together is because of the people who make it happen. All these people went to school with each other. They bounce around to different contracts at different companies. Their friends are each other’s friends, and they share information and help each other out where they can because even when they’re competing, they’re still in the same boat.
You can see this as collusion that these people would have the gall to communicate with each other, check each other’s notes and have each other’s back, but you’d be completely wrong. This is the result of working in a specialized field where so many are dedicated towards creating something great that is for the benefit and eduction of their audience as a whole. Do they get it right every time? No, you can’t run this fast without sometimes scraping your knees. But it’s impossible to watch the machine in action and not stand in awe of the people who only want to add to the discourse.
