#GamerGate Was Always About Ethics in Game Journalism; But Let’s Get Specific

The last time I wrote about #GamerGate was in October of 2014. My life has changed fairly significantly over those past 6 months. I’m sure anyone who has been involved with this situation can attest to a myriad of life changes as well, be they Pro-GG or Anti-GG.

The first time I wrote about #GamerGate was when I sat down and had a conversation with many of the people involved in this situation on Twitch. I heard their concerns and what they were upset about, discussed industry practices within the context of my own experience, and we compared notes on what could be effective ways to communicate their grievances safely and legally. So much time has passed since then that yesterdays seem like a blur.

In November of 2014 when ethical discussions were arguably at their peak, I asked people to take a survey of 3 questions concerning their grievances with the current game journalism climate. Given the intensity of the situation at the time and attempts to co-opt data by bad actors and others, it was my intention to perform the survey and then sit on the data for some time until people forgot about it. This post contains the results of that survey.

A few notes about the Game Journalism Ethics survey:

As strawpoll.me was used to conduct the survey, results such as gender, age range, sexual preferences, etc are not available.
The questions and answers themselves were formulated based on the most common discussion topics and concerns that I observed being vocalized by the mass of people participating in #GamerGate across Reddit, 8chan, and Twitter respectively.
It is not scientific in the least and likely has a flaw somewhere, if not several. The purpose was to gain a broad picture of what #GamerGate IS and what its concerns are to its participants.
There was not an equal number of respondents to each question. The lowest response was 1642 participants, with the highest number of participants at 2002.
Respondents were instructed to choose the answer that matched closest to their feelings, if they chose to respond at all.
So far as I can tell, these strawpolls are UNABLE TO BE ARCHIVED with Archive.today correctly; screenshots are utilized here. Tampering of the polls is likely to occur from the moment this post goes live.

The most immediate bit of data that we can conclude from the Game Journalism Ethics survey is the following: #GamerGate is made up of more than 300 people, contrary to some ridiculous beliefs. There is an assumption being made here, but I believe it to be a reasonable one; the questions were worded in a very specific way that would make them unappealing to answer to anyone who was not involved in nor care about #GamerGate or game journalism ethics.

Without further ado, the ethics survey results.

Which of the following would cause you to no longer participate in #GamerGate?

In this question, respondents were specifically asked what actions taken by game journalism media would make them done with #GamerGate. Out of 2002 respondents, an overwhelming 72% of them said “All of the Above” based on the following choices:

All of the above.
Video game journalism publications each sat down and reformed their ethics policies in-line with the Society of Professional Journalist Ethics Code, with easy public viewing of these policies.
Journalists implicated in ethical breaches were let go from their respective publications and replaced with new staff.
Video game publications had an annual reader ethics audit of their sites by the community, with community feedback being taken seriously, and where applicable, implemented.

2. #Gamergate Journalism Content Question: Which of the following bothers you the MOST about current blog-style game journalism content?

In this question, 1693 respondents were asked what content by ‘blog’ game journalists bothered them the most. The answers were significantly more split here, but 52% of respondents said that tabloid-style hitpieces against ‘unliked’ developers/studios bothered them the most. The second thing that bothered them at 25% of the vote was ‘inappropriate’ editorials/opinion pieces being the majority of content. Their choices were as follows:

Tabloid-style ‘hitpieces’ designed to destroy what is perceived as ‘unliked’ developers/studios by a game journalism publication.
‘Personal’ editorials/Opinion pieces being the primary content (‘personal’ being things that would be better served/more appropriate on someone’s personal blog and not front page of a publication)
Game reviews are too focused on individual subjective tastes, and do not contain enough ‘product review.’
Too much hero worship by publications (e.g. ‘Celebrity dev’ pandering)
Off-topic content taking up too much space (e.g. things mostly unrelated to video games; this excludes crime stories with a video game angle to them)
Not enough industry news (e.g. News of game releases, Previews, talent moving to other studios, layoffs, etc)

3. Which of the current game journalist behaviors bothers you the MOST?

In this question, 1642 respondents were asked what game journalist behaviors bothered them the most. This was the most divisive of the 3 questions presented to the respondents. 38% of them agreed that inaccurate information presented as fact and poor visibility of corrections bothered them the most, and the next highest at 26% agreed that failing to recuse due to potential bias from and/or lack of personal disclosure was a bigger issue. The answers available to choose were the following:

Inaccurate information often presented as fact, with poor public visibility of corrections.
Failing to recuse due to potential bias from and/or lack of personal disclosure about those they are reporting on (be they games or people, etc)
‘Censoring’ reader feedback (Note: Feedback that falls within accepted community guidelines; not inflammatory, trolling, illegal content, etc)
Failure to disclose gifts/review copies according to FTC regulations (this applies to US based outlets)
Poor ‘public-facing’ behavior on social media (twitter tirades, etc)
Flip-flopping: Either a journalist or a blogger, depending on which is more convenient at the time.

When I opened this post, I stated that the most immediate data one could glean from this survey was that there are far more people involved with #GamerGate than unethical news outlets and internet pundits would have you believe. It should be painfully clear that most of the people involved in #GamerGate missed this survey completely. But that’s not the most compelling bit of data to pull from this survey.

The most compelling bit of information that you could pull from this is that if you merely sit down and ask people what their concerns are, THEY WILL TELL YOU. It has nothing to do with misogyny, or driving women or minorities out of gaming. #GamerGate was always about ethical breaches and ethical concerns in game journalism. Yet 8 months later we are still here, with these concerns left mostly unaddressed.

Perhaps it is time to stop character assassinating your audience, and to actually have a discussion with them. As you can see, they’re more than willing to share so long as you bring good faith to the table.