Gamergate
Learning about gamergate is really sad to hear about. I wasn’t extremely familiar with gamergate prior to class but after reading these articles and talking about it in class, I was shocked at how women are treated when they are just trying to enjoy their free time playing video games and create a living for themselves with something they love which just happens to be video games.
I think social media, which is a huge platform, is great for promoting but there is consent bullying going on because people feel some kind of way behind a computer or phone screen and its sickening how cruel people can be. The one article written by Caitlin Dewey, The only guide to Gamergate you will ever need to read, towards the middle she shows some tweets from twitter that were written to a female that was addressing women in the gaming industry. The tweets are extremely graphic, talking about showing up to her house and killing her and if she had children, they would also be killed. Dewey compared these tweets with Law and Order SVU episodes because of how disturbing they were. She also goes on to saying that the trolls really dig into these females lives to find their phones numbers and addresses. Then they put that information out on the internet for everybody to see and harass them. (Dewey, paragraph 18)
Also relating to that, there is one specific person known as “Pewdiepie”, his real name Felix, he used the N word towards a player while streaming online. He doesn’t apologize for it basically just saying he has freedom of speech to say whatever he would like. This article is written by Patricia Hernandez, Indie Dev Calls for Copyright Strikes Against Pewdiepie after he says N-words on Stream. There’s a large group of people that responded back to Pewdiepie after that. Because of that situation, hashtags and twitter profiles were made to create backlash towards him in hope to stop him from making YouTube videos.
Learning about this has been eye opening in a sense because I as a female have played video games and know many females that also play video games regularly and I would hate to see them being harassed by online trolls that think men are in control. Relating this back to the one presentation in class about gender in the gaming industry, gamers are divided pretty equally. Women make up 48–52 percent of gamers.
“Don’t panic: There’s good news here. Both mainstream gaming critics and many gamergate supporter insist that brutal trolls are just a small, vocal minority. There’s plenty of social science to back that up, too: We know that people are more aggressive, more argumentative and more nasty when they’re permitted to comment on something without using their real name.” (Dewey, paragraph 23)
People feel a sense of empowerment when it comes to the internet, they think they can say whatever they want and hurt people just because they want to. This kind of relates back to the golden rule: treat others the way you want to be treated. I will never understand why people could be so cruel and threaten people on the internet and hide behind the screen.
“We believe that everyone, no matter what gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion or disability has the right to play games, criticize games and make games without getting harassed or threatened, he wrote. “It is the diversity of our community that allows games to flourish. (Dewey, paragraph 27)
This quote stood out because I believe everybody should be included, video gaming isn’t just about gender. It needs to be diverse. Everybody should support each other.
References
Dewey, C. (2014, October 14). The only guide to Gamergate you will ever need to read. Retrieved December 13, 2017, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/14/the-only-guide-to-gamergate-you-will-ever-need-to-read/?utm_term=.134d488f3d13
Massanari, A. (2017, October 9). Never Alone (Kisima Inŋitchuŋa): Possibilities for participatory game design. Retrieved December 13, 2017, from http://www.academia.edu/19727288/Never_Alone_Kisima_In%C5%8Bitchu%C5%8Ba_Possibilities_for_participatory_game_design
