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Ah, sweet schadenfreude! The gamebros at 4chan have been insisting publicly that the whole #GamerGate campaign — you know, the vicious attacks on game developer Zoe Quinn and other women in gaming — has been a spontaneous grassroots uprising against corruption in the world of game journalism, not a targeted campaign by misogynistic 4channers and their allies to ruin the lives of Quinn and everyone even vaguely connected with or even just aligned with her.
Well, it’s just become a lot harder to make that argument with a straight face. Last night, Quinn announced that she’s been lurking in the IRC where 4chaners have been diligently and often quite deviously planning this “spontaneous” uprising. And she’s started posting screenshots that seem to offer pretty incontrovertible evidence of just how duplicitously 4channers planned every element of #GamerGate.
You can find Quinn’s tweets of these screenshots laid out neatly on this Storify page; it’s essential reading for anyone who’s been following all this.
But I thought I’d highlight some of my favorite bits.
Here, 4channers talk about trying to hack her email:
definitely no raids ever happen because of 4chan and I definitely hacked myself mmhmmm pic.twitter.com/3309AiQk3u
— zoë “Baddie Proctor” quinn (@UnburntWitch) September 6, 2014
Here they spout bizarre conspiracy theory — while conspiring to hack another website.
this has pure insanity AND some illegal shit in it pic.twitter.com/rRo5KVFBhZ
— zoë “Baddie Proctor” quinn (@UnburntWitch) September 6, 2014
In this screenshot — you can find the whole thing here — 4channers talk candidly about how they hope to ruin her career:
More of the same:
because this is about integrity. not revenge. not harassment. not hurting people. pic.twitter.com/rSSm4ZJG4T
— zoë “Baddie Proctor” quinn (@UnburntWitch) September 6, 2014
Here some 4channers talk about #NotYourShield, a supposedly spontaneous bit of hashtag activism in which people of color — and white dudes pretending to be people of color — attack “social justice warriors” for supposedly using them as “shields” for their attack on gaming. Notice the dudes at the end talking about showing up on Twitter “as a Latino” and “in blackface” to support the campaign.
Given how damning a lot of these screenshots are, it’s hardly surprising that they freaked out when Quinn started posting her screenshots:
https://twitter.com/MsMinotaur/status/508177920687210496
Too late, dudes. Too late.
If you take four levels of Social Justice Rogue you’ll end up with a BAB of +3 which is only one lower than a single class Social Justice Warrior. In return you’ll get four levels that have 6 additional skill points each level up, 2 dice of sneak attack, trapfinding, trap sense, evasion, and uncanny dodge. For my money it’s a fair trade since it would only put off entry into the Duelist class by one level. But it’s just a suggestion of course. 🙂
d715 – Please note that saying someone’s lying a lot is not debunking. Saying if we respond to this more than we already have it’ll make us look bad is not debunking.
It’s almost like 4chan’s constant use of harassment in many forms has resulted in people realizing they harass people.
But pendraegon, d715 has almost definitely seen some 4chan jpeg that thoroughly debunks this (by means of some scrawled MS Paint text), so clearly we must accept his authority.
@pendraegon
You should cut d715 some slack. It’s WAY harder to harass a crowd of people than just one or three persons, and d715 has no practice in conducting civil discourse, with facts and stuff. When the only thing you know how to do is abuse the vulnerable, and you’re faced with a group of people who aren’t especially vulnerable, you can be forgiven some disjointed flailing.
Oh right, I forgot that MS Paint text that draws tenuous connections between people and contradicts the images it’s using is a valid form of sourcing now. My bad, guess we’ll have to pull down the entire feminist conspiracy to take over video games and turn them all into The Sims and Animal Crossing now. Dang it took so long to set up too. Good men died setting up the scaffolding, it’s ok though I mean they were sacrificing themselves for feminists causes. The way all women and beta males want.
Did I get a bingo yet? I can probably find some more nonsense talking points to toss in.
I call Social Justice Gnoll.
Hyena Girl – That is terrifyingly appropriate. You should specialize in stealth skills, get a ghillie suit and become a grassy gnoll.
Really? That’s interesting. I’m sure you can easily show us the evidence that proves she’s wrong, then.
…
*chirp*
Is Social Justice Swashbuckler still available?
Maistrechat – I believe Social Justice Swashbuckler is still available. Would you prefer the 3.5 variant class or the Pathfinder advanced class version? Just for accurate record keeping of the party breakdown.
I’ve never played Pathfinder but from the SRDs that version of the class definitely seems to be the one I’d prefer.
Wow, what a pointless post, d715. Thanks, really, for this:
“This was already debunked Zoe cherry picked or wrote them herself
notice how she only posted the OP of that 4chan post?
Because the rest are calling it a clear trap/shutting it down
But whatever like you idiots care”
You forgot to post your citations, silly. Also, you’re in with the bad guys. You’re part of a mob that lies to you and says it’s more productive to hate women then it is to go outside and meet new people and form healthy relationships or whatever.
If one of you nerds started saying Zoe bites off the heads of puppies and drinks their blood, the rest of you would believe it in a sec and start spreading the lie around. Your hate movement isn’t the best PR for whatever it is you think you’re fighting — or pretend to be fighting.
“Cherry-picking?” I would like to know in what broader context hacking into somone’s e-mail, impersonating racial minorities on Twitter (in “blackface” even), plotting to ruin marriages, careers and framing people for racketeering, and planning how to harrass and spread lies about Quinn, Sarkeesian and “SJWs” would be considered acceptable behavior.
Rogues get all the cool skills. I’d happily trade a slower progression for some cool Rogue skills. Dammit, it’s been too long since I’ve played D&D.
Sparky – I hear that, I haven’t grinned this much in months now. I really need to try and get a reliable game going.
Maistrechat – I made the switch over to Pathfinder when fourth ed came out. In my humble opinion it’s vastly superior to anything WOTC has put out since Hasbro bought them. Paizo really hit the mark, with a few exceptions. The Mythic Adventures book feels really rushed with all sorts of typos.
And Pathfinder Social Justice Swashbuckler it is. Enjoy your panache points. 🙂
Social Justice Librarian. OOK!
RE: pendrageon
Inflated scores and outright lies for pay have been a pretty open secret for years. I think that’s a large part of why things like Let’s Play videos and longer form reviews have become more common.
Definitely. There was this PS1 game called ‘Galerians’ that I was really curious about. It had gotten rated a 6 on PlayStation magazine… not great, but I figured it was at least okay.
Then I saw a Let’s Play, and it was very clear that the game was barely playable. The items you needed to survive the game were invisible, so you had to search EVERYTHING, but the game also would become unwinnable if you took too long. The controls were so clunky the LPer had problems like running into walls… and this was a guy who had beaten the game numerous times before. Sure, the story was interesting, but the gameplay was so hamfisted and awful, I was like, “Jesus Christ, why did this get a 6?” Even the Let’s Player couldn’t keep me engaged through it all, and I usually like his commentary. (Which is focused on the details and history of a game, rather than humor or review.)
RE: Breakfast Man
LPers blatantly take money to promote games on their channel, tho. How exactly is that less corrupt than the press at large?
Enh, a LPer can gush about a game all he likes. If I see that he has trouble running into walls and dying on the same jump over and over again, I’m still going to think the game sucks. Also, I’m not watching a Let’s Play to find what swank new shit to buy; I’m watching a Let’s Play to see games I have no interest in playing myself or wouldn’t know about otherwise. (Though I did end up buying Alice: Madness Returns because the Let’s Play made it look playable and enjoyable, which it was. No regrets there!)
Seriously, I highly doubt Sweet Home and Galerians were paying Lotus Prince, fifteen to twenty-five years after the games came out. Whatshisface LPed Dangan Ronpa because at the time, it was thought that the US would never pick it up, and he wanted to translate and show it for an English-speaking audience. (Yeah, so he translated AND screenshot his playthrough. That’s heavy-duty.) And Markiplier seems to be pretty honest about where his games come from: “Hey, I got sent this weird biofeedback game from Such-and-So, I’m going to check it out and see what it’s like. Wow, this heart monitor thing is uncomfortable.”
I have no doubt that some Let’s Players are doing it for the money, but I don’t watch them.
I mentioned to my boyfriend about GamerGate since he’s a gamer, and told him that Zoe Quinn was being targeted and harassed. He decided to look it up and said he found something about it on Escapist.
I asked him how he felt, and he said “well according to this, this Zoe Quinn lady is insane. She had a chip implanted on her hand to give out steam codes. Wow. What a nut.”
I asked what that had to do with gamergate, and he said because he doesn’t really care, she’s crazy. I asked if he felt that somehow justified the rape threats.
He said his point was to take what Zoe Quinn says with a grain of salt. He claims the IRC things she posts are fake. I was very disappointed, and I’m not sure what to say on it next. I hate giving up on a person who I think I could change to help better the gaming community, but when he just plain doesn’t believe people are harassing her, and I can’t come up with any “concrete evidence” in his opinion, it’s like arguing with a wall. :/
@St0dad
I think I would ask myself what exactly I liked about this guy, why he is my boyfriend and why he should continue to be my boyfriend. You know the old advice, it’s not how to guy treats you but how he treats the waitstaff at the restaurant that tells you about his character?
Incidentally, I’d like to mention to anyone I might have been talking to in another thread who might be reading this one: this is why the stereotypes about mad people are DAMAGING. Zoe Quinn may be mad or she may not – it actually doesn’t matter, factually, one way or another, because she’s had the label applied to her and now her credibility is GONE (at least with this one guy) for no reason whatsoever. Anyone want to try to claim to me, again, that feeding this stereotype is completely innocent? I again have a case of clear abuse being waved away on the grounds that the victim is crazy and cannot be believed on any topic.
So far the best exchange I’ve had on twitter was this one:
Him- “Everyone on 4chan calls everyone else a fag. Explaining why would take more than 1 tweet.”
Me- “oh yeah? Sexism and homophobia. There, explained it. And look, 40 characters left.”
@st0dad:
Sounds like you just learned that your boyfriend might actually be a horrible person.
This will convince no one. If “yeah but”ing can cause the majority of users on relatively mainstream tech sites to defend threatening peoples’ lives, then the fact that it was a purposefully orchestrated troll won’t convince them either.
@Binjabreel
It’s so much worse than that.
4chan originally came from Something Awful, a site whose membership revels in obnoxious “lol so edgy!” muck, but generally doesn’t actually believe any of it. 4chan has gone from a similar place to being overtaken by actual bigots and other mean-spirited creeps that hide behind “but I’m just joking!” and use their intentional anonymous ambiguity as a catch-all excuse. The whole site is one giant No True Scotsman, applied to anything and everything that happens on it, and they use this ambiguity to mentally justify all the horrifying shit people do on the site without doing jack shit to combat it.
That was so bad it was good, pendraegon. John Fitzgerald is laughing under his eternal flame.
samantha – One does ones best. 🙂
St0dad – Quinn is definitely a bit odd in my opinion, and I’ll admit I’ve heard from a few places that I consider solid that she may not be always concerned with being completely honest in what she posts online. That being said not a single bloody thing she’s ever done justifies the endless horseshit that’s been fired her way over the last 3 plus weeks and I have yet to see any real solid evidence that any of the 4chan logs are faked. Whole lot of people insisting they are, but precisely zero proof of it. I’ll just remain quiet on the matter of your boyfriend as I don’t know him.
LBT – Yeah, that’s why when I have time I try to rely on LP’s myself these days if I’m not sure if I should shell out for a game. It’s not a perfect way to judge a game of course but it’s better than nothing. Which is what most industry reviews are these days.
RE: Policy of Madness
this is why the stereotypes about mad people are DAMAGING
Yup. On a more microcosmic level, I’ve basically had to cut all my family, and the only two members I talk to, I’ve had to basically accept that I will never be able to tell them why I left everyone else. I’m the mad sheep of the family; why would anyone believe anything I say about my “sane” family members? Why would anyone take my side?
I can’t imagine either of my remaining relatives doing that, and I can not mentally handle the idea of being shoved under the rug again. So I just don’t tell them.
RE: pendraegon
Exactly! I mean, I don’t even have the patience for the Let’s Players gushing, most of the time, which is why I tend to stick with Lotus Prince (who focuses primarily on sharing details or history about the game, and leaves any reviewing till the very end) or Markiplier (who is mostly busy screaming and flailing and being goofy). Of course, they’ll give their impressions of a game, if they didn’t they’d have to be constantly mute, but still, it’s a lot easier to skip.