So yesterday I discovered a #GamerGate manifesto that started with these dramatic pronouncements:
We are Gamers.
We are alive.
And that was just the opener.
By the time the manifesto manifestoed itself all the way to the end, the anonymous author had warned us that games were a poor beleaguered “art form” that needed to “be protected from the dogmatic rhetoric of a clique of totalitarian ideologues,” angrily “denounce[d] the mercantilization of debased social justice,” and taken a few swipes at “careerist writers who sacrifice social harmony, human ethics and intellectual honesty on the altar of Controversy.”
The manifesto-writer declared that the aforementioned gamers who are alive collectively “reject the Industry of Outrage and it’s [sic] guilt-based economic model … reject the ideological megaphones who perpetually parrot their prejudiced hate,” and get a bit peeved when their gender, race, sexual orientation and so forth are “traded on the mediatic market, in return for ideological brownie points.” Mediatic market?
This all seems like a really long-winded way of saying that #GamerGaters really hate it when anyone in the gaming media says anything mean about them.
But at least one of the readers of this manifesto was excited enough by it to pay this dude, who reads stuff out loud for money on YouTube, something like $350 to turn the manifesto into this video:
Well, let’s just say that my cats — fervently if a little confusedly opposed to feminism in all forms — were a bit more impressed by the manifesto, and this video, than I was. And they insisted on making one of their own. I promised I would upload it to the internet for them, so you can scroll up to the start of this post to watch it.
Sweetie Pie Jonus, the grey tabby, wandered off the script here and there, but as much as I hate the message of the manifesto I think she did a pretty good job overall. And she didn’t bite anyone in the process.
Here’s the whole manifesto, if you prefer that old-fashioned “reading” thing:
Wow, their paranoia is practically self-ridiculing at this point. Why the fuck would Zoe dox herself? Even as a false flag, that makes no sense, because then people who really want to hurt her get her real data.
These guys are both evil AND idiots. (Hey, there’s no law that says you can’t be both!)
Policy of madness,
Meanwhile with all of these rape and death threats being hurled at feminists online, if one of them does decide to act on his fucked up fantasies, the rest of them have provided him with excellent cover.
I wish I believed the Gamergaters we not aware of the very real danger they are putting women in. I think most of them do though. That’s part of the thrill for these guys. It’s a safe (for them) outlet for their violent misogynist fantasies. I think they get off on shutting b*tches up with threats of rape and violence. It doesn’t matter if it’s gaming, atheism, or putting a lady on your money. The men sending these threats and supporting and encouraging the men sending threats know they are not threatening women because of what principled heroes they are. They know they aren’t defending men who threaten women and spread lies to encourage other men to threaten women because of how brave they are. They’re doing it for the same reason men harass, grope, assault and masturbate in front of women on trains, on the streets, at work and in schools. It turns them on to make women feel violated and afraid.
Finding and excuse to blame women for being abused and sexually assaulted by men is not new and that is all Gamergate is.
We see this all the time with any minority that is harmed by the keepers of the status quo. Every single one of them “had it coming” and if the reason they had it coming is a blatant lie, that’s fine with them.
Yep, nothing like letting something evolve freely by holding a death grip over it and making sure nobody but you gets to touch it or look at it or say anything bad about it.
The irony. It burns.
Women are friggin’ getting chased out of their homes. And GamerGaters are whinging that someone predicted that their title will go away. Those poor, ignored, abused consumers. Will someone please think of them? How can they go on living if they start to feel bad about seeing naked dead women splayed all over their entertainment? Or if game devs start making less than five bajillion new games in which they get to look at naked dead women every year? Or if, THE HORRORS, games start getting made for people who aren’t hardcore gamerbros, too?
And yeah, fine, we’re up to four? five? different professional women who have been doxxed and graphically threatened in an attempt to ruin their careers. But those women are the industry of outrage, and GamerGaters clucked their tongues once or twice at the people making criminal threats, so it’s not that bad, and just shut up and listen to them already.
GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
seconded.
“We Are Alive”
Maybe GamerGate idiots are actually members of the undead.
I am a gamer. But at this moment I really wish I wasn’t. #Notyourshield straight back at you #GamerGate!
Ain’t it kinda like when a grade-schooler starts swearing to try to sound more grown-up, but it just makes them sound like an insecure little kid?
BRRAAAIIIIINNNZZZZ! They need moar BRRRAAAIIIINNNNZZZZZZ! Or, they need to grab a brain. Either one.
This point has been made many times but I’ll reiterate. All art forms are subject to criticism. That this manifesto writer is asking for video games to be taken seriously as an art form while simultaneously demanding that games not be analyzed from a feminist perspective displays a truly staggering amount of cluelessness.
I don’t know if I can stomach taking on this whole manifesto but I’ll translate my *favorite* paragraph.
Of course misogyny exists but I’m going to say it isn’t real unless a man says outright that he hates all women. Any misogyny I or my friends engage in is going to be dismissed because I’m going to play innocent and pretend I’m not being misogynistic. Also, I will dismiss any discussion of misogyny in our culture as trivial compared to how badly women have it in developing countries. Feminists are only allowed to discuss misogyny when it happens elsewhere.
My goal is to silence any discussion of misogyny in gamergate, the video game industry or our culture at large. I will do this by projecting a desire on the part of feminists to silence dissenting voices. I am intellectually dishonest and immoral so I will accuse feminists of being these things so that no one will be able to call me out on it.
Personally I wish that instead of harassing and threatening Zoe, GamerGate went the route of some Pakistanis in the early 90’s during the Salman Rushdie thing and made an insane, low budget action film with her as the villain. At least it would’ve been over quicker.
I apologise for using the word insane like that.
A little early for Halloween…
I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned before that Pantz has been one of my nicknames for my cat Darrow since way before I started coming here. I’m not even sure how, but for some reason Darrow became Dare-pants and eventually shortened to just pants or sometimes panties. It’s probably misandry to call my male cat panties. Poor guy.
It’s amusing to me that someone else calls their cat that. Here I thought I was original.
No, d00d. You know what’s REALLY intellectually dishonest and immoral? You claiming that games as currently construed are sacrosanct and therefore not subject to feminist analysis in the name of some bogus “social harmony” which happens, FYI, to be based in gross misogyny and “every woman in her place” BULLSHIT.
THAT’s what’s intellectually dishonest and immoral, you fucking moron.
“We are gamers. We are alive.”
Yeah, dude, ‘cuz it would be super weird if you were writing this while dead.
NOM NOM NOM WORD SALAD.
Wait…. was this written against GG, or for it? The hampster wheels are turning so hard here that you really can’t tell.
After reading this monument of self-deception I’m starting to think that projection should be a regulated addictive narcotic.
The mating call of reactionaries and conservatives everywhere.
translation:
“Evolve naturally” = “we will scream and scream and scream to prevent anything from changing.” Hokay.
Translation:
http://www.toysrus.com/product/prodpop.jsp?LargeImageURL=/graphics/product_images/pTRU1-16622051dt.jpg&displayTab=enh&productId=23327756&totCount=0
I do find it funny how equality is meant to be inharmonious.
Unless you are a dada artist or Karl Marx, writing a manifesto just makes you look like a pretentious douche.
It’s all so ridiculous.
On the Brianna Wu front, this move seems ill-advised:
https://twitter.com/Spacekatgal/status/521349952073920512
@Nero is Milo Yiannopoulos, Breitbart’s rape apologist and all-around asshat.
Ahem… I’ve written a preamble to a Manifesto.
A spectre is haunting video games — the spectre of Social Justice. All the powers of game journos have entered into an unholy alliance to promote this spectre: Literally Who’s 1-39, the scam artist Anita Sarkeeeeeeesian, and a bunch of feeeemales on tumblr, as well as their mangina lackeys like John Scalzi, PZ Myers, and the rest of their Nazi-like jackbooted thugs. And I think maybe the Pope too, I hear he’s said things that sound kind of Social Justice-y, so let’s just toss him in there. (Anyone know his twitter handle?)
Where is the gamer in opposition that has not been decried as my-soggy-knees-istic by non-gamers (by whom I mean people who play games I don’t, or feeeeemales who play the games I do but have some criticisms of them) who wield all the power? Where is the SJW that has not hurled back the branding reproach of “Hey maybe it would be cool if there was a greater diversity of games, so that more people could enjoy this fun hobby” against the more advanced and brave #GamerGaters?
Two things result from this fact:
I. Social Justice, which we all know is a terrible thing, is already accepted by all corrupt vidya game journalism outlets (by which I mean every such outlet that has ever said anything mean about the small subset of people who play games and think like me, but not any outlets (such as YouTube gaming enthusiasts who have taken money to promote particular games) that haven’t said anything mean about us).
II. It is high time that #Gators should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish our views, our aims, our tendencies, and confront the evil forces fighting for social justice with a manifesto of our movement–a movement that is organized enough to drive our enemies off the internet, but also disorganized enough that we can claim to disassociate itself from any self-proclaimed #Gator who attracts negative attention. (Although actually, we never truly disavow any of the words or behaviors of the #Gators attracting negative attention; we merely pretend they have nothing to do with us, while we are saying the exact same things that they do.)
@cloudiah
Oh wow, WHY.
Also, I find it kind of funny that the guy representing #GamerGate in that little pow wow admittedly sucks at gaming. If they hadn’t already broken my irony meter, that right there could have shattered it hard enough to fling shrapnel to the moon.
“Anita Sarkeesian’s not a real gamer!! WHAA! Let’s listen to a guy who just started playing instead!”
You know what, you little #GamerGate fucks? YOU are not real gamers. Real gamers enjoy gaming for the fun of their own personal enjoyment of gaming, not because it’s supposed to be some exclusive boy’s club. Real gamers rely on their own opinions of what they enjoy in video games instead of pointing mortified fingers at anyone who DARES criticize anything to do with gaming. REAL GAMERS COULD GIVE A FUCK IF THEY’RE CALLED GAMERS. Just SHUT. UP. AND GAME.