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With interest in their pet cause waning, #GamerGaters have been casting about for something that might give their little movement an infusion of energy and new supporters. They got a temporary boost a month ago from the ridiculous concoction that was #ShirtStorm, but that didn’t last.
And now, as you may have heard, they’re trying again with yet another contrived controvery called #MetalGate.
On Friday, a writer for Death Metal Underground warned fellow metalheads that “the same people who intruded into the gaming industry despite a striking lack of actual contributions” have now decided to take over the world of heavy metal music.
His proof of this Social Justice Warrior invasion? A Spin article mentioning – and celebrating – what it described as a recent “increase in conversations about racism, politics, and feminism” amongst metalheads. And a 2006 Washington Post article suggesting that metal was getting more “socially conscious.”
No, seriously. His entire argument relied on an 8-year-old newspaper article and a single sentence in Spin.
But apparently that’s all it takes to create a #Gate these days. #GamerGaters, desperate for some sort of continuing cultural relevance, are hanging onto the new hashtag with the grim determination of, well, I was going to say this guy
… but the dog is pretty adorable, and he seems to be really enjoying himself.
But, anyway, #MetalGate is now a thing.
GamerGate celebrities Mundane Matt and Sargon of Akkad have already posted YouTube videos on the subject; bumbling Sarkeesian Effect co-creator Jordan Owen has weighed in with a nearly hour-long lecture on the subject in which, among other things, he explains at length why he is not comparable to Beavis or Butthead. (Well, obviously; Butthead is a lot less obtuse than Owen.) Fortunately, he’s not in a bathtub this time.
Roosh’s Return of Kings blog – a kind of bellwether of manosphere opportunism – has posted its own guide to the alleged controversy, prophesying that
The SJWs will likely try the same excessive tactics with metalgate that they used on gamergate and shirtgate, and they will get the same negative reaction from the masses. The harder the SJWs push, the more Average Joe is repulsed by them. Their unfounded optimism and willful naivety will be the death of them.
[For even more ridiculous reactions on Roosh’s video game blog Reaxxion, see this post of mine.]
Over on Twitter, meanwhile, outraged metalhead #Gamergaters and neoreactionary Manosphereians and other easily outraged asshats are busily posting tweets about the evils of SJW influence in metal; the Tweeters include some names that will be familiar to long-time readers of this blog:
Oh lovely, now #metalgate is a thing – guess being one of the most accepting groups of people on the planet isnt enough for some people
— TotalBiscuit (@Totalbiscuit) December 13, 2014
I would like to see all kinds of groups standing up in solidarity with GG, daring the SJWs to do anything about it. #gamergate #metalgate
— Fidelbogen – gab.ai/Fidelbogen (@fidelbogen) December 14, 2014
#MetalGate #GamerGate aren't about metal, games, fem-supremists want to kill any semblance of conventional masculinity in society that's all
— Rollo Tomassi (@RationalMale) December 14, 2014
https://twitter.com/Reyeko_/status/543918108944367616
https://twitter.com/runsonmagic/status/543803519837671425
https://twitter.com/voxday/status/543733247122100225
Some other, er, highlights from the discussion.
(CONTENT WARNING: Slurs galore.)
.
.
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https://twitter.com/beantownborn/status/543639435179745281
#MetalGate
Troll/10. You retards can't touch metal, we aren't afraid to call a cunt a cunt. Cunts.
.— PewpSchute (@ThePewpschute) December 13, 2014
https://twitter.com/CactusTheLynx/status/544059034676895744
So long as you're not a cunt metal heads will like you. If you're a cunt you'll get called out for being a cunt. Don't be a cunt #MetalGate
— Emily Galiette (@TheGrlThatDates) December 13, 2014
https://twitter.com/genophilia/status/544165045123694592
https://twitter.com/SiliconNooB/status/543697727251427328
The desperation could not be more obvious. Sorry, fellas, but this one isn’t going to take off.
Hell, even #GamerGate’s most famous hanger-on is dubious, asking
Is #MetalGate real or a joke
— Milo Yiannopoulos (@Nero) December 13, 2014
If you can’t even convince Milo to believe – or pretend to believe – your bullshit, well, you’re kind of screwed.
Eh, David? That TotalBiscuit tweet is misplaced in your article, you should probably take it out. I think you may have misinterpreted the comment, but he’s not agreeing with metalgate there, but mocking it like this site does. Starting his sentence with ‘oh lovely’ is a good indicator of the sarcasm that follows. I can just hear him facepalm as he typed that tweet. It doesn’t deserve to be up in that list (at the top, at that).
Just something I noticed while reading the article, I’ll go back to lurking now.
The irony of all of this, besides for Vox Day listening to one of the more social justice oriented metal artists, is the sheer idiocy of this. Metal’s always had a foot in the social justice sphere. Marilyn Manson? Otep? Korn? Slipknot? Any of these names ring a bell? Hell, even in the hair metal days you had Dee Snider giving a speech to Congress about free speech, and goddamn, hair metal artists were more feminine than tons of women. Just, in general, how fucking stupid are some people?
Standing up for free speech is the opposite of what SJWs want; they want metal to become a dialogue about SJW topics like feminism, anti-racism, LGBT, etc.
Oh, hello, troll. You’re late to the party. Very late.
And very wrong, too. You do realize that a lot of metal is already about those things, right? And always has been? And then there are all the parodies…
So if you think “SJW” stuff is trying to shove itself into metal… you’re even later to the metal party than the comment party.
Bye now, troll. Run along to a more recent set of comments; maybe you’ll be more amusing there.
Whuh? Free speech is already limited, and neither feminists nor SJWs had anything to do with it. And unless you are listening to dredge like ICP, the majority of your metal bands deal with social issues – poverty, racism, imperialism, corporate greed, and so on.
BTW – what’s so negative about having social dialogue?
Fair warning, the link in the troll’s name appears to go to a literal Nazi site (I say “Appears” because I only read one “Article” and nopetopus’d out as quickly as I could).
@troll
Yeah, you’re right, how dare Rage Against The Machine exist! Damn social justice warriors, invading metal…
Learn what free speech is, dipshit. It isn’t being a bigot without being criticized. It is the government not being able to silence you. Meanwhile, like most art alot of metal already leans to the left.
Cry moar, pathetic bigot.
I’ve come to the conclusion that these guys just don’t understand content on anything but the most superficial level, and that’s why they think that SJWs haven’t been in metal since the beginning. Didn’t some of them try to appeal to Jello Biafra? These are people who could listen to Holiday in Cambodia and think it really was suggesting Cambodia as a fun vacation destination.
@cassandrakitty:
If there’s any group that actually deserves to be called “Social Justice Warriors,” it’s the metal bands that use warrior-like imagery in their music.
Manowar for great justice and loincloths!
You were correct. Links have been removed.
I desperately want that troll to watch the video of Otep’s “Menicide” that I posted earlier in the thread.
I couldn’t think of any more misandrist song than that (used, BTW, as we use it here on WHTM, because I love that song and I love Otep).
That gave me the strangest image of the great Man o’ War wearing a loincloth.
Less ridiculous than what the rest of us are picturing, honestly.
Now there’s a frightening thought! 😀
I’m not sure you know what “dialogue” is since it doesn’t involve restricting speech in any way.
Opposing Stalin-esque thought control is bad?
Poll: does Nihil realize how ridiculous he sounds y/n?
I vote for no. Cuz no one self aware necros old threads.
This is the thread that got necro’d?
Aaaand another name for the “I don’t understand what “Free speech” or a “dialogue” is.
Free speech means the government can’t arrest you for what you say, nor can the government silence you. It does not mean you have to be given a space to shout whatever you want, nor does it mean that we have to listen to you without complaint.
Which leads me to my next point: A dialogue is a conversation between two or more parties where each party is given a chance to speak. (Note I didn’t say anyone has to listen).
Feminists don’t want “Stalin-esque thought control”. In fact, I dare say feminist want the opposite. We want to open a dialogue with other people. We want to talk about things that matter to us. You’re just mad that we’re wise to your game and don’t want you to come in and derail everything because you don’t care for what we have to say.
To say otherwise is a huge fucking red flag that you’re here in bad faith, and wouldn’t listen to anything we have to say anyways, necrotroll #46573.
Flounce and stick it.