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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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.
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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.
If #punkgate becomes a thing, I’m just going to reply to any and all pro-punkgate posts with Bad Brains and Fugazi links.
@kittehserf:
Well, yeah. Still, some days I feel like I’d almost be willing to go be interviewed by Jordon just so I can explain to him, I as an extremely ill-informed Social Justice Warriorling, how bizarre his characterization of us is. Just to be that one little link to the real world that he and his buddies are so obsessed with avoiding.
We should give them a list of people to tweet at! Since they’ve already pestered Jello Biafra, I suggest that they go bother Sasha Konietzko next.
@proxieme:
Funny you all are talking about gamergators potentially starting #punkgate. The gators apparently believe that SJWs are the ones that are starting the -gates, and are wondering whether #rapgate is going to be next (it’s exactly as racist as you would think).
They think SJWs are the ones that are starting these -gates somehow. It’s so dang bizarre.
So SJWs started metalgate 8 years ago in Spin, and the metal community just noticed now? Sounds legit.
We’re basically the illuminati, operating behind the scenes in subtle but powerful ways. So subtle, in fact, that save for a throwaway line in an old article, there is absolutely no evidence of our involvement. Yet we’re still infesting the culture, somehow, and accomplishing things.
Well, this should make things more thematically appropriate for all of us filtering “sjw” to “skeleton” and “social justice warrior” to “spooky scary skeleton”.
Not entirely what tactics Roosh is thinking the spooky scary skeletons in question are going to use, being that #shirtgate and #gamergate were about actual things that actually happened, rather than a sentence in a Spin article. Not entirely sure the general public cares, and the music press is pretty well-aware at this point there’s a tech-bro type supposedly-apolitical-but-not-really thing in much of the American metal scene and a heavily reactionary edge to much of the European one.
“SJWs … [a]re all cultural marxists who think the state should be god”
As a confessed aspiring SJW, it is my understanding that most SJWs do not want the state to be god, just do a reasonably competent job of taking care of ALL of its citizens in time of need — to be a competent servant of the public good.”.
Is there a topic, real or imagined, that Jordan Owen can’t make an hour long anti-feminist video about? I know there’s no accounting for taste, but I have real trouble imagining a Owen superfan who watches all these rambling videos. I assume even the skull guy taps out after a few minutes and lies about watching the whole thing.
OMG I read the whole thing while thinking “Not metal, oh why did you have to mess with metal? Why not keep your ugly filthy heads out of it? Why?”
But then I got to the comments and just had one awesome metal tour without leaving my chair, and I remembered exactly why I loved metal so much when I was younger. I even feel younger.
This is an awesome place, my love to David* and all of you <3
*by which of course I mean the ferrets in a cat suit in a David duit.
This is not exactly metal but I’d still like to share it:
Is “cultural Marxism” the best way of picking reactionary crackpots, or what?
Also, from the deathmetal.org article:
I’m not sure who this dude thinks “they” are in their laboratory carefully measuring out test tubes of well-known rock bands, or how they’re under the impression that “hard rock” started after those two groups, but it’s somewhat indicative of the sort of mindset that gets us from “some people in metal are talking about what metal’s about” to “now we’ll only get kiddy metal with lyrics about being nice to minorities!”.
Also, not a big metalcore listener at all, but I get the distinct impression that socially-themed (I think that’s what he means by “sociable”?) lyrics were one of the things least likely to be taken over from hardcore – angstiness is more of a theme to the poppy stuff I’ve heard. No idea what the Converges and Dilinger Escape Plans and that are on about, so maybe it’s happening there?
I’m just glad he put some clothes on for this one tbh.
Which just so happen to be an AC-DC shirt. 😀
I don’t know what would be scarier… If he just shoots videos wearing whatever he has on at the time he gets the idea, or if he purposely wears bathrobes and birthday suits to make a point.
Technically, he did shoot in the bathtub when talking about porn and fifty shades of grey…
Feminist Metal xP
Maybe he thought that it was thematically appropriate to be bathing while talking about 50 Shades. Just not for the same reasons the rest of us might think.
What is it with these aggressive tools deciding that a widely-consumed and diverse subset of things somehow belongs to them? Like, seriously bros, you don’t need to be gatekeepers to keep all the undesirables out of being consumers. They’re allowed to like it and critique whatever they want.
Cripes, what’s next? Bacongate? Those filthy SJW are corrupting the good, manly name of bacon, trying to get it off the shelves and replace it with cruelty-free soy bacon substitute, those monsters! And the only way we can stop them is by launching large scale harrassment campaigns against women and minorities of other stripes! Hurry, self-absorbed white men! Hurry! Save our bacon!
So they’re trying to attach themselves to groups that have a history of being misunderstood and criticized. Oh. I haven’t seen this reported on any of the metal sites I follow, so it probably won’t kick-off.
Heh, that they’ve got Green Day and Disturbed as metal bands is hilarious to me. Especially with Disturbed being dismissed by most hardcore metal fans as being ‘too soft’ or generic tripe.
I suppose they could try to rally around the more macho bands like Pantera, with their ‘tough guy’ personas and all, but even then it’ll be hard to escape the social justice elements like attacking racism – also, “lesbian love is accepted and right”. I suppose they might find solace in some of the rape and violence lyrics espoused from Brutal Death Metal bands like Cannibal Corpse; but given that they’re the musical equivalent of films like Saw and Halloween, nobody is going to take them seriously enough to actually attack them. Although I wonder if “I Cum Blood” would be classed as misandry?
Maybe this song will speak to them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgCRPriksBk
As it goes, I’ll leave with some more undergroundy atmospheric stuff:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuu3QyvKe1g
I think we should start our own gate over something girly, just to take the piss. Cupcakegate maybe? Macarongate?
@Catalpa:
I guarentee if Anita tweeted that she thought bacon was unethical, #bacongate would be real.
Can someone make this happen, pretty please? I honestly think this would happen, and it’d be amazing.
I eat turkey bacon instead of real bacon most of the time. Is that misandry? I sure hope so!
For #rapgate, I wonder if they’re going to try and get Chuck D on board. Given their track record, I wouldn’t be surprised.
Yeah, misandry. I’d eat turkey bacon. This is why I hate men. Because of these INSANE waste of life “men”. UGH
@kirbywarp:
You see, the gate was always there, it’s just the Gators are helping you to see it clearly. Like sculptors. Hungry, angry sculptors.
What do you suppose would happen if someone told the gators that Spinal Tap is not a real documentary?
And to go along with our well-known and scientistically proven liking for spending lotsa money on valueless ephemeral fripperies, I think Croquembouchegate or Soufflegate might do the trick.