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Opportunistic pickup-artist douchebag Roosh V jumps aboard the #MetalGate train as it derails

#MetalGate, losing altitude fast
#MetalGate, losing altitude fast

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#MetalGate, we hardly knew ye! Despite the earnest effort of a small army of opportunists to stoke the fire – some of them #GamerGaters, others “dark enlightenment” neoreactionarires – the contrived controversy that was #MetalGate has already lost most of its steam. All you need to do is take a look at Topsy to see how quickly the hashtag burned itself out.

This is hardly surprising, given that the alleged controversy was little more than an utterly transparent attempt by ideological hacks to breathe life into the decaying corpse of #GamerGate and to drive traffic to terrible “dark enlightenment” blogs.

So before #MetalGate becomes a fading memory, I’d like to take a moment to highlight the efforts of one notable neoreactionary to turn the faux controversy into a war against “Social Justice Warriors” – and pump up the traffic to his struggling video game blog.

I’m talking, of course, about werewolf impersonator and woman-hating pickup guru Roosh Valizadeh. Roosh was late out of the gates in his attempt to capitalize on #GamerGate by launching his hilariously clueless video game blog Reaxxion. But with #MetalGate he moved more quickly, publishing three rabble-rousing posts on the subject in three days.

I mentioned one of them in my last post. But it’s the two he’s published on Reaxxion that are the real winners.

Yesterday, Reaxxion’s “ethics officer” Sam Roberts – yes, that is a thing – delivered an over-the-top rant warning metalheads that “enemies of metal are upon us.”

These alleged enemies? Social Justice Warriors, the all-purpose boogeyman that strikes terror in the hearts of #GamerGaters, Men’s Rights Activsts and neoreactionary werewolf PUAs alike. Roberts defined SJWs as

far-left weirdos with nothing going on in their life, who try to inject their toxic, tiresome political ideology into every field imaginable. They’ve taken over Atheism, Science Fiction Books, and they were poised to take over video games until #Gamergate started roundly thrashing them. Now, with what’s being called #Metalgate, we’re finding out that they want to take over heavy metal too. …

If these people get their way heavy metal will be neutered to the point where you could play it on a school bus

The horror!

After attacking two critics of metalhead douchebros – one of whom he describes as a “preening sissy” – Roberts ends with this rather comical call-to-arms:

If metalheads don’t want to end up neutralized and pussified, they’ll have to fight back. Gamergate shows the way here: if the media starts pushing a lousy band because its bassist has a vagina, mock them relentlessly. If a magazine starts hassling you like a schoolteacher for using naughty language, boycott them. Spread the word: if you’ve got twitter, use the hashtag #Metalgate. Don’t think [sic] The worst thing you can do is assume that somebody else will do your fighting for you. The enemies of metal have arisen, and it’s time to cut them down like dogs.

Appended to the article we find this embarrassing correction:

Update: An earlier version of this article incorrectly identified Kerry King as the frontman for Slayer. He is a guitarist.  Reaxxion regrets the error.

Oops. Totally not metal, dude.

Reaxxion followed up this post with one today from irate #GamerGater Steve Alexander, who fantasized about a mythical alliance between gamers and metalheads that will defeat the SJW menace once and for all:

GamerGate is actively uniting liberals with conservatives under the umbrella of freedom of expression.  But SJW’s don’t realize this, and have now attacked the metal crowd.  They’ll soon find out that all their strategy will accomplish is to unite hardcore gamers and the metal crowd into a righteous mob.

We will learn from each other—gamers will bring their knowledge of leveraging social media and e-mail, and the metal crowd will bring their extreme energy and uninhibited expression.  Together, marching in step, some wearing Converse while others wear steel toe boots, we will crush this censorship of our favorite mediums.

Huh. I guess gamers who are also metalheads will wear Converse on one foot and a steel-toed boot on the other?

Let me know how that goes.

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katz
9 years ago

“Science fantasy” (or “futuristic fantasy,” or what have you) can be a useful term, I think, if one uses it to mean “stories in an ostensibly futuristic/high-tech settings that make use of fantasy tropes,” eg Star Wars, with its wizards and swordfights.

But if you use it to mean soft sci-fi, then we’re back to the initial problem: That these terms are not really useful genre classifications and are instead primarily used to dismiss works and content creators that the establishment doesn’t want to include in their camp. Usually women.

emilygoddess - MOD
emilygoddess - MOD
9 years ago

But if you use it to mean soft sci-fi, then we’re back to the initial problem: That these terms are not really useful genre classifications and are instead primarily used to dismiss works and content creators that the establishment doesn’t want to include in their camp. Usually women.

Or things known to have large female fandoms, like Doctor Who.

kittehserf
9 years ago

Pff, I doubt there’s a writer alive who hasn’t shelved something after walking into an insurmountable plot hole. I did it once on the very last chapter, right before the captain of the guard was set to spontaneously behead the baron.

Oh hell! 🙁

GrumpyOldMan
9 years ago

For the record, I don’t believe that I get to decide what is or isn’t sci-fi, I get to have an opinion and others get to decide whether that opinion has any value, to them, if they care.

Also, I really don’t know about “hard” Sci-fi or “soft” Sci-fi, it just seems to me that if you’re going to call Science Fiction, it should have some commitment to real science. I get queasy about seeing bad science particularly on TV and in movies, because misunderstandings about scientific issues (see, for example, global warming denial and the Ebola panic) can have very serious public policy consequences. I have not read much sci-fi since I was young, 50 years ago, but I have watched some fairly recently. I am shocked — shocked I tell you — to hear that some men are trying to invalidate the contributions of women on one pretext or another. But in my circle of family and friends there are more scientifically inclined and accomplished women than men, and sometimes I have to be reminded that some people still live in the Dark Ages where it was/is believed that women can’t STEM.

@POM: I really like your take on the matter. I HAVE always preferred the shows that are mostly social commentary divorced from the conflicting context they would have in an earth-bound situation; for example, the Ferengi as a criticism of greed and materialism. And that’s probably why I particularly remember that Star Trek episode. And probably one of my problems is that many sci-fi shows have a lot of battle-oriented episodes, and as a pacifist, I am always dismayed by the apparent casual assumption that conflict and war are natural and inevitable — which unfortunately might be true.

katz
9 years ago

Also, I really don’t know about “hard” Sci-fi or “soft” Sci-fi, it just seems to me that if you’re going to call Science Fiction, it should have some commitment to real science.

Why? It’s just a name. You don’t expect steampunk to contain actual punks, do you?

thebewilderness
thebewilderness
9 years ago

I get where the confusion lies, GOM. They divided the sciences into hard and soft. They divided SF the same way. Except they then divided it dissected it chopped spindled and stapled it because the overlaps made them waily waily waily.

GrumpyOldMan
9 years ago

@Katz: That old joke: If tin whistles are made of tin, what do you use to make foghorns.

katz
9 years ago

Right, so why do you insist that science fiction has to contain actual science?

GrumpyOldMan
9 years ago

So it’s sort of like a literary analogy to Welsh rabbit?
I just don’t comprehend why you would call it Science Fiction if science isn’t a major component. Isn’t that somewhat like making a lemon meringue pie with pumpkins?

cassandrakitty
cassandrakitty
9 years ago

Yeah, futuristic fantasy is a thing, and a rather big thing in terms of movies (Star Wars being the most obvious example), but the thing is, not all futuristic stuff that isn’t focused on science is fantasy, and excluding everything that isn’t excludes a lot of the most interesting authors in the genre (and allows the ones who’re good at science but not particularly good at writing to keep patting themselves on the back so hard that it’s a wonder they don’t dislocate their shoulders).

The sci-fi must be super sciencey purists kind of remind me of the gamergate dudes, now that I’m thinking about it. Same conviction that they own the medium, same hostility to women and POC, same determination to throw everyone they don’t approve of out of the treehouse, same wailey wailey about how evil SJWs with their interesting plots and their stories with protagonists who aren’t straight white men are ruining everything.

contrapangloss
9 years ago

I kind of like the genre well mixed, because there are some days where I’m totally up for complex world and scientific system building (i.e. their science doesn’t strictly have to match with our science, ergo “It’s cute you humans still think string theory is useful” so long as it’s complex and believable and has a systematic method)… and there are some days where I really just want to read about aliens who hug out all their problems.

I’m still looking for more of the second type.

Please tell me there is a book out there, with a planet of Chewbacca type folks, who are really good at giving the bestest hugs? And have ships that run on the power of positive brainwaves?

cassandrakitty
cassandrakitty
9 years ago

I’m still bitter about realizing that no, a pet Chewbacca was not going to be a possibility, as a child.

contrapangloss
9 years ago

I know, right? I never so much wanted him as a pet, though. I just always felt like he’d be the best friend ever.

weirwoodtreehugger
9 years ago

Personally, I always wanted a creepy luck dragon
http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/img/mv530d74aa.jpg

cassandrakitty
cassandrakitty
9 years ago

You could always get a Lhasa Apso, it’s basically the same thing, just smaller.

kittehserf
9 years ago

“It’s cute you humans still think string theory is useful”

I dunno, some alien invaders think it has its uses …

http://files1.coloribus.com/files/adsarchive/part_873/8738805/file/friskies-cat-food-clew-small-70957.jpg

Kestrel
Kestrel
9 years ago

After watching the original Star Wars trilogy I desperately wanted an Ewok. I was very young. Now I am much older and I annoy my husband by referring to Ewoks as the only redeeming feature of that Universe. 🙂

contrapangloss
9 years ago

Okay, if this is going off on a Star Wars tangent, again, anyway:

http://youtu.be/PGYAPr6UKhs

I will forgive the original series pretty much all faults, just because John Williams. Music. Ewoks.

Falconer
9 years ago

@Fib:

Speaking of Star Trek, sjw and women I just want to point out that Davis Aurini has a YouTube video called “Sluts, Whores and the Economy Of Star Trek”.

It’s…something.

I bet it is.

@GrumpyOldMan: Sorry, that’s kind of what I meant: They keep trying to win the fights of the 60s, largely by legislation and Supreme Court rulings.

@contrapangloss:

They never quite figured out how to work in Deux ex Worf, though. That would have been awesome.

I blame the writers. They never let him hit with the ship’s weapons, and he’s a great melee fighter unless and until the villain of the week needs to establish its credentials.

@PoM:

Star Trek envisions a post-scarcity society, with essentially unlimited free energy that can be transformed into any object anyone needs.

If I understand the replicator right, the Federation has essentially harnessed room-temperature fusion, and uses it to make Chicken Surprise (Surprise! It’s a tribble!).

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/130/7/c/tribble_coffee_by_3golondrinas-d4z9vmz.jpg

Falconer
9 years ago

@Kestrel:

Now I am much older and I annoy my husband by referring to Ewoks as the only redeeming feature of that Universe. 🙂

I imagine it must be very tiring when fellow Star Wars fans keep checking you to see if they can spot the “Bizarro No. 1” necklace.

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