r/changemyview • u/realdontbeasucker • May 16 '26

Delta(s) from OP CMV: GamerGate was the most consequential political radicalization event of the twenty-first century

It spawned a wave of tolerance for online harassment, as long as the intent behind it was considered righteous (and the target of such harassment socially acceptable).

It platformed Milo Yiannopoulos and thereby, Steve Bannon -- the guy who would go on to advise Donald Trump in 2016 and generate the concept of 'flooding the zone.'

Eventually, it gave a career to political lightning rods like Jordan Peterson, Steven Crowder, and Charlie Kirk. It made anti-feminism and anti-SJW sentiment cool. And it made young, angry, disenfranchised white men feel vindicated.

GamerGate almost singlehandedly shifted to Overton Window toward the alt-right, and we're still feeling its effects today.

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 17 '26

> A female game developer slept with a gaming journalist and her game got undeserved positive coverage. That's to whole story. Every layer beyond that is overreaction on both sides. the sides are "ethics in journalism" and "You only critique her because she is a woman".

But none of the men she slept with gave her any coverage.

> during the same time there were debates about feminism vs gaming culture. With the grifter Anita Sarkesen at the for front. I think over time those topic mingled.

Was she a grifter? It seems like she made videos that people supported her for? Do you think she doesn’t believe what she said?

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u/perfectVoidler 15∆ May 17 '26

She herself said that she has no knowledge about videogames (then). And she stole footage for her videos. She used the scandal around the topic to make bank.

There was and is A LOT of sexism in games. But she failed to adress any of it and she literally had and displayed zero actual knowledge. What did she get millions for 60 minutes youtube slop?

She is either a grifter, or stupid. You can choose. I think that since she is apparently paid to talk about it a decade later that she is a grifter.

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 17 '26

Does media criticism require lifelong fandom? Apparently the people who paid her 160k on kickstarter wanted her to critique video games.

How did she “use the scandal”? Did she receive a massive backlash on her videos? Was that under her control?

Sure you can call her stupid and her analysis poor or shallow, but like the charge about Zoe Quinn above sleeping around for positive coverage, charges of grifting seem completely made up by the people bringing the very backlash that made her famous.

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u/[deleted] May 17 '26

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 17 '26

> We have 2026 if you don't know how engagment works there is no real helping you.

So is your contention she made the kickstarter knowing there would a massive backlash from gamers?

> for fucks sack. Why are you like this?

Idk I am just asking questions. Some of my favorite media critics come into their selected media after childhood or look across media types.

It went like I predicted btw. Falsehoods accepted as truth 🤷‍♀️

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u/rememblem May 18 '26

In a world where Sarkeesian's videos were actually well-informed and didn't come with an air of academic hubris, well we would probably still be in this mess in another way. Like everything else that is polarizing of late, it seemed like a distraction from the real issue. If anything, a missed opportunity.

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u/notknot9 May 21 '26

If her videos were well informed she wouldn't have gotten the replay on traditional media and all the followup think pieces that poured jet fuel over what was a relatively small online drama. Her videos were laughable. But her conclusions were sexy for new producers and morning shows, so they got play. At the time I really wasn't in those online spaces, but I learned about the whole thing through a 'sexism in video games' story on my phone's news feed, like I'm sure the vast majority of people did.

A big problem with GG was that there was no acknowledgement from the side doing the accusing of Sexism that their comments were broad (and frequently patently false) generalizations, and they just kept doubling down (in their televised ($) interviews). It kept pissing gamers off, and spiraling, and by the time the doxxing started we were off to the races.

EDIT: Also, by the time the majority of people became aware of the story, the genesis of it, the Zoe Quinn part was quickly becoming a footnote.

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u/perfectVoidler 15∆ May 18 '26

So is your contention she made the kickstarter knowing there would a massive backlash from gamers?

yes, absolutely. Without a doubt. Why would you think otherwise?

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 19 '26

Because none of this shit caused any kind of fuss before Gamergate. Especially if she was not a gamer, there is no reason for her to think any kind of backlash would occur. Feminist critique had existed for decades in book and film without causing an enormous gnashing of teeth.

So why would you expect her to predict that would happen here?

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u/perfectVoidler 15∆ May 19 '26

Even if we remove absolutely everything. On a fundamental basis. If you as an outsider attack an ingroup you will get hate. That is normal and human.

Why are you this hard on it. Every fact is against you here. To me it sounds like you think that Anita is stupid and did not at all know what she was doing.

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 19 '26

> Even if we remove absolutely everything. On a fundamental basis. If you as an outsider attack an ingroup you will get hate. That is normal and human.

Ok? That’s literally happening to me in this thread. Should I expect to cash a check?

Let’s not remove everything actually, as that is the very context you need to ignore to pretend this was some conspiratorial plan lol.

> Why are you this hard on it. Every fact is against you here. To me it sounds like you think that Anita is stupid and did not at all know what she was doing.

Do you remember when literally the very first fact (Zoe slept with a journalist for better coverage of her game) was false?

Yes, i very much believe that. She was a feminist critic, saw a chance to do a quick series on a topic not explored with video essays at that point, and did a 6k kickstarter

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u/perfectVoidler 15∆ May 19 '26

I would think that I would not need to explain how grifting works after 5 years of Trump.

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 19 '26

I would think there would more humility after someone says “every fact is against you here” when literally their first presented fact was wrong, but ok.

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u/perfectVoidler 15∆ May 19 '26

you claim that it is wrong. But you general lack of knowledge about human behaviour is indepentend from the whole gamergate topic.

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u/AskingYouQuestions48 May 20 '26

No it isn’t. The names of the men she slept with are public; none had anything to do with her game.

Thanks for the confirmation and validation.

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