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Posted: 2/3/2017 8:35:22 PM EDT
This is where meme troops became battle-hardened, and Milo first became feared and hated.
#GamerGate – the canary in the coal mine
Looking back, it’s hard to overstate the cultural significance of GamerGate: it marked when the Left suddenly and unexpectedly lost control of social media, right at the point where the influence of social media actually started to matter. In a sense, it was the second wave of discontent that started with the arrival of anti-MSM blogs in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, but within a very different internet environment compared to ‘The Golden Age of Blogging’ 2001-2010. As has often been the case in military campaigns, when one side becomes greatly overextended, they only realise they have lost the initiative when they seek to advance and experience a completely unexpected reversal: a result that may seem obvious and perhaps even inevitable to a historian looking back, but which was far from obvious to the people on the ground at the time. So certain was the Left that they had won the culture war, so confident with the established media under their effective control that ‘truth’ was theirs to declare, that they gave up on any pretence of objectivity. After all, their enemies had been swept from both airwaves and print (I sometimes cannot tell the difference between the Times and the Guardian and the Economist). And so they began to manoeuvre with the assurance and arrogance of an army under an umbrella of complete air(wave) supremacy, a supremacy that suddenly proved to be illusory because opinions had moved on-line. I could just as easily be talking about Brexit or Trump, for it was a widespread tone deaf lack of introspection by establishment folk that made those things possible (albeit for very different reasons)… but the way I see it, GamerGate was the canary-in-the-coal mine. And almost no one on the Left noticed that particular canary had fallen off the perch and dropped dead. I imagine when the history of Brexit and Trump are written, GamerGate will probably be a forgotten footnote (and it is indeed a mere footnote), but I think it was (and sporadically still is) a more significant series of protracted skirmishes in the culture war than a lot of us Old Farts realise, a very successful clash that radicalised many younger people in ways that horrify the Tranzi Left. And their response every time has been to double down as if nothing has changed, eventually stripping words like ‘misogynist’, ‘racist’ and ‘nazi’ of any meaning in the process. View Quote https://www.samizdata.net/2017/01/gamergate-the-canary-in-the-coal-mine/ |
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It was like the Spanish Civil War. The rehearsal for the big one.
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It's hard to overstate the cultural significance of GamerGate.
Agree, wholeheartedly. GamerGate was the first round of a political cage match that's still going on with Pepe/alt-right/centipedes vs. the regressive Left. |
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It actually stopped the left in their tracks, they had nothing because the gamers didn't fucking care. They can scream all they want, it doesn't make it true and GamerGate proved it.
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what about the tea party? I think they're the ones who started the shift from the main stream media into social media.
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https://68.media.tumblr.com/31d2b97411e080046fdbc807253e73b4/tumblr_inline_ne3zfxTIP51s460h4.jpg View Quote Not entirely. A big part of the reason for its existence were allegations of sexism in gaming. |
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In hindsight looking back it was one of those minor things that ended up being big, and very pretty important. Far as I know it was the first time the leftist got shutdown in their tracks hardcore, and someone made them retreat backwards.
A threat versus gaming culture, but who before the gamer's stopped the leftist irl, or online before, and forced them to ever back down? When the internet brigade wasn't enough, the leftist busted out the mainstream media slaves, to go after the gaming community for not being their PC utopia, and even that didn't work. Set up a situation where the folks who like Trump, who the online world is their domain went all in, and set up The_Donald on Reddit, and not only secured a online beach head, but got so big even the owners of Reddit all in for Clinton couldn't just shut them down by hitting delete. Younger folks didn't vote in record numbers for Trump, but it did demoralize lot of them to not vote Clinton, and "Red Pilled" lot of folks who post election are now on the Trump train ready to go all in for him 2020. I lurked from the start of Gate Gate onward. By the time I am working on my credit hours to have enough to take my CPA exams down the road, expecting lot of this to be class material if I have to take anything poli-sci. Looking forward to books written about all this. It's something that could have only happened in America, even online America imo. Or I could just be a random nerdy 13'er, but what a ride it has been! This shit delivered! Best election ever! |
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Any good summaries of gamer gate? View Quote Here's a great summary from the OP link "one guy who, discovering that his game-designer girlfriend was spreading her charms widely, wrote a long blog post about it, letting out the secret that her paramours were writers in the game-critique industry who were giving games high ratings for factors unrelated to the actual games (wink wink). And then he got piled on by people defending her right to lie to him and sleep around because she was a poor repressed woman, and then they got piled on by guys saying, no, she’s a whore and so are these game critics, and then the SJW types decided all gamer-guys were nerdy neanderthals who hated women, and the fun began. Good times . . . Point is, the SJW’s went full-bore just knowing that, like all the times before, they would win and vanquish the dolts and reign over the battleground de jour. Oops." And the relevance .... "what GG showed was that SJW’s operate entirely within the realm of public shame. And when they tried to do battle with opponents who were incapable of being shamed, the SJW’s weapons became useless. The pattern was set – all it took was somebody who was truly shameless, but on a national stage. Once Trump stood up, said something outrageous, got shit for it, and kept doing it anyway, the spell was broken." |
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GG was a cluster fuck of a mess. There was plenty of retardation on both sides. People argued about a pornographer's wedding. Felicia Day got doxxed. Beta males were brow beat into submission. A guy was told to go get cancer and he complied.
There would be no meme war without it, though. It was the anti-liberal turning point for a ton of kids. We are literally where we are now because of Zoe Quinn. |
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A million people should email Zoe Quinn and thank him for Trump.
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It was like the Spanish Civil War. The rehearsal for the big one. View Quote That was... that was... simply... beautiful. |
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The comments section has some of the most insightful and brilliant writing that I've ever read in responses.
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Gamergate was a BIG fucking deal, which is why the NRA was stupid as fuck to attack "violent video games", especially since that's how a majority of kids are introduced to guns these days.
At the Shia 4chan thing, all those 4channers talked about what a big deal that was to get them off the sidelines and into the fray. Bless those shitposters. |
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Really? People still give a shit about GamerGate? View Quote You should because it's what started the avalanche of discontent. It was the jumping off point for every thing that is going on now. It's when all of the bullshit finally got turned around. It's like Midway in a culture war. |
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Welcome to rational thought themed forums. There's lots of them. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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The comments section has some of the most insightful and brilliant writing that I've ever read in responses. I had to bookmark that forum, very impressive. |
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The tea party was a fart in a whirlwind. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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what about the tea party? I think they're the ones who started the shift from the main stream media into social media. Ya if anything the tea party proved how completely out of their element many on the right were. They were being good people exercising their rights only to read and hear they were bad crazy folks. They backed candidates that turned out to be sharlatons. Gamergate was different because it happened in a realm most of the gamers were comfortable with. They knew they were being lied to and knew how to fight back. What good is shaming someone that gets called a fag daily. Who lives with the real threat some retard will call the police to his house because he is better at a game. |
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Here's a great summary from the OP link "one guy who, discovering that his game-designer girlfriend was spreading her charms widely, wrote a long blog post about it, letting out the secret that her paramours were writers in the game-critique industry who were giving games high ratings for factors unrelated to the actual games (wink wink). And then he got piled on by people defending her right to lie to him and sleep around because she was a poor repressed woman, and then they got piled on by guys saying, no, she’s a whore and so are these game critics, and then the SJW types decided all gamer-guys were nerdy neanderthals who hated women, and the fun began. Good times . . . Point is, the SJW’s went full-bore just knowing that, like all the times before, they would win and vanquish the dolts and reign over the battleground de jour. Oops." And the relevance .... "what GG showed was that SJW’s operate entirely within the realm of public shame. And when they tried to do battle with opponents who were incapable of being shamed, the SJW’s weapons became useless. The pattern was set – all it took was somebody who was truly shameless, but on a national stage. Once Trump stood up, said something outrageous, got shit for it, and kept doing it anyway, the spell was broken." View Quote Thank you for explaining this. |
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https://68.media.tumblr.com/31d2b97411e080046fdbc807253e73b4/tumblr_inline_ne3zfxTIP51s460h4.jpg View Quote Why would gaming journalism be any different than other journalism? |
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Why would gaming journalism be any different than other journalism? View Quote Basically it's not but gaming journalism is more closely related to gun journalism. Before every idiot with a blog and YouTube channel came on the scene there was a lot of thinly veiled shilling. Just imagine if a gun company person was giving handies to gun writers to get good reviews (not free shit but actual sexual favors). Then when called out non gun people come out of nowhere and say you are the problem. |
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Don't google Zoe Quinn. She looks like a petrified bowel movement that a 3 yr old found and then doodled on with crayons.
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I read the whole thread over there. It was awesome, some of the best reading in a while.
ETA: I think the tea party played a role but not on the same story line. What that did was show a huge chunk of people what the Republican Party actually was. When the TP actually had some success and sent people to Washington, those people turned on them when the got bought by the RP. That opened their eyes to the fact the change was impossible from "within." Then, when Trump came along, the RP did to him what they did to the TP. Then their eyes were really opened and freed them to get on the Trump train. A The tea party was middle Amearica, flyover country people clinging to their guns and religion. The RP was foolish to treat them as they did and it bit them in the ass. A lot of them, if not most of them, were Trump voters because the RP had fucked them over not because they liked Trump at first. I'd bet a lot TP types would never have voted for Trump a couple years ago. |
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Really? People still give a shit about GamerGate? View Quote Even less radical liberals started to eat the own in the aftermath. |
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I had to bookmark that forum, very impressive. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes |
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I read the whole thread over there. It was awesome, some of the best reading in a while. ETA: I think the tea party played a role but not on the same story line. What that did was show a huge chunk of people what the Republican Party actually was. When the TP actually had some success and sent people to Washington, those people turned on them when the got bought by the RP. That opened their eyes to the fact the change was impossible from "within." Then, when Trump came along, the RP did to him what they did to the TP. Then their eyes were really opened and freed them to get on the Trump train. A The tea party was middle Amearica, flyover country people clinging to their guns and religion. The RP was foolish to treat them as they did and it bit them in the ass. A lot of them, if not most of them, were Trump voters because the RP had fucked them over not because they liked Trump at first. I'd bet a lot TP types would never have voted for Trump a couple years ago. View Quote This is very true. I was heavily involved in the Tea Party movement in Virginia almost from Day One. The Republican Party came in very smoothly after a while, acted like we were buds, gave the leaders free training on activism, pulled it in-house, then strangled it. It was eye-opening for A LOT of us. We learned damn quickly that the Republican Party is just as obsessed with maintaining its own power as the Democrats. Two competing wings of one Big Government Party. Shitbirds of the highest order. You know how cops say they operate along an ask-tell-make spectrum? Tea Party was the Ask. Trump's election was the Tell. The Make will be very violent, i fear. |
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That's not the point. The point it is exposed millions of normally non-political people to SJW lunatics and swung the identity politics pendulum against the radical liberals. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Really? People still give a shit about GamerGate? This. It showed gamers that even their little subculture was a target of of SJWs, and that they faced an existential threat unlike anything they'd seen from the right. This is what focused all that weaponized autism on the PC left. |
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The thing about GamersGate is that it pulled a lot of people away from the left/liberal spectrum and redpilled them to the right in an instant. Its proof that if you attempt to win an argument against a population segment via shaming, its bound to blow up. Its the same with so much else that's happened since then: The left is trying to eat itself alive, and a lot of people have turned right wing due to the SJW tards out there.
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Don't fuck with nerds who have tons of time on their hands.
The Internet is their super weapon and they just want to be left alone like the trolls they are. Weaponized autism for the lulz. |
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Ya if anything the tea party proved how completely out of their element many on the right were. They were being good people exercising their rights only to read and hear they were bad crazy folks. They backed candidates that turned out to be sharlatons. Gamergate was different because it happened in a realm most of the gamers were comfortable with. They knew they were being lied to and knew how to fight back. What good is shaming someone that gets called a fag daily. Who lives with the real threat some retard will call the police to his house because he is better at a game. View Quote This, exactly. |
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