It seems there an attempt to have a moderated discussion (or a debate depending on who you ask) between people supporting the #GamerGate consumer revolt against corrupt games journalism and the folks who…what? Support corruption in games journalism? Oh, that’s right…it’s the people claiming that GG is in fact only trying to harass and bully women out of the gaming industry.
The claim that GG is trying to evict women qua women from the gaming industry should be easily dis-proven by showing even one woman that GG has supported in the industry; women like Lizzy Finnegan , LLShannon, Vivian James, Jennifer D. , and projects like The Fine Young Capitalists. I could continue this list all day and the opposition would likely hold to the claim that GG is trying to purge women from gaming. It’s their only option… well, unless they want to try to argue the merits of corruption.
That’s not really the thrust of this post, however. The real point I want to make is this: Choose the anti-GG representatives wisely.
This discussion/debate reminds me of another such attempt at discourse with ideologues who had pretty much the same claim as the Anti Gamergate folks. The dialog was a moderated one between atheist/skeptics who opposed the infusion of atheism with a dogmatic version of radical feminism. The radical feminist side also made the claim that their opposition was only interested in driving women out of the atheist community. This claim too was made despite the fact that many women also opposed the dogmatists. You may remember the Atheism Plus debacle and the great rift it caused in the atheist community, but you may not know of the attempt to bridge the rift and its utter failure.
Atheist Ireland head Michael Nugent, a very open minded and patient man, proposed a structured textual discussion of the issues involved in the Great Rift. Over the course of several weeks, that dialog took place on a website dedicated for just that purpose. The dialog, such as it was, destabilized and broke apart for several reasons. One reason was the format was overly structured and many posts seemed to become an exercise in writing as pretentiously as possible. This is not the reason that concerns me.
Another reason the dialog collapsed was due to deliberate malfeasance of the “You menz just want to kick womynz out of atheism” side’s moderator and primary participant. Stephanie Zvan, famous for defending straw man tactics as valid (see link comments starting at #8) , defending the practice of internet doxing, and celebrating finding new people to block, ensured the dialog process would never amount to any real healing of the divide; dragging the dialog out by arguing over trivialities until many simply lost interest. The speculation that Zvan passed on personal information gained through the dialog process to a fellow blogger for release wasn’t substantiated, but the fallout from that doxing certainly chilled the proceedings.
I’m sure by now you can see the direction I’m going with this post in regard to the Airplay debate with Gamergate supporters and its detractors. Although I wrote about what a good opportunity the Airplay debate is for GG to get out from under the crippling weight of the media narrative that has been spun by its opponents, the debate can still be torpedoed by the opposition. The participants must be selected with care for this debate to have any serious repercussions in the industry. One aGG panelist who spends the entire allotted time arguing about the meaning of the word “is” or other nonsense can consign this debate to the dustbin of gaming history.
Get some time.
I wrote a short piece 2 days ago but focused on who would represent GamerGate because I don’t think it matters much who’s chosen for the anti side, it’ll be the same screed heard from the beginning. What I wanted to see is representation for GamerGate that would not fall into the obvious traps that have been laid in the past by the anti’s.
It’s much more important, IMO, to have reasonable and calm speaking for GamerGate than worrying about the “other side”. If that occurs, then the anti’s will “out” themselves as the ones that are spewing the hate across the Internet.
This is bound to happen, unfortunately. There isn’t much that critics of Gamergate have outside of the usual tactics that you’ve already covered – the Kafka Trap, Guilt by association, gish-galloping, and reframing. Sargon adapted to this very early, having been given the runaround by Jenni Goodchild on a Gamergate stream last Autumn. His showing on Pakman was someone that was exceedingly well prepared.
Whoever goes on is going to have to rigourously rehearse the most aggressive arguments, which shouldn’t be difficult to do – they’ve been repeated thousands of times.
With this in mind:
http://americanfolklore.net/folklore/2010/07/brer_rabbit_meets_a_tar_baby.html
SubMan:
I can find no fault with your admonition that, if there is to be a debate on GamerGate, the gamer side must choose wisely. But, I think that another aspect to consider is whom the GG group will be debating against. In fact, I imagine that that’ll be an even more important factor in how the results will be viewed.
As you point out, the event is being organized by journalists, and not just gaming journalists, so there is a chance to widen the audience to some extent. Folk who know little or nothing about gaming will surely see this, and it might be their first real introduction to the subject.
If you read the commentary from here:
http://journoterrorist.com/airplay/
Note that some of the suggestions sound more like a lineup for a cage match than a debate. Isn’t there something in there about how Christina Hoff Sommers will “crush” Sarkeesian? Well, if not, that is the tone.
(Not that it probably isn’t true.)
Of course, the GG people must really like Anita; they keep giving her free publicity. She’s like a tar-baby, begging to be hit again. (And that’s a problem with several others besides from her.)
Anyway, it might not be a poor decision to think a move ahead.
Not so bad to get a bit o’ tar on you if you can outfox a fox in the end.
Koretzky mentions “GamerGaters and their opponents,” but if the adversaries in this case are the usual cast and crew of narcissistic charlatans, it is going to be difficult to assert that the GG objective has anything to do with ethics in journalism when you look at the other side of the stage and there are no journalists, but instead a group of “SJWs,” such as Anita and three others attempting to bask in her glow.
The “ethics in journalism” theme won’t even (genuinely) get off the ground then, but the journalists in the audience will get a decent laugh, and likely a good story at gamers’ expense, once again. You don’t want the gathering to be some comedy of errors or sideshow, with the whole time spent wading through obfuscation, misrepresentations, fabrications, lies, myths and delusional, disingenuous nonsense, all of which is fairly possible considering the number of time-wasting shysters on the other “team.”
When the gamers are up to their elbows and knees in tar, they best be thinkin’ what direction they’d like to be throw’d. Or, perhaps it would be easier and wiser to steer clear of all that and simply make certain that the debate remains on, and dedicated to, the topic that has been declared by these gamers all along (but nearly utterly ignored by the media at large, and unfortunately by many gamers as well).
*Some of the media has acknowledged it, but hardly equitably or sincerely.
Name the Anti-GG panel first, and consider keeping the more inconsequential “SJWs” out of it.
Few of them have anything of meaningful value to offer.