Fans are, by definition, fanatical. But that fanaticism can also lead to a level of obsession that can trigger some very bad things like threats of death, kidnapping, torture, stalking and financial ruin.
There’s a hot trend among a vocal minority of gamers right now: the harassment of women developers and critics. Of course, this sort of thing is not new in tech – or, let’s face it, across the internet – but in the video games industry it has hit a fashionable peak.
On Thursday, it was widely reported that the North American media critic Anita Sarkeesian had fled her own home, thanks to rape and death threats from angry gamers targeting her and her family. Her crime was to produce a series of YouTube videos analysing the depiction of women in games from a feminist perspective.
Sarkeesian’s plight eerily mirrors that of games designer Zoë Quinn [see footnote], developer of the experimental adventure, Depression Quest, who has also had to pack up and move in with friends, after an online campaign of hatred against her.
Earlier this month, Quinn’s ex-boyfriend published intimate details of their relationship online, and her sexual history inexplicably became the centrepiece of a large-scale, industry-wide debate about journalism, nepotism and ethics.
Accusations were hurled at Quinn via gamer forums and sites like Reddit and 4Chan. Gaming news blog Kotaku clarified that an alleged breach of journalistic objectivity concerning Quinn never actually took place. But the hate speech continued.
Yes, it’s been quite a banner season for the collective of self-identifying core gamers who gather on forums to muster shared fury. Now they feel they are at war with a group of left-leaning games writers and developers who they refer to as “social justice warriors” – this is effectively anyone who has ever questioned the patriarchal nature of the games industry or the limited, often objectifying depiction of women. Because, you know, games are fine as they are thanks.
http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...in-video-games
Online harassment, no matter the reasoning, is always about power and positioning, about putting people in their place, said Nathan Fisk, lecturer at the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
"Fans are invested in the stories and worlds that developers create, and certain design decisions can be seen by fans to threaten those stories and worlds. " said Fisk, who was featured in Bullying in the Age of Social Media.
Developers, both named and those who wish to remain anonymous, tell Polygon that harassment by gamers is becoming an alarmingly regular expected element of game development. Some developers say the problem was among the reasons they left the industry, others tell Polygon that the problem is so ubiquitous that it distracts them from making games or that they're considering leaving the industry.
Toulouse said that when he started at Xbox he analyzed the problems Xbox Live was having with this issue and determined that one solution was to have a single person as the face of enforcement for Live, a "sheriff."
"Customers needed to know that there is someone who is in charge of making sure this gets better. What came along with that, unfortunately, was SWAT teams and threats and abuse."
"Microsoft didn't know what to do," he said. "I would bring it up. I would say, 'Hey, I am putting my family at material risk, by you wanting me to be this public sheriff.'"
Toulouse said he asked for security because people would tell him they were going to kill him at events like PAX.
"They were like, 'We don't do that,'" he said.
Edwards points to George Lucas' very public semi-retirement last year as an example. In January, Lucas told the New York Times that he was retiring, blaming in part the negativity of fans.
"Why would I make any more," he said, "when everybody yells at you all of the time and says what a terrible person you are?"
"If someone as successful as George Lucas, someone who has been arguably both creatively and financially successful, is basically hanging it up because he's tired of hearing the negative feedback, that's a pretty serious thing," Edwards said. "He is such a prominent person and to have him so publicly talk about that particular issue, it kind of resonates with a lot of people."
http://www.polygon.com/2013/8/15/462...support-groups



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