Thank you for writing this. It's refreshing to see and hear others speak about these things outside the very typical leftist/progressive/woke paradigm.
Some time ago I was trying to clarify for myself what people usually mean when they say someone is 'toxic'. I ended up reading a couple of explanatory pieces, one of them being this one at Psych Central which gives a list of signs of toxic behavior: https://psychcentral.com/blog/whats-a-toxic-person-how-do-you-deal-with-one
Interviewing two psychotherapists about it, they suggested (among others) the following signs that you are dealing with a toxic person.
- You’re emotionally affected by their drama
- You dread (or fear) being around them
- You’re exhausted or you feel angry while you’re with them or after your interaction
- When you’re with them, you feel like you’re “walking on eggshells”
These articles against 'toxic gamers' and whatnot don't feel like there's any fear or "walking on eggshells" going on, not in the slightest! They sound more like pretty standard condemnations, or in some cases like the author is looking down on them. To me it feels more like the authors of these pieces are the ones being 'toxic'.
Another theory is that perhaps 'toxic' doesn't actually mean anything to them. It's just a negative-sounding word to append to their otherwise normal condemnatory articles. The statement "John is toxic" is perhaps not a statement which can be true or false at all, but rather it means something like "John is very bad!!!" to them.
> The real problem with GamerGate wasn’t the original backlash against video game journalism and online censorship, but the way the movement was rapidly taken over by right-wing astroturfers who could care less about video games and were simply trying to score political points. The video game press did their part as well, alienating as many readers as possible and fanning the flames, all while pushing them into the arms of Milo, Breitbart and various YouTubers.
I disagree with this paragraph on factual grounds: Milo, etc, did not take over GamerGate. Long after they came onto the scene GamerGate remained a big tent movement.
For example, if you look at the speakers elected by GamerGate for the SPJ's airplay: Milo Yiannopoulos, Brad Wardell, Cathy Young, Christina Hoff Sommers, Oliver Campbell, Mark Ceb, William Usher, Jennifer Dawe. Milo and Willaim Usher are the only two who're far right.
Apart from that note I liked the article. And I do agree with your point about video game press fanning the flames and pushing people away. But I think you're overstating it's effects, and overstating it's direction. I don't think ShoeOnHead is the only GamerGater who went for left-wing anti-establishment positions. I know some in the UK who were big Corbyn supporters (though to be fair, that's fairly normal for their age group).
Good article! I read the Vox article a while ago and was disappointed at how much of a fluff piece it was and how it does a roundly false equivalency of the Snyder Cut advocates and ties it to toxic male culture. Wherever you go where you find individuals passionate about something, you will find a subset of those individuals who escalate things to a toxic level, for whatever reason it may be.
There was a recent kerfuffle on Chess.com. Due to the expansion of internet services and everyone moving to online chess matches due to the pandemic, more chess games are taking place online. Since chess is an algorithmic based game that has been adapted to A.I., there has been an increasing prevalence of cheaters using this type of A.I. during matches to win. Long story short, a chess master was playing online with an unknown player from the Philippines, the unknown won, the chess master was known to call people out on cheating as he said he could recognize the types of moves a computer would make vs. what a person would make with a certain prevalence and he reported it to Chess.com, Chess.com reviewed the incident, they banned the unknown, the unknown's son got involved and made a post outlining why there was no cheating and complained that they took one of the few things his dad had in his life, and then the flood gates of toxic hell unleashed with the usual death threats and other unsavory talk directed towards the chess master and Chess.com.
It's a game of chess, the game itself had no real-world consequences outside of some bruised egos, but it escalated exponentially. Heck, I'm into amateur entomology and I've seen knuckleheads almost come to blows over the phylogeny of insects.
Rather than digging deeper into the nature of these toxic individuals, the Vox article did a thoroughly topical examination of some unsavory people attaching themselves to the Snyder Cut and tried to tie it haphazardly to some other events while waving off other toxic individuals and their endeavors because they're not white straight males and they didn't get what they wanted and the media coverage that the author perceived to be similar or fair in their eyes. It was an absurdist article, but I guess it got the traction they wanted.
Jesse Singal made an interesting Twitter thread about the author of this article a while back: https://twitter.com/jessesingal/status/1374394037038325766
IIRC, Romano was involved in some drama in the Harry Potter fandom a long time ago but I don't remember the details.
Thank you for writing this. It's refreshing to see and hear others speak about these things outside the very typical leftist/progressive/woke paradigm.
Some time ago I was trying to clarify for myself what people usually mean when they say someone is 'toxic'. I ended up reading a couple of explanatory pieces, one of them being this one at Psych Central which gives a list of signs of toxic behavior: https://psychcentral.com/blog/whats-a-toxic-person-how-do-you-deal-with-one
Interviewing two psychotherapists about it, they suggested (among others) the following signs that you are dealing with a toxic person.
- You’re emotionally affected by their drama
- You dread (or fear) being around them
- You’re exhausted or you feel angry while you’re with them or after your interaction
- When you’re with them, you feel like you’re “walking on eggshells”
These articles against 'toxic gamers' and whatnot don't feel like there's any fear or "walking on eggshells" going on, not in the slightest! They sound more like pretty standard condemnations, or in some cases like the author is looking down on them. To me it feels more like the authors of these pieces are the ones being 'toxic'.
Another theory is that perhaps 'toxic' doesn't actually mean anything to them. It's just a negative-sounding word to append to their otherwise normal condemnatory articles. The statement "John is toxic" is perhaps not a statement which can be true or false at all, but rather it means something like "John is very bad!!!" to them.
Glad to see there can be an objective examination of events in this day and age.
> The real problem with GamerGate wasn’t the original backlash against video game journalism and online censorship, but the way the movement was rapidly taken over by right-wing astroturfers who could care less about video games and were simply trying to score political points. The video game press did their part as well, alienating as many readers as possible and fanning the flames, all while pushing them into the arms of Milo, Breitbart and various YouTubers.
I disagree with this paragraph on factual grounds: Milo, etc, did not take over GamerGate. Long after they came onto the scene GamerGate remained a big tent movement.
For example, if you look at the speakers elected by GamerGate for the SPJ's airplay: Milo Yiannopoulos, Brad Wardell, Cathy Young, Christina Hoff Sommers, Oliver Campbell, Mark Ceb, William Usher, Jennifer Dawe. Milo and Willaim Usher are the only two who're far right.
Apart from that note I liked the article. And I do agree with your point about video game press fanning the flames and pushing people away. But I think you're overstating it's effects, and overstating it's direction. I don't think ShoeOnHead is the only GamerGater who went for left-wing anti-establishment positions. I know some in the UK who were big Corbyn supporters (though to be fair, that's fairly normal for their age group).
This is a nice read 👍🏽
Good article! I read the Vox article a while ago and was disappointed at how much of a fluff piece it was and how it does a roundly false equivalency of the Snyder Cut advocates and ties it to toxic male culture. Wherever you go where you find individuals passionate about something, you will find a subset of those individuals who escalate things to a toxic level, for whatever reason it may be.
There was a recent kerfuffle on Chess.com. Due to the expansion of internet services and everyone moving to online chess matches due to the pandemic, more chess games are taking place online. Since chess is an algorithmic based game that has been adapted to A.I., there has been an increasing prevalence of cheaters using this type of A.I. during matches to win. Long story short, a chess master was playing online with an unknown player from the Philippines, the unknown won, the chess master was known to call people out on cheating as he said he could recognize the types of moves a computer would make vs. what a person would make with a certain prevalence and he reported it to Chess.com, Chess.com reviewed the incident, they banned the unknown, the unknown's son got involved and made a post outlining why there was no cheating and complained that they took one of the few things his dad had in his life, and then the flood gates of toxic hell unleashed with the usual death threats and other unsavory talk directed towards the chess master and Chess.com.
It's a game of chess, the game itself had no real-world consequences outside of some bruised egos, but it escalated exponentially. Heck, I'm into amateur entomology and I've seen knuckleheads almost come to blows over the phylogeny of insects.
Rather than digging deeper into the nature of these toxic individuals, the Vox article did a thoroughly topical examination of some unsavory people attaching themselves to the Snyder Cut and tried to tie it haphazardly to some other events while waving off other toxic individuals and their endeavors because they're not white straight males and they didn't get what they wanted and the media coverage that the author perceived to be similar or fair in their eyes. It was an absurdist article, but I guess it got the traction they wanted.