So today’s claim: Adam Baldwin was the person who started GamerGate.

Reality check: Did he, really? In this Reality Check, I am going to challenge this very notion widely held as gospel truth by GamerGaters. I’m letting you know ahead of time right now: my final verdict is False, but read ahead anyway.

The basis for this claim is this tweet Adam Baldwin made on August 27th 2014:

However, using Topsy range-based search, We could see that there were quite a few tweets with #GamerGate that precede Adam Baldwin’s one.

But before Adam Baldwin’s tweet, what were people tweeting #GamerGate about?

Ignoring people misspelling the name of GamersGate, the Sweden-based online distribution service, there were 2 particular incidents attached to the #GamerGate hashtag in 2012. The first was the controversy surrounding the bankruptcy of Curt Schilling’s 38 Studios. The #GamerGate hashtag was coined for the first time in May 14th 2012 by a man named Adam. No, not Adam Baldwin, this Adam.

Adam Leonard from The Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Rhode Island. The hashtag took off soon after that:

This particular incident is not very exciting to talk about. However…

The other incident attached to the #GamerGate hashtag involves a scandal surrounding the then-Senate candidate Colleen Lachowicz (Democrat). Here is a summary:

On October 4th 2012, on their official website, The Maine Republican Party published a press release that aimed to character assassinate their competitor for a seat in the Maine State Senate. The Maine GOP found out that Lachowicz was a World of Warcraft gamer, and made some scathing infographics in order to smear her reputation:

These infographics were spreaded around to Maine voters when the Senate election was near (early November 2012). Lachowicz was condemned for her gaming hobby, as if being a gamer alone is somehow enough to turn you toxical by nature (sounds familiar?).

This press release caught fire on the media, and the #GamerGate hashtag was used to tweet about it:

The website created for the smear campaign against Colleen Lachowicz is still online. On this site, you can see a very consistent pattern: fear-mongering, spinning what people say on an online forum as if it’s a secret club to paint them in the worst possible light, taking online comments out of context. It’s all condensed in this one video:

Does all of this seem familiar? It’s all so similar to how the media has covered 4chan for the last couple of months. In fact, let’s try adapting the quote from GOP infographics into the current #GamerGate and see how it sounds:

What’s worse? In 4chan, they get away with crude, vicious and violent online comments.

It’s similar to this. Compare that side-by-side to the press release by the Maine GOP. Those who proudly think they are fighting a right-wing movement had no idea how much they themselves had in common with right-wing media, particularly in this case, none other than the Tea Party. Certain editors can’t see the irony though:

Another tactic that the Maine GOP employed was that they persisted on the same talking point over and over again in order to discredit their opponent. You know, if their core demographics were fed the same propaganda over and over, the GOP would have their votes secured. That tactic was actually much older than any living person in the GOP. At the risk of being called out for invoking Godwin’s Law, I dare say it’s actually the same propaganda tactic lifted straight from Adolf Hitler’s playbook. Below is a real quote from Mein Kampf, Chapter VI: War Propaganda:

Ironic, isn’t it? Seems like I wasn’t the first one to invoke Godwin’s Law after all.

But once again, does this all sound familiar?

In short: Same hashtag, different era, opposite agenda, same old tactics.

It’s no wonder why gamers want politics out of their hobby. They have been hated by both sides of the political spectrum. Not even a person with both gaming and politics in her life wants the 2 to mingle.

Final verdict: False, there was another #GamerGate 2 years ago, on the opposite political spectrum, and coined by a different Adam.

I still got some trivia for GamerGaters: The GOP smearing campaign worked… to a certain degree, at least. During the 2012 Maine General Election, Lachowicz’s competitor — Republican Thomas Martin Jr. had won 6 out of 7 municipalities in District 25 of Maine, leaving only one left: Waterville — Lachowicz’s hometown and last bastion of her election campaign, sounds familiar? Despite having nothing but her own hometown to count on, this one municipality single-handedly won Lachowicz her Senate seat by a landslide difference. Senator Lachowicz is still in office at the time of writing.

A gamer triumphed over smearing propaganda that day.