

Luke McKinney demolishes the idea that notional corruption in the press can be fought by harassing women, or participating in an ex-boyfriend's awful, privacy-invading vendetta against his girlfriend -- and notes that the original incident that sparked the campaign was a fabrication.

#4. Zombie Social Media

Mentioning #gamergate online is like scrawling a giant dick over the Bat-Signal before lighting it: you've summoned a whole horde of crazies, and the only result will be pain. One mention on Twitter and you're mobbed by a horde of accounts, all with incredibly strong opinions and many entirely coincidentally created in the last month. There haven't been so many freshly hatched eggs trying to drown out all human communication since Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

"I DON'T AGREE WITH THE HARASSMENT, BUT WHEN THEY'RE NOT CHANTING 'WHORE' THEY RAISE SOME FAIR POINTS!"

#2. The Alleged Corruption Never Happened

Did I mention that the corrupt game review, the one that is the alleged reason this blew up, never existed? I just did. And now I should mention again that the game review never existed. That's something that should always be mentioned again, possibly with hovertext or an interstitial page every time anyone uses the #gamergate tag: this was started by total bullshit.

When that was revealed, the gaters decided to carry on anyway. It's almost as if the original story was nothing but a thin veil over pre-existing hatred! They swore to expose corruption in the system, revealing that various gaming writers knew some indie developers. Which shocked the ass off everyone who'd thought gaming writers scrimshawed their articles onto little wooden balls from inside sensory-deprivation baths connected to ENIGMA decoders.

Gaters don't seem to know that the game journalism "industry" is about 20 meters across. Probably 10 by the time you read this. Gaters act aghast that people whose entire career is based on games sometimes play and pay for games. Would it be better if they didn't? And, what, the only way to avoid corruption would be to get sent things for free?

The alleged scandal is a pathetic fantasy. A woman bestowing sexual favors so that men will look at the video game she made? Hey, losers, when choosing an excuse to attack female developers, maybe don't choose one that sounds like the letter you wrote when you thought the Game Boy was a spinoff from Playboy.