GamerGate: On Vengeance and Escalation

First, some GamerGate supporters absolutely, 100% engaged in systematic harassment and abuse of women in the games industry and press. This harassment didn't start with GamerGate, and will likely not end with GamerGate. Many of the same people who have been harassing Anita and other women as part of GamerGate have been doing it for years prior.

But, beyond harassment, I think there's something interesting to think about as it relates to GamerGate as a thing, and why they always seem to be so angry: the GamerGate approach to formulating responses that value vengeance, perceived justice, and escalation.

Getting Even and Getting More Than Even

The narrative arc of many popular games follow this pattern: a wrong is made against the protagonist, the protagonist is angered and wants revenge, in the act of vengeance the protagonist discovers more wrongs, the protagonist's acts escalate in scale and effect until the game finally culminates in an all-out "final boss" battle where everything is on the line.

It's a pattern that is attractive for pretty basic reasons. It puts the player on the side of justice. It serves up constant helpings of righteous satisfaction. It consistently escalates the stakes to impart the importance of player actions. But most importantly, there is a prevalent trend of not just stake escalation, but also one of weaponry.

In games, you don't just want to match your enemy, you want to destroy your enemy. You want to overpower them, to bring the bigger weapon, to deal more damage in a trade of blows, to exploit structural weakness. A disproportionately excessive response is not only fun in games, but also many times explicitly encouraged.

When Leigh Alexander wrote her "'Gamers' are over" piece, the response wasn't just an equivalent article expressing disagreement, but rather an overwhelming escalation where the goal was to not just disprove Alexander's article, but to forcibly shutdown Gamasutra as a whole. This was not seen as an unjustified overreaction, but rather as a proper, righteous act of vengeance: Gamasutra published an article critical of 'gamers', therefore we must shutdown Gamastura so they they no longer have the power to ever publish a piece that is critical of 'gamers'.

Consider, for a moment, some of the goals that many GamerGate supporters have unified on:

Emailing sponsors and advertisers because they felt a bunch of articles were unfairly criticizing gamers

Donating to TYFC because it appeared that Zoe Quinn didn't like them

Emailing Dell and denouncing the statement of a Dell executive who is in no way related to the gaming press or the game development industry

Donating to anti-bullying charities because two Gawker employees -- who do not write for Kotaku or generally cover games -- made some admittedly ill-worded and ill-timed tweets.

That last item is telling. GamerGate supporters have spent the past few days focused on sticking it to Gawker. Not because of any explicit breach of journalistic ethics, but because two Gawker employees unrelated to the gaming press made some sarcastic, mocking tweets in their direction. They have been emailing Gawker advertisers and asking if they 'support bullying'. Most recently, they have moved to directly using the emails of C-level executives of the brands and companies that've found associated with Gawker.

It's a pattern of revenge and escalation of vengeance that falls in line with the other acts listed. A single statement by a Dell executive who is unrelated to games journalism prompted email campaigns to, what, fire the Dell executive? Issue a public apology? Not only would any perceived endgame not in any way, shape, or form affect the ethics of games journalism, I don't even think many GamerGate supporters have an endgame scenario in mind when engaging in email campaigns. Or, at least, not one that reflects on the core rhetoric of GamerGate: that of ethics in games journalism.

I've said it elsewhere, but I'd like to say it here too.

GamerGate is not a movement based around ideals, but a movement based around revenge. Its actions are not acts in the service of an overarching goal, but acts in the service of vengeance. Its endgame, as described by actions rather than rhetoric, is not one of ethical journalism, but one of escalated destruction, where targeted outlets are stripped of advertisers, of readers and, ultimately, of opinions unfavorable to the movement's supporters.

EDIT: Apparently a lot of GamerGate supporters think this an actual Polygon article written by a member of the Polygon editorial staff despite it living in the forums section of the site, having "forums" in the URL, having a "forums" breadcrumb above the title of the post, and my bio making it clear I'm not a writer/journalist but an engineer for Vox Media as a whole.

So in the interest of overwhelming clarity: This is a forum post, with all the editorial endorsement and reflections on the overall site's views that most forum posts anywhere represent. Read: more or less none.