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Colin finally got to interview Alyssa Mercante

schaft0620 said:
I always thought that they would be friends if they just met.
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The first like 10 minutes are essentially that. Two people just talking and realizing they actually have a lot in common.

The entire interview was good IMO. I'm sure a lot of people probably wanted Colin to fire back at her but IMO she didn't really say anything out there or what many would expect her to say.

I think people don't realize how progressive Colin is in some ways.
 
Sorcerer said:
She is understandably shy of being interviewed and attacked. (She even has left the game's business behind it seems) Colin had to chase her for a while to get the interview. She finally agreed. It wouldn't be a good look for Colin to have her on and have him be hostile to her.
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That's the thing. You don't need to be hostile to conduct a good interview. There's a middle ground between a softball interview and a hostile interview. Just some basic follow up questions when she's making an argument that doesn't make sense or making assumptions that are questionable.
 
adamsapple said:
er ... is there a back story that would make this interesting?

without context this means nothing ..
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I'm also not sure what the big problems are with her in particular tbh. Would appreciate if someone could come up with a summary. According to google the awful stuff around Night in the Woods happened before she rose to prominence.
 
MayauMiao said:
Maybe she found religion.
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I believe she makes a point of saying she will do what she has to do for the part in terms of dressing up and the like. The industry she is in probably requires she has a more normal/natural look. When you are in games you don't have to be so formal I suppose.

She talks about her tattoos and at one point is worried someone is stealing her motorcycle outside.
 
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AmuroChan said:
That's the thing. You don't need to be hostile to conduct a good interview. There's a middle ground between a softball interview and a hostile interview. Just some basic follow up questions when she's making an argument that doesn't make sense or making assumptions that are questionable.
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They both flat out say in the interview that they disagree on many things. She was probably wary of Colin and put him off for a long time. And Colin admits he has said things that he really regrets, so her caution is understandable. But it turned out to be a great interview in the end.
 
hououinkyouma00 said:
I think people don't realize how progressive Colin is in some ways.
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Most people are like Colin, but the purple people have convinced themselves that anyone that doesn't fall in line with 100% of their world views are bigoted. Hopefully more interactions like this can take place instead of them crashing out and wanting to censor and cancel all opinions they don't like.
 
I don't know anything about this girl, but holding grudges and wanting retribution or people to have their feet held to the fire for old takes is reset era stuff. It doesn't really serve any purpose. People do change and evolve. And even if this girl didn't, who cares, it's just a conversation. Two people of like or unlike mind can get together and have dialogue without someone trying to dunk on the other.
 
Frustrating that right leaning people extend the olive branch towards this sort of dickhead.

I hate this nonsense about finding common ground. Complete bollocks. There's plenty of space. Fuck off and leave us all alone.
 
DragoonKain said:
I don't know anything about this girl, but holding grudges and wanting retribution or people to have their feet held to the fire for old takes is reset era stuff. It doesn't really serve any purpose. People do change and evolve. And even if this girl didn't, who cares, it's just a conversation. Two people of like or unlike mind can get together and have dialogue without someone trying to dunk on the other.
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Im fine forgiving people who fucked up on her level that show a modicum of contrition. She's still pretending to be a victim.
 
Nah, aren't rehabilitating this woman's reputation. She is still the same piece of shit she always was, she still posts the same crap online, she still holds the same terrible view and hangs out with the same terrible crowd. She still constantly engages in the gaming industry, btw. She was also literally retweeting a pedophile's Gofundme a few days ago. She is still suing people who dared to call her out on her bullshit on Twitter.

She's a garbage human being and this two hour softball conversation doesn't change it one bit. The fact even Kotaku couldn't stand her bullshit and fired her so tell you how insufferable she is. She is broke and trying to pimp her book, plain and simple.
 
Any word on what she's doing now? In terms of career/job, I mean?

The AI summary made it sound like she mostly blames men and doesn't do any self-reflection about her own role, which makes it sound like a waste of time to watch.
 
She's damaged goods to many and this is probably an attempt at damage control. If she's willing to engage in a meaningful debate without resorting to victimhood and maybe have some common sense too, I'm sure people will get over her terrible past.

But for now ...
Suspicious Brown Dog GIF
 
Zero fucking idea who any of these people are.
I'm fifty four years old and been in the game biz for thirty one of them..do I need to know these people? Will my boss get angry if I don't?
I've got mouths to feed and bills to pay...
 
Pedro Motta said:
I don't know about Alyssa Mercante and the GamerGate stuff, and at this stage, I'm too afraid to ask.
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At this stage I still don't know what the fuck GamerGate even is

It's also one of the stupidest fucking names ever that absolutely has zero correlation to Watergate. Retards, the lot of them.
 
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My only comment is if you enjoy hot takes without nuance, are too lazy to view people beyond memes or just generally are allergic to complex thoughts..... Don't watch it.
 
Sorcerer said:
She is understandably shy of being interviewed and attacked. (She even has left the game's business behind it seems) Colin had to chase her for a while to get the interview. She finally agreed. It wouldn't be a good look for Colin to have her on and have him be hostile to her.
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Some of the people in this thread are just showing how hostile the internet has become. And how big of a cesspool it is. But your response, and some of the others here show that there's still some sanity in this world.
 
laynelane said:
I think this one of the main reasons why many people distrust games media. Access journalism, ideology presented as fact, villainization of the audience, etc. It's very telling that someone coming from a gaming media background like herself cannot see something that is obvious to so many (that being the complete lack of traditional journalistic standards in games media). It's also why games media, which is dying out, doesn't seem to have much of a chance of course correcting. They can't/refuse to even see there's a problem with their behavior.
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I listened to the interview and she's talking more about people like smashJT and Dreamcastguy. People purposely stirring up shit to get clicks.

Say what you want about traditional gaming media but they never got as bad smashJT.
 
DragoonKain said:
I don't know anything about this girl, but holding grudges and wanting retribution or people to have their feet held to the fire for old takes is reset era stuff. It doesn't really serve any purpose. People do change and evolve. And even if this girl didn't, who cares, it's just a conversation. Two people of like or unlike mind can get together and have dialogue without someone trying to dunk on the other.
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People like her are the reason good studios became bad and have closed.

People like you are the reason it continues.
Has she taken back all the stuff she said, including "you can't be racist to white people"?

If not she should be chased out until she does. And if you cared about the industry and good games you'd agree
 
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Serious revisionism and gaslighting bullshit going on in that interview, but that's par for course for these types.
 
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I can't understand the idea of sympathizing with people who try to destroy our hobby. A man can't get any more cuck than that, no wonder he got his accounted hacked, even his dog must feel embarrased.
 
ChorizoPicozo said:
Ill Do It Myself GIF


Here is a concise summary of Sacred Symbols+ Episode 515, featuring an unexpected conversation between host Colin Moriarty and journalist Alyssa Mercante (formerly of Kotaku).

Key Takeaways

  • The Eternal Culture War: They explore why gaming's cultural divide remains so toxic, analyzing the transition from GamerGate to the recent "Sweet Baby Inc." controversies.
  • "Winning Isn't Enough": The title's core premise examines the psychology of online movements. They discuss how factions that gain cultural or institutional power often refuse to accept victory, continuing to act like aggrieved underdogs instead of responsibly wielding their influence.
  • The Collapse of Games Media: Alyssa details the economic death of traditional games journalism, explaining how the collapse of traditional outlets has created a massive power vacuum.
  • The Rise of Influencers: They discuss how this vacuum is now dominated by independent creators and streamers (like Asmongold), who steer modern gaming discourse far more than traditional websites do.
  • Bridging the Divide: Despite their differing political and industry backgrounds, Colin and Alyssa find significant common ground, emphasizing the need for good-faith dialogue over internet shouting matches

Alyssa Mercante's position in the interview focuses on three main points:
  • Seeking Good-Faith Dialogue: She steps outside her typical media bubble to show that people on opposite sides of the gaming culture war can find common ground through nuanced, face-to-face conversation rather than internet outrage.
  • The Defensive Reality for Women: She explains that enduring years of hostility in gaming spaces naturally forces women to enter the industry with a defensive mindset or a "chip on their shoulder" just to survive the toxicity.
  • Journalism's Economic Collapse: She views the death of sites like Kotaku as a harsh economic reality, warning that the resulting vacuum has shifted immense power to independent streamers who lack traditional journalistic standards.

Does she understand the role of media in the shift of gaming discourse toward a more antagonistic, toxic narrative toward customers, especially straight white men?


Based on the actual dialogue in the podcast, the short answer is no, she does not fully agree with or validate that specific narrative, though she acknowledges the fractured state of the discourse from a different angle.
he frames the defensive or sharp mindset of modern media figures (particularly women) as a natural response to surviving a hostile environment,
rather than taking responsibility for driving ideological polarization.


Its Over GIF by MOODMAN
Happy Well Done GIF
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Seth Meyers Lol GIF by Late Night with Seth Meyers


Thanks for summarizing an absolute snooze fest I'll FOREVER be grateful for the time you have saved me from enduring
 
Ogbert said:
Frustrating that right leaning people extend the olive branch towards this sort of dickhead.

I hate this nonsense about finding common ground. Complete bollocks. There's plenty of space. Fuck off and leave us all alone.
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en.wikipedia.org

Horseshoe theory - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Your post is 100% Resetera energy. You are doing the same thing that they do with the whole I only want to hear from people who think exactly like me and if you don't then it's war bullshit.
 
Angry_Megalodon said:
I can't understand the idea of sympathizing with people who try to destroy our hobby. A man can't get any more cuck than that, no wonder he got his accounted hacked, even his dog must feel embarrased.
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Most druggies are incapable of long-term analysis. So it's not a surprise that he thinks playing nice with grifters is a good idea; short-term success is what makes sense to people like him.
 
ChorizoPicozo said:
It's almost like calling everyone who disagrees with you a Nazi has nasty consequences, huh?
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Without endorsing or shitting on one point of view, I genuinely have not followed the back story, but found the interview fairly sane albeit both Colin and Alyssa kind of glossed over some pretty important points lol, wanting to minimise faults. But that does not invalidate what they did want to focus on, and I'm pretty sure rape threats whilst online are not the lived experience of most male gamers..... So you know that might explain some of the angst. Sad thing is there are absolutely a bunch of people here who are ok with that type of behaviour, just quietly I expect a (very) few actually participate in similar behaviour based on some completely shameless posts I've read over the years. On the other hand Colin brings up out of context DEI as an issue (Victorian England and misrepresenting who actually aristocracy would be in order to be inclusive) and she waves that one away. I'm with Colin on that one btw wholeheartedly.

The most important and salient point is that they can actually have the conversation, and they are both 100% right about algorythms driving this compartmentalisation of the internet. This rendering of individuals down to two dimensional caricatures of complex people because you cant cover that in a one sentence forum post or whatever a tiktok short has shrunk to by now.

I do say its brave to drop in an AI response with just two prompts for a complex issue. I mean there are 4 reddit sources. I genuinely lol'ed the moment I saw that. AI can only work on what other people say, it has no true cognition. Even when trying to isolate facts rather than opinion its rare I need less than half a dozen prompts calling out bullshit or narrowing scope, establishing context etc.
 
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Unfortunatecookie said:
Most druggies are incapable of long-term analysis. So it's not a surprise that he thinks playing nice with grifters is a good idea; short-term success is what makes sense to people like him.
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lol wut

This interview isn't going to bring in good numbers or "success". Colin likes having conversations with and interviewing people with a wide range of beliefs. This interview isn't some sort of "oh this will get me brownie points" lol.

Chris is nearly socialist but yet still one of his best friends, Dustin is a pretty conservative Christian with beliefs on the right side of the spectrum, Matty is apolitical as far as I can tell, Gene is very left leaning, and I'm sure Brad is left leaning as well. He's gone on record saying multiple times that he wanted people on his shows with different beliefs.
 
Their discussion completely ignored policies that have been embeded into major publishers like MS and Sony that are still affecting games being released.

"You guys won, just let it go!"

Fuck off with that shit.
 
mckmas8808 said:
Some of the people in this thread are just showing how hostile the internet has become. And how big of a cesspool it is. But your response, and some of the others here show that there's still some sanity in this world.
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mckmas8808 said:
This is the same woman as that thumbnail? Wow! And why is she saying this? What's the context? Because this seems weird.
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Imagine making these two posts back to back. You literally know nothing about this woman, or what she's done over the past few years, and you're trying to play moral arbiter for people for being too hostile. Then you post the next time asking why she seems so weird....because she is always that way. That's who she is, the woman in the interview is fake. As for this specific video, she went on Giant Bomb, started running her mouth:
During an appearance on Giant Bomb, Mercante issued her challenge stating, "I want people in the industry to be a little bit louder about people being mean to other people and maybe say it's not a good thing. Maybe say we don't want you around if you're going to be a cunt and hateful and the games industry naturally not because anyone is making them be diverse because the world is diverse, you stupid motherfucker. And if you have a problem with that, come fight me, physically, bitch."

Oddly, after just issuing the challenge, one of the other individuals in the room then asked if anyone had taken her up on it. She responded, "No, because they're all pussies."
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Two separate female content creators took up her challenge, there was even a $1k purse for the winner, and after a dozen more tweets about how she would kick their asses and "wouldn't even have to train" she chickened out.

Also, this shit happened last year and Mercunte is still friends with and reposts comments by this Ana Valens person, as late as last week. Enjoy, it's disgusting:

www.womenarehuman.com

Transgender Columnist Fantasizes About ‘Trans Girls’ Violently Raping Women

US — Brooklyn, New York. On August 31, 2020, Ana Valens, Trans/Sex columnist for The Daily Dot, uploaded disturbing audio recordings, envisioning a future world with breeding facilities where you g…
www.womenarehuman.com www.womenarehuman.com

And even better is her multiple comments about "her" pedophilic urges or how "she" likes to play Fall Guys with children, with a vibrator in her ass that goes off any time she touches another player.

There are the kinds of people you want us to be less hostile to. These are the people who you think we should show grace, or have any modicum of respect for?

That's why this interview is stupid, because people like you see it and think she is a normal, rational human being, when she isn't, hasn't been, and will never be. And you can see it in this thread, half of dozen of you, who don't know one thing about her trying to make it out like we're the unreasonable ones here, so her bullshit fake facade is working.
 
RafterXL said:
Also, this shit happened last year and Mercunte is still friends with and reposts comments by this Ana Valens person, as late as last week. Enjoy, it's disgusting:
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I'm a bit lost, this is a 2020 article, what was the interaction last week? Valens sound mentally ill btw.
 
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Unfortunatecookie said:
Most druggies are incapable of long-term analysis. So it's not a surprise that he thinks playing nice with grifters is a good idea; short-term success is what makes sense to people like him.
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Short-Term success? Colin says right in the interview (and on Sacred Symbols) he can't wait to retire and put this all behind him. I think he feels like he has nothing left to prove at this point.
 
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Ashamam said:
The most important and salient point is that they can actually have the conversation, and they are both 100% right about algorythms driving this compartmentalisation of the internet. This rendering of individuals down to two dimensional caricatures of complex people because you cant cover that in a one sentence forum post or whatever a tiktok short has shrunk to by now.
Click to expand...
She was a participant in that process though. And as a writer for a (once) noteworthy outlet, she had a bigger platform than a forum post or tiktok vid to explore all sides of theargument. But she didn't. Is there any introspection there, or no?
 
uncreativename said:
That's how an interview should be imo, more about the person being interviewed than the interviewer. And if the person being interviewed is saying some bullshit lol, well you have to have some faith in your audience that they'll be able to figure that out on their own
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That's actually not what an interview should be. What you're describing is a generic conversation. The point of an interview is to allow the person being interviewed to express their opinions on certain topics. A good interview will then pick up on certain things being said and push the person to explain their opinions further and in some cases justify how they feel about certain things.

The interviewer is supposed to be the voice of the listening audience. Not some passive bystander.
 
InterMusketeer said:
She was a participant in that process though. And as a writer for a (once) noteworthy outlet, she had a bigger platform than a forum post or tiktok vid to explore all sides of theargument. But she didn't. Is there any introspection there, or no?
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I didn't get the sense there was much, other than burnt out on the whole thing. Colin on the other hand, he owned being a (small) part of the problem years ago. Presumably went after some people. I'm not defending her, just think based on her lived experience (as told) that its no surprise at all she came with an agenda. I suspect male gamers would on the whole probably not understand the impact logging in to a toxic hobby environment all the time would have. No doubt some would say why continue then, the correct answer is actually push back, because f*ck them, who gets to decide who can't participate. I actually admire that. (edit: snip the last bit)
 
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Raven77 said:
That's actually not what an interview should be. What you're describing is a generic conversation. The point of an interview is to allow the person being interviewed to express their opinions on certain topics. A good interview will then pick up on certain things being said and push the person to explain their opinions further and in some cases justify how they feel about certain things.

The interviewer is supposed to be the voice of the listening audience. Not some passive bystander.
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To be fair it's not like Mercante is making a comeback. The interview took place because Colin pursued the idea even after being initially shot down.
To go after someone, you tried to get on your show, who was probably reluctant at that, wouldn't exactly be tactful. She left the industry, so she is not currently enraging people. She has moved on. No real agenda here and I don't think we will see her doing the rounds of podcasts and such. That's probably it for her as far as Video Games go.
 
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RafterXL said:
Imagine making these two posts back to back. You literally know nothing about this woman, or what she's done over the past few years, and you're trying to play moral arbiter for people for being too hostile. Then you post the next time asking why she seems so weird....because she is always that way. That's who she is, the woman in the interview is fake. As for this specific video, she went on Giant Bomb, started running her mouth:

Two separate female content creators took up her challenge, there was even a $1k purse for the winner, and after a dozen more tweets about how she would kick their asses and "wouldn't even have to train" she chickened out.

Also, this shit happened last year and Mercunte is still friends with and reposts comments by this Ana Valens person, as late as last week. Enjoy, it's disgusting:

www.womenarehuman.com

Transgender Columnist Fantasizes About ‘Trans Girls’ Violently Raping Women

US — Brooklyn, New York. On August 31, 2020, Ana Valens, Trans/Sex columnist for The Daily Dot, uploaded disturbing audio recordings, envisioning a future world with breeding facilities where you g…
www.womenarehuman.com www.womenarehuman.com

And even better is her multiple comments about "her" pedophilic urges or how "she" likes to play Fall Guys with children, with a vibrator in her ass that goes off any time she touches another player.

There are the kinds of people you want us to be less hostile to. These are the people who you think we should show grace, or have any modicum of respect for?

That's why this interview is stupid, because people like you see it and think she is a normal, rational human being, when she isn't, hasn't been, and will never be. And you can see it in this thread, half of dozen of you, who don't know one thing about her trying to make it out like we're the unreasonable ones here, so her bullshit fake facade is working.
Click to expand...

Is it a facade? Or is the other version of her the fake person, who's putting on a stunt in order to "play tough" in front of the internet crowd?
 
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