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Leigh Alexander: "'Gamers' don't have to be your audience. 'Gamers' are over."
- Thread starter Gsak
- Start date
- Status
I don't understand who she is talking about. It's like she's lumping /v/ in with typical buy Call of Duty and Madden every year while picking up some gaming shirts type of people. I think the people from her examples would treat the average Gamer guy that major publishers rely on the same way they treat their supposed SJW enemy. They would feel that publishers abandoned them to cater to both Gamers and SJWs and ruined their games.
Suzushiiro
Banned
I'd say that the big difference between gaming and other mediums is that the people who like/make porn or trashy romance novels comprise completely different circles at all levels (consumer, journalist, industry) from the people who like Harry Potter or artsy films. Video games don't quite have that yet in that there are lots of forums, news/editorial outlets, and even publishers that deal with both artsy indie/indie-like games such as Gone Home or Child of Light and AAAA annual releases like Assassin's Creed and CoD.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
The point she's making is that it should be inclusive, and shitty nerds are the reason it isn't.
all this shows is she's willing to respond to morons in kind and she has good taste in anime
Amazeballs
Member
But gaming IS inclusive. Look at the many people who play games now as opposed to 10 years ago. Getting into gaming has never been easier. Mobile, Tablet, consoles and even the Wii craze.
Her point is all nerds aka gamers are horrible people and should get away from her hobby.
That's not being inclusive. That's being a *dick*.
Exactly. The nerds behind the current harassment campaigns are just bullies now. They're traitors to everything nerds ought to stand for.
Gsak
Member
Blanket generalization much? I wonder, how many people are turned off vg culture by the corruption in the industry and the gaming press.
UpDownLeftRight
Banned
I think it's less the matter of what's being projected but generally her aggressive attitude to anyone who thinks differently to her, and her lazy attempts to shut it down by parroting her same thought process as if it were established fact. To me the projection originally came off as an attack at others lifestyles, but now I feel she's just a bitter person with a chip on her shoulder after seeing her approach to criticism. I also feel I should do the same as you though and probably just leave it at that. I get the feeling this thread will end up heated and that's not really my sort of thing.
Imru al-Qays
Banned
Jesus are there no fucking adults?
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
It's definitely more inclusive, but let's not pretend the big titles are fairly representing gaming's diversity or are as socially conscious as even pro wrestling.
Honestly, I'm not wanting to include anyone who makes rape and racist jokes, and guess what I hear in every other competitive CS:GO game I play?
Señor Coyote
Banned
Basically the rise of YouTube gaming personalities makes it hard for traditional media to compete. For instance as a PC gamer I like to read RPS once in a while but at the end of the day watching a "WTF is" by Total Biscuit is far more informative than any written article. Sites like Giant Bomb are aware of this and spoken a lot about it on their podcasts.
Holy Order Sol
Member
Yeah it's definitely not a monolith. Follow enough of them on Twitter and you're bound to see arguments on matters you wouldn't expect if you were to assume it's a unified movement.
Those are some serious gymnastic skills you have there. She makes a living writing for a living. She means exactly what she is saying.
Actually I can't really tell what her point is, honestly. These both seem like valid interpretations, she could just be doing a horribly awful job at communicating on Twitter (which wouldn't really entirely be her fault), or maybe she just is being an entirely shitty person to "nerds," whilst still making a valid point about how the word "gamers," is kinda useless and how gamer culture isn't inclusive enough.
Suzushiiro
Banned
One could argue that journalism in general is becoming irrelevant. When it comes to events happening in places where we have social media (the situation in Ferguson being a prime example,) at least, we get more of our facts via tweets from people who are actually there than paid journalists.
In gaming in particular you could certainly argue that they're a needless middleman in this day and age.
Whiskeymatt
Member
If that's her point, then "Gaming is for everyone, and it shouldn't be restricted to and by a small subset of enthusiasts" is a better reply that fits easily on Twitter that isn't combative or counter-productive. You're not going to look any better than a shitty group of people if you act the same shitty way that they do.
Shmuely Bully
Member
Gamer isn't any more of a stupid term than cinemaphile or audiophile and the occupation is about as worthwhile an investment of time and money. Heck, if videogamephile wasn't such a mouthful people might use that instead. These terms don't have to make sense to anyone outside of the culture they describe.
Iorv3th
Member
Wow.
Why do you guys feel the need to use nerds as an offensive blanket term? Especially when you are posting on a gaming forum? You don't see anything wrong with that?
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
"Shitty nerds" is what I said, and I think a lot of us know some. I guess you're choosing to relate.
Suzushiiro
Banned
Apparently there's a #reclaimanimeavatars hashtag going around (that I think she may have started?) inspired by the fact that a lot of the people criticizing/trolling/harassing people on Team Social Justice Whatevers over the past couple of weeks have had anime character avatars.
Gsak
Member
Shitty nerds are not the beginning and the end of this industry. They are a vocal minority which needs to be taken care of. However, saying "gaming isn't FOR nerds"... How does this statement help in any way? Other than pointing out her hypocrisy? She's writing about people attacking other people and their immature behavior, and then she acts exactly likes them. So I take it that being a "dick" is better than being a "nerd"? And ffs, if she wants to go that route, she's writing for games and tech. She's not exactly the frat-person.
Darkmakaimura
Can You Imagine What SureAI Is Going To Do With Garfield?
Yup, except the only thing I would add is the hacking and threats crowd are a whole new low. No excuse for that whatsoever.
kiunchbb
www.dictionary.com
Shitty people are shitty people, they just happens to also being a nerd.
Now I think about it, the term nerd should die too and be all inclusive. Everyone is nerd for something.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
No its not, its actually in alignment both with her point and with arguments I've seen put forth elsewhere, pointing out that there's a vocal contingent of video game players who think that the medium and the industry is "theirs"
Iorv3th
Member
Because shitty people isn't specific enough?
ActuallyHulk
Banned
I feel like this whole Twitter war thing is getting out of hand.
What does that have to do with the tens of millions of people who play games?
It's one thing to be critical of an actual community. Like that of a specific game, that has a specific culture and following. But Leigh et al are just demonizing all gamers.
Her labelling people who play games as nerds is just school yard bullying. There is no intelligent debate here. Just Leigh being self righteous and vindictive against an entire demographic.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
She's targeting what she calls nerds. I can understand the sort of people she's referring to. Shitty nerds. I'm not making any big statement about how being nerdy is a bad thing.
Her message is that game makers don't have to target gamers. I don't know where you're getting all the rest of this other than taking personal offense at her tone or descriptive word choices.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Replace CS:GO with Dota
Or Call of Duty
or Street Fighter
or the comments about Zoe Quinn
or the comments about Sarkesian
or the comments about any issue relating to anything that involves the overlap of games and women
if these people are a minority, then why doesn't the supposed "majority" that disapproves of their sexism and misogyny (and racism or whatever) ostracize them? I'm not denying that they're a minority, by the way, but in the very article we're discussing she talks about how the majority is harboring and fostering their toxic behavior
I'm a nerd. It's why I get angry when I see other nerds acting like douchebags. Surely you didn't think my post you quoted somehow included all nerds when it clearly included an important qualifier; that would just be poor reading comprehension.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
Exactly! I play CS:GO nearly everyday, and every single day there are multiple n-words, calling women sluts just because they chose to use voice (which I guess they read into as being the woman wants attention for being a woman), kids yelling that they're going to rape people in explicit detail, etc. No one ever says a fucking thing about these horrible people.
Imru al-Qays;127542578 said:
The adults are busy engaged in adult activities.
These debates are always shaped by the people least qualified to shape them. People with a special combination of too much free time, ignorance, a complete lack of self-awareness and the mentality of a middle-school student.
In the end it's completely self-defeating. The implicit message of Leigh's piece is "you shouldn't take this stuff seriously because clearly I don't take it seriously myself."
https://twitter.com/leighalexander/status/505099333659021313
This is a "thought leader." Someone who thinks that criticism can be dismissed because the critic isn't sufficiently well-known or doesn't have the requisite number of Twitter followers.
If gamers are so terrible then Leigh Alexander is the writer they deserve.
Iorv3th
Member
fair enough
They should. That's one thing I like about xbox live with the ability to report people for sending messages that contain harassing stuff and they usually end up getting banned. I don't know how many people end up bothering to use it though.
Trolls. Idiots. Abusive people.
These are valid terms.
Nerds/Gamers isn't. They're blanket terms. The former often being used as a pejorative term, and Leigh's use of it follows suit in using it as an insult. The latter covers so many people as to be meaningless. Like criticising film goers, or book readers.
John Rabbit
Banned
that leigh alexander is targeting people with, in her words "myopic and insular attitudes" and "tunnel-visioned, inflexible, embarrassing seriousness" is the very height of irony.
All this hatred of "gamers" is absolutely asinine. There are millions of "gamers" in the world. Millions of them. Sure there are some bad apples, but it's terrible to generalize an entire group of people constantly, and literally bully them and call them "nerds" and perpetuate stereotypes that are wrong and hurtful.
This is similar to generalizing all muslims because a few make terroristic threats, this is the same as generalizing all catholics because a few bombed some abortion clinics, or generalizing feminists because a few hate men so much that they want to castrate all men.
This is the same bullshit through and through, this hatred and malice only leads me to one idea. If you hate gamers so much, why the fuck do you still continue to work for a company whose main target demographic are these people that you hate so much?
All this shit does is just agitate a group of people who feel threatened, a lot of whom were bullied and harassed in their younger years with the same terms you're using today to bully and harass them.
Gamers are just people who like to play games as their primary hobby, that's all. It's such a broad term given to literally millions of people that it's incredibly silly to paint them in such a broad brush.
This is similar to generalizing all muslims because a few make terroristic threats, this is the same as generalizing all catholics because a few bombed some abortion clinics, or generalizing feminists because a few hate men so much that they want to castrate all men.
This is the same bullshit through and through, this hatred and malice only leads me to one idea. If you hate gamers so much, why the fuck do you still continue to work for a company whose main target demographic are these people that you hate so much?
All this shit does is just agitate a group of people who feel threatened, a lot of whom were bullied and harassed in their younger years with the same terms you're using today to bully and harass them.
Gamers are just people who like to play games as their primary hobby, that's all. It's such a broad term given to literally millions of people that it's incredibly silly to paint them in such a broad brush.
There have been many articles about those types of people though. The unfortunate thing is you can't police what people say. You can report them or mute. Sadly that's about all we can do.
I've seen this same sentiment argued before, and I just can't bring myself to agree with it. Then again, as a journalist, I guess it's my livelihood on the line if it does become the prevailing thought. The problem with relying (solely) on social media and blogs for news and information is how easily they can be slanted and biased without appearing as much. Say what you want about Fox News and MSNBC, but at least they wear their bias on their sleeves.
You also run into a serious issue of conflicting facts and the real message not getting out. That's a major problem with our 24/7 broadcast news culture in this day and age, where so many just throw out whatever they hear instead of waiting for confirmation of fact. But it's still a larger issue with social media.
I truly hope, not only in the game "journalism" industry, but throughout journalism as a whole, we can find that balance. We're certainly not there yet, but journalism is much more integral to our society than some believe.
Maintenance
Member
The majority is not posting on forums. Recently there was an article that said that most of the gaming demographic are adult females. If what you're saying is true, the most woman would be agreeing with what is being said, while in reality they would not. They are not heard because they are not posting in places like NeoGaf, 4chan, reddit, etc.
And this contradicts what I pointed out how exactly?
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