Gamers = Muslims

[Underseer]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkai...look-at-the-controversy-sweeping-video-games/

This is the relevant section of the article:

Accusations of harassment and hacking began flying from both sides. Both Quinn and YouTuber Anita Sarkeesian reported death threats forcing them to leave their homes. One game developer went so far as to pen an open letter against harassment of women in the industry, garnering hundreds of signatures. (Though petitions against harassment sound about as effective as wars against terrorism. Abstract ideas and random actions can’t be stopped via wars or wishes. Update: I should note here that much of the online harassment we see against women is very troubling. I’m just not sure anyone, including myself, knows how to put an end to it.)

Anonymous death threats and anonymous rape threats are simply not an acceptable means of public discourse, but unfortunately it is all too common among gamers. Were Quinn an Sarkeesian overreacting? I have no idea. I don't know the details. I'm not going to speculate on that, and frankly I don't care. However, the fact remains that gamers are pretty much the only group I can think of that is as inclined as Muslims to casually toss out anonymous death threats over fairly trivial offenses. Sure, American conservatives do it too, but not to the extent gamers do.

I imagine this is just in-game "trash talk" that got out of hand. After spending so much time threatening to piss on each others' corpses or rape each others' mothers, some gamers start to talk like that in real life to real people, and that simply is not appropriate.

If you want to talk about #GamerGate, please start a separate thread for that. I am only interested in talking about the propensity to toss out anonymous death threats at real people. That crap needs to stop. We are not Muslims (well, most of us aren't).

 

[Underseer]

This really underscores the inherent insanity:

http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/27/6...n-says-she-was-driven-out-of-house-by-threats

Read the title of that piece:

Trolls drive Anita Sarkeesian out of her house to prove misogyny doesn't exist

See why I'm comparing the gamer community to Muslims? This kind of crap is right up there with "Death to those who say Islam is not a religion of peace."

 

[GenesisNemesis]

Do these gamers represent the majority of gamers? Somehow I don't think they do.

 

[Keith&Co.]

See why I'm comparing the gamer community to Muslims? This kind of crap is right up there with "Death to those who say Islam is not a religion of peace."

And we should force Isis members to convert to Christainity or we will have to kill them.
Confess your witchcraft or we'll torture you until you confess to witchcraft.
Throw all the homosexuals onto an island and they'll eventually all die out.

Meh. Compare the gamers to humans and you're done. Further division into specialties is redundant.

 

[Underseer]

Do these gamers represent the majority of gamers? Somehow I don't think they do.

Do Muslims who issue anonymous death threats represent the majority of Muslims?

It doesn't matter for the purposes of this comparison.

You don't see religions other than Muslims insisting that it's OK to to use death threats to prove Islam is the religion of peace as long as you think the person is really evil, and you don't see music fans insisting that it's OK to use anonymous rape threats to prove that you're not misogynist as long as you think Sarkeesean is oppressing men.

 

[repoman]

I have been following this topic a lot. On my phone now, so can't get into all the details of what i have "learned". Basically, after the tell all blog from the jilted ex, there was a DMCA by Zoe on MundaneMatt's youtube channel. Then that somehow got InternetAristocrat (youtube again) to make a long screed video about it that got 500k views in jst a couple days. IA has serious passive aggressive asshole charisma and I laugh at some parts of his vids. Think a meaner Dice Clay who is actually serious.

One of his older videos (when he was "jim81jim" ) he attacked an mildly autistic very nerdy guy in a 20 minute rant. It was brutal, but i couldn't look away. I guess i am evil too

So, he may actually be a person whose internal makeup discredits his arguments. Listen to him if you are too young or dont have a solid enough moral center and you will be a worse person for it.

 

[repoman]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8QfJijl0mo

That is an example of InternetAristocrats earlier work. Big guy taking on a middle school nerd.

--------------------------------------------

In my opinion, the user "Big Al" is a much more level headed guy who should have been the one to make the Zoe Quinn video, but being sensible and well balanced won't drive views. He has an interesting take on Tumblr which is related to the zeitgeist of the Zoe Quinn story:

 

[Unbeatable]

Do these gamers represent the majority of gamers? Somehow I don't think they do.

Do Muslims who issue anonymous death threats represent the majority of Muslims?

It doesn't matter for the purposes of this comparison.

I'm trying to figure out why this comparison matters. Who cares if you're doing something that Muslims also happen to do? Are you really trying to rely on a shared anti-Muslim bias to dissuade a particular behavior?

You don't see religions other than Muslims insisting that it's OK to to use death threats to prove Islam is the religion of peace as long as you think the person is really evil, and you don't see music fans insisting that it's OK to use anonymous rape threats to prove that you're not misogynist as long as you think Sarkeesean is oppressing men.

Of course it's not OK to use death/rape threats to "prove" these sorts of claims. Because that's just not how proof works.

On the other hand, it is how other things work. You can't use death/rape threats to prove that you're peaceful, or prove you're not hateful, but you sure as hell can use threats to manipulate your enemy's risk reward calculation. Even if they're not intimidated into submission, the cumulative psychological effect of constant harassment isn't really going to just roll harmlessly off of a normal person. So there is a realistic chance of wearing them down over time. Moreover, even if they personally don't crack under the pressure, people who might otherwise have followed their lead are bound to see what they had to endure and question whether they're willing to go through the same. So the death/rape threats have a deterrent value. Granted, the deterrent value is greater in the case of radical Muslims, who are actually known to occasionally follow through on their threats. But it's not as though misogynistic violence is unheard of. We just haven't seen it occur in connection with someone like Sarkeesian yet. Or at least not as far as I know.

 

[repoman]

folks, unfortunately you have to get into the gritty details of this story to even have a clue what is going on. It will take live 6-8 hours of reading and seeing the more popular videos about it to get a flavor of how many twists and turns it has taken. This is something that most of scattershot posters on this generalist board will not do. You think that reading an article in TheVerge or The Guardian will do this topic justice? Think again.

One thing that I think that is a bit naive of the critics of gaming media is that they seemed totally shocked that corruption has happened. Fuck, come on! Corruption is all over the place and often in people who act like their shit doesn't stink and very often in non-profits which is at the heart of the corruption with the Independent Games Fest (IGF) involving a shit ton of the people related to Zoe Quinn. Non-profits are such a scam in many ways - just pay yourself a huge salary and spend your "charity" money on your cronies.

 

[Clivedurdle]

Who cares if you're doing something that Muslims also happen to do?

I must have forgotten the news when gamers herded thousands of people onto a mountain or cut off people's heads in London and Iraq.

 

[dystopian]

Do these gamers represent the majority of gamers? Somehow I don't think they do.

Do Muslims who issue anonymous death threats represent the majority of Muslims?

It doesn't matter for the purposes of this comparison.

Actually, it kind of does. Even if the majority of muslims do not believe non-muslims ought to be killed; they do ALL share the same basic religious beliefs and texts which the hardcore fundamentalists use to justify their actions.

Gamers do not have a set of unifying beliefs, doctrines, or ideology. The only thing that defines a gamer is that they like games.

Now I don't think that the actions of a few muslims speak to the nature of the majority of muslims; but at least because of the shared beliefs there'd actually be a case for doing so, unlike with gamers.

However, the fact remains that gamers are pretty much the only group I can think of that is as inclined as Muslims to casually toss out anonymous death threats over fairly trivial offenses

That's a failing of your brain, not gamers. As I said, gamers do not have unifying traits like muslims have, so they're not really a 'group' you can make generalizations about. You could, if you specifically said something like FPS gamers, or what not. But not "gamers". But more to the point, it isn't gamers or muslims that casually toss out anonymous death threats over trivial offenses; it's HUMANS. Seriously, how long have you been on the internet that you think death threats from muslims or gamers are somehow more prevalent than those by anyone else? I see casual death threats, anonymous and non-anymous everywhere. Both on the internet and in real life. Go to the wrong sportsbar and you'll be inundated with death threats just for looking at someone funny; so why single out gamers, who unlike fundamentalist muslims, do *not* have an established pattern of actually carrying out their casual threats anymore than does the random driver who threatens the guy who cut him off on the road with death?

 

[Underseer]

Do Muslims who issue anonymous death threats represent the majority of Muslims?

It doesn't matter for the purposes of this comparison.

Actually, it kind of does. Even if the majority of muslims do not believe non-muslims ought to be killed; they do ALL share the same basic religious beliefs and texts which the hardcore fundamentalists use to justify their actions.

Gamers do not have a set of unifying beliefs, doctrines, or ideology. The only thing that defines a gamer is that they like games.

Now I don't think that the actions of a few muslims speak to the nature of the majority of muslims; but at least because of the shared beliefs there'd actually be a case for doing so, unlike with gamers.

However, the fact remains that gamers are pretty much the only group I can think of that is as inclined as Muslims to casually toss out anonymous death threats over fairly trivial offenses

That's a failing of your brain, not gamers. As I said, gamers do not have unifying traits like muslims have, so they're not really a 'group' you can make generalizations about. You could, if you specifically said something like FPS gamers, or what not. But not "gamers". But more to the point, it isn't gamers or muslims that casually toss out anonymous death threats over trivial offenses; it's HUMANS. Seriously, how long have you been on the internet that you think death threats from muslims or gamers are somehow more prevalent than those by anyone else? I see casual death threats, anonymous and non-anymous everywhere. Both on the internet and in real life. Go to the wrong sportsbar and you'll be inundated with death threats just for looking at someone funny; so why single out gamers, who unlike fundamentalist muslims, do *not* have an established pattern of actually carrying out their casual threats anymore than does the random driver who threatens the guy who cut him off on the road with death?

Unifying beliefs are not any part of the comparison. You're simply introducing them into the comparison to construct a special pleading fallacy.

And no, Muslims do not universally believe that unbelievers should be killed any more than Christians universally believe that abortion doctors should be murdered. So even if we ignored the special pleading fallacy, your argument still doesn't work.

 

[dystopian]

Unifying beliefs are not any part of the comparison. You're simply introducing them into the comparison to construct a special pleading fallacy.

And no, Muslims do not universally believe that unbelievers should be killed any more than Christians universally believe that abortion doctors should be murdered. So even if we ignored the special pleading fallacy, your argument still doesn't work.

*You're* the one who'se setting gamers (and muslims, in your other posts) up as being somehow different in the degree to which they make anonymous threats, and you do so without anything other than anecdotal evidence at best. Distinguishing gamers (or muslims) as somehow being different than the rest of humanity in that regard is the special pleading here; pointing out that gamers are not really an actual 'group' because they lack a common framework/identity the way people belonging to a particular religion (remember, you're the one who brought muslims into this) do is not special pleading, it's just a basic fact.

And no, Muslims do not universally believe that unbelievers should be killed any more than Christians universally believe that abortion doctors should be murdered. So even if we ignored the special pleading fallacy, your argument still doesn't work.

Why is it you do not see the irony of making this statement? Muslims do not universally believe that unbelievers should be killed, but you nonetheless felt compelled to start a thread complaining about how gamers sometimes make threats, and that needs to stop "because we're not muslims".

So... what, you don't believe that muslims universally think that unbelievers should be killed, but enough of them do to justify a bigoted comparison between gamers as a whole and muslims as a whole (rather than just between the asshole gamers and asshole muslims specifically)?

Why don't you address the real point I made; which was that it is *human* beings who are likely to make threats, and not specifically the members of very loosely defined 'groups' who just happen to have caught your ire?

 

[bigfield]

This really underscores the inherent insanity:

http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/27/6...n-says-she-was-driven-out-of-house-by-threats

Read the title of that piece:

Trolls drive Anita Sarkeesian out of her house to prove misogyny doesn't exist

See why I'm comparing the gamer community to Muslims? This kind of crap is right up there with "Death to those who say Islam is not a religion of peace."

I fucking knew it: Muslims have been actually trolling the Western world for decades.

All the Muslim outrage about depictions of Mohammed has just been a giant piss-take to get a rise out of Westerners.

I also find it funny that "trolling" is now synonymous with online harassment of any kind.

Dear media twits,

Learn what words mean before you use them. After all, using words is apparently what you do for a living.

Cheers.

 

[bigfield]

However, the fact remains that gamers are pretty much the only group I can think of that is as inclined as Muslims to casually toss out anonymous death threats over fairly trivial offenses. Sure, American conservatives do it too, but not to the extent gamers do.

And how exactly did you intuit this "fact"?

 

[Bronzeage]

I'm giving this my best effort, but for some reason I can't take a death threat from a "gamer" in any serious manner. Maybe I have fallen prey to a stereotype, but how would a gamer carry out this threat? Does he leap from the bushes with a chain gun or run me down in the street with a stolen Maserati?

Is there really something to the idea that video games can make a person calloused to violence and thus become more likely to murder real people, as a logical progression from video fantasy to the satisfaction of real world mayhem.

Of is the idea of Death Threat Gamers just another aspect of their fantasy world?

 

[bigfield]

Of is the idea of Death Threat Gamers just another aspect of their fantasy world?

Whose fantasy world?

It is great ammunition for professional victims like Sarkeesian, who earn money by publishing these threats.

 

[dendrast]

Some gamers are women.

Some gamers do not have a full grip on reality.

Some gamers are misogynistic.

(Substitute any group noun for gamers. eg, politicians, sports fan, christains, muslims, dentists....)

 

[Bronzeage]

Of is the idea of Death Threat Gamers just another aspect of their fantasy world?

Whose fantasy world?

It is great ammunition for professional victims like Sarkeesian, who earn money by publishing these threats.

The Worker's Compensation rates for a professional victim must be murder.

I've tried to get into video games, but the last time I spent any amount of time on them was about 10 years ago, when online gaming was brand new. I had friends who were deep into WoW type games from the beginning. I just didn't have the time for that sort of thing.

So, what's the deal? Are there really gamers who have become so antisocial, they've become a threat to public order, or is this another case of attention whore deficit disorder?

 

[dystopian]

So, what's the deal? Are there really gamers who have become so antisocial, they've become a threat to public order, or is this another case of attention whore deficit disorder?

There are people who've become so antisocial they are a threat to public attention, who also happen to be gamers. None of them became that way *because* of gaming, though.