htown1980: You've illustrated my point perfectly. None of the points you have raised has anything to do with journalistic ethics. You don't like their viewpoint, you don't like them advocating it, making arguments in favour of it, lobbying for it, etc. As I say, it's completely fine for you to do that (although I disagree) but it's not about ethics in journalism.
Well speaking for myself I don't care that much about ethics in game journalism, personally I consider that the main thing missing from game journalism is not ethics... it's actual journalists. If I ended up siding with GG it's not because of ethics but because I cannot stand bigotry and demagoguery.
So yes, that's true for me at least.
But on the other side it doesn't mean that it's not an ethical concern too.
There is nothing wrong with having a personal opinion, there is nothing wrong with having an interest in social justice (I would even say that it's actually a pretty healthy thing to have), there is nothing wrong with wanting more diverse games (heck most my favorite game genres are nearly dead so I would love more diverse game genre); but that's when you start thinking that your opinion gives you the moral high ground and the right to start throwing hate and insults towards those with a different one that it become a problem.
And it's already bad enough if you are some random person on the Net, but if you happen to also be a journalist (or at least pretend to be one) then yes, I do consider that it's also a journalist ethic issue.
htown1980: Side note:
Has any journalist actually claimed ALL violent games are specifically violent to women?
Has any journalist tried to force censorship or change at the point of a gun?
I'd be interested to see links
It's usually a lot more insidious that that, it's done via multiple ways for example
Using "emotionally charged" to demonize things they don't like : calling them "
toxic", "
misogynist", "
perpetuating rape culture", "
reactionary", "
promoting violence toward woman,etc... and of course you can mix things for more impact : "
this game is not bad but it would be so much better without all the toxic misogyny in it Shaming and attacking developers or publishers who don't follow the one truth : calling extremists, hate mongers peoples who support or just give the benefit of the doubt to the wrong side or simply dare to question the validity of their arguments, dog pilling devs for a character/art/trope they disprove of,etc...
And of course you also have the good old hypocrisy that always works wonder :
"
I am not asking to censor games... but asking developers to stop their evil objectification of woman is not censorship" (you get bonus point for using as many emotional charged words as you can), "
I am not not asking to ban games... but when others do I applaud with both hands" or the always popular "[i]I am not asking to censor games... but asking distributors to stop selling them or publishers to no longer publish them is not censorship"
