Mate, you called me a racist. Time to take it back. Don't be shy now.

There are plenty of pale non-white nerdy manchildren out there, it's not even up for debate. I used to have two Chinese roommates. The only time they left the house was for food and drinks. They rarely saw the Sun. They were pretty pasty-white pale.

Having said that, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if the most vocal people talking against wokeness and diversity and inclusion, were white. Not in the least. Especially those talking about reverse racism.

Now that I've clarified and proven you wrong, it's time for your apology. Chop chop!

If you must know, the Kotaku article wasn't too bad. It reported the perspective of SBI perfectly fine. I even agree with some points of said article - the industry needs more transparency. The main issue with the article (and Kotaku in general) is the lie by omission - done to essentially foster a misconception. They fail to mention the harassment campaign initiated by an employee of SBI, there were plenty of screencaps and archives that could be found by anyone willing to put a modicum of effort into investigating the issue.

Of all the places they went to look for the other perspective they went to Discord. Discord is a toxic cesspit regardless of which side of an issue you fall on when it comes to politics. It's a horrible source for anything unless you want to talk directly to a developer in their discord or you're looking for US airforce secrets. Anything else and you're just fishing for a specific response. Kotaku could have talked to the creator of the Steam curator instead, but nah - that would actually get the other side's perspective. As to my source for the SBI harassment campaign - myself, I witnessed it personally.

The wokeness is less of an issue for me than most seem to think. I have plenty of games on the SBI list that I was looking forward too despite being "woke". Most of those games are no longer of interest to me because of how SBI acted in response. I may still pick up GoWR because I'm more of a DRM-free activist than anything else and I want to encourage Sony to distribute more games here (it's a compromise for sure - DRMfree wins out though). Quite a few games on the SBI list are automatically boycotted by me regardless of content simply because they have DRM.

With all that out of the way - what is your opinion of the SBI reponse to the curator?

Yeah it wasn't, was it? Certainly not full of factual inaccuracies, misinformation and all those things that people are accusing it of.

You could argue that they're lying by omission, I might even agree. No article will mention everything surrounding the topic, but if you think it really relevant to the article, then it should be included.

I'm more concerned about real life harassment and even death threats that were made as a result of GamersGate 1.0 and 2.0, at Kotaku writers, and Sweet Baby Inc. writers and employees. That's not even up for debate. On the one hand you have a Steam group with some guy who never played the games, outraged at inclusion and tolerance, and is trying to cancel creative content, and there's an attempt to have this group closed for doing so. On the other, Real Life harassment of real life people. Hm. Even death threats apparently at the Kotaku writer. I believe I know which one is worse, and the other I would barely even call harassment.

If you ask my opinion, it was not cool to try and have the Steam group closed down. But it was also not cool to try and incentivise groups of people to cancel creative content due to ideology. But what remains is the real harassment - something none of you have touched upon.

Yes, well, going to the "source" to get their side of the story, means going either to the Steam group, or the Discord group, whilst trying drudge through unverifiable facts and misinformation. Good luck writing an "accurate" article and representing them fairly.

I actually touched upon these topics with that B1tF1ghter dude who ran away screaming in CAPS, but these were some of the things I brought up. Would you like to explore them a bit? They seem relevant again:

2. Given that they went to the primary source on one side (Sweet Baby Inc.) and attempted to go to the other (the conspiracy theorist community and Discord group/Steam group), how would you have represented the other side? What would you have done differently? Do you think both sides should get equal representation in an article like this?

Once, BBC made a feature interview about climate change. Their mandate at the time was to represent both sides of the issue as much as possible. They had a renowned climate scientist on one side, and a (science-denying) "skeptic" with no peer reviewed publications to his name. They both got the same amount of time to argue their points. Even though the matter of anthropogenic climate change is settled science, and there hasn't been a single credible peer reviewed article published in the past two decades refuting it, the guy got equal footing than the factual scientist.

Do you think both sides should get the same exposure in such a case?

3. Do you think that a video gaming article built on one side on conspiracy theories and non-verifiable facts, could ever be comprehensive and conclusive?

4. Don't you think the burden of proof is on the ones making the claim that Sweet Baby Inc. did all those terribad things? Why does Kotaku have the responsibility to get to the bottom of the matter, when the accusers don't even have any verifiable facts (and indeed declined to argue their case, instead banning the journalist)?

5. What is your opinion on the Sweet Baby Inc. controversy, and do you base it on any verifiable facts?

6. Do you think your own prejudices and preconceptions have anything to do with the way you view the articles? Meaning, if the message was different (Sweet Baby Inc. is the devil in disguise and the ruin of the whole video gaming industry due to "wokeness"), would you have accepted the article?

7. Do you think sources should be dismissed outright, without even going through them and objecting to its content? Can someone just dismiss an entire source, like if it comes from Fox News, it's automatically bullishit and shouldn't even be given the benefit of consideration? Should the reader at least attempt to read the article, and establish whether they have major objections to its content, before acategorically dismissing it?

8. What does journalistic integrity mean to you? Is the fact that the source admits when they are wrong, and redacts articles/corrects them after the fact, enough to say that they have journalistic integrity? If one source redacts articles, and the other never does, which one has more journalistic integrity?

They definitely didn't handle the situation well, and their PR department (which doesn't exist, as it's just a company of 16 writers) should be fired. Yes yes, any PR, good PR. Bollocks, this resulted in vicious hatred and harassment against them. No good came of it.

This is the first time somebody asked me this. Thank you! Or even my opinion on the general matter.

Sweet Baby Inc.'s response to the Steam group owner, who never played their games, yet rallied support to cancel their creative content, and manufacture outrage, was not only ineffective in its goal, bad PR, but also just futile. Unless I'm not aware of something, trying to close down a Steam group and get the guy banned for possibly violating the company's TOS, and submitting a report, is not really harassment. It's a dick move, and if he broke TOS or lost his gaming library on his anonymous profile, that would be sad. A tear might be shed somewhere. Or just the world's smallest violin playing somewhere. By a cricket. But let's be real here - it pales in comparison to Real Life harassment of real life people, and what they had to go through, and what they are going through. Nobody should be subjected to that when writing about freely expressed artistic content, or writing about video games. That's insane.

So unless I'm missing something about the Steam group owner's "harassment", it by no means justifies what happened next.

This thread has came down to one fighting the world. lol

Can we all just shut up and enjoy the game? Gosh...

You clearly said pasty-white pale nerd manchild, which is a racist term used against white people. I saw pasty-white used in person to verbally assault people. Stop lying and being deceiving. lol . You could of easy said something like  nerd manchild, but no you had to bring color into it. 

By the way, I'm mixed.

Yeah, the spark that lit the conflagration should have been included. If it had I would've considered the Kotaku article to be fair. The woke stuff was kindling that contributed to it sure but you can't just talk about the controversy without mentioning the thing that set it all off.

I would've hoped that it goes without saying - but apparently not. I condemn in no uncertain terms any and all harassment. Even the creator of the curator page has asked for the harassment to stop because it accomplishes nothing (I can't link to the statement on steam cause Gog wouldn't like it). Nothing SBI (or Kotaku) has done warrants things like death threats

That said, I don't consider making a list harassment and refusing to buy such games does not constitute harassment either.

I've always hated the term "settled" science. The whole point of science is that it's never settled. Even some recent observations have called into question some of the laws of science (law of conservation of mass might not apply to the universe at large if expansion isn't the result of dark matter/energy for example).

But yes, the evidence of climate change is ponderous. As a journalist all evidence should be presented even if the other side doesn't have any. If the other side does have evidence don't refuse to present or acknowledge it.

I'm not looking for comprehensive and conclusive. I just want truthful honest reporting that doesn't intentionally leave important details out. The entire SBI controls all woke content is a bit much with no evidence without more transparency - but their reaction was well documented and archived.

I'm fine with the way Kotaku presented people's opinions on the woke stuff. The reaction to the curator has plenty of evidence, which is what most people blew up over.

Well, I witnessed the entire thing unfold on twitter in regards to the curator response. As for the wokeness - any game SBI works on seems to be woke to a certain extent. I don't know if that's the result of SBI directly or if they're just attracted to projects already woke. Them working on something is a good indicator that whatever project they're working on is woke. I personally don't mind too much and was looking forward to games that were new IP or already established diverse IPs like Shadow Gambit and Kingdom 80s.

My big issue is that many of the established IPs they were involved were ruined, not necessarily by being woke - usually by terrible writing. GoWR - way too many characters talked like teenagers and some of the dialogue is cringey. Suicide Squad too the Arkhamverse and just dropped a wrecking ball on the whole thing making a mess out of established canon. Alan Wake 2 requires going into spoilery stuff so I'll avoid that one.

Like I said, I would've accepted it if they reported the most basic part that started off the controversy in the first place.

No, I read the Kotaku article first, saw they left out the most important part and then dismissed it.

If they add corrections/redactions sure. I have yet to see any expansion or correction regarding SBI from Kotaku. I doubt I ever will but would be pleasantly surprised if they did.

As a gamer, threatening to take away my games would be a pretty big sin - but nothing deserving death threats or anything of the like.

When someone says White NO ONE is going to think Chinese or anything OTHER than White for the vast majority. That other poster was dogwhistling then trying to gaslight that they weren't saying what they actually WERE!

It's really not, especially in context, especially after I clarified. I know you want it desperately to be the truth, but you are lying and grossly misrepresenting me when you accuse me of being a racist. It's time to take it back. Be an adult.

When and where, and by whom, out of curiosity? In any case, I'm a reasonable man, I could probably see how people could through very creative means and in context use that as a derogatory term generalizing white people if you added some words to it, it's true. However, you would have to be really creative, under strict context criteria, and sensitive about the topic. But yeah, anything's possible.

And you are grossly mistaken here.

You seem to under the belief that skin-complexion equals race. You are demonstrably false, which means you are not talking in good faith, you're doing this on purpose. Nobody actually believes such things, in reality. I refuse to believe that, I haven't given up on humanity. Yet.

Anyways, chop chop, time for your apology!

Okay. And? What significance does this have on anything? Why did you say this?

Skin complexion does not equal race. I know you want it desperately to be true, but it's a fact. Live with it. Or not. I don't care.

Mentioning the colour of someone's skin in an obviously derogatory judgemental tone, the context of your post is clear. If you just wanted to mock "nerds" or "manchildren", you would have just said that and left it at that. Instead you felt the need to expand on that by judging people based on the colour of their skin (and you're the only one in the thread doing that). So your comment was indeed racist, your defence of that a shallow "It's different when I do it" form of denialism, and "You all owe me an apology for calling me out on my racism" is pure junior-playground level gaslighting.

Edit: Just for the record, I'm mixed race myself (French-Moroccan), and I can see straight though your "I'm not a racist, but..." rhetoric.

The Kotaku article's main topic wasn't GamersGate2.0, but Sweet Baby Inc. and their work. It's even in the title: 'Sweet Baby Inc. Doesn’t Do What Some Gamers Think It Does'. The Wired article however went into the controversy and the atrocious harassment that people received/receive: "The Small Company at the Center of ‘Gamergate 2.0’ Montreal-based Sweet Baby employs just 16 people. They now find themselves the targets of gaming’s latest harassment campaign." https://www.wired.com/story/sweet-baby-video-games-harassment-gamergate/

You seem to be only talking about the Steam curator's treatment. But that came later. Before that, the group existed full of people against diversity and inclusion and Sweet Baby Inc.'s perceived contributions to games. That's what was being discussed, not that the group's popularity exploded due to the bad PR actions of SBI, nor the alleged "harassment" by Sweet Baby Inc. against the gamer who never played the games he is trying to cancel.

But should they get the same exposure? And the reason why that controversy and public backlash occurred, was that an actual scientist, with many peer reviewed papers with high impact ranking, had the same amount of time and exposure and credit, as the non-scientist, when talking about science! That's insane. I get it that it's good practice when reporting on an issue to represent both sides, but damn. I don't want to hear quacks talking about medicine when I go to the hospital. I want to see an actual medical doctor and physician.

Hearing what the other side says, and then refuting or dismissing it, is not the same as giving them equal significance and exposure. In this case, the takeaway from the BBC interview was that there was significant disagreement about anthropogenic climate change. This kind of representation is entirely harmful to the public, as it misrepresents reality completely. The scientific consensus was studied in a few peer reviewed papers itself, and it's something like 99.9-100% papers that agree with anthropogenic climate change. Whilst consensus is a relatively new way of looking at things, it is needed in this day and age when lobby groups cherrypick and sow doubt based on singular papers published in low quality journals, like some of the oil lobbyist ones. In any case, you got me talking about the most important topic in the world, that I feel passionate about, yet I will stop due to forum rules and won't mention it again.

Again, the Kotaku article focused more on the whole "Is Sweet Baby Inc. even inserting woke characters into video games" based on their interview. I also don't think the so-called "harassment" was anything compared to the real life harassment of people that occurs to this day from Detected and others. However, Kotaku should have mentioned some of those things, as they seem important to some people, at least for posterity's sake, I agree.

I just don't see how that would make people so angry. Does Steam even take away people's Steam libraries? What do you have to do to achieve that? How does losing some video games, compare to death threats? This is the "both sides bad" argument, except there are indeed degrees of bad here. Why would one enrage people so much, and lead to the other?

They are fairly responsible journalists that have edited articles post-release. Unlike many other alternative media sources. I doubt they will add extra stuff to the SBI article at this point or ever, and it might be because they want to focus on SBI's side of the story more than the Steam group owner, but that's just speculation. I wouldn't have minded if they mentioned SBI's attempt to close the group, if it seems so important to people they are prepared to dismiss it and the surrounding harassment perpetrated.

....

I'm glad we can kinda agree on certain things! Like that harassment is always bad, and the harassment against Sweet Baby Inc., Kotaku, and many other writers, is horrific and much worse than whatever the Steam group owner of the cancel group SBI Detected experienced, as it included death threats on real life identities.

Your answers (yay) to my questions are appreciated, as I was trying to understand where people are coming from.

I still think we are focusing too much on the so-called harassment of the angry anti-woke video gamer, and not the real life harassment of the "woke writers" or the actual meat of the subject:

Does SBI do what anti-woke gamers claim it does? (when it comes to games).

Do you think it does? You somewhat mentioned that there's not a lot of evidence for such strong claims, or that it would be difficult to prove. Still, do you think Sweet Baby Inc. has that kind of veto power and influence it is being accused of?
Not even a little bit. I'm entitled to throw in adjectives at nerds who haven't seen the sun for weeks, as they nerd-rage frothing at the mouth in their caves, without being accused of racism.

Repeat after me: Skin complexion does not equal race.

Where have I even implied "Its different when I do it!" "It's different when I am racist!"? You're grossly misrepresenting the issue and jumping on the hate band wagon.

If I falsely called you racist for no reason, or due to some unclear event or words, on a public forum, would you accept it? Or would you demand an apology for the misrepresentation of your character?

Again, what significance does this have? Why do you mention it? And I have never even implied what you accuse me of, stop misrepresenting and lying about what I actually said!

Why you so angry?

I don't go around judging people on their skin colour (as you did in post 304), so this pure blame projection. You said it, not me, you own it. End of discussion.

Why ignore everything I said to you? Are you afraid of something?

Did I offend you? Did it hit too close to home? Are you a part of the "frothing-at-the-mouth pasty-white pale manchildren" who never leave their basement? It's OK if you are. Over here at GOG, nobody will judge you. You're among friends.

Reported.

Edit: Stop trying to contact me with creepy "friend" invites too.

For what exactly? You reported yourself for falsely accusing me of being racist? And lying about my character?

Well good for you!