I agree that disclosure of financial relationships is important, but I think practically speaking expecting the disclosure of personal and "other" relationships is difficult. Are writers supposed to give a list of each occasion they have met someone involved in the development of a game on a social basis? Where is the line drawn? When out for a drink, had a chat at a convention, sat next to each other at a conference. I can't see that working.

I think this is a terrible idea. In my view each writer must have the freedom to chose what they write about. If someone doesn't like a particular writer's style, they can go somewhere else for their information. Requiring people to put forward both sides of a story never works. There will always be arguments about whether there are two sides of a story or whether both sides are equally represented. The crazy people who argue that vaccinations cause autism are a perfect example. When writing an article about vaccinations (or climate change), a writer shouldn't be forced to give equal time to people who hold discredited views on the topic. Who is going to vet these articles before they are published to ensure that all opinions are represented?

Personally, I think it is important for private organisations to be able to censor discussions on their own private forums. If people don't like it, they can go to forums that don't censor discussions. If you take away someone's ability to censor discussion, you open them up to accusations that they may be endorsing defamatory comments made in their forums and potential liability. I think telling other that they should leave your home if they say something you find offensive is as important as free speech itself.

Fact checking is important but I would oppose any measure that takes away a writer's independence to select what information they present and what information they consider irrelevant.

I haven't read any articles that blame straight white males for anything or "straight[s], white[s], male[s]" for that matter. I am sure they exist though. Again, I think people should have the right to say that if that's what they believe, and people who are offended by it can argue against it or not support those websites. People who agree with them can do otherwise. The free market is a wonderful thing.

Personally, I think people who are offended by "gamers are dead" articles and feel they need an apology, should seek some help. You are going to be get offended by a lot of things in life and if you can't handle an article being written by someone you don't know about people who aren't actually you (although you think it might be), you are going to struggle with a lot of things.

Whilst I think these points are admirable, they seem quite Orwellian. For me, freedom of the press and the independence of writers is paramount. I don't think games journalists/writers should be treated any differently from other journalists/writers. I find it strange that GG people seem to think they should.

I don't get it. Say I was gay. I'd understand that I would be underrepresented because of how sensitive the issue is for a large amount of people. I wouldn't expect a lot of games to have a gay character. Why? Because in real life, a lot of people hide their sexual orientation so why would it be different in games? Also, it doesn't make sense in many settings.

I had to laugh in Wasteland 2 when people were about to die and they both confessed to loving the same woman - and one of them was a girl. Stuff like THAT I can admire because it doesn't feel forced and it fits the game.

Journalists are expected to use objectivity and have a code of conduct. This is the case for all other journalists, just seems to be different for the gaming press. Using your definition, what was wrong with what Zoe's ex wrote then? Shouldn't he be afforded the same independence and freedom to spout his nonsense? By that matter shouldn't the Gamersgate people be able to say anything they wish, no matter how offensive? Why are they getting censured and banned. Pick one and apply it to all.

Something simple would be nice. Something like this is my friend is good enough for me at least. I don't think this is an acquaintance is necessary.

The original quote was talking about debate and conversation, not the articles themselves.

I agree that freedom of speech does not generally apply to private organizations - but by the same token private organizations should not be able to pressure other private organizations into censoring things. Attempting to silence ALL discussion about a subject anywhere should not be allowed. There is a reason gamergate is so focused on twitter - a horrific place for such discussions but an unavoidable one due to necessity.

Leigh Alexander " You know, young white dudes with disposable income who like to Get Stuff."

Casey Johnson "Many of the people slagging on Sarkeesian and Quinn bind their arguments up in bigger issues, saying that Quinn's situation shines light on ethical quandaries in games and gaming journalism, and Sarkeesian's illuminates crowd-funded "scams" where "social justice warriors" "cherry-pick" evidence to undermine the massive business and culture of video games, rightfully owned by a particular kind of white man."

Arthur Chu "Or maybe it has to do with the historical accident of gaming being seen as the last refuge of the straight white male, a neglected medium that because it was neglected was able to lag behind movies, TV, and music in the push to be culturally inclusive."

Joseph Bernstein "Imagine that as movies spread from laboratories to theaters over the next decade, the people who naturally gravitated to them were people who liked science fiction and new technology and had disposable income and time: young white suburban dorks."

Not to mention a lot of articles have an angry white guy yelling at the monitor as a picture on the page - that alone says a thousand words.

There's more - you just have to look. Twitter especially is suffused with accusations that all gamers are cis white males. And these are the NICE ones. The real assholes are asking for people to prove gamers are even human!

As for free market - there's always Mighty No 9 to show how that works out. Don't approve of them? They'll just steal your money so they don't have to worry about the economics of pissing off the fan base. Free market works real well with the yakuza and mafia also.

I personally can't understand how someone who considers themselves a gamer and not be pissed off at these writers. They are supposed to write about your interests because it's pretty much what they are about - writing articles about games. Instead they stab you in the back and twist the knife. Honestly, I don't care about an apology anymore - that might have worked a month ago. They are going to crash and burn because they know nothing about their audience and were insane enough to attack them.

That's the point with freedom though. Zoe ex can say whatever he wants, and I can call him a douche for saying it. Gamesgate people can say whatever they want and if I think it is offensive, I can call them out. Likewise I think journalists should be entitled to say what they want, if you don't like it, complain and get your gaming news elsewhere. I don't think writers should be told what to write and how to write.

I have never heard anyone suggest that a journalist who wrote, for example, on the massacre in Dili, should have give coverage to the massacre from the side of the Indonesian soldiers.

I don't think journalists necessarily have to be objective. John Pilger is a fine example.

Obviously you know nothing of journalism. A journalist cannot spout random insults calling entire swathes of the population names. As much as the claims of misogyny what about the misandry of the so-called gaming journalists. Apparently they get a free pass.

Journalists are supposed to act on a higher level than the masses else they deserve to lose their pedestals and can join with the unwashed masses. To call all gamers misogynists means those non-journalists should be removed from their assignments. Plain and simple.

I agree there should be disclosure of friendships, but I can see difficulties with drawing a distinction between an acquaintance and a friendship. Different people may have different views on what amounts to a friendship. My real problem with the proposal was the reference to "and otherwise". I have no idea what that means.

I disagree. Anyone should be entitled to put pressure on anyone else to say, you should not discuss this and if you do, I will boycott you. Its fundamental to freedom of speech.

Let's say for example gog.com allowed homophobic comments to be made. I should be entitled to say, thats not cool. I am not going to buy from your site and I am going to tell other people not to do so until you ban those kind of comments. I think I should be entitled to do that.

I don't know any of those people. As a straight white male I am not offended by those comments. I don't have a problem with people making them. If Might No 9 has stolen anyone's money, they should do something about it, video game consumers have the same rights as any other consumer.

I guess for me when they wrote articles about gamers being dead I was able to draw a distinction between people who play video games and the stereotypical gamer that those articles were referencing.

I didn't read those articles as suggesting that all people who play games are that stereotypical gamer, but that that stereotypical gamer is a dying breed and is being replaced with a more mature, more diverse group of gamers of different genders, cultural backgrounds and views.

When I grew up, in Australia, gamers were predominantly white or asian "nerdy" males under the age of 15. Girls generally didn't play games. Adults generally didn't play games. People who were cool or good at sport generally didn't play games. Those kids had certain attributes. I think that has now changed. Gaming is far more inclusive. Women play (and criticise) games. Old people (like me) do as well.

Here is a quote from one article "Note they're not talking about everyone who plays games, or who self-identifies as a "gamer", as being the worst. It's being used in these cases as short-hand, a catch-all term for the type of reactionary holdouts that feel so threatened by gaming's widening horizons. If you call yourself a "gamer" and are a cool person, keep on being a cool person."

I understand that some people need that to be explained to them, but I didn't.

Actually they can, and actually they do. Perhaps its just the press in the UK (seriously doubt it) but many newspaper articles use highly derogatory terms to describe people claiming benefit and foreign immigrants (and those that do both), and I'm sure many other groups.

Follow their reasoning to a t and you'll earn the right to exclude yourself from the ones being insulted, eh?

Imagine two girls. One girl is drinking a cocktail. The other, situated in a completely different spot, is drinking orange juice.
Your friend points to the girl drinking the cocktail and says "Look at that girl drinking orange juice!". Do you turn around, point in a completely different direction and say "Surely you meant this girl! The description doesn't fit the other one!" or do you correct him differently, by saying "No, she's actually drinking a cocktail."?

I could forsake the subtleties of pragmatics for a completely logical set of statements and understand the article like this:
"If you are a gamer, you are evil"
"I am not evil"
"Therefore - I am not a gamer"

I'd rather say - fuck their reasoning. If they were honest enough to say something along the lines of "There's this particular group of people that we believe to be this and this... and even if they don't exist - we disagree with such and such things", this would be a somewhat different matter. They consciously used the term gamer. In closing, I will leave you with enough rope to hang yourself - there IS an interpretation that can save your line of reasoning. You simply need to accept the logic of this joke:
"- Mom, dad... I am a homosexual, just like *celebrity X*.
- Well, Johnny... Do you have a million dollars?
- Ummm... No. Why?
- Well, in that case, Johnny... you are not a 'homosexual'. You're just a 'faggot'."

I don't really understand the cocktail/juice analogy. I'm not sure it is a good one in this situation.

The logic bit I understand, but I think it is more nuanced. I would put it more like this:

1. There are many definitions of the word "gamer"
2. One is, someone who plays games as a hobby.
3. Another is a person who plays games (usually a young male), thinks games are for males, who believes criticism of gaming is an attack on him personally, who abuses people who do criticise games and is change averse.
4. In my experience, there are more of the first definition of gamers than there were when I first started gaming.
5. In my experience, there are far fewer of the second definition of gamers than there were when I first started gaming.
6. Therefore, the definition used by the writers of the article must be the second definition.

I'll ignore the "joke".

Hold on... Why? Why would anyone use a definition that fits fewer people?

No, you're smarter than this. Get your ass back to the cocktail thought experiment and understand me.
The guy points to a girl and claims she is drinking orange juice. You can fixate on the "orange juice" part and insist that he means a completely different girl who DOES FIT the description but has jack shit to do with ANY of this... or you can simply correct the guy, assuming that he means the girl who is actually drinking the cocktail, and tell him that she's drinking the cocktail. If you remove the pointing part from the story, IT STILL WORKS. It still makes sense. You probably have experienced this yourself, when someone gives you a description that fits X, you KNOW that they mean Y and correct them, tell them that they're improperly describing Y. For bonus points you can mention that their description perfectly fits X.
Hell - even simpler example. If someone yells "Hey, idiot!" you can either assume that they're talking to someone else, since you're not an idiot, or you can turn around if you have reason to believe that they're referring to you, in spite of you not being an idiot, perhaps in spite of there being an actual idiot in the vicinity.
Don't tell me you still don't get it.

The joke shows the issue exquisitely. The parent is clearly using a different definition of "homosexual", right?
Well, that's the goddamn problem. I'm a gamer. You insult gamers - you insult me. You don't mean people who identify as gamers? Don't refer to not-necessarily-gamers as 'gamers'. It's that simple.

Maybe we try this. Lets look at fluke. Fluke can mean:

A fish, and a flatworm.
The end parts of an anchor.
The fins on a whale's tail.
A stroke of luck.

Whenever some uses the word "fluke", you don't just assume that "fluke" will mean whichever has the most in number, you look at the context that the word is used and read the sentence with the appropriate definition. If you get it wrong, and someone says "no not the fish, the fin's on the whale's tail", you don't say, "well I understood you to mean fish, therefore that is what you mean" (or maybe you do say that).

To me, it was so obvious what the articles were saying when they said "gamers are dead" that I didn't need the explanation. Again, it doesn't bother me that some people are more literal and did need the explanation. I just find it strange that they then choose to ignore it.

I understand the orange juice thing, I just don't understand how it assists those people who are using the broader definition of gamer to feel insulted by the articles about gamers being dead. To me, the term gamer (or girl) is clearly meant to mean one thing (girl with orange juice/second definition of gamer in my analogy), and people are incorrectly assuming it means something else (girl with cocktail/first definition of gamer in my analogy).

I don't think the joke does show the issue very well at all. I don't know anyone who uses the definition of homosexual that the parent uses, but even if people do use that definition of homosexual, doesn't that also not assist people who are misunderstanding the use of the word gamer in those articles (as it shows that there can be multiple meanings for one word - which they seem to be ignoring)?

I'm a gamer, you make a comment about a sub-set of gamers that clearly has nothing to do with me, you don't insult me. If you do insult me, that's fine, people insult me all the time, I move on.

I also don't understand why people take these things as a personal insult. Obviously the person who wrote the article doesn't know you personally. If someone says to me "Australians are racist", I'm not insulted by that. I say, yes there is a problem with outright and casual racism in my country and it sucks.

No, don't you bullshit me like this. Sure - you've answered precisely WHAT I'VE SAID. You haven't addressed WHAT I MEANT. Let's look at the definition of 'gamer', shall we?

"gamer
ˈgeɪmə/
noun
noun: gamer; plural noun: gamers
a person who plays a game or games, typically a participant in a computer or role-playing game.
"every gamer has suffered from small-screen videos"
NORTH AMERICAN
a person known for consistently making a strong effort, especially in sport.
"he's a gamer, always ready to go that extra mile"
game1
geɪm/Submit
adjective
comparative adjective: gamer
eager or willing to do something new or challenging.
"they were game for anything"
synonyms: brave, courageous, valiant, plucky, bold, intrepid, stout-hearted, lionhearted, unafraid, daring, dashing, spirited, mettlesome;
antonyms: timid, unwilling
"
For bonus points - look at that list of synonyms. Look at it! Glorious.

Other than in the darkest corners of SJW parodies, "gamer" is never defined to mean "misogynist, white cis-gendered manchild".
If you bring connotations into this, you've already lost. If you insist that the definition is different is SOME CIRCLES, then those circles can go fuck themselves.
Don't be a scumbag analytic philosopher, because *I* am smarter than that.

The irony of this statement is simply hilarious...

See - as I've mentioned before, when I get spat in the face, I don't say "it's raining". It would be a lot more convenient, wouldn't it?
What we have here is a group of people who use language in a very unorthodox way. That's basically your claim. That's your goddamn defense. "They mean something completely different, therefore you should disregard the interpretation that seems the most obvious." Gotcha.
What a glorious argument they've made too. They've defined gamers as misogynistic assholes... and then said that gamers (that is: misogynistic assholes) are evil. Wow! That's newsworthy, isn't it? That's not all! They also said that this conveniently defined minority (that neither you nor me are part of)... no longer exists! Holy shit - we're now discussing something that DOES NOT EXIST using a language we've assembled for our own purposed! We claim that the LABEL we've assumed to mean something completely different than it is commonly referred to SHOULD NO LONGER BE USED (even though it never has been). We tell this to the public at large. Do you not see the slightest bit of insanity, inherently present in your interpretation of this brought to its logical conclusion?

That's why I explicitly told you that I gave you enough rope to hang yourself with. I was expecting you to recoil and rethink your stance. I witnessed you tighten the noose.
What you seem to be advocating here is next to linguistic anarchy. I could say ANYTHING, and then claim I understand the words differently, making my statement reasonable... but taking away their impact. The "death of gamers" articles rely on this ambiguity to seem both true and insightful. Once you strip away their double meaning, they are either baseless slander or self-evident trivia.

FFS, man... "No true gamer"? This seems to be a hilarious inversion - "all true gamers are misogynists. If you're not - that's OK, you're just not the TRUE gamer we are writing about".

Making such generalizations in complete honesty is something I find insulting. That's probably because Truth is mai waifu ;P.

Sorry mate, I can only respond to what you write. If you want me to respond to what you mean, you are going to have to write what you mean. That said, I agree that, that is one common definition of gamer. All I am saying is that the term "gamer" can mean different things, and I am not alone, there are many others who think that as well (hint: some of the authors of certain articles - if you read them carefully you can see it quite clearly - see below).

I don't think "gamer" means "misogynist, white cis-gendered man child". I don't believe I ever said that. I agree that gamer does not mean "misogynist, white cis-gendered man child". We have found a point of agreement!!! :)

Again, I don't think they have defined gamers as misogynistic assholes, but I appreciate some people are super defensive about that kind of thing and see those allegations everywhere.

You'll agree that the definition of words changes over time. I really don't think they are being that unorthodox. As I tried to explain earlier (poorly apparently), I have been a gamer for 30 years, over that time the meaning of gamer has changed (the medium being quite new and all).

Here is a quote from another article:

"Gamer was once a convenient shorthand. Two people who had a shared love of a relatively niche medium could use it to identify each other and then bond over something that they wouldn’t necessary talk about in mixed company. The general public used it disdainfully, but it was meaningful.

That hasn’t been true in nearly a decade. As the term splintered, people clung to it and its variations. But now we’re all realizing something that has been true for years: People who play video games don’t need a label—they’re just people. "

Now you might not agree with that use of the term "gamer", but by you refusing to accept that meaning, you are just turning what was not intended to be a personal insult into one. If that is how you get your kicks, more power to you I guess.

I am really not following what you are trying to say. Are you saying words can only have multiple meanings if you say they do?

Are you saying, in the very articles where the authors explain what the mean by "gamer", that they are lying about that meaning? They don't actually mean the particular people they express refer to in the article, but they secretly mean all gamers? We should just completely ignore the context? To me the context is very important, using my example earlier, its how you tell the difference between a fluke, a fluke and a fluke, not to mention a fluke.

I am not sure why you quoted "No true gamer". I don't believe I have ever used that phrase. I don't believe true gamers are misogynists. I don't even know what a "true gamer" is supposed to be.

Well you might find you will go through life being insulted often. I hope you find a way of dealing with that.

Perhaps you can clarify something for me. You say in these article "gamer" means "person who plays games". Do you actually think that this article is about how people who play games are "dead' (figuratively dead, not literally I presume)? What possible basis would there be for saying that?

I'll have to take your word on this. Logos my witness - it's not because I haven't tried explaining it...

I explicitly mentioned that the article relies on ambiguity. With the regular definition their article is impactful but untrue. With their custom-made one - it's true but unimpactful. The only way it can function is by being illogical - relying on BOTH definitions BLENDING into one. The only way it can convince anyone is by relying on their initial bias when introducing their definition of "a gamer".
Imagine eradicating every occurrence of the word "gamer" in these articles. Imagine substituting it with something else, giving its definition, and following that - explaining what was intended to be explained. How much sense and how much of an impact would the articles have?

I have no idea what perplexes you so much about something plenty of people seem to have understood in an instant. Look up "connotation" if you must. Maybe that will provide you with some insight. Otherwise, if you insist that these articles aren't trying to paint people unfavorably and with broad strokes, I can only encourage you to do what I do - read posts carefully and try to figure out what the most reasonable argument imaginable could be.