The GamerGate “scandal” continues to rumble onwards, with furious video game players continuing to protest that their misogynistic, abusive, death threat-generating consumer protest movement is actually about “ethics in video game journalism”. Kevin Wagner at Deadspin, in his story about the latest woman to be driven from her home over death threats, is correct to note that this is a kind of rebirth of America’s post-Reagan Culture Wars – a reactionary cultural group, threatened by the suggestion that maybe the things it self-defines with shouldn’t be centred entirely on meeting only its needs and meeting its demands, is lashing out with conspiracy theories and hate.
For those who write about GamerGate – be it on a website or on social media – it’s clear that among this small, loud group of (almost entirely white and male) people, there are sub-groups which approach the issue with different tactics. There are those who make up the dark, cold star at the centre of this mess, inventing lies and generating the abuse; and then there are those orbiting on the icy edge of this system, who often sincerely believe that they are part of a consumer boycott movement, and who see no contradiction in condemning the hatred they see while putting forward the false arguments that are used to justify the abuse in the first place. Some might call them useful idiots. (And sometimes, it’s possible to feel sorry for them. Rarely, but it is.)
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