Nameless

[muckefuck]

Over the last few days, I've been reading up on the developments in GamerGate, trying to puzzle out whether I'm missing something and there are some legitimate grievances behind all the mobbing and abuse. All it's done is bring down my faith in humanity another notch.

It also makes me eternally grateful that I got my youthful anger out of my system when I did, back when the stakes were so much lower. The worst that ever happened to me in terms of abuse was one forged email from "God" berating me for my misbehaviour and fake news clipping plugging in my name as the suspect. The only time I had to deal with an email bomb, it was on a work account that I never use and, thus, a more-or-less random attack.

It also makes me more baffled than ever at young people's seeming indifference to online privacy issues. I never worried about anything more than upsetting a friend by betraying a confidence or tipping off a boss to how much private posting I was doing from work. The idea that I could have hundreds of enraged anonymous haters bombarding my workplace with hatemail and even DOS attacks because of an opinion I expressed never crossed my mind.

It makes me more thankful than ever that I've found such quiet eddies of the Internet to hang out. And it makes me more sceptical than ever about the latest Internet jihad. Yeah, it felt good to see Cook Source taken down over the haughtiness of its copyright-clueless editor. But even at the time, the thought occurred to me that this same tactic could be deployed against...well, anyone. All the characteristics which made the online world so enticing to me when I discovered it over twenty years ago are turning out to have terrifying drawbacks. I wonder if it's really possible to fix them and still keep what's good about this mode of communication. I certainly have trouble seeing how to balance anonymity with answerability or empowerment with responsibility.

Comments

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

Somebody needs to do a Guide to Gamer-Gate for Old Farts (like me.) I don't have the slightest clue what it's all about, and I keep reading allusions to it, which makes me worry that it's something important that I should care about.

I've seen people hounded to suicide by online interactions. (Well. It's quite possible, I suppose, those people would have found another reason to commit suicide. Still.) Maybe because things one's read on line seem to originate inside one's head and so seem oddly intimate? I don't really know. But I do know the peculiar power of Internet flames has to do with the nature of the medium somehow more than the actual words.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

Several people have tried to write that guide. Here's the most amusing version (though, as with most good satire, it's funnier the more you know of the actual events): http://www.clickhole.com/article/summary-gamergate-movement-we-will-immediately-cha-1241. I find that, in general, Vox is pretty good at backgrounders. Here's their take from about a week ago: http://www.vox.com/2014/9/6/6111065/gamergate-explained-everybody-fighting.

[bunj.livejournal.com]

I've also been avoiding reading about this, because I also suspected it would bring down my faith in humanity. After your post, I finally broke down and read the articles you linked to - and it all turned out to be just as repulsive and depressing as I suspected. I know the Vox article says this is kind of a growing pain as gaming journalism becomes more legitimate. It's also true that historical and continuing attacks on video gaming from a sociological perspective has probably contributed to a bunker mentality. But, holy-moly, that's a lot of misogyny and hate.

I suppose, if there's one advantage to internet hate, it is the semi-permanence of it. If someone is shouting invectives on the street, it's easy to miss or dismiss. Having it all there in black and white, and in such massive quantities (including actual attacks on peoples' livelihoods and property), makes it impossible to ignore.