Yeah it can be more than one thing, but since it started out as people basically attempting to psychologically and professionally destroy Zoe Quinn because of uncorroborated claims made by an obviously perturbed ex, and attempted to do so under the guise of caring about journalism ethics (the journalist in question getting little to no flack at the time funny enough. Probably something to do with not having a vagina), the legitimate concern many held to was mixed up in what began as blatant sexism and an excuse to attack the Quinn and suffered for it. Anyone associating with it could be too easily dismissed because they regularly refused to acknowledge the actual origins of the name and movement and condemn the whole damn thing. It'd be like going around saying you're a nazi because you're for socialism. Maybe you're not one of the ones who wants to kill all of the people who aren't white, but you're not doing your cause any favours by claiming to be a nazi instead of just saying you're a socialist.Originally Posted by Spuuky
And Skyblade, the original inciting incident was the Zoe Quinn thing. And seeing as there was no actual evidence any of it was true except the word of a clearly pissed off former lover/boyfriend or whatever, the fact that it blew up at all when there have been much better examples of conflict of interest in the industry that are proven to exist and received no attention until then is pretty damning. She was attacked because she was a woman and someone gave people a reason, not because they really cared about ethics in journalism. That people who didn't realize this and never bothered to learn about it jumped in later because all they saw was the smoke screen those original attackers put up got involved is unfortunate because they managed to delegitimize their arguments by associating with a group of people motivated to do awful things by sexism.
If gamergate had originated solely as people concerned about a possible conflict of interest they would have been after the journalist to explain themselves and looking for people to corroborate a story that never should have made it past the he said she said stage without it. Instead they attacked the wrong person with no real evidence and did some horrendous things. The entire movement was poisoned before it even began and I say that as someone who actually cares about conflicts of interest and ethics in game journalism.
I never said it was only misogyny. I said it began as some thinly veiled but still very obvious misogyny and more reasonable people let themselves get wrapped up in defending it. But it was too late because the name was already toxic to anyone who actually followed everything that happened with the Zoe Quinn stuff as it was going on. Again, you can't associate with nazis, call yourself a nazi, but then just try to say you're only for socialism, not the jew killing stuff. It doesn't work that way. You either distance yourself from the group that started out to do terrible things or you're going to lump yourself in with them. It's that simple.
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