Whoa. Correia Takes the SJW Movement to Task · 12:13am Nov 15th, 2014
I know, I've been quiet lately. I've been trying to finish up the first draft of Colony (which is in the final act now, finally), and that's kept me pretty busy. Hunter's story is getting its editing pass this weekend (so ... tomorrow, actually, dang) and will start going up not long after I work out the cover details.
Anyway, before I get back to work, I just wanted to share a link. This link, specifically. It's from Larry Correia's blog, and it's sort of a summation, a "why I do this," of sorts. And it tackles, of all things, the SJW insanity and how it's been hurting writing.
Thing is, I feel he makes some incredibly good point. Correia's been fighting this fight for a while, and he's never been shy to point how foolish an opponent's arguments are. With this post, he summed up just about everything distubing that's been permeating the writing culture, and in a very blunt, to the point sort of way.
Warning: It IS blunt. But sometimes bluntness is needed, and in this case, I happen to think Correia is entirely correct.
I'd prefer not to kick off a firestorm of controversy in the comments, and with this one, that's a possibility. So in the event you want to weigh in on this, remember the rules of my comment threads, please: No cursing. Be considerate and well-spoken. Don't resort to nastiness, bile, or any of the other typical, less-astute methods of conversation seen around the internet.
Anyway, I need to get back to work! This book needs to get done!
A very interesting article. And its doubly so for what they imply beyond just with direct words. I rather like it.
I'm honestly gonna have to disagree here, and very much so.
Partly because, while there are a few decent points in Correia's post, it's primarily a rant about SJWs. Particularly how mean he claims they are, and how he says they hold up the worst examples of sexism and racism and then say all their opponents are like that...while Correia himself zeroes in on one or two SJWs and them equates those people with all SJWs in very absolute terms. Methinks this is a case of the proverbial pot and kettle.
But I will admit my biggest objection is based on emotions. Sue me. But I've heard enough from "the other side" to verify that, oddly enough, they're scared too. Scared of very similar things, even. Scared that, if they say and write and create and be what they want to they'll be attacked and hurt.
I guess in the end it's the same old prisoner's dilemma the human race has always faced, eh?
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Here's the thing though. I've been following Correia's blog for a while. I follow him on Twitter, too. And those accusations he says SJWs make? They make them (you can track anything until it's locked or deleted, and then you go to the internet archive). He's been on plenty a receiving end of twitter threats, publicity smears, and all sorts of SJW rage. At one point it got so bad that his wife actually received phone calls from old college friends who had read some of this stuff about how her husband was a rapist, psychopath, etc, and had called to make sure she was okay.
This isn't nearly a case of the pot calling the kettle black. It's a case of the kettle raging at the silverware. Horrible things have been flung at Correia, all because he won't knuckle under to the agenda. Granted, most of it is nuts. It's amazing, for instance, how many times he's been accused of simply being a "white, privileged, man." He's Hispanic. He grew up on a dairy farm. When one prominent writer who accused him of being a white bigot was responded to with the information that he was Hispanic and from a diary farm, she replied that he clearly was 'not Hispanic enough' along with a bunch of nastier things I won't print here.
Is Correia innocent of not being direct and aggressive? Not at all. But he's been taking this group on one post at a time, and I've only seen confirmation of what he's saying. These people battling him are vitriolic, acid-spewing hatemongers, and he's weathered some of the worst of it. Read through his history and check his Twitter feed along with those who have linked to him on the attack. It's not a pretty picture.
Thanks for posting this. Was a nice read to see. Very blunt, and at the same time refreshing in a way.
The fire rises my friend.
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I'm in a tight spot here because I have quite a few friends in the "SJW" circuit (and I vehemently oppose GamerGate, etc), and I still agree with some of the aims of the movement even though I really don't want to go as far as shaming members of a minority for not being enough of a part of the solution. Both sides of this divide are adamant in maintaining that it's the other side who slanders and threatens and harasses while ignoring the bad apples on their team, and it's really fucking exasperating. I just want an environment where nobody is afraid to share experiences and people are civil to each other.
It's especially ironic because the "you're not thinking enough like you're marginalized" practice seems a hell of a lot like gaslighting, a practice that the movement itself has called attention to and reviled. (For those that don't know, it's about taking people with legit grievances related to marginalization and convincing them that it's all in their head and everything's fine, in a mildly brainwashy way.)
There have been times (especially when I read about the GamerGate thing and got angry) when I wanted to be known as SJW in times of solidarity, but it's just a label that lumps you in with other people who aren't like you and lets people make assumptions about you that might not be true.
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Neither is Bob Chipman or Zoe Quinn's Twitter feed. I am not convinced that this is the one-sided beatdown as you seem to be implying it is.
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You know what, I was trying to figure out how to put it but Solitair said a lot of the stuff I'm feeling.
I also admit that a lot of my initial reaction was colored by the fact that reading articles and posts about the "Gamergate" controversy is where I heard the term "SJW" first. In that context, it's often getting used by 'Gaters to describe just about anyone who opposes them. When people who seem a-okay with hurling death threats against anyone who so much as says "hey maybe we should rethink how we treat women in videogames" it gets fairly easy to assume their enemies must be alright. I admit I may have allowed myself to oversimplify things, and it wouldn't be the first time people claiming they're fighting for the right have been just fighting for themselves (cough, TERFs, cough).
Getting back to Correia's post, I personally still think it's rather hypocritical to talk about your opponents in harsh absolutes while complaining that it's bad when they do it, but I can understand that he's under a lot of pressure and so would be inclined to be fairly aggressive by now. I will agree that being told he's "not minority enough" to have his views count is bunk, though. I can't really speak to his writing and the reaction to it, since I've never read anything by him.
I hope this clears up any confusion.
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You haven't? Man, you are missing out! Go down to your local library and grab a copy of Hard Magic or Monster Hunter International. I highly doubt you'll regret it. Correia writes amazingly fun action-adventure stories, the kind that keep you up until 4 AM turning pages to get to the end. They won't change your life, but as he's pointed out, that's not the point. He just wants to write a good, fun, awesome book, and he's very good at it.
It also makes it really interesting when his detractors have tried to attack his stuff, because there isn't much to do aside from point fingers and say "I don't like this." The last time one of them tried to be more direct, they accused him of hating democrats because one of his books featured the "Office of Coordinator of Information" as a villain, put in high power by FDR, talking about how fake the name was and how no president would ever do that, especially not a democrat. Larry's response (aside from laughter) was to link him to a history page about the very shady Office (which later was broken up and became several still-existing semi-shady government organizations, including the CIA). Said office was real, and very much a darker part of America's history.
Long story short? They're very fun books, and he does his research.
2597149 I'll keep it in mind then. Thanks.
Oh boy. Fair warning to you, VikingZX. Gamergate is a very heated discussion that I think runs parallel to what Correia is talking about, except in the games industry. Any attempts so far to have a discussion with games journalists about ethics in journalism (more or less spearheaded by YouTuber TotalBiscuit) aside from one individual (Stephen Totillo, EiC of Kotaku) have been ignored, and anyone wanting to use the hashtag has been called every name under the sun so far, from a hate campaign dedicated to driving women out of the games industry to "worse than ISIS". The biggest strength of Gamergate is coincidentally its weakness, that of it being a leaderless consumer revolt. Without a leader, everyone has to read up on the issues and articles, and decide for themselves on their plan of action, rather than listening and believing any demagogue.
Unfortunately, the fact that anyone can just out of the blue create an account, sling insults or death threats, and then attribute it to GamerGate is a problem if you do not take into context the dozens of replies condemning those messages. Twitter is an obvious example, with a group that attempts to report and police harassment, calling themselves the GamerGate Harassment Patrol. On a side note, Twitter is a horrible platform to have a debate on.
The topic of generalizing "the other side" on any side is a huge problem, and one I believe to be rooted in semantics. How one person defines "SJW" often is not the same as another. Same thing with the terms "feminist", "harassment", and even "gamer". With the former, I've had to argue with some pro-GamerGate folks that GamerGate is not against feminism as a whole, based on the fact that GamerGate folks are in agreement with discussion by the FactualFeminist Christina H. Sommers. At the same time, I've seen some folks against GamerGate (which I usually label as Anti-GamerGate) at the same time call Mrs. Sommers an anti-feminist. The term harassment is also under a lot of usage. When neutral interviewer David Pakman asked developer Zoe Quinn if she was interested in appearing on his show for an interview, she claims he was harassing her. Then mainstream media decides to misappropriate the man to the "Pro-GamerGate side". As for the actual term gamer, well, that's probably one of the reasons GamerGate even sparked off. About eleven articles from different sites was released within the span of 24 hours all claiming that "gamers are dead". Combine that with censoring discussions on several sites, including even 4chan, and you have a massive backlash.
So one of the best gifts on the internet (anonymity) is also one of the worst. Trolls are probably having a field day seeing reactions on both sides. I know that there are groups such as the GNAA and Bill Waggoner Crew that are enjoying this and milking every moment.
Apologies if this counts as derailing the topic, but I see parallels with what Correia's saying happens to him, and what's happening to what is apparently a small group of cis white men leading an as of this date a three-month long hate campaign to drive all women from the games industry.
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There is one difference, however, with what's happening to Correia and the writing industry as a whole and the whole #Gamergate thing. The first is that it's been happening for a lot longer, decades, even, and it's gotten to the point where the crowd that now self-identifies as SJWs is in control of a lot of the industries once proud awards and institutions (such as the Hugo awards). The second is that Correia and other authors aren't facing nameless hate. It's very named, very public, and very organized. He's not talking about people who just happen to be loud on Twitter. He's talking about people who write news articles for newspapers such as the UK's Guardian and other large news groups (granted we all know The Guardian is a bit of a joke, but it's still large, widely read newspaper). These are people who identified themselves and then publicly attacked him via news articles simply for putting himself in the running for the Hugo award. These are people who have slandered him, attacked him, urged their hordes of followers to attack his page and downvote his books—all because he dared make himself eligible for a Hugo award and the (gasp) asked his followers to read the Hugo submissions and cast their vote for whatever they felt deserved it. He was accused of trying to "game the system" by telling his fans to be part of the Hugo process, and then in the same articles accusing him of such, his accusers rallied their own fans to vote for specific books for reasons such as, and I am not making this up, voting for one story the person in question had never read but wanted to win because it was "written by a woman."
Correia didn't just wake up and decide to start a fight. He's been attacked by self-identified SJWs who are some of the more prominent members of the whole movement for years now, and he's really taken it for the team. He's been called all sorts of things, accused of all sorts of things, and he just keeps on trucking. But it's not an overnight thing here. Larry's a great guy and a fun writer, and he's very sick of how badly the book industry has been warped by this movement (and it's been warped badly). Larry just wants an industry where people can write what sells and people enjoy reading, not where you can only right what a select group of people tell you you're allowed to write about (which is what it's been slowly moving towards).
I understand that anonymity online is a big thing, but Correia doesn't go after or bother with the anonymous stuff unless it's in really ridiculous extremes. He goes after the ringleaders, the people who are writing news articles about this kind of stuff and that have hundreds of thousands of followers. The people that really drive the movement.
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I'd have to disagree with you there. Just because the games industry is fairly new compared to literature, doesn't mean SJW's haven't gotten a foothold in video games. A difference is that they haven't taken the AAA parts yet, where the dollar is the bottom line for decisions. However should you take a look at the Indie scene, there is a different story. A point GamerGate has been attempting to look into is if they actually managed to take over IndieCade, and the Independant Games Festival, which are two important events where indie developers promote their game in a competition. There have been allegations that judges have a financial stake in some of the games being judged, and thus would be biased towards that game winning. Should a game win the competition, it gets a free pass onto Steam, where plenty of consumers purchase said game due to the promotion. You can see where there would be a possible conflict of interest.
Now as for the second point you make, I admit there is a difference there. Because there is indeed a third faction aside from the angry folks of GamerGate, and those against the hashtag. That would be trolls stirring up things on both sides. However, those against GamerGate aren't all nameless. And some of them are organized. Some folks in GamerGate dug up what is called GamesJournosPro, which is a mailing list proving that there indeed exist a group of writers from different publications that should be competing against eachother, but instead are colluding to spin a narrative. It should raise eyebrows when eleven different publications comes out with very similar articles stating that "Gamers are Dead"
And, not to belittle Correia, but the same things have been happening to certain folks within the Games industry. Slighty reaching out of straight video games, an early example would be what had happened to Max Tempkin, the person responsible for creating the card game "Cards against Humanity". Accused of raping someone, several publications picked up the story and raked him across the coals. Even when acquitted and an apology made by the accuser, Kotaku writer Patricia Hernadez has this to say in the comments section:
A closer example to video games would be Stardock CEO Brad Wardell, who had allegations of sexual harassment against him in 2010 that was dismissed with prejudice in 2013. During that time however, several games publications "reported" on the situation, with Kotaku (once again) putting in the headlines that there was "Damning Evidence" against him (later changed to "heavy allegations"). Since then, he has been attacked and threatened in a similar manner online, being called racist, sexist, evil, and a whole slew of other names that also have been swung at the gamers of GamerGate. Some folks have had their employers called and been accused of supporting a hate movement, to the point where some have been fired over supporting the topic.
As for the accusations of skewing the votes, I ask that you refer to the part above about IndieCade and the IGF.
What I'm trying to argue is that it's not just literature that has been warped. I congratulate his efforts, and just wanted to make note that the people of GamerGate understand what he's going through to a degree. And as for dealing with it, as a leaderless movement there are several "Operations" ongoing, the most prominent one being Operation Disrespectful Nod, and their current largest target being Gawker Media. A lot of us are ok with SJWs having an opinion, as much as we disagree. We draw the line when their opinion gets put on a pedestal and any attempt at criticism gets called out as harassment and the critics insulted.
I won't say I agree with everything Larry said. But I do agree with most of it.
If nothing else it did remind me I needed to spend a bunch of money on his new books. Plus I want to get my hands on a MHI patch.