The gaming industry and gaming press is plagued with cancerous accusations of misogyny aimed at all sectors of our precious and well-loved trade, all from a group of ill-informed and self-serving false idols of the neo-feminist movement. Gaming journalism is more and more pointing the finger at you, the gamer, and the game producers, accusing you of heinous crimes and the implicit support of an evil and oppressive industry as if you yourself were the criminal.

Every day, more and more, we read about how we, the men and women, boys and girls, all who identify as gamers, are a part of this cruel misogyny.

But we must draw a line, and decide enough is enough.

Arguments made by neo-feminists on oversexualisation of women in gaming are loaded with false assumptions, biased and loaded conclusions, and even outright lies. As any gamer will tell you in a heartbeat, everything in games is oversexualised, and every gamer, male and female, loves it this way. The landscapes, the violence, the storylines, the people, absolutely everything in many games has been highly oversexualised. This has been the same of all art for centuries. From art depicting glorious battles, where leaders were felled in dramatic and romantic ways, or the over the top everything seen in movies and films. These neo-feminists seem to have taken it upon themselves to try and overdramatise the fact that in some games, women are dressed in extremely provocative and skimpy ways, only to completely ignore the fact that many of the men are too. Both sexes are also always highly disproportionate in body dimensions. They are completely romanticised and fantastical characters from a story. They are nothing more, and nothing less.

Does Fallout: New Vegas advocate cannibalism? Does Counter Strike advocate terrorist bombing? Does Mario advocate jumping? Does Assassins Creed advocate murder? Does Thief advocate theft? Does Poker Night 2 advocate gambling? Then why say Hitman advocates rape? Why imply Watchdogs advocates sexual slavery? Why imply Red Dead Redemption advocates prostitute abuse?

To really drive home the fascist lies, remember that Hitman does NOT advocate rape (it punishes the player for harming a stripper in the only tiny segment of the entire game featuring strippers), Watchdogs does NOT advocate sexual slavery (in fact, in that tiny segment that features sex slaves, you’re tasked with shutting down the slave ring), and Red Dead Redemption does NOT advocate prostitute abuse (in fact, the neo-feminist blog video depicting this act was completely fake, at no point is that a sequence of events unless you very specifically go out of your way to do this). Do not let the fascist lies trick you.

“The road from legitimate suspicion to rampant paranoia is very much shorter than we think.”

Abuse received by neo-feminists online is abhorrent. However, the fascists will wear this abuse with a proud grin like a medal on their chests. The abuse and threats made by obese losers in their basements between masturbating to midget porn will never, ever form a real threat. No neo-feminist has ever been in danger of assault, attack or rape. The statistic of similar threats being followed through has been and will remain zero. These self-serving feminazis will show off their abuse with a deep sense of pride, in the hopes that being insulted and threatened will somehow elevate her argument and position.

What will the neo-feminist fascists do to harm the industry if given power? What creative processes, what storylines, character ideals, what future talent will they stifle, censor, forbid, in an effort to shape the expanding and free evolution of gaming into something that fits their standards?

“With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.”

Do not let the fascists tell you what we can and cannot have in our games. Developers, do not let them stifle your freedom to express and create, and design games that live on in our hearts forever. Do not falter as the fascists try to have your liberty to be creative be censored and restricted by their rules, their regulations, to fit their ideals and their opinions.

End the fascism, and let our gaming industry once again break free of chains that some would put onto us.

We, the petition signers, the men and women, boys and girls that love our games so much, will not let our industry be bullied and cornered by self-serving neo-feminist fascists. The industry isn’t perfect, but it’s ours, and we love it.

#gamergate

Ms Sarkeesian, Tear Down This Wall