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It was going to happen eventually. In late August of 2019, a whole bunch of people called out developers who had sexually assaulted/raped/harassed//intimidated them. Let's see if we can talk about it politely, with respect for other people's opinions. One developer has already killed himself; expect this conversation to be full of triggers for both people who have been victims of sexual assault and people who have considered suicide. I assume that the mods will be paying careful attention; if they want to nuke this from orbit, I can see why. Next post will contain a list of links as of 8/31/2019.
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Sep 1, 2019 05:11
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Roundup by Venturebeat Alec Howolka, died 8/30/2019. (Aquaria, Night in the Woods) Zoe Quinn, who leveled the first public accusation, has deleted their twitter. Madpoetess, his sister, has protected her tweets about his death. Scott Benson's eloquent description of the events, originally on Kickstarter, is here. Link roundup on Reddit. Alexis Kennedy (Sunless Sea, Cultist Simulator). See here. Vlad Micu (consultant for indie games) Accused of harassment by Mina Vanir. Michael Antonov (Oculus) Accused of sexual assault by two women Marc Ten Bosh (Miegakure) Accused of harassing a fellow developer at PAX EAST Ken Wong (Monument Valley) Accused of emotional abuse. Has apologized. Jeremy Soule (music for many games, including Skyrim and Guild Wars) Accused of rape by Nathalie Lawhead I'd like to emphasize that "Why didn't you go to the police?" shows profound ignorance of the legal system. In the USA, to accuse somebody of sexual harassment requires a lawsuit; you can't just head down to your local police station. Furthermore, if you accuse somebody of actual rape, the cops (and later the prosecutor) decide whether you're a "believable" witness. "Can't be addressed by the law" is not the same as "Didn't harass anybody." 9/1 (from 2018) James Portnow (Extra Credits) is accused of tolerating Tyler Carpenter's harassment of Soraya Een Hajji, and of withholding a paycheck to force another employee to sign an NDA. (I found this one hard to summarize accurately.) 9/2 Scott Benson is eloquent about Alec Howolka's emotional abuse of him during NitW. "Alec was excellent at keeping groups of people siloed off and giving them the responsibility for his actions, for his well-being, for his journey to be a better person." 9/3 A.M. Darke accuses Kingdom of Loathing creator Zack Johnson, then her husband, of emotionally and physically abusing her, and of ignoring Randy Mack's rape of her. Gdoc with details. Johnson apologizes on Twitter and confirms her story. Ironically, Darke had posted the day before about Johnson's talking about what a bad person he'd been and how he'd gotten better ... to everybody but her. (Updated version 9/3) 9/6 Jeremy Soule has his lawyers send Nathalie Lawhead a Cease and Desist. 9/12 Tyrone Rodriguez, of game publisher Nicalis, runs a racist workplace. More. More. Rodriguez notpologizes 9/23 Adam Myers, CEO of Failbetter Games issues a damning statement about Alexis Kennedy. 9/24 Lesleyann White talks about protecting other employees from Kennedy, and about his victims' fears of meeting him at professional conferences. Cease to Hope provides a historical rundown of previous public reporting of game developers harassing. Depressing reading, because as usual very few consequences. Arsenic Lupin fucked around with this message at 21:54 on Feb 28, 2020 |
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Sep 1, 2019 05:37
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Not much of a cogent reaction in the face of how constant this has been outside of the sheer 'world is a gently caress' bodyblow of the sum total and hoping this leads to a continued snowball of people finding the confidence to come forward. One thing I do want to mention is Ben Judd is another major name that has been implicated in sex pest trash and other awful poo poo by a victim from the industry who spoke up in a series of tweets here: https://twitter.com/dirtbagboyfren/status/1166544727849623552 This hasn't exploded as much as the others in terms of visibility or a chain reaction of accusations, not that I need those to believe the victim, obviously, but has already seen some fallout and response from past associates of Ben's with Ash Paulsen from GameXplain in particular expressing disgust and disappointment. I personally think his name's worth including.
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Sep 1, 2019 06:08
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Arsenic Lupin posted:Jeremy Soule (music for many games, including Skyrim and Guild Wars) Accused of rape by Nathalie Lawhead I encourage everyone to actually go to this link and read Nathalie's post in detail, because it is a very good explanation for how things like this pop up, and how they are able to keep popping up if the industry as a whole has a culture that accepts and supports abusers. It will answer questions like "why does someone stay around a person who abused them?" or "why wouldn't you just tell someone?" Also, alongside the sexual abuse, it's a story about how the gaming industry takes advantage of new, enthusiastic labor and strings them along without compensating them properly, and also pushes people to their absolute limits far beyond what a job should reasonably allow. It's a microcosm of many things wrong with the industry as a whole, and I hope that her coming out and talking about it, alongside these other women, will finally spur on some sort of actual change in the culture of the industry beyond just lengthening everyone's lists of "Men We Shouldn't Work With".
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Sep 1, 2019 06:33
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Don't know if it's related or not but apparently the yogscast had to get rid of a couple of people for being some flavour of sex pest too, either way it's not just a problem with developers.
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Sep 1, 2019 07:26
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The entire industry is filled with creeps, basically.
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Sep 1, 2019 07:28
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Grapplejack posted:The entire industry is filled with creeps, basically. the entire society 
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Sep 1, 2019 07:33
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Grapplejack posted:The entire industry is filled with creeps, basically. Yeah it's not super surprising considering the hiring process is basically "best porfolio wins" in the creative industry. The people who are willing to give their whole lives to making hyper-realistic guns are also the capital-g Gamers that you have nightmares about engaging with on social media. I watched a TEDtalk recently in an animation class - it was from a guy who worked at Riot games in 2012, but viewing it through the post-Schreier lens was very strange. He was incredibly awkward and he was talking about opening up and being more social and outgoing and "spontaneous" and I couldn't stop imagining him farting on people in the office
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Sep 1, 2019 07:39
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It probably wouldn't solve it entirely (Just look at Hollywood) but I think if game devs actually unionized it would be a strong first step to combat the exploitative environment of the industry that helps foster this poo poo.
Accordion Man fucked around with this message at 07:49 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 07:47
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Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide.
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Sep 1, 2019 07:50
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Accordion Man posted:It probably wouldn't solve it entirely (Just look at Hollywood) but I think if game devs actually unionized it would be a strong first step to combat the exploitative environment of the industry that helps breed this poo poo. Unions would be a major contributor toward many things. I don't think anyone believes that doing these public twitter callouts is the best or most healthy way to handle these sexual harassment situations, but like Murderverse said, the Nathalie article is a great illustration of why there's almost no other option. The sexual harassment going unchecked is a similar symptom to the other incredibly lovely behaviors going on, like her not getting paid for incredible stretches of time. It's an industry people desperately want to be in and bosses desperately want to make their games and are willing to do whatever they have to to get them made.
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Sep 1, 2019 07:51
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Byolante posted:Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. What's the down low on the Vic situation? I saw some things on twitter earlier that his non professional lawyer hosed up his court case by replying super late, and basically admitting guilt in the court document. There's not a lot of places to get a factual "this is what he's accused of" without getting slammed with CHUDs
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Sep 1, 2019 07:54
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Byolante posted:Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. Seriously? That's your take on this whole thing? Super Hot take, bro. Alec's sister said "Yeah, this is pretty much true". and specifically asked people not to go after the accusers. (which of course, isn't going to be honored.) And as to the last sentence of your Nuclear Take.. do you or do you not remember that there was an IRC channel created by GG specifically designed to try to get ZQ to kill themselves? edit: I feel sad for everyone involved. Yes, including Alec. It sounds like his mental illness was a major factor in his behavior towards other, and I'm sorry that he couldn't figure a way to make things better other than suicide
SirFozzie fucked around with this message at 07:59 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 07:57
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Byolante posted:Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. If saying someone abused you is "conspiring to destroy them" then logically the only acceptable solution is to shut up and let them keep doing it. Which, I would personally suggest, is not an acceptable solution. If you honestly accuse someone of wronging you and they kill themselves as a result, you are not the party responsible for their death. Also, if you can't handle people being mad at you for being a sex pest, maybe don't be a sex pest?
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Sep 1, 2019 07:57
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Byolante posted:Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. lol this guy
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Sep 1, 2019 07:58
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Byolante posted:Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. 
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Sep 1, 2019 07:59
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tithin posted:What's the down low on the Vic situation? I saw some things on twitter earlier that his non professional lawyer hosed up his court case by replying super late, and basically admitting guilt in the court document. The entire video of the Ron Toye court deposition is available online. Additionally Toye is a known spouse abuser and the facts as they currently stand make it seem Rial's accusations were a way of mitigating Toye's anger at her for having a friendship with Vic.
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Sep 1, 2019 07:59
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Raping women? NOT raping women? I just wanted to grill!
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Sep 1, 2019 07:59
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Tell you what, Byolante: if this was a conspiracy, you're accusing Zoe Quinn and at least one other person (her conspirators) of murder. Do you have any evidence? If not, how is what you're doing any different than what you believe she did to Holowka?
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Sep 1, 2019 08:02
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Don't loving engage in good faith with that garbage.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:02
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Also definitely sure the horde of chuds crawling out of the woodwork had nothing to do with quinn wanting to log off for a while.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:03
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tithin posted:What's the down low on the Vic situation? I saw some things on twitter earlier that his non professional lawyer hosed up his court case by replying super late, and basically admitting guilt in the court document. https://twitter.com/greg_doucette/status/1139656018261086214 The Threadnaught is a good way to see Vic's "defense" gets shredded.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:03
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I think there's some level of sincerity behind that hot take - almost every abuser was abused themselves, this is learned behavior. Witch hunts are not beneficial, they make people who are in the wrong potentially double down and believe they are being slighted. Ultimately in an ideal world they'd get help and break the cycle, rather than be enabled for a decade then get publicly shamed and end it all. It requires a lot more open communication and hopefully this is the first lurch in that direction. There will be many moments that come from this which are not public and are beneficial - potential victims that are able to read the signs, potential abusers that realise they need help. It's really important to keep the conversation open to both sides - how to recognise when you're being abused, and how to notice when you are inadvertently doing it to others. cubicle gangster fucked around with this message at 08:06 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 08:03
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OwlFancier posted:If saying someone abused you is "conspiring to destroy them" then logically the only acceptable solution is to shut up and let them keep doing it. Also, before anyone mentions it: the legal system does not help accusers when it comes to sexual assault and harrasment. If the consequence of taking the law in your own hands, in order to warn people about someone who is active in an industry, is that the accused kills themselves, that's on the accused, on society in the sense that we've failed to raise good men and create a legal system that helps victims, and not in any way on the accuser. I feel for Howolka's sister, reading that Twitter thread was painful because open grief is painful, but he dug his hole. Black Griffon fucked around with this message at 08:07 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 08:05
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SirFozzie posted:https://twitter.com/greg_doucette/status/1139656018261086214 Byolante posted:The entire video of the Ron Toye court deposition is available online. Additionally Toye is a known spouse abuser and the facts as they currently stand make it seem Rial's accusations were a way of mitigating Toye's anger at her for having a friendship with Vic. Thanks - I'll read over the link. Literally my whole knowledge of the situation prior was "someone accused a voice actor of something" but trying to find out more didn't clear anything up as to what he was accused of. Dude has a lot of people defending him online and I didn't want to prejudice myself one way or the other. tithin fucked around with this message at 08:09 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 08:05
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Black Griffon posted:Also, before anyone mentions it: the legal system does not help accusers when it comes to sexual assault and harrasment. If the consequence of taking the law in your own hands, in order to warn people about someone who is active in an industry, is that the accused kills themselves, that's on the accused, on society in the sense that we've failed to raise good men and create a legal system that helps victims, and not in any way on the accuser. I think the successful prosecution rate for rape reports was something like 1% or so in the UK, I recall recently? Yeah it's just not a thing the legal system can handle as it stands.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:10
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OwlFancier posted:I think the successful prosecution rate for rape reports was something like 1% or so in the UK, I recall recently? It's a global problem, fundamentally.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:11
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Byolante posted:Perhaps, in light of how the Howolka incident happened, the pro-jared thing, the James Charles thing, the ongoing clown fiesta that is the Vic Mignogna situation, instantly believing any random accusation and immediately doing everything to destroy the career and life of the accused is not an appropriate reaction. Everybody involved in this poo poo instantly deleted their twitter because they all know they conspired to destroy somebody and ended up killing him. I don't recall any 'gamers' deliberately driving people to suicide. i'm not gonna engage with all of this because it's bad faith garbage but it should be noted that even the four things that you named that are supposedly things that are bad and have ruined lives involve: *a man who has had multiple work peers and his sister come out and support his accuser and say "we've confirmed this with other people who knew him" *a man whose awful behavior has been an open secret over his super long career and has creeped out numerous co-workers *a man who keeps contact teenage/adolescent fans in a sexual way, *a guy who is a beauty vlogger who got into a feud which has almost nothing to do with abuse in the games/media industry. these are the people who you are defending
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Sep 1, 2019 08:12
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Black Griffon posted:Also, before anyone mentions it: the legal system does not help accusers when it comes to sexual assault and harrasment. If the consequence of taking the law in your own hands, in order to warn people about someone who is active in an industry, is that the accused kills themselves, that's on the accused, on society in the sense that we've failed to raise good men and create a legal system that helps victims, and not in any way on the accuser. You are legitimising vigilante justice? If somebody lies and ruins you then its your fault and the legal system's fault? Are you so far down the rabbit hole you can't identify that in the process of trying to protect the victim you are blaming vicitims and legitimising abuse.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:14
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Byolante posted:You are legitimising vigilante justice? If somebody lies and ruins you then its your fault and the legal system's fault? Are you so far down the rabbit hole you can't identify that in the process of trying to protect the victim you are blaming vicitims and legitimising abuse. So you think the people accusing are lying, then?
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Sep 1, 2019 08:16
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OwlFancier posted:So you think the people accusing are lying, then? no, he's saying that informing the public about someone who abused you is literally just like going around assaulting criminals extrajudicially
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Sep 1, 2019 08:17
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DC Murderverse posted:i'm not gonna engage with all of this because it's bad faith garbage but it should be noted that even the four things that you named that are supposedly things that are bad and have ruined lives involve: OwlFancier posted:So you think the people accusing are lying, then? Pro Jared and James Charles have posted the receipts showing they were lied about so yeah, I would say people lied about them. The Vic Mignogna thing I described as a clown fiesta because basically everyone involved in that is a scumbag trying to ruin everyone else.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:18
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You're both taking stances at total opposite ends of the spectrum. What the gently caress are each of you trying to achieve? Do you actually want to help people, further a meaningful conversion, or just argue about who's got the most correct opinions? Shitloads of peoples lives are ruined on both sides. The conversation should be how can people who play, talk about and work in games prevent this from happening and offer support to hopefully make it happen less.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:19
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Like 1. This isn't vigilante justice, this isn't going out and executing people unilateraly, this is a group of people saying that someone wronged them, and then the other people in that someone's social circle talking together and deciding to distance themselves from the someone as a result of believing the people doing the accusing. This is collaborative social decision making. 2. What's the alternative, again? If you want to avoid that what do you suggest? They just need to keep quiet and not rock the boat even if they know they've been wronged? If you're saying you don't want people to accuse anyone of anything even if they've been wronged because that's too harsh what do you want?
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Sep 1, 2019 08:19
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I have no idea who Pro Jared or James Charles are but Vic Mignogna is a serial sexual harasser of underage girls. So comparing them to his case does not make them come off very well.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:20
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Byolante posted:You are legitimising vigilante justice? If somebody lies and ruins you then its your fault and the legal system's fault? Are you so far down the rabbit hole you can't identify that in the process of trying to protect the victim you are blaming vicitims and legitimising abuse. Yeah I loving am. I'll defend that just like I'll defend antifacism, civil unrest, illegal action to defend the environment and a myriad other things that might or might not be vigilantism. Because while I'll be the first to say that it's loving horrible if an innocent gets caught up in it, I'm not a loving child and I'm not a loving bootlicker. The established justice system punishes innocents as well, at much higher rate depending on how you define innocence. Edit: sorry (to the thread not Byolante) next post will be more polite, we're still at page 1 Black Griffon fucked around with this message at 08:23 on Sep 1, 2019 |
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Sep 1, 2019 08:20
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Byolante posted:You are legitimising vigilante justice? If somebody lies and ruins you then its your fault and the legal system's fault? Are you so far down the rabbit hole you can't identify that in the process of trying to protect the victim you are blaming vicitims and legitimising abuse. What's your evidence that Zoe Quinn and whoever you believe her conspirators are deliberately drove Holowka to suicide? I'm curious because, like you, I believe we should be careful about accusing people of heinous things in public. I think you and I can both agree that we hope nothing bad happens to Zoe Quinn or any other victim.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:21
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DC Murderverse posted:no, he's saying that informing the public about someone who abused you is literally just like going around assaulting criminals extrajudicially Look at how this happened. There was no due process, there was no period of finding the truth. ZQ posted some stuff on her twitter. Immediately his entire industry blacklisted him and booted him from the studio he founded. If the people who facilitated this thought they hadn't done something unconscionable there wouldn't have been a mad rush to try and scrub the internet of their actions.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:21
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Byolante posted:You are legitimising vigilante justice? If somebody lies and ruins you then its your fault and the legal system's fault? Are you so far down the rabbit hole you can't identify that in the process of trying to protect the victim you are blaming vicitims and legitimising abuse. A person killing themselves when their crimes come to light is absolutely not vigilante justice. That's absurd and I seriously doubt you really mean that. People who've been subject to abuse know that getting the police on side is an uphill struggle at best. Unless you wander on in there right after a violent rape, while your body is still a fresh crime scene, it's difficult for them to gather evidence. And even then we've seen again and again that that evidence may not even be tested, and since the examination process is traumatic in itself, it's not surprising a lot of people don't put themselves through that. And that's if your abuse even leaves clear physical evidence! Sometimes, the best we can do is warn each other, and hope to reduce the chances of the predator hurting someone else too.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:22
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Black Griffon posted:Yeah I loving am. I'll defend that just like I'll defend antifacism, civil unrest, illegal action to defend the environment and a myriad other things that might or might not be vigilantism. Because while I'll be the first to say that it's loving horrible if an innocent gets caught up in it, I'm not a loving child and I'm not a loving bootlicker. The established justice system punishes innocents as well, at much higher rate depending on how you define innocence. Also yes I would also go so far as to suggest that if your choice is extrajudicial action or literally nothing else then I'm personally quite liable to find your actions justifiable. But this isn't Zoe Quinn roleplaying as the bloody punisher, this is literally the lightest possible form of action you can take, saying someone did a bad thing.
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Sep 1, 2019 08:23
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