VG247 pulls support and coverage of GOG.com following pro GamerGate tweet [Update: GOG apology]

Lucumo said:

I did edit my post after the picture got posted and before your post. Maybe try not to be over-aggressive in the future.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

You edited your post after I had posted my. Sorry if I sounded too harsh, but I think most people here are sick and tired of this same ol' song and dance every time GamerGate is brought up. You can see that people are already trying to pass this off as "interpretation" or "unrelated to GG".

I think the best stance anyone can take is to not give an inch to GamerGate. If something can be event tangentially related to them, then it has to be called out immediately. Giving it the benefit of the doubt only emboldens gatos to see how far they can push the envelope.

alosarjos said:

God... Now everything is related to politics and sexism...

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

did you even look at the actual tweet or did you just want to vent randomly?

Kalor said:

I'd be surprised if the person posted it without realising the context because if you're a social media person for a gaming company in 2018, I would expect that they know about Gamergate and the context of the gif.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Plus, any description of 'Games Journalism dying' within the last few years has good odds of being a GamerGate reference.

Frustratingly saw this the other day, and began investigating the dates. Floored me that GOG would allow this.

Really hope that wasn't the intended meaning and just an ignorant PR guy using that gif because it's edgy and kinda funny without knowing what it is about. I didn't know the meaning of the date before this thread and I also didn't know that the dev supports Gamergate and I consider myself at least informed when it comes to gaming news. If I would have had to guess what the date means in context to the scene it would be the release date of something Postal related that got torn apart by the press.

Waiting for clarification on gogs part before I judge.

They were going for shock value, that's for sure. As in, in some circles, refering to any tragic or controversial event in a "funny" way can be seen as edgy and counter-cultural.
This one was topical to video games and didn't involve mass murders, but still, two mistakes:
-Tweets will reach everyone, and not only your intended audience. It will reach people you are making fun of, and potentially people who were involved in the events referenced in the date. That's going to make people react.
-Removing it before preparing a PR statement (probably hoping nobody saw it?). Don't act unprepared or in haste, or if you do commit fully and do the whole procedure, PR statement included, in haste. This makes it look like the post was more thought out than the removal.

Edit: I'm not sure I read the tweet as "pro-gamergate" like interpreted here, as gamegate has become part of the ever-growing list of "should not but whatever" horrible memes that seem to become commonly used and branch out of their original crowd. - Not saying that it's a good idea to use it commonly (side effects of visibility etc.). I don't like how those spread.

Hamster Plugin said:

It does. August 2014 is when Gamergate started. It's specifically a pro-gamergate message. Games Journalism is just an excuse for the right-wing harassment campaign that it actually was.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

derFeef said:

Plus it's the date Zoe Quinn started to get death threats.
So yeah, the pissing on the tombstone is fucking disgusting, not to mention even posting it.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

In that case, especially with the latter, someone seriously fucked up and this should obviously be addressed.

Referencing the timeframe where someone starts getting death threats is a dumbass move.

Don't expect any strong statement from GOG/CDP. So far they've taken the Valve approach on this matter. "Republicans buy sneakers too."

After I saw this I felt ashamed I bought Postal 2 and the dlc.

The fact GOG posted this is even more disgusting.

Joey Ravn said:

You edited your post after I had posted my. Sorry if I sounded too harsh, but I think most people here are sick and tired of this same ol' song and dance every time GamerGate is brought up. You can see that people are already trying to pass this off as "interpretation" or "unrelated to GG".

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Nope, look at the edit time. It's before your post was up. The problem is that OP was lacking information (he only edited after Yukinari posted the picture of the tweet). Even the quote there says it's a .gif "of someone pissing on a headstone marked 'games journalism'". Games journalism had problems since pretty much the beginning but in the 00s it got definitely worse due to more "benfits" for whoever was testing/previewing the game/writing an article about it. So it's no surprise that the earlier posts are more questioning.

Zomba13 said:

I assume it was this? (This is an image of the gif because I couldn't find the gif):

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Yes. That was the date GamerGate became a thing.

Good on VG247 for taking such an immediate (and definitive) stand against this.

Like... What the fuck, GOG?!

Nitpicker_Red said:

They were going for shock value, that's for sure. As in, in some circles, refering to any tragic or controversial event in a "funny" way can be seen as edgy and counter-cultural.
This one was topical to video games and didn't involve mass murders, but still, two mistakes:
-Tweets will reach everyone, and not only your intended audience. It will reach people you are making fun of, and potentially people who were involved in the events referenced in the date. That's going to make people react.
-Removing it before preparing a PR statement (probably hoping nobody saw it?). Don't act unprepared or in haste, or if you do commit fully and do the whole procedure, PR statement included, in haste. This makes it look like the post was more thought out than the removal.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Yeah the removal without anything to state why shortly after isn't doing them any favors. I'd be really surprised if they would think no one or even many would see it. After all, I assume they pulled it because they started to see the deserved backlash.

God dammit.

Again people:
Harassment is BAD.
Pro-GG is BAD.

Don't endorse these fucks.

That has been a PSA.

Oh god, not GOG

Also, this is a very specific thing to post, so lol at those users claiming that it may have been posted in ignorance.

They better release a statement apologizing and fire whoever is in charges of the Twitter account

The title of this thread implies that GoG deliberately posted some pro Gamergate Tweet. In reality it could've been posted as a jab at gaming journalism without knowing whatever hidden meaning was behind it.

Kadin said:

Yeah the removal without anything to state why shortly after isn't doing them any favors. I'd be really surprised if they would think no one or even many would see it. After all, I assume they pulled it because they started to see the deserved backlash.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Yeah if it was a mistake you'd think they'd tweet out an apology right away

"Sorry we didn't put two and two together" or "we didn't understand the reference"

If you accidentally align yourself with an army of whining hateful man babies then you'd think you'd want to distance yourself from that ASAP

Lucumo said:

Nope, look at the edit time. It's before your post was up. The problem is that OP was lacking information (he only edited after Yukinari posted the picture of the tweet). Even the quote there says it's a .gif "of someone pissing on a headstone marked 'games journalism'". Games journalism had problems since pretty much the beginning but in the 00s it got definitely worse due to more "benfits" for whoever was testing/previewing the game/writing an article about it. So it's no surprise that the earlier posts are more questioning.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Fine. There's barely a minute difference between my post and your edit. I didn't see your edit until I had finished posting my message. Silly me.

But, really, that's besides the point. The problem is that many people are more willing to give this a pass than to actually question the reasons behind the tweet. How many people have claimed not to know about the date, or not to know about Running with Scissors's past support for GamerGate? "It lacks context", "can be a mistake", "I didn't know about 2014", "maybe it's a mistake"... Every single time, all the same justifications. So, let me ask you, if someone admits they don't know why this could be seen as pro-GamerGate support... why do they rush to justify it under plausible deniability?

Eh, this is a weird one. The Postal franchise's entire raison d'etre is to cause controversy, to offend people. Be that the games, or the movie. Pee on people. Offend religions. Use a cat as a silencer. Randomly kill bystanders. All this because you can, not because there is any proper reward for it: be an offensive disgusting asshole just because this game allows you to do so. For what it is, it's fun, at least Postal 2 is for a while. I haven't played the DLC that has the GamerGate reference, but I'm not exactly shocked or offended by the fact the devs decided to throw that in too - whether they truly believe in it or not, after 9/11 jokes, rape jokes, etc. it feels almost mandatory for them to stay relevant. Mind you, I am not justifying it, and I have no idea about the devs' actual political and social views.

As for GOG's tweet, I also don't know what to think. It's unfortunate to extrapolate that from the game. I personally had no idea what that date represented, so I guess it could have been a honest mistake, but you never know intent. VG247's stance seems correct: if this was an intentional move, they're basically implying gaming journalism is trash, so why should they bother wasting their precious "trash" space talking about a company hating them? This with how CD Projekt treats their employees and views unionized devs is not exactly a good look. Seems fair to stop covering them at the very least until someone from GOG speaks up and gives out an explanation. Because Postal 2 is an offensive game, it should be, and they are right to sell it because it's a piece of gaming history for better or worse. But it shouldn't be advertised as "buy this game because it supports GamerGate and hates gaming journalism".

For further clarification (and this should probably be added to the OP), August 28, 2014 isn't actually "the beginning of Gamergate" (that was August 16) but was specifically the date where Leigh Alexander published her article "'Gamers' Don't Have to Be Your Audience. 'Gamers' Are Over." Frequently and falsely referred to by Gators as the "gamers are dead article," the article prompted several other gaming sites to publish their own articles of agreement with Alexander's thesis (that video games no longer need to be targeted at the "hardcore" white male gamer, and can be targeted at a more mainstream audience instead). Gators completely lost their shit, insisted that all of these sites were colluding with each other, falsely claimed that the articles were attacking the video game industry or contained some kind of death threat, and "Gamergate" as officially went mainstream.

Amiibola said:

Oh god, not GOG

Also, this is a very specific thing to post, so lol at those users claiming that it may have been posted in ignorance.

They better release a statement apologizing and fire whoever is in charges of the Twitter account

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Agreed. Though, I'd go a step further and insist that they also condemn Gamergate; nothing less is acceptable after they have implicitly invoked it.

Coded messages to hate groups is not something that should be forgiven lightly.

Joey Ravn said:

But, really, that's besides the point. The problem is that many people are more willing to give this a pass than to actually question the reasons behind the tweet. How many people have claimed not to know about the date, or not to know about Running with Scissors's past support for GamerGate? "It lacks context", "can be a mistake", "I didn't know about 2014", "maybe it's a mistake"... Every single time, all the same justifications. So, let me ask you, if someone admits they don't know why this could be seen as pro-GamerGate support... why do they rush to justify it under plausible deniability?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I can only speak for myself but I try to always look at the good within someone whether an individual or a company. Maybe it's foolish but that's how I try to approach something like this when I don't have all the appropriate knowledge. So I asked from the start for clarification and then just went from there. I hope it didn't come across that I wanted to deny it from the get go, that was not the intention at all.

- Games Journalism
- August 2014
- Originally posted by game dev with the hashtag #Gamergate

That's not even a dog whistle, that's plain as day.

Hella said:

Agreed. Though, I'd go a step further and insist that they also condemn Gamergate; nothing less is acceptable after they have implicitly invoked it.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Yup, this too. It slipped my mind

oni-link said:

Yeah if it was a mistake you'd think they'd tweet out an apology right away

"Sorry we didn't put two and two together" or "we didn't understand the reference"

If you accidentally align yourself with an army of whining hateful man babies then you'd think you'd want to distance yourself from that ASAP

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I think this might be an issue of how PR procedures work.

They got the authorisation to post that tweet.
They didn't get the authorisation to post an apology PR statement on behalf of the company.
(or don't feel confident enough about being able to write it properly without hiring an apology specialist)
But they probably had the authorisation to delete any tweet that was problematic.

At least that's how I interpret the delay in statement, while the deletion was instant the moment it became polemic.
I think every PR person should have a list of quotes re-confirming a company's ideology they can use freely "in case something goes wrong".
Or always pair the approval of a risky PR move with a counter to it. Be prepared to things going wrong. Be aware of the risks.

I mean you don't need to be an expert on gamergate to realize that posting a gif of the player character pissing on game journalism might not be the best idea.

VG247 is in their right to interpret this as a dogwhistle because what kinda person would otherwise opt to choose this area in particular. They could've picked every other possible location in the game and took this one.

Mondo said:

I mean you don't need to be an expert on gamergate to realize that posting a gif of the player character pissing on game journalism might not be the best idea.

VG247 is in their right to interpret this as a dogwhistle because what kinda person would otherwise opt to choose this area in particular. They could've picked every other possible location in the game and took this one.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I agree with this. I had no idea it was about GamerGate and what that date meant without this thread's context. But still, showcasing that to sell the game seems to be a poor taste choice regardless. And this is from someone who does own and has played Postal 2. It's a game with an offensive nature, but that doesn't necessarily mean the GamerGate aspect has to be the selling point in 2018.

Was seriously confused and disgusted when I caught that GOG tweet some hours ago, what in the hell.

Good on VG247 for reacting so swiftly. My guess is that some dumbass employee was trying his luck, but why not issue an apology tweet instead of quietly deleting it? Guess this will force them to make some statement.

If nothing else, this sets a precedent that sympathizing with GG isn't tolerated, which I'm all for.

Man, people ITT really pretending not to see the significance of the date on the tombstone even after it's been explained multiple times already in this same thread?

It's like the speedrun version of "I don't even know what Gamergate is" being dropped 50 pages deep in a Gamergate thread.

Zomba13 said:

I assume it was this? (This is an image of the gif because I couldn't find the gif):

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Well, now I've learned the meaning behind it all. I didn't realize the developer was Pro Gamergate.

I still think it couldve been done in ignorance. Not everyone knows these details and that could include whomever handles their Twitter account.

GOG WHY

Good response by VG247.

Mondo said:

I mean you don't need to be an expert on gamergate to realize that posting a gif of the player character pissing on game journalism might not be the best idea.

VG247 is in their right to interpret this as a dogwhistle because what kinda person would otherwise opt to choose this area in particular. They could've picked every other possible location in the game and took this one.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Any marketing underling who want something (meta) video-game related (because GOG is a video game store, and gamegate is about games right? /s) while also edgy because that's trendy and related to the game's theme. It's Postal that they are marketing, after all. I'm positive someone in the PR chain even hoped in their heart for such controversy to happen.

Good lord. I hope GOG has a meaningful apology for this. Whoever tweeted that knew what they were doing.

If not - well let's just say I dropped Steam, so at this point I have no issues with abandoning storefronts.

ShinUltramanJ said:

Well, now I've learned the meaning behind it all. I didn't realize the developer was Pro Gamergate.

I still think it couldve been done in ignorance. Not everyone knows these details and that could include whomever handles their Twitter account.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

To assume that the employee running their social media account is oblivious that gamergate is a thing is giving them quite the benefit of the doubt imo. You can't navigate gaming twitter without constant exposure to GG jerks.

Didn't knew about this (link in the OP):

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/lane-davis-ralph-retort-seattle4truth-alt-right

Man, the Internet really brought all the freaks together, christ

No reason to overreact and panic VG247. They probably didn't know the reference, hence the deletion of the post.

Come on

The problem is that the gif can be interpreted as a dogwhistle that panders to hate group GamerGate, which itself has been proven to lead to radicalism and even murder.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Um yeah.. and probably GOG.com probably realized this later. I think it's hyperbolic reaction from them but ok, their decision, not gonna judge them.

ShinUltramanJ said:

Well, now I've learned the meaning behind it all. I didn't realize the developer was Pro Gamergate.

I still think it couldve been done in ignorance. Not everyone knows these details and that could include whomever handles their Twitter account.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Let's assume that the person managing the Twitter account wasn't aware of the GamerGate connection. Why choose, of all things, a snapshot of the game in which the character is pissing on a tombstone that reads "game journalism". Why? What point were they trying to get across?

That's why I can't buy into the "it was unintentional!" explanation. Even if it were, what kind of massage is GOG giving about their stance on game journalism? Come on, now.

Edit: I see the handwaving of the issue continues to pop up, even two pages into the thread. Wow.

Joey Ravn said:

Fine. There's barely a minute difference between my post and your edit. I didn't see your edit until I had finished posting my message. Silly me.

But, really, that's besides the point. The problem is that many people are more willing to give this a pass than to actually question the reasons behind the tweet. How many people have claimed not to know about the date, or not to know about Running with Scissors's past support for GamerGate? "It lacks context", "can be a mistake", "I didn't know about 2014", "maybe it's a mistake"... Every single time, all the same justifications. So, let me ask you, if someone admits they don't know why this could be seen as pro-GamerGate support... why do they rush to justify it under plausible deniability?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

You are being over-aggressive again. The point is that you said (or accused me, if I want to take a different tone as well) of editing my post after you made yours which isn't true. It has nothing to do with you seeing my edit after finishing your post.

As I said before, you have to ignore everyone before Yukinari posted the screencap/OP edited his post (which happened a bit later). Looking at the first page, apparently even a moderator ignored that and banned a user responding to a poor OP which lacked any useful information.

ghostcrew said:

Maybe try not using the 'political correctness gone mad' argument before you've even seen the tweet in the future? The post that you were happy to agree with without seeing the image just got a 5 day ban.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Just preserving this for posterity.

Roy Mastang said:

No reason to overreact and panic VG247. They probably didn't know the reference, hence the deletion of the post.

Come on

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

No, it's a good move. Until this is resolved, it's a clear pro-GG thing.

Joey Ravn said:

Let's assume that the person managing the Twitter account wasn't aware of the GamerGate connection. Why choose, of all things, a snapshot of the game in which the character is pissing on a tombstone that reads "game journalism". Why? What point were they trying to get across?

That's why I can't buy into the "it was unintentional!" explanation. Even if it were, what kind of massage is GOG giving about their stance on game journalism? Come on, now.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Yep, it's even cropped and zoomed... so yeah.

I think it's fair to see people expressing criticism of this tweet and, in my opinion, the fact it was deleted is a good thing. The question of whether that should really be attributed to the entire company and not just to their social media representative is important yet unanswered though. Beyond that, I don't feel like issuing sweeping judgments.

One thing that's especially bad is that the person posting this had to put a lot of effort into looking up (or recreating) that gif since it doesn't show up at all if you gif search postal 2 on google.

JCG said:

I think it's fair to see people expressing criticism of this tweet and, in my opinion, the fact it was deleted is a good thing. The question of whether that should really be attributed to the entire company and not just to their social media representative is important yet unanswered though. Beyond that, I don't feel like issuing sweeping judgments.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

same. the tweet was unquestionably terrible and ignorant and whoever was responsible for the social media should face the music but nothing is gained from digging up the broadest brush and sweeping it across the whole screen while covering both ears.

Whoever posted it should be fired.

I mean anyone who actually played this game probably knows this is still by far one of the least offensive things in it. Postal 2 is all about insanely offensive shit, i mean the game is even banned here in Germany and a few other country's as far as i know.
That doesn't excuse the tweet but at least they deleted it pretty fast.

Not sure if intentional, but I imagine they would be aware of it. There are plenty of images of Postal when googling they could have used to show a game which has "no filter", this seems very specific.

Let's wait and see what they say I guess.

https://www.gog.com/forum/general/why_does_gog_kotow_to_sjws/page1 gog has some interesting audience, btw.

If you're ignorant on the subject of gamergate, it's just a few seconds away to google "August 2014 gamergate" and understand the significance of the date being the start of the harassment campaign. GOG and CD Projekt could issue a statement on their stance unless if they're fine with VG247 cutting ties with them.

derFeef said:

No, it's a good move. Until this is resolved, it's a clear pro-GG thing.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Νο, I disagree with this statement, I think overreaction is the root of many problems in every industry.

Lets see what they do now

Running a social media account for GOG.com and not knowing about GG? I don't believe that at all. The deleted tweet only makes it worse. Not a good look for GOG at all.

I'm going to give GOG the benefit of the doubt and assume that the person posted it didn't know what they were doing.

This diminishes every second they stay silent. How hard can it be to just send out an apologetic tweet?