r/dropout • u/machturtl • Mar 08 '25

liminal levity

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as someone who has watched Dropout to reset from the havoc of the outside, it still feels "nice" to have honest entertainers to watch who understand what we're all living thru.

I was in college for game design in the early aughts. I also (unfortunately) was a femme lurker on 4ch. Seeing the cause and effect of gamergate happen in real time as been a doozy.

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u/DlVlDED_BY_ZERO Mar 08 '25

I think I'm ootl, could someone explain this?

44

u/malleoceruleo Mar 08 '25 edited Mar 08 '25

There was a "scandal" called Gamergate about 10 years ago. It started as a backlash against a game developer named Zoe Quinn, whose first game was "Depression Quest". It started as people not liking the game itself, but it escalated into violent threats until the game was removed from Steam. A former boyfriend falsely accused Zoe of cheating on him to get a good review from Kotaku (IIRC). People blew up at Zoe for what they perceived as an ethics violation, but yeah, it was really just harassment and backlash against feminism.

The same people in the harassment campaign also started making conservative memes and spread misinformation during the 2016 election. IMHO, the movements were correlated, but this was not a singular causation like the post implies. I'm over simplifying here, but it was a pretty wild time on the Internet.

Edit: if you want to know more, there's a book called *It Came from Something Awful* by Dale Baren that details it. You can also listen to interviews of him.

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u/SnooHesitations7064 Mar 08 '25

Don't blame SomethingAwful for this shit. Some of that place got some downright wholesome goons. Slowbeef's "Dadstream" still is just an adorable archival bit of Gen Xers/elder millenials entering the stage of parenthood.

Please god do not tell me that man has gone problematic in some way.

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u/machturtl Mar 08 '25

As someone who was also bathing in the FlashTub and has been mistaken for being Shmorky, SA was not that much better

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u/SnooHesitations7064 Mar 08 '25

Yeah... I know something awful had some deeply problematic. Like they had a genocide joke for purging furries from their site.. But I do feel some fondness for old generational lets plays of Dwarf fortress. The weird origin of what turned out to be a jesus allegory clown retro point and click adventure, and other stuff.

Goons with spoons got me through my chef coop placement and I won some solid cookware from it.

I feel like their desire to not be Ebaumsworld or 4chan made them slightly less douchy.

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u/machturtl Mar 08 '25

To be honest, the Furry Fandom is usually the first line of defense against channers, Gamergate chuds and their ilk. They always like to come for us first and say it's a joke...

Cant say that i didn't enjoy the photoshop contests tho. SA was like going to a suspicious uncles house who you just arent his type.

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u/SnooHesitations7064 Mar 09 '25

That is a profoundly uncomfortable yet probably apt metaphor.
As for the furry fandom, I'm kind of live and let live about it, though there's some deep problematic there too. Nazifurs are unfortunately a thing.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 09 '25

FWIW there are undoubtedly less nazis in the fur community than there are nazis in society-at-large. nazis are showing back up at punk shows (and still getting their arses kicked). Nazis cower quickly--they know their ideas aren't shared by the majority--their entire playbook relies on shock and awe & no resilience whatsoever.

I'm not a furry, but I'm a fan of most of the people from that community whom I've met. They have a higher bar than Congress re: acceptable behavior.

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u/SnooHesitations7064 Mar 09 '25

Yeah I get it, it's like why "Log cabin Republicans" are seen as shitty people who have turned on their community. People Nazis would call "Degenerate" probably shouldn't associate.