"Nintendo fires Treehouse employee who was target of harassment campaign"

[kane_magus]

"Former Nintendo of America staffer violated company policy, Nintendo says"

So GamerGate is still a thing that exists? And Nintendo ended up firing someone because of their asinine bullshit? *weary goddamn sigh + facepalm + headshake*

Yeah yeah, Nintendo came up with some bullshit technicality for why they did it, but it was really because of the GamerGate bullshit. Rapp was a feminist and GamerGate hates feminists, oh yes precious we hates it forever, so they fucked her over with a smear campaign, and Nintendo just didn't want to deal with it, that's all.

(EDIT)

Here is an interesting video from a guy who claims to be a GamerGate supporter (more's the pity for him), talking about all of this shit:

(EDIT 3) Embed replaced with archive.org link because the original video was set to private. (/EDIT 3)

"This was a witch hunt. Flat out. We're better than this."

Um, no. He's openly calling himself a part of GamerGate, therefore, by association, he is not better than that, because GamerGate itself is demonstrably not better than that.

"I want no fucking part in that. I want no fucking part."

Then, uh, maybe he should stop calling himself part of GamerGate?

Ohhh but but but some GamerGate-supporting assholes also got fired from their jobs because they were GamerGate-supporting assholes and that's clearly equivalent to this...

No, it's not. GamerGate is an irredeemably toxic shithole. Always has been. In my not at all humble opinion, anyone fired from their jobs for supporting that shit means that absolutely nothing of value was lost from the company that fired them.

I like that this guy is apparently trying to, I don't know, "fight the good fight" or what-the-fuck-ever from the inside, from within GamerGate, trying to stop the doxxing and smearing and witch hunts and so on and so forth, but... dude. Really. If that's what he's seriously trying to do, then he's been fighting a losing battle on that front from day fucking one. He should drop the GamerGate label and do his own thing. He shouldn't hang that albatross around his neck if he wants to be taken at all seriously by anyone not already mired right beside him in the tar pit that is GamerGate.

(/EDIT)

(EDIT 2)

And here is an article by Jim Sterling. This is another one of those rare instances where he's actually using his dark powers on the side of good.

And I like how he doesn't even refer to GamerGate by name, but just refers to them as "Third Party Individuals." I might start doing that, if I ever have reason to write about it again. Or maybe I'll just find/replace "irredeemably toxic shithole" for every instance of "GamerGate," in the future. We'll see.

(/EDIT 2)

Comments

[owsf2000.livejournal.com]

A lot of companies, particularly big ones, have clauses that prevent you from working an extra job without their permission. Main use of these clauses is to prevent you from working with a competitor, but as you know it can also be used as an excuse to terminate someone's employment for things that are actually unrelated.

So before I make a decision for myself as to whether or not Nintendo was just giving in to the witch hunt or not, I'd want to know what that other job was. Of course, there is no doubt they found out about the second job due to the harassment.

(My comment isn't about those Third Party Individuals mind you. It's entirely about whether Nintendo was giving in to the pressure (if her second job was completely unrelated to anything Nintendo would have a reason to worry about) or if they saw a potential conflict of interests with that other job. Any large company would show the door to anyone found out to be working for a competitor.)

But I do agree with you about the guy trying to act like the good guy, as if GamerGate has any ability to shed itself of the shit it's mired in. People that want to try to do what GamerGate claims it wanted to do (the whole journalistic integrity stint iirc), should just go about and focus on that. And DROP all reference and association with GamerGate. Because as soon as you attach that title to your name, you instantly become associated with EVERYTHING toxic related to it. And the whole integrity thing is wiped away no matter how loud you scream about it.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, as you say, the thing is that Nintendo almost assuredly wouldn't have found out about the second job she was working if not for Irredeemably Toxic Shithole "sleuthing" it out and tattling to Nintendo about it.

And on top of that, from what I can gather, unless I misread something, she wouldn't have needed to be working the second job to begin with, if not for the supposedly "lateral move" Nintendo previously forced her to take, which was again pretty much a direct result of the smear campaign by Irredeemably Toxic Shithole in the first place.

So, in the end, from everything I can tell, whether Nintendo was within their rights to shitcan her or not, it's still all pretty much due to the the witch hunt and the sleuthing bullshit by Irredeemably Toxic Shithole against her.

[owsf2000.livejournal.com]

I was wondering where you got that extra info at first - looks like I stopped reading the linked article early. I got down to where they mentioned they reached out to Rapp and would update with any info she provides. After that, for me, there's a big ass white space on the page so I assumed it was finished, cause fuck off comments. ^^

I'd assume the spaces are caused by adblock. So sorry to them but I ain't opening up my computer to potential malware by adding them to the whitelist, especially since I never go to polygon without someone linking me to something specifically - of which you're the first to do so in the last year or more. ^^

Still not sure who she was moonlighting for though. If it was a competitor, then I still wouldn't hold Nintendo itself with a grudge. Regardless of how it's found out, a company has to act in it's own best interests. (For better or worse. Admittedly this policy is also the source of some of the biggest economic fuckups, speaking generally.)

But regardless, yeah, the GG assholes are still assholes. Especially where this amounts to nothing but a temper tantrum with the mentality of a kid. If you don't like how a company localizes a game... don't buy it. If you must, also state WHY you're not buying it. And that's pretty much the extent of any kind of backlash you should take. Targeting individuals with shit like this ain't acceptable under any circumstances, male or female.

I've seen various JRPGs and the like get similar and worse treatment in their localization. Generally I'll either get it anyway (If I think the 'damage' is minimal - for instance, I can handle a dubbed-only localization, even if I vastly prefer subtitled options for VA-heavy games) or if the game starts to appear so heavily censored that you'd have to wonder what the point of bringing it over even was... I'll leave it at the store.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

For me, it's showing an image below the "will update with any comment she provides" bit, and then below the image, the next paragraph starts with "After Nintendo's statement was released, however..."

Yeah, I'm not blaming Nintendo for it, not really. I agree that they were within their rights to fire her if she was indeed working for a direct competitor or some shit like that, though I still think that it was at least partially just a technicality that they used in order to get rid of her without having to otherwise dirty their hands with a contrived controversy manufactured around her by Irredeemably Toxic Shithole in the first place. She shouldn't have been working for a competitor to Nintendo while still employed by Nintendo (if that is indeed what actually occurred), no, but I'm just saying that regardless of where she was working the second job, A) Nintendo probably wouldn't have found out about it, since she was apparently doing it anonymously, and B) she most likely wouldn't have even needed to do the second job to begin with, if not all directly as a result of the actions of the shitbags in Irredeemably Toxic Shithole. They were actively trying to cause what did indeed actually end up happening, i.e. Nintendo firing her. Right or wrong (and whether the right or wrong lies with Nintendo or Rapp or both), most likely none of it would have happened if not first for Irredeemably Toxic Shithole. If not for them and their machinations, I seriously doubt any of this would even be a Thing™ at all.

In any case, no matter what else, I bet that the fecal repositories in Irredeemably Toxic Shithole are patting themselves on the back for a job well done and that they consider this to be a victory for them and their dicklint tactics. The only ones truly worthy of censure here, in my opinion, are the human septic tanks who actively call themselves a part of Irredeemably Toxic Shithole who do this kind of bullshit (and even the ones who don't do this kind of bullshit, but who still consider themselves to be a part of Irredeemably Toxic Shithole, because it is an irredeemably toxic shithole in which they are still actively participating of their own volition). Really, there needs to be some real, hard consequences against witch hunt smear campaigns like this, beyond just people tsking and wagging their fingers at them and saying what naughty little manbabies they are.

To go off on a bit of a tangent... it's kind of funny, because a lot of people lately seem to think that all this harassment of women in the video game industry only just relatively recently started up, with the Zoe Quinn stuff (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/717704.html) or the Anita (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/720974.html) Sarkeesian (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/735633.html) stuff, but really, they've been doing this sort of horseshit for quite a bit longer than that (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/561385.html).

But, actually, it's about ethics in video game journalism, amirite?