While I was doing my daily walk I was listening to a podcast and they were talking to someone who has been playing D&D since the 80s. He was talking about how the hobby had been infiltrated and at a convention Anita was a special guest speaker who spoke about ........ wait for it....... sexism in Dungeons and Dragons.
How did she get to where she is and why did gaming companies bend the knee to her? Did she ever claim to even like video games?
It's funny because when I first heard the feminists whining about "toxic gaming" and how they heard abusive language on games I was a little sympathetic (this is before I realized what was coming) but then I realized that 99% of the "toxic" behavior is basically normal trash talk between guys.
Just Some Guy (great youtuber if you've never listened to him) once responded to these feminists complaining about not being welcomed and needing a "safe space" by saying that they were always welcome and there have always been women who liked nerdy things, but these particular women only started being interested when it became trendy in pop culture to be a nerd/gamer.
She honestly reminds me of the girls when I was growing up who made fun of my friends and I for liking video games, Star Wars, Sci-Fi, etc.
This is why I always say to be wary of any female who enters the hobby and can't shut up about being a female gamer/nerd. Same goes for any minority. There were always women and minorities interested in the various nerd hobbies but for some reason that is ignored along with the popular characters. Also, be very wary of any white guys who wring their hands and lament the "lack of diversity" in their hobby.
Sorry for going off on the tangent, but how in the heck has Anita gained so much power? Blackmail?
I can answer that.
She didn't in 2010.
She did for the Feminist Frequency Kickstarter in May 2012: Tropes vs. Women in Video Games.
I doubt she had a 'come to jesus' moment and became a born-again gamer. I suspect she adopted the guise of a gamer to make her feminist grift work better, in a "Do better, fellow gamers" sort of way.
It's not that she really became or ever was a gamer. That was just a tack for her self promotion. It was purely a marketing move, likely learned from her time promoting teleseminars.
She's been trained as a conwoman. She runs something between a crowd-funded MLM for NPCs and a protection racket on game devs. That's the brand of ideological snake oil that she's selling.
Wow! That is very accurate. You are right, for as much as I love Big Bang Theory, I do see it as a moment when being nerdy became trendy.
I would think at some point these companies realize who their base audience is. Look at what is has done to the comic book industry. Chasing the elusive blue haired weirdos.
The iPhone was also released in 2007.
50/50 demographic is surely a bad decision. They shouldve made games that is either 95% male demo or 95% female demo.
Gaming got to where it is because of majority male demo.. if it was majority female demo, it would never be as popular. Notice how its the male stuff that is cool, never anything female.
When was there a time where males rushing into a female majority demo hobby? Its always females rushing into female hobby, clubs and places.
The demand for inclusivity is the end result of mediums that have already peaked within their targeted demographics. When we look at the “golden age” of D&D it was still a small medium but had reached its peak within the consumer base who utilized it. This allowed people who had neither interest in what they were selling or who were intentionally trying to subvert the market in an attempt to reach a larger scale of consumers. The induction of social media made this impact far worse because companies no longer had to cater to their consumer base but to the outrage mob online. Anita is basically like the Italian mob, “This is a nice product, it would be a shame if I started breaking stuff.” Companies pay her to hold back the mob she created, I wouldn’t call it blackmail as much as extortion.
The X does make it sound cool.
As others have mentioned, I think her success can be pinned on a few factors:
An anecdote to illustrate point 3:
At one point in the past, I worked as an engineer on a game at Blizzard. We had a designer come in from Rockstar, where he'd worked on GTAO. He told me that he had personally invited Anita to visit Rockstar, and was super proud of having a picture with her.
He was exactly the kind of San Franciscan you'd imagine. Weak chin, super progressive politics, narcissistic, lazy, untalented, and definitely enjoyed the idea of his wife having sex with a big black guy. He was fired for sexual harassment.
Typical. Many feminist guys are sneaky rapists. Just go along to try to get some pussy.
To be fair to him, the standards of sexual harassment there were "awkward flirting." However, I think it likely that he was worse than that. I never pried into the details.
I wish you were wrong but as time goes on I’m seeing what you mean
Because corporate america believes in appeasement rather than fighting back unless you actually buy their product, then they are all about crushing you and your opinion. They know stupid people will continue to buy their product as long as they produce it and look like they care about pet cause dujour.