I know this discussion is had fairly often, but I was watching ShortFatOtaku’s stream about the DrKarlyn v. ShoeOnHead “debate”, and wanted to share a bit of my experiences I have had as someone who used to see themselves as being on the left.

Pre-Trump, I was fairly apolitical, but growing up in the South, I had lots of interactions with the “religious right.” As an atheist that supports equality, at the the time I thought that I must be center-left, because I had misconceptions on what the right stood for. It was about this time that I started running into the “woke” Tumblr types and would see some of their ridiculous posts about gender, diversity and racism. I laughed at these thinking they were a bit far out there, but dismissed them.

Soon afterwards GamerGate happened, but I wasn’t really aware of it at the time. I still played games and hung out in various communities, but I wasn’t aware of all of the stuff going on with journalism at the time. Some friends at my high school had shown me Feminist Frequency, but I just saw it as some weirdos who had no idea about gaming, not as a potential threat to the hobby. I stayed fairly apolitical during this time, but that didn’t last long. While spending time online, I started to see more and more “woke” nonsense and started watching “Feminists DESTROYED with FACTS and logic” compilations. I was made aware of Milo, Alex Jones, Ben Shapiro, and Project Veritas. I started going down what some people call the “rabbit hole.” I started watching “Skeptic” YouTubers including Shoe. I started watching Tim Pool and the Quartering daily, and made my way onto half-KiA as a lurker. I had begun to take the “red-pill” and was getting slightly obsessed. I didn’t like what I was seeing, but I needed to see more and more.

Eventually I made my way over to our Sub as a lurker, still, and became aware of more, that the half-KiA mods wouldn’t allow because it didn’t relate to gaming. I still see myself being closer to the center than to the right, but I feel like I can never vote for the current left, because they are so far gone. It is very cliche, but I feel like I was pushed away from the left which led me here. I’ve been around the sub for a while now, but only became active recently.