The art of being Bill

This is the dumping ground for my artwork, some of my writing, and the occasional rant and shout out.

[billthemanfromkentucky]

Attention PR Jabroni’s

So apparently Rougestar acted like a retard on Twitter again. And like clockwork, you kids started screaming “OH NO, SLADE MADE US LOOK BAD”, “MUH PR” and shit along the lines of “OH NO, WHAT WILL THE MEDIA THINK OF US NOW!!!111!!!”

 Really? You lot are still worried about what the likes of Gwaker, Vox, Newscorp or Comcast owned “news” outlets (MSNBC, NBC, CNN, Headline news, just to name a few)  have to say? After almost 10 months you still think that maybe the big boys in the crooked press are going to give us a fair shake? Ladies and gentlemen, when this whole thing kicked off back in August, we knew that we were going to be painted as the villain, we knew that the media at large was going to outright lie to the general public about what #gamergate was about, and we knew that the mainstream press was NOT going to cover a topic that dealt with corruption in ANY form of journalism. So why in Lemmy’s name are you still trying to play politics with these fat cats? We donated to charities dedicated to feeding the needy a, feminist charity encouraging women to get into game development, suicide prevention and donated to a victim of SEXUAL ASSAULT and they still claim #gamergate is a hate movement dedicated to harassing women out of the video game industry. The mission of #gamergate has been echoed by Whit people, Black people, Latinos, Filipinos, Japanese, Americans, Brits, Germans, Dutch, gay, strait, bi, trans people all over the fucking world, and the media along with members of the incestuous cool kids club that has become the indie “scene” swear that we are a bunch of straight white guys with multiple sock puppet accounts. We have proven time and time again that the press (both gaming and mainstream) have violated multiple SPJ guidelines and are more concerned with profit and sensationalism than with reporting actual news. And yet they dismiss these facts faster than a creationist because someone said something mean to a few rich white women from the suburbs. With all of that said, why in the hell are you still worried about PR? Are you trying to get a celebrity endorsement? If so, let me remind you what happened the last time a celebrity picked up the #gamergate hashtag.

David Draimen picked up on #gamergate, claiming that he was a proponent of freedom of speech and artistic freedom. He tweeted the hashtag, talked a little shit about SJWs, the “Liberal Media” (Which should have raised a few red flags) and against the whole #changethecover spat. He was all buddy buddy with us until he found an old twitter post by the guy who took over the daily show (Trevor Noah). The particular post was a Jew joke triggered Draimen to the point of demanding that #Gamergate dog pile on a comedian’s twitter. When the majority of #gamergate supporters told him “Not your personal army,“ he outright Libeled us, calling us anti-Semites for not saying “how high” when he barked jump. You know what happened to #gamergate after that “PR nightmare”? Not a damn thing.

“But the SWJs will go after my friends and family if I don’t pull the PR card!!!” May I ask why in the FUCK you thought coming out publicly in support of us was a good idea if your livelihood depends on being on good terms with these morally bankrupt yuppie spawn? From threating 13 year old boys who dare to question them, to attempting to bring grievous harm on a single mother who called them on their bullshit, to calling in bomb threats on the United States Capital, it should have been clear from even prior to GamerGate that these people have no moral fiber and will do ANYTHING up to and including illegal actions to destroy you and your reputations.

And yet you clowns are still going on about “Muh PR” knowing good and Goddamn well about all of the bullshit that we have weathered for the past 10 months. Knowing that Milo Yanopolis, a “journalist” (Let’s be honest, his GJP leaks was probably the only relevant articles he ever put out) from a conservative “news” outlet has been the one journalist to stick up for #gamergate. Because of him and Adam Baldwin’s political stance, #gamergate has been referred to as “the video game equivalent of the Tea party” despite the fact that most of the people in this group have various different political, religious and philosophical views. The only reason #gamergate has made it this far is not because of PR, but it is because we stood together despite our differences and demanded a clean press. When the press refused to listen to reason, when they refused to publish the facts, we hit them where it hurts the most, their wallets. Because of operation disrespectful nod, the press referred to #gamergate as a ( loosely paraphrasing here) war on the media, thus killing any chance of positive PR. Make no mistake, this is a war on the media we are fighting, but it is a war on a corrupt media that these chunderheads defend because it is in their bottom line’s best interests to keep you and the public at large ignorant of the world and the things going on in it. It is not a war we started, but it is a war that we will win. There is no cavalry coming. The corporate media chuds will not help us, this is Midway Island for us, the stakes couldn’t be higher. We are fighting for our freedom of speech, we are fighting for artistic freedom. The only way we are going to come out on top of this is if we stand together against the authoritarian elitists and zealots that claim we are worse than ISIS because we dared to question their narrative. Now stop bitching about PR and help out or take your vanity and fuck off somewhere.  

Sources in no particular order

DAVID DRAIMAN SAGA OF DRAMA

(Yes it’s from Ralph, deal with it)

http://theralphretort.com/alex-lifschitz-boyfriend-gets-pimp-smacked-by-disturbeds-david-draiman-1915/

http://theralphretort.com/draiman-demands-gamergate-stand-trevor-noah-401015/

Game Journos Pros (yes it’s from Neo-con central, Deal with it)

http://www.breitbart.com/london/2014/09/21/gamejournopros-we-reveal-every-journalist-on-the-list/

http://www.breitbart.com/london/2014/09/18/the-emails-that-prove-video-games-journalism-must-be-reformed/

Meanwhile at the Washington post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/20/inside-gamergates-successful-attack-on-the-media/ 

Gamergate supported charities 

http://gamergate.me/charity

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Z85GQF9--s

advocates of social justice defend threatening a 13 year old boy

and an article about how low these dirt bags will go

https://jennofhardwire.wordpress.com/2015/01/06/gamers-discussing-gamergate-scandal-are-being-harassed-wheres-the-coverage-this-article-will-be-regularly-updated-with-documented-harassment-of-gamers/

www.deepfreeze.it  A site dedicated to pointing out unethical practices in the gaming press (now if we only had something like that for the mainstream press)

[billthemanfromkentucky]

I'm back

Lets keep this short and sweet shall we? I have been buried under a massive pile of real world priorities for the past few months. Between becoming an uncle, working two jobs, losing those two jobs, picking up a new job at a factory and working on a survival horror title (I'll plug that later), I have not had enough time in the day to attend to the tumblr page. While those previously mentioned personal happenings would seem to be legitimate cause to neglect my writing, the main culprit here is a simple lack of motivation and the over loaded sense of impending doom caused by my own neurotic mind set and problems at home. But enough of that crap, I've got some undertakings to carry out here. 

First off, I will be talking more about #gamergate and the important issues that the conversation brings up in regards to the what passes as news coverage in this mad corporate landscape (No Milo, SJW pandering is NOT one of those issues). I also plan on throwing in my two cents in on current trends in comics (reboots, rehashes, reruns and other less important shit) just to lighten the mood here and there. Also, now that I have a damn decent paying gig, I can actually afford to buy some vidya gaems and offer up my enlightening opinions on how you can get more bang for your buck. Speaking of money and vidya, I got a bone to pick with certain companies in the triple A industry, and it's not just EA (who actually have not been outright evil lately, what's that temperature in hell again?). All of this and more will be talked about at great lengths on this humble little blog.

[billthemanfromkentucky]

A little Hatred can be good for the soul

A table full of high powered assault weapons, trench coat full of ammo and grenades, a super sized Glen Danzig knock off and dialog written by someone's 14 year old nephew right before a montage of senseless violence for the sake of senseless causes a flood of offended tears across the internet. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the return of the exploitation genera in video games as brought to you by the trailer for Hatred, and the reactions that followed.

On October 16'th 2014, Polish developer Destructive creations released the trailer for their upcoming debut title Hatred, an Isometric shooter that puts you in the role of a nameless crazed gunmen

hell bent on wiping out as many innocent bystanders as possible before being taken out himself. While the actual core game play seems to be strait forward running and gunning through a level (based on what was shown in the trailer), the sheer savage brutality of the more up close and personal kills, along with the whole genocidal mission perpetrated by a the angry white man angle, upset a lot of members of the gaming press (I'll get to that in a moment). When addressing the motives behind making this angstsplotation title, the head of Destructive creations had this to say on the first post of the official website

“The question you may ask is: why do they do this? These days, when a lot of games are heading to be polite, colorful, politically correct and trying to be some kind of higher art, rather than just an entertainment – we wanted to create something against trends. Something different, something that could give the player a pure, gaming pleasure. Here comes our game, which takes no prisoners and makes no excuses. We say ‘yes, it is a game about killing people’ and the only reason of the antagonist doing that sick stuff is his deep-rooted hatred. Player has to ask himself what can push any human being to mass-murder. We provoke this question using new Unreal Engine 4, pushing its physics (or rather PhysX) systems to the limits and trying to make the visuals as good as possible. It's not a simple task, because of the game's non-linear structure and a lot of characters on the screen. But here at Destructive Creations, we are an experienced team and we know how to handle the challenge!”

The majority of the professional gaming press were not amused by these shenanigans. Polygon staff described their initial reaction as being reviled by the content of the trailer, prompting Ben Kuchera to claim that shock culture is dead, referring to the trailer as “...pandering to a 90s-era sense of culture shock that is no longer effective”. Colin Campbell, also from Polygon, referred to it as “the worst trailer of the year” due to the extreme violent content. I could go on to talk about how the other major players in gaming press were disturbed/disgusted by the trailer, but I sincerely doubt anyone is genuinely shocked by their reactions, so I'll just skip over that and let you google it. The gaming press were not the only ones who were less than enthusiastic about the content of the upcoming game. Euro Gamer reported that Epic games, creator of the Unreal 4 engine Hatred used, asked the polish based studio to remove their logo from all marketing associated with the game. Along with the unreal logo being pulled from the trailer, The NYPD apparently asked Destructive Creations to remove their logo from the game all together according to the description in their updated trailer.

While some may view the reaction of the gaming press response as an overreaction and slightly sheltered, there reaction is not exactly unwarranted. Think about like this, just a little under 20 years ago, we had Joe Lieberman (former senator of Connecticut) demand that the gaming industry with government censorship (regardless of how unconstitutional that would be) if they continued releasing these ultraviolent games. In the early 2000's, the gaming industry not only had to deal with Jack Thompson ( former Florida lawyer) and his one man crusade against the industry, but also Joe Lieberman and Hilary Clinton's attempt to pass a bill in 2005 that was intended to heavily regulate and possible ban the sale of titles that touted what they deemed as offensive content in order to protect the children (of course). With all of that and a certain feminist pop culture critic touting the same rhetoric used by the previously mentioned self righteous individuals to advocate censorship of an art form in the name of some vaguely defined sense of common decency, it's no wonder the press reacted in such an over dramatic fashion. But here is something obvious that shouldn't have to be brought up that no one seems to have considered, we're all (legally considered) adults here. The likelihood that someone is going to download this game (or any game like this) and then go on a rampage is actually slime to know according to the majority of studies on violent media's effects on real world violence.

As I scrambled to finish this article, my mother asked me what I was working on. I then explained that the trailer for Hatred managed to stir up a bit of controversy and that this article was covering that and the game in question. “Just the trailer” she asked. I said yes just the trailer. After being asked If I had actually played the game before writing this and then being asked how I could for an informed opinion based only on the trailer (which is actually a good question) I showed her the trailer. As the trailer played, she stood there stone faced while nursing her morning coffee as the scenes of realistic(ish) violence played. After the 90 seconds of footage, she simply responded to this savagery with an underwhelming “eh”. “Well, I wouldn't let any of my children play this game” she said looking right at me, “but then again, I'm a responsible parent”. At the end of the day, it is not the job of developers, publishers, lawmakers or the press to keep the children sheltered from materials perceived shocking/disturbing/offensive, that responsibility will always fall on the shoulders of the parents.

That being said, there is something else that should be taken into consideration before claiming that this sort of game goes to far. Exploitation/shock value has always served to push the bounds of what we can talk about and show in any medium. Would films like “Easy rider” have come to be if Russ Meyer had not made “Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!”? What would the horror genre look like today if films like “Last house on the left (1972)” and “Texas Chainsaw Massacre(1974)” never existed?  Where would films be today if Night of the living dead never held up a mirror to society with it's grisly commentary?

 Now, lets say Hatred does well on the market, how long will it be before someone takes the level of violence showcased there, and then use it to generate a genuinely thought provoking experience? For all we know, Hatred could be the precursor to a game held in the same amount of regard as “A clockwork orange”. Now that might seem like a bit of a stretch, but when you have games like “Spec Ops: The Line” have being compared to “Apocalypse Now”, It seems as if video games can achieve that level of notoriety. But in order to get there, someone has to push the bounds, step on a few toes, and possibly offend a few people in the process. Hatred aims to do just that. 

[the-rageaholic]

Thoughts on the upcoming DareDevil TV series?

I think it makes my dick hard. 

Before anyone says ‘But what if it eats?’ here’s the thing: I fully expect it to. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t give it a whirl. For every Batman ‘89 and Batman Returns, the Caped Crusader has spawned equally numerous movies and TV shows that have sucked ass through a garden hose. Daredevil’s comics have been of a consistently higher quality than Batman’s since… literally forever. 

I’m just grateful Daredevil is finally even being presented with an opportunity to suck! 

Godspeed!-RazörFist

[billthemanfromkentucky]

What are your thoughts on the costume? kinda looks like the suit from Trial of the Incredible hulk

[billthemanfromkentucky]

Attention all who are interested in Gamergate

Do you like videogames but can't stand the douche bags running the gaming press. Are you just hearing about this mess and actually wanna see who the media is talking about? Then have I got a hashtag for you.

#OPSkynet is the new hashtag created by gamergate supporters intended to further connect the gaming community that the media has tried so hard to divide. With this hashtag, you can meet fun new people on the twitters, follow new peoples and get new followers. That's it really, So yeah here is the stream. check them out. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrRrXgrwn_s

[gamergateharassment-blog-blog]

https://twitter.com/_icze4r/status/521176234743844865

[gamergateharassment-blog-blog]

https://twitter.com/_icze4r/status/521176234743844865

[billthemanfromkentucky]

ROBOTS OR DINOSAURS?

Dinosaurs. They are theoretically easier to make via genetic engineering and could easily wreck robots. Besides, you could augment them with cybernetics and add at least 100 levels of bad assery to them, with science.  

[billthemanfromkentucky]

The corporate media and you, their pet mushroom

I was originally planning on making a post about the crap Mitch Mconell has pulled over the years on my tax dollars. Shortly after I started writing that, MSNBC, CNN and the Huffington post decided to chime in on #gamergate by talking to those who have been accused of unethical behavior in their field (Evan Narcisse of Kotaku on CNN for example) Instead of going over the major talking point of gamergate (journalistic integrity), they opted to go with Briahna Wu's "This is a war on women by cis white male gamers" narrative despite the tweets shown on the Reid report stating differently

 Long story short, not only did Mrs. Wu go on to claim that Gamergate was campaign organized to keep those pesky girls out of the tree house that's out to get her, she also claimed that the entire gaming industry is either consciously or subconsciously sexist. Now that's kinda of an odd statement seeing that she's an indie developer who's sole credit in the four years she has been a developer is her 1 game, yet she claims show to know most female developers in the industry. Her resume consists of four years as an independent developer, one IOS/pc game (revolution 60, july 2014), co-hosting a weekly podcast as of may of 2014 and a grand total of six gaming related articles, yet she some how knows almost every woman in the sexist industry she has barely participated in. 

Now that Wu's obligatory half paragraph of irrelevance is out of the way, lets  get to the real point. Three years ago, Dylan Ratigan went on a rant live on MSNBC during his show. In this rant, Ratigan went over how utterly corrupt our political system was truly become due to congress essentially being on the payroll of special interest groups (Unions/corporations/ect.)  thus working for them and not the people who voted them into office. Fast forward to May 15 2014, after 2 million plus American citizens petitioned to reform campaign finance laws by overturning the supreme court decision that allows corporations to donate as much cash as they see fit to the candidate of their choice (essentially buying elections), prompting a call for an amendment to the united states constitution that that would have. Did MSNBC cover this story? nope

“How could you say such hateful things? Briahna Wu is a down trodden women fighting for equality in the industry. You just hate Women” her supporters will say after hearing about this post. First off, she is not down trodden/under privileged or what ever the hell phrase you lot use when talking about the legitimately fucked seeing as she comes from a family that can just give her 200 grand to start a studio like it's nothing. Second off, no I'm not saying this because misogyny, I'm saying this because our mainstream press has become nothing more than a sick joke at the expense of the people who rely on them for information. These parasites are not interested in the facts, they are only interested in keeping their corporate sponsors happy by sensationalizing the ever loving crap out of a story and not running anything that would be upsetting to the shareholders (like flood wall street and Wolf Pac). Do you honestly think these mainstream, sub humanoid chumps are going to cover a story about corruption in ANY form of journalism when they have a history of corruption longer than my arm, the fact that MSNBC has had some of the exact same issues that the gaming rags have had should raise more than a few red flags when it comes to their credibility. Lets go over their colorful examples shall we?

Keith Olberman, a well respected poor man's John Stewart, managed to get himself into some trouble with his boss back in 2010's mid term election by donating $2,400 to three democratic candidates (including Jack Conway here in Ky). He was promptly suspended indefinitely with out pay for violating the company policy of not donating to politicians, kinda like how Polygon staff donate to developers on a monthly basis via Patreon . Back in April of 2007, Don Imus of Imus in the morning a simulcast that ran on MSNBC for over ten years, described members of the Rutgers women's basketball team as “some nappy headed hoes”. Naturally this along with Mic Savage telling someone to “get aids and die” and Adam Baldwin getting fired for from MSNBC for calling a paparazzi a “Cock Sucking Fag” did not sit well with some folks (Imus actually had advertisers pull out of his show over his comments). Members of a major press outlet making offensive, borderline antagonistic comments/articles leading to sponsors dropping their ads, gee why does that seem so familiar? Not only has MSNBC shown a blatant disregard of ethics over the years, they have also made it a point to avoid keeping us up to date on important shit that has major side affects on our day to day lives here in these United States of America.

So we already touched on the whole not covering a story on an amendment to the constitution that could completely reform campaign finance laws and it's subsequent murder at the hands of the corporate welfare enabling sack of filth we call Mitch and his fellow corporate shills in the republican party, they also failed to make any mention of the Comcast/Time Warner Cable merger, a prospect that was not met with much fan far on part of the customers. But why would MSNBC talk about this when their one of the news outlets owned by NBC, which is owned by Comcast. Speaking of NBC, remember how Israel was bombing the Gaza strip into oblivion and claimed that it was Hamass making the IDF waste civilians to make the press ask questions? On July 16th 2014, Israel's naval forces bombed an open beach where five children were playing, four of the five children were killed. There was absolutely no evidence of Hamas activity, no sight of enemy rockets, just five children playing soccer on the beach. This tragedy was witnessed and reported on by many western journalists including NBC Ayman Mohyeldin. How did NBC react to Ayman's hard hitting piece? They ordered him out of Gaza and replaced with Richard Angle and an American producer who doesn't even speak Arabic after pro Israel pitched a fit about Ayman being “too balanced”. The death toll over the 29 days of Israel “mowing the lawn” reached 1,900, an estimated %80 being civilians.

On October 31, information on the FCC's “Split the baby” approach to net neutrality was leaked to the public (and verified on Nov. 1st) and met with nothing short of absolute disdain. This split the baby approach separates internet service providers into two categories, the standard consumer package and a package referred to as “the back end” a service in which broadband providers server as a conduit for websites to distribute their content. Let me be frank (as if I wasn't already), this is a terrible idea that poses a genuine threat to the first amendment by giving multi-billion dollar corporations like Comcast last say when it comes to what content goes online and what does not. And what is MSNBC doing while this is happening despite the 4 million people who demanded a free and open internet? Their probably too busy talking to the well off, white, over privileged suburbanite yuppie spawn Matt Binder about how It's rape even when there is consent (no seriously he does say that). But why would MSNBC dare commit an act of journalism after when the last thing they want to do is to offend their corporate sugar daddy even if the facts that contradict the arguments of Briahna Wu are glaring at them right in their face.

“Bull, your just using ethics in journalism as a cover to harass women” is the standard response from those who are “Anti-Gamergate” Just to further prove a point, I'd like to direct your attention to an interview Anita Sarkeesian did with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now. Pay attention to how Amy Goodman conducted this interview. She asked questions based on established facts, Anita speak without leading her, and remained neutral in regards to her professional stance on the story. That is how journalism is supposed to work folks, relay only the facts to your audience and let them form their own opinion on the subject you bring up. It's a crying shame that MSNBC and other members of the mainstream press missed that particular memo, otherwise our country would actually be well informed when it comes to major current events. However, I have a sneaking suspension that the corporations that own the mainstream news outlets would prefer that we, the people, be treated like mushrooms. Kept in the dark and fed bullshit. 

[anonymousdeveloper]

A lot of you people against Gamergate talk about how the campaign is about harassment. How you’re against harassment and how, ergo, you’re against Gamergate, and how the campaign started as harassment of women. It’s a hate movement. That’s understandable. To use the understatement of the century,...

[kidt82]

[mentalalchemy]

I laughed too loudly at this

[billthemanfromkentucky]

An open letter to Chris Mancil and the triple a industry

So, a few days ago Chris Mancil, the director of digital communications over at EA games, decided to chime in on #gamergate and the issues that have been brought up. The man's thoughts on the matter can be found here on reddit, While I agree with most of his points, there is one major sticking point that needs to be addressed. Before I continue, I'd like to make something clear. I'm not speaking for gamergate supporters, hell, I'm not even speaking for the other working stiffs that put up with the soul crushing monotony of of the underpaying 40 hour work week. For me to even attempt to speak for such a staggering amount of people would be nothing short of arrogant. This well meaning post is coming from the mouth of a man that works too hard for the money needed to pay the bills and enjoy a wonderful hobby like video games.

"Its not really about ethics. Games Media and Games Development have always been intertwined like Siamese twins. We depend on each other greatly, and this relationship (when properly balanced) benefits games and gamers as a whole."

Yes, when there is a proper balance between games media and game development, games and gamers can benefit greatly from this relationship. How else would we know about upcoming titles that might peek our interests without a well functioning gaming press? However, there has been a lack of proper balance since Gurtsman was fired from gamespot due to a negative review for "Kane and Lynch dead men" he put out back in 2007. Now, lets move the clock forward a few years shall we?

 The individual before you is one Colin Moriarty, a senior editor over at IGN. Back in 2012 this fellow here responded to the outrage surrounding the release of "Mass Effect 3". The majority of complaints from the community against the game were primarily focused on the day one DLC and the lackluster pick a color ending that never really seemed to reflect any of the choices the player made throughout the series. Instead of looking over both sides of the argument, addressing the issue of day one DLC and putting together a well thought out article, Colin decided to put out a video that outright claimed that all the complaints were from gamers who suffer from a false sense of entitlement. This attitude, along with IGN's appearance of blatant bias due to the ads for the game smeared all over the site, Jesica Chobot (Then IGN contributor) being in the game, and their lack of covering any activity that might paint EA/Bioware in a negative light does nothing to dispel an image of impropriety to say the least.

Like you said Chris, this whole thing has been cooking for years with many other examples of a perceived lack of ethics involving many Indie devs and triple a studios alike. You came into this discussion wishing you could defuse this situation. The thing is, I believe developers, both large and small, can help. And no I don't mean help one side or the other. No, just look at everything that got brought up here. Gaming news sites have been accused of being just a tad bit too friendly with the developers, along with being paid by developers for positive reviews  for the past seven years. This over all lack of transparency on part of the games media and game developers, along with the dismissive condescending attitude towards anyone who dared complain about being unsatisfied with their game, are a couple of the main reasons #gamergate happened. If you or any other major publisher/developer are serious about wanting to help defuse the situation, this is what you could do. Just be strait with us while encouraging gaming sites to do the same when you send review copies out, that and don't just out right dismiss customer complaints as children throwing a tiff over getting a blackberry instead of an I-phone. Seriously that's it. That little bit of effort can go a long way towards establishing transparency in the industry as a whole, thus showing the gaming community that the gaming press can be trusted to give an unbiased opinion. Now to be clear, this proposal is not the magic cure all, but it could be the first step leading to a stronger industry. It's certainly better than doing nothing or continuing on with the status quot.

Please don't take this modest suggestion as me trying to tell you how to do your job or as some form of an attack on your company, there is no true malice in these words. This is me voicing my complaints as customer and making a suggestion that might help the current issues that have been brought up during #gamergate, instead of just bitching for a little over a page and a half about what I don't like. You said yourself that there seems to be a sense of alienation, a fear of being meaningless, and a loss of connection between you and the audience. I agree with that sentiment one hundred percent, that's why I'm addressing you directly Chis. I personally wanna see Gamergate end with a better relationship between the gaming community, developers, and an improved gaming press. But in order for any of that to happen, someone has to take that first step. Like I said, I'm not trying to tell you how to do your job, I'm just offering up my two cents since you wish you knew how to defuse all this tension. Obviously I can't make you do anything since I'm just a no name wage slave from Kentucky, the hell am I gonna do, blog about it (oh wait)?

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I hope this little post helps.

Have a wonderful day.

Sincerely

Bill “The man from Kentucky” Raymer

p.s

One quick question before I pass out, why did battlefield hard line get delayed? I was kinda looking forward playing cops and robbers with my friends this holiday.

[billthemanfromkentucky]

Dear Gamergate The past few weeks have been insane haven't they? We have seen the gamin press industry brought to it's knees, big names speaking out, an official ongoing investigation being headed by the F.B.I, and thousands of people standing together all demanding Integrity in their press. And for what, videogames? Yes, this 4 week long on-line campaign was brought to you by a bunch of folks who just want to play videogames. What, you think I'm being condescending? Most of us came here because we love video games, that's just a a cold hard fact. That doesn't mean that the movement is a childish tantrum on part of the gamers, it means there are thousands, if not tens of thousands of people from different walks of life rallied around a legitimate art-form and all cried out in unison for a reform in their press. Now I may not be the smartest work mule out there, but I don't see anything childish about that. After watching all of this happen, seeing what a community can do come together for a noble cause, I found just a little bit of faith in people. Gamer Gate is probably the best thing that has ever happened for me, you inspired me to be more than just another wage slave, you inspired me to do more than sit on my ass, thank you for that.  When I made the post on Anita, I honestly thought I was helping, but every sense then I have noticed that there are more people losing confidence in gamergate and it's mission. I'm sorry, I truly am. Through my eagerness to get the information out to the public, It appears that I have inadvertently done more harm than good. The post in question became looked upon as an attack on Anita and has been used as such by certain individuals who may or may not be using gamergate to further their own agenda. This was never my intention. My intentions were simple, prove that the gaming press failed to do their basic leg work, thus failing to live up to the title of journalist. The fact that she lied is not important at the end of the day, the fact that the entire press ran with the story without verifying their facts is what's important here. At least that's what I thought I was doing. All I can do is be better in my attempts at journalism, listen to those who have harshly (and rightfully) criticized and my work and carry on. Like I said earlier, I have no agenda outside of doing what I feel is right. As long as the facts are available to the people, I can sleep better at night regardless if you know who I am or not. Thank you for being awesome and keeping me honest. Now, lets play some video games.

[billthemanfromkentucky]

The Press Statement

The Email I received from the SFPD in regards to last night's story

Officer Albie Esparza #4150 Public Information Officer San Francisco Police Department Office of the Chief of Police Media Relations Unit

Me. Greetings, first off, let me just thank you for taking the time to read this. My name is Bill Raymer and I'm working on an article going over online harassment and it's real world consequences and I wanted to ask a couple of questions. http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/08/29/gaming-vlogger-anita-sarkeesian-is-forced-from-home-after-receiving-harrowing-death-threats/

On August 29, the Washington post ran an article on the subject of Anita Sarkeesian (an internet, feminist commentator) was forced to flee her home after receiving "viable" death threats over Twitter. Sarkeesian then went on to claim that the SFPD were clueless as to handle threats online, even going on record claiming that she was asked why didnt she stop making content when the threats

(https://twitter.com/femfreq/status/506868395841581056) After taking all this information into consideration, I have a few questions.

Me  How did dispatch really answer Anita Sarkeesian's call on the August. 26th of august (she alleged the call took place between 8pm an midnight)?

Officer Albie   I have been unable to locate any record on the date or name with the information provided. You may ask our Department of Emergency Management who handles 911 calls. They are at 415-558-3295

2. What is the standard procedure when dealing with a victim being harassed through social media?   The department takes all crimes seriously. Victims are treated with respect and reports are filed and investigated.

3.When did the Washington Post (or any news media outlet) contact the Sfpd about this story?     The Washington Post never contacted our office for any comment on this story.

So, there you have it folks. I did take the liberty of calling the number provided to me prior to this email, they claim to never have received a call either.

[billthemanfromkentucky]

The Girl who cried wolf and the press that sold it to you

I didn't want to write this piece, I really didn't. I wanted to write a nice little article that I could possibly sell to a few gaming rags for a quick buck to pay the rent (I owe people money) and shed the facts. I had been one of the many vocal critics of Anita Sarkesian that stated that her claims of harassment were more often than not an over exaggerated sob story of victim hood generated for the sole purpose of gaining publicity and cash. Sarkesian has also made it a habit to put time in browsing her Twitter feed. Hours upon hours of time and effort browsing her twitter feed like the self-absorbed suburbanite pustule filled sack indigent human flesh that she is. It's obvious that a meticulous amount of effort goes into her selection of 20 plus screen caps of trolls considering that she can get hundreds of tweets in an hour or two. But despite her tendency to over exaggerate her problems, I still didn't want to write this piece. I wanted to be proven wrong and taste the bitter taste of humility on the stage of public discourse. This could have been a piece that took a look at how what happens online can have some serious ramifications. This would be article could have been deleted and replaced the ultimate college liberal shrine to political correctness while maintaining that Gamergate is not about harassing women. It could have been all that apologist crap with a healthy dose of bitter sarcasm, had the facts not confirmed my dark suspicions to be true.

  From August 27 through the 31st news broke that Anita Sarkesian of tropes v.s women fame was forced to flee from her home when faced with threats of necrophilia, possible cannibalism from the fiendishly degenerate gamer know as Kevin Dobson. This act of psychological war fare prompted the unfortunate Miss Anita to call the local authorities only to be turned away by their blatant incompetence, according to her oh so trustworthy Twitter feed. Had this just been reported by the same gaming rags that launched a massive smear campaign, I would have wrote it off as more blatant lies manufactured to paint #gamergate as a misogynistic movement. Then the story popped up on comics alliance while browsing Twitter (I can only imagine what my facebook feed looks like).  "That's weird” I thought to myself, “Why is gamer gate cropping up on a comics site?" After a quick search on google I discovered that the conversation blew up overnight, grabbing the attention of the internet at large like an atomic bomb exploding in the night sky. The mad jackals that unleashed these articles on Anita's night of terror onto the public at large were none other than the likes of The Washington Post, The L.A Times and Yahoo news. As I read these fantastic tales from these reputable news sites, I discovered that none of them ever got a statement from the police. "Now that's damn strange, doesn't the press usually contact the police when addressing an event they dropped the ball on?" I looked over Sarkesian's Twitter feed to see what happened what really happened that night. Do to the limitations of my cheap smart phone, I could only go back an hour, an hour that comprised of literally hundreds tweets talking about the side show event  Sarkesian's career had become comprised of. After finding no success asking questions on the smart phone (a couple of which got me blocked by Adam Sessler) I commandeered the grossly outdated laptop of my best friend and plunged deeper into the matter and found her claims of police incompetence.

  After seeing how her fans reacted, I decided to find out exactly how the cops handled her call that night. If the cops really did just suggest that she should just stop talking about video games to stop the threats, then there would be a serious case of victim blaming and negligence, sparking a massive outcry towards the San Fransisco police department.  If the cops had a different story, then that would mean that these half deformed ghouls that are supposed to be professionals lack any sort of professional ethics.

  I reached out to the San Fransisco police department and asked them what happened on the night of the 26th, the night of infamy. I expected to hear a prepared blanket statement about how the San Fransisco police department takes all threats seriously, I was also ready to sift through forums requesting a record of the dispatch calls from the that night. I was not prepared to hear the dispatcher tell me that they never received a call from Anita Sarkeesian's home address. I then informed dispatch of the comments Sarkeesian made about her call with the police department on a public forum and then that's when she gave me the prepared statement on how serious the cops take these sorts of things.

Anita Sarkesian has just made a clear cut and dry example of why the message of #Gamergate and #notyourshield may be more important than opposition would have the audience at large believe. Through Anita's bold faced lies, that conveniently happened right around the time her last "Tropes vs. Women" video dropped, we have just witnessed favoritism in the gaming press. It's like the press took one look at Anita Sarkesian's Twitter feed and decided to run with it as if it were the Gospel word without doing any fact checking, critical thinking, or even so much as a phone call to the third party involved in the story. But it's not just the gaming press that suffers from this cancer, even the Washington Post, the L.A Times and Yahoo Business Insider failed to do their basic legwork required to be a reporter. If these parasites can't ask questions, do research, do the leg work, or even make a phone call and report all of the facts, then why do we continue to listen to them?

  #gamergate and #Notyourshield is the gaming community as a whole standing up and demanding a higher standard from the press as a whole. We want the facts, not some tabloid click bait made for the victim's publicity. Like I said, I didn't want to type this, I would have much rather been stoned to death on twitter than discover that the mainstream press has been infected with this cancerous mentality.

  The only question that remains is the big one. Why? Why did she do it? Why did she go on Twitter and lie to thousands of her followers? Why did the press automatically assume she was right and shift blame on the "Gamer" Instead of asking the cops for their side of the story? Was this a case of collusion? Did the timing of these articles have anything to do with the fact that the company Anita Sarkeesien works with, Silverstien media, is connected to the Independent Games Festival, which is quite possibly under federal investigation? Or is this all just the cliche tale of the little girl who cried wolf? Who knows.

_________________________________________________________

http://herocomplex.latimes.com/games/gamergate-related-controversy-reveals-ugly-side-of-gaming-community/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/08/29/gaming-vlogger-anita-sarkeesian-is-forced-from-home-after-receiving-harrowing-death-threats/

http://www.polygon.com/2014/8/27/6075679/sarkeesian-driven-out-of-home-by-online-abuse-and-death-threats

[billthemanfromkentucky]

There's something about Zoe, walking the trail of #gamergate

Alright folks, if you've been anywhere near the internet for the past few weeks and have an interest in gaming, you know that there is a massive tidal wave of angry gamers, journalists, talking heads of PR groups and indie game developers across social media. The subject has ignited wars of flame where ever it arises like a horseman at the end of times. Now if you have been following the gaming press, you have been told that this anger from the gaming community is nothing but the misogynistic ramblings of lonely, fat, white, basement dwelling man children. If you actually took the time to read the twitter posts related to #gamergate and #notyourshield (or any reading on the subject for that matter) you can clearly see there is something else going on in the background.

Just to be clear, while there may have been a few "terrorist gamer" jerks that turned this into an excuse to harass Anita Sarkeesian(tropes v.s women fame) and Zoe Quinn (Depression Quest) by just talking nasty vile, foot fungus smelling trash just cause they can, does not mean that is the mentality of the majority of those involved in the conversation. That's like saying all Muslims are evil because of I.S.I.S, it's a bogus generalization generated to smear the other side of the argument. #gamergate may have been born from the sexual escapes of an indiscreet game developer, but it matured into a serious conversation on the subject of journalistic integrity, unethical business practices and nepotism within the independent games industry.

Now that the obligatory intro that clearly states where I stand on the subject is out of the way, we are gonna talk about the penis, and we are gonna talk about the vagina (deal with it). Here are the cliff notes of what has happened as of this posting. All my sources will be linked at the end of the article. Just felt y'all should know bout that.

      On August 16th 2014, the ex-boyfriend of Indie scene darling Zoe Quinn took the douche rout of getting even by posting the fact she slept around with five dudes. Now if these five dudes were just some random Larry, Curly, Joe, Moe and Shemp  nobody would give a fuck outside of the standard slut shaming jerks. (Haters Gonna Hate).

However, since all of Ms.Quinn's sexual partners have been revealed to be major players in the Indie Industry (for want of a better term), her midnight rooster diving sent up a red flag that should have prompted an investigation on part of a suspiciously silent gaming press. Only when pressured with questions did these soulless, entitled yuppie vultures respond by claiming that this was a non issue. Really?!? any one with an ounce of common sense can see there is something odd going on here. Jim Sterling, are you really gonna tell me that the fact that the gaming press outright ignored facts that disproved Quinn's harassment claims (and ignoring the harassment she has done) along with the fact that she slept a “reporter” from Kotoku/Rock paper shotgun one day after an article promoting her game Depression quest was published are unrelated and thus not news worthy? How about you Escapist, would you really have me believe that the claims of Phil Fish's Polytron being funded by the people who afterwards started Indiefund, for a percentage of his profits, and then became the IGF judges that voted Fez as their winning game are not worth a few hours of digging through the facts available to verify if these claims have merit to them or not? What did the gaming press do after all of these "coincidences" piled up to the point where the audience at large could see past the dust kicked up by the biased circling of the wagons, leading to more questions?

The press lashed out and released a total of 13 articles claiming that "gamer is dead" on August 28th 2014. The Escapist, Kotaku, Destructoid, Gameranx, and Gamersutra among others all participated in a scorched earth campaign against they very people they reported to. All because the audience who noticed all of these odd condenses pile up to the roof and had the shier gall to ask  what's going on. Reporting to the public at large that all of those who dared ask what's going on were misogynistic, basement dwelling, white, male nerds who were out to get Zoe Quinn and Anita Sarkesian for not staying in the kitchen (Paraphrasing obviously).

So now that we have the major info dump outta the way, lets talk about where we are as of 12:36 am est. The immediate fallout of this conversation has seen video game enthusiasts of all walks of life in #gamegate  rally for journalistic integrity with the additional banner of #notyourshield. An entire community of gamers standing arm in arm actively refusing to take this venomous bile being spewed by the press. and boy did the press feel it.

The loss of traffic to gaming press sites could prove problematic to some individuals not related to any of this mess still has to sell his game. but with news of backroom deals in the independent gaming scene outright dominating the conversation on twitter, the options for getting the word out about his game launching on 9/9/14 seem limited...

Until someone conveniently brings up a possible connection between his company and those involved in this mess. Now I'm not saying Tim Schafer is or is not directly involved in this (worse case scenario, he probably took the money and didn't ask questions) since there has yet to be any proof connecting him to any criminal activity as of 9/9/14. However, it does certainly appear that there is some tomfoolery a foot here due to how this "revelation" shifted some attention over to doublefine and Tim Schafer judging by how many tweets were made on the subject. While it is possible that this little infodump may have been made for the sole reason of insinuating criminal activity, it appears that the actually reaction was some free publicity. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that the drama stirred up as a method of trolling for publicity.

  It may not be a case of trolling for publicity, and this may be a simple misunderstanding, but we can all agree that Schafer had more to gain from this shit storm then he had to lose. After all, if he were involved in a in a possible racketeering scandal, It would be ignorant if he were to take these charges lightly when there is an ongoing federal investigation into the matter (more on that in a bit)?

Note that this is a man known for his wit and his sense of humor, he knows how to play a crowd and he knows how to captivate an audience, of course he's going to take advantage of this because he's got a game to push. Now lets say for the sake of argument that Tim Schafer and Vital studios did work together to generate publicity, Is that a bad thing? A man's gotta make a living somehow, how else is he gonna let the people know his game is out when the possible costumer can't trust the outlet where they get their information? By going to the people directly to the costumer. Now lets make something crystal clear for those just stumbling onto this massive controversy, the focus of #gamergate and #notyourshield is holding gaming news sites to a standard of journalistic integrity. That means you don't write stories in exchange for sexual favors, you report all of the facts to your audience, you damn sure don't insist that your core audience hates women because they asked questions demanding all of the facts and if you are caught doing any of those thing, you need to be handed your walking papers on the spot just like any other working stiff who fucks up on the job. Just because a few "well known" developers are possibly involved in an ongoing federal investigation does not mean the participants(for the most part) in the gamer gate conversation has it in for every game developer.

Now your probably asking about that racketeering I mentioned earlier.

Sammual Sales over at Gamer headlines wrote an article on the subject. In his article, Sales claims that Phil Fish and members of the independent games festival are under an investigation led by the FBI on charges of racketeering. "The basic gist behind it is that Indie Cade originally gave Phil a large sum on money to jumpstart Fez. Indie Cade and Polytron then took seats as major judges in the 2011 and 2012 Indie Games Festival, boosting its chances to succeed and gain the publicity to make the title the major hit it became".

While there has been no statement released by the F.B.I at the time of writing this, it appears that one could speculate that these claims of an ongoing investigation might have some validity due to the sudden silence of shortfatotak's account on the subject after speaking to a lawyer(so if you see her, don't ask her about it, it is possible that she legally can not talk about what she knows)

This has been an insane past couple of weeks folks, and I think it's safe to say that there is much more madness that has yet to emerge. All we can do as a community is keep the facts readily available for those who want to know the full story. More to come as this twisted tale continues to develop.

Sources used (for further reading)

http://www.ign.com/blogs/robojules/2014/09/02/the-editor-has-no-clothes

http://www.gamerheadlines.com/2014/08/moving-forward-worst-week-gaming-whats-next/ http://gamesnosh.com/gamergate-silly-sounding-sincere-call-fair-representation-gamers-within-media/                                  http://whatculture.com/gaming/10-things-need-know-gamergate-scandal.php                                                               http://www.modvive.com/2014/09/01/gamergate-accountability-problem-sexism-one/           

http://www.gamerheadlines.com/2014/09/gamergate-polytron-fbi-investigation/#ixzz3CrmHPSVX

Vids that got this ball rolling

MundanMatt video (original pulled due to copyright claim from Zoe Quinn) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Equc1QnQ9rw

InternetAristocrat vids on "The Quinnspearacy" (Strong language) Pt 1  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5-51PfwI3M

Pt 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKmy5OKg6lo

pt 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km3DZQp0StE

[billthemanfromkentucky]

A Nightmare on Elm street fan art I did this about a year ago when I had a job that allowed me the luxury of time to improve on my art. The proportions are a bit off and the legs are too long, but all in all I don't think it looks bad. What do you guys think?