(Edited: Sections edited and rewritten with stronger and more direct language instead of making implications. More text added, additional opinions added.)



Understandable, since it's a hot-button issue that tends to be very polarizing. The article linked at the top of this thread makes it clear that the media has generally tended to side against gamergate, so most of the articles you see will be from that perspective. The current version of the Wikipedia article seems to have a lot of good information on what it's about, though who knows what the article will look like tomorrow. My guess is that those who are pro-gamergate would like to see the Wikipedia article rewritten to be more balanced towards their side, and I seem to recall there was initially a lot of back-and-forth editing on the article. I tend to think the media and Wikipedia are currently covering it pretty well, but if you asked anyone who sides with the movement, you'd get a different story.

The next question is: When does an issue genuinely deserve balanced coverage? If someone does something bad because they think they are righteous, does their side deserve to be covered in a "balanced" way? Or do we simply report that they did something bad, and this was their reasoning for doing it? Depends on whether you think their actions were wrong, and whether you think they were actually righteous or not. When you disagree with the actions and you do not believe the perpetrator was righteous, then there's no "issue" and there is no reason to be "balanced": You just report that a crime was committed and move on. I think that's what most of the media did, because that's the level of coverage it deserved.




Gamergate is the name used by the group of people doing the harassing. I think that means they were the bad guys. Of course, if you asked the members of gamergate, they would say they were the good guys, because they think they are righteous. If history is written by the victors, then in this case, the victors (and in this case I'm defining victory as the general public and media opinion, cited in the article linked at the top of this thread) will tend to say that gamergate was the bad guys. And they do tend to be *guys* specifically, that's part of the nature of the movement, as the wikipedia article will clarify. Whether you agree that they're the bad guys depends on how you feel about the hot-button issues which are raised therein. If you believe that they were righteous to harass/dox/threaten these women, then you probably think they were the good guys, too.

There is the other issue, which is, any movement of any size will have factions. Some of the members of gamergate were denouncing the actions of some of the other members. Since, as a movement, it was very amorphous to begin with, it's hard to actually pin down who represents what. Did it start with someone raising issues calmly, and then get overtaken by zealots? Or did it start with the zealots, and are those calling for more reasonable discussion the outliers? Hard to tell. In general, though, the movement very quickly came to represent the harassment campaigns, quickly overshadowing anyone else who tried to make their points more calmly. The catch phrase for the movement, "actually, it's about ethics in games journalism", carries some irony with it, because the members of the movement in general were seen as doing quite unethical things, and were targeting people in such a way at to make it clear that it wasn't about games journalism at all, it was really about sexism and misogyny all along. If there was anyone in the movement actually trying to make games journalism more ethical, then, aligning themselves with the gamergate name was counterproductive.

I also have a personal belief (not supported by any evidence) that a lot of the gamergate movement was actually just a bunch of kids: internet trolls and griefers with nothing better to do, who just see this as a giant game they could play, something mischievous they could do without getting caught. Even if this is true, it doesn't make the situation any less serious. There were still plenty of non-anonymous adults standing up for the movement and rallying those troops.




I don't know, I'm sure it depends on your definitions of "professional" and "victim", but from my point of view, the victims were the gaming industry professionals who were targeted for harassment, and as far as I know, the members of Gamergate, the ones who launched the organized campaign of harassment, were not professionals in the gaming industry.




Because even if you're not a gamer, a massive number of humans are, and understanding that some of the people in the industry are being targeted for harassment is important, because this is an important social issue. This issue has farther-reaching implications than just gamers or games journalism. It shows how the internet can be used as a tool for doing hurtful things, and shows us the places where the internet can be improved for the better. It reminds us that the human race and its cultures are still deeply mired in sexism, misogyny, and other problems, which are hard to fix, but which nonetheless need addressing. It helps us improve the future of the human race by exposing our sometimes-hidden darker tendencies. It is an example we can use to teach our children important lessons. It shines a light: it helps us recognize when there are hurtful things happening around us, perhaps happening to our friends or perhaps perpetrated by our friends, which otherwise might have gone unnoticed, and gives us a chance to maybe do something about it.

Sexism, misogyny, bigotry, and intolerance are learned behaviors. So are respect and acceptance. If we can be shown situations where negative attitudes have specific negative consequences, it's worth looking at, because it helps influence us, as a species, to improve. Minds can be changed (sometimes), and our children can learn from our mistakes. I believe that, over time, humanity will improve to be better about these things, and recognizing the places where we can make improvements is a critical part of that. I believe that this improvement is happening all around us today, in clearly visible steps, and that we need to be attentive to it, and not get complacent about it. So we need to point out and pay attention to the places where we're losing ground on that progress.

The fact that, today, we can even talk about any of these things (gamergate, sexism, bigotry, etc.) as an "issue" that needs "balanced coverage" completely *horrifies* me. We need to aim for a future where these things are no longer in question, and are just accepted as wrong. We'll get there, as long as we don't ignore the bad stuff when it comes up.