There remains no doubt that the anti-gamer narrative peddled by gaming journalists and echoed by the gaming media uses fear as its fuel. People have long ago cast the social justice advocates in gaming as new moralists, and their actions and words in regards to Gamergate only reinforced the notion. Dubbing it fascists, sociopathic, “a culture of terror“, the Tea Party of videogames, “ISIS with Steam accounts” and a million other delirious insults. Even allowing for the obvious hyperbole, the fearmongering is the clear goal: these people will stalk you, hack you and potentially explode vans near you.
But a post from Kazerad has brought to my attention to just how much the fearmongering really does work into bringing people to oppose Gamergate. People with little experience in the games market or the internet are absolutely terrified not of what Gamergate is, but what Gamergate is said to represent by distorted media accounts. Here’s the post, with the operative part highlighted.