"Tabletop gaming has a white male terrorism problem"

[Ratman_tf]

39 page thread on the X-Wing miniatures forum.

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/216195-are-we-part-of-the-problem/page-1

I pegged this as a threat narrative when I read the tumblr post. I don't mean to sound all smarty-pants, I would have likely fallen for this kind of thing just a few years ago myself.

The problem is rape and sexual assault of women is a hot-button topic, and it gets people fired up. Perfect outrage fuel.

[crkrueger]

So there's a lot of stuff that happened to her...not going to address any of that stuff in the past.

What I want to know is, and as far as I can tell, no one is even mentioning...

What the hell did she say about Malifaux that allegedly pissed off Malifaux fans and Wyrd employees to harass her?

[Warboss Squee]

39 page thread on the X-Wing miniatures forum.

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/216195-are-we-part-of-the-problem/page-1

I pegged this as a threat narrative when I read the tumblr post. I don't mean to sound all smarty-pants, I would have likely fallen for this kind of thing just a few years ago myself.

The problem is rape and sexual assault of women is a hot-button topic, and it gets people fired up. Perfect outrage fuel.

Whelp. I just post my link in that thread, let the dog pile begin to prove the most virtuous.

[Cave Bear]

Satanists to rapists to terrorists in just three decades.
Evidently, Dungeons & Dragons players are not to be fucked with.

[crkrueger]

The funny this is, this relates to the Islamic terrorism argument that we have going in the Christian persecution thread.

On purple, we have guys like Cam Banks saying...

It has everything to do with white and male. It isn't demonizing to call out the actual demons in a community. Rapists, abusers, and harassers often don't think what they're doing is even a problem, and so when you confront them with their actions and show them what consequences their actions have, they make every effort to excuse it, defuse the situation, or move the blame to something else.

Of course white men don't hold a patent on bullying. But saying "hey, that's unfair that you're targeting my demographic" is just something the privileged groups are going to have to suck up for a while until they can make an effort to root out the toxic elements of their demographic. Or, to put it another way, how many straight white males are forced to deal with the potential threat of a "creepy narcissistic loner" at a convention, game store, or gaming event They don't, because they're not the demographic the abusers, harassers, and sexual assaulters target repeatedly, over and over, until you get climates of fear like the one we're talking about here.

The thing is, he's right.  If I was in a FLGS and I heard a guy behind the counter say to a 13 year old girl "Old enough to bleed, old enough to breed." I'll call the fucking cops and out his ass as a pedophile.  If the cops didn't show up, my next call would be to the local paper.  If I saw a dude cornering a girl working at a shop and laying hands on her, I'd get involved and it wouldn't be pretty.  

The way I grew up, you just don't stand for that shit, and I've gotten in my share of brawls throwing beatdowns on guys that got stupid at concerts, frat parties, whatever, and I've had a few beatdowns thrown my way as well because I stuck my nose into someone's party with a passed out coed.

But you see that idea...that a group has to police it's own, that it has to stand up and not allow toxic segments of the group to affect the whole, is a valid and really axiomatic idea.  Yet, for some reason for a lot of people on the Left, it applies to "white male terrorism" but not "Islamic terrorism" or even "Sunni terrorism" or even "Salafi terrorism".

[JamesV]

The thing is, he's right... you see that idea...that a group has to police it's own, that it has to stand up and not allow toxic segments of the group to affect the whole, is a valid and really axiomatic idea...

I agree, and I think there's solid support and awareness for this in the gaming community, for instance Pundit's own arguments against catpissmen, or the (in?)-famous geek fallacies. At the same time we get pieces like this one where the issues being discussed are legitimate, but shared through anecdotes that beggar belief.

[crkrueger]

I agree, and I think there's solid support and awareness for this in the gaming community, for instance Pundit's own arguments against catpissmen, or the (in?)-famous geek fallacies. At the same time we get pieces like this one where the issues being discussed are legitimate, but shared through anecdotes that beggar belief.

Yeah...I never take anyone at face value, I always question.

I've had friends who have been raped, molested, groped, placed under constant threat of same...but not all the same friend.

Everytime I hear of someone whose entire life story is a never-ending sequence of victimizations, my default is to call bullshit.  The earliest stuff probably happened, and then after that, it's political or self-aggrandizement because they think they are now working for The Greater Good and thus any and all lies are excusable.

I think that's just horrific, because lies never help.  People are going to call you on them, and you end up hurting other people.

Basically, I think a lot of the public confessionals are people taking one for the team.  They know there are some really toxic, venomous, evil, rotten fucks out there, so they throw themselves into the mix, drawing these assholes out from under their rock to spotlight the problem.

Unfortunately, Truth never comes from Lies. Ever.  You say shit I know probably can't be all true and that obvious fakery paints every possible thing you say, valid or not.  Add in the fact that when you obviously lie, you draw lies upon yourself.  People who know you are full of shit, deliberately say toxic, venomous things simply because they know you are full of shit.  Thus, by deliberately acting as bait, you end up in the public eye as the rough equivalence of entrapment.

You speak the Truth, and people come at you for it, you can prove it, and you will win, eventually.

Who knows about this woman's personal experiences, but the Malifaux things seems like total horseshit.  Mearls did what the Malifaux guy did, ask for evidence of wrongdoing.  He got the same thing...absolutely nothing.

You look at Social movements that succeeded in long-term, lasting change, they didn't accomplish it by "any means necessary".

[thedungeondelver]

Y
Who knows about this woman's personal experiences, but the Malifaux things seems like total horseshit.  Mearls did what the Malifaux guy did, ask for evidence of wrongdoing.  He got the same thing...absolutely nothing.

Oh did she demand a job at WotC, too?  Threaten to sic the FBI on them?  Make dark pronouncements of having mountains of evidence that the rape and death threats are coming from inside WotC!?

[Piestrio]

But you see that idea...that a group has to police it's own, that it has to stand up and not allow toxic segments of the group to affect the whole, is a valid and really axiomatic idea.  Yet, for some reason for a lot of people on the Left, it applies to "white male terrorism" but not "Islamic terrorism" or even "Sunni terrorism" or even "Salafi terrorism".

I don't know. It certainly sounds good but it reeks of "collective sin" which is generally good for nothing but justifying all sorts of evil.

Certainly people, as individuals have a responsibility to stand up to bad behavior but to turn this into some free floating guilt and collective misdeed is to fundamentally mistake the map for the territory.

[James Gillen]

I don't know. It certainly sounds good but it reeks of "collective sin" which is generally good for nothing but justifying all sorts of evil.

Yeah, I decided not to get dragged into the posts on Facebook.  For some reason the equation of "white male" with "terrorism" made me think this might not be a reasonable argument.

JG

[Piestrio]

Yeah, I decided not to get dragged into the posts on Facebook.  For some reason the equation of "white male" with "terrorism" made me think this might not be a reasonable argument.

JG

I often find that these people are so far gone that it's nearly impossible to talk to them. They've defined and redefined themselves into an epistemic fortress from which there is no escape.

They've completely closed themselves off from any voices or knowledge not from inside their self imposed bubble.

[David Johansen]

Of course, if the things said on that thread were said of any other group you'd get banned in an instant.  It's a clear and inflammatory troll post and it's gone on for what?  50 pages or so?  I tried to say a few salient things like that Winnipeg is a pretty white population and that wider societal issues tend to flow into the gaming populace but the gaming populace can't change the wider society.  It's tricky posting on rpg.net since many things you might say are ban-worthy no matter how true they are.

[daniel_ream]

I've read the court conclusions of her trial (http://www.manitobahumanrights.ca/publications/legal/garland.pdf) and I don't agree it was a kangaroo court

Canadian Human Rights Tribunals are kangaroo courts, full stop.  They are not legal courts and are not bound by any of the traditions of English common law found in actual criminal courts.

There were some very loud and messy challenges to their authority some years ago that resulted in changes at the federal level, if not the provincial.

[crkrueger]

Oh did she demand a job at WotC, too?  Threaten to sic the FBI on them?  Make dark pronouncements of having mountains of evidence that the rape and death threats are coming from inside WotC!?

I meant Consultantgate, when everyone was claiming Zak and Pundit were transphobic hatecriminals.  Mearls basically said "Email me the proof" and no one ever did.

The Malifaux president did the same thing.  No one ever did.

[JesterRaiin]

Satanists to rapists to terrorists in just three decades.
Evidently, Dungeons & Dragons players are not to be fucked with.

And  bloodthirsty pirates! Don't forget about bloodthirsty pirates!