Games business figures highlighted the inextricable hyperlink between tradition and actuality at GDC final evening as they condemned final week’s horrific terror assaults on mosques in New Zealand. One contribution, from veteran designer Tim Schafer, was unequivocal: “fuck white supremacists.”
The subject was broached by narrative designer and host of the Independent Games Festival Awards Meg Jayanth (through GamesIndustry.biz). Referencing her award on the identical present in 2015 for her work on 80 Days – an explicitly progressive and inclusive game – she spoke of the jarring distinction between what that second and the contemporaneous GamerGate motion every represented:
“It felt at that time as though we rejected that campaign of hatred. But it’s actually never felt closer to me right now. A mutated strain of that poison that made video games its testing ground has bubbled up in Christchurch, New Zealand. It fueled a monster who went to a mosque with murder in his heart, and if we don’t utterly, and vocally, and wholly reject these people – these Nazis, and fascists, and white supremacists – then we are inviting them in. If we make room for them, then there is no room for anyone else.”
At the Game Developers’ Choice Awards later that night, Schafer endorsed Jayanth’s sentiments, and despatched his like to Muslims worldwide. He added:
“I hope this isn’t controversial, but fuck white supremacists. I think it’s sad that racists and other hate peddlers feel safe in any space that’s remotely connected to videogames, and I think we all have an opportunity in our work, in our daily lives, and in our platforms big and small, to make it absolutely clear that we do not tolerate any of that crap.”
Just in case you have not seen it your self or did not wish to retweet it from some shitty nazi defender, here is Tim Schafer saying “Fuck white supremacists” at GDC pic.twitter.com/wYJpFRVq45
— *Blasts you with Forearm Laser* (@valzongburnt) March 21, 2019
PCGamesN wholeheartedly agrees. There is nothing controversial about this sentiment. Let or not it’s universally endorsed.
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