GamerGate was an unusual 2014 movement which purported itself to be about gaming journalist integrity, but its origins with the Wizardchan rivalry and alleged cheating scandal¹⁾ would cast serious on these claims, on top of its former name being the Quinnspiracy.

Despite lacking any goals or structure, a copious amount of manipulation from early alt-right reactionaries to virtue signalling progressives would help shape the general consensus about this being a culture war, except they didn't really do much and sorta vanished by mid-2015.

Prior to the movement, it should be noted that gaming journalists have actually been questioned for their ethics and integrity since the early 2000s.²⁾ This actually persists into the modern day, considering all the memes about how gaming journalists are ironically bad at the games themselves. However, we're getting way ahead of ourselves, so let's set the scene back to 2013.

In 2013, video game developer Zoë Quinn submitted Depression Quest to Steam Greenlight,³⁾ and its name caught the attention of Wizardchan's infamous board for depressed virgins, “Virgin9000” (/v9k/),⁴⁾ on December 6, 2013.⁵⁾ Quinn didn't react kindly to this⁶⁾⁷⁾ and claimed that they doxed her,⁸⁾⁹⁾ which confused the Wizardchan users who insist no such thing happened,¹⁰⁾¹¹⁾ but the media ate this up.^12)13)14)

As a result, the crocodile tears helped Depression Quest get approved by January 8, 2014,^15)16)17) then we saw Quinn go on a tirade against “The Fine Young Capitalists” (TFYC) over a misconception about their video game idea contest.¹⁸⁾ Depression Quest would release on August 11, 2014,¹⁹⁾ but this was followed by Gjoni's scandalous post about Quinn's alleged affair on August 16, 2014.²⁰⁾

While the author was swiftly banned from Penny Arcade²¹⁾ and Something Awful,²²⁾²³⁾ this scandal was such a hot topic that some YouTube channels covered it. However, Quinn responded with takedown requests, if said videos used footage of the game.²⁴⁾²⁵⁾ In retaliation, 4chan and Reddit users initiated the “Quinnspiracy” and decided to help raise $71,496 USD for The Fine Young Capitalists' crowdfunding campaign.²⁶⁾

Once the crowdfunding campaign finished, the communities would design “Vivian James” and “Gilda Mars”, two characters that would cameo in Afterlife Empire but essentially became mascots.²⁷⁾ During this, the movement caught the attention of libertarian Statesian actor Adam Baldwin, who would coin “GamerGate” on August 27, 2014,²⁸⁾ but then “gamers are dead” happened.^{29)30)31)32)33)34)35)36)37)38)}

The movement, now operating as “GamerGate”, would initiate “#NotYourShield”,³⁹⁾⁴⁰⁾ then began this huge mass mailing campaign to hurt the revenue of gaming journalism websites. In this very brief window, while aggressive, they did achieve their stated goal as possible conflicts of interest were addressed with outlets like Kotaku (Gawker),⁴¹⁾ Polygon (Vox Media),⁴²⁾ Destructoid,⁴³⁾ and The Escapist.⁴⁴⁾⁴⁵⁾

Unfortunately, the movement's luck ran out, with 4chan and Reddit starting to suppress their discussions,⁴⁶⁾ Some of the 4chan users noticed and set up /burgers/ on 8chan on September 16, 2014,⁴⁷⁾ then 4chan formally banned the subject on September 18, 2014,⁴⁸⁾ so 8chan welcomed them with open arms⁴⁹⁾ as they decide to migrate from /burgers/ to the more aptly-named /gg/.

During this, we'd get an unusual article from the far-right Zionist-owned Breitbart, where the then-writer Milo Yiannopoulos insinuated that a “GameJournoPros” mailing list was responsible for the negative media.⁵⁰⁾⁵¹⁾ Many would insist that this event would help shape the “alt-right”, with Brietbart's then-chairman Steve Bannon gloating about this⁵²⁾ before becoming a vital Trump 2016 strategist.⁵³⁾

The following months were not so kind for the movement on 8chan, as /gg/ went up for adoption,⁵⁴⁾⁵⁵⁾ so its users quickly fled to /gamergate/ in December 2014.⁵⁶⁾ After this, /gamergate/ was hijacked and raided around March 23, 2015, splitting them into /gamergatehq/ and /ggrevolt/. By this point, all of their momentum had vanished, so they settled for a general thread on /v/.

Aside from the Bollea v. Gawker lawsuit that incidentally worked in their favor,⁵⁷⁾ there isn't much else to say about the GamerGate movement since then. 8chan ended up dying in August 2019, so /v/ moved to a refuge until 8chan returned as 8kun, but the arrangement didn't last long,⁵⁸⁾⁵⁹⁾ so /v/ would decide to migrate to the 8chan clone “8chan.moe” in 2020 where it, surprisingly, continues to stand today.

When you factor in how the internet was once dominated by edgy suburbanite culture, it shouldn't be a huge surprise that “counter-counterculture” had been brewing with the internet's growth and cultural shift, but it never left infancy until GamerGate created a clear divide with constant negative press, allowing reactionaries to plant the seeds for what became the alt-right movement.^60)61)62)

However, churnalists often overestimate its impact, despite the alt-right caring very little for it,⁶³⁾ and will magically tie it to Pizzagate,⁶⁴⁾ QAnon,⁶⁵⁾⁶⁶⁾ January 6th,⁶⁷⁾ Depp v. Heard,⁶⁸⁾ incels,⁶⁹⁾ etc. This essentially turns GamerGate into an empty buzzword to reprimand conservatism with, drawing attention away from how it supposedly affects the impressionable youth or contributes to post-truth politics.

• The term “GamerGate” uses the -gate suffix, referencing the Watergate scandal.
  • While the practice has become common in recent decades, there are a considerable amount of people who criticize its usage as illogical, lazy, overdone, and reactionary.^70)71)72)
  • As such, the etymology has nothing to do with GamersGate (a Sweden-based online store) or Gamergate (a female worker ant who can assume the role of queen).
• For languages that use the Cyrillic alphabets, “GamerGate” is written as “ГеймерГейт” (GeymerGeyt).
• I don't think politics is the place to solve, like, digital nudity or localizations in video games.
  • In addition, I don't think the existence of pro-Depp stances during the Depp v. Heard trials can be tied to GamerGate when you can actually find women that sympathize with Depp, plus this instills a false dichotomy ignoring cases where both sides of a relationship can be abusive.
• Notice how I didn't mention Anita Sarkeesian, the feminist media critic that 4chan users always held a dislike for, or Brianna Wu being awkward and throwing herself out there.^73)74)75)

• DeepFreeze - An ancient GamerGate resource, documenting news outlets and journalists they had conflicts with, though it hasn't received any new additions or updates since 2017.
  • GamerGate Wiki - Self-explanatory, though partially broken due to a wide IP range ban.⁷⁶⁾
  • @icejournalism on Twitter - The associated account, seems inactive since 2022.
• /v/ (Catalog) on 8chan.moe⁷⁷⁾ - Current board for the #GamerGate general discussion thread.
• /r/KotakuInAction on Reddit - An active hub for GamerGate, though they lack anonymity.
  • /r/GamerGhazi on Reddit - In the past, this was a significant anti-GamerGate hub on Reddit.
• Gamergate (harassment campaign) on Wikipedia - Heavily anti-GamerGate and convoluted.
• GamerGate on >KnowYourMeme - Heavily pro-GamerGate, but it's messy and you would probably get laughed at if you tell people to read an article on fucking KnowYourMeme.
• Gamergate campaign on Encyclopedia Brittanica - While anti-GamerGate, it's actually readable.