Anita Sarkeesian on Video Games’ Great Future

Anita Sarkeesian, in an op-ed for The New York Times:

Those who police the borders of our hobby, the ones who try to shame and threaten women like me into silence, have already lost. The new reality is that video games are maturing, evolving and becoming more diverse.

Those of us who critique the industry are simply saying that games matter. We know games can tell different, broader stories, be quirky and emotional, and give us more ways to win and have fun.

As others have recently suggested, the term “gamer” is no longer useful as an identity because games are for everyone. These days, even my mom spends an inordinate amount of time gaming on her iPad. So I’ll take a cue from my younger self and say I don’t care about being a “gamer,” but I sure do love video games.

Exactly right. The dead-enders are lashing out, in brutally ugly ways, because they’ve already lost. But they haven’t even lost their games — all they’ve lost is their de facto position as the only sort of game players who mattered.

★ Tuesday, 28 October 2014