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I don’t agree with your opinion, so you must be punished

At first, I couldn´t quite place where I’ve heard the name Steve Hogarty (a game journalist) before, but then I remembered a “little” incident concerning him, EA and an H&M-themed Sims 2 expansion pack (this incident took place back in June 2007. I believe), to make a long story short. Steve Hogarty got blacklisted by EA after his review of the H&M expansion for Sims 2 (not only that, a EA executive wanted Hogarty to get fired on top of that). Well, I heard about this story last summer, but since then. I haven´t heard a word about Steve Hogarty, until now, that is, because last night I spotted a rather disturbing tweet by Hogarty.

So what did Hogarty say (tweet) exactly? Well, obviously he likes the thought of kicking footballs in the face of #GamerGate supporters (as seen in the picture down below). I mean, it´s perfectly fine to not agree with someone else opinion and thoughts, but it´s a completely different story to use violence against someone, simply because the person in question happens to hold a different opinion then yourself (the same thing goes for threats of any kind). That´s not okay on any level. However, it´s alright to debate with people, or to just have an exchange of words and thoughts (not an exchange of fists or threats).

This is wrong on so many levels…

Violence and threats don’t belong anywhere

That´s at least how I try to communicate with people at all times, in a civilized and mature manner. As you tend to have a much more pleasant experience that way, but just like I stated early on in this article. Besides the H&M expansion for Sims 2 “incident” I didn´t know all that much about Steve Hogarty, well, it turns out that he has said some quite disturbing things in the past as well:

How exactly would he even know for sure who´s a GG supporter, and who´s not?

Since when did a hashtag become equivalent to isis?

Steve Hogarty is far from the only guy that has threaten to use violence against GG and it´s supporters though. Just take a look at some of these pictures fromt past events:

If I’m not totally wrong now, Keegan Bean deleted his Twitter account shortly after that he tweeted this out.

Wouldn´t it be funny if Fabrício “Vai Cavalo” Werdum said that his a GG supporter? I think you get my point. As anyone could be a GG supporter.

My point would be this. Most of these people are supposed to be white knights and Social justice warriors, but still their behaving like the monsters they have sworn to protect others from (oh the irony). I also find all of this to be somewhat hypocritical as well, since these people claim that #GamerGate is a hate and harassment group, and at the very same time they use threats of violence against them? How does that even add up in the end? So it feels rather fitting that Sargon of Akkad released a video called “The #GamerGate Harassment Narrative is Dead, #SPJAirPlay” just recently (I would recommend everyone to watch that one when you got the time for it).

As Sargon´s video puts a lot of focus on that particular field and topic (#GamerGate Harassment, truth Vs lies, etc.). So what are your thoughts and opinions on this subject?