The latest harassment campaign occurring over a Steam profile and community posts should be less surprising than it is, TBH. Valve's hands-off approach to moderation, along with creating a forum for every single video game, has led their Community tab to be one of the most toxic hubs on the Internet. Turning off the forum feature in Steam wouldn't fix the toxicity, but it'd sure as hell give it one less space to fester unchallenged.
Another observation: nearly every "great" article we've seen linked across Cohost, Bluesky and Twitter is only adding fuel to the fire. We've seen a lot of writers taking the harassment campaign at face value, explaining "No, this isn't how the industry works at all." The thing is, we know that. The harassers and YouTube personalities at the forefront of this know that. So why are you addressing their vitriol by what they're saying, when their words mean something else entirely?
The way these fascists are wielding woke translates to "There are too many Black/queer/women characters in video games." Would you deem it necessary to challenge their claims if they were saying what they meant? No, because it's obvious that they're wrong, and it's equally obvious that they're not going to be talked out of it!
By addressing their words in this manner, you're debating on their own terms. And you never debate a fascist on their own terms, as history has proven time and time again. Yet here these outlets are, repeating the same mistakes from nearly a decade ago, refuting their "concerns" rather than shutting them out entirely. It's especially infuriating when some of these outlets were around for the same old shit, making the same, decade-old mistakes!
The next time you find yourself tempted to address the people engaged in this harassment campaign, ask yourself this. Do you really want to debate someone who sees anyone under the "woke" umbrella as subhuman? Or would you rather do literally anything else with your life?
