Why is GamerGate everywhere and nowhere? Discussing the shell game. (Reddit X-Post) Repost from Reddit: This is an extension of recent topics spurred by the Allison Rapp debacle in which a Reddit anon discussed what they called Shell Game Propaganda, a close cousin of classic Doublethink, with enough key distinctions to consider it separate, if related. To quote: [T]he trick is making people choose a lie over the truth, but that's problematic because it always involves the risk that someone will choose truth. With the kind of propaganda we're seeing here, you tell two lies, both painting a negative but mutually contradictory image of your chosen target. It doesn't matter if people don't believe both at once, because that was never the goal. It only matters that they believe one, and it doesn't really matter which. The mutually contradictory nature of the lies actually works in your favour since no matter which lie they choose, they're going to assume that since the other option is so different, one of them must be true. You never need to offer the truth, and thus there's no risk that people will choose it. Examples: GamerGate has no female members, and any who claim to be female are sockpuppets BUT ALSO GamerGate uses its highly-visible female members as shields from criticism. GamerGate is a tiny niche movement that doesn't represent the majority of gamers in any way BUT ALSO GamerGate is a clear indication of pandemic sexism and racism in gaming culture Among the most sinister: I highly recommend browsing the examples link for the most complete picture. So the distinctions are: Imagine if you were already in the professional practice of being a crappy propaganda shill game journo, with the kool-aid keggers, doublethink, click-bux and everything, right?  You live in a media-city political landscape surrounded by media-city sycophants all mostly out to squeeze a buck out of their own politically charged brands of pseudo-intellectual wankery creativity, right?  Well, if you were so deep into saying or doing crappy things to others over ideological differences, ideology based rage-baiting, media-city political shilling journalism, that you can't see the harm in your own douchery anymore, it would kinda seem like the tons of people you were screwing over were actually some kind of boogeyman, right?   You're not going to admit to yourself that you've been an opportunistic media-city scene-whore all along, it's a shadowy cabal of haters that only coincidentally consists of everyone you've screwed over.  Should these people show up to oppose you with consistency over a period of time?  Proof of conspiracy!  Now it's an organized shadowy cabal!  What?  They're also showing up in others cities too?  This is an epidemic, we must alert the U.N.!  They're in Japan now??  Dear effing GODDESS THEY'RE EVERYWHERE - COMMENCE MEDIA BLITZ!!  Egads what's this?? Despite our global publishing power, people still won't "listen and believe" in absolute totality as we continue to blindly fuck over swaths of people in our industry, in alarming quantities the world over??  REALITY HAS A CONSERVATIVE BIAS!! It's like game journos this particular brand of media-city scene-whore have had this lusting boner for media-city scene life and material success, but never learned the classic scene maxim:  “Be nice to people on the way up because you'll see them again on the way down.” This is why GamerGate is everywhere and nowhere. We're everyone and everywhere when they need to use the shell game to distract from their own crappy behavior. We're 200 sexless neckbeards (and also pussy-crushing dudebros) in our parent's basements when they need to sell their crappy behavior as “activism.” This is also why GG simply can't be wrong.  Wrong as in incorrect. Wrong as in erroneous conclusion via empirical data, or wrong as in not having all the angles where, if we did, we'd "get it" and move on.  They were right; we were wrong.  Got it. We must also be obtuse shitslingers, wailing hyper-consumers, and internet-arguers who are "the past" versus "the now".  Why we must also be the Klan mixed with ISIS, who are also literally Hitler conspiring to nerve-gas all of gaming from our numerous interdimensional rape dungeons as well.  Why our wanton bloodlust must be so great that our untold millions of crimes and innumerable mass graves where we throw all the icky girls remain so impossible to find, but are "totally a real thing" (according to twitter and the press).   We do all this (and more, so I hear), BUT ALSO we can be easily defeated - forever and ever - with enough subscriptions, Patreon donations, and the most dreaded and powerful Divine Retweet. It comes back to what we suspected at the beginning.  As long as we're boogeymen, no one is paying attention to them, and they get to sell all the GG-fic they want and call it journalism.  It's all one, big, scene-whoring money engine - who cares what it's doing to...you know...the actual gaming industry.  The victim scene-whore money must flow. tl:dr: "Be nice to people on your way up because you'll meet them on your way down." x "May the bridges we burn light our way." = "We create our own demons." Gamergaaaaaaaaate!!! Thoughts? Original post. ed: content, structure, updates Update:  I'll be updating this with relevant links to keep it as a resource until such a time as I'm satisfied it's gotten around.  I know it can be a bit of a navel-gazy subject, and damn is my humor awful, but special thanks nonetheless to u/Andreus for sharing his ideas, and to you for reading.