Of course, the point is that they can't be refuted. They're not claims for which a refutation is a well-defined concept.
Sartre once wrote this about anti-Semites, but it applies equally well here (and, to be clear, I am making no implication about whether the people using the same tactics today are also anti-Semites, just that they're using the same tactics):
"Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past. It is not that they are afraid of being convinced. They fear only to appear ridiculous or to prejudice by their embarrassment their hope of winning over some third person to their side."
The only winning move, for those of us who believe in words, is not to play.
It was never about "corruption" in journalism, especially not in gaming journalism. If it had been, it would have focused on AAA devs rather than a random indie developer who was a woman.
You're falling for the trick. 'piotrjurkiewicz isn't using words responsibly - I specifically and clearly said that I'm not comparing anyone to anti-Semitism as a belief, just the pattern of rhetorical arguments, and yet that was the objection. You are obligated to take seriously the claim that this is about ethics in journalism, when it simultaneously is and isn't, and yet 'piotrjurkiewicz feels no obligation to take what I said seriously.
In any case, the rest of Sartre's essay is completely on point. Among other things, it addresses this exact ability to believe a thing and its contradiction, and make it only a problem for the people who are trying to argue against them in good faith - it's quite scary how accurately Sartre in 1944 was able to understand these modes of trolling (and trolling is really the term for it). Harvard has the first chapter online:
There's an interesting question in there of what, exactly, the anti-Semite is going to do once they're not able to hate the Jew. That's the only thing Sartre couldn't see in 1944, but he did see that it's not about anything the Jewish people are or do, but as the other. Today we've declared anti-Semitism unacceptable, but we've got enough other others.
I don't think Guardian is a trustworthy source on this, having in mind their heavy left bias. They won't present any arguments which could undermine the narration that it was pure anti-women witchhunt, simply because it won't fit their ideological line.
Look, they even managed to somehow connect the 2-years old event to the last month's three most hot keywords of left-leaning media: Trump, alt-right and hate. This shows that this article is a opinion piece targeted to a specific group of readers in order to amplify their existing beliefs, rather than a balanced description of facts.