[7dare]

> Evidence suggests that these are mostly just attention-starved gamers looking to impress one another

What is the link with gaming I'm missing here? Is 4chan simply associated by gaming defacto? I don't see anything else about video games or any evidence of these people being gamers in the article...

[ericdykstra]

"Gamers" and "Gamergate" is a generic boogeyman that media outlets can use to direct their anger at. See "Why Young Men of Color Are Joining White-Supremacist Groups" [1] for another example.

The obvious answer to "Why are non-whites joining white supremacist groups" might be "They're not white supremacist groups, they're just mislabeled by people who call everyone they disagree with nazis."

The article explains that it is, however, Gamergate and Ayn Rand that are turning non-white people towards white supremacy, even though Gamergate and Ayn Rand don't have an opinion on racial superiority as far as I know.

edit: It looks like I triggered the NPC downvote algorithm. I hope the next patch gives them dialogue choices.

[1] http://archive.is/P0X3D

[whywhywhywhy]

To me, the real explanation for a lot of this bizarre nonsense is because journalists are spending all day on Twitter which in reality isn't the real world it's technically just a very popular internet forum with a few famous users and they've begun to not understand that what happens on the internet forum Twitter does not represent what's actually happening in the real world.

This is how internet forum drama gets mistaken as actually something people in the real world actually think about.

Once you start to see this it becomes so strange that you can even tell when a journalist is a Twitter addict just from some of the terms and thinking they start to include in their articles.

There is very much a Twitter hivemind heavy users start to tap into, and unlike say Reddit users or even 4chan users they mistake Twitter as being the real world and the hivemind as reality.

[ericdykstra]

Indeed. When ~journalists~ spend their whole day on Twitter, it means their resolution of the world is incredibly minute.

Think about the most significant events from 2005. If you're looking back at that resolution, the small day-to-day stuff gets filtered out. The signal to noise ratio of what's actually significant is pretty good.

These journalists are literally involved in the minute to minute. They wouldn't even notice the signal if it kicked them in the head, because they live in the noise.

[castlecrasher2]

>They wouldn't even notice the signal if it kicked them in the head, because they live in the noise.

This is a pretty apt description for that entire group, really. Many people live exclusively in the consumer world and have largely abandoned foundations of society like building a family or participating in local community, and I think it manifests in the internet tribalism we see.

[ericdykstra]

Indeed; it's unfortunate, really.

I step in and out of engaging in political discourse online, but spend most of my time outside of it. I only come back to test my (hopefully) improved perspective to see how my worldview holds up against the critiques that the internet throws at me.

I'm about due to another half year or more recess away from social media, though. It definitely wears on you.

[hugg]

Maybe they think that only gamers know what an "NPC" is. But, feels like a stretch.

[qubax]

You aren't missing anything. It's just a far left propaganda outfit keeping with the message - "alt right", "right wing", "far right", "gamer", "incel", etc.

Ctrl-c, Ctrl-v.

Also, this story is like a week old. It's funny how it only reached HN via a nytimes post.