Adobe, Mercedes-Benz are Latest to Pull Ads at the Behest of GamerGate

You might be wondering what kind of doublespeak inanity is going on when tech giant Adobe’s announcement that they’re acquiescing to GamerGate requests is accompanied by an anti-bullying graphic, so allow us to explain. It’s a series of unfortunate events.

Last week Gawker contributor Sam Biddle cracked some poor jokes about GamerGate on Twitter, suggesting (or jokingly suggesting) that the perpetuators of the so-called movement, linked throughout its existence with harassment and threats of violence toward women, deserved to be bullied themselves. As a statement of any level of humor, “two wrongs make a right” is never particularly defensible. His handful of tweets were, however, an juicy target for GamerGate, which has been attempting lately to spin the narrative about the amorphous group around entirely to one where GamerGate supporters are the bullied parties, preyed upon by “social justice warriors” who… I guess want to keep ethics out of video game journalism? For reasons.

General reminder that when women become the target of GamerGate attention they are bullied not merely by casually hateful tweets but literally driven out of their homes by death and rape threats. Like, I don’t believe in playing the “your misfortunes are worse than mine” card, but seriously. Moving on.

Biddle publicly apologized, acknowledging that his tweets were hurtful and poorly intended, early this week. At that point a renewed campaign to complain to the advertisers of blogs and other outlets that take an anti-GamerGate stance had ensued, and has, in the ultimate of ironies, actually succeeded in getting Mercedes-Benz and Adobe to pull their ads from Gawker on the grounds that they refuse to support bullying.

Mercedes-Benz has since reinstated their campaign. Hopefully Adobe will soon, having just received a call from Brianna Wu, driven from her home by GamerGate-borne death threats two weeks ago.

(image via Shutterstock, photoshopped by us)

Previously in GamerGate

• Former NFL Player Chris Kluwe RIPPED GAMERGATE UP In an Expletive-Filled Op-Ed
• Zoë Quinn Talks #GamerGate On MSNBC
• Joss Whedon, Boston Globe Journalist Smack Down “But GamerGate Is About Journalistic Ethics!” Argument

Are you following The Mary Sue on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Pinterest, & Google +?

Have a tip we should know? tips@themarysue.com

Author

Close

Susana Polo

Susana Polo thought she'd get her Creative Writing degree from Oberlin, work a crap job, and fake it until she made it into comics. Instead she stumbled into a great job: founding and running this very website (she's Editor at Large now, very fancy). She's spoken at events like Geek Girl Con, New York Comic Con, and Comic Book City Con, wants to get a Batwoman tattoo and write a graphic novel, and one of her canine teeth is in backwards.

twitter