Video Games Have Never Been Woke
The gaming industry has become far more symbolically liberal over the last decade. But it’s critical to contextualize these shifts.
After 2011 there was a major shift in how symbolic economy professionals thought about, talked about, and pursued “social justice.” As I demonstrate at length in my forthcoming book, these changes were visible along many different dimensions — cutting across the symbolic industries — and were largely
Jory Pacht
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5d
This has to be the worst researched article I have read from you.
1) You call those who disagree with you reactionaries, which shows your obvious political bent.
2) You are not a gamer. If you were, you would be aware that there is a huge disconnect between the legacy gaming press, which you constantly reference and gamers. The gaming press, tends to be far left. Gamers are not. In you want to hear the other side listen to YouTubers such as Critical Drinker, Nerdrotic, Geeks and Gamers, etc. You do not have agree with those views, but you have to be aware of them. In the word of John Stuart Mill, He who knows only side on side of the case know little of that" Quite frankly I am disappointed that you chose to hear only one side. You are better than that
3) There are people who play games and there are gamers. You are correct that both men and women pay games, but gamers are overwhelmingly males in their teens, 20's and 30's. When game studios overlook this, they lose money. Take for example Suicide Squad, Kill the Justice League. That one game, widely derided as woke, lost Warner Brothers $200 million, Star Wars Outlaws, in which the prime character looks like a 40+ year old woman, will likely suffer a similar fate.
4) You are correct, making money should be the prime objective of any company. But before you can make money, you have to get money. Larry Fink, CEO of Blackstone, which manages nearly 10 trillion dollars in assets, is the father of ESG, He stated in 2017, "You have to force change. You do that by requiring companies to have ESG programs in place to get VC or PE funding. So, Game studios have to keep their PE/VC partners happy, as well as their fans. That is extraordinarily difficult. The result has been that many smaller gaming studios have gone out of business and some of the larger ones are hurting. Meanwhile Asian studios, unencumbered by ESG, are booming.
There has been a widely held assumption in the entertainment and other industries that you will add new costumers if you go woke and still keep your old ones. That has proven not be true. The old ones leave in droves. Lucas Studios, the prime example of this, has yet to make back their purchase price of the studio from George Lucas. You can make a lot of money selling high fat ice cream to your demographic and be far left (Ben and Jerry's) It doesn't work nearly as well when you are selling Bud Light, tractor supplies or woke games.
5) Instead of calling the other side reactionary, you should actually listen to them. You do this in your other areas of research. Who knows? You might actually learn something.
Jory Pacht
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5d
From the Babylon Bee
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xmXVUaafxs&t=49s
