Electronic Arts and other big gaming or tech companies have teamed up with the Anti-Defamation League to combat purported right-wing extremism and push social justice within gaming.
Both EA and the ADL are pledging to fight right-wing extremism in gaming, with a new proclamation via the German branch of EA and their PR director Martin Lorber (via The Post Millennial) earlier this year.
Electronic Arts Germany and the German government are teaming up with Good Gaming – Well Played Democracy and Keinen Pixel den Faschisten (No Pixels for Fascists) to reportedly prevent gamers from being radicalized into neo-Nazis.
When looking at the folks behind these groups it becomes clear this is a veiled attempt at stifling what their staff perceive as inappropriate in the gaming industry.
Good Gaming is supported by the Amadeu Antonio Foundation, an activist group headed by former Stasi secret police informant Anette Kahane. Kahane got in trouble recently for sending brochures to German schools claiming a girl’s family is right-wing if she wears dresses, or does chores at home.
No Pixels’ co-founders are both Pascal Wagner and Aurelia Brandenberg, both big proponents of the common myth that video games have a widespread radicalization or right-wing problem, or that video games are exclusionary. Brandenberg noted recently that gamers are typically anti-diversity and right-wing, full of “toxic nerd masculinity in their treehouse.”
Good Gaming notes their goal is to analyze how ” right-wing alternative actors are increasingly trying to foment a misanthropic atmosphere on gaming platforms.” It’s worth noting many tech companies in the United States and elsewhere have already joined or have established similar groups and projects.
The non-profit Games for Change revealed their advisory board recently, and it includes, once again – the Anti-Defamation League, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, EA, Ubisoft, and more. Their goal is to create a “more diverse, inclusive, and positive online environment for youth” while also fighting “hate speech” and other forms of “toxicity.”
They added, “No systematic work at scale has been done to understand, document, and synthesise anti-racism, anti-hate and harassment, anti-toxicity, and prosocial efforts across gaming communities.” This basically echoes the same mantra as No Pixels.
Games for Change published their latest brochure, which suggests gaming culture is “exclusionary and discriminatory, reproducing and encoding systems of bias and inequity that pervade society as a whole.” Their goal is to use gamers and video games as “important and potentially powerful tools for achieving broader goals of social justice.”
Our take: Niche Gamer has existed as a non-partisan gaming and tech website, producing content that simply tells you what is worth checking out. We have always been against censorship of any kind. We have always ensured our community is welcome to all, regardless of your beliefs or politics. If you care about free speech and creative freedom in gaming, you should let Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, and more know this cannot be allowed, and that gaming is a welcoming space.
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