But My Wand Craves Release!
It really shouldn't come as a screaming shock that some people are whining about the pushback they're getting for wanting to play Hogwarts Legacy. It undercuts the lie you can "vote with your dollar". It proves what a lot of us already know, players are meat, and marketers are desperate to equate all of the History of Queerness to a crappy mid-tier that'll be gone in 6mo. It's the apotheosis of the rainbow-washing they've been doing for decades.
Don't get me wrong, I understand local Pride orgs who take sponsorship from Budweiser or whatevs, floats and permits and such cost money. That's not the same as a streamer who's throwing a temper tantrum because their audience objected.
There is a lot going on but, come on. How much does he make again...? Imagine having that platform, then comparing queer people to those oppressing them, putting himself as the victim. That's the bait-and-switch the pink-washing companies have been vying for: Pity the poor company who sponsors anti-trans Senators but has "domestic partner" benefits! They're doing their best!
What even is that? Queer people are the real bullies, not letting Hasan play a game loudly at them when they've asked not. Also notice, they're powerless and "chirping", and bullies who overpowered him. Is that "Woke Mob" rhetoric I hear...? But please Hasan, tell me more about what abuse tactics and systemic oppression look like. They want you agreeing all of queer is equivalent to some streamer losing 100 views because it reduces us to an ad campaign. "I could have done a fundraiser for 'you people', but now..."
This isn't youthful innocence, dude's 32. The game will be gone in 8mo, some of these people will be bullies for years. And whoa doggies are the op-ed writers desperate to make the homos as bad as the people who are trying to outlaw their existence.
That said, one thing I want to really highlight is even without the trans bullshit from Rowling, there's the massive Antisemitism, the massive anti-Indigenous "History of Magic in North America", the massive anti-Asian nonsense... There's a lot of poison that was already in the well.
I guess what I'm saying is, I have barely any idea who half of these people are. I don't really watch letsplays much except for games most people have never heard of (Shoutout to the three people who will recognize "Who's Lila"!) or games I readily admit are problematic faves like Skyrim or Fallout. But I sure as hell don't deny they're problematic. Forgive me if I'm not really in the mood for apologia of nerds who are desperate to make their wand fire. Play your damn game bro, just stop whining that we left the party.
And my goodness was he whining. He tweeted about it, went into other people's tweets to complain about it, he was even in some YouTube videos complaining about how he can never do anything right so it must just be that all of YouTube is brainpoisoned or something. If that's true, he was an active participant in the poisoning:
I can think of many things to compare being asked not to play a game to: someone saying not to eat cake before bedtime, someone telling me Elmo is really a puppet... But sweeping legislation banning basic healthcare and access to public bathrooms for entire segments of the population? That, as they say, is a bit of a reach. And for what? To say the quiet part out loud, that you genuinely only care about your LGBTQ audience if they praise (and pay) you sufficiently? That's just bullying. We get that enough from non-allies my guy.
Yanno, being queer in the 80s and 90s was a shit show. Seriously, you're talking about the period where AIDS was still called GRID right through to the Defense of Marriage Act. There was inter-community drama like you would not believe. He wouldn't know because by the time he was 10 it was basically over. But there's books, there's videos, most people know what Stonewall was... These feckless nerds can't possibly think they're the victim here. I guess I'm just too old school, I can't imagine a damn video game being "a bridge too far", let alone "needless drama". It's people in your audience asking you to not be intentionally cruel. What timeline is this?
Sure, when it comes down to it, there's no ethical consumption under capitalism. But that doesn't mean it's a free-for-all, it means we have to be more selective and attentive to our actions and how we build community. It's getting really damn scary out there and I've got a lot of friends who are feeling it hard. If you have the chance to make their lives even one millimeter less horrific, passing it up is bad enough but flinging yourself on the floor and demanding they apologize for even letting you know the chance existed is just so much worse.
