Talk:Gamergate/Archive 62

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More mention of GG

Outrage Over ‘Call of Duty’ LGBTQ Pride Brings Us Full Circle to Gamergate

Almost a decade ago, video game culture helped give rise to the "anti-woke" movement that continues to plague us today

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/call-of-duty-outrage-lgbtq-pride-gamergate-1234771626/

Doesn't seem to add anything new, but continued mention. Maybe use as fresher RS? - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 02:11, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Add to impact section?

Video Game Conventions Are Still Hotbeds Of Sexualized Abuse

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/video-game-conventions-still-hotbeds-164000370.html

It was a familiar refrain. It’s been nearly a decade since the video game industry was rocked by Gamergate, a protracted, organized, and relentless harassment campaign against female gamers waged, in part, by members of the alt-right. And despite endless denunciations of it across the industry, along with promises to do better, women who attend gaming events and conferences say what happened at GDC is hardly surprising. Sexism among developers and gamers is still prevalent in Discord chats and subreddits; despite all the tough talk from the gaming establishment, the industry–and gaming conventions in particular–remains hostile to women and femme-presenting people.

Impact? Or lack thereof? - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 02:16, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Britannica as a RS for this article

In this case, it seems a bit circular/self-referential to use https://www.britannica.com/topic/Gamergate-campaign as a source in the Wikipedia entry, because it looks like a lot of paraphrasing of the Wikipedia entry over at Britannica.

You'll have to look for Britannica's entry, but I'm a little dubious. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources

- ForbiddenRocky (talk) 17:07, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

https://compactmag.com as RS

While I don't find particular fault with what was written, I'm giving https://compactmag.com a bit of side-eye as an RS. It hasn't been around that long. - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 17:14, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

RS, YESPOV, ATTRIBUTEPOV, DUE, compact source, conversation source

Rather than start an edit war, I would like to talk about this edit a bit more. WP:YESPOV and WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV are met, but these two sources are not very good on as WP:RS, and in particular Compact is barely a year old.

And while I agree with to the relevance to some degree, I also do not think the additions completely rise to WP:DUE and start to border on WP:COATRACK

I think the removal was the better edit. - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 19:41, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

I think that the last thing the article needs is more opinions. We have too much of that already. If we want to discuss the long-term impact of Gamergate there's a ton of high-quality sources now, there's no reason why we would need to devote an entire paragraph to what someone wrote on their blog. Like, yes, sure, we can include it as attributed opinion, but why would we? It's not an opinion by someone particularly notable or relevant, and there's no indication that the opinion itself represents some major stream of thought on the subject. (As an aside, I do wish that we had more guidelines, or at least essays, on when to include opinion. Policy only says that we can, which is spectacularly unhelpful in situations like these, when dealing with topics for which massive realms of opinion exist.) --Aquillion (talk) 19:58, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

I have to agree that this doesn't seem like a useful addition to the article. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 19:58, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

I removed them originally, but I'm not wedded to removing them. Mostly I just thought it was a bit much, that these weren't the greatest of sources and the writers weren't necessarily of any note. I also concur with the section notice that the quotes are a bit long in this section. But there's nothing wrong with covering GG in 2023, if it's still being covered in sources of note - David Gerard (talk) 16:51, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

@EvergreenFir: any comment? - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 13:43, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

@ForbiddenRocky Thank you for the ping and starting this section. Sorry I missed it originally. It seems clear that four editors I respect are in consensus that the content should be removed. I have no objections. EvergreenFir (talk) 16:48, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

You must have miscounted, I can't possibly an editor worthy of respect! — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:02, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Edit request

In the section "Brianna Wu and other targets of harassment," it reads, "Shortly after the Gamergate hashtag was coined, video game developer Phil Fish had his personal information, including various accounts and passwords, hacked and publicly posted in retaliation for defending Quinn and attacking her detractors." That final "her" should be changed to "their" as Quinn's pronouns are they/them, which are already used elsewhere in the article to refer to them. Wehpudicabok (talk) 08:21, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

 Done, good catch. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 16:31, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Edit Request

In the Brianna Wu section, there is a confusing sentence: "The term "social justice warrior" emerged as the favored term of Gamergate proponents, resulting in its pejorative use becoming mainstream." I think it should be: "The term "social justice warrior" emerged as the favored term of Gamergate proponents to refer to their opponents, resulting in its pejorative use becoming mainstream." Cerulean Depths (talk) 20:11, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

 Done CJ-Moki (talk) 05:39, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Edit Request

From the "Legacy" section:

"Business Insider compared QAnon and the GameStop short squeeze to Gamergate by referring to all three as "populist uprisings"."

I genuinely, in good faith, don't see how the GameStop short squeeze is that similar to GamerGate. If there was widespread doxxing and harassment involved, but I don't recall that much. Especially since it's only from one source and, IIRC, a earlier edit that compared the Hogwarts Legacy boycott (which did have doxxing and harassment involved) to GamerGate got reverted. TuneyLoon (talk) 19:44, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

That's something to ask Business Insider. But it sounds like they're just saying they're all "populist uprisings," and that's the extent of the comparison. They weren't bringing up the harassment angle. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 20:26, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Though, just because they say it doesn't mean we need to include it. The other parts of that section reflect major aspects of the topic which have significant, sustained coverage; this is just a one-off article making a passing comparison. Given the amount of coverage the topic as a whole has received I'm not sure it's due for inclusion unless there are other sources saying similar things. Like - the way it was positioned was weighing it equally to the connection to QAnon, which makes absolutely no sense given the vast difference in coverage. --Aquillion (talk) 20:47, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

That's a fair argument. This likely counts as a "trivial mention" and can be discarded. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 20:55, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Split Legacy section?

I was looking at this article out of curiosity and because I just don't understand this situation at all and I saw how long the Legacy section was. I was wondering whether or not we should split it so there's a separate article for it (something like Legacy of Gamergate). What are your thoughts on the idea? Great Mercian (talk) 21:37, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Thinking about it immediately after posting it, I am worried something like Legacy of Gamergate might glorify it, which is slightly worrying. Great Mercian (talk) 21:38, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree. I also wonder if it really needs to be split—or if we could simply revamp the Legacy section, giving more prominence to recent sources with a more comprehensive POV? Just a thought. Woodroar (talk) 22:27, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

I disagree, but only with the word choice; a split is a good idea. Imho, "legacy" is usually associated with positive feelings and attitudes, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it's the "positive aura" of a title like "Legacy of Gamergate" that irks you. If so, I sympathize, and I agree, because it irks me, too. But all you have to do is give it a neutral title, like Impact of Gamergate, and that positive aura disappears (for me at least), and it becomes neutral. I think that would be an ideal title, unless someone comes up with something better.

I think there is no question that the "Impact" topic is WP:Notable, and at 72kb of prose, this article is in WP:SIZESPLIT territory, so really the only question is whether it should have its own article or not, and whether there is consensus (and enough volunteer hands) to do it. So to be clear: I support a split to Impact of Gamergate. Mathglot (talk) 01:14, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Three more words, from a thesaurus: after-effects, aftermath, and consequences. I think I like aftermath even better than impact; plus it's completely neutral. Mathglot (talk) 01:22, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

@Woodroar: @Mathglot: shall we do it then? Great Mercian (talk) 18:55, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Great Mercian, I would say, not yet. Because of the extremely contentious nature of this topic, making this change now based on just a handful of editors might ruffle a lot of feathers. This page has 650 watchers, and probably more than that are interested in what happens here. I would advertise this proposal at a more central venue (a WikiProject, WP:VPR, etc.), and get buy-in from a larger number of editors. If there is a clear trend of support (which, imho, there will be), then I think we can move forward. But we are not quite there yet. Mathglot (talk) 19:05, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, a split would need a lot support. Perhaps an RfC? Before that, I would suggest drafting something, even the outline of an article, along with the sources you would use. That would help show that you don't intend it to be a "look at how great Gamergate was" article. Woodroar (talk) 19:13, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, organizing it as an Rfc with a formal proposal to split off the Legacy section into a new article, with a few naming choices as options (and don't forget a "don't split" option), would also bring in more eyeballs. Mercian, do you want to take this on? If you haven't organized an Rfc before, I can help. Woodroar's idea of a draft is a good one; maybe we should hold off on the Rfc, and do a draft first. The title of a draft doesn't etch anything in stone, but how about, Draft:Aftermath of Gamergate or Draft:Impact of Gamergate? (Note that we don't need the parenthethical in the title, because there is no 'aftermath' for the ant.) Mathglot (talk) 19:20, 14 January 2024 (UTC) P.S. regarding a title, this ngrams is kind of interesting. Mathglot (talk) 19:24, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I've started Draft:Impact of Gamergate with a copy of the current section. For starters, I plan on only adding an article skeleton (refs section, maybe some See also, categories, etc.) and not making any changes to the content at all. I should be done with this shortly; pls stand by... Mathglot (talk) 19:37, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

@Great Mercian and Woodroar: Draft:Impact of Gamergate is now available. Now that it is, if we're going to do an Rfc about a split, it should be done as quickly as possible imho, so that the existing #Legacy section doesn't start to drift away too much from the Draft. Do one of you want to take on creating the Rfc? As noted above, we should notify relevant WikiProjects, probably also WP:VPR, and any other centralized discussion that seems reasonable. Mathglot (talk) 23:38, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I went ahead and created it below, as #Split proposal. The guideline is opposed to using an WP:Rfc for that purpose, and so I followed the regular WP:SPLIT procedures, and notified all the WikiProjects, so hopefully we'll get a good response with a clear consensus one way or another. Mathglot (talk) 09:31, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

PDF of Jeong's The Internet of Garbage is not a WP:COPYVIO

Re: @Sideswipe9th's revert of my edit.

The PDF link in question is not a copyright violation. When I first found it on Google, I thought it was too, but I soon after found a page from the publisher (The Verge) linking to the PDF in question:

The Internet of Garbage 1.5 available for free as a PDF...

"PDF" links to it. cv-revdel is unnecessary.

— Toast for Teddy (talk) 22:34, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I saw the RevDel request and restored the link. I came to the same conclusion, the publisher publishing their own e-book on their own servers is not a copyvio. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 22:38, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Huh, sorry for that. When searching for it all that came up for me was our article on the book, an Amazon listing to buy it, reviews of it, and social media commentary. I'll undo the request on your sandbox now too. Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:40, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. — Toast for Teddy (talk) 22:40, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Reverted the request in your sandbox now too. Might I suggest adding a hidden comment after the citation template with the URL to the publisher page linked above, in case someone else runs into the same query sometime after this talk page section is archived? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:44, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

 Done — Toast for Teddy (talk) 22:55, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Split proposal

 Courtesy link: § Split Legacy section?

I second Great Mercian's proposal above to spin off the § Legacy section into a separate article, title to be determined. The article is currently 71 kb of prose (236 kb raw) which is large enough. The content of the #Legacy section is large and well-sourced enough to make its own page. You can view a copy of the #Legacy section split off into its own draft here. Mathglot (talk) 08:31, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Pinging TP participants @Woodroar and HandThatFeeds:, and all listed WikiProjects notified. Mathglot (talk) 09:09, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Survey

• Support as nom-seconder. I chose the provisional title Draft:Impact of Gamergate based on this ngrams, but I'm open to any title. Mathglot (talk) 08:31, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• I support this effort, as I think it's a helpful thing to go into detail on. I do think the "Social, cultural, and political impact" section can probably be incorporated into this new article as well. I'm not entirely sure how to feel about the timeline-like presentation, in particular because the section headers don't seem to correspond to anything in particular other than arbitrary timeperiods. Personally, I would try to section off impacts on separate fields instead, but I recognize that it all ties together. It's complicated, but the tail on Gamergate is long and will need an article like this. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 10:23, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  Maplestrip, I completely agree, and have raised this at Draft talk:Impact of Gamergate#Section heading naming and organization. Your comments there would be welcome. Mathglot (talk) 10:30, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. While I agree that the Legacy section is too long, I don't believe that splitting is the solution. I feel that too many of the sources used in the section aren't sufficiently removed from Gamergate to be useful to readers. (As a comparison, imagine writing an article or section on the impact/legacy of World War II and using sources from 1943, 1944, 1945, 1946, etc. How can we expect the effects to be evident while it's still happening?) I also believe that we devote too much space to individual sources and rely on far too many quotations, to the point where WP:UNDUE and WP:COPYVIO are concerns. If we only used sources from, say, 2018 or 2019 and later, and rewrote the content thematically, we could probably get the section down to 3 paragraphs: one on continued harassment of women and journalists on social media, one on the rise of the alt-right, and one more general paragraph. I'd be open to changing the section name to "Impact", which feels more neutral than "Legacy". Woodroar (talk) 14:12, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  I would quickly note that it's been nine years since the start of Gamergate, and eight years since the "end." This would be more like making an article about the ongoing fallout of World War II in, say, 1948 or even 1954. I think the comparison is a bit silly, though. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 14:26, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. Woodroar is right about this - the problem is the excessive (and in many cases redundant) quotations. The section could convey the same information with greater brevity, that should be the solution. - MrOllie (talk) 14:20, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  Rather than reducing the size of the current section, it should be greatly expanded, but WP:DUEWEIGHT concerns prevent that while it remains part of the current article. See #Discussion below. Once it is spun off, I agree that the Legacy section here can be significantly shortened per WP:SS. Mathglot (talk) 23:27, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  From what I can see in reading the sources, the quotes only tend to be the highlights of more detailed articles. There's a lot of detailed writeups on this subject that are currently summed up only with a quote or two, and I think these can probably be explored more in-depth. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:30, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support per nom. Great Mercian (talk) 15:32, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - and agree with Woodroar. Time for judicious editing and summarising of content over spinning it off (I've been suggesting as such for most of the articles existence). We have a lot of quotes attributed to individuals, most of the quotes are intrinsically linked to the subject matter of the article, meaning if you were to move them it would require re-contextualising a lot of the content elsewhere. The idea that a section can just be hived off per the draft is not an appropriate solution. Koncorde (talk) 17:29, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose The legacy section needs paring down and editing before splitting. Splitting is putting the cart before the horse. - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 17:54, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  What good would paring it down actually do? I feel it would be a huge betrayal to pare down even a character of information. Great Mercian (talk) 02:50, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

• This article has a fraught editorial *history*. This history led it to a editorial style having way too much quotation and not enough summary. The legacy section suffers from this, too. A general fix for the entire article is probably the thing to do first, rather than a split. - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 21:58, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose This article is long, but I don't think there's a way to split this topic without losing some valuable context. I agree with editors who say there are excessive amounts of quotations. It should be possible to summarize the same thing in fewer words, particularly the legacy section. Shooterwalker (talk) 19:30, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose, at least for now. The article as a whole, including this section, has issues with blow-by-blow accounts of events and opinions that lacked WP:SUSTAINED significance and which are better covered with a more brief summary rather than a rambling list of everything that has ever mentioned Gamergate in any context. In particular there are WP:QUOTEFARM issues (which this page has had for a long time, and would only become worse if we tried to turn the quote-bloated legacy section into its own article.) We would be better off trimming things first and summarizing broad threads of coverage rather than relying on so many quotes. I don't think we'd need to split the article after that, but if it turns out that there's too much stuff that can't be trimmed, we can revisit the question. --Aquillion (talk) 03:10, 27 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose for now. I agree with above that the section needs some serious cleanup before considering a split, especially its excessive reliance on long quotes. Some further comments: I really like the 'overview' given in the first few paragraphs but I am confused as to why the rest is broken into years rather than by topic. Second, from skimming many of these paragraphs in this section, a good chunk read more like retrospectives rather than an impact/legacy. Yeoutie (talk) 23:10, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Discussion

Impact is a much bigger topic, and needs to be expanded not reduced

The impact or legacy of Gamergate is a much bigger topic than the events of Gamergate itself during the time it was going on. The view from only a few years later in 2024 makes clear that Gamergate has had a profound impact in numerous areas, which are only poorly covered in the current article, such as development of internet attack tactics, misinformation, online recruitment, rise of the alt-right, presidential campaign politics in the United States, ditto in Brazil and elsewhere, the January 7 Capitol Hill attack, mainstreaming of racist and misogynistic opinion in public forums and even by some political candidates, and much, much more (that's just off the top of my head).

These subtopics are all poorly covered in quantity and in quality in the #Legacy section, and hidden by the chronological sectioning already mentioned by some editors, which was an outgrowth of the rapid development of the article in its early days as Gamergate unfolded. A chronological organization no longer serves the article well, and would be best reorganized thematically, not chronologically. (I am not the first to point this out, and I agree with those editors who have already done so. In particular, Koncorde, you said that "the idea that a section can just be hived off per the draft is not an appropriate solution", but that was never the idea. Moving it to draft is only a first step, but you have to start somewhere, and having it there permits the thematic restructuring and expansion that keeping it local does not. So I actually agree with your comment.)

A comparison with World War II was made above, self-labeled as "silly", but although they are vastly different topics in their nature, as far as their impact, the comparison is not so silly. World War II had a profound, lasting, and global impact in numerous areas of human endeavor; exactly the same thing can be said about Gamergate. We need a separate article about the impact in order to be able to give a proper accounting of the latter; there is no way it is going to happen in the context of the current article. It needs to be reorganized thematically, and greatly expanded.

A thematic organization will make it clear what the huge number of secondary sources about the impact already do: that there is an enormous amount of material to cover in the topic of the impact of Gamergate. In fact, Gamergate has already had a lasting, profound, and global impact on social media, national and international politics, public opinion about journalism and representative democracy, mainstreaming of extremist opinion, presidential elections in numerous countries, and even the nature of public debate and truth itself in a world of post-truth politics, and that impact is likely only to grow.

To those arguing for reducing the number of quotations and reducing the size of the Legacy section in the current article, I think that approach is doomed, and it's only a matter of time before the Impact article is split out. Looking further on, I predict the Impact article will itself spawn a number of child articles on various subtopics of the overall impact; but let's not get ahead of ourselves. As for where we are right now in 2024, there is more than enough sourcing to support a standalone article on the Impact of Gamergate, and keeping it as a section in the current article unduly straitjackets its expansion per WP:DUEWEIGHT concerns. It should be split out to allow a proper treatment of the topic. Mathglot (talk) 23:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Not to second guess the outcome, but this has vague air of WP:SYNTH / OR about it as I'm honestly failing to see the supporting articles in my day to day experience. If there is sufficient sourced information to justify an "Impact of Gamergate" / "Legacy of Gamergate" article then it will stand alone, similar to Alt-right pipeline and Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia. I would suggest writing in draft this proposed article / expanding to demonstrate this. In contrast this article has been in dire need of editorial oversight for way too long. Koncorde (talk) 13:31, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Huh? The Draft already has 55 references, and that's before beginning the restructuring and expansion process. If we add in section § Social, cultural, and political impact as has been suggested above, then it would have 82 more. That said, I agree that it should be expanded, but it's a process, and there's no deadline. The bottom line is notability, and I believe the topic is without question notable, or do you disagree? Mathglot (talk) 01:00, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I am referring to sources that support some grand "legacy of" which smacks a little underwhelmingly supported by current sources. Lots of sources, in and of itsef, does not mean those sources support an article on its own or will retain relevance in review. As a basic fork of this content it supports what it supports here but is a bit of a laundry list of newsy articles that happen to mention Gamergate or ascribe something to it. Which is fine for here, if unnecessary. So my point is if there are sources that support its expansion into a wider topic then I have not seen them and if it's repurposing what already exists then that feels SYNTH / OR.

At present I think significant quantity of the article is unnecessary to summarise what Gamergate was and what came out of it. Therefore the argument of a content fork based on size of article may be unnecessary, and the argument for notability of specifically a legacy of Gamergate I haven't yet seen. So by all means create the draft of the article, and it's probably better to do so from a blank slate explicitly with articles that support the premise rather than cobbled together over a decade here. Koncorde (talk) 15:26, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

"mainstreaming of racist and misogynistic opinion in public forums" I was under the impression than misogyny has been mainstream throughout the 20th century and has seen little to no decline in the 21st century. Slut-shaming is still ongoing. Dimadick (talk) 02:28, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Sweet Baby Inc - Gamergate 2

Is it notable to mention the recent events surrounding Sweet Baby Inc that is being described as Gamergate 2. Below is a possible addition for the article. It can be cleaned up to be more neutral.

In March 2024, a harassment campaign led by previous Gamergate leaders (Redacted) and (Redacted) surfaced on Twitter and nicknamed as Gamergate 2. It started as analysts researched into why several high profile AAA video games were rejected by their fan bases. The common thread that manifested is Sweet Baby Inc - who is the consultant responsible the narratives straying too far from each game's corresponding mythos and established characters. There was spontaneous injections of political ideology that wildly stood out in every failed game that broke each fandom's immersion of their corresponding canon in favor of political pandering causing each game to be massively rejected. When a Steam curator created a list of Sweet Baby Inc games, (Redacted) and (Redacted) of Sweet Baby Inc initiated a harassment campaign to have followers falsely report the curator as breaking the Steam code of conduct. The harassment campaign backfired causing (Redacted), (Redacted), and Sweet Baby Inc to scrub their social media presence. The backfired harassment campaign caused a flurry of YouTube videos, memes, and new articles spreading more awareness of Sweet Baby Inc's involvement of injecting unnecessary political wokeness in video games causing games to fail and eventually causing studio layoffs and in some cases whole companies and franchises shutting down for good. Pusher (talk) 05:27, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

It would be more helpful if you could annotate your proposed section with citations to reliable sources. Until then, it does not seem to me either to be due or verifiable. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 06:12, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

This seems like unverifiable nonsense, especially injecting unnecessary political wokeness. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 14:16, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

This entire article is complete nonsense. I find it farcically hilarious that Encyclopedia Dramatica has a less biased take on the incident in question, than Wikipedia. MutedL (talk) 04:39, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

If you're listening to ED, you're not interested in unbiased opinion. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 01:58, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Says who, some nobody editor on wikipedia? MutedL (talk) 22:54, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Two nobody editors, at least. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 23:07, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Sure, why not? I'll never be butthurt enough to consider it a personal attack. MutedL (talk) 23:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Oh hey, Kotaku published an article summarizing events. And unsuprisingly, it does not support your viewpoint. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 02:02, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

TheGamer have also put out an article, and it also doesn't support the narrative proposed above. Nor does Dot Esports, though it does mention an unnamed employee of the company asking their followers to report the list and its creator for breaching the Steam code of conduct. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:16, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Well if that is the case then I abandon the proposed the edit. I can't go against Kotaku. They were part of the mass media that gave me my "15 minutes of fame" in the summer of 2022. :) Pusher (talk) 05:03, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Right, except this is all irrelevant since before the CEO has gone on record saying exactly the opposite of those agitprop articles. MutedL (talk) 16:27, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

What? Seriously, this statement is incoherent, I cannot understand what you're saying.

Except the bit where you're accusing these articles of being politically-motivated propaganda, which... yeah, not a good argument. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 16:49, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Oh, never mind, you only have 64 edits total. Note the section below, you should not be commenting on this article per WP:CTOP. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 16:53, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

I could care less what you think I should or shouldn't be commenting on. MutedL (talk) 19:38, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

While the article is 30/500 restricted, it's not WP:ARBECR. Non-extended-confirmed editors can make contributions to this talk page, same as any others, and subject to the usual rules about talk page conduct in a contentious topic. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:40, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Not quite. While you're correct about the restriction being 30/500 and not technically ARBECR, it is a difference without distinction here as they are functionally the same thing. Extended-confirmed is granted automatically once an account has existed for at least 30 days and has made at least 500 edits in the first place. So by definition, there are very few if any scenarios in which a non-EC editor is allowed to be making contributions to this talk page, as it is a restriction under the CT policy itself, not ARBECR, that applies to "edits and pages in all namespaces" (including Talk pages) per footnote "b". ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 00:51, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Edits to this talk page fall under CT, but there's no active restriction on this talk page. If you're uninvolved, you could decide this talk page needs some restriction. Until something like that happens, less experienced editors are allowed to participate—but not to do so disruptive let, obviously. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 01:27, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

The template at the top of the page is super unclear about that, juxtaposing standard restrictions, the general contentious topic designation, and the "Furthermore..." additional restrictions within the span of three lines within a single template, while not clearly indicating who/what the source was for each, or clearly differentiating the scopes of each. ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 03:11, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Much of the contentious topics situation is unceasingly opaque, so I empathize. The template in question is Template:Contentious topics/page restriction talk notice, in case you'd like to look into tweaking it. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 03:33, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Actually ARBECR is functionally different to 30/500. Per the text of ARBECR the only action that non-extended-confirmed editors are allowed to make on articles subject to it are non-disruptive edit requests. They are not allowed to participate further than that in talk page discussions. 30/500 has no corresponding prohibition on non-extended-confirmed editors contributing to article talk pages. As a result, ARBECR is a much stricter restriction on non-extended-confirmed editors.

Practically speaking for this article, while editors like MutedL are not allowed to edit the article, they are still fully allowed to participate in any talk page discussions. Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:25, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Motives are closer to goals than ideas

The infobox lists misogyny, anti-feminism and anti-progressivism as motives. These words probably describe the thinking of the Gamergaters but what they wanted to achieve is more appropriate here. It would be probably better if it was phrased along the lines of "Suppression of feminism and progressivism in video games". Everybody agrees on the harassment element which is obviously a means that goes a long way towards a goal of suppression. From the "Purposes and Goals" section:

Several writers who attempted to understand Gamergate's motivations concluded that, rather than relating to purported issues with gaming journalism ethics, Gamergate represented an effort to suppress opposing views.

Nxavar (talk) 10:51, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Reminder: Contentious Topic editing restrictions apply to this talk page as well.

Editors should take note of the warning at the top of this talk page indicating this is a contentious topic (CT) under active arbitration remedies, to which editing restrictions apply. The contentious topics procedure applies to all edits and pages across all namespaces, broadly related to a topic, which includes article talk pages. Specifically, editors here should be aware of the requirement that "You must be logged-in, have 500 edits and an account age of 30 days". Edits in violation of the CT standard restrictions may be reverted, and any single uninvolved administrator is authorized under the CT procedures to impose editor restrictions including sitewide and partial blocks, topic bans and page bans (from the entire contentious topic, a subtopic, or specified pages within the topic), interaction bans, revert restrictions; as well as page restrictions including page protection, revert restrictions, and others. ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 05:13, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

@Swatjester:, it appears the the talk page is not set up 500/30? Could you (or some other admin do that)? So that underqualified editors can't get into trouble by editing? i suppose some admin should clean up all the outdated admin stuff WRT gamergate - ForbiddenRocky (talk) 07:10, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

At the moment, this particular talk page seems to have cooled down a bit, so I'll leave it to some other admin to put that restriction on if they feel they need to. ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 15:41, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

Actually there seem to be several cases this month of very new editors with some knowledge of Wikipedia policy either starting new topics or being active in debates on this page - there was another yesterday, and another user with few edits supported the topic-starter in the discussion. If it’s possible to just restrict access that seems like a good idea to me. Lijil (talk) 07:14, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

Purpose and goals summary

I just rewrote the lead slightly to better explain the origin of conspiracy theories about Zoë Quinn. There's a lot in the article about how "ethics in games journalism" was always a smokescreen to cover up the misogynistic abuse of Quinn and others. Seems like the lead should mention this as well. Thoughts? —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 04:24, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Yeah it should be if it’s not already. GamerGate is well established to be mostly or entirely a harassment campaign. Dronebogus (talk) 12:29, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Just added "Several commentators in the mass media dismissed the ethics complaints as a deliberate cover for the ongoing harassment of Quinn and other women". —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 19:09, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

infobox lists misogyny, anti-feminism and anti-progressivism as motives while the only serious study I have been able to find about Gamersgate supporters seem to indicate the opposite.

https://christopherjferguson.com/GamerGate.pdf

Comparisons Between GamerGate and the U.S. Population on Social Values: According to the study, gamersgate population support action against Global warming Affirmative action, Marijuana legalization, Gay marriage, Abortion and Universal healthcare above the U.S. population mean

"Ultimately it appears that the common narrative associating GamerGate with right-wing, regressive White men (Braithwaite, 2016; Horgan, 2019; Romano, 2018) is not supportable, given the current data. Indeed, GamerGate supporters appear to be more left-wing than the general public and also diverse in terms of race, gender, and other demographic variables than is often assumed"

Quijote3000 (talk) 15:56, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

You will find extensive citations supporting those descriptors in the body of the article. MrOllie (talk) 16:32, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

• In general, primary studies (especially one like this, that is just a single poll of people's self-described politics) are not great sources. The article does contain much higher-quality sources, eg. - these are in agreement that misogyny, anti-feminism and anti-progressivism were the primary motives. The paper you present acknowledges itself that the conclusion it draws from its single poll is WP:FRINGE (even in the quote you presented, cites three others that it seeks to debunk, but only has a single poll of self-described opinions to do so.) If the conclusions they drew from their poll of how people involved in the topic described their own politics were borne out, you'd expect them to be confirmed by other studies, and they haven't been. Ultimately the fact that it's a poll of self-described politics means that it's just about how Gamergate supporters wished to be seen; and we already cover, in the article, the fact that Gamergate supporters made substantial efforts to influence the way they were perceived. But those efforts were (as the massive list of citations above shows) ultimately unsuccessful at convincing people that the sort of responses they gave to eg. the poll in question were actually representative. That sort of thing is why we rely on secondary coverage rather than initial polls - it's not unusual for an author to draw a sweeping conclusion from a poll that isn't borne out later. --Aquillion (talk) 17:30, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

FWIW the paper is also only cited 26 times, with a large number of those cites being to unrelated portions of the paper and not the primary claim about the identities of gamergaters. The paper is also self-contradictory, given that it's single poll actually supports the conclusion quite dramatically that GamerGate is white, male, heterosexual, and cisgender; the paper's authors appear to be only quibbling over the political alignment, not the other demographics. Seems quite fringe to me. ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 16:40, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

• Hmmm, if gamergate supporters claim that the movement is not about that, shouldn't the article reflect that?, if all the "high quality sources" seem to describe the opposite of what the movement supporters are claiming they support, then maybe those sources are not reliable in the first place.

  ...at least as a rule of thumb I think people should have the right to define themselves rather than just being labeled by their counterparts (I don't claim information from the opposing view should be removed, but I think any movement should be described first by what the supporters claim they want and in second place the criticism rather than be defined by the criticism).

  I quote from reliable sources guideline:

  "Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published sources, making sure that all majority and significant minority views that have appeared in those sources are covered (see Wikipedia:Neutral point of view). If no reliable sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it."

  So if there are really no reliable sources representing the point of view of the protesters. Maybe we should remove the article. Lobishomen (talk) 17:08, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

  No. We go with what the reliable sources say, not self-descriptions. If we went by the standard you propose, every corporation would be full of righteous people working to better the world through commerce, and Stormfront would be 'a community of racial realists'. NPOV does not mean WP:FALSEBALANCE, we don't give equal validity to self-serving claims. MrOllie (talk) 17:19, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

  Hmmm, if gamergate supporters claim that the movement is not about that, shouldn't the article reflect that?

  WP:MANDY applies. Of course they're going to claim it's not a harassment campaign, because harassment is bad & they don't want people to think they're bad. But reliable sources agree that it is a harassment campaign. So there's no point in putting up any particular GGer's claim that it's not. There is no right to "define" yourself here, because most people are going to use the most self-serving description they can think of, which is why we prefer what secondary sources say.

  Twisting that around to say the reliable sources are in the wrong is just not going to fly here. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 20:47, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

  "Reliable" means independent sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Not the ones that endorse a particular point of view. Next you'll be saying Church of Satan should be deleted because it doesn't uncritically accept The Satanic Bible as the truth. I second the appeal to WP:MANDY here; Gamergaters have a documented history of trying to manipulate public perception via the Fine Young Capitalists, NotYourShield, etc. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 19:42, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

  No, self-ascriptions generally can't be relied upon because humans are almost universally self-serving. We should always go by what the reliable sources state. TarnishedPath^talk 11:57, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

References

Category:Internet vigilantism

It's a bit weird for this category to be included given that the word "Vigilantism" isn't mentioned anywhere in the article at any point. Anyone know the specific reason for the inclusion? Trade (talk) 15:43, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

There are definitely sources available on the link, judging by a quick ["gamergate" + "vigilantism"] search. Unless someone wants to do some work on collecting and summarizing them, I'd support removing the category per WP:CATV's

Categorization of articles must be verifiable. It should be clear from verifiable information in the article why it was placed in each of its categories.

Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 19:01, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

They/them pronoun confusion

As someone who is not familiar with gamergate, there are some parts of the article which are confusing because of how Quinn's they/them pronouns are used. The lead currently contains the following sentence:

Gamergate began with an August 2014 blog entry called "The Zoe Post" by Quinn's ex-boyfriend, which falsely insinuated that Quinn had received a favorable review because of their sexual relationship with a games journalist.

The sentence gives the impression that it's about a sexual relationship between Quinn, Quinn's ex-boyfried, and a games journalist. I know it's because Quinn's pronouns are they/them but their pronouns haven't been mentioned yet in the text.

Then their pronouns are mentioned in a footnote, but it's still pretty confusing:

Called "The Zoe Post", it was a lengthy, detailed account of their relationship and breakup that included copies of personal chat logs, emails, and text messages. The blog falsely implied that Quinn received a favorable review of Depression Quest in exchange for their sexual relationship with Nathan Grayson, a reporter for the gaming websites Kotaku and Rock Paper Shotgun.

I assume the first "their" is about the relationship between Quinn and Quinn's ex-boyfriend, and that the second "their" is about a relationship between Quinn and Grayson, but the second could still be interpreted as "Quinn's and Quinn's ex-boyfriends" sexual relationship.

I think these sentences should be written more clearly (by someone who knows what the sentences are supposed to mean). Paditor (talk) 08:49, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

I agree. I've tried some very minor rewording - replaced the first "their" with "Quinn's" to read "which falsely insinuated that Quinn had received a favorable review because of Quinn's sexual relationship with a games journalist", and removed the "their" from the second to give "The blog falsely implied that Quinn received a favorable review of Depression Quest in exchange for a sexual relationship with Nathan Grayson". Hopefully that reads better. - Bilby (talk) 09:03, 21 July 2024 (UTC)

Wired article concerning Gamergate and Kamala Harris

A discussion in Wired of the playbook that arose during the Gamergate campaign and how it has been used in other contexts Acroterion (talk) 00:44, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Transphobia and attempted outting of Brianna Wu

Should it be added that several proponents of Gamergate attempted to out then stealth trans woman Brianna Wu as part of the harassment campaign? Turtletennisfogwheat (talk) 07:58, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 5 November 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. There is a consensus here that the harassment campaign is not a primary topic  — Amakuru (talk) 20:54, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

---

Gamergate (harassment campaign) → Gamergate – In /Archive 13#Requested moves (12 November 2014), there was no consensus to move to Gamergate due to recentism and whether it is the primary topic. In Talk:Gamergate (ant)/Archive 3#Requested move 20 August 2021, there was consensus to move the ant species to use its qualifier. It is now clear that there is no recentism issue, and the hatnote indicates this is the primary topic "GamerGate redirects here. For other uses, see Gamergate (disambiguation)." Sir Kenneth Kho (talk) 22:37, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

• A nitpick on the "primary topic" bit: GamerGate—that is, camel case with 2 capital Gs—redirects here, as nobody writes "GamerGate" when discussing the ant. It doesn't mean that this article is the primary topic. Gamergate is a disambiguation page. Also, there have been 6 move discussions since that 2014 discussion, so I wouldn't put too much stock into just "recentism". They're all under the "Other talk page banners" banner at the top of the page. Woodroar (talk) 23:08, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support I really don’t think anyone outside of biologists even knows “gamergate” is a type of ant. This isn’t like the infamous Bill O’Riley vs. Bill O’Riley debacle— one’s an obscure technical term and the other is an extremely infamous harassment campaign. Dronebogus (talk) 00:13, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

  agreed! Laugoose (talk) 20:30, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

• Support per nom.--Ortizesp (talk) 19:36, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose as there is still data coming out about both topics and "obscure" is only of value as a term when used to demote the usage of something outside ones scope of knowledge. Gamergate as a caste of ant social structure is not going to go away at any point. The harassment campaign is over, and as the legacy section shows, each years coverage has moved more and more to basic level "compared to" analogies and a full lack of in-depth conversation. Recentism seems to clearly be applicable here.--Kevmin § 23:30, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose per Woodroar and Kevmin. This gets rehashed frequently, but there's still no policy-based reason to move the article from its current name. We should retain the disambiguation page at Gamergate and keep this page as-is. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 13:23, 7 November 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. I suppose I'll add an official !vote here. The harassment campaign article currently gets more views than the ant article. And given the campaign's influence on the alt-right and later harassment and disinformation campaigns, I don't see that interest disappearing tomorrow or next year—but I also can't see it staying relevant forever. Every retrospective I've read puts it firmly in the past, not an ongoing event. The ant was named first and gamergate ants will almost certainly outlast the relevance of the harassment campaign, Wikipedia itself, and probably humans. I don't think it's a burden for searchers to land at a disambiguation page where they can see options for the harassment campaign and ant, or for the Adventure Time character or note about GamersGate. I mean, to be fair, the camelcase GamerGate redirect should probably go to the disambiguation page as well, just to help dispel that confusion. Woodroar (talk) 17:42, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

  This won't stay relevant forever, but as long as culture war isn't over, this would be the primary topic in most people's head, and a contentious topic at that. I am hesitant to do a WP:CRYSTAL here, but I am quite sure culture war will continue for at least 20 years per WP:RECENT#WP:20YEARTEST, it will be very useful to keep this as primary topic during that time. Sir Kenneth Kho (talk) 18:19, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

• Support nobody is looking for a niche ant when they're searching for gamergate. Scuba 22:49, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

  nobody is looking for a niche ant when they're searching for gamergate This seems to sit squarely in statements without data territory. You're saying nobody at all searches for the ant caste by its official name??--Kevmin § 23:31, 7 November 2024 (UTC)

  Yeah, Not sure what sort of demographic group is searching for ant castes named Gamergate... unless they knew it was an ant and put (ant) at the end. Scuba 05:42, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

  The problem here is that "knowing to put (ant) at the end" is learned behavior for searching and editing on wikipedia, not innate search behavior taught in school or higher education. You are creating a strawman argument that the ant is NOT a search topic ever and using that to endorse your position.--Kevmin § 19:13, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose Gamergate was a decade ago already, periodically re-upped or mentioned in passing as a historic footnote to the alt-right. The ant is eternal. The "for other uses" at the top likely needs refining is all I would say. And, unrelated to this specifically, the article long ago needed a rewrite. Koncorde (talk) 02:43, 8 November 2024 (UTC)
• Comment “the ant will always be relevant” is technically true, but dismissing Gamergate the harassment campaign as just something that will fade away in x years is WP:CRYSTAL. If we took this ad absurdum, you could say the primary topic of Mario being the video game character is recentism, because the name itself has been around much longer, but that is obviously silly because there’s only one “Mario” most people are thinking of when they type it in. Similarly, who is seriously searching for information on a type of ant when they look up “gamergate”? None of the first-page hits on DuckDuckGo are for the ant besides its Wikipedia page. Dronebogus (talk) 14:11, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

  It already has faded away and is referenced in the past tense. It was a thing that happened briefly a decade ago. The people searching Gamergate for ants (or writing thesis, or producing research content, or studying entomology) are the same ones doing it before 2016, and will continue to do so forever because it is, like, science. This does not mean Gamergate ceases to be mentioned, or doesn't generate hits or search results - and why prior consensus agreed on the disambiguation. This is also why the sentence In a few cases, there is some conflict between a topic of primary usage (Apple Inc.) and one of primary long-term significance (Apple). In such a case, consensus may be useful in determining which topic, if any, is the primary topic exists. Mario meanwhile is covered later by the statement: Non-encyclopedic uses of a term are irrelevant for primary topic purposes; for example, Twice is about a Korean pop band, despite the existence of the common English word "twice", as the latter is not a topic suitable for an encyclopedic article of WP:PRIMARY. Koncorde (talk) 21:57, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

  “Happened in the past” is not a measure of relevance any more than happening in the present is. Is Woodstock irrelevant because it only lasted a few days? Is Randy In Boise’s Junkyard Band relevant because they’re currently touring garages in the vicinity of Ada County? Dronebogus (talk) 12:27, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

  It very specifically is a measure of long term relevance as referenced in the example of Apple Inc vs Apple. The significance of coverage of the event confers notability for the creation of an article. After the event, the significance is maintained through repeated coverage. Woodstock (as the given example) has persistent, repeated, significant and notable coverage and new significant material produced about it annually (along with insignificant and non-notable coverage where it is merely referenced). Gamergate as a harassment campaign isn't. Gamergate occasionally comes up in single instances of research, commonly referenced as a precursor to some element of the Alt Right - but the topic itself isn't discussed, rather it is used as a bellwether type event. There are typically articles written from time to time with titles such as "What we didn't learn from Gamergate" etc but there is little meaningful content (either about the victims, the actions, and certainly not the perpetrators beyond the speculative attribution of the thing to a group of people who may or may not be now a part of another thing). In contrast (per example previous) Apple Inc is likely the most searched topic, the most routinely covered and so on - but an Apple is an Apple, Valve is a Valve, just as a Gamergate should be a Gamergate. Koncorde (talk) 01:49, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

  Except nobody knows what a gamergate is besides an entomologist. It isn’t even considered a valid word by my spellcheck, i.e, it’s an obscure technical term almost nobody uses. Dronebogus (talk) 00:24, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

  Arguments from incredulity do not really give any traction to your point though (you not looking for the Caste =/= NO ONE searches for the caste). Policy is where changes come from, and as it stands now, there is a continually decreasing amount of novel coverage for the harassment campaign, while the ant caste isn't going to go anywhere an has the lasting persistence of science topics.--Kevmin § 18:02, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

  Bkonrad’s argument directly below is concrete evidence that almost nobody is looking for the ant. The opposes are many, but they’re all based on four main arguments: “it’s too old” “it’s too new” “it’s the status quo” and “the ant is just more worthy”; these are all vague and subjective in their importance. Dronebogus (talk) 07:34, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

  Bkonrad’s argument missed all the points the @KoA: provided regarding the nuance of flash in the pan events vrs established topics with lasting use in a field. A situation you also are ignoring,--Kevmin § 19:31, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, there is a small population of individuals in a narrow field of study who might use the term with some frequency (some of whom are apparently thin-skinned enough to get bent out of shape that more people are interested in other things). This niche technical term in is dwarfed by the overwhelming disparity in what readers of this encyclopedia are looking for. Any comparison with Apple (fruit) vs Apple (company) is without merit. Nearly every speaker of English knows what the Apple fruit is, even if the company generates more traffic. For gamergate, it is likely less than .01% of English speakers who know about (or might ever think to look up) the ant-related topic. older ≠ wiser 20:55, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

• Support. This is a bit ridiculous. The page views and wikinav show pretty overwhelmingly what readers are looking for in this case and it is not ants. The ants can be added specifically to the hatnote in addition to the dab so readers looking for the ant are still only one click aways just as they would be with the current setup. older ≠ wiser 17:11, 11 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support per nom. Theparties (talk) 00:48, 12 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support, if we can make a compromise, why not rename the ant article to Gamergate (insect/or ant)? Cburt777 (talk) 19:29, 12 November 2024 (UTC)
• Comment. Nothing that prior to this comment, the other affected page on the ants was never notified. That's an inappropriate WP:VOTESTACK in terms of notification when comments are being made about the ants while leaving out the audience that would be most knowledgeable about it when discussing WP:PTOPIC and focusing instead on only this page's audience instead. I didn't notice this was going on until I stopped over at the disambig page's talk today. I'll put notifications up shortly. KoA (talk) 19:50, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

  Idk what that means Cburt777 (talk) 21:59, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

  @Cburt777; Primary topic grabs typically require multi-page moves, but if they don't, it is still courtesy to notify the other pages listed on the disambiguation. Sennecaster (Chat) 07:41, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. While this topic certainly still gets mentioned, coverage has declined sharply; it seems silly to suggest that it would be more appropriate as the main article than it was a decade ago when it was in full-swing. --Aquillion (talk) 20:39, 13 November 2024 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. per WP:PTOPIC. It's one thing to have the current disambiguation setup, but to call the harassment topic the primary topic would be a huge pardigm shift from previous discussions that isn't reflected here. I'll get into the substance below, but this does feel like a bludgeon for editors at the ant page not wanting to have to deal with a controversial topic. Over the last 10 years, this page has had a lot of controversy over its title and ambiguity on what to call itself to the point moratoriums have been put in place on RMs partially to give the ant topic a break. For the harassment topic to suddenly be the primary, there would have to be something huge that changed that wasn't covered ad nauseum in all the past RMs. Here's the history I had from the last RM below:
  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1041117019#Requested_move_20_August_2021
  2. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1039653835#Requested_move_12_August_2021
  3. Talk:Gamergate_(ant)/Archive_1#Requested_move_28_December_2015
  4. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_45#Requested_move_30_August_2015
  5. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_46#Requested_move_20_September_2015 (moratorium put in place on requested moves)
  6. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_32#How_about_calling_this_article_.22GamerGate.22
  7. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_30#.22Movement.22_or_.22Controversy.22
  8. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_28#Requested_move_14_February_2015
  9. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_13#Requested_moves
  10. Talk:Gamergate_(harassment_campaign)/Archive_37#Requested_move_15_May_2015

  This initial proposal leaves out a lot of what actually happened in the last RM, but the core issue here is that comments in support aren't really addressing the core issues found in the last move. It wasn't primarily a matter of recentism, but instead rangling with two aspects of PTOPIC:

  1. A topic is primary for a term with respect to usage if it is highly likely—much more likely than any other single topic, and more likely than all the other topics combined—to be the topic sought when a reader searches for that term.
  2. A topic is primary for a term with respect to long-term significance if it has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with that term.

  For the time being, the harassment campaign has higher views in terms of PT1, but all of our guidance related to views, search hits, etc. have strong cautions against carte blanche use of those stats, especially in terms of WP:NWFCTM and our internet audience where internet topics like the harassment topic are going to be more popular. For PT2 though, that's where the ant has a pretty clear case. Previous closes were clear too it is apparent that a clear majority of the community would prefer a primary topic in favour of long-term significance. Personally I think that puts the ant squarely as the primary topic even when weighing all of that with an even hand. With that said, the harassment campaign over 10 years never had primary topic status, though in the 2021 RM, it was just split down the middle to have a disambiguation page instead of having the ant as the primary topic. That at least did stop the RMs for a time, but I'm not seeing anything here that would suggest that something has majorly changed on that side since 2021.

  The other issue I'm seeing is the naming of the harassment campaign regardless of the ants. All the RMs I mentioned above show the history of how much the topic title has morphed and been contentious. Calling it the harassment campaign parenthetical seemed to finally settle that down, but undoing that is going to increase the ambiguity again. At the end of the day, the last RM at least made it so no one is astonished. You type Gamergate into the search and you're either going to see the two options you want already Gamergate (ant) or Gamergate (harassment campaign). If you click the first result, you get the disambiguation page which guides you even more. Unless there's a major resurgence of Gamergate-related harassment in coming years that truly adds to the event, it's pretty hard for it to leap-frog two levels up to the definitive primary topic. KoA (talk) 21:16, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

  I thought I'd revive a bit I wrote at the last RM that actually focuses on the ant side of things.

  A gamergate is a worker ant that is able to reproduce, which the article outlines as unique for most ant species. This currently impacts all individuals of species within at least five subfamilies and 17 genera (as opposed to only a of subset of individuals within the species Homo sapiens for the harassment event). For the ants (or really any biological trait this fixed in multiple species), there is not a reasonable doubt this million-year+ old trait will just suddenly disappear and stop affecting all of these species. In fact, that CRYSTAL policy specifically calls out such arguments as a violation: Although currently accepted scientific paradigms may later be rejected, and hypotheses previously held to be controversial or incorrect sometimes become accepted by the scientific community, it is not the place of Wikipedia to venture such projections. When scientists name these traits, they are generally also stable in usage Mermithergate is a similar example of these terminology being common in biology.

  Much of this long-term impact is something inherent to WP:SCHOLARSHIP/biology topics and is why PTOPIC also mentions long-term education aspects being of higher value. On that note, ant gamergates are something that’s likely to come up in biology textbooks when discussing ant colonies since eusocial animals are often a common example in varying degrees for both kids and college students. It might be a footnote in more basic biology books, but if you get into common intro-level courses at say college, this kind of thing can easily come up in sections dealing with insect diversity.

  While common usage metrics have consistently been an issue for this discussion, looking at scholarly metrics helps. Google Scholar is well known, but generally not that reliable for things like citation metrics, etc. because they include a lot of non-scholarly sources. Web of Science is usually a more conservative (scientifically, not political) search engine in that regard. Just typing in gamergate gave 189 articles (49 more than in 2021). Of these, 94 mostly focus on the gamergate ant, and 95 involved the harassment topic. That's giving the harassment topic a handicap since that includes mere mentions of Gamergate in that context in the search parameters. That paints a very different picture than those haphazardly using Google searches. At the least academic attention (or use) isn't any higher for the harassment topic, so you'd be hard pressed to call that the primary topic based on search hits. WP:PT2 is what really anchors discussion here. KoA (talk) 21:32, 13 November 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose per KoA and others, the fact that people are finding the article they are interested in via the disambiguation and also learning about other uses supports retention of status quo. Shyamal (talk) 02:09, 14 November 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:PTOPIC. While the harassment campaign is more notable in tv news and right-wing twitter/X/parler, it is not necessarily so world-wide, and most importantly, in the scholarly literature. See also: Ngrams for GamerGate vs Gamergate vs gamergate. Wikipedia is a scholarship-driven institution, and harassment of video game journalists is not any more important than entomology in the world of scholarship. Keep the disambiguation page, and keep these two pages (ant) and (harassment campaign) disambiguated. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 18:07, 17 November 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose Pure pageviews and Google hits are not the sole criterion of primary topics. As per others, mentions of the ants and the harassers are pretty balanced in scholarship, if not having the ants come out on top. Can we put a permanent moratorium on move discussions now? The "harassment campaign" part of the title gives WP:SPA editors a good reason to keep attempting this move for the foreseeable future. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 12:09, 20 November 2024 (UTC)
• Comment: Leave how the title is and don't change it, or change it to "GamerGate". I'm only speaking for the title, btw. Tonkarooson • (📭|Edits). 05:32, 23 November 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Isn't this page compromised from its original intent?

Covered by the FAQ (Q4), nothing new to discuss here --Dronebogus (talk) 20:34, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

I thought the whole thing started because of lack of transparency in mainstream gaming journalism, which is why there is extensive distrust in gaming journalism in the hobby at the time of writing, before said journalists themselves (who have no agency in politics) tried painting everything in a social political light to shift the blame and cover their tracks of said dishonesty, all because a game dev tried sleeping with a journalist for a good review of a mediocre game.

With the announcement from the US government that Gamergate's political efforts was in part quietly paid for with tax payer money to further left leaning propaganda goals, such as that of Politico and a so-called "disinformation game", doesn't renaming the article from Gamergate controversy to Gamergate (harassment campaign) further skew the legitimacy of the article away from intellectual honesty of what Gamergate actually was and try to rewrite history by trying to paint it as a harassment campaign and nothing more serious than that?? Samalik16 (talk) 04:04, 10 February 2025 (UTC)

What the hell are you talking about? Reliable sources say GG was a harassment campaign against women and minorities. This is all redpiller Alex Jones bullshit. As for the taxpayer money thing, double WTH are you talking about? Something Elon Musk pulled out his ass? Dronebogus (talk) 11:51, 10 February 2025 (UTC)

I don't know about "reliable sources". Pretty much every source I could find that called GG a "harassment campaign" utilized a ton of selection bias. I mean, only a few of the Gamergaters actually harassed anyone. The majority of them were upset about the corruption in the video game industry.

When the topic is holding the media accountable for its BS, you can't trust the media. Do your own research, Samalik16. WikiFloath (talk) 17:19, 12 February 2025 (UTC)

See the FAQ at the top of this page, specifically Q4. Acroterion (talk) 18:23, 12 February 2025 (UTC)

If you have reliable sources that support either of the points "only a few of the Gamergaters actually harassed anyone." and "The majority of them were upset about the corruption in the video game industry." feel free to add them to the article. However, give you have dismissed every actual reliable source used already because of "selection bias", I would not expect this to be possible. Horep (talk) 19:52, 13 February 2025 (UTC)

If you don't like reliable sources, please get off Wikipedia. We are not interested in replacing researched facts from reputable media outlets with random garbled nonsense from blogs. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 22:02, 13 February 2025 (UTC)

No. GG started because Erin Gjoni got dumped and tried to have his girlfriend harassed, but people laughed him out of the room. He came back with the "ethics in game journalism" angle, and used that to convince people to go after his ex. It was always a harassment campaign dressed up as "ethics".

The rest of your post about "paid for with taxpayer money" is based on biased misinformation being pushed by Elon Musk and his cronies. The second you look at their claims, it turns out they're blatantly misrepresenting what the money was used for (or are too stupid to actually understand what they're looking at, either is likely). — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 21:59, 13 February 2025 (UTC)

Requested move 26 February 2025

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. Withdrawn by requester. (non-admin closure) Jeffrey34555 (talk) 06:51, 4 March 2025 (UTC)

---

Gamergate (harassment campaign) → Gamergate (campaign) – According to WP:QUALIFIER, only as much detail as is necessary to distinguish one topic from another should be used. There is no other notable campaign known as "Gamergate", therefore using (harassment campaign) as the disambiguator is redundant. Update: see my comment below. feminist🩸 (talk) 02:09, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose This is less clear for no additional value. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 05:25, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
• Support. The gamergate is quite unique and original, so we doesn't need any additional clarifications in the name in general. Especially if it so biased. However, the article itself is generally very non neutral and was written based on POV one of the main sides of the conflict. Solaire the knight (talk) 08:27, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

Oppose whitewashing. Dronebogus (talk) 13:32, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose we shouldn't whitewash—blindlynx 14:09, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose per Pppery. Sergecross73 msg me 16:13, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose per Pppery. Read the archives of the past 4 move requests to see why the article is where it is.--Kevmin § 16:37, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

Soft Support this change. WP:QUALIFIER is extremely clear cut on this. The previous rejections of Gamergate campaign seem to center on this idea that this name would be less clear, but this seems to directly contradict WP:PRECISION. Maybe people will be more inclined to remember Queen as a rock band, not a band, but we still title the article Queen (band). Campaign may also refer to a military campaign, but campaign is still widely understood within the context of an organized group of people doing politics. As far as "no additional value" is concerned, a shorter article title is easier to navigate to by virtue of being quicker to type. Accusations of whitewashing are flat out wrong, as the nom clearly does not suggest changing the article content to not refer to Gamergate as a harassment campaign and does not even make a WP:NPOV argument in favor of the move.

The soft part of my soft Support comes from my preference for a natural disambiguation, either Gamergate campaign or Gamergate movement, which both see a good bit of use on Google Scholar. Based5290 :3 (talk) 17:36, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose. I also have concerns about whitewashing and how unclear the unmodified "campaign" is. In fact, "campaign" is so vague that we tend to include a modifier across the project. For example, our articles on military campaigns use it, except when we throw in the word "war". And articles about advertising campaigns also include the modifier when disambiguated, except when we use "advertisement". Maybe that's a sign we should use Gamergate (harassment) instead? Woodroar (talk) 00:29, 27 February 2025 (UTC)

  I have no objection to Gamergate (harassment) as an alternative title to address whitewashing concerns. feminist🩸 (talk) 02:03, 27 February 2025 (UTC)

  I'm sorry, that was mostly a joke. Mostly. I mean, I prefer it to Gamergate (campaign) but I don't know if it makes much sense? I'd still much prefer to keep the name as is. Woodroar (talk) 02:13, 27 February 2025 (UTC)

  "Gamergate (harassment)" would be an improvement over the current title as far as WP:PRECISION and WP:QUALIFIER are concerned, as it provides enough detail to distinguish this topic over other topics named "Gamergate", without being overly precise. feminist🩸 (talk) 08:19, 2 March 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose Not this again. No, we have no reason to soften the name. The argument based on WP:QUALIFIER is misplaced: it is clearly labeled by reliable sources as a harassment campaign (not simply a "campaign"). — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 19:21, 27 February 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. The current title is accurate and clearly identifies the topic. I was surprised to learn there are other topics and articles called "Gamergate". The disamb let me know this article covers the topic I expect with this title. "Campaign" alone is ambiguous and has multiple meanings. "Harassment campaign" is necessary to distinguish and this topic. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 03:43, 1 March 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose - current title is clear and explicit. Put down the stick, that is an ex-pony. --Orange Mike | Talk 03:53, 1 March 2025 (UTC)

  This proposal will obviously not pass, but I object to the categorization of this proposal as WP:DEADHORSE. As far as I am aware, no previous discussion has proposed "Gamergate (campaign)" as a title before, making it separate from any previous debate on titling this article. feminist🩸 (talk) 08:17, 2 March 2025 (UTC)

• I can't formally withdraw this given that two editors have supported the nomination, but on second thoughts, I think Woodroar provides a convincing argument against the move: (campaign) is not commonly used as a disambiguator due to its ambiguous nature, such that (advertising campaign) is used as a disambiguator instead of plain (campaign). Consider this WP:WITHDRAWN. feminist🩸 (talk) 11:47, 2 March 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

@Jeffrey34555: technically this should not be closed early because two editors have commented in support, but this is otherwise appropriate for a WP:SNOW closure. feminist🩸 (talk) 12:48, 4 March 2025 (UTC)

Reference footnotes?

I've discovered some sentences in this article have at least four or five references attached to them. Should we group said references using the {{efn}} with a note saying Attributed to multiple references: where necessary? Thanks, Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 21:21, 20 April 2025 (UTC)

No discussion is taking place at the moment, so I've implemented the {{efn}} template for now. Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 02:13, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

Requested move 14 June 2025

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Moved as proposed. WP:PT has two branches: the first one, pageviews, is clearly in favor of this move. The second one, long-term significance, has been hotly debated here. Overall, the preponderance of the harassment campaign even in scholarly literature won the most support in the discussion and won the argument; it's hard to say which one will have more long-term significance, but the evidence is clear right now about which one does. (non-admin closure) Red Slash 15:46, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

---

• Gamergate (harassment campaign) → Gamergate
• Gamergate → Gamergate (disambiguation)

– The only other page named Gamergate has to do with ants, as a niche topic. Gamergate - the harassment campaign - is by far the most referenced "Gamergate"; any google search will confirm this. As such, the harassment campaign should be the main page. TypistMonkey (talk) 07:57, 14 June 2025 (UTC) — Relisting. CoconutOctopus talk 10:04, 21 June 2025 (UTC) — Relisting. CoconutOctopus talk 19:05, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

Support because nobody really cares about the ant outside of entomologists and a few random bug enthusiasts. The ant is obviously very important in its own right but we should cater to the average intelligent adult as indicated by principles like Wikipedia:Principle of least surprise, Wikipedia:COMMONNAME, Wikipedia:Jargon, etc. Not that this is actually going to happen because of Wikipedia:Status quo stonewalling, but I know from experience that if enough competent users repeatedly request something in good faith eventually the stonewalling has to crack. Dronebogus (talk) 08:09, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

• Close no evidence presented anything has changed since last time []—blindlynx 13:58, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

  Other than the fact that it keeps happening, implying that the topic remains relevant and of more interest than the ant no layperson has ever heard of. Dronebogus (talk) 17:08, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

  Its an ant caste not an "ant". Please at least take the time to understand the topic in discussion. Laypeople are not the deciding factor, as all the information for the harassment is now coming from experts as well.--Kevmin § 17:14, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

  An ant caste is an ant. That’s like arguing a cook isn’t a human because it’s a human occupation. Dronebogus (talk) 00:21, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

  I get that but reopening this just to have the same arguments over and over again is pointless. Last time we did this was less that a year ago, unless there is new evidence this is a waste of time—blindlynx 17:49, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

• Support as per nom and above. Fade258 (talk) 14:07, 14 June 2025 (UTC)
• Strong support. The harassment campaign is the primary topic. Pageviews shows the harassment campaign has 94.6% of views, a ratio of >17:1 compared to the ant. There is no doubt that the harassment campaign is primary topic by usage and has been from the start. (This Pageviews includes a longer time period and the former page name.) It has notable spikes in interest, reflective of ongoing and recurring relevance. Many prior arguments focused on "recentism" and lack of enduring notability or longterm significance for the harassment campaign. The Gamergate harassment campaign began more than a decade ago and continues to be discussed on its own and in relation to current events. A Google Scholar search for publications since 2024 shows, on the first 5 pages, 4 publications about the ants while the remaining 46 cover the harassment campaign. "Gamergate" returns 1,500 Google Scholar hits while "Gamergate -videogame -game -Internet" returns only 126, some of which are still referencing the harassment campaign. The harassment campaign is written about in a range of social science and humanities disciplines internationally, in addition to popular media. Even Britannica has an entry on Gamergate (harassment campaign). After 10+ years, the harassment campaign has substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with the term (WP:PT2).--MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 14:56, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

  I don't see how the myrmecological concept of gamergates lacks substantially greater enduring notability and educational value. The amount of search results or pageviews is not all that makes a topic notable - newsworthy events and controversies, by their very nature, will always receive far more coverage than other topics, regardless of enduring notability or educational value. That's like saying that any given plane crash is more notable and important than the flaps of the airplane - it's an apples and oranges comparison, of course there will be more general coverage and pageviews of an event than of a technical concept! The myrmecological use of the term gamergate predates the modern internet, is discussed in hundreds of academic texts, and will continue to see use as long as the few hundred ant species that produce gamergates still exist (so, long after anyone in this thread is dead and gone) - as a natural phenomenon, it is unlikely to ever become irrelevant. If that's not enduring, I don't know what is. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 07:21, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

  I agree that both topics are important. I also agree that determining primary topic among totally unrelated topics requires some care, but this is something we do all the time on WP. The criteria on determining primary topic says there is no absolute rule but provides much guidance (WP:DPT).

  • I've already shared the WikiNav (in reply to Jts1882 below) and Pageviews data showing the harassment campaign has far more visits than ant currently and for more than a decade at this point.
  • I've shared Google Scholar data showing that the harassment campaign is widely written about in academic sources to this day, far more often than the ant. A Google Scholar search for gamergate returns 11,000 all-time hits. From 1983–2013, there were just 535 publications. There were more than 10,000 after 2014. All-time Google Scholar search for "gamergate"+"ant" returns just 1,140 hits.
  • Ngram shows an enormous rise in popularity for the term in books after 2014, with capitalization indicating much of the writing is about the harassment campaign.
  • News results unsurprisingly refer exclusively to the harassment campaign. Contrary to what has been asserted in prior RMs, not all recent coverage is a mere passing reference or historical foot note. For example: Salon (Feb 2025), CNN (Mar 2025), The Week (Aug 2024), Wired (Aug 2024—twice!).
  • The harassment campaign has 760 wikilinks in articles, compared to 72 for the ant—more than 10x. This is an indication of its widespread reach and relationship to topics covered across Wikipedia.

  WP:DPT is clear that historical age and first usage are not determinative of primary topic and that: A topic may have principal relevance for a specific group of people (for example, as the name of a local place, or software), but not be the primary meaning among a general audience. The opposition to this move is not supported by Wikipedia policy and practice. Coverage of the ants is restricted to entomology and related publications both inside and outside Wikipedia and always has been. The harassment campaign has been widely covered in a range of sources and remains relevant to many subject areas for over a decade. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 19:45, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

  I'll reiterate that assessing the primary topic in this case on the basis of numbers is fundamentally flawed and something that WP:PRIMARYTOPIC warns against. It doesn't feel particularly encyclopedic, or in any reader's best interest, to read PRIMARYTOPIC as privileging newsworthy events over established natural phenomena. Events, especially controversial and/or internet-based events, will obviously have outsized impacts on these metrics over scientific concepts. Establishing a primary topic when comparing two totally disparate topics like this should absolutely not rely solely on numbers - something that PRIMARYTOPIC explicitly mentions with the example of Apple Inc (the company) as a topic of "primary usage" and apple (the fruit) as a topic of "primary long-term significance". The harassment campaign may receive primary use but the myrmecological concept, as a well documented natural phenomenon observed in hundreds of species, has obvious long-term significance (enduring notability and educational value, as PRIMARYTOPIC puts it), and despite the outsized use of the term online being in reference to the harassment campaign about a fifth of the users visiting the disambiguation are still clicking through to the less popular use of the term. The word "gamergate" has no primary meaning among a general audience, even with the wealth of news and academic coverage of the online harassment campaign - most people who are not chronically online (a category I would argue most Wikipedia editors fall into) have never heard the word before in either context and will be surprised to learn of both meanings. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 07:39, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

  The difference is that everybody knows what an apple is while gamergate (ant) is an obscure, specialist topic. As a global, general audience, non-specialized encyclopedia, Wikipedia does 'privilege' subjects that are widely covered in diverse publications when assessing notability and primary topic. The ants themselves may be ancient but the subject has only been covered in a few hundred sources annually, mostly specialist publications, since the 1980s. (EDIT 18:17, 17 June 2025 (UTC): In fact, only a handful per year, per review of Google Scholar and JSTOR publications.) Gamergate (harassment campaign) has been the far more widely covered topic for one-quarter of the time the ants have been written about. To dismiss a topic such as this as 'unencylopedic' reveals a bias towards niche, specialist topics that is contrary to Wikipedia policy and practice—not to mention Britannica‍'s. The harassment campaign succeeds on every test and consideration at WP:DPT while arguments for the ant's co-primacy rest on assertions directly contradicted by the the guideline—that older topics of interest to specialists can never be overtaken by news events and social phenomena. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 16:37, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

  To dismiss a topic such as this as 'unencylopedic' reveals a bias towards niche, specialist topics that is contrary to Wikipedia policy and practice This is certainly not my position - I support the current disambiguation, not making the myrmecological concept the primary topic, on the basis that while the harassment campaign fulfills WP:PT1, its extensive use is not so great as to override the myrmecological concept's fulfillment of WP:PT2 (enduring notability and educational value). I do not believe either topic should be privileged, because both are of importance in their respective areas. I think you're taking a narrow reading of WP:DPT - DPT explicitly warns that metrics like WikiNav, Google(/Scholar) results, pageviews, and wikilink usage are flawed and should not be solely used to decide a primary topic. There is no primary meaning of the word "gamergate" among a general audience, and while the online harassment is likely to attract more attention, the amount of people seeking out the myrmecological use of the term is not so insubstantial that capital G Gamergate overwhelms all other usages. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 00:29, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

  I was careful to specify "co-primary", as I do understand what you are arguing for. I have presented multiple lines of evidence that do show Gamergate overwhelms all other usages with at least a 100:1 ratio of scholarly publications (seemingly much higher) and an even greater dominance in other general audience publications. When all the tools for assessing significant, ongoing coverage show the same wide margin and it has been stable for >10 years, the consistent finding should not be discounted. I'm curious what threshold might satisfy the opponents here. Perhaps most people are not familiar with either subject, but surely many more are familiar with the harassment campaign, and many more are likely to encounter Gamergate in this context each day and turn to Wikipedia for more information. As the guideline states in another section: To be clear, it is not our goal to astonish our readers, and the topic that comes first to mind indeed often is suitable as the primary topic (WP:TITLEPTM). --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 03:07, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

  • Another source comparison: JSTOR has 60 results for gamergate from 1983–2013 and 579 results from 2014–2025. I did not find an article about ants until p. 4 of the 2014–2025 results. A search for gamergate ant articles from 2014–2025 returns 72 results—notably, only four of the results on the first page are about the ants, the rest are about the harassment campaign.

  --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 16:50, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose Again as noted by blindlynx--Kevmin § 17:12, 14 June 2025 (UTC)
• Comment Previously discussed less than a year ago, with the consensus being "Not moved". Also previously discussed in 2014 (Not moved) and in 2015 (withdrawn after unanimous opposition.) 162 etc. (talk) 17:13, 14 June 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose: the precise disambigation currently in use makes it easy for readers to find the version of the term "gamergate" that they're looking for, and I see no benefit to designating the harassment campaign as the primary topic. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 01:11, 15 June 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. Both are niche topics, even if one gets more coverage. The disambiguation makes it easy to find the correct topic. It also seems improper to keep raising this when it has been discussed many times. I'd suggest a better title would be Gamergate harassment campaign which is more descriptive and unambiguous.  —  Jts1882 | talk  07:18, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

  The harassment campaign is certainly less "niche" as it's discussed in a range of disciplines and sources. More people will have heard of the harassment campaign, given its impact and continuous widespread coverage, and someone encountering the phrase for the first time and wanting to learn more is far more likely to hear it in this context than in the ant context. Wikinav shows that >75% of readers navigate to Gamergate (harassment campaign) from the DAB page while <20% navigate to the ant. This move would improve navigability for >3/4 of readers by taking them right to the page they want, while those looking for the ant would experience no change. Instead of landing at DAB page first and click on the ant article, they would land at the harassment article first and click to the ant from the hatnote. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 03:29, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose Gamergate the harassment campaign does not have the longterm significance to unseat the 40-year-old scientific term, regardless of popularity as an article. As for the arguments that entomology is niche, so are internet harassment campaigns. The average Joe is unlikely to know what either "Gamergate" are. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 07:27, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

  The “average joe” is extremely likely to have no idea about the ant, but only somewhat unlikely to not know what “gamergate” the campaign is. Two topics not being universal household names doesn’t make them both equally obscure. Dronebogus (talk) 00:24, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose: per blindlynx. YorkshireExpat (talk) 21:18, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

Support. Since 2021, this article has dominated in terms of pageviews and news, surpassing the ant article by tens of thousands of views, as well as comprising of a supermajority of traffic redirect (over 75%!). Seeing most of the "oppose" arguments above, I do not believe that the disambiguation page helps in finding the correct topic; in fact, I would say it inconveniences the average person.

Think about it: the word "Gamergate" has the suffix "-gate", which to many people, reminds them of the Watergate scandal (or other controversies/scandals with the suffix -gate), not the ant group. Also, the mere fact that a person searches up "Gamergate" means that they must have heard this phrase somewhere, possibly in the news, a book, etc... Seeing that most of the books and articles reference the harrassment campaign (and shown in the WikiNav), I dare say that this article is the WP:PTOPIC of "Gamergate". Jeffrey34555 (talk) 05:04, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

I don't see how the disambiguation page inconveniences readers - either they land on the disambigation page and spend one extra click navigating to the topic they were looking for (and learn of an interesting alternate use of the term "gamergate"), or they navigate to the exact topic they were looking for when using the Wikipedia searchbar thanks to the disambiguator.

Reiterating what I said in a comment above, views and news coverage are not the only measure of notability, and to compare a controversial event to a natural phenomenon in these terms is inherently flawed. Those metrics are biased in favour of events and biased against "boring" but important technical concepts - not an encyclopedic approach. ~17% (about a fifth) of pageviews going to the myrmecological concept demonstrates that, while it will naturally receive fewer views than the controversy, a substantial portion of readers were looking for the less popular usage of the word despite the overwhelming popular coverage of the harassment campaign. Previous discussions + the present discussion in this move request shows no consensus that either the harassment campaign or the myrmecological concept has (per PRIMARYTOPIC, emphasis mine) substantially greater enduring notability and educational value than any other topic associated with that term. Ethmostigmus 🌿 (talk | contribs) 07:56, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose per blindlynx's reasonings. Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 08:12, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

• Support It actually seems very strange to me that a clear WP:PRIMARYTOPIC is somehow not the primary article. If I search even on Google Scholar, I have to go all the way to page 5 to get even one article about ants. This feels like a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS may have formed here that isn't in keeping with the global WP:DISAMBIG guideline. Loki (talk) 12:45, 16 June 2025 (UTC)
• Support Kind of per Loki and WP:CCC; a LOCON seems to exist that doesn't seem to reflect the SIGCOV reflected in multiple HQRS. Pace, the ant caste *facepalm* It also looks like Dronebogus's prediction has come true. Happy days, —Fortuna, imperatrix 17:03, 17 June 2025 (UTC)
• Support Obviously true, but per Loki and Drone. Not sure why this is controversial. Parabolist (talk) 01:07, 18 June 2025 (UTC)
• Support; Overwhelmingly the primary topic. Æ's old account wasn't working (talk) 13:47, 18 June 2025 (UTC)
• Support I believe the ant article (Gamergate (ant)) could plausibly be merged into the page on Ant colony, which would result in a ~50k byte article if merged verbatim. The latter is suffering from the typical "early Wikipedia general-biology article" syndrome, so it'd be nice for it to receive an overhaul (it needs copyediting and more citations, given that the study of eusocial insects is a rather large topic in biology, hence why the ant gamergate term was even coined in the first place).Anthropophoca (talk) 12:13, 19 June 2025 (UTC)
• Support per PRIMARYTOPIC. The harrassment campaign is many times more the target of our readers. We serve the readers. Binksternet (talk) 16:08, 19 June 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose The endemic systemic bias of Wikipedia editors towards the perspective of a terminally online Western audience should be resisted not embraced. Binksternet writes above, The harassment campaign is many times more the target of our readers. We serve the readers. No, No, Never. We serve everyone. However, we should be especially mindful to serve the needs of those who are not our readers. We must not be an encyclopedia for the rich. The only topic with long term significance is the ant and that topic should be at the undisambiguated Gamergate, as it once was. CIreland (talk) 02:21, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

  The only topic with long term significance is the ant is very clearly not true. I don't know how the editors here have convinced themselves of this. It's over a decade after the harassment campaign and it is by far the clear primary topic even among recent sources. If I search for gamergate on Google Scholar and include only results since 2024, I don't get a result about ants until page 3.

  Just because something is a major news story doesn't mean it lacks long term significance. WP:RECENTISM does not mean "news" (or "the internet"): many big political news stories and controversies have huge long term significance. The type of ant also has long term significance, but very clearly historians of the internet and of politics are still going to be talking about Gamergate 50 years from now, and probably in greater numbers than anyone is talking about the type of ant. Loki (talk) 04:53, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

  You and several other editors in opposition are trying to right a great wrong—or prevent one—based on your perspective on what WP should be and which subjects should be prioritized. This is fundamentally at odds with the project. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 12:42, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS is about importing issues external to the project and using Wikipedia as a battleground for those issues. WP:SYSTEMIC BIAS is a long acknowledged internal issue that is widely understood to be something to be guarded against if we are to maintain a neutral point of view. The narrowness of Wikipedia's social and cultural demographic is a long recognised problem and there have been countless efforts both on en.wiki and by the Foundation to mitigate it. It seems every other week I get watchlist notice about some project or other effort to universalise Wikipedia's perspective and coverage beyond that of the majority of its editor base. Countering systemic bias is not some fringe concern for the encyclopedia: it has been a perpetual effort almost since the project's inception and our tendency to over-favour the perspective or a Western internet generation has been one of the canonical examples of that bias. CIreland (talk) 13:43, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

Thank you, I agree that countering systemic bias is important. Nothing in that essay addresses the P&G-based determination that the harassment campaign is primary. The arguments against reflect a POV that favors natural phenomena and “hard science” over the diverse disciplines and publications that cover the harassment campaign. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 20:34, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Your argument is that "clearly" people will be talking about Gamergate in 50 years. Wikipedia is not a crystal ball, and if people really are talking about it in 50 years and it is equally as popular, there would definitely be an argument for it being primary. But we are not psychics who can predict that. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 18:26, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

I mean, that's not my whole argument. You missed the part where I pointed out that people are still clearly talking about it 10 years after it happened. That's already long term relevance. Loki (talk) 21:44, 21 June 2025 (UTC)

Indeed. What many of us are saying is that the harassment campaign is more widely discussed and has been for 10+ years, and not “just” by the chronically online. To require 50 years just because the ant was described first is out of step with policy and practice and is a new standard I’ve not seen in any other DPT discussion. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 20:26, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

• Support per Myceteae. – Supertian8 (talk • contribs) 15:20, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose, same as last time. I favour GamerGate as a natural disambiguation. See ngrams. Improving internal navigability should not be our only concern, especially when most visitors get to our articles via other routes. Landing at the dab page in this case is the good kind of astonishment, the astonishment of learning that the term "gamergate" actually already existed for an ant caste before it was coined for something else. It's informative (like Imamate of Yemen that I recently created per a discussion). I would be surprised if many people were annoyed by it. Srnec (talk) 23:44, 25 June 2025 (UTC)

  Discovering a new topic you'd never heard of is one of the great joys of Wikipedia, but we should not intentionally misdirect our readers because a handful of editors think a lesserknown topic is worth their time. Besides, a hatnote to the other topics accomplishes this without slowing down the thousands of readers looking for the more well known topic. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 20:02, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

  Yes, I don’t see why a hatnote wouldn’t be the superior option. There’s only one notable alternative topic anyway, since I’m going to guess 0.0% of anybody is looking for an incredibly minor Adventure Time character who appeared in one episode (why do we even have them listed as a possible option, especially since their name is literally just a pun on the ant?). Dronebogus (talk) 06:16, 29 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose per blindlynx. Gamergate as a disambiguation works as it is. Eilidhmax (talk) 01:16, 26 June 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. I'll say what I said last time, because I don't think it has changed: The harassment campaign article currently gets more views than the ant article. And given the campaign's influence on the alt-right and later harassment and disinformation campaigns, I don't see that interest disappearing tomorrow or next year—but I also can't see it staying relevant forever. Every retrospective I've read puts it firmly in the past, not an ongoing event. The ant was named first and gamergate ants will almost certainly outlast the relevance of the harassment campaign, Wikipedia itself, and probably humans. I don't think it's a burden for searchers to land at a disambiguation page where they can see options for the harassment campaign and ant, or for the Adventure Time character or note about GamersGate. I mean, to be fair, the camelcase GamerGate redirect should probably go to the disambiguation page as well, just to help dispel that confusion. Woodroar (talk) 01:29, 26 June 2025 (UTC)

  It is certainly no more a burden for readers looking for the ant caste or the Adventure Time character to click through from a hatnote. Is it your position that a historical event can never be a primary topic over a natural phenomenon? I'm curious whether you have read the comments in support of this move as they address your arguments and many others raised in prior RMs. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 20:11, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

  I have read them and I disagree with them. Woodroar (talk) 21:16, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

  WP:CRYSTAL applies equally to assertions that it will be relevant in 200 million years or whatever as to assertions that it won’t. In 50 years aliens from Yerbalax 5 might invade and exterminate humanity, then NEITHER will be the most relevant because GamerGate is now most famous and notable as an operatic baritone on Yerbalax 5. But right here, right now, among humans on Earth, GamerGate the harassment campaign is the most famous and notable use of the term. Dronebogus (talk) 06:10, 29 June 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose – Everything I have to say has already been said. I disagree with the conclusions of the support votes. Yue🌙 09:51, 30 June 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.