So, astrology is now science?

That appears to be a possibility in light of this latest science news:

Researchers studied 400 people and matched their personality type to the season when they were born. The scientists claim people born at particular times of the year have a greater chance of developing certain personality traits. They said this was because the seasons had an affect on certain chemical substances in the brain, such as dopamine and serotonin, which control mood. They discovered that babies born in the summer were much more likely to suffer mood swings when they grow up.

In contrast, those born in spring tended to be excessively positive, upbeat and optimistic. They also found that those born in the autumn were less likely to be depressive, while winter babies were less likely to be irritable.

As the scientific research progresses, it would be interesting to map these “chemically generated seasonal personality types” to the various astrological signs and see how well they match. It would certainly be amusing to see the expression on the faces of various science fetishists upon learning that they were henceforth to be deprived of one of their favorite rhetorical devices.

Pinkshirts vs GamerGate

No worries, once “pinkshirt” becomes widely adopted as a derogatory term for a feminist or SJW, there can be little doubt that the pinkshirts will promptly pretend that it isn’t a “Vox Dayism”:

Ian Miles Cheong @stillgray
So sad to see GamerGaters latching onto Vox Dayisms like “pinkshirts” to refer to feminists. Oh well, they deserve each other.

One thing I find mildly bemusing is the way various pinkshirted newbies and wannabes still have no idea how long I’ve been in the game industry or what I do there. I mean, Wikipedia isn’t exactly complete, but there is SOME information there.

Laurel Halbany ‏@neverjaunty
@scalzi It’s pretty impressive how many shitbirds who never heard of gaming before this are jumping on GamerGate to peddle their snake oil.

John Scalzi ‏@scalzi
@neverjaunty As soon as GG happened, it was just a matter of time before that one signed on. Which is fine. The two deserve each other.

That’s even dumber than the accusation that my father somehow obtained my column at WND for me. For the record, I have been professionally reviewing games since 1991, beginning with the St. Paul Pioneer Press, then Chronicle Features, and then for Universal Press Syndicate, Computer Gaming World, Electronic Entertainment, and the Atlanta Journal/Constitution. Since I retired my AJ/C column, I have continued to write for various game industry publications since then, albeit not under this name.

I happen to know exactly what sort of corruption is rife throughout the games media; I was the only game developer permitted to write for CGW for exactly that reason. Johnny Wilson and Chris Lombardi both trusted my integrity, as did the editor of Electronic Entertainment. They knew I would cut my thumbs off before I would give a false review of any game. And they sure as hell wouldn’t have trusted the integrity of the most of the current breed of “game journalists”.

Ian Miles Cheong ‏@stillgray
Reminds me of Vox Day and every other parasite who’s latched onto this stupid movement.

Space Bunny ‏@Spacebunnyday
You might want to look at the dates of @voxday ‘s posts on the topic before claiming he’s “latching on” to it.

As it happens, I’ve known the games media longer than most of its biggest names have been around. I grew up with the late Paul Anderson and I still have a cassette tape with “Three Chord Song” and other songs by Andy McNamara’s band around here somewhere. I remember when Game Informer was Funcoland’s six-page in-house rag. I am familiar with the constant pressure the games media faces to ensure the flow of advertising money from the very companies it is reviewing. Some organizations and individuals are able to retain their integrity, but unfortunately, most don’t. Unless you truly love games more than money, you will succumb eventually. The smarter ones usually end up migrating to the development side in the end, where the influence is smaller but the pay is better.

I never accepted anything from anyone except free games for review. I suspect most of today’s “game journalists” would leap at the chance to sell out for a trinket or a free dinner, much less a skanky pinkshirt. Not only are they corrupt, some of them are even in ideological collusion, as can be seen by the timing of these various “Gamers are Dead” articles:

‘Gamers’ don’t have to be your audience. ‘Gamers’ are over. Exclusive http://archive.today/l1kTW Leigh Alexander Gamasutra Aug 28, 10:00am

An awful week to care about video games http://archive.today/rkvO8 Chris Plante Polygon Aug 28, 1:21pm

The death of the “gamers” and the women who “killed” them https://archive.today/ZyLdw Casey Johnson Ars Technica Aug 28, 5:00pm

A Guide to Ending “Gamers” http://archive.today/2t93l Devin Wilson Gamasutra Aug 28, 7:57 pm

_We Might Be Witnessing The ‘Death of An Identity’ https://archive.today/ht088 Luke Plunkett Kotaku Aug 28, 8:00pm

_Gaming Is Leaving “Gamers” Behind http://archive.today/jVqJ8 Joseph Bernstein Buzzfeed Aug 28, 8:29 pm

_Sexism, Misogyny, and online attacks: It’s a horrible time to consider yourself a gamer https://archive.today/HkPHc Patrick O’Rourke Financial Post Aug 28, 9:33pm

_It’s Dangerous to Go Alone: Why Are Gamers So Angry? http://archive.today/9NxHy Arthur Chu The Daily Beast Aug 28, time unknown

_The End of Gamers https://archive.today/L4vJG Dan Golding Tumblr Aug 28, time unknown

_This guy’s embarassing relationship drama is killing the ‘gamer’ identity https://archive.today/L4n6p Mike Pearl Vice Aug 29, time unknown

And as far as “never heard of gaming” goes, Ender and I are in the process of testing our latest Fifth Frontier War module. For VASSAL. Which, by the way, I named.

VPFL Week 6

73 Greenfield Grizzlies (5-1)
68 Texas Chili Eaters (4-2)

59 RR Redbeards (5-1)
49 Bane Cornshuckers (2-4)

87 Gilbert Gamma Rays (4-2)
69 Mounds View Meerkats (4-2)

74 Boot Hill Bogs (1-5)
73 King (2-4)

77 Favre Dollar Footlongs (3-3)
69 Clerical Errs (0-6)

Dems are getting worried

The checked-out president is beginning to make Democrats, both politicians and in the media, observably nervous and twitchy. Consider Frank Bruno at the New York Times:

Rationally or not, this is one of those rare moments when Americans who typically tune out so much of what leaders say are paying rapt attention, and Obama’s style of communication hasn’t risen fully to the occasion. Even as he canceled campaign appearances and created a position — Ebola czar — that we were previously told wasn’t necessary, he spoke with that odd dispassion of his, that maddening distance.

About the ban, he said, “I don’t have a philosophical objection necessarily.” About the czar, he said that it might be good to have a person “to make sure that we’re crossing all the T’s and dotting all the I’s going forward.” He’s talking theory and calligraphy while Americans are focused on blood, sweat and tears.

Ebola is his presidency in a petri dish. It’s an example already of his tendency to talk too loosely at the outset of things, so that his words come back to haunt him. There was the doctor you could keep under his health plan until, well, you couldn’t. There was the red line for Syria that he didn’t have to draw and later erased.

With Ebola, he said almost two weeks ago that “we’re doing everything that we can” with an “all-hands-on-deck approach.” But on Wednesday and Thursday he announced that there were additional hands to be put on deck and that we could and would do more. The shift fit his pattern: not getting worked up in the early stages, rallying in the later ones.

It’s more understandable in this case than in others, because when it comes to statements about public health, the line between adequately expressed concern and a license for hysteria is thin and not easily determined. Still, he has to make Americans feel that he understands their alarm, no matter how irrational he deems it, and that they’re being leveled with, not talked down to, not handled. And he has a ways to go.

“If you were his parent, you’d want to shake him,” said one Democratic strategist, who questioned where Obama’s passion was and whether, even this deep into his presidency, he appreciated one of the office’s most vital functions: deploying language, bearing, symbols and ceremony to endow Americans with confidence in who’s leading them and in how they’re being led.

Right now in this country there’s a crisis of confidence, and of competence, and that’s the fertile ground in which the Ebola terror flowers. That’s the backdrop for whatever steps Obama and Frieden take from here. With the right ones, they can go a long way toward calming people who are anxious not just about Ebola but about America. I don’t even want to think about the wrong ones.

That is not the writing of a happy rabbit. After all, it is pretty hard to argue for more government intervention as one watches an indifferent president lurch half-heartedly from one potential disaster into the next one.

Trolls beware

Andrew Marston, among others, would appear to be heading for some serious jail time if he doesn’t change his ways:

Internet trolls will face up to two years in jail under tough new laws proposed by Justice Secretary Chris Grayling following a number of high profile cases. The sentence for internet abuse is presently six months but under the plans Mr Grayling is proposing to take a hard stance and quadruple it.

As Spacebunny pointed out, although this law is nominally intended to protect women, the reality is that it’s going to affect a lot more women than anyone suspects. I would encourage every black knight to be sure to log and report all harassment from female trolls. Because they expect men to be unwilling to hold them accountable for their actions, they’ll set themselves up for prosecution more readily than their male counterparts.

Speaking of trolls, I already have large collections of Andrew’s comments as well as smaller ones belonging to Phoenician and Tad. Trolls never seem to realize that once you have as few as three examples of their posting, all one has to do is to call their ISP, or alternatively, Google, to correctly identify them. Call yourself whatever you want, hide your IP address with Tor, it makes no difference. As long as Point A and Point Z are known, everything else in between is irrelevant.

I also find it a bit ironic that some people have tried to label me a troll in the past when I have never trolled anyone anywhere. I have no need to do so. If I wish to express my opinion about someone, I will do so here, in the open, where everyone can see it.

On what one hopes is a completely unrelated note, you can now access my book recos on Recommend without registering or signing in. I’ve also added a link on the left sidebar, under Voxology, if you wish to keep up with it. I’ll be adding one or two books from my 2014 reading list every day, then I’ll probably start in on the 2013 books. If you’re on Recommend, note that you can create a list and then designate it for public view in Edit/Settings. It’s a new feature, so it’s not exactly user-friendly yet, but as you can see, it is functional.

Ay caramba

Spain’s industrial output has collapsed to 1976 levels. This is why the EU is going to collapse in the next ten years; it has completely failed on its promises of delivering economic prosperity. All it truly ever had to offer was a medium-term credit bubble in exchange for the mass sacrifice of national sovereignty.

On the topic of Firearms

This should make for an interesting discussion. At Recommend, they need to determine the appropriate topics and sub-topics where recos will be categorized. Obviously, Firearms is too broad to cover everything from optics to 3D printing, so what are the most important subtopics. For example, I immediately thought of the following:

Firearms: rifles
Firearms: handguns
Firearms: shotguns
Firearms: ammo
Firearms: optics
Firearms: customizing
Firearms: tactical shooting
Firearms: gunsmithing
Firearms: 3D printing

What else am I missing? And I can tell you right now that there will not be a Firearms: sexual orientation subtopic devoted to the discussion of 9mm Glocks.

Also, I’ve got a specific list set up with all of my book recos. 24 so far, and I expect I’ll have the entire 2014 reading list in by the end of the week.

Barack Obama, homosexual harasser?

Some old news about the current resident of the Oval Office comes out of the closet:

Barack Obama served as the president of the Harvard Law Review while in law school there, and during his tenure in that position, he was allegedly accused of sexual harassment. Two editors at the law review filed complaints with the university administration alleging that Obama had engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior. The university allegedly settled the cases and offered them agreements that allegedly included financial compensation and required them to remain silent about the nature of the settlements.

The story, based on one reported in The Kansas Citian, is reported here. The claim is that Barack Obama, while president of the Harvard Law Review, engaged in sexually inappropriate behavior with two male editors of the review.

Sodahead reported this about the allegations, “In a series of comments over the past 10 days, Obama and his administration repeatedly declined to respond directly about whether he ever faced allegations of sexual harassment at the journal. They have also declined to address questions about specific reporting confirming that there were financial settlements in two cases in which men leveled complaints. THE KANSAS CITIAN has confirmed the identities of the two male journal editors who complained about Obama but, for privacy concerns, is not publishing their names.”

The report also claims someone ask[ed] White House press secretary Jay Carney about the allegations, “White House spokesman Jay Carney told THE KANSAS CITIAN the president indicated to White House staff that he was “vaguely familiar” with the charges and that the university’s general counsel had resolved the matter.”

If this sort of completely unsurprising news about Obama’s predilections is finally surfacing, one can only conclude that the PTBs are very unhappy with his presidential performance. Is it the economy? Is it failing to pass or unilaterally declare the immigration amnesty? Or is it that even PTBs don’t want to find themselves bleeding from their eyeballs and they’re no happier about the lack of a travel ban than ordinary Americans?

Needless to say, one can expect that the mainstream media’s complete and determined lack of interest will be deafening. Their eyes will remain firmly averted unless and until a) the relevant documents surface or b) the two male journal editors speak out.

Business advice from SJWs

I thought juxtaposing this pair of posts from Re|Action was both informative and more than a little amusing:

This is an open letter to Steve Butts (IGN), Stephen Totilo (Kotaku), Justin Calvert (Gamespot), Chris Grant (Polygon), Dale North (Destructoid), Ludwig Kietzmann (Joystiq), and all other Editors-in-Chief of gaming websites:

1) Publish a highly visible reference statement explaining your site’s stance on sexism, racism, classism, ableism, homophobia and transphobia.

2) Hire (more) people to moderate your forums and comments sections.

In February, I wrote a guest editorial for Kotaku. I enjoyed writing for a mass audience and I would sincerely love to write for Kotaku again. I’ve seen Stephen Totilo dive into the fray when a blogger on N4G produced an elaborate conspiracy theory that Kotaku was seeking to generate revenue through feminist articles. I appreciated seeing Stephen Totilo articulate his strong stance off site and I wish he would do so in a perma-linked resource at the top of Kotaku. All this being said, my one experience with Kotaku commenters was brutal.

3) “Take the risk.”

You will anger readers by taking a stand. Some of them will leave. Some of their threats to leave forever are not, in fact, empty. You’ll get flak from NeoGaf and Reddit. 4Chan will make the same ugly threads about you as they do about me and my friends.

Do it. Piss them off. Take the risk. Make a decision now that they are not worth your time and that the ad revenue they provide is not worth the toxic atmosphere they bring to your sites. They’re not worth continuing to bear the reputation of being an unsafe place for people who are not straight men.

“An Open Letter to Games Media” was published on June 19, 2013. It was followed, not too terribly long afterwards, by this:

[re/Action] is closed
We tried something new, but the market has spoken. We published three issues

In other words, no one is buying what they are selling. So take their advice at your peril. In a similarly astute manner, another SJW trans-something or other, John Scalzi, is repeatedly insisting that he totally doesn’t care, not even a little bit, that many gamers continue to announce that they will no longer buy his books due to his anti-GamerGate position. He had yet another tweet on the subject yesterday:

It genuinely flummoxes some folks that I don’t care if they stop buying me because of my GamerGate opinions.

Assuming that he is telling the truth, which is always a risky proposition, his stated position does surprise some people considering that Intel and Mercedes obviously don’t share it. Unlike John Scalzi, both corporations value the opinions of gamers enough to have stopped advertising on Gamasutra and Gawker Media, two sites that have taken explicit anti-GamerGate positions. So, perhaps #GamerGaters also need to let @torbooks and @pnh know that they will no longer be buying books from Tor Books as a result of John Scalzi’s oft-professed antipathy for genuine gamers concerned about the politicization and corruption of the games media. Perhaps Tor Books cares about their customers, even if John Scalzi does not. The fact that Tor still publishes Orson Scott Card, the Great Satan in the eyes of the pinkshirts, suggests they do.

The observable reality is, as @AngryHarrysPage noted: “ actually poses a genuine threat to the progressive establishment. They’re causing economic harm.”

On a side note, it’s telling how many of these “women in games” are actually men wearing dresses, men who aren’t fit to wear Dani Bunton’s shoes. It is also informative to note that most of the actual women involved in anti-GamerGate don’t play games, don’t design or develop games, and observably don’t know much about them.

Time to get hardcore

Random idea. Ender is nearly done with his rework of my original Fifth Frontier War module and we’re gearing up to play it. Now, I’m wondering if there is anyone here besides the game’s designer who has significant experience of it and would care to serve as a rules catcher, given that the chances we are going to get a few things wrong on this second attempt are all but guaranteed. (The first one went down in flames when we wanted to use the table for ASL after getting things mostly set up.)

As a general rule, we never try to fix rules that we miss, but instead seek to play properly from the point at which the mistake is noticed. I’m going to post the turns here for the edification of the three or four readers who are actually interested, and I figure that we may as well take advantage of any real FFW experience. Corrections are welcome, so long as it’s kept in mind that this is a first playing.

Big Chilly and I set the game up several times when we were in high school, but we never got beyond plotting the initial turn because it took so long to setup and we always ran out of weekend. That’s one of the things Ender has improved in the module; the standard setups are already in place when you start. The other nice thing about having it on the computer, of course, is that it means we can use the projector….

Sure, there is Ebola and mass immigration and the general decline and fall of Western civilization to take into account, but the simple fact is that this is occasionally an awesome time in which to be alive. Fifth Frontier War on a five-meter wide board on the wall… and no need to clean up a game in progress? And to think I once thought that playing Wing Commander on a 50-inch screen was the pinnacle of techno-civilization!