I am glad Adria Richards has been fired and fled the Internet. I hope she does not stay gone, but I think this is a great learning experience.
“Oh, my gawd, Pawk, are you saying that she deserved threats of rape? DEATH THREATS?!?”
No, but she most certainly earned them. Now, before you rage and decide to hate me because of that statement, let’s take a closer look at the person who is the central cause of all this drama. Richards has done this before. She has flown off the handle, overreacted and gone public to wage her war for feminine equality. And she rarely ever actually does it in a subtle or even rational fashion. She lashes out, publicly. She doesn’t talk to those she attacks, she just attacks.
She has a history of this. The company who hired her did so as a PR move, plain and simple. They knew she would be a handful. They knew she might cause an issue. They hoped she would take the opportunity and show that she could handle it. What she did was blow it on a scale and size of which warrants termination. It doesn’t matter the reason. They are not cowards, they are wise business people. They took a risk and it blew up in their face. They are cutting their losses, not abandoning a valuable employee.
Richards does not deserve to work in the capacity she did. As it was clearly seen, she is using her access inappropriately. This would be the same with someone who frequently told secrets being given a job in R&D snapping a picture of the latest tech and tweeting it out. She violated what her role required of her, and as such she needs to remain terminated.
The greater lesson, the lesson I hope has now been forcibly pounded through her skull, is that overreaction is bad. She has felt the brunt of overreaction. She got one guy fired. She did not kill anyone. This guy will find work again, likely not without struggle, but he will work again. Everyone will move on. And yet, a good segment of the Internet turned on her, raging and lashing out as she has done in the past, simply with more unconstrained vitriol than she has had in the past. However, she should now know that her constant jump to the ultra-dramatic, the public shaming, is no better than the abuse she has suffered for doing that.
There is a way to create a change. You know how that is? By following the example of Kenzie Wilson. She saw a lack of games. She has a passion for gaming. So she asked her mom to go learn to program, and started a fundraiser on Kickstarter to do just that. And in a week where “Donglegate” (GOD I hate that Watergate was ever a thing) makes us think the industry is not changing, along comes who is truly the future of gaming to show us it is changing, and will continue to do so.
Kenzie is a feminist. Not Adria. Adria is a drama queen, a self-promoting jackass who got served a quintuple helping of the crap she has been dealing out for damn long time. She has learned that, just because the world offers you a stage, it does not give you a pass when you do something to hurt another person with no better reason than that you can. She could have been polite, asked them to stop, and if she was rebuked, outed them. She could have ignored it. But she chose the absolute worst option, followed through, and paid the price.
And no, those guys were not in the right. It was a bunch of innocent, 12 year old potty humour. It’s fine when your audience is cool with it. And it’s not like Richards herself was above it when it was in her favour. But, by the same token, by all accounts, it was not nearly as bad as she said it was, and did not warrant termination of anyone. But, you see, that is what happens when someone has a platform and an inability to understand the consequences of its misuse.
With great power, comes great responsibility.
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