New Testingstan

Kryten wrote:Isn't an american intervention likely to lead to full-scale Hezbollah intervention? Never mind the potential reaction from Iran...

Well Iran already got to fuck us once in Iraq, they'd love an opportunity to do it again in Syria.

the only choice we're given is: how many megatons?

let's just push the button we'd be better off dead

Infinity Biscuit wrote:I'll ask again, Ryan. What makes you think this would actually work out the way you think it will?

There are no other avenues we could pursue that could actually prevent them from continuing to fight each other.

And besides that, to do nothing would mean we allowed chemical weapons to be used on civilians without consequence. Surely you see the problem with that.

And how do you feel that doing this would actually 'prevent them from continuing to fight each other'? The presence of an occupying force in Iraq didn't prevent a sectarian civil war.

What would happen if we simply propped-up Turkey for it to put its own boots on the ground (and only its own), propped-up the part of the rebellion we find the least worst and supply it with weapons, and we "simply" enforced a no-fly zone and naval blockade ?

But would that be like backing Saddam 2.0?

What if we successfully privatize world peace?!

Ugh. People on the internet are arguing about Anita Sarkeesian again.

I get it, you don't like her because you think she's telling you to stop having fun and that your games are evil, and she may or may not have cribbed some gameplay footage without giving credit. Can you please just let it go already and find something else to be outraged over? This is getting tiresome.

Oxymoron wrote:What would happen if we simply propped-up Turkey for it to put its own boots on the ground (and only its own), propped-up the part of the rebellion we find the least worst and supply it with weapons, and we "simply" enforced a no-fly zone and naval blockade ?

As I understand it, the Turks are too focused on their own internal disunity to be in a position to intervene right now.

Darksi4190 wrote:Ugh. People on the internet are arguing about Anita Sarkeesian again.

got a link?

the most amazing thing i ever saw was i was just looking at random links and one of them was about the new call of duty game having female soldiers

guess what the comments were about? how sarkeesian is a man hating idiot. unbelievable - she wasn't even remotely mentioned in the article!

maybe on the bright side it means she's getting the message out and people talking

http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ ... an.268446/

The kicker is that I do think she comes off a little judgmental towards gamers at certain points in her videos, and at times does seem like a "stop having fun girl," but this is goddamn ridiculous. I mean they just won't let it go. Any time Sarkeesian puts out a new video or someone tries to refute her arguments Spacebattles explodes into a 20 page thread.

Gamer culture is so goddamn toxic that being harsh enough to be an actual wakeup call can't be a bad thing

I've never really considered it to be "toxic," but then again i'm male, and have only rarely played games with females, so I really don't know what the experience is for the average female gamer.

C'mon mang, this is an industry that was founded on the battle cry of SEGA DOES WHAT NINTENDON'T!

Darksi4190 wrote:I've never really considered it to be "toxic," but then again i'm male, and have only rarely played games with females, so I really don't know what the experience is for the average female gamer.

Then practice some basic empathy?

Gamer culture is intensely, absurdly, and abusively toxic to women, beyond all reason and logical thought.

It's toxic in general, but worse to women.

adr wrote:the only choice we're given is: how many megatons?

let's just push the button we'd be better off dead

Love that song. LOVE it!

Darksi4190 wrote:http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ ... an.268446/

I've been watching that thread, the side of common decency seems to have gotten a fairly firm upper hand in it fairly early and pretty much triumphed. It's mostly just poor THASF being his usual self and a bunch of people beating on him now, and even that seems to be winding down.

That does seem to be the way these things usually go on SB. You've got a vocal minority of terrible people, but they're outnumbered and beleaugured by the decent. It's really rather satisfying to see at times.

Unrelated, but I had to share this : http://krokobyaka.deviantart.com/art/Vl ... -336706772

Darksi4190 wrote:I've never really considered it to be "toxic," but then again i'm male, and have only rarely played games with females, so I really don't know what the experience is for the average female gamer.

Have you recently tried to play team cooperative shooters or DOTA-clones as a solo individiual? Holy fuck do those communities tend to be toxic hellholes.

Co-op shooters yes. I play Mass Effect 3 and Gears of War 3. I can only recall a handful of occasions where anyone even spoke to me over the mike, and usually they were at least polite, if not openly friendly.

Dota is a shit game that's incredibly boring as every game plays out in exactly the same way. Try to deviate from the set path and you cop a ton of 'NO NO NO WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO DO X NOT Y'

Well excuuuuse me your highness, I didn't realise the fate of the fucking world was at stake.

Shit like that is why griefers exist.

DotA is a great game at low levels of play and at high levels of play.

The middle levels of play are the shit ones, and I avoid them by only playing co-op bots with friends.

I can't help but think for a second though, everybody always talks about how gamers "trash-talk" each other and such, and Infinity says that its "toxic," but i've rarely encountered "trash-talk" that was anything other than jovial. Yes people talk shit to each other sometimes, but usually in my experience its in a "tongue in cheek" type of way, like they're just kidding around for you. It's rare for me to respond to "trash talk" with anything other than laughter.

Could all the talk of the "toxicity" of the gamer community be overstated, or is my experience just atypical?

Have you considered that you may be bothered significantly less by things like slurs, bigoted language, and threats of violence (sexual or no) when you're a straight guy?