"What Is #Gamer Gate?"

Charis Books and More welcomes another edition of "Dear Games" an ongoing collaboration with students the GA Tech Game Studio, exploring the intersection of feminism, games and online culture. This month we'll take a look at the phenomenon known as "GamerGate" a campaign of online harassment that has brought increased scrutiny to toxic and misogynist aspects of "gamer" culture and online discourse more broadly. Guest speakers Jordan Killpack and Akil Brooks, two local developers, will share their perspective on GamerGate before fielding questions from the audience for discussion. While you may have learned about GamerGate from a recent episode of Law and Order SVU, or coverage in news outlets ranging from the NY Times to Rolling Stone, we'll be sidestepping the mainstream media hype for a nuanced discussion of where GamerGate came from, what it means to folks in the tech industry and games community and how its related to feminist discourse online Jordan Killpack is a web developer and tiny game enthusiast. A graduate of Georgia Tech, she likes to make weird Internet stuff in her spare time. She enjoys playing roller derby and listening to corny disco music. Akil Brooks is a professional software engineer and a future MA student in Film, Video, and Digital Imaging at Georgia State University. He spent his teenage years tinkering with computer art and game programming and then majored in information technology at Macon State College (where he also haunted the library as a tutor). Following an internship at a video production shop, he moved to Atlanta to pursue a graduate program in digital media, but took some time off from school to explore the world of web development. He intends to resume his studies this fall.