Safe from whom: PAX’s Diversity Lounge doesn’t seem welcoming

Penny Arcade has announced a Diversity Lounge at PAX 2014: a safe space where marginalised groups can play games and have conversations about minority issues in gaming. Within minutes of the announcement, the target community of the lounge had largely laughed this off, suggesting that it was woefully inadequate and borderline offensive.

[SeraphimBlade]

"This first caught up to them when they were called out for making rape the punch line of an unfunny joke in a comic strip entitled ‘dickwolves’."

Good to see BOTH sides are able to over-simplify each other and get facts wrong.

That's not the name of the strip, (it's "The Sixth Slave") and anyone who read it can tell you rape was not the punchline. It was a tiny part of the set-up, for a joke about MMO narrative. Was that okay? It's debatable. But let's not misinform people by telling them the joke was "lol rape."

I empathize with Penny Arcade as some guys who weren't sure where to draw the line, and have no idea how to fix the issues they're blamed for. Krahulik, in particular, seems to be making an effort to turn himself around, but that isn't the kind of thing someone can do just by saying they are. Unfortunately, this is one of those issues where no matter what you do, you'll piss people off.

EDIT: Also, it makes it sound like Krahulik just took to twitter and started bashing transgender people. (Aside from generally making Penny Arcade sound like a cesspool of women/LGBT-hating, but I digress) What happened there was a discussion about a game designed to help women masturbate, somebody said it "wasn't inclusive," it turned into an argument, and that kind of snowballed into him tweeting faster than he was thinking. Again, maybe not okay. Again, not quite as bad in proper context.

[brighthand]

note: this is to politically correct people in general, not the author of the article.

*sigh* You politically correct guys have no idea how pathetic you appear to the rest of us when you make your appearances in public venues and try to socially engineer the surroundings to your liking with your hackneyed attempts at pushing your repulsive agendas.

This industry is a culture that grew from infancy to its current stage, not in some gender-Marxist, racially-charged, sexually-influenced, incubatory test tube, but out in the vast expanse of imagination and passion of the programmers, writers and artists who all banded together to make it what it is.

It so happens that most of the people involved in this industry are mostly white, straight, MALES, which to some people, constitutes a problem in today's new-aged hyper-sensitive society; and the solution to this "problem" is always the same: forced parity or attention seeking over-representation. All the while, those of us who are not white didn't ask for this stupid attention, and want only to go about our lives and accomplish our goals, are being dragged into the vortex of negativity that you guys create, and are handed those welfare hand-me-downs that you guys are always demanding, thus having our own value under-minded because you refuse to do anything else but whine and complain about how bad you feel that the industry produces material proportional to the demographic that comprises it.

You want change? Get yourself a degree in Computer Science or art or something and start producing the games that you want to see. STAHP YAW WHINING!! DOO IHT!

Plot twist: I am a mixed-race male who would fall under the description of the target audience of this foolish "Diversity Lounge," and I find such an initiative insulting to me. Accepting something like this means you see yourself as being inferior in some way, and that you need to be coddled or insulated in order to compensate for that inferiority. -Very well. You are welcomed to be inferior, but I will be content to simply attend these things and go and do whatever I want: such is the prerogative of a normal (read NOT inferior), PERSON.

[memots]

I clicked Agree.

You're obviously a very smart person, but i question why you waste your time on N4G.
You should be writing this in an article or take it straight up to them (@penny arcade). I am not being sarcastic you make a very valid point and something i did not really see from that angle.

[MestreRothN4G]

Agreed. I just don't think the 'you don't like how musics are racist? Turn into a musician' logic. But that's all.
Both first and second answers were quite intelligent and indeed strange to see on N4G.

[brighthand]

lol at yours and MestreRoth's disconcertion about finding thoughtful posts on n4g. Thanks for the compliments. I usually just lurk but I read about the "Diversity Lounge" and was impelled to respond out of disgust; just trying to restore balance to the force, I guess...

[ShaunCameron]

Thank you!

<You want change? Get yourself a degree in Computer Science or art or something and start producing the games that you want to see. STAHP YAW WHINING!! DOO IHT!>

I wouldn't hold my breath for them to do that, because then they'll start whining about how the "closed-mindedness" of the industry caused their game to flop.

[palaeomerus]

I hope you guys finally run Pax into the ground once and for all. Then you can complain about it being gone.

[ShaunCameron]

But of course they're not gonna take any responsibility for it being gone in the first place. After all they had good intentions. They were trying to make it a better place. They were doing everyone a favor. LOL