I think this is the thing today I hate most about places like ResetEra. They're specifically a gaming forum, but god forbid you want to use a game as escapism, or a fantasy, or even just a fun thing to play. No, it has to have the right message, and it has to only annoy whites/men/straights/cis, never them, and it has to be treated as a hill to die on for their politics. I want to play someone good-looking? Fuck you, unless troons also want to bang them, then it's OK. I want to not think about the current world for a bit? Fuck you, no game can be separated from the creators, the context, the subtext that we've insisted is there, and we won't let you discuss it without bringing it up.
I know the joke's on them, because places like ResetEra so heavily censor wrongthink that they're constantly surprised when it turns out that doesn't get people on your side, it just means you forget that there's a whole world out there that thinks you're nuts. But they also actively cultivate a world where only Approved Fun is allowed, and they are the police of it. And along with that are these constant little reminders that they hold certain beliefs that they will go to the mat for every time - or in this case, ban you for challenging, or not even sharing hard enough. Say you like certain games, designs, fun things? That's a banning. Point out where what they believe is inaccurate, let alone stupid, based only on feelings, or might be influenced by their loudly proclaimed mental illnesses? That's a banning.
It's not even that they're miserable - it's that they're so spitefully, hatefully miserable, and it's mandatory you feel the same. On a forum that's meant to be about games. They are the antithesis of their stated purpose, and they're proud of it. I dunno - most days I can just laugh at their insanity, but occasionally it just gets to me, that relentless, aggressive destruction of any joy. They're in a hell of their own making, but goddamn if I don't occasionally empathise with someone like thediamondage, who should have known what posting on ResetEra would lead to, but still got taken out the back and shot because he dared to want to not live in the idpol/problematic nightmare for a bit. They've taken the Heckler's Veto and enshrined it as a central tenet of the board, but of course only for the right kind of Heckler, a Heckler who is 'one of us', a Heckler who is never stuck on defending something, always stuck on making sure no one can talk about a topic - preferably at all, but if they must it has to be heavily caveated with the knowledge you're breaking the rules by enjoying something that has been deemed bad.
