Culture Doom co-creator John Carmack is headlining a 'toxic and proud' sci-fi convention that rails against 'woke propaganda' - Carmack heads the list of "guests" at the upcoming event that bills itself as a sci-fi convention for people "tired of woke propaganda."

By Andy Chalk published about 6 hours ago


(Image credit: Bloomberg (Getty Images))

Id Software co-founder and former Oculus VR CTO John Carmack is facing criticism for his recent announcement that he will be attending BasedCon, a sci-fi and fantasy convention for fans who are "tired of woke propaganda."

"I’m going to be at basedcon.com again this year," Carmack tweeted. "I had read books from and twitter-interacted with three of the authors (more since!), but I wasn’t sure what to expect last year. It turned out fun, in a grass-roots con way that reminded me of the old Space Access days.


Tweet (Archive)

"I was just going to show up as a normal attendee / fan of the authors last year, but Rob [presumably BasedCon fouder Robert Kroese] nudged me into doing a talk and some panels, and I enjoyed it."

Attending a convention is a pretty unremarkable thing most of the time, but BasedCon isn't like most. Its website claims the convention "isn't about pushing any particular ideology," while at the same time listing examples of "based beliefs" that the organizers subscribe to:

• Men cannot give birth
• Guns don’t kill people; people kill people
• A fetus is a human being
• Socialism has failed everywhere it’s been tried
• Discriminating against white people is racism

The website complains that while "sci-fi cons used to be a lot of fun," in recent years they've been dominated by "a small clique of authoritarian jerks who made them into venues for pushing social justice dogma." That in turn sparked controversies like Sad Puppies, an effort to push right-wing authors to the top of Hugo Award voting, and the misogynistic harassment campaign Gamergate, got Gina Corano fired from The Mandalorian, and drove the push "to get Critical Race Theory and other social justice garbage into schools."

It also warns that if you happen not to embrace those beliefs, you should probably stay away: "If you think people with a certain skin color can’t be racist or you expect people to use made-up pronouns when talking about you, you may want to do a reality check before coming to BasedCon."


(Image credit: BasedCon)

Carmack is known for having something of a libertarian bent—he recently defended the idea of self-made billionaires(opens in new tab), for instance—and has never seemed particularly concerned about his public image. And he gets a lot of slack, because he's a little weird and he made Doom and Quake. But headlining an event like this is a step too far for a lot of his followers on social media.


Tweet (Archive)

Tweet (Archive)

"I've been a fan of yours over half my life and it's disappointing you're going to an event run by people with such reprehensible views," one follower wrote. "Please reconsider. There's so many better tech events that would gladly have you."

"Dude, you gave me a glimmer of hope interacting with my tweets about forms of address and VR, and now you're going to a party of chuds where /this/ is their raison d'etre," another replied. "This sucks."

One Twitter user pointed out that BasedCon does not disclose its location. The event will be held in an unnamed hotel in Grand Rapids, Michigan, but "for security reasons" does not share specifics with anyone who isn't registered to attend. I think that's a very revealing detail about the real nature of BasedCon: If you're not willing to tell people where your event is being held, maybe it's worth examining why.

The whole thing is kind of gross and sad, and there's really no arguing that Carmack isn't aware of the ugly side of the event. The website spells it all out quite clearly, and as he said on Twitter, he knows the organizer and this won't be his first trip to the show. As many people responding to the situation have pointed out, it all comes down to the old adage: Never meet your heroes. I've reached out to Carmack for comment and will update if I receive a reply.

Source (Archive)

 

[Balr0g]

I just have to say this: Rip and tear until it's done John!

 

[Cyclonus]

As much as I hate the woke faggotry that infected the gaming industry, I can't agree with denouncing socialism. Democracy itself is socialism, the CEO Of Microsoft's vote is worth the same as the vote of a guy working minimum wage. There was a bipartisan group of yank politicians who issued a statement denouncing socialism. The response to that should have been "Awesome! If you hate socialism so much, us tax payers can stop paying your wages!" Libertarianism is all fun and games until some troon becomes CEO of Sony through diversity hiring and orders that all future games must feature at least one scene of a transphobe being forced to suck the girl cock.

 

[The Mass Shooter Ron Soye]

Commander Keen is a based, rugged individualist.

 

[Kill a Troon for Pikamee]

So Carmack was always the based John huh?
Good for him.

DoomWorld trannies absolutely seething right now, lmao.

Edit:
View attachment 5127117

Carmack is indeed the superior John.

After Carmack and Romero parted ways, Carmack made Quake II, Quake III and RTCW. Romero made Daikatana. QED

 

[Useful_Mistake]

As much as I hate the woke faggotry that infected the gaming industry, I can't agree with denouncing socialism. Democracy itself is socialism, the CEO Of Microsoft's vote is worth the same as the vote of a guy working minimum wage. There was a bipartisan group of yank politicians who issued a statement denouncing socialism. The response to that should have been "Awesome! If you hate socialism so much, us tax payers can stop paying your wages!" Libertarianism is all fun and games until some troon becomes CEO of Sony through diversity hiring and orders that all future games must feature at least one scene of a transphobe being forced to suck the girl cock.

Today I found out that all forms of government are secretly socialism.

 

[teriyakiburns]

Today I found out that all forms of government are secretly socialism.

ur mum is socialism

 

[Useful_Mistake]

ur mum is socialism

Sir, please, you can't just murder people right in the open!

 

[Cyclonus]

Today I found out that all forms of government are secretly socialism.

Basically, yes. It's just a matter of degree. A society without socialism would have no taxes, you just pay for everything you use as you use it. Imagine toll roads, but for everything. There would be no police, only private security for anyone who pays for it. If you are forced to pay for something by the government whether you want to or not, then it's socialism. Disagree? You fucking define it then.

 

[Catler]

You will never be as good of a programmer as Carmack or half as influential, sorry trannies.

 

[Useful_Mistake]

Disagree? You fucking define it then.

Nigger, your definition, by necessity, makes all other forms of economic and governmental definitions pointless. It's as if I claimed that every object that exists, and ever existed, is a "sky" and complained when people called me a retard for it.

Socialism is a socio-economic doctrine in which the state seizes your property and resources (totally), maintains strict and total control over the market, and micromanages everything else. Notable examples are Nazi Germany, Soviet Union (Communism being a derivative of the socialism with different political systems).

 

[Slav Power]

Carmack was the superior John just was Wozniak was the superior Steve. I have great respect for both John Carmack and Steve Wozniak for the pioneering computer autists that they are and a complete and utter disdain towards John Romero and Steve Jobs, the former being a tranny chaser whose only rise to fame was making a few maps for Doom and the latter being an egotistical freak that took credit for all the successes of Wozniak's and other Apple engineer's ingenuity.

Remember, if John Carmack wasn't the absolute genius that he is and he didn't decide to make a massive MS-DOS game because he figured out an amazing coding breakthrough, no one would've heard about John Romero. Romero would be nothing without Carmack.

Oh yeah, don't forget that John Carmack is the same guy who broke into a school with fucking thermite to steal Apple II's at the age of only 14 years old, and he's the same guy who told some stupid feminist that he's not gonna hire people to Oculus based on whether or not they have a cunt between their legs, but on their actual talent and expertise. He is indeed as based as it can get.

 

[sodaboard]

I like the idea of a con that states you can have fun without libshit but like the other guy said most people tend to use "own the libs", "cry more snowflake", etc. as a selling point to attract the conservacuck crowd, which are less threatening to my social and employment status but are just as annoying to be around. I don't want politics or social issues in my sci-fi. I don't care what the actors think about saving Bolivian sea turtles from extinction. I don't want to show a vaxpass and pledge to always support [leftie org] just to get in. I just want to go to a con to get some cool art and crafts and take pictures with cosplaying women in skimpy outfits. But I guess the latter is illegal now.

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

I think we're getting close to there being an actual Based Department.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

Having said that, I neither want in-your-face right or left ideology in my entertainment. The problem with such solutions is that it inevitably becomes a mirror image bastardization of the thing I took issue with in the first place. It's inevitably every bit as cringeworthy, pandering, and embarrassing as what it set out to be a countermeasure to in the first place. I don't just want the other side of the coin, as that solves nothing.

I dunno making trannies seethe will never not be amusing, at least to me.

Besides, it isn't like this con popped out of a vacuum, we've had years of bullshit in one direction, can't say it bothers me to have small degree of pushback heading the other way.

Will be interesting to see if they avoid cancellation, though.

Edit: Is the backpedaling beginning?
Twatter / archive is not taking this, I get a "something went wrong," message.

 

[Catloaf]

If you're not willing to tell people where your event is being held, maybe it's worth examining why.

Maybe because they don't want trannies coming and shitting up the place and physically attacking people... Jeez, I wonder

 

[Slav Power]

Maybe because they don't want trannies coming and shitting up the place and physically attacking people... Jeez, I wonder

Count Dankula talked about this numerous times. Whenever he's at some comedy event, the reason they give away the location where it's hosted at the very end is to stop leftist lunatics from fucking it up by either threatening the venue owners before it starts or by invading the event and destroying it that way.

But no one ever mentions that because they're the good guys, and if you're being secretive about the event's location, you must be doing something illegal, because we never do anything illegal. And we definitely don't exclude people from all the big events that they're compelled to make their own one, if they do that it must be because they're evil nazis and that event must be destroyed.

 

[frozen_runner]

I don't know that I want a bunch of neocon, fundie (I am well aware I'm stereotyping) sci-fi books, comics, movies, and games. I want a variety of genuine stuff, not predictable stuff.

But if you aren't making it absolutely clear you won't tolerate an invasion of progressive bullshit, you will be invaded. So I guess I'll allow it.

 

[Matt Damon]

So how long until the terminally pozzed payment processors and credit card companies refuse to work with them, making it financially untenable? If you don't think that's the next step, you haven't been paying attention for the last seven years.

 

[Tasty Tatty]

I support this thing, but "based con" is such a cringe name, even when it's in fact a based con. Heh.

I was just shitposting on twitter about how doomguy is faithful to the LORD our GOD all the while making reddit speds seethe and now Carmack does this. Doombros, we dabbing good on spastics.

I have no idea about this game, but people have been sperging for days about the main character not being a Christian despite -allegedly- lore says otherwise.

All the faggots crying about Carmack's attendance are the reason the tech industry is in such a terrible state. Carmack was one of the founders of 3D gaming who spent his life creating what these trannies are now crying about.

Fire up the E-ovens and ban these seething fucks from tech. It would cut down on the pedo problem as well.

If they were honest and consistence, they'd drop any game related to this guy in the same way they wanted to boycot HP game.

 

[FlappyBat]

We got to this point by having people on the right never standing up for what they believe and just saying they want to be neutral. That just means we only shift further and further left. Having based con to own the libtards is cringe as shit, but having people push back beyond just being neutral is the only way we're going to stop diving down the slippery slope leftward.