I wonder if anyone else remembers this. It came to my mind because I was reading this story:

https://www.sbsun.com/2023/08/19/shop-owner-shot-killed-over-rainbow-flag-outside-clothing-store-near-lake-arrowhead/

The owner of a clothing shop in Cedar Glen was shot and killed Friday night, Aug. 18, after a person made several disparaging comments about a rainbow flag displayed outside the store, authorities said.

The suspect was found nearby by arriving deputies, who shot and killed him, San Bernardino County sheriff’s officials said.

This is… horrible. I don’t even know how to describe it. For the first time in my adult life, I’m genuinely horrified and fear for my LGBT+ brothers and sisters, as well as their allies (which includes me, fuck).

2013 felt… different. Two years later in 2015 gay marriage would be legalized nationwide.

I remember thinking EA was trying to pull the wool over our eyes. I remember thinking that LGBT+ acceptance in 2013 was doing well. I remember thinking they were throwing up that people voted for them as worst company over LGBT+ inclusion as some kind of way to hand-wave away their awful business practices. Going back, though…

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/04/ea-executive-responds-to-worst-company-poll-we-owe-gamers-better-performance/

In the past year, we have received thousands of emails and postcards protesting against EA for allowing players to create LGBT+ characters in our games. This week, we’re seeing posts on conservative web sites urging people to protest our LGBT+ policy by voting EA the Worst Company in America.

Does anyone else feel like me, and feel dumbfounded and like I just didn’t think conservatives were that organized at the time? More to the point, I just didn’t trust anything EA said and thought they were lying. I don’t think they were lying anymore. I was wrong.

I wonder, does that mean that far fewer people hated them than we thought, for their business practices? I mean, we’ve seen years of steady profits for EA, it’s not as though they’ve lost a ton of business…

I’m curious what other Lemmings thoughts are on this. I just kind of had a bit of an epiphany about it recently and came back around to thoughts on the subject because of (sigh) how awful everything is.

  • vis4valentine@lemmy.ml
    41·
    1 year ago

    Wait. Out of all the bullshit and evil stuffs EA has done over the years, they were voted worse company in America over gay characters?

    That is ridiculous.

    There is plenty of reason to hate EA. The only good thing they’ve done in a while was making The Sims even Gayer. But then they sell you a glorified overpriced and utterly worthless stuff pack.

    • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      39·
      1 year ago

      making The Sims even Gayer.

      I’m old enough to remember the Sim Copter antics in 1996.

      The game gained controversy when it was discovered that designer Jacques Servin inserted an Easter egg that generated shirtless men in Speedo trunks who hugged and kissed each other and appear in great numbers on certain dates, such as Friday the 13th. The egg was caught shortly after release and removed from future copies of the game. He cited his actions as a response to the intolerable working conditions he allegedly suffered at Maxis, particularly working 60-hour weeks and being denied time off. He also reported that he added the “studs”, as he called them, after a heterosexual programmer programmed “bimbo” female characters into the game, and that he wanted to highlight the “implicit heterosexuality” of many games.

      Servin would go on to be one of the founding members of the Yes Men.

    • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      10·
      1 year ago

      It’s also telling that EA at the time referenced emails and postcards. It’s quite likely that a lot of the people on the right pushing this might not have even played any of these games themselves. They’re old geezers sending in postcards, why use a postcard??

    • fidodo@lemm.ee
      7·
      1 year ago

      That sounds like ea making an excuse for why they were voted worst company. I don’t doubt that they got those emails and letters but I doubt that was the major reason they got voted worst. That was a year they had a lot of gaming controversies

      • Duamerthrax@lemmy.ml
        3·
        1 year ago

        This is the most likely reason. Companies love reframing their earned hate as bigotry. Alt right goes along with it because it gives them validation.