3mo ago

To appease a Steam user's demands for straight representation, Webfishing added a 'Straight' title that costs 9,999 fish bucks

www.pcgamer.com To appease a Steam user's demands for straight representation, Webfishing added a 'Straight' title that costs 9,999 fish bucks

Some people are just fishing for attention.

63 comments

I don't know if this is a hot take, but I think allowing straight and cis people to identify as such is appropriate, because the alternative assumes that we live in a state of default heteronormativity.
If anything, I want to live in a world where homophobes get mad that if they want to be assumed to be straight online they have to identify like anyone else. No one gets assumed to be straight any more. That's better imo.
- Nothing I enjoy more than asking a good ol' boy his pronouns.
- The default should be "I'm horny" but unless I specify you have to guess who I'm horny for.
  
  Maybe one day we can get there, but right now it might be better for a lot of folks if the default was "I'm not horny".
  But I'm with you on the dream.
  
  Wow such asexual-phobia! (/s but only a little) Not everyone is "horny".
  
  Pan-sexual then, perhaps?
  
  heh, this totally reminds me of Terry Pratchett's dwarves, that spend a lot of time trying to find out what's under the beard of the other first without asking that akward question xD
- as an almost maximally privileged person (cis straight etc), i want my whining fellows to shut the fuck up. Just stop. Stop taking up all the god damn space. Just be quiet. It's okay not to be included in every scene all the time.
  Your point about not assuming people are straight by default is valid. But I mostly just want some cis-het folks to stop embarrassing me by being fucking insufferable.
- Uh, maybe I will have to specify myself, too. Never tought like that.

The quotation marks are a nice touch. Quality trolling.
- I think a question mark in parentheses would also do the trick

Finally, representation for gay people who are into irony.

Brooo you can get the title of shithead? Why would you wana be labeled as straight when you could be shithead instead? lol. That's what I would go for haha
- Yeah I'd much rather take that over any sexuality. It's a much deeper insight into my personality than just "straight".

Obviously that steam guy was probably coming from a place of bad faith, but the response is maybe imperfect no? This would look pretty bad if the roles were reversed I think. (genuine question I am hoping I am told why this may not be the case; I have nowhere else to ask)
- It's okay to take context into account and not just look at it as a math problem. Targeting a minority isn't the same as doing it to people who make up 90% of society but are whiny.
  
  I totally agree that an unacceptable proportion of straight people are whiny about any manner of minority representation, but doesn't this also affect straight people who are normal about this? Maybe it'd be more fitting to give a demeaning title to homophobes, eg. the steam complainer, but provide regular title to everyone else somehow? Thanks for taking the time!
- I don't think its ethical to portray straight people in video games at all.
  
  Bioware is well ahead of you. Haven't most of their romanceable NPCs been bisexual for ages now?
  
  Could you please define "potray"? /genq
- The roles are not reversed, though (quite the opposite), so no need to worry about that:
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dw_mRaIHb-M
  
  Yeah the history of oppression is definitely reason to dislike those that support it, but it seems ill-fitting to have this affect all people who identify as straight no? (Not just cis straight people who don't support that oppression but also trans straight people and other exceptions, as another commenter pointed out)
- Obviously that steam guy was probably coming from a place of bad faith
  The Steam forums actively encourage this kind of bad faith behavior:
  when a post gets a new reply it's moved to the top of the forums. So as long as people are engaging with a post, even if it's just to make fun of a bigot, it keeps getting pushed back to the top.
  Users can "award" posts for various things (helpfull, cool, funny, etc) and users have taken to giving 'Clown' awards as a way of making fun of posts. Whenever one of your posts gets an award, you are given Steampoints you can use in the Steam cosmetics store.
  This results in every game having bad faith posts "complaining" about wokeness so that people will make fun of them with Clown awards as a way to farm Steampoints. The developer bringing attention to it just helps them get more.

If a community was fighting over something so trivial like this I'd consider leaving the game entirely.
- Then you should probably leave every game, because you can probably find some dumbfucks that argue about this everywhere. There are less than 30 people posting on this Steam discussion linked.
  
  On this topic, I remember seeing a thread for Frostpunk 2 asking if it had DEI stuff in it.
  There aren't even any real characters in Frostpunk 2. Tf are you talking about DEI for in a game with no real characters?
  
  Honestly then... it probably didn't warrant a response that will only bring more attention to their whining and more people rushing in to "support the cause"

Wait... This is an entire game? I've seen memes of it and I thought it was about an update to Animal Crossing.
- It's very fun, feels like a return to simple web chatroom type games that I've really been longing for. It's real enjoyable if the idea of casual fishing with some random people seems appealing to you!