Frogs, clowns, and swastikas Alt-right |
Chuds |
Rebuilding the Reich, one meme at a time |
Buzzwords and dogwhistles |
One Angry Gamer is a gaming-related blog created by William "Billy D" Usher. As the site became larger with more authors contributing to it, it grew from being a rather standard pro-gamergate site to a "SJW rekt, get woke go broke, Feminazism is cancer" clickbait site with an extreme reactionary bias, to a full on alt-right fascist website with sympathies to Neo-Nazis like Red Ice TV[1] and Nick Fuentes.[2] They were so abhorrent that KotakuInAction, the most popular gamergate subreddit, disowned them for their hypocrisy and outright racism.[3][4]
The site is currently barely active, and what it does post is standard and fairly bland gaming and anime content.[5] In May 2022, the owners announced that the domain was for sale.[6]
One Angry Gamer's main contributor Billy D and his smooth-brained brethren were an embodiment of all the worst stereotypes about gamers. Misogynistic,[7][8] homophobic,[9][10] transphobic,[11][12] racist,[13][14] weirdly obsessed with lolicon[15] and fan service,[16] which wouldn't be that remarkable if they weren't so obsessed with diversity (which they don't like) and non-white countries (with the only exception being Japan of course) "infiltrating" the West (which they do like, if Westerners are alt-right reactionaries like them).[17] They also liked to complain about everything being political[18] unless something happens to agree with them.[19] The problem with that line of thinking is that everything is political, especially One Angry Gamer, a website that was strongly politically motivated in complaining about anything that isn't a straight white Christian man. They only tolerated women in games if they're adequately sexualized, believe that people of colour or people of different sexualities in their games is "degenerate propaganda", or the left trying to force "diversity" into games (presumably to destroy the West), and like to paint LGBT people as pedophiles, while also running articles complaining about games that sexualise children being censored. They also liked to complain about conservatives being "attacked" and the anti-white plan that they believe the "eevill leftist cabal" is participating in. Almost all of their articles were about how SJWs are ruining gaming, NSFW articles about which hentai William Usher gets off to, and the occasional white nationalist op-ed.
The site was also heavy with ableism, pushing conspiracy theories[20][21] (note: these two articles were written a few years after One Angry Gamer correctly pointed out that while the Comet Ping Pong emails were strange, there was no evidence that a pedophile ring was involved),[22] white genocide fearmongering,[23][24] Islamophobia,[25][26] and fat shaming.[27][28]
In June 2020, Billy D became the laughing stock of the internet after composing a list of "Traitors to America",[29] listing corporations and internet personalities who voiced their support for Black Lives Matter after the police murder of George Floyd. The similarities to Gamergate's DeepFreeze list are of course purely coincidental, and many of the entries have additional negative comments about the people involved. In response, many internet personalities not yet on the list made fun of Billy D, causing them to speak up about Black Lives Matter. Billy's response to this seems to have been to add anyone making fun of him to the list, with the resulting list amounting to almost every personality and studio in the gaming industry.
For extra irony, a large number of the corporations and personalities on the list are not even American, but were added anyway because they "cater to and influence the American audience".[29]
The entire thing eventually culminated in someone mentioning that the list was having the opposite effect, listing creators who are supporting Black Lives Matter[30] as a good thing, resulting in Billy being utterly dumbfounded.[31] Finally, Rami Ismail (a member of the indie studio Vlambeer, the creator of the game Nuclear Throne) made a mirror of the list[32] that does not give One Angry Gamer ad revenue or traffic.
Sometime during the fall of 2020, Billy departed the site like a coward because he was losing money. The site stayed dormant for a few months until it was brought into new management. The Traitors to America list was deleted shortly afterwards along with most of the articles written by Billy, presumably in an effort by the new owners to distance themselves from him and his blatant bigotry.
According to him, Billy D has been "rustling Jimmies for years covering video games" and "drinking the tears of game journalists". He also likes to say "niggertry" and "faggotry" a lot.[33] Amusingly, his avatar Rorschach is a Watchmen character written by Alan Moore, a far left anarchist with extremely progressive views (Leftist infiltration must be extremely bad when the founder of a reactionary website proudly references one). Ironically, Rorschach is usually portrayed as a socially awkward person with poor hygiene, issues with women, psychotic outbursts, sociopathic behavior, and hard-right "tough on crime" politics who Moore created as an unflattering caricature. So maybe William chose the right avatar.[note 1]
Despite being one of the most obnoxious reactionary sites on the internet, One Angry Gamer did occasionally make valid points. They rightfully criticized Donald Trump and conservatives for claiming that video games cause violence,[34][35] as well as being heavily critical of Gab,[36][37] even if that's only because Gab doesn't like porn. They also made a rather nuanced article about ProJared's controversy, not resorting to "#MeToo is cancer", "Projared's a male feminist", or "Cancel culture is garbage" arguments that you'd expect them to make.[38]