Yeah I checked out the Geeks + Gamers video on it since it seems a bit more in depth then Quartering... and only has a fifteen minute video (while looking I saw Shadiversity has apparently released an hour plus long video plus another forty minute video
) and two things:
1. Apparently the twenty minutes I saw on YouTube was the entire bit involving Matt Walsh talking about Video Games, which actually shocked me because like I said, I watched the video kind of expecting it to be cringe, but the only controversial take I could see was maybe in the final minute.
2. Most of the stuff I saw on Twitter and from the other bits and clips people posted honestly seems to be strawmen of the video Matt Walsh made, or bringing up previous statements he made. Like there were some social media posts stating that Matt Walsh stated that "He is the one" who brought wokeness in gaming to mainstream light, but Matt Walsh actually never said that. He references other folks for most of the video. He just stated that Wokeness in gaming has avoided the mainstream reportage by and large, which I think is a fair enough statement to make. And if it wasn't clear, he made it pretty clear on Social Media that he never said that or meant to imply that.
Other people, like The Quartering, when Matt Walsh replied to him, simply threw up a screenshot of some article Matt Walsh made one, two, five years ago or whatever which is fine, Matt Walsh has stated he's not a gamer, plays video games and doesn't like "screentime" for kids and young adults, whatever. But that's literally a red herring in this regard. And there's a lot of that going on.
Geeks + Gamers actually states his main issue is with the final minute of the video, which is again what I thought was the only thing that could be controversial. Matt Walsh literally makes a few broad or blanket statements which on the face of it, could be taken the wrong way but IMHO could be taken with as little as a shrug.
So Matt Walsh states towards the end: "
The video game industry, without a lot of fanfare, has transformed into a tool of propaganda and surveillance. It's an effective way to indoctrinate children precisely because it hasn't received much attention... So it should be getting a lot of our attention. Now finally that attention is here."
Taken in the worst possible light and ignoring a healthy dose of context and common sense, this seems to invalidate all of the Geeks + Gamers, Quarterings, Nichegamers and others in the world, but Matt Walsh throughout the video has used those sources he's supposedly ignoring as sources in this very video. He cites the Steam group that tracked Sweet Baby, various Twitter accounts, a podcast that had Gummiez and The Quartering on it etc.
He also repeatedly stated this was in reference to the mainstream earlier and to reinforce that point talked about how shitty Games Journalists are compared to even already shitty mainstream journalists and cites several examples. He then talks about how open wokeness is in the Video Game industry compared to even other industries considered woke. He also repeatedly cites how mainstream press and parents seem ignorant of a lot of this, which IMHO is true by and large.
If The Quartering and Geeks + Gamers just took a step back, they would realize that if and when these "Gamergate" issues pop up and receive attention from the mainstream press, as sparing as it is, it's wholly in the negative. Conservative outlets ranging from Fox News and New York Post to yes, the Daily Wire or OANN or Newsmax, barely ever cover this as a counter narrative like they would... trans ideology or abortion etc.
Matt Walsh continues: "
That's another reason to keep these games as far away from children as possible. And if you do that, games journalists, literally the lowest form of journalists on the planet, will accuse you of harassment and that's exactly how you know you're doing the right thing."
So unlike his previous statement which I feel was just an exercise in interpreting things in the worse way possible, this statement actually seemed the most controversial to me when I saw the video originally and was like the only controversial line in the whole video when I initially watched it.
The main issue is that Matt Walsh, whose self professed ignorant of video games because he's not a video gamer, implies something he's mentioned before. He sees all of this as another reason why kids shouldn't play video games. He has repeatedly stated that Kids spent too much time in front of "screens" and this is just another reason for him to do it.
A lot of the criticism seems to come from the fact that people interpret this as Matt Walsh stating people just shouldn't play video games in general and abandon the whole industry or some such which has more traction. With that sweeping statement of kids shouldn't play video games, he doesn't add any nuance like "Kids shouldn't play games too much" or "Kids shouldn't play woke propaganda games" so criticism over that seems fair to me. He should clarify at the very least but the statement itself isn't without merit.
People, kids especially, spend far too much time in front of "screens" and video games are a big part of that. So is television, streaming, and TikTok and other social media etc. But as Geeks + Gamers states, it seems unrealistic to just divest Kids from video games. Screen time should be reduced by parents and guardians, but people should fight the wokeness and activists (like Geeks + Gamers says) and take back the video game industry.
Later in the video Geeks + Gamers tries to state that Matt Walsh, calling Games Journalists the lowest form of journalists (which they are) is somehow meant to insult and smear gamers in general, which... seems like a big stretch to me, especially since he doesn't expand on it.
So in short, I honestly think this is a whole lot of nothing. If there's "grift" going on in jumping in on the current thing, I wouldn't say its on the part of Matt Walsh in this case. It's literally two closing remarks that are the source of this controversy.