A Death-Threat Over RPGs? Mike Mearls Stalked? Remind Me Who's 'Toxic' Again?

So yesterday I was out of touch on account of a local blackout. I wasn't able to write my blog entry, unfortunately, but that didn't stop me from going to a local bar to check out the World Cup Final.  I have to say, it's rare to see me cheering for Germany in just about any context, but there we are: Politics, religion, and football make strange bedfellows; and if Argentina had won, they would have been absolutely insufferable for the next four years at least.


So lo and behold, I get back to the internet today, the lights restored, to find that the link I was planning to post as my "cracked monday" installment is completely overshadowed by the fact that I just got a Death Threat on account of my having been employed as a 5e consultant.

Just to clear things up: this guy, who I don't really know myself (but apparently has a history, more of that below), has posted a deaththreat after quoting, "retumbling", whatever (I have no idea what you call a tumblr share) from another tumblr site ("wouldyouagreethat"), which has for days now (since 5e came out) been posting out-of-context quotes of mine, Zak S., Gareth Skarka, Jonathan Wick, and James Desboroughs to try to inaccurately represent all of us as part of a pseudo-activist slander/outrage campaign. 
Is there really any question at this point about this being a hate site? About the outrage brigade being a hate-based movement, who are very much showing their true colors? 

But here's the thing, as much as I usually like things being about me, and as much as in this particular case I'd probably feel more relieved if it was just about me, it's not. This is about 5e.  Most of the people continuing to try to push the "outrage", and who have, in the face of a total lack of any true and meaningful accusations to present that would actually be worthy of any real condemnation (instead of "we just don't like them and think they're mean") been consistently 'upping their game' over the last few days (though I don't really know how they can 'up their game' past endorsing death threats at this point...) are also people who coincidentally have been on record as being opposed to 5e for some time. Some are frustrated game designers who are upset they didn't get to help influence the future of D&D and I did (or Zak did, or Mike Mearls did), some are 4e fanatics, many are Storygamers. 
And if it hadn't been about me, if Zak and I had not been employed by Wizards of the Coast, you can still bet that most of these people would have found something else to invent "outrage" about, to get angry about and attack the product.

Case in point? Mr. Death-threat up there.  I was told by Mike Mearls that long before this guy called for me to be shot, he had been harassing Mike and stalking him on twitter to the point that he had to block him, and is considering involving the police.

So there you go, these are the people who are pretending to take the moral high ground. They're the ones trying to pretend that it's people like me who are 'toxic', and that they are acting out of love, and not livid impotent rage. 

RPGPundit

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