I posted this to my private Twitter tonight, but I feel like it does deserve a space here for those of you who support Thoughty and want to understand why there’s been some lapse in posts. The good part is, now that I’ve written this out, I feel reinvigorated with my desire to continue writing here and doing the work Thoughty is intended to do. The complicated part is, I need space from the way the hobby and industry become your life if you’re not careful, and from the troublesome aspects of the community and industry. I’m still going to write for Thoughty, design games, and do safety/content work. I just want to do it on my own terms from now on, and I hope that you will continue to support that.
As always, you can find me on Twitter @ThoughtyGames and use the contact form on the site if there’s something specific you’re interested in me featuring. If you want to support my continued journey as a creator and here at Thoughty, I am now only on ko-fi.com/thoughty for funding and you can find my games on IndiePressRevolution, DriveThruRPG, and especially briebeau.itch.io. By the by, my name is officially changed to Beau Jágr Sheldon!
If this post resonates with you, know that you have my support in seeking your own path and finding joy, and that I hope your fire never burns out.
Content warning for discussion of perpetrators of harm.
So, late night thoughts. I think I want to quit the Games Industry. I still like making games, & I do want to do something with Thoughty (but I’m not sure what that is since I’m struggling to write for it & can’t seem to acquire writers). I want to do safety/content work. But.
While I have no other means of making income, and this is the biggest issue with wanting to leave, the industry itself and the communities that surround it are filled with missing stairs for me. They are filled with memories of trauma, failure, and rejection. Unendingly.
I want to make games with my partners, and support them. I want to make games & would like to make money on them, but even now that’s not super successful for me. I want to continue reviewing games & talking about game theory on Thoughty. I don’t want to keep feeling like this.
I have been accused of a lot of things that I can’t find the truth in over my time in the community. I’ve also made plenty of mistakes which I’ve tried to own up to. However, I’ve also watched a lot of people do harmful things and just…walk it off. Become more successful.
I have often felt like I’m screaming into nothingness when I have tried to talk about the constant abuses in the community, the toxic business practices, the cultural flaws. Worst of all has been when I know someone has done harm, but I’m not the one who can give light to it.
I have seen harm, I have experienced harm, and I have supported people who were harmed, & the problem is, I don’t have piles of screenshots or emails or witnesses to back up the wrongs I’m aware of, & I also struggle because I don’t want the response the community gives, either.
I don’t want “well, there’s no receipts” or “the victim(s) aren’t ‘credible'” or “this harm isn’t bad enough” or “there’s no way a marginalized person could cause harm like that.” I ALSO don’t want “we should ostracize this person” or “this person deserves to starve/suffer.”
What I want is “hey, person who is accused of perpetrating harm, acknowledge that you have taken actions that harmed people, apologize for those actions, & make efforts to change without erasing all evidence of your wrongdoing so that people can engage with you with awareness.”
I want that alongside “there is no such thing as a bad victim, a victim is not responsible for substantiating their harm to the point that the substantiation causes trauma, and all harm is valid to be addressed and respected, & we will not erase this harm.” Can you imagine?
But what we have is hidden abuse from people of all backgrounds that is regularly excused, dismissed, or forgiven by the people who weren’t the victims. We have people rising to success on the work of others, then turning on those who did that work. Perpetrators of harm thrive.
It literally doesn’t matter what prompted my feelings about this today because I think about this EVERY DAY with all of the people who have continued to get away with harmful acts who I don’t hate, but I do want to take accountability & I do want to change & I do want witnessed.
People in hobby & professional games are so willing to turn their eyes from genuine harm for the sake of their fictional experience & for the sake of promoting the people they have convinced themselves cannot do harm. We have seen this again & again and it burns us to the core.
But I am not a phoenix. I cannot rise again and again. I have a limit. I struggle to care for myself because every waking day in the community is riddled with news of more people perpetrating harm in so many different ways that I feel sick imagining a convention again.
Who will welcome me? Who will shun me? Who will go silent when I join a table, or antagonize me if I speak my mind on a panel? Who will ask questions about people who hurt me? Who will undermine my experience? Who will hurt my friends & colleagues? Who will get away with it?
On top of all of that, who that I thought I could trust will I see spending their energy to justify those acts against me or against others? Who will validate harmful, alienating, unjust acts in the community, and break my heart? So many have done these things, I lost track.
What happens is I internalize it, I see it as just to validate harm against me. I see it as right to say that I must be the problem. I see it as valid to claim that things I do not do with ill intent are meant as cruel and harmful things. And worse!
I end up feeling like maybe the way things work is just. That it’s better to let talented, toxic people succeed rather than acknowledge their flaws and give them impetus to change. That we should let people who are accused of harmful acts continue because they’re creative & fun.
It wounds me. It is like a skipping record player, repeating the same keening clip of agony: this is how it has always been, this is how it will always be; the players may change, but the game never will. And I have lost the game, more than once over, for my trust & mistakes.
I don’t want to keep knowing all the things I know and not being able to do anything about it when someone gets away with harmful acts. I don’t want to keep starting to form bonds with people only to have them ripped or withering away. It is too cruel. It is wrong to me.
I know you can’t market products or content without being a part of the community & aligning yourself somehow. I know you can’t succeed as any kind of creator without either privilege, networking, or both. I still want to create. I just can’t sacrifice myself or others to do it.
I guess the tl;dr is that you will see creative work from me going forward in my spaces and my control, but that I am making a choice to put myself first, & that means the community and industry will have to change before it gets any more of me than that. I doubt I’ll be missed.
If you have read this far, thank you. I hope that you are still with me. In any case, please take forward this simple message: there is no limit to how much good you can do in the world, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive every goddamn day to reach it – and that includes the good you do for yourself.
