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They are already being slowly canceled (losing subscribers for over a year straight) for being visibly transfem/nonbinary. They seem to have no problems working with others given that they work with the same people for years and years[Justin was one of Sterling’s longest term collaborators so that conflicts with my original argument], and they also are a rare independent, anti-capitalist, and loudly pro-worker voice in games media.
I will go and read the more recent plagiarism claim, but they have consistently called out asset flips and other industry plagiarism for years and years, so that doesn’t ring true to me either.
Being wrong about whether a game was racist over a decade ago isn’t really that significant, to be honest.
Edit: Does anybody have a real source for the plaigarism and treating assistants badly claim? Because a forum post (even a hexbear one) with no real sources isn’t gonna cut it.
Edit 2: I have located the two sides of the story for the JSS and Justin (editor/assistant) pay dispute. Feel free to make up your own mind. Justin’s Side (sorry it’s hard to read, click through to each Twitter post to see the images in full)
James Stephanie Sterling’s side
!spoiler spoiler my opinion after reading both sides
I think that JSS publicly denouncing Justin was not a proportionate or appropriate response to him telling 3 friends in confidence about a pay dispute, especially when JSS is a public figure but Justin for the most part isn’t and they live in different countries now. I also think Justin’s story rings true more often.!<
So, I don’t doubt for a minute that them coming out as non-binary is a contributing factor, and the conflict with Justin likely hasn’t helped either, but I think some of their decline in popularity is also just because their content has grown stagnant. I was a fan for a while, perhaps I still am, but I’d say about a year or so ago I began disengaging with their work, largely because it began feeling repetitive. I’ve talked with others fans/former fans, and they’ve echoed similar sentiment. They’re channel is mostly just the Jimquisition now, while they’re content used to be more varied, with let’s plays, trailer reactions, one off videos about various topics, weird shit they just posted for shits and giggles. Also the Jimquisition itself was more varied, it used to have episodes about a variety of topics, some involving actual amateur investigative journalism, interviews with industry professionals, discussions of controversial topics. Now it’s just rants about how shit the game industry is, which yes it very much is and it’s worth ranting about but ranting about the same shitty thing every week gets dull.
It’s an affect that happens with a lot of YT channels and podcasts, whatever their topic of focus is it become well tread ground after a while and things get repetitive. Same things seems to be happening to , besides the hosts being Libs and Liam being a fucking piece of shit, their episodes are starting to get a big samey cuz they’ve covered almost every genre of engineering disaster at this point, now only the weird off topic episodes are fun. It’s easier to avoid this with media coverage cuz there’s always new media but for whatever reason I think Jim is losing their passion for it, seems they just wanna focus on wrestling. Which is fine but I guess the channel is also their income so they wanna keep it going.
I kinda stopped watching them around 2019 for similar reasons, having followed them since I randomly started watching Jimquisition on the Escapist in like 2013. Hearing about how much the game industry sucked just got sort of depressing and I didn’t really care about the latest horrible gaming news. They also kinda stopped doing a lot of the funny side content I used to tune in for, like Let’s Plays of awful Steam games.
For the past few years I’ve been watching a lot of Matt McMuscles for my weekly gaming slop
I don’t think racism has a statute of limitations, but I do think that a decade of positive activism can make up for previous reactionary writings.
I have read the above linked Sterling Destructoid article, which is a reactionary response to legitimate concerns about racist themes in an early RE5 trailer. I also read JSS’s 2009 article about RE5 in which they claim that RE5 is actually anti-racist and the people calling it racist are the real racist. This article is clearly racist, reactionary content complete with an R slur in the first sentence. I have not found an apology for this.
However, their video right after the 2020 George Floyd protests began–in my opinion–shows they have grown a lot since their review of Resident Evil 5 in 2009. The most relevant section begins at 8:25 of this YouTube video. In the video, they acknowledge systemic racism, racist police brutality, and the inadequacy of most corporations’ somber jpeg responses to the police murder + mass peaceful protests without specific, actionable policy promises. They also touch on intersectionalism and relate it back to class struggle and provide links to support anti-racist orgs.
While I would prefer a clear, specific apology, I think they are firmly now a force for anti-racism when they speak on the matter, but they seem to avoid the topic to let others who are more informed speak on it.
Meanwhile, they are consistently anti-terf, anti-transphobia, anti-homophobia, anti-capitalist, pro-worker, pro-union, and call out injustice wherever they see it, in addition to amplifying and sometimes publishing whistleblowers’ claims.
I will be the first to call them out if they say or write something racist, but I’ve been watching their channel since 2015 and I’ve never seen them do so since that point.
Edit: I wrote the above before I was able to read about Justin and JSS’s pay dispute and dueling abuse/exploitation accounts. Links in comment above.
It is odd how people demand an apology from someone who’s more than made up for an edgy past with actions that show which side they’re on. Usually an apology will end up getting written off as disingenuous anyway.
They are already being slowly canceled (losing subscribers for over a year straight) for being visibly transfem/nonbinary. They seem to have
no problems working with others given that they work with the same people for years and years[Justin was one of Sterling’s longest term collaborators so that conflicts with my original argument], and they also are a rare independent, anti-capitalist, and loudly pro-worker voice in games media.I will go and read the more recent plagiarism claim, but they have consistently called out asset flips and other industry plagiarism for years and years, so that doesn’t ring true to me either.
Being wrong about whether a game was racist over a decade ago isn’t really that significant, to be honest.
Edit: Does anybody have a real source for the plaigarism and treating assistants badly claim? Because a forum post (even a hexbear one) with no real sources isn’t gonna cut it.
Edit 2: I have located the two sides of the story for the JSS and Justin (editor/assistant) pay dispute. Feel free to make up your own mind.
Justin’s Side (sorry it’s hard to read, click through to each Twitter post to see the images in full) James Stephanie Sterling’s side
So, I don’t doubt for a minute that them coming out as non-binary is a contributing factor, and the conflict with Justin likely hasn’t helped either, but I think some of their decline in popularity is also just because their content has grown stagnant. I was a fan for a while, perhaps I still am, but I’d say about a year or so ago I began disengaging with their work, largely because it began feeling repetitive. I’ve talked with others fans/former fans, and they’ve echoed similar sentiment. They’re channel is mostly just the Jimquisition now, while they’re content used to be more varied, with let’s plays, trailer reactions, one off videos about various topics, weird shit they just posted for shits and giggles. Also the Jimquisition itself was more varied, it used to have episodes about a variety of topics, some involving actual amateur investigative journalism, interviews with industry professionals, discussions of controversial topics. Now it’s just rants about how shit the game industry is, which yes it very much is and it’s worth ranting about but ranting about the same shitty thing every week gets dull.
It’s an affect that happens with a lot of YT channels and podcasts, whatever their topic of focus is it become well tread ground after a while and things get repetitive. Same things seems to be happening to
, besides the hosts being Libs and Liam being a fucking piece of shit, their episodes are starting to get a big samey cuz they’ve covered almost every genre of engineering disaster at this point, now only the weird off topic episodes are fun. It’s easier to avoid this with media coverage cuz there’s always new media but for whatever reason I think Jim is losing their passion for it, seems they just wanna focus on wrestling. Which is fine but I guess the channel is also their income so they wanna keep it going.
I kinda stopped watching them around 2019 for similar reasons, having followed them since I randomly started watching Jimquisition on the Escapist in like 2013. Hearing about how much the game industry sucked just got sort of depressing and I didn’t really care about the latest horrible gaming news. They also kinda stopped doing a lot of the funny side content I used to tune in for, like Let’s Plays of awful Steam games.
For the past few years I’ve been watching a lot of Matt McMuscles for my weekly gaming slop
Being wrong about racism (being racist) is significant to me. You sound about white saying that it has a statute of limitations.
I don’t think racism has a statute of limitations, but I do think that a decade of positive activism can make up for previous reactionary writings.
I have read the above linked Sterling Destructoid article, which is a reactionary response to legitimate concerns about racist themes in an early RE5 trailer. I also read JSS’s 2009 article about RE5 in which they claim that RE5 is actually anti-racist and the people calling it racist are the real racist. This article is clearly racist, reactionary content complete with an R slur in the first sentence. I have not found an apology for this.
However, their video right after the 2020 George Floyd protests began–in my opinion–shows they have grown a lot since their review of Resident Evil 5 in 2009. The most relevant section begins at 8:25 of this YouTube video. In the video, they acknowledge systemic racism, racist police brutality, and the inadequacy of most corporations’ somber jpeg responses to the police murder + mass peaceful protests without specific, actionable policy promises. They also touch on intersectionalism and relate it back to class struggle and provide links to support anti-racist orgs.
While I would prefer a clear, specific apology, I think they are firmly now a force for anti-racism when they speak on the matter, but they seem to avoid the topic to let others who are more informed speak on it.
Meanwhile, they are consistently anti-terf, anti-transphobia, anti-homophobia, anti-capitalist, pro-worker, pro-union, and call out injustice wherever they see it, in addition to amplifying and sometimes publishing whistleblowers’ claims.
I will be the first to call them out if they say or write something racist, but I’ve been watching their channel since 2015 and I’ve never seen them do so since that point.
Edit: I wrote the above before I was able to read about Justin and JSS’s pay dispute and dueling abuse/exploitation accounts. Links in comment above.
It is odd how people demand an apology from someone who’s more than made up for an edgy past with actions that show which side they’re on. Usually an apology will end up getting written off as disingenuous anyway.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I found the links to Justin and JSS’s accounting of their dispute. The links are in the comment above yours here.
Thank you.