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Brianna Wu

Brianna Wu

Part of a series on GamerGate. [View Related Entries]

Updated Apr 13, 2017 at 01:37PM EDT by Adam.

Added Feb 24, 2017 at 12:37PM EST by Adam.

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About

Brianna Wu is a video game developer, computer programmer, and politician, as well as the cofounder of independent video game development studio Giant Spacekat. She entered the public eye following the harassment she received during GamerGate. Following the 2016 United States Presidential Election, she announced that she would run for a seat in the United States Congress against Massachusetts Rep. Stephen F. Lynch.

History

Wu cofounded Giant Spacekat in 2010 with Amanda Stenquist Warner, adding Maria Enderton as lead programmer.[1] Wu was the developer of the studio's first iOS game, Revolution 60, released in July 2014. The game featured female protagonists and was critically acclaimed, listed as one of the ten best indie games when it was demoed at Pax East 2013. Wu also was the cohost of the podcast Isometric, which ran from 2014 to 2016 before it ended, and is now cohost of the podcast Disruption.

In October of 2014, Wu posted tweets critical of pro-GamerGate advocates, mocking their fight against "an apocalyptic future where women are 8 percent of programmers and not 3 percent." On October 10th, an anonymous user on 8chan posted Wu's address, phone number and email to the /gg/ (GamerGate) board. Several users responded denouncing the post and raising suspicions that it was part of a false flag attack (shown below, left). That evening, Wu tweeted that she was contacting the police after receiving threats from a Twitter account named "Death to Brianna" (shown below, right).


File hider 141298516558ing 12 62 KB 400040 3:4 2804322 7247402 702) Uh oh, I accidentally Brianna Wu Name: E-mal The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19.5505 ID: 25ea4c No 83806 The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19 56 59 ID: 25eaic No 83824 et ouf of here. Brianna 2283800 inb4 she screencaps this post and says OMG MUH SOGGY KNEES on twitter The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19:55 38 51bb42 No. 83808 You f----- 83800 The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 1958 25 ID: f18aad No. 83831 2283851 2283 Reported File ohidti 1412985505721 ng·se , KB, 57-527, 3431, Za g) . The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14(Fri) 19:55 45 10: 5cf464 No 838 10 File 'hdei 1412985344988pg (1044熄280x311. 282311, wsermura) α- ㄧㄧ˙ she is lurking. posted her own info herself 甲~w mate.. 2283300 What are you doin? The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19 59 12 ID: 6f1bce No. 83834 Brianna, pls leaf The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19:55 38 2283800 go away gnaa bd05d1 No. 83813 The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19.59 36 ID: He140 No.83836 File hider 1412985575280 ing s5 KB 200200. 1:1,Seat Daiy Me 283800 The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19:55.48 ID f18aad No.83814 why are you trying to get yourself harassed? this is not a game you f------ retard reported, stop trying to fake an attack Brianna The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 19:55 54 l. 563ddc No 83815 false flag F--- YOU The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 20:01 58 ID: 4b61e7 No.83846 File hide: 1412985718102 png 892 83 KB. 08 887,508 887. ) 283800 Remember to publicly shame, and discourage doxxers at every occassion, and warn any potential victims regardless of which side they're own or beliefs The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 20:02:40 ID fa2074 No 83851 쯔 283831 she quoted me lel The Leader of Gamergate 10/10/14 (Fri) 20:03.19 ID: f18aad No.83853 How big is your victim complex Brianna? Can't take a couple people talking about how s--- your game is so you pretend to dox yourself for attention? F--- off       * Brianna Wu ekalgall Follow And, here's the part of the night where l call the police Reply t Retweet ★ Favorite More 19s Death to Brianna @chatterwhiteman spacekatgal I've got a K-Bar and I'm coming to your house so I can J shove it up your ugly feminist c---. 591 215 RETWEETS FAVORITES 8:14 PM-10 Oct 2014

On October 13th, MSNBC covered #Gamergate with Eric Johnson and Brianna wu during which Wu claimed the death threats she received came from #Gamergate and 8chan.co (shown below, left). On October 14th, Frederick Brennan and Brianna Wu were featured on a Huffpost live segment in which Wu blamed Brennan and #Gamergate for her doxing, after which Brennan refuted the mistakes of Brianna's explanation (shown below, right).
On March 17th, 2016, Syfy channel aired episode 102 of "The internet ruined my life". It featured an interview with Brianna Wu about the death threats she received.



Wu set up a legal fund for families affected by GamerGate and offered an $11,000 reward for anyone who provided information that led to the prosecution of those who sent her death threats.

Oppressed GamerGater

On October 9th, 2014, Brianna Wu tweeted an image macro series titled "Oppressed GamerGater" to criticize the GamerGate community.[32] In reply to this, on the online imageboard 8chan, users started to create new image macros of the character with messages that disagree with the contra-gamergate community. This development was subsequently shared the next day on the /r/KotakuInAction subreddit.


YOUARE LYING I NEVER HIT YOU U ARE TEARING ME APART, LISA YO generator.net eneratorne NO ONE CARED WHOI WAS THE TILIPUT ON MASK emegenerator.net erriegenerator.ne TRIES TO MAKE FORCED MEME DO YOU FEELIN CHARGE? memegenerator.net

Samus is a Transgender Woman

On September 1st, 2015, Wu and Ellen McGrody published an article titled "Metroid’s Samus Aran is a Transgender Woman. Deal With It." on the feminist pop culture news website The Mary Sue.[1] Both authors claimed that Samus Aran from the Metroid series is a male-to-female transgendered woman, using developer comments and instruction booklet excerpts as sources.


H CONTRIBUTORS Metroids Samus Aran is a Transgender Woman. Deal With It. by Brianna Wu at 2:48 pm and Ellen McGrody | Tuesday, September 1st 2015 0 Share G+1 Pin it tumbir

Within 24 hours, the article had 2000+ comments and made Samus trend on Twitter with almost 4,000 tweets in one day.[13] Criticism of the article focused on the author's lack of sources and mistranslations. An anonymous user on Wikipedia began editing the Wikipedia article for Samus Aran to include references to transgenderism, and claiming those who were reverting the edits were "Gamergators" and "transmisogynists." This user was quickly blocked and the article locked.


Discussion on whether Samus is transgender [edit] I tried adding the proper info on Samus being a transwoman, but apparently some reactionaries probably found out and now are not only vandalizing the article, but creating an edit war. Please revert the vandalism caused by them and then lock the article. Thank you!12602:304 CFE0:FA09 E036:C835:6DE5:C (talk) 01:22, 2 September 2015 (UTC) "reactionaries"-are you serious? The only article that came out about this gives political reasons as the primary reasoning behind this, the first paragraph is "there's been a lot of talk lately about the lack of women protagonists in videogames. But our problems with diversity don't stop there. As one article recently noted, shockingly, there have only been 14 playable black women in videogame history. Gamers who aren't cisgender white men often find themselves lacking characters they can rally behind." Are you seriously considering this a legitimate source without biases? The mairn reasoning for writing this article is to stick it to a strawman of a industry entirely dominated by "cisgender white men." TussilagoFanfara (talk) 11:54, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Samus as a transwoman? Where did you get that from? GamerPro64 01:23, 2 September 2015 (UTC) There were no sources on the page about it either. Shouldn't that be a priority? -Aldude999 (talk) 01:26, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Yes. Unless you have a source, a reliable source, I would consider these edits vandalism and unproductive. GamerPro64 01:27, 2 September 2015 TC http://www.themarysue.com/metroids-samus-aran-transgender-woman/ It should work. _ Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:304:CFE0:FA09:E036:C835:6DE5:C (talk) 01:29, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Reads like poorly researched fanfiction, is a blog post (contributors) on a non-reputable biased source, and is directly counter to official sources. Samus is not a transwoman, no matter what some demagogue's fanfiction says. Also, "Transmisogynist" is not a real word. KITA (talk) 01:43, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Transmisogynist is, in fact, a word: see this Wiktionary entry. It derives from a relatively newly-coined but well established term Transmisogyny. (This doesn't in any way contradict your primary assertion, of course.) 208.85.32.249 (talk) 02:22, 2 September 2015 (UTC) (edit conflict) Thank you for providing a source but The Mary Sue is considered a situation source in the Video Game projects. And I'm not really seeing any evidence of Samus being trans. Unless an actual member of Nintendo trans. GamerPro64 01:35, 2 September 2015 (UTC) nfirms this we shouldn't use this source or say she is A newly written article is the furthest from a reliable source. Until this is verified by the original creator it should not be considered reliable. Evanx11 (talk) 01:33, 2 September 2015 (UTC) The page has no references from anyone it quotes, no official word, no videos, or written statements. Just curious if there's anything like that out there? It just doesn't seem sufficient to me is all. -Aldude999 (talk) 01:35, 2 September 2015 (UTC) It will never have any official word. The developers haven't said anything conclusive, and the MarySue article is pure speculation based on a conclusion that had little evidence and only biased thinking. Until the devs give a definitive answer to the question, it should be assumed that Samus is female You reactionary MRA gamergators have nothing reliable to disprove the article. The Mary Sue falls under Wiki's list of sourceable websites. If Brianna Wu states that Samus is a transwoman, which she has WITH evidence, then that's what the article will include. The only way I'll stop is if the creator himself will step up and say that no she isn't. Until then, your reactionary dogpiling won't help this time.2602:304 CFE0:FA09 E036:C835:6DE5:C (talk) 01:39, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Your vandalism has been reverted and the article is locked. Have a nice day. 69.115.224.183 (talk) 01:41, 2 September 2015 (UTC) Your lack of faith in other editors and assuming they are all "reactionary MRA gamergators" will get you nowhere but assumptions from everyone else that you are either here to troll or here to push an agenda and not collaborate. That source is considered unreliable for video game articles, from an author who is not a full time writer at the publication. I don't think the 'evidence' of the article is sufficient but that doesn't affect whethe game characters being t Even if this argument was made from a reliable source, unless that source directly quoted the the Weedwacker (talk) 01:54, 2 September 2015 (UTC) siders it reliable to use. On cle fromm on-reliable source about f the most recognized female video s is not something that is accepted as fact requiresC tersourcing from the creat reven inc ors saying "yes this was always the case" t would t be a small blurb somewhere in the cle saying "x speculated that Samus is trans", not inserting it all over the article as fact Go t You won't be laugh afte ntact the sysops to revert andalism. Have you transmisogynist f-- 2602:304:CFE0:FA09 E036:C835:6DE5:C (talk) 01:43, 2 September 2015 (UTC) super ellen 3d world@kadybat 53m Ugh. They're trying to take Poison away from us, y'all. They don't want us to have Samus, they don't want us to have Poison. F--- that. super ellen 3d world @kadybat 52m I am not going to be left in a world where the only single transgender woman treated with dignity in a game is Vivian. F--- that El super ellen 3d world @kadybat 51m -Samus is trans -Poison is trans -Link is trans -Zelda is trans -Tails is trans YOUR FAVS ARE TRANS. THAT'S IT わ t: 7 ★20 super ellen 3d world @kadybat 50m I don't care about canon, I don't care about authorial intent, I demand queer representation and I will subvert and take away your spaces わ 6 ★17 https://archive.is/vjS7e super ellen 3d world @kadybat Follow I don't give a f---. This is revolutionary queerness. This is dismantling the pointless colonial binary. You can't have this.

Run for Congress

Following the 2016 Presidential Election, Wu announced that she would be running for a seat in the United States as a Democrat against representative Stephen F. Lynch of Massachusetts. Wu cited her fight against the alt-right as evidence she could fight conservative forces in the United States government. On January 17th, 2017, she officially announced her run and posted a video supporting her campaign (shown below).



Brianna Wu for Congress 2018 from Brianna Wu on Vimeo.


On April 12th, 2017, Brianna Wu tweeted a potential logo for her campaign. The tweet, shown below, has since been deleted.


Brianna Wu . Follow Spending the morning working on campaign bumper stickers. This is one of my concepts to pitch to team. anna

Instantly, Twitter users began mocking the design as being more suited for purposes other than a political campaign as well as its general poor design.


Chris Person& @Papapishu Following i'm sorry this is actually f------ killing me rianna ali, still a witch @ali_west Follow 1:28 PM-12 Apr 2017 K. Thor Jensen @kthonensen + Follow Brianna Wu rianna Wue Folow Spending the morning working on campaign bumper stickers. This is one of my concepts to pitch to team. Spending the morning working on campaign bumper stickers. This is one of my concepts to pitch to team anng

One user, @jimpjorps,[3] tweeted several jokes about the logo. The most popular, with 175 retweets, read "that Brianna Wu logo looks like it belongs on a steampunk burlesque lounge that gets shut down by a health inspector." The Daily Dot[2] covered the story the following day.


0L gabagool420@juno.com @jimpjorps 24h Replying to @jimpjorps the Brianna Wu logo is on the label of an exclusive line of studded leather collars only available at Spencer's Gifts 0L gabagool420@juno.com @jimpjorps 24h the Brianna Wu logo is as far as a group of 15-year-old Unreal Tournament modders got with their planned Blade ll total conversion わ11 ロ37 ·288 0L gabagool420@juno.com @jimpjorps 24h people with synesthesia see Brianna Wu's logo and smell a combination of cloves, crushed velvet and sugar free Monster 205 o0L gabagool420@juno.com @jimpjorps 24h if you were a bartender and the Brianna Wu logo walked into your bar you would reflexively have the bottle of absinthe in your hand 2 18 ·180 0L gabagool420@juno.com @jimpjorps 23h at this point I've probably put more thought into what the Brianna Wu Logo evokes in me than she did into the logo itself

Search Interest

External References

[1] Wikipedia – Brianna Wu

[2] Daily Dot – Weird Twitter is mercilessly roasting Brianna Wu’s potential campaign logo

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