Shutting Down Feminist Frequency

After I made the conclusive decision that the time had come to close Feminist Frequency, my first fully-formed thought was: “Holy fuck!” We—that’s all of us who have been on this journey together—have done so much. We made changes to an industry that were desperately needed, shaking up the status quo and distributing content in the early days of video punditry. While we weren’t the first voices in the conversation about inclusion in gaming, we were part of building a community that meant more to its members than we could ever have anticipated. Seeing even more people take up this mantle and continue the work has been heartening; many people working within the industry, even people I have been critical of in the past, have supported and worked to create real change. So I know you’re asking: why now?

The best answer I can give is the honest truth: I’m exhausted.

Anita irrevocably changed how I viewed myself as a gamer. More specifically she changed how I thought about the people who make games, why games treat female/women the way they do, how those horrid defaults impacted the treatment of other underrepresented people.

There are times when one person can make a difference and Anita Sarkeesian is such a person. She didn’t stop with just herself. She built an organization and movement to carry the work forward. She walks the talk as so few people do. She changed the game of gaming for the better. I don’t think games like Horizon Zero Dawn would exist without her work.