Episode 151: Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Online Harassment For A Virtuous Cause

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Jesse Singal provides an update to the update to his San Francisco party for Blocked and Reported Primos, as well as his struggle to plan it.

Katie Herzog gets introduced to gaming through the new Harry Potter game, Hogwarts Legacy. The controversy over JK Rowling’s views on gender issues have now spilled over from Twitter to the gaming press, Discord, and Twitch. Streamers are afraid to play it, servers are being raided, and writers are refusing to review it.

Plus, not-so-famous actor Armond Hammer discusses tying up women, eating their ribs, and stealing their toes, which then gets turned into an NFT.

And here’s the link to the Blocked & Reported store, for those who asked:

https://shop.gutentogltd.com/collections/barpod

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SF Party

San Francisco party update

Semi-Emergency San Francisco Party Update

Update to the update

The BARPod/Singal-Minded Party Is On For Wednesday, February 15 In San Francisco

Hogwarts Legacy

Hogwarts Legacy on Steam

https://store.steampowered.com/app/990080/Hogwarts_Legacy/

Rowling’s “middle-aged moment”

https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/jk-rowling-liked-transphobic-tweet-in-middle-aged-moment-137860

Rowling’s essay on why she speaks out on sex and gender issues

https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/

American polling on transgender issues

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2022/06/28/americans-complex-views-on-gender-identity-and-transgender-issues/

British polling on transgender issues

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/articles-reports/2022/07/20/where-does-british-public-stand-transgender-rights

Aja Romano on Rowling’s “people who menstruate” tweet

https://www.vox.com/culture/21285396/jk-rowling-transphobic-backlash-harry-potter

Axios: “Hogwarts Legacy game launch becomes referendum on J.K. Rowling”

https://www.axios.com/2023/02/06/hogwarts-legacy-jk-rowling-launch

Patrick Klepek, writer for Vice’s Waypoint, on the coverage of Hogwarts Legacy

Patrick Klepek @patrickklepek

Watching gaming outlets jump through rhetorical hoops to justify coverage on Hogwarts Legacy isn’t surprising, but it’d be more honest if they played it straight and just said “our shaky business model does not allow us to ignore any game that might sell 10 million copies.”

The Gamer refuses to review Hogwarts Legacy

https://www.thegamer.com/thegamer-stance-hogwarts-legacy-harry-potter/

Morgan Park of PC Gamer is “haunted by JK Rowling”

https://www.pcgamer.com/hogwarts-legacy-review/

Hasan Piker (HasanAbi) on being afraid to play the game

https://livestreamfails.com/clip/150055

Twitch chat harasses a woman (Shelby of Girlfriend Reviews) to tears for playing Hogwarts Legacy

https://www.dexerto.com/hogwarts-legacy/twitch-chat-berates-streamer-to-tears-for-playing-hogwarts-legacy-on-launch-day-2053952/

Dexerto reports on a site featuring a tracker to see if streamers have played the game

Dexerto @Dexerto

A site has also surfaced yesterday, featuring a tracker to check if streamers have played the game

The official Hogwarts Legacy Discord server was put on a 5-minute chat timer after large-scale raiding

smiles @ROFLsmiles

@jessesingal The entire hogwarts legacy discord server was raided by “Allies” spamming hateful shit, leading to the server slowing down conversation with 5 minute timers. Funny we didn’t get this fake performative outrage for the past 3 dogshit Fantastic Beast films that JK worked on directly

Armie Hammer

Armie Hammer Breaks His Silence

https://airmail.news/issues/2023-2-4/armie-hammer-breaks-his-silence

“The Fall of Armie Hammer: A Family Saga of Sex, Money, Drugs, and Betrayal”

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/03/the-fall-of-armie-hammer-a-family-saga-of-sex-money-drugs-and-betrayal

Page Six: “Armie Hammer’s DMs call into question the timeline of his suicide story”

https://pagesix.com/2023/02/08/armie-hammers-dms-call-into-question-timeline-of-suicide-story/