Matt Walsh Brings Video Game Infiltration Mainstream
Some more prominent names are starting to take an interest in the video game industry and what companies like Sweet Baby Inc. are doing to it – and doing through it. X is aflutter this morning over Matt Walsh of The Daily Wire devoting a large segment of his podcast, The Matt Walsh Show, to the woke agenda in video games, and he talks about some of the things we’ve been writing and making videos about here at Geeks + Gamers (as have many others) over the past couple of weeks. You can watch the video game portion of the podcast below:
Everything Matt Walsh said in that video is correct, and while it’s mostly stuff everyone here has known for some time, he adds a few new wrinkles about government involvement in the politicization of video games. He’s also mostly correct about the unusual brazenness of game developers and games journalists in revealing their true intentions and the uglier sides of themselves. I say “mostly” because I remember this loon talking about her “not-at-all-secret gay agenda”:
SCOOP: I've obtained video from inside Disney's all-hands meeting about the Florida parental rights bill, in which executive producer Latoya Raveneau says her team has implemented a "not-at-all-secret gay agenda" and is regularly "adding queerness" to children's programming. pic.twitter.com/eJnZMpKIXT
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) March 29, 2022
However, the most important thing in the video is something Matt Walsh says early on: the mainstream has not been talking about this. And I don’t mean CNN, MSNBC, CBS, and the like; nobody expects them to highlight agenda-driven entertainment in the same way nobody expects Darth Vader to say, “Somebody ought to rein in those Stormtroopers before they hurt someone.” But the more prominent conservative outlets, like The Daily Wire and Breitbart, haven’t spent much energy, if any, on the subject, either, and if you’ve ever heard any of them talk about video games, you know why. They don’t like gaming; they look down on it as a children’s activity that even kids probably shouldn’t be doing, and they insult anyone over the age of 5 who likes to partake.
I’ve always thought this was a massive tactical mistake for them and indicative of their personalities; at heart, they’re fuddy-duddies whose idea of fun is shouting at the neighborhood kids to get off their lawn, with the occasional World War II documentary for when they really want to let their hair down. And that’s fine; have fun however you want (without hurting anyone else). But in ignoring gaming completely, they’re ceding a massive territory in the culture war they’re always whining about because of their snobbery. As Matt Walsh says in the video, video games are a much larger industry than movies and television; plenty of gamers are either conservative or could be convinced to swing that way. But when they look for an alternative to the Sweet Baby Inc.s and the hate-spewing games journalists, all they find are uptight squares telling them to put the controller down and read an Abe Lincoln biography.
And I don’t want to beat up on Matt Walsh or The Daily Wire too much. They do a lot of good work in trying to break conservatism into the arts, and Walsh has accomplished some amazing things with protecting kids from genital mutilation, and I’m not just talking about his What is a Woman? documentary. And they stick up for people like Gina Carano, giving her some opportunities. They’re not the bad guys. But I think this is an area where they’ve been asleep at the wheel (and not just them), and I’m glad they’re waking up to it because they’ve shown a willingness to fight these fights. Moreover, I think this is the spark that could spread a fire to more mainstream outlets. For example, look who shared Matt Walsh’s podcast on X and threw his two cents in on the woke-ifying of video games:
Video games need to get rid of the woke bs.
Getting lectured with tedious propaganda is not why people play games! https://t.co/zpAhR42QEs
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 14, 2024
Elon Musk is another guy who has accomplished a lot in the culture war – at great personal expense – and people will take notice if he starts talking about something like this. His commitment to free speech has been a national game-changer, and it’s drawn praise and ire in semi-equal amounts. Regardless of the context, his comments are going to spread, as will Matt Walsh’s. And if Sweet Baby Inc.’s hair-pulling hissy fit has proven anything, it’s that they hate it when people talk about what they’re really up to; just ask Sweet Baby Inc. Detected’s creator, Kabrutus.
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