games

Not a lot of people will remember this but GamerGate is what lead to the initial popularity of 8chan. Although GamerGate was originally centered around 4chan, 4chan banned discussion of GamerGate in September 2014 and then all the GamerGate freaks moved to 8chan. The GamerGate board on 8chan was the most active board for a long time. Christopher Poole aka moot decided to sell 4chan in 2015, saying that he was tired of dealing with controversies like GamerGate.

The popularity of 8chan is what lead to the Qanon conspiracy theory. While Q originally posted on 4chan in October 2017, the next month Q began posting exclusively to 8chan until December 2020. There is a decent amount of evidence that the identity of Q was either Jim Watkins (the owner of 8chan) or his son, Ron Watkins. If 8chan had not been popularized by the first GamerGate, 8chan might not have had enough notoriety for the Qanon conspiracy theory to spread as much as it did.

Qanon helped to reshape the Republican party. Qanon helped elect politicians like Marjorie Taylor Greene. Qanon is what motivated some people to participate in January 6, such as the Qanon shaman.

So while this GamerGate 2 is probably silly nonsense, it could be laying the groundwork for a worse political movement in the future.