At first glance it seemed solid but as I reread it, thought about it more, and listened to more women's takes on the response it became clear it was not what I had initially thought. I liked Nick's work, it helped me through some really rough times, and I wanted to give him a second chance but the situation seems to be a mess. Hell, at this point I even feel guilty for recommending his stuff to so many people.
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Nick Robinson (Polygon) answers to sexual harassment allegations, leaves Polygon
- Thread starter LordKano
- Start date
At first glance it seemed solid but as I reread it, thought about it more, and listened to more women's takes on the response it became clear it was not what I had initially thought. I liked Nick's work, it helped me through some really rough times, and I wanted to give him a second chance but the situation seems to be a mess. Hell, at this point I even feel guilty for recommending his stuff to so many people.
Here I thought I was crazy in thinking the apology letter posted felt kind of disingenuous at first glace. Sad to see that is in fact that. Everything posted so far goes well beyond what one might consider "flirting" online and while I was almost ready to give Nick the benefit of the doubt that he as some sort of twisted view of what flirting actually is, this is all just wrong.
mr teaspoon
Member
I don't really see how this is being considered to be a good apology.
"Not that long ago, I had an extremely small following online."
Who cares? What you did was wrong by any metric. Whether you had one follower or one thousand, whether you were in the games industry or just some putz working at Subway, what you did was wrong. This is not in any way a case of 'fame hitting unexpectedly.'
As others have rightly pointed out, his whole thing is self-infantilization (see: the way he managed to include 'people draw pictures of me!' in his apology about unwanted sexual advances). The apology essentially boils down to, 'Sorry. I didn't know I was famous now. And as a Big Person, I'm not allowed to act that way.'
"Not that long ago, I had an extremely small following online."
Who cares? What you did was wrong by any metric. Whether you had one follower or one thousand, whether you were in the games industry or just some putz working at Subway, what you did was wrong. This is not in any way a case of 'fame hitting unexpectedly.'
As others have rightly pointed out, his whole thing is self-infantilization (see: the way he managed to include 'people draw pictures of me!' in his apology about unwanted sexual advances). The apology essentially boils down to, 'Sorry. I didn't know I was famous now. And as a Big Person, I'm not allowed to act that way.'
The unicorn apology of "Hello, my name is Nick, i am a serial harasser" that some were obviously hoping for was hardly going to happen. (I still prefer it over the "sorry for nothing, ima start a patreon!")
It's flawed, but probably (hopefully!) sincere. - in a way that he hasn't quite grasped the sincerity of the allegations and what kind of culture he contributed to purveying.
Let's hope he'll take the further criticism seriously, with regards to less focusing on the impact this had on his 'fans' but rather the impact this had on his targets.
edit: whoa those abby tweets. I might reevaluate my judgement. hmmm :/
It's flawed, but probably (hopefully!) sincere. - in a way that he hasn't quite grasped the sincerity of the allegations and what kind of culture he contributed to purveying.
Let's hope he'll take the further criticism seriously, with regards to less focusing on the impact this had on his 'fans' but rather the impact this had on his targets.
edit: whoa those abby tweets. I might reevaluate my judgement. hmmm :/
BreezyLimbo
Banned
she currently does
No, she's new to the industry, but she's worked in the improv industry in the past so she might be familial with the same kind of behavior. Then again I can't be sure of that entirely. She was also on a podcast with Danika and Ben a few days ago and Nick was definitely brought up in some off-mic chatter between the two that was eventually edited out and re-uploaded.
Fuck, yes. Abby's the best. Saying things like they are instead of beating around the bush.
I can't believe how many people were actively thanking Nick Robinson on Twitter for his "apology", as if all of them had any stake in this matter.
It's a bad apology, and I'm glad that that seems to be the consensus. I hope he gets his shit together, not so that I can justify liking him again, but for the sake of any women he "flirts" with in the future.
I still don't know if I think he's rotten or just stupid, but either way I'm hanging up any hope of being a fan again.
I still don't know if I think he's rotten or just stupid, but either way I'm hanging up any hope of being a fan again.
No? Nick was Polygon. She's at Giant Bomb.
ummmmm
Are you talking about Ben or making a sly comment about Abby's offhand comment that she called Ben "Nick" a few times accidentally.
Monkeyball
Banned
Harassing is not flirting.
With the amount of women (who are in know the know about things we generally aren't) not really buying this apology, I think it's safe to say it doesn't hit the marks it needed to.
Honestly his best course of action, if he's not going to actually fess up, is to completely leave the internet and get an unrelated job.
Honestly his best course of action, if he's not going to actually fess up, is to completely leave the internet and get an unrelated job.
That apology was pure horsehit. "Oh I just didn't know" "oh the fame was to much"
Spare me. This isn't about you.
There's a good damn story to write about how a Games Media personality can go around *for years* soliciting women and teens for nudes (or worse) and nothing happens until he's rude to man.
Spare me. This isn't about you.
There's a good damn story to write about how a Games Media personality can go around *for years* soliciting women and teens for nudes (or worse) and nothing happens until he's rude to man.
Stone Vagabond
Banned
Seems like a weak response when his idea of flirting was "can we fuc yet" apropos of nothing.
BreezyLimbo
Banned
Oh, I thought that comment read as 'Does she currently work with Giant Bomb?'.
MY BAD
Kenzodielocke
Banned
Oh man... those first page replies.. I agree with Abby here..
Complicated
Banned
Abby is such a badass. Goddamn.
PumpkinSpice
Banned
Kinda of two minds here. His apology reads that he is trying and will at least attempt to do better, which is certainly good. But it also reads that he's not anywhere close yet, and doesn't seem to get why what he was doing was a problem.
I don't really know what is going on here but from what I've heard so far what he was doing doesn't sound like flirting. And whether he was doing this as a public figure, as a professional interacting with others in the field, or as just Joe Blow it still doesn't seem acceptable.
So yeah I'm not really a fan and I don't really care if he comes back or if he is successful in the future or whatever but he'll need to do a lot better than this.
I don't really know what is going on here but from what I've heard so far what he was doing doesn't sound like flirting. And whether he was doing this as a public figure, as a professional interacting with others in the field, or as just Joe Blow it still doesn't seem acceptable.
So yeah I'm not really a fan and I don't really care if he comes back or if he is successful in the future or whatever but he'll need to do a lot better than this.
toythatkills
Member
I can only read this as "what I did was totes cool until I got famous. Then I should have stopped."
It's bizarre. There's half of what would be a decent apology in there somewhere which is completely negated by the other half.
It's bizarre. There's half of what would be a decent apology in there somewhere which is completely negated by the other half.
MemoryHumanity
Member
Sounds like he's genuinely sorry. A strong apology.
Its an apology to his fans, not his victims though. And even then, he is trying to downplay what he did. Not a strong apology at all.
He said sorry. Keep reading. It was other people who clued him in to what he was doing, and now he realizes he made a mistake and is sorry.
CambriaRising
Member
The reading comprehension in this thread is woeful.
BreezyLimbo
Banned
It doesn't matter, trying to tell these people why the letter is bad, really. Nick wrote that letter not to be a sincere apology, but to appease his own fans and get them back on his side. Because after all, they're going to be the ones who pay for his future patreon.
To find any sincerity in his letter, is like trying to find an honest man in a den of thieves.
Sparrowhawk
Member
Yeah, I thought it was a pretty good apology at first until I reread it.
Maybe I need to look at the DMs he sent again, but they seemed more like harassment than flirting.
Edit: lmao yeah that was definitely not "flirting"
I have the feeling that all these users who jump 12 pages in and say "Classy dude, so sincere" have not even bothered reading the page they are on, let alone the whole thread.
BreezyLimbo
Banned
I hope he is. His higher ups told him to hold off on the article till Polygon came to their conclusion.
Monkeyball
Banned
Too many people in this thread are gullible and just seem they want to defend this guy.
Master_Funk
Member
I really don't think if you truly wanted to apologise, you'd brag about how famous you are and all the cool fan art you got. And this is on top of the whole use of the word 'flirting' throughout and just continuing to seem ignorant of his actions.
Okay. Should be a good read, I always enjoy Patrick's articles. And now he has Austin for additional insight.
He got halfway there. Recognizing that his position of power made his "hitting on people" extra slimy is right but he missed the part where the way he was coming onto people was slimy to begin with.
More important than the words is the behavior though. We probably won't have a chance to evaluate if dude does his contrition right as he fades away into obscurity.
More important than the words is the behavior though. We probably won't have a chance to evaluate if dude does his contrition right as he fades away into obscurity.
ClosingADoor
Member
Ehm... Does he really think the only problem was his "flirting" now that he is more known? The actual act of his "flirting" is the problem, no matter who you are. Because that stuff was uncalled for and came out of nowhere for the girls he approached.
BreezyLimbo
Banned
It's a shitty way to make him seem like a victim. 'WHOOPS I WAS FLIRTING! I DIDN'T REALIZE FLIRTING WAS SUCH A WRONG THING! GUESS I WON'T FLIRT AGAIN!'
It's making him look like a lovely dubby simp. "Poor me, i was just flirting". It's pathetic, and it is a red flag that abusers like to use. "Oh sure make me the bad guy, I'm just trying to care, I guess I won't care anymore". Except with flirting.
ScientificPizza
Banned
I hope so. Dude deserves to be truly exposed
Okay, having read through this thread and the tweets linked, I want to try breaking down the apology. Hopefully this will help anyone who - like me - actually bought it on a first glance.
By the third word, we've got some deceptive language here. "Messed up" makes it sound like he made a mistake. This would be nitpicking if not for the fact that that that's clearly how the apology is framed.
Even if we put the severity of what he did aside, Robinson did not make a simple mistake. We know from souIspear's tweets that he was silencing women that he harassed. He knew that what he did was wrong, and that there would be consequences if they became public. Instead of changing his behaviour when he realized that, he instead tried to manipulate others so he could more safely continue his behaviour.
He did not make mistakes. He acted exactly as he intended to.
Here we have him referring to his harassment as flirting. Now, it's entirely possible that he's doing that to avoid legal action. But it's also being used to add to the framework that what he did was an innocent mistake rather than intentional, targeted abuse. See below.
Assuming he was doing the same thing before he became popular as he says, he's was still telling women, unsolicited, to send him nudes. He was still telling them to keep silent.
He briefly admonishes his actions before he was popular by saying that some of the advances were unwanted or handled poorly, but that's not the issue. This wasn't just normal flirting that some people just didn't like. This wasn't just handled poorly, as his actions make it clear it's delibrate. The advances should not have come in this form at all.
Additionally, he's focusing on Twitter, as if the issue is simply that he doesn't know how to handle himself properly through that particular medium. But we're also told that he engages in predatory behaviour in person.
The issues with power he describes are in and of themselves fair, but the issue is that they're meant to distract from the predatory nature of his behaviour and shift the issue to changing context. They might still be there if the apology was genuine, but that's not what they follow, so it serves to provide enough sincerity to make it look like the whole thing is sincere.
Building on the image he's been creating, this is attempting to move the responsibility to the shifting context and make the apology seem genuine.
This might have been appropriate in an apology if his actions were okay in the previous context, but they aren't. This might have been appropriate in an apology if he actually didn't know what he was doing, but his actions have demonstrated that he did.
This is the really grand bit of manipulation. The obvious bad apologies fail because the guilty party is blatantly just saying things to get themselves out of blame, maybe slapping some token "I'm sorry" and "I feel bad" into it because they know they're supposed to. This doesn't look like that. I think this is the part that really fooled me and others.
The thing is, here, he makes it a point to establish that he's actually learned something. He makes it a point to acknowledge that there's a problem with what he did. The issue is that the problem he's acknowledging still isn't the real problem. He's still putting it on the context, not on his intentional predatory behaviour.
So you think he's learned, but he hasn't actually addressed what he should have learned.
For those of us who thought it was a strong apology at first, I think what we expected it to be - at best - was this. Just talking about how bad he feels without actually having any reflection on his problems, never outright stating what he did and why it was wrong.
Robinson's crafty enough to be specific here and to say that he made a mistake. It's specific enough to look genuine, to look like it isn't deflecting. But, again, what he's apologizing for isn't really what he did. That's the deflection.
By the third word, we've got some deceptive language here. "Messed up" makes it sound like he made a mistake. This would be nitpicking if not for the fact that that that's clearly how the apology is framed.
Even if we put the severity of what he did aside, Robinson did not make a simple mistake. We know from souIspear's tweets that he was silencing women that he harassed. He knew that what he did was wrong, and that there would be consequences if they became public. Instead of changing his behaviour when he realized that, he instead tried to manipulate others so he could more safely continue his behaviour.
He did not make mistakes. He acted exactly as he intended to.
Here we have him referring to his harassment as flirting. Now, it's entirely possible that he's doing that to avoid legal action. But it's also being used to add to the framework that what he did was an innocent mistake rather than intentional, targeted abuse. See below.
Assuming he was doing the same thing before he became popular as he says, he's was still telling women, unsolicited, to send him nudes. He was still telling them to keep silent.
He briefly admonishes his actions before he was popular by saying that some of the advances were unwanted or handled poorly, but that's not the issue. This wasn't just normal flirting that some people just didn't like. This wasn't just handled poorly, as his actions make it clear it's delibrate. The advances should not have come in this form at all.
Additionally, he's focusing on Twitter, as if the issue is simply that he doesn't know how to handle himself properly through that particular medium. But we're also told that he engages in predatory behaviour in person.
The issues with power he describes are in and of themselves fair, but the issue is that they're meant to distract from the predatory nature of his behaviour and shift the issue to changing context. They might still be there if the apology was genuine, but that's not what they follow, so it serves to provide enough sincerity to make it look like the whole thing is sincere.
Building on the image he's been creating, this is attempting to move the responsibility to the shifting context and make the apology seem genuine.
This might have been appropriate in an apology if his actions were okay in the previous context, but they aren't. This might have been appropriate in an apology if he actually didn't know what he was doing, but his actions have demonstrated that he did.
This is the really grand bit of manipulation. The obvious bad apologies fail because the guilty party is blatantly just saying things to get themselves out of blame, maybe slapping some token "I'm sorry" and "I feel bad" into it because they know they're supposed to. This doesn't look like that. I think this is the part that really fooled me and others.
The thing is, here, he makes it a point to establish that he's actually learned something. He makes it a point to acknowledge that there's a problem with what he did. The issue is that the problem he's acknowledging still isn't the real problem. He's still putting it on the context, not on his intentional predatory behaviour.
So you think he's learned, but he hasn't actually addressed what he should have learned.
For those of us who thought it was a strong apology at first, I think what we expected it to be - at best - was this. Just talking about how bad he feels without actually having any reflection on his problems, never outright stating what he did and why it was wrong.
Robinson's crafty enough to be specific here and to say that he made a mistake. It's specific enough to look genuine, to look like it isn't deflecting. But, again, what he's apologizing for isn't really what he did. That's the deflection.
There's definitely some of that, but I'm so glad that the majority of the responses in the Twitter chain are echoing this thread in saying where his apology falls short. The apology already felt off when I first read it, but seeing everyone else's comments helped me put my thoughts in order.
ScientificPizza
Banned
this a good post
good ass post, and the conclusion I came to after a few hours
Excellent FJM-style breakdown on the apology.
@russpitts has been relentless about this topic.
"I'm a predator trying to come out of this looking my best" is my take away
Do you not see a problem with explaining why someone should not admit to a crime. You're advocating that one should subsume their wrong doing in order to rise again, or at lest not be punished.