After receiving a Game Award for helping devs to network and find new jobs, Amir Satvat saw himself under hateful attack.
Winner of the first Game Changers award said he received hateful messages towards him and his family following his acceptance speech.
Winner of the Game Changers Award
Acknowledging the unprecedented rash of game industry layoffs over the past few years, this year's Game Awards also gave out an award to honor Game Changers like Amir Satvat, a figure well-known in the gaming industry for his efforts to help laid-off developers find new work.
During the event, a video told the story of Satvat's project helping to place nearly 3,000 people in jobs. Satvat accepted the award with a heartfelt speech, challenging the crowd to change the gaming industry for the better.
Even though the biggest part of the viewership responded positively to Satvat‘s words, the segment also received some criticism.
Hateful and antisemitic criticism
There have been claims that the award was a cynical attempt to glimpse over the fact that The Game Awards celebrated exactly the people who have been responsible for the poor state of the business.
In a lengthy LinkedIn post, Satvat said:
I've also been accused of creating 'jail-worthy fraud' and mocked for 'just making one spreadsheet people enter info into,' usually by people who spent all of 8 seconds looking at our site with no understanding of the work we do or the impact we've had. We have 15 resources across 5 different resource homes and there is a lot of depth to our community, as any of you who have used it know
However, some critics went way beyond that and Satvat found himself under attack. People claimed that he was presented as a kind of folk hero, when in fact he is part of the problem and a sinister “industry plant” with a manufactured heartwarming story.
Some messages even went so far insulting Satvat, his family and making antisemitic comments about his wife.
"This can happen to you too when you sacrifice over 2,000 hours of your time to help the industry – this is the 'reward' for two years of service," Satvat wrote and went on "I did not want to say anything but there have been too many comments about my family, about my wife, about her religious background, and other things that are way over the line for me not to say anything."
Satvat ended by saying that this post will be his last words towards all these hateful comments and that he will go on to pursue “positive, public service”.
What are you opinions on that case? Do you think the criticism towards Satvat is justified?
