Why Douglas Tennaple's views on homosexuality are hurtful and why It doesn't change my opinion of his work.

Say it ain't so Doug.

So... *deep breath* remember how you felt when a personal hero turned out to be a lot different in reality than you'd imagined? While looking for material for my SAVE ARMIKROG article below, I came across something deeply troubling. A 2 year old article on GayGamer (an exceptionally well written site) covering a particularly nasty exchange between a homosexual individual and Mr. Tennaple on his blog. It's bad, it's...bad. I mean, he compares a homosexual relationship to a guy taking a dump in the ladies room. 

It's bad.

His work on The Neverhood changed me. It had me look at the interactive medium and made me want to "do that."  I didn't care what that meant at the time and the fire still burns. I once had a dream I was answering phones at the Insomniac Games branch twenty minutes from my home, and woke with a smile.

Usually rhetoric like that makes me angry, but now I'm just really really sad. It's one thing to be ideologically opposed to same sex marriage, it's another to be so mean about it. But you know what? He is in no position to stop any political ground gained on the movement and his work has never reflected any agenda of the sort. That is just what he believes and he is capable of producing worth while art divorced from those ideals.

So I find only my opinion of the man has changed and I'm still pleased as punch Armikrog is a thing that could happen. But now I'm just gonna... I'm... christ. I'm gonna make a drink and stare into the middle distance for a while.

This hurts.