Helldivers is a satire of fascism — now, it’s being dragged into real-world politics. “Yesterday was an interesting day for the Helldivers community.” That’s the very obvious understatement that announced the reopening of the Helldivers gaming subreddit in the small hours of Saturday morning. On Friday it was discovered that Tyler Robinson, arrested for the alleged killing of Charlie Kirk, had inscribed messages on the casings of several bullets found at the crime scene. One of those read “Hey fascist! Catch!” accompanied by an up arrow symbol, a right arrow, and three down arrows, a reference to the code to call down the 500KG Bomb stratagem in the cooperative shooter Helldivers 2. Unsurprisingly, within minutes the official subreddit and Discord servers were thrown into chaos. Moderators quickly locked the Helldivers subreddit, pointing to a high number of posts that violated its rule against “Real-World Political Discussions.” Similarly, references to Robinson, Kirk, or the 500KG Bomb stratagem were quickly deleted on the Discord server, and some users speculated the code had been flagged for autodeletion. (Arrowhead Game Studios, makers of the Helldivers series, hasn’t released a public statement about the incident and didn’t respond to a request for comment.) Users merely asking why the subreddit was locked were shut down — “We are not allowed to discuss, I would suggest looking elsewhere,” one user was told. In moderation gaps and conversations with The Verge, Helldivers fans mostly seemed confused and a little concerned about what might come along with all of this sudden attention. “I just don’t want to see a community I love get slandered to no fault of their own,” one Discord user, Inferionix, wrote. Helldivers is hardly the first piece of media tied to an act of violence; the Columbine High School shooting famously put an unwelcome spotlight on Doom as commentators searched for a meaning behind the attack. But Kirk’s slaying inspired widespread calls for retaliatory violence by Republicans, making the still-ongoing search for Robinson’s motive particularly high-stakes. Even discussing it is risky, as lawmakers and right-wing tycoon Elon Musk are surveilling social media to police social media users’ responses to Kirk’s death, demanding firings at employers including Microsoft. The subreddit mods said in their reopening post that nobody was banned during the initial flood of shooting-related comments, but anyone who discusses it in the future will be. One brief bastion where fans of the game could share their feelings was the Helldivers 2 subreddit, which doesn’t have the same strict ban on real life political discussions. A megathread there, at least for a while, was filled mostly was fans marveling at just how surreal the situation was. “Waking up and hearing a sitting governor of the United States say ‘Notices bulge OwO whats this?’ was a goddamn flashbang,”
via gthe verge: The Helldivers community is coping with a spotlight it doesn’t want
siehe auch: Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer scratched bullets with a Helldivers combo and a furry sex meme The suspected shooter left a hodgepodge of extremely online taunts. Tyler Robinson, apprehended last night in connection to the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, allegedly left engraved bullets at the crime scene that were covered in a furry meme, a reference from the video game Helldivers 2, and an extremely online taunt. In an FBI briefing this morning about his arrest, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox described the sequence of events that led to the capture of Robinson, 22, who was turned into the police by his father. They also clarified the nature of the notes engraved on the bullet casings found at the scene, which had been rumored to be slogans relating to antifascist and “transgender ideology.” As it turns out, the messages are a confusing mix of internet memes and pop culture. As described, the bullets read (exact capitalization not confirmed at this point): “Notices bulges OWO what’s this?” “Hey fascist! Catch!” Up arrow symbol, right arrow, three down arrow symbols “Oh bella ciao bella ciao bella ciao ciao ciao” “If you read this, you are gay lmao” The first bullet casing, which was fired, is a meme referring to furry online roleplay, according to Know Your Meme. It’s not hard to see where the “antifascist” conclusion came from on two of the other bullets: “Bella ciao” is an Italian song adopted by partisans and resistance fighters while Italy was governed by the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini. Cox said in response to a question during the conference that the “hey fascist” message “speaks for itself.” Three downward-slanting arrows are a symbol used by both historical and contemporary antifascists. But the full arrow sequence was quickly recognized as something else: a combo from Helldivers 2 for calling the Eagle 500kg Bomb stratagem. The world of Helldivers — which evokes Robert Heinlein’s book Starship Troopers and the subsequent movie — concerns fascism thematically; developer Arrowhead has characterized it as a satire where players fight for a fascist state. As for the use of “Bella ciao,” the song has no obvious connection but given its historical significance, unsurprisingly does appear in a Helldivers 2 mod, as well as in at least one other video game, a World War II-themed strategy game called Hearts of Iron IV.
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