Ugh, Anti-Abortionists... Again

I'll start by laying out all my biases. I'm pro-choice, I'm sex-positive, and I'm feminist, i.e. I believe women should be the ONLY people with the right to choose what they want to do with their own bodies.

That said, even though I'm pro-choice, I do understand the sentiment of people who are pro-life. I don't support women who utilize abortion as a form of birth control and, like many pro-choicers, I don't support late-term abortions.

What I hate the most out of this entire debate, aside from the complete lack of any kind of civil and sane conversation, is anti-abortionists who think it is their God-given right to do anything to make their point, such as secretly record a Planned Parenthood doctor and then editing a video to intentionally mislead viewers. I'm not saying that Planned Parenthood doesn't alter abortion methods to preserve fetal organs for donation; I don't know what they do because I don't work there.

What I am saying though is that I find the use of propaganda, the harassment of people outside clinics, the existence of "crisis pregnancy centers" that give false information to deter women from abortion, and the use of violence against abortion providers utterly despicable and abhorrent.

Anti-Abortionists, the only thing you are doing is harming the pro-life cause.

How I Am #RedefiningHERstory: Becoming a Social Activist

Originally posted on Truth In Reality.

I think I’ve always wanted to be an activist. When I was younger, social injustices would make me furious while my peers would shrug and go, “Well, what can you do?” And I couldn’t answer that question. I didn’t know what I could do. Or rather, I thought that there was nothing I could do. I believed that activism was something that other better stronger people could do. So I did other things. I pursued a career in academia because I figured at the very least my work at an educational institution could change students’ lives by expanding their minds.

Read more...

Time jump!

Almost two years since I last posted. Wowsa. Lots has changed. Too much to put in one post. So... it will come out slowly over time. Maybe.

Slow Week, Interview, My Industry?

I didn't realize until yesterday that I haven't updated in a while! Things have been much quieter lately, for better or worse.

Last Thursday, I helped out showing off Organic Panic at Sandbox Strategies, a video game PR/marketing firm. Admittedly, I had to force myself to mentally check in. Networking can already be tiring on its own. Schmoozing and trying to get press interested is a lot like that -- except more stressful. Higher stakes perhaps...? It's made me realize how much more comfortable I am meeting game devs. But! Growth occurs outside your comfort zone, right? As night went on, I felt better. In the end, I had fun.

In other news, I have a job interview this Friday (!). The waiting has made me anxious. Hopefully the next time I post, it will be about how awesome it went and how I have a lot of good feelings about it. I applied to this place a while back. Late May or early June. It's the last "loose end" after I decided I wouldn't apply to any other jobs. I turned down that QA Tester position in June to see where this path would lead. It was a gamble. Even if it doesn't pan out though, I don't have any regrets. Sometimes when one door closes, you're stuck for a period of time in which nothing else opens. The nice thing though is that while you're waiting, you have the freedom to knock on other doors. And you really never know who or what will answer.

A few days ago, it occurred to me that the game industry has become my industry. That was a strange thought. It still is a strange thought. Like working towards any dream, your mind can become so focused on your end goal that you can forget how far you've come.

Here's to hoping for a more interesting post next time! Ha!

Swampy Week: Kickstarter Success + Misc

We reached our $40K goal for Organic Panic's Kickstarter on Thursday! The date was 8/8, by the way! Which make sense because luck really was on our side. We were at 63% (~$25K) with less than two and a half days left (!). 528 backers pledged within the last three days. It really does feel like the stars and planets aligned. Three big things really made it happen: an unprompted shout out by 5 Lives Studios to their 15K Kickstarter backers for Satellite Reign, a Polygon article, and a Reddit Ask-Me-Anything. Weird to think how things can turn out. On Sunday, we were talking about what we'd do if the Kickstarter didn't make it. On Monday, we had a whopping 12 backers (!). Everything else started happening on Tuesday. So, all that to say that, miracles can happen!

I've been so exhausted this week. Mostly from being busy with the Kickstarter. You'd think that afterwards we'd be able to relax. Nope! Still had tons of stuff to do -- posting to social media, editing the update to our backers, emailing press, thanking press that covered us. I just wanted to celebrate with sleep.

Kickstarter aside, I still had other things I needed to prep for too. My phone screening for the community manager position was yesterday. I don't have a single negative thing to say about this company. For the time being though, I'd rather not name them. (Don't ask me why. It's just an irrational impulse of just-in-case, even though I'm not really sure of just-in-case what.) Anyway, it was just a screening with their HR department to schedule an in-person interview and possibly talk about salary expectations. I hate talking about money, so I left it at "negotiable". They were 20 mins late in calling me, which made me nervous. Not about their company, but just the anxiety of waiting. But it went well. The recruiter was super friendly and open, and he answered all of my questions about the company, etc. I have yet to write back and schedule an interview. (Eeps! Need to do that!) But I'm excited to see where this goes.

The other thing I had to do after the Kickstarter was prep for a meeting with the Ruby RPG group I've been "working" with. I say "working" in quotes because I've been so focused on other things that I hadn't done anything at all for them for this past month (!). It's funny to think that my life is at a point where "work" involves playing a game. Haha! That was the prep I had to do. I had to play the first build of our RPG and give feedback. Not hard at all. Like usual, I had two weeks to do it, but didn't do it until two hours before the meeting. The meeting went well though. I'm glad I got to touch base with them. As for the project, we originally wanted to release something by December. Now we're talking about releasing a demo by December instead. Much more doable at this point. I said I was still for it. Now I just need to get on making those maps I said I'd do!

Speaking of game making, I still haven't finished that GameMaker platformer that I've been super secretive about. Ugh. I'm a shitty friend. Which makes no sense right now because I haven't revealed its purpose. But when I actually do have something semi-playable, I can talk about what it is.

Man! I'm really busy for someone without a full time job!

As you can guess, I haven't gone to any game events this week. It's not that there weren't things going on. The NYC Gamers meetup had an indie demo night on Monday and IGDA NJ had their monthly demo night on Tuesday. But I was just too swamped. Not to mention any free time I did have, I just wanted to rest.

The good news is that I finally got to sleep to my heart's content last night. Ha! I just remembered that there's also the Killer Queen Tournament and Livestream at the NYU Game Center tonight. I'll most likely skip out on that too. I just want to spend today lazing. Maybe even play a game or two!

Community Management Calling...?

I mentioned last time that I've jumped on board Organic Panic's social media (e.g. Facebook and Twitter). We're in the last 28 hours of our Kickstarter campaign! Last night, we were all up until 4am (!) on Reddit. For a while I was live tweeting the thread. By 3am though, in anticipation of sleeping, I started scheduling today's Facebook posts.

It's been incredibly fun thinking of new posts and trying to find ways to keep people upbeat and engaged. I don't know what it is. Probably the human interaction...? I've always enjoyed the community management I've done for GoPrezzo too. It's strange to think that a job that never crossed my mind as something I'd want to do turns out to be fitting of my personality. I was reading a Gamasutra article on community management and the role of the community manager. It talked about traits of a community manager: "patience, empathy, self-confidence (but not too much), teamwork, management skills, humility, rigor, ability to listen, etc." I like to think those things describe me! :)

Like I said before, I used to think it was a nothing intern position that any college kid could do. In some ways, I would say that's still true. I wouldn't call it mentally taxing and it doesn't require any specific training. If anything, it's more emotionally taxing because you're trying to stay positive while dealing with negativity. But it's been so much fun. I'm not sure how else to phrase it, but in many ways it allows me to be myself. Or at least the self that I always want to be.

Funnily enough, just yesterday, I finally heard back from a company where I applied to be a community manager (!). I'm scheduling a phone interview with them for this coming Friday. Even the past few days doing community management for Organic Panic has given me loads of experience. Here's to hoping the Kickstarter is a success and everything else goes well!

More Organic Panic, GoPrezzo, NO JOB SEARCH!!

The past two weeks have been generally good. There were a few plunges along the way, but overall I've been keeping afloat. Staying busy has helped. What's key though is that it hasn't been my own intent to consciously stay busy. That rarely ever works for me. Mostly, I've been helping Last Limb promote their Kickstarter for Organic Panic. Because it's time sensitive, I've had to force myself out of my mopey states.

The campaign ends this coming Thurs (!). We're currently at 62% from 744 backers. There's a lot to make up before we hit our goal, but we're doing what we can to spread the word. We've gotten some really good press including a preview in GameInformer, a shout out from Gamers Hell, and a blurb in Critical Indie Gamer. I'm still bothering media people, so the hope is that we'll get some more people to the page. Oh yeah! I almost forgot to mention that Last Limb presented again at the NYC Games Forum demo night on July 23rd. That was a really fun night. We hung out at O'Lunney's afterwards. This past Thurs, Aug 1st, was our preview party at Fontanas. It was a great success! We had a really good turn out which included a number of media people. Here's to hoping it leads to something that will give us the boost we need.

Admittedly, I've been stressed about the campaign. But it's the good kind of stress -- the I-need-to-get-my-butt-into-gear kind of stress. There's still a lot on my list of things to do: post to forums, follow up with media, upload our stuff onto sites with user content. Eeps! I also just started doing a little bit of social media yesterday. Actually, I had a bit of a rant about how our messaging needs to be more positive. In light of that, HERE'S COME POSITIVITY!!

I haven't been up to a whole lot else. My manager at GoPrezzo left the company. It was sudden (to me, at least), but I also wasn't very surprised since she's been working on her own startup for a while. Now I'm the only one who's based in NY! The good news is that GoPrezzo is expanding. I was told that there might be a more concrete position for me down the line. In her goodbye email to me, my manager said I "have a bright future ahead". :)

One thing I haven't mentioned yet is my decision to focus on my health. The job search has been a source of incredible stress, particularly when feelings of guilt, shame, uselessness, and all sorts of BAD came into play. So, I've made a conscious decision to put that on hold for the moment while my brain recoups from grad school and the like. Actually, this decision has made all the difference in my outlook and my mood. I thank one of my best friends for giving me what I've unknowingly been looking for: permission to not search for a job.

To wrap up, LET POSITIVITY WIN THE DAY (and the Kickstarter)!!