Polygamer - A Podcast of Equality & Diversity in Gaming & Video Games
  • About
  • Episodes
  • Guests
  • Subscribe
  • Contact

Polygamer #23: GTFO director Shannon Sun-Higginson

Posted on June 10, 2015 by Ken Gagne
GTFO

GTFO is a documentary about women, discrimination, and misogyny in video games. Featuring interviews with Brianna Wu, Maddy Myers, Courtney Stanton, Jenny Haniver, and more, the film examines gamers’ experiences as developers, journalists, competitors, academics, and community organizers. Filming began in 2012 and concluded in mid-2014, months before GamerGate broke, demonstrating that these issues are systemic, extending beyond a few high-profile incidences.

In this interview with director Shannon Sun-Higginson, we discuss what prompted her to make gaming the subject of her debut film; how being a casual gamer helped rather than hinder her approach to this topic; pursuing funding on Kickstarter; how she incorporated GamerGate into the film’s coda; who the film’s target audience is; how she hopes the film will change perception of the gaming industry; and her experiences as a woman director showing GTFO on the film circuit.

Co-hosting this episode of Polygamer is Monica Castillo — film critic for International Business Times, co-founder of the Boston Online Film Critics Association, co-host of the Cinema Fix podcast, and feminist who introduced me to Anita Sarkeesian. You can find Monica on Twitter and Tumblr.

GTFO released on June 9, 2015, for streaming via multiple outlets, including Vimeo and Apple Podcasts. Monica saw GTFO at SXSW, while Ken was comped a ticket to its Boston Independent Film Festival screening by Women in Games Boston co-organizer Nina Huntemann.

Download the audio edition of this interview below or from Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Overcast, Pandora, Pocket Casts, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive.

https://media.blubrry.com/polygamer/www.polygamer.net/wp-content/uploads/podcast/pg23-gtfo.mp3

Podcast: Download (Duration: 53:27 — 25.3MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | Pandora | iHeartRadio | Stitcher | TuneIn | RSS | More

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)

Related

Posted in Podcast | Tags: director, documentary, film, GamerGate, Get The Fuck Out, GTFO, misogyny, Monica Castillo, movie, Shannon Sun-Higginson, Vimeo, Vudu, women |
« Polygamer #22: Philip Jones, director of Gaming In Color
Polygamer #24: Happy Father’s Day, Edward F. Gagne »

Subscribe

Get our free email newsletter for updates on equality, diversity, podcasts, and more!
Send voicemailSend voicemail

Leave us a message, and we'll answer it on a future episode!

My Tweets

My Tweets

Recent Posts

  • Polygamer #128: Reflecting on Eight Years
  • Polygamer #127: Helene Utterback on polyamory
  • Polygamer #126: Aenne Schumann of Arcade Spirits
  • Polygamer #125: Game to Grow
  • Polygamer #124: Cyndi Wiley, Iowa State University’s Digital Accessibility Lead

Other podcasts

  • Character Reveal
  • Checkpoint
  • Ethics and Video Games
  • Feminist Frequency Radio
  • Spawn On Me
  • The Weekly Cooldown

Archived podcasts

  • +7 Intelligence
  • Diversi
  • Engage!
  • Fresh Out of Tokens
  • Gayme On
  • Girl on Guy
  • Less Than or Equal
  • Not Just a Game
  • Nuchallenger
  • Take This

CyberChimps WordPress Themes

Creative Commons License Polygamer by Gamebits is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Based on a work at https://www.polygamer.net/. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at https://www.polygamer.net/about/.