Posted in: Games, Video Games | Tagged: Markus persson, minecraft, Notch

Minecraft's Creator Makes More Terrible Tweets, Then Publicly Backpedals

Sometimes when you look in on Notch's profile on Twitter and see non-Minecraft posts, it's hard to tell if the guy is being serious or if there's some sort of cultural language barrier in Sweden we're not aware of. (Which incidentally, we can't wait to see the comments section blow up on both sides to say how wrong we are on this one today.) Below is a tweet that Markus "Notch" Persson sent out on Thursday, which has since been deleted.

So you start the day with a tweet that's both insensitive to LGBTQ people and encourages violence. Then he followed it up with another deleted tweet that said: "Seriously, you morons don't see how segregation and punching upwards will accomplish nothing more [than] reinforcing the illusion there is a divide?"

The comments that followed below that post were a litany of fans, Minecraft players, and people who had no clue who the hell he was telling him how dumb this statement this was. Because, much like many of you reading this, I don't recall a story of anyone being beaten and killed solely because they were straight. There was a small share of supporters, which of course there was, it's the internet. But then when someone offered a simple question to this statement, his response is both baffling and seemingly lacked any kind of sensitivity or awareness of the situation.

This isn't the first time Notch has been in the public eye from a terrible tweet. After his company was bought by Microsoft three years ago, it appears his entire online media presence is focused around his opinions, and has since remained in headlines almost solely by virtue of his Twitter activity. As reported by Crave, his most recent incidents started "with him arguing against the term "mansplaining" back in 2016 by saying that women were "c**tfusing the issue" and "shaming" his gender, while earlier this year he interjected in a controversy surrounding The Last Night creator's anti-feminist tweets by calling indie developer Zoe Quinn a "f**king c**t."

Within a few hours of seeing the outrage that followed, Notch deleted the tweet and quickly backpedaled his way out as fast as his fingers could take him.

Now… Let's be very clear on something. At some point in time, you have to take responsibility for your words, especially on statements that reflect on society in general. You can try to defend Notch all you want and claim he was making a joke, or that there's a cultural barrier that somehow he hasn't learned to overcome yet. But there are certain topics that are kind of universal at this point, and LGBTQ rights are sitting in that Top 10 list across the globe at the moment, especially when we still have countries that castrate gay men, and others (like in America) where that community still gets harassed and threatened daily.

The point we're making is that when public figures send out messages like this to an audience of almost four million followers, many of whom are still in the 14-21 age range and could be dealing with sexual identity issues or harassment themselves, maybe you should take a moment and choose your words just a little better. Even if he was joking, this was in poor taste, and his explanation doesn't justify the stance he seemed to take earlier.

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