CV NEWS FEED // An enormously popular video game whose user base includes children has been revealed to contain widespread and overt LGBTQ content.
VICE magazine co-founder Gavin McInnes took to X (formerly Twitter) Thursday to post images his young son encountered while playing the online survival game Fortnite.
“My ten-year-old boy is playing [Fortnite] when this option appears,” McInnes wrote. “Rewards include going from straight to pansexual. WTF!?”
McInnes showed four pictures of what appeared during his son’s gameplay.
One screen advertised an “LGBT Box PVP.” On it were several flags representing certain so-called “identities” under the LGBTQ umbrella, including the “transgender,” “pansexual,” and “nonbinary” flags. They were displayed on the backdrop of a “pride” flag.
The term “PVP” is usually used by the gaming community to refer to “player versus player” conflicts.
Another screen showed two cars racing each other, accompanied by the words “LGBT Box Fights.”
The two other screens showed a player’s avatar situated on a “pride”-colored rainbow floor and surrounded by various types of LGBTQ flags.
Last March, Fortnite reached a half-billion registered users worldwide. This figure amounted to over 6% of the world’s population at the time and was roughly one-and-a-half times the population of the United States.
A 2018 survey showed that 62.7% of the game’s players were under the age of 24. The data did not show how many of them were minors.
Fortnite is both developed and published by the North Carolina-based Epic Games, Inc. Since 2021, the company has hosted Fortnite’s annual Rainbow Royale, which has been described as an “an explicitly LGBTQ+ Pride event.”
“Join us as we celebrate love, understanding, acceptance, and all of the colors that make up our community,” Epic Games wrote in announcing the 2022 iteration of the event:
Rainbow Royale returns! Celebrate your pride and the LGBTQIA+ community with fun in-game events in Fortnite, express yourself with Sketchfab, and discover new exciting games in the Epic Games Store.
In addition, Fortnite co-creator and former Epic Games executive Donald Mustard went on the record confirming that “Crystal,” a popular “skin” in the game, is a “lesbian.”
“[S]he likes women,” Mustard casually said in a statement that was instantly heralded by LGBTQ activists.
AXIOS called Mustard the “mastermind” behind the extremely popular game.
A Fortnite fan account on X indicated that “Crystal” is “one of a number of Fortnite skins confirmed to be LGBTQ+.”
Tim Sweeney founded Epic Games in 1991 and currently serves as the company’s CEO and majority shareholder. According to Bloomberg, the game developer’s net worth clocks in just above $6 billion. This makes him, as of January 12, the 415th richest person in the world.
In 2020, Sweeney suggested that video games can be used as a medium to advance political beliefs and “[make] people think about things.” To make his point, he compared gaming to the bestselling novel “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
In the same speech, the billionaire said that “companies need to divorce [themselves] from politics.”
“There’s no reason to drag divisive topics … into gaming at all,” he added, stressing that gaming studios “should get the marketing departments out of politics.”
