@cougar_sean
Both the Hacker Manifesto and the Cyborg Manifesto deal with the question of freedom and power within their texts. The very word “manifesto,” according to Merriam-Webster, is defined as “a written statement declaring publicly the intentions, motives, or views of its issuer.” Does this not, by the very definition, give way to the power of speech—and the freedom to say what you believe? The First Amendment of the United States’ Constitution applies to all US citizens. Why shouldn’t it be applied to hackers and what Haraway refers to as cyborgs? The hackers mention that they “exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias…” (Paragraph 13), which proves the existence of racial equality or rather the lack of race altogether in the digital world. The Cyborg Manifesto, on the other hand, discusses the equality of women in the workforce. It is said that there is a “continued intense sexual and racial division of labour, but considerable growth of membership in privileged occupational categories for many white women and people of colour” (Haraway 19). Beyond this, hackers feel a sense of connectedness to the machine, much how cyborgs feel, but also because “It does what I want it to” (Paragraph 9). This idea of bonding with a machine is not new, but the spread and support of people who seek out that connection is.
Gamer Culture Manifesto: Much like hackers, gamer culture is often times stereotyped and belittled because of misunderstandings. Society sees a person staring at a screen for endless hours, but a gamer sees a window into a virtual world. In life, a person may feel powerless, a slave to the man. But in games, one is only as limited as your own imagination. In many ways, games are an escape from this world and a window into the next.