Five Nights At Freddy’s Creator Retires After Controversy Involving Cancel Culture
Cancel culture has come for the creator of Five Nights At Freddy’s. The game creator has announced that he's stepping down.
This article is more than 2 years old
Scott Cawthon, the creator of the survival horror media franchise, Five Nights at Freddy’s, announced his retirement from public game development amid criticism of political donations to Republican party candidates, including former president Donald Trump, which sparked a series of controversies involving cancel culture. The independent developer stated that he’s okay with retirement and that he’s handing off the Five Nights at Freddy’s IP to another developer.
Scott Cawthon has officially retired, ending the night shift at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza after a blessed, fulfilling, and prosperous career, according to IGN. Cawthon’s retirement from Five Nights At Freddy’s was mainly influenced by the controversies sparked by a Twitter post sharing insight into his political donations to the Republican Party. This led to massive backlashes against the developer, who posted an explanation of his behavior on Reddit that received praise on Reddit but a largely negative reaction on Twitter. See the tweet below.
The Twitter community’s backlash centered Cawthon in the cancel culture’s cross hairs, which further led to threats of violence and home invasion against him. This prompted him to write the aforementioned Reddit statement in the first place, stating that the threats made him and his family feel unsafe. All because he voted and financially supported the candidates he felt could best run the country, which is well within his rights as an American citizen. In his closing lines, the creator of Five Night at Freddy’s stated that people don’t want to discuss things with one another anymore; all they want is a string of endless apologies and submissions. He concluded his post with, “I have always loved, and will continue to love, this community and this fanbase, even if someday it doesn’t include me anymore.”
It’s worth noting that his Reddit post received exceptional praise from the platform’s community, including the members of the LGBTQ+. However, while the original post still stands, its comment section has been disabled by the page’s moderators due to disagreements between Cawthon’s supporters and his opponents. Still, in light of recent threats of violence, Cawthon announces his retirement in an official statement on the ScottGames.com website (which is now unsafe to visit due to possible virus concerns), praising the Five Night at Freddy’s fandom, who has shown him tremendous support over the last few weeks.
A lot of that support came from the LGBTQ community, which is crucial to the entire story, namely because Cawthon’s political donations supported certain political parties whose candidates have shown anti-LGBTQ+ sentiments in their beliefs. Given how a substantial part of Five Nights at Freddy’s fandom crosses over with the LGBT+ community, it’s pretty easy to understand their negative reaction on Twitter, which by all means doesn’t justify threats of violence and home invasion against the franchise’s creator. Luckily, the individuals on Reddit seem more reasonable.
According to his official statement, Cawthon will continue making games and RPGs for his kids, even though he admitted he isn’t very good at making the latter. Does this mean the end of Five Nights at Freddy’s? No. Cawthon stated that he’ll let someone else run the game, someone of his choosing and someone he trusts. The game is a massive success and one of the most beloved horror game series of the past few years, with an enormous fanbase.
