The GAMe PLACe
| “ | Chris would rarely ever shake anyones hand after a game, and when he did, he quickly followed up with hand sanitizer. | ” |
| Mimms | ||
The GAMe PLACe is a comic-book, game, card, toy, and hobby shop in Charlottesville. For several years, up until the summer of 2008, Chris hung out there on a regular basis, going there every Friday without fail to play the Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh! card games. The shop hosted the Pokémon TCG League where Chris served as a self-proclaimed volunteer gym leader (though he was not endorsed in any way, and was largely simply tolerated by the store).
After a long period of scaring off customers and being a confrontational douche, Chris was permanently kicked out of the store by one of the managers, Michael Snyder, on 28 August 2008. Since then, Chris has attempted several times to regain access to the store, to no avail thanks to Michael's insistence.
People of note
Chris originally met Megan Schroeder at The GAMe PLACe in 2005, where they bonded over their shared interest in Yu-Gi-Oh! Megan continued to hang out at the shop even after her friendship with Chris collapsed in the spring of 2008, although their relationship by that point was strained to say the least. Once she broke off all contact with Chris, she did her best to ignore him entirely when they were at the store at the same time.
The other two best-known patrons of the shop, aside from Chris himself, are Daniel Mimms and Lucas. The two friends are the primary source of most of what is known about Chris's behavior at The GAMe PLACe (and most of the information in this article), which they revealed during a detailed Q&A session on the PVCC forums. They're also famous for having taken and uploaded the first photograph of Chris to reach the internet, which Mimms snapped and Lucas uploaded to 4chan in the fall of 2007.
Michael Snyder, one of the store's managers (he isn't the owner, though he's sometimes mistakenly described as such) would eventually become one of Chris's real-life nemeses when he kicked Chris out of the store in the summer of 2008.[1]
Chris's attitude at The GAMe PLACe
In his early days at The GAMe PLACe, Chris's behavior seems to have been more "childlike," for lack of a better word. According to Mimms, who was a regular at the store for the entire time Chris hung out there, Chris avoided using foul language when he first started gaming at the store.[2] He also never failed to show up for Pokémon games in his old Ash Ketchum costume.
The costume was eventually retired, however (by the time of the 2007 photo, Chris was showing up in his usual colorful clown shirts and sporting the Sonichu medallion), and Chris's behavior grew more aggressive and vulgar over the years. According to Mimms and Lucas, Chris often became angry at his card-game opponents, even small children. An October 2007 e-mail from Megan mentions an incident where Chris was extremely threatening and insulting to a guy whom he thought was putting the moves on his gal-pal.
Mimms recounted a few instances of Chris displaying his dislike and distrust of black people. He was openly suspicious of the young black kids he played Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh with, apparently because he thought they were going to make off with his cards.[3] Chris also nearly managed to earn himself a beating from an older black gamer by the name of TJ:
| “ | Chris yells at him, "I'm going to smack your effing face down!" and TJ stands up like hes going to beat his ass. Chris shrinks back and and says "I mean your face down monster..." | ” |
| Mimms, Mimms and Lucas Q&A | ||
Likewise, Chris's homophobia occasionally surfaced while he was hanging out at the shop. A gay regular at the shop by the name of Eric was the target of mockery and threats from Chris (although Mimms noted that, for obvious reasons, Chris wasn't likely to ever do him any great physical harm).[2] Chris also assumed that two of the shop's regulars were gay because they happened to exchange a few jokingly romantic remarks — his literal mind took that as proof that they were a couple.[2]
Chris the TCG gamer
| “ | Chris was pretty awful at all the games he played. | ” |
| Mimms, summing up Chris[4] | ||
Though he apparently spent plenty of money buying new cards at the store,[5] and built them into a sizable collection of themed decks, Chris didn't have any aptitude for deck-building or strategy in the Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh trading-card games. Even when playing against small children, he rarely won games or advanced in tournaments, although Mimms recounts one occasion where Chris managed to win a match on a day when most of the regular players were absent, and proudly hollered "I'M THE LEVEL-UP KING!"[4]
Chris often declares that he was a gym leader in the store's Pokémon league (an older player who manages tournaments, keeps track of wins and losses, and so forth). It's mentioned on his resume, for instance, and he talks about it in the Father Call. However, his memory has apparently inflated his role considerably. "He wasn't actually a gym leader," says Mimms, but rather a substitute who took the place of the regular gym leader on a few occasions. He also wasn't very good at the job, reportedly becoming angry and snapping at the players he was supposed to be taking care of.[4] This earned him his first ban from the store, lasting a month, which according to Lucas began on 4 April 2008.[1]
To Chris's very slight credit, Mimms says he did resist using his custom Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh cards in actual games.[3] Mimms and Lucas also noted that he played the Universal Fighting System card game, often playing "bimbo" characters such as Cassandra from the Soul Calibur series and Chun-li.
The GAMe PLACe photograph
In the fall of 2007, Chris discovered the Encyclopedia Dramatica page devoted to him. There, he also discovered a blurry photograph of himself, which had been taken and posted to 4chan by Mimms and Lucas respectively.
Though he'd already pretty thoroughly blown a gasket over the ED page, Chris went even crazier trying to discover the identity of the photographer. In an e-mail to Anna McLerran from November 2007, he mentions pestering the staff of The GAMe PLACe to go through their anti-theft camera footage to find out who had taken the photo.[6] (Unsurprisingly, they weren't very cooperative.) According to Mimms, Chris complained about the photo and the ED page so loudly and frequently at the store that the management eventually threatened to kick him out if he didn't stop.
Chris also complained to his mother, who apparently became as angry or more so. At one point, early in November, Chris's parents visited the store and interrogated Mimms as to the origin of the photo. After Mimms admitted that he had snapped the picture (but feigned ignorance as to how it found its way onto the internet), they threatened to take legal action, but never actually did so.[4]
Chris's "investigations" continued off and on for months after he originally found the picture. In an e-mail to Megan (sent in March 2008 and oddly situated in between desperate apologies for the porn he drew of her), he recounts an indirect confrontation with Lucas at The GAMe PLACe on 8 March.
| “ | So it brought up to mind my first word being "Monkey", so I told Mimms that. And with a turn around towards the accompanying Lucas, I said in his direction, "Well, that's something new you didn't know about "be-4" about this "Chan". I noticed a look on his face like, "Wow, I can totally wail on that tidbit of information." He said nothing. | ” |
| Chris's idea of subtlety, from the Megan e-mails. | ||
Later, Lucas gave his own interesting take on the story.
| “ | The funniest part about that is that I have no recollection of him saying that to me whatsoever. I had no idea I was even a suspect until I saw that email. | ” |
| Lucas, Mimms and Lucas Q&A | ||
Chris gets the boot
Chris's behavior offended the store's management in a number of ways. Aside from punting his gym-leader duties, scaring the small children he played card games with, picking fights with other players, and generally being a racist and homophobic creep, he would truck his video game consoles into The GAMe PLACe and take over the shop's flat-screen TV for considerable amounts of time, loudly sang along to Britney Spears during games, pitched fits inspired by his hatred of the Hex Bawx in public, and so on.[7]
The trigger for his permanent ban in August 2008 was a shouting match with a young black kid. That particular incident was merely the straw that broke the camel's back, though — "Mike was looking for any reason to ban him at this point," says Mimms.[3]
Predictably, Chris did his best to resist getting kicked out of the store. He brought his parents in to argue his case with Michael Snyder, to which Michael responded by calling the police. Despite a fierce response from Barbara Chandler, Chris and his family failed to move either Michael or the cops, and every indication is that Chris will never be allowed back into the store.[3]
In the Jackie e-mails, Chris offers his own chronology and version of events. There, he claims that he was thrown out of the store much earlier than Mimms indicates, in June 2008. The so-called "Wii Incident", according to Chris, was when Michael Snyder forced Chris to stop bogarting the TV for his Wii. Doing this apparently caused a number of children to miss out on obtaining a few trade-only evolution Pokemon. Chris got angry and wrote a letter, sign, or simply scrawled a note on the side of a card box stating "Michael Snyder Loves the "Fiddlesticks" out of Mary Lee Walsh". This, Chris claimed, was Michael's last straw and he booted him then.
According to the CWCipedia article for Megan Schroeder, Chris claims that Megan was there the day he was banned and claimed that she just stood there in shock, refusing to speak up for him. In reality, of course, she was simply disgusted by his behavior like any rational person would have been and relieved that his being kicked out of the store would be the last time Chris would ever be in her sight[8]. Also, she refused to defend Chris not because of shock, but because of his sexual harassment, destruction of her dignity, anger issues and overall immaturity, ultimately cementing the fact that nobody wants Chris to ever return to the store.
Unbanning attempts
Chris has repeatedly attempted to overcome his ban and gain readmission to the store. As mentioned in a July 2008 e-mail, Chris sent a letter to Michael Snyder shortly after his initial one-month ban. In March 2009 he attempted to apologize in the best way he knew how: posting a video to YouTube on the off-chance the individual addressed would see it. This was not the most sincere apology in the world, since Chris made it clear in a later video that he doesn't really understand why he was thrown out in the first place. A month later, in April 2009, Chris attempted to sneak into the store, but when a cashier recognized him and caught him, Chris ran.
Almost two years after his initial ban from The GAMe PLACe Chris would try again to get the ban lifted. In the Jackie emails Chris reveals that he attempted to go to The GAMe PLACe after church on 11 April 2010. When one of the cashiers saw Chris and recognized him, he threatened to call the cops. Chris got angry and bolted. The next day Chris visited the store again to talk to Michael Snyder in an attempt to have the ban removed. However, the visit did not turn out in Chris's favor, as the audio from the incident shows. Michael refused to revoke the ban (later noting on YouTube, that Chris was actually reading the apology from a pre-written script[9]) and Chris took this about as well as could be expected; he flipped Michael off,[10] yelled "JEW!" at him, and left the store in a huff. The police were called about the incident, according to Mimms, but Chris was already long gone by the time they arrived; whether the police's involvement will continue remains to be seen.
Later that day, Chris uploaded the audio of the incident to YouTube, accompanied by a description soliciting harassment and "trolling" of Michael and his fellow employees. However, it was removed from the site in a matter of hours due to a "Terms of Use Violation". Considering Chris's anti-Semitic remark directed at Michael, his invitation for others to harass him, and the possibly illegal nature of the recording, it's easy to see why it was pulled.
Chris has never fully understood why he was kicked out of the store. According to Mimms, Chris didn't see what was wrong with his behavior at the time,[1] and he evidently hasn't reflected on the subject much in the intervening years. During the April 2010 visit to the store, the only possible grounds for his ban he could remember was the aforementioned "Wii incident." Later, when he posted an ad on CWCipedia complaining about Snyder's refusal to lift the ban, Chris appeared to believe that the store manager refused to let him in because he hated him personally and people with autism in general.
With Chris's continued failure to overturn the ban, it is clear that his chances of winning entry to The GAMe PLACe are almost as remote as the chances of his duck entering China.
The Charlottesville Incident
On 4 June 2010, Chris visited The GAMe PLACe. He claimed that he wanted to take a photograph of Snyder to use as a dartboard, but when Snyder saw him with his camera outside, he chased Chris. Chris claimed that he tried to drive away but was accosted by Snyder, his daughter and the police. Snyder's version was more succinct:
| “ | Christian is in my parking lot right now being grilled by the police. He took pictures of my daughter and tried to run me over with his car. they witness this, and I bet they still do nothing about it. | ” |
The police listened to Chris rant about the trolls for a while and eventually sent him home with a warning.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Mimms and Lucas Q&A: Chris's ban from the store
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Mimms and Lucas Q&A: Racism and homophobia
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Mimms & Lucas Q&A: Initial post
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Mimms and Lucas Q&A
- ↑ Mimms and Lucas Q&A: Chris as a customer
- ↑ Chris e-mails: November 2007
- ↑ Mimms and Lucas Q&A
- ↑ http://cogsdev.110mb.com/cwcipedia/index.php/Megan_Schroeder
- ↑ YouTube comment by Mike
- ↑ YouTube comment by Chris