Link: Golfland Family Fun Centers provide definition of Family as one man, one woman

April 21, 2009, 05:21 PM

by joel, via Guy Dads -
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Semi-local, semi-famous Golfland in Sunnyvale, CA has developed a cult audience over the decades, which is now described like a grand mythos by would-be game industry insider types looking to add an air of credibility to their “freelance journalist” personas (I refuse to believe the acronym “SVGL” has been used by any real person). It’s always been a notable arcade, but basically a typical one that provided miniature golf as an easy ploy to convince your parents to take you there for the purpose of playing videogames instead. Later in life, the steady supply of location tests, large, rare, or otherwise obscure machines kept Sunnyvale Golfland in business long after the other Silicon Valley arcades closed. So there are some fond memories there.

Too bad Golfland hates gay people. In November of last year, the writers of this blog (about “two married Jewish gay dads, their six children, and life on the town”) discovered through the database of California Proposition 8 supporters that the family ownership of Golfland Family Fun Centers donated a combined $35,000+ to foist homophobia into the state constitution. The Guy Dads provide a breakdown of donations by family member, location, and title of employment, exposing a bit of nepotism in Golfland hiring practices, too, I guess.

I wasn’t particularly surprised to learn this, but I am surprised it was only reported on activist blogs and not on any videogame related ones. There is a website called gaygamer.net. They run banner ads for gourmet food and Subaru cars (literally, I’m not stereotyping), but they didn’t report this. I guess I don’t understand the purpose of a gay videogame site then. As for the idea of a boycott, I went to “SVGL” last Friday for a Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 3 tournament. I was sad to see the storied rows of cabinets have largely been replaced by redemption machines, occupying maybe 60% of the floor space. And crappy ones, not even ski ball. So, that takes care of that.