As most of my friends know, things that happened this past week have left me feeling very disheartened. I've been staying away from reading all the articles involving Cross Assault since I got home. Today I was curious enough to check out a couple. @ProtomCannon's article on SRK (http://shoryuken.com/2012/02/29/back-to-basics-getting-beyond-the-drama/) made me remember why I love the fighting game community so much. I've always loved being a part of it, but for the first time in my life I was told by my coach that I did not belong, and this attitude was heavily reinforced throughout the week. It was the worst feeling ever.

This article made me think of Evo and how much fun I've had every single time I've gone. It's an undescribable experience. Then I thought about NorCal Regionals, and the team tournaments I've been to where people have depended on me (and I pulled through). Countless sessions at Keystone II and Scunsion's, where people are willing to open the doors to their homes so we can grind out games and level up together. Spending every Friday at local arcades, meeting the oddball Gen or Hakan player that walks in and bodies someone and leaves everyone speechless. I realized even though I'm going through a very hard time right now, if I don't get through this I will be giving up all of these things I love.

I thought I was a strong enough person to be on this show but the fact is one person, with the assistance of a few stream monsters, brought me to my breaking point. Maybe some people (like the people who wrote the @Kotaku article) don't understand that it was just one person who did this to me. I understand it looks like this is the FGC's fault, I felt that way too until I got home and had a couple days to process everything that happened. I was so appalled at what Aris said on the 5th night that I could not stop crying, the next day I made the decision to leave because of it.

But that night, and every minute since then, I've received hundreds of comments/tweets from people both in and out of the FGC supporting me. Those people outnumber Aris like 200-1. Maybe I'm a quitter, maybe I'm weak, maybe I've been through enough bullshit in my life that my breaking point is lower than "normal"; the fact is, at that moment the only people who could make me feel part of the FGC again was the FGC. All the support made me realize that only one person has wronged me, not the entire FGC... I have support there.

So Kotaku, if you want to see how supportive and kind the FGC is, I can send you a screen cap of my inbox flooded with support from these people.

In short: my coach was a jerk, he doesn't represent the entire community. I'm not ever leaving. See you at NCR.

I'll leave this here: http://vimeo.com/13324213

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