For the past six months, I’ve been watching Jason Thor ‘Pirate Software’ Hall tank his entire life. He’s never flown far from controversy. But ever since a very bad judgment call he made in January, he’s been steadily losing everything he ever achieved. This judgment call—along with other flaws in his character—bear some surprising similarities to those we find in evangelical men. Today, I’ll show you what I mean.
(This post and its audio ‘cast first went live on Patreon on 7/25/2025. They’re both available now!From introduction: Gary Hart’s mistress discovered after he taunts journalists; Harvard Business School case studies; the updated Benihana’s simulator.)
SITUATION REPORT: The roach himself, Pirate Software, might be going down
Pirate Software is Jason Thor Hall. He’s an indie game developer on a perma-Early-Access title called Heartbound. He’s way into ferrets and operates a sort-of-sketchy rescue for them, as well as having a ferret fursona called Maldavius Figtree that goes way back.
In a way, Pirate Software’s past year of nonstop drama makes me feel like Inigo in The Princess Bride.
Let me explain—no. There is too much. Let me sum up:
For many years, Pirate Software has courted controversy in various ways. But in January, he began his fast slide to oblivion by making a serious mistake during a streamed raid in World of Warcraft (WoW). What he did is called roaching—he scurried away from a bad fight without trying to help his teammates. When his teammates called him out for this mistake, he responded by insisting he’d done nothing wrong: “It’s not on me. Not at all.” Eventually, he ragequit the stream (at around 3:50 in the following clip) with a dismissive “See ya round.”
Since then, the guy sparked a string of self-caused controversies: He got kicked out of that WoW raiding group, got interviewed by a psychologist on YouTube (and suggesting a serious inability to self-reflect). In addition, he got caught cheating at puzzle games to impress his viewers. Later, a number of commenters laughed at him for vastly exaggerating his work experience (and for using his supposed “seven years at Blizzard” as a source of borrowed authority). And these controversies are just a few of the total number.
Really, it makes revelations about him artificially mega-boosting his voice’s bass to sound more manly seem almost reasonable.
Pirate Software and his tragic misunderstanding of Stop Killing Games
Mainly, people are upset with him lately because he almost killed a consumer rights initiative called Stop Killing Games (SKG) because he completely misunderstood its meaning. Refusing to accept that he’d been dead wrong about SKG, he doubled down by attacking its leader for equally stupid reasons. His opposition nearly destroyed the initiative, but thankfully a few big names in the gaming sphere noticed and revived it at the eleventh hour.
Pirate Software has a long history as a liar, fabulist, and control freak. That history goes back even before he got hired during his father’s tenure at Blizzard—despite having no training or education whatsoever in video games.
The internet has been enjoying Pirate Software’s fall from grace, especially with SKG cruising into its final days with a strong chance of success. Hundreds of drama YouTubers have talked about him in the past week or so.
What I see happening with Pirate Software mirrors trends I’ve tracked in evangelicalism for over a decade. It’s the same set of flaws, just with different wrappers.
Pirate Software can’t apologize, won’t apologize
So many people I’ve seen commenting on his situation have mentioned that if he could have just apologized for roaching in January, none of this would be happening now. To an extent, yes, that’s true. But his lack of accountability in January isn’t just a one-off mistake. It’s the backbone of his entire personality.
His entire self-image is that of an elite mega-hacker, expert coder, wise community leader, and supremely-skilled gamer. Unfortunately, he can’t back up any of those claims. He doesn’t have the skills, intelligence, or personality needed for any of it.
The version of Pirate Software who could have apologized in January also wouldn’t have caused any of his other controversies. The Pirate Software we actually have at home is one who cannot take accountability at all.
If that sounds familiar, it should. We see that same flaw in evangelicals.
When a false identity conflicts with reality
As people grow up, they assemble their sense of identity out of their achievements, personality, background, aspirations, and more. An authentic sense of identity derives from these real factors. Whether it’s a mistake or a triumph, it all goes into our sense of self.
For some people, that’s not enough. When they look at those factors, none of them seems good enough. Instead, they want to be grander than they are. More important. More special.
Most of all, less flawed.
Flaws equal weakness. Weakness leads to pain of all kinds. So weakness must be hidden away, papered over, ignored.
Such people present a false face to the world. It’s the face they wish they had. The one they feel they should have had. When challenges arise to their constructed persona, they launch an aggressive defense. And they must. If that façade shatters, they will be naked to the world.
It cannot have been easy for Pirate Software to grow up in the shadow of a parent who revolutionized video games forever. His dad, Joeyray Hall, was one of Blizzard’s first ten employees, joining up soon after the company began.
That’s an incredibly tough act to follow for any kid. And this one couldn’t do it. He briefly attended college to study entomology, then dropped out. True to form, he never pursued any further formal education. That would mean he lacked something he needed. That lack equals weakness, and we all know where that leads. Based on his coding, I suspect he also fears making lots of mistakes as he learns a new skillset. And he can’t admit he makes mistakes.
It’s sad to imagine someone so terrified of being known as he actually is. But I’ve seen so many evangelicals just like that.
An ongoing march of phony evangelicals
Evangelicals themselves are well aware of their authenticity problem. They’ve known about it since before they knew they were in decline, as one 2014 post from The Gospel Coalition reveals. At best, that post tells us, they achieve “a safe, faux-openness that establishes an environment where vulnerability is embraced, only up to a point.”
There’s a reason for that. They know exactly what will happen if they show too much of the wrong kind of vulnerability.
Evangelicals tend to put the cause of their lack of authenticity down to something like “fear,” as Tim Gustafson did in one of his posts.
One answer is fear. Every church is comprised of ordinary human beings, but we often refuse to acknowledge our similarities to each other. We feel as though we ought to rise above our problems—especially temptations.
Yet so often we don’t. And so we regularly fake it for fear of what people will think. We fear that others might pull away from us if they knew the worst about us. This, of course, leads to hypocrisy. [Source]
See? Any TRUE CHRISTIAN™ is authentic to the core because “the fruit of the Spirit” (meaning roughly the evidence of Jesus’ presence in believers) naturally creates it.
There’s no Jesus doing anything at the center of Christianity
That’s exactly why they’re so dishonest. Their beliefs say Jesus is doing something, but their reality reveals he isn’t doing anything at all.
In truth, Christian faith is a messy wrestling match with reality. Nothing about this world or Christians themselves works like their religion says it should. “The fruit of the Spirit” isn’t doing anything at all. Christian groups operate just like any other group of people in their situation would.
For many reasons, Christians who try to present themselves more authentically get a lot of side-eye from their more performative peers. They’re admitting something that none of those others can bear. They suffer for it, too. For proof, just ask any Christian with a decidedly un-dramatic testimony how it feels to be stacked against a Satanic Panic fireworks display.
Evangelicals also can’t apologize or self-reflect
None of this is new to evangelicals.
In 2013, Crying out for Justice accused evangelicals who can’t admit they’re wrong of being “unsafe (and unsaved).” Nobody who needed to hear their message listened to it.
Two years later, The Aquila Report warned readers: “Beware of those who never admit fault.” Their writer notes:
[T]he more I meet people who never admit fault and never apologize, the more I am very cautious around them – especially if they call themselves Christians. [Source]
But nothing changed. As religion writer Timothy Gloege noted a couple of years later, “being evangelical means never having to say you’re sorry.”
In 2018, The Gospel Coalition complained that evangelicals lacked “a theology of apology.” Notably, it mostly focuses on Christians who feel moved to apologize for the past actions of other Christians. That does sound a lot safer than self-reflection. They were still working on the issue in 2021.
In 2019, Understanding the Gospel complained about how hard it is for so many evangelicals to apologize for their wrongdoing and mistakes. Its writer tried to lay out a good template for an apology, but I doubt it moved the needle much. By 2021, Faith Bible Church was telling readers not to apologize but instead to seek forgiveness, which is the tribe-approved substitute for apologizing.
David French recently wrote that evangelicals are “in a new normal now,” one that “means no apologies.” But there’s nothing new about it. It’s just more obvious now.
Pirate Software and evangelicals found a really maladaptive way to self-soothe
A recent study suggests that when Christians think their god has forgiven them, it may make them less likely to apologize to the real people they’ve wronged. But as Pirate Software shows us, secular people can also refuse to take accountability.
The problem isn’t that Christians are asking Jesus for forgiveness and stopping there. They are, yes. But the problem goes deeper than that—so deep that it transcends religion entirely.
The problem is that they’re soothing away internal feelings of inadequacy and blame in ways that are tribe-approved substitutes for actual accountability. Their leaders and culture have taught them a whole host of substitutes for being good, decent human beings, and they’re using those substitutes to the hilt.
They cultivate as false a face as Pirate Software has. Within their culture, others may hesitate to challenge them, either. Those false faces boast lots of Jesus frosting and Christianese underpinnings. Their owners often construct networks of yes-men who happily reinforce that false image for their own gain. Anyone pushing back against the façade faces criticism for jeopardizing its owner’s reputation—or their entire religion’s credibility.
Secular culture operates a bit differently. Out here, we’re far better able to demand accountability from public figures who need a dose of it. Phonies may last a long time, even for years, but they tend to get ferreted out—if you’ll pardon the pun—a lot faster.
NEXT UP: Episode 4 of Alpha Series! This one’s about how to have faith—though as we’ll see, evangelicals have performative substitutes for that one too. See you soon! <3
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Endnote
As Pirate Software’s drama continues to unfold, SKG cruises into its final week. If you’re in the EU, I encourage you to sign this initiative. It only takes a few seconds to do, and it could have industry-wide repercussions on consumer rights to the video games they’ve purchased.
1 Comment
Alpha Course #4: In faith, the missing ingredient is Jesus - Roll to Disbelieve · 08/24/2025 at 7:50 PM
[…] lose their witness through being caught committing hypocrisy and displaying personal flaws like not being able to apologize and make amends for […]