
NSFW: Individual investigations on Alison Rapp have discovered what her moonlight job may have been
Editor's Note: We want to make a few things clear: Doxing and/or harassing a person's family is deplorable. In addition, no one involved in this article has any issues with sex workers. It does seem reasonable that Nintendo, particularly as a kid focused company, has a legitimate reason to let a person go if a representative of Nintendo engages in it. The information below, as we understand it, was at the time, on public sites. Yes, someone connected the dots, but this particular info was not truly hidden or "stolen". As far as we know, Alison Rapp has not confirmed or denied the information below and it may not be her. This article has been edited to make that more clear. In addition, we've pulled some links that have been evolving beyond their original content in ways we don't agree with.
Alison Rapp, who was recently fired from Nintendo for moonlighting, has rocked the gaming community despite the situation being a personal - and not a public - affair. Many people have jumped in from various angles claiming that her dismissal was rather unfair and unjust, or completely necessary and justifiable. While neither side has agreed on anything, new information on Rapp's second "job" may turn the tide against her...
WARNING: THE FOLLOWING IS NOT SAFE FOR WORK. READER DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
Moonlighting is actually accepted at Nintendo. It’s policy.
— smol pterodactyl (@alisonrapp) March 31, 2016
According to a Twitter post by Rapp, Nintendo accepts moonlighting under its policy. This statement has been the cause for contention from both supporters of Rapp and anti-Rapp individuals. The reason for this is that it directly conflicts Nintendo's statement. According to the official Nintendo press statement to Mashable:
"Alison Rapp was terminated due to violation of an internal company policy involving holding a second job in conflict with Nintendo’s corporate culture. Though Ms. Rapp’s termination follows her being the subject of criticism from certain groups via social media several weeks ago, the two are absolutely not related. Nintendo is a company committed to fostering inclusion and diversity in both our company and the broader video game industry and we firmly reject the harassment of individuals based on gender, race or personal beliefs. We wish Ms. Rapp well in her future endeavors."
-Nintendo of America
It should be noted that this statement does not explicitly state that Rapp was fired because she had a second job. As such, Alison Rapp was certainly not lying. However, she wasn't exactly telling the truth either. As many anti-Rapp supporters have pointed out, the "conflict with Nintendo's corporate culture" has led to many speculations of what this actually meant.
Supporters of Rapp have suggested that this was a result of the harassment she faced from certain interest groups around the period of March 2016. However, the anti-Rapp parties have found evidence of what the real reason for Rapp's dismissal may have been.
Aaaand another low-res, cropped teaser from my recent shoot. Enjoy! âï¸ pic.twitter.com/8Sxe4JIt0k
— smol pterodactyl (@alisonrapp) February 7, 2016
While Rapp was initially believed to have been terminated after harassment following alleged comments on whether pedophilia should be legalized, the anti-Rapp party dug deeper into why she might have been fired. Not long after her termination from Nintendo, anti-Rapp groups discovered a Twitter post containing questionable images - posted by Rapp - which she was selling to customers (seen above).
While these things may seem like enough for some to fire a public relations officer, this was only the tip of the iceberg. New evidence has surfaced that suggests Alison Rapp may have been working as a paid personal escort going by the false name Maria Mint. The following images from The Ralph Retort are damning as the tattoos (and other accessories) from the Maria Mint escort site conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that this may have been the job that led to Rapp's dismissal.
NOTE: It should be pointed out that these images are merely the ones that can be safely displayed on this website. Other sources have found much more revealing images that display irrefutable evidence of Rapp's involvement.
While the attempt to hide all tattoos was near perfect, a careful eye can pick out the bottom two edges of a red star tattoo in the image on the left
The blurred tattoo seems to match those belonging to Alison Rapp
This image of the identical ring (on the same hand nonetheless), combined with the other images pulled from Maria Mint's web page build a near impregnable case against Rapp
Another piece of evidence - which may be entirely coincidental - is that Maria Mint's escort site has since been taken down for 'maintenance'. The escort in question also worked in the Seattle area (of which it is publicly known that Rapp lives in). While the site may be down, archives of the webpage still exist, and if they are truly tied to Rapp it is completely understandable why a family-friendly company such as Nintendo would fire her. This has been supported by yet another finding by the individuals investigating her background.
One individual took images from both Maria Mint's website, as well as Alison Rapp's Twitter page, and ran it through an online application that tears apart the data. Remarkably, both images ran identical camera IDs, lens serial numbers, and various other camera identifiers. For those who don't know, every camera that is manufactured carries unique code (known as exif data) that is placed into each image that is taken. That means that beyond all reasonable doubt, rather:
- Alison Rapp and Maria Mint (if not the same person) used the same camera. This could happen if the camera was second-hand purchased.
- Alison Rapp took pictures for Maria Mint.
- Maria Mint and Alison Rapp are the same person.
It should be noted that - regardless of Nintendo's corporate reasons for her termination - prostitution is illegal in the state of Washington under Code RWC 9A.88.030 and RWC 9A.88.070. Should the evidences against Rapp prove to be true, there is little doubt that the company dismissed her in order to save face. Unfortunately, it seems to have had the opposite effect since the International Game Developers Association has since criticized Nintendo's actions - albeit due to Rapp's withholding of the truth, and Nintendo's typical silence regarding corporate matters.
It is unfortunate that Alison Rapp lost what many would consider to be a dream job, and perhaps we should have pity for her as a result. Sadly, the fact of the matter is that she broke company policy - no matter how much she may try to hide it.
While she may not have lied about moonlighting being allowed at Nintendo, it should come with common sense that there are certain jobs one should not hold while working at a family-friendly company. The internet is a very easy place to be both lost and found in, and hopefully this serves as a reminder to those working in any industry that you should never post anything that could be used against you.
What do you think of the Alison Rapp case now that this information has surfaced? Do you think Nintendo - or Rapp - could have handled the situation better? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below!
-
Message to everyone: It doesn't matter what she did as her side job, the fact she had one, and her contract said she couldn't was grounds for the firing.
Yes, what people had to do to track that down borders on the side of fucking scary as shit (it's way past creepy), but even if she was, let's say... Selling kids toys, that would be a second job, and grounds for a firing.
Nintendo's employee contracts state (paraphrased), "You can't have a second job." If you sign that, you agree to it, and so should stick to it. Now I'm not condoning the shitty behaviour both sides exhibit, it's just crappy... And how she got outed chills me to the core of my soul's core. Yet, she broke contract, and was fired. Then lied about it for a while.
Again, whatever she did as her 2nd job, is irrelevant to what happened... Because the fact she had one... etc etc. I think what we should know, is how exactly she was 'exposed' because that, more than anything, is what scares me.
Anyway, that's my thing on this, and I will leave it at that. -
This is warrantless witch hunting and frankly, pretty shameful.
Is this the kind of garbage we want the gaming community to be known for? What does this have to do with games? -
Arguably, the one thing it has to do with games is that Rapp did cause a number of developers to lose faith - and withdraw projects - from Nintendo systems. Well, at least, that's the reason we published this article: to prove that Nintendo was not wrong.
However, should the gaming community at large have tackled this to begin with? No, not really. Both anti and pro GG are at fault here for her situation getting this out of hand. If you make accusations against a group that wasn't (by a technicality) at fault for her dismissal, they're going to try to prove themselves innocent. Once Nintendo proved that, and you poke it again, it's going to fight back again.
For the love of god... It's a bloody revenge cycle as cliche as Agamemnon's trilogy. Where in Hades is Athena when you need her for some divine intervention? -
loopy_6764April 11, 2016, 9:54 amAmazing how neogaf , kotaku, were so quick to slam Nintendo, and now nothing but complete silence from them when the truth comes out.
Shows they have zero credibility. And are now eating crow on a scale never seen before.
What a bunch of complete Muppets. -
It's honestly a shame that more newsgroups simply stop their narrative where it stops appealing to their main demographic. I feel sorry for any journalists who work for these groups who face harassment by association due to the agendas of their employers. Some of us just want to write news and play video games.
-
I am not sure how I feel about this being made public knowledge (if it is without a doubt true, which some things point to do it being so.)
This unveiling will be seen as evidence of the harassment Rapp has supposedly been receiving for the past few months. If this information was obtained just to smear her, not cool.
However, this also shows Nintendo had a very justifiable reason for her termination. If they knew about this, they also stayed classy by not going into details for her termination.
Regardless, she should know better than to put those things on social media. She works in PR for crying out loud, for Nintendo, the only company who actually cares about maintaining a consistent image. An "all-ages" one at that.
It stinks she lost her job, but it may be that she has only herself to blame. Maybe the Big Bad Nintendo isn't to blame after all? -
The problem here is a mix between GG and anti-GG politics, and Rapp's own stubbornness. The first two signal boosted that she got fired. Her own denial made the two feel like they had a point to defend/attack. I really don't understand what she tried to accomplish, but now it's happened, and frankly a lot of this could have been avoided from the start.
It really makes me wonder sometimes if either side is really trying to do something good. I mean, would anyone really be defending her if she wasn't a spotlight figure - a woman at that? Imagine this:
"A person got fired from a company because their public actions were deemed harmful to the company's image and did not match their values."
Would anyone have leapt to that person's defense? Probably not. How do I know? Because it happens every single day. Rapp was just the only one to get called out to the public eye. -
MathenautApril 10, 2016, 11:20 pmI can understand why some would have sympathy, it's not wrong to.
As it stands, Nintendo was had every right to save their own asses when it came to light what they had in Rapp. Not much worth saving in this kind of PR disaster. -
My stance is the following: Do whatever the hell you want, but don't put it on social media unless you like taking a swift kick to the genitals. It's the first thing they teach you in Elementary School (or at least back in the 90s they did) whenever you had computers class in the library. Even then, we didn't have social media yet like we do now. You'd think people would be more informed in 2016.
-
My own feelings on this are mixed. If someone or someones brought this to light purely to hurt Alison Rapp under the false circumstances, then it's pretty low.
But, Nintendo is realy not in the wrong.
First, big companies like Nintendo usually have what are called Morality Clauses. This is why if a contracted employee is arrested or involved in a criminal case, they can be dismissed to protect the company, etc. -
Rapp is a victim not of GamerGate, or of "SJWs" or anything of the sort. She is a victim of the internet and social media as a whole. Her personal life was published, it became part of the public sphere, and her personal life is spiraling deeper into the gutter as a result of it.
It's sad, really. I just wish that she (and her supposed defenders) would just let this go and let her be before someone decides to dig out something worse about her. -
There have been rumors of Alison Rapp having a second job on the side that came into conflict with Nintendo but there was no solid proof. Even though the evidence presented is convincing, I'm still on the fence about it as its all coming from a few questionable sources with limited credibility.
-
I just don't understand why she would even post half of these things. They're all damning evidence against her, and nothing on the internet disappears. Maybe she could have got away with it if she didn't post anything on her Twitter page, but she did so anyway. I learned in 4th grade that it was a serious internet no-no to post anything that could be used against you. To do this when you act as the face of a family-friendly company - one that got serious flak from devs because of her attempts to bend the truth? That's just asking for trouble.
EDIT: Mind you, this was in the 90s, back before social media was really a thing. You'd think people would know better by 2016.