Strawberry Shortcake Krahulik and Holkins received a
cease-and-desist letter from
American Greetings Corporation over the use of American Greetings'
Strawberry Shortcake and
Plum Puddin' characters in the April 14, 2003
Penny Arcade strip entitled "
Tart as a
Double Entendre". The duo chose not to enter into a legal battle over whether or not the strip was a protected form of
parody, and they complied with the
cease-and-desist by replacing it with an image directing their audience to send a letter to a lawyer for American Greetings. They later lampooned the incident by portraying an American Greetings employee as a
Nazi.
Jack Thompson On October 17, 2005, Krahulik and Holkins donated US$10,000 to the
Entertainment Software Association foundation in the name of
Jack Thompson, a disbarred attorney and activist against violence in video games. Earlier, Thompson himself had promised to donate $10,000 if a video game was created in which the player kills video game developers (
A Modest Video Game Proposal), but after a
mod to the game
Grand Theft Auto was pointed out to already exist, Thompson called his challenge
satire (referring to the title of the letter as a reference to "
A Modest Proposal") and refused to donate the money. He claimed these games were not going to be manufactured, distributed, or sold like retail games, as his Modest Proposal stated, and therefore, the deal went unfulfilled. His refusal was met with disdain, given that multiple games were created or in the process of being created under Thompson's criteria. Krahulik and Holkins donated the money in his place, with a check containing the memo: "For Jack Thompson, Because Jack Thompson Won't". Thompson proceeded to phone Krahulik, as related by Holkins in the corresponding news post. On October 18, 2005, it was reported that Jack Thompson had faxed a letter to Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske claiming that
Penny Arcade "employs certain personnel who have decided to commence and orchestrate
criminal harassment of me by various means". Holkins defended the site by saying that the "harassment" Thompson referred to was simply "the natural result of a public figure making statements that people disagree with, and letting him know their thoughts on the matter via his publicly available contact information". On October 21, 2005, Thompson claimed to have sent a letter to
John McKay,
U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Washington, in an attempt to get the
FBI involved. Thompson re-iterated his claims of "
extortion" and accused
Penny Arcade of using "their Internet site and various other means to encourage and solicit criminal harassment". Penny Arcade denied the charge of "extortion", noting that they paid the $10,000 to charity, and asked nothing in return. Thompson claimed the harassment of him is a direct result of Mike Krahulik's posts, which listed links to the
Florida Bar Association. Thompson accused
Penny Arcade of soliciting complaints to the Bar against him, even though Krahulik actually posted the opposite, asking fans to cease sending letters to the Bar, as the Bar acknowledged that it is aware of Thompson's actions, thanks to previous letters. The Seattle PD eventually acknowledged receiving a complaint from Thompson, but have commented that they believe the issue to be a
civil, rather than
criminal, matter. They noted that this was from initial impressions of the letter they received, and their criminal investigations bureau is reviewing the letter to make sure that there were not any criminal matters that they missed. On the same day,
Scott Kurtz, creator of the webcomic
PvP (webcomic) and a longtime friend of Krahulik and Holkins, used the image of the letter Thompson sent to the Seattle PD to create a parody letter in which Jack attempts to enlist the aid of the
Justice League of America by claiming Gabe and Tycho to be villains of some description. The
Penny Arcade shop had at the time sold an "I hate Jack Thompson"
T-shirt, claiming that every living creature, including Thompson's own mother, hates Jack Thompson. On March 21, 2007, Thompson filed a
countersuit to the
lawsuit brought against him by
Take Two Interactive claiming that they are at the center of a
RICO conspiracy.
Penny Arcade was named as one of the co-conspirators. At
Sakura-Con 2007, Krahulik announced that the suit had been dropped.
Dickwolves controversy In an August 11, 2010 comic entitled "The Sixth Slave", an
NPC pleads with a player who then refuses to save him: "Every morning, we are roused by savage blows. Every night, we are raped to sleep by the dickwolves". The strip drew criticism from many commentators, including from
The American Prospect and
The Boston Phoenix. Krahulik and Holkins dismissed these criticisms, later selling "Team Dickwolves" T-shirts based on the strip. They later removed the "Team Dickwolves" shirt from their store due to complaints that it made potential PAX attendees uncomfortable. After the removal, Krahulik posted online that removing the shirts was only partly caving to pressure but mainly due to people who had personally emailed him and were reasonable with their concerns. Krahulik also stated that anyone still hesitant about going to PAX even after removal of the shirts should not come to PAX. In September 2013, on the last day of PAX, Krahulik told a panel that he thought that "pulling the dickwolves merchandise was a mistake", to cheers from the crowd. However, Krahulik later apologized on the
Penny Arcade website, stating that he regretted contributing to the furor that had followed the original comic. Both critics of the comic strip and Krahulik and Holkins, made claims of receiving verbal abuse through social media and
death threats. In a 2012 article in the
Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, academics Salter & Blodgett used the Dickwolves incident as a case study into "hypermasculinity and sexism within the gaming community", and argued that "this case highlights how the hypermasculine discourse encourages the overt privileging of masculinity over femininity and discourages women from engaging in gendered discourse within the community." =="Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory"==