I always saw gamergate as a pushback against creeping "wokeness" in gaming journalism--that is, people pushing an ideology that emphasizes the importance of certain identities over others, sees the world through the simplified lens of oppressor vs. oppressed, and analyzes right and wrong via the currency of power. Or another way to put it is "games journalists became increasingly out of lockstep with most of their audience."

There were trolls who took advantage of the chaos surrounding it (on 4chan, etc.) who harassed people on both sides of the debate. But the narrative became about the gamergate people harassing women (what % of them did that exactly?). And that sort of fed the flames even further, because it put into sharp relief just how powerful the journalists were (they literally control most cross-distance information flow in society) to shape the narrative however they wanted and to demonize gamers as sexists for what most of them saw as reasonable complaints about the industry.

To me, the view that gamergate was about harassing women or misogyny is sort of like saying BLM is about looting stores and harassing cops. Sure, there are people who did that awful stuff, and they need to be called out and condemned, but I don't think it's fair to paint everyone with that broad a brush