The fate of Alexis Kennedy's contribution to DA4

Leaving aside the wider question about whether we should reject the art along with the artist because of behaviour that has been alleged against them, as opposed to any criminal charges actually being brought (there have been instances of high profile figures being accused through the media and then police/state prosecutors establishing there is no case to answer), in this instance I see no reason why Bioware should ditch the entire project they hired him for. Since they no doubt wrote it into his contract that they retained full rights over the material, there is nothing to stop them using it but not crediting him if they are concerned it could impact on their final product to do so. However, if the material was not credited to anyone else, people might draw their own conclusions as to the source.

It is equally possible that his contribution was ditched along with much other material at the time of the reboot, so the problem no longer existed even before the current revelations.

Absolutely. For decades, most attempts at speaking out about this stuff were largely disregarded and swept under the rug, especially when the abusers were famous. Given that historical context it’s very important that allegations be taken very seriously, and especially there should be no reason to doubt when they come from multiple sources.

As far as I know nothing he did was really legally actionable, just profoundly scummy and toxic, the kind of stuff that paints a clear picture of a really shitty person. Regardless, it’s very understandable that many of the victims speaking out do not pursue legal action: even apart from the fact that some of the cases involve international logistical difficulties, taking cases like these to court is an emotional nightmare that consumes a lot of financial resources, and to boot they rarely result in a conviction under normal circumstances, even less often when the accused has more financial resources or influence to draw on. It is an entirely valid tactic to instead simply publicly out their unacceptable behavior via the signal boosting the internet age has newly enabled, which can have the multiple results of warning others so they can avoid falling victim to the abusers, opening up the possibility that they will to some extent be held professionally accountable at the very least, and increasingly building a culture where this kind of shit is not as easily swept under the rug and victims can feel safer speaking out.

However, it is widely known how the digital media can be used to bully and ostracise. There have also been occasions of accusations being made against someone in the past which has ruined their career, only to later be shown to have been totally unjustified. I am fully aware of the fact that victims of predatory and emotionally manipulative people also historically have had to struggle with not being believed and that has allowed the perpetrators to continue their behaviour.

This is why whilst I would not wish to reject accusations against AK out of hand, I am also disturbed that the entire business seems to be based around revelations made over Twitter. If the person has done things in their personal life that are criminally abusive then it should be reported to the police. If the person has done things in their professional life that are unacceptable but not necessarily criminal, this should be reported to their employers. If this has been done and the employer has ignored the complaints, then the organisation should be reported to their regulatory authority. There are official channels that people can go through and where these days people will be listened to but to conduct trial by Twitter is not the way to go about it and is too open to misuse by the vindictive as well as the genuinely and justifiably aggrieved.

Why assume that victims didn't take legal routes first? It seems that in case of AK the victims have first reached out to Failbetter itself and decided to go public when not only it did little to the perpetrator, but has exposed other victims to someone who used his privileged position to prey on people.

Never mind that it was pointed out already that sometimes there is no legal path to take on in certain cases or it is very difficult. We know for a fact a lot of victims have reached out to their employers or law enforcement and nothing happened or things went from bad to worse. Going public appears to be the most effective recourse at the moment, especially when it comes to people whose actions aren't necessarily criminal, but scummy and ultimately disregarding them allows for toxic environment to exist and worse things to happen.

Like... I don't know what position you take on airing dirty laundry like it happened in case of Bioware and other game studios recently. None of what they did appears to be criminal (in BW's case) yet a lot of people - fans and non-fans - believe bringing issues of unhealthy work environment to public attention will both make people aware that the games they love and crave come at a human cost and that a lot has to be done to make things better, especially on the employer's part or within larger systems. It's not that different in case of different kind of toxicity within game industry and beyond.

When worrying about what happens to men who are falsely accused, it's worth remembering that what usually happens when a woman tells people that a prominent and successful man harassed, assaulted and/or raped her is ... nothing much of anything.

Maybe there's some social media noise. Maybe they lose some work over it. Maybe if they harass, assault and rape a lot of people over many years there might eventually be some actual consequences for their career and/or freedom to wander around harassing, assaulting and/or raping people. But it's not like Neil DeGrasse Tyson or Geoffrey Rush or Jonnhy Depp or Louis C.K. or Lawrence Krauss or Anthony Kiedis or Michael Fassbender or many dozens of others I could name are starving in a gutter.

The reason women tell other women these things (whether via whisper network or via Twitter) is that maybe it will warn other women that the man in question is not safe to be around.

Artists like all people when they do something against the law, should be judged same way as everybody else.
Some artists can get a strange kind of immunity.
As for their creation, depends on the content, I'm not huge on censorship but if some people have been abused, for the sake of them getting better might want to tone it down on the praise for a while.

I have not read any detail of the whole story, and don't really feel like it, but people in general should never be put on too much of a pedestal.
I'm a huge fan of rock music, a lot of musicians I enjoy had abusive relationship sometimes with underage girls (some "groupies" stories aren't for the faint of heart), got to give it to the rock universe, it can be super gross but at least it was somewhat honest...if those dudes get metooed well...I'll still enjoy their music but I won't shed a tear for them. If they traumatised some girls/ women with their excesses, reparations need to be made.
Anyway when there are power dynamics, and there often is in the workplace, you always always have a risk for abuse to happen.

"Witch hunt" isn't a great metaphor for this. Witches didn't exist, but abusive scumbags do exist.

Edit: I just don't see any problem with someone being named and shamed for something he should be ashamed of.

No it isn't and what you're doing now is a textbook example of strawman argument.

Thinly-veiled agenda pushing against a perceived wrong-doer. I expect the anti-sjw brigade to show up soon to spew their bullshit in turn. Most of them got butthurt when the political thread got closed tho.