Each new video that Anita Sarkeesian posts is a sign that the bullies are losing
Anita Sarkeesian, still standing
On Monday, Anita Sarkeesian posted the latest installment of her Tropes Vs. Women in Video Games series on YouTube, a half-hour examination of the ways in which video game makers use sexualized violence against women as a cheap way to spice up their narratives and appeal to straight male gamers.
Her tone was measured, her analysis clear and logical and supported by dozens of clips from a wide assortment of games.
Late Tuesday night, this happened:
That’s right: Sarkeesian was forced to leave her home due to violent threats against her and her family … because she made a YouTube video analyzing violence against women in video games.
She then posted some of the threats she had gotten from a Twitter account set up specifically to harass and threaten her and her family. [TRIGGER WARNING for graphic rape and death threats.]
For a larger version of the screenshot, see here.
Sarkeesian has also been tweeting some of the other threats she gets on a daily basis from anonymous gamers who are incensed that a woman has anything critical to say about their precious video games.
“Go ahead, screen capture this and tweet it you piece of shit” ummm… ok. I’m not afraid of strawman "rebuttals". http://t.co/8B74uYJOOU—
Feminist Frequency (@femfreq) August 27, 2014
You’ll notice that several of these threatening comments mention videos by Thunderf00t, a “skeptic” videoblogger best known, at least in the corner of the internet I write about, for a series of videos in which he viciously attacks some of the women who’ve drawn the most internet hate from angry misogynists – from skeptics like Rebecca Watson and Melody Hensley to video game maker Zoe Quinn and video game critic Sarkeesian.
Thunderf00t’s attacks have won him kudos from assorted Men’s Rights activists, from the regulars on the Men’s Rights subreddit to A Voice for Men “operations manager” Dean Esmay, who has praised his videos and urged other MRAs to subscribe to them.
In other words, the harassment of feminist women on the internet is directly linked to antifeminist propagandists like Thunderf00t – and his MRA fans and enablers.
The constant, vicious, personal attacks on Sarkeesian you see not only in video game circles but from Men’s Rights Activists – on Reddit, on A Voice for Men, on YouTube, and so on – have helped to create a hostile environment in which critiques of sexism in games result in real-world death and rape threats against women. This has an undeniably chilling effect on the free speech of women. That in fact is the intent of the harassers.
Margaret Atwood once famously observed that
Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.
I think we need an internet corollary to Atwood’s observation:
Men posting on the internet are afraid that women will block them. Women are afraid that men will treat them like Anita Sarkeesian.
Thing is, Sarkeesian keeps moving forward, diligently researching and putting forth the videos she promised she would. All the huffing and puffing of her critics and attackers hasn’t shut her up. Each new video she puts out is a testament to her courage and her perseverance. Each new video is a blow against those who would shut women up. Each new video helps to inspire others who’ve gotten similar threats to continue speaking up and speaking out.
Supporting Sarkeesian helps to support every woman who wants to be able to speak out online without fear of violent threats. There’s no better proof of this than how angry the biggest misogynistic bullies get whenever feminists and other people of good conscience rally around her. The bullies are still angry about the money she raised via kickstarter, money that has enabled her to bring a new professionalism to her videos.
Hell, AVFM Bully-in-chief Paul Elam is still so angry about this that he’s already accusing her of “damseling for dollars,” collecting “gash-cash” because of these latest Twitter threats. Indeed, in a post that’s a lot more revealing than he intends it to be, he complains bitterly that she’s getting bigger donations than he is:
I am jealous. I have had half the major media in a couple of countries disingenuously and maliciously demonize me. Even after forcing some retractions I bet I got more threats than Sarkeesian.
My reward? Jack shit.
Maybe it was because I didn’t swoon hard enough or treat the threats like they were tickets to Disneyworld.
Oh, don’t be modest, Paul. You take in tens of thousands every year by pretending to be some sort of human rights generalissimo. You raked in $35,000 this summer by trumpeting “threats” that you were saying privately were phony.
While Elam “damsels” and fumes, Sarkeesian simply goes about doing the job she set out to do. Each video she puts out is yet another “fuck you” to her haters, and they know it.
U mad bros?
Here’s the video that caused all the stir. It’s well worth watching. CONTENT WARNING: Graphic violence against women.
Posted on August 28, 2014, in a voice for men, a woman is always to blame, advocacy of violence, antifeminism, are these guys 12 years old?, Dean Esmay, entitled babies, evil women, harassment, mantrum, men who should not ever be with imaginary women ever, men who should not ever be with women ever, misogyny, MRA, no games for girls, no girls allowed, not-quite-plausible deniability, paul elam, rape culture, sarkeesian!, threats, video games and tagged a voice for men, anita sarkeesian, anti-feminism, antifeminism, men's rights, misogyny, MRA, reddit, threats, twitter. Bookmark the permalink. 649 Comments.
Lea, no one is saying it’s a person’s fault if their toe is stomped on. However, there’s no empathy here, no awareness of the fact that the goal is to shame some toe-stompers into becoming aware of the inherent nastiness in toe-stomping. To shame and bully them into doing something about it. It’s like policing people’s fantasies, judging them for their thought crimes. If you consider how many toe-stompers stomp to escape the world of bullying, this would be perceived as simply another attack. Does that justify toe-stomping? No, but can no one even consider where that might be coming from?
Breakfastman- Never! The South was WELL on its way to ending slavery on their own. They were just doing it gradually. Weening themselves off of it like one would do a potent drug. Having that civil war (that they started BTW) was so unnecessary and evil because the North were just a bunch of big bullies. Especially those Abolitionists. I mean, won’t someone think of the white dudes?
pawsjones- It’s actually quite common and EXTREMELY maddening when MRAs and anti-feminists appropriate feminist/womanist/SJ language for their bullshit arguments. They misappropriate it and turn the whole damn thing into farce.
redpoppy: Yup. I’ve taken to referring to it as Cargo Cult social justice. They use the terms, attempting to get the veneer, but with no understanding of the substance.
@pawsjones
Hi!
@redpoppy
They surely do, and I know it all too well. I’m not in the least surprised, it just gets to me more some days.
@Auntie Alias
Hello! May I be so bold as to say I adore your nick, it’s brilliant!
So a history that includes threatening his then girlfriend with murder-suicide doesn’t count as a pattern of behaviour? I’m going to side-eye that. I definitely agree that what happened to him in prison was horrible.
Can you prove that they are sexist.
Can you describe what a sexist game would look like to you? What would a video game have to entail for you to consider it sexist?
On the subject of “gash cash”, that phrase (or rather, juxtaposition of words) has been around for quite awhile. The first time I saw it was on a full-page phone sex ad in a porn magazine (Hustler’s Barely Legal, in case anyone’s curious) in the early 1980s. Specifically, it said “More ga$h for your ca$h”. Note that the magazine wasn’t mine; I was only something like 7 or 8 at the time. Also, I considered the pictures and ads which consisted of the bulk of the magazine to be boring and mostly read what few articles it contained; mainly remember that ad because of that odd wording.
As a side note, I also remember one article in particular, “The services of a slut” (or something similar, don’t remember the exact title) which also struck me as weird at the time, though I wouldn’t have been able to say exactly why back then – it was basically anti-slut-shaming, sort of, while making sex to be all about the man’s pleasure.
And as a further note, I wouldn’t be surprised if at least some of the MRA were exposed to such things at a very young age (seriously, even pre-internet, at least some children had easy access to porn) and were thoroughly corrupted by it.
@pawsjones
Thanks! Are the paws in your user name kitty paws?
“No one has even once said You are bad people for liking this”
Of course they have. That’s the whole point of pointing out the violent imagery in video games. That’s the whole motivation behind social justice, to try and shame people into becoming aware of their behavior.
“However, there’s no empathy here, no awareness of the fact that the goal is to shame some toe-stompers into becoming aware of the inherent nastiness in toe-stomping”
No, when somebody steps on your toe, I think you should assume it is personal, deliberate, and motivated by nastiness. Then you should revel in your feelings of persecution and launch a good campaign to get toe stepping regulated and banned.
@insanitybytes22:
(Hey, btw, the topic is “misogyny,” not just violent imagery. Don’t leave out the sexism and pretend this is just people grasping pearls at violence existing in games)
You don’t understand what shaming is. Saying something is bad isn’t shaming. A result of pointing out the bad thing might be that people are ashamed that the bad thing exists, but that’s just a side effect.
Social Justice is not about making the oppressors or the privileged feel bad. It’s about fighting for the rights of the oppressed and the non-privileged.
Get it right.
Yeah, no. Back away from the word “shaming,” I think it’s tripping you up. Might watch out for “bullying” as well.
Deliberate toe-stepping IS banned by law. It’s called ‘assault’. Your examples are as tortured as the dudes in my mentions.
Ninja’d by kirbywarp.
@insanitybytes22 By that logic aren’t you trying to “shame” and “bully” people with your posts? Your clearly arguing that the sort of behavior here and in Sarkeesian’s videos is flawed. So why are your criticisms valid, but those of others just attacks?
Alright, I’ll bite: what sort of thing would constitute “irrefutable proof” of sexism, Exuin?
And yet here you are, doing the misogynist equivalent of demanding transitional fossils and linking to Answers In Genesis.
@Auntie Alias
They are, yeah, even if just a tribute nowadays as I am kitty-less since last year (part of why it’s taken me so long to start commenting, too many kitties when one is mourning one’s own).
@insanitybytes22: “Of course they have. That’s the whole point of pointing out the violent imagery in video games. That’s the whole motivation behind social justice, to try and shame people into becoming aware of their behavior.”
No, they haven’t. That is not anyone’s opinion, and certainly not Anita, as she has mentioned multiple times in the series that it is entirely possible and okay to like things that are problematic (parts 2 and 3 of the damsel videos, specifically), so long as you can accept that they aren’t perfect and they have those problematic elements. I, for instance, am a fan of both the Hitman games (which are exploitative as hell) and the works of HP Lovecraft (which can often be racist as hell). The point of social justice is to get more people to see those problems so we can move past them, to something better for everyone.
@ib22:
This is one of your things where you try to make our position look silly by using toe-stepping as a metaphor, right? So are you saying misogyny is only real if it is personal, deliberate, and motivated by nastiness? Are you saying that sexism in games is just a mistake, like accidentally stepping on a toe? “Oops, sorry, accidentally spent a month of development time getting this in-game cut-scene of a woman being beaten to work properly. My bad.”
Are you saying that people are “reveling in feelings of persecution” when they try to point out that “hey, lots of games use women, usually sex workers, in the background as corpses or cheap character development for the male characters?”
Inquiring minds wish to know.
@BreakfastMan Well said, inanitybytes also ignores the idea that criticism as a medium is not designed to tear down. It exists to bring flaws to view so that they can be strengthened. Any good artist that I’ve ever known is quick to thank their editors and critics because without them they will never improve.
Hell no aspect of human existence improves until someone is willing to point out the flaws inherent to it.
OK, I haven’t red the comments, so just jumping in here.
I have not exactly “enjoyed” watching Sarkeesian’s videos, but I have watched them all, because they are fascinating, informative, and valuable.
I told my Mom about it, today, and she just gave a blank look. “They wouldn’t really do that.”
“Yep. It’s part of the game. I saw video. Grand Theft Auto, for example…”
“What’s that?”
I envy my mother her innocence.
I saw another screed about how this guy played the game through 60 times, and never saw anyone doing to the female NPCs what Sarkeesian demonstrated on her video, so he claimed that it’s not that bad (only a small percentage of the game actually involves this), and that she must have actually performed the acts FOR the video, to show off what players can (but DON’T! They’d NEVER!) do in game.
Well, that’s kind of her point. The games were designed so that you *could* do this stuff. If there was absolutely no market for it, if no gamers ever wanted to do that, why would the game designers bother to include ALL. THAT. CODING?
Answer? They wouldn’t. They wrote that code because they had enough people asking for it. So, dude who says you never saw it – bully for you. Have you interviewed all the male gamers out there? Because I guarantee, the ones who would do it are definitely out there, and they have the ears of the designers.
If the designers dropped the coding from the games, then these oh-so-righteous male gamers wouldn’t even notice, because they never actually participate in any of it, and it’s just a tiny fraction of the game, anyway. But the game designers could then claim to be oh-so-righteous, too! Yaaay!
It’s all disgusting.
Do you often walk up to strangers and demand that they pay attention to you, or is your entitlement limited to online interactions?
And if it had, it would have been parody or something.
@IB, Fuck your “but they were bullied!” bullshi. I was bullied. I was abused. And yet, you don’t see me threatening to show up at black people’s houses and rape them to death when they point out the entrenched racism in my hobbies. Having been bullied doesn’t absolve people of the responsibility for basic fucking decency.
I think of them as parrots, repeating words without really understanding their meaning. But MRAs aren’t nearly as cute as Disco:
@Pawsjones, hi and welcome!
The difference between “please don’t make games like this” and “please don’t play games like this”: learn it.
weirdwoodtreehugger:
Angry nerdbros always assume that there is no such thing as nerd ladies who were painfully shy and awkward throughout most of their youth and mercilessly bullied for their niche obsessions. Apparently we just spring fully-formed out of the ground in our early twenties, shimmy into our sexy superhero costumes and proceed to stalk hapless nerds around ComicCon so we can ensnare them with our fake nerd cred and lady charms.
Meanwhile, in reality, I wasn’t particularly shy, but as a teenager I had terrible acne, no idea how to dress myself and was so socially awkward that I still cringe thinking about my poor clueless thirteen year old self. I also openly cared about doing well at school and had no idea that this is basically social suicide until it was too late to hide it. I was more or less invisible to guys my own age until I went to university. My teenage years were so lonely and painful that I can still keep myself awake for half the night replaying the excruciating details in my head.
Yet I’ve somehow managed to restrain myself from sending graphic torture fantasies to people who criticize my hobbies.
insanitybytes22:
This is just silly bullshit. Critiquing a piece of media is not bullying in any way, shape or form. Saying so is hugely insulting to anyone who has ever actually been bullied. Do you also feel “shamed” if when people you see advertisements highlighting poverty and asking you to donate money? Bloody hell, and I thought it was women who were supposed to be overly sensitive.
No, it’s actually nothing like that, at all, on any level, because unlike “thought crimes”, videogames are actual physical things that are consumed by millions of peoples and play a role in shaping culture and attitudes. By this logic, no one should critique any media ever, because all media is inevitably tied up with someone’s inner fantasies and critiquing it might hurt their feelings.
I see IB22 in the “recent comments” sidebar on this article and wonder …should I bash my head against a wall now or should I wait until I read the thread? Hmmm….
Disco is too cute! MRAs…..not so much. :/
tinyorc- I’ve also been a nerd/geek all of my life. I really hate it when they completely dismiss girl geeks because they think we aren’t “real.” We’ve been here the whole time if you fucking bothered to be aware of your stupid surroundings instead of your own selfish bullshit. I also had to deal with being horribly awkward and liking good grades and history and dressing frumpily and all the social backlash that entails. A good hearty, fuck you, to these assholes is well deserved.
tinyorc:
I believe IB22 is self-designated a woman (and cis-sexual, to the best that I’ve been able to discern), and we usually let folks stick with their preferred designation, even if they are utterly awful human beings regardless of sex or gender (which IB22 definitely is).
@freemage, oops, my bad and I apologize to IB22 for misgendering her.
@tinyorc & redpoppy Seriously have these idiots never been in a game story. I’m lucky enough to live by a truly awesome game and comic store and you can’t swing a cat (plush cat of course) without hitting a geek girl. And not the mythical fake geek girl either hard core magic players and comic collectors. Not so many female Warhammer geeks though. Which is unfortunate.
@emilygoddess
Hi, and thank you!
BUZZZZZ WRONG!
The purpose is to get people to CHANGE their behavior, so that non-privileged people don’t have to suffer. Making privileged people feel bad does nothing useful to the victims of social injustice. We don’t care about your damn guilt, because this isn’t about YOUR feelings.
Following your tortured metaphor: it doesn’t matter if the toe-stomping was accidental or not, it still hurts – and it would do good for you to change your behavior so you don’t go around tripping on other people’s toes all the time. Instead you scream bloody murder and say that others should move out of the way instead. What about no?
Heh. The last tournament I was in (King of Tokyo), I sat down and looked across the table to see a bright fourteen year old girl. She grinned at me, and I quailed. And then she introduced herself as, and I’m not kidding, “Medea”.
Needless to say, she kicked the collective ass of everyone at our table.
pendraegon- You’d be happy to know that I know at least one gal who is into Warhammer. I, myself, haven’t really played any of the games or painted any of the models, but I find the whole universe fascinating. Especially Warhammer 40k. My friend is super into Adepta Sororitas.
For that matter, I really like Adepta Sorirtas. They’re so bad ass it hurts in the most delicious of ways.
emilygoddess:
Yeah, this. By IB22 logic, numerous English professors were “bullying” and “shaming” me throughout my university career by pointing out problematic racial tropes in some of my favourite books and plays. Edward Said probably wrote Orientalism back in 1978 deliberately to make me feel awful for liking Aladdin. And don’t even get me started on the lecturer who explained Tolkien’s racism to us – doesn’t she understand that I used to turn to Lord of the Rings to escape from my sad lonely childhood? In fact, the whole Postcolonial Literature course was probably designed to make me feel like an asshole.
Lady, you’re a friggin’ idiot. I mean, thanks for stopping by and proving you don’t shit about social justice and a host of other things, but Jesus, don’t you have anything better to do with your life?
@redpoppy LOL I respect the sororitas but at the end of the day it’s Greenskins all the way. Da red ones go fastah!! after all. :)
Seriously though almost every gaming group I’ve played with has had one or two female players, and frankly were the better for it. I’ve noticed, at least amongst my friends, when there’s a mix of genders at the table we’re more likely to engage in actual role playing rather than just kicking open the door, killing the orc and taking his loot.
pendraegon- Hehehe so you like da Boyz, eh? My ex really liked dem Orks. He once wrote an entire battle synopsis using their particular brand of speech. It’s rather Cockney sounding, isn’t it?
@redpoppy It is, which interestingly was deliberate when the system was being created since it was considered a low class dialect by the developers. The Orks were always my favorite though I still miss the rules that let you steal abilities from other armies by modifying the figures. Now if you add an Eldar weapon to an Ork unit it just turns into a generic shootah.
I have to say, the community seems pretty invigorated today. Maybe that blow-up the other night was something we really needed.
Hey, speaking of invigorated, IB22 has wandered over to the Heartiste/Don Draper thread and dropped another stinkbomb of that special brand of stupidity that she buys in cartons of discount non-sequitors.
This ought to be required reading for all the fauxtraged dudebros pretending that someone pointing out unpleasant things in games clearly means that critic hates games:
How To Be A Fan Of Problematic Things.
e.g. I love Scrubs. But I can totally understand how it could be upsetting to the point of being unwatchable for someone with a different set of life experiences, privileges or beliefs. There’s a lot I cringe at (racial and gender stereotypes, depiction of sexual harassment that sometimes gets extremely disturbing, a heck of a lot of gender policing, just to name a few).
That doesn’t mean I’m saying anybody who likes that show is evil, or that all copies of the DVDs should be thrown into the woodchipper, or even that I don’t like the show. It just means I appreciate that it’s flawed (deeply, deeply flawed, sometimes).
Kirbywarp : Social Justice is not about making the oppressors or the privileged feel bad. It’s about fighting for the rights of the oppressed and the non-privileged.
Maybe – but you don’t have to look too far to find some using it as a means of boosting their own egos and engaging in social swarming of designated targets.
Lovecraft and Tolkien were racist, and I still enjoy their writings a lot. I’m willing to admit that they’re racist.
It was a bit painful to me when it was pointed out in Tolkien’s case. I hadn’t thought about it…but it was pretty obvious, and also obvious that I’d not noticed it because I’m Caucasian. Which was a bit embarrassing to realize.
I didn’t go ballistic or issue death threats, a’aight? I just accepted a somewhat painful and obvious truth about an author and series of works I loved.
So…
…What I don’t get is the absolute outrage when Sarkesian points out the sexism. Would it pain the fans of these games to simply say “Yeah, ok, I hadn’t thought about that before, there it is.”
Well, considering she’s getting death threats, apparently it DOES pain them that much.
I don’t get it. It’s not like she’s paying someone to code this stuff in, it’s in the game.
In fact I’d heard about the “shooting the hooker to get your money back” thing that the latest incarnation of GTA did way before any of this.
So…is looking at and/or engaging in female NPC exploitation REALLY that important to the male gamer’s enjoyment of gameplay? The reaction kinda says it might be, doesn’t it?
That’s a pretty scary thought.
Oh for fuck’s sake… STOP USING BULLYING TO JUSTIFY BIGOTRY!!!!!!!!! JUST FUCKING STOP!!!!!!
I had my fucking nose broken in fucking Kindergarten. KINDERGARTEN! At 13 and 14 I was suicidal as hell and was in fact told, many times, by my fucking peers, that I should kill myself. I can’t count how many times I was asked in fucking high school if I’m going to “go all Columbine at the school”. I cannot tell you how many fucking times the women I found attractive called me ugly, and how I was made fun of mercilessly for being a fucking virgin (which was assumed… I never fucking talked about it until I started my fucking blog a couple years ago). Whenever I walked into a fucking room, people would point at me and just start fucking laughing. Even some of my fucking teachers bullied me.
I still suffer really bad social anxiety and phobia over this. I still get a twinge of paranoia whenever any group of people I’m not actually talking to starts laughing, because my first thought is “they’re laughing at me” and I want to run and fucking hide.
And yet here I fucking am, not screaming about how terrible “Social Justice Warriors” are and supporting feminist causes and fucking calling out bigotry where I see it.
I’m throwing my glove in the ring. If you’re a misogynistic shithead… if you think the whole point of social justice is to shame people… you were not bullied. You were one of the fucking popular jocks who did the bullying.
Prove me wrong you shits.
(For the record, this is directed at IB22 and anyone else who uses this same reasoning.)
Can we have a rule that IB can only piddle in the corner in one thread at a time? This is getting tedious. I’m all for feeding the fun trolls until they burst, but this one is just a mean-spirited pain in the ass.
@Tinyorc
Sample dialog post Elliott Rodger shootings:
Some guy: I’m not defending his killing spree, but women have to understand how incredibly painful it is to be young, awkward, and dateless — to be romantically rejected — to be alone.
Me: We do understand. In fact, women experience the exact same thing.
Some guy: But it’s not the same.
Me: Explain how.
Some guy: …….
blahlistic:
Or even just say “Ok, I don’t care, this has no impact on my life” and continue shooting hookers in GTA or whatever. Nerdbros, no one is taking away your pixelated boobies any time soon! All we’re suggesting is that the boobies could be attached to playable characters more often, or at least to NPCs who serve the plot beyond getting raped and murdered.
“…if I already didn’t have long experience with watching you continuously misconstrue conversations and dance around the point.”
“Edward, I know who you are and yes, you’re a sexist asshole. I did not say that you are a sexist asshole because you criticize Anita’s work and you know it. Don’t play dumb. I said I was familiar with you and with your bullshit. Don’t show up here and expect no one to know you from elsewhere. You like to go to feminist spaces and act like an asshole. You have a history of it. You should leave. Go play with your friends at the Slime Pit.”
Who are you and why are you watching me? In any event, there is another mild criticism of Sarkeesian that I have, though not one that’s particularly her fault. When you take someone like say, Roger Ebert – he could be brutal in his reviews, but he also could be quite complimentary. He critiqued movies, but you could tell he loved movies. Sarkeesian’s videogame series has gotten a little bit preachy, and while not explicitly saying so seems to suggest if you like games like Grand Theft Auto you hate women. This is obviously rubbish, and triggers a strong defensive reaction in people. I know she isn’t saying that, but her critiques do come across that way a bit. There isn’t a lot of love for games that comes across in her videos.
@strivingally, I was thinking of linking to that essay, but I didn’t think IB22 would bother to read it.
And yeah, Scrubs. It’s one of my all-time favorite shows and I still quote it all the time, but goddamn if JD isn’t an enormous sexist asshole.
You haven’t heard her gush about Papa & Yo, have you? Or watched the latest one all the way through to the end? Or seen her playing Zelda?
I can’t imagine anybody who didn’t love the medium would play through as many hours of games as A.S. has to get the footage and examples for her videos.
I love gaming (eight games machines in my house, from across multiple generations). That doesn’t mean I don’t agree with Anita that there’s a lot of problems with portrayals of women in games. In fact, someone who’s not invested is *less likely* to bother trying to agitate for change, simply because it’s a waste of their time.
Also I have no doubt that if Sarkeesian had been less formal, analytical and dispassionate in her delivery, she’d be slammed for being a bimbo, knowing nothing about her subject matter and playing the “fake geek girl”.
Welcome to another round of You’re Female And You Can’t Win!
Gah. Sorry, my last comment is obviously addressed to Edward.
@Julie, RIGHT!? I encounter that attitude so much – this idea that men, for some ill-defined Reasons, feel rejection much more keenly and deeply than women, like it’s a super special brand of Male Loneliness that we ladies could never possibly understand.
Like a lot of sexism, I think it comes down to empathy. Men, in general, aren’t really expected to be able to empathize with women in the same way women are expected to empathize with men. Most mainstream media doesn’t treat female characters as full human beings with the same emotional breadth and depth as men. Media that does centre women and their emotional lives and relationships tends to be considered niche and low quality – chick flicks, romance novels, etc. So when we tell men that we do actually experience rejection and yes, it fucking hurts for us too, they are genuinely surprised and take a while to process the idea that we might also have complex inner lives that don’t conform to stereotypes.
Men feel rejection more accutely than women?
Is that what people who think women aren’t fully human believe?
If men do feel rejection more acutely it’s because it’s wounding their sense of entitlement, not because they just have more or deeper feels in general.
…I had that in my teens and 20’s. I find it more sucky than my return to agoraphobia…Funny how I find it less painful to think people might want to kill me than they are laughing at me.
You’re awesome. Don’t let the bastards get you down, man.
@Shiraz, it seriously seems to be a real belief that some men hold. I’ve seen it used to justify everything from catcalling to domestic violence, and even had conversations about it with male acquaintances IRL, whose arguments basically boiled down to “but you don’t understaaaaAAAAAAaaaaaaand.”
cassandrakitty:
Boom. Nailed it.
@strivingally
I don’t disagree with you – I’m not saying she doesn’t love games, but her presentation makes it look like she doesn’t. For example, Grand Theft Auto is a very popular and very highly rated game. By just about any standard, it is a good game. However, the way she critiques focuses entirely on the problems with it, and none of the good. Critiques can always cause hard feelings, but if the viewer feels you are being unfair or misrepresentative, it can cause a lot of hurt feelings.
For example, take a movie like Taxi Driver. It’s a critical favorite and a popular film that deals with a lot of different issues. If you tried to critique the movie by reducing down into a simple example of misogyny, you would insult a lot of people who like the film.
Hugs if you want them Nathan. And solidarity. I didn’t get it quite as bad as you, but bad enough.
I am a big fan of the Chronicles of Narnia and it suffers from a lot of the same issues as Tolkien’s writings. Also, I’m not even remotely Christian. But I still greatly enjoyed the stories and the overall universe. But I definitely recognize how problematic it is. I would not recommend the series to anyone of the Muslim faith. Really not a good series of books for Muslims or people of Middle Eastern descent.
I also don’t get the feeling at ALL that Anita hates video games. I think she loves them so much that she feels it is THIS important to go through all the really terrible aspects of games and point out why they are terrible. She, like many many other gamers, want to IMPROVE the quality of video games BECAUSE we love them so much.
Edward Gemmer: Me? Just a dude that’s been reading Freethoughtblogs since it was founded, and Scienceblogs since that was founded. You stand out.
And as for your “mild suggestion”, you do realize this is the first of her topes vs women in video games videos which didn’t have the following disclaimer at the beginning:
“As always, please keep in mind that it’s entirely possible to be critical of some aspects of a piece of media while still finding other parts valuable or enjoyable.”
Apparently, that’s not enough. Would you like her to stroke your hand, and tell you “There there, I really don’t think you’re a terrible person for playing a video game where you murder a prostitute in a snuff bar to use her body as a distraction”.
Would that be enough?
@tinyorc
“but you don’t understaaaaAAAAAAaaaaaaand.”
Ah yes, I’ve heard that before. I put that one on a shelf next to, “Give him a chaaaaaaaace.”
“If she really liked games then she wouldn’t be so critical about this game that many people like” really isn’t a very strong argument. Critics are not obliged to carefully work around the feelings of people who are fans of any given cultural product when critiquing it.
Reblogged this on Just a History Geek and commented:
From David Futrelle, another insight into the impacted bowel of the internet that is the manosphere.
I’m thinkimg I should start a new battle cry. “I critique because I LOVE TOO MUCH!” Not all criticisms come from a place of love but I feel it is apt for this situation.
Despite my better judgement I checked /v/.
featured flat out chemtrail level conspiracy theories about zoe quinn
whining about PAX changing some mens bathrooms into womens bathrooms
and just general AAAA SJWS ARE GONNA STEAL MY VIDYAGAMES nonsense
Lady Gamer: You’re stomping on my foot.
Gamebro: No I’m not.
LG: Yes you are. Could you please stop?
GB: Ugh, I’m just stomping up and down for fun. I can’t even tell whether your foot’s there.
LG: Well, it is, and you’re stomping on it.
GB: Then you’d best leave. Because I decided this is the room where stomping happens.
LG: But it’s the room with the cool toys and snacks and stuff. I even brought some of the snacks. I just want to have a good time without getting my foot stomped on.
GB: See, this is why people with feet shouldn’t be allowed in here. They’re too mentally inferior to understand our culture.
LG: Why does our culture include stomping on my foot?
GB: I didn’t say I was stomping on your foot. You said that, which makes YOU the REAL foot-stomper.
LG: Ow! You did it again!
GB: Prove it.
LG: You’re doing it right now!
GB: That’s just an isolated incident.
LG: Fine. (three hours later) Here’s extensive video footage of you stomping on my foot and other people’s feet, along with a lengthy academic explanation of how stomping on people’s feet causes pain.
GB: Argh, what is this burning sensation? It’s…shame! You made me feel bad for stomping on your foot!
LG: So you’ll stop doing it?
GB: I’M GOING TO KILL YOU BITCH. KILL YOU WITH STOMPING.
LG: …You don’t get to share my snacks.