Many of you are no doubt aware of this already, but I just wanted to highlight a recent appalling example of the rampant misogyny in the gaming community online: the harassment that feminist pop culture analyst and video blogger Anita Sarkeesian has gotten for her Tropes Vs Women Kickstarter project, a video project designed to “explore, analyze and deconstruct some of the most common tropes and stereotypes of female characters in games.”
Her YouTube page has been inundated with comments calling her, among other things, a “Dumb ass nazi [obscene gender-related slur],” “faggo.. I mean lesbian,” and “the reason why womens are the inferior gender for the whole history of mankind.” IRONY ALERT: while some are calling her a Nazi, or comparing her to the KKK, others are denouncing her as a “bolshevik feminist jewess” and a “fucking ovendodger.”
And still others are defacing her Wikipedia entry with all sorts of vile shit. (Here’s a screenshot.)
Here’s her discussion of the harassment, which includes screenshots of some of the comments.
An Escapist piece on the harassment, which is where I got the quotes above.
A Jezebel piece, “When There’s So Much Bullshit Online, You Forget How to Feel.”
A piece on The Mary Sue, “The All-Too-Familiar Harassment Against Feminist Frequency, and What The Gaming Community Can Do About It”
Kotaku also weighed in, leading one commenter there to note that similarly misogynistic comments appear there all the time.
Meanwhile, over on the Men’s Rights subreddit, temple117 garners 138 net upvotes for a post urging poor oppressed men to “Fight back! Sexism exists for males too, support these men in their expose of gender tropes in video games!”
And, joy of joys, Men’s Rights buffoon Bernard Chapin has weighed in on the controversy as well. After dismissing the harassment — using a “funny” voice, apparently the most powerful weapon in his rhetorical arsenal — he suggests that women complain about video games because games are a male thing, and women are jealous that men are paying attention to something other than them. “Whatever the male is enjoying himself at,” he says, “it diverts him from taking orders; that’s got to be the focus of their ire.” Then he accuses Sarkeesian of being without “honor” because she’s asking for money to fund her project. (Might want to take that critique up with your pal Paul “Donate Today” Elam, dude.) His video is below, if you want to waste your time with it.
But before you get to that, here’s something a bit more encouraging on the gamer misogyny front: Comedian/actress/gamer Aisha Tyler’s take-no-prisoners takedown of the misogynist assholes who attacked her for allegedly ruining an Ubisoft press conference at the recent E3 gaming extravaganza, apparently by being too female or something. Here’s a screenshot of her comments, and a surprisingly un-disgusting Reddit discussion of the controversy.
Here’s Bern:
It’s possible I’m oversensitive; as I said, I’m not generally one to get into the fray (here or anywhere else), so I may have entered without the requisite armour. As for myself, I found the posts very hurtful, to the extent that I was perhaps not able to appreciate the “content” as much as would be ideal. Speaking for myself, I don’t think it’s necessary to match criticism with a “tone” such I saw in the posts. But I guess I must remember that I can’t make the internet be how I would ideally like it to be, and that threads like this have a tendency to get somewhat heated, and that I should not take things too personally. I will try to remember, as I hope others here will remember, that (excepting hateful trolls like Owly) we’re on this site because we hate misogyny and want to see it mocked, which means we have a lot of essential things in common – a lot more than our differences. Honestly, I was hurt by those posts, but I recognize that third parties may see the posts differently than I do, and that the posters may not have intended to be really hurtful. Differences and spats aside, we’re on the same side.
Oops, the preceding post was directed at cloudiah. But I guess I’ll direct it to Ithiliana, too.
I guess the best thing at this point, Ithiliana, is to agree to disagree. If my own post came off as quite hurtful, then I apologize.
@Dev: Do you realize that your entire lengthy comment up above is an exended example of tone trolling?
You don’t reply to a single issue of substances that Rutee or I brought to the table.
All you do is go on at length about how mean we are, and how all you want is civil discourse, and how blah blah.
OK, here’s my response to you without a single cuss word: I went back and looked at my comment to you (that’s how I realized your reply to me was nothing but tone trolling and that you didn’t address any issues of substance)–here is a quicky summary of the CONTENT of my post without any nasty cuss words.
1. You didn’t like me calling Idylle a troll. I explained why: “continued missing of the point, despite explanation, and the insistence of trying to use certain phrases (elaborating: in ways that show a fairly severe cluelessness about how those phrases are used). TL;DR: don’t try to lecture me on social justice theory and practice unless you know your stuff. Here’s a protip from an English teacher: words change; people have connotations to words; different places define troll differently. If your feelings can be that destroyed by a bunch of strangers considering you a troll, well, then, maybe stay off the internet?
2, You used a plural pronoun continually (we, our) throughout your to inflate your personal opinion to a community status, trying to give your comments more authority. I don’t recognize your username, neither does pecunium who has both hung out here longer than me and has a better memory for names, so trying to speak in a faux-authoritive manner when you have no authority makes your ethos sink–i.e. by trying to pretend to an authority you don’t have, you come off looking ridiculous.
3. Others have pointed out that you don’t seem to understand what tone troll means: go re-read their comments. Consider why I might consider your response to be tone trolling: i.e. ignore everything that’s said to clutch pearls and bewail incivility, as if incivility in a kyriarchial system is the worst thing evah.
4. More faux-authority–lecturing us on the difficulty of speaking about “women’s issues” in real life and lecturing us on how to go about it here (a place where, again, you are not really a regular commenter). You don’t know anything about our lives, so telling us how difficult it is in “real life” when, as pecuniuum pointed out, internet communication is real communication between real people unless you’re a robot, is making a huge assumption, perhaps a projection.
I live with a woman; I am lucky enought to have a number of women colleagues; I don’t have any problem finding my spaces even in rural Texas to talk about ‘women’s issues’ though I don’t use that term (did you read the part about why I find the use of that term problematic? Any response to that?) Plus, the idea that any discussion of women’s issues MUST contain a “civil” concern for teh poor menz is…..one that is controversial among feminists.
5. Any response to my experiences and knowledge of feminisms? You want to lecture me about what “we” do to get good feminist discussions? Really? Not that I expect you to know anything about anybody here, but assuming that you are more informed than anybody on a blog discussion is likely to result some fairly serious egg on the face.
The issue isn’t wanting to discuss issues–it’s coming in and lecturing (if you were a man, I’d call it mansplaining. I was trying to think of a phrase to use for you, but nothing came to me).
6. How is me saying that your arguments are not strengthened by your genital configuration destroying you? Do you really think by saying “I’m a woman” that would mean something to the participants at this site? Did you mean to imply that anything you said would be lessened if you were a man? Why?
There, see, all nice and polite language to express total disagreement.
So, can you get off your high horse and talk without demanding a degree of what you define as civility that begins to imply that you think any disagreement is uncivil (i.e. projection)?
@Dev: I’m not sure which comment you’re apologizing for–I found neither to be hurtful.
Irritating, repetitive, resonating with anti-feminist rhetoric (“why do you all have to be so mean and angry? why can’t you just be nice?), but not in the least hurtful.
Dev sounded familiar to me, but then I realized I was thinking of Developers^3, not a happy association.
Honestly, Ithiliana, I fail to understand why I have made you so angry. Perhaps you’re stronger than I am, since I have become emotionally exhausted by all this, while you still seem to be going strong. I am done trying to argue with you; we’re obviously not getting anywhere. I read your arguments and I disagree with them, and will continue to disagree with them, and apparently it is the same with you. I get the feeling that, even when we try to talk about the same subject, we’re actually speaking about very different things, which means your arguments breeze past me, and vice versa. We might as well be speaking different languages, and that is no way to argue. I am not going to try anymore. You can continue arguing by yourself, if you like.
So you disagree and yet refuse to make any arguments or respond to anything she’s said. You’d rather talk about how Ithiliana is so angry (she certainly doesn’t seem angry to me) and how she’s hurt your feelings so horribly. Nope, not a concern troll at all! Nothing to see here folks!
Eh, anyone who feels “destroyed” by being told that people thinkg they’re trolling in less than perfectly friendly and conciliatory language is probably going to be miserable commenting anywhere on the internet. It’s rare that I call anyone oversensitive, but in this case…
She isn’t angry really…O_o
Dev, just talk about anything that ithiliana mentioned. She even put them in a numbered list. Just pick one. And say anything about it. Show us that you understand that this conversation involves content.
Dev: Perhaps it’s because I’m neither angry nor particularly emotionally engaged with someone who is wrong on the internet that I can keep on keeping on!
You haven’t made any arguments that I’ve seen (except in your first posts)–it’s been all emotion and hurt and tone trolling.
I don’t care if you agree with me or not–I was laying out some of the reasons a number of us reacted badly to what you thought was civil attempts to engage–you can learn from it, or you can ignore it, and I don’t care.
I don’t think we are talking about the same things–I’ve seen no evidence of it–nor do I buy the crap theory of “different languages.”
But I don’t really care–my serious feminist work is not done here (this is relaxation for me–yep, including the long walls ‘o text), and I learned a long time ago not to care too much what random passersby on the internet think of me (any more than random passersby offline).
I’m not sure if this is a flounce or not–but in any case, toodles!
Dev, now you’re just being assy. You’re still scolding, and now you’re pulling a “poor me” and want to take us on a guilt trip. Careful, or I’ll think I’m dealing with my mom.
What flipped switches earlier–and you were hardly destroyed–was that this is not the venue to trot out “what about the menz.” That you fail to realize this after repeated explanations is on you.
@Hellkell: I know! I mean, considering the Forces of Destruction unleashed on some of the more obnoxious and horrifyingly nasty trolls, what Dev got was nothing!
I will admit the “let’s all be civil and agree to disagree” is one of my buttons–especially when it’s not about what the best pizza toppings are (clearly, canadian bacon and fresh tomatoes sliced on top when it comes out of the oven, thin crust, and extra cheese can be nice but is optional but not required), but about how oppressed men are and how I as a feminist (who was fucking indoctrinated for the first two decades of my life to be NICE to the fucking men) should work on their problems–definitely can piss me off (but that’s not the same as angry).
You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry ;>.
(My dept. head and best friend in the department said that she’d only seen me angry once or twice in the 19 years we’ve known each other, but it was scary as hell–that I turned into a buzz saw….)
Ithiliana, I’m not a fan of the “agree to disagree” either. Not here, anyway.
And usually, the ones who bitch loudest about tone and civility are about to drop a bomb of tone-deafness and incivility theirownselves.
@Hellkell: It’s kind of like the people who interpret free speech as “nobody can criticize me for what I say.”
People who drone on and on about civility are usually concerned about others not treating them by (their own) definition of civility, not about whether they are being civil to others.
And barging into a discussion on one very specific topic about a woman being harassed on the internet for feminist activity to derail to “what about the menz” is seen by many on the internet as rude.
Not civil.
But that did not seem to occur to either Idylle or Dev.
(Not sure I ever said so, but I love your icon–is that one of the Disney Siamese cats from….I keep thinking LADY AND THE TRAMP but that’s probably wrong. Dalmatians? erm, Disney?)
It’s not Si or Am from Lady and the Tramp, it’s something I found years ago on the net and has been in my random pic file. But now I want to find Si or Am!
Holy shit, I have to think you haven’t been to college/been a parent/had parents/had siblings, or you’d have long since shriveled up and died by now. That or you’re just “emotionally exhausted” when it suits you, one or the other.
Many of my favorite college memories involve my undergraduate thesis advisor, who could be just ruthless to you if he thought you weren’t working up to your potential–I got a rough draft of my thesis back once with an entire page crossed out and nothing in the margin but NO in all caps. And you know what? It was a bad fucking argument, which I revised.
hellkell:
*deep breath*
Meeze–a–meeze–a–meeze–a–meeze–a–meeze!
Meeze!
Well, dang, the video’s private now.
It’s the cat from 9 Chickweed Lane.
I love the MRA theory that all horribly misogynistic comments everywhere are being planted by feminists. WTFinF? How can they say that with a straight face?
Yeah, that’s the major difference, that she is actually going to do research on the topic at hand to give an educated perspective, whereas the guy running the misandry in video games series is probably just going to name some things off the top of his head. You know, the reaon MRAs are so angry at her request for money to finance this is because I doubt any of them ever research anything. It’s all reactionary drivel. None of what they say even has a small basis in reality. They have no idea how much time, money, research, and effort goes into a well-crafted documentary.
No, seriously, I’m guessing that these are the same types of people who advertise for free photography/videography/etc services on craigslist. People who expect you to show up with thouands of dollars worth of equipment and training, and to volunteer your time which you could be getting paid for, to work on their shitty projects.
It’s clear that the production value will be nonexistent, and that this will be just another youtube opinion video (which, yes, with the exception of the expense of a webcam and computer which they probably already have, is $0.00). And for this claim that the extra money is going to charity, well, to quote Whitney, “I wanna see the receipts.”
Another vapid schmuck who thinks ‘ad hominem’ is a fancy way to say ‘personal insult’. No no, you see, ad hominem is a very specific kind of logical fallacy, wherein one insults the character of a person to imply their argument is weak.
“Dev can’t be correct, she is a vapid twit” is ad hominem.
“Dev’s failure to understand the concept of a tone troll indicates she is a vapid twit; that she is super concerned with appearance over content is not a good sign of her character” is a personal attack, but is also an attack on your position, and therefore, not a fallacy.
Your inability to look at content does not say positive things about you. A lot more was said than to just call you a tone troll.
Can you read for comprehension? It means the poster is derailing a conversation to whine about tone; You are a textbook example of the fucking concept.
Oh honey, don’t get delusions of grandeur here; I, and I suspect most others, just think you’re a mediocrity. Spite would imply actual effort spent on the dislike, rather than mockery and summary dismissal.
lulzilla. Look, fool, the very thing you are complaining about, you tried to do. You just weren’t successful. As if it’s my fault you can’t play to the audience. But it seems despite your complaints that some of us took the mic from you, you still have one. Curious, isn’t it; it’s as if you’re trying to evoke the imagery of the lone, valorous rebel. Anything to avoid the reality that you’re more an annoying, pompous twit, whining at every perceived moral failing and merely annoying passerby.
What I said to you is the verbal equivalent of phasers set to ‘annoy’. You ain’t seen nothing yet.
You don’t even understand the original definition, do you?
Oh, you don’t mean to cause trouble. Feel my apathy. You derailed to whine about tone.
Anyone else think this is Idylle’s sockpuppet? I’ve been thinking that the whole time, just for the timing and the fact that they seem to operate on the same basic level.
@Rutee: I wondered idly about the possibility of a sockpuppet based on what seemed like some stylistic similarities as well as timing.
Also: the fact that Dev so often uses “Honestly” or similar usages to preface her statements about how she feels pings alarm bells: rather than just saying “I feel X,” to use “honestly” and other types of intensifiers implies falsehood to me (i.e. someone who is trying so hard to appear ‘honest’ that they’re undercutting themselves”).
Well, you’re fucking terrible at it.