Over on The Spearhead, W.F. Price celebrates the harassment directed at Anita Sarkeesian’s Tropes Against Women video project as a sign of a powerful new backlash against the evils of feminism, a backlash he’s proud to be a part of. Dudes being obnoxious to a woman on the internet: Men’s Rights at its finest.
Oh, sure, Price acknowledges, some of the attacks on her were “juvenile” – and thus not as effective as they might otherwise have been — and the controversy did enable Sarkeesian to raise more than $130,000 for her project, but Price even sees this as a victory of sorts:
As for Sarkeesian’s success, we should be happy about it, because I can’t think of a more worthless way to spend over a hundred thousand dollars than in finger-wagging over video games. For one thing, it’s sure to piss even more guys off, and the game industry is very competitive, so her documentary (now expanded to 12 parts!) will likely have zero effect on production and consumption of this form of entertainment. The feminists are simply pissing all the money away, and that’s fine, because this time they’re paying for it themselves.
No question about it: those grapes were definitely sour.
Naturally, the Spearhead regulars were overjoyed by these new signs of, er, progress. Here are some highlights from the discussion that followed; lest I be accused once again of cherry-picking outliers, each and every one of the comments I quote below got literally dozens of net upvotes. This is what these guys really think.
Mojo offers a sort of backlash manifesto:
Feminists will never understand that it is -they- who are the oppressors. They cling to their delusion that they are the ‘underdog’ against the system, even as they control the system.
Revolution requires an enemy class to attack … this is seen as justified when the enemy class controls the system. But feminism is perpetual revolution. So what happens when they gain control over the system? They continue to attack the enemy class, i.e. men, thinking they are striking the next blow against the patriarchy, when what they are doing is more like a pogrom.
Yep, he went there.
Now -they- are the system, they are able and more than willing to intimidate, humiliate, expropriate. It will get indefinitely worse if they have their way. Liberal feminism leads -necessarily- to radical feminism.
Still, we don’t need feminists to ‘understand’ that they are the persecutors (I imagine some of them know this full well and are just misandrist sadists, little Eichmanns). It doesn’t matter what they think or know or understand. What matters is what -we- think, know and understand, and how we are going to act on it.
So … like the swivel-eyed feminist lunatics progressing from attempted assassinations to laying the foundations for institutional and legal abuse … I ask you – what are we going to DO with this knowledge and awareness beyond changing online discourse? …
Thinking like a leftist, though: why not attach ourselves to the GOP in order to subvert its gender politics and radicalize it in the MRA direction? That kind of approach has worked wonders for leftists and their infiltrations into public institutions …
Huh. Reactionary anti-feminists attaching themselves to the Republican Party? No one’s ever thought of that before.
Keyster offers some equally, er, innovative thinking:
Feminism has failed because women as a group adopted the notion of “equality” with men, while stubbornly clinging to their sexual/reproductive power over men. Had feminism truly helped women “realize their greatness”, there’d be far more great women. Instead there’s just more feminists. It’s run it’s course over 3 generations and it’s out of time to prove itself righteous.
The original “male chauvanist pigs” of the early 70′s, were right all along. Women are biologically and chemically ill-equipped to be men. If the Creator had meant women to be more like men, he wouldn’t have given them the ability to bring forth life from their bodies.
Ryu not only embraces the backlash, but seems perfectly fine with the notion that the Men’s Rights movement is a hate movement:
Good. Hatred and anger are power. Whenever you hear someone say “stop the hate”, it is a call to throw down your greatest weapons.
Young Guy purports to speak for all young guys (manginas presumably excepted):
If feminists think men, especially young men, are angry, they don’t know the half of it. As a 26 year-old male, I have seen this society bend over backwards to accommodate women all the time.
The school curriculums are geared toward female success. Schools have countless women’s programs. Female teachers can be as hateful as they want towards male students without facing consequences. People cheer when girls succeed in school, but jeer when boys succeed in school. Even though females have every advantage in the education system, they somehow still have the audacity to complain. They take fluff majors but don’t realize anyone with less than half a brain could pass classes in the humanities and social sciences.
What makes so many MRAs such proud yahoos?.
Oh, and just look at the workplace. Sexual harassment laws give women freedom to dress slutty and still have the nerve to complain when men sneak a peek. If you are a man who has a female co-worker, you have to walk on eggshells everyday or else you can get fired because the twat in the other room got her panties in a bunch over something minor you said. You can be a man who has busted his ass everyday to succeed in your chosen profession, only to see it mean nothing because some woman who was nothing more than an affirmative action hire. If this isn’t bad enough, you get these useless women who are subpar, yet they still never shut up about breaking through the mythical glass-ceiling that they didn’t break and didn’t exist in the first place.
Working men, forever cursed by subpar women.
Also, I have really had enough of women dragging this country down with their dead-weight. Female soldiers, police officers, and firefighters are liabilities. No, all you ladies in these jobs, you aren’t heroes. I am going to go insane if I hear one more female soldier, police officer, or firefighter cry about not getting the respect she thinks she deserves. She doesn’t get respect because she doesn’t deserve respect. The military, law enforcement, and firefighters would be A LOT better off if women stopped lowering the bar to astronomical proportions.
“Lowering the bar to astronomical proportions?” Young Guy here has clearly not yet mastered the fine art of metaphor.
He blabs on a bit longer before wrapping up with:
The backlash is not only real, but it is well-deserved. Apologies won’t erase the damage which has been done. Acting like what happened because of feminism either didn’t happen or was minor is a slap in the face. Saying women have suffered from feminism just as much as men is like spitting in the faces of all the men who have suffered ten lifetimes of pain because of feminism.
Not one, not two, not five, but ten lifetimes of pain? MRAs really are the world’s greatest drama kings.
Andrew S., meanwhile, seems a little confused as to what feminists would like to see happening in the video game industry:
It will be interesting to see if feminists can ruin the gaming industry like they ruin pretty much everything else. There is a lot of money being made off “gamers,” and even guys like me who play the occasional game but aren’t hardcore contribute a lot of money to the industry.
I doubt there are a lot of young guys and men out there who are going to want to play games that involve a bunch of screaming feminists, and where the object of the game is to destroy the “evil patriarchy.” The truth is guys who play games want their female characters to be either hot, large breasted, ass kicking types, or sexy non-feminist types that you save. If the gaming industry changes this dynamic to much due to Feminist/liberal pressure they will destroy a cash cow. And feminism will have yet another “victory.”
Unrestricted and uncriticized access to giant tittied video game ladies: a sacred men’s right!
Kevin evidently speaks for many when he says he wants video games to remain a boys club:
Video games are pretty much the only place that feminism can’t invade unless the principle consumers of them want it. You don’t have to play with girls, or listen to girls, or do other pansy shit. You probably can’t leave a football team and join a different one that has no women, you sure as hell can do that online. Don’t like all the teamwork talk? Play by yourself.
Feminists don’t like video games because; they can’t make them, they can’t force you to buy them or play them even if they did, they couldn’t ruin the experience for you unless you wanted them to.
You can do anything feminists don’t want you to do, and best of all you’re rewarded for it.
Anonymous Age 70 doesn’t even play video games, but he was pleased to learn that you can shoot ladies in them:
Speaking of video games, I am reminded of my son 8 or 10 years ago. I visited him, and he had some kind of shoot-em-up video game. He was partnered with a dearie, and the instant the game started, he always put a bullet in the middle of her forehead. Then, he’d laugh as if it were the funniest thing ever.
I told him he was a sick man, but I was also laughing as if it were the funniest thing ever.
Seriously, he told me he performed better with her dead than needing to be protected.
A great analogy for marriage 2.0, yes?
Women, can’t live them, can’t shoot them in the head. Except in video games!
Criticizing video games is misandry!
Wanna see me generalize about men? On average, men tend to like slender hour-glass figured women with well-defined, well-proportioned breasts, buttocks, long legs, long hair, and thick full red lips.
Okay…so I don’t look like that. What should I do?
1. Roll around on the ground wailing about how cruel life is and how awful men are and I WILL NEVER HAVE SEX BECAUSE I AM OPPRESSED. (This was how I spent high school. It was very attractive.)
2. Surgically alter my entire body.
3. Realize that “the average man” does not mean “all the men” and I’ll probably have more luck in the dating scene if I go after men who actually like me, rather than some Platonic ideal of femaleness.
4. Remember that, despite not looking like Miss Buxley from “Beetle Bailey,” I somehow managed to get married.
5. Reflect that a civil rights movement that’s mostly worried about getting its members laid probably does not have a lot of real civil rights problems.
3bis: realize that a lot of men will judge you badly anyway, for having done cosmetic surgery.
@ShadetheDruid: RICE PUDDING! I love!
I can make it either old fashioned way (start with uncooked rice) or newfangled time saver way (start with cooked rice), and it’s damn good.
And BREAD PUTTING. YUM!
I’m a “let’s put in molasses as primary sweetener” for bread pudding.
thebionicmommy wrote: ”I was annoyed at Rosin bashing Ann Romney…”
What Rosin said was: ”Guess what? His wife has actually never worked a day in her life. She’s never really dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of the women in this country are facing.” This after Romney said that Ann had told him about the economic concerns of women around the USA.
I don’t see how that can be read as an indictment of all stay-at-home wives and/or mothers, unless you only focus on the second sentence. For the Romneys to talk about how their own lives enable them to understand the economic woes of so many of us, no, I don’t think they deserve a pass even while we acknowledge that raising five children is hard work.
From what you’ve written, I think you’re probably in the same place that my mother was. It made no sense for her to try to work outside the home as long as my sisters and I hadn’t started school. She worked hard at home, taking care of three children and a husband, cooking, cleaning, gardening, canning, making all our clothes, very active in the Church and the PTA. Once my younger sister started school, though, my mother wanted to go into nursing, not only for her own satisfaction, but from the realization that my father’s salary would probably never be enough to buy a house or for us to afford to attend college. Her earning a salary did make a big difference in our lives.
For us to act as if Ann Romney has a clue as to the choices women like my mother or you had to make, no. That’s ignoring the tremendous wealth of the Romneys.
Kyrie is right about Sherlock.
Going back on the gaming subject…What does everyone think of Adventure Games…Anyone play old school games like Heroes Quest, Kings Quest, and the like? or the modern ones like The longest Journey, and Monkey Island?
I had really bad experiences when I tried playing Diablo 2 online…players forced you to challange duels and were often very sexist and racist….I tried laying Diablo 3 online and pretty much got the same thing…not towards me but the chats were all like “thats so gay” “women suck” blah blah so yeah…I like to only play with friends or by myself.
Honestly, I get sort of annoyed by SAHM mom critizising as well…the Feminieste article wasn’t mean spirited or anything, but you know what, what works for people works for people.
@Pecunium
What is a Schlemmertopf?
It’s clearly a german word, but as a german, i have never actually heard of it before. Is it a pot? A recipe? Google doesn’t give me any clear answers.
I feel confused.
Yeah, I’ve played the Monkey Island games, they’re awesome.
Katz: did you do that? 🙂
Warning, another long rambley post by me! 😀
I can’t comment on the adventure games part because they aren’t really my thing, but on the topic of online gaming, it can be pretty horrible. Any time I play online I turn off the chat if I can, for a start. And I say that as someone who’s privileged, so obviously I don’t have the same experience as someone who’s actually the target of the comments.
And that’s not even getting into the douchey players that do their best to ruin the fun of others. They’re like trolls, except you can’t ignore them.
Though i’ve found that not all games are the same either. Recently i’ve only played like… two online games, but neither of them were awful experiences.
One was the Guild Wars 2 beta, and didn’t see any incidents there (not to mention people actually help each other, the game is set up quite nicely to encourage teamwork and non-doucheyness). The other was me playing a bunch of Blacklight Retribution, and i’ve only seen one incident in that (where someone was actually called out for saying something was “gay”, though they doubled down and were defended by a couple of others), which is impressive for an FPS game. I totally expected a game series like Diablo to have an awful community though.
I also try to play with friends if I can, and rarely with random strangers, though I don’t have many friends so that can be hard. 😛
Kyrie: No, found it online courtesy of someone who apparently thinks like you.
As a female gamer on the go, I mostly play handheld games- anything from simple puzzle games to complicated SRPGS (Disgaea! <3). I have actually heard Guys on the Internetz (TM?) try to argue that handheld gamers aren't "real" gamers because we don't have console-graphics blockbuster FPS games to play all the day long.
To that I say- Is it a game? Do you play it? Then you're a gamer.
If you want to be a hipster elitist douchebag and randomly disinclude people just because of their gender or race or sexuality, there's this place called STFU that you can visit and hopefully never leave.
ShadetheDruid-Guild Wars is fun! It is also great that you can just buy the game without playing tons of money a month for
Nanasha–Amen! honestly, I am starting to get annoyed at this, if it isn’t a game where you are fighting a bunch of creatures, or shooting things then it isn’t a real game. Like what is the differnce between someone who plays hours of SIMS and hours of Halo? They are both games!
Hypothetical man: “Karalora, how can I be attractive to women?”
Me: “Odds are, you already are. Maybe not all women, maybe not even most women, but it’s a big world. Find the women who are attracted to men like you. Bathing generally helps, as well as not acting like an entitled creep.”
It’s funny, that exact thing (people’s denial of certain games as “real” games) came up a bunch of posts ago, but it got buried under all the troll droppings. 😛
Sigh…I remember when gamer meant D and D freak…
Anyone here ever play Heros unlimited?
Hey try being taken seriously as a gamer when your favorite game is Harvest Moon….
My ears are atill ringing from the peals of laughter.
Harvest Moon! I remember one time someone randomly handed me a handheld game thingy (can’t remember which one, might have been a DS or something) with Harvest Moon on it.. I sat and played it for, like, hours.
Ha ha, I like Lego Star Wars and Lego Indiana Jones. I hope that makes me True Hardcore Gamer™
Spent the past few days playing Plants vs. Zombies since my save file was on my old computer.
I’ve been playing Final Fantasy X compulsively the last couple weeks.
I’m not sure if this is a “guy”/”real” game because it has killing and RPG elements and tough guys with swords, or a “girl”/”not real” game because it has colorful sparkles and happy music and a female protagonist with character development and adequate clothing.
But I am sure there are people who won’t play it unless someone answers that meaningless question for them!
It looks like AFLAC’s sound and fury is pretty much over, but I’d still like to note the irony of somebody complaining that popular culture mocks traditional masculinity as fetish-clutching and simple-minded and subsequently asserting, without providing evidence, that the eeeebil feminists want to prevent him from simple-mindedly clinging to guns as a masculinity fetish.
Porridge = rolled oats + milk/water/both + sweet/salt/both
Oatmeal = as above, but with coarsely ground oats instead of rolled.
At least, so it is in my English dialect. Other thing are also technically porridges, but porridge, without further specification, is made of oats.
I personally consider salted porridge inedible except in times of dire need, but there are those who claim it as the one true porridge.
I shall have to ask some Scots.