Yesterday I wrote about a vile online game in which players were invited to “beat up Anita Sarkeesian,” the feminist cultural critic who’s faced endless harassment because she had the temerity to ask for donations to fund a video project looking at sexist tropes in video games.
The game, which (happily) has been removed from Newgrounds.com, where it was originally posted, was put together by a young Canadian gamer named Bendilin Spurr. On the game’s page, he offered this explanation as to why he created the game:
Anita Sarkeesian has not only scammed thousands of people out of over $160,000, but also uses the excuse that she is a woman to get away with whatever she damn well pleases. Any form of constructive criticism, even from fellow women, is either ignored or labelled to be sexist against her.
She claims to want gender equality in video games, but in reality, she just wants to use the fact that she was born with a vagina to get free money and sympathy from everyone who crosses her path.
That doesn’t really explain much, as asking people for voluntary donations to a video project is a far cry from “scamming,” especially since she’d asked for far less, and that the misogynist backlash to her project began long before she’d collected anywhere near this amount.
It also doesn’t quite explain why Bendilin felt that a Sarkessian-punching game was the best format to make this, er, critique.
Last night, after learning from the comments here that young Bendilin had a profile on Steam and a Twitter account, I decided to peruse both to see if I could find more clues that might explain his foul game.
On his Steam profile, he’s set forth his basic philosophy of life, video games, and how much women suck:
I think it’s just adorable how absolutely no girls are any good at video games, just like how no woman has ever written a good novel. They are nothing but talk and no action, probably because girls are such emotional creatures and base everything they do on their current feelings and then try to rationalize their actions later. How pathetic.
You know what’s priceless? When a gamer girl posts a pic of herself looking as slutty as possible and then throws a fake fit when people talk to her like she’s a whore. What did you think was going to happen, you dumb broad? Lose thirty pounds.
Sadly, these aren’t terribly rare or original opinions for a young male gamer.
Over on Twitter, Bendilin has offered a number of conflicting explanations for why he felt so much hostility for Sarkeesian and her video project that he felt justified in creating a video game devoted to punching her in the face.
There’s the fiscal argument:
There’s the laziness argument:
There’s the rather strange argument that Sarkeesian is not taking the proper time to research the subject, although she has not yet started the project. (Also, one of the reasons she was asking for money was so that she could take the time to research the subject properly.)
The “nuh-uh you’re wrong” argument:
The “she won’t listen to me argument.” Part one: The Lego Incident
And Part 2, in which our hero explains that making a video game about punching someone in the face is a great way to open a dialogue with them:
Naturally, Bendilin, like most misogynists, fervently denies that he’s a misogynist:
Yep, that’s right. The guy whose Steam profile claims that “absolutely no girls are any good at video games” and that “no woman has ever written a good novel,” and who decided to express his criticism for a video project that hasn’t even started by making a video game in which players punch the woman behind it in the face, is angry that anyone might conclude that he hates women.
Well, Bendilin, if you wanted to defend video games and the gaming community at large from charges of sexism, you’ve done a bang-up job of it.
UPDATE: Bendilin is also an artist! Here, Virgil Texas takes a look at Bendilin’s erotically charged Sonic the Hedgehog art.
That last paragraph and the update contained
When I dislike someone, I avoid them. I might make some rude comments about them behind their backs, if I’m in an especially childish mood. I don’t threaten to rape, maim, or kill them. I don’t expend a lot of energy jacking off over fantasies about their being beaten. I don’t publish their personal information in an effort to encourage like-minded people to commit physical violence upon them. I don’t stalk and harass them.
Sarkeesian isn’t lobbying to have gaming shut down, or gamers hunted down, incarcerated, and punished. She asked for voluntary funding for a project to explore an issue that is of interest to a great many people.
You’re defending an inappropriate, disproportionate reaction to a non-threatening act.
That statement doesn’t have anything to do with what I said. Did you mean:
If so, I need to reach for “It’s actually a bit more complicated than that” stamp once again.
The above question appears to conflate ‘violent rhetoric against [group]’ with ‘manifests anger with specific targeted violent fantasies’. In either case, yes, caution should be exercised, but should it be the same caution? Probably not.
I said a FEMINIST.
Anyway I’m fine with someone not hiring the person (not even sure it was a woman) who made that game.
Somehow “this isn’t unique, there’s loads of games about beating up real people!” doesn’t make me feel any better.
Sharculese: There’s a large segment of gamers that are just like that, they don’t particularly need this event as a reason to be either. You can file that under “reasons I don’t read game websites or forums”.
“In fairness, that HeyBaby video game is about targeting sexual harassers and stalkers, not random men in general, not even MRAs in general.”
And the Beat Up Sarkeesian video game is about targeting just one specific person. So it’s even less sexist than that. 🙂
Unimaginative: I dunno, I’ve looked over those comments and it’s like a regular day on 4chan. Not saying I approve of it, I personally wouldn’t write something like that, but I can see where it comes from. I’ve watched a few of Sarkeesian’s videos and I find her pretentious and annoying.
Sarkeesian said “Hey, I’m going to do a series of youtube videos that you don’t have to watch unless you want to. Int hem I’ll be talking about women and tropes and gaming and stuff. If you’d like to donate to the project, feel free to do so!”
And the response was overwhelmingly men trying to prove her points were wrong by doing the very things she was going to critique.
Do you really not see how that works?
Agatha Chrstie.
@Cliff:
I tried tracking down Lady Killas Inc, who made the game, and all I’ve found is that they’re located in Europe. No other games made by them, and no indication of who is actually in the company. *shrug*
@Johnny_M80:
Hey, Kirby might be puffed up at times, but call him (her? it? I think its a him canonically but I’m not sure) nothing and you’re liable to disappear into his (?) black-hole of a stomach.
Then Kirby’ll take your powers of “failure-to-understand-basic-English”, condense it into a little shiny star, and use it to clock Dee-Dee-Dee on the head.
That got away from me somehow…
@Johnny_M80
“Those games are an old tradition.”
There are lots of stupid, old traditions that have been kicked to the wayside, what’s the point?
“Why is such a big deal being made over this one?”
Because someone trying to bring attention to misogyny in video games had a misogynistic video game made after her as a protest. The irony of this situation didn’t just break the irony meter, the damn thing blew itself up. Get it yet?
@Johnny
And the Beat Up Sarkeesian video game is about targeting just one specific person. So it’s even less sexist than that.
Right… targeting a woman who made no violent threats against anyone is the same as a woman targeting a man who is repeatedly stalking and harassing her in a dark alley. Check.
If 4chan is your measure of acceptable human interaction, I’d say you might want to set the bar a little higher.
The ironic part is, the only reason she got the money is because she’s viewed as weak, helpless and infantile, which she is, yet she’ll use the money to bitch about women being portrayed as weak, helpless and infantile.
2-D Man: You’re right, I meant employers. My mistake.
And why the hell does the existence of one bad thing make it okay for you to do more bad things, just to make it even? Shouldn’t the end goal be LESS BAD THINGS?! D:
“Because someone trying to bring attention to misogyny in video games had a misogynistic video game made after her as a protest. The irony of this situation didn’t just break the irony meter, the damn thing blew itself up. Get it yet?”
The game makes no statement about women as a whole, just one person. You can call it tasteless, but why misogynistic?
@Johnny
I’d like to see walk through a dark alley filled with men who can easily overpower you while they look at you like you are a juicy hamburger. Then have to listen as they make comments about how your appearance is sexually arousing them. Unfortuantely, this a facet of women’s reality that we have to deal with.
I’d like to know if this guy’s mom knows about his little project, and what she thinks about it.
I wish there was a “Send to poster’s mom” button on Twitter sometimes.
Cliff, you might rethink that assessment:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127559029
Fembot: Right… a game about killing male catcallers is better and totally different than a game about punching a woman who annoys you. Got it.
@Johnny
So if a white man made a video about beating up Jesse Jackson, and white men everywhere thought it was a hoot, there would be no racist implications for you? Because, you know, Jesse Jackson is annoying?
Tulgey – My bad for not reading up.
Anyway. Johnny needs to decide whether this sort of game is good (in which case he should be defending Hey Baby) or bad (in which case he should stop defending the asshole in the OP). Can’t have it both ways.
@Johnny_M80:
The reason why she was targeted is what makes it so.
Defending yourself against a man threatening you with physical violence > threatening a woman with physical violence who is peacefully making an internet video.
Are you really this dense? Stop trying to defend the indefensible.
“Wow, does Sarkeesian have a lot of Facebook and forum accounts. I mean like thousands. She must have a staff doing this.”
And you know what makes it all the more suspicious? It’s not like hoards of screeching, entitled, y’all-don’t-know-what-it’s-like-being-male-middle-class-and-white wastes of carbon turn up every single time it’s even hinted that the video game industry’s treatment of women and minorities might be less than perfect. I don’t know how she expected to get away with it.
Fembot: I’m sure the Reverend Al Sharpton would call for a candlelight vigil or something but no, I wouldn’t be overly concerned. People who spend their lives looking for things to be offended by, will always find them.