And so the Internet has found a new woman to hate. Most of you are probably already familiar with the Adria Richards debacle that’s developed over the past several days. If not, Jill at Feministe has a good summary of events:
Adria Richards, formerly of the company SendGrid, was at a tech conference this week when some dudes behind her made a series of inappropriate and sexual jokes. Annoyed by the pervasiveness of misogyny in the tech world, she snapped a photo of them and put in on Twitter with a complaint. One of the conference organizers spoke to the men and they apologized. Totally reasonable! Good response, PyCon. Later, one of the dudes got fired. Instead of getting mad at the company that made the choice to fire him, the internet hordes descended on Adria. She was on the receiving end of rape and death threats. Her address and phone number were published. Her blog and her company’s website came under DDoS attack. Oh and then her company, SendGrid, fired her.
Like Jill, I think firing someone for a “dongle” joke is an overreaction, to say the least. But Richards wasn’t responsible for that; indeed, she told the fired man she hoped his employer would reconsider and take him back.
SendGrid’s firing of Richards is far more problematic. It’s one thing to get in trouble for acting like a sexist boor; it’s quite another to get in trouble for simply pointing out someone else’s problematic behavior. Richards faced a virtual lynch mob for simply documenting an example of the everyday sexism that permeates the tech world; by firing her, SendGrid essentially sided with the mob.
Is “lynch mob” an unfair term to describe those who’ve gone after Richards? No. In this context, the term is sadly apropos, as the target of all this online “activism” is not only female but black – two strikes against her in the minds of many of her, er, “critics,” who attacked her as a “fucking nigger” as well as a “cunt.” (The more genteel racists referred to her derisively as a “diversity hire.”)
Numerous commenters have already documented some of the appallingly racist and misogynist attacks on Richards. (The links in the above paragraph contain plenty of examples.)
Here, I’d like to focus specifically on the attacks on Richards coming from Men’s Rights activists – that is, from people who like to think of themselves as upstanding human rights activists for the 21st century, virtual equivalents of Martin Luther King. In fact, many of the reactions of MRAs show them to have far more in common with the bigots who fought against the civil rights movement than they do with King.
In the Men’s Rights subreddit, the MRA masses gave more than one hundred upvotes to a graphic describing Richards as a “racist, sexist and hypocritical cunt.” Evidently pointing out that white men as a class have certain advantages in the world is a kind of “racism.”
Elsewhere in the subreddit, aasorted commenters indulged themselves in gendered slurs. Greyfeld got dozens up upvotes for comments denouncing Richards as a “feminist cunt” and a “screeching harpy cunt.” DerpaNerb described Richards as “a racist/sexist cunt [who’s] clearly … not capable of doing her job properly.” Buster2209 scored 160 upvotes with a comment describing Richards as a “stupid bitch [who] brought it on herself.” Cyridius simply declared “I hate her because she’s a dumb ignorant bitch.”
Others happily gave the Men’s Rights movement credit for Richards’ firing. The execrable EvilPundit got 180 upvotes for a post essentially endorsing the virtual lynch mob and declaring Richards’ firing to be proof that the Men’s Rights movement had entered a “new phase.”
Sorry to burst your bubble, Mr. Pundit, but there’s nothing new about men harassing and threatening a black woman.
AnnArchist – a former contributor to Reddit’s now-banned Beating Women subreddit — reacted with indignation to someone who pointed out Richards had been harassed:
Over on A Voice for Men, where the locals describe themselves with no sense of irony as Men’s Human Rights Activists, there was much rejoicing over the firing of Richards, who was variously described as an “entitled bitch,” a “sociopathic bitch,” a “femshit” and a “bush pig.” Naturally, the c-word, applied to all feminists, made an appearance as well.
Daflory hoped that Richards’ firing would be the start of an industry-wide purge:
Adria Richards seems like an entitled narcissist, who had become used to deference as a moral authority through her impeccable credentials as a diversity goddess: black, Jewish, and female. …
No one ever told Adria Richards that she was at best only an tolerated guest in the world of tech, and she could either play by male rules and contribute, or get lost. Hopefully other feminists in tech will get a similar message.
And August Løvenskiolds’ mind went straight to the gutter:
[A]fter being outed as a betrayer of her customers, none of them will want to work with her, and any tech company that hires her will instantly lose credibility.
She’s going to be hard-pressed to find a job as a sex-worker unless the light is quite dim.
Taking a step back from the particulars of the incident, Mark Trueblood wondered if a man strike might help to put things right once again:
I’m pretty sure Amnesty International doesn’t exactly endorse this sort of “human rights” activism.
@Argenti Aertheri
That’s too funny XD This may only prove I’m, like emotionally 12, though.
I don’t know why all meds are white pills, but I’ve got anti depressants that come in two doses, a 100mg pill and a 25 mg pill, and it really bugs me that they’re different colors. THEY ARE THE SAME MEDICINE, WHY ARE THEY DIFFERENT COLORS! um…hehe…anyhows.
@Argenti Aertheri
If you hadn’t realized ignore it, it means I speak well enough to get my points across and should be judged accordingly.
I meant I didn’t know in what context the comment similar to mine came up.(just for …disclosure?)
Also, thanks, I already read that.
Slings and Arrows is wonderful. Only three seasons, but the opener is a bit of Music Hall sort of doggerel, and changes each season.
His Passchensdael is pretty good, if a bit conventional; and a slightly overdone in the ending (which is hard to say about that battle, in that war).
TomBCat — context was just that fundamentally the same topic came up here and there, the same day, drunk me was remarking on the serendipity of it.
And as someone who failed English because of failing spelling, I love autocorrect.
talacaris: For starters, you dont’ consider me an actual troll, which is demeaning. Secondly, all I hear is “boring, weaksauce &c”, while others get hundreds of replies,like looksie/virgil. So what did he do more intelligently than me?
Nothing. You are aspiring to the bottom. They are not being more intelligent than you are. What they aren’t is quite as transparent. You will never manage it here, because you have confessed to one and all that your purpose is to troll. What they have, and you lack, is a pathetic sincerity.
Paul Gross is funny. I think, under other circumstances, I would probably find Due South-era Paul Gross reasonably attractive. But that show first aired in 94, when I was 5 and he was about 35; so when I look at him, all I think of is my dad.
TomBCat, I might have been a little harsh on you earlier, so I just wanted to extend my apologies. I had just finished reading the epic Pharyngula thread on Adria Richards and was kind of wired for trolls, but you seem like you’re here in good faith.
I know you’re in Melbourne, so I might be lifting your hopes unreasonably. I went to a practice that gave acupuncture – no needles!! Yaaaayy!! – they used lasery thingies. Aaaand, they were GPs. So the consults, treatments were covered by Medicare – different, lower rebates for these, but much, much cheaper out of pocket than anyone I’ve ever heard of practising as non-medical acupuncturists.
Did I mention? Acupuncture with no needles! Yippee!
(I know there are some people who argue that this isn’t acupuncture at all. But I don’t care. It was bluddy marvelous. But time consuming to go 2 or 3 times a week.)
mildlymagnificent – that’s worth looking up!
It might also explain a sign I see about laser therapy for quitting smoking, which always makes me go “huh?” – it could mean laser acupuncture. (I don’t smoke, it’s just a sign that caught my eye because it seemed weird.)
I checked on my private insurance, and their extras cover includes acupuncture, so if it’s something to try, I’ll have a look about that laser version. No needles makes all the difference.
I think Paul Gross may be older than my dad and I still want him to do sexy things to me. He is so. Freaking. Hawt. Men with Brooms, baby. Thats where it’s at.
I just checked – he was born in 1959. Older’n me, younger’n my sister. 🙂
Yup, older than my dad. Do. Not. Care. That man is a national treasure.
I just finished watching another episode of Due South! Fraser and the Inspector snogging on top of a moving train packed with explosives. Oh my. 🙂
Pecunium nailed it. You think of trolling as an activity requiring intelligence? All it requires is a keyboard. They’re more vile (VILE!) because they believe it. You lack conviction. That makes you a weak troll.
And it makes you a terrible human being. You think that joking about hating women is funny. In a backdrop where hating women creates an atmosphere that kills women. Literally kills women. (you don’t even have to get off the front page here to see that, you know)
And you know this, and you perpetuate it anyway.
It makes you unfunny, unclever, and rotten to the core.
Would you like more responses? Take a little time to think very hard about your life, about the choices that have landed you in the sad place where you are. Because you could continue to be the most boring troll in creation, or you could reconsider your life choices. There are a lot of non-boring things you could be doing.
Try one of them, maybe.
” You think that joking about hating women is funny”
No. Where have I done these jokes? Where have I written directly hateful things? Quibbling on language, nomenclature and producing illogic and warped perceptions of reality is another thing.
“You lack conviction. That makes you a weak troll.” And as I’ve said before, if you’re convinced you are not a trolling.
And yes trolling must require intelligence, to select which fact of reality to distort, which rules of logic to warp, which context and semantic to ignore. And then avoiding direct hate and invocatives, beacause that’s ugly. So stop wishing for better trolls, because it is not so easy. Or at least, if you’re gonna continue with these kind of wishes, please specify what you want. Somebody have said here that I’ve been switching between faux-troll and genu-troll. Is the faux-troll approach more preferrable?
You’re dull even when you’re trying do whatever it is you’re trying to do here. Just leave.
This is why you fail, right here. Because your entire trolling run is one long joke about hating women, and you don’t even know that.
It’s the entire purpose of your existence here, and YOU CAN’T EVEN SEE IT.
Go read a book.
“Because your entire trolling run is one long joke about hating women, and you don’t even know that” No, I’ve always tried to avoid the hateful things,
“It’s the entire purpose of your existence here, and YOU CAN’T EVEN SEE IT”
Because it is not so.
Denying it doesn’t make it less so.
You picked a side a long time ago. By your antagonism, you declare every hateful word to be true. By your position, you affirm the things the other trolls say.
You think your hands are clean just because you don’t say it yourself?
Being oh-so mild mannered and polite and yet just annoying enough to rile up some people, thus provoking scolding and “proving” that feminists are unreasonable meanies is what talacaris sets out to do. He’s not stupid, just dishonest.
“You picked a side a long time ago. By your antagonism, you declare every hateful word to be true. By your position, you affirm the things the other trolls say.”
Guilt by non existent association. A says something. B replies something hateful. C does some nitpicking about the way A expressed the statement. By your logic C has picked sides with B and stands under with what B has said. This is obvious that is not so.
“You think your hands are clean just because you don’t say it yourself?”
Of course. I can’t take responbility for what other people do.
Yeah, go you. You don’t bully marginalized people yourself, you just police them while the haters shout.
C sure as hell ain’t standing with A.
Take responsibility for what YOU do.
” “proving” that feminists are unreasonable meanies is what talacaris sets out to do. ”
I have never used that argument, so that’s not my point