So you may have heard about that Kickstarter that raised $16,000 for a loathsome Reddit PUA’s “handbook on how to bully women who don’t like you into sex, while preserving your claims to believe you had consent should you need to tell the police,” as Amanda Marcotte aptly described it in her post on it yesterday. Slate’s Alyssa Rosenberg also has some thoughts on it.
I don’t really have anything to add.
There’s a petition up demanding that Kickstarter simply refuse to fund what is essentially a how-to guide to sexual assault. Last I checked, it had gotten nearly 60,000 signatures.
EDITED TO ADD: Casey Malone, who wrote the blog post that brought this awful project to the attention of people outside of the sleazier corners of Reddit, wrote Kickstarter about it and got a response suggesting that Kickstarter, while planning to go ahead and fund the project, will be reexamining its policies as a result of the controversy. Malone posted some further thoughts.
EDITED AGAIN: Kickstarter has offered an apology. You can find it here. But I’m just going to repost the whole thing:
Dear everybody,
On Wednesday morning Kickstarter was sent a blog post quoting disturbing material found on Reddit. The offensive material was part of a draft for a “seduction guide” that someone was using Kickstarter to publish. The posts offended a lot of people — us included — and many asked us to cancel the creator’s project. We didn’t.
We were wrong.
Why didn’t we cancel the project when this material was brought to our attention? Two things influenced our decision:
- The decision had to be made immediately. We had only two hours from when we found out about the material to when the project was ending. We’ve never acted to remove a project that quickly.
- Our processes, and everyday thinking, bias heavily toward creators. This is deeply ingrained. We feel a duty to our community — and our creators especially — to approach these investigations methodically as there is no margin for error in canceling a project. This thinking made us miss the forest for the trees.
These factors don’t excuse our decision but we hope they add clarity to how we arrived at it.
Let us be 100% clear: Content promoting or glorifying violence against women or anyone else has always been prohibited from Kickstarter. If a project page contains hateful or abusive material we don’t approve it in the first place. If we had seen this material when the project was submitted to Kickstarter (we didn’t), it never would have been approved. Kickstarter is committed to a culture of respect.
Where does this leave us?
First, there is no taking back money from the project or canceling funding after the fact. When the project was funded the backers’ money went directly from them to the creator. We missed the window.
Second, the project page has been removed from Kickstarter. The project has no place on our site. For transparency’s sake, a record of the page is cached here.
Third, we are prohibiting “seduction guides,” or anything similar, effective immediately. This material encourages misogynistic behavior and is inconsistent with our mission of funding creative works. These things do not belong on Kickstarter.
Fourth, today Kickstarter will donate $25,000 to an anti-sexual violence organization called RAINN. It’s an excellent organization that combats exactly the sort of problems our inaction may have encouraged.
We take our role as Kickstarter’s stewards very seriously. Kickstarter is one of the friendliest, most supportive places on the web and we’re committed to keeping it that way. We’re sorry for getting this so wrong.
That is an apology. Some people could learn a thing or two from this.
David Futrelle,
Man this is disgusting. I’m glad there is a petition to stop this thing. I really hope the people behind Kick Starter have the decency to denounce this thing.
Stay classy, Reddit.
I’ve been watching this with disgust over the last few days. Pretty much confirms what I’ve suspected for some time, that PUAs, MRAs and their ilk are former “Nice Guy” basement dwelling, woman hating losers who deliberately target the most vulnerable of women.
Kickstarter came out and said that they found the project abhorent but that it doesn’t go against any of their current policies. They have apologized for what they consider a major oversight in those policies and are reviewing and (one hopes) rewriting the policies.
I think that that’s the best response that it was reasonable to expect, all things considered, apart from “Having written the policies so that this wouldn’t happen in the first place” which is not possible by now and would involve a time machine. This, of course, assumes good faith on the part of Kickstarter and that they’re not just saying that as a PR dodge.
The can of worm that could be opened by having projects retroactively pulled for going against a policy that didn’t exist when you created/funded your project is possibly worse than having that one project go through, as long as they’re actually serious about reviewing the policies.
I think it’s important that we put them on the spot for having failed to write policies covering this sort of things, and also that we keep them honest on their intentions of revising their policies, but I think it’s risky to say that we want them empowered to just go “fuck the policies” if there’s controversy, because IMO this sort of power usually ends up being disproportionally used against women, PoC, non-mainstream gender identities or sexual orientations, etc. Anita Sarkeesian’s Kickstarter, for instance, could have ended up a casualty if some overzealous employee (or KS managers, feeling the heat from all the online dudebros raging) had the power to just decide to retroactively ban projects that don’t go against the site’s policies.
Silly ladies! You’re just a collection of holes for the all-mighty penis.
I’ve seen a few folks make the argument that this clause in their terms of use–
•is unlawful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, deceptive, fraudulent, tortious, obscene, offensive, profane, or invasive of another’s privacy;
–is enough. Dunno. Not a lawyer, not even on TV.
BlacBloc, where did you see this? I’d like to add it to the post.
In before O. argues that this is about feminists hating PUAs (as opposed to what it really is, which is feminists criticizing a manual on how to commit sexual assault).
That’s actually a good point, though I’m really worried about the open-endedness of that policy. “Obscene” and “offensive” is very vague terminology.
David- this allegedly quotes an email from Kickstarter: http://caseymalone.com/post/53394156872/hey-everyone-if-youre-here-its-probably
The quotes from the man’s writings were indeed abhorrent and DEFINITELY would have violated Kickstarter’s terms of use…
…had they been on the Kickstarter page. That’s the problem, and why they’re not pulling funding from it. The evidence submitted, the writings that would make it into the book, were not part of his page, or used in his pitch. They were previous writings from the subreddit, completely external from his Kickstarter, and while it’s an easy enough conclusion to draw that they would have made it into the book, it’s not in Kickstarter’s current policies to go digging through project creators’ histories with extensive internet background checks.
Are you sure it wasn’t aliens?
Along the lines of what @quantumscale just posted…
I read this response to Casey Malone’s piece on Tumblr.
http://designislaw.tumblr.com/post/53404348356/have-a-goddamn-spine-kickstarter-date-rape-manuals
Some people would say it’s too extreme… but we are talking about a book that advocates sexual assault here. One that obviously a LOT of people are going to buy and read and follow, now that Kickstarter has decided not to pull the plug on it.
I know this is off topic but Calgary is under a state of emergency due to flooding. I’m alright because I live in a high neighborhood, but I think some other manboobzers live in Calgary and I hope they are alright
This is the response I got last night from the petition creators:
Not cool Kickstarter.
View this email in your browser
There’s good news and bad news.
The good news: We received over 50,068 signatures in just over a day, which is awesome. The bad news: We’re gutted. Here’s why:
Last night, 9:30 pm
Our CMO, Naomi, called the Kickstarter CEO Perry Chen on his cellphone. She left a voicemail encouraging him to call us back. He has not returned our call.
This morning, 10:15 am
Over 20 of us went to the Kickstarter HQ to deliver your signatures, as promised. We had some posters, but we were quiet, courteous, and only stayed for 10 minutes.
Our CMO Naomi and petition writer, Ben, asked to enter the building to deliver the signatures to Kickstarter CEO Perry Chen.
Instead, the company’s office manager came downstairs and told us we would not be allowed to enter. She assured us the signatures would be delivered to the CEO. (Note: We felt awful for this woman! Who sends the office manager to handle this?! So, when we got back to the office, we sent her flowers. We think Perry ought to buy her flowers, too.)
Noon
Many of you alerted us to the fact that Kickstarter had spent hours deleting your posts on their Facebook page. As one of you tweeted at us, “deleting Fbook comments is never a good sign.”
Today, 3:00 pm
We reached out the author personally, offering advice and insight from a professional author and relationship blogger (who works for us!) on how to improve his book so that it does not promote sexual assault. If this book is (apparently) going to be funded and written, we want to make sure nobody is going to get hurt. Our goal isn’t lots of clicks or to embarrass anyone, we just want to make sure violence against women isn’t rewarded…ever.
Today, now (5:48 pm)
We’re disappointed and saddened. We love Kickstarter. We’re truly shocked at how poorly they have handled this. It’s been over six hours since we delivered the signatures, and over 17 hours since we left the CEO a voicemail. We have received no response – through personal channels (like a returned phone call) or on social media. Don’t 50,000+ signatures matter to them?
The bottom line(s):
We’re bummed. We really thought Kickstarter would pull this thing down – or at least make a very strong statement about their position on violence against women and projects that could encourage it.
We’re not giving up. (a) We’re going to throw ourselves at this author to make sure he writes a positive book. (b) We’re going to keep collecting signatures until we get a response from Kickstarter. (c) We’re going to continue going after awful things like this, everywhere. If there is a petition you think we should run, tell us at http://www.dosomething.org/petitions/ideas.
DoSomething CMO, Naomi and petition writer, Ben deliver 47,056 signatures to Kickstarter. Notice how scared their office manager looks (when we got back to our office, we sent her flowers).
Copyright © 2013 Do Something, All rights reserved.
You joined a DoSomething.org campaign or became a member on the DoSomething.org website! Kudos! See all campaigns at: http://dosomething.org/campaigns
Our mailing address is:
Do Something
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New York, NY 10010
@Dave:
The problem I’m having with all this is the fact that those with the biggest itch to scratch haven’t seemed to come up with a better mousetrap. The simple truth of the matter, as the current issue clearly shows, is that there is huge demand for what the Seduction community has to offer – and that the Feminists and their allies (read: you, et al) have FAILED to come up with a better way to meet and greet Women for guys who want to. So long as this persists, the Seduction can and will continue to make money hand over fist. Even if you are successful in shutting this particular project down, it won’t address the key core issue I am highlighting right now.
Make a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door.
Clarisse Thorn has failed. Amanda Marcotte, ditto. Lindy West, nada.
And so on.
Game, is here to stay. At least until somebody comes along with something better.
Shutting down voices we don’t like, doesn’t qualify.
O.
These quotes… They’re just like stuff you read from various dog gurus. Like, there are lots of dog gurus out there who’ll tell you to do stuff to your dog that’s threatening, intimidating and even causes physical pain, and they tell you that the dog loves to be treated like that, because dogs want a true leader to follow, and if you do all this stuff the dog will admire you and do everything it can to please you, not because it feels threatened or want to avoid being hurt again, but merely because you’re Da Big Alpha. This is exactly the same, although about women instead of dogs. (Note: I think this is complete bullshit when it comes to dogs too.)
…ugh, fucking fuck… grrr…
This framing? That’s the problem.
Seriously, that is TERRORISM!!!
Ladies, have sex with guys you don’t want to, or they’ll have to rape you!!!!
Fuck that.
Not feminism’s fucking problem, chump.
@Cloudiah:
“In before O. argues that this is about feminists hating PUAs (as opposed to what it really is, which is feminists criticizing a manual on how to commit sexual assault).”
o: Actually, quite a few Feminists have made their hatred of the whole of PUAs quite known (and have in fact excoriated Ms. Clarisse Thorn for even trying to be evenhanded and fair to the Seduction community as a turncoat) and it is clear that they (read: Feminists) want to shutdown the current Kickstarter project under discussion.
So, they are indeed doing merely more than just “criticizing” Seduction guides…
O.
@doomkitt3n
Looks like we have Viscaria checking in on the Open Thread, and leftwingfox on the thread right behind this one.
Stay safe, everybody!
Rape manuals.
Kickstarter just offered a real apology. I’m updating the post again.
Kickstarter posted this not too long ago: http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/we-were-wrong
Short version: they can’t stop the money from going to the creator, but they will take down to project page, ban all future “seduction guides,” and are donating $25k to RAINN.