I’m back from a brief vacation in Migraineland, and thinking about the ways in which Men’s Rights Activists love to appropriate the language of feminism and other progressive movements, usually in ways that are face-palmingly ass-backwards.
Take this recent discussion on the Men’s Rights subreddit of the dire threat of “fake gamer girls” invading the “male space” of gaming. The generically named guywithaccount sets up the discussion with this post:
![I want to talk about "fake geek girls" (self.MensRights) submitted 9 days ago by guywithaccount For those of you who don't know about this, there's a bit of a controversy in what I'll call the geek community. Apparently, when women attend geek conventions (that is, those celebrating e.g. video games, comic books, sci-fi and fantasy), some men accuse them of being "fake geeks" or demanding that they prove their "geek cred" by correctly answering trivia questions made up on the spot. Here's one article (of many) that talks about it: [1] http://bookviewcafe.com/blog/2013/08/08/the-fake-geek-girl-nonsense/ My concern for this issue is that, like anything else that involves gender, feminists and feminist sympathizers are attempting to dominate the discussion and frame the whole thing from a feminist and gynocentric perspective. The prevailing analysis might be summed up as "geek culture is deeply misogynistic, and the people complaining about fake geeks are just sad little losers who hate women." IMO, the geek subculture has provided a somewhat-safe space for many men who have been snubbed by the rest of society, where they are not expected to prove their value to each other by carving notches in a bedpost or exemplifying traditional masculine traits. The increase in mainstream appeal and female participation over the past decade or so threatens the safety and exclusivity of this space, and the backlash from male geeks is a somewhat-predictable response to the invasion of their space. Of course, there are few spaces just for men, and when someone tries to create or preserve one, they're accused of misogyny. I suspect that some of you don't give a crap about any of this and see the whole thing as petty, but realize that it's not happening in a vacuum. I believe it's merely a symptom of the fact that men have almost no voice in gender discussions and their needs are routinely denied or ignored.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/fakegeek.png?resize=573%2C541&ssl=1)
Now, there is a teensy bit of gold in this pile of bullshit: the notion of a “safe space,” where oppressed people can come forward and discuss their issues without fear of being talked over or shut down by those outside their group — who have more power in the world and who may not have their best interests at heart (or who may just be Blabby McBlabbypants types).
But there are a couple of giant problems with this notion when it comes to gamer dudes declaring gaming a “safe space” for men. The first is that, despite lingering resentments over being “snubbed” in high school or wherever — evident in the OP and in comments throughout the discussion — these guys are not actually an oppressed people by any measure that really matters.
Indeed, many of them — as tech dudes in a male-dominated tech world — are in fact in fairly privileged positions. For them to claim they need a “safe space” to protect themselves from the evils of “fake gamer girls” is a bit like Klan members claiming they need a “safe space” to protect themselves from blacks, Jews and Catholics. (Which is more or less what Klan members have argued over the years, albeit in less PC language.) No, I’m not claiming that all MRAs are the equivalent of hood-wearing Klan members. Only some of them are.
The second problem with the “game world as safe space for men” aregument is that YOU CAN’T JUST DECLARE BIG CHUNKS OF THE WORLD TO BELONG TO MEN. Yes, men dominate the gaming world in sheer numbers, both as game-makers and game-players. (While women make up nearly half of all game players — 47% — men tend to dominate the “serious” games that many geek dudes claim are the only ones that really count.) But gaming doesn’t “belong” to men any more than, say, novel-reading “belongs” to women — even though surveys suggest that women make up a staggering 80% of the fiction market in much of the English-speaking world.
Yep, that’s right: Women dominate “noveling” much more dramatically than men dominate gaming. Yet you don’t find women denouncing “fake noveler boys” or declaring that the male brain isn’t wired to understand the subtleties of written fiction.
No, in fact men are actively welcomed into book clubs. And my best friend, a woman, has spent much of the 18 or so years or our friendship trying to get me to read this novel or that novel, though over the years she’s only succeeded in getting me to read maybe one or two of her suggestions, which were pretty good, I have to admit. (I do plan to read some of the others, really.)
If you’re a socially awkward guy and want a safe space to discuss that, find a therapist, find a support group. Don’t pick on women gamers and pretend this is somehow your right because you’re oppressed as a socially awkward guy.
Anyway, here are some other dumb comments from the Reddit thread. YetAnotherCommenter warns feminists that they may lose some powerful allies if they continue acting so feministy.
Speaking of nerds who can’t get laid — which we weren’t but which these guys keep bringing up (and identifying themselves as) again and again — guia7ri seems to harbor some lingering resentments from high school, and who better to take that out on than attractive geeky women?
Hey MRAs, if you wonder why feminists sometimes describe MRAs as bitter men who hate women because they can’t get laid, it’s because MRAs like gui7ri so often EXPLICITLY DECLARE THEMSELVES BITTER MEN WHO HATE WOMEN BECAUSE THEY CAN’T GET LAID.
Meanwhile Byuku blames it all on evil feminists pretending to be geeks in order to make trouble. Because that’s what feminists do.
That’s how they get you!
EDIT: Added a sentence to temper and clarify my assertion that men “dominate” gaming.
@CassandraSays
Have you spoken with his Darkness?
Whoa, sorry for the apostrophe abuse.
We care.
saraheliza: I dropped the Dark Lord an email. The stench of sock is overpowering.
No one here thinks these idiots don’t want any women in the world.
The original claim made by someone (maybe you?) is that the particular subset of male geeks want “everyspace” to be woman-free. Their words. Well, “everyspace” would be exhaustive of all places in this world, therefore, no such place would exist where women could be. That would be a woman-free world.
See where using hyperbole get you? The original commenter should have acknowledged that male geeks want a specific and limited environment without women where they can be geeky in the manner with which they craft that identity. Your issue should be with the first commenter who made the “everyspace” comment, not with me. The lesson is … avoid hyperbole.
^sarahliz. wow, I am sorry.
Where’s that popcorn? I can’t believe he just tried to lecture Pecunium on the US military.
Pell o’clock? Anyone email the dark lord?
The lesson isn’t “avoid hyperbole,” the lesson is “avoid Asher.”
I wonder if you can use trollfroth to make espresso drinks. It has to be good for something, right?
Worst. latte. EVER.
*hands falconer the popcorn* this is likely to be good
At least lattes can’t type.
So, as women are agents; and so posesed of independence,
Ah, yes, the argument to free will. The problem with arguing from free will is that you are simply going to be picking and choosing what things are the products of free will and what are conditioned by prior cause. Once you admit even one speck of free will into a conversation then the entire notion of cause and effect has to be discarded for that conversation.
I have been asking for yearrs of advocates of free will to provide me with a demarcating principle to distinguish human behavior that is the product of free will versus behavior that is conditioned. None have ever managed to do it and most haven’t even tried. No, women are not any more autonomous than men and to base anything on autonomy is to completely rule out cause and effect (unless you can establish said demarcating principle).
Pell, does give his resume a lot.
@ Aaliyah
Ooh, is it video time?
“I openly call myself a ‘reactionary’. It’s just a label and the particular application of a sequence of letters doesn’t establish the function of a thing. For example, the function of a horse isn’t determined by the fact that we label it with the letters h-o-r-s-e.”
Aww, it’s Babby’s First Almost-Semiotics! Adorable :3
(NOTE: By using the sequence of letters a-d-o-r-a-b-l-e, I’m merely applying a series of letters and not establishing the function of an Asher.)
they will not (by and large) conform to these slack-jawed nitwits ideas of how “women” ought to behave;
Argument by aspersion. Basically, you’re just saying “those people are stupid so we can discount anything they say”.
which, in some regards, is them wishing a world free of women (as agents) and inhabited
Enough with they hyperbole, already. I’m pretty sure there’s a vast chasm between some subset of the population wanting a separate “male geek identity” space and wishing all women would conform to that identity.
“Exclusionary” is not a bad thing; it’s just a … thing. Mostly, to exclude simply is to say “hey, you’re welcome to go find your own space and do your own thing”. Exclusion has it’s beneficial side.
@falconer
At least that hilariousness will make up for some of his* massive boring-ness.
*asher’s massive boringness. Pecunium is not boring. Duh.
HE DENIES FREE WILL!
I TOTALLY CALLED IT!
probably everybody could see it coming down 6th avenue but still
I TOTALLY CALLED IT!
Cassandra — I was thinking as much when pecunium called him a liar…
It’s EA o’clock!!
http://youtu.be/_r2ywSxuYKE
@Argenti Aertheri
Dang what song did you post?
/danged youtube videos rarely show up here for me.
Aw, man, I always miss the new chewtoys until after the good posters have gotten their licks in. I had to skim a lot of that, but looks like you folks did a good job. Since he’s still here, though:
“What you are doing is relying on the current general social sentiments involving Klan members in order to make a specious equivalence between the Klan and male geeks. ”
Nope. No matter how many times you repeat this, it won’t be true. The comparison was being made between “Klan Members” and “Self-designated Gatekeepers To Geek Culture Who Demand That All Of Geekdom Be A ‘Safe Space’ For Male Geeks Specifically.”
All of us have understood this distinction. The subset of geekdom that David is calling out is NOT the entirety of it; indeed, that’s the whole point of the discussion. Your persistent failure to acknowledge this leaves us the classic decision about trolls:
A: You’re an illiterate idiot with no reading comprehension skills;
B: You’re an unmitigated liar who will cheerfully espouse bullshit, knowingly, in order to obfuscate an issue.
When the choice is “liar or fool”, the proper answer is, “Why should I give a fuck?”
@Falconer:
I had to look up the quote he was replying to figure out exactly how he got from male geeks to free will.
He literally just jumped on the word “autonomy,” ignoring any context to how the word was used, and decided to rant about free will. The original was just talking about how women aren’t going to just do whatever men tell them, since they are people with autonomy.
I know this is like totally OT, but I don’t really trust anything Asher says at this point, so citation needed.
First off, I am the only one who has consistently avoiding using intellectually dishonest rhetoric, so this claim is really bizarre. Second, that particular method was called the boats, and might be in Plutarch, not sure. The Greeks were amazed at the level of cruelty in which the Persians frequently engaged and that particular method involves a story from the Cyrus/Darius conflict.
Cyrus was the younger but he was a natural born military leader, a man’s man, whereas DArius was reputed to be a bit of a fop. In the final battle between them one of DArius’ captains killed Cyrus and then bragged about it when drunk. For defying Darius as the sole source of the victory Darius had that captain put to “the boats”. It’s not a super obscure story if you have an interest in ancient history.