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.
Yes, babbling. Nothing like those Words of Pure Wisdom and Reason that come from you.
Asher: Assuming your story of the prof being that happy with your work is true… what happened?
How did it all go so wrong.
Because when I got stories (as a newspaper editor) which were like yours, I sent them back for rewrite.
Hell, I had one which wasn’t half as bad as yours, and I had to kill it (which took three other stories, and entire page, down with it).
You had such promise, and now it’s come to this. The Tragedy, such a great talent lost to the world.
Asher: Hell, this entire conversation is an apt demonstration of my point.
What point? I thought your point was that constructing an analogy Asher doesn’t like is intellectually dishonest.
Which is exactly what I’m doing in a limited number of my comments. The comment involving reasoning from women consistently contributing to societies implying that women haven’t been oppressed is an excellent example. It’s not that I really believe or, for that matter, don’t believe it,
Guess what chump, that’s the definition of intellectual dishonesty.
Rape and death threats aren’t enough for you, shitstain?
Drop the dense act, it does not play well.
For those of you who equate a feminist getting fired for her willful behavior and four little girls getting killed a bomb blast:
A little girl is a non-combatant. A feminist is a combatant. Combatants are fair-game. Now, certainly a bomb is not proportionate to the level of combat but firing for some behaviors that are unethical or illegitimate to advance a particular ideology is certainly proportionate to the level of combat.
If you are a feminist, male or female, and you use your job to advance that personal political agenda then being fired is a perfectly reasonable response. You are not a non-combatant.
“Because you don’t related exclusionary identities to badness?
I don’t. You do. I’m just pointing it out.”
When? Because I can, and have, repeatedly, quoted you using the concept of exclusionary identities and “badness” within the same paragraph, and thus, presumably, the same train of thought. Go find where I once said that identities excluding people not identifying as such means those not ID’ing as such are bad.
We are talking about a specific kind of exclusion.
A specific kind to which most people do not object. It is encumbent on you to explain why they should hold the same objections as you. Simply reiterating “that’s exclusionary” does not cut it.
No I don’t. It’s quite clear to me and everyone else what those standards are, given the context. This is a social justice blog for fuck’s sake.
I’m not going to state them for you. You’re the smart guy, after all – go figure them out yourself. Go use that genius head of yours.
You’re supposed to be a smart guy, right? We don’t need to spell it out for you if that’s the case.
It’s got nothing to do with smarts. I just don’t agree with you and the onus is on you to explain why I should.
If it applied equally to everyone it wouldn’t be a norm, it’d be more like a universality. Norm would need to apply to a majority, or at least a plurality, of people, but not all.
Obviously norms are restricted to specific, local contexts. If a norm is not applied equally within that context then it isn’t a norm. Otherwise, you’re just arbitrarily picking and choosing when to apply the norm and when to defer it.
Aw, you mean my snark at pecunium that I was going to have to exclude him cuz he’s cis? Now that’s just hilarious. Learn to friendly banter.
Pecunium knows more about me than anyone here, by miles, and, unlike you apparently, got that I was kidding. Joking. Attempting to prove the absurdity of the idea that identities limiting one to that identity, while others identify elsewise, means they view each other as bad, or anything besides different.
Typical, as in not universal, as in applies to most, but not all, people is EXACTLY WHAT A NORM IS!
Norms are local and are applied equally within a specific social context but not at all outside that particular context.
Dear feminist central committee – I must object to the fact that my uniform still has not arrived! As a combatant for more than 20 years I really feel that this delivery timeframe is not acceptable.
Well, morals are all contextual anyway, right?
Correct. The term comes from the Latin “mores” simply meaning customs. What is, gernally, customary in any social context is moral for that context. You have christian morality, german morality, feminist morality, communist morality, even nazi morality, had the regime survived long enough to establish norms and customs.
Now, most of these are certainly not my morality but they are moral systems, nonetheless. None better, a priori, than any of the others.
Re: norms — go back to your dictionary and try again.
Re: “Simply reiterating “that’s exclusionary” does not cut it.” — you fucking brought up exclusionary identities! As for the OP’s discussion of exclusion, let’s spell it out! “there are few spaces just for men” — implication? This should remain one. Which means excluding not-men (which, to these fools, means cis women since trans* people just don’t exist in MRAland)
Gender stereotypes
Almost every stereotype ever to develop has a solid basis in reality; that’s howthey become stereotypes. About the only stereotype I’ve ever seen to have zero validity is the one that “polish people are stupid” and that came from the Nazis and their disdain of ethnic slavs.
Oh, so being a feminist means it’s open season for every asshole to send you rape and death threats. I see.
Notice troll hasn’t said those are bad things?
“Norms are local and are applied equally within a specific social context but not at all outside that particular context.”
So the location of ones organ are dependent on one’s geographical location, good to know. In case you forgot, that was what caused you to bring up how anything not universal isn’t a norm at all.
pecunium — I gotta run, school him in living in the early days of a better nation. I’m playing it over here.
You must be a hit at parties.
Do you actually interact with people offline?
Why are we engaging with this pond scum again? Even if he weren’t utterly incoherent, he’s basically stated outright that he’s totally comfortable with his bigotry.
Yep, because social perceptions based on misconceptions have no role in creating stereotypes. They’re all grounded in reality somehow.
I think it’s safe to say that, you walked up to any social scientist and repeated what you said, that person would either guffaw or weep for you.
Asher: De jure? Sure. De facto? Almost certainly not. What you are implying is that the average guy in all of human history held money over his wife’s head in a power struggle between them. That’s just absurd.
Yes, good thing I didn’t say that (which an intellectually honest person wouldn’t pretend I had).
But that de jure matters. Because oppression (in this topic) is systemic. If he wanted to, he could. Moreover, she knew it. If he did, the law allowed it, and if she fought it, the law would enforce it.
Look up Scold’s Bridles.
Oppression, you does not understands it.
. Presumably,men could have divorced their wives on any whim but did not do so. Why not?
You’re thick, if you think that somehow disproves my point. It’s because the women were oppressed. It’s textbook. Those women who wanted to leave were prevented; because the law (de jure, that club of the state which you so cavalierly dismissed before) oppressed them.
Asher: Nope. You made the postive assertion he was wrong. You need to prove it, or withdraw the claim.
Wait, did you just assert that I needed to prove a negative? Yes, yes you did.
No, no I didn’t.
P1: David is Wrong.
P2: This is logically provable.
C: It can be proven.
You are confusing “wrong” with negative.
I tell ypou there is no 1,500′ long sea-beastie which can climb to the top of der Matterhorn.
That is a postive statement. All it takes to disprove it is some 1,500′ sea beastie which can climb to the top of the Matterhorn.
Just one.
Now, if you are trying to say it’s impossible to disprove the validity of Dave’s analogy, I will agree with you, but that’s because it’s a valid analogy.
David is the only making the argument and using an analogy to try and seubstantiate it. The onus is on him to demonstrate that the premises are valid and not on me to demonstrate that they are invalid. he needs to come out and provide evidence that male geeks, or some gatekeeping portion of them, are the equivalent of the Klan
Again, nope. You are making the positive statement he is wrong. You get to prove that he is wrong (you can do that, right?).
I think those who have argued his rightness, are correct. I think this from having observered geek culture (which you say you don’t have great personal knowledge of: though you deign to lecture us on it’s ins and outs), and from the examples others have provided: to you.
So the bar is getting higher, part because all you are doing is shrieking that he has to do what you tell him to, or admit that his wrong (which is also something you, and pretty much you alone, are telling him to do).
So it’s heads you win, tails he loses. He either dances to your tune, or has to dance to your tune.
That’s (wait for it)…
Then you obviously need to be BLINDED by the CUTE. They turned 6 months this past Sunday.
You just said that norms are universal!
Engaging? I’m having far more fun writing about aliens and unicorns.