So how much do some angry gamebros hate Anita Sarkeesian? Enough to send me death threats … for writing about the death threats sent to Anita Sarkeesian.
Shortly after my post on the threats against Sarkeesian went up on Thursday, I got these messages sent to me as anonymous “asks” on Tumblr. These were all in succession, in this order; I’m pasting each one individually instead of the whole bunch at once so you can read them in the order in which I got them. [TRIGGER WARNING: Violent threats; I’m putting them past the jump.]
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There is a certain irony in that last comment, whether or not it came from the guy (and I’m pretty damn sure it was a guy) who sent all the threats that immediately preceded it. It’s pretty clear to me that Sarkeesian has no need to fake anything; obviously her haters aren’t exactly shy about sending death threats to people they don’t like.
And if this is what my inbox looks like for merely writing about Sarkeesian, I can only imagine what her inbox looks like. I suspect she gets threats like these all the time; the reason she called the police about several of the threats she got this week is that the threateners posted her personal information as well.
In the interest of full disclosure: Here and here are screenshots of these messages as they appeared in my Tumblr inbox; I’ve blurred out the personal information of the people sending me cat pics.
Needless to say, I’ve turned off anonymous asks on my Tumblr blogs.
So is IB banned now, or what?
She has this moralizing-aunty tone I think is totes insufferable. Bless her heart I pray for her & etc.
IB doesn’t get that being a good woman doesn’t protect you from anything. You can still do everything “right” and get raped. You can not drink and not go out on after ten and it can happen. The first time I was sexually harassed was at my part-time job. I was sixteen and the line cook fondled me. Did I deserve it, for… being the hostess at the restaurant?
She thinks that the only women who ever get raped did something to deserve it; it’s shit Christian theology. Read the book of Job, IB!
– Caroline.
World of Warcraft has a great open world, and enough stuff to do that if you get bored with one thing, there’s always something else to do. Even when you’re leveling you have multiple zones for your level range, so for instance if you’re bored of the jungle you can head up to the swamps instead.
Internet hugs to childrenofthebroccoli and your kitty!
My kitty caught some kind of bug a few years back. She became totally listless and stayed that way for a few days, so I took her to the vet. The blood tests were inconclusive, but she got put on antibiotic pills and got better. Hopefully it’s something simple like that!
More cute, for the puppy-lovers:
@karalora; that’s basically how Penny’s been acting; she’s usually really curious and affectionate, but the last few days she’s been spending the entire day hiding under my sister’s bed and barely even coming out to eat or use the litter box. She still put up a fight when we tried to put her in her carrier, though, which I took as a good sign.
A few years ago my cat started to behave strangely, fever, inactive, etc. Turned out she had a bladder infection due to feline urinary tract disease (I think? I think that’s what it’s called). She has to eat a special and expensive food, but is all better now.
These “threats” (well the threat parts of it) are all quotes from the video game team fortress 2. Which is kinda the sweetest and most cartoony “shoot em up” game ever made.
God damn it.
Nequam: That was pretty much my reaction, too. 😐
Anyway… this game I’ve been playing… it’s a mobile game, which you can get for most smartphones. Its called Guns Girl Z. The plot takes place in an all-girls school, in which a zombie apocalypse occurs. You play as a cute anime girl, and using all kinds of guns and melee weapons, you have to fight your way out past your zombified friends and classmates in an 2D-style beat-em-up style game. And along the way you unlock more weapons and outfits that enable stat bonuses. I’ve been enjoying it very much. It’s fairly mindless entertainment, and I enjoy playing a cute anime girl stabbing, shooting, and killing other zombified anime girls. Oh, yeah… and it’s free too, so you know…
Article’s more than a bit triggery, but pertinent, and possibly good to read if you are a fellow survivor, or know a survivor of violence:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/camelswithhammers/2013/07/vulnerability-victim-blaming-and-the-just-world-fallacy/
From the blogpost:
Grothe has been and continues to be a colossal ass. Wild horses could not drag me to TAM.
wait… did you say you played GTAV? You better not let Anita find out… just saying, its not exactly a game she… approves of.
The point, reptile0009 has missed it…
The whole bit about “fake” death threats reminds me of the exchange between Christopher Lloyd and Eileen Brennan in *Clue*:
Professor Plum: What are you afraid of, a fate worse than death?
Mrs Peacock: No, just death; isn’t that enough?
@gillyrosebee
How?
Lee: I suppose it’s possible that Randi doesn’t know about and wouldn’t agree with Grothe’s stand. (I’m thinking here of when the Jane Goodall Foundation got all huffy over a Far Side cartoon where an ape grooming another ape finds a blonde hair and says “Have you been hanging out with that Jane Goodall tramp?”– only to reverse positions when Goodall herself said “Actually, I though it was funny!”)
Even implausible death threats are creepy…
Someone once called my job and said they planted a bomb in my car…a very drunk person, my car’s behind a 7-foot high security fence with floodlights bright enough to read a book by, and in plain view of the desk where I mostly sit at to watch the camera feed and open access gates.
I thought about all this and was like…”no fucking way someone could have done that.”
…I still took a deep breath when I turned the key in the ignition…
Anyway, David, very little chance it’s serious, but document it. Sympathies extended.
If nothing else? if you do not have security cameras at your abode please to freaking get a security cam system right the hell now, what you need to be concerned about is anyone lurking around outside.
Said lurker would probably be a totally unrelated burglar casing your residence anyway…so not to worry… :p
Nequam: Hopefully not…you’d think one of the more respected rationalist organizations would be more sympathetic.
@reptile0009: Sarkeesiam points out, repeatedly, in her videos that liking problematic stuff doesn’t make you a bad person. I, personally, love a ton of movies, books, and games that I recognize as having misogynistic elements; the Princess Bride, the Dresden Files, Sly Cooper, God of War, the list goes on. If I limited myself to things with no problematic elements, I would be playing nothing but Tetris and be reading only the backs of cereal boxes. It’s ok to like GTA as long as you acknowledge that it contains sexist themes, and don’t harass people when they point that out.
Okay, okay, whatever… whatever. I’m not gonna argue with you guys… really wouldn’t do no good.
Oh gawd, Inanity got sent back to the turnip farm, and I missed it? Damn.
And yeah, how about that anonymous guy. His tough posturing (and his “not so tough now, are ya” bluster) seems a little…ironic, considering that he’s hiding behind the Internets.
Willfully misinterpreting the things Anita Sarkeesian is saying seems to be a mainstay of all her critics. It’s like they don’t even hear what she’s saying. Ever. About anything. I bet they do just as well with reading comprehension.
This is balls. Death threats are balls, IB22 is balls, and this mockery of cultural criticism is balls. I’m so tired of all these balls in my face.
Maybe it’s just me, but that sentence is waterworks. Kitties and hate shouldn’t mix.