On Friday, expat woman-hating woman-chaser Roosh Valizadeh put up a post on his Return of Kings blog with the sensationalized headline “Did Anita Sarkeesian Commit Felony Wire Fraud?”
Roosh breathlessly “reported” that
Two independent journalists have confirmed with the San Francisco Police Department that Anita Sarkeesian, a video game social justice warrior, may have used false pretenses to raise money for her non-profit entity. The police have said that she has not contacted them as she claimed after receiving a Twitter death threat in August. Under Federal law, this may put her on the hook for felony wire fraud.
The two “independent journalists” in question are tech journalist and self-described “fan of 4chan” Milo Yiannopoulos of Breitbart, and Davis Aurini, the cigarette-smoking, scotch-drinking, Anton LaVey-looking blogger who’s trying to raise money to make a “documentary” about the evils of Anita Sarkeesian and “social justice warriors.”
Both journalists – well, the one dude who writes for a sleazeball right-wing site and the other dude who’s not actually a journalist at all – did indeed contact the San Francisco Police Department and were told by a media spokesman that he couldn’t find a record of Sarkeesian contacting them about the threats she received in August.
This bit of “news” sent #GamerGaters and other Sarkeesian-haters around the internet into a bit of a frenzy.
But it turns out they got worked up over nothing. The police spokesman just hadn’t looked hard enough. A day after Tweeting a number of accusatory questions to Sarkeesian, Yiannopoulos had to backtrack, noting in a series of Tweets that he’d had another conversation with the SFPD, who told him that Sarkeesian had in fact reported the harassment to the FBI.
Another writer posted emails he’d gotten from the police spokesman that seemed to confirm Yiannopoulos’ updated information. In the emails, SFPD Public Information Officer Albie Esparza said that Sarkeesian had indeed contacted the SFPD in August but that the case had been handed off to the FBI. (I’ve confirmed this with Esparza .)
Given that the main “proof” that Sarkeesian was lying about the threats she said she received had just vanished into thin air, you might expect that Roosh and Aurini might, you know, correct their now-clearly incorrect posts on the subject and retract their accusations. Well, not so much.
Roosh’s post remains up, with only a brief “update” at the end, noting that “the police have changed their story and now state that they were contacted.” Aurini’s post remains unchanged, and as I write this he’s posted nothing more on the subject.
Even considering the people we’re dealing with here, the hypocrisy is breathtaking.
Roosh ends his post by declaring that
these new revelations concerning Sarkeesian show that no form of media is safe from the SJW and feminist agenda, and that we must do all the fact checking ourselves. The entire media establishment in the United States is potentially corrupt. Proceed accordingly.
Yet he refuses to frankly acknowledge that the “new revelations concerning Sarkeesian” were based on faulty information, offering instead a weasel-worded “update.”
Aurini, for his part, claims in his post to be “fight[ing] for openness and integrity within Tech and Video Game circles.” But he hasn’t bothered to update his post.
When ethical journalists discover that they were wrong about something, they acknowledge their errors and post straightforward corrections. When they get something spectacularly wrong, they apologize.
Somehow I don’t think we’ll be getting apologies from either of these guys.
And thus we get to the whole wire fraud thing. In his post, Roosh repeated a claim made by Mike Cernovich of the “game” blog Danger and Play, who tweeted:
https://twitter.com/PlayDangerously/status/510245982131335169
https://twitter.com/PlayDangerously/status/510246926990594048
As it turns out, there’s zero proof that Sarkeesian lied about anything here. And she made no direct connection between the threats and her Tweet asking for donations.
Indeed, by Cernovich’s logic it’s Davis Aurini, not Anita Sarkeesian, who’s guilty of felony wire fraud. Why?
Because in his post, he made a direct connection between his accusations against Sarkeesian and his own fundraising efforts. Here’s how he ended his piece:
Personally, I’d like to see a lot MORE documentation on Sarkeesian, because this isn’t the only claim she’s made which I suspect is fraudulent – and not just her, but all of the individuals hiding behind the shield of Social Justice, and the journalists who have been aiding and abetting them, culminating in outrage known as #GamerGate. That’s why Jordan Owen and myself have started a Patreon page, so that we can create a feature-length documentary about these people and their methods, and how they bully and victimize the very people they claim to support.
So please help us get this documentary made, so that we can fight for openness and integrity within Tech and Video Game circles, and expose the professional victims for the con artists that they are. Please support our documentary, The Sarkeesian Effect: Inside the World of Social Justice Warriors.
Given that Aurini now knows that his post was based on faulty information, and given that he hasn’t corrected his post or retracted his insinuations, could he now be guilty of felony wire fraud?
For what it’s worth, I don’t think so. While admittedly I’m no lawyer, Cernovich’s logic seems to me like a bit of a stretch.
I do feel safe in saying, however, that neither Roosh V. nor Davis Aurini should be lecturing anyone about ethics.
UPDATE: I confirmed with the SFPD that Sarkeesian had indeed called the SFPD and that the case was handed off to the FBI; the post has been updated to reflect that.
@armenia4ever
BAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHAAAAA *snort* *cough* *choke*
Assuming that you’re not another sockpuppeting piece of shit, you belittle the legitimate struggle of trans and gender queer people with this bullshit.
Also, *snerk* yeah, we’re the transphobic ones. Seriously TERFs have been personas non grata at every feminist event or space I’ve taken part in. Go log into call of duty or the WoW general chat and tell me how transphobic your “gamer” allies are.
@armenia4ever:
What the everloving fuck are you on about? You were the one who mentioned transpeople. There were no TERF arguments being thrown around, nor are there any now. Can you point me to a single instance of transphobia on this thread? Where is it? All I’m seeing is people calling out a self-absorbed jackass, no people making transphobic comments.
I swear, antifeminist idiots who’ve heard of the transphobic fringe ideas within feminism always pretend it’s a big gotcha to the whole movement. Just as an aside, antifeminists (such as MRAs) are notoriously worse in their treatment of transpeople, so I don’t advice you to go that route.
Oh my tap-dancing, chain-smoking, vodka-drinking, skateboarding Christ. You’re making this up as you go along, aren’t you? Not once during the whole rape and death threat hullabalooza have I heard a single voice of criticism that accuses Sarkeesian of being transexclusive and not, you know, of being a woman who criticizes misogyny in video games.
Why not? Because this is not about trans issues. This is about a woman attempting to point out misogynistic elements within a medium, and misogynistic gamerdudes trying their hardest to make up all kinds of bullshit accusations (from fraud to transphobia) in order to hide the fact that yes, all the hate and threats really are just about a woman attempting to point out misogynistic elements within a medium.
Sarkeesian did not invent the gender binary elements in video games. They were already in place, and she’s pointing them out. It’s worth having a discussion about the portrayal of transpeople in media*, but you’d have to be a derailing fuckhead to demand it of a female critic discussing misogyny and not male critics discussing… some other stuff. Apparently, women are not allowed to talk about issues that affect them specifically without taking every other group into consideration, while men are allowed to talk about whatever shit they want to talk about without anyone demanding anything from them. Funny that. And by funny, I mean fucking obnoxiously sexist.
People can care about trans issues without bringing it up in every context. Are you condemning all videos discussing other problematic elements within video games (portrayal of POC, for instance) because they don’t bring up transpeople? Of course not. Which proves that Anita Sarkeesian is not being criticized for her choice of focus, but for other issues entirely.
My everfucking genitals, you’re both pretentious and dull. Jaysus.
*For the record, I agree that games like GTA V have utterly abysmal portrayals of transpeople, but that’s to be expected from games that cater to the cishet male audience with misogynistic, homophobic and transphobic attitudes. Which means that Sarkeesian is on the right track in her criticism of such games, even though she’s not choosing to deal with those specific arguments.
I love how you went straight from “I’m being bullied” to “I’ve heard worse”. Are you even trying to be consistent?
Then again, your attempt to define “gamer” was a garbled mess in which being a gamer requires critique, but only if you’ve played an arbitrary percent of a game…honest to god, it made so little sense I’m wondering if it was even supposed to. I think you might just be nonsense trolling.
Also: dude, there are trans people here, including trans dudes who game, so IDK what you think you’re winning by trotting that out. I wish LBT was feeling better, he’d fucking pwn you right now.
Whoops, guess I hallucinated all those nonbinary feminists I used to hang out with (mostly while tabletop gaming – hope that didn’t blow your mind).
And I suppose we collectively hallucinated the nb folks on this very site. Can we at least agree to keep imagining them? I liked hallucinating pictures of Argenti’s axolotl.
@James Yakura
I refuse to believe that anyone has actually made it through character creation in FATAL, let alone actually played a whole session.
JUST LEAVE ME MY FANTASIES
Axolotl, axolotl all out free! *sings*
Bobby: BTW, I don’t want her to stop making her videos. The more she exposes herself as an intellectually vapid clown, the less headway she makes into videogames, a hobby that wants nothing to do with her.
That’s why that open letter in support got no one to sign it… oh, wait it got more than 2,000 signatures from developers*
That’s why Tim Schaefer called her names… Oh shit, he said she was right.
It’s why Steve Jaros said “VOlition Games won’t change a thing”… Damn.. what he said was, ““I actually tweeted out the link to the video yesterday about women as background objects and said that every game developer should watch this and sometimes is guilty of it,” he said. “I think that [Sarkeesian’s] right in that case.”
So… it’s not “video gaming” (which is larger than “gamers”, who now make up a minority of players) that doesn’t want anything to do with her. It’s hateful shits who are upset their fantasy worlds where women are objects, not people, is changing, and blamer her for it.
*you know, the people who MAKE the games.
Nationalist Dude:Halfwit. I like it. This is almost like online bullying.
Note, these insults are nothing to us trans folks. We’ve experienced much worse.
Check your cis privilege.
Fail.
If you want to claim some aspect of discrimination, membership in the class has to be known. Otherwise (this is what privilege is all about) the assumption is that one belongs to the the class, “normal” (for whatever valule normal has in the community).
Then the treatment must be related to the covalen aspects of the class, and the ignorance/denial of experience of class members by the non-class member.
To no one’s surprise you did none of those things.
Nomenclature, yer doin’ it wrong.
Holy shit, armenia4ever might be one of the most dishonest trolls we’ve ever had around here.
Kookaburra, axolotl, kookaburra, axolotl!
I can keep singing…
http://www.politicsforum.org/images/flame_warriors/flame_62.php <- armenia4ever
You don’t own gaming.
#GamerGate doesn’t own gaming.
You don’t speak for me.
Fuck you.
seraph
Must be this. Claiming to be trans, rejecting binary gender, and manically anti-feminist? That kind of cognitive dissonance is just…no.
Kookaburra, axolotl!
So… we are the nasty anti-trans people, who hate them.
You are defending your natural allies, Gamers: who are so accepting and inclusive of anyone, regardless of their gender, gender-presentation, etc.
They would never dream of hating on someone for critiquing aspects of their hobby, esp. not aspects which demeaned, diminished and dismissed entire classes of people who are just as they like to imagine themselves.
Nope, they would never attack someone like that.
Just throw out a TERF accusation. It’s the only thing that makes evil SJW feminazis feel bad! They’ll agree with anything you say if they are scared they’ll be called TERFs!
Armenia,
If you’re actually trans (thanks to the 4chan sockpuppet aspect of this whole thing I’m skeptical of any claim to a minority status) and are actually concerned about trans issues in gaming, make your own videos about it. Or blog about it. Share your work with enough people that your “real gamer” buddies find out about. I’m sure they would never give you the same treatment they gave Sarkeesian.
Sorry, “who are not just as they like to imagine themselves”.
Must get coffee.
To clarify, I meant I’m skeptical of the claims obvious trolls make to minority status. Not skeptical of clear non-trolls.
@Pecunium
“Nationalist Dude.” I like that! I’ll use that for Mr. Halfwit from now on. Unless he’s perma-flounced quietly. (He hasn’t pulled a full meltdown yet, just lame non-sequitors indicating general lack of awareness of the topic at hand. I’m interested to see if we’re dealing with a “Lisa”-style sock-puppet)
Now, now, WWTH, that’s just rude. You’re actually suggesting armenia4ever does something besides whine about why some woman isn’t doing their activism for them?
For shame.
Armenia, I say this as a gender-non-binary person.
Also as someone who was married to a trans woman.
Fuck you, you’re a fucking hypocrite.
You expect us to care about your manfeels without giving a flying fuck about us.
You pull out the trans card, thinking that this is going to get you off the hook for acting like a jackass.
We aren’t hating on you for being trans, it’s about you acting like a douchenozzle.
“As a hedgehog astronaut, I have faced worse insults. I can’t believe the erinaceinaephobia I’m seeing here. Check your human- and gravity-privilege!”
Yup, that makes about as much sense and bears as much relation to the actual conversation here as what Armenia4ever is saying. Note: I am not saying A4e is not trans. But I am saying zie is fundamentally dishonest.
See, to me, “professional victim” implies that Sarkeesian is, in some way, raking in money from her victimization. But when I asked for some explanation of this, our troll just skipped away from it and disavowed any knowledge of how this hustle works.
Clearly Troll4Evah just uses words, and what they mean is less important. Calling Sarkeesian a “professional victim” sounds like a snappy insult, so it gets thrown out there, and the meaning of those words is not so relevant.
So I think it’s clear that when Troll4Evah calls zirself “trans” it could mean what we would normally think of as “trans,” or it could just be a word that was thrown out there because it sounds snappy and there is no meaning behind it at all. Troll4Evah’s relationship with words is haphazard, and no assumptions should be made.
Professional victim is a moderately widespread term of dismissal. It’s used to imply that someone belongs to an oppressed group; one the accuser will admit has legitimate grievances, but that this person isn’t addressing actual problems.
Instead they are taking advantage of those real problems to create problems where there were none before, and so create drama/turmoil where there was none. Then they parlay that to fame/money.
Al Sharpton is accused of it. Sarkeesian is being accused of it. It’s a handy piece of rhetoric (and a dog-whistle). It manages to say that not only is this person a fake, but they are a fake who is manufacturing social strife where all was comity and sweet accord.
So the problem they are addressing is not only not real, it’s designed to make people feel guilty when they did nothing wrong.
People who use it, are either deluded, stupid, or evil (combinatory effects, of course, magnify each of those traits).
Again, check your cis privilege feminists.
The fact that everything has to be about a lack of recognition or attention to binary gender is why I dislike feminism. Its bad for society. Stop concentrating on binary gender and look beyond.
Judging by the comments on here, transphobia and feminism will alwa be intertwined because you can’t see past binary gender.
Nationalist Dude, you’ve already said that fifty posts ago.
Actually, fuck this troll. I’ll put on a dress, it makes me feel much happier than playing with this chew toy.
Non-binary AMAB signing off.