Reddit, what the hell is your problem?
So last night I discovered the PunchableFaces subreddit. That’s right, an entire subreddit devoted to posting pictures of people so that Redditors can fantasize about doing them bodily harm.
While most of the pictures in the subreddit are of boys and men – some targeted for being “faggots” – the recent posts (as of this writing) with the greatest number of upvotes and comments were, naturally, aimed at women. Specifically, at two outspoken feminists who’ve been singled out by Men’s Rights Activists and #GamerGaters for endless harassment: video game critic Anita Sarkeesian and Canadian feminist activist Chanty Binx, perhaps better known amongst her enemies as “Big Red.”
Here are five of the worst comments I’ve run across in the, er, discussions about these women.
Needless to say, TRIGGER WARNING for explicit threats of violence and rape.
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.
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1) This rapey comment about Anita Sarkeesian:
2) This comment about Sarkeesian with more than two dozen upvotes:
3) This comment about Chanty Binx:
4) This other comment about Chanty Binx:
5) And this other other comment about her:
BONUS: Three comments about much-maligned game designer Zoe Quinn, the subject of another post on the PunchableFaces subreddit:
![fuckyourteam 2 points 2 hours ago Wtf is this cunt looking at? permalink save report give gold reply [–]edu_gon95 [S] 5 points 2 hours ago Hopefully an incoming fist permalink save parent report give gold reply [–]ovenbutt 2 points 2 hours ago I want to pretend it's a fist coming straight for her face.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/quinncomments.png?ssl=1)
One more BONUS Zoe Quinn comment:
Oh, and as an ADDED BONUS, here’s another terrible comment, this one directed at a gay teen boy whose picture is the third-most upvoted one on the subreddit as of this writing.
Why exactly is Reddit providing a forum for hate speech and explicit violent threats directed at, among others, gay teenagers and women who are already the regular targets of widespread harassment and threats?
H/T: r/againstmensrights
Michael, libel, incitement of hatred, threats, doxxing and publishing private photos of other people has in most countries consequences beyond “being criticized”.
It should also be noted that Emma Watson is a kitty overlord lover. She has two. Bubbles and Domino.
Leela, that sounds awful. Here are some cute pics of Maru the Cat. http://mewanty.net/maru-the-cat-book/
Hey Leela I’m sorry to hear that!
Cloudiah, that’s cute 🙂
Ikeke I LOVE that page.
As if she couldn’t get any more awesome!
I agree that, if something is legally actionable is done, legal action should should be taken. However, with specific reference to what’s being discussed the OP, there doesn’t seem to be any legally actionable infractions. If a poster would like to argue that PunchableFaces constitutes incitement to violence or assault, they should do so. However, appearing to assert that morally reprehensible speech–after all, that is what kind of speech is being promoted on PunchableFaces–is prima facie illegal seems to skirt the very issues that the First Amendment was written to address.
@Michael McG:
This is not about legal consequences. The first amendment puts heavy restrictions on law-enforced speech restriction.
Reddit has been notorious for taking “freedom of speech” to its extreme, with the admins constantly siding for letting anything onto their site (including illegal content) unless they get negative media attention for it. They get very huffy whenever they’re put on the spot for shitty content on their site; it’s pretty clear they think they represent an ideal and can’t imagine why they are even being criticized for it.
That’s the attitude of “freedom of speech with no consequences” people are talking about. It’s about social consequences, and about who Reddit gives a platform to. A better site would ban the “punchable faces” subreddit and refuse to host similarly hateful content.
Michael, I think that Sarah, Jojo, and redpoppy were referring to a lot recent reddit occurrences, including the nude photo leaks. Plus, wishing to be able to punch people in the face and rape them because they said things that you didn’t like or expressed themselves in a way that you didn’t like does come pretty close to suppression of their free speech. And one could easily argue that this subreddit counts as incitement to violence.
Stay classy, Reddit.
I find it slightly confusing when people mention the tort of libel and the crime of incitement to hatred and then claim that the consequences which they mention are not in part legal consequences. That said, I realize that not all consequences have to be legaland that a lot of consequences that people in online communities complain about are in fact social consequences with no legal force.
Leela, so sorry to hear you’re having such a horrible time :(. May Bootsy be entwined around your ankles tomorrow, watching over you and swiping at any who would be jerks. Praise her.
The fact that things as pathetic and juvenile as “emmayournext.com” are being made as counter-responses to her UN speech actually serve to strengthen her validity, not detract from it. These people aren’t the sharpest tools in the misogyny box.
Major, right? She’s amazing.
I think most of us here were talking more about social consequences more than legal but if a legal case could be made, I’m pretty sure they’d cite the same argument. But, mah mendments.
Do you have the presence of Bootsey in your life, Leela?
Leela, have a Bootsy!
http://lovemeow.com/2014/06/bootsy-the-cat-with-anime-eyes/
It appears that I have indulged in my bad habit of focusing on a related but rather irrelevant topic. The posts to which I was originally responding are–upon rereading–ascribing a particular, prescriptive attitude towards free speech to the GamerGaters rather than describing the function of appeals to free speech within the GamerGate scandal and in general last “lax-law” communities on the Internet. (I refer to it as a scandal because it is truly scandalous the way in which the women who are the targets of the GameGaters have been treated not because I think the GamerGaters have a valid point about whatever they think they have a valid point about.)
I apologize for the derail.
Everyone, I really, really mean this. Thank you for your hugs and brain bleach. I do feel better about my personal shit. <3
Brain bleach: here’s a baby I made.
http://www.shaenon.com/cookie.gif
Shaenon, your baby is adorable. So is the blanket the baby is lying on, but you didn’t make that, so…
(Good taste in choosing it though)
Michael, can this please be the last time you do that? Cause really, it’s getting annoying.
OT: But it’s only fitting that Bootsy and her sister are Siamese…I’m owned by-I mean, I have three, and they’re very amazing.
On topic: I’m just disgusted. I wish I had something smarter or more clever to add, but I’m jsut so appalled.
BABBY! IN GIF FORM! (Seriously, that’s a cute baby you made there.)
The fact that you don’t find some of my other opinions relevant our that you may not agree with doesn’t make them–or the way that they are communicated–annoying.
I’ve gotten some good laughs and read some great stories on some of the more popular subreddits, but now that I know that this kind of wretched putrefaction of the human condition takes place in other corners of the site, I’m definitely pulling the plug. Bye-bye.
The jokes, they write themselves.
Do you find being dismissive an effective mode of communication?
Actually I’ve decided that ignoring you would be a lot more fun for me. Bye now.