Like their identical cousins the Men’s Rights Activists, GamerGaters have a bizarre fondness for terrible graphics and “memes” and collages of blurry screenshots designed – if that’s the word for it – to spread their sometimes incomprehensible propaganda.
The graphic above, found on Twitter, is my favorite GamerGate graphic so far, I think, and not only because it looks like a famous old Windows screensaver gone wrong. No, this little graphic wins my heart because it so baldly, if inadvertently, reveals the sheer ridiculous hypocrisy of GamerGaters claims of victimhood, and the intellectual bankruptcy of their #NotYourShield campaign.
In the graphic, as you can see, GamerGate’s mascot Vivian James, the perpetually petulant girl gamer who wants to do nothing but game, tries to fend off an array of accusations and epithets swirling around her. “Cis White Male,” “Misogynist,” “Rapist,” “KKK,” “MRA.”
But Vivian James can’t be any of those things, apparently, because she’s a GIRL. NOT YOUR SHIELD!
While it’s certainly true that Vivian James is not a cis white male, or a rapist or a member of the KKK, it’s also true that she is COMPLETELY IMAGINARY.
Unlike all those GamerGaters who are indeed cis white males, misogynists, rapists, nazis and MRAs.
If you’re trying to change the perception that your movement is made up of a bunch of entitled (and, FWIW, mostly white) manchildren who feel threatened by real women with opinions different from their own, you might want to think twice about using a manic pixel dream girl whose slogan is “shut up and play” as your, yep, shield.
Oh, I know, there are real women involved in GamerGate. But aside from Vivian James and the non-gaming “based mom” Christina Hoff Sommers, and perhaps our friend Cameralady, it’s doubtful even most GamerGaters could name more than one or two, if that.
EDIT: As several people on Twitter have reminded me, I forgot to mention one of the most creepy things about Vivian J. — the color scheme of her sweater is apparently a reference to a really creepy, rapey meme called “piccolo dick.” Which you can read about here, if for whatever reason you want to.
Also: the phrase “manic pixel dream girl,” a reference to the manic pixie dream girl trope, popped into my head partway through writing this. But after posting this I decided to google it to see if anyone else had used the phrase — it seems like a pretty obvious one. And indeed people have. Here’s a cartoon called Manic Pixel Dream Girl, an account of growing up as a female video gamer.
Dear GamerGomers: Shut up and play.
Sincerely,
WOMEN.
There are many examples of women GamerGaters, one example is @SlushStuff. She isn’t misogynist, racist, or any such thing.
The picture is instructive, but not the way the designer meant it to be: Vivian isn’t sad that she is being accused of misogyny; she’s sad because because misogynists are using her as their shield while they hypocritically scream “Not your shield!”, hiding behind imaginary profiles.
Vivian James is very revealing: GGers couldn’t find a real, flesh-and-blood woman that they didn’t hate, so they created one. Because she is a creation, she is completely under their control. That’s the only way they can interact with a woman: if she is completely under control and doesn’t have any kind of opinion that isn’t given to her by her masters.
Says a lot, doesn’t it?
“sometimes incomprehensible” ?
It might be more accurate to say “almost always incomprehensible”.
To be honest, I have met a lot of women on twitter who insist they are feminist and GamerGate.
And I’ve found most of them on Anita Sarkeesian’s feed, trolling the crap out of her. >_<;;
And one of the words in that picture is aspie? Why is that an insult and what has this got do with people with Aspergers syndrome anyway? As someone with Asperger’s syndrome, I feel offended that that word is placed alongside “racist” and “misogynist”.
It’s so gross. They’re using the image of a gamer girl who just want to be into games in peace and not be harassed…sounds familiar?
@Jono 4channers love insulting people by calling them autistic.
This image is such a reversal.
Don’t forget the part where they refer to Vivian as their “Daughter” while simultaneously drawing porn of her.
I’m not kidding.
I’m having trouble seeing how “We own the media” is an insult, or how it alleviates the “racist,” “kkk” and “hategroup” accusations.
*perpetual fountain of barf*
and keep in mind that “Vivian James'” green and purple hoodie is a rape joke.
@Jono, do you know who Brianna Wu is? The GG movement claimed she sent a Tweet to CameraLady calling her a “fucking aspie.” Wu later proved the Tweet came from a different account (someone created a Twitter account with a capital “i” that looked like a lower case “L”.
It would have been obvious regardless, because Wu doesn’t use language like that on her Tweets, while 4channers use the slur “Aspie” frequently.
The fact that it was fake isn’t important, though, the fact that they created one more boulder for Bullshit Mountain is.
Can explain about the hoodie being a rape joke?
How is the hoodie a rape joke? I totally believe they’d do that but….
How is the hoodie a rape joke? I totally believe they’d do that but….
Oops double post… sorry
sorry, can *you* explain, blah blah
I haven’t commented on a blog for years so bear with me.
Here you go: Piccolo Dick page from KnowYour Meme (should go without saying that it’s NSFW and trigger warning for depiction of rape).
“But but but… how can we be misogynists if this fictional girl we invented for the sole purpose of agreeing with us agrees with us?”
@bertie:
So fucking what? The allegations of gamergate being misogynistic, and now racist and ableist, aren’t disproven by having some women on the gamergate side.
Do learn how to argue, or run away and let the adults talk.
Strivingally- thanks. That was…informative. Anybody have any brain bleach?
This graphic is exactly what the Owen Aurni documentary, The Sarkeesian Effect is going to attempt to prove, and in the teaser we saw three wimminz. Don’t forget miss short hair cut hipster looking “we used to go to the park and sit under trees and roll cigarettes and talk about how much we hate liberals” (big laugh from Auruni). that’s her exact quote, or they didn’t sit under trees, I can’t remember.
I’ve seen a couple on facebook in comments on articles on the subject saying “feminists go away!”
And yeah that’s just a few. But there is never complete shortage of laydiez that will join the patriarchy parade.
If I could pay people to watch this, I would.
http://chezapocalypse.com/episodes/s4e7-gamergate/