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.
“Vivian James: FREE HER!”
Yes, we totally should help free her! I wonder if she uses her mic in team games on random servers. The main reason I generally refused to even go on public servers when I was playing lots of Left4Dead was so I didn’t have to deal with the asshats I knew were waiting to harass me for the crime of playing while female, especially since I preferred Zoey just so that my character and I would share a gender.
Another interesting thing about the purple-and-green color combo: yes, it may be connected to “Daily Dose,” but it also is the color scheme for Disney’s Fairies/Pixie Hollow lifestyle brand. Vivian should have a favorite Pixie Hollow character. I vote Zarina.
@Leum:
And so what?
@Leum, the thing with Tumblr is that a lot of Tumblrs seem to have developed a code, where words mean things that they don’t mean in other places. I don’t have a problem with Tumblr people coming here, what I have a problem with is them coming here and insisting that THEIR word meanings are the correct ones, and policing people who use words in the normal way.
It’s one thing to talk about the problematic implications of unthinking use of a slur, and try not to use it anymore, or at least around people who find it hurtful. It’s another thing to come into a different place, and get enraged that people are using a word you find objectionable because *you’ve* added meanings to it that nobody else is aware of.
Ditto. Only played Left for Dead (1&2) with folks I knew after that one time.
I move we start a #FreeVivianJames hashtag.
Seconding Katz’s suggestion.
@Skye, I have a feeling that our experience is excessively common.
Someone who’s good at art should make her a friend and start tweeting that at gamergaters.
I remember there being a false equivalence-ridden, apologetic article about GamerGate that also had the gall to try acting as if it was impartial as well – even though almost everything about it lionized Gaters while demonizing anyone who didn’t like it:
http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/25/gamergate-an-issue-with-2-sides/
(And you know he’s totally impartial due to having a twitter name like “Libertarian Blue” and retweets comments made by such ingenious minds like Adam Baldwin and Milo Yiannopoulos, or making dumb claims like “[t]he hostility of politics towards facts has echoes of creationism / religion. That’s why skeptics (correctly) rejected Atheism Plus.” Weird, all those anti-Atheism+ types seemed to outright loathe any facts brought up by, well, anyone…)
One of the writer’s argument as to why people should stop being so mean to GamerGate: they came up with Vivian James! He claims she is non-idealized (even though she is) and how she represents how the “movement” isn’t sexist (even though she’s purely fictional and not real – though it wouldn’t matter if that was the case).
This is like arguing there is no sexism among comicbook readers ’cause, hey, they have superheroines like Wonder Woman! ‘Cause, y’know, nevermind Powergirl’s “boob window” or the “boobs-and-butt pose” documented by sites like the Hawkeye Initiative or the “Women in Refrigerators” trope or how many artists try and insert as many gratuitous views of a woman’s posterior despite being inappropriate.
I banged this out in a real hurry, but…
http://pierre.thecomicseries.com/images/comics/75/bc0f7219092d7de2f3a073fc67dc4285432039572.jpg
I feel sad that Poutine is not in the comic, otherwise great. 🙂
I did like the touch of having one of them wearing knight armor… 😀
I love that comic, Katz!
And maybe, if anyone can find green and purple striped hoodies, we can all go as her for Halloween? I’d have mine stencilled “Feminist Irony Shirt” first, though, just so the world knows it IS a costume.
Katz, that’s awesome!
katz, love it!
Is the third one Pierre? If he is, where is his moustache? ::cries::
The third one isn’t Pierre. I think it’s a Social Justice Commissar. Keeps the other SJWs in line, yanno.
It was the hat that fooled me. 🙂
@katz, that’s brilliant! Social Justice SWAT Team to the rescue!
A quick concept, also banged out quickly, Sigourney Ride. Like Vivian James (video games), her name is based on something related to gaming. Strategy guide. She knows Vivian from Steam.
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2014/299/0/2/gamer_girl_by_aerinea-d84au19.jpg
(please excuse my lack of knowing how to embed links)
Green and purple was my fav color combo as a kid, I think maybe originally because of Barney. (Slightly embarrassing, but true.) 🙁 🙁 🙁
Green and purple are actually my two favorite colors. But I don’t ever wear them together. I like to pair a bright color with a neutral.
Aerinea: I like. “Sigourney Ride” is an awesome name because it makes me think of Sigourney Weaver and Sally Ride.
…And now I am sad that there is no movie about Sally Ride starring Sigourney Weaver.
WWTH, I guess kids sometimes have garish taste. I remember having a green and a purple pair of Keds, and wearing one of each with an opposite colored sock on each foot.
Alternate names:
Evelyn Hupp (levelin’ up!)
Shiva Talok (achievement unlocked… okay, that one’s a stretch)
Xenia Platt (or anything else that gives you “XP” as initials)
I’m hitting a mental block here.
Wanda Tu (walkthrough)
Effie Price (FPS)
Emma Mo
katz, I wanted to invoke those two awesome women on purpose!