What a surreal life Anita Sarkeesian must lead, in which virtually everything she says and does becomes grist for the Great Internet Lady Harassment Machine, Sarkeesian Division.
Take the latest blowup, which followed a few comments Sarkeesian made in the wake of Friday’s school shooting in Marysville, which may have been triggered by the shooter’s angry response to a romantic breakup. On Friday, Sarkeesian posted a few thoughts on the matter on Twitter:
We need to seriously address connections between violence, sexism and toxic ideas of manhood before boys and men commit more mass shootings.
— Feminist Frequency (@femfreq) October 24, 2014
Not a coincidence it’s always men and boys committing mass shootings. The pattern is connected to ideas of toxic masculinity in our culture.
— Feminist Frequency (@femfreq) October 24, 2014
While it it not literally true that every single mass shooter in history has been male, we are talking about an almost exclusively male club: one recent attempt at crunching the numbers found that 97% of school shooters have been male, and 79% of them white. (The Maryville shooter was Native American.)
In any case, the notion that a crime so heavily associated with men might have something to do with our society’s notions of masculinity isn’t exactly a radical notion. Indeed, it seems rather obvious.
But to Sarkeesian’s many haters, on Twitter and elsewhere, it was as if Sarkeesian had just posted a video of herself drowning puppies. Cue the twitterstorm.
Here are just a selection of the literally hundreds of lovely comments that Sarkeesian had Tweeted at her on Friday and Saturday after making her original comments.
[Giant TRIGGER WARNING for violent, explicit threats, harassment]
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There were, of course, the explicit threats:
And the implicit threats:
And the sexual harassment:
And those who merely expressed their hope that Sarkeesian would kill herself:
Or die a horrible death:
Or simply die :
But not everyone wished violence on her. Some just told her that the threats and/or harassment she’s already getting is totally justified:
(Apparently by “fishing” Mr. de Alba means “expressing an opinion or making an observation.” Also note that the tweets that set off this latest wave of harassment didn’t contain the #GamerGate hashtag. )
Speaking of harassment, we’re just getting started in our chronicle of the latest wave.
Let’s continue with an assortment of Tweets using the c-word, a favorite slur amongst Sarkeesian’s detractors.
Why, yes, that is Suzanne McCarley, A Voice for Men’s “Assistant Managing Editor” happily adding her voice to the harassment.
Others pulled out the f-word:
She was called a “bitch.”
She was called a “whore.”
She was called a “terrorist.”
And a Nazi:
One fellow said that he thought Sarkeesian’s tweets were actually worse than the shooting itself:
And one even declared her “officially worse than Wil Wheaton,” the former Star Trek:TNG actor who has won mass opprobrium from internet dicks for publicly expressing his belief that people should not be dicks.
To add insult to injury, a few reported Sarkeesian herself to Twitter for various imaginary infractions:
Another asked why she wasn’t in jail for her, er, crimes:
Just to remind you: these tweets are all from TWO DAYS’ worth of harassment and threats on Twitter. And this isn’t all of them.
At this point anyone who claims that Sarkeesian is “making up” the harassment she gets, or writing it herself, or just the work of a “few trolls,” is either disingenuous or delusional.
I’ll leave the last word to Sarkeesian herself.
Our culture is deeply sick when simply asking questions about how toxic forms of masculinity may harm men leads to hours of hate on Twitter.
— Feminist Frequency (@femfreq) October 25, 2014
EDITED TO ADD:
ATTENTION NEW COMMENTERS! I would like to draw your attention to this bit from my comments policy:
[I]f I’m writing about someone who’s gotten harassed by misogynists on the internet, and you want to talk about how much they deserved it, or what a lying liar they are? Well, fuck you! Your comments go right into the trash.
So take that into consideration. It might save you some time.
CORRECTION: I removed a screenshot of a Tweet that wasn’t threatening but was posted by a troll. See here.
This is kindergarten-level philosophy. “What if all people behaved the same way?” “But they don’t!” “Yes, but imagine for the moment a pretend world where they do.” “But … but they don’t!” “I know that, but use your imagination to pretend a world where they do.”
Actually, I think even a kindergartener could follow along with that.
Oooh, we have a new contestant trying out for troll of the year. Unfortunately poorly designed graphics will not get you very far. I recommend catchphrases. No one’s going to remember you next week if you don’t come up with a good catchphrase.
That’s not an ad hominem attack. This is an ad hominem attack:
t1oracle does not grasp the first thing about graphic design and layout. Therefore, his argument that men and women are of equal value is clearly wrong.
See what I did there?
Likewise, that wasn’t a strawman argument. What Milo Bloom does in this strip is a strawman argument:
http://www.thecomicstrips.com/store/add.php?iid=85989
And FFS, someone insulting you isn’t an ad hominem. Me calling you, say, a disingenuous sack of fetid bat guano, isn’t an ad hom.
Me saying that because bat guano is notoriously bad at constructing an argument, your argument must be bad so I’m not going to bother reading it, now THERE’S an ad hom.
Do keep up.
@weirwoodtreehugger
Men and women are different but equal. My use of imagery is symbolic, not literal.
“Also if men are inherently different than women, and the vast majority of mass shootings are committed by men, it suggests that there is something maleness that makes one want to shoot many people. Right?”
No it would not.
1) Not all shootings are mass shootings.
2) The men who committed mass shooting did not shoot because they were men.
3) The women who have shot others are not men.
All frogs are amphibians, healthy frogs jump, but jumping has nothing to do with being an amphibian.
The men who commit these crimes mostly suffered from severe depression. Have you ever considered that maybe something is causing these men to suffer from depressed thoughts, and then preventing them from doing something about it? None of that justifies their actions. However consider that most children are abused by women. Does that mean that child abuse has something to do with femaleness?
Mass shootings have as much to do with maleness as child abuse has to do with femaleness.
@Fibinachi
My grasp of the ad hominem fallacy is already solid, thank you. Do you always suggest that strangers on the internet are unintelligent, or you do just reserve that for the ones who disagree with you?
Sorry, it’s the former. I have a raging god complex that assures me in a silken whisper that I really am that much smarter than everyone else.
It’s hard to shake because the preponderence of evidence often displayed to support said theory.
“You seem not to understand that I was asking a what-if question, and this lack of understanding is preventing us from having a conversation”, again, is not an ad hominem.
Didn’t mean to insult you though, I have to learn stuff all the time too.
If anyone has a “mental illness is to blame” box on their bingo card, you can mark it (again).
Hmm, I don’t know, have you considered unrealistic gender roles coupled with societal pressure to not admit weakness, and therefore avoiding seeking help?
Gonna have to back up your assertion there, bucko. How do you know that a majority of children are abused?
Then we’ll get into your assertion that most abusers of children are women.
Abusive ad hominem usually involves attacking the traits of an opponent as a means to invalidate their arguments. Equating someone’s character with the soundness of their argument is a logical fallacy. Mere verbal abuse in the absence of an argument, however, is not ad hominem nor any kind of logical fallacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
People who don’t even address the argument that most mass shootings are committed by men say what?
Holy crap, that’s awful. Where to even start?
Nearly all mass shootings have been men. Like, 98%.
Likewise, I’d be willing to bet that the numbers of gun homicides by men is vastly higher than by women, though that statistic is harder to find good numbers on.
But I also know that when you adjust for the fact that vastly more women are the caretakers of children than men, it’s insanely more likely that a man will engage in child abuse than a woman. Now, that adjustment hides a shitload of other social factors, but still.
Maybe they’re depressed? Gee, if only they weren’t constantly being told that being sad or depressed wasn’t manly, or that the only acceptable emotional states for a man are “horny” and “angry”. Or if only there wasn’t a massive stigma against men getting help. Gee, I wonder what could be propping up *that* status quo? Could it be… Toxic fucking masculinity?
Good, so you’ll be aware it’s not a logical fallacy when I call you a disingenuous fuckwit who wouldn’t know an argument from the hole in the ground he crapped in this morning.
Nah, your arguments don’t stand on their own merits. Explaining to you that you don’t grasp hypotheticals and you confuse “if” and “ought” is just icing on top of the cake.
Oh, noes! The University of Wikipedia has been invoked! I have no choice but to melt down into a puddle as though water had been thrown on me!
Next he’s going to tell us that atheism just means a lack of belief in gods, and doesn’t and shouldn’t inform our behavior towards our fellow human beings.
@t1oracle
Because I have an extra 5 minutes, I’ll give you a short, free lesson on “is” vs “ought.”
An “is” statement is also called a descriptive statement. “The balloon is red.” “We are in Fresno.” It is an observation of the world as it stands.
An “ought” statement is also called a normative statement. “These balloons ought to be/need to be/should be red.” It is a statement about how the world ought to be. Often normative statements are accompanied by explanations as to why things should be this particular way. “These balloons need to be red in order to match the cake.”
However, a complicating feature of descriptive statements is that, outside the realm of purely natural phenomena (and to some degree within the realm of natural phenomena), the choice of how to describe something carries within it a hidden normative value. “The balloon is red” implies that there is an object that can be rightly called a balloon, which has a characteristic that can rightly be called red, and it is proper to describe the balloon by its “red” characteristic. These are all normative assumptions.
This becomes more obvious when talking about social constructs like race. The fact that we describe someone as “black” and another person as “white” presupposes that racial categories exist and that the terms “black” and “white” can be properly used to describe them. There is a hidden normative statement within this superficially descriptive statement: that describing someone by a racial category is proper, and therefore the racial categories themselves are proper.
You’re welcome. You’re now better equipped for your next internet discussion.
This one has been amusing. I vote that he stays.
His graphic is reminiscent of this series that we did back in the day:
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/267/7/1/misandry2_by_jewelleddragon13-d6norcv.jpg
I’m still waiting for a catchphrase. So far… blah, blah, blah, nope, nothing funny enough. Frankly, I’m not sure if this one is creative enough to come up with a catchphrase; doesn’t understand how words work, doesn’t understand how arguments work, doesn’t understand how hypotheticals work…
I am disappoint.
Congratulations, whoever is responsible for the site. By combining feminism and troll-baiting, you’ve sucesfully created a business model. After all, the number of idiots online is only set to increase, and you’ll never be out of work.
So go ahead, point at those idiots and laugh. ‘Expose’. Because nothing is as constructive as tracking anonymous messages posted on the Internet.
I think I’m going to start my own site, cataloguing the gems people leave on the walls of public toilets.
Honestly, I’ve been for spoiled for trolls. If they don’t have a house DIRECTLY ON THE BEACH, I’m just not interested.
Katz … no. Not you, too. The … the colors! They burn!
At least your text is legible.
Our troll seems to have crawled out from a rotten log in some remote jungle where he has never been exposed to discussions about sex roles and gender stereotypes. I will note that he has apparently heard the word “heterosexual” but never seen it written out, since he spells it “hetorsexual”.
“Masculinity” and “femininity” do not refer to the essential quality of being male or female; they refer to the social roles that a sexist culture tries to force on men and women. “Masculinity” means being strong, dominant, rational, never showing emotion, never admitting to needing help, and being prepared to use verbal abuse or violence whenever it seems useful and necessary. “Femininity” means being weak, submissive, hysterical, emotional, vulnerable, and avoiding verbal or physical confrontations if possible. Asserting that these are equal involves some very weird math.
I would argue that all masculinity is toxic, but the term toxic masculinity tends to be used to indicate a condition where men feel their maleness is being questioned and respond with hate speech, threats, assault, and murder.
t1oracle, get a clue.
Hey everyone, I have an idea. If it’s unacceptable to talk about the causes of a mass shooting after a mass shooting, let’s make a rule that it’s also unacceptable to mention what someone did to deserve harassment after someone gets harassed.
If you want to criticize Anita Sarkeesian, you have to get everyone to stop threatening her for at least 24 hours.
I have to admit, I’m itching to put a comma in katz’ graphic… but I’m weird that way.