The Halloween Costume of Great Misandry

Wait, is not liking facial hair misandry? That would be awesome if so, would make it so much easier to get my 10 daily acts of misandering in. It’s like v8 for evil feminists!

So on Halloween the dude in the pics above went out dressed as a … well, a Men’s Rights Activist, I guess, or maybe a GamerGater, or Redditor?

It’s most likely a GamerGater, the Doritos and Mountain Dew are a clear reference to the Dorito-gate, the previous controversy in the gaming community—well, the one that was actually about ethics in videogames journalism.

I’m a bit surprised that burning the effigy of a 17th century religious extremist isn’t considered misandry, on the basis that his name was “guy”.

But yeah, I don’t know why some people think Guy Fawkes was ever a folk hero to us Brits. He’s no Robin Hood. We celebrate the fact that he FAILED to blow up our king and parliament. We cheer the status quo.

V is a different matter. His character succeeded using Guy’s methods, but his motives were entirely different, and I think most fans of Anonymous have only seen the movie adaptation of the V for Vendetta graphic novel, because I there’s a lot more complexity around V, his identity, his politics, and the adoption of his image by the citizens of the dystopian state he inhabited, if I recall.

To me the Guido mask just represents people who uncritically consume media, and embrace simplistic, so-called “anarchist” politics. Gamer-gaters in a nutshell – this costume is perfect.

I’m just picturing someone helping someone style themselves with a classy piece of clothing or hat, “Here, wear this, this is classy. .. Wear it with this Hawaiian shirt.

For people who speak and think almost entirely in stereotypes, they sure are willfully obtuse about cultural shorthand when it suits them. “What is this ‘Mountain Dew’ you speak of? It’s a refreshing, lively drink enjoyed by millions!” “Big noses are anti-semitic? I had noooooo idea! Maybe YOU’RE the racist, since you brought it up.”

Amazing, isn’t it? Show them a caricature copied line-for-line from a cartoon about how the Jews should be exterminated and they’re all “meh, nope, not seeing it.” Show them a guy in a fedora and Hawaiian shirt and suddenly they’re all “OFFENSIVE STEREOTYPE!”

It’s like how dogs are deaf when you say the word “bath” but miraculously regain their hearing when you say the word “treat.”

V is a different matter. His character succeeded using Guy’s methods, but his motives were entirely different, and I think most fans of Anonymous have only seen the movie adaptation of the V for Vendetta graphic novel, because I there’s a lot more complexity around V, his identity, his politics, and the adoption of his image by the citizens of the dystopian state he inhabited, if I recall.

I read the graphic novel since I was 16 (8 years, that’s trippy O.o). Anyway, like you said, there is a lot of complexity. In the graphic novel V is an anarchist but Hollywood needed to make him into a vague sort of freedom fighter. The biggest change between graphic novel and movie is when V takes over the London broadcast to deliver his message. In the movie it’s a more generic freedom fighter call to arms. In the graphic novel V goes into detail on the evil and ineptness of the whole human race throughout it’s history. Mainly he attacks humanity for its blind obedience to authorities and its bullying and cowardice. He even assumes a god-like role, telling that if humanity didn’t smarten up it would be “fired” from its “job”.

Also, in the graphic novel V is more enigmatic, manipulative, and malevolent. In the graphic novel V is manipulating Evey the whole time, grooming her to be the next V, which he succeeds. In the graphic novel Evey is his pawn from beginning to end. In the movie, Evey is more independent. Due to the graphic novel fans even speculated that V was a woman named Valerie, who was put in a death camp because she was lesbian. That possibility was only ruled out when the creators specifically stated that V wasn’t Valerie (I think). In either case, the man (or woman) in the death camp became V because he read Valerie’s letter (or was Valerie).

In the graphic novel, V goes into much more detail about how he wished for humanity as a whole, not just the people of Britain, not just to be free from their current tyranny, but to be free from government forever. He’s speaking of a fundamental change in humanity. Of course, Hollywood couldn’t have that though. Also, after V has died, he tells Evey to take off his mask. She obliges, but she ends up taking off mask after mask after mask of all the people in Evey’s life. (She must have told V so he would know.) Finally she pulls off a mask to reveal her own face when V first knew her. The whole experience makes her decide to become the new V.

Anyway, enough of my epic lecture. 😛

Seeing this, all I can think of is costume guy and his friends are probably a fun bunch. I also wonder what costume got first.

Heh, we’re about the same age, Bogdan. 🙂

But yeah, none of the people who have adopted the “anonymous” mask seem to have given the same level of scrutiny to their politics as Alan Moore did to V’s.
I guess everyone just wants to be a Hollywood anti-hero – complex, flawed and ambiguous characters don’t make great role models.

Still, I don’t think even V had much to do with Guy Fawkes other than symbolically committing acts of terrorism on the 5th of November. It almost pisses me off that I’ve seen some kids quote the rhyme as if it’s Fawkes who’s a “hero” like V in the movie, and they couldn’t even spend 2 seconds looking up Bonfire Night on Wikipedia.

Anyway, nowadays it’s mostly an excuse to watch fireworks, and stuff our faces with parkin and toffee apples. 😀

I INTERRUPT THIS THREAD

I NOW RETURN YOU TO YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED PROGRAMMING

I don’t remember getting a basement rash from the naggy ex-boyfriend. He really looked better with his beard grown out. My experiences would leave me to believe that stubble could abrade badly. Shaved off or grown out would not cause abrasion…

Um, my one ex-gf would shave, but not keep up with it enough, thus resulting in a very painful face rash. 5 o’clock shadow of the basement is bad, ok?

Stubble anywhere is ideally designed to cause skin irritation in anyone unfortunate enough to be rubbing up against it.