The Honey Badger Brigade — the all-female-except-not-really gaggle of antifeminist YouTubers — has been raising money, and quite a lot of it, to pay their possible legal bills as they seek “legal redress” against the Calgary Expo for booting them from the event.
So far they’ve raised nearly $14,000 of their goal of $40,000, which they say “will be used for legal costs and costs directly related to our ejection from the Calgary Comics and Entertainment Expo,” whatever that means. That gives them some wiggle room. As “victims” go, they’re pros.
On the group’s fundraising page, the Badgers accuse the Expo of tossing them out
due to our Men’s Rights Activism and unpopular view of modern feminism. Therefore it is our belief that the actions taken by the Calgary Expo staff were of a political nature and contravene the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, in particular freedom of conscience, freedom of thought and freedom of association.
Apparently this is one of the most important civil right struggles of our time.
While the Expo hasn’t given a clear reason for why the Honey Badgers were evicted, I’m guessing it’s not for the group’s “view of modern feminism” but because the group came to the expo flying the figurative flag of GamerGate, a loosely organized but highly virulent harassment campaign disguised, not very convincingly, as a campaign for “ethics in game journalism.” Oh, and possibly because they seem to have gotten into the expo under false pretenses.
Even if we were to assume that the Honey Badgers were booted for being Men’s Rights Activists, there is a teensy bit of irony to their complaint. You see, the HBB is closely tied to Men’s Rights hate site A Voice for Men. Indeed the two most visible HB’s — Alison Tieman and Karen “GirlWritesWhat” Straughan — are volunteer staffers on the AVFM masthead, as is HB hanger-on Sage Gerard.
Last summer, most or all of the HBB attended AVFM’s first conference, held outside Detroit; Straughan spoke at it. Here they are posing with their AVFM comrades.
You know who wasn’t at that conference? Feminists, whom the event organizers made pretty plain were not welcome. Indeed, as journalist Jeff Sharlet noted in his remarkable account of the conference in GQ, attendees seemed to be obsessed with defending their little event against an angry mob of feminists that never materialized.
They keep saying, “No feminist better try coming here!” Local police have dispatched four officers, and the conference attendees have deputized even more security from their own ranks. “Security” wears black polo shirts, and there are a lot of black polo shirts, but since the line is slow, security decides to sweep us all in with a request to return for a “check.” Nobody does. Only one feminist later attempts entry, an activist who goes by the handle “Dark Horse Swore.” The black shirts eighty-six her.
Only a few of these dastardly feminists made it into the event, posing as journalists. Oh, wait, they were journalists. Somehow I suspect that security at AVFM’s planned conference this year will be tighter.
I also suspect that the Honey Badgers will be there, recounting the story of the terrible injustice done to them by the Calgary Expo.
H/T — @idlediletante on Twitter, who’s been keeping tabs on the money so many #GamerGaters are raking in.
@Paradoxical
What is it is that they’re just parroting words they hear “SJW” say, because there’s 5000^1000x more people that are sympathetic to transgender issues than they are for the MRM. They’re trying to use these words so MRA flunkies who have no actual idea what the fuck transgenderism is can say, “HEY! They’re TRANSGENDER! YOU AGAINST TRANSGENDER PEOPLE?”
They’re trying to use their followers’ ignorance (or give their followers a way to spread ignorance) to bring sympathy to their cause, to make “SJWs” the bad guys because suddenly they’re against a bunch of transgender individuals. But they’re misusing the word “transgender” in a way that still makes them “female” and thus in the correct gender binary the MRAs approve for their own benefit and for their followers who are extremely ignorance about transgenderism and transexualism.
You know there’s going to be people who don’t know exactly what happened, but are willing to donate because they think transgender people were victimized, if they describe themselves as transgender and have people tweet and shit describing them as such.
That’s the only way I can make sense of whatever the fuck they’re trying to say here.
I think they’re trying to claim trans status because they believe it to be a group that has privileged victim status. Similar to the right wing men who believe rape victim is a privileged status.
These people are just disgusting.
So, this means AVFM will champion trans rights now, right? That’s totally a thing that will happen?
sunnysombrera:
I’ve always been pretty liberal but an ex introduced me to a particular thread on metafilter where women were detailing their experiences of cat calling, stalking, being followed home and rape. It opened my eyes to just how bad things were. That kind of shit should not be so normalised that people fear rocking the boat by talking about it. Sorry, slight tangent, my empathy on overdrive for some reason.
@Paradoxical:
You’d have to be extremely flexible mentally. Like how do you even get your leg there?
Double Bonus points for awesome use of scrubs gif.
Banana Jackie Cake:
I get the impression they’ve annoyed you with this. Fair enough, they really seem to have no idea what they’re saying. It really is like small children parroting what they’ve heard adults say without any understanding of what it actually means.
Nope, nope, nopity nope NOPE. That’s NOT how transgender is defined. If you’re born with a vulva, ovaries, uterus, etc. and consider yourself female, it doesn’t matter if you “look masculine” — you’re still a cis woman. The butchest of butch lesbians is still a cis woman if she was born with those girl parts and assigned “F” on her birth certificate. You only get to say you’re trans if you were born with a penis, testes, prostate and so forth, are assigned “M”, and consider yourself female in spite of that. If you weren’t designated male at birth, you’re not a trans woman. You’re as cis as your sissy sisters, sister.
Being an insufficiently girly-looking cis woman can certainly suck, as you don’t have pretty privilege to (slightly) compensate for sex discrimination, but that does not make you trans, you fucking idiotesses. You are not being discriminated against on the basis of gender just because you cut your hair short and don’t wear makeup, even if you ARE bitter at Roosh, Fartiste & Co. for not trying to pick you up in a bar.
And damselling, my dears? You’re soaking in it. You weren’t ejected for being unpretty and unpopular, you were kicked out for lying on your application forms, and you KNOW it. But hey, it must be a righteous cause if it gets you free cash, right? So yeah, crank up the fuckin’ waterworks, ladies. Make like your own straw version of a feminist, eh?
And when you’re done fundraising, Money Badgers, throw some cash my way. You really need to pay for my busted irony meter.
@lith
It annoys me when someone describes themselves as transgender by using a definition of transgender that DOESN’T FUCKING EXIST, yes.
@Auntie Alias
Technically.
FFS, either Tieman is thick as a brick or she’s can’t stop shoveling ridiculous self-serving bullshit in hopes of helping their cockamamie plan to get press and/or suckers’ donations. I’m going with the latter obviously.
“We wear tee-shirts and jeans in public! Karen has short hair and is bisexual! We don’t, uh, damsel, which is totally a thing. No other women are like this, so you might say we are technically transgendered. The fact that we refer to ourselves as women and lived as cis women are entire lives is irrelevant.”
@Bina
Thank you for articulating what I couldn’t properly say.
@Bina what you said. Because I can’t formulate words. Too confused.
@Bina
Well there are trans men. Presumably, she sticks both trans men and women under “transsexual” before mangling the concept of transgender.
Tierney:
Tierney is suggesting any deviation at all from gender stereotypes or social roles makes you transgender, no matter what gender you identify as or how you actually live your life.
Hey, guess what, female firefighters and stay at home dads, you’re transgender and didn’t even know it. I’m a lesbian and have been the only women not in a dress at formal events in the past, so involuntarily throw me on the transgender pile as well.
This, of course, is infuriating nonsense, particularly because there is no fucking way Tierney actually believes this.
She may believe that she’s discriminated for her anti-feminism, while, somehow, all of Western society obeys every whim of the “damselling” feminists and/or non-FeMRA women.
This has fuck all to do with her bullshit transgender hand waving of course.
Brooked:
LOL! I know, right? I’d love to see her explain damselling to a court.
And there really is no fucking excuse for her ignorance. I don’t know if she’s still there but there was a transgender woman hanging out with them who was transitioning.
Perhaps the HBs do not understand that the Charter only applies to government action. Not sure you could find any ethical lawyer willing to take this case.
Word means things! You can’t play Humpty Dumpty and use them all anyhow. “Technically not cis-gendered” is not a free pass; it’s not actually anything.
This annoys me as much as when people spell it ‘Ghandi’, and that’s a lot.
Wow, multi-ninja’d.
Even ignoring their misuse of words with meanings, they still don’t make sense:
So which group do they think is trying to address this problem, and should be worth supporting rather than disrupting? Is it
1) unimaginative video game creators who routinely include “damsel in distress”
or
2) feminists who talk about unimaginative video game creators
?
Well. That’s appropriative, transphobic and just plain fucking stupid all at the same time.
There’s already a word for women with “Dudely” interests, you know: Tomboys. I mean, there shouldn’t have to be since interests shouldn’t be separated by gender, but whatever.
@ venny
“what does this mean? which one them is sorta-kinda Hispanic and which one is definitely Latino?”
What I was trying to intimate was that, while the one guy is definitely the son of Cuban immigrants (though not of refugees, as he has tried to claim) the other is in every point aside from that of raw ancestral fact (which is not that important in and of itself) a white dude from Canada who has left Canada because he understands, as a politician of a certain bent, that there’s more and better pickin’s in the U. S. of A. — But it was probably rude of me to say so.
Right.
Getting money from suckers.
I am always uncertain of my own morality, but about 20 years ago I knew a guy online on a MUSH. He had some dubious features, but he was pleasant to talk to, there was fun rp, we talked a lot about rl ooc.
He knew I was living on disability benefits, and he offered many times to send me money.
I always said no.
It would have been easy to say yes, and I didn’t even know if he was serious, but I always said no.
A few years later I learnt another female from that MUSH had spun him a tale about needing money desperately for an abortion, so her bf never knew she had been unfaithful.
She was quite upright to us later about it having been a total lie.
He sent her the money.
And I was all ‘How could she DO that ?’
I don’t understand the HBs , AVFM, or Roosh etc either.
Why am I picturing this whole thing in the South Park Canadian voice? “We want more money….just money….you know…from the internet.”
https://youtu.be/EmZRLxnXamM
Auntie Alias- rofl that quote. Does Tieman actually believe that women who are “masculine” are someplace in the genderqueer/ trans neighborhood? As in, women who don’t wear makeup and do wear pants like Tieman are “technically not cisgender”??
Rofl that’s rich.
@idledillettante, I suspect she knows better and is just trying to manufacture something that will allow her to claim discrimination. It’s inconceivable that she hasn’t been exposed to information about what transgender really is. I wonder what Karen and Hannah thought about being classified as trans!
I’m sure you’ll be shocked to hear this, but they’re talking out their ass if they think the charter of rights and freedoms has anything to do with this.
“On the group’s fundraising page, the Badgers accuse the Expo of tossing them out”
“While the Expo hasn’t given a clear reason for why the Honey Badgers were evicted,”
I’m guessing (though probably wrongly) that even a moron like you might be able to figure out that they have a point at least to this point.
“You know who wasn’t at that conference? Feminists,”
Feminists weren’t welcome because they don’t give a fuck about men. If you found any feminists who were actually concerned about men’s issues, they would be welcome. Of course, you’re going to be dishonest. That’s what feminists do. They reason they wanted security was for feminists protestors trying to break into the conference. You know those entitled princesses who don’t think women should have to pay for anything including a ticket.
“Only a few of these dastardly feminists made it into the event, posing as journalists. ”
Because they were too damn cheap to pay for a ticket.