So over the weekend some enterprising 4channer decided to try to create some mayhem and make a few quick bucks by concocting a fake feminist conference, and selling tickets to it.
He — I’m pretty sure it was a he — headed to /b/ to round up some accomplices.
The co-conspirators assembled in a TinyChat to work out the details of this brilliant scheme.
BE SURE TO SPELL FEMINIST CORRECTLY OR NOBODY WILL BELIEVE YOU.
Alas! Someone must have spelled feminist incorrectly, because as it turns out, no one did believe them, and word quickly spread on Twitter that FEMCON2015 was indeed a CON.
It didn’t exactly help that, their entire knowledge of feminism seemingly derived from antifeminist memess, none of the FEMCON2015 promoters had any idea what real feminists sound like, and the fake feminist Twitter accounts they set up were about as believable as Steve Buscemi’s undercover teenager on 30 Rock.
Here are some of the highlights from the would-be FEMCON artists’ brief careers on Twitter.
“Veronica” tweeted “her” first TOTALLY REAL HUGE FEMINIST comment at 2:12 (my time) Sunday afternoon.
Hey girls, I'm a huge feminist, and I can't believe I didn't have a twitter! I'm assisting in the creation of FemCon2015 in NY atm
— Veronica Hanson (@FeminsitVeronic) July 26, 2015
Literally one minute later, “Jessica” here tweeted HER first TOTALLY REAL feminist comment.
Just to let you know: You don't need to do whatever your boyfriend tells you to. You're independent! #bestrong #feminism #feminist @femfreq
— Jessica Alice (@Jessikacie) July 26, 2015
Two minutes later, she tweeted about the TOTALLY REAL conference.
ANYONE ELSE AS EXCITED FOR #FemCon2015 AS I AM?! Just bought my tickets today! Flying down in a few!! @Femcon2015 #feminism
— Jessica Alice (@Jessikacie) July 26, 2015
This TOTALLY REAL liberal showed how liberal “she” was with TOTALLY REAL liberal tweets like these:
https://twitter.com/ProgFembo/status/624684086720897024
https://twitter.com/ProgFembo/status/625034891491545088
Then followed up with a plug for FEMCON2015.
https://twitter.com/ProgFembo/status/625487206090715136
The OFFICIAL fake account of the fake conference — which has now apparently been banned — tried to whip up fake enthusiasm for the fake conference:
Looking at @Femcon2015’s tweets last night, before the account vanished, I noticed “she” had 85 followers, pretty good for a brand-new non-celebrity account. Let’s see what some of these followers had to say!
@Femcon2015 Emma Watson
— Joe Cockx (@Generic_nam3) July 26, 2015
This was Mr. Cockx’s only Tweet.
But some of @Femcon2015’s other followers tweet a bit more regularly. Like Claudia here:
This seems to be a popular topic amongst @Femcon2015’s followers.
I crossed out the info, BTW.
There are more like this, but I think you get the idea.
SPECTACULAR SUCCESS, FELLAS!
H/T — r/GamerGhazi, Sari’s Whimsy, and @srhbutts
@Mew York Kitty Just chiming in to notice you’re a fellow furry mammotheer from NY. 😀
@guest
OK thanks for the answer, I was curious about it. Also since animous post as such I’m guessing that’s your name? That’s cool lol
@Sarity eeyup. And a kitty, which apparently Manoshphere types hate for some reason.
Also, someone mentioned this above, and maybe we could make a fake feminist convention for them to “protest” at and maybe even lure them into a gay bar? After all, they actually believe everything they’re saying about feminists! Dead serious. You could tell them feminists are secretly seven-eyed Reptilian aliens who eat the flesh of cishet white men by vomiting stomach acid onto them and sucking it up through their proboscises and they’d actually believe it! It’s a sad scary world when you take the Redpill. (I’m ex-Redpill, and it’s great being off of it. It really is like a drug addiction. Say No To RedPills.)
@Mew York Kitty I’m glad to hear you managed to detox yourself Don’t know if you’re a convention-going furry, but it crushed my heart at this year’s Anthrocon when 2 The Ranting Gryphon paused his act to mention how much he’s been asked to write anti-feminist material lately and ask his audience to cut that shit out. And then see the improv games become so nauseatingly full of rape jokes like I’d never seen before. -_- I’d really hoped furdom would remain a safe space from redpill fuckery being such a liberalistic LGBT-friendly community, but alas (you give me a little hope that trend could fizzle though. ^w^ Welcome back from the dark side).
I can’t say I’d get behind tricking manurespherians with their own fool schemes, much less troubling an innocent gay bar with their unfriendly presence. The worst thing you could do to these people is keep them exposed to sunlight, as David is doing (if however you’re up for a furry gay bar meet, I’d be all for it.*u*)
And then they wonder why they aren’t pulling in many gay guys. And why the gay guys (and the women, and everybody else for that matter) are all laughing and shaking their heads at them. It’s Teh Stoopid, stoopid!
Meanwhile, this feminist is friends with a LOT of gay guys, and finds them to be natural allies when it comes to deconstructing, analyzing and criticizing traditional gender roles and other sexual hogwash that’s been passed down through the eons. Whereas MRAs, much as they moan about having to “be a man”, are actually still perpetuating toxic masculinity while deep in denial. Their idea of “rebelling” at traditional gender roles seems to consist solely of punching women in the mouth instead of behaving like a gentleman toward them.
And they wonder why we laugh and shake our heads at them…
@Sarity I remember more people got upset that he made jokes about suicide and demanded that Uncle Kage ban his act. Also because of double standards when someone applied to have a transgender panel, but Uncle Kage said it was apparently not “family friendly” or something. Aside from that, Anthrocon was actually really good this year, and it’s a pretty queer-positive environment as the fandom is in general.
Also, I guess they forgot about that other part and the other less prominent controversy where RedPill furries were offended by him saying he was a feminist. The kind that still think Zaush did nothing wrong, when he very likely did. Even people who question what actually happened know Zaush is a terrible person and that they wouldn’t let him near their female friends.
@Bina It’s pretty clear why LGBT folk would sympathize with feminism with the whole deconstructing gender roles thing. Of course, there’s a lot of controversy, especially with TERFs being the Gamergate of feminism and all that. But generally we seem to get along just fine, and I’m hoping that the TERF wing goes away.
Same here. I recently had a bust-up with someone I thought was a friend, but who was really a TERF — but don’t call them that, and don’t call them out, because they’re remarkably like the Nice Guys™ who say “I’m not an MRA but…” Well, I called her out, briefly and politely. And then I left the Facebook group she founded, which was turning increasingly TERFish and less and less progressive, OR identifiably feminist for that matter. She even posted stuff from overtly right-wing and racist sites to bolster her “Trans is Teh WRONG!!!” viewpoint. Shortly after I left, she unfriended me. I was half expecting it, so it wasn’t much of a shock. I was fed up with her shit-flinging, and to be honest, I don’t miss her OR that group. I just feel sorry for those who stayed. Goddess only knows what misinformation they’re picking up on gender issues by sticking around in there…
@Mew York Kitty – Well done jumping ship!
Their latest thing seems to be pushing the idea that FF relationships have the highest amount of domestic violence. Even the egalitarians appear to have picked that one up by osmosis. The hivethink hugbox atmosphere is so strong that ideas make the rounds like a piece of gossip about an illicit affair in St Mary Mead.
What really depresses me is the way so many of the gay men who buy into their spiel accept heartbreaking levels of double standards, often setting themselves up as the One Good Gay for the straight approval.
@DJG: I’d be careful with using the word “hugbox”, it’s an ableist dogwhistle.
@Bina, there’s a feminist blog I no longer visit because I couldn’t stomach her increasing transphobia, a pity as her commentary on the manosphere is pretty good.
I’m not exactly sure what it even means to be ‘Trans Exclusionary’? Does it mean refusing to accept a trans woman as a woman? Or excluding trans women from being feminists? Or excluding trans women from female spaces? I gather trans men don’t come in for the same hostility from TERFs, which makes this an actual case of misandry.
@ Sn0rkmaiden
There’s obviously going to be different views on that issue, but from discussions with some of my realworld feminist friends who identify as ‘gender critical’ their view is:
Trans women are not women. They are men who are trying to intrude on women’s spaces or at best people with a psychological illness on a par with body dysmorphia.
People who identify as trans women could theoretically be feminists or feminist allies but only in the same way as men can.
Anyone who was socialised as male should be excluded from women only spaces.
I can see why this is controversial.
@Alan,
yup I would agree that’s controversial.
My only experience with this was a few years ago when I briefly attended a bisexual women’s group. There was a call to vote on the issue of allowing pre op trans women to continue attending the group.
Apparently what raised this as an issue was an individual claiming to be a trans woman had attended one of their meetings, only this individual was not dressed as a woman, and later made inappropriate approaches to other members, detailing sexual fantasies etc, and generally making everyone feel really uncomfortable.
Obviously that sort of thing is not cool, but I think the decision to make this about all trans women was a big mistake. At the meeting I tried to put forward that they just have a policy of banning any individual who behaved antisocially (such a ban could apply to cis or trans), and I did vote against the exclusion, but ultimately they voted to exclude and it caused a lot of bad feeling.
She’s also a wife and mother to one son, and now, as announced in a recent tweet, twin girls! The thing is, when you’re a woman in a male-dominated industry, you’re under scrutiny from all sides, and what should’ve been one woman’s happy family announcement has evolved into an “example” for working women everywhere.