So a horse-loving, feminist-hating Roosh V fan popped into my Twitter mentions today, defending Roosh against accusations of rape by noting that he’s never actually been charged or convicted of rape. Which is true, though not actually proof of his innocence any more than OJ’s acquittal in criminal court is proof that he didn’t murder his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend.
When Phil pointed out that his belief that Roosh is a rapist seems to be supported by Roosh’s own words, Ms. Smith declared that Roosh’s own words didn’t count, because they appeared in a post of mine. And that’s when, for better or worse, I entered into the discussion myself.
And then I asked the questions I ask everyone who accuses me of taking quotes out of context: Have you read the original quotes in context, and if so, could you tell me how I misrepresented them?
I don’t think anyone I have ever asked these questions to has given me a satisfactory answer. Most slink off at this point, their bluff called.
But others continue to bluff and bluster onward, doing their best to avoid answering the questions — either because they have read the quotes in their original context, and know full well that I didn’t misrepresent them, or because they haven’t read the quotes in the original and don’t want to admit it.
Still, I don’t think I’ve ever run across a bluffer quite as brazen or as persistent as Ms. Smith, who somehow managed, over the course of several hours of on-and-off “debate,” to avoid saying whether or not she actually read any of the books she claimed I was misrepresenting. Or even the post of mine she was ostensibly critiquing.
As the hours went by, her attempts to wriggle out of answering these rather basic yes or no questions took on a kind of Dadaesque grandeur. Read on, if you have the patience for it.
Seeing the name “Mina” so often in my mentions made me think of the Bollywood classic “Eena Meena Deeka,” which is certainly more entertaining than Mina Smith’s “arguments” above.
Guilt by association has it’s problems, but when you are RT’ing people who say cuckservative earnestly, you’re in a bad place.
*gasp*
It… it’s like a million irony meters cried out in terror, and were suddenly exploded.
It’s pretty clear they were trying to bait you into giving some definition they could reject or exploit, because they couldn’t possibly defend Roosh on merits alone. And it’s pretty clear that they were trying to use the whole PUA thing of controlling frame. Yeah, I’d probably have bailed out or devolved into snark early on. You have impressive fortitude, David.
Roosh fears the mammoth. His moderate followers are fleeing or have fled. He’s left with the rats.
Because that was obvious to those of us who actually read the article. And since “Mina” refused to read the article or state that they did…
Wow, that Mina has a lot of time on his hands!
alaisvex-
It’s a power play, favored by abusers.
You control the dialogue and disempower your target while also getting to portray yourself as the more trustworthy member who the target must prove themselves to.
If you actually do engage, they’ll just cycle the requests (as we see in the followup to the “define: rape” statement), eventually ending back where they started. Since the goal is to waste time and prevent a genuine debate focused on the viewpoints they actually hold and the reasons they hold them (that a woman is property of a man and rape is a really good tool for terrorizing women into obedience), it’s very effective for what it is seeking to do. And it allows the thrill of control over a target who does engage as you’re forcing them to jump through your hoops that you fully know are meaningless.
If the target attempts to disengage, the abuser has two tacks, one is to declare victory because they “refused to answer basic questions” (we see that there in the exchange and everytime some rando starts screaming at Zoe Quinn or Anita Sarkeesian) and then use that failure to engage as proof of wrong-doing and as a reason to dismiss their argument. (“Oh, blah de blah, yeah, they’re too scared of debate and couldn’t even defend their arguments to honest question”).
If they engage in the wrong way or call you out on their shit, you can declare victory anyways or you can go the hostile route, increasing harassment and calling in other sealions to pile on until the target gives up and you can declare victory (again we see that in the popup of randos in the thread).
If that still doesn’t work, accuse the target of things you get called by people like the target. It doesn’t matter if you don’t understand what it means, since everyone knows that the enemy only says things in order to score points, same as you, so throw it all at the target as it must mean something bad to them otherwise they wouldn’t have used it to score their points. (see the rando accusing David of being a sealion).
The point is always to run out the clock, exasperate the target, and make it less pleasant for the target to be online and in the public sector so that they just end up spending less time there thus allowing you more domination of the space.
It’s a pretty well-worn round-and-round at this point and has been honed to online terroristic perfection by channers, misogynists, racists, homophobes, and right-wing apologists for years now.
Because if what you really want is the endurance of the status quo, nothing works better than making any discussion of the alternative or any attempt to affect change a toxic repetitive argument that enriches no one.
The interesting thing is that the power play loses all power if the target just blocks them or the medium they are using just bans them, which is why these same fuckweasels are usually the loudest whiners about moderation efforts, closed comment sections, blocklists, and so on and why they often employ IP scramblers and the like to evade moderation attempts. And it also allows them to claim a form of victimhood as after all every abuser has the right to unfettered access to their target whether their target wants it or not…
To be fair, we don’t know “Mina’s” gender. As much as I am loathe to admit it, there are most likely female fans of Roosh, statistically speaking.
I would like to think that there aren’t female fans of RapistRoosh, but let’s not misgender someone out of spite, shall we?
@Paradoxical Intention
OK, I hear what you’re saying.
But what I’m saying is that more women than men know, in an up-close-and-personal way, what it means to be a victim of rape.
“Define: Consent.” Christ, it’s like you were arguing with a wall.
Did we have a troll that went by that name? Because Mina sounds familiar. Also, Mina is behaving a lot like Had to Be Said. If there was no troll on here that went by that name, maybe Mina and Had to be Said could be the same person? Had to Be Said could be getting back at David for being banned. Hhmmmm………
Okay, but that still doesn’t excuse misgendering someone. :/ I’m not sure if “Mina” is a male or female, hence why I used gender-neutral words like “they” to describe them.
Just a reminder, purposefully misgendering someone is a tactic that MRAs use to spite people (specifically when they want to spite/harass transgender people or when they want to insinuate that a man is feminine because being a woman is their best insult). Let’s not stoop to that because one, it’s morally wrong, and two, I don’t want to give MRAs ammunition to point and go “See! Feminists are just as bad as they claim we are!”
So, still kind of a shitty thing to do, regardless of intention, Kat.
That conversation got so stupid I couldn’t even finish reading the post.
You lasted a he of a lot longer than I did there. Kudos for that.
James aka Thasceles
I’ve been thinking about Had to be Said, and about the behaviour of certain ‘Gaters, #braveheros and other reactionary types I’m acquainted with; and it occurs to me when I read this that among a certain type of person argument itself is considered to be a pleasant diversion. It doesn’t matter what the argument is about, or what why; what matters is that you are disagreeing with that person even if it’s pure sophistry. If they say that the weather is great, you must either say it’s terrible or change the topic.
Sadly, there seems to have been a Darwininian process that’s sharpened these argument tactics, because they’ve developed techniques which are extremely effective for abstract jousting but extremely poor methods for actually examining the underlying concepts. They will cherry pick and ignore (as Had To Be Said did), they will engage in pretzel arguments about increasingly semantic matters (as above), they will Gish Gallop and jump around; but the one thing they will avoid doing at all costs is defending a consistent position of their own. These tactics all win fights, as long as winning a fight is all you care about, rather than advancing a cause of your own.
I’ve seen exactly the same behaviour run rampant throughout movement atheism: it is considered praiseworthy to demolish another person’s position, but advancing an alternative position is hardly considered. If pressed, they will drop some thought-stopping words like “science” or “equality” to define their own position, but will not spend time developing those ideas when they could spend time attacking another person instead. While I identify as an atheist for progressive politics reasons, the movement is full of those who seem to be there purely for the sake of fighting.
This is the attitude of the person who sees beliefs as a lumberjack sees trees. They will attack people who have coherent ideologies but offer no alternatives or points of agreement. It’s nihilism. The only defence against it is to cease holding anything as important or meaningful or desirable; meaning that this is in fact evangelical nihilism.
It makes me think: do all groups have such people harassing them? Does Stormfront have a constant influx of people attacking them with such tactics? (Say what you will about the tenets of national socialism, dude, but at least it’s a philosophy.) Does the Daesh have to deal with sealions?
Someone define ‘sealioning’.
Please – really, what does it mean?
(too lazy to look it up…)
So… um. Far be it from me to make insinuations based on obnoxious Twitter behavior, but why is it that every time the pretty basic concepts of consent and rape come up in a discussion, some people make it their life’s work to try to muddy the issue, or to derail the conversation? I dunno, it just makes it seem like they have some personal interest in trying to excuse certain kinds of behavior.
And as their tactic on the internet seems to based on bullying and abusive behavior, it makes me wonder even more how similar their go-to tactic might be in real life. Despite what 4channers and other skidmarks on the underpants of humanity try to claim, your anonymous behavior on the internet definitely reflects how you behave in real life, or at least how you would like to behave if you thought you could get away with it.
And once again, antifeminists are throwing around social justice and debating terms without having the faintest clue of what any of them actually mean. I’m so glad I don’t have a Twitter account. The sealions that frequent this blog are infuriating enough.
For anyone who doesn’t know, it’s derailing an argument with stupid ass questions pretty much.
@EJ (The Other One)
Yes. I think the same exact nihilism is also reflected in their opposition to social justice; Since they’re blind to their own privilege and don’t give a shit about anyone else but themselves, they not only refuse to believe that anyone else would have anything they genuinely care about either, but also think that nobody should. Similarly, they believe nobody is honest on the internet.It’s projection.
At worst, they know there are reasons why people should care about rape, misogyny, etc., but they try to stop these issues from being discussed, since they know more people becoming aware of social problems could lead to change. At their best, they are immature and dishonest trolls. At their worst, they’re straight-up abusers.
In some measure, this nihilism can be seen in everyone who defends the flawed perspective of “neutrality”, while, in fact, embracing right-wing beliefs and rhetoric. It’s dishonest and lacking in self-awareness.
@rugbyyogi
Here’s a perspective:
http://simplikation.com/why-sealioning-is-bad/
I think this part fits.
Basically, it’s a “debating” tactic where instead of engaging in honest argumentation, the sealion intentionally misinterprets the other party’s position and keeps asking for definitions they could easily find on their own, essentially wasting everyone’s time. Instead of the debate being about a specific subject, it devolves into a mess of smaller discussions about definitions and nitpicking that the sealion uses to try to derail and undermine the original argument, ultimately causing the other party to quit the conversation out of frustration. The sealion can then claim victory and accuse the other party of failing to live up to the debating standards set by them.
As EJ said above, it’s nihilism. Sealions are privileged enough to have an ungodly amount of time on their hands, and they use that privilege to waste everyone else’s time. I admit to having fallen prey to sealions a few times on this very blog.
[robot voice]
Define: human
[/robot voice]
Boogerghost:
You’re not driving “above” the speed limit unless your car is literally flying over the traffic sign.
Also the speed limit must be at least 88 mph.
And your car must be a DeLorean.
And you must have a PhD in Futuristic tinkering.
@Buttercup:
Shame on you for using GOTO. 😛
Stuff like this, where some so blatantly avoids answering a question, is the reason i prefer talking about this stuff face to face with whoever is arguing, they can still derail it all and avoid the question but it’s much harder when you’re in the same room as the person your talking with.
“Define consent.”
Okay, here’s a good context-specific primer: http://www.consented.ca/consent/what-is-consent/
“Too much work. Read it to me!”
Um, no.
“Why won’t you define consent?!”
Goodbye, sea lion.
Yeah, the only thing worse than hatemongers are their fans, who demand you analyze their masters words as it would be the fucking Divina Commedia.
Aren’t sealions usually unfailingly polite? Mina seems more like a rabid weasel.
Also, what an absurd and juvenile debate tactic:
PERSON #1: I demand that you jump through this hoop I’ve set up way off in the weeds.
PERSON #2: No.
PERSON #1: Victory!! I win!