So right-wing garbage site Breitbart has apparently decided to pander to the angry gamer demo even more explicitly with the launch of Breitbart Tech, “a brand new vertical dedicated to coverage of tech, gaming, and web culture.” Naturally, they’ve tapped the unlovely and ungracious Milo Yiannopoulos, Gamergate panderer par excellence, for editor.
Yesterday Milo went to the KotakuInAction subreddit, one of Gamergate’s main hubs, to announce the good news.
One Puckish Redditor gave Milo a little pop quiz to test his knowledge of technology and gaming. Milo, well, failed it.
![HBlight 314 points 19 hours ago Can you, offhand, name your specs for your pc? What model phone do you use? What do you think makes it good? Same question for a tablet if you have one? Complete the following phrase: "It's not a big truck, " Who is Linus Torvalds? Why is 60fps better for gaming even if 24 is perfectly fine for movies? If you can't answer these questions, do you plan to hire those who can? Plenty of "tech" writers out there who just use technology a lot. I'm just wondering if you are willing to get more into the culture of tech beyond this culture war in tech. :P permalinkembedsavereportgive goldreply [–]yiannopoulos_mActual Yiannopoulos, and a pretty big deal ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)[S] 181 points 18 hours ago I can see I still have much to learn.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/milofakegamer.png?resize=526%2C364&ssl=1)
One might presume that such an obvious fake gamer would quickly be hounded from the business by an angry Gamergate mob.
But, nah, someone explained all the answers to Milo and the regulars went on celebrating Milo’s new gig.
Because it’s all about ethics in knowing absolutely nothing about video games.
H/T — r/ShitRedditSays
@Orion:
I think Dodom meant that when dating kinky men, it’s a thing they expect to have occur in the bedroom. If there are any clubs which mandate anal sex as a condition of attendance, I’m not aware of them.
I will say that in my attendance of kink events, most of them have been in vetted environments – I.e. you can’t get in unless you’re already well known and trusted, or know someone in the community who will vouch for you, or if you meet with the hosts of a particular event in advance to see if they consider you trustworthy enough to give you a chance. I don’t know what non-vetted environments are like, but my experiences are nothing like VOoT and Dodom are describing. And locally, at least, it seems safer and more respectful than some of the other people seem to be implying.
…Correction, meant to say “I don’t know what non-vetted environments are commonly like” because the only one I’ve been to was a kink convention, which you have to pay a lot of money to get into, so I would imagine that would weed out most of the casual creep/abuser types.
Just noticed this, and: no. No no no no no no no. I don’t think anyone should go to prison for obscenity, because “I know it when I see it” is not an acceptable way to decide who to lock up. There is no way for a publisher to know in advance whether a jury will find a given film to be obscene, and I don’t think it’s just to imprison someone who didn’t willfully break the law. If we must punish obscenity, then it should be sufficient to confiscate the profits and issue an injunction.
Max Hardcore (real name Paul F. Little, apparently, according to wikipedia) was sent to prison for the wrong crime; what he actually did was commit rape on camera repeatedly. Let us be clear on that. The fact that the court chose not to prosecute him for that is a travesty; the fact that they only gave him a two-year sentence is a travesty, and the fact that the docket said “obscenity” instead of “sexual assault” is a sad indictment of the sort of society we live in. However, if that’s the only charge that was forthcoming, then that’s vastly better than nothing.
I accept your argument that obscenity laws are in principle a bad idea; but I feel that in this case they were used acceptably, that is as a stopgap where the court didn’t bring other charges and it would have been a greater miscarriage of justice to bring no charges at all.
EJ thanks for those sex-negative links. I skimmed over both and will read them thoroughly later when I have time. One thing that bothers me about the term “sex positive” is that it was coined in response to feminists who were not anti-sex per se, but anti porn and prostitution industries. So being anti-sex industry means one is automatically anti-sex or sex negative? Appearanlty some people thought so!
While you’re probably right about porn driving the demand for anal sex, particularly among teens (and this IS a concern, because we’re talking unrealistic expectations among the very young and inexperienced, not to mention a huge distortion caused by purity culture), the adult-diaper thing is way off. I know oodles of gay guys, and none of them are in diapers, even though pretty much all of them have done butt stuff at some point, if they’re not doing it on the regular (and have been for many years). The anal sphincter, like the vagina, is made of muscle. It doesn’t stay stretched. It bounces back. If this were a serious issue among them, don’t you think they’d issue a public health warning about it, as they did about unprotected sex and AIDS? Yet, oddly, there is none. Hmmm. What does that tell you?
My concerns about getting the poops during butt stuff are a slightly different matter — IBS is triggered by certain foods (such as legumes, very hot peppers, or anything with a lot of fibre). Mine also acts up when my period is at its crampiest. And I suspect it can also be triggered by penetration, which is why I don’t want to risk that. I’m not, however, afraid of ending up permanently in diapers, and I think that concern is way overblown, not to mention way silly. (And yes, more than a little homophobic, so cut that out.)
Bina | October 30, 2015 at 9:32 am
” Merely the act of *having* boundaries, to some people, seems to be an invitation to violate them.”
– But those types are usually very firm about their own personal boundaries!
” But yeah. He didn’t understand that boundaries are not about a “lack of trust”, as he often kvetched. And when I countered that he was being extremely inconsiderate, he didn’t seem to pony that at all.”
– I dated this one guy for six months who one day hinted at anal. He was flying out to spend the weekend with me so I borrowed a dildo. That night when we were involved I pulled it out. He was like “whats that?” I said you, “you wanted anal sex, bend over” He got angry. I mean ANGRY. Later that week I dumped him because I hate the attitude. The attitude is ” I watch anal porn and my conception of it is doing it to a woman, not having that woman do it to me, because…. because….I don’t know why actually.” NOT ON MY WATCH!
This is the same guy who in the beginning of the relationship said it was not natural or realistic to expect monogamy from men, especially in long distance relationships. When I employed the PUA tactic of “agree and amplify” and said “Great! I’m so happy you and I are on the same page about seeing other people ” he started nervously stammering and backtracked.
Men don’t like to be players in their own game.
Here’s how that comment was supposed to read:
EJ
Thanks for those sex-negative links. I skimmed over both and will read them thoroughly later when I have time. One thing that bothers me about the term “sex positive” is that it was coined in response to feminists who were not anti-sex per se, but anti porn and prostitution industries. So being anti-sex industry means one is automatically anti-sex or sex negative? Appearanlty some people thought so!
” Merely the act of *having* boundaries, to some people, seems to be an invitation to violate them.”
– But those types are usually very firm about their own personal boundaries!
” But yeah. He didn’t understand that boundaries are not about a “lack of trust”, as he often kvetched. And when I countered that he was being extremely inconsiderate, he didn’t seem to pony that at all.”
– I dated this one guy for six months who one day hinted at anal. He was flying out to spend the weekend with me so I borrowed a dildo. That night when we were involved I pulled it out. He was like “whats that?” I said you, “you wanted anal sex, bend over” He got angry. I mean ANGRY. Later that week I dumped him because I hate the attitude. The attitude is ” I watch anal porn and my conception of it is doing it to a woman, not having that woman do it to me, because…. because….I don’t know why actually.” NOT ON MY WATCH!
This is the same guy who in the beginning of the relationship said it was not natural or realistic to expect monogamy from men, especially in long distance relationships. When I employed the PUA tactic of “agree and amplify” and said “Great! I’m so happy you and I are on the same page about seeing other people ” he started nervously stammering and backtracked.
Men don’t like to be players in their own game.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Sorry, I copy, paste and then forget to edit out the parts I’m not addressing.
PS: EJ, I saw doc about Max. He insists everything was always consensual. Where is the scoop on his raping people? This is another problem with “consent” that the sex neg links you linked for me attempts to address.
Trigger warning: description of sexual assault.
I’ve seen one of his films, back when I was a less good person. It featured a young lady being violated while pleading for him to stop and physically trying to get him to cease (including fighting for breath whilst to being unable to talk due to oral penetration.) I am told that his films weren’t scripted, meaning that this was something that simply happened in front of the camera and was then edited, cut and published.
I defy anyone to tell me that that is either consensual, responsible or acceptable. The fact that the actress chose not to make a criminal complaint is neither here nor there.
EJ,
Okay, that’s good to know. I checked his Wikipedia page to find out why he went to prison and, shamefully, rape allegations weren’t mentioned. I would still be in favor of repealing obscenity laws, because putting him away for 2 years isn’t enough to justify the costs of such laws, but if that’s the tool the prosecutor had, I guess it makes sense that they used it.
Well in the doc he said those types of scenes were all consensual. See this is why I am anti-porn. The viewers just never knows for sure what’s really going on. That’s the nature of the industry.
Snowberry,
I wouldn’t. It seems to me that you’re falling victim to something akin to the assumption that the typical rapist is a dark-alley attacker. In this case, your assumption is that rape is committed by full-time rapists who have no other reason to be where they are.
If I were raped at a science-fiction convention, I would not assume that I was attacked by a non-nerd infiltrator who had bought a pass solely to look for victims. I would assume that my attacker was a big fan of sci-fi, bought the ticket in hopes of getting his books signed by a favorite author, and then decided to commit rape when an opportunity arose. Similarly, if I were raped at a kink convention, I would assume that my attacker probably really was there to take rope classes and socialize with other male doms, groom female subs, or throw popcorn at the screen at the bad movie night.
@Virtually:
I suspect Little may have a shaky outlook on what constitutes consent. “She agreed to it beforehand without knowing what was going to happen” and “she accepted the money and didn’t make a fuss afterwards, knowing that her career might be ruined if she did” may well be, to him, an ironclad defence.
I wouldn’t. It seems to me that you’re falling victim to something akin to the assumption that the typical rapist is a dark-alley attacker. In this case, your assumption is that rape is committed by full-time rapists who have no other reason to be where they are.
I’m confused. So, the mostly-vanilla MRAish guys which supposedly attend BDSM events in order to pick up submissive women to “break”… the ones which some of the people on this thread seem to think are a big thing… are they the equivalent of a “dark alley-attacker” or not? That would considerably affect my interpretation of this statement.
Snowberry,
Just the opposite. I’m saying that it’s tempting but misguided to assume the threat comes from unenlightened or mostly-vanilla interlopers. In many cases the abusers or rapists are leaders and core members of the community. If I got attacked at a kink convention, I wouldn’t assume that my attacker had bought a ticket just for the chance to assault me. I would assume that he was there to hang out with his friends, take a workshop, and get a book signed by a favorite author, but he took the opportunity to assault when it came up. In civilian life we like to think that assault is committed by strangers in alleys; in kink life we like to think that it’s committed by fakes, interlopers, and the unenlightened, but the truth is that in both cases assault and abuse tends to be committed by our friends and by familiar faces.
This touches on a longer post I need to make addressed to EJ, which I don’t have time to make now. Basically, I think our disagreement about fetish porn comes down to definition more than to data. You seem to want to draw a bright line between authentic kinksters and vanilla/mainstream/chudwah appropriators; I’m not certain that’s useful or possible.
I’m going to interpret that as “they are, and they’re neither common nor the real threat”. Because answering “are they or are they not” with “the opposite” followed by an answer to a different question entirely is how you make things clear as mud.
Whats the meaning chudwah?!
I’ll go back and look for it but the other day on Return of Kings some dude commented that he joined a BDSM community because he thought it was the only place in modern day America where he could find a submissive, non-feminist woman!!! He said he left the community eventually because, according to him, the women in it were, and I quote, “crazy”.
“BDSM grew out of the conflation of two scenes, the gay leather S&M scene and the straight femdom B&D prostitution scene, neither of which matter nowadays because the internet happened and swept all the Old Guard stuff away. (A lot of gay leather people are pissed about that, incidentally, and see it as appropriation of their space and crowding them out. ”
Interesting. Many Radfems feel the same way about sex-pos liberal feminism and LGBT politics.
“It featured a young lady being violated while pleading for him to stop and physically trying to get him to cease (including fighting for breath whilst to being unable to talk due to oral penetration.)”
For the life of me I can’t imagine anyone being aroused by seeing such a thing. I can’t imagine anyone being anything but disgusted and sad, feeling deep empathy for the victim and rage at the perpetrator.
Snowberry — Sorry about the confusion. Honestly, it was a bad analogy and at this point I’d just like to retract it. Your latest comment mostly captures what I was trying to say, but let me just try explaining myself without analogies. In kink spaces, one runs into two types of abusive men. The first are outsiders or newcomers who have popped in expecting the scene to work like their porn, or the portrayal of BDSM on mainstream TV, or their own personal patriarchal mythology. They tend to discover quickly that the scene is not what they expected it to be, and disappear, but they’re common enough that a few are underfoot at any given time. The second are well-known insiders who use the connections, status, and goodwill they’ve built up over time to groom victims and cover up their misbehavior. Their pattern is pretty similar to the way that men with status in any subculture use it to facilitate abuse, but with the added benefit that kink by its nature makes allegations of abuse more difficult to prove.
Every insider starts as an outsider, so abusers of the first time can transition over time into abusers of the second type. I wouldn’t say that either is uncommon, or that either is “the real threat.” I’d say that both have to be taken seriously, but that I make a point of emphasizing the risk of insider abuse because it is very tempting to shift blame to outsiders.
“But if you look at the subsection of kinksters who are heterosexuals in female submissive relationships, you find both sensible feminists, but also unreconstructed patriarchs, or people who profess to believe in political equality but insist that female submission is human nature.”
“The first are outsiders or newcomers who have popped in expecting the scene to work like their porn, or the portrayal of BDSM on mainstream TV, or their own personal patriarchal mythology.”
– Hello Return of Kings commentor rand other Manospherians “dabbling” in the “scene”.
Oh yeah. Did anyone else here catch the Lifetime Movie “The Secret Life of a Single Mom” and its portrayal of BDSM?
@Orion: I meant privately. Using classifieds, or meeting someone and finding out they were interested. Small sample because that’s something one quits after only so many tries.
@Virtually:
Apologies. A chudwah is a Clueless Heterosexual Dominant-Wannabe; that is, a man who has no interest in the kink scene and its mores, but is merely there because he believes it’s a good place to pick up sexually experimental women. The term dates from the late 90s, I believe, and is a conflation of several terms from other subcultures which are familiar with such people: “clueless” among goths, “hetboy” from gay culture, and “wannabe” because it was the 90s.
As Orion points out, such people do get underfoot. They seldom remain, but are numerous enough that there are normally one or two at any time. There are also female equivalents but while irritating, they’re seldom as harmful (or else people are patriarchal enough to see them as a good thing.)
The RoK commenter you’ve mentioned sounds like exactly that: coming in under mistaken impressions, with no interest in kink except using it to dupe women into sleeping with him, and then puzzled when it turns out that his shit wasn’t welcomed with open arms.
“There are also female equivalents but while irritating, they’re seldom as harmful (or else people are patriarchal enough to see them as a good thing.)”
Patriarchal enough? Then the female equivalent must not be a Dom.
The Lifetime Movie Network tried to ride on the heels of 50 Shades and came up with this;
I don’t want to butt into somebody else’s conversation unwanted, but I’ve recently joined the kink scene myself and I’m very fascinated by the whole thing (on an academic as well as erotic level!), and I’m personally trying to reconcile my interest in the scene with my feminist beliefs, so this is all very interesting to me. But i am still a newbie, so keep that in mind.
One thing I’ve noticed from browsing around fetlife and elsewhere is that in D/s pairings (hetero, homo, male or female dom alike) these folks sure are sentimental. It’s very odd for someone who isn’t accustomed to the blending of BDSM concepts and romance the way people can describe submission/domination/sadism/masochism as not just fetishes but as profoundly romantic expressions of love. To many, beating your partner is not an act of violence; it is an act of worship and devotion. Allowing yourself to be beaten is not a self-loathing or miserable thing; it is a way of connecting profoundly with the person you love. Acting out a scene is a demonstration of your trust and devotion to one another. It’s extremely difficult to understand if you’re not into that kind of thing, but when you experience it, it’s very powerful. So I think watching from the outside as someone is flogged or something may be disturbing to some, and they may think they are seeing something oppressive or cruel or violent when both participants are actually connecting on a very emotional level. So that is the first thing to keep in mind when we are talking about the politics of BDSM; the power exchange is not one-sided, and it is not simple, and it is not (when it is done properly) about harming someone.
Secondly, while I agree that there are very angry and dangerous people that use kink as a cover (look up the Jian Ghomeshi scandal, for example) for abuse, it is also important to recognize what a big and hotly discussed issue that is in the community. There are vanilla men (and women) who are angry and abusive too, and while it is protested often in feminist spaces, it is not part of the mainstream conversation as much as it is a part of the conversation in the kink community. Consent is a big deal in BDSM. Abuse is a big deal in BDSM. Any practitioner worth their salt has spent a good long time thinking, talking, and reading about these concepts. And while I think it’s very true that abusive people do slip by without being called out sometimes, it is still not a permissible or ignored part of the culture by any means. The dominant attitude that I have observed within the community is one of respect and care.
Lastly, I think that it is kind of exclusionary and hetero/cisnormative to reduce the discussion of BDSM to a male/female oppression dynamic. There are gay couples who practice power exchange. There are lesbian couples who practice power exchange. There are straight couples who practice femdom, and there are couples of all orientations who switch. Now, of course we can’t just pretend that the culture we live in, with all its problems, doesn’t affect us, which is why fem subs push a very uncomfortable button for many of us, particularly feminists. But any time I start to feel that discomfort or worry that this practice conflicts with my beliefs (which I take very seriously) I have to remind myself of the wider picture of the community; power exchange is not the same things as systemic oppression; otherwise femdoms, switches, and gay D/s couples could not exist.
I’m no expert in BDSM so this might seem a little flaky. I’ve mentioned on here several times about my father’s abusive relationship with my mother being motivated by patriarchism, and the religious upbringing of my mother taught her to tolerate it. Any violence committed against her, and myself as a child was framed in such a way as it was ‘discipline’ rather than abuse, therefore an act of love. When I was older, my father used to encourage me to fight back, and I did not know why at the time. I have been discussing this recently with a friend, who is an older man who has worked in mental health and as a prison nurse for over 40 years, and also has experience of the kink scene, as his ex wife was into it (and eventually left him for a Dom)
This friend believes that my father wanted an S&M relationship, and was excited by adrenaline, he got very psyched by fighting and enjoyed being hit or kicked in the nether regions. I knew my father was an abuser, but never saw it as sexual until now, since he did not do any actual sexual acts to me. It was mostly outbursts of anger and aggression, and goading me and my mother to become aggressive towards him.