Because they are people with little else in their lives and Anita’s analysis is perceived as a threat to their security blanket.
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No, I’m not self-censoring because of how others may perceive me, I’m deciding not to participate anymore because I feel like the discussion is absolutely off course. If Sarkeesian wants my advice on how to improve her videos she can ask me, until that happens I feel like criticizing her choice of words on forums is part of the problem.
Well, except that’s manifestly wrong. I’m sure plenty of trans men experience misogyny every day from people who believe them to be women. (Not to criticize you, more to add to your point that definitions are tricky)
I actually did too the first time I read it, but:
In so doing, these men have ably demonstrated the point Sarkeesian sought to make all along: that gaming is riddled with misogynistic violence, and that this violence reflects a real-world misogyny rampant within the gaming world.
“Rampant within” is not “identical to.” Cory doesn’t actually say that the misogyny complete pervades games or is felt by all gamers, he says there is a substantial subset of gamers who have real-world misogyny which causes/influences the misogyny they display through gaming. It’s still true that you can play an open world game and kill lots of women without holding any misogyny in your heart, but it sure isn’t true that all gamers are like that.
I’m going to break this down. First the question of whether that means politics is riddles with misogynistic violence. That’s a bad analogy. If a group of people makes art that depicts sexist images, you can’t conclude they are sexist; but if they are demonstrably sexist in their normal lives as well, you might reasonably say their art reflects that. But clearly, either can exist without the other.
Second, as for misogyny being rampant within the world of politics? Isn’t it?
I’m fine with “this is off topic and not what we are talking about here,” but if you think that men aren’t seen as dangerous when they want to enter professions that care for small children then I’d like to live where you live. I’ve discussed this with many men and most seem to have made decisions, whether major ones like choosing a career or minor ones like not going to see the Lego movie alone, to avoid being perceived as a threat to children. It is systemic.
No really, this is a big problem. When people say, “Misogyny hurts men too,” that’s a real thing. Why did psychiatrists think there were five times as many trans women as trans men a few decades ago? It’s because they rarely actually spoke with trans men - it was obvious to them why a woman would want to be a man but they insane to them that a man wanted to be a woman. Men taking on any role that women traditionally take on is extremely stigmatized and that stigma is often rationalized with fears of men being violent and/or pedophiles.
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In America, misogynists probably include a lot of guys raised by negligent or narcissistic (or worse) mothers ( or fathers), which is why they hate women… They weren’t born this way, but their destiny was pretty well set by the time they were three. Misogyny is part of a larger constellation of emotional problems. For adolescents, it’s important that other kids not get pulled into those belief systems.
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He said “This is the real world buddy. Toughen up your ass or it’ll break”
I said “I’m not your buddy, buddy. And your real world is a fake.”
Waterboys; ‘Let it Happen’.
Sorry, just reminded me of the subject of reality.
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Speaking from the perspective of someone who went to a public school where a.) almost all the teachers were women and b.) made no secret of their disdain for having to tolerate boys, and as an adult working in an office environment where the HR manager–the person we went to to report sexual harassment–was a woman whose literal response to a sexual harassment claim against a woman was to laugh it off, thank you.
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I find it weird that there is a conversation on if the threats were credible or not. I had my thinking on this shift about five years ago. I used to just laugh at non-credible internet trolling. I had a local band jerk release my cell number and email addy to his fans over something ridiculous. I got three days of phone calls and email threats. None of them credible at all, but it was seriously disturbing. I felt like I was under siege. Even totally non credible death threats are life impacting.
Credible or not, this is real life impacting stuff. Anyone that partakes in this kind of behavior should have to face criminal consequences.
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Yeah; before I decide that she sent in a fake threat or not, I’d like to have some proof. The way Twitter handles things, though, they probably just disabled the account and that’s the end of it
So, yeah, if you’re of the mind that you think she’s a big phony and is sending in fake threats to get donations through the Damsel in Distress effect, here’s a radical solution: don’t send money.
ok, “person1” sent sarkeesian a link to the offender’s profile while she was at the computer, logged off from twitter, let’s see if this add up:
-
offender tweets about Sarkeesian’s blood and whatnot 0 seconds
-
person1 IMMEDIATLY reading the tweet 3 seconds
-
person1 without pause snooping into the full profile 6 seconds
(you have to open another link in a small window to get there) -
person1 sending sarkeesian the link via e-mail (not a tweet since she
is logged off) that’s typing “omg U hav 2 C dis” and pasting the link
10 seconds (if she types fast, and has his/her email ready in another window) -
sarkeesian reading the email 3 seconds (because she checks her
mail immediatly) -
sarkeesian following the link and reading the tweet 4 seconds
-SCREENSHOT TAKEN- total time (on unlikely perfect circumstances) 26 seconds
off by 14 seconds.
Also, the screenshot is not photoshopped, follow the link to anita’s tweet, don’t believe me, believe FACTS
Bless your heart child, we need more internet detectives.
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“because you’re a girl.”
This is not in any way a rebuttal to your comment, I agree with what you say, just trying to build something on top of what you’ve already said so well, to single out that this is not the response men get for saying the same thing, the fact that men don’t get death threats when they agree with Anita is the telling part for me.
Why do I think this distinction is important?
Because there’s no way to prove to these people that their argument is wrong because the argument doesn’t matter, hopefully these people will learn that they can’t go around threatening people even if (hopefully) they didn’t intend to follow through with those threats.
And hopefully this will deter other assholes from doing the same.
What they will not learn is that they are wrong to feel rage, they won’t learn that they are flawed for categorically hating women, they won’t learn how to argue their point because they never had a point, if they did, they would have made it, the rage response comes from the powerlessness they feel to have been proved to be in the wrong.
The distinction I make is not that they prove themselves wrong, but that they already know they are wrong. In response, rage.
I argue that they know Anita is right, (and therefore never had a point to make) and that that’s what triggered the rage. That they felt they could do such horrible things was because she is a woman and thus immediately devalued her.
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Genuinely curious as to what kind of recourse could accomplish this? Most of us (enlightened Boing Boing readers!) aren’t friends with people who behave this way or would quickly stop being friends with people who behave this way. There are just laws against making threats against people. Besides being aware of the fact that flaming misogyny exists and is a serious problem, what can one do? I mean, I suppose one (or many) could go to a discussion board where flaming misogynists do their ranting and lecture them, but that wouldn’t really accomplish anything (also would be a horrible experience). What other recourse is there?
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Why are you assuming that the link was sent after the last tweet?
Reading those tweets, I can imagine that person1 might have sent a link to their profile somewhat earlier, because all of those tweets are awful, and then the later ones were posted subsequently, the last of which a few seconds before the screencap.
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It’s for sure a thing, just not a huge thing, or even the primary determinant keeping men out of these professions. I am a man who taught elementary school and have male friends who have as well. I work peripherally in the field of early childhood now, and we still discuss the issue when trying to get “Men in early childhood” recruitment efforts and studies through. My (female) boss often cites an anecdote from her days of training young teacheers about a parent being fairly aghast that a man was going to be changing diapers. The parent, when challenged, backed down from her assumption.
However, the perception of the job as “women’s work” is far more powerful in keeping men out of the field. This is propped up in large part by conservative men. Plus the fact that teaching and early childhood are barely considered professions, pay like shit, and have very little chance for advancement or professional recognition. Some women have kind of “reclaimed” the idea of “women’s work” in a strange attempt to elevate the field, and women professionals in the field by saying that women have a natural gift of working with children that men just can’t achieve. To me that feels like a misguided attempt to build a foothold in a male-dominated world, and is a twisted reaction to institutional sexism.
Taking Cory’s argument, which is that men have so much more power and influence than women to shape the world, and try to argue against it semantically is a pretty fruitless endeavor, and isn’t really going to be able to outshine it’s “Not All Men Aren’t Discriminated Against” veneer. There’s a place for discussion of individual issues affecting men because they are men, but to say that they limit men’s choices, or pursuit of happiness on any scale comparable to the level that women have been constrained, pigeon-holed, held down and oppressed is just laughable.
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The recourse I’m interested in are ones that dispel the apathy. I think most of the ‘flaming’ comes from apathy, and getting people, apathetic ones, to discuss and confront these issues is the only route that will cut the negative space that lets these things spin wildly out of control.
So it’s boring conversations like increasing budgets for education, finding policy’s that address/monitor male dominated fields of business, electing more women to political office, and identifying where disparities are and why that is.
I don’t think you can put out these flames, but you can start to recognize how to deprive them of oxygen.
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Misogyny played for lulz can’t be defused by dialog.
Misogyny based on blind hatred can’t be defused by dialog.
Misogyny based on ignorance can only be defused by dialog IF that person is open to that dialog.
That doesn’t really leave a lot of space where it’s worth attempting dialog, does it?
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While I’d say this is a total derailment of what I understand as a more emotional response to the terrible sexists making death threats, I’ll pipe in that society without specific misogynists and misandrists can be incredibly sexist. For a specific example of something seen in most nations, and particularly the USA, just look at the Selective Service System.
http://www.sss.gov/Fsdrivers.htm
If you are a young male, you are effectively stripped of your right to drive and have the potential to be thrown in jail if you don’t wish to be a part of system that makes you a pawn to be disposed of at random in the case of warfare. And just because females can opt in, just as indentured servants could “opt in” to slavery, does not make it any less terribly sexist against men, who are expected to quietly take it.
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Agreed. Which is why I’ve reiterated multiple times that I’m emphatically NOT saying just that. The post you responded to was to a reply where it was asserted (or, more accurately, that it is a worldview from the 70’s) that sexism against men somehow simply doesn’t count, due to men’s ability to simply retreat from it’s consequences. What I cited was just one particularly large target. I was quite amused when it was immediately dismissed as, first, entirely imagined and non-existant on my part, then as existing, but entirely justified due to men’s elevated authority(?!).
The point isn’t that we should be paying attention to that, instead of sexism against women, or, that they’re somehow equal, either in frequency or importance. It was a word of caution that, while endeavoring to make some positive change that a writer is interested in, in this case, Mr Doctorow, it’s kind of important not to dismiss those that might otherwise support you, even if their main issue of interest isn’t the same one as yours. You don’t have to be a Men’s Rights activist to acknowledge that there are places and situations where each gender gets a shit deal, and it’s wrong in every instance.
Claiming that it cannot, by definition, be a conditioned, societal thing? Pretty shocking stuff.
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I like that and it’s so true.
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