To those asking about the Escapist bit, here we go.
Most of this can be found here: https://storify.com/alexlifschitz/escapist-drama though I will be going into more detail on some of it.
The Escapist recently published an article titled “Female Game Developers on Gamer Gate” in which several female game developers all anonymously (by request) discussed the whole gerbergate thing. They were, shall we say, rather negative.
To proved TWO SIDES, the Escapist then published an article titled “Game Developers on Gamer Gate” (see the first issue?) in which several male game developers talked about gamer gate with much more positive reactions.
And then a few problems came up.
For starters, not everyone in that list was an actual game developer. Some were just dudes. You see, the guy who actually did all this sourced it all from 4chan. He has also been very unabashedly loud in his support of gamergate, so hey, corruption in games journalism, right? This lead to most of the questions being incredibly biased from the start. Then it turns out there’s other problems with the people being asked. Again, some were not even game developers. One, Slade Villena aka RogueStar, was one of the bigger harassers in the beginnings of gerbergate, eventually trying to organize a harassment effort get Zoe Quinn to kill herself, also tried falsifying tax information to get Anita Saarkesian arrested, and even harassing and attacking other Escapist staff. Another was Brad Wardell, who is basically a living version of those cheesy mandatory office videos that teach you how not to treat employees. Yet another was James Desborough, a tabletop games indie developer “famous” for his constant books about demeaning women and engaging in harassment campaigns of anyone who even so much as disagrees with him, at one point writing a full essay on how much he loves to talk about rape.
This is who the Escapist felt was worth giving an open forum to.
And just to wander back, look at these fucking questions.
“Imagine a development team composed of middle-aged white men creates a game explicitly aimed at young men called AMERICAN VENGEANCE that features a lantern-jawed white American soldier attempting to save his exotic-dancer girlfriend (complete with jiggle physics) from torture at the hands of Jihadists. Violence is the only way to advance in the game and the girlfriend’s torture is as graphic as anything in the movie SAW. But as far as violent shooter games go, it is exceptionally innovative, gorgeous, and fun. Is it fair to give the game a low review score for lacking inclusiveness? Is it fair to give the game a lower review score for having violent or misogynist themes?”
That is a literal question the Escapist asked one of these people.
But it actually still doesn’t stop there. In a few interviews, the interviewed listed personal information, real life names, and/or social networking addresses of their favorite targets to get others to attack them. In one case, the aforementioned Desborough began listing the people he hated most – all of whom immediately went under attack as soon as the articles were published.
The Escapist has fixed a small number of these problems. SOME of Desborough’s targets were edited out, though not all. The added “Male” to the title. RogueStar’s interview was taken out. But the overwhelming decision to keep almost everything else intact paints a very grim picture.
At this point someone is bound to say “Well what about literally this one specific person that works there and isn’t terrible?” Well, apologies to them, but it does not matter. The website they work for acknowledged how much of the above was a problem, and then didn’t do a damn thing about it. Several of the people listed out as attack targets are still being attacked – some of whom are friends of mine.
And that is why The Escapist is the website that hates women, rather then just the website with terrible journalism. Because they KNOWINGLY TOOK ACTIONS that lead to women being attacked, and when confronted with it, shrugged it off. Shortly after the articles were released, multiple women – some publicly, some privately – went under attack and had to momentarily drop off the internet. Some had to go further and call the police.
The Escapist and Greg Tito, in turn, stated “we don’t condone harassment” and changed nothing.
Tag: misogyny
I DID meet a fake geek girl once. Turned out she was in fact an assortment of squirrels in a trenchcoat.
Those squirrels sure did know a lot about Batman, though.
it’s pretty common for people discussing rape culture within feminist discourse to conveniently leave out disabled girls, but this is just a casual reminder that disabled women are far more likely to be sexually assaulted, abused or raped than able-bodied women. on top of that, 50% of deaf girls and 54% of deaf boys have been sexually abused or assaulted. so please stop leaving us out of your discussion about rape culture.
“I can remember speaking to a 12-year-old boy, a football player, and I asked him, ‘How would you feel if, in front of all the players, the coach told you, you were playing like a girl?’ Now I expected him to say that I’d be sad or I’d be mad or I’d be angry or something. No, the boy said to me, ‘It would destroy me.’ And, I said to myself…. if it would destroy him to be called a girl, what are we then teaching him about girls.” — Tony Porter
This quote is from an excellent TED talk by Tony Porter, an educator and activist who is internationally recognized for his efforts to end violence against women. In his talk, “A Call to Men,” Porter explores the social conditioning that he refers to as the “man box,” which can lead men to disrespect, mistreat, and abuse women and each other.
To watch his talk, which is especially timely during October’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month, visit http://bit.ly/1s4Nqwz. Porter is also the cofounder of A CALL TO MEN: The National Association of Men and Women Committed to Ending Violence Against Women: http://www.acalltomen.org/
Here’s the dirty little secret about this though: there is no such thing as withholding sex because there is no situation in which you owe another human being sex. Ever. Your body is 100% your own and you get to consent or not consent to other people doing things to or with your body for whatever the hell reason you would like. This includes because you’re pissed off at the person, because they did something you didn’t like, because you just don’t fucking feel like it, because you’re tired, because you don’t feel attractive, because you’d rather read a book…any of the above. And not wanting to have sex with someone because you have negative feelings towards them at a given moment is not in fact punishment. It’s actually a very natural human feeling not to want to be physically intimate with someone when you’re annoyed/angry/hurt/sad with them. Oddly enough letting someone be close to your body when you don’t feel emotionally close to them doesn’t always feel great (if that’s your thing then go for it, but for those who don’t like it then there is no fucking reason to apologize).
But the idea that you can pull some sort of power play in a relationship by not giving the other person something which you don’t owe to them in the first place makes no sense. It would be like telling your partner that you’re going to punish them by not baking them chocolate chip cookies every day: sure, maybe they would like those cookies but in no way are you obligated to bake them cookies anyway, so they should probably be just fine getting along without it. The idea that you should feel as if the only way you can express that you’re angry or upset or unhappy in your relationship is by taking ownership over your body in a way that is so basic it should never have been a question is somewhat disgusting. If your partner has you so convinced that you owe them sex, no wonder you feel a little angry or vindictive towards them.
im SO SICK of hearing about how feminism “helps men” i don’t care why do they need to be reassured that they will benefit from it before they can support us fighting for basic human rights and liberation
Most mass murderers do not go from zero to 60. Rodger made escalating assaults on women (splashing coffee on them, attempting to shove them off a ledge) before his killing spree. Both Cho and Justin-Jinich’s murderer harassed women before they killed anyone. When such acts go unnoticed and unpunished — because we expect men to harass women, and it’s not outrageous or even noteworthy when they do — they can become stepping-stones to more conspicuous and less socially acceptable acts of violence.
Interesting to note that while a history of animal cruelty is widely accepted to be a link with becoming a serial killer, the link between cruelty towards women and killing women is still up for debate. If a guy abuses a cat and then shoots women we say “we should have seen it coming that guy was nuts”, but if abuses women and then shoots women we say “we had no way of seeing it coming that guy was a perfectly polite, kind and wonderful human”.
(via marxisforbros)
No. 169 – “Fedora Enlightenment”
The guys gets some unwanted advice on the art of women while at the bookstore. This is certainly a No Fedora/Brony Flex Zone indeed.
the reason male comic book fans work themselves into a frenzied rage over “fake geek girls“ is because they think they can’t get a girlfriend because of their love for comic books (a.k.a nerdiness). if they accept that geek girls genuinely love comic books, then they’re left with the cold harsh reality that it’s not their nerdiness that makes them unattractive to women, but the fact that they are misogynistic condescending dickbags who need to be avoided AT ALL COSTS
She wears short skirts I wear t-shirts and we’re both getting sent home from school because its distracting to boys apparently
LemonGrenade 