Feminist Frequency (old thread. Locked)

Not that anyone asked, but here's my take on the "dickwolves" debacle:

• The "dickwolves" strip is pretty tacky. I don't agree with the people who say it makes a punchline out of rape (the punchline is more to do with the way defined quest objectives in MMORPGs encourage behavior that would be ludicrously callous in Real Life), but I can see why some people found the offhand mention of rape triggering. That said, such crudity is typical of the humor in PA and any regular readers who got up in arms over it were being a bit silly.
• On the other hand, the creators handled the criticism extremely badly. An appropriate response would have been along the lines of "We're sorry for anyone who found this triggering, but we've been making sick jokes for a long time and we're not going to stop now. If it bothers you, you're better off not reading the comic." But instead they doubled down, mocked the people who were triggered, and launched the "Team Dickwolves" campaign, implying that you have to be in favor of rape jokes in general, or else you're as prissy and humorless as the aforementioned critics.

So yeah...the initial protest was somewhat misguided, but there was no excuse for what followed.

edited 12th Apr '14 3:31:52 PM by Karalora

Stuff what I do.

I'm not to sure what to think about this, honestly. Sure, rape jokes are pretty tasteless IMO, but the idea that it shouldn't ever be brought up because some people might be offended by it kind of weirds me out. Since different people are offended by different things, it's virtually impossible to say something that someone, somewhere, won't find offensive, especially if you're a big-name comic artist.

In practice, there's a pretty big difference between "it's offensive" and "I'm offended", the former implies that everyone should be offended by it and be ashamed for liking something, and the latter implies more of a personal distaste. The webcomic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal does a good job of explaining the problem here.

The whole thing kind of reminds me of the whole drama that surrounded the takedown of the blog "Ask Princess Molestia" in the brony fandom a while back. The blog was, all in all, pretty crass sexual humor, but a few people saw the title and started this really massive campaign against it. Now, while I never really liked the blog or its sexual jokes about horses, I feel that people on all sides of the issue were just going about it completely wrong.

On the one hand, we had the people who resorted to online bullying and harassment in attempts to take the blog down. In one instance, they attacked fanartist Pixelkitties, an actual rape victim, for not agreeing with their methods. A woman on Tumblr with the username Tenafly-Viper did a pretty good summary of why some people might have been upset with the way the anti-Molestia people went about it.

On the other side of the spectrum, we get people who took this whole campaign against an overused fan character as such a personal affront that they went out of their way to send PinkiePony and other users death threats, rape threats, and other nasty things that no person should ever say. They responded in such a nasty, awful manner that not only did it hurting her, it also trashed the credibility of anyone who might have had any genuine reasons for disagreeing. In no time at all the whole thing descended into a mess of mudslinging an insults on all sides of argument, and any point that might have been made by either side was lost in the vitriol.

I'm probably just rambling by now, but I guess my point is that I don't think people should ever see things like this in terms of black and white, or that it's pure good vs. pure evil, or complete oppression versus the virtue of freedom. I feel it's important to understand all sides of the issue, and at least try to consider how or why other people might disagree on certain things before making a judgment.

edited 12th Apr '14 3:36:17 PM by Zennistrad

The personal is political.

I'm not certain what that means, exactly. Is it about a political stance?

edited 12th Apr '14 3:42:23 PM by Zennistrad

As someone who can get sick from triggers (conversion disorder, what a joy), I take umbrage at "I'm offended" = "personal distaste". I really don't want to be offended by things, nobody does. A video that I wasn't ready for brought back every abuse/crazy memory that I was trying to get over, and gave me a hernia that I'm still trying to sort out. That was two years ago.

edited 12th Apr '14 3:44:33 PM by emeriin

I cut up one dozen new men and you will die somewhat, again and again.

What I mean by this is that, to my mind, the fundamental moral principle of progressive politics is the belief that politics must be primarily understood on the level of the individual. And furthermore, it must be understood in terms of the real experiences and material conditions of actual people, not in terms of some theoretical image of what people like. In other words, the basis of politics is actually going and talking to people, especially those who are marginalized or oppressed, and then engaging with what is actually happening to them.

I copy/pasted the immediately previous paragraph from someone a great deal more eloquent than myself.

edited 12th Apr '14 3:46:22 PM by unnoun

For given me for yet another Clarke's Third Law snowclone.

I wonder if...

A sufficiently broadcasted public criticism of a person or institution's character is indistinguishable from character assassination on the person or institution.

@emeriin: Well yeah, of course nobody wants to be offended. People have an inherent desire to be comfortable with their lives. But I feel that it's important to understand that trying to stamp out anything that might be considered offensive to some is ultimately impossible.

A long time ago, I was diagnosed with a mild case of Asperger's syndrome. I'd always gotten the feeling that I was a bit weird, but it's another thing entirely to have it confirmed by a psychiatrist. In the following years, I was placed into a special program in middle school specifically for autistic children. That was the moment my life immediately took a turn for the absolute worst.

Throughout middle school, I was constantly the target of bullying and harassment. People called me names like "sped" (short for "special ed" and always used in a derogatory context), and I constantly felt as thought I was the most hated kid in school. At least two of my teachers pretty much overtly hated me, and my parents later told me after I graduated high school that one of my middle school teachers lied to them in a PTA meeting so that she didn't have to give me the support the program required.

I tried multiple times throughout middle school to distance myself from the kids in the program, since they were so widely picked on by everyone, and to distance myself from the label "Asperger's", because it carries nothing but shame and ridicule. In high school I'd managed to move to a more "normal" program, but I was still part of special education, and I still felt at many times like I was rejected by everyone. Now that I'm in college, I feel that I've finally manage to break free from the shackles of the label "Asperger's" and all the bullshit that I experienced because of it. Before now I've never even brought up online that I was diagnosed with Asperger's because it brings me that much shame to be associated with it. I'm only bringing it up now because this thread is one of the few places I've seen online where people are not overly judgmental of labels, so I feel that I can make this argument safely.

Anyway, imagine my offense when I find that people on the internet are using "autistic" as a derogatory label, similar to "retarded." It's one of the most commonly-used insults on places like 4chan, Reddit, Youtube, or any other public internet space. I've even seen people on Tumblr who are self-proclaimed social justice advocates using "autistic" as a way of attacking anyone who might not share their views on social justice, often with the term "fedora" or "neckbeard" attached to it.

It's hurtful. Very hurtful. For a while I tried to shout them down, insult, and belittle them for it, since I was so pissed off and hurt by the way they used a term that I had been forcibly identified with since childhood. But after a while, I realized that getting pissed off at them didn't change a thing, it only gave them more reason to act hostile. They saw themselves as innocent, and that they did nothing wrong, so getting angry at them and trying to silence them made them feel like they were being unjustly attacked.

Eventually, I realized that the only way to get people to change their attitudes is not to attack or belittle them for it, or to try to silence them, but to give a reasoned reply that calmly explains what they did wrong. I refused to stoop to their level by resorting to insults or flaming. If by some chance I couldn't change their attitudes, I had to learn how to simply move on and accept that not all people will be flexible enough to consider my perspective.

Point is, I'm no stranger to being offended by something. I've seen plenty of things that were incredibly offensive and hurtful to me on a personal level. But I had to learn the hard way that this doesn't give me an excuse to shout down others who do offend me, because that never works. The best solution is to reply calmly and without insults, because then people are more likely to show sympathy.

edited 12th Apr '14 4:23:06 PM by Zennistrad

Really? Strange. Yelling at people has worked for me multiple times. It's shown people I'm serious about something. In fact, my biggest issues have come from when I've been polite. It's almost like there are many different life experiences and you shouldn't discount one just because it doesn't apply to your own. If you've found what works for you — awesome, but it's not a catch-all strategy.

Read my stories!

I'd argue that this is more that people simply don't want to put up with you at all, not that they're being remotely sympathetic. Based on what I've seen when people get angry about social justice issues online, others will probably just use it as a means to attack you as soon as your back is turned.

edited 12th Apr '14 4:38:04 PM by Zennistrad

I think "being the better person" in the context of social justice is very overrated. You have to be a lot worse than just being rude to "stoop to the level" of someone being oppressive.

If you can explain to people with super saintly patience why they are being oppressive then good for you, but I don't think that should be expected of anybody nor do I think it makes all that much difference in the long run.

Civility is wasted on some people.

edited 12th Apr '14 5:04:51 PM by DrStarky

Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian

So do you think if a criticism of a person or institution is broadcasted far enough and the criticism is harsh enough, that it can be considered character assassination?

Does it really mater worlder?

Often when a person is reciving just criticisim, if its bad enough to destroy there charecter they deserved it, and if not then it is unjust criticisim which is a diffrent problem.

The problem I have with this attitude goes back to my fundamental belief in "two wrongs don't make a right." I don't believe that it's at all possible to bully your way to a better world.

You can't fight hate with hate. You can't fight prejudice with prejudice. You can't expect the world to improve by being overly vitriolic towards other people who might not share your view. I've encountered people who I actually agreed with on social justice issues that forced me to seriously reconsider my opinion, since they were such an asshole I didn't want to be associated with them. Like Seth Macfarlane, it made me desperately want to disagree with them just to spite their dickish behavior.

To be extremely hostile towards others who don't understand your view is not only hurtful to them, it also undermines your argument by making you look like the bad guy.

Depends. People rightly attacked Metroid Other M director Yoshio Sakamoto for his sexist interpretation of Samus in Metroid Other M, but it was never so hostile that it came off as hateful to him on a personal level.

edited 12th Apr '14 5:12:43 PM by Zennistrad

But if you remain calm, no one will listen, since its "Obviously not a bad enough problem"

You have to let them know just how bad the problem is, and most of the time that can not be done in the way you vouch for.

But as this post (and many others) point out, the only people getting told "don't fight hate with hate" are the minorities, never the majority who hurt people in the first place.

edited 12th Apr '14 5:19:07 PM by emeriin

I cut up one dozen new men and you will die somewhat, again and again.

And if you don't remain calm, you'll give them even less reason to listen, because they'll see it as an attack.

I was once accused of saying something sexist a couple years ago, but instead of being told what exactly the problem was, I was simply told "you're privileged." It's an accusatory phrase that gives no context and did absolutely nothing to tell me what the problem was. And it made me angry. It made me angry because I was being attacked and I didn't know why. It made me think that I was the one who was being the target of prejudice, not the other way around.

It wasn't until someone actually bothered to explain to me what I did wrong, and do so without insulting me, that I was actually willing to consider anything that other people would say.

If you are going out of your way bully people because they are oppressing you, you are not helping. You are making things worse. You are making people who don't know what they are doing wrong want to hate you for lashing out at them. I don't see what's so hard to grasp about this.

Of course, feel free to bully me because I disagree.

Let me put it this way.

If you treat oppressed minority lashing out at a bigot as bad as the reverse, you are a holding the minority to a much higher standard because it so much harder for them to keep their cool.

There is NOTHING hypocritical about saying the intolerant don't deserve tolerance. Some people won't see anything wrong with what they do until it becomes inconvenient for them to do so.

Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian

Violence on the other hand.

Well, "eye for an eye makes the whole world blind".

Except for one thing, when a victim lashes out against a bully, it isn't "bullying" It's lashing out, bullys are usually people in a place of social comfort compared to the deeds they carry out.

Bosses can bully their employees because they hold the reigns of occupation.

Bigger kids can bully smaller kids because they allocate the fear/respect of smaller kids.

A woman on a blog saying men should get their right to vote taken away isn't the same as a man on a blog saying women should get their right to vote taken away on the simple fact that the social climate surrounding both comments is going to be extremely different.

Dictating the conditions under which resistance is permitted is one of the most basic oppressive tactics in existence.

I feel like a lot people think confuse "non-violent" (Not talking about you in particular) with "Always super friendly! Even to oppressors!"

edited 12th Apr '14 5:53:07 PM by DrStarky

Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian

And so is dehumanizing the enemy group by making broad, negative statements about them.

Furthermore, nobody is trying to "dictate" the conditions of resistance, since people are still allowed to do these things. They have the right to say what they want, and they always will. What they don't have is the right to be protected from people calling them out for what they say. Freedom of speech is not freedom from consequences.

You people are starting to scare me. Like, seriously, genuinely frighten me. I genuinely do support the cause of social justice, but the way you people are going about like I shouldn't be upset when people say these things? Like, if a woman on a blog says that men should have the right to vote taken away from them, how am I supposed to react? Am I not supposed to be offended? Am I not supposed to be upset at someone saying something so incredibly nasty?

Speaking of the whole world being blind, isn't justice supposed to be blind? What's wrong with being blind, you want to be offensive to blind people?

Recognize it as hyperbolic venting from someone who doesn't really have the power to make that even close to a reality.

How do you expect how people who deal with oppressive shit everyday to act? Do you expect them always express their frustrations in a polite, rational manner?

edited 12th Apr '14 6:17:49 PM by DrStarky

Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian