Not all forms of threatening are equal, but “I’m having extremely violent fantasies about you and I know where you (and your children) live” isn’t a tiny thing, and it goes rather beyond “I hope you die”. (Is there a name for the rhetorical trick of choosing, not just a non-central example, but a minimized non-central example?)
Part of the point is that women are sometimes the target of harassment campaigns online. Some of the attackers may have an interest in the ostensible issue, some may be pure trolls. It seems as though a lot of the attackers are male.
I doubt that there are a number of women who left their homes because of nothing in particular.
When I mentioned above that people underestimate the effect of the worst people on their own side, I meant that just as I tend to underestimate the way feminism can add up, I think you’re underestimating the number and forcefulness of the vicious people on your side.
I’m still incredibly angry at the way Kathy Sierra was driven out of public life.
I’m curious about why this comment got so many downvotes, if anyone would care to try explaining. I’m saying “try explaining” because any one person can only know the reason for at most one downvote.
The problem is that no matter your intentions the phrase reads as a complete dismissal of Viliam_Bur’s argument. That is how these discussions turn ugly.
Would this qualify as a sufficiently scary threat? Both men and women receive various kinds of abuse online. I would guess that most of the aggressors are men, but victims are of both genders. Being a victim of online harrassment is not a uniquely female experience, although some specific forms of harrassment may be, mostly of sexual kind. I would also guess that victims of “swatting” are typically men, but I have no data about it.
Now I feel it would be good to split the debate into two completely separated topics: feminism and GamerGate. Debating them as if they are the same thing would make this all extremely confusing. Framing GamerGate as “angry white men against feminists” is merely a propaganda of one side; in reality, both sides include angry white men, and both sides include feminists.
1) I believe I have read a few stories about violent behavior of feminists, but I usually don’t keep records of things I read online. If my memory is reliable, the complaints about abuse from feminists usually came from LGBT people, although officially the feminists are supposed to be on their side. Googling for “violent feminists” mostly brings false positives, but also this.
I admit I am confused about the phenomenon of online SJWs. Are they supposed to be a part of feminism, or is that a separate thing? Because their opinions seem similar to some extreme feminist opinions. Seems to me these people do a lot of online harrassment, although on internet it is difficult to prove something isn’t merely trolling. And generally, even if someone is a feminist, that doesn’t mean that everything they do is done in the name of feminism.
2) Here is a collection of abuse towards pro-Gamergate people. Again, it’s difficult to prove who did that. We would have to debate each piece of evidence individually, but I’d rather avoid that.
That first link strikes me as not extremely scary, and it seems to be a rant rather than a threat which was sent to someone in particular. Furthermore, it doesn’t have specific details about injuries and degradation. It isn’t a photoshopped image of the person being threatened, either.
Gamergate is hopelessly weird—as you may know, the initial post was basically a man talking about having been emotionally abused by a woman, with only a minor mention of games and journalism, and it morphed into something completely different.
As far as I can tell, SJWs consider themselves to be part of feminism and/or the one true feminism. I haven’t seen a claim anywhere that they aren’t feminists, and at least one suggestion that there’s no point is saying that they aren’t feminists, even if they’re wrong-headed.
It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of moderate feminists (like most people) aren’t engaging with SJs because that looks like a lot of work and no fun.
Is it just me or is this a proxy bravery debate? Are we collectively committed to getting to the bottom of who / which tribe is the true victim of those mean people on the internet? I’m not entirely sure why this has been promoted to the level of “have two extremely smart LW posters discuss”. You both are quite keen thinkers, and I imagine the topics this funges against for your attention will delight yourselves and the wider LW community even more.
Yeah, I’d say motivated thinking.
Not all forms of threatening are equal, but “I’m having extremely violent fantasies about you and I know where you (and your children) live” isn’t a tiny thing, and it goes rather beyond “I hope you die”. (Is there a name for the rhetorical trick of choosing, not just a non-central example, but a minimized non-central example?)
Part of the point is that women are sometimes the target of harassment campaigns online. Some of the attackers may have an interest in the ostensible issue, some may be pure trolls. It seems as though a lot of the attackers are male.
I doubt that there are a number of women who left their homes because of nothing in particular.
When I mentioned above that people underestimate the effect of the worst people on their own side, I meant that just as I tend to underestimate the way feminism can add up, I think you’re underestimating the number and forcefulness of the vicious people on your side.
I’m still incredibly angry at the way Kathy Sierra was driven out of public life.
I’m curious about why this comment got so many downvotes, if anyone would care to try explaining. I’m saying “try explaining” because any one person can only know the reason for at most one downvote.
Comments like these are not helpful. Especially not on a highly politicized topic such as the one the two of you are discussing.
I don’t know if it’s enough to matter, but I only mentioned motivated thinking because Villiam brought up the possibility.
The problem is that no matter your intentions the phrase reads as a complete dismissal of Viliam_Bur’s argument. That is how these discussions turn ugly.
Would this qualify as a sufficiently scary threat? Both men and women receive various kinds of abuse online. I would guess that most of the aggressors are men, but victims are of both genders. Being a victim of online harrassment is not a uniquely female experience, although some specific forms of harrassment may be, mostly of sexual kind. I would also guess that victims of “swatting” are typically men, but I have no data about it.
Now I feel it would be good to split the debate into two completely separated topics: feminism and GamerGate. Debating them as if they are the same thing would make this all extremely confusing. Framing GamerGate as “angry white men against feminists” is merely a propaganda of one side; in reality, both sides include angry white men, and both sides include feminists.
1) I believe I have read a few stories about violent behavior of feminists, but I usually don’t keep records of things I read online. If my memory is reliable, the complaints about abuse from feminists usually came from LGBT people, although officially the feminists are supposed to be on their side. Googling for “violent feminists” mostly brings false positives, but also this.
I admit I am confused about the phenomenon of online SJWs. Are they supposed to be a part of feminism, or is that a separate thing? Because their opinions seem similar to some extreme feminist opinions. Seems to me these people do a lot of online harrassment, although on internet it is difficult to prove something isn’t merely trolling. And generally, even if someone is a feminist, that doesn’t mean that everything they do is done in the name of feminism.
2) Here is a collection of abuse towards pro-Gamergate people. Again, it’s difficult to prove who did that. We would have to debate each piece of evidence individually, but I’d rather avoid that.
That first link strikes me as not extremely scary, and it seems to be a rant rather than a threat which was sent to someone in particular. Furthermore, it doesn’t have specific details about injuries and degradation. It isn’t a photoshopped image of the person being threatened, either.
Gamergate is hopelessly weird—as you may know, the initial post was basically a man talking about having been emotionally abused by a woman, with only a minor mention of games and journalism, and it morphed into something completely different.
As far as I can tell, SJWs consider themselves to be part of feminism and/or the one true feminism. I haven’t seen a claim anywhere that they aren’t feminists, and at least one suggestion that there’s no point is saying that they aren’t feminists, even if they’re wrong-headed.
It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of moderate feminists (like most people) aren’t engaging with SJs because that looks like a lot of work and no fun.
Is it just me or is this a proxy bravery debate? Are we collectively committed to getting to the bottom of who / which tribe is the true victim of those mean people on the internet? I’m not entirely sure why this has been promoted to the level of “have two extremely smart LW posters discuss”. You both are quite keen thinkers, and I imagine the topics this funges against for your attention will delight yourselves and the wider LW community even more.