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Roderick

Feminism

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That account has another video titled "Moderate Islam: A MYTH!", in which the host dresses up as a Muslim and part of his costume is an artificial monobrow. Not that that demonstrates anything concrete about the catcalling video, but it does give you an idea of the place that this argument is coming from. Sure, it's a young good-looking guy presenting it in a modern and "vibrant" way (that stupid contorted face scream he kept doing was very YouTube), but it's just a fresh face on the same old reactionary bullshit. Which I guess should be obvious, but I'm worried people will be taken in by the slick production values and veneer of reasonableness.

Besides all that, a pretty obvious criticism of the video is that what he's doing isn't catcalling. He'd probably argue that neither is the drive-by compliment thing, but it is. If you're already in a conversation with someone, or in a less public environment, it's not the same thing. That doesn't mean it's welcome or OK (it's pretty creepy to try to chat up someone who is literally required to be there and not leave), but that's a whole other discussion.

 

Mostly what makes me sad is that I don't know if I trust people to have the critical eye for things like this. I see this, and I see a lot of people like this guy, people who revel in their ignorance. And that makes me sad. I'm really glad that the Idle Thumbs fanbase is what it is.

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What do people here think of this guy? Someone on Facebook linked to one of his pieces "Fuck Yes or No", which I thought was ok, and I read a couple of more. He seems to be pretty anti-PUA, but ...

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That video is dumb as fuck for a variety of reasons, but it can be handily refuted with a single objection: he isn't cat calling. That's... not what cat calling is.

 

The youtube comments, however, are a fantastic encapsulation of why this shit is actually a problem (as loathe as I am to believe that youtube comments represent an accurate slice of mainstream opinion). Woman objects to video; is told she is overreacting/was probably too ugly to get catcalled anyway. Woman points out flaws in video while also stroking male ego with "but feminists do overreact to this stuff!"; is called "a good girl" and given a pass. Literally someone calls her a good girl. What even.

 

Also I just want to punch this recommendation in the face.

 

F4WPEOb.jpg

 

 

I'm into this because I want to see dude culture fucking crash and burn. Even in a relatively secular, liberal nation like mine (we were the first to give women the vote!), masculine ideals still permeate everything like a thick, hazy fog. "Be a man" is a common sentiment, not just in spirit but spoken in those exact words. Even social issues have to be marketed to appeal to overt masculinity. This is an actual ad that ran here -

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDEWjoIGs8I

 

It scales from this stuff all the way down to relatively benign things. There's a long-running ad where a thick-necked rugby player explains that depression isn't about "manning up and getting over it," it's about seeking help. Which is a fantastic message, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with the ad except that it had to be that way. There is no way this ad would have been remotely successful if the spokesperson wasn't the very embodiment of masculinity. Which, again, isn't a problem in and of itself, because men absolutely are expected to just "man up and take it" in a variety of ways, but it's such a fucking drain to know that my society's ideals are so poisonous in this way and that the very people being poisoned are resisting the cure.

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In less funny news, Time put "feminist" on their poll of Worst Words from 2014 that should be banned, alongside "bae," "basic," and "influencer," and it's winning by a huge margin. Time's rationale is about people overusing and misunderstanding the term, which just makes it one of the top three tone-deaf moves of all time, rather than the number one.

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4Chan has a history for manipulating Time "whatevers of 20XX" polls to say stupid things with the first letters of poll choices, so I have no doubt that their MRA-friendly members are totally trashing this one.

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4Chan has a history for manipulating Time "whatevers of 20XX" polls to say stupid things with the first letters of poll choices, so I have no doubt that their MRA-friendly members are totally trashing this one.

 

So really, it's more the fault of a magazine like Time, which regularly reports on women's issues, for giving misogynists an opportunity to flex their muscles.

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Or trolls who have jumped on the misogyny bandwagon because of the lulz. I was thinking about this person of the year thing in Time, where Kim Jong-Un won because of 4Chan and they managed to make the results spell "KJU GAS CHAMBERS" with the first letters of each person's name.

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They also did the same thing if you read the list in descending order, although it said something different. I can't remember what it was. (Or, so I read recently, without bothering to confirm.)

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Time's rationale is about people overusing and misunderstanding the term, which just makes it one of the top three tone-deaf moves of all time, rather than the number one.

 

I don't think I agree with that interpretation. On the poll page Time seems to be indicting "the word" for no other reason than celebrity fatigue (surprise, you write for Time), as they might have a decade ago with liberalism in general as a supercilious Hollywood cause. Beginning the entry by stating that you have "nothing against" feminism is akin to saying "I have no problem with black people, but ..."

 

It shows a profound lack of empathy for why the amount of discussion on feminism is necessary, not a higher-minded critique of its cultural misuse.

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So something fun happened in Australia recently, which is good because we also have the G20 going and that's just been embarrassing because 18 out of 20 countries want to talk about climate change and Australia is petulantly stamping its foot.

 

ANYWAY

 

One of our morning presenters, Karl Stefanovic, is basically paid to be a dipstick, and has achieved a small amount of fame because of how naturally he embodies that role, starting from the time he did the entire show drunk because he'd had too much to drink at the local TV awards ceremony and it hadn't actually left his system by 6am. Certain sections of the internet have discovered that there's this TV presenter that --

 

fuck_yeah.gif

 

--that's him.

 

Of course, he's a dipstick, not a douchebag. His co-anchor there is Lisa Wilkinson, and because she is female she gets critical comments from viewers and fashion commentators every time she wears the same clothes twice. Now Karl thought this was bizarre, and decided he'd deliberately start wearing the same clothes every day to see when he starts getting the same viewer comments.

 

It's been a year and the only people who've noticed are in the studio with him and can smell a suit that hasn't been washed in a year. So he decided to tell people about how people keep picking on his mates for wearing clothes too often when he wore the same suit for a year without comment, and how that wasn't fair.

 

Good on ya, Karl.

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Apparently, Time removed "feminist" from its word poll.

 

Or, as KotakuInAction put it: SJW bullies get Time to remove "Feminist" from their poll about which word should be banned in 2015 even though it crushed other options

So I'm a bit behind on some of the details but what the hell is "KotakuInAction"?

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The "good" side of GamerGate. That is, the side that doesn't communicate through 8chan. Though I'm sure there's some overlap. EDIT: Guess I should specify that it's a subreddit.

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The "good" side of GamerGate. That is, the side that doesn't communicate through 8chan. Though I'm sure there's some overlap. EDIT: Guess I should specify that it's a subreddit.

If they're using the term "SJW" then I can't consider them good.

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There's a reason I put it in quotes. They would put forth that they're the only side that matters because they don't harass etc blah blah hypocrisy. Anyway enough talk about gooberglab!

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KIA exist to decry "tumblrina" style overreaction whilst unironically overreacting to every imaginable thing. Seriously the funniest thing about people like that is how often they mock feminists for being "offended" versus how often they pull things out of their ass to be offended about. Only it's not offence when they do it because they coat everything they say in a paper-thin veneer of "fact" and "reason."

 

What's everyone's thoughts on this? I'm kind of in two minds but I don't have a very nuanced take on it (spoiler: neither do 99% of people commenting on it).

 

http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/news/g546a6fc73886f/Sweden-considers-sexist-advisory-label-for-games/

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It being an advisory, I'm not sure how that's much different than warnings regarding violence, language or drug usage, other than I suppose a greater potential for disputes regarding the validity of the label. Perhaps it's that where violence in games is taken to be something at least extraordinary, if not outright bad, sexist content is more internalised - you'll never shoot anyone, but you could certainly have a shitty attitude towards women.

I suppose it could get pretty thorny. Would it describe sexism depicted by games, or only sexism embodied by games? Is it about sexist games, or games with sexism in them?

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What's everyone's thoughts on this? I'm kind of in two minds but I don't have a very nuanced take on it (spoiler: neither do 99% of people commenting on it).

 

http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/news/g546a6fc73886f/Sweden-considers-sexist-advisory-label-for-games/

 

Sweden has always (at least in modern history) taken a very pro-women stance on things (see their prostitution laws for example) so this is kind of par for the course. I skimmed the comments very briefly, and I just saw "LOL what about sexism vs men?? LOL" and stuff like that, but one thing that Sweden's pro-women stance has done is created more equality, even though it is still lacking in some areas. ( see here here and here for some info). Another example is of course, required paternity leave, so I feel but cannot say for certain, that the intent is more balanced than just empowering the women. That is to say, more about making it equal instead of just boosting women's rights. In other media as well, just look at the Girl with a Dragon Tattoo, (original title : Men Who Hate Women) and the female characters included in there. 

 

Of course, there are a lot of people who don't like the trend. 

All in all, i don't think such a change will affect sales or damage the industry, and I think it is on par with Sweden's attitude towards changes and trying things to see if they work or not. Granted, I haven't lived in Sweden for 20+ years, so I may be a bit or very out of touch. 

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KIA exist to decry "tumblrina" style overreaction whilst unironically overreacting to every imaginable thing. Seriously the funniest thing about people like that is how often they mock feminists for being "offended" versus how often they pull things out of their ass to be offended about. Only it's not offence when they do it because they coat everything they say in a paper-thin veneer of "fact" and "reason."

 

With regard to the shirt thing: This counter-reaction stuff is so tightly coupled now and has no sense of irony. A statement characterising a legit objection as overreaction, that itself then became days of sustained outrage, booming long after the dude apologised.

 

 

What's everyone's thoughts on this? I'm kind of in two minds but I don't have a very nuanced take on it (spoiler: neither do 99% of people commenting on it).

 

http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/news/g546a6fc73886f/Sweden-considers-sexist-advisory-label-for-games/

 

At this point, I want it to happen just to annoy misogyinists/gaters/etc. Perception of sexism should be normalised, and we should just way overshoot on all of these things so they end up having to concentrate sustained attention to win even the most trivial victories. The more things they have to fight, the lower the stakes they can actually contend become.

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Susan Arendt has a nice piece up at Joystiq about the ordinariness of gender diversity in Dragon Age Inquisition.

 

Except it is a big deal, because it's a scene you never see in video games without it being a Thing, without their womanhood being the entire point of them being together, doing whatever it is they're meant to be doing. If the situation were reversed, and it was four men and one woman, nobody would blink, because that's considered normal. By doing something equally unremarkable, BioWare has constructed a situation that's both progressive and disruptive. Not that the Inquisition gives a damn, of course. They've got work to do, and couldn't really care less which bathroom everyone at the table prefers to use.

 

It's something a bunch of people have noted in the multiplayer as well, the launching MP characters available are split 50/50 male and female. Just cause. There is a hilariously awful thread over at the Bioware forums with a few men angry that there aren't more male options in DAMP.

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