Is #GamerGate misogyny posing as concern for ethics?

[Covenant]

And the whiny baby Eron Gjoni who started this whole thing is still basking in the glow of it. The whole thing is massively embarrassing.

The final nail in the coffin for #GamerGate's claim that this had anything to do with ethics in journalism was when their most prominent spokesmen joined forces with Breitbart.

I'm a bit confused as to what you are talking about. Who is the "most prominent spokesmen" for GamerGate, and how did they join forces with someone who's been dead for 2 years?

Breitbart refers to the Breitbart News Network, which is a far-right news dump for the people who find Fox "fair and balanced" but like to relax with something that caters to their "right of center" views a little more. IE, it is a horrible wasteland of deranged thought. One of the first major media outlets to not take a shit on GG's lawn was Milo Yiannopoulos, a noted tech blogger of the right and from the UK. He made early waves by tweeting that the police should beat the shit out of the G20 protesters before they actually did and one of them died, at which point he deleted his tweet. He also made a stink when... uh lemme check the date...

...okay, back at the 2009 TechCrunch Europe GeeknRolla conference there was a panel on women in the tech industry, and because the male on the panel was sick, Milo offered to join in and threw a wrench into things (no harm there) by offering the view that there's no need to change the state of play in the tech industry because it is a sector "men naturally perform better in" and it would be patronizing to the women already in tech to change things to get more women involved. There's a lot of discussion back and forth about what a "tech job" is and so forth. In any case, it's old news now, but it was a minor stir at the time.

It's also noteworthy that he is a conservative Catholic but also gay, so you would think he would be more sympathetic, but apparently not. He attended the University of Manchester and the University of Cambridge but failed to graduate either one. Yes I'm using deliberately mocking language there.

He was one of the first people to jump in to cover GamerGate and described the detractors as "an army of sociopathic feminist programmers and campaigners, abetted by achingly politically correct American tech bloggers" which seems to indicate computer programmers but I think he means culture programmers? In any case he's one of the Breitbart reporters most actively supporting the GG tag despite the fact that he basically has contempt for gamers. This is something that, I think, most of the GG people are aware of. I think, at least? I don't know, but when shown the evidence they assume that he has seen the error of his ways and thus is okay. This is hypocritical when you take into account the "not a real gamer" claims thrown at Sarkeesian despite the fact that she has and does and did never say that video games create psychopathic killers or that game players are all sad sack losers. So when a far-right commentator comes down from the mountaintop and says "I play games now" then that's legit, but when Anita does it's "boo hiss, I bet your KDA is for shit, not a real gamer until beaten Halo on legendaaaaaryyy...."

Anyway, Milo quotes re-posting evidence for my scurrilous claim:

"My tweets look hilarious in retrospect."
"Few things are more embarrassing than grown men getting over-excited about video games."

"Am I too old for video games?"
"I understand why young people might get the odd thrill from beating up a bad guy, or catching a glimpse of a nipple or two. But there’s something a bit tragic, isn't there, about men in their thirties hunched over a controller whacking a helmeted extraterrestrial? I’m in my late twenties, and even I find it sad. And yet there are so many of them – enough to support a multi-billion dollar video games industry. That’s an awful lot of unemployed saddos living in their parents’ basements."

"...Is it that these games provide a bit of macho reinforcement to the terminally beta? It is hard to escape that conclusion. Might I suggest that if you want to feel like more of a man, you should head down to the gym or the football pitch. buff up and then bang a few birds 'IRL'?"

"This murdering psycho killed these people not from a hate of women, but because of video games."
"So ignore the shoddy, opportunistic posturing from feminists about Rodger’s crimes. It’s the blurring of fantasy and reality in today’s video game-obsessed young men that’s the real enemy. If there’s a cultural milieu that contributed to the creation of Elliot Rodger, it was that of nihilistic video games, not the myth of patriarchal oppression."

...and so on. Basically, now he says he plays games and has a newfound respect for them versus their feminist enemies, but in truth he's always been skeptical of women in the tech industry (as his previous commentary and journalism attest to) and seems to have a big issue with feminism in general. When a guy went out and shot a bunch of people because he says he's mad at women for not having sex with him, Milo jumps in to attack feminists and say its not misogynistic. I think killing people because women didn't have sex with you is kinda the textbook definition: now, how that thought got planted (like how deranged individuals may be drawn to neo-nazi rhetoric rather than having been made deranged by it) is another idea, but he seems heavily invested in a fight against feminism.

I think he just discounts the value of women, and has been told that he's a misogynist for so long that he's eager to attack them any chance he gets. I have no idea why, he's not exactly the societal expectation of a masculine icon himself: he's an average tech-guy in looks and his other claims to fame are being a massive Mariah Carey fan who gushed about traveling across national borders to buy her stuff earlier and his organizing of a Michael Jackson flash-mob. So he's no Rush Limbaugh, he just seems to have a very insular world-view and some kind of "I've got my acceptance, screw the rest of you" view on the expansion of inclusivity. I've also known some gay men who have really strange views on women, but I'm going to assume the normal conservative and Catholic politics are the variables here. I mean, it's not difficult to write a critique of identity politics or feminism in general, but it would be hard to square that with the kinds of comments he has for women.

So that's why people give a Spock Eyebrow to the GamerGate people pointing to Fox News, Breitbart, and Milo (and others) as the "voices in the wilderness" that support them with fair and unbiased news reporting: because those sources are not at all fair or unbiased based upon their previous reporting. Thus their involvement is suspect, especially when they had previously (as the right-political media and Milo in specific had been) publicly bashing you for being laughable and sad.

When someone scores points off you, and then uses you as a weapon to bash their allies, it is good and proper to suspect you have been co-opted for their benefit and not yours.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Ah, I didn't realize that Breitbart was a news service, I thought it was just that one dead asshole. And I've heard the name Yiannopoulos with respect to GamerGate but didn't realize he was such a miserable little prick. Thanks!

[Covenant]

Ah, I didn't realize that Breitbart was a news service, I thought it was just that one dead asshole. And I've heard the name Yiannopoulos with respect to GamerGate but didn't realize he was such a miserable little prick. Thanks!

I mean, I'm not going to demonize the guy, he's not a total monster, and I'll believe him when he says he was sent a threatening package and that sucks. I just have a sensible level of suspicion when someone like him (ie, someone who seems to have a consistent ideological axe to grind) takes up the banner of something like GamerGate.

This also muddles the "ethics in journalism" thing because Milo and Breitbart have terrible ethical standards and deliberately put out opposition ideologically-motivated news that distorts and mischaracterizes facts. They were involved in the Shirley Sherrod smear campaign, as noted previously, as well as the Fake Undercover ACORN video release, the Paul Krugman "bankruptcy" hoax and a bogus and blatantly fabricated account that Chuck Hagel attended a "Friends of Hamas" meeting. They basically repost bogus news when it matches their ideology (the Krugman thing was essentially an Onion-style newspaper that got reposted and Breitbart took it as legit) or they fake news or intentionally edit and mischaracterize and decontextualize statements made by people they have an interest in taking down.

This makes the "ethics" claim weaker because their ally is a paragon of ideologically-based unethical journalism that until this point had parodied gamers with a far-worse stereotype than any the feminists and SJW boogeymen have done. Milo has not only called them basement-dwelling permavirgins in literal terms, he claims that World of Warcraft inspired a murderous rampage.

I think it is a goes-nowhere claim to say that "gamers hate women" since that is really a useless claim, especially when one of their other advocates is a female conservative think-tank member, who is also known for her anti-feminist views more than her pro-videogame views. They don't hate women. They are just expressing a vein of conservative thought that believes the playing field is either equal already, or currently slanted in favor of women, so further attempts at "inclusivity" become Trojan Horses for some kind of conspiratorial fascist matriarchy. It is a deranged view, but it is utterly banal in how common it is among conservatives. GG may not try to be a right-wing movement but they have allowed their language to be driven by right-wing ideologues.

A lot of them don't even know what kind of dog-whistle language and imagery they're using, but a huge amount of them are still casually bigoted.

[Edi]

Andrew_Fireborn's bullshit tossed out to Parting Shots.

[Queue]

As Edi says, this was a unanimous decision by the admin staff, but I think it's important to comment whenever we do what we say we don't do - namely ban people for advocating an unpopular opinion.

In this case, it's my opinion that sexist and anti-feminist speech isn't just unpopular, it's harmful to the board. Specifically, to those women who have been harmed or threatened harm by sexists, or to the victims of common sexism, who all might feel less welcome here if we don't admit to the sometimes uncomfortable notion that not all speech deserves an equal hearing. This action is inarguably a case of the staff choosing to take a position on the issue, as we've done with other social issues in the past. We're okay with that.

The staff supports women, supports victims of sexism, and will not welcome people who don't.

[Terralthra]

Speaking as one of the people who's expressed very unpopular opinions before and not been banned, I can only say that the transparency and clarity exhibited here, as well as the reasoning behind the decision, are excellent to see.

[Covenant]

There is a way to have a meaningful debate about issues without turning it into useless and dangerous rhetoric. We are having a civil, if cautious, discussion about rape statistics elsewhere--that's something which should be much more inflammatory than the stuff being kicked around here. But nobody there is choosing to fire off direct attacks on individuals and are instead talking about facts, figures, and philosophies. This abstracted conversation is really missing from here--it's tied up in identities and sides and personalities.

The stuff Andrew was saying is actually pretty moderate for GG people as a whole, I've been on 8chan and 4chan a bunch trying to dig past the twitter spam to see what's really at the heart of this so I could come to a reasoned opinion on it. Andrew even distanced himself from gamergate somewhat, which is unusual for a partisan. Still, if this is the face of moderation it can be obvious why the controversy has taken on such a negative image... and why a majority of people feel that the Ethics stuff is basically a smokescreen.

So when even the moderate and well-spoken advocates for GG activity seem to become obsessed with proving certain persons are bad, rather than sticking to the bigger issues, it really looks ridiculous.

Most people interpret the broadfire attacks on some outspoken feminist critics as attacks on women in general. I think that is partially a mistake: I think they're attacks mostly on those individuals, partially on straw feminists in general, and informed by a non-political mind in an environment filled with conservative or right-wing reactionary thought. Does anyone know why some people choose to focus on certain individuals rather than issues, as if beating down a figurehead actually proves some larger point wrong? Some kind of Guilty By Association logic mixed with feeling personally offended by certain individuals out there. I am not sure they understand any other way of understanding this issue other than through the lens of personal attack.

The only unifying thread between people like Andrew and Spekio and Yan seems to be a dislike of some of the personalities involved. Yan, even as he was being piled on and eventually conceding some points at the top of page 12, still felt that he needed to leave "Zoe might have caused ethics breaches with her sex life" as a parting thought and just wanted to say that he gets riled up when Zoe is painted as a saint. Yan, I'm not mocking you, just saying that it seems really strange how far certain people (the people in GG especially) feel they need to go to take down her image or defeat the other people trying to build her up.

Amidst the things Andrew said in the now canned rant he went on was a response to me where he said "Ah, you do understand where this started" but then joked that I had it reversed, when I was talking about the tone police. He also went on to argue that fake nerds are a "real thing," and said things about needing to "test" them and compared a nerd to a chef with skills. Here is really the crux of the problem, which Stas identified way back when he said that some people are invested in establishing fake accolades and accomplishments to justify their level of attachment, rather than treating it like an interest that they enjoy without having it define themselves. This is a consumer identity, where your status is defined by the amount of material you have purchased and consumed (experienced) and where he equated skill in cooking or programming with a "skill" in knowing nerdy stuff, and a skill that you need to test others on in order for them to be allowed to be interested in things. That is, I think, the real insanity.

The other things, particularly the anti-feminist stuff, seem to be conservative (or at least reactionary) politics more than they are motivated by any inherent aspect of games. This predicts better why you see so many female and traditionally anti-game voices supporting the gamegate tag. Just like how ultra-conservative women can be anti-feminist without actually identifying with the same language you'd predict of a male misogynist, so can they support gamergate without seeing a logical contradiction.

It would probably be better to call GG "reactionary anti-progressive identity politics posing as concern for ethics" rather than misogyny in specific. When you try to debate a female conservative who attacks feminists it can be difficult to make the "misogynist" point stick. You are forced to rely on the "internalized sexism" claim which, again, may be way off the mark. First principle is not to assume ill-intent when you can assume ignorance instead, and I think we can probably point to a lot of these young female GG supporters as women who think feminists just don't want to bootstrap themselves up, or who think that they're jealous of pretty girls, or that they're man-hating lesbians.

From the things Andrew and others elsewhere (not here) have said I would think that's an easier claim to make: standard ol' conservative thought about changing the rules to help get in more voices, and their predictable lack of interest in examining the structural factors that create the disparities we see today. Given that many of the GG supporters are young they are also bound to be mostly unschooled in political thought and not likely to be highly political themselves, which gives them really no framework except defensive reactionary bullshit with which to respond to people coming in and saying "Some of the stuff happening in some of the things you like is bad, and we would like to tell you why."

I just go on and on about this. I find it personally frustrating to an extreme degree because this is my industry and I really find it upsetting that this is what they think.

[DaveJB]

The stuff Andrew was saying is actually pretty moderate for GG people as a whole

Andrew claimed he didn't actually support GamerGate. Even if we take that at face value however, assuming my interpretation of the board rules is correct, he committed at least two offences - including engaging in personal attacks on other users, and using ad hominem attacks as an excuse to dismiss the arguments people were putting forth - that would have been bannable regardless of the subject matter, or the fact that he opened his post with a blatantly sexist diatribe aimed at Broomstick.

It's weird, because whereas I've seen more than a few people identify with GG but repudiate those using it as an excuse to act like misogynists, Andrew actually did the opposite!

[TheFeniX]

I think it is a goes-nowhere claim to say that "gamers hate women" since that is really a useless claim, especially when one of their other advocates is a female conservative think-tank member, who is also known for her anti-feminist views more than her pro-videogame views. They don't hate women. They are just expressing a vein of conservative thought that believes the playing field is either equal already, or currently slanted in favor of women, so further attempts at "inclusivity" become Trojan Horses for some kind of conspiratorial fascist matriarchy.

Just from my experience, the playing field is level in a few areas. Women put up with the same amount of vitriol in gaming that men do. I'm talking about just playing online games. Games that coddle assholes will have said assholes attack men and women without prejudice. In games with a better female representation, the burden is swapped. Like, in an MMO, if I'm doing something wrong as a guy, I should know better and I'm a fucking retard for not doing X build Y way. But women get the kids-glove treatment and usually have to deal with the idea that, even though they've shown they know exactly what they are doing, they need help. To me, targeting women with gender specific insults and stereotypes isn't that shocking: it's what they do.

Just like I had to troll through innumerable servers to finally find a gaming community and people that were interested in not being morons, women have to do the same thing with the added disadvantage of having a female voice. It wasn't surprising that we ended up with a few female regs who stayed because no one would bitch at them for being women, but also wouldn't treat them like children who needed their hand held.

The issue is the bigots assume this sort of flip-flop parity extends to female personalities with a name and a face and it's pretty evident it doesn't. There's nothing particularly special about what has happened to Quinn in the context of video games or other entertainment venues. I'm not saying there's no problem, there definitely is. But the general consensus, that I've read, is this is some oddly specific problem for video games when you can find examples of it anywhere.

That said, this is a serious issue, but I have a hard time not laughing at some of the insanity. Men are being sexist in video games: must be losers who can't get laid? And we now have an ex-football player saying "fite me in RL not online and see what happens."

It is a deranged view, but it is utterly banal in how common it is among conservatives. GG may not try to be a right-wing movement but they have allowed their language to be driven by right-wing ideologues.

I've heard more than enough cracks about Palin and Coulter, some of them on this forum, specifically directed at their gender and about how people would like to fuck them or not. I'm betting this is less about political ideology and more about people just being people, but I don't know about opening that bag of cats.

[madd0ct0r]

I think I remember the last thread that happened in, and the offenders were slapped down sharpish. I guess as more of the board become parents/mellow attitudes shift.

[Broomstick]

Andrew claimed he didn't actually support GamerGate. Even if we take that at face value however, assuming my interpretation of the board rules is correct, he committed at least two offences - including engaging in personal attacks on other users, and using ad hominem attacks as an excuse to dismiss the arguments people were putting forth - that would have been bannable regardless of the subject matter, or the fact that he opened his post with a blatantly sexist diatribe aimed at Broomstick.

I was pretty sure he was trying to bait me and draw me into an argument, which I why, after my one post noting his comment, I shut up. There are quite a few men on this forum who "get it", anyway, when it comes to most female issues and they were already addressing the main points.

Basically, I refused to be a punching bag with a target on the side for his amusement. Good job, the rest of you, for engaging his bullshit.

[Darth Yan]

One of the common complaints is why GamerGate didn't go after the Shadows of Mordor.

broken

I believe it was actually Totalbiscuit (Who is pro gamer gate) that brought the news to the public. Also, some writers have been blacklisted for supporting it.

[TheFeniX]

I have no idea what's going on there. Who is Cheong? Why does he seem to have a stick up his ass about TB?

That said, reading his twitter did lead me to this. You know.... so... that's a thing.

[Terralthra]

I have no idea what's going on there. Who is Cheong? Why does he seem to have a stick up his ass about TB?

That said, reading his twitter did lead me to this. You know.... so... that's a thing.

It's similar in general principle to the argument that "reverse racism" isn't really a thing. Essentially, it is a distinction made especially in academia between race- or sex-based prejudice, which is individual stereotyping, hate, violence, etc., based on sex or race, and racism/sexism, which is that prejudice + a system of societal power which protects that prejudice and its exercise. Black people can be prejudiced against white people, but since by and large, in the US, white people have most of the political and economic power, the prejudice held by black people is largely impotent.

It's a common distinction in academic circles, and a useful one, but it frequently runs up against disambiguation issues in the non-academic world, where "sexism" and "sex-based prejudice" are synonymous.

[AniThyng]

I have no idea what's going on there. Who is Cheong? Why does he seem to have a stick up his ass about TB?

That said, reading his twitter did lead me to this. You know.... so... that's a thing.

It's similar in general principle to the argument that "reverse racism" isn't really a thing. Essentially, it is a distinction made especially in academia between race- or sex-based prejudice, which is individual stereotyping, hate, violence, etc., based on sex or race, and racism/sexism, which is that prejudice + a system of societal power which protects that prejudice and its exercise. Black people can be prejudiced against white people, but since by and large, in the US, white people have most of the political and economic power, the prejudice held by black people is largely impotent.

It's a common distinction in academic circles, and a useful one, but it frequently runs up against disambiguation issues in the non-academic world, where "sexism" and "sex-based prejudice" are synonymous.

What happens when one race has the economic power and the other the political?

[Darth Yan]

racism and sexism are hatred and disdain for another group because of their gender or race. So by definition if a white person thinks black people are all thugs or a black person thinks whites are subhuman oppressors who are always out to get them and are all oppressors....than the black person is just as racist as the white person. If a woman thinks all men are brutes who go around raping....yes you are as sexist as if a man were to say all women should stay in the kitchen.

The Power + Privelege is self serving twaddle for the most part. Yes there is bigotry in society. But racism is not something that only white people can feel.

[Terralthra]

It's similar in general principle to the argument that "reverse racism" isn't really a thing. Essentially, it is a distinction made especially in academia between race- or sex-based prejudice, which is individual stereotyping, hate, violence, etc., based on sex or race, and racism/sexism, which is that prejudice + a system of societal power which protects that prejudice and its exercise. Black people can be prejudiced against white people, but since by and large, in the US, white people have most of the political and economic power, the prejudice held by black people is largely impotent.

It's a common distinction in academic circles, and a useful one, but it frequently runs up against disambiguation issues in the non-academic world, where "sexism" and "sex-based prejudice" are synonymous.

What happens when one race has the economic power and the other the political?

I don't imagine such a situation would be sustainable in the long term. Sooner or later, political power will bend money to itself, or economic power will corrupt the political establishment.

racism and sexism are hatred and disdain for another group because of their gender or race. So by definition if a white person thinks black people are all thugs or a black person thinks whites are subhuman oppressors who are always out to get them and are all oppressors....than the black person is just as racist as the white person. If a woman thinks all men are brutes who go around raping....yes you are as sexist as if a man were to say all women should stay in the kitchen.

The Power + Privelege is self serving twaddle for the most part. Yes there is bigotry in society. But racism is not something that only white people can feel.

Your entire post is begging the question.

There is, per se, a difference between black people feeling fear, suspicion, and hatred of white people, and white people who feel fear, suspicion, and hatred of black people, and have economic and political power to act on those feelings to the detriment of that race. Academics and sociologists who have been studying these problems for decades have distinguished between those two empirically different phenomena by calling the former "race-based prejudice" and the latter "racism". Insisting that you think "race-based prejudice" should be called "racism" doesn't actually make the phenomena identified by academia as "racism" disappear. Call it whatever you want. "Racism-with-power". "Structurally-supported racism". Sure. But at some point, the argument about what to call racism, and how to disambiguate the two phenomena lexically, turns into denial of the idea of structurally-supported racism, or equivocating that it somehow the phenomena are equally wrong, despite one having vastly more harm attached to it.

[PKRudeBoy]

It's similar in general principle to the argument that "reverse racism" isn't really a thing. Essentially, it is a distinction made especially in academia between race- or sex-based prejudice, which is individual stereotyping, hate, violence, etc., based on sex or race, and racism/sexism, which is that prejudice + a system of societal power which protects that prejudice and its exercise. Black people can be prejudiced against white people, but since by and large, in the US, white people have most of the political and economic power, the prejudice held by black people is largely impotent.

It's a common distinction in academic circles, and a useful one, but it frequently runs up against disambiguation issues in the non-academic world, where "sexism" and "sex-based prejudice" are synonymous.

What happens when one race has the economic power and the other the political?

I don't imagine such a situation would be sustainable in the long term. Sooner or later, political power will bend money to itself, or economic power will corrupt the political establishment.

racism and sexism are hatred and disdain for another group because of their gender or race. So by definition if a white person thinks black people are all thugs or a black person thinks whites are subhuman oppressors who are always out to get them and are all oppressors....than the black person is just as racist as the white person. If a woman thinks all men are brutes who go around raping....yes you are as sexist as if a man were to say all women should stay in the kitchen.

The Power + Privelege is self serving twaddle for the most part. Yes there is bigotry in society. But racism is not something that only white people can feel.

Your entire post is begging the question.

There is, per se, a difference between black people feeling fear, suspicion, and hatred of white people, and white people who feel fear, suspicion, and hatred of black people, and have economic and political power to act on those feelings to the detriment of that race. Academics and sociologists who have been studying these problems for decades have distinguished between those two empirically different phenomena by calling the former "race-based prejudice" and the latter "racism". Insisting that you think "race-based prejudice" should be called "racism" doesn't actually make the phenomena identified by academia as "racism" disappear. Call it whatever you want. "Racism-with-power". "Structurally-supported racism". Sure. But at some point, the argument about what to call racism, and how to disambiguate the two phenomena lexically, turns into denial of the idea of structurally-supported racism, or equivocating that it somehow the phenomena are equally wrong, despite one having vastly more harm attached to it.

As far as the first point goes, sounds pretty much like Malaysia. As to the second point, what's wrong with calling it institutional or structural racism? Quite frankly I think it should be on academics to be as clear as possible, because when someone uses racism as a shorthand for structural racism, most non-academics will think they are speaking about prejudice, since that is what everyone else uses it for. When someone says minorities can't be racist because they are using your definition of racism, they would be correct, but unless they are talking to someone else who is aware of the academic definition, most people will think they are saying that minorities can't be prejudiced, which is laughable.

[TheFeniX]

It's similar in general principle to the argument that "reverse racism" isn't really a thing. Essentially, it is a distinction made especially in academia between race- or sex-based prejudice, which is individual stereotyping, hate, violence, etc., based on sex or race, and racism/sexism, which is that prejudice + a system of societal power which protects that prejudice and its exercise. Black people can be prejudiced against white people, but since by and large, in the US, white people have most of the political and economic power, the prejudice held by black people is largely impotent.

It's a common distinction in academic circles, and a useful one, but it frequently runs up against disambiguation issues in the non-academic world, where "sexism" and "sex-based prejudice" are synonymous.

Yea, the scale is heavily weighted to one side. But to claim one side doesn't exist at all gives me some insight into why people might not like FemFreq. Telling me academicians have changed the definition doesn't compel me when it's pretty fucking evident that's not the way the term is being used on the Interwebs. To me, it's in the same boat as saying "men can't be raped."

[Terralthra]

I agree with you, in general. Due to my work, I interact with a lot of academics (:D) so, I have an understanding of the language in use on both sides of the debate, but I think it would be much more appropriate to construct academic definitions that at least line up with those words that are in common usage. Racism, as commonly used, means what academics call race-based prejudice, and sexism, as commonly used, means what academics call sex-based prejudice.

It's kinda dumb, since all it does is trigger stupid arguments as above. It's way more important to point out that there is a definite structure to how race-based prejudice and racism play out in the real world, regardless of what you call them.

PKRudeBoy -

I don't know enough about Malaysia to comment intelligently. As far as "structural racism" goes, it covers some of what's implied by the academic "racism", but not all of it.

[PKRudeBoy]

I agree with you, in general. Due to my work, I interact with a lot of academics (:D) so, I have an understanding of the language in use on both sides of the debate, but I think it would be much more appropriate to construct academic definitions that at least line up with those words that are in common usage. Racism, as commonly used, means what academics call race-based prejudice, and sexism, as commonly used, means what academics call sex-based prejudice.

It's kinda dumb, since all it does is trigger stupid arguments as above. It's way more important to point out that there is a definite structure to how race-based prejudice and racism play out in the real world, regardless of what you call them.

PKRudeBoy -

I don't know enough about Malaysia to comment intelligently. As far as "structural racism" goes, it covers some of what's implied by the academic "racism", but not all of it.

From what I've heard online and from a friend that grew up there, the majority ethnic Malaysians control the political process, while the minority Malaysian Chinese dominate the economy.

As to the rest, I agree that it's semantic nitpicking, but what way too many people (not saying you, but people in general) don't realize is that semantics are really, really important when you are trying to convince people. The fact that you may be a hundred percent correct really doesn't matter if you alienate your audience through poor choice of wording.

[AniThyng]

PKRudeBoy -

I don't know enough about Malaysia to comment intelligently. As far as "structural racism" goes, it covers some of what's implied by the academic "racism", but not all of it.

From what I've heard online and from a friend that grew up there, the majority ethnic Malaysians control the political process, while the minority Malaysian Chinese dominate the economy.

Yes, this. A look at the top 10 richest Malaysians will give you, last I checked, 8 chinese names, 1 indian and 1 malay. Not that this is particularly relevant to ordinary people since they are the 1%, but on the other hand, a casual look at the middle and upper management as well as the professional white collar workforce of most private companies (be they local or the local operations of MNCs) would bias chinese, while the reverse is the case in the public sector/civil service (perhaps even more so in favor of the malays)

That being said, Malaysia is actually i think 22% chinese, with urban areas going up to 40-50% chinese, with the population uniquely unassimilated (compared to chinese minorities in say, Indonesia or Thailand or even in places like Australia, because a Chinese immigrant will adopt english and the surface trappings of westernization but not Islamic malay culture...) so this contributes tremendously to tensions I think.

[Lagmonster]

It's kinda dumb, since all it does is trigger stupid arguments as above. It's way more important to point out that there is a definite structure to how race-based prejudice and racism play out in the real world, regardless of what you call them.

'Kinda dumb' is one way to phrase it. My choice would be 'counter-productive'. What she said might be relatable to sociologists, but the average person heard, "I dismiss as false your claim of having been associated with a group you hate and/or disagree with". That's basically fighting words and makes her look like a revolutionary rather than a reformer, which probably isn't the best vehicle for the social change that's needed.

Personally, I find it hard to get behind Anita's message because she's such a divisive figure, but was enthusiastic to get behind Emma Watson's. This despite the fact that as far as I can tell, they have the same goal.

[Covenant]

Well yeah its counter-productive, but who cares if you get behind her message? She's high profile because she's a god-damned punching bag for people who have an axe to grind and she has one interesting web series which gets people angry as fuck, and that is really all. She is by no means the only person involved in this discussion, nor is she the best educated or the best published. People like me defend her from unreasonable hateful attacks because unreasonable hate needs to be opposed, but if all of the GG people just gave up and deleted their twitter accounts I'm pretty sure she'd get through this 15 minutes of fame pretty fast. Even when she was doing nothing at all (ie, before her series came up, and during the loooong hiatus moments between posts) she was being relentlessly attacked and brought up as this terrifying figure. There's a segment of the population who is actively scared of her even when she does and says nothing. She's neither a revolutionary nor a reformer, she's just a critic with a "why do we not talk about some interesting issues" bent that is not even all that pushy or forceful. The massive blowback has (and does) only reveal a twitchy raw-nerve social justice regressivism on the part of the people being offended when she takes offense.

It is like someone coming into Arbys and saying "This is not great food, even though I do like some of the menu items. Let us talk about how this food could be better" and then being sent death threats and bomb threats by hundreds of angry Arbys fanboys, even though Arbys itself is down with the commentary. It boggles the mind.

Trying to avoid angering insane people is not useful--it is way more counter-productive than the occasionally incorrect and incendiary things she does say, like this recent comment. I'm glad people are jumping on her for this, as it is an unfair and unqualified jab that only makes the conversation less-intelligent, but kow-towing around some hard points to make mouthbreathers happy is always a worse solution. It is better for everyone to say the uncomfortable thing, let them get all angry about it, have a discussion, and move forwards. Reclassifying sexism a hundred new ways to make these men less angry is pitying a power majority to the detriment of academia and people in a position of weakness.

Honestly though, why get behind someone else's message at all? Just get a message of your own. Neither side in an intellectual debate should depend upon figureheads or individual faction heroes to do the arguing for them, nor should they focus on what those individuals are saying to the exclusion of the actual debate. No matter what Anita says she is not, nor has ever been, a democratically elected leader of the "Everyone Who Is Not Gamergate" international guild, so continuing to point out these things just seems to serve the same (self-defeating) purpose of character assassination. The idea that "discrimination against ___ isn't ___ism" has been around for so long that anyone with an honest interest into racism/sexism/whateverism would have already run across the whole discrimination+structural power thing already.

[Lagmonster]

I don't think I need to address your back-story and explanation for her situation, as it's reasonably point-of-fact. Tell me if I missed something important.

She's neither a revolutionary nor a reformer, she's just a critic with a "why do we not talk about some interesting issues" bent that is not even all that pushy or forceful.

I think she's absolutely agitating for change; that's been part of the message I'm getting in her videos. And it's much needed change.

And either way I don't see how hiding in the mantle of the critic could help. "Oh, I'm not out to change anything, I'm just a critic". Okay, then, come see me when you are ready to accomplish something. I'll just keep enjoying my power and privilege while you think it over.

Honestly though, why get behind someone else's message at all? Just get a message of your own. Neither side in an intellectual debate should depend upon figureheads or individual faction heroes to do the arguing for them, nor should they focus on what those individuals are saying to the exclusion of the actual debate.

Because it's easier to agree with a human than an idea. And I think that's really important in this issue, because the people who have to change the most are generally contented, well-meaning people, more akin to cats in a sunbeam than whip-masters in a palace. That kind of person doesn't get off their ass to be part of a turbulent academic discussion.