Senate Let's Talk: Feminism

I strongly disagree that the story in RDR is better than the story in GTA IV. GTA is a savage beatdown of the fallacy and fantasy of the American dream. Nothing in GTA V comes close to the majesty of GTA IV.

 

Look I'm not sure where you heard it but I don't eat human beings.

Anyways, a while back, people were talking about harassment. I don't think even the staunchest allies understand how goddamn insidious and infuriating it is. Imagine that there's something about you that you cannot change, and that a solid 50 to 70% of people you encounter will stare/comment/make a joke/whisper because they think you can't hear. That's what it is. And you can't do anything about it, because if you do, you're the rude one for calling out ****** behaviour or refusing to play along. Even a victory feels bad at that point, and you wind up walking around with your guard up all the time.

And that's not to say that people don't want to be noticed sometimes. Attention is nice now and then. Imagine you had a third eye in your forehead and everyone wanted to see it and comment on it and felt you owed them your time because they just think it's cool and they're just trying to be social and nice. I mean, sure, even if you're the most genial person out there, at some point you'd say, "**** off, okay? I'm just trying to get my coffee."

That's how harassment works. It's masquerading as compliments and people "taking an interest" or "being friendly" or, hell, even just checking you out. That's on a good day. On a bad day, it's comments and catcalls and other BS. It sucks. And not everyone does these things, but enough do and enough have that it ruins things for you.

I have it pretty easy - relatively speaking - because I'm just a notably (like, notably) tall man. But it still sucks. At least there's something notable or out of the ordinary that people annoy me about - it's got to suck even more when the "notable" thing is you're a woman.

Whatever, that's all probably ridiculously pedantic mansplaining on my part, but I felt like sharing it.

 

I figured that you would like that snore-fest - it makes the laziest, broadest caricature of American society possible, wrapping it up in a thoroughly dull sad-sack protagonist whose endless set of stupid decisions really can only be blamed on himself. the DLCs were good, with more of a sense of humor like the earlier GTAs.

If you really want a scathing assault on the American dream, Fallout does a much better job of it. Plus, in keeping with the thread, you can actually play as a female.

 

Which Fallout? Real Fallout, or fake Fallout?

 

We need more people like you. It's really hypocritical how many who consider themselves feminists would argue the opposite.

Yes, I referred to that in the apology. I really don't advocate any of their tactics so my defense of them, while coming from a much different place than the misogynistic *******s you speak of, was still a mistake. What my problem is with the general subject of what occurred with Sarkeesian and GamerGate was that they created that polarized atmosphere I spoke of in which you try to tell the idiots that resided in GamerGate to quit being so abhorrent in their behavior, you're accused of being a cuck (because being reasonable is just a sign of cowardice apparently) and if you disagree with Sarkeesian's views, you are essentially a closeted GamerGate supporter who is "part of the problem". These were real situations I had seen play out and they never ended well. It's essentially an unstoppable force colliding against an immovable object and all the decency gets crushed between them.

I did a long while ago and I never should have tried to salvage it. I believed it was gone and it was the correct thing to believe.

This statement is contemptible. Utterly sordid bull****. It's pure cruelty. What, do they think that someone doing something with your body against your will while you're unconscious is fun? That it somehow isn't frightening and dangerous?! REALLY?

 

Great Scott, are you an isomorph purist?

 

Fallout 3 and 4 are terrible.

Fallout 2 is god. Fallout NV a worthy tribute.

 

Well, I better start calling you Conan because you know what is best in life.

 

Yes. Fallout 2.

 

Uh.

1) Find one.
2) lol at you considering yourself the authority on what feminism needs more of and less of.

 

Well, my statement makes a lot of sense considering that the actual definition for feminism is "the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social and economic equality to men".

 

When you say "we need more people like you" - who is the operative "we" there?

 

The people who actually advocate the equality part in the definition of feminism whilst realizing that men face problems of their own in society as well. Some of those problems (disadvantages in terms of child custody, adequate representation of rape, etc.) have been mentioned. That seems like a pretty reasonable and healthy mindset to have. I like to think many people who are on this forum have this mindset. That's what I meant by "we".

 

Ah ha, then I reiterate my lol and raise it with an lmao, good sir.

 

Is there any reason in particular for that?

 

1) You constructed a mythical group of "many" straw feminists who go around regularly arguing that female video game characters should have more shields than male characters without providing any evidence of this even existing or acknowledging whether they had provided any particular reasoning for thinking such a thing.*

2) You quoted one dictionary definition of feminism - which inherently ignores the very real and crucial fact that there are many feminisms - as a way of positioning yourself as an authority or gatekeeper to what "feminism" needs or doesn't need. Maybe you think that you can logically deduce that the word equality in the definition means that all feminists should agree that video game characters should have the same shields as male characters, but that would ignore the factors mentioned in my footnote. Aside from that, this should go without saying, but if anyone is an authority on what feminism needs more of, it certainly wouldn't be a man.

3) Defining feminists as people who "actually" advocate for equality, as though, again, your mythical straw feminists are out there seriously making demands for matriarchy and oppression of men. (Note, men losing certain kinds of power and advantages over women is not oppression of men and in fact is required for equality.)

4) Considering yourself one of those people who advocates for female equality considering the kind of crap you've been saying in this thread tbh.

5) Bringing the structural inequalities men face up without acknowledging that these inequalities are actually the result of patriarchal norms and expectations. (Women are caregivers and belong in the domestic sphere > therefore men have more difficulty getting custody. Women are weak and victims and men are strong and fighters, therefore men should never show emotion or admit weakness. Also sexual violation is something that happens to women and is therefore emasculating for men to admit or speak about. So male victims are not proportionately represented in rape statistics.)

6) Yeah, everything anakinfansince1983 said

In conclusion, lol.

* For example, if the female avatars in the game have lower HP or are attacked more often than the male avatars, that might be a fair reason to make an argument for providing them more armor.

 

Pretty much, Anakinfan. Feminists who hate men undermine themselves.

One of my friends put it this way: "For me, a feminist is one who advocates for the civil and social rights of all individuals, regardless of their gender..."

 

Honestly please explain to me how saying "Feminism is about advocating for ALL genders" is different from saying "All lives matter?"

 

Boba Nekhbet Going to have to say "my bad" on this one. I was referring to people who are extremists and did it quite poorly (I was tired and it was late at night for me lol).

As for point #4, as a person who apologizes and concedes to other people if the arguments he made that he personally feels were unsatisfactory/not truly reflective of his personal values/crap, a person who regarded the comments made supporting Brock Turner's criminal offenses to be cruel, sordid and contemptible, and considers Conor Dwyer's comments regarding losing to a superior female swimmer to be stupid, I CERTAINLY wouldn't be the kind of person who advocates women's rights. Suuuuure.

I don't understand what your purpose is in lecturing me about what caused the problems I mentioned. I know why they exist so that goes without saying. It still doesn't make it any less harmful to the people those issues affect because they are men and the issues arise from patriarchal norms.

anakinfansince1983 If there's anything I'm not looking forward to if she becomes president, it's pretty much everything in that article.

 

I certainly appreciate you owning up to your (repeated, consistent) missteps in this thread, so thank you for owning that. As for the second comment, honestly, all I have to judge you on is your posts that I've seen in the last few pages of this thread, and they don't indicate to me that you're quite on board with feminism. You don't get an automatic pass as an ally just because you said one mean thing about Brock Turner once somewhere. When I mess up in a discussion about racism, I don't pull out a pedigree of all the non-racist and antiracist things I've said and done in the past, I just own it, apologize, and try to learn. You're not going to convince anyone that you're a good ally by using examples from the past while consistently "misspeaking" because you were posting while "tired" in the present.

My point in lol "lecturing" you lololol is that you framed it as "feminism" vs "problems men face" when in reality these things are not separate or at odds.

The problems men face that you pointed out are ones that will generally be resolved by the aims of feminism. Like anakinfansince1983 said, a women's movement focusing more on women and centering discussion around women isn't indicative of anyone failing to "realize" that men face problems too. It's not an either/or thing.

 

i enjoyed this article by dana schwartz. it's slightly off topic, but does touch on some of the key points of the current discussion.

 

I understand what you mean.

 

Talos156

I just want to observe that Boba Nekhbet is doing you a favor (or two, or more) by explaining various things to you. It's not something that's necessary for her to do, but she's kind enough to break things down. I learned from her posts on this page, and I became aware of more than one blind spot, or if not a blind spot, then certainly where my vision is poor at best.

None of us want to be tagged or thought of as a person who isn't for equality, or is associated in any way with something negative about these issues. I find it helpful to consider that I don't know very much, and that I probably have a lot more to learn from others than they do from me.

I can tell that you care, and that you seem to want to understand things-- I can relate with that. My advice is to just listen-- we men should do a lot more of that, generally speaking.

 

Yeah, no worries here. I understand her intent and I appreciate her previous post.