Anita Sarkeesian faces backlash for disabling Youtube comments.
In celebration of International Women’s Day, people are taking to the Internet to complain about Anita Sarkeesian. The first installment of her long-awaited video series about sexism in video games was released yesterday, inspiring an inevitable torrent of backlash. Aside from suggestions that she “stole” the Kickstarter funding for the Women vs. Tropes in Video Games series, much of the criticism is because she disabled comments on the YouTube video.
[…]
Leading the charge against Sarkeesian’s decision is Tumblr user amazingatheist, who posted a ten-minute video entitled “Who’s The Damsel Now?“ Arguing that Sarkeesian’s “censorship” of YouTube comments counteracts her message about strong women, and that her TED talk about online harassment amounts to “whining,” amazingatheist says:
“What are you afraid of, Anita? Why can’t people have a discourse about your material? Why can’t people make their opinions towards your content known? I understand that some comments will be abusive in nature — probably most will — but so what?”
Ironically, the existence of this response means by definition that amazingatheist is making his opinion known, as well as participating in a discourse about Sarkeesian’s material. [READ MORE]
The amazingatheist destroyed his own chance at participating in these discussions by being a misogynistic MRA. Just in case, that link needs a trigger/content warning so TW: rape, misogyny, abusive language.
The woman got bombarded with rape and death threats when she talked about the idea of doing this series. And people are up in arms about her not wanting to deal with that during her actual work??
So aside from the misogyny aspect here (and that isn’t to downplay it at all, because holy fucking shit you ASSHOLES,) I would like to point out something that appears to be lost on 95% of the denizens of The Intertubes:
No one is required to let you air your opinion in their space.
This includes the comments section of anything they upload to YouTube.
Seriously, the number of people who think that they are somehow owed the right to comment on things boggles me. You want to bitch about someone’s videos, comment on news articles, disagree with someone’s Facebook post? Go do it in your space. No one owes you shit.
And in particular, no one you are abusive and violent toward owes you shit.
I’m still boggling at this bit: “I understand that some comments will be abusive in nature — probably most will — but so what?”
Abusive in nature…but so what?
That comment says everything, doesn’t it?
After all, who fucking cares about what it’s like to receive death threats, rape threats? About what it’s like to have people barge into your space to pour violent, abusive vitriol all over your work? They are owed that opportunity, apparently. They are owed the opportunity to abuse you, and if you deny them that, you’re “censoring” them.
I would like everyone to think about that for a moment. @amazingatheist thinks it’s OK to threaten & abuse women he disagrees with – he’s done it himself, and he’s certainly never had any problem with anyone else doing it.
Abuse is OK. But protecting yourself from abuse? OH NO, CAN’T HAVE THAT.
What a shitstain.
Fuck “the amazing atheist” and all his fedora-clad MRA homies.
And people wonder why women don’t make it big on the Internet as often as guys do. This is one of those reasons.
A woman will only be successful on the domain of the Internet if her breasts are showing and she values herself with little regard. That way sexist men don’t feel threatened and will be more open to having a brainless fool in the lime light. Twist any word a woman says and get enough fellow sexists to agree and you’ll always win. Always.
And I am so fucking tired of this bullshit. Thinking that someone OWES you something when they have created it is absolute nonsense. In the words of Mark Twain “the world owes you nothing. It was here first”. These people who post videos/etc. also OWE YOU NOTHING. You have chosen to set foot in their domain and now follow their rules. If that means no commenting then it is not your place to criticize their decision. You are a guest in their “house” and you should follow their rules.
Got it?
Good
Well said!
Though if a woman WANTS to act sexy or show her breats on the Internet, that’s up to her, but when it’s the only way to get people to watch (and only watch since I next to garauntee that they don’t LISTEN), then something is fucked up.
Blenderbender1811 on wordpress 