Emphasis on sad. I’ve been a fan of her work for years and years, and quite abruptly she has completely flipped from an ally and supporter of social justice to someone who is more concerned about defending harassers. It’s a terrifying reversal: how can somebody so completely change their perspective, and worse, how can they switch from a white hat to a black hat? Katelyn Burns has a very good summary, it’s especially useful because there are a lot of obscure alt-right YouTubers I’d never heard of before explained and defined.
How did she switch sides? It’s a familiar story to anyone who knows anything about religious cults. She got love-bombed. It was especially effective against someone who has a long history of empathy and willingness to listen to anyone.
In a series of videos, Green revealed that her shift was a result of “red pilling,” the term for a twisted Matrix-inspired recruitment process coined by men’s rights advocates, pick-up artists, and the “alt right.” The process involves a recruiter who attempts to position white supremacists as oppressed truth tellers while spinning phony racial and gender science as “free speech” that’s being trampled on by feminists and the political left.
I also learned something about YouTube.
Lindsay Amer, a queer YouTuber who has experienced response videos firsthand, explains:
“You see these anti-feminist YouTubers who gain hundreds of thousands of followers in under a year. I think there’s a lot of money in anti-feminism. The content is really easy to make and it doesn’t have to be high quality. Someone can just turn on a camera and rant and say something controversial and know that it’s going to get a ton of views. I see people who recut my videos with their bullying commentary added.”
Troublingly, up until recently, such videos were not only supported by YouTube, but incentivized. Because response videos are so easy to make, it was easy for reactionary YouTubers to churn out a lot of content, which YouTube then prioritized in an algorithm that favored prolific output, high view counts, and abundant comments — even if those comments were toxic. Gaming the very closely held secret of the YouTube algorithm became a de facto path to internet stardom, and the format was perfect for response-video creators. Even after changes to their algorithm in December of last year, YouTube has continued to discourage vloggers from preventing harassment — according to Amer, when users disable comments and the sidebar for other suggested videos, their content is less likely to be promoted by the algorithm, and their view counts plummet.
I had no idea. A couple of years ago, I shut down comments to my YouTube channel because I was seeing the opposite of love-bombing — I was constantly getting hate-bombed. The comments became useless because the swarms of anti-feminist trolls would barrel in and rage about feminists and throw in buckets of incoherent abuse no matter what the topic was…and there were multitudes of downvotes that would automatically appear within minutes of an hour-long video. Not only is there a simple-minded formula for gaining avid followers, but those same simple-minded, avid followers become a tool you can use to suppress other critical points of view.
YouTube is broken. It’s still broken. I don’t think Google is incentivized to fix it, either, and it’s become a reactionary breeding ground for assholes who don’t need to provide substantive discussion to become popular — they just need to repetitively echo the same hatreds over and over, reaffirming the prejudices of the lowest common denominator. As Anita Sarkeesian accurately said,
“You make your name on YouTube by making these dumbass videos that just say the same shit over and over again. I hate to give you attention because you’re a garbage human, whatever dude.”
Observation:
Her flip occurred at the same time that LBGTQ+ and feminist content started getting “flagged as sensitive viewing” by YouTube, thus reducing the reach of those videos. Green’s prior audience was primarily American minors, especially minors in the Bible belt, since sex-ed is so heavily censored in those areas. So YouTube effectively knee-capped her content’s ability to reach its intended audience, which would sabotage her old channels.
This is just to add to the bit Amer said:
I suspect it’s a bit of both: 1) “I can’t make money doing sex+” and 2) “but I can make lots of money handing the microphone to frauds like Blaire White.” Then, despite the fact that nearly everyone who has criticized alt-right material focuses on the impact or consequences of their proposed policies, Laci can be all like “oh my gosh, they’re just ordinary human beings!” even though the filthy hippies criticizing said alt-rightists were never demonizing them to begin with. Meanwhile said hippies are told we need to debate someone who thinks we belong in a gas chamber by the likes of Green, who is conveniently profitting off the so-called “debate.”
Repeat ad nauseum. -_-
Some sort of undercover operation? No, that doesn’t make sense. This is disheartening. Like someone decent giving in to the iron-clad grip Republicans have on our government, and deciding to become a full-time asshole con-man.
I’ve seen a number of articles describe this sort of “gaming” Google, and by extension YouTube, for political purposes, a methodology that helped Trump get elected. Similar practices are done to promote businesses. It’s “fomenting,” a term used by Jim Crammer to describe stock manipulation practices.
Keep in mind that the big money behind this alt-right agitprop are stock manipulators, or “hedge fund managers.” Some are even data scientists. The collection of misfits and misanthropes who do the leg work…love-bombing, hate-bombing, etc…have the skill set to quickly deploy multiple Internet identities to create the illusion of “hundreds of thousands of followers in under a year.”
I appreciate this sounds like a conspiracy theory, but the combination of the Internet and big data to manipulate mass audiences is real. If Hitler’s genius was using “mass media” (radio), then this is Hitler on steroids. Google may be an unwitting ally, but they have become really rich from placing advertising with the content and they seem uninterested in exploring how to level the playing field.
She hasn’t “switched sides,” at least not voluntarily. She said she was open to talking with people she disagrees with, and that was apparently enough for her to be excommunicated from the feminist community.
The article linked mentioned that the red-pilling happened after a March 29 debate with White. That timing might be significant – I remember Green saying on her tumblr once that her depression was always the worst in April. She might have been more receptive than usual to the love-bombing in that period, especially if the seeds for it had been sowed earlier with dialogue with some of the folks she’s sidling up to (including her boyfriend).
@#4 Jessie Foster
That’s true, and she has said she hasn’t renounced any her progressive beliefs. Green wasn’t the only one talking about dialogue, either.
@4. If by “open to talking with people she disagrees with” you mean “engage in an intimate relationship with an anti-SJW vlogger”, then sure…
I’m sorry but I’m not convinced. I checked her channel the other day and she seems to be more interested in talking to the other side. I think it is futile but whatever, that’s not flipping sides. I also find it very disgusting that as soon as people do small “slights” they suddenly get shat on, or even as the first disgusting comment here shows, they get accused of “doing it for the money”, specially if they are women. Wow, what a fucking assholish, sexist comment, siobahn, you must be ashamed of yourself. So, no, in the last videos that I saw, she still calls herself a feminist and I also do not see where she says there are “only two genders”, in fact she says the exact opposite, as far as I can remember.
Providing apologism for internet harassment isn’t feminist. Saying white supremacists have a valid point of view isn’t feminist. She’s says she hasn’t switched sides to give her new political positions additional credibility. Basically she’s Christina Hoff Summersing it. And since when were accusations of selling out to conservatism a sexist accusation? Conservatism is hella flush with cash, of couse they buy people.
Right, the liberal feminist humanist intersectionlist left unleashes sexist accusations of “she’s doing it for the money”, “she’s getting the D”, “she’s getting laid” as soon as someone does not pass their purity test. Fuck off. I’m guessing sooner or later she will make more videos explaining her situation, and then we can just her on what she says rather than this nonsense.
I caught Laci’s recent videos, and knew immediately that she would recieve pushback… but I did not expect it to be this inaccurate.
In a series of videos, Green revealed that her shift was a result of “red pilling,” the term for a twisted Matrix-inspired recruitment process coined by men’s rights advocates, pick-up artists, and the “alt right.” The process involves a recruiter who attempts to position white supremacists as oppressed truth tellers while spinning phony racial and gender science as “free speech” that’s being trampled on by feminists and the political left.
In a word, no. Laci was not ‘love bombed’ nor actively recruited; as she explains in her video, she took it upon herself to converse with the people she disagrees with in response to the treatment she saw Tuvel recieve from Hypatia. She explains her thought process here (a little after halfway through); the video was named “TAKING THE RED PILL?” to rebut that claim, which was being made by various MRA toolbags. Recall that slymepitters have been claiming for yours that FTB is collapsing – they crave any vindication or sign that their enemies are faltering, so they magnify Deep Rifts and the like.
No has she not become a black hat, an antifeminist, or any other of that nonsense. Completely flipped from ally to defender of harassment? Wow. Her only change, that I have seen so far (I don’t follow twitter of facebook, so I am going solely by her youtube videos) is that she is stepping back from the shun mentality. But really, watching the video would be better than my summary.
#Jessie Foster, lotharloo
It’s interesting isn’t it that being a little less rapid in shunning people is enough to trigger the shun reflex…
Dammit, just noticed that my comment at #10 screwed up. The paragraph beginning “In a series of videos,” is supposed to be a quote within the first quote. My comment resumes with “In a word, no.”
She’s been completely silent on her Tumblr for some time now, but her Twitter reveals more.
Are Holms, lotharloo, and Jessie Foster regular commenters here? Because it would be really disappointing to see her “both sides/just starting a dialogue/have you thought about these points” bullshit fool legitimate people. I know it’s important for anti-sjw propaganda purposes that it be “feminists” who disseminate some of their points, so it makes sense that rightist trolls would parrot the “she’s still a feminist” propaganda. But has it fooled actual leftists?
@4 Jessie Foster: That sounds like a lot of the alt-right manipulation I’ve seen and have heard others allude to in that they insist they’re just trying to have an honest conversation (see also: JAQing off) and that SJW are these fragile snowflakes that can’t handle even that. I’ve never seen any actual evidence to suggest that SJW communities can’t or won’t talk to people they disagree with; just assertions that this is so. On the contrary, I have seen people who support social justice try to have conversations with people they disagree on Twitter or other media. So I’m finding it difficult to accept your claim.
@7 lotharloo: The article PZ linked to said she shut down a Facebook support group page. If that is true, this is more than just “interest in talking to the other side” because why shut down a support group page if that is all it is? Also, pay attention. Christina Hoff Sommers calls herself a feminist, does she not? Point is “switching sides” does not mean one drops the labels. (It seems Khantron has already raised this point @8.) Often what I have seen is people on the right stress claim that those on the left aren’t actually feminists and imply that they are the “true” feminists.
Also, I find you may be putting words in Siobhan’s mouth somewhat. Never heard of “cognitive dissonance?” One could unknowingly change their views to resolve cognitive dissonance…cognitive dissonance that could be caused in part by the fact that assholes on YouTube make more money than those trying to make a positive difference in the world. There need not be ill intent on Green’s part here and I don’t see Siobhan as saying there was, which seems to be what you were implying.
This part was going to be my original comment: Unfortunately, this makes me think of a woman’s online profile I saw two weeks ago where she was claiming to be a humanist and a feminist, but the profile included a really bizarre “caveat,” as she called it, where she railed against “trigger warnings” and safe spaces and, where it really got weird, was claiming that the left ignores people’s experiences. That seemed such a contradiction to me. The point of trigger warnings would seem to be a recognition that people may have had experiences that are going to cause them to react to content differently than others. The “caveat” also included other standard right-wing claims that the left “celebrates victimhood” (or something like that).
These couple events are not only sad, but a bit concerning. Are these right-wing jerks winning people over with their manipulation tactics?
@Jessie
That claim is badly undermined by the fact that she has been mocking & blocking the numerous intersectional feminists who have offered to correct her butchered strawmen since she began this quote-un-quote “dialogue.”
@Holms
I’ll pre-emptively don my wide-brimmed hat, long coat, and pitchfork just to help along the inevitable cries of “witch-hunting,” but I find it painfully ironic that you think this constitutes a defence of Green.
Exhibit-A: Laci Green responded to Kat Blaque’s criticism of her red pill series by calling her a sociopath.
https://twitter.com/kat_blaque/status/877553557959917568
Exhibit-B: Green’s harassment support group being dismantled because Lindsay Amer expressed reservations at humanizing the people who spent so much energy dehumanizing the people in the support group.
http://marinashutup.tumblr.com/post/161405058238/can-we-just-talk-about-how-lindsay-amer-sent-this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaB1s7GU9WY
Exhibit-C: Excusing and minimizing the harassment campaigns coordinated by Sargon of Akkad
http://geekandmisandry.tumblr.com/post/162231197360/i-just-watched-part-of-a-laci-green-twitter-video
Now we’re once again pretending this is about villainizing a feminist for “having a two-way dialogue.”
It’s not. It’s criticizing a feminist for claiming to have a dialogue whilst simultaneously running out her critics. It’s about upholding the same alt-rightists who have been harassing and gaslighting and unleashing a ceaseless stream of truly unconscionable bullshit on progressives whilst simultaneously blocking and ignoring the same progressives who tried–with eminent civility, even–to express reservations about giving even more platforms to the same YouTubers who already have hundreds of thousands of subscribers while ignoring the more constructive, less popular, contributions to feminist discourse. Soft-balling, excusing, misrepresenting and outright ignoring the criticisms of alt-right work serves to benefit who, exactly?
Next I’ll be accused of being “obsessive” since I have all these links. I do so enjoy these well-poisoning Catch-22s posed by lotharloos and Holmses of the world.
She started using “SJW” unironically (with her own definition, but still) and seems not to like identity politics. If she hasn’t turned into a full bigot yet, it could be a matter of time if she keeps this up.
I am starting to agree with the love bomb suggestion.
Her Twitter posts receive bunch of responses from people praising her for being on both sides and fair. But, when you click on those people’s twitter accounts, they are posting/retweeting hate from known liars and haters.
Laci, as I have been impressed upon via her videos over the years, seems to be a considerate person. These people are using this trait against her.
Yes, she is smart. So am I, yet I fell victim to this behavior before too.
@18 Siobhan:
Thanks for providing links to evidence here. Prior to this, I’d only watched her Youtube videos, and it gave the impression that all she was doing was trying to have civil conversations with anti-SJWs*, but this reveals that there is indeed a much more concerning undercurrent to it all.
*Which I was supportive of, if only to learn how people are led into these positions, and in particular if any of their complaints have validity. Working to address the actually valid complaints they might have is a good way to keep people from falling into the deep end. (eg. MRAs often lure people in by pointing to issues like only men being drafted and divorce courts favouring mothers. If they didn’t have those issues to complain about, they’d have to start with made-up issues, which would be less likely to attract people in the first place.)
I’ve never followed her stuff too closely and I don’t know whether she “flipped” or “switched sides” or anything.
But I am curious what “having a dialogue” with blatantly anti-feminist white supremacists consists of.
And what is an example of fairness and compromise with regards to bigots:
Women should be paid 90 cents to the dollar and black people should only be injured and not killed by cops?
Saad@#22:
But I am curious what “having a dialogue” with blatantly anti-feminist white supremacists consists of.
Listening to them, mostly, while they gish gallop all over you.
Kreator, #19
lotharloo, how’s that for a purity test?
trying to have civil conversations with anti-SJWs
Sounds like an episode from Argument Clinic. Oh, wait, it basically is:
https://freethoughtblogs.com/stderr/2017/06/13/argument-clinic-dirty-deeds/
The idea is not to have a civil conversation at all, but rather to lure someone onto your chosen playing-field, so that they have the advantage of whatever additional control they get over the dialogue – up to, and including, deleting or restricting the entire discussion if it doesn’t result in a “win” (see for example: Mick Nugent’s invitation to managed civil discourse, or a typical creationist debate scenario)
“Listening to them, mostly, while they gish gallop all over you.”
Yes, that, or using the agreement to cover the hate they spread elsewhere.
@Khantron #15:
First up, I haven’t visited the site in months up until a few days ago, so I think infrequency in itself doesn’t and shouldn’t mean trolling or being a shill. Can she be a feminist? Yes. Linda Lovelace had a conflicting life with conflicting accounts, one such account was her being the poster child of the feminist sex wars of the 1970s and ’80s, waged between sex positive and sex negative feminists. The latter group started the issue with wanting to ban lesbian porn as they saw it as exploitation. Even recently when fundamentalist religious politicians wished to pass a bill on mandating Californian adult actors to wear condoms while performing acts, a group of such sex negative feminists were there to campaign for the mandate.
When I was half my age and younger, I belonged to a far right group, with loosely connected common goals and attitudes. There are some who are versed enough in psychology to know people don’t like to feel ashamed, so it’s vital to appear as the good guy, hence the offer of “we just want to talk but nobody listens”. It’s obvious that it’s not debate they want, they look for jaded members. I can’t seem to recall his name right now, but there’s this men’s rights activist scholar who was a former feminist, and nowadays he makes money by “dispelling the myth of the wage gap”. People who don’t achieve stardom in something so they fall back on the opposition because the prodigal son or daughter is a good story.
#Siobhan #18: I might not have a PhD in political science, but please, we shouldn’t use the label alt right. No political or social movement can exist on self identification, but by how academics define said movement. The far right has started a smile offensive to appear as merely antiestablishment and fighting for the little guy, but they’re still bigots. Spencer, who came up with the label is banned from Europe for hate speech, and the irony is that Orban initiated both the ban and the obstruction of their racially charged convention.
@Infophile
Even if we were to accept a limitation to just her videos, I’m not going to pretend it is ethically straightforward to hand one’s microphone to proven frauds and shucksters who already have a massive audience.
Let’s look at an example here:
I agree that it can be valuable to start a dialogue with the caveat that someone must be approaching in good faith (which is why I’m responding to you, because I’m still assuming good faith on your part). But for Green to invite on to her show someone whose response to evidence is to mock the appearance of the person questioning her (Source: http://genderanalysis.net/2017/04/playboys-puff-piece-on-intellectually-dishonest-blaire-white/ ) is to equate rigorous, evidenced argument with vicious ad hominems.
Considering how “the appearance of the arguer” has historically been an anti-feminist ad hominem to discredit women, I’m not sure how giving screen time to soft-ball someone who uses that exact style of ad hominem against her critics suddenly qualifies as feminist work. If we were really to accept the claim that the valid complaints are a good place to start, why wasn’t Green drilling White over her use of a historically misogynist trope to invalidate feminist criticisms? That seems like a perfectly reasonable complaint to me.
Why is it always the valid complaints of the alt-right’s shallow end that must be assuaged? When are any of these fuckers going to put in half the effort to talk about why Blaire White mocking her critic’s teeth is a vile fucking thing to do? We’ll never know, because Green is using her 1.5 million subscribers to instead talk about the superficially valid complaints the red-pill cultists supposedly have, as represented by an intellectually bankrupt fraudster no less.
In that vein, amuse yourselves with a bunch of MRAs rationalizing how feminism’s history of opposing conscription is still misandry: https://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/55zfgr/women_feminists_have_historically_opposed/?st=j4h88zcv&sh=31846fcd
These are not positions one can reason oneself into, and they aren’t positions that one can be reasoned out of. I’m not convinced “more exposure” is even remotely helpful at this point, and extending the olive branch (“they’re actually really nice guyz, look at me hug them!”) to people with abusive histories strikes me as dismissive of the consequences that abuse had.
Opening dialogue with the other side? You mean like Contrapoints? Who debates with the very same assholes Green is getting cozy with on their own channel. Funny how no one is remarking on the “sad story of Contrapoints”. Funny how no one is “excommunicating” Contrapoints from feminism. Here’s the deal: Laci came in saying she wants to have a dialogue, pretending that this is some new revolutionary shit, ignoring the people who did just that, and is now using language and behavior that are anti-SJW red flags. As another poster has said, she is Christina Hoff Summering.
@#6 This post is sexist as fuck. Who she sleeps with is not your business. I agree with Lotharlo that some of the criticism of her borders on the very sexist. Especially on youtube.
@Siobhan
The whole “just in it for the money” is an old sexist trope. Not saying it couldn’t be true because I do believe she is Christina Hoff Sommering, but I dont blame others for seeing it as sexist.
@secondtofirstworld
Fair enough. I am left wondering if there’s a better way to summarize “the overlap between white supremacists and cishetero-patriarchy apologists” though.
@logicalcat Contrapoints got some shit for having lunch with Shoeonhead and Armoured Skeptic. Check the replies on his twitter.
Shiv@#31:
“the overlap between white supremacists and cishetero-patriarchy apologists”
Are you kidding? That’s poetry right there.
Hard to keep up with the neo-jargon. Enigma variations.
@logicalcat
That would seem to contradict your later assertion:
You’re trying to argue that Green has been unfairly “excommunicated”… right after comparing her to Sommers? Christina Hoff Sommers is generally understood by feminists to be an anti-feminist, which tells me you implicitly believe the same of Green:
From https://sinmantyx.wordpress.com/2014/12/07/my-little-takedown-of-christina-hoff-sommers/
So you undermine your own point. That, and I did not even know ContraPoints as a channel existed before now.
Regardless of Green’s motivations for the project, she will profit from it because she is soaking up the viewership from the white supremacist, cishetero-patriarchy apologist channels. It has all the capitalist exploitation parallels of mainstream media outlets who keep publishing yet another “second wave feminist says something awful about trans women!” articles. Nothing new is gained, and while the minority is once again put on the spot to defend our humanity, all the host of the “debate” has to do is squawk something about “free speech” and folks will stop noticing they’re raking in the outrage clicks and counting up their ad dollars. Laci Green’s red pill video? 1.5 million views. Her HIV education video? 130,000.
I don’t have to speculate on her motives for the project to know this is at least one probable consequence. Nor am I the first to notice how trans people’s lives being turned into a kickball is a profitable industry: http://transadvocate.com/predatory-publishers-and-their-dupes_n_15763.htm
It’s a meta-criticism. Green and the media more generally (and yeah, ContraPoints too, now that you’ve pointed them out) are collecting tidy sums while us trans folk have to deal with the blow-back of having our lives “debated.” I can’t imagine why we might be a bit tetchy about yet another person having doing this under the guise of a debate, never mind that said person was someone we trusted and someone who clearly understood the impact of harassment.
But, you know, Pope hats and writs of excommunication make for a much more entertaining narrative I guess. Which is odd, because I’m specifically wearing my witch-hunting hat right now. The least y’all can do is decide which murderous religious institution my exasperation supposedly represents. How am I supposed to know what to shout after I burst through a rice paper panel?
My own reaction to her “new direction” has been discomfort, but some interest in seeing where this goes. I only know her via her youtube videos, and not all of them.
It seems I’m lacking information on the subject, based on the comments here.
@29 Siobhan:
I didn’t see this video. I skimmed through her videos in this series, and didn’t see her handing off her mic to anyone. Was this in a different video of hers?
Anyway, I’m starting to suspect that I was projecting onto her what I might be doing in her place (recon basically, figuring out what leads people into these odious views in the first place). The evidence presented in this thread is showing that that almost certainly isn’t her goal.
One thing I did notice was that the titles and thumbnails of the YouTube videos I did watch of hers seem deliberately misleading compared to the content. For example, the video titled “HOW MANY FREAKIN GENDERS” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8S4hMjFTSI) has a thumbnail with the words “ONLY. TWO.” on it, heavily implying this is her conclusion in the video (her actual conclusion basically boils down to “it depends on what definition of ‘gender’ you use”). I was assuming that she was doing this to try to lure anti-SJWs into a more nuanced discussion, but perhaps I shouldn’t have extended her as much good faith.
Because valid complaints should be addressed regardless of the source. I’m not saying they should be assigned a high priority, especially if the only victims are odious in their own right. And I’m not saying we should necessarily prioritize them. But it might help to avoid creating more enemies in the future.
I think of it like fighting terrorism. You can fight the existing terrorists, ignore, them, contain them, etc. Or you can look at what you’re doing and see if there’s anything you can change to help avoid creating more terrorists in the future. Is your fight against terrorists causing damage to infrastructure and civilian casualties, angering people and turning them into terrorists? Then maybe a good long-term strategy is to change tactics so that fewer terrorists are created. And here, if there is something that feminism is doing or not doing that is driving men into the arms of MRAs, it might be worth considering if it’s worth changing that.
@Infophile
I’m game, if we ever find actual evidence on which to assess this. :/
As I said, that Reddit thread showing feminism’s history of opposition to conscription doesn’t seem to have dented the MRA talking point about conscription being an anti-man feminist conspiracy. I’m sure I could find more with a quick Google. At this point I’d wager it has less to do with the accessibility of the information and more to do with whether they’re interested in finding it to begin with, something the debate genre does nothing to resolve.
Also
@Infophile
“Blaire White & Laci Green: A Conversation”
https://twitter.com/gogreen18/status/845083842599776257
“been watching your vids and appreciate your perspective. sometimes i agree, sometimes i’m confused. wanna chat?”
Again, part of the context here is that Green has invited White to chat well after White’s repeatedly demonstrated abusive behaviour towards other trans people (for example [STRONG CONTENT NOTICE for transphobia]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ac-aipJ1inQ )
@Siobhan ContraPoints is genderqueer, so I think she’d share in the blowback you describe.
@Siobhan
Actually I was pointing out that no, we are not giving Green shit for talking to these people. That she is not being unfairly excommunicated. I used Contrapoints as an example of someone who has taken the time to have a dialogue with some of the worst people on youtube and yet does not get any heat for it from any of us. This is because his opening a dialogue feels more genuine where as Laci’s does not. I’m on your side. I should of made it more clear.
@Jessie Foster
I stay away from twitter, so I’m sorry I didn’t see this. The shit he got I dont believe is on the same level as whats going on with Laci Green, but that may be because his channel is much smaller. I still say, based on everything else I’ve seen, that Laci is giving off to many red flags. Red flags I dont see from other youtube “SJWs” who have also tried to open a dialogue with these people.
@infophile
Yeah. It’s called ‘existing’. It’s called ‘standing up for our humanity’. It’s called ‘wanting to be treated like actual people’. It’s called ‘not being passive when people pour shit onto us’. Basically, we’re challenging their world view, and that makes them uncomfortable, so they run away and become assholes.
Decent people don’t date white supremacists.
And yes, I’m fucking judging her on this.
Also, remember the former Fox News lady whose name has slipped my mind who did the cozy up to Alex Jones interview? That’s exactly what Green is doing, including the snuggle up super happy selfies.
Time to excommunicate ContraPoints.
https://twitter.com/shoe0nhead/status/878337690869026816
https://twitter.com/ContraPoints/status/878328592815407104
Holms @ #10
You really haven’t even done the most basic of research have you. Or maybe you have ..
Laci is now a full on SJW deriding opponent. And your support suggests you are an idiot or suspect or both. I have my eye on you.
@Jessie Foster
I guess I’m the only one who doesn’t see anything wrong with that picture(that is critical of Laci). What Contrapoints doesn’t do however, is parrot anti-SJW catchphrases unironically and exhibiting other red flags. Like how she says our side of the fence bullies people, and she says this while defending actual bullies. I’m still subscribed. I want to see how it goes, but its hard to see the things others here have posted and not be concerned about where Laci is headed.
@38, 39 Siobhan:
Thanks for the link on that. Perhaps I’ll watch that to see what is actually said, if I can steel my stomach well enough.
I’m not aware of anything rigorous enough to constitute evidence, so all I can do is recall anecdotes to have something of a starting point. Basically, the reasons/excuses I’ve heard break down into the following categories:
1) Misinterpreting the loss of privilege as oppression (eg. seeing affirmative action programs as favoring women rather than trying to equalize the playing field)
2) Misattributing the blame for other issues onto feminism/feminist gains (eg. False accusations of groping in subways in Japan leading to almost certain conviction, but this is an issue with the guilty-until-proven-innocent criminal justice system in Japan, arising due to the difficulty of making accurate determinations of who a groper is in a confined space)
3) Cases where society’s sexist expectations favor women (eg. custody hearings)
4) Frustration with all-or-nothing feminists (ie. feeling that even small improvements aren’t good enough, as they’ll always find something else about you to criticize)
Categories 1 and 2 don’t really have much that can be done about them, aside from more education perhaps helping a little. Fixing category 3 is more in line with the goals of feminism, from the perspective of reducing sexist expectations of all sorts.
As for category 4, there’s already a lot going on with trying to fix this – replacing “call out culture” with “call in culture,” for instance, but I think more probably needs to be done. This is even one of the reasons Green gave for her “taking the red pill.” Of course, it’s hard to simultaneously get across that a lot of things are (or should be) unacceptable while also accepting people that do these things due to the fact that they’re still in the process of unloading all the baggage they were brought up with. Just writing it out like that seems like a contradiction, so I get why it’s hard.
Is any of this actually what drove Green off, or was something else going on? Damned if I know.
I have no idea who contrapoints is or why I should care. I’m not talking about them. I’m talking about Green
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2017/06/26/which-speech-do-you-choose-to-defend-and-which-do-you-choose-to-shut-down/
There’s nothing wrong with taking a selfie with someone you have some disagreements with. It doesn’t make you a bad person.
Would PZ take a selfie with Hitchens were he alive. I would say yes he would*. Still doesn’t mean PZ would support his positions completely.
*Correct me if I’m wrong PZ.
@50 Jessie Foster
Okay we’ll just ignore the rest of the behaviour I’ve linked to and pretend this is about selfies.
Got it.
@Siobhan
I wasn’t responding to you.
@Jessie Foster
Green’s recent history changes the context of her selfie, so you should be.
@9
That’s not the problem with her dating him. Dating a known harasser shows that you are at least ok with harassment. Full stop.
Somewhere in my files, I have a photo taken with Hitchens! No problem taking it, I liked the guy in a lot of ways, but it doesn’t mean I think he was without error.
Carl Benjamin, on the other hand, I wouldn’t want to be associated with at all.
What about Ray Comfort?
What Laci Green is doing is a necessary thing in an important sense, in a social conflict we want to have positive and negative approaches. That does not mean that there are not wrong ways of approaching “the enemy” in a positive sense. How do you relate to those doing the negative approach?
The people of atrocious behavior and belief will bring up how they have been criticized and they will present it as persecution. Laci was persecuted. It’s hard for me to judge this because Laci experienced something that I’ll never be able to completely understand with my life experience.
I see Laci as trying on a new “social suit” as result of the situation. It’s understandable to me because I am in the middle of constructing my own and they have had some very stark perspective shifts. I hope that Laci has friends talking them that can offer them some other perspectives. I act the way I do because I am naturally good at the negative approach. I also don’t judge the approach of people I want to support in a social conflict. As a cis white male on the socially aggressive side of things I can’t tell a lot of people how they should interact with bigots driven by irrational intensity. I have the luxury of feeling that in-group positivity that makes a positive approach something that tends to come to mind more readily.
This one is new to me in a lot of ways and I need to think about it, Criticism of someone in the same group as the person I want to help has some complexity. But I am enjoying the opportunity to read what people think about it and feel about it.
Having dialogue with virulent misogynists and racists means you think one of two things:
1) They’re right about some things and “SJWs” are wrong about those things so there’s need for a compromise
2) They are simply misguided innocent souls that need to be shown the light
Which one is she doing?
I’m happy to hear if there are other reasons one would open dialogues with contemptible shits like Sargon.
Giliell, #43
Yup. This is not judging someone for their sex life. Dating isn’t simply sex. It means they get along with bigotry. It’s one step beyond the “reach across the aisle” horseshit.
@Siobhan
I think that’s wrong. But it also wasn’t just a response to criticism of a video series. Kat attacked her personally by saying her previous work was irrelevant and useless and that she was being motivated entirely by money. And this all comes in the context of Laci losing friends and dealing with misogynistic abuse and harassment from some people who disagree with her.
But again, I agree that dismissing someone as a sociopath is completely unproductive and probably hypocritical given her stated goals.
In reference to the first link, Laci said on her askfm that she responded to Lindsay like that because they’d already had a lot of previous discussions in other threads, but I can’t verify if this is true.
I pretty much agree with Marina’s video.
I don’t think she did that. She made clear that Sargon was responsible for the bulk of harassment she had received, and that forgiving him was something she was doing just for herself and her own mental health.
@Saad
3) Ignoring ideas you don’t like doesn’t make them go away, so it’s important to actively and directly confront them.
I think Jessie Foster is a liar that’s here in bad faith. They frequently misrepresent the arguments of people here and comment #61 is a detestable lie that leftists don’t confront the ideas of deplorables and harrassers. We don’t need to give them a platform to liars to spread further lies.
Khantron (#62)
Yeah, I’m sick of this lie that to confront and contend with ideas we have to actively engage with the people espousing them, no matter how toxic or abusive they are or how often they act in bad faith. The same bullshit was brought up to justify Megyn Kelly’s interview with Alex Jones, as if someone trying to “expose” him just had to face off with him in person. It’s BS, and any commenter here should know better.
@Khantron
Doubt it.
@A. Noyd
Not what I said. Also, you might be a bit too confident in your beliefs if you think “lie” is a good descriptor for viewpoints that differ from your completely subjective judgement on the importance of debate.
Richard Dawkins sez… YES.
Foster is a liar.
The selfie thing was the culmination of a list of problematic things Green had done. Foster made it seem like selfies in the absence of the rest were the problem thus misrepresenting the argument.
Foster is a liar.
@Khantron
ok
Eh, I agree with the ultimate conclusion, but I think [Insert Jessie Foster’s preferred pronoun, which Jessie Foster could not be arsed to disclose when snapping at me for assuming ‘he’ based on previous interactions, here] is more of a “cloudcuckoolander“: [Insert Jessie Foster’s preferred pronoun, which Jessie Foster could not be arsed to disclose when snapping at me for assuming ‘he’ based on previous interactions, here] has internalized some truly bizarre assumptions about how the world and people work, and doesn’t even seem to have enough awareness that they are, in fact, assumptions, to even be defensive about them. [Insert Jessie Foster’s preferred pronoun, which Jessie Foster could not be arsed to disclose when snapping at me for assuming ‘he’ based on previous interactions, here] is still constitutionally incapable of engaging in what others would normally consider “good faith,” but [Insert Jessie Foster’s preferred pronoun, which Jessie Foster could not be arsed to disclose when snapping at me for assuming ‘he’ based on previous interactions, here] is technically correct that it’s not quite a “lie.”
@Azkyroth, B*Cos[F(u)]==Y
I think you’ve mistook me for someone else. I’ve never snapped at anyone for using an incorrect pronoun. Call me he, she, they, zir, your imperial majesty, whatever. Doesn’t matter to me.
Azkyroth may be thinking of Jessie Harban.
I take falsely representing an issue while technically not lying for 500, Alex.
First of all, the issue with Sargon and his minions isn’t “having some disagreement with”. It’s somebody who leads harassment campaigns against feminist, like Green herself. He is currently leading one against Anita Sarkeesian. Cozying up to him and acting like it’s just some personal disagreement and can’t we just get along and look at what a nice fellow he is to me in person* is minimising the harm he’s doing.
Second, yes, doing that and thereby throwing people who are getting rape and death threats under the bus makes you a bad person. As others have said, it’s not the selfie, it’s the context. It legitimises Sargon and his position.
*Aren’t they always, especially when you’re damn useful for their game.
None of which makes you a sociopath. You also cannot have your cake and eat it. Either those personal attacks are wrong or they’re not. You’re excusing Green by blaming Kat.
Ever thought about how those friends must be feeling? What I’ve seen are massive waves of sadness and disappointment by people who liked Green and considered her a friend. There’s a massive feeling of betrayal on their side, especially on the side of trans women.
Therefore it’S totally reasonable to side with misogynists and harassers.
BTW, there’s something the antis get right in principle (though never in detail): not all criticism a woman receives is misogynistic. And even if money wasn’t her primary motivation it still won’t hurt her financially.
Also, please show evidence for the harassment as in targeted, personal, massive.
Show me where the people who disagree with her are making rape threats and jokes.
She’S siding with those who do that to her critics, so cry me a fucking river.
And she’s completely innocent in this, right? She’s not an agent, only a poor victim (especially of the trans feminist cabal. Please note the transphobic undercurrent of positioning a cis woman opposite trans women, declaring the latter side to be the real misogynists. Nothing to see here, just move on)
BTW
“Oh baby I’m sorry I hurt you, I won’t do it again” is probably the oldest page in the abusers handbook, along with the gospel of forgiveness. We all know where that ends. But since this isn’t an intimate or even really personal relationship, the thing will play out differently: Sargon and his minions will probably lay off of her while they are continuing to hurt others. They and Green will point to her forgiveness and thus reinforce the idea that it’s really the victim’s fault and responsibility, that they have the power to stop the abuse if they just behave themselves.
YouTube comments are cancer. I’ve never seen these Left or Feminists people commenting on youtube, yet somehow these mythical people are out there stopping free speech, chasing the rule of law and trying to turn everyone gay (or something? – ‘muh gender!). All I EVER do see is people raging out about the left and SJWs, again and again and again. On reddit, 4ch, TV news, newspapers, youtube, Facebook etc.
I see more people spending time defending the Alt-Rights right to talk than I’ve ever seen people defending the Lefts right to speak. Same goes for Dawkins and Harris. Apparently Milo, Spencer and the rest should be allowed to spread their toxic speech, but some college kids protesting them speaking at their own college is the “regressive left”.
It seems to me, honestly, it’s more old white men being afraid of change. It’s OK for Darwkins, Borris and the rest to champion the destruction of other cultures and religions. But as soon as it comes to ripping apart their culture (history of sexism, racism and bigotry), they suddenly switch sides.
I asked on Reddit once, to point me to where these “SJW” and “Regressive Lefts” are, and all I got back was a link to a 5 year old blog post by a retired blogger and a link to a closed down website about Atheist+. So these evil people are just some bloggers (what happened to free speech!). Thats it. No KKK group, no Alt-Right, dedicated Reddit groups, 4chan, militant groups, Proud Boys, Neo Nazis, nothing equivalent at all. Thats the _ONLY_ reason BLM get brought up, is because they WANT a group they can point to and blame. Since that didn’t work out, they’ve just gone back to attacking this mythical SJW and Regressive left group. It’s all a con, to fire up hate, receive patreon money and to get votes. It’s nothing more that what the Nazis did (blame the gays and Jews). And its disgusting people like Harris and Shermer and media corporations are feeding it and defending it. History will not look kindly on this period of time or its “champions”.
….wait, they’re different?
…oops.
My apologies. I retract that entire comment. x.x
…and potentially one or more others. :/
So I’m sure the contents of Sargon’s YouTube videos and Twitter page will be changing drastically going forth, right? And I’m sure he’ll be blocking almost the entirety of his usual fans and commenters.
No?
Weird. I thought dialogue.
His channel description on YouTube:
Haha.
He’s like a parody of the white atheist dudebro.
@Azkyroth, 75
Genuinely no offense meant for Jessie Foster: I consider myself in most instances a careful reader, but I’ve made the same mistake, in my head, many times across several recent posts. Confluence of context and content, I reckon.
@Saad
A third reason for communicating with these people is converting on the fencers. I remember back then before the deep rifts of youtube atheism, where the atheist would debate the otherside. Many have said that these conversations are the reason why they switched positions. When they compared the content and how they behave. Its easy to pretend that you are a rational and intelligent in a youtube vlog speaking alone in the camera. The facade comes un done when they have to speak to someone who is actually intelligent.
To be clear i dont think you can do this with sargon. He is so off the rails and idiotic that anyone watchingbhis channel is too deep to be saved easily, but not impossible.
But you know what. Maybe that was a different time.
Also some of these anti-sjw never actually have heard our arguments. They are in a bubble. My best friend is one of those ” listens to bith sides” moderates, except when i speak with him he tells me he has never any if the arguemnts using. Even thi to me they are run if the mill.
@Giliell
Not true.
https://twitter.com/gogreen18/status/879770825435394048
(This is from 3 days after she personally forgave Sargon)
Oh, right, it’s even worse, she’s blaming the target of harassment for being harassed.
@Giliell
You understand that by insulting Sargon while operating as a panelist, Anita violated the policy of the venue, right? And that’s not my personal opinion, that’s according to a statement put out by one of the organizers of the event.
Laci is taking the same position as the organizer: Anita violated the code of conduct, but there’s also a broader context. That certainly isn’t “blaming the target of harassment for being harassed,” and to think it is either reveals an ignorance of the situation or an overwhelming bias that is preventing you from properly evaluating the facts.
@Jessie
Now you’ve stepped into my domain.
What insults? Be very specific. If it’s insulting to name ones harasser that arrests the momentum of serious social change I care about.
@Brony
Shithead, dumbass videos, garbage human being
@Jessie
She said those things while giving the talk?
And you can show me where in the rules you are talking about this?
Personally I think those are fine things to call ones harasser. The thought of calling Sargon a dumbass, garbage human being makes me smile.
Oops! I forgot asshole. I would not want to leave that out.
I mean shithead. I’ll post when my attention is not divided. My apologies. I think the distinction is meaningless in any event.
@Brony
Yes
Statement from Hank Green and VidCon:
https://medium.com/@VidCon/vidcon-debrief-e6bb4e187a28
Oh, look, Jessie Foster, top class harassment apologist.
Hank Green is wrong, but even he acknowledged that they failed to apply proper scrutiny and act when a group of people who have targeted a woman for years came to her panel in force.
They were not some innocent audience maligned by the powerful panelist.
@Jessie
I can accept Hank Green’s word provisionally. Sarkeesian broke the rules, and I’m happy to see Green is taking the wider context into account. So go ahead, take you little cookie and have your little party. You are functionally helping harassers and abusers by shoving the social emphasis towards hyper-focus on the behavior of the victim and leading us in the same tired, thoroughly unacceptable social dance.
Get the fuck over yourself. White, cis, male, Christian and other groups used to being in the socially dominant position need to learn to be able to deal with insult and content in parallel. Partly because the same dance you are leading us on is used to oppose application of [insulting characterizations] (racism, sexism, bigotry, rapist…), partly because a victim of harassment should be able to insultimate thier harasser at a fucking panal on harassment. I’m fully in support of changing that rule because letting the victim be authentic in attitude towards harasser makes the situation clearer and more legitimate. A fucking panel addressing a social problem should give the sufferer of the problem advantage validation, the cause of the problem disadvantage and rational limitation, if it wishes to pretend to want to actually solve anything. Green at least seems to have some instinct there.
I don’t give a shit. On average we white, male, cis (and similarly socially positioned) need a thicker skin and the dominant group tends to try to control what is considered insulting and implicit bias gives them advantage in directing attention towards the victims. I’m more interested in looking at the abuser to see what predatory behavior prompted the passion. Sure, in a general sense your sensitivity to insult matters because society gets unbalanced there as well. But that is not the case here. You are being useless to all but the social predators here.
I’m still pointing out that you did not link the rules directly or a transcript, though the latter nay nor be available yet.
https://feministfrequency.com/2017/06/26/on-vidcon-harassment-garbage-humans/
I don’t know if I buy Anita’s narrative that the goal of Sargon and his friends was to harass and intimate her.
The person she is talking about is Bunty King. Here he is, hearing out Franchesca Ramsey (a feminist Anita mentions later in the article as being a target of harassment and intimidation from Sargon’s group):
https://twitter.com/chescaleigh/status/878747242500300801
This is the guy who was sitting next to Sargon during Anita’s panel:
https://twitter.com/Andywarski/status/878771659284426754
And here is Sargon’s immediate response to Anita insulting him @14:14:
https://twitter.com/NikkioftheNorth/status/880783302814302210
I can understand why Anita would react the way she did. Sargon has criticized and mocked her in dozens of videos. But her claim that the group was there solely to harass and intimidate seems to be contradicted by the evidence.
Anita may be too quick in assuming the worst about people, as she did with Boogie2988:
I’m not sure why people think she’s “completely flipped”…but one of my guesses was “black and white thinking”.
@Jessie Foster
It might be a complex situation where the people like Sargon aren’t fully self aware or situation aware. Who knows. But it strains credulity to think it’s totally innocent or kind for them to sit right there in the front row. That’s not about hearing her, that’s about being seen and heard by her, interaction. It’s obviously so that he can interact with her without her being able to stop him, even though he knows she wouldn’t consent to interacting.
@Brian
But they were listening quietly up until the point Anita called out Sargon. You can watch video of the full panel.
B*tches be lying, eh?
So 20 dudes who spend a lot time harassing her and making money of it (looked at Sargon’s Twitter page?) take up the front rows of the panel, watching every move she makes but of course she’s in the wrong thinking that people who have been targeting her for years are up to no good. Clearly that’s something every person of good faith would d to start a respectful dialogue, right?
@Giliell
Did you stop reading my comment after the first sentence? I gave you examples of good faith engagement by the people who Anita believes were there solely to harass and intimidate. Scroll back up to #93.
And yeah, sitting quietly and listening to someone is usually the first step in starting a respectful dialogue.
A useful concept, “de facto”. It’s legal if that matters.
Basically no matter what the intentions the result in reality is X. So we have two examples of one person receiving a large amount of negative and violent attention. They are not the same. The “criticism” that people like Anita receive comes from a very different source. She receives a base cultural reaction from a large group of people that resort to personal language, often violent and gendered personal language.
It’s not just Sargon. If not Sargon than some other people trying to apply social pressure about people they want to control. It’s not just Anita, it’s Brianna, it’s Chanty, it’s Hillary.
So the second person is Sargon. He got socially criticized by the first person so that is a defining characteristic. Because he triggered a focus of movement towards Anita means he’s an example of the kind of person who is going to have to be criticized of one wants to shift a society in a more moral direction. Sexed and gendered social abuse requires a response towards such abusers at multiple social levels.
It’s why we focus on Trumps awful personal habits of mind and behavior. He’s the top example. There are others below.
If they genuinely wanted to just hear her out, and this was a talk that was being videoed, why not watch the video later? They must have known that turning up, in a group, after harassing her for literally years, would be perceived as threatening. Criticising Anita for not giving them the benefit of the doubt is fucking bullshit.
@jefrir
As far as I know, there was no “official” recording of the panel. All the videos come from random people who were there, so there was no prior guarantee that anyone would be able to see the talk online. And the point of Vidcon is to see Youtube creators in person. Watching the video later removes any chance for dialogue after the panel. Maybe they should’ve sat a few rows back, but I’m not sure how much of a difference that would’ve made. It wasn’t a massive crowd watching the panel so Anita probably would’ve noticed Sargon either way.
They still, at a minimum, put their interest in attending the panel above her right to feel safe. That is not how you start a respectful dialogue.
Not that I believe for a second that Sargon has any interest in dialogue – his history is very much against him there.
@jefrir
The same thing happened with Franchesca. Sargon and his friends attended one of her speaking engagements. She noticed them and called them out (in a less aggressive way than Anita did). Afterwards a few of them connected with her on twitter and they met in person and they apparently had a very productive conversation.
https://twitter.com/chescaleigh/status/878747242500300801
“Why don’t we just talk?” was Sargon’s immediate response to Anita calling him a garbage human being.
@96, Jessie Foster
He was seen, just like he wanted, obviously. And when he was seen, his first reaction was the one thing boiling on his mind, what he’s really after (not hearing her):
S: “Why don’t we just talk?”
A: “Whatever dude!”
S: “Exactly. You never want to talk”.
Just like I said, “so that he can interact with her without her being able to stop him, even though he knows she wouldn’t consent to interacting.”. His reaction is to say “exactly! gotcha! you never want to talk (to ME)”, rather than “eh, this person does not want to speak to me in particular, I’ll respect that”. Pretty obvious.
Also, good point from Miri:
And she distinguishes this from apologizing after merely “fucking up” a bit.
It takes far more than an amateur getting an apology out of an abuser to fix an abuser. Even professionals rarely, if ever, can fix abusers.
https://www.ecok.edu/sites/default/files/siteContent/administration/centers-programs/brandon-whitten-institute/Why%20Does%20He%20Do%20That.pdf
Woops, that last link wasn’t the one I was looking for (though maybe it’s still relevant). Here’s the one:
http://unityandstruggle.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Lundy_Why-does-he-do-that.pdf
@Brian Pansky
But Anita was the one who initiated the interaction. Sargon was just sitting quietly, and she called him out directly. And if Sargon had attempted to interact with her by interrupting her while she was giving her talk, she could’ve just had security escort him out, so I’m not sure what you mean by “her not be able to stop him.”
@Jessie
This is not going any better for you.
In #103 you basically want the victim to make up with their abuser. That is disgusting. It’s mostly featured in as a part of religion but that sort of dominance behavior is not exclusive to them. Anita can talk to Sargon when she is satisfied the he has apologized for what he did.
All this looking at the victim and not the predator. It’s socially cowardly.
@Jessie
In #107 you are neglecting the wave of misogynistic abuse that she received as a result of Sargon’s actions.
Initiation? So myopic of you.
That’s it!
That’s the big problem with Jessie Foster’s argument.
JF is acting like this is the first time Anita and Sargon have had any interaction.
@103, Jessie Foster
I’m not familiar with that incident, but perhaps rewording it to: “that’s not how you respectfully start a respectful dialogue” would be a more correct complaint.
“Happy endings” are logically compatible with disrespectful beginnings. And no one is entitled to dialogue after disrespectful beginnings.
@107, Jessie Foster
Maybe what I said wasn’t completely accurate. Maybe. I could pick at a lot there, but I’ll try to get at what I think is the root here.
You’re really hung up on the verbal incident. It doesn’t completely matter. It could have never happened, so let’s look at the situation up until that point in time, before it even happened.
He knew that she didn’t want to do certain things (quote: “you never want to talk”). There’s about a dozen ways that he must have been aware (probably gleefully aware, tell me I’m wrong) that sitting front row there is not something she wants to see. That’s why he sat there.
I think that’s what I’m trying to get at, and so that’s why your response “But Anita was the one who initiated the interaction” isn’t really working for me.
Is that basic enough that we can agree on it?
test
.
sorry internet issues
.
preview works
Brony
No, it’s just that in Jessie Foster’s world (and Laci Green’s nowadays) Anita is the perpetrator and Sargon the victim. Because 5 minutes of behaving himself obviously mean that now she is supposed to act as if nothing ever happened and as if his Twitter page wasn’t still displaying a crude caricature of her.
Jesus wept, what a disgusting, disingenuous shit you are! He and his cronies, after a long history of vilification and harassment, occupy the entire front rows at Sarkeesian’s talk. That’s further harrassment right there.
Jessie Foster,
Why would we be interested in conversation with anti-feminist, anti-human, right-wing, delusional chuckleheads? What of value could they possibly bring to the table. The Germans have an adjective to describe such. It’s my new favorite profanity–arschgeburt.
@KG I think your comment is harassment.
@a_ray Why would you ask me a question if you’re not interested in conversation?
@Giliell I think Anita was somewhat justified in her actions. I also think she was wrong about the intent of Sargon and his friends.
@Jessie Foster:
Sure. But this wasn’t Sargon’s first step, was it? There were interactions with Sarkeesian long before this talk. If this was an actual first step, okay.
BUT THIS WASN’T THE FIRST STEP.
The first step for Sargon was to disingenuously critique her. Then Sargon engaged in snide mocking while denying that Sarkeesian had made useful points with which it might be worthwhile to engage. Then Sargon encouraged harassment by others. Then Sargon repeated his actions so frequently and for so long that even if he hadn’t gotten anyone else involved, his own actions, by themselves, constituted both abuse and harassment long before the day of the talk in question.
You can talk all you want about first steps. That doesn’t apply when we’re ten thousand steps in. At this point, there is readily apparent, high-quality, overwhelming-in-quantity evidence of bad faith, abuse and harassment committed by Sargon and targeting Sarkeesian.
If, at this point, Sargon actually wanted dialog, he’s taken ten thousand steps away from any reasonable point of engagement, and merely sitting isn’t moving him any closer to that point of reasonable engagement. He has to take ten thousand steps in the opposite direction from that in which he’s been headed in the last few years to arrive at any point where a bi-lateral discussion is reasonable or likely.
If I shoot you in the head, then show up at your hospital bedside so I can hear your perspetives on traumatic brain injury, I’m not taking the first step in starting a respectful dialog. I’m continuing a pattern of threat and intimidation that has already caused actual harm.
Fuck your bullshit pretend-ignorance, Jessie Foster.
1. Intent isn’t fucking magic.
2. And you know that because you’re really good in leglimancy?
3. How many times do you have to get hit before you automatically raise your hands in protection whenever the person doing the hitting is approaching you? In short, why should Sargon et al. get any kind of benefit of the doubt when they have a long history of being abusive bastards as has been demonstrated.
You’re supporting abusers and abuse while blaming the victims of it. I sincerely hope you’ll never get into the situation where you’re the victim and then have to deal with people like yourself.
Oh, look, being totally not trolling and very respectful.
@Crip. I dont think Sargon has encouraged the harassment of Anita. If you have a video where he does, I’ll happily change my mind. People who learned about Anita through his channel certainly have harassed her, but unless he’s encouraging them to do so, I don’t think he’s responsible for their actions. And, like I’ve already said, I understand why Anita responded the way she did.
@Giliell How many times do I have to repeat myself? Anita was somewhat justified (I use somewhat because she violated the rules of the venue). Sargon mocked her, she insulted him. That’s fair. As for intent, that can be inferred through actions. Scroll up to #93.
Jessie Foster, please show me with evidence where you should have shut the fuck up…… Long past that point.
The inability to acknowledge you should have shut the fuck up is a sign of wisdom.
Do you have any wisdom?
@Nerd You’re the only person on this site who I won’t argue with. That’s partly because you never contribute anything interesting or challenging, but more so because you’re almost always incoherent.
@Jessie
What are you afraid of?
Probably of being irrelevant.
Jessie Foster
Who are you, really?
I intend to ask PZ, but, would you care to ‘fess up, first?
@Jessie
Someone willing to put in this much text is personally invested. If you are going to do the last word thing I get to do the probing questions thing. What are you afraid of?
I’m afraid of being found out and grizzly bears.
Jessie Foster
what are you afraid of?
Public speaking, death, spiders.
Jessie Foster
Why does the link in your nym like to this?
…..
404. That’s an error.
The requested URL was not found on this server. That’s all we know.
…..
like=link
Idk
chigau — it’s obviously a fake link. Jessie Foster/Harban is nothing more than a troll.
Brian Pansky
Thank you for those links, I have some bedtime reading to do!
oh no I’ve been discovered what will I do
Jessie Foster #134
No. You have access to your Profile. You can fix it.
Jessie Foster #137
You could get banned.
Jessie Foster
Oh FFS. He has actively harassed her himself. That ship has long sailed. Also, did you look at the link I posted? Where he tweets at Franchesa Ramsey? She has made it clear in the past that she doesn’t want anything to do with him, still he tweets at her, knowing full well what his followers will do, i.e. descend on her mentions in droves. He doesn’t have to literally say “folks all go to her account and keep tweeting at her”. You’re either very stupid or very dishonest if you claim that there is no connection between him asking a dishonest question (it’s not as if Google closed shop or that there aren’t prominent black men who tweet about blackness. People don’t exist to be your personal educator) and the reaction of his fans towards her.*
*Mafia movies with Jessie Foster
Bad guy who has burned down 10 restaurants and killed 5 children to restaurant owner: Ahhh, such a nice restaurant. And are these your children? What beautiful children!
Restaurant owner pays bad guy money.
Jessie Foster: Why is the cop harassing the poor guy? The restaurant owner gave him that money without any force, it was a gift! He was just making polite small talk!
Ding Ding Ding Ding!
Past actions: harassment. What’s the most reasonable conclusion?
@Chigau idc
@Jessie
So no fear of losing something good or gaining something bad motivating you?
You come here supporting the sexist and misogynistic status quo, applying social pressure to a victim to once again make up with their abuser and you are not even willing to get into what you fear? No fucking way am I cooperating with a social momentum designed to keep women in a second place. Especially not with someone unwilling to get into why I should care.
No clue what you’re talking about bud
@Jessie
I could start picking out the non-literalisms like “excommunication” that replace actual descriptions of what you are feeling about. That’s avoidant behavior since it replaces a usable description of what is happening with rhetoric.
So far it seems like you fear people who want to call out their abusers or anyone that chooses to publically critisize someone acting abusively. You seem to fear people being legitimate about the intensity of their feelings. While that is rhetorical itself, in the face your obstinate need to do the last word thing (social dominance peck-peck-peck-peck-…)
I want to know what simplest human behavior being role-modeled you don’t want to see continued. I want to know what it is you fear losing if something about the dynamic continues and becomes more widespread. No one does what you are doing for no reason.
It is what it is Jessie.
There is a social momentum here. A flow to the interactions in the comments here that is biased by the shared worldviews and sociopolitics of the bloggers and commentators. We care about long term change in social behavior here. I’m looking at it in simple raw terms, how do you get rid of sexed and gendered abuse? Billions of people. But with a structured way of communicating. There is a vibe here and I won’t pretend that changing an actual culture requires focused changes in behavior to end things like sexsim, racism, homophobia and the general category of bigot they are contained within.
I’m not going to pretend that anyone can actually usefully talk about how to fix the culture in here with you applying the pressure that you to do the overall nature of the information that people encounter when skimming down the page. De facto, you are shitting up the social message that deal with sexed and gendered abuse. You are functionally providing social benefits to awful people at best.
Sargon triggered a flood of sicking human garbage. He said things about other people that I find truly sickening. He is a misogynist, racist, and other kinds of bigot. I don’t care what he felt about it. It happened. There is a sickness in the culture and at best he is an implicit, unconscious bigot suddenly confused about how the word conservative suddenly got focused on him.
If you want the last word I will make you work for it. I will go back through the comments of other people responding to you and I will look for every little think you did not respond to and I will go trail hunting things you may be especially sensitive to or unable to functionally deal with. Then I’m going to start pressing harder and harder.
Then I slowly start leaking the insults in, but I do it rationally so there’s not one thing you can do about it but sputter. I use words like ignorant, bigot, callous, enabler of rapists and misogynists. These are those de facto things that are no matter what you feel about it. I start with the insulting characterizations. I start using shit, garbage and I point it at your arguments, beliefs, way of thinking, actions. If you bear any resemblance to the alt-right at this point you will act like I insulted you as a whole person and refuse to functionally interact with the characteristics.
I build up to a really good call out more and more as a matter of habit nowadays, I’m legitimately experimenting with what I do. You may protest to the contrary, but I don’t believer you are a person who cares about fixing sexed and gendered abuse, and you have a personality that keeps it going. It is what it is. I hope you figure it out because like many others I think you do want to improve things in your own way, but in too many things you don’t really know how beyond the peck-peck-peck-peck-
I meant “There is a vibe here and I won’t pretend that changing an actual culture does not require focused changes in behavior to end things like sexsim, racism, homophobia and the general category of bigot they are contained within.”
Intensity and typos can make for interesting errors. I did not edit. I gotta watch the impulsivity. My apologies.
She simply stated she was open to talking to the “others”. The community that supported her quickly turned to wanting to lynch her. How can you claim to be for inclusiveness or diversity when you attack her for basically “thinking wrong” as far as you’re concerned. When you claim to love diversity in identity – minorities, gays, etc but are unwilling to tolerate any diversity in opinion there is some serious double think happening. This is the snake eating it’s own tail. Rather than supporting her during a very difficult time, she’s attacked, even by close friends. How different is it from religious fundamentalists who love you until you question the dogma or reveal you’re gay and you are excommunicated (or even killed in some religions). When you embrace the idea of “thought crimes”. It’s only a matter of time before your allies become your enemies when you say or do the wrong thing.
Incidentally, she claims to be happier than she’s ever been. Recently she said all this controversy felt like the pain and drama of leaving Mormonism all over again. That’s telling… They’ve treated her like she left their cult.