Feminist Video Game Critic Driven Out Of Her Home By Death Threats From Gamers

[LanternWaste]

After releasing her newest web series Feminist Frequency’s “Tropes vs. Women,” which focuses on how women are depicted in pop culture and video games, Sarkeesian has suffered an onslaught of online harassment. Immediately following the series’ latest installment, “Women as Background Decoration (Part 2),” that harassment escalated, causing her to call law enforcement and flee her home.

She later posted responses from one particular user who claims to know her parents’ names, where they live and where she lives. He threatened to “rape [Sarkeesian] to death.”

Twitter has been heavily criticized for not taking online threats seriously. In 2013, the microblogging site changed its policy so that blocked users could still follow and see posts from the users that blocked them. The policy was quickly reversed after a flood of complaints said the change made victims of harassment feel trapped and less safe. Moreover, critics said the move was a direct product from Twitter’s white male-dominated environment.

Despite those figures and growing criticism from the gaming community, female lead characters are rare. When women do appear in video games, they’re frequently over-sexualized, and being beaten, kicked, stomped on, or shot. Sarkeesian homed in on the issue in the video that sparked her harassment, criticizing game creators over reliance on domestic violence and the sexualization of female tropes — even in death — simply for shock value without actually critiquing the scenarios or circumstances surrounding the gender-targeted violence.



http://thinkprogress.org/culture/2014/08/28/3476787/feminist-video-game-critic-death-threats/



The events of the last paragraph are eerily and accurately portrayed in a thread by RedQueen which is still on page one of GD; as are the half-witted and trivializing rationalizations being made that "it's just a cartoon." Yet I wonder, if it was "just a cartoon" or if it is "just a video game", why the death threats against Sarkeesian, or the aggressive (yet empty) defenses targeting RQ's premise...?

[NuclearDem]

1. I can't even bring myself to call these POS basement dwelling misogynists gamers.

They make the rest of us look like complete assholes.

[ismnotwasm]

2. And I know you guys aren't

Creepy fuckers.

[el_bryanto]

3. That's fucked up - what would drive somebody to act that way.

At a certain point it's just flat out hatred of woman. Even if you disagree with someone to threaten them and their family - - - i have no words.

Bryant

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

4. On a whim, I took the wayback machine to a year ago.

When someone posted a thread about Ms. Sarkeesian's "Tropes Vs. Women" video in General Discussion. I looked that thread up and re-read it.

Between the few that were screaming that she "made everything up" or "didn't buy any video games" there was this ugly, ugly simmering thread...they hated her just because she dared criticize their precious games.

I play video games myself. And even I hadn't seen the pattern, or hadn't quite noticed it among the vast multitude of games out there until I saw her first video.

I see that sadly, the stain of misogyny hasn't left DU. It's only gotten stronger. (And don't even get me started on Discussionist.)

[el_bryanto]

5. There's something interesting about peoples reactions in this area

Or in comic books or, well, sex where people really seem to get riled up. I can't say for certain, but I think that if one were to post a thread commenting on how women suffer economically by being held back compared to their male colleagues the reaction would be less worked up.

I guess it's because most people aren't bosses. It's easy enough for a guy to say "Well if I were a boss I'd treat everybody fairly, but I'm not." It's easy enough to externalize that patriarchal way of looking at things. When it comes to video games, you don't have that option (assuming you play video games). You can't pretend that you aren't, theoretically at least, part of the problem, if you buy games that have those sorts of images in them. And many games have at least elements of those issues in them; I can certainly think of a few that I have played and even enjoyed.

At a certain point you have to accept your own blinders/flaws whatever they might be - it's the first step towards working against them.

Bryant

[seabeyond]

6. this is it. and this is the struggle, the battle, the hardship. and yet, i keep saying.

if you are so tired of it, imagine how tired i am of the insults, the rapes, the entertainment of rapes. i am sittin in the audience also.

[KitSileya]

7. In addition, it is the anger of an 'underdog' being criticized by those considered beneath him.

'Nerds' consider themselves underdogs, and they like knowing that there are others who have less status than them, women. At the same time, they feel threatened by women, who can do what they do just as well as they do. It threatens their perceived superiority in the few areas where they think they are superior. When women point this out, it engenders a vituperative hatred out of all proportions.

I think it is the same mechanism as when many poor or lower-class white people look at black people - they are lower in status, and any black person that succeeds is a threat to them, and must be attacked, verbally, or physically if they get the chance to do it without risk, such as with Darren Wilson.