Friday, November 15, 2013

Today's YouTube Comments Picks and an Article on Internet Harassment Worth Reading


From the comments to a video about some Stirling University lads loudly singing a song in a public bus.  A very funny sexist joke the song is  and the lads were just having fun and horrible feminazis are trying to limit the freedom of speech.

The comments were astro-turfed*  by MRAs I think.  Whether Person A in the next exchange (about whether the song is an example of rape culture)  is one of them or just a garden variety misogynist is hard to know.  But pay attention to the way he defines his hatred of feminism as based on his contempt towards women:


Person A:
Rape culture doesn't exist you fucking whore.
 
...
 
Person A, to Person B who asked about the use of the term "fucking whore."

All feminists are fucking whores. I don't need to "suss out" the truth, I'm not a leftist.
 
...
 Person B:
 
Person A, you sound like a bright chap - what are the characteristics of a "fucking whore?"
 
...
 
Person A answers the question:
 
A person who uses their body for monetary gain, either directly, such as sex for direct payment, or through more discrete means. Feminists us their natural ability as women to nag and ignore logic to recieve special treatment.

There ya go!  All is now explained.

Reading the comments (yes, yes, I know and will get back on the wagon right away) is extremely hilarious!  I was laughing so hard my tummy now hurts, because many of the comments argue that there's nothing wrong with the chant, that it's just a bit of fun and not at all misogynist or sexist or rapish and they do that by calling those who got "butthurt" by the song soft twats and cunts!

The logic, it kills me.  Then there was this comment (spelling mistakes retained) by Person (perhaps a person) C:

Woman are subhumans. The world was a better place when they had the same rights as slaves.

Some are intelligent, some are strong, some are hard working.

But all of them are emotionally instable and not able to rationally decide when it matters. Therefore they should do what their men (fathers, brothers, husbands) tell them.

The same  commenter (Person C)  also wrote that one other person commenting is:

a fat ugly loser femnazi who can't handle free speech. It's idiots like you that are destroying FREEDOM in the West and turning our countries into police states. You are a disgrace to the human race.

The point?  Other than some odd masochistic streak in me that makes me read this shit?  The connection between the hatred of feminists and the hatred of women.

This article is worth reading on issues of the above type.  These types of comments are not just among the bottom mud crawlers of YouTube, but appear in the email inboxes of women who happen to be academics or politicians or otherwise in the public eye.  What such comments share is the use of identity (gender, race, sexual preference)  as the basis for the slur without any actual discussion of the ideas that provoked the anger so expressed.
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*Used here in the sense that a large number of comments probably originated in a call on some manosphere site.