According to the definition of misogyny, it’s “the hatred or dislike of women or girls, manifested in sexual discrimination, denigration of women, violence against women, and sexual objectification of women”. Why am I talking about this? Because it’s come up recently in Eve, and even though it’s a touchy subject, I have opinions about it.
In real life I’m in favour of equality. We’re all equal in this world, we’re all human beings. Unfortunately, I’ve had some problems along the way with this belief; in particular, with members of minority groups that have something to gain from the benefits they get from being a minority.
I’ve had conversations with so-called ‘anti racists’ who say they want equality, but when I start talking about my beliefs in equality, that everyone should receive the same benefits or no one should receive them, then they start calling me racist because equality means taking benefits away from the minority to give to everyone. Apparently if I wasn’t racist, I would be supporting them to get more than the majority.
I also have this problem when I talk to feminists. I believe that all people should be treated equal, and while feminists say they agree with this, in practice they don’t. Consider this:
- we have gyms for everyone and gyms for women – but we can’t have men’s gyms
- we have clubs for everyone and clubs for women – but we can’t have men’s clubs
- we have rights for everyone and rights for women – but we can’t have men’s rights
And when I’m told that ‘things for everyone’ should be enough for men, I end up asking – if that’s the case, why isn’t it good enough for women? And that’s when things start getting ugly.
In today’s world, as soon as you start questioning the beliefs, attitudes or expectations of women, you’re suddenly labelled a misogynist. You’re allowed to question the actions of groups and organisations and men, but any questioning of a woman’s actions labels you as a hater of women.
Let’s refer back to the definition of misogyny – the hatred or dislike of women. So when did questioning a woman or disagreeing with her mean that you hate or dislike all women?
I know I’m generalising. Most of these accusations only come from feminists, not from all women. I understand that, and I understand that most women are not like feminist women. Many of these feminists are also extremely vocal, however, and their voices are heard far and wide, demanding to be heard and obeyed, while the voices of the majority remain silent because they don’t want to be tarnished negatively.
Recently, we had a female Prime Minister here in Australia, who began labelling members of the Opposition as misogynist because they opposed her. It was because of her gender, apparently, rather than the way the political system has worked for more than a hundred years…. So the media picked it up, as they’re wont to do, and we quickly had a national discussion around workplace water coolers based on ‘the new reality’ that if you didn’t support the female Prime Minister because she was a woman, then you obviously hated all women.
I had this confirmed when I tested it one day. The conversation came up, and I decided to say, “There’s no way I’m supporting her. Her government’s policies are stupid.” Raised eyebrows from the women in the discussion. One of them asked, as I thought they would, “Oh, so you’re a misogynist too?”
Now, just to put things in some perspective, I love women, as many of us men do. But as soon as I question a woman’s stance on certain issues instead of immediately supporting them – just like I would question a man – then feminist women (and feminist-sympathising men, too) label me as a man who hates all women. It’s just ridiculous.
It seems that the only way a man can avoid being labelled a misogynist today is if he supports women over men, never questions them, constantly praises them, gives them everything they want, and does his best to worship them and get others to worship them too. The woman can never do wrong, and if you say she can, then you obviously hate women.
And that brings me to the reason I’m writing this blog post.
Poetic Stanziel wrote a post called CCP Owes Us Nothing. In it he talks about the sense of entitlement that people have. But we all know he’s not just talking about people. He’s talking about a particular woman who inspired him to write his post.
Some people like to be more politically correct than me.
An Eve Online blogger / podcaster / player / community member decided to take extreme offence at a song being played during a CCP broadcast of the recent alliance tournament. The song, like many songs by black artists out there, used racist and sexist terms, and she decided to blame CCP for it.
Now, CCP didn’t create the song. It was a popular song amongst the community, and it was just one of many thousands of other songs with similar racist and sexist tones. This woman is black as well, and instead of accepting this as part of the reality we currently exist in (even if you disagree with it, it’s there), she decided to blame CCP for it and go on a campaign against them.
So CCP tried to do the right thing and apologised to her, and tried to give her gifts to appease her enraged anguish at the great offence done to her. But this woman, in her righteous indignation, decided to lash out even more and slander members of CCP’s staff with sexist and derogatory comments, so CCP took back their offers of peace and politely told her to go to hell.
This just fuelled more rampages from her and she decided to rage-quit, calling CCP racist, sexist and misogynist for not giving her what she wanted.
As a black feminist woman, she felt entitled to special treatment. She demanded it. And then when she didn’t get it, it was because everyone involved hated women. Including the entire Eve Online community, which she made clear when she said, “the Eve Online community is not a place where I am wanted or appreciated.”
She’s right. But only because of her intolerable behaviour. It’s not because she’s black, or because she’s a woman, but because she felt she had a sense of entitlement to get more than what she deserved.
I was going to say I’ve got no time for this kind of feminist stupidity, but then I’ve spent a lot of time writing this blog post, so maybe I have got time for it. Just not in the ways that feminists would want me to.
I support CCP’s actions here. I support common sense over stupidity, and I support the idea of not rewarding people for intolerable behaviour. She tried to label people as racist, sexist and misogynist in order to get what she wanted. What that was, I’m not really sure. And it backfired on her.
Feminism is great. But demands of entitlement due to race or gender is not. It’s racist and sexist to make demands based on your race or your gender, and I’m glad CCP refused to reward it.
UPDATE 26 July 2013:
What a fascinating response there’s been. A bunch of angry people here, and a riot on Reddit. If I was into ‘looting for tears’, today would be a good day. Hello to you all!
Here’s something else for you to think about, or enrage you, whatever you prefer. Instead of striving to be equal, many feminists and feminist sympathisers are striving to be victims, and to encourage more women to be victims. They’re shouting out to the world to save them from ‘the big bad man’, because they believe they’re weak, and they believe they’re special, and they believe they deserve special treatment.
Sounds like victim mentality to me, with an entire system in place to encourage it and reward it.
Now, if you want to be seen as a victim, keep going. Keep fighting to empower yourselves as victims. Keep fighting to have the world around you treat you as a victim. You will be exactly what you want to be.
Personally, I’d like to empower women to recognise that they’re not victims. They don’t need to see the world as being out to get them because they’re a woman. There are many, many women who get by in this world quite nicely, understanding that they’re an equal part of the society around them, appreciated and respected by everyone, men and women alike. It’s because they don’t see themselves as victims, and they don’t struggle to be seen as victims.
I refuse to treat women like victims. And I’m disappointed that so many men out there fall into the trap of treating women like victims too, by supporting ‘pity me, for I am a woman’ attitudes.
Misogyny is the new sexism and is a buzzword abused by feminists, It’s the same as people abusing racism.
They are offended they would normally say, but instead they say Misogyny or racism or some other everyone is out to get me card and get a free pass to be as much of an ass as they can.
And when confronted with their hypocrisy they just play the same card again.
I’m all for equality, but I’m not interested in equality for self-serving bastards who use their cry’s for justice to get their own selfish ways.
This is quite the issue with the old democratic countries(US,Canada), and not an big issue anywhere else. Sexism and racism have been maketed in such a way by the media, that the mentality of some people have been changed to the worst.
Everything has gone from “Don’t do it” to “Don’t even try to think at it, else we burn you”
If i do not agree with your oppinion, i can use one of the “endgame” discussion stoppers: Msogyny/Racism
Take a step back for a second. If women were treated equally as men in every way at regular gyms, why would they feel the need to start their own in the first place? If the law protected women the same as men, why would women need laws and rights just for them? It sucks that women have to resort to either isolating themselves or using the law to force men to not act like assholes towards them. But until the vast majority of men can do that on their own, or in other words until there is true equality, such measures are not entitlement but necessary. Any corrective measures can go too far or be too sweeping, but that’s not proof the underlying condition it’s trying to address doesn’t actually exist.
Do you really feel this confident in your argument/stance? Don’t you sometimes feel that when you’re at your most confident about your argument that your argument is most vulnerable?
In this case, you’re a white man (yes, the gender and race that’s been completely privileged for thousands of years) and you’re still so confident of this argument? I find this quite amazing.
I don’t think I’ve seen anyone in EVE ever have anything against women. What I have seen is EVE players be against *women who draw attention to the fact that they’re women*. I’ve been on fleet-ops with women, in corporations with women, and the most I ever heard about it was “oh, I didn’t know we had women in here, hello!” after a girly voice comes through comms.
Being against a woman does not mean you’re against all women. That distinction is the problem.
In my time I’ve seen plenty of cases where certain EVE players, despite not being women, have loudly and proudly told women who complained about discrimination or ostracism just how they should really feel. Speaking as men who’ve never experienced sexism against women first hand, they speak with conviction that what those women experienced was in no way sexism, and that anyone who feels offended is simply doing it wrong.
Their arguments tend to boil down to some variation of “This is our safe space to act however we like. It’s nothing personal so you shouldn’t take it as such. This is the way it’s always been and we’re not changing for your sake. So either HTFU or GTFO.” Bonus fail points for calling women in general overly emotional when one of them actually leaves over such treatment.
This is a game where after a woman announced her intent to fight off an invasion by saying “I won’t be a victim,” one of the game’s most prominent bloggers immediately accused her of “playing the rape card” in a war where he didn’t even have a stake. I won’t say who, since that seems to be a thing now, but let’s just say his blog is link in this post and leave it at that. When such incidents and worse happen repeatedly in this game, the accusations of normalized misogyny get pretty hard to ignore.
There are plenty of male attention seekers in EVE as well, but you don’t see them constantly harassed to anywhere approaching the level directed against a woman who has the gall to act in the same way. Meanwhile, because so many good old boys have decided that sexism is not a problem in EVE, “attention whore” is brandished as the catch all refrain against any woman who dares to raise her voice.
Increasingly of late I’ve felt like I’m staying in this game despite the wider community, not because of it. It’s attitudes like this blog that’s turned me into a bittervet towards the people and not the game, which is a damn shame.
so you’re saying that if I’m a white male, then I have no right to an opinion? That’s interesting. Could you tell me more about that?
i do not question your right to an opinion. i question the quality of your opinion.
You question the “quality” of his opinion. I think you judged his comments on his presumed ethnicity. I am sure you harbor some ill will toward “whites” for whatever reason but it means little. You truly do not wish to have a honest and truthful discussion.
Tony, how can we accept the validity of Black Claw’s opinion when he generalises about one group but complains when another generalises about his group?
Sure, complain about being labelled as a misogynist, but don’t then start raging about “feminists” as if all the people who labelled him as “misogynist” for disagreeing with Labor Party policies are “feminists” as opposed to “trolls”.
Black Claw’s use and definition of the term “feminist” in this article is deeply offensive.
i think you are white, male and privileged. i doubt very much you’d recognise equality of race and gender if it ever happens. your definition of equality is that things stay exactly as they are.
If you’re a white man writing on how a black woman should feel about an issue that involves black women, then your reasoning better be damn impressive compared to the one who actually has first hand experience of what it’s like to live as a black woman. ‘Well I think she’s wrong because I know black women are equal enough already, and anyone who disagrees is just entitled’ isn’t going to cut it.
I think your a racist for saying or even mentioning his skin tone. And that you generalized that whites are privileged. Maybe its not privileged but just damn hard work. And you demean that work by even suggesting it. I am sure there are people who have inherited wealth from their families or maybe just got lucky and won the lottery. But I will be damned if you slander a whole class of people that way. You would be more than pissed If I mentioned an entire continent that has a slew of nations that can’t seem to get it together but that must be due to someone keeping something away from them. This is exactly what the author was discussing. Instead of blaming and using your ethnicity or gender to cry about your perception of reality make a better life for yourself with full equality. I am all for it. But if you don’t succeed do not blame someone else.
Imagine a wall full of circular holes, that circles can keep walking in and out of with no difficulty.
Now imagine that the triangles manage to get the resources together, after years of not being able to fit through the circle’s holes, to drill a single triangle space into the wall.
Now imagine that the circle — who previously supported the triangle’s efforts because they are well-rounded (har) and value equality — comes along and sees the construction project. But instead of being happy, they get angry.
“Well, I won’t be able to fit through your hole!!!!” the circle cries.
“I helped you get the drill!!!!” the circle shrieks.
“Make it fit me too!!!!” the circle demands.
The triangles, barely holding it together enough to get a triangle hole together, stare at the circle in confusion.
“You have all the holes you need,” the triangles explain. “This is for us. You don’t need to fit through our hole, too.”
“YOU’RE BEING UNEQUAL AND HURTING MY FEELINGS!” the circle wails. “I DON’T SUPPORT YOUR HOLE IF IT DOESN’T FIT ME TOO. GIVE ME MY DRILL BACK.”
“It’s not your drill, it’s our drill. You helped us get it, because you said you cared.”
“I ONLY CARED WHEN I THOUGHT YOU’D MAKE A HOLE EVERYONE COULD FIT THROUGH. YOU’RE PERPETUATING INEQUALITY!!!”
“Why is it up to us, the small group that has never been able to fit through the wall at all, to make a hole everyone can use? Why isn’t it up to you, the people who have been able to cross back and forth at will for years? We just want to see the other side; why are you yelling at us?”
“I DIDN’T ASK TO BE BORN A CIRCLE, OMG. I’VE HAD TO WORK HARD ALL MY LIFE TOO. YOU’RE JUST BEING BIGOTED AGAINST ME BECAUSE OF SOMETHING I CAN’T CONTROL, JUST LIKE EVERYONE IS AGAINST YOU.”
“You are interfering with our project and asking us to comfort you while we’re trying to make progress. Please leave.”
“I’m going to tell everyone about this,” the circle warns. “Nobody will support you now.”
“Apparently nobody ever did,” the triangles sigh, getting back to work
Just wow. So you are advocating trianglism?
Good post. Thanks for this right up.
you’re welcome!
You’ve generated quite a few comments:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/1j0kjj/misogyny_in_eve_online/
so it seems 🙂
I have to say I agree with your sentiment on this. As a women I a fully supportive of equality not special privileges or treatment. The equality aim in my mind is hindered by such things and to be honest the biggest thing holding my gender back is my own gender.
Trust me most women are more then capable of holding their own and whenever they take the stance of saying they need special treatment because they are a girl they are normally doing it because it is the easy option.
Most of this stuff boils down to respect and manners and some people don’t have them and some do.
Thanks @arwensoundance:disqus it’s nice to see someone else seeing and speaking reason
Thanks @arwensoundance:disqus it’s nice to see someone else seeing and speaking reason
Well that escalated quickly…
*grin*
*grin*
I just provided an update on this post. Enjoy 🙂
You know Mr Claw, there’s an acronym for what society is experiencing these days with all its political correctness and all. It’s called Can’t Understand Normal Thinking.
Your comments about Julia Gillard display just how arrogantly uninformed you are. Willful ignorance is not an excuse for anything. So here are a few links to help you understand the claims of misogyny in the Australian House of Representatives. You may browse at your leisure and update your post (and attitude) at your will.
Tony Abbott claims abortion is “the easy way out”: http://bit.ly/9YegoL
Tony Abbott doesn’t apologise for endorsing “bitch” and “witch” labelling of Prime Minister Julia Gillard: http://bit.ly/g4e1mX
Tony can’t even talk cordially to women: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7aj8B5sM2o
And for a slightly less hyperbolic view of Tony’s attitude to women in general, check out Marieke Hardy’s article here: http://mariekehardy.com/blog/post/a-quiet-word-just-between-us-dames/ — in which Marieke reminds all Australian women that Tony is just looking out for their best interests.
You could, of course, go through the entire video history of the House of Representatives to remind yourself of the difference between John Howard (who simply refused to acknowledge anyone on the other side of the house) and Tony Abbott (who chooses to believe that women are not able to lead or make important decisions like men can).
And of course who can comment on Tony Abbott’s attitude towards women without bringing up the Leigh Sales interview on the 7:30 report where Tony tries using charm to win over a pretty woman, only to find that this woman was an accomplished journalist acting like a shark with blood in the water: http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2012/s3573785.html – Tony was out of his depth and had no idea how to handle a woman who was also an accomplished interviewer.
Now back to your comment to your corp mate here in the comments thread: you seem to be suggesting that you are two different people, on inside the game and one outside the game. While there is some lassitude to be expected in a role playing game, the only time we allow a longer leash is when your ingame persona is offensive. When your out-of-game persona is offensive (do you really believe that Tony Abbott is not a conservative white male with outdated ideas of gender role stereotypes? Do you really believe it is okay for you to tar one group of people with the same brush while complaining about them doing the same to you?) continuing to play with you ingame is effectively showing support for you in real life.
So your corpmate took what action she could: withdraw the only meaningful support she can.
“Tony can’t even talk cordially to women”
He can barley even talk! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OxBjDHrEZg
“we have gyms for everyone and gyms for women – but we can’t have men’s gyms
we have clubs for everyone and clubs for women – but we can’t have men’s clubs
we have rights for everyone and rights for women – but we can’t have men’s rights”
Mate you are either ignoring inconvenient facts or you are childishly naive.
not really just look at Augusta and/or any men club or organization. If women are not allowed they will whine that the organization is being sexist. I think you wear the childish naivety pretty damn well.
“They will whine that its sexist” – another example of using a vocal minority to label a much larger population.
those gyms, those clubs.
So because you didn’t use the word “all” you didn’t mean “all feminists”? You also didn’t use the word “some”. Just the word by itself implies all of a category: “I also have this problem when I talk to feminists …”
Not “some feminists” but “feminists.” The lack of qualification implies the general case.
You are not thinking clearly. Your thinking is clouded and muddy. Even worse, when you are alerted to your error you respond with denial! It is like you think we are wrong for not understanding the unspoken thoughts that form some bizarre context in which the phrase “when I speak to feminists” only refers to a subset of feminists with whom you have a problem. The issue for those of us reading your blog is that we do not have that context and you did not illuminate the context in which that phrase does not indicate that your problem occurs when speaking to any feminist.
Ok, your discourse has nothing about it that would suggest you are not a hardline feminist.
Please call him a “Misogynistic Pig” in the next few coments
Ps. can you understand what i am doing?
In English, when you use a word that describes a set of things without qualifiers, you implicitly involve the whole set.
“I also have this problem when I talk to men.”
“I also have this problem when I talk to turtles.”
Yes, I understand that you are being obtuse and have no idea what you are talking about,
What should anyone do when they witnesses misogyny? To ignore it is to show the perpetrator it’s fine to keep going, but now you’re saying to actually raise a fuss is to embrace the “victim mentality.” According to you, what should happen next?