Speaking Up

Fantastic post. This happens all the time. We don't always talk about it because often you end up having to explain why someone can't talk to you that way.

You have to explain that your safety is valuable and something worth caring about.

You have to defend why anyone should care about it over something else, as if we can only care about one thing at once.

You have to explain why being a woman with an opinion doesn't mean you should be willing to put up with it, or that you somehow can't be shocked, angered, scared or saddened by these comments.

Bonus points: I know who those DMs are from. Because I've had similar DMs from the same person. This is someone who has openly said he follows me (and, I believe, you) simply because harassing us for talking about these things is his duty.

This kind of crap (the harrassment, not your post about it!!) makes my blood boil. People need to grow the hell up already.

The thing that makes me second saddest about this (saddest prime is the fact that someone was raised to think talking to other people like that is okay) is the lost opportunity. Internet anonymity gives me the opportunity to discuss ideas with a minimum of personal bias. I often know nothing about the commentator or poster beyond the screen name. So I can evaluate a statement, post or comment purely on its merits and respond in kind.

But like bullies do everywhere, they have screwed up a chance to have a discussion focused almost solely on the topic and not the participants. Attacking the person is a tactic that shows the weakness of the debater's argument or opinion. When you add in the violent sexual nature of most of these attacks, these boy-apes (sorry, the term "man" cannot be applied to them; real men don't talk to anyone that way), they reveal themselves for the vicious cowards they are.

And man or woman, my hobby has no room for cowards.

T. it makes me sad to hear you self censored your self! What we need is more you on the internet not less! When you self censor the terrorists win, and that's what these fools who send you shit are, internet terrorists. They make you afraid, then you stop doing the awesome stuff you should and then they win.

Keep being awesome and eff the haters!

You know, there are differences depending on the rules edition and in Organized Play we see... just kidding. In all seriousness, thanks for bringing up this topic. We are all fallible, imperfect, wonderful, and beautiful in various ways. When gamers discuss topics like depression, insecurity, discrimination, and the like it helps create a common understanding. It raises awareness for those that don't usually see the issues and creates acceptance and community for those that are sadly impacted by them.

Thanks for being a part of the gaming community and giving your voice to the hobby, despite what it sometimes costs you emotionally. Perhaps I am naive, but I see things as having greatly improved at the gaming table over the past 15 years. The RPG portion of the Internet will likely undergo an improvement, if slow, as more places refuse to allow discrimination and hatred for peers and as everyone becomes more accustomed to the benefits of having talented women as prominent members of our hobby.

Having active participation by both genders makes our hobby stronger. I owe a tremendous amount of my gaming hobby to my mother. She encouraged me to join our school's D&D club in the sixth grade and later found another group for me in high school. She is an avid reader of just about everything and like my father, was an English teacher. She loves to write poetry and fiction and to share what she experiences in the world with others through writing. She also has an amazing gift to see the best in all people and to effortlessly forgive everyone's shortcomings. Her values and creativity were a great complement to my father's emphasis on dedication to one's work, attention to detail, and encouragement to be more outgoing. It took both of their perspectives for me to find the balance I enjoy. Neither of their characteristics are solely male or female, but active involvement by both genders helps our hobby by bringing in wider perspectives, ideals, and approaches.

Ugh, I can actually guess who DM'ed that crap.

Personally, I want the meme "no girls in the internet" dragged behind sauna and put it out of its misery.

I'm sick and tired of being told that I can't be a female because I like nerd things X, Y, and Z.

This strange attitude combined with the shit women actually get when they dare to have an opinion about something in public is puzzling. Why the hell would I tell people that yes, I am a woman, and I like Linux, sci-fi and RPGs, when people gleefully tell those women that they need to be [insert an obscene list of sexual violence here] good and hard and possibly by the commenter himself.

I'm just glad that this year this issue is finally getting the attention it deserves.

I'd lose my mind if my wife had to put up with nonsense (the only polite word I can think of) like that. It happens anywhere that people inclined to act like this can do so with little to no fear of repercussions, and it's vile.

I suppose the question to be asked is "How do we deal with it?"

Since it's intolerable, no one should be asked to simply ignore this kind of treatment and carry on with their day, so that's out.

There are no means of auto-censoring these comments*, and even if there were it's just throwing a blanket over the problem, not solving it. Nothing good there.

That seems to leave education/socialization and community policing.

The former requires that people be raised with a value system that enforces equality along with other social mores. We don't have any control over how people other than our own children are raised. It is possible though -within the gaming/geek community- to ostracize people that behave like this. I, for one, would not have anyone at my table if they did this. It's a small step, but it's a step.

However, the latter (policing) can be used to some degree, although it would still be difficult. People who violate social mores are often ostracized, and with good reason. Although we can't kick someone off the internet (oh, what wonderful, terrible things I would do with that power...) we can decide to downvote vile YouTube comments and report similar comments on other sites for moderation. People using offensive, but non-threatening language can be moderated into oblivion and they'll either get banned, stop, or create a new account and keep going. Eventually they'll either give up or get an IP ban.

Taking it a step further, sending threats over the internet is a Federal crime in the US** and can be reported as such. This should only be used in the case of the worst offenders, as trolls and "haters" who aren't being threatening aren't committing a crime, they're just being jerks. Threats of bodily harm are not, nor have they ever been protected speech. It's criminal behavior and must be treated as such.

For the record: No, I'm not worried about 'ruining some poor boy's life' because of those messages. If I wouldn't worry about the criminal charges leveled against some kids that would spray paint hateful comments on a house of worship, then I certainly won't care about the fate of these people. Especially considering that they do this simply because the target keeps their reproductive organs on the inside.

*Yes, chatfilter-style systems exist, but they just invite people to circumvent them, so I deem them useless for this purpose.

** http://www.ibls.com/internet_law_news_portal_view.aspx?id=2064&s=latestnews

We need more people to speak out about this kind of thing; you are a hero for doing so. Bravo. I'm going to go post links to this blog post on Facebook and Twitter now, because people need to read it.

wow I knew that trolls were harsh but I was not aware it was this bad those comments you received are completely out of line. from a fan I hope you don't let it get to you I enjoy hearing you on the tome show and reading your blog.

As always, I am stunned at how poorly socialized and downright hateful (some of) my fellow men can be. I was raised primarily by women; maybe that has something to do with my personal attitudes...

By the way, your "trigger warning" made me go look up that term and its usage. What an excellent idea! Not sure how I missed it on the Internet up until now.

Thank you.

Thanks for talking to us about this Sarah. I have a daughter that I want to raise Geekish. I'm going to do whatever I can to make it a more positive life for her.

Very good post. There's never any excuse for sexism, racism or homophobia or sending people abusive messages. Next time, I'd retweet the idiots so everyone can see how fuckwitted they are and then block them.

And keep on doing your thing.

Richard

Thanks for using your platform to bring this to more people's attention. Men don't have a monopoly on ideas and nobody should be threatened, especially in a hobby which depends critically on social interaction. Everyone should be welcome at the table.

This is depressing that it is still happening, one would hope they we had evolved to be better than that. But things will not change unless people take a stand, and thank you for doing so. We will stand with you.

@Sean, I think that bears repeating.

We will stand with you.

Nobody should feel afraid to be online, least of all to talk about a game. I'm just frustrated because I can't wave my Tolerance Wand and have the trolls change stance from Standoff to Acceptance. Or at least Peaceful Tolerance.

"Gaming Community, Tear Down This Wall!"

Men and women should be equally subject to roughly the same amount and kind of abuse from internet trolls, I agree. Hopefully they can be persuaded.

Bullying in all of its form is derived from a sense of fear and/or feeling of powerlessness. Internet bullying is different only in that those who wouldn't be able to do it face to face now find that they have a modicum of power in as much as you no longer have visual cues to determine their intent. Death and rape threats have existed as long as fame has been a factor. I agree with you that they should not exist. I am sorry that you have had to deal with this. It is the tragedy that those who can not win their arguments via logic often resort to this tactic. Fear is a driving force in making decisions. The Romans used against the Christians and the KKK against civil rights activists. Women have faced much in their pursuit to leave a homemaker role and step onto equal footing with males. With each step forward the resistance becomes a little less. Their is hope that someday people will look back and shake their heads in shame at how us first forgers into the wilds behaved. Until then we must persevere and not bow to fear to drive our choices. I sincerely hope that the beastly behavior of a few does not drive you into other projects like so many others have been.

Cheers!

Hey girl!! Can I just say you're awesome? Thank you for not apologizing for your opinion. It's real and valid and you are completely entitled to have one and blog about it no matter who tries to shut you down. Go you for being brave and blogging about what you love.

Hi Sarah, as a male I have been subjected to this by playing female characters in MMO's. It was a real eye opener into the trouble faced daily by women on the internet.
I was harassed, abused and even kicked out of group events solely on the perceived fact that I was a woman.
At 1st I tried correcting them by pointing out I was actually an over 40's male, but I soon stopped doing that, because I thought "what the hell does it matter what sex I am?"
Talking to several of my online female friends only showed me how prevalent this type of abuse was.
Easy for me to say as a male, but never give up. There are many of us male's who fight to stop this rubbish.

Tam

Outstanding post.

Some places seem to breed hate and stupidity online. YouTube is certainly one of them. I use the http://clea.nr/ browser extension just to hide the comments, and it makes it a much more pleasant place to be.

The thing is that I know hiding them isn't a solution; that's sweeping the problem under the carpet. What makes certain places "acceptable" to post defamatory remarks (about either sex, though women bear the brunt to this, in my experience) whilst others don't? A defamatory remark on Twitter, for example, gets gunned down pretty quickly, and politeness (generally speaking - there's alway idiots everywhere) is the norm. I think some of that needs to be laid at YouTube and Google's door for allowing such behaviour to become so widespread in the comments themselves. There is a line between moderation and censorship but YouTube do neither, and absolve themselves of any responsibility for what they tacitly allow.

In my role-playing games I (and all of my regular gamers) routinely play female characters, especially when superhero gaming. A PC's sex, as with their personality, race or creed, is one more facet of the character and role-playing gives us an opportunity to explore playing someone who is not us. And that, ultimately, is what role-playing is all about. It's an opportunity to wear someone else's shoes.

Hopefully it should make us more tolerant people as a result. That's the theory, anyhow.

Just wanted to chime in and wish you all the very best of luck, you have supporters here. The gaming community and our wee subculture is far poorer when creative and forward-thinking people are being driven away.

Also kind of sad that 'I am not a boy and want to play games' counts as forward-thinking.

Thanks everyone! I've been reading everyone's comments but life has me a bit busy to respond at the moment.I appreciate all the encouragement. I realize this is a hard and complicated issue. Thanks so much!

geek girls are awesome, and asshats are asshats.

What a lovely post. Thanks!

I often feel like I should apologize for the actions of men on the internet. On behalf of my gender, please know that the work that you're doing is good, and the entire roleplaying game community is better for your contributions.

There seem to be far too few women voicing their opinions in this community (and given a lot of the terrible bile that spews forth from many sexist/chauvinistic/idiot commenters, it's understandable why), yet they are some of our community's best, brightest, and most valuable people.

Please, keep up the good work with Sarah Darkmagic. Know that for every one, ten, or a hundred men slandering the site, there's one woman reading it and considering starting up an RPG blog of her own.

Please do it for that one woman.