19 ms·

We were wrong

• emingo 13y ago
  Maybe I was raised by a bunch of rabid dogs... But after reading the cached page... I really don't understand what the creator did wrong? He was a guy that I a lot of people can identify with, whom is publishing a book about his experiences? Is seduction intrinsically bad?
  • dwb 13y ago
    There's paragraphs to write on the subject, but in short, yes this was very bad. Details here: http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-harmless http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-...
  • inglesp 13y ago
    I don't have anything to add beyond this quote from the linked-to blog post: "Even when a girl rejects your advances, she KNOWS that you desire her. That’s hot. It arouses her physically and psychologically.”
  • famousactress 13y ago
    It seems pretty clear you haven't read the parts of the published guide that were raising alarm flags. They're quoted in this blog post linked to from the apology: http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-harmless http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-...
    • aeorgnoieang 13y ago
      It also seems fairly clear that you haven't read the context of those same quoted parts.
      • famousactress 13y ago
        I think I did, and I still find the content deeply revolting.
  • redwood 13y ago
    There must be more in the depths of reddit that made this far worse than it seems within the kickstarter page..
  • swombat 13y ago
    See http://curiousrat.com/kickstarter-allowed-funding-for-a-sexual-assault-manual http://curiousrat.com/kickstarter-allowed-funding-for-a-sexu... Quoting from the "manual": > 5) Get CLOSE to her, damn it! > To quote Rob Judge, “Personal space is for pussies.” I already told you that the most successful seducers are those who can’t keep their hands off of women. Well you’re not gonna be able to do that if you aren’t in close!” > “All the greatest seducers in history could not keep their hands off of women. They aggressively escalated physically with every woman they were flirting with. They began touching them immediately, kept great body language and eye contact, and were shameless in their physicality. Even when a girl rejects your advances, she KNOWS that you desire her. That’s hot. It arouses her physically and psychologically. > Decide that you’re going to sit in a position where you can rub her leg and back. Physically pick her up and sit her on your lap. Don’t ask for permission. Be dominant. Force her to rebuff your advances. This is the bit that's being decried as "intrinsically bad" - not seduction in general - because it advocates invading another person's personal space and touching them when they've expressed they don't want to be touched "because it will arouse her".
    • Tichy 13y ago
      A bit further on they also write that the seducer should learn to figure out when NO really means NO. And if humans are wired that way (responding to touch) then it's not the fault of somebody writing a book. There is also scientific research that people are more likely to respond to your requests if you touch them while asking. It's just psychology.
    • Alex3917 13y ago
      > This is the bit that's being decried as "intrinsically bad" - not seduction in general - because it advocates invading another person's personal space and touching them when they've expressed they don't want to be touched "because it will arouse her". They are banning all projects related to seduction though. This seems a bit excessive, considering even the supreme court basically released a guide to seduction at one point. (C.f. the 'one bite at the apple' rule as it relates to sexual harassment.)
    • pbhjpbhj 13y ago
      >touching them when they've expressed they don't want to be touched // Maybe I'm being an idiot but where did it say that in your quote? Perhaps it's this line: >Even when a girl rejects your advances, she KNOWS that you desire her. // I'd say implicit in that is that "when you have to stop because they've rejected your advance it's fine because they KNOW [blah blah blah]". To be honest it's Kickstarter's gig, but I think putting someone down in this way for simply advocating diminished personal space in social interactions, seems a bit heavy. Seriously from the "We were wrong" post I was expecting the "manual" to be telling you how to feed someone rohypnol [memory removal drug] not to touch their back when you're on a date. >Content promoting or glorifying violence against women or anyone else has always been prohibited from Kickstarter. // Where's the bit that promotes violence? It must be very obvious in the book otherwise they wouldn't surely be risking libelling the creator by making them out to advocate violence against women.
  • maximilianburke 13y ago
    When the guide is written like a rape manual, yes, yes it is. It features quotes like: "Pull out your cock and put her hand on it. Remember, she is letting you do this because you have established yourself as a LEADER. Don't ask for permission, GRAB HER HAND, and put it right on your dick." (from: http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/1dvnem/above_the_game_part_7_physical_escalation_sex/ http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/1dvnem/above_the_...) The whole thing is disgusting, degrading, and has no place on this earth.
    • roc 13y ago
      At the same time... if this same content was written as fiction, with the viewpoint character/hero accomplishing his goals through these same methods and relaying that same philosophy through dialogue or internal monologue, would it be (as) problematic?
      • pseut 13y ago
        You're asking whether it would be as problematic if it were a different book? I guess it depends. It's not like fiction/nonfiction is a switch that you can toggle without making other substantive changes.
      • loumf 13y ago
        Of course it wouldn't. Is that surprising? Fiction is different from a how-to manual and should be treated as such. It's not just the literal words in a particular paragraph, it's also the surrounding context.
        • roc 13y ago
          I agree the context matters, but there's a long history of equivocating the fictional and instructional, on the part of people who try to draw these lines with regards to speech. [1] I simply don't think the line is as clear-cut, for many of those who were outraged at Kickstarter. I think the company may have inadvertently stepped out onto a PR tight-rope. [1] Note the use of words like 'murder simulator'/'rape simulator' or the outrage and claims of sexism/homophobia/stereotyping whenever there's a fictional representation of a character or situation that happens to (however briefly) conform to some stereotype.
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  • tomjen3 13y ago
    Apparently for these people seduction = violence against women. I haven't seen such a broken thinking process anywhere else. If anything seduction is about giving women what they really want. That said it does have a somewhat, hmm, sketchy reputation which is no doubt related to a combination of loathing for men who have a difficult time getting laid and the extreme marketing tactics that those kinds of guides are usually sold with. And seduction isn't inheriently bad, but there are still some around who are trying to be politically correct and seduction isn't exactly something you are supposed to talk about in polite company.
    • rimantas 13y ago
      Take a look at some survey on the subject what women want in terms of sexual fantasies. Dominance from men will be high at the top.
      • mindcrime 13y ago
        Just read My Secret Garden by Nancy Friday sometime. Women have some f%!#ng sick fantasies... but somehow men are painted as the sexual predators / deviants, from whom the pure, wholesome, virtuous, innocent girls must be protected...
      • draq 13y ago
        <irony>Of course, because some women want dominance from men, it means that all women loves it. If you unpermittedly invade the personal space of 100 women, and only 10 complain about it, then it's only 10% sexual harassment, right?</irony>
        • aeorgnoieang 13y ago
          By the same reasoning, if some women do NOT want "dominance from men" then all "dominance" is sexual assault?
          • draq 13y ago
            To establish that dominance is not sexual assault, you should communicate. Simply to impose a dominant behaviour in case of doubt is not a GOOD strategy and may be sexual assault.
  • eco 13y ago
    I'm confused too. The blog post mentions violence against women and sexual-violence several times. The cached page is unreachable for me but I suspect a "seduction guide" doesn't advocate hitting women. Seduction guides are often sleezy from what I've seen and appear to be more effective at taking advantage of lonely men than they are about taking advantage of women. The blog post stops just short of calling this a rape guide though which I highly doubt is the case.
  • j546 13y ago
    That's because the project page itself was done in a way that doesn't raise any flags. But if you dig into what his book actually contains, then you'll see what's wrong with the project. In all honesty I don't blame Kickstarter for approving it originally because at face value the project does seem harmless, but nevertheless they f'ed up and admitted to their mistake and I applaud them. It's never easy to admit you were wrong.
  • pizza234 13y ago
    Most of the negative arguments against seduction have a few root causes. Seduction science is very disturbing. First, it disturbs women because it's perceived as a shift in the roles and their power over the other. Second, it disturbs men, at least some of them, because when read it from the armchair, looks just ridiculous. Third, expert players ("PUA"s) are very often troubled people, who become expert because they have a great need for validation. Their writings can be perfectly valid and effective, but surrounded by tons of self-validation, so they cause aversion to the person rather than the content. There is a mix of #2 and #3 in the reaction to your comment. The problem is that the things written look rape when put out of context. Abstractly, they are all forms of physical assertion. Nobody, except fools and rapists, would do them where inappropriate. Putting the girl's hand in one's k is something that is effective in a very specific context. Putting a a girl on one's lap is something that, again, is effective in a very specific context. Both of them are not* done unless one expects a consenting reaction. The key difference between physical assertiveness and rape is that the first is done with expected consensus, the second with expected dissent (so that force is involved). The armchair critics are mixing the two, just because they don't have idea of how those things work in real life. Regarding the general idea of seduction, that's a separate subject, and it's actually complex and multi layered. Summarizing, seduction is at his essence psychological hacking. Asserting that it's bad the exact analogue of a non-engineer saying that hacking is bad. To conclude, the guy writing the book is clearly psychologically troubled, and there are way better books than his.
• Tichy 13y ago
  I guess to understand this one has to consider that Kickstarter is based in puritan America?
  • vacri 13y ago
    I'm not sure where you get that from. Puritans have never been big on the rights of women.
    • Tichy 13y ago
      They seem to have a problem with the notion of sex, though.
    • freehunter 13y ago
      Puritans in 1600, no. Puritan America in the 2000's, sex is a very taboo subject, especially when it comes to women.
      • mwfunk 13y ago
        This was clearly, obviously, blatantly not in response to anyones hangups about sex in general. Not wanting to be associated with creepy, rapey stuff written by and for creepy, rapey people is hardly Puritanical, it's more like being a human being.
        • Anderkent 13y ago
          But judging this content as creepy and rapey is quite puritanical. All this screams about rape for something that sums up to "you're about to have sex? Don't ask her to grab your dick, guide her hand to it".
          • mwfunk 13y ago
            No, it is not.
        • freehunter 13y ago
• xauronx 13y ago
  Jesus, seems like an over reaction. Books and guides like this are nothing new, and should be taken in context/used appropriately. A nerd in a club is going to take this brash advice like: "All the greatest seducers in history could not keep their hands off of women. They aggressively escalated physically with every woman they were flirting with. They began touching them immediately, kept great body language and eye contact, and were shameless in their physicality." And not go up and rape a woman, but perhaps take a chance and put their hand on the girls shoulder during conversation to show interest, where they might have otherwise oddly looked away from them. Also, there's a huge difference between personal conduct in a night club and in a library. Anyhow, I'm a nerd with a SO that has never drank and hates night clubs but that's my take. Seems like any other topic and people would be crying free speech and censorship. A guide like this isn't going to turn a normal man into a rapist.
  • ebiester 13y ago
    The excerpted quotes of advice were pretty damn rapey. The problem is that many (every one I've seen) of these "seduction" manuals are written in a way that is hostile toward women.
    • angersock 13y ago
      Would you mind listing some of the quotes you found "rapey"?
      • citricsquid 13y ago
        The blog post linked from the kickstarter blog post includes lots of examples of what most people would consider to be "rapey" “Decide that you’re going to sit in a position where you can rub her leg and back. Physically pick her up and sit her on your lap. Don’t ask for permission. Be dominant. Force her to rebuff your advances.” http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-harmless http://caseymalone.com/post/53339539674/this-is-not-fucking-...
        • 13y ago
• blairbeckwith 13y ago
  Reading some of the comments on that blog post, I left thinking: Am I a terrible person? I just don't see what's wrong with this project, and I certainly don't see the link between it and "sexual violence" – where is Kickstarter making this connection? Say what you will about the seduction community, my very brief and infrequent encounters with it have been largely positive and I left thinking that they were a generally respectful, if a little bit misguided, group. There's some of their terms and techniques I don't like, such as "negging", but there's things like that in virtually every community that I don't like. Certainly not sexually violent.
  • goldins 13y ago
    No? "Decide that you’re going to sit in a position where you can rub her leg and back. Physically pick her up and sit her on your lap. Don’t ask for permission. Be dominant. Force her to rebuff your advances."
    • shawabawa3 13y ago
      The author's response: http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe > The thing that the commenters on social media are leaving out is that the advice was taken from a section in the guide offering advice on what to do AFTER a man has met a cute girl, gotten her phone number, gone on dates, spent time getting to know her, and now are alone behind closed doors fooling around. If "Don't wait for signs, make the first move" promotes sexual assault, then "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid was a song about rape. Doesn't seem very rapey when you consider this is after several dates and they are alone together. He also says over and over again "If she says no, stop immediately".
  • deong 13y ago
    Grabbing a woman's hand and forcing her to touch your exposed penis is, I think, sexual violence by almost any reasonable standard.
    • garethadams 13y ago
      If a girl is already in a private, intimate setting with you after you've met her a few times – like that part of the guide relates to – then sex probably isn't too much of an unreasonable assumption. Of course that counter-article cherry-picked quotes from all over the guide and threw them together to make it sound like these were all things you should do on first meeting someone
• josh2600 13y ago
  Great apology. Right to the point, no dodging blame, and an acknowledgement of the debt to society. Now, that being said, is this not a take on the book "the game", about picking up women? Am I missing something or is Kickstarter now picking and choosing what is "good" content? Obviously they have to do this to some extent, but where is the line drawn?
  • HaloZero 13y ago
    I read "The Game", I was curious. It's less how-to guide than a journalist foray into becoming ingrained into the pick up community. Any behavior by the people in the book is just stating facts about what they did. So while it might be viewed as a beginner guide, it's more of a story than anything else. I believe this is more akin to a guide to specific actions that you should take that are basically misogynistic.
  • throwit1979 13y ago
    As it is with everything else, the line is drawn at "if enough people become offended".
  • joshguthrie 13y ago
    To me (and based on everything I read/searched/saw/experiences in the "community"), The Game is not really about "you're gonna have sex with plenty women", it's more about "you have to be a better person and then, you may happen to have sex with plenty of women". It's about self-improvement: it's about "go out, socialize and meet people", it's about "have an activity that you enjoy and that drives", it's about "know yourself and know what you want",... Sure, sex is there (Because we're adults and if some of us like the married life, other crave for the carnal pleasure of one-night-stands) but it's mostly "don't shoot yourself in a foot by asking her if she still thinks about her ex". It was never about forcing oneself on women, it was about "fun for you and the persons you want to interact with". That said, even I would punch anyone who'd follow the "advices" from this "book".
• illtakesix 13y ago
  I think it's worth reading through the creator's response to the situation: http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe. He claims and reasonably supports that the highlighted excerpts were taken out of context.
  • swombat 13y ago
    Definitely. Key part to quote: > The gist of the controversial advice is "Don't wait for signs before you make your move. Let her be the one who rejects your advances. If she says no, stop immediately and tell her you don't want to do anything that would make her uncomfortable. Try again at a later time if appropriate or cease entirely if she is absolutely not interested." > The thing that the commenters on social media are leaving out is that the advice was taken from a section in the guide offering advice on what to do AFTER a man has met a cute girl, gotten her phone number, gone on dates, spent time getting to know her, and now are alone behind closed doors fooling around. If "Don't wait for signs, make the first move" promotes sexual assault, then "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid was a song about rape.
• gilrain 13y ago
  I won't touch the issue of whether the action was right or wrong here on Hacker News, but I think everyone has to admit that this is a brilliant example of an apology done well. They do not equivocate (the "sorry you were offended" apology) and they take direct action to fix what their users felt was wrong (new policy made) as well as somewhat atone for the original offense (donation to RAINN). It's also written simply but very skillfully: zero weasel words or anything. I happen to agree with the action taken, but bravo in any case for the brilliant apology!
  • scrrr 13y ago
    You are right about this being a good apology, but I think placing to much value on a good apology is not healthy. We are already living in a world where words, promises and good intentions matter too much. In the end, actions matter most. In fact, they are the ONLY thing that matters. I prefer a company with a good track record that issues bad or no apologies to a company with a bad record, but great apologies for all of their mistakes. I'm not saying anything about kickstarter.com here. I just want to make a point about, and I'm saying this with a wink, apology-porn.
    • cwp 13y ago
      You're right that actions matter. Part of what makes this a good apology are the actions that back it up. They took meaningful action to redress the harm they caused, and put a policy in place to prevent the mistake from recurring. It's awfully hard to build up a record of bad actions followed by good apologies, because good apologies are more than just words. But I think words are important too. The folks at Kickstarter clearly regret not having cancelled the project before it was funded, and that comes through in their apology. They gave the reasons for their failure, without turning them into excuses. That kind of sincerity is rare, and it's important. I'd rather see companies defend their actions when they believe they were right, sincerely apologize when they believe they were wrong, and never issue insincere non-apologies.
  • tomjen3 13y ago
    I don't see it as brilliant, I see it as a giant foot-in-mouth situation (which may be colored by the fact that I don't have a problem with seduction guides in general, and haven't seen the material in question) - until now Kickstarter has been neutral on legal content so if I see something I don't like, well too bad, but now there is a precedent for removing something because somebody finds it offensive, but others like it; so now they either have to issue an apology and retract the next offensive thing (say a t-shirt commemorating the ban on assault weapons) or lose their stance as neutral. If they had instead issued a non-apology-apology they would have been of the hock.
• vacri 13y ago
  No, they weren't wrong. They decided not to do a snap judgement on a controversial topic. Let it slip with what little time is left, examine post facto how it got through, tighten the cracks, explain it to the punters. They did everything right except think that they did it 'so wrong'. Making snap judgments on new areas of information can bite you back and make things much worse.
• DannoHung 13y ago
  Look at all these HNers defending sexual assault.
  • emiljbs 13y ago
    Oh, wow, really? So just because some people are asking "Hey, is there something intrinsically wrong with these guides or what?" they're defending sexual assault.
    • blocking_io 13y ago
      Yes, because there is something intrinsically wrong with these guides.
      • dionidium 13y ago
        I think what you're experiencing here is a crowd that isn't satisfied with claims of intrinsic wrongness that don't include evidence. You do realize that you're not allowed to just state opinions as facts, right? That's not really how arguments work around here.
        • blocking_io 13y ago
          This is a direct quote from a guide written by the author of the guide under discussion: Never, ever, ever, wait for a SIGN before you escalate! You will miss out on the vast majority of chances if you sit around waiting for SIGNS. Men are notoriously bad at reading women's minds and body language. Don't think that you're any different. From now on you must ASSUME that she is attracted to you and wants to be ravished. It's a difference in mindset that makes champs champs and chumps chumps… Decide that you're going to sit in a position where you can rub her leg and back. Physically pick her up and sit her on your lap. Don't ask for permission. Be dominant. Force her to rebuff your advances The author advises his readers to assume that their partner consents to sexual activity. This is a recipe for sexual assault. At some point one of his readers will misread the signs put out by a partner and they will sexually assault them.
• kepano 13y ago
  I don't think one can fault Kickstarter for this or the Kobe Beef Jerky incident. As the platform grows so will the number of abuse cases. The submission process is a fairly strict filter, but from there the project is more than crowd-funding, it becomes increasingly about crowd-sourcing the due diligence process. My concern is that a crowd-sourced due diligence process can be slow and requires active participation from the backers. That sense of common responsibility is what's needed to help the company take rapid action and for the community to remain a positive place for funding great ideas. I hope Kickstarter can continue inspiring that proactive participation from its users.
• hacker789 13y ago
  Women are sensitive, fragile, inferior creatures who require constant, vigilant protection from honorable men. If it becomes necessary to take a few quotes out of context in our noble quest to protect the fairer sex, so be it. Kudos to Kickstarter for adhering to feminist principles. > The thing that the commenters on social media are leaving out is that the advice was taken from a section in the guide offering advice on what to do AFTER a man has met a cute girl, gotten her phone number, gone on dates, spent time getting to know her, and now are alone behind closed doors fooling around. If "Don't wait for signs, make the first move" promotes sexual assault, then "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid was a song about rape. http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe
  • lewispollard 13y ago
    Well of course the misogynist doesn't believe he's misogynistic. Why should his opinion matter more than the hundreds of people who complained?
    • tomjen3 13y ago
      Truth is not subject to voting and Kickstarter has proved that they consider women inferior and in need of protection by banning this type of content.
      • calibraxis 13y ago
        When companies reject racist manuals, they're not taking the position that non-whites are "inferior and in need of protection". They're simply making the ethical choice, to the dismay of the people who enjoy racist sorts of things. Same goes for the misogynist manuals they're now taking the ethical stance against. So much for your ad hominem. I'd give Kickstarter kudos, except ethics are what people are supposed to have.
        • knowaveragejoe 13y ago
          This is, of course, equating this guide to a manual for sexism and not what the majority of women find attractive.
• citricsquid 13y ago
  How does removing the kickstarter project after funding has taken place work for the backers? Do the backers no longer get their rewards? Does the project creator have no access to the backers information? Will Kickstarter refund the backers out of pocket? Strange situation.
  • bayesianhorse 13y ago
    The backers shouldn't have a bone with the that project. They should have seen the issue themselves before backing.
    • deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
• iandanforth 13y ago
  I don't respect this. I acknowledge that as it is their playground they can make this kind of judgement call, however I have always believed that freedom of speech also protects the freedom to hate and be a terrible person. There are countless texts, movies, and other 'creative works' which both condone and encourage violence against women, mass murder, torture, and other things I find abhorrent, but I don't get to ban any of them, and that is a good thing. If your mission is focused on art I would encourage the kickstarter group to go back and re-read the history of banned works of art, and pay attention to which groups were pushing for those bans. I suspect you won't like the company you now keep.
  • loumf 13y ago
    "Freedom of speech" is a limit on the government, not on private companies.
    • maxerickson 13y ago
      As usually codified in law. There is plenty of room for people to believe that rights to speech should enjoy greater protections (I don't mean to defend that position, I mean to acknowledge it).
  • Dylan16807 13y ago
    They are refusing to organize payment to these things. They aren't 'banning' them in the sense you're talking about. I find your comparison offensive. You're twisting the meaning of the word 'ban'.
  • azar1 13y ago
    I see no denial of the author's freedom of speech here. The author is free to host and fund their misogynist drivel on their own server, and Kickstarter doesn't seem to be denying that. Kickstarter has a business to run, and has some semblance of ethics, so it has chosen to refuse to offer its service to this content.
  • shiftpgdn 13y ago
    Two things: One. Freedom of speech is a first amendment right to protect you from censorship by the government and the government only. Anyone, anywhere running their own service is fully within their rights to boot you off. Two. A sleazy pickup artist book isn't anywhere remotely near any previous works of banned art. I would consider something as awful the film Cannibal Holocaust to be fine art before I used that term for some idiotic kickstarted pick up artist book.
• patrocles 13y ago
  Kickstarter should claim safe-harbor as they are a conduit. This case means they open themselves up to being required to censor every project for every jurisdiction. Kickstarter apparently views the cost of that censorship as much less than the community cost. Seems unlikely to be the case.
  • mcintyre1994 13y ago
    I believe they've always censored in a fairly opinionated manner. I'd only be speculating if I tried to say why, but I imagine it's to do with wanting a much more active audience - a site needs to do a lot more to make you give your money than just keep on reading. If their projects list turned people away they'd be in a lot of trouble.
• pathy 13y ago
  For the sake of completion: http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe This is a statement on the matter by the author, linked in the original Reddit thread.
  • angersock 13y ago
    Relevant quote from your link: "The thing that the commenters on social media are leaving out is that the advice was taken from a section in the guide offering advice on what to do AFTER a man has met a cute girl, gotten her phone number, gone on dates, spent time getting to know her, and now are alone behind closed doors fooling around. If "Don't wait for signs, make the first move" promotes sexual assault, then "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid was a song about rape."
• OvidNaso 13y ago
  The linked blog post has an update that is really interesting: [UPDATE: In the opening paragraph of this beast I mentioned a Kickstarter campaign that I am passionate about, that represents everything I like about Kickstarter. But for some reason I am getting bombarded with e-mails from people that think that project and “Above The Game” are connected. And now people are pulling funding for the project I’m pumped for. Because of that, I’ve removed any mention of them by name.] Makes you question if any thought was put into the situation by many of the people who are outraged.
• oscardelben 13y ago
  Has anyone read the actual response from the book author? http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe http://pastebin.com/zwHYzCZe
• dirkgadsden 13y ago
  It's easy to see why there aren't more women in computing with the mountain of rape culture, misogyny, and male privilege on display in these comments.
  • tomjen3 13y ago
    And it is easy to see that whenever women are mentioned, or connected, people like you feel like you don't need to back up your assertions with facts, quotes, figure or any kind of argument. Hn is an intellectual place. That means that we sometimes discuss news that requires you to read and understand the other sides point of view, not merely dismiss it out of hands with a few choice words that are chosen to silence debate, not to improve mankinds understanding of things.
    • dirkgadsden 13y ago
      "on display in these comments" is a pretty clear reference to a source. The people here defending the whole PUA genre are defending an objectification of women. The PUA approach treats women as objects that are to be manipulated to achieve the end the PUA desires. Defending such an objectification is a hallmark of male privilege throughout history, and furthermore is a type of misogyny and characteristic of rape culture.
  • Chris2048 13y ago
    Because opinion here isn't dictated? Feel free to express your own opinions on the matter, but don't start with the slander because you dislike the opinion of others.
    • dirkgadsden 13y ago
      Slander is spoken falsehood, I think you meant libel. Also something is only a falsehood if it is false, and much of the writings here are quite characteristic of misogyny, rape culture (esp. apologetics), and male privilege as commonly used in SWE.
      • 13y ago
• lotharbot 13y ago
  >> "the decision had to be made immediately". Kickstarter believes their only choices are "allow to continue unimpeded" or "cancel the project". This incident suggests a third possibility: "flag for review". They could set up a policy which allows them to temporarily suspend a project, placing a short-term hold on project funds so that they do not go either to the creator or get refunded. The review process would need to be fast and transparent, but not so fast as to require snap judgments.
• doki_pen 13y ago
  He mentions having only 2 options to decide whether to cancel or let the funds go through. Isn't there a third option that they could use in the future, Put a delay on the transfer while you review it?
• samspenc 13y ago
  Why is Kickstarter unable to return the money?
• ebbv 13y ago
  Dear fellow HN dwellers, If you read the writings of the Guide's author and do not recognize that it is misogynistic and advocating sexual assault, you have a problem. That problem is that you are mistaking sexual assault for "taking the first step." You do not need to resort to pulling out your dick and forcibly placing the woman's hand on it in order to "make a move." There's literally hundreds of other things that aren't sexual assault that you could do before resorting to that. If you believe that's a reasonable "move" to make, then you not only have no imagination, but your judgment of what's acceptable behavior is way, way off. It doesn't matter if this is a woman who you're behind closed doors with for the first time, that's not a normal, acceptable "move". That kind of thing is for people already in an established, ongoing relationship with a solid foundation of consent. Without that consent, it is assault. I strongly urge all of you who "do not see the problem" with the author's writings to do more research into exactly what consent is, and what women (as a whole, obviously it varies from individual to individual) see as acceptable, expected behavior. If women are loudly saying "This is assault.", you need to take them at their word, because it is their judgment, it is their consent that matters. Not yours. Sincerely, A married, 34 year old HNer who is ashamed of this community right now. EDIT: I thought this was obvious but I have already read all the comments in this thread and all the "context" the excusers are providing. If you think pointing me to that again is refuting my points, then you didn't understand what I wrote.
  • Metrop0218 13y ago
    "it is their judgment, it is their consent that matters. Not yours." Amen brother.
    • Cushman 13y ago
      Just to be clear, because this is something misogynists like to pick on, both matter. The point of this is that you can't assume their consent just because you do. Of course, men who don't have experience with not having the power to consent struggle with this idea.
      • angersock 13y ago
• loumf 13y ago
  Kickstarter is a private company that can decide what they want to have on their site for whatever reason they want. They have to answer to their customers. If you disagree, don't use Kickstarter. But the idea that they have to comply with "freedom of speech" or be consistent or anything else doesn't make sense to me. Every store curates it's inventory with whatever rules they deem appropriate. Kickstarter never claimed that any possible piece of content was ok.
• mkr-hn 13y ago
  For those who want to see what this book would have looked like, it's a collection and expansion of the author's posts on /r/seduction: http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/11piau/above_the_game_part_1_primer_on_who_you_will/ http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/11piau/above_the_...
• hosay123 13y ago
  Heh. So enslaving sentient organisms for the purposes of entertainment (cockroach robot app) is classed as a "creative work", while teaching teenagers how to pick up women results in outcry? And no I'm not suggesting some equivalence between women and cockroaches, I'm objecting to their frivolous dismissal of the project on the grounds of it not being a "creative work".
• boldpanda 13y ago
  This book will sell more copies now that it's been banned by Kickstarter. I'm curious how the funding was going before this, I can't imagine it was getting much traction. I quantify this as a paranoid over reaction by Kickstarter, if the post wasn't breaking any of their terms of service.
  • Zelphyr 13y ago
    Agreed and now about a million more people will have heard about this project that otherwise probably wouldn't have. This reminds me a little of when The Last Temptation of Christ came out in the late 80's. All the bible-thumpers were screaming about how blasphemous it was and that everyone should boycot it. Which, of course, people being people they did the exact opposite and had to endure what turned out to be a pretty bad film.
    • kamjam 13y ago
      Also the Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie, which due to the protests, banning by all the Islamic countries, the fatwah on the author and associated press (and this was in the days of before the Internet!)just made the sales go through the roof.
  • Inufu 13y ago
    http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:X5RDu8S9XCAJ:www.kickstarter.com/projects/tofutofu/above-the-game-a-guide-to-getting-awesome-with-wom+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=at http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:X5RDu8S...
  • tbirdz 13y ago
    >I'm curious how the funding was going before this, I can't imagine it was getting much traction. The kickstarter blog post mentions that they couldn't stop the project from receiving funds, so the project must have been fully funded for that to happen. I don't know how much they were asking for, and whether or not they got more funding than they requested, though. EDIT: It seems they made $16,369 pledged of $2,000 goal.
• philliphaydon 13y ago
  I'll probably get down voted for this, but reading through what was written, and based on the fact woman LOVE the book, 50 shades of grey. I'm kind of lost as to why on one side everyones offended, and on the other side its what they desire... Yet get offended.
  • balsam 13y ago
    This book: purportedly gives power to men. 50 shades of grey: describes a powerful man ceding power to a woman. Conclusion: politics brings out the extremes in people.
  • Crake 13y ago
    It's a power differential thing, I think. What's most baffling is that... With feminists: It's ok if women want sex, but not ok for men to want sex. With fundamentalist conservatives: It's ok if men want sex, but not ok for women to want sex.
• VikingCoder 13y ago
  So, were they also wrong to allow Cards Against Humanity?
• Paladiamors 13y ago
  I don't think Kickstarter's response to this incident is incorrect. We're talking about the legitimacy of a single blog post vetoing 686 backers (according to the cached link on the kickstarter post) from what it looks like from the kickstarter post. I don't think that this response was particularly measured: -1) Does it only take a single blog post to have kickstarter ban a project? 1a) Can we be certain that the blog post did not take the passage out of context? 1b) Can they be sure that the seduction manual was intentionally promoting the alleged "sexual violence"? 1c) Was there any reasonable attempt to communicate with the author to address the paragraphs in issue? -2) What number of the kickstarter community reacting negatively to this project? 2a) Was "Sexual violence" the only controversial topic? 2b) Was a specific (kickstarter) clause for violation cited? 2c) Was any law broken because of this project? 3)Can malicious intent be proven? [1] If you actually look at the link to reddit comment link I don't even see conversation that could be taken as people taking this as "sexual violence" and there is even one comment from a female user (derina585) that recommends changing the language and offering advice. This reaction to lynch mob the guy is unwarrented and is somehow legitimized by kickstarter's "apology." I think that we need to take a closer look at the information before jumping to conclusions here.
• jmduke 13y ago
  A lot of comments are getting into the issue of whether or not seduction stuff is appropriate/misogynistic/etc., which I think is missing the point. Kickstarter received a vocal outcry against the material. They responded quickly and fairly to remediate the issue. There are tons of times that a business is pressured/advised to stop doing something when that 'something' isn't strictly illegal or immoral. How they respond to those opportunities defines them going forward. Part of Kickstarter's value proposition now is a certain level of content curation: moving forward, they're much less the 'anything-goes' crowdfunding platform than they used to be. I suspect they're okay with this, given how much they're pushing the social networking aspect of their site (and for good reason -- their stats on how many users went from funding the Veronica Mars or Zach Braff kickstarters to other initiatives were pretty impressive.) Free enterprise, of course, also dictates that now there's a vacuum for a competitor which has less (or no) qualms about stuff like this.
• alan_cx 13y ago
  Just read this thread, and it applies to my newly learned wonder phrase: "Tyranny is the suppression of nuance" Not many people working with the nuance here, are there? Its gotten very black and white , and if you don't agree with one side, you must simply be a sexual predator.
• mkr-hn 13y ago
  I see the same quote about stopping if there's any rejection being repeated endlessly in this thread. Treating consent as a simple yes/no ignores the reality of a culture where women are taught to be quiet and compliant, and where they're punished when they don't go along. In a culture where half the population is treated as subservient objects, it's a good idea to seek explicit consent every time.
  • aeorgnoieang 13y ago
    There is no monolithic "culture" of which all humans are members and of which all women are treated as subservient objects. There are in fact many overlapping cultures throughout humankind and there is a staggering array of diversity among them in all kinds of dimensions.
• doktrin 13y ago
  What a cesspool of a thread. Why is HN consistently at its worst when gender issues are brought up?
• mathattack 13y ago
  I am a fan of "I'm sorry" posts, though they have become frequent enough to become cliche. When they put a $25K donation behind the apology, then it's a lot more than false humility. "Fourth, today Kickstarter will donate $25,000 to an anti-sexual violence organization called RAINN. It’s an excellent organization that combats exactly the sort of problems our inaction may have encouraged." Well done!
  • earh 13y ago
    KS got shaken down by a mob for $25K. Well done by the mafia, indeed.
• deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
• noamsml 13y ago
  This annoys me greatly. Whether or not the book itself was bad, an open platform shouldn't have to apologize for not immediately censoring its users on public outrage. To the contrary, I would have expected an apology if, given the first blush or public outcry, they suspended the account without a proper investigation into it.
• DanielBMarkham 13y ago
  META: I know it's wrong to talk about flagging, but I think it's also important for the community for people to try to bring up good reasons to flag posts. I read the linked article, I skimmed many of these comments, and hell if I got anything useful at all from them. Dating standards and decisions about misogyny and important topics, but they're also highly subjective. We HN'ers could argue until the cows come home and not accomplish a damned thing. In addition, it's highly emotionally-charged. A couple commenters tried to take the conversation towards how a company should act in the face of public outrage. Kudos to you guys. You were drowned out, though. I love talking about controversial topics. Heck, I'll post about the existence of God, the reasons for controlling speech, the relationship between organized religion and societal progress -- I really love good conversations among smart people about important things. But I got none of this here. Just a bunch of people making speeches to themselves. Which looked like it could go on forever without either the writers or readers gaining much insight. I flag not based on the topic, but on the quality of the comments I see around the posting. So I had to flag it. Sorry.
  • Helianthus 13y ago
    Provided HN is going to remove categories of posts, I've always advocated banning gender discussion from HN. It's just not the forum for it, and it's the same circle of discussion you see on r/politics. HN is a "cultivated" free speech zone, which is another way to say it's an arbitrarily censored forum where some legitimately objectionable material is filtered away, some good material is lost through false positives, and we _still_ frequently have garbage content and constantly moan about it because the "cultivated" part is supposed to mean we only see gold. To state plainly what I see in this topic: white men talking about feminism presumptuously. White knighting; "as a man, I..."; mansplaining. They're all terms I hate because they totally box out men from participation, which is destructive and actually its own topic. But they apply here.
    • Crake 13y ago
      >To state plainly what I see in this topic: white men talking about feminism presumptuously. White knighting; "as a man, I..."; mansplaining. But how do you know the person you're talking to is male? Or white? The person might be womansplaining instead of mansplaining for all you know. Are you assuming they must be white and/or male because they disagree with you? If so, is this because you consider opinions held by people of a certain skin color or biological sex to be innately inferior to others? Something to think about.
• king_jester 13y ago
  So many of the comments here are trying to justify this project's content by saying this are things to do when you are with something you've already been dating/wooing. I just want to say that the majority of sexual assaults are perpetrated by someone the victim knows and that ANY kind of intimate contact does not justify further contact that someone has not consented to. Saying otherwise is an attempt to justify rape.
• zedshaw 13y ago
  Wait, I'm going to sidestep the whole book's ultra-crazy content and ask a kind of really obvious logistic question: Why the hell was he doing a kickstarter for a book he could easily publish online for 0 money down and only cost him the time to write it and maybe get a copy editor? The content of this book, and most similar unpopular material, is designed for the internet. That's how 50 Shades of Gray got its start, and there's been underground sex and erotica content for decades online. Doing a kickstarter just seems like a blatant scam or complete laziness, either are an indication that he won't finish the book. So why the hell was he doing a kickstarter? Idiot.
  • Zelphyr 13y ago
    Brilliant actually. Look at all the people talking about his book now.
    • zedshaw 13y ago
      Looked like he already had people talking about it, and this was definitely not planned. It's a stroke of pure luck not genius.
      • Zelphyr 13y ago
        The point I was trying to make is that publicity itself is often the reason projects get put up on Kickstarter. I suspect the author did the Kickstarter project knowing he could effectively publish for free but wanted to generate the buzz that currently comes with having a Kickstarter project. And maybe even to gauge interest. If he wouldn't have been able to raise $2K then it may have been worth dropping the idea altogether. The negative publicity is the stroke of pure luck. Now he'll make even more because of the free publicity the book is getting now.
• bjhoops1 13y ago
  It's really quite remarkable how much good will a simple apology can generate. I wish more individuals and organizations recognized this.
• gfunk911 13y ago
  You start by saying that if you disagree with you you're a misogynist pig, and any discussion of the merits is wrong. Just think about times you've read other people say that, and try and think it over.
• solarmist 13y ago
  I can't believe I haven't seen a single comment about non-verbal communication. No, a girl doesn't want you to ask for a kiss (it comes off as incredibly lacking in self confidence), but she better be touching you, smiling a lot (at you not just in general), laughing at your jokes, playing with her hair and/or many other things that show you she's saying she wants you to go further. Everyone here is talking exclusively about verbal communication, but in courting non-verbal communication is the key context. Women are masters of it, but most men are only barely aware of it and that's where most of the problems in these kinds of materials come from and how well authors teach inept men how to read and respond to body language is what really separates a decent "dating" guide from a misogynistic "how to get charged with sexual assault" guide. The Guide's author is a horrible writer and only makes passing references to reading non-verbal communication, but builds all of his "techniques" upon it. That's why they are all so horrible. If you're chatting with a girl and she's smiling, playing with her hair and glancing down when you make prolonged eye contact you're probably okay to brush against her arm or touch her shoulder or elbow or even if you're bold pick her up and put her in your lap (but that'd force a girl to immediately decide if she likes you or to reject you). In contrast if you're talking at a girl and she answers in the minimum length sentences, won't look at you, and has her arms crossed then touching her in anyway is going to make her want to get the hell away form you. Similarly if you're in your bedroom because she came home with you when you invited her, you've been making out and her shirt is off then opening your pants and putting her hand on your penis probably isn't the smoothest thing, but probably isn't a deal breaker for her at that point either. Again opposed to you sharing a taxi with her and asking her 10 times if you can come up for coffee/tea/drink then once you're inside her place and pulling your penis out, that's probably going to get you thrown out at the very least if not having the cops called on you. This guide focuses exclusively on what the guy should "do" which, without a similar guide on how to know how and when to "do" those things, will lead to bad out comes if not sexual assault. It's written from the perspective of an instruction manual for a video game/passive object (the girl), which is a lot of what misogyny is all about, do A then B then C and you save the princess.
• tomp 13y ago
  A woman has never asked me if I wanted to have sex... Rape? Sexual assault? Come on!
• gregd 13y ago
  Here is an entire quote from one of his passages on a reddit thread: Hi guys. First off, big props to thesacred. I went out with him yesterday and he has tons of game. Looking forward to many scandalous nights with him and others in Tokyo. He skipped the club to go attempt a threesome! Awesome! Anyway, if you've followed my FR's recently, you've probably seen me mention the Physical Push/Pull (PPP) move I've been using. It's basically where you substitute actual physical pushes and pulls for emotional push/pulls, OR combine them with emotional push/pulls for maximum effect. I was field testing it as an OPENER in the club yesterday and my GOD did it work. I highly recommend some of you guys try this out, but it's not for the faint of heart. Example: [see girl on dancefloor or near bar] [approach] [hook her in with your arm] "Aww you're so cute. Come here." [shove her aside HARD, seemingly randomly] [approach someone else and say hi] [Turn around. About 75% of the time she'll be staring at you with a huge grin on her face.] [Walk back over to her.] "You really are so cute, you know that?" [repeat] This is one of those "reality destroyer" openers where girls have NO IDEA what just happened. You can open as many sets as you want throughout the club/bar this way and decide which ones you wanna pursue further at your leisure. I did this yesterday in a dance club. I re-open a girl by walking up, grabbing her, caveman-ing her against the wall & kissing her. Then I cast her aside and get a drink at the bar. The entire time she is staring like "OMG who is this guy?" (in a good way). I come back to her with my drink. "Come on, let's go." I walk her to the corner, escalate kino, smalltalk a bit. Fast forward and guess who is getting a BJ in the dark corner of the club? THIS GUY! Gentlemen, try this out. It's not only extremely effective but it's hilariously fun. Your friends' jaws will hit the floor when they see you pull this off. Go and do likewise, gents. http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/f6ve5/fr_tofutofus_physical_pushpull_as_an_opener_short/ http://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/f6ve5/fr_tofutofu...
• DanBC 13y ago
  I wish there was a moderate MRA group, that wasn't full of hateful idiots.
  • super-serial 13y ago
    Go to Japan. Gender roles are ingrained into the culture and women are naturally feminine. A lot of MRA groups seem to fight the hate with more hate... maybe these guys just need a change of scenery.
    • diyang 13y ago
      What do you mean by "naturally feminine"?
• benblack 13y ago
  I made a shirt for all you guys who think the rape, erm, PICK UP ARTISTE, book is totes cool and nbd http://www.cafepress.com/mf/79293678/i-am-rape-culture_tshirt http://www.cafepress.com/mf/79293678/i-am-rape-culture_tshir...