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I'm kind of torn... I've lost a child to SIDS, but I would not tell people that they can't make dead baby jokes at risk of revictimizing me. So many people have

by mpyne 13y ago

I'm kind of torn... I've lost a child to SIDS, but I would not tell people that they can't make dead baby jokes at risk of revictimizing me. So many people have a pain point of some sort in their lives that if we go down that route there will be nothing left but PC-compatible sayings perfectly fit for a poster in corporate America. But at the same time the reaction to the controversy around the comic has been all types of screwed up by Gabe. Right or wrong, people have made it clear that the dickwolves thing makes them feel physically uneasy (at best). Whether it's right for people to feel that way is basically immaterial by this point; the argument was lost long ago, and Gabe is chasing after a train that is long departed. So while I don't doubt that Gabe (and Tycho) do not literally support people being raped, they have been told in no uncertain terms that is how many people perceive support for "Dickwolves". Any further push for 'free speech' there must come as a package with instilling a culture of rape... again, even if that's not how they mean for it to be perceived, that doesn't change the reality of how it is being perceived. I empathize with Gabe's greater point, but the fact is that he needs to start choosing different battles if he wants to win this 'war'. This particular battle was lost long ago.

mbreese 13y ago
I think that you're right that the real controversy wasn't over the comic, but rather his reaction to it. After reading the original strip (embedded in the article), I wasn't offended, and thought that it made a particularly good point about the screwed up ethics of quests. But, even though I wasn't offended, I could see how others might be and might want to express that. But then instead of simply explaining what the point of the strip was, and leaving it alone, he went off and made a big deal of it and tried to play the victim. That's where he is clearly in the wrong. He needs to listen to people who are telling him to stop talking about it. He lost, move on.
kazagistar 13y ago
> Any further push for 'free speech' there must come as a package with instilling a culture of rape... again, even if that's not how they mean for it to be perceived, that doesn't change the reality of how it is being perceived. Instilling implies a real effect, not just a perception of intent. In other words, culture must become measurable more pro rape as a result for there to be real harm. I haven't seen the evidence of this anywhere: the only effect it has had as far as I can see is people who are against mentioning rape at all getting angry about their perception of it (not changing anything).
- pemulis 13y ago
  Would adding up the number of rape threats directed against his critics count as a measurement?
  - bryze 13y ago
    Should public figures be held responsible for the actions of their fanatics?
    - danielweber 13y ago
      If they are on the Other Side from me, yes.
    - Aloisius 13y ago
      If a substantial number of your fans are sociopaths, then you should probably do something about it.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Should Obama be held responsible for the actions of his Naval officers if he declares we should pursue missile strikes in Syria? I mean, saying something and then your fans going overboard is one thing. But everytime 'dickwolves' gets mentioned the fanatics pull out the big guns again... maybe at some point Gabe and Tycho should anticipate that women out there will be the target of those same fanatics if they push the D.W. button again?
      - jlgreco 13y ago
        I'm not convinced that we can map the ethics used with situations involving the military chain of command to situations involving informal mobs. Now, we still have concepts like "inciting imminent lawless action" that are fairly non-controversial, so clearly there is at least some sense of blaming people who tell others to go make a mess, but I don't think that is nearly as clear-cut as your example.
      - danielweber 13y ago
anigbrowl 13y ago
I'm kind of torn... I've lost a child to SIDS, but I would not tell people that they can't make dead baby jokes at risk of revictimizing me. Sorry to hear that. A key difference there is that SIDS is a medical problem whose incidence is unaffected by whether people make jokes about it or not. Rape (and sexual assault in general) is a crime whose perpetrators may feel more emboldened to act if there's an atmosphere of amused tolerance around it. And unfortunately, there are a lot of people who behave poorly when in a crowd and try to excuse their poor behavior by saying it's just meant in a spirit of fun. I wholly agree that the original comic was mildly but unintentionally offensive, but making a sticking point out of it and repeatedly reviving the issue comes off as little better than trolling.
mynewwork 13y ago
So, did anyone actually read the comic? A slave is pleading to be rescued, and brings up that in addition to being a SLAVE he also gets raped. There is nothing 'supporting rape' in the comic or the joke. Rape is used because it's literally the worst possible thing, that if even being a slave wasn't enough to make the hero care, maybe that would. The joke is "The hero only cares about his quest, not the suffering of the victims". Slavery and rape were used because they were the two worst possible things the victims could be suffering from. How does anyone go from that to suggesting the artist is supporting rape?
- dfxm12 13y ago
  If you think this is about the comic itself, then you should get brought up to speed on the issue. It's this type of shortsightedness/inattention to detail/poor logic that sent the author down this path of scorched earth bullying. >How does anyone go from that to suggesting the artist is supporting rape? What are you referring to when you say that? The comic? Again, people on the other side of this issue are no longer talking about the comic. This is about the author's bullying and mobilizing others to bully victims & people sympathetic to victims that their opinions don't matter. It's about people in a position of power who would rather abuse that power than try to make something good come from it. It's about turning a deaf ear to decency & tact in the name of stubbornness (and monetizing bullying). Also, from the article: @Teamrape wrote, “And remember, since @cwgabriel [Krahulik] will wear his dickwolves shirt, it’s okay to wear yours. We will show those that want to crush free speech" That's from @teamrape, not @teamfreespeech. What's the issue here again?
- wonderzombie 13y ago
  Anti-pattern: individuals determining what is and isn't offensive to large, non-uniform groups of people. I get that you posed this as a question, but if you think that people who find it offensive are just humorless and don't get the joke, you're just doing a variation on the aforementioned.
- mpyne 13y ago
  I read the comic. I thought it was funny enough at the time. I didn't think it had anything to do with trying to make rape itself sound funny. It was an over-the-top gag poking fun at the weird ethics of WoW-type games, Mission Accomplished. But the comic isn't really the point anymore, and even the detractors don't seem to be focusing on the comic as much as on the reaction to the criticism by Gabe and others at PAX. At this point the reaction is basically telling people they shouldn't feel the way they do. But I'll bet most of those people really, really wished they didn't feel the way they do, that if they could flip a switch and just see past all of it that they would. They've at least been fair about telling Gabe this too. Whatever else Gabe thought about how people would interpret not just the comic, but the shirts and jokes and etc. around the comic, that's not how they actually are interpreting that. Given that he knows that and does it anyways, you have to ask what he's really trying to accomplish. I think of it as a different type of dog whistle. Gabe blows on it and doesn't hear much, but there are people who hear fingernails on a chalkboard. And they are telling him that, and begging with him to stop, and then he goes selling shirts with a dog whistle on it. WTF?
gcb0 13y ago
> I'm kind of torn then, to put you at easy: 1. "making the joke": they did not even made a joke! they did made the joke several times in the past with the fruit fucker, raping oranges. nobody cared. In this particular comic, rape is described as, well, rape. A very bad thing, mentioned from the victim as 'hell'. so, no joke was made about rape. period. 2. "the response": it was never a response to rape victims. It was a fuck-you to people that monetize on rape victims and all other society victims for government and charity money. They were the ones creating the noise. They are the disease. They deserve a fuck-you.
wonderzombie 13y ago
Mm, not really sure rape is a great hill to make your stand on when it comes to freedom of speech in America. It's not like there's legislation prohibiting same, much as nakedly racist language is still legal. It's just socially unacceptable because a large class of people find it offensive. So, again, rape seems like a really poor area to draw a line in the sand. There's a vast chasm between a pain point like "I broke my leg" and "my ex physically coerced me into having sex." Remember, people aren't upset about the mere mention of rape, but jokes that trivialize it. As far as re-victimizing you, well, that's your choice to make. I don't think an individual ought to generalize their own experience to everyone else's, whether they're a victim or not. Some rape victims may have reached a point where they're fine with jokes about it, and some aren't. I'll bet you could find a number of people with similar experiences to your own who would not be comfortable with that flavor of humor.

by mpyne 13y ago

mbreese 13y ago

I think that you're right that the real controversy wasn't over the comic, but rather his reaction to it. After reading the original strip (embedded in the article), I wasn't offended, and thought that it made a particularly good point about the screwed up ethics of quests. But, even though I wasn't offended, I could see how others might be and might want to express that. But then instead of simply explaining what the point of the strip was, and leaving it alone, he went off and made a big deal of it and tried to play the victim. That's where he is clearly in the wrong. He needs to listen to people who are telling him to stop talking about it. He lost, move on.

kazagistar 13y ago

> Any further push for 'free speech' there must come as a package with instilling a culture of rape... again, even if that's not how they mean for it to be perceived, that doesn't change the reality of how it is being perceived. Instilling implies a real effect, not just a perception of intent. In other words, culture must become measurable more pro rape as a result for there to be real harm. I haven't seen the evidence of this anywhere: the only effect it has had as far as I can see is people who are against mentioning rape at all getting angry about their perception of it (not changing anything).

pemulis 13y ago
Would adding up the number of rape threats directed against his critics count as a measurement?
- bryze 13y ago
  Should public figures be held responsible for the actions of their fanatics?
  - danielweber 13y ago
    If they are on the Other Side from me, yes.
  - Aloisius 13y ago
    If a substantial number of your fans are sociopaths, then you should probably do something about it.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Should Obama be held responsible for the actions of his Naval officers if he declares we should pursue missile strikes in Syria? I mean, saying something and then your fans going overboard is one thing. But everytime 'dickwolves' gets mentioned the fanatics pull out the big guns again... maybe at some point Gabe and Tycho should anticipate that women out there will be the target of those same fanatics if they push the D.W. button again?
    - jlgreco 13y ago
      I'm not convinced that we can map the ethics used with situations involving the military chain of command to situations involving informal mobs. Now, we still have concepts like "inciting imminent lawless action" that are fairly non-controversial, so clearly there is at least some sense of blaming people who tell others to go make a mess, but I don't think that is nearly as clear-cut as your example.
    - danielweber 13y ago

anigbrowl 13y ago

I'm kind of torn... I've lost a child to SIDS, but I would not tell people that they can't make dead baby jokes at risk of revictimizing me. Sorry to hear that. A key difference there is that SIDS is a medical problem whose incidence is unaffected by whether people make jokes about it or not. Rape (and sexual assault in general) is a crime whose perpetrators may feel more emboldened to act if there's an atmosphere of amused tolerance around it. And unfortunately, there are a lot of people who behave poorly when in a crowd and try to excuse their poor behavior by saying it's just meant in a spirit of fun. I wholly agree that the original comic was mildly but unintentionally offensive, but making a sticking point out of it and repeatedly reviving the issue comes off as little better than trolling.

mynewwork 13y ago

So, did anyone actually read the comic? A slave is pleading to be rescued, and brings up that in addition to being a SLAVE he also gets raped. There is nothing 'supporting rape' in the comic or the joke. Rape is used because it's literally the worst possible thing, that if even being a slave wasn't enough to make the hero care, maybe that would. The joke is "The hero only cares about his quest, not the suffering of the victims". Slavery and rape were used because they were the two worst possible things the victims could be suffering from. How does anyone go from that to suggesting the artist is supporting rape?

dfxm12 13y ago
If you think this is about the comic itself, then you should get brought up to speed on the issue. It's this type of shortsightedness/inattention to detail/poor logic that sent the author down this path of scorched earth bullying. >How does anyone go from that to suggesting the artist is supporting rape? What are you referring to when you say that? The comic? Again, people on the other side of this issue are no longer talking about the comic. This is about the author's bullying and mobilizing others to bully victims & people sympathetic to victims that their opinions don't matter. It's about people in a position of power who would rather abuse that power than try to make something good come from it. It's about turning a deaf ear to decency & tact in the name of stubbornness (and monetizing bullying). Also, from the article: @Teamrape wrote, “And remember, since @cwgabriel [Krahulik] will wear his dickwolves shirt, it’s okay to wear yours. We will show those that want to crush free speech" That's from @teamrape, not @teamfreespeech. What's the issue here again?
wonderzombie 13y ago
Anti-pattern: individuals determining what is and isn't offensive to large, non-uniform groups of people. I get that you posed this as a question, but if you think that people who find it offensive are just humorless and don't get the joke, you're just doing a variation on the aforementioned.
mpyne 13y ago
I read the comic. I thought it was funny enough at the time. I didn't think it had anything to do with trying to make rape itself sound funny. It was an over-the-top gag poking fun at the weird ethics of WoW-type games, Mission Accomplished. But the comic isn't really the point anymore, and even the detractors don't seem to be focusing on the comic as much as on the reaction to the criticism by Gabe and others at PAX. At this point the reaction is basically telling people they shouldn't feel the way they do. But I'll bet most of those people really, really wished they didn't feel the way they do, that if they could flip a switch and just see past all of it that they would. They've at least been fair about telling Gabe this too. Whatever else Gabe thought about how people would interpret not just the comic, but the shirts and jokes and etc. around the comic, that's not how they actually are interpreting that. Given that he knows that and does it anyways, you have to ask what he's really trying to accomplish. I think of it as a different type of dog whistle. Gabe blows on it and doesn't hear much, but there are people who hear fingernails on a chalkboard. And they are telling him that, and begging with him to stop, and then he goes selling shirts with a dog whistle on it. WTF?

gcb0 13y ago

> I'm kind of torn then, to put you at easy: 1. "making the joke": they did not even made a joke! they did made the joke several times in the past with the fruit fucker, raping oranges. nobody cared. In this particular comic, rape is described as, well, rape. A very bad thing, mentioned from the victim as 'hell'. so, no joke was made about rape. period. 2. "the response": it was never a response to rape victims. It was a fuck-you to people that monetize on rape victims and all other society victims for government and charity money. They were the ones creating the noise. They are the disease. They deserve a fuck-you.

wonderzombie 13y ago

Mm, not really sure rape is a great hill to make your stand on when it comes to freedom of speech in America. It's not like there's legislation prohibiting same, much as nakedly racist language is still legal. It's just socially unacceptable because a large class of people find it offensive. So, again, rape seems like a really poor area to draw a line in the sand. There's a vast chasm between a pain point like "I broke my leg" and "my ex physically coerced me into having sex." Remember, people aren't upset about the mere mention of rape, but jokes that trivialize it. As far as re-victimizing you, well, that's your choice to make. I don't think an individual ought to generalize their own experience to everyone else's, whether they're a victim or not. Some rape victims may have reached a point where they're fine with jokes about it, and some aren't. I'll bet you could find a number of people with similar experiences to your own who would not be comfortable with that flavor of humor.