I get what you're saying... but I think you're getting downvoted because it's dangerously close to victim-blaming. No matter what they wrote, nobody ever deserves graphic threats of rape and murder.
And, c'mon, by your definition pretty much anyone with an internet presence and an opinion is a public figure, and therefore a "target." I don't think that's a helpful way to approach the problem.
>>In the area of competitive sports, it is pretty common to receive death threats for athletes who do not perform well.
You are making this comparison because you haven't fully thought things through. In your mind, death is worse than rape, therefore receiving death threats is worse than receiving rape threats. But it's not so simple.
Rape threats are significantly worse than death threats, for a similar reason that killing children is worse than killing adults. Women are a vulnerable group in society -- they are smaller and physically weaker than men on average, and are socially oppressed on top of that. If both rape threats and death threats are an attempt at exerting power (with no intention of actually carrying through with the threat), then rape threat is a lot worse because it exploits a vulnerable group in the most mentally damaging way possible.
Funny, for most things that you wrote, one could say the exact opposite, with equivalent validity.
> You are making this comparison because you haven't fully thought things through. In your mind, death is worse than rape, but it doesn't automatically follow that receiving death threats is worse than receiving rape threats. But it's not so simple.
> Death threats are significantly worse than rape threats, for a similar reason that killing children is worse than killing adults (a child has a longer life and more choices to make than an adult, so killing a child is more choice-reducing than killing an adult - just as killing is more choice-reducing than raping). Men are a vulnerable group in society -- they are physically stronger than women on average and therefore work more dangerous jobs, and commit more suicides and die sooner on top of that. If both rape threats and death threats are an attempt at exerting power (with no intention of actually carrying through with the threat), then a death threat is a lot worse because it exploits a vulnerable group in the most mentally damaging way possible.
You seem to be missing the important part, where we are comparing death threats made against adult male sports players and rape threats made against women.
Death threats against players are made as a way of voicing displeasure with the player's performance or the result of the game. The intent is to air frustration. Since competitive sports themselves are a way of bringing out the human primal side, being the target of threats or other displays of hostility is perceived and treated as part of the culture (even though it still sucks).
Rape threats against females are made as a way of mentally and emotionally damaging them. The intent is to harm, oppress and silence. This alone makes them way worse than death threats made against players, because women are targeted specifically due to their perceived weakness and inferiority.
P.S. I'm very disappointed by the down-votes. If people are disagreeing with what I'm saying then the situation is much more hopeless than the anecdotes in the article suggest.
> Death threats against players are made as a way of voicing displeasure with the player's performance or the result of the game. The intent is to air frustration. Since competitive sports themselves are a way of bringing out the human primal side, being the target of threats or other displays of hostility is perceived and treated as part of the culture (even though it still sucks).
You could easily say the same thing about violence/death/rape threats against people writing opinion pieces online (which is what this conversation is about):
"Making threats when you disagree strongly with someone is perceived and treated as part of the culture (though it still sucks)".
> Rape threats against females are made as a way of mentally and emotionally damaging them.
I don't see how you can credibly conclude that when it happens to a sports player, "it happens all the time so it's nbd even though it sucks", but when it happens to an online writer who happens to be female, it's a much higher level of significance and is intended to mentally/emotionally damage them. I'm pretty sure that's the purpose of all violent threats? Seriously, how would one make a violent threat to anyone without expecting that it may mentally or emotionally damage them?
> women are targeted specifically due to their perceived weakness and inferiority.
This has to be a joke. Google "death threats twitter" and you'll see a billion examples of every person under the sun who's inspired ire on a large scale (for whatever reason). For fuck's sake the creator of FLAPPY BIRD got death threats. I think this whole culture of "take every Twitter loon's vioent threat as if it may be serious" is a good one in the name of prudence, but it's disgustingly hypocritical when people turn around and go "oh except for threatened sports figures, and except for threatened X and threatened Y, those are crappy but not that big a deal".
> I'm very disappointed by the down-votes. If people are disagreeing with what I'm saying then the situation is much more hopeless than the anecdotes in the article suggest.
You think the situation is hopeless because people don't agree with your very specific, intricately constructed apologia of death threats against public figures in sports?
How many people would be offended at the statement "white people can't see the colour purple"? Very few, I'd imagine, because it's patently ridiculous.
If you imply that women are inferior though, the statement has to be vigorously opposed. Imply that feminism isn't necessary, and the tumblr and twitter brigades will come out to shame and silence you, until you agree that women have it harder.
It's absurd behaviour for a group of people who supposedly believe women are equally capable as men. Once you figure this out, feminism makes a lot more sense. When they can blame men, they blame men. When fairness requires them to blame women, they blame 'society'.
Perhaps people are disagreeing with you because you are the worst kind of sexist - the kind who thinks their sexism is justified because women have special needs.
I don't think I agree with your premise, but even if I did... what's the point you're trying to make? That women would be safer if they never voice an opinion?
I'm guessing they're saying that "women working in the industry don't get rape threats for working in the industry. Women who do get rape threats are women with twitter accounts"
Maybe that's true (I don't think so), but like you said so what? It doesn't make it any better.
One thing that's often missed is that it's not only men making the death and rape threats - one of the people jailed for threats against Caroline Criadoperez was a woman. It'd be interesting to see what portion of the "troll"[1] population is women.
as an anonymous woman in tech, I guess what he is trying to say that women need to stop thinking that all the unfairness in the tech world is directed to them. Men suffer too. Yes, women mostly suffer because they are women and because stereotypes suck. But that doesn't mean that women should be segregated as a group that is the only victim of harassment.
Hopefully you don't mind me responding here. I appreciate your attempt to understand what I was saying but I was only saying that the experience of an anonymous woman in tech is going to be different from the experience of a public writer on the Internets, when it comes to abusive language.
It's just like any other IT guy's day. Go to work, do your job, fuck up a bit, say sorry, give others a hard time when they fuck up :P But seriously, no difference apart from the fact that I can see men at work are very cautious around me as far as cracking jokes is concerned. But I can't really blame them with all these sexual harassment out of nothing stories floating around everywhere now, can I?
It's all in the delivery. But yours is pretty much the experience I have seen from the outside: anonymous tech female worker is NOT receiving rape/death threats on a daily basis from co-workers or customers.
I'm glad your life is as uninteresting as the regular IT guy ;)
Nope. I'm saying no one is free from this sort of behaviour when they put themselves in the public eye. Look at sports-related tweets after a big loss.
Simply having a Tumblr account you post thoughts to is being "in the public eye"? If so, then that category must include nearly everyone who works in tech.
Sorry, that slipped my mind. I thought it was a Reddit post. In any case, it wasn't a random Tumblr blog, it was reblogged by someone who has been the target of online hate because of whatever reason. Hate transfers onto associates.
And, c'mon, by your definition pretty much anyone with an internet presence and an opinion is a public figure, and therefore a "target." I don't think that's a helpful way to approach the problem.