Maria Toorpakai Wazir is a star squash player with a promising international career. Born in Waziristan, a highly conservative region of Pakistan, she had to disguise herself as a boy when she took up the sport - and later received ominous threats for playing in shorts.
“I am a warrior, I was born a warrior, I will die like a warrior.”
This comic accurately sums up my feelings towards those who complain about The Hawkeye Initiative.
I’ve seen my share of “fake geek girl” shaming, and just thought having a Fairy Gamer Momma to come to the rescue would be nice. I know they exist, I’ve met plenty who are amazing and could beat my ass at any version of Mario Kart. Give the Gamer Momma in your life a big hug! :D
ugh…if only this didn’t include threats and physical bullying (assault).
Anita Sarkeesian at TEDxWomen 2012 (by TEDxTalks)
I’m sharing this because This is Thin Privilege has also been attacked by waves of trolls (or what I call trollwaves) who coordinate on Reddit threads and 4chan forums (the largely unmoderated fora she talks about in the video).
Tumblr is a great space for activism because it allows me to deal with trolls on several different levels of moderation and blocking. I suggest checking out my block/report list for users you should block/report if you plan on reading the notes of the posts from This is Thin Privilege.
The kinds of comments I get — mostly Disqus that never see the light of day, though also in the reblogs — have likened me to both Hitler and Stalin, suggested that I need to be shot multiple times, said that I’m a terrible example to young girls and that people like me are destroying the planet by virtue of our existence. I get 10 comments like this a day, more when a post from This is Thin Privilege is picked up by a Reddit thread, on 4chan, or skinnygossip. Just like my hobby of sorts is activism, the hobby of these people is hating other people online. They encourage and cookie each other, just as it’s described in the video, with social merit badges for particularly heinous comments, especially if those comments get the right kind of play (which is why we say not to feed the trolls).
But these hate campaigns don’t always have a sad ending. Sarkeesian raised 5x what she set out for in her Kickstarter, largely due to the visibility she garnered being the center of such a large attack. No one should have to go through what she went through, but I’m very glad she capitalized on it.
Ada Blackjack aboard her rescue ship, 1923.
In 1921, 23 year old Alaska Native Ada Blackjack joined an expedition to Wrangel Island north of Siberia as a cook and seamstress. Ada and four men chosen for their expertise in science and geography survived on the island for over a year before rations ran out. At that point, three men tried to cross the frozen Chukchi Sea for food while Ada and Lorne Knight, an ailing member of the group, stayed behind. Lorne died in April 1923. Ada was rescued in August 1923. The three men who left to seek help were never heard from again. Ada lived to age 85, living a quiet life and raising two sons.
The photo above was found on Jennifer Niven’s webpage. She is the author of Ada BlackJack: A True Story of Survival in the Arctic, the digital edition of which is current $3.03 on Amazon.
Free birth control causes U.S. abortion rates to plummet
Free birth control could prevent 1,060,370 unplanned pregnancies and 873,250 abortions a year in the U.S., according to a study.AND IN OTHER NEWS WATER IS WET
don’t be too clingy
don’t be such a ‘girl’
be a woman
but be hairless like a child
don’t wear skimpy outfits
don’t be such a ‘slut’
be modest
but take it off when i ask
don’t assert yourself
don’t be such a ‘bitch’
be nice to me
but don’t be a fucking doormat
don’t be ignorant
don’t be such a ‘bimbo’
be intelligent
but don’t argue your opinion with me
don’t wear make-up ever
don’t be so ‘insecure’
be yourself
but don’t complain if i don’t like it
(Source: tamamuratamao)
Pornography has a self imposed system of keeping ourselves as safe as possible while supplying the type of product that consumers demand. “Bizarre as the ritual is, it seems to work.”
The tests that we voluntarily use are expensive. Because so many performers test so…
In French, it simply means a summary,
which limits what it can and can’t convey
despite my padding and hyperbole.
No room to cite the winter night I lay
inside an ambulance (my friend was dead),
they strapped me down, the flares lit up the snow.
No place to say how…
