At this point, I'm almost completely convinced that if I were to attend a major video game
event, literally any event... whether it be E3, PAX, CES, or even their relevance-challenged
brethren the Tokyo Game Show... that by simply walking into a group of random nerds... and
loudly shouting the name 'Sarkeesian'...
I could instantaneously spawn a riot that would make Rodney King reflexively shit his
pants.
5 years ago, this chick wouldn't have taken up space in the comments section of a gaming
news article, let alone the body text, and yet in 2014, thanks to sites like Kotaku lending
this woman appalling quantities of unwarranted relevance...
she's inexplicably become the cause celebre of entirely too many gamers and self-appointed
social activists.
I don't even think this rant needs to be about feminism.
So it won't be.
Because the issue isn't feminism any longer.
And that's perhaps Anita Sarkeesian's greatest sin: So abhorrently slipshod has been her
research...
so unfathomably inarticulate has been her 'message'... that the question is no longer
even 'are video games sexist?'
Which for the record, I believe is a topic that warrants exploration and analysis.
But no.
The question now is 'how is this being remotely construed as journalism'?
And let's not gloss over that sin.
It's major.
There are people - most of whom with which I vehemently disagree, for the record - but
good people... who have devoted their entire adult lives to the principle of advancing
the feminist cause through the delicate waltz of activism, and debate informed by a deeply-held
personal conviction.
Which is why, when a half-wit slattern sock-puppet like Anita Sarkeesian jetés across the dance
floor, break-dancing to fuckin' Chopin, everyone gets up in arms.
Often without expressly knowing why.
And let's not be obtuse, here.
The simple fact is: In the same way that a broken clock is right twice per day, the woman
occasionally has a valid fucking point.
Was, for example, Lara Croft founded on an idea of objectifying a completely one-note
female protagonist long enough to sell 13-year-old boys on a by-the-numbers 3D adventure game?
No.
She wasn't.
That's why Crystal Dynamics invested hundreds of thousands of dollars rounding off jaggy,
PS1 polygons in an effort to make Lara's breasts MORE ROUND in Tomb Raider 3!
Of course there's sexism in video games.
Of course it exploitative.
It just isn't everywhere in video games.
And this only deepens Anita Sarkeesian's earth-rending ignorance.
Equipped with only the most superficial pseudo-facts, and the most cursory understanding of the
subject in question, the woman fumbles her way through a poorly-worded, mal-researched
parody of journalism...
her incompetence ultimately serving only to swell the size of her eternally growing chorus
of detractors, and supporters, each one more informed by knee-jerk prejudice than the last.
And as both grow, so too does the chiclet-brained feedback loop of her own undeserved importance.
And yes.
It's absolutely true that elements of the woman's detractorship comprise something a
hivemind.
Actually, it isn't true, because the word 'hivemind' implies that many of these pants-shitting
imbecilia on 4chan actually possess a fucking mind.
But for every one of the witless mob that dons their pitchfork / torch / bib-overalls
ensemble at the merest utterance of the surname 'Sarkeesian'... there's an equally knee-jerk
cavalry of self-styled white-knights leaping to the defense of a damsel in distress...
who has nothing but contempt for the very concept... of a 'damsel in distress'.
The result is a cavernous divide the size and scope of which we haven't seen since...
Jonah Hill last publicly yawned.
The imperative, from my perspective, is simple: That everyone - supporters and opponents of
feminism alike - must come to understand that regardless of where we may individually fall
on a given issue...
Anita Sarkeesian... must go the fuck away.
At her absolute best, she's a hapless and inarticulate spokeswoman of ideas much larger
than her narrow field of both intellect and expertise will allow.
If you want to argue that the woman is unwittingly calling attention to larger issues, I can
readily concede that fact... but I'd add that every time she stumbles through yet another
half-wit harangue on Feminist Frequency...
she also mischaracterizes and misrepresents your entire movement.
Feminists should want Anita Sarkeesian to take the red-eye out of this debate for the
same reason Universal Healthcare advocates should oppose Obamacare.
Because it's such a chest-slapping, hamfisted perversion of the concept's original intent...
being marketed and sold by a spokesperson with motherfuckin' hamstrings of clay... that
allowing it to persist within the debate will only do further damage to the very people
who put it forward to begin with.
I'm RazörFist.
Godspeed!