The problem with men

This has been an unpleasant week; by which I mean I have been reminded many times that for women, every week is an unpleasant week. All this came across my screen.

The dark side of Guardian comments
“New research into our own comment threads provides the first quantitative evidence for what female journalists have long suspected: that articles written by women attract more abuse and dismissive trolling than those written by men, regardless of what the article is about.”

The women abandoned to their online abusers
On the internet, if I ever complain and say; ‘This has happened, I’m sick of it’, people say; ‘You’re on the internet, what do you expect?’
“There’s no support for women at all, from the police or anyone else.”

This horrifying and newly trendy online harasment tactic is ruining careers
“Both 8chan and Kotaku in Action regularly crowdsource research into the histories of private individuals who’ve done little more than post about feminism on social media.”

I will come forward
How a prominent New Zealand music identity conducted a troubling series of relationships with young women, including girls as young as 12.

Tabletop Gaming has a White Male Terrorism Problem
“I know that if I speak out against the abuses myself and my friends have suffered as a result of our participation in the “friendly gaming community” I can expect to be silenced with extreme prejudice.”

But at least there was also, in response to that last one:

For good men to see nothing
I have a list of things you can do.

Ruminator: Rape & NZ culture

I expanded the first chunk of that last post into a longer piece for the Ruminator: Rape is easy here.

It’s another example of how I’m using the existence of the Ruminator as a prompt and motivator for a different style of writing, with a different set of goals. (e.g. I write here often for myself, whereas there I often write to whatever audience I imagine.) I’m very pleased to be a contributor to the Ruminator and intend to keep sending them content.

The Ruminator is also fundraising. In theory “pay our writers” is part of the goal but I’ll just be happy if it covers the ongoing costs of hosting and registration. If you like what the Ruminator is doing, you might want to send a few virtual coins its way…