The R Word
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I was deeply moved by this, truly.
When I finished reading and reflected, though, I thought of that legendary line from Shakespeare "What's in a name?" Sure, you touched on the point that the definition of words change over time, but the fact of the matter is is that the word "rape" isn't used in malice or cruelty or intentionally used to cause upset. The only reason it causes upset is that those who immediately correlate the word with their own horrific experiences -- like yourself. Indeed, I'd say that although some gamers could use some soap in their mouths, conflating words (abstract concepts, on their own) with experiences may very well lead to difficulty in any element of life.
Trivialising rape is bad, of course. But using the word rape in a completely different context as many gamers do shouldn't attract as much upset. I remember something Charlie Chaplain once said: "Laughter is the tonic, the relief, the surcease for pain." If we let concepts and ideas hurt us so, we truly give in to them. We must laugh at them, ultimately. In a sense, gamers have come to embody this; in the face of every atrocity and tragedy, the general reaction is to laugh at it in some new and creative way in defiance of sadness and shock.
My interpretation, anyway. I know, I'm a psuedo-intellectual fuck.
When I finished reading and reflected, though, I thought of that legendary line from Shakespeare "What's in a name?" Sure, you touched on the point that the definition of words change over time, but the fact of the matter is is that the word "rape" isn't used in malice or cruelty or intentionally used to cause upset. The only reason it causes upset is that those who immediately correlate the word with their own horrific experiences -- like yourself. Indeed, I'd say that although some gamers could use some soap in their mouths, conflating words (abstract concepts, on their own) with experiences may very well lead to difficulty in any element of life.
Trivialising rape is bad, of course. But using the word rape in a completely different context as many gamers do shouldn't attract as much upset. I remember something Charlie Chaplain once said: "Laughter is the tonic, the relief, the surcease for pain." If we let concepts and ideas hurt us so, we truly give in to them. We must laugh at them, ultimately. In a sense, gamers have come to embody this; in the face of every atrocity and tragedy, the general reaction is to laugh at it in some new and creative way in defiance of sadness and shock.
My interpretation, anyway. I know, I'm a psuedo-intellectual fuck.
^^^^^ That may be all well and good, but, like reclaiming racial epithets, that is not your call to make
Edit: For the rape culture guy, check out http://oforganon.tumblr.com/post/11150747104/to-all-those-men-who-dont-think-the-rape-jokes-are-a it's just one example, but its pretty sharp.
I wouldn't threaten to stab someone in jest if they'd been stabbed. I would do it to a friend who hadn't been stabbed, maybe wave a pen around like a knife and make comically exaggerated stabbing gestures. It's about context, knowing your audience, and the severity/liklihood of triggering them.Iron Lightning said:
Edit: For the rape culture guy, check out http://oforganon.tumblr.com/post/11150747104/to-all-those-men-who-dont-think-the-rape-jokes-are-a it's just one example, but its pretty sharp.
Well I can't speak for "people" but it's not what I do. I'll generally talk about anything unless I know that it's a sensitive issue for who I'm talking to and when I say that I literally mean the people I'm talking to. I'm not going to worry about the random strangers standing around me within earshot, the people who walk by me, the people who are in the queue in front of me or behind me and most certainly not the other people in an online game I'm playing.upgray3dd said:
Healing, you say. Mr. Anonymous here doesn't believe he can heal. He thinks he'll always be this way as evidenced by this paragraph:itsthesheppy said:
Clearly, he does not think that he can heal. This means that, by his own admission, however he's been trying to heal has not worked at all. Considering that his method of healing is based on avoidance and repression, this is not surprising. People don't always know how to heal themselves perfectly. If they did then there would be no use for psychologists. Someone who doesn't think they can heal shouldn't be left to their own devices to heal because it won't work.Anonymous said:
Also, I'm not doing anything that could be described as barging into Anonymous' room. All I'm doing is posting a comment on his thread that he probably won't even read. Also, sometimes you have to use slightly harsh language to get through to people.
Was I being rude? Yes, I certainly was. Sometimes that's the only way that works, though.
I've been reading articles and watching videos on the escapist for a long time. I've never registered because I never felt a desire to comment or anything. But now's a little different. What you wrote is really powerful and what it must have taken to write it... I know it had to be rough.
I went through a trauma that was very similar and very different when I was little. It was a family member. Someone I loved and respected at the time. And when it happened I didn't know what to do. Years and years went by and I never said anything. He passed away even and still I didn't speak up. I didn't want it to be real. I had this image of this person and everyone in my family adored him too, and then that happened and. I don't know. I couldn't break that image.
My fiance is a victim too. I never knew until I went to a family reunion with her and she saw one of her attackers making nice with the rest of the family. He said hi to her and gave her a hug. And then she apologized for not feeling too well and asked me to take her home. She was shaking the whole ride back. And then we shared these secrets we just couldn't tell anyone else.
But beyond the events I'm not sure the ripples really effected our lives. We continued as if nothing ever happened. In fact I saw Jimquisition earlier in the day and I actually couldn't see the big deal. I felt like, as someone who's been there and moved on, I could see something like rape in a game and not have it hurt me. My fiance and I have been talking about it since the tomb raider controversy started and we kind of thought it was silly. But then I read this article.
I think a thing like this, like anything really, can affect people in wildly different ways. My fiance has no problems with intimacy or lingering issues resulting from the attack. I too don't have them. It always felt to me like old wounds. I never felt psychically crippled. But what you said about triggers. That kind of scares me I guess. I haven't come by one, but she has a few times. For her it's people who resemble her attackers and this one kind of car. She's fine all the time, but then she see's something like that and it takes her back to that place for a stomach churning instant. I've never had to "relive" what happened to me. Even now I'm pretty cold and methodical about the whole thing. But the thought of having to revisit those old feelings, the sadness and betrayal, the guilt and the fear, the doubt. That bothers me and makes me uncomfortable even writing this.
I suppose I want to thank you? For opening my eyes at least. Maybe for me or her or a person who's never had to live through that a rape scene doesn't mean much. But if it could throw other people back into that place in their mind, that's terrible. And really I never considered it before reading this.
I went through a trauma that was very similar and very different when I was little. It was a family member. Someone I loved and respected at the time. And when it happened I didn't know what to do. Years and years went by and I never said anything. He passed away even and still I didn't speak up. I didn't want it to be real. I had this image of this person and everyone in my family adored him too, and then that happened and. I don't know. I couldn't break that image.
My fiance is a victim too. I never knew until I went to a family reunion with her and she saw one of her attackers making nice with the rest of the family. He said hi to her and gave her a hug. And then she apologized for not feeling too well and asked me to take her home. She was shaking the whole ride back. And then we shared these secrets we just couldn't tell anyone else.
But beyond the events I'm not sure the ripples really effected our lives. We continued as if nothing ever happened. In fact I saw Jimquisition earlier in the day and I actually couldn't see the big deal. I felt like, as someone who's been there and moved on, I could see something like rape in a game and not have it hurt me. My fiance and I have been talking about it since the tomb raider controversy started and we kind of thought it was silly. But then I read this article.
I think a thing like this, like anything really, can affect people in wildly different ways. My fiance has no problems with intimacy or lingering issues resulting from the attack. I too don't have them. It always felt to me like old wounds. I never felt psychically crippled. But what you said about triggers. That kind of scares me I guess. I haven't come by one, but she has a few times. For her it's people who resemble her attackers and this one kind of car. She's fine all the time, but then she see's something like that and it takes her back to that place for a stomach churning instant. I've never had to "relive" what happened to me. Even now I'm pretty cold and methodical about the whole thing. But the thought of having to revisit those old feelings, the sadness and betrayal, the guilt and the fear, the doubt. That bothers me and makes me uncomfortable even writing this.
I suppose I want to thank you? For opening my eyes at least. Maybe for me or her or a person who's never had to live through that a rape scene doesn't mean much. But if it could throw other people back into that place in their mind, that's terrible. And really I never considered it before reading this.
I just want to say that I think the tomb raider issue is a tricky one that has been clarified by this article. I can't imagine how hard it was to write this, and I commend the author.
The way I see it, both arguments have merit. On one hand, They are trying to humanize a character who, before now, has been a sexualized cardboard cut out in terms of depth. This may not be the most elegant way to go about it, but I think they are going somewhat in the right direction, if they are careful about it. one way to humanize a character is to put them into human situations. If the scene shows how terrible the act is, it may re-sensitize people to it, make them understand what they couldn't without using the unique medium of games.
on the other hand, the automatic hardship for women should most certainly not be rape, especially considering that I'll bet that there are not any people making this game that can understand the experience. I'm glad that is the case, of course. I don't want anyone to go through what the author has described. But that also means they have no right to portray it. I read an article earlier that says writers should make a character, flesh them out, and give them personality, then make them female. because rape is not gender neutral, rape is not something that should be a challenge to get over, and it is not something that can be taken lightly.
I think the part of this article that hit me close to home was this "Imagine if someone captured your flag or dominated you in deathmatch, then rubbed in your face how your sister was killed by a drunk driver or your dad abandoned you when you were little. That's how close it cuts."
My cousin was killed in a car crash with an ambulance a few years ago. every time my aunt or uncle hears a siren, they begin shaking. I still get a pit in my stomach and a slight sick feeling every time I'm reminded about it.
I have used the term in online gaming. this has made me understand how that feels. I will never do so again. thank you author for making this clear to me. thank you for putting your vulnerability for the world to see. thank you, and I'm sorry.
The way I see it, both arguments have merit. On one hand, They are trying to humanize a character who, before now, has been a sexualized cardboard cut out in terms of depth. This may not be the most elegant way to go about it, but I think they are going somewhat in the right direction, if they are careful about it. one way to humanize a character is to put them into human situations. If the scene shows how terrible the act is, it may re-sensitize people to it, make them understand what they couldn't without using the unique medium of games.
on the other hand, the automatic hardship for women should most certainly not be rape, especially considering that I'll bet that there are not any people making this game that can understand the experience. I'm glad that is the case, of course. I don't want anyone to go through what the author has described. But that also means they have no right to portray it. I read an article earlier that says writers should make a character, flesh them out, and give them personality, then make them female. because rape is not gender neutral, rape is not something that should be a challenge to get over, and it is not something that can be taken lightly.
I think the part of this article that hit me close to home was this "Imagine if someone captured your flag or dominated you in deathmatch, then rubbed in your face how your sister was killed by a drunk driver or your dad abandoned you when you were little. That's how close it cuts."
My cousin was killed in a car crash with an ambulance a few years ago. every time my aunt or uncle hears a siren, they begin shaking. I still get a pit in my stomach and a slight sick feeling every time I'm reminded about it.
I have used the term in online gaming. this has made me understand how that feels. I will never do so again. thank you author for making this clear to me. thank you for putting your vulnerability for the world to see. thank you, and I'm sorry.
It's bad form to assume that another person can do what you did. The nature of the crime perpetrated against you and against Anon are similar to each other in pain and circumstance, but there is a key difference: you are you, and Anon is Anon. Trying to say that another person, with a different mind, personality, and upbringing should be able to 'get over it' because *you* could is bad form. I would never assume that someone else can do what I did in my life, because no two people are exactly alike - even identical twins.Iron Lightning said:
And whether or not you 'recover' is certainly *not* due to strength of character. I mentioned upthread that I've worked with torture victims, and the variety of long-term results and coping mechanisms is eye-opening, since they're not all what you'd expect. I've talked with Marines who cry every night for years because of what they went through, and 'normal', untrained civilians who, after a few months of 'dealing with it', picked themselves up and got on with their lives, like you did. One reaction does not, and should not, invalidate the other. Bootstrappiness shouldn't be applied to recovering from this level of trauma. Some people get over physical and sexual trauma better than others. I certainly recovered much easier from mine than a lot of people I've worked with.
In short: berating a victim for being a victim is kinda just... well, proving that you are so proud that you 'got over it' and were so driven to overcome the trauma (for which I applaud and congratulate you, by the way, with all sincerity - good for you!) that you lost a tiny bit of humanity along the way, for which I am sorry. Everyone is different in their skills, their tastes, their preference for ice cream flavor... so it seems a bit disingenuous to assume that everyone has the same capacity for dealing with these kind of horrible situations.
I'm truly glad you were able to move past what was done to you, but don't assume that compassion for another is an enabler of victimhood. The most abused person I know denies completely that they were ever a victim, accuses others of having the 'victim mentality'... and then blames all their shortcomings on others because it's never their fault. So, it can go both ways.
I typed out a reply in which I decided to take your advice and I wrote out about two paragraphs of stuff I later read and deleted, because it made me sound like a total jerk. I will instead only say that whatever brand of therapy you are offering, I can't see anyone wanting. You're welcome to open your own "shout at trauma victims until they feel better, through magic" practice, and best of luck to you.Iron Lightning said:
Exactly, my friend. Now, pray tell, in a situation where the audience is unknown (as in, say, a random session of Halo 3) is it alright to say "stab" despite not knowing if you'll trigger a harmful reaction or not?CaptainKarma said:
Dear gods thank you. I've written my own blog posts on my own actual rape experiences and I don't think it will hit people as much as this article will. Thank you for having the courage to write about WHY people don't like hearing that "they've been raped" or whatever. I've told a few of my friends that I've been raped once but I can't manage to tell two of my friends that one of their friends they hooked me up with raped me.Anonymous said:
Edit:
Not everyone who uses the term rape play falls under that umbrella. A lot of us who use that term understand the full meaning of it. I'm comfortable with it if the person understands what rape is.jemima101 said:
Different people, different places, different things allowed.Steve Butts said:
Basically you don?t use the same kind of language in every social interaction. In my family, for example, my kind of speech is closer to my father?s than to my mother?s.
I guess what is happening is that the gaming and internet community is discussing and developing their own good manners and costumes.
My own rule in the internet is to behave like I am always meeting a new person. So the harsh jokes and language are saved for a moment where I got to know thm better.
Maybe the online guilds and clans should just post to anyone before entering the kind of language that is acceptable there. Going from the whole spectrum:
?Queen of England??4Chan?
Agreed that they just entered a game where there's killing but not raping. But mind that people getting confused in why virtual killing is alright but virtual raping is not, is because the act of murder is viewed as also being an extreme act of cruelty in the same level of rape so they are weirded out by this.Susan Arendt said:
After all, killing (justified or not) is also an assertion of power over someone. You deny the existence of a person not allowing her to have nothing anymore: love, hate, sex, stress, joy, sadness. You deny them even the right of complaining since the dead don't talk.
Words are words, and they can be - and often are - used intentionally to hurt people. I am, however, a firm believer in the philosophy that words can only wound if you let them. It's the same reason I don't hesitate to use the word "****" any more then I do to use the word "dick" or "fuck". I curse, not often (Because my lexicon isn't so diminutive as to require it), but I curse. It is my prerogative to do so.
And yet, using the word "Rape" as gamers often do does strike me as more than a little bit off-center. Am I a rape survivor? No, I haven't had that misfortune. I do know rape survivors, though. A disproportionate amount of women I have dated/pursued/had sex with have told me they are survivors. I was even falsely accused of it. Once. Fortunately, I've never had to convince a court of that, because I was never officially charged. I think it was just leveled at me to harm my reputation. Which is weird, because this was high school, I was a virgin, and had just moved to town, so nobody even knew me. That, and it didn't work. So, I have some experience in the subject. Not a lot, but some.
Regarding the Courts: A person very close to me - that is to say, the woman I am currently dating - was recently devastated after he rapist was found "Not Guilty" on all thirteen counts of rape and molestation leveled against him. The Guilty DO walk, and they do it very, very often.
Why do gamers even use the word "rape" at all in the context that they do? It's not technically accurate. It's not even close to accurate. I understand some level of separation from technical accuracy, "I", instead of "My character", for instance, but the games in question are often fanatically violence-centric. "Murdered" is appropriate in these context, I think (It's the one I tend to use, anyway), "Kicked [your/his/their] ass(es)" also works - why do people drop the rape-bomb? Maybe it's that "game culture" is so blatantly, backwards and sexually immature that it's just the thing? That's... really the only answer I can think of. It's also totally reprehensible. One the same level as "Oh no, there's gay sex in ME3" is reprehensible.
Of course, reprehensible only has one level on my little internal bookshelf of values, so that that as thou wilt.
Letting the arrow strike you - to steal from Anon's metaphor from the top of page 5 - is partially your fault, yes. I say this even with my personal experiance with the subject readily at hand. I walk on eggshells and poke and prod to try and not trip any of my SO's triggers, but she (In fact, they) have always played it cool when I did - accidentally. They didn't freeze up, traumatized. They let me know what I did, they let me know that I was pouring lemon juice on a wound and not suturing it, as was probably my intent.
Articles like this are an unfortunate necessity for the gaming culture - but, Anon, it's your civil obligation to tell people that such casual indifference isn't right. The world is a cruel, hard place, populated with cruel, but soft people. Why lament the arrow wound? Why not remove the bow? Why not invest in some armour? "Not cool, guys" isn't hard to say when your friends scream "rape" at the Television, hell, I do that. People chill right the hell out as soon as their callousness has been dragged into the light.
Excellent article. Excellent First Step.
Now how about everyone here helps our Anonymous friend fight? How about we say "not cool, man" every once in a while, eh?
And yet, using the word "Rape" as gamers often do does strike me as more than a little bit off-center. Am I a rape survivor? No, I haven't had that misfortune. I do know rape survivors, though. A disproportionate amount of women I have dated/pursued/had sex with have told me they are survivors. I was even falsely accused of it. Once. Fortunately, I've never had to convince a court of that, because I was never officially charged. I think it was just leveled at me to harm my reputation. Which is weird, because this was high school, I was a virgin, and had just moved to town, so nobody even knew me. That, and it didn't work. So, I have some experience in the subject. Not a lot, but some.
Regarding the Courts: A person very close to me - that is to say, the woman I am currently dating - was recently devastated after he rapist was found "Not Guilty" on all thirteen counts of rape and molestation leveled against him. The Guilty DO walk, and they do it very, very often.
Why do gamers even use the word "rape" at all in the context that they do? It's not technically accurate. It's not even close to accurate. I understand some level of separation from technical accuracy, "I", instead of "My character", for instance, but the games in question are often fanatically violence-centric. "Murdered" is appropriate in these context, I think (It's the one I tend to use, anyway), "Kicked [your/his/their] ass(es)" also works - why do people drop the rape-bomb? Maybe it's that "game culture" is so blatantly, backwards and sexually immature that it's just the thing? That's... really the only answer I can think of. It's also totally reprehensible. One the same level as "Oh no, there's gay sex in ME3" is reprehensible.
Of course, reprehensible only has one level on my little internal bookshelf of values, so that that as thou wilt.
Letting the arrow strike you - to steal from Anon's metaphor from the top of page 5 - is partially your fault, yes. I say this even with my personal experiance with the subject readily at hand. I walk on eggshells and poke and prod to try and not trip any of my SO's triggers, but she (In fact, they) have always played it cool when I did - accidentally. They didn't freeze up, traumatized. They let me know what I did, they let me know that I was pouring lemon juice on a wound and not suturing it, as was probably my intent.
Articles like this are an unfortunate necessity for the gaming culture - but, Anon, it's your civil obligation to tell people that such casual indifference isn't right. The world is a cruel, hard place, populated with cruel, but soft people. Why lament the arrow wound? Why not remove the bow? Why not invest in some armour? "Not cool, guys" isn't hard to say when your friends scream "rape" at the Television, hell, I do that. People chill right the hell out as soon as their callousness has been dragged into the light.
Excellent article. Excellent First Step.
Now how about everyone here helps our Anonymous friend fight? How about we say "not cool, man" every once in a while, eh?
I commend this article and its writer for doing such fine work and being brave enough to step forward. At times, there are ways in which I can understand when things happen around you they bring back memories or feelings we'd rather leave. While mine may have not been real I still get a feeling in my head like it's happening to me.
Mine started with a simple nightmare when I was young of being tortured. i won't go into details but what has stuck with me for the longest time was the feeling of my torturer putting a knife to my forehead. Ever since then, every time I see such an event I am reminded of it and it really disturbs me to the point where I can't think of anything else. But what bothers me the most about it I feel as though I can feel what happened in my dream. I can't accurately describe what happens but I do find it strange.
While it might have been insensitive to equate that to what this writer has gone through, to me it feels as if I can understand a little of what the writer has felt when such a sensitive issue comes up.
And I want to point out to all people who don't feel as if issues such as what happened to this author can happen to both genders is radically insensitive to the victims and need to have their eyes opened to what is going on around them.
Mine started with a simple nightmare when I was young of being tortured. i won't go into details but what has stuck with me for the longest time was the feeling of my torturer putting a knife to my forehead. Ever since then, every time I see such an event I am reminded of it and it really disturbs me to the point where I can't think of anything else. But what bothers me the most about it I feel as though I can feel what happened in my dream. I can't accurately describe what happens but I do find it strange.
While it might have been insensitive to equate that to what this writer has gone through, to me it feels as if I can understand a little of what the writer has felt when such a sensitive issue comes up.
And I want to point out to all people who don't feel as if issues such as what happened to this author can happen to both genders is radically insensitive to the victims and need to have their eyes opened to what is going on around them.
It heartens me so much to see so many people posting support for this article. It's easy to feel glum over the one or two naysayers, and miss the scores coming out in support.
You might want to work on your delivery? Or perhaps you should consider the opinions you have on things, and why the things you say might negatively affect people?Fluoxetine said: