Reddit would be awesome if they'd do something about the racists and misogynists. Even if it was nothing but banning them for brigading other subs, which is a bannable offense anyway.

Of course Yahoo and Youtube can't do it...They'd lose half their videos and 90% of their comments, heh.

Edit: And 4chan would be a ghost town.

Gosh, wouldn't that be something!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12596695

and furthermore, here's who they think is to blame:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5471956

the correct way to go, but unlike EarlG, I believe that posting on DU at all is an act of feeding trolls.

There were a spate of questions recently in ATA where DUers asked whether their DU contributions were used for DI. The admins kept saying that they are two different companies. However, the two companies profit the same people, and those are the people who refuse to support in any way the women who support them by posting in their sites.

All these posts lately that describe the mechanism of domestic abuse seem to have eerie parallels with the treatment of women on DU: the women keep thinking and hoping that things will get better, and genuinely have affection for the abuser. The abuser says things like "why do you make me abuse you?" which is the same sentiment as what EarlG said in that linked comment. The women are told they deserve what they get and it is their job to take what the man dishes out (which is not that far off from "all these abusive posts against feminists are useful because the rest of us learn so much, and it is your job to take the abuse for our benefit.&quot The abuser gives a lot of lip service, but refuses to make any changes. The abused women think about leaving but never do. Which is how things go on DU.

In the past, I gave the admins as much benefit of the doubt as I could. I assumed their decisions were made from a profit motive, and women on their sites were simply collateral damage to that. Now I see I was mistaken, and they are holders of the very attitudes we are trying to fight. I am pretty sickened that I ever contributed money to them.

It's not aimed at you specifically, Squinch, and I'd welcome hearing the opinions of other female DUers. You said:

My question is what changes (and I mean specifics, not merely 'I want an end to misogyny') need to be made at DU? I'm not looking for names of DUers as examples, but more things like 'if someone were to turn up in a thread and say something like:.....'

Maybe my opinion as a woman, a feminist, and a DUer since 2002 doesn't count, but Skinner and EarlG are no more misogynists than they're anti-semites or Islamophobes, and I mention those two forms of bigotry because I've been aware in the past some DUers have accused them of being those things. I've been on MIRT many times since DU3 started, and they've nuked misogynists along with other bigots that make an appearance at DU. The MIRT team's been nuking a repeat offender who zeroes in on feminists pretty regularly this term. Do you think admins who are misogynists would let misogynists be nuked or nuke them themselves?

In the case of what happened over at Discussionist, four separate juries voted unamimously to hide those posts. Then before either admin arrived, the troll had created a sock-puppet, which was an instant nuke. I've seen accusations thrown at them that if not for the sock, the troll would have merely had to sit out a time-out, which Skinner corrected when he posted over at Disccussionist about it.



Also, EarlG was *not* blaming the DUer he replied to for what the troll posted. He was correctly pointing out to her saying: ' I would like to see misogyny taken seriously by the admins here at a DU, and make this a place where women can post without this crap.' that she'd brought 'this crap' to DU and it hadn't been here before that...

The thing is that 'this crap' wasn't posted at DU. It was posted on another site, and it was brought to DU by the person who was demanding EarlG make DU 'a place where woman can post without this crap.' Which is what he pointed out when he said: 'But the only reason this crap is here is because you posted it here. It wasn't here until you did that, was it?'

Try signing up for MIRT next term, Squinch. It gives an insight into how DU works when it comes to dealing with trolls and disruptors and as it did with me when I first joined MIRT, you get to see firsthand that the admin aren't sitting on their hands and letting bigots rampage through DU. They catch up to them sooner or later

Sometimes it's good to take a break. I've done that before. Yr voice is one I'd be sad to see go, as even when we disagree (and I can only think of one feminist-related thing we disagree on) I've found what you say worth listening to and thinking about.

For just one thing, the First Amendment and the rest of the Bill of Rights applies only to government. Message board owners are perfectly free to ban hate speech and many do. Private citizens are perfectly free to tell people to STFU or go elsewhere. Hell, even governments, to which the Bill of Rights DOES apply, punish hate speech.

The real issue is why so many board owners seem reluctant to include speech that hurts women with speech that hurts members of other groups that have been discriminated against historically in this country. What would not be allowed as to people of color, Hispanics, religious minorities, members of the GLBT community, etc. is allowed as to women. Why?

Is it because no one moves out of a neighborhood because a woman moves in? Is it because board owners are male? (I've been on boards run by women who censored racism, but not genderism.)

I don't know the reason. But it is not that civil liberties or free speech would end. Or even that there's nothing else to discuss on a political message board if posters can't post hateful, condescending, etc. things about women.