In my time as an active feminist, many things have confused me about the way people respond to the concept of feminism. A lot of them boil down to: Is anything that diminishes feminism automatically supposed to be funny? I don't understand how a hundred men can think that saying "Go and make me a sandwich" or "You're really ugly" or "Oooh, I have a penis" over and over again is somehow really cool and clever and amusing. I also don't understand why "sammich" is suddenly a word.
A helpful troll explains that "it's fun to annoy you and you just don't understand that." No, troll. What I don't understand is exactly how you intend to annoy me with your endlessly repeated cliches and remarks about your genitalia. Is it simply their presence in what is meant to be a feminist space? Is it the repetition? Or is the content supposed to needle us? I'm genuinely unsure. I'm also curious, in a rhetorical sense, as to why these men feel the need to keep emphasising their dicks. I sort of think it's meant to be threatening, though it comes across more as "it's really small", but it's slightly odd. I also wonder how many of these men would say, if confronted, that they were just being funny and can't you take a joke and humourless feminist and what's next on the overused cliche list, and how many would claim that they were, in fact, making a valid point.
In Jessica's screenshot of youtube comments, I find the one that says: "[D]o you honestly think you are smarter than me? You better have an Iq [sic] above 125, stupid bitch" especially funny. Ooh, 125! That's, like, so huge! I'm not sure if that's the highest IQ he's ever come across or it was just the biggest number he could think of. Either way, the answer is yes, I do, stupid little boy, and the fact that you think 125 is so enormous is really rather adorable.
I have to console myself with the thought that all of these men are right to feel threatened by me. Should the troll brigade, through some strange quirk, actually find this trafficless blog, I will warn them beforehand that any comments like those in the screenshot will be made with either "Go mow my lawn, little boy" or "Hahaha, small penis!" Because the power of the internet does not extend to the education of anonymous morons, and I would prefer to amuse myself rather than waste my time.
Showing posts with label Fun With Trolls. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fun With Trolls. Show all posts
Saturday, 31 May 2008
Sunday, 20 April 2008
Prescott Has Bulimia (and Jen Swears a Lot)
John Prescott has suffered from bulimia. Good grief.
I'm impressed that he's talking about it. In his position, I certainly wouldn't. "John Prescott is fat" jokes have long been a staple of British political humour (example: "He can't wear a tie and a belt at the same time, or he'll turn into sausages"), and I'll be keeping a close watch on next week's edition of Have I Got News For You to count the bulimia jokes. Because bulimia is funny. It's a fat joke and a vomit joke, all in one handy little package.
He says it was brought on by stress:
"The only break I ever took was to eat. That’s all I did. Work, and then quickly eat something. It became my main pleasure, having access to my comfort food. So what I did was stuff my face with anything around, any old rubbish, burgers, chocolate, crisps, fish and chips, loads of it, till I felt sick - but at least I’d had the pleasure of stuffing my face and feeling really full. Then there would be a weird kind of pleasure in vomiting and feeling relieved."
I had terrible trouble with comfort eating as a teenager. I never threw up, but I was a binger for years. I still find a sick sort of comfort in a giant bar of chocolate. With that fully disclosed, I bring you the comments left on the article, horrible spelling and grammar left intact.
"Ah poor Prescott... not. He ought to be grateful that he could pay the bills unlike the 5 million poor people [blah blah blah fishcakes]."
"All that taxpayers' money down the drain, literally, as you can be sure that the food bills would have been paid out of expenses." Seriously, what does that have to do with it? Why are they harping upon about taxpayers? Gah.
"Even as a bulemic [sic] he is a failure." GAH.
"What a cheek to try and gain public sympathy by blaming the stress of office for his greed and his Neanderthal lavatory etiquette. It seems from some of the earlier posts that a few gullible souls have already been taken in." GAAAHHHH.
"...talk about a Big Girls Blouse." (I feel ever so slightly comforted that none of these idiots can spell or punctuate. Don't ask me why. It's Big Girl's Blouse, ass.)
"Bulimia - what a laugh - who has ever seen such a gross overweight, over eating man like Prescott suffering from Bullimia - what a load of rubbish." Oh, fuck off. Fuck. Off. Take your horrible sentence formation and your nasty views and fuck off.
I'll stop there. I'll ignore the tremendously amusing man who compares bulimia to throwing up a kebab when you're pissed and all the other posts talking about "greed". This really frightens me. He's too fat to be bulimic? Huh? Most of the time I love this country. I love the people, I love our collective attitude towards life. I love that no politician is too high or too important to take the piss out of. The one thing I truly hate about the British is our refusal to have personal sympathy with someone whose professional decisions we don't agree with. It disgusts me that people are proudly claiming they'll never feel sorry for him because taxes are going up (bear in mind the man is now retired and has nothing whatsoever to do with the Auditor's new tax plans), or because he's got more money than them, or because he's got a memoir coming out. "Ooh, what a coincidence," says someone sarcastically, having not bothered to read the article. This is IN the memoirs. That's where the story came from. The memoirs are about to be serialised by this newspaper. Dipshit. I hate these people.
Look, I'm no John Prescott fan. I thought he was incompetent as a politician, terrible as a public speaker - like the wonderful Linda Smith, I suspect language isn't his first language - and awful PR for Labour both as a party and a government. If you're an MP, you don't punch protesters. Even if they have thrown an egg at you (ooh, egg! That's food! Look out for a "Why Prescott Really Threw That Punch" bulimia joke coming soon to a comedian near you!). I thought he was completely useless. I still think that, as a professional politician, he was completely useless. However, it doesn't follow that he deserved to get an eating disorder because he was so useless. His uselessness doesn't preclude my now admiring his courage to be honest about it. He's a 69-year-old gruff Northern man with a big stomach. Eating disorders, in the public imagination, are the province of skinny, whiny suburban teenage girls. A man who gets an eating disorder is pathetic. A fat man with an eating disorder is just asking for it. I intend to make a John Prescott Bulimia Bingo card for my personal use when watching TV for the next couple of weeks.
To John Prescott, I say: Well done, that man. Well done. And I apologise for the utterly shitty quality of this post.
I'm impressed that he's talking about it. In his position, I certainly wouldn't. "John Prescott is fat" jokes have long been a staple of British political humour (example: "He can't wear a tie and a belt at the same time, or he'll turn into sausages"), and I'll be keeping a close watch on next week's edition of Have I Got News For You to count the bulimia jokes. Because bulimia is funny. It's a fat joke and a vomit joke, all in one handy little package.
He says it was brought on by stress:
"The only break I ever took was to eat. That’s all I did. Work, and then quickly eat something. It became my main pleasure, having access to my comfort food. So what I did was stuff my face with anything around, any old rubbish, burgers, chocolate, crisps, fish and chips, loads of it, till I felt sick - but at least I’d had the pleasure of stuffing my face and feeling really full. Then there would be a weird kind of pleasure in vomiting and feeling relieved."
I had terrible trouble with comfort eating as a teenager. I never threw up, but I was a binger for years. I still find a sick sort of comfort in a giant bar of chocolate. With that fully disclosed, I bring you the comments left on the article, horrible spelling and grammar left intact.
"Ah poor Prescott... not. He ought to be grateful that he could pay the bills unlike the 5 million poor people [blah blah blah fishcakes]."
"All that taxpayers' money down the drain, literally, as you can be sure that the food bills would have been paid out of expenses." Seriously, what does that have to do with it? Why are they harping upon about taxpayers? Gah.
"Even as a bulemic [sic] he is a failure." GAH.
"What a cheek to try and gain public sympathy by blaming the stress of office for his greed and his Neanderthal lavatory etiquette. It seems from some of the earlier posts that a few gullible souls have already been taken in." GAAAHHHH.
"...talk about a Big Girls Blouse." (I feel ever so slightly comforted that none of these idiots can spell or punctuate. Don't ask me why. It's Big Girl's Blouse, ass.)
"Bulimia - what a laugh - who has ever seen such a gross overweight, over eating man like Prescott suffering from Bullimia - what a load of rubbish." Oh, fuck off. Fuck. Off. Take your horrible sentence formation and your nasty views and fuck off.
I'll stop there. I'll ignore the tremendously amusing man who compares bulimia to throwing up a kebab when you're pissed and all the other posts talking about "greed". This really frightens me. He's too fat to be bulimic? Huh? Most of the time I love this country. I love the people, I love our collective attitude towards life. I love that no politician is too high or too important to take the piss out of. The one thing I truly hate about the British is our refusal to have personal sympathy with someone whose professional decisions we don't agree with. It disgusts me that people are proudly claiming they'll never feel sorry for him because taxes are going up (bear in mind the man is now retired and has nothing whatsoever to do with the Auditor's new tax plans), or because he's got more money than them, or because he's got a memoir coming out. "Ooh, what a coincidence," says someone sarcastically, having not bothered to read the article. This is IN the memoirs. That's where the story came from. The memoirs are about to be serialised by this newspaper. Dipshit. I hate these people.
Look, I'm no John Prescott fan. I thought he was incompetent as a politician, terrible as a public speaker - like the wonderful Linda Smith, I suspect language isn't his first language - and awful PR for Labour both as a party and a government. If you're an MP, you don't punch protesters. Even if they have thrown an egg at you (ooh, egg! That's food! Look out for a "Why Prescott Really Threw That Punch" bulimia joke coming soon to a comedian near you!). I thought he was completely useless. I still think that, as a professional politician, he was completely useless. However, it doesn't follow that he deserved to get an eating disorder because he was so useless. His uselessness doesn't preclude my now admiring his courage to be honest about it. He's a 69-year-old gruff Northern man with a big stomach. Eating disorders, in the public imagination, are the province of skinny, whiny suburban teenage girls. A man who gets an eating disorder is pathetic. A fat man with an eating disorder is just asking for it. I intend to make a John Prescott Bulimia Bingo card for my personal use when watching TV for the next couple of weeks.
To John Prescott, I say: Well done, that man. Well done. And I apologise for the utterly shitty quality of this post.
Sunday, 13 April 2008
Personal Lexicon: Naderbots
Look, another Part Two of a regular feature! I'm on a roll this week.
I was reading this excellent Shakesville post a while ago, and my intention was to use it to start a post of my own about the American elections. However, I took a glance at the comments first. Most of them are, for some unfathomable reason, by one guy banging on about Ralph Nader. The post doesn't mention Ralph Nader, but apparently this funny little man has absolutely nothing to say about anything else. Considering the original post was so interesting, this really annoys me, but someone used the term "naderbot" to describe him, and I'm always on the market for funny new words.
Because ScriptFrenzy is in progress (I refer to mine as Rent meets Yes Minister), I immediately thought of a whole chorus of Naderbots who show up at inopportune moments and sing about something irrelevant. They're going into my script as a chorus of protesters who turn up and sing about how great Ralph Nader is, despite the fact that they're in England and Nader has nothing to do with British politics. I foresee the Naderbots as a great recurring feature in my writing (what better way to pad out a Screnzy or NaNo?) - always referred to as Naderbots but given a new subject for each story. In NaNo '08, the Naderbots may sing about kettles. Screnzy '09? Punctuation. Dammit, I really want to write songs about punctuation.
Naderbot is soon to enter my everyday life as a term for someone who, no matter what is going on around him, talks about his chosen subject and only his chosen subject. No segues, no lame attempts to link it to the conversation at hand, nothing. In such a situation, Ralph Nader may be brought into the conversation as shown:
Naderbot: Blah blah chosen subject blah did you know that [insert crap fact] blah.
You: You know who's great? Ralph Nader.
Naderbot: What does that have to do with [chosen subject]?
You: Ralph Nader cares about the planet. How cool is that?
Naderbot: Oh. [chosen subject] blah blah.
You: Nader is awesome on Bacon-lettuce with cheese issues.
Naderbot: ?
You: Nader is not God, because we Nader supporters do not believe in a God, or Gods, or any master real or imagined.
Naderbot: !
Also, please note the original Naderbot's highly amusing outrage that he is not getting props from the feminists despite his support of sex-selective abortion in the third world. I kind of think he's a bored kid who thinks he's a satirist, but I really hope not. I took all the Nader-based quotes except the first one directly from the Naderbot, and I so want to believe there's someone in the world who genuinely speaks like this. I love the Naderbot. I'm having so much fun with this. He keeps referring to "imperialism" and "empire" (Naderbot thinks he's in Star Wars! and Nader rhymes with Darth Vader! Spooooky.) and anyone who disagrees with Nader not only isn't a progressive, but HATES progressives. That's his entire response to any contradiction.
Naderbot fun:
"Nader has sacrificed for us all, yet we show no gratitude."
"Jesus was a socialist, if he could get himself to vote...it would be for Nader."
"Deride, deride me if you must. But you know I speak the TRUTH!"
"Why do you turn your back on Ralph? Is it because he's Lebanese! You racist bastard."
"Your aloofness is very un-progressive. I also like Progressive Rock."
"Dude, I'm not gay, but I would blow you if you promised to vote for Nader."
There will never again be such an entertaining spammy troll.
I was reading this excellent Shakesville post a while ago, and my intention was to use it to start a post of my own about the American elections. However, I took a glance at the comments first. Most of them are, for some unfathomable reason, by one guy banging on about Ralph Nader. The post doesn't mention Ralph Nader, but apparently this funny little man has absolutely nothing to say about anything else. Considering the original post was so interesting, this really annoys me, but someone used the term "naderbot" to describe him, and I'm always on the market for funny new words.
Because ScriptFrenzy is in progress (I refer to mine as Rent meets Yes Minister), I immediately thought of a whole chorus of Naderbots who show up at inopportune moments and sing about something irrelevant. They're going into my script as a chorus of protesters who turn up and sing about how great Ralph Nader is, despite the fact that they're in England and Nader has nothing to do with British politics. I foresee the Naderbots as a great recurring feature in my writing (what better way to pad out a Screnzy or NaNo?) - always referred to as Naderbots but given a new subject for each story. In NaNo '08, the Naderbots may sing about kettles. Screnzy '09? Punctuation. Dammit, I really want to write songs about punctuation.
Naderbot is soon to enter my everyday life as a term for someone who, no matter what is going on around him, talks about his chosen subject and only his chosen subject. No segues, no lame attempts to link it to the conversation at hand, nothing. In such a situation, Ralph Nader may be brought into the conversation as shown:
Naderbot: Blah blah chosen subject blah did you know that [insert crap fact] blah.
You: You know who's great? Ralph Nader.
Naderbot: What does that have to do with [chosen subject]?
You: Ralph Nader cares about the planet. How cool is that?
Naderbot: Oh. [chosen subject] blah blah.
You: Nader is awesome on Bacon-lettuce with cheese issues.
Naderbot: ?
You: Nader is not God, because we Nader supporters do not believe in a God, or Gods, or any master real or imagined.
Naderbot: !
Also, please note the original Naderbot's highly amusing outrage that he is not getting props from the feminists despite his support of sex-selective abortion in the third world. I kind of think he's a bored kid who thinks he's a satirist, but I really hope not. I took all the Nader-based quotes except the first one directly from the Naderbot, and I so want to believe there's someone in the world who genuinely speaks like this. I love the Naderbot. I'm having so much fun with this. He keeps referring to "imperialism" and "empire" (Naderbot thinks he's in Star Wars! and Nader rhymes with Darth Vader! Spooooky.) and anyone who disagrees with Nader not only isn't a progressive, but HATES progressives. That's his entire response to any contradiction.
Naderbot fun:
"Nader has sacrificed for us all, yet we show no gratitude."
"Jesus was a socialist, if he could get himself to vote...it would be for Nader."
"Deride, deride me if you must. But you know I speak the TRUTH!"
"Why do you turn your back on Ralph? Is it because he's Lebanese! You racist bastard."
"Your aloofness is very un-progressive. I also like Progressive Rock."
"Dude, I'm not gay, but I would blow you if you promised to vote for Nader."
There will never again be such an entertaining spammy troll.
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