I follow LineHollis on Twitter. She rules, and that's a great image. Just to clarify above, I wasn't attempting to say that people shouldn't be calling it out, absolutely they should. But I think acting like this is some kind of sinister plot by Sony, and Sony should be actively punished for it, is indeed missing the point. It's not one of the egregious examples of sexism this industry has to offer, and at worst, it's really just a very strong underscore of an existing problem. Using it as such is good. edit: I do hope my original post didn't come across as any of those highlighted statements in her image. I think it's a very real example of sexism while *also* just happening to be because it was the people who hold those positions who were on stage. But the reason that is a thing is because of the sexism and gender imbalance which is rampant in workplaces.
You know that thing we do where we argue over whether its a good idea to do something even though nobody here has suggested doing it? It'd be awesome if we didn't do that. Someone on the Internet suggested boycotting Sony. They aren't here. Take it up with them if you've got a beef, because charging in to declare that someone might have gone a bit overboard in supporting a good cause is purest flamebait. I know it wasn't intended that way, but seriously. Classic concern troll. Nobody here is not buying a PS4 because there was too much sausage on stage. We're not buying PS4s because $429 is just $30 too much.
You neither said the men "just happened" or that a token woman would be "thrown" in there, so we're all good. But in all seriousness, I tried to make it clear by quoting other parts of your post and not the explanation for the gender imbalance to make it clear I was not intending to link the content of your post to that image. OH WAIT.
I don't think this example is a good analogy and indeed the same theory, as the mechanics involved in it are if anything, opposites -- giving to charities requires you to spend some resource, one you have limited amount of. You can't indeed give it to them all. On the other hand boycotting a company bases on not giving them your resources. This is something definitely far easier to achieve, especially in situation we are talking of, when you choose to do without not some sort of basic good necessary for one's survival, but just a very specific form of personal entertainment. (as i understand it, the argument is "why is Sony being singled out of all game makers", not out of all companies in the world no matter their focus. Because like you note, this involves gamers)
On the other hand, it looks like SOE has a scholarship for girls starting: https://www.soe.com/girl/ (Though it looks like it has been around since 2008 -- sounds like they've been doing a real good job of promoting this thing...)
There's also no requirement that you actually have to be a girl to be a G.I.R.L. But it's nice to see a company like Sony willing to throw around $10,000 a year towards a noble cause. I mean, sure, for a corporation their size it's basically like tossing a penny into a wishing well, but at least they're making the wish!
Bonus points for making me recoil with an OH GOD BODY HORROR reaction to a "sexy" ad, Sony. Not a lot of advertising can say it's done the same in a single image.
I doubt that thing gets a lot of female companionship, so that's gotta be kinda awkward late at night when, y'know.
I'd almost forgotten about the corollary to the MultiBoob, which is the Thumb Penis. Here's a link, which I should warn you includes a high quality picture of said Thumb Penis.
So that's why Sony keeps the left analog stick below the D-Pad - they apparently have some interesting ideas about how gamers are using their controllers.
'Tis a banner day for neckbeards and MRA enthusiasts everywhere! Friendzone has been added to the Oxford Dictionaries! (Along with some other stupid words like 'dumbphone' and 'tweetable'.) My favorite quote: Well. Yeah.
I do not understand, even a little bit, what that ad is even supposed to convey. All it makes me think about is tiny penises. Well, okay, that and that someone at that ad agency (or many someones, I guess) has some serious issues.
In good news I just read a 40+ comment thread on Reddit about a woman's review of DF, which the subreddit hated, and not once did anyone bring up the author's sex in any sort of disparaging way. I was pleasantly surprised.
I guess... I guess it's saying that playstation 4 is the console for men who with tiny dicks who want a four breasted woman? That's... got to be a pretty narrow demographic, right there. I mean, sure, they'll sell one to every member of NMA and RPGCodex, but then who? edit: Oh yeah, I hadn't even thought about reddit. Hey, maybe there's a bigger market than I thought!
It's impossible to tell the sex of a Dwarf anyway. It's the beards. And DF is pretty, uh, open-minded when it comes to relationships.
Not on topic but ye gods what a terrible premise for a Dwarf Fortress review. Playing DF without consulting tutorials and wikis is like trying to take the bar exam without studying--indeed, based on my experience, it would be more difficult than the bar.
Reddit has its pockets of decency, there was a recent post that hit near the front page that was basically a big takedown against some guy raging that he couldn't find a 'female'. That was basically , "stop being a douche and treat them like actual people and stop calling them females" (don't have it handy or I'd link it)
Well that turned out to be backwards from what I expected. I guess this is one spot where I sort of deviate from the general opinion here, I find friendzone to be a fairly useful/descriptive word - I think the 'omg I am entitled to sex because I am a NICE GUY' baggage with it tends to come from the person using the term, not the term itself.
No, I think that's pretty common actually, and what you describe was certainly my first reaction to the term. But I've changed my mind on it, after thinking about what "friendzone" suggests is inherent to male-female interactions. It seemed to me like I was just resisting the need to move around a bunch of mental furniture in response to what rethinking this concept implied (ie the entire genre of romantic comedies). The nice guy stuff just makes it a bit more obviously toxic, but the core is rotten.
Maybe part of my dissonance with it is I hear it used to describe a lot of combinations other than 'female object, dude in friendzone' (probably most often for gay dudes, probably because they're pretty much the only single people I know anymore.) "Only one person is interested" seems a fairly universal sort of relationship dynamic and a word that is shorthand for that seems handy.
Could you give an example of using "friendzone" in a sentence that doesn't contain any of that weird responsibility-displacing meaning? I don't think it automatically connotes the 'nice guy entitled to sex' meaning, but if all you're using it to say is "I'm attracted to someone who only likes me as a friend," then you can just say that. "S/he friendzoned me" places the responsibility for the lack of attraction on the other person, when really they haven't done anything to you at all. Or if they did, you put them in a 'romance zone' first. Same with the usual complaint about being led on by the other person - they're not doing anything you aren't allowing them to do, because you're choosing to remain in that situation while complaining that someone else put you there. In the end I think it's just a cheap way of refusing to take responsibility for your own situation. If you're attracted to someone who doesn't share your feelings, that's too bad, but you can move on from that if it's painful - or better yet, just accept the friendship without treating it as a consolation prize.
"Dude, you are in the friendzone, get over it and move on." I guess I am thinking more in terms of how I might use it, which is unlikely to ever be to describe *myself*.
Well, I think that's an interesting part of it, because while its most common use (just statistically, using statistics out of my ass) is in male to female descriptions, I'm sure that same thing extends to many things outside of that. So perhaps sexist is not the right word, because although it's often accurate and presumably the negative connotations are in large part derived from disdain for female agency, it has a lot to do with the sort of broad responsibility questions that Jay is bringing up.
I definitely think the origins of the term are toxic, the first time I saw it used was in some terrible screed describing exactly what the friend zone was and how you ended up there. But it is also a term which accurately portrays the idea of "I am interested in this person, but this person is not interested in me in that way." Is there another word for that? I bet there is in German, only it's like sixty characters long and has dots in weird places.
Nice end-around! I don't think that really adds anything useful, though, and it still absolves the hearer from acknowledging that he put himself in the friendzone. I see where you're coming from, and as Charles mentions, avoiding "friendzone" does mean you have to use more than one word, but that's a price I'm willing to pay to avoid it completely.
I think you guys are using it wrong. The dictionary definition places it as a noun, not a verb. You can't be "friendzoned" by somebody else unless you're using some asshole slang version of the word, and I'd agree that ain't right.
Friendzone, like so many words, depends on who I am hearing it from and in what context. So I can't say I find the word Always Wrong. If a guy I know says, "Alas, I am in the friendzone," I don't immediately go HISS UR A CLOSET MRA and cut all ties because he thinks of women as prizes to be won. Some of them will mean that, and I will sideeye the hell out of them and explain to them that he's being a bit of a douche. And some of them are just using shorthand for "why we didn't get together, and why I am going to stop barking up that particular tree." I also don't think "she put me in the friendzone" necessarily makes the woman the villain, though. I don't think dudes necessarily put themselves in the friendzone every time, either. I had guys that I didn't click with that really should've, and while I never had to officially condemn them to Life in the Friend Zone, they would've been 100% correct if they said *I* had put them there. Sometimes a dude does nothing wrong whatsoever, he just doesn't make my motor run. It ISN'T his fault, it's just the way it is. Again, it's all about context and who is using the word. But then, I have also heard it used by women referring to women they are interested in, men referring to men they are interested in, and women referring to men they are interested in. It has shitty origins (lots of words do!) but I feel it's being shifted towards something useful, and am perfectly happy to let it do so.
