Slashdot Mirror
Interviews: Ask Brianna Wu a Question
Brianna Wu is the head of development at Giant Spacekat, a company specializing in cinematic experiences using the Unreal engine. She’s also a frequent speaker on women-in-tech issues and was one of several women subjected to a campaign of attacks in Gamergate. Wu has worked as a journalist and politico. She currently has a patreon campaign which helps to offset the costs of doing speaking engagements and work to further the goals of feminism and women in tech. Brianna has agreed to give us some of her time and answer any questions you may have. As usual, ask as many as you'd like, but please, one per post.
What was your college life like?
Are y'all doing anything aimed at dome projectors for a planetarium?
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
I never heard much about game developers, but it seems like GamerGate has put many of them in the spotlight, specially women.
Has the Gamergate movement somehow boosted your popularity and of other game developers and benefited you in any way? Do you regret that a big part your popularity didn't stem from the work you've made all these years in your professional life and rather from a political counter-movement?
Sorry for my lousy english.
So, instead of taking the opportunity to ask her anything you want, you're going to leave the site for giving you this chance? Well, enjoy that, I guess...
When someone says, "Any fool can see
Not directly no. I don't and I haven't. My direct experience has been just the opposite with folks bending over backwards to give them a shot. If you are female and have even a basic aptitude you can write your own ticket at most places I've worked. I'm not saying women don't suffer negative experiences but disproportionately? I don't think so.
Well, that just goes back to one of my points that the Game industry is just the tip of the tail of the dog here. This stuff starts with Madison Avenue and "feminist" glamour magazines.
Even women don't want to watch ugly girls.
They aren't any better about this stuff than guys are.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
You misunderstand, Im sure Wu has had plenty of horrific experiences, I just think most of them have been brought upon herself for the purpose of garnering attention, sympathy and money. I know plenty of women in male dominated industries, specifically 3D illustration and programming (>80% male in my experience), none of them have experienced anything even remotely akin to a 'boys club'. Yes it's a sausage-fest, but they're generally perfectly accepting of any women that they get to work with. My main objection is that somebody with a reputation of milking every penny of sympathy they possibly can from those gullible enough to believe everything she says, has somehow obtained a Slashdot frontpage entry *with a link to her donation page*. Regardless of what you or I think of her, it beggars belief that even for a Q&A promotion the "Im a victim, give me money" link still gets through.
she was caught faking her own harassment.
And I'll bet real hard cash that she ignores every single question of any merit. Wu has been asked many many many questions over the months, she has pretty much refused to answer a single one, instead resorting to calling people sealions for having the audacity to question her official line. All we will see here is a puff piece, the answered questions will all be about how she's a victim, how people should send her money and how she's completely innocent of any wrong doing. Can't wait to see the hug box in action.
Way to miss the point. This post is bait. Slashdot does fine as a respite from the gamergate and all associated bullshit. Would like to keep it that way.
User since 1998.
GamerGater here. Were not assholes. Gamers have been demonized (literally) since the 90's when we got accused of being satanists. Then came Hillary, Jack Thompson and now Anita Sarkesian with similar accusations.
Perhaps we're just tired of turning the other cheek.
What you originally said and what you said in this post are two different things. Once you figure that out you'll understand the downmod.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Let me see if I have this right: You're positing she has a volunteer (or perhaps compensated) army of Twitter users with orders to publicly harass her online. And she wants Patreon money to hire a person or people to combat this army? Seems a hghly-inefficient way to make money...
Defending IP by destroying access to it? That makes sense, RIAA/MPAA. Go to the corner until you can play nice!
Well at least the mods will have an easy time filtering out the questions as the usual drivel is, unsurprisingly, posted by anon cowards.
I don't have a question, but jesus christ people grow the fuck up.
scam artist or not, I'd request you not misgender her. I'd rather not give this type the high ground on this issue. You'll also confuse the issue and drum up sympathy for people who will defend her for being trans*.
Its "offtopic". thats why. How she was born has nothing to do with unethical activity. Its a personal attack on a very hotbutton topic which will do nothing but legitimize her.
GG has not been around since the 90s...it refers to a specific event. While it's true that gamers have gotten a lot of flack, myself being a gamer since the 80s I've got to say the amount of hate shot at women by the GG community is unacceptable. Just look at the posts here. Half are misogynist and hateful trolling, a good portion attack Brianna being transgendered, another portion accuse her of lying...if you can't see how poisoned a fruit GG is you're willfully turning a blind eye to abuse and it makes you as complicit as those people who demonized gamers when we were growing up. Female programmers did not demonize you growing up, gaming industry insiders did not demonize you. People outside of all those who you claim demonized you are the target of these attacks by GG. It's wrong.
Dear Samzenpus, how to you justify click-bait crap like this when you have the discovery of new sub-atomic articles being announced? I know that this will probably get 500+ comments, but do you realize that you are driving away the really interesting people that will make slashdot sustainable in the long run?
Nobody who matters cares about Brianna Wu or GamerGate. I come here to read opinions of people who matter. Do you care about readers like me?
Kinda funny really, given the movement absolutely started with misogyny: a boyfriend writes a clearly deranged hatchet-job on his former girlfriend, and, because women, amirite?, a legion of very, very, stupid men decide to take revenge on the former girlfriend and make her life a living hell, many admitting at the time that they wanted to drive her to suicide, knowing she suffered from depression.
Then they pretended it was about EIGJ, but nobody believed them, because every post saying this said the following, endlessly paraphrased:
And so it moved from being purely about misogyny, to being about misogyny and people who have the gall to fight misogyny.
And here we are, overrun with the bastards on Slashdot of all places. Why is this AC? Because I can't be bothered any more.
in light of your recent behavior on reddit that had you removed from a subreddit aligned with your own cause...
Have you ever been diagnosed with a personality disorder, and if so, which one?
Not that I really want to take the GG side, but how is it about misogyny (hatred of ALL women) when the accusations were leveled at exactly ONE woman?
And while there were other very, very specific women targeted by people using the hashtag (note here that I am being very careful here not to blame an entire group for the actions of a few), if there were more women, where are they? The media is in the tank for women and stories of harassment (rightly or wrongly - as we learned from the UVA case, and the case against Bill Cosby, but a woman with a true story to tell will no doubt be taken seriously regardless), so if the problem is so widespread and entrenched in the industry, how come there aren't more women coming forward to tell their stories? There must surely be women that are encouraged to come forward and tell their stories if things are just so terrible and need to be changed.
Why is it we hear about the same women, over and over again? Who's pushing that narrative?
Like I said, I really, really, really don't want to take the GG side (since I find that both sides are off their rockers), but I find the side that's against more deplorable for turning the word "misogyny" into something that means virtually nothing anymore.
Why is it a problem that whites enjoy privileges (read: don't face problems that people of color do)?
Why is it a problem that men enjoy privileges (read: don't face problems that women do)?
Why is it a problem that the rich enjoy privileges (read: don't face problems that the poor do)?
The answer is... nobody is claiming any of those things are a problem. It's not a problem that men don't face problems, it's not a problem that whites don't face problems, and it's not a problem that rich people (including children of rich parents like Brianna here) don't face problems.
It's only a problem that the opposite groups (women, minorities, the poor) do face problems.
And it's a problem when the people who don't face those same problems blow off the problems as being non-problems, just because to them, in their privileged positions, they aren't problems. It's not a problem that anyone is in a privileged position; it's a problem that other people aren't, and it's a problem for the people who are to blow off the problems of the people who aren't.
And to get back to GP's point: the problems that the non-rich face are probably more important and influential than the problems that the problems that non-men and non-whites face. I would much rather be a rich black woman and deal with the disadvantages of being black and a woman (that'd mostly amount to people saying and thinking things that would hurt me emotionally) than be a poor white man and deal with the disadvantages of being poor (that mostly amount to constant material threats to my continued health and safety).
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
Just curious, Why did you Slander Brad Wardell? StarDock
And call for a Boycott of His efforts?
I suppose this is a troll because, the unstated purpose,, is to only ask questions that let Wu promote their agenda.
They might as well just give us the list of questions they have decided will be answered, instead of playing this game of guess the questions on the list.
Thanks for clarifying, but isn't that precisely what an asshole would say?
You are welcome on my lawn.
If a young female high school student asked you, "Should I become a game developer?" given your horrific experiences, what would you say; and is what you say different now than it would have been before your experiences surrounding GamerGate?
All your allegations might be true. But for an outsider who has only followed the whole 'GamerGate' nonsense with half an eye. You sound exactly like every misogynistic neckbeard I've met in my life.
As I said, everything on theralphretort.com might be true, but if you know nothing about the situation it looks like vindictive whining.
It could be nerdy socially awkward games who are unable to not sound like whiners but still are correct. On the other hand anybody who says the current gaming culture isn't sexist should get their head out of their ass.
As I don't really feel like reading the endless diatribe both sides are wasting ont his matter, I still err on the side of siding with the females on this topic.
regards,
an old fart.
Few women can start their own game companies or publications. Any top feminist friendly companies you'd recommend to women wanting to break into tech/games/tech writing?
If someone isn't an asshole, they generally don't have to go around assuring other people that they're not an asshole. And if you feel you have to explain to others that you're not an asshole, despite appearances, then you should ask yourself, "Why does everyone say I'm an asshole? Is it possible that they're right?" Doesn't that make sense?
It's like when Richard Nixon addressed the nation to say, "I am not a crook", thereby verifying his crookedness, because who but a crook has to assure people that they're not a crook?
You are welcome on my lawn.
The problem with what you're saying is that it makes accusations tantamount to guilt. Someone says something bad about you, or worse still, starts some kind of smear campaign to get something bad about you widely believed? With your attitude the possible responses are (1) deny the accusation, thereby "proving" the accuser right, or (2) lie down and accept that the world now believes something bad about you and there's nothing you can possibly do about it because anything you try will only make you look more guilty.
The good news is, now you can say bad things about people who want to hurt or discredit and there's nothing they can do to defend themselves, either!
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
For the record, I had never heard the claim that Brianna Wu is a transwoman before today, and I have no idea if it's true or not. I have followed GamerGate only minimally and can't say I understand all the issues.
BUT, if it's true that Brianna is a transwoman, that is certainly not off-topic. It's the same as Rachel Dolezal claiming to be black, and to have suffered her whole life for being black, when she is white and grew up in a racially accepting family. If Dolezal wants to make herself look black and claim to be black, that's fine with me, but it stinks of hypocrisy for her to lie about her past, her experiences, and her identity while at the same time claiming to be a spokesperson for people with that identity!
Likewise, if Brianna Wu is a transwoman but also claims to speak towards a personal history of suffering gender prejudice and so forth, it doesn't exactly look kosher.
Or because she was a hateful, sociopathic, gaslighting asshole before being a woman?
Some people don't believe in fairies. I don't believe in The Patriarchy.
Considering you have spoken out in the past about female characters in games being overtly sexualized, could you explain why the protagonists of your own game Revolution 60 wear what appears to be skintight lycra to show off their perfect hourglass figures?
I've been reading daily since 1997, but I can't condone pandering to a professional victims and hatemonger and giving out a patreon link to fund more of this crap
Reddit was destroyed by SJWs in a matter of weeks, if Slashdot wants to follow the same route and promote safespaces after almost 20 years of being a respected destination, fine.
Any good suggestions?
That's not creepy at all.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I have a suggestion of a transsexual I would actually like reading an interview about in Slashdot. Sophie Wilson (ARM chip designer). I respect that work.
What I do not respect is reading about people who make their career around politically correct bullshit and produce nothing of value. This isn't news for nerds and it isn't stuff that matters.
I don't think she appointed herself as a leader, she just gained some notoriety because she was the target of GamerGate harassment.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
As MRAs love to keep pointing out, men can be victims of gender prejudice too. In any case, she is a woman, and guys threatened to rape and sexual assault her, so by any measure she has a right to speak about those issues.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Remember, folks, if someone speaks out against any abuse, they're nothing more than attention-seekers playing the victim card.
Required reading for internet skeptics
Disagreeing with Ms. Wu is not harassment.
Asking Ms. Wu hard questions is not harassment.
Informing people about Ms. Wu's potentially criminal fraud in regards to her business, her online ventures, and her faked harassment, as well as her history of using racial and homophobic epithets before her latest persona as a Third Wave Faux Feminist, is not harassment.
Criticism of Ms. Wu is not harassment.
Debate with Ms. Wu's supporters is not harassment.
NONE of the discussion here has been harassment. This is a public forum and if bringing up Ms. Wu's name causes an outcry of disgust, that is the price of being a professional victim and a "polarizing" personality on social media.
Harassment is not a catch all word meaning "someone was mean on the Internet." It is not a shield against any debate, criticism, or disagreement. Don't play into the professional victims like Ms. Wu trying to use it as such.
No harm, no foul. It's only by (sometimes vigorous) debate that we can come to a better understanding on controversial topics.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
What are your own thoughts about the sexist manner in which you were banned from /r/gamerghazi? Is the misogynistic toxicity of that community reflective of the anti-gamergate faction?
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
Rules can't supercede regulative authority.
The convention is public. The FCC has already made multiple rulings that whatever can enter your camera (since your eye is one) is permissible to be recorded. Your cover for Brianna makes zero sense in the face of regulative authority. It doesn't matter if he broke the rules, because the rule violates government regulations and is therefore unenforcable.
Same way you can decrypt police transmissions in your own home, front yard, or back yard. Same way you could re-transmit them in the clear on another channel (as long as you don't violate transmission power/channel regulation.)
If it enters your property, you are free to do with those photons or radio waves as you damn well please. No pictures means no video, either, since a video is multiple pictures strung together, but I saw plenty of fucking video cameras there.
You have zero standing, here.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Have you ever produced anything of note, notability commensurate with your celebrity status? Have you ever demonstrated any technical ability?
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.