"We're the people that decided posting toxic bullcrap is activism" (Something Awful vs Jessica Price)

From this

Remember Cozy?

Bad nerds have been arguing over cozy things again.

To review, the cozy story is a story of comfort, without alarming, disturbing or controversial elements. The game Ryuutama is supposed to be cozy. There's a lot of meal breaks, I hear. If art is suppose to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable, it supposedly does the first thing.

That is all well and good. They heyday of cozy games was in the early days of the pandemic when Animal Crossing was like the second-most discussed topic after Tiger King. Undeniably, the players were afflicted and in need of comfort--we all were.

Like most purportedly wholesome things, cozy has an extremely online fandom bent on making it the most catastrophically toxic subject possible, and they have extended the Theory of Cozy far beyond simply sustainable statements like "Some people like it". Our story begins there.

The Worst Theory of Cozy 

For most of history, cozy was untheorized. People enjoyed cozy mysteries in drawing rooms by Agatha Christie, they watched cozy sitcoms where people slightly richer than them had low-stakes adventures with people they wish they knew, they put put cozy pictures of children with big eyes swinging on swings on the fake-wood-panelled walls of their trailers.

The closest thing to a theory of cozy at that time was more just outraged, Christian and openly conservative opposition to non-cozy things like horror and violence in movies. In other words, cozy only approached intellectual heft when wielded against something and then only barely. Nobody argued for the superiority of cozy--their entertainment was so cozy all the time they didn't realize it until Stephen King or Elvis or John Waters came along and made something Not Cozy.

Then came the Internet. Cozy wasn't just for lazy Sundays or Reagan moms anymore. Cozy was rebranded as a revolutionary aesthetic pitting femme-coded softness and reasonableness against boycoded grit and propensity for violence. This theory wasn't articulated by intelligent people (there'd been no new social science backing up any connection between games and violence in the intervening years), but it was articulated.

In our neck of the woods, in role-playing games, a Theory of Cozy was used by most of the worst nerds against the OSR and all other interesting games. Lots of that played out around the least cozy games, like LotFP. The idea was: the extremely online worst nerds liked wholesome things, not things that referred to any kind of harsh reality or imaginative reflection thereof.

The actual objective truth is even if we view art as there to Comfort The Afflicted, the Afflicted deal with bad stuff in a variety of ways. Elizabeth Sandifer has described this as "hugboxing vs scab-picking". In other words, every marginalized artist from Kenneth Anger to 50 Cent and whatever the latest trans catgirl making harsh-noise metal is on your social media timeline right now has as much reason to make or like  painful, not-comforting art as anyone else. There is (again) no research in social science suggesting otherwise.

Also, for what its worth, everyone I'm aware of who advocated a Theory of Cozy in the RPG space also lied about rape. Seems uncozy.

for example, Ken Russel's deeply uncozy 'The Devils' was recently re-released to basically universal acclaim from everyone smart because nobody really believes cozy theory

Cozy Theory Isn't Real

So all this has put worst nerds, despite the fact that they love games with swords in them, in the position of having to be pro-cozy, because to be otherwise would be to go back on attacks that they've been making since at least 2009.

Here's UK-based harasser Zach Cox (aka Jellymuppet, of the really ugly-looking Greek-themed game Atrapos*) and RPGnet moderator/Something Awful goon Kai Tave, who did a Lancer thing*  rapping some game I never heard of over the knuckles with the Theory of Cozy just this past week:

The point is thousands of Internet-hours have been expended by cozy nerds attacking creators for daring to suggest to consumers they'll be attacked by cozy nerds for what they created.

Of course all this hullabaloo and all these attempts at social superiority are, yes, caused by people who, repeat, play games where you kill things with swords. There are various verbal gymnastics where someone tries to show how their killing things with swords is less toxic than your killing things with swords, but ask any difficult questions and they all disintegrate into a pool of tears and Steven Universe DVDs.

(Doubt me? If you are a cozy theorist named here I will pay you 1000$ right now to show up in the comments and answer all the questions put to you about why liking cozy games shows you're better in some way than the rest of us. If you're so afflicted, you're gonna want that 1000$.)

But really: none of these ideas are real, people don't say them because they thought them through, they say them to socially signal to each other that they are on the same team and whatever.

A good example is Kingdom Death. Both the Something Awful goons* and Fred Hicks* of cozy-favorite RPG Fate attacked Kingdom Death as the worst then the cozy-even-more-favorite Matt Mercer* was like "Oh Kindom Death is cool!" and visited the Kingdom Death factory and that created so much cognitive dissonance everyone just shut up and pretended it didn't happen.

Point being: aside from a few genuine sacred crackpots, this advocacy for cozy was all an elaborate social signalling mechanism that was bound to fall apart eventually, just like the "boobs in games are bad" rhetoric fell apart the second Lady Dimitrescu showed up.

So This Week

Someone wrote an essay expressing skepticism of the concept of Cozy Horror. This was attacked by bad nerd, former Paizo employee, and cryptoconservative Jessica Price* (aka Delafina777). Her response to this essay was classic Cozy Theory:

...and then something wild happened that has rarely happened before: the other bad nerds* from Something Awful actually disagreed. Tuxedo Catfish* for example:

Now the reason they dared to disagree with a fellow scold (and a well-known woman, no less) was not a good one--it was because this time the target of their attack was on Team Something Awful.

What's remarkable is that it features the Something Awful goons basically deconstructing all of the tactics they've been using on everyone else for years:

Like, goons admitting someone's using social justice language dishonestly AND that the only reason they had sympathy for someone was tribal allegiance? Could this be...self-awareness? 

"...we're the people that decided posting toxic bullcrap is activism"

I would write something here but this sociopathic goon just said it for me. Yes, Travis, you're the people that decided posting toxic bullcrap is activism. 

"We're the problem."

Yes, you fucking are.

"There's got to be a better way to live than reading EVERYTHING as uncharitably as possible". 

And, to top it all off--here's a whole articulate theory of why these people act like this--from one of the chuds who acts like this. It's so reasonable I have nothing to add. Click to enlarge:

Now, I know this is naïve to even ask but, if they understand that they're the problem and they've been attacking artists for stupid reasons for over a decade: when are they going to apologize to us?

Full documentation of this internet fight here.

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*who helped all the other asterisked people here lie about rape . Here's the audio.

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Lair of the Hardcore Dangerous Extradimensional Sorcerer

A high-level dungeon, season to taste.

The PCs are nominally supposed to free the prisoner (8) and defeat the Sorcerer (21).

The entire dungeon is made of some material on the border between crystal and white marble with translucent veins that seem to move. The material automatically resists any attempt to manipulate or bypass it--it has an extra saving throw to prevent Passwall, Stone Shape,  Teleportation, et al. and if that save succeeds, some unsavory disaster will occur--the caster ends up half-stuck in the wall, for instance.

1.

Eldritch Polyhedra

These are hovering guard constructs, each about the size of a fridge. They cast a random offensive spell at any intruder every round as if 10th level. AC 20, 50 hit points.

2.

Perfidious Mirror

Entering the room through either of the trapped doors without the Sorcerer's key activates the mirror. It reflects everything accurately except it also contains a thief, who pickpockets one (real) item per round the room is occupied by stealing it from the PCs' reflection. The items are deposited at 22. Smashing the mirror results in seven years bad luck--Disadvantage to everything.

3.

Vestibule with Hypnotic Carpet

Save or believe you are sinking into the carpet--if so, you'll scream, alerting those nearby.

4.

Ooze Pool

The ancient ooze here is actually sentient (Zitha'Ninua of the Hallowed Gate, last survivor of a long-vanished oozvilization), and the sorcerer consults it from time to time, in return his servants throw it the flesh of prisoners and intruders.

The secret door in the masonry is actually on the far side of the ooze and nobody knows it's there except the crowling, who sometimes uses it when the ooze is asleep.

5.

Humunculery

Lined with cubby holes in which dwell the sorcerer's various small slaves and humunculi, mostly employed to deliver messages and occasionally curses. They sleep unless molested.

6.

Hall of Torture Chandeliers

Most of the unfortunate chandeliers are long dead and rotted away to bone, but a few are still living, tied up in impossible positions. Whether this is part of some ritual or just the Sorcerer's idea of cool decor is anyone's guess.

7.

Crowling Lair

A 2' tall crow-man makes his nest in the secret room here. He has been living here for years undetected thanks to his small size, 19 Dex, the fact that he's a 15th level thief and a tiny gauntlet that prevents him being detected by magic. He has a decent amount of other treasure squirreled away here as well.

He's here about half the time, and the other half he's sneaking around trying to find a good time to backstab and rob anyone who makes noise nearby.

8.

Prisoner

Whoever the PCs are looking for is here. If they have special powers, the mask prevents them from using them. The Sorcerer has the key to the prison and mask.

9.

Alchemesphere

This 20' diameter thing rotates and shifts ominously while hovering five feet off the floor. It has 83 knobs which glow when touched and, as it spins, reveals a hollow core. Placing any object inside and activating any given number of the knobs transforms whatever is inside into an equivalent mass of another substance. What substance? The substance whose atomic number is equal to the number of knobs activated. 79 knobs equals Gold.

10.

Nythrax Gnashgristle

This most-badass of minotaurs is cursed to guard this room until he dies. Magic has kept him alive for 500 years but the only food he gets is intruders, so he is always upset and almost always hungry. 4 attacks per round.

11.

Organ

Maybe it has powers? Maybe it's the Leviathan Organ of Nasen-Ra? Maybe the sorcerer just likes music.

12.

Spooky Library

Sorcerous tomes, as you'd expect. A Seafarer's Guide to Athas is a fake book and lifting it activates the secret door--the Sorcerer knows about this door and uses it.

13.

Psychedelic Nightmarescape Room

This place is all fucked up and you end up just floating through it. Anyone entering this area must save or be affected as with a Maze spell, and--whether they are affected or not they need to pass an Int test for each door to tell that its even a door. The trap on the door to room 8 activates a magic alarm that echoes through the entire dungeon.

14.

Astronomy Room

Various devices for measuring the stars and the space between the stars.

15.

Specimen Room

No big deal unless you open the jars--or they get broken in a fight...

16.

Pocket Dimension

The Sorcerer performs insane experiments here. Save or be Confused every round you're in here, and the trap on the south door activates an alarm that pulsates through the entire dungeon. Like room 13, you kinda float around in there and must save to even find the far door.

17.

Concubine's Bedchamber

A fearsome sorceress in her own right and nobody to mess with, however:

-She does not know about the secret door, which comes out behind a folding screen so she won't see you if you sneak in, and

-She might be willing to bargain with intruders in exchange for knowledge or power. She won't directly attack the Sorcerer or his creatures, though--too dangerous.

18. 

Crystal Chamber

A creepy humming. The crystal formations are worth 1000gp per foot along their longest side but are very fragile and if they break they cause random magic effects. The trap on the door only activates coming in from 19, and its an alarm that calls any nearby creature.

19.

Puzzle Room

Note that from this side the door to 18 is magically locked.

This puzzle consists of a large square table inset with:

-20 slideable squares

-22 slideable rectangular tiles of various sizes, as short as 3 squares on a side and as long as 7 squares on a side

-3 elbow joints, 1 square wide

The answer to the puzzle is to reconstruct the map of the dungeon. Answering it allows access to the 18 (otherwise only reachable via the secret doors) and deactivates the alarm on the door.

20. 

Jester's Perch

The Jester tends to hang out here, bored, practicing tumbling or juggling, basically because the Sorcerer wants them on hand at all times in case he needs something.

The Jester is relatively subdued, as jesters go--almost more like a mime. He grins horribly and speaks in short, cryptic taunts. He is immune to the first attack in any round, which he will mock, though he is vulnerable while doing it. Indeed, he is invulnerable while silent--nimbly sidestepping or grinningly enduring whatever is done to him, but he can't help making fun of those who try, which fucks him in the end.

The trap on the door to 21 just does massive damage to anyone who touches it uninvited.

21.

The Sorcerer's Chamber

He has a scary magic sword and can use it plus cast a spell each round. He also has any of the PCs magic items that the mirror in 2 managed to steal. Any of his minions not yet dead will roll up to help.

22.

The Treasure Hoard

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You Suffer--But Why?

My Weird, Dark, Twisted Habit

Seventeen years ago. (Seventeen years ago?) When I started this blog, that is, when I decided to take on another thing in addition to taking care of a spouse with chronic illness, making art to sell in galleries, being in porn movies, playing games, and doing all the other chores a person does to stay around and sane, I had a simple idea about doing stuff on the Internet.

In fact, I'd had this idea since I started doing anything on the Internet, much earlier, near the beginning of my art career. Arguably even since I started doing pretty much anything as an adult: 

If I was going to do something--especially something time-consuming--I should know why I was doing it. And, as a corollary, whatever that reason was, I should feel good about that reason, like that was a good reason.

If I was going to hang out on a website I was going to have it for a reason I knew and I felt good about, if I was leaving a comment I was doing it for a reason I knew and felt good about, if I was disagreeing with someone I was doing it for a reason I knew and felt good about, if I was telling everyone someone else should fucking go to jail I was doing it for a reason that I knew and felt good about, if I was telling literally anyone literally anything on here I was doing it for a reason that I knew and felt good about.

A vital caveat here is "because I was bored" is, for me, not a good reason. Because I have about a hundred other more fun or productive things I could be doing if that's the best reason I can come up with. If I'm bored I could read a book

The reason I started writing this blog, for instance, is because I run games at home with my friends and those games are fun and have all kinds of benefits and when I write about games on here I sometimes get ideas from people who I interact with or who build on the ideas I have here about how to make those games more fun. Benefit.

Many People Do Not Have Reasons

One thing it took me a really long time to learn is that most people do not think this way. They just do stuff and are not conscious of reasons.

For many people, they were either born into-, or quickly adapted to-, a world where writing your thoughts and feelings online in a comment section or even a whole blog entry is either:

• As instinctive as breathing
• Literally because they were bored and had nothing else to do, or
• Actually something they're lowkey embarrassed about

Person with very strong takes on what is Problematic in Gaming:
"I love arguing about petty shit and calling people idiots"

I've had this lack of intention rammed home to me in a million ways. In public conversations with people just bragging about how they don't have or need reasons (free speech!), in private conversations with people who repented their poorly-thought-out decisions, in Dr Weisman's article and the interviews she taped, and in perfectly friendly conversations with all kinds of people when just asking them about their lives and why they made the decisions in them.

A lot of people, all over, just never think much about why they're jabbering.

Who Cares?

This seems pretty abstract until you have into a conversation where someone's intentions for typing something and shooting it out into the universe come up.

You ask a guy why they raised a controversial issue, why they decided to get mad about James Maliszewski's specific Kickstarter, that specific niche game's art choice, or the casting of that specific Marvel movie and they act like you just asked for their credit card number and a full survey of their mother's sex life, itemized by year and position.

That is: they act like its offensive to ask them for their goals, or a lot of work for them to figure out their goals, or both. 

Of course, a statement of goals is preliminary to any conversation about whether any given instance of screaming about things on the Internet is going to get you to them or whether those goals are even worth it.  That is: to fix anything or make any of it worthwhile.

A lot of people just haven't thought that hard about it. They're suffering from a terminal case of Heideggerian thrown-ness, just showing up in the world doing things because that seems unreflectively like the thing to do.

Anyway, so...don't be like that? Or at least not when there's stakes to what you're saying.

A Review of Those Magnetic Dungeon-Block Things (& some other tabletop toys)

So you may have noticed, on Facebook and wherever else, ads for Click-Blocks those little magnetic dungeon blocks...

Somebody got them for me for my birthday and my review is: they rule.

Yes, that's a real frog. 1$ on Ebay plus shipping from Guatemala.

Each one is a little cube, scaled for a D&D-scale 5' square, apparently filled with bits of magnetic sand or ball-bearings, so they stick to whichever other block or blocks is/are next to them.

The pack I got had both those grey stone-looking boxes and the wooden-crate looking ones. If you want to get all magical-girl their website has all kinds of Disney-colored blocks for actual children as well which I might pick up.

In addition to all the obvious uses, I also just like:

-Being able to grab a short stack to indicate a character is levitating or whatever

-Quickly snapping-together a little pencil-holder or dice corral or something on my desk

-Using the different-colored blocks or the different pattern-sides to subtly indicate that one block is where a trap or hidden feature is, even though it just looks like I threw a thing together.

The only non-obvious limitation on them is that if you have a block not supported directly from below, it's not strong enough to support a metal miniature--though it might hold a plastic or paper one.

As long as we're here I also want to give a shout-out to just like blocks. Like regular block-blocks. I Ebayed a pack of A-to-Z for like twelve bucks and they're infinitely useful.

I like neat dungeon scenery as much as the next guy--including all the cool walls and stairs and stuff that Dwarven Forge or whatever makes--but the thing is they can be a struggle to keep adapting to situations that come up and crucially, they usually don't stack well. 

Regular old kids' building blocks are at least kind of useful for nearly any situation. Plus they're strong, durable, cheap, less fiddly than Legos, and can be used to teach your players basic shapes and common animals.

In most dungeons I like to use the blocks themselves to indicate a corridor rather than the more model-builder way of using the blocks to build walls and indicate the corridor using the space in-between. It's easier to see them and saves time and blocks.

Also, here's a review of using a real dead giant isopod to represent a giant isopod: freaks players out and works every time.

Also recommended: this wooden prison, sold as a D&D "dice jail" that I picked up at the Ren Faire. The doors slide up and down, so its very serviceable as a dungeon cell---like twenty-five bucks.

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Interview With A Man Who Is Angry About Hot Goth Porn Girls

Maybe the second in a series of interviews with people who are totally wrong?

Anyway, readers will be aware that a lot of people get mad that porn stars play D&D.

An adjacent issue is that people get mad when porn stars--or any sex workers really--do literally anything. 

There was a recent internet controversy where a video of a bunch of model-types did a sexy video and they were goths. The internet got very upset that goths were shown as being hot. There was also something about Drake? Idk. There was discourse.

Here at D&D With Porn Stars we know a thing or two about goth sex workers but this is the Internet, where actual knowledge is often a tremendous handicap in trying to figure out what people are talking about.

So I interviewed one of them.

I started talking to B00GIEpunk and asking why he cares about any of this, he eventually got real frustrated and stopped answering and said that he would only respond if I paid him or if it was a formal interview. I said Ok, its a formal interview.

He then put a bunch of perfectly reasonable conditions on the interview assuming I'd decline (he does not assume good faith--which is evil). I agreed to the conditions, he said:

Q:

Ok, you've said that these girls in this video represent a trend that you don't like, is that right?

A:

Yes, with one qualification: I'm not saying the women themselves are the problem, I'm saying the way they've been selected and presented appears to reflect a broader, commercially legible stereotype of goth femininity - the conventionally attractive, sexualised "goth girlfriend" archetype - and I find that flattening of a much broader subculture irritating.

Siouxsie Sioux

Q:

So, the idea of this as "flattening" would seem to suggest that this piece of media is part of a *more* significant trend than lots of *other* media which portrays goths in different ways. Why is it *more* significant than other kinds of media takes on goths?

A:

I don't think it has to be more significant than every other portrayal of goths for "flattening" to be an accurate description.

Different representations can coexist, including ones that pull goth aesthetics in very different directions. My point is that this video participates in one recurring shorthand - namely, goth femininity reduced to a narrow, conventionally attractive, sexually legible aesthetic.

"Flattening" describes what happens within that representational pattern - a broad music-based subculture with many aesthetics gets compressed into a smaller set of immediately recognisable visual cues. It doesn't mean that pattern has successfully erased every competing representation, nor that this particular video is culturally more powerful than all of them.

So I wouldn't claim this video is uniquely significant. I'd claim it's recognisable as one example of a broader stereotype that is significant enough to be culturally familiar in the first place.

Patricia Morrison (Sisters of Mercy)

Q:

If it's not more significant than say "the goths in South Park" or "goths represented as losers who watch too much anime and need to touch grass" or "Goths who will boil and eat your cat" then why are you steamed?

A:

Because "significant" and "annoying" aren't synonyms. I don't need to believe this is the single most culturally powerful depiction of goths in existence to dislike what it's doing.

What irritates me about this particular stereotype is that it takes a subculture with decades of music, fashion, DIY culture and internal diversity and filters goth women through a very familiar lens of sexual desirability - "goth" as an accessory to the fantasy of the hot, available goth girlfriend.

The South Park goths are a caricature too. So are the "anime loser" and "cat-boiling weirdo" stereotypes, and I can criticise those when they're in front of me as well. Other stereotypes existing doesn't make this one less worthy of comment - this happened to be the representation in the video I was looking at, so it's the one I commented on.

I don't rank every cultural irritation on a league table before I'm allowed to be annoyed by it.

Maitri and Valor (Christian Death)

Q:

So would you say "I'm being annoyed on the Internet about something that doesn't really matter"?

A:

I'd say I'm annoyed on the Internet about something that isn't especially high-stakes, which is different from saying it doesn't matter.

Most cultural criticism concerns things that aren't matters of life and death. Representation, stereotypes and commodification can still be worth noticing and discussing without pretending they're the gravest problems facing humanity.

So yes, it's a relatively minor irritation. No, I don't think "minor" means "meaningless."

Cosey Fanni Tutti (Throbbing Gristle)

Q:

Well, I know you said you didn't have a problem with the women themselves--you do understand that they agreed to do this right? And it's basically part of their job?

A:

Yes, of course. I understand that they're consenting adults doing paid work, and I haven't suggested otherwise.

My criticism isn't that the women were somehow coerced into appearing, nor that they're personally responsible for every cultural meaning attached to the finished product. It's about the product itself - how it selects, frames and packages a particular version of "goth femininity" for an audience.

People can willingly participate in something and that thing can still reproduce a stereotype. Consent answers the question "did they agree to do it?" It doesn't answer the separate question "what cultural image is this piece of media constructing?"

Caroline Pierce (currently playing an elf ranger)

Q:

Ok. I'm asking a different thing. Knowing that these people worked on this project as their job, do you get that your nuance between "I don't like this video" & "you're not real goths" might not be real important to them--especially with thousands of others saying obnoxious things to them?

A:

Yes, I understand that. If someone is already receiving thousands of obnoxious comments, they may not care very much about the distinction between criticism of a piece of media and criticism directed at them personally.

But that doesn't make the distinction unreal or unimportant in what I'm actually saying here. I'm responsible for the claims I'm making in this interview, and I'm being explicit that my criticism is of the representation and packaging, not of the women as people or their legitimacy within the subculture.

I can understand why somebody on the receiving end of a pile-on might not stop to parse that distinction. That's a question of how criticism is experienced, though, not whether the distinction itself exists.

Vampira

Q:

The extent if your grievance is "this annoys me but I can't think of any way it really affects anything" correct?

A:

No, that isn't correct. I've said it's low-stakes, not that it has no effect. My criticism is that repeated commercial shorthand can narrow how a subculture is popularly understood, particularly when women within it are repeatedly filtered through a sexually marketable archetype.

I'm not claiming this video causes some large, independently measurable social harm by itself. Cultural representation generally works cumulatively, not because one video changes society overnight.

So if you want to characterise my position as 'this annoys me and it isn't terribly important,' that's fair. 'I can’t think of any way it affects anything' is using your own interpretative wording to misrepresent what I said.

Ms. Cassandra Peterson

Q:

Ok, so this "narrowing"--how could that affect anyone concretely?

A:

Concretely, repeated narrow representations can affect what audiences come to recognise as "authentically" goth, which in turn affects how people within the subculture are perceived and treated.

That can mean:

- women who don't fit the conventionally attractive, sexualised archetype being treated as less recognisably goth

- people assuming goth women are inherently sexually available or performing for male attention

- commercial spaces increasingly rewarding the most immediately marketable version of the aesthetic

- newcomers encountering the subculture primarily through that stereotype rather than through its music and broader history

None of those effects requires this one video to be uniquely powerful. They're cumulative effects of repetition. My claim is not (and has never been) that this video causes measurable harm by itself, but that it participates in a representational pattern which can shape expectations about what goth women are supposed to look like and what their participation in the subculture means.

Penny, who ordered this miniature

Q:

Let's start with the first one: if someone is not conventionally attractive and so they're not read as goth (by someone really stupid and impressionable who watched some videos) who cares? Why would even they care? How does this hurt anyone?

A:

Because being persistently misread or treated as inauthentic within a community you actually belong to can matter to the person experiencing it.

That doesn't require catastrophic harm. It can mean being dismissed as "not really goth," being excluded from spaces or conversations, having your taste and identity treated as illegitimate, or being expected to perform a narrower aesthetic to be recognised at all.

And I don't think you need to posit some uniquely stupid person who watched one video. Cultural stereotypes work through repetition: people absorb shorthand from lots of media and social encounters until it starts to feel like common sense.

You asked me for a concrete effect. That's one. If your next question is "but why should anyone care about that effect?", that's a different argument.

Chelsea Wolfe

Q:

Why should anyone care about that (entirely hypothetical) effect? Both the person causing it and the person feeling it would appear to have such a severe mental health problem to start with that the video wasn't the issue. The problem is untreated mental health problems.

A:

If you continue framing ordinary social behaviour, identity, or (illegal claim deleted) as evidence of "severe mental health problems," or otherwise introduce (illegal claim deleted) premises into the questioning, the interview is over. You're free to challenge my argument as aggressively as you like, but I'm not obliged to participate in (illegal claim deleted) or pathologising framing.

I don't accept the premise that caring how you're perceived within a community, or being influenced by cultural stereotypes, constitutes a "severe mental health problem." Those are ordinary features of human social behaviour.

People care about belonging, recognition and how others perceive them. People also absorb stereotypes. Neither of these require a mental health diagnosis.

And even if someone involved did have a mental health condition, "therefore the surrounding social influences don't matter" wouldn't follow anyway. Individual psychology and social environment aren't mutually exclusive explanations.

You asked for a concrete way narrowing representation could affect someone. I gave you one. Declaring everyone involved "mentally ill" doesn't actually rebut the mechanism. It just changes the subject in a deeply offensive way.

Morticia

Q:

Offended or not, do you dispute either of the following:

1. Someone who decides someone isn't a goth because they're not attractive has a mental health problem

2. Someone who decides they care significantly whether that person thinks they’re a goth has a mental 

health problem 

?

A:

I dispute both. Neither of those facts, by itself, is sufficient to diagnose someone with a mental health problem.

More importantly, I explicitly told you that continuing to frame ordinary social behaviour as evidence of mental illness would terminate the interview. Your very next question did exactly that.

So the interview is over. You may publish the answers given during the agreed interview period under the terms we established. I won't be answering further questions.

Astarte

Q:

Yeah you have been perfectly clear: you think things that are absolutely bananas aren't and that pretty much explains your whole deal. No need to ask any more.

Brides of Dracula