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Cybersafe

Anita Sarkeesian launched a Kickstarter campaign to create a video series exploring portrayals of women in popular video games. She received extensive online harassment and threats from the gaming community in an attempt to silence her critique. Despite the abuse, her Kickstarter campaign was successfully funded and her videos received millions of views. The document outlines appropriate online behavior and consequences for cyberbullying or harassment. It also provides a lesson plan for discussing these issues as part of a Women's Studies class.

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77 views6 pages

Cybersafe

Anita Sarkeesian launched a Kickstarter campaign to create a video series exploring portrayals of women in popular video games. She received extensive online harassment and threats from the gaming community in an attempt to silence her critique. Despite the abuse, her Kickstarter campaign was successfully funded and her videos received millions of views. The document outlines appropriate online behavior and consequences for cyberbullying or harassment. It also provides a lesson plan for discussing these issues as part of a Women's Studies class.

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api-301551406
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Promoting Cybersafe Behaviour in my Learning Area in Schools:!

Womens Studies!
Ashleigh Joseph!!

2096130!

!
!

Kickstarter is a website that allows people to present their ideas to the public, and then

gives the public an opportunity to support their projects by donating money to them (Kickstarter:
2014). When Anita Sarkeesian launched a Kickstarter campaign aiming to explore portrayals of
women in popular videos games and make a series of Youtube videos about the topic, she found
herself the victim of a mass of online threats and abuse from the gaming community.!
All of my social media sites were flooded with threats of rape, violence, sexual assault,
death. And youll notice that all of these comments are specifically targeting my gender
There was a campaign to report all of my social media accounts, including my Kickstarter,

my Youtube, my Twitter. And they would report them as fraud, as spam, even as terrorism,
in an effort to get them suspended. They attempted to knock my website offline, hack into
my email and other accounts. They attempted to collect and distribute my personal
information. There were images made in my likeness; pornographic images made in my
likeness, being raped by video games characters. And sent to me again, and
again. (Sarkeesian in TED: 2012). !

Anita herself believes that the harassment was the gamers communitys way of attempting

to silence her, and have the boys club status of gaming remain unchanged. This is just another
example of male privilege in popular culture: these games are made mostly by men for the target
audience of men (Sasman: 2013. pg. 9). Being such a male dominated industry, you would think
that women may no be represented at all, but those very few that were are (with very few
exception) objectified and sexualised beyond reason. Anitas arguments are rational, intelligent,
well articulated, and backed up with plenty of facts and evidence, yet she was still attacked. !
!

Youll note that on the first image, the target pledge goal was six-thousand dollars. Thanks

to Anitas those who paid attention to her messages and passionately supported her, she has
raised $158, 922 from almost seven-thousand backers. Her most watched video on Youtube
Damsel in Distress: Part 1- Tropes vs Women in Video Games, has had over two million views.
But despite the success of her campaign, shes still receiving threats, and thus the comments
section on her Youtube videos has been disabled. The people who disagreed with the ideas that
Anita was expressing werent just content to dispute her opinion and evidence, or even to public
disagree with her by posting respectful, but opposing views on her social media accounts. They
felt justified to go much further by publicly publishing serious threats of violence against her, and
when that didnt work they tried to silence her cyber voice by reporting her to her social media site

admins (and thus getting her banned or kicked off those sites), as well as hacking her accounts
and attempting to distribute her private information. !

Year 10 Womens Studies !


Cybersafe Behaviour Plan !

!
Inappropriate and offensive content counts as imagery or written words that are: abusive, violent,

sexist, racist, sexually explicit, contain explicit words/swear words, etc!

What is not okay:!


Posting inappropriate or offensive content on a public blog or social media site!
Sending inappropriate or offensive content via a social media site, email, or any other messaging
application!
Revealing private details (weather it be personal details or contact information) online!
Revealing someone elses private details online!
Posting, uploading, or sending any images or videos of someone else without their permission!
Altering images of yourself or other people in an inappropriate or offensive way!
Hacking into anothers online account or posting/sending content posing as someone else!
Persistently contacting someone if youre aware its unwelcome (Department of Education,

Trainging and Employment: 2013. pg. 4)!

What you should do if you are a victim of any of the above:!


DO NOT RETALIATE OR RESPOND!
Block the perpetrator!
Talk to your parents!
Talk to your teachers!
Talk to school counsellors!
Report posts, etc to the administrators of the site (this may cause the original poster to lose their
social media account!
Report physical threats to the police (pg. 6)!

What you can do to prevent becoming a victim of Cyberbullying:!


Dont trust others with embarrassing or personal photographs of yourself!
Be selective about who you share your account details with!
Only make contact with known/real life friends on social media sites

How to report an incident of harassment or inappropriate content:!


By reporting someone you know who has posted inappropriate content to the school or police, they
will be forced to remove it!
If the original poster or sender is unknown or anonymous you can contact the sites directly!
Facebook:!
www.facebook.com/safety!
Instagram:!
www.help.instagram.com/154475974694511!
YouTube:!
www.youtube.com/t/contact_us!
Twitter:!
www.support.twitter.com!
Tumblr:!
www.tumblr.com/help!
Moshi Monsters:!
www.moshimonsters.com/parents!
Club Penguin:!
www.clubpenguin.com/parents (pg. 11)!

Consequences for unsafe cyber activity:!


This school takes a zero tolerance stance on cyberbullying and harassment and therefore all
perpetrators of this act (which includes original posters and anybody who shares) will be
suspended.!
If the issue is ongoing students may need to attend mediation sessions (pg. 9)!
Serious issues of cyberbullying (such as unlawful stalking and possessing, distributing and
making child exploitation material is an illegal offence and will be reported to police (pg. 10)

!
!
!
!
Lesson Plan!

!
Title: ! !

Cybersafety!

Topic: ! !

Womens Studies!

Year Level: !

10!

Aim Questions: !

What is the proper etiquette when posting online about gender issues and

why is it important?!

What are you likely to encounter when engaging with the online community

about gender issues?!

Materials required: ! The use of a Smart Board or projector. Each students needs access to an
!

iPad or computer!

General Information:! Most students will be aware of the basic rules of cybersafety and how to act
responsibly using the internet and social media. They have been studying gender issues for
almost the full semester, and therefore are aware of the terminology and feminist theory.!

Learning Activities:!

The teacher will introduce the students to Anita Sarkeesian and explain the objective behind her
Kickstarter campaign. The class will then watched Anitas TED video, making them aware of the
amount of abuse she received from people online. The teachers will then lead an open
discussion were the students will be encouraged to openly talk about this issue. Asking and
answering questions like: Do you think the abuse she received was fair or warranted? How
would you react in her situation? What could she have done about it?!
Next the teacher will hand out a copy of the year 10 cybersafety agreement that the class will go
over briefly and then discuss how it relates to Anita Sarkeesians example of cyber harassment.
The class will also talk about internet Trolls, and talk bout what motives them.!
The students will be asked to go online with their iPads or on a computer, and find a hateful or
uninformed comment, that they disagree with that is posted on a link or video regarding gender
politics. They will write it down and then come up with a respectful response which kindly
articulates their disagreement. They will not actually post their response. !
Lastly each student will share the comment theyve chosen and their response to it, to the class. !

!
!

!
!
Kickstarter, INC. (2014). What Is Kickstarter. Available: https://
www.kickstarter.com/hello. Last accessed 1st November.

TEDx. (2012). Anita Sarkeesian at TEDxWomen 2012. Available: http://


tedxtalks.ted.com/video/Anita-Sarkeesian-at-TEDxWomen-2. Last
accessed 1st November.

State of Queensland (Department of Education, Training and


Employment) 2013. (2013). Cybersafety and Cyberbullying: A Guide for
Parents and Caregivers. Available: http://education.qld.gov.au/
studentservices/behaviour/qsaav/docs/cyberbullyingcybersafetyprintfriendlyguide.pdf. Last accessed 1st November.

Sasman, L. (2013). Why do Male Gamers Hate Anita Sarkeesian. Sister


Namibia. 25 (2), 8 - 9.

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