EPISODE 10: BIGOT SCUM
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: This is Marcia. She's been repeatedly banned from Facebook for saying things like, "Men are scum."
Marcia: I'm a comedian. I do misandrist humor. Certain men think that all feminism is is a bunch of women sitting around, talking about hating men and about how all men should die. So I'm like, "Let's just give the people what they want."
Dylan [VOICEOVER]: And this is Andrew who heard about Marcia and went on her page to call her a "bigot."
Andrew: At least to me, in my opinion, feminism is a fairly toxic ideology. I think feminism outreached its bounds at this point and really to me, it seems like the supremacy movement.
[Phone dialing sounds. Phone rings. Guest picks up.]
Marcia: Hi Andrew.
Andrew: Hey Marcia. Great to be talking to you.
[Instrumental of ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals begins to play.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER INTRODUCTION]: Hey. I'm Dylan Marron and welcome back to Conversations With People who Hate Me, the show where I take negative online conversations and move them offline.
We'll be returning to a regular release schedule on April 2nd so think of this episode as a teaser of a new format. You've heard me speak one on one with people who have said negative things about me on the internet, but I wanted to change things up and share this platform with others who have received their own digital negativity. And that could include you! Have people said negative things to or about you on the internet? Well, after this episode, head on over to www.ConversationsWithPeopleWhoHateMe.com to fill out a form so that maybe you can be a guest on this show and move your own online conversation offline.
In today's episode, I'm speaking with Marcia Belsky, a standup comedian and a proud feminist who jokingly embraces man-hating humor as part of her comedy. Marcia has been repeatedly banned from Facebook for writing things like, "Men are scum."
Now, the story of her ban was picked up by news outlets and it reached a man named Andrew who upon hearing Marcia's story, looked her up on Facebook and called her a "bigot."
First, I'll speak one on one to each of them and then I'll moderate a conversation where they speak to each other. While the format is different, the intention of this show remains the same: this is neither a debate nor a search for common ground. It is simply a show where two people have agreed to get on the phone with each other and listen. So let's get things started.
[Music fades.]
Dylan: Hi Marcia.
Marcia: Hi.
Dylan: How are you?
Marcia: I'm so good.
Dylan: Yeah?
Marcia: Yes. Thank you so much for having me.
Dylan: So Marcia, you have become known for three famous words.
Marcia: Oh god. [laughs]
Dylan: On social media. What are those words?
Marcia: Well, now, I'm going to be known as Marcia "Men are Scum" Belsky probably for the rest of my life.
Dylan: You have been banned from Facebook for saying that.
Marcia: It's been kind of a long saga with Facebook. I'm a comedian and I do, like, misandrist humor, certain men thing that all feminism is is a bunch of women sitting around, talking about hating men, and about how all men should die. So I'm like, "Let's just give the people what they want!" [Dylan laughs] I wanted to make jokes that show what that type of feminism would look like but not in the way where it's undermining where that anger comes from in a way where it's actually giving credit to where that anger comes from. You know? So, the first time I got banned from Facebook, I had a photo that was up as my cover photo for like a year. That was me as an adorable six-year-old child. I have a little speech bubble coming out that says, "Kill all men." The likes were high. It was up for like a full year. Then I think someone reported my photo that said "kill all men," and it was removed. I was banned for 24 hours.
Dylan: Separate from this conversation, when, how did you get into comedy?
Marcia: So I started comedy at 19 because my theater program was crap. I thought I wanted to be a actress but to be honest, I'm not that great of an actress. I'm pretty stiff. [Dylan laughs] So-
Dylan: That's okay. Look, you found a path.
Marcia: You find your niche and you go. But yes. So I've been doing it for a long time now, like nine years. Then I saw this shift happen to this online stuff probably when I was like 23, 24. When I moved to New York, Twitter and Facebook became really important in terms of people knowing who you are.
Dylan: Yeah. This is interesting to hear how you became a comedian. Separate question is when did you start identifying as a feminist?
Marcia: It was in college taking classes, sociology and things like that where I could actually put terms and theories behind these things that I always perceived. So that's when the dots really started connecting in my mind.
Dylan: Currently, what would you say your brand of comedy is?
Marcia: Well, I mean I do a podcast with my cohost Rae Sanni called Misandry with Marcia and Rae. The joke is that no matter what feminists do, they are going to be called "man haters." They are going to be called "misandrists." It's a way of taking that word back essentially. It's like okay, let's just skip a step and we'll call ourselves misandrists and let's get started. I basically built this matriarchal fantasy world in my head as a coping mechanism, as armor, as a way to make jokes for other women. I don't actually want all the men to die. Every woman gets to save two. But it's for a cathartic relief of this anger that makes you feel impotent because there's not a lot you can do in your station as a woman besides sort of little acts of agency and resistance. So then they see me as hateful. I accepted that and the trolls start coming.
Dylan: What are some of the kinds of things people say to you online?
Marcia: "You're ugly," "ugly cunt," "fuck you," like things like that. I honestly can't remember a lot of the comments because I really block it out. I feel like I think I have to. I think if I internalized any of it, it already does weigh on me, but it would weigh on me too heavily. I delete them and I almost try and forget about them as quickly as possible. In some ways, it's interesting because what they want, either consciously or subconsciously is to make sure that you know as a woman who is claiming to be feminist that they can still make you feel bad about yourself within the lens of the male gaze and male power. So they're like, "Oh, you feel good about yourself? Well, I, a man, am going to call you ugly." For most women, that will affect you in some way because you know how much your value is placed on how men see you. So subconsciously when a bunch of guys are calling you ugly online, you get scared, "Oh, there goes my value." That's exactly what they want. They want you to feel bad about yourself to the point that you shut up. What they don't see, maybe some of them, the nicer ones who truly just feel that I'm a bigoted person is that they don't see how much shit women eat on a daily basis from men. So then when they see a sarcastic, "God, fuck all the men," they say, "That is truly so hateful, it's disgusting and I'm going to tell her."
Dylan: So recently, you got one comment in particular. It just said "bigot." What did you feel when you got that comment?
Marcia: I mean those comments frustrate me more than someone who is just calling me an "ugly feminist cunt" because someone who is calling me an ugly feminist cunt, they want women to shut up and I know that what I'm doing is good. But when someone calls me a bigot or truly thinks that I'm a hateful person, I do react to that because then I feel misunderstood and I get frustrated at the blindness that privilege lends to people. So the bigot comments hurt me because I feel like how do I even begin.
Dylan: Yeah. So the person who wrote that comment that called you a bigot under your post, his name is Andrew. I just want to be clear that we're not equating what he said, calling you a "bigot-"
Marcia: Yes.
Dylan: With-
Marcia: This "ugly cunt" stuff.
Dylan: Yeah. It's different, and it's a different beast. But still, a negative comment on the internet.
Marcia: Yeah. Well, and it seems to come from a more genuine place. Like I said, that is the only thing I'm interested in clarifying. I'm much more willing to talk to people who truly feel that I am bigoted as opposed to somebody who I know just wants women to shut the fuck up in general.
Dylan: Okay. Well, great. Okay. So hang tight, I'm going to go talk to Andrew. You stay right there.
Marcia: Okay.
[Solo conversation ends. Phone rings. Second guest picks up.]
Andrew: Hey Dylan.
Dylan: Hey. How are ya?
Andrew: Doing great.
Dylan: Yeah?
Andrew: How about yourself?
Dylan: I'm good. How's your day going so far?
Andrew: It's going well. Got the first snow of the year, but I was able to get my morning run in still so it's not too bad.
Dylan: How long have you been a runner?
Andrew: Gosh. Third grade I want to say.
Dylan: Oh my god!
Andrew: Yeah.
Dylan: That's really young to start.
Andrew: I know. We had to do a mile run starting in third grade. I think it's the first we were required to do it.
Dylan: [laughing] That is early!
Andrew: In.
Dylan: Yeah. So you did it. Running has always been meditative for me, you know.
Andrew: Yeah, I find the same. It calms my mind very well, gives me a lot of time to think about stuff I need to work through.
Dylan: Andrew, I guess my first question for you is what made you want to reach out to Marcia originally?
Andrew: Um. You know I just think that at least to me in my opinion, feminism is a fairly toxic ideology. Her saying, "Men are scum," getting banned from Facebook, now I don't necessarily agree that she should've been banned. But I'd like to just understand the reasoning behind why she feels it's okay to be saying, "Men are scum," but then advocating for women's rights.
Dylan: Does that feel hurtful to hear her say, "Men are scum?"
Andrew: It doesn't really feel hurtful to me. I mean I don't take it anything personally like that. I don't know Marcia. It's not directed at me, it's just I don't think it's a very productive thing to be doing especially when you're advocating for equal rights.
Dylan: So you went on her Facebook and you called her a bigot. Then you messaged her and you said, "You think saying men are scum doesn't make you a bigot. Wouldn't I be a bigot if I said women are scum?" Talk to me through your reasoning of like what makes you feel that way.
Andrew: I mean I don't want to say women are scum. I don't think that. I believe men and women are equal. That's why I'm not a feminist. To me, it's just doesn't seem productive like I mentioned before to just be going out and calling people scum or anything like that. I mean historically, women have been oppressed by men. There is no doubt about that. There definitely was a place in the world for feminism at one point. But at this point, I honestly don't see that there is much of a point. If there is, I don't see why it has to be odds with men instead of working with men or doing its own separate thing. I think feminism outreached its bounds at this point. Really to me, it seems like the supremacy movement.
Dylan: You think feminism is searching for supremacy for women. Where did you start feeling, thinking that feminism was a toxic ideology as you said earlier?
Andrew: I'd say it started in high school, either my junior or sophomore year. My best friend in high school was, at the time, I called her a femi-Nazi. I thought at the time, I supported feminism. It turns out she is actually a lot more moderate than a lot of feminists are. I considered myself a feminist early, I'd say I was in support of feminism. I think getting to know her, I realized I really don't agree with just about anything she had to say.
Dylan: What was your friend doing that inspired you to called her a femi-Nazi?
Andrew: At least the first time I can remember, I had mentioned that a girl I found attractive was hot. She went ballistic about that. But every time I heard talk about a guy, she would say words like "yummy" or just sexually degrading terms about a guy she thought was attractive. It didn't bother me. But what bothered me is that she would attack me for calling a girl hot but then use way more explicit sexual terminology or objectification about men and say that I'm being sexist and what she's doing is okay.
Dylan: We're talking about oppression, we're talking about marginalization and all of those words that we snowflakes love to use. But do you feel in any aspect of your life that you've ever felt marginalized or oppressed?
Andrew: Everyone will be marginalized and oppressed at some point in some way regardless of how privileged you are and everyone will be privileged in some way as well.
Dylan: Just to say because this is an audio medium and not video, but you are a white man, right?
Andrew: Yes, a straight white male.
Dylan: Okay. Great.
Andrew: That means I can't talk in certain places I guess.
Dylan: Is that what you feel that it means?
Andrew: I feel the radical feminists and social justice warriors definitely. The amount of times I've heard, "You're a white male," shouted at me or at other white men, to be like using the Three-Fifths Compromise of the rationale to not let a black person talk.
Dylan: Do you really think that those are comparable?
Andrew: I don't think they're comparable but I think it's the same ideology. I mean it's completely different positions that people are in but either way, you're degrading someone down to their skin color and using that as what you use the basis of your beliefs on them instead of who they are.
Dylan: Yeah. I mean I really disagree with you on that because I think if you're bringing up like the Three-Fifths Compromise when slaves were considered only three-fifths of a human, I think saying that is so rooted in a really toxic pervasive macro racism whereas saying, "You can't speak, you're a straight white man," which by the way I'm not cosigning, I'm only saying it in the context of this argument, but saying, "You can't speak, you're a straight white man," is more born out of the idea that straight cis white men have been speaking for social movements for so long. Does that jive with you or you're not totally into that?
Andrew: To an extent, yes. I mean we've definitely had our voices heard more than other people. But why make us your enemy because of that?
Dylan: Here's a question, what did the women in your life today think about feminism?
Andrew: I can only think of one who has a political view on it at this point. She would be anti-feminist. Other than that, to the extent I know every other woman I know currently doesn't have an opinion for or against it.
Dylan: Really?
Andrew: If they do, they've never voiced it. Yeah.
Dylan: Huh. Have you asked the how they feel in this current moment of #MeToo trending on social media and public talks about sexual harassment and stuff like that?
Andrew: Not really. It's never something I've thought of bringing up in conversation. It's never anything I've heard any woman in my life bring up in conversation either. I mean if it came up organically in conversation, I have no issue but I feel weird to go ahead and ask people I know, "How do you feel about X, Y, Z political aspect of whatever?" I mean I tend to actually avoid talking about politics with most people because I find that you don't get a whole lot accomplished. It just becomes a verbal fist fight.
Dylan: Does the #MeToo movement feel like an overreaction to you or does it feel justified?
Andrew: I actually have no idea what the #MeToo movement is. You're going to have to fill me in on that.
Dylan: Oh my god. Yeah. The #MeToo movement is women and men but mostly women have been posting status updates, posts sharing their instances of sexual assault and sexual harassment with the hashtag MeToo which is essentially raising your voice, raising their voices to say, "This happened to me too." #MeToo was brought up by this social activist, Tarana Burke a while ago and then it just started trending again. But you haven't seen it at all?
Andrew: No, other than from Marcia. She was the first and only time I've ever even heard about it.
Dylan: Huh. So that's so interesting. Marcia is like your in to the idea of what feminism is?
Andrew: Kind of. I mean, I've interacted with other feminists quite frequently in the past. I don't know. I've seen some of the things she posts on Facebook and it seems, well, I'll use the word "bigotry". It seems like there's some bigotry behind a lot of it.
Dylan: You still standby what you wrote under that post of hers? You still think that she's a bigot?
Andrew: Yes.
Dylan: Hm. All right. So our next step is getting you on the phone with Marcia.
Andrew: Awesome. I'm looking forward to it!
[Phone dialing sounds. Phone rings. Guest picks up.]
Marcia: Hi Andrew.
Andrew: Hi Marcia. Great to be talking to you.
[BREAK]
Marcia: Good to be talking to you too.
Dylan: Andrew, Marcia, this is your first time talking to each other.
Marcia: Yes.
Andrew: Yep.
Dylan: Andrew, how does this feel for you?
Andrew: I mean it's a little anxiety-inducing. I hate phone calls, but I feel comfortable for the most part.
Dylan: No, totally. Marcia, how are you feeling?
Marcia: I feel the same. I feel a little bit anxious. I also hate talking on the phone.
Dylan: Great. Guys, common ground.
Marcia: Exactly. [laughs]
Dylan: You found it, we're done. So this is the end of the call, you know?
Marcia: Yeah. So that's it. Thanks, Andrew.
Andrew: Great. Glad we worked that out. [Marcia & Andrew laugh]
Dylan: I know.
Vin Cacchione: Can we also deal with levels for a second?
Dylan: Yeah. Andrew, do you mind if we just look at audio levels for a second?
Andrew: Yeah. That would be awesome.
Dylan: Andrew, could you just say inconsequential like narrate your day so far so we can get your audio levels?
Andrew: Yeah. I woke up this morning, decided to ignore my alarm clock. So I got out of bed about 20 minutes before we're supposed to be having this conversation.
Dylan: Okay. [laughs]
Andrew: I just finished getting dressed after we're supposed to, gave me some time to practice my drums.
Marcia: I'm a musician too, Andrew. [laughs]
Andrew: Oh what do you do play?
Marcia: I play piano and a little bit of guitar.
Andrew: Oh that's awesome.
Marcia: Yeah.
Andrew: String instruments are impossible.
Marcia: Yeah, I know.
Dylan: Well, look, this is perfect. You guys can form a band.
Marcia: I know, we're going to jam. [laughs]
Dylan: [laughs] We got drums. We got piano. We got guitar.
Marcia: Yeah.
Dylan: Let's start here, guys. Marcia, you got widely known for saying, "Men are scum" on the internet and then, Andrew, under a post that Marcia made, you called her a "bigot."
Andrew: Yes.
Dylan: Andrew, do you want to hear a little bit of the background of where the men are scum thing came from?
Andrew: Yeah, I think that'd be great.
Dylan: Okay. Marcia, kind of take it away. Talk to Andrew about the genesis of "men are scum."
Marcia: Okay. Yes. I had a friend who is a female editor. She, during the #MeToo campaign, wrote a list that went viral that was featured on the Guardian and some other websites that was basically little things that normal men can do better. She got some really extreme negative reactions from certain men online. So she posted photos of these type of threats and negative comments that she was receiving. Some were very, very harsh. Then I commented underneath this post of hundreds of photos of men threatening her, "Men are scum." That comment was removed as hate speech. I was banned for 30 days from Facebook.
Dylan: Okay. That's great. Andrew, would you mind walking Marcia through the genesis on why you commented "bigot" under a post of hers?
Andrew: Okay. Marcia, are you familiar with who Sargon of Akkad is?
Marcia: Yes.
Andrew: All right. He does a weekly series called This Week in Stupid where he had a short clip about you being banned for posting men are scum. So I said, "Well, I've never heard of Marcia before." So I thought it'd be interesting if I can get any reaction from you. So I went and messaged you obviously, as you know, and commented bigot because I believe anyone that would unironically take a class of people based on something like gender or sex which you can't decide and say they're scum would be a bigoted comment.
Dylan: Andrew, you're more in the camp where it's saying nobody should say "men are scum" but you also believe that men shouldn't say "women are scum?"
Andrew: Yeah. I think if a man said women are scum, they would be a bigot. Honestly, I think it's disheartening that we have to be having this conversation. I wish we could just treat people like people.
Dylan: Marcia, what's your response to this?
Marcia: I mean, it's difficult because I don't feel that I come from a hateful place. My jokes are more to poke fun at what men view feminists as.
Dylan: And wait - I don't know if you know that. Andrew, did you know that Marcia first said "men are scum" sarcastically?
Andrew: It's hard to read any sarcasm into a post online. I'm going to leave that as a no, but ...
Dylan: I do think that's true, right?
Marcia: Tone gets lost. Yeah.
Dylan: In general, online, tone gets lost.
Andrew: As far as comedy goes, I take no offense if anyone says something in jest. I probably have the darkest sense of humor out of anyone you'll come across. But I don't, once you leave comedy, once you're out of the realm of comedy and you're posting men are scum, that's where I disagree. There's no reason to generalize.
Marcia: Say for example, I get harassed by two different guys on my way to work at 7:30 in the morning, which happens. Then I'm frustrated. So then I post on Facebook, "God, men are so annoying." What I wrote is very clearly sexist to people who are just reading it without context, but what they're not seeing is the five times that I've been harassed at 7:00 in the morning just trying to get to work. So they feel generalized when I'm speaking about a very certain group of men and then also the system of male power that allows those men to keep behaving that way. So I sort of make cathartic jokes where I talk about men because I feel like you said, I feel dehumanized. I think that we're probably not going to agree on privilege or that discrimination does not always work equally in terms of different groups, and I understand that.
Dylan: Can I just jump in here?
Marcia: Yeah.
Dylan: Andrew, how does the word "privilege" sit with you?
Andrew: I really don't like the word, honestly. I think there is privilege no matter who you are. So I think it's really reductionary to talk about it.
Dylan: Why so?
Andrew: Because all you're doing when you're looking at privilege is you're looking at the sum of what people are made up on things they can't choose like race, sex, sexuality, gender, etc. Why are so we concerned about what people can't choose? I want to look at people for who they are, not what they are.
Marcia: Can I say something?
Dylan: Yeah.
Marcia: I think that that's interesting because the term "privilege" came from the fact that certain people were not allowed to have a voice to discuss wanting to be treated as an individual. The word "privilege" came from white people and men as a whole in the early stages of America and continuing not being able to see that there are people who want to be treated as an individual, who are then being grouped. Then the word "privilege" comes to try and put a label to those people who have the power and then the people who have the power start to feel generalized in the same way. Like you said, why shouldn't a white man be able to be treated as an individual? He absolutely should be. But the word "privilege" comes from the fact that other groups did not feel that they were.
Andrew: I find it interesting that we keep going back in history. I mean we're living in the modern day, we're not living in the early stages of America. What's in the past is in the past. We can't change that. We look at history and we say historically, it was this way. So because historically it's that way, we're going to act like that in the modern day. You don't see Jews saying, "Well, the Germans killed six million of us, fuck the Germans." I've never heard a Jew say that. But historically, the Germans killed six million Jews.
Marcia: You can't ever look at the current moment aside from history. You can say that what we're living in is different, but history has led us to where we are. So unless you can find a clear moment where history has stopped, then I think we can say, "Okay, history is done and now we can be over." But every moment of history has led into something else. So you might not get American Jews saying, "Fuck the Germans." But the Germans made a clear separation from themselves from the Nazis. They said, "We are not Nazis anymore and Nazi ideology is illegal. Nazi symbolism is illegal." In my opinion, our culture has not done these same clear things because we still see discrimination, it has just changed forms.
Dylan: It seems like we're hitting the very standard impasse in these conversations, right?
Marcia: Yeah.
Dylan: We don't have to come away from this all agreeing.
Marcia: Right.
Dylan: Do you know what I mean?
Marcia: We're not going to probably.
Andrew: No, I don't think we ever will.
Dylan: Yeah. Yeah. You guys just said that in tandem. I just want to do a quick, Andrew, I'm sorry this is going to be a very snowflake-y question [Marcia laughs] so get ready.
Andrew: Doesn't bother me.
Dylan: Okay. Great. Andrew, how are you feeling right now in this conversation?
Andrew: I'm slightly annoyed because I mean, I feel like what I'm saying comes from a factual basis but we're ignoring it for emotions.
Marcia: I feel the exact same way, but against you which I think where this gets interesting because we both feel very correct. And I think we both feel very emotional and yet we feel the other is having a nonfactual approach. But I also think it's interesting too that you feel very offended by me generalizing men, but you feel very entitled to generalize feminists.
Andrew: Well, I mean have you ever had a conversation with a feminist as a man?
Marcia: Have you ever had a conversation with a man as a woman?
Dylan: Both of those are actually very valid questions.
Marcia: Yeah. It's about the missing the point of view. You're right.
Dylan: I would love to hear from both of you, each of you, how would you define feminism. Marcia, I'd love for you to go first.
Marcia: I mean to me, like I said, feminism is just saying that historically, power is skewed towards men. Feminism is the work to make that historical imbalance more equal in every way and as that changes. Feminism is just the equality between the genders to me.
Dylan: Andrew, how would you define feminism?
Andrew: Pretty much as far opposite as you can get. I define it as an anti-white, anti-male supremacy movement.
Dylan: Anti-white, anti-male... female supremacy movement?
Andrew: Yeah, female supremacy movement.
Marcia: And I believe it's a false categorization to somehow think that it's women trying to achieve supremacy when in my opinion, we can hardly achieve equality.
Andrew: I mean the same is true. I've been the same thing that happens to you by men happens to men by women. The difference is I'm not going around calling it sexism.
Dylan: Andrew, I'd love to hear more about that. Like what kind of harassment have you experienced online?
Andrew: I'm talking in person, I don't care about what happens online. If I don't like someone online, I'll block them.
Dylan: But I think the difference is I've seen the kind of harassment that Marcia experiences and it's like unlike anything I've ever experienced. Like what kind of harassing messages do people ask you online?
Andrew: Virtually none, I mean other than mostly this thing, like I get on X-Box Live and some 12-year-olds tell me he's fucked my mom. I can just block anyone that sends me something I don't like.
Dylan: Okay. So I am sorry to admit this, I know very little about X-Box Live. Marcia, do you?
Marcia: Oh yeah.
Dylan: You do know?
Marcia: I mean not like a lot, but I know that 12-year-olds call you, say that they fucked your mom, yeah. [laughs]
Dylan: Okay. Andrew, you just block them and you just put it out of your head, right?
Andrew: Yeah, I don't see any reason to get upset about someone who has to type to me. If he was going to be like, "Well, you're a piece of shit." Then I'm like, "Cool, aaand you're on the block list."
Dylan: Do you think maybe it's easier for you to just block them and move on because like you don't experience that harassment in the real world?
Andrew: I mean, what do you mean by harassment in the real world? It seems like an awfully vague sentiment.
Dylan: I just mean like have you ever been harassed offline?
Andrew: Yeah, horribly. I mean everyone has, it's called life. It's what's going to happen to you.
Dylan: But I don't know that I can just accept that, I don't think that that should happen to you.
Andrew: If it's founded in something, listen to it. If it's not, ignore it.
Marcia: I do try and ignore harassment except in real life, except for that it often makes me feel physically unsafe to the point that it's hard to even leave my house sometimes.
Andrew: I've never actually met a woman who feels unsafe to leave her house, maybe that's just because of where I live. It's a safer area or something, I don't know.
Marcia: I do think that there are a lot more women than you might realize. We're not so scared to leave the house that we don't leave the house. But we make ... If I leave my house without headphones, I know that I'm going to have to look down at my feet or else a guy is going to talk to me, like that type of thing. We all make decisions and like you said-
Andrew: You don't like guys talking to you?
Marcia: Well, this is where we get in the conversation too. No, I don't like strange men talking to me or feeling like they have the right to talk to me whereas I understand that a lot of men don't see why it's anything more than just a compliment or a flattering thing. But that's, like you said, we're not going to agree ideologically. But I am interested just to see that to me, it was hurtful to be called by a bigot by a stranger. To you, you felt compelled to do so because you truly felt I was a bigot. In some ways, I understand that as well.
Andrew: You see, I don't like calling people bigots. I honestly would be like just the world be full of love, but I'm going to call it out as I see it. You're honestly quite a nice person, but I don't think that generalizing someone doesn't make them a bigot so unfortunately, I have to stand by that.
Marcia: It's just that online, sometimes the humanity gets lost. Like what I keep saying is that it's sort of like when you're driving in a car and someone cuts you off, and you're like, "Fuck them and fuck their whole family." It's not something you would say if it was a human looking you in the face. But then it's like we're both driving in cars, and I can Bluetooth my entire opinion straight into your car. We don't really know each other as people. I think that this, it just spurs this cycle of hate where we're losing nuance in conversation and everyone online is forgetting that the person they're talking to is a human with their own background experiences.
Andrew: This is off topic slightly, it doesn't have to be in the podcast, it has nothing to do with the podcast. But just a note on what I found that helps me be a happier person is just assume everyone has good intentions. Someone cuts me off in the car, instead of getting pissed off, I say, "I hope you get where you need to get going to." [Marcia laughs] I move on with my life, I don't get upset. I wish them the best of luck.
Dylan: I know you said this is off topic, I actually don't think it's off topic at all because I think that gets to the core of where you're coming from. I think, Andrew, that you are a truly good person who dreams of this utopia that I don't think you see that other people don't live in. You were saying, Andrew, that you don't know women who are afraid to leave their house or women who are harassed in the street everyday. Whereas I who live in New York City and am friends with someone like Marcia, like I am in contact with women all the time, I see women being harassed all the time.
Andrew: When you say harassed, what does that mean?
Marcia: To me, harassment is very specifically along the lines of a sexually-based demeaningness or control, attempt to control, bullying along sexual lines is harassment to me. Beyond that, there are so many different forms. Harassment can be a boss very subtly making you respond to his sexual come-ons. It's sort of lose, lose however you respond. If I don't smile at him, he might not give me that promotion. If I do smile at him, I only got that promotion because he's interested in me sexually. Then harassment on the street is just sort of that me being a woman, I am there for your public consumption whether I want to be or not. If I'm in public, then I have given consent to being bothered because I'm a person in public. So then to me, harassment is when I am bothered simply for existing in my body around other people. I'm not saying men can't be harassed. I'm saying that, and this is where we'll disagree, endemically, that the numbers are much more skewed the other way.
Andrew: No, I agree. I think women let's say catcalling be an appropriate word for it?
Marcia: Catcalling is a form of harassment, yes. I do think it goes further than that. I've been followed. Most women have been touched on the street in some way whether or not it's fully groping or just sort of a grab at wrist, things like that. Being made to feel sexually demeaned and possibly afraid.
Andrew: Why afraid? What do they do that makes you afraid?
Marcia: I'm scared that they're going to attack me physically, stop me from going where I need to go. If it's night and there's only me and a man passing each other on the street, that could be the nicest guy in the world, but my thought is, "What's this man going to do to me? And who would see it if he does?"
Dylan: Can I also pose a theory to both of you?
Andrew: Yeah.
Dylan: I feel that we are still at the early stages of understanding how we all exist on the internet together. Suddenly, we're all seeing each other. So these conversations that previously would've been private, Marcia, to you among feminists circles are now going public. So when you say something sarcastic as a joke like "all men are scum," then that-
Marcia: It's seen as really serious and also, I'm representing what feminists believe.
Dylan: Yeah. It's misread by people outside of your community. So people within the comedy community here, people within your friends circle, of course with a few exceptions, see that and they're like, "Ha, ha, LOL, I'm going to give it a like." Right? Andrew, you are coming from a very different community. When you say something like calling Marcia a bigot, in your mind, what she's saying is bigoted, but it's like we're all meeting each other. We're all terrified of all the different ways that we've lived our lives up until this moment and now we're like-
Marcia: It's a culture clash.
Dylan: Yeah, it's a culture clash. I feel like we get scared and we defend ourselves, and we defend our worldviews. We stand up for what we believe in. So that's kind of where this clash comes from. Wouldn't you guys agree with that?
Marcia: Yeah.
Andrew: Kind of.
Dylan: Okay. Andrew, why kind of?
Andrew: I just don't see how you can say this community that goes around calling a group of people scum on predetermined traits and say that's not hatred.
Dylan: Andrew, even though ... That's almost like humor of the oppressed. Does that make it different? Learning that it's like a humor coming from a marginalized position?
Andrew: Well, I don't think it's a marginalized position. I don't think we're going to agree on that.
Dylan: Okay. So closing questions, Andrew, are you going to do anything differently after this call?
Andrew: I'm sure I am. I mean I can't think of anything off the top of my head. It's something I'm going to have to ruminate over probably for a couple days, but I'm sure it'll affect me and my actions in some way.
Dylan: Marcia, same question for you.
Marcia: I think it'll change the way that I see how certain strangers approach me online because my experience has added up to feeling very defensive to men contacting me online in anyway or people in general contacting me online in anyway that I don't know. So I think that talking to a person like Andrew in the future will remind me that every single one of these people, even the overtly hateful ones, are people.
Dylan: Okay. So with that said, I think we're going to close this out.
Marcia: Andrew and I are going to form a band because he's a drummer.
Andrew: I'm pretty excited.
Marcia: And I play piano and sing.
Dylan: Yeah. Are you excited, Andrew?
Andrew: I'm totally excited. [Marcia laughs]
Dylan: Okay.
Andrew: Someone to jam with.
Dylan: Can I propose a name for your band?
Marcia: Sure.
Andrew: Yeah, ready.
Dylan: I would say Bigot Scum. [Marcia laughs]
Andrew: Bigot Scum, I like it.
Marcia: Bigot Scum! Look out for us, we're going to be in Europe soon.
Andrew: Sounds like some slam dunk metal band.
Marcia: Yeah.
Dylan: Yeah! Okay. Death metal or it can be Bigot Scum and it can be like beautiful choral harmonies.
Marcia: Yes, yes. Let's be Bigot Scum and we'll be a church choir.
Dylan: Yeah.
Andrew: There we go. I'm down.
Dylan: Marcia, Andrew, I'm so glad that we had this conversation.
Marcia: I just want to say thank you for talking to me, Andrew. This was a really great experience for me. It was really nice to talk to you.
Andrew: Thank you. I agree. It was nice talking to you, Marcia.
Dylan: Andrew, thank you so much for being willing to do this. Marcia, thank you so much for being willing to do this. I guess we'll all see each other on the internet.
Marcia: Yes.
Andrew: Awesome. Thanks for having me.
Dylan: Thanks. Bye.
Marcia: Bye, Andrew.
Andrew: See you, Marcia.
[Phone call ends with a hang up sound. The drumbeat from ‘These Dark Times’ by Caged Animals kicks in.]
Dylan [VOICEOVER CLOSING CREDITS]: If you would like to be a guest on this show and take your own online conversations and move them offline, please visit www.ConversationsWithPeopleWhoHateMe.com for more information.
Conversations With People Who Hate Me is a production of Night Vale Presents, Vincent Cacchione is the sound engineer and mixer. Christy Gressman is the executive producer. The theme song is These Dark Times by Caged Animals. The logo was designed by Rob Wilson. And this podcast was created, produced and hosted by me, Dylan Marron. Special thanks to Adam Cecil, Emily Moler, and our publicists Megan Larson and Christine Ragasa.
We'll return with regularly scheduled episodes on April 2nd.
Until then, remember, there is a human on the other side of the screen.
[Chorus of ‘These Darks Times’ by Caged Animals plays.]