[I posted this a couple of days ago but accidentally deleted it last night, so I’m reposting it. I apologize for the confusion, and for the loss of all the comments. I’m going to see if I can recover the comments, but I don’t know how it’ll go. Thanks to Dangerous Minds I was able to save my original commentary.]
Our tech wizard, Jon S., and reader Katie C. sent in a link to a Danish campaign by the organization Children Exposed to Violence at Home to raise awareness of domestic violence. The campaign is called “Hit the Bitch!” and features a game where you can smack a woman around using either a mouse or your own hand if you have a web cam:
The game has now been limited to Danish users only.
The woman gets increasingly bruised and bloodied as you hit her. I forced myself to try the site and hit her twice, and it was honestly sickening to watch her head jerk backward or to the side and hear the sound of the slap and her reacting. At the top, a counter keeps track; you start out as 100% Pussy, 0% Gangsta, but your Gangsta rating goes up every time you hit her:
Apparently, though, when you get up to where you’d be at 100% Gangsta, it instead says 100% Idiot, as though this is a real put-down that is going to make you think really seriously about domestic violence. I am trying to think of any context that would make this seem like a good idea, or an effective way to combat domestic violence. I mean, ok, yeah, I guess people might be made more aware of it after hearing about or playing the game, but is it likely to have any positive effect?
It seems more likely that people who don’t already take domestic violence seriously would either be uncomfortable, leave the site, and never think about it again, or find it funny to play for a few minutes just to see what would happen…and somehow encouraging people to slap around an image of a woman for fun seems like a really weird way to get people to think more seriously about domestic violence.
UPDATE: Comments closed.
Comments 11
Erik — November 20, 2009
It looks like comments are gone for this post, I can't see them any more.
a — November 20, 2009
Perhaps the moderation found the discussion ideologically too "challenging".
Nick — November 21, 2009
See above, guys. The comments were lost when the post was accidentally deleted. They're trying to recover them.
eninnej — November 21, 2009
I'm just catching up with my feeds, which captured the original post (though not the comments), and noted that the following updates seem to have been lost in this version:
In a comment Jillian adds,
A Danish friend just told me what the woman is saying. Two of the quotes are as follows:
“why would I fuck your best friend he’s just as ugly as you”
“I’ll dance with anyone I want to dance with”
UPDATE: Reader Jacque provides a more complete translation:
In the beginning when the girl comes in she says: “You don’t get to decide if I dance with people or not.” Then the voiceover says “What are you doing? You cant even control your bitch. A couple of slaps will help…in the end the voiceover comes in again stating: “It’s not fucking gangstar to hit bitches, you lost the game when you lifted the hand the first time. There is no excuse. None!” Then comes a womans voice: “In Denmark every third girl in college is in an abusive realtionship. If you are one of these seek help … etc…”
Verlinkenswertes (KW 47/09) | Criminologia — November 21, 2009
[...] “Hit the Bitch!” Danish Anti-Domestic Violence Campaign (Sociological Images, 18.11.2009) [...]
AsgerJon — November 21, 2009
It's really strange that people will form such poor opinions of something whilst
admitting to not understand the very words. So here's a complete translation of all
of the dialogue in the game:
The girls walks into the screen, where she announces that she has bad "the best
night". Then a pause.
"Of course I have danced with someone!" Anoter pause.
"You have no right to determine with whom I can and can't dance"
Then a male voise which has this, uhm, sort of "gangster" dialect, the origins of
which I can't make out, and it says: "Oops, it would appear as if you have no
control over your bitch, a few slaps ought to help"
Then the game begins, and you choose the control either by your mouse or webcam.
Before and during the first slaps, the girl says the following sentences in a
seemingly random pattern:
"Why would I have slept with your best friend, he's just as ugly as you!"
"Only your IQ is smaller than your penis"
"If I desire to go out with Maria, then that's what I will do, it's my life"
This next one is not easily translateable, so I'll just paraphrase: You suck so much
that it's difficult to believe.
Again, impossible to translate, but a word play between being drunk and having an
erection.
"What part of 'Fuck off' don't you understand.
As the "pussy-gansgster" parameter reaches about 40 %, the girl says new statements:
"Perhaps you have been beaten up as a child, but don't take it out on me."
"You are weak, get that in to your head!"
"You have always appeared as a loser, but now your behavior has removed all doubt."
"Is that really the hardest you can hit?"
"The only instance in which you feel manly, is when you have sex with me, whilst I'm
screaming 'NO!'"
"You call me an ugly cunt in front of your friends, but what does that make you? The
one who can get only ugly
cunts?"
"WHAT THE HELL IS THE MATTER WITH YOU!!?"
When the aforementioned parameter reaches around 70 %, we again hear new messages:
"Is that all you've got?"
("crybaby" may not be an accurate translation, but it was all I could find in the
dictionary)
"You weak little crybaby, you really think that you are the only capable of hitting,
do you really?"
"You ridiculous little man, fuck you!"
"Are you stupid or something? A 'NO!' is a 'NO!'"
"Do you feel strong now?"
"You say to me that if I really love you, I will do what? NO! If YOU really love ME,
you will not make me do things, I don't want to do."
When the parameter approaches 100 %, the girl will say all of the abovementioned
things, but obviously in a different recording, as the actress is more injured at
this point.
Once the parameter reaches 100 %, the girl falls, and the male voice comes back and
says: "You are an idiot. It's not 'ganster' to hit women, you made yourself a pussy
and an idiot the very moment you raised your hand the first time. There exists no
excuses for using violence, none! So seek help before it's too late."After this a
female voice (perhaps the voice of the actress?) says: "[In Denmark]... there is in
every class from 9th to 12th grade 2 girls who are in a violent relationship. If you
are one of the men who use violence, or a girl exposed to violence, then seek help."
A pause followed by a call for the viewer to share the game on facebook, twitter,
and etc. the spread the message.
One has to realize that the objective of this game is first and foremost to get
people, especially young men between 15 and 19 to talk about the taboo topic of
domestic violence. This campaign has already achieved this, and it has done so by
daring to be different than existing campaigns.
Campaigns seeking to alter behavior or draw attention to a specific point in public
service is very often ridiculed, as young men in Denmark are being fed with such
throughout their youth, seemingly with little to none effect.
But why does this problem even exist, why is it that there are women and girls out
there, who are getting abused, not by muggers or other criminal strangers, but by
men with whom they are in a relationship, when the objective of relationships is to
be in love? I think it has to do with jalousy, and jalousy is a very strange
emotion, different and stronger in many ways than other emotions. Firstly jalousy is
onset by an outside source, secondly jalousy is a very strong emotion that can very
easily and very quickly turn into uncontrollable anger, and thirdly then jalousy is,
like many other emotions, beyond our free will; One simply can't choose to not feel
jalous, if that's what one feels. Violence against women then occurs when jalousy
turns into anger, but it doesn't have to. All of us, I think, will at some point in
our lives feel jalous, and luckily we can use our free will to choose, what we want
to do with the jalousy, so if you find yourself feeling jalous, here's what you
should do (this is directed towards men):
1. Try to shrug it off.
In most cases your girl friend was just having a little fun.
2. Okay guys, I know this sounds girly and everything, but it is just how it is!
Talk about it. Tell your girlfriend that her behavior has made you jalous, then the
ball is in her court. If then her responce is to start shouting "you have no right
to feel jalous", you should attempt to explain to her, how you have no free will
over what you feel in this regard, and if she can't understand this, and stays
angry, then shrug it off, or find a new girl friend. Fortunately many girl friends
will see the affection in you, which causes you to feel jalous, even if she doesn't
see it at first. Think about it, you are feeling jalous because she means something
to you, and girls are great at spotting that type of thing.
3. If you are not mentally capable of shrugging it off, and you can't talk about it
with her, and you suddenly find yourself having hit her, then it's time to seek
fucking help!
Remember, our free will is what makes us human, and it is what enables us to make
choices, but it's not an absolute ability by no means! You are simply not capable of
choosing to feel happy, you have to earn and pursuit happiness. Likewise you cannot
choose not to feel jalous, when you feel it! So I suggest you learn to accept this,
and then to you ladies, remember that most of what men do, they are doing for you at
some point, so cut us some slag, if we act like jerks every now and then, but do no
allow men to stay abusive. If he has hit you once, then the only thing that can keep
him from doing it again is some sort of professional help. Get out of abusive
relationships, and if you see friends or relatives, who are being abused in a
relationship, it is okay to point it out.
That’s Ms Linkspammer to you (4th December, 2009) | Geek Feminism Blog — December 3, 2009
[...] warning) A very confronting a Danish anti-domestic violence campaign features a computer game in which the player assaults a [...]
Village Idiot — December 11, 2009
But maybe men are evolving toward more democratic domestic beliefs because they don't like the ease with which they can be assassinated? In a democratic household, according to your logic an angry wife would have to kill a majority of her family if she wished to seize control of the TV remote (or whatever the power struggle happened to be centered around).
Then again, getting your history from a set of Cliff's Notes with missing pages (apparently) and your understanding of domestic relations in the U.S. from watching All in the Family and Married: With Children reruns might just produce the kind of commentary you offered. Incidentally, it appears you were once Hooked on Phonics but have since managed to kick the habit.
I thought "...everybody thinks about there carriers now a days..." was brilliant; it was almost a plausibly genuine series of errors. Almost. Overall it was still a troll fail, but thanks for playing.
British PSA about Dangers of Cabs Implies Rape (Trigger Warning) » Sociological Images — February 25, 2010
[...] not the first time violence against women has been used in PSAs. There was the Danish Hit the Bitch campaign and pretty much every PETA protest ever. There was also the CSI ad that showed a dead woman’s [...]