Anita Sarkeesian is a widely recognized feminist media critic of Canadian-American origin who also works as a blogger, Internet personality, and public speaker. She was born in 1983 in Ontario, Canada, the daughter of Varkis “Wally” Sarkeesian and Seta Kegham. Anita graduated in Communication Science from the University of California, Northridge, and earned a Master’s degree in Social and Political Thinking from York University in Ontario, Canada. Her parents are American but moved to Canada from Iraq in the 1970s. She has a sister named Ida Sarkeesian, with whom she grew up under the care of her parents in Burlington, Ontario.
As an adolescent, Anita Sarkeesian developed an interest in issues of gender identity and feminism, which led her to launch the website “Feminist Frequency” in 2009 while still a student at York University. Her main goal was to provide easy access to media criticism and to focus on feminist issues. She was brought into the media spotlight in 2012 when she launched a crowdfunding campaign to fund a series of short educational videos to highlight gender representation in video games in the context of sexism. As a result, she received several anti-women threats and harassment from parts of the video game culture, but the negative reaction also brought a lot of publicity to the project, far exceeding its original goal.
Anita Sarkeesian finally released the first part of the video series Tropes vs. Women in Video Games in March 2013. The series eventually comprised a total of 18 episodes, which were released between March 2013 and April 2017. Following the success of the series, Sarkeesian has also released several other educational videos on the Feminist Frequency website that focus on the portrayal of women in film, television, and other popular media.
In addition to her work on the Internet, Anita Sarkeesian has spoken on various platforms, including Women in the World, The Media Evolution Conference, GeekGirlCon, and xoxo. She has also been a guest speaker at the United Nations on several occasions. Anita Sarkeesian received the Honorary Award of the National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers in 2013. The following year she received the Harvard Humanist of the Year Award, the Game Developers Choice Ambassador Award 2014, and was also nominated for Microsoft’s Women in Games Ambassador Award 2014.
In March 2015, Sarkeesian was named one of Time Magazine’s 30 “most influential people on the Internet,” and the following month she was also named one of the magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.
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Anita Sarkeesian Net Worth
Anita Sarkeesian’s net worth is currently estimated at around $1 million, which she has accumulated during her career as a blogger and media critic. Despite the numerous threats and harassment, she has received over the years, Sarkeesian has remained determined and has established herself as one of the most influential women on the Internet.
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Despite the favor she seems to enjoy with higher authorities, some sections of society still disapprove of Anita Sarkeesian’s growing popularity as a feminist media critic. Over the years, several vicious online campaigns have been launched against her. All kinds of attacks have been made against her, including death and rape threats and hacking her social media accounts.
But all this intimidation ultimately worked to her advantage, as it actually proved that women actually suffer a lot of harassment and abuse at the hands of some unscrupulous asocialists. The courageous way she dealt with the incidents also increased her popularity and portrayed her as a very strong, courageous, and outspoken feminist, one that other women should emulate.
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The campaign launched by Anita Sarkeesian on the Kickstarter platform in 2012 to fund the series “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games” was a massive success. The campaign’s initial funding target of $6,000 was achieved in just 24 hours. A total of $158,922 was realized from the campaign, allowing it to expand the project beyond its original scope.
In 2015, international technology giant Intel joined forces with Feminist Frequency in a multi-million dollar effort to provide better career opportunities and positive characterization of women and other minority groups in the technology and gaming sectors.
