The London Sunday Times reports on a new British study:
Danny Dorling, the report’s author and professor of human geography at Sheffield University, said that marked changes in the social status of women explained the shift.
“The decline in the female murder rate is probably due to women being more likely and able to walk out of violent relationships,” he said.
“People have both became aware of how dangerous domestic violence is and how fruitless it is to stay in a violent relationship. In addition, women have become economically better off and so, in increasing numbers, they can afford to walk out.”
What a dangerous, subversive movement. We need more of it.
We must be stopped.
I was GOING to stop you, but when I went to lock you into the purdah, I found that you had all gotten jobs and left!
Curses. Foiled again.
Don’t worry, Feminism still hasn’t been able to stop pregnant women/new moms for taking the blame for getting themselves murdered.
*Stands proudly as an evil, ‘family’ destroying, lesbian feminist*
Wait! Forgot the hairy-legged part … dammit, don’t have hairy legs …. anyone have some hairy legs to spare? Anyone?
Yoohoo! Need some hairy legs here!
Yo !
(I’m allergic to razors, but I pluck my chinhairs, if that’s any consolation.)
Can I donate my evil feminist properties too? I’ve got everything but the “lesbian”. I’m sorta butch-lookin’, though, if that helps.
“This is the future of the new Iraqi government – it will be in the hands of the clerics. I wanted Iraqi women to be free, to be able to talk freely and to able to move around. I am not going to stay here.” — Dr. Kuzai, an obstetrician and women’s leader who met President Bush in the White House in November 2003.
Apparently…it’s catching on.
not to nitpick, but for the success it did for women, it would appear that feminism completely failed men.
When did it become feminism’s job to save men?
No, no. Jake the Troll is right. Women should stay with abusive men until we’re killed. That way, with any luck, more men will end up in jail for murder. Think of how much safer the streets will be if we’re just willing to sacrifice that teensy bit more. More dead women and more men in jail. What could possibly serve men better than that ?
(Cue Tammy Wynette. Fade out.)
A Room of One’s Own.
My legs are fairly hairy, but I kind of need them so I’m going to have to offer my apologies here.
My legs are fairly hairy, but I kind of need them so I’m going to have to offer my apologies here.
Why, you selfish, selfish person Nick! ;)
Yeah, looks like I’m one of them hairy-legged, selfish feminists.
I’m about to go visit my mom and was thinking of shaving beforehand. I could probably fill up at least a freezer baggie full-o-hair for you Sarah. … more if I do the pit-hair too.
perhaps when it is described as , which is defined in the american heritage dictionary as: Affirming political, economic, and social equality for all. such would imply that one would equally defend and protect boys (that is to whom the study is referring to by “young men,” or males in the 14 to 23 year old bracket) and men. at least, that is the impression i got.
but perhaps i am mistaken, through my own lunacy, in assuming that these young boys’ and mens’ deaths are horrid and worthy of protection and prevention.
if you would not trouble you much, could you explain why these deaths matter less than the deaths of women? and along those lines why feminism, being egalitarian, should have no responsibility to prevent the murder of these boys and men? also, i would like to know if you think these men and boys are equally human in comparison to women, and therefore equally worthy of protection from violence, or if you believe them less than human, and therefore expendable?
this is the link which failed to link properly. http://www.amptoons.com/blog/archives/2005/08/22/why-feminism/#comments
and along those lines why feminism, being egalitarian, should have no responsibility to prevent the murder of these boys and men?
Others can answer better than I can, but I would hazard a guess that it is because feminism is mostly concerned with raising women up to be equal with men rather than expending energy on the already privileged class. See, trying to make an egalitarian society doesn’t mean that you put resources into protecting the class with power. In trying to make an egalitarian society, one would most likely put one’s resources towards trying to raise the status/power of the disadvantaged classes. But this is only a guess.
Jake Squid–well said. But one more detail–
jaketk, did it mention who exactly was killing all those unfortunate young men?
It remains true in large part that men kill women–and each other. And it’s rather more difficult to make a case for feminism as causation for that.
feminism is typically supported, funded and used soley for the benefit of upper-class women, so it would seem, purely on a logical basis, that the goal isn’t to create an egalitarian society, but simply to shift the balance of power.
the article states that the majority of the boys and men are poor, so how are they a privleged class? now perhaps i am mistaken in assuming that poor men are legitmately poor, i.e. they have no means out of their situation. and perhaps i am also mistaken in assuming that all children, including boys, would be worth saving.
however, if a society is truly egalitarian, that is it seeks to make people equal, would not that society, upon seeing that poor boys and men are nearly three times as likely to be murdered (and about 30% to 40% women), help them, particularly given that the wealthy would simply continue to ignore their plight?
i would like to thank you for answering my questions. it’s unfortunate that you don’t feel that male lives are worthless, but at least you answered honestly, regardless of the misandry.
interestingly enough, no it did not. then again, it did mention who commits the majority of abuse and murders of children either.
Supported and funded I’ll buy, but that could have something to do with the fact that upper-class women have more time and disposable income with which to support and fund a movement.
But used? Solely? Are you really trying to imply that feminism has done nothing to benefit working-class women and families? That affluent feminists have pursued only goals that will benefit other affluent women?
I won’t pretend there aren’t individual feminists who think making affluent women equal to affluent men at the expense of working-class women is a feminist issue. I’m working-class myself, and it gets to me, but they aren’t all of feminism. A great many feminist goals benefit rich and poor alike, and others, like making healthcare and childcare more widely available, will tend to benefit working-class women more than affluent ones.
jaketk, do you similarly support the shift of economic imbalance from rich men to poor women? Or are you just whining “Hey you rich spoiled bitches, give all your money to poor men now, else I will call you all hypocrites!” If rich women gave their money to poor men, that would make things ok just how? Oh, I know, no man should be poorer than a woman and all. That would be so unnatural.
Poor men and boys have rough time (as do poor women and girls), that is why I support progressive taxation, well-funded public education, well-funded public health care among other good stuff. That is unrelated to feminism, but feminists tend to be progressives in their other political beliefs. (Correct me if I’m wrong [no, that wasn’t directed to you jaketk]).
Did it mention who generally are the primary caretakers?
Too priceless. Jaketktroll whines in one thread about how he shouldn’t have to spend any of his own money to support anyone he doesn’t personally like– chiefly cheap floozies who can’t keep their knees together (because that’s what most abortions and most women’s health issues are all about). Meanwhile, in this thread, he whines about how if feminists were really good people, they’d give poor men and boys all their money and time.
Tortured logic there, to anyone but an MRA troll. After all, in MRA-land, any moment or penny a woman spends on women’s issues is time and money cruelly wrenched from the clutches of its rightful owner, the male. It’s not a male’s job to care for another male who’s abused. Manly-males have more important stuff to worry about ! “Egalitarian” in this sort of scenario simply means, “Wahhhh !!! I’M important !! Pay attention to meeeeeeeeee !!”
First of all, in both the sentence quoted above and in post #22, you said the exact opposite of what you appear to mean. Please proofread your posts a little better before you post them, if possible.
Second of all, stop making personal attacks on other posters. Don’t claim that other posters consider male lives worthless unless you can quote them explicitly saying so; don’t accuse other posters of misandry.
I’m willing to let anti-feminists post on my threads as long as they display a reasonable grasp of argumentation (rather than just making up unfounded accusations against feminism out of the blue), write comprehensible English, and refrain from being insulting. Please clean up your act on all three of these counts, if you want to continue posting here.
the article states that the majority of the boys and men are poor, so how are they a privleged class?
They are members of the privileged class called “men.” The majority of white people are poor, yet they are still part of the privileged class called “white.” Is that so difficult to understand.
it’s unfortunate that you don’t feel that male lives are worthless, but at least you answered honestly, regardless of the misandry.
If this isn’t a troll – and a badly done one at that (I think that he meant to leave out the “don’t”) – then I don’t know what is. As is the bit that Nick pointed out.
I’m not going to waste any more time with a person who is here only to lie and to distort what others have said.
I think that Amp is secretly paying a subscription fee to some professional online-sock-puppet-generator that specializes in creating custom trolls to help increase a board’s traffic. Nothing else explains the tedious similarity in the arguments of each and every troll that pops up here.
Amp, I gave you that twenty bucks with the understanding that you were going to buy yourself a nice tie for work or something, not rent-a-trolls. I want my money back. :/
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nick kiddle writes: “But used? Solely? Are you really trying to imply that feminism has done nothing to benefit working-class women and families? That affluent feminists have pursued only goals that will benefit other affluent women?”
no, merely that the majority of affluent feminists have pursued goals that only benefit other affluent women.
tuomas writes:
i made no mention of supporting any shift of economic imbalance. i simply stated that “the wealthy would simply continue to ignore their plight.” i would certainly love to see a shift between the wealthy and the poor, for all working-class people, including myself, not just poor women.
could you give me an example of where i am whining about spoiled bitches not giving their money to poor men? and also, couldn’t that statement work in the reverse?
that isn’t my arguement, so i will not defend it.
your point being what exactly? that it is okay that women abuse more children than men because they are around them more? most crimes against blacks are commited by blacks. are you suggesting then that whites then shouldn’t be concerned with that and seek to prevent it simply because they are not black? i thought in an egalitarian society that gender would not matter, and therefore a crime would be a crime, and would be equally wrong regardless of who committed the crime or the victim of the crime.
ampersand,
in all fairness, you did not say this on the other thread in which i was accused of wanting to punish women, wanting to control women’s bodies, or wanting to deny general healthcare (which you also accused me of), or even on this thread where i have been accused of not wanting to spend my money on cheap floozies, none of which i have ever stated.
squid stated quote: Others can answer better than I can, but I would hazard a guess that it is because feminism is mostly concerned with raising women up to be equal with men rather than expending energy on the already privileged class. See, trying to make an egalitarian society doesn’t mean that you put resources into protecting the class with power. In trying to make an egalitarian society, one would most likely put one’s resources towards trying to raise the status/power of the disadvantaged classes. But this is only a guess. (i posted this in full to prevent any accusations that i nitpicked his statements)
i am no historian, but from the little history i know, the poor men have never been a “privileged” class. even the argument that all men are a “privileged” class is fairly weak, since all men do not have power, or prestige, or a means of remedying their poverty. what is paritcularly interesting is that poor men includes poor minority men, which in this country, and in Britian, are typically the most unprivileged classes, and i don’t believe anyone can honestly argue that a poor black man has more privilege than a poor white woman.
i reached the conclusion that squid thinks poor men as worthless, i.e. lacking worth; of no use or value, when he stated: rather than expending energy on the already privileged class. perhaps you read this differently than i did, but i took this to mean that they are not worth the effort because of their privilege. they can remedy the problem themselves, and it is not our problem (feminists), but rather theirs.
if this was not the intent, then my apologies.
as for the misandry, i have read enough of your posts here, on ifeminists, and at stand your ground, as well as heard you speak on glenn sacks show, where you have accused men of misogyny for much less. had i made such a statement about women, you would call me a misogynist. or about blacks a racist, or gays a homophobe, etc. so i think it is fair to call squid’s statements an example of misandry when he clearly stated that he felt poor men were too privileged to need feminism’s assistance simply because they are male.
it is your site, but i think it is seriously unfair to allow your friends to make sarcastic, sexist, insulting, mocking and unfounded remarks, and then reprimand me for suggesting that squid’s comment is sexist and that he doesn’t value men when if the statement had been said about women, you would have banned me from your site.
i would like to ask, however, if you would address my points about egalitarianism, what it means, and whether feminism is in fact egalitarianism.
jaketk,
This will be my last communication with you as you seem to intentionally ignore answers to your questions. But here is one last attempt to see if you have any honesty in you at all:
You said, in comment #33:
i am no historian, but from the little history i know, the poor men have never been a “privileged” class.
How is it that you completely ignored comment #27 in which I wrote in response to your question:
the article states that the majority of the boys and men are poor, so how are they a privleged class?
They are members of the privileged class called “men.”
You are woefully ignorant of what “class” is and what “class” means and the fact that one can be a member of more than one class.
Poor men belong to 2 entirely seperate classes. They belong to the class called “poor” which is not a privileged class. Okay, pay attention here, this is a really difficult concept; they also belong to the class called “men” which is a privileged class.
Although the feminist movement doesn’t put much energy or resources towards helping the class “men,” it does put quite a lot of energy & resources into helping the class “poor.”
Whew, that’s a load to assimilate! Take an hour or two to think about this and then come back and read the rest of this comment. That way you’ll be fresh for the next revolutionarily difficult concept that I am about to lay out for you.
then you wrote:
i would like to ask, however, if you would address my points about egalitarianism, what it means, and whether feminism is in fact egalitarianism.
Feminism is not, in fact, egalitarianism. However, egalitarianism is a goal of the feminist movement.
Now I know that is a difficult concept to grasp and an exercise in logic as well. So, before you answer, I’ll ask you to meditate on those 2 sentences and try to understand them before you ask the exact same questions & make the exact same, unsupported, accusations again.
jaketk, on post 32: No, my point isn’t that it’s “o.k” for women (abuse is never ok) to abuse children more because they are around them more, my point is that of course you are going to see more violence against children from people who actually are around children, than from people who aren’t. It isn’t a matter of morality (women being more abusive than men naturally, as you seem to imply) , but of opportunity. A nanny with a sad,inexcusable tendency to abuse children can follow those tendencies, while a mountain hermit with similar tendencies probably won’t.
squid,
i’m sorry that you feel that you were blown off because i did not address your answer.
to respond to your answer, let’s see it again: They are members of the privileged class called “men.”
you stated that i am ignorant of the meaning of the word “class”. so let’s address that first.
the word “class” has a whole host of different meanings, but what your usage is commonly applied to means people having the same social or economic status; “the working class”; “an emerging professional class.” but clearly, all men, which is what you stated by saying “men”, do not have social and/or economic privilege, as you suggested. you then changed your argument to allow for men of poverty to be unprivileged. before you did not address it and stated “They are members of the privileged class called “men.”” if i am mistaken, could you show me where in your initial response you allowed for this.
as i said, i am no historian, but i cannot recall any instance in the US (let’s stick to this country for a moment) where poor, particularly poor minority males have exercised any real privilege. as it stands, minority males, particularly black and latino males, are routinely targeted, are a disproportionally large number of both murderers and victims, are the most at risk as victims of violence, health problems, and poverty, and as it stands occupy few powerful positions. more than that, they face no only discrimination as a result of their race, but their gender as they are more often targeted as “trouble makers”, thieves, rapists, murderers, dishonest, lazy, unintelligent (which is mildly ironic given that you called me ignorant), and thugs far more often than female minorities.
now, none of that changes the fact they are male, and yet they have zero privileges.
so let’s readdress your comment “They are members of the privileged class called “men.”” did you intend for this to literally apply to all men, or did you mean really mean white males? or did you mean rich and/or wealthy white males? and along those lines, are you factoring in the power of the insanely wealthy (which most poor men have no control over), the elements of racist that still exist (which most poor men have no control over, to a certain extent), and societal expectations (which most poor men have no control over)? it seems that you are willing to accept that poverty comes without privilege to men, but you assume that by being male they exercise some sort of “male privilege,” which either had no affect or doesn’t exist given that the murder rate doubled.
honestly, don’t you think that’s some pretty weak privilege if you can’t even stop your boys from being murdered?
now, you stated that feminists put in “quite a lot of energy & resources into helping the class “poor.”” well, this kind of contradicts what you stated before about “feminism is mostly concerned with raising women up to be equal with men rather than expending energy on the already privileged class.” this is clearly contradicted by the results of the study, since one would logically assume that if feminists were indeed the poor as whole, both murder rates would have decreased. so which one it is? are feminists helping the “poor,” which would include males, or are they putting all their resources into helping poor women, which clearly doesn’t change the overall situation of poverty by all that much, and has no affect, or perhaps contributes to, the rising murder rate of males?
now i have a serious question for you. if feminism is not egalitarian, i.e. it is not all-inclusive, then how can it promote egalitarianism? this actually makes no sense, and is completely illogical. it sounds as if feminists wish to have an equal society, but are unwilling to be the first to provide equality. in other words, it is like the christian right who says we’re all god’s children, but not if you’re gay. doesn’t like a contradiction to you? that one of feminism’s goals would be equality and yet it would not practice it all?
you are right, that is not egalitarianism so much as it is socialism, and a rather frightening reversion of socialism.
as a side note, while i’m sure ampersand will reprimand you on your sarcasm, let me just say that before you resort to sarcasm, which can be quite amusing, you should at least double check your previous statements to make sure you haven’t contradicted yourself. you should refrain from calling a person ignorant simply because you disagree with his argument. and most importantly, you should make sure that you aren’t making “the exact same, unsupported, accusations again.”
ann coulter does it, so it can’t be that hard.
tuomas writes: No, my point isn’t that it’s “o.k” for women (abuse is never ok) to abuse children more because they are around them more, my point is that of course you are going to see more violence against children from people who actually are around children, than from people who aren’t. It isn’t a matter of morality (women being more abusive than men naturally, as you seem to imply) , but of opportunity. A nanny with a sad,inexcusable tendency to abuse children can follow those tendencies, while a mountain hermit with similar tendencies probably won’t.
i don’t know if women are more abusive than men. i do know that women commit more abuse against children than men, though i could truly careless so long as they aren’t allowed to walk because they’re women, which is often the case. my point was that it shouldn’t matter who the victim is or who the perp is, which is the reason why “who commits most murders” was brought up. it should not matter, and it is truly sad that to some people it does matter and it is excusable.
It’s already been explained to you that any particular instance of female privilege is irrelevant because on balance men are privileged.
This is so obvious that Jake Squid is entitled to address you with sarcasm and condescension, a particulary smarmy kind of insult because it entitles the speaker to invoke plausible deniability and, if that isn’t cowardly enough, it is the more so because he is a member of the protected class on this board.
Amp states that “anti-feminists” must (1) avoid unfounded accusations, (2) rite gud gramer and (3) avoid insults. That the kool kids aren’t held to the same standard is evident in any thread any time to the first-time visitor. Of course, it’s Amp’s board and he is free to do what he wants including portraying himself as intellectually honest. We all self-actualize our own way.
So, Squid states boldly and chivalrously and italicizedly that “They are members of the privileged class called ‘men,'” without the slightest inclination to prove that the “class” on the short end of longevity, a time-honored index of quality of life, is, in fact, the privileged “class.” Are there other such indeces, Squid? Have you fully accounted for this, Squid, or is this just an “unfounded accusation?” Or is it that jaketk and I are “woefully ignorant” because we don’t subscribe to your religious fundamentalism?
(Yawn.)
http://www.amptoons.com/blog/archives/2004/09/15/the-male-privilege-checklist/#comments
In post 89 of this earlier discussion, Pasatiempo, already well-versed (if not schooled) in this debate, referred to the Male Privilege Checklist as “the bleatings of passive-aggressive non-entities.”
Your feigned lack of experience in previous discussions of exactly what male privilege is are duly noted, Pasa. My, my… a lying, disingenuous troll. Who woulda’ thunk it ?
Maybe you and jaketiktroll should run off now and start your own DV shelter for poor and/or minority men. I mean, because you’re both sooooo sincere in your concern for poor and/or minority men. You couldn’t possibly just be using them as a club to badger middle-class White women with. Oh, no. (rolleyes) Compassion just oozes out of your earlier posts, particularly jaketiktroll’s proud insistence that his money is HIS, by gum, and none of the shiftless lower orders (ie– women) have any right to it.
I guess “egalitarianism,” or what passes for it in MRA-land, isn’t the responsibility of men, only women. (Yawn.)
Didn’t this come up on the “race traitor” thread a couple of weeks ago? Men are privileged because when they’re compared with their female peers (affluent men with affluent women and working-class men with working-class women), the men always have the better deal.
That’s just crazy-religious-fundie-talk, Nick.
Insult
I referred to half of the Checklist that way – the half that is about “what is said.” Note the passive voice. In the passive voice there is no subject; that is, the subject is a non-entity. I apologized for the word “bleatings.” Since I am “feigning” by not referring to an earlier post, why don’t you show me a post in which you’ve ever apologized for anything, Alsis, or is this another Rule of Momentary Convenience to which the kool kids are exempt?
Insult
Was this a statement or is this another smarmy form of insult and unfounded accusation that entitles the writer to plausible deniability? Is it a statement or isn’t it Alsis?
It isn’t the responsibility of men or women. Nor is it the “responsibility” of those that advocate it. But if integrity means anything to you…
Unfounded accusation? Where’s the proof of this?
The kool kids agree. Therefore it must be so.
You know where the door is, Pasa. Perhaps our host will miss you, but I certainly won’t any more than most feminists probably will.
If you don’t want to be insulted, stop baiting. If you want to prattle about “integrity,” try acting as if you yourself had some small scrap of it.
Since you’ve demonstrated your skills with the search function, here’s a clue: it works the same way at SYG. Why don’t you scamper on over, alsis, and try it. You’ll find that I’ve only participated in two threads:
1. Where I’ve tried to convince them that putting women in positions of political power will benefit men.
2. Where I’ve taken them to task for their negative attitudes about women playing in men’s golf tournaments.
I live only to help others clarify their thinking and I’m honored when I can accomplish that, just as you’ve honored me, alsis, with your impish insults.
You have a movement based on a fundamental assumption: that men are privileged relative to women. Tell me how it would hurt your movement to prove that…unless, of course…
I’ll say this about SYG – even though they generally see only that which validates their point of view (like the Kool Kids, here) and even though the calibre of misogyny there approaches that of misandry here (well, okay, not quite), I can show you many times when Dr. Evil has admonished posters for making generally negative remarks about women. Can you show me where the equivalent has happened here or did you really want to discuss integrity?
Now, scamper, alsis. Scamper, scamper.
which doesn’t hold any water when it comes to the atrocities commited against black, latino, chinese, and native amercian men in this country. but i’m sure that you can find some way to explain how James Byrd had it better than black women when he was dragged to his death, or how it’s so much easier for a group of latino boys to walk down the street past a cop car, or how much better it is for black and latino men, along with most poor men, who are serving more time for the same crimes women commit. certainly you could “find” a reason, but given the history of violence directed almost exclusively at minoritymales in this country, as i said, it really doesn’t hold any water.
but if you have any examples of how these men have a privilege that is of any real value ( i.e. they can actually use it) that is not extended to women, i would love to see them.
alsis39, your concern for abused boys and men is impeccable. i haven’t seen such concern since the archbishops, cardinals and the pope handed over all the nuns and priests who raped little boys.
i suppose i have just being whining about my privilege. i’m a male, so clearly it was I who raped my aunt when i was 4 years old. such is my narcissism that i should downplay my privilege of no longer being able to have children. how horribly mistaken i’ve been in thinking such acts were somehow wrong and worthy of prevention. no, you’re right. it would be much better for me to shut my mouth, take it like a man, and stop trying to stop keep adults, especially women, away from other 4 year old little boys who go around raping them and abusing their male privilege. no wonder my uncle took his own life. he couldn’t stand his privilege of having raped so many adults in his long 23 years.
now i must go and listen to “cry me a river” lest i actually begin to think raping little boys is a crime…
It’s been proven, Pasa. You just don’t like the proof, so you ignore it.
I don’t care whether you hang out at SYG, The Hard Rock Cafe, or the Junior Woodchucks. You’re a misogynist and a troll. You and men like Jaketiktroll don’t come here to learn anything. You come for a good wallow in self-pity and a chance to set up straw folk for feminists to waste energy knocking down. You don’t even believe in your hearts, such as they are, much of what you say. For instance, if you truly believed that far too much of the MPC was taken up with “passivity,” and that by extention too much of feminism was taken up with it, you’d be aboard the feminist bandwagon with bells on. What could possibly suit a wannabe’ dominator, such as yourself, more than a planet full or women who focused on nothing but our own passivity ?
Trouble is, feminism is not merely about passivity. Discussing the issues espoused in the MPC might make some women weep, “Oh, poor me,” and send them off into a corner to stare at their own feet. However, I don’t think most women –or men who are truly interested in learning– use it in that fashion. Most women want to understand why they feel helpless in a patriarchal society as a stepping stone to breaking out of helplessness.
That’s what really crawls up the noses of patriarchs, Pasa. It’s what leads them to whine that women don’t care about men because DV shelters don’t tend to men in equal numbers to women. The feminists who worked, fought, lobbied, and dug deep in their own pockets to create DV shelters (which, despite Jaketiktroll’s ill-informed whinging, do not merely tend to women of the country club set. Nor do they exclude abused boys.) didn’t sit around passively;That’s for damn sure.
If men really give a shit about abused men, why aren’t they working, fighting, lobbying, and digging deep in their own pockets to build DV shelters that would cater to the needs of men who have experienced domestic violence ? Why the continual need to dump all that on the shoulders of feminists, who would be the first to point out that DV shelter employees don’t get rich, and can’t even care for all the women in the community who need help ?
Jaketik, I think you should stop trying to make me into the scapegoat for the abuse you’ve suffered. And stop putting words in my mouth in the bargain. I don’t understand why your abuse somehow translates into your right to turn around and lob a volley of completely unsubstantiated acusations at women who support DV shelters for women. If the slice of pie you and other men are getting is too small for you, it doesn’t speak well of you at all that the only people you want to grab more pie from are those who have as little, or less, than you do. Why not show some meaningful nerve, and learn from the women who built support networks from next to nothing ? Why not learn from feminism, instead of sneering at it and tearing it down in some ham-fisted and ill-advised campaign to ease your own pain ?
I’ve read this board for about two years and have only posted in two threads. If I don’t come here to learn, then what?? Self-abuse?? All the great jokes??
I’m looking at phosphorous dots on my computer screen, utterly unthreatened by them and trying to respond directly to those that form themselves into the word, “alsis.” You, on the other hand seem to feel the need to project onto me whatever it is that will make you feel comfortable. So, don’t go to SYG and see what I’ve said. Call me a “misogynist.” Make cracks about “Junior Woodchucks.” Categorize me, assume my belief system and dismiss me. All of this obviously benefits you in some way and doesn’t bother me. Therefore, it’s a net positive and a good thing.
Now, would you like to link me to the proof? I may have missed it but I certainly didn’t ignore it.
alsis39, two words: grow up.
now you’re going to lambast me for putting my time, money and effort into helping abused men and boys? it’s obvious that you care so little about preventing abuse or protecting children based on your tactless comments. you want to be the victim so badly that you would literally post some of the most sexist nonsense i have ever seen. i honestly haven’t seen comments so blatantly biased since i watched videos about the civil rights movement. it takes a certain wantonly cruel attitude to flat-out dismiss what i said, and then have the audacity to claim that i am making you the scapegoat when 5 out of your 8 posts on this thread have done exactly that to me.
you said i should learn from feminism. my aunt is a feminist, just as you are. what more do you want me to learn from her, or you? my aunt lifted no finger to stop any of the abuse that happened in my family. instead, as a feminist she blamed it on ” the patriarchy” and then proceeded to participated in it. of course, she conveniently found no contradiction in this, with which you appear agree. so what exactly am i supposed to learn from feminism that i haven’t learned from the non-feminist men and women who have taken in their homes and shown me what it is like to be treated as a person, something no feminist has ever extended to me?
equality? i support groups like Stop Abuse For Everyone; feminists do not.
prevention? i put my money into groups that provide services and forums for male victims of abuse; feminists do not.
empathy? i support local initiatives to help the poor and working-class (which i happen to be) when i have the extra money to do so; feminists do not.
tolerance? i speak at conferences about my experiences of abuse not only at the hands of my aunt, but a person who grew up in an abusive family, and tolerate comments like yours in the hopes that the men at these conferences will get the courage to speak up and ignore comments like yours. as a side note, i have actually had men 30 years my senior come up to me in tears for daring to speak about my abuse.
social responsibility? i spend three days out of the week volunteering to spend time with other abused children. i would spend more time, but i have to work, and i have an equal responsibility to my two brothers and two cousins.
i don’t blame women as a class for what happened to me. i don’t mock any feminist attempts to bring services to abused women. more importanly, I don’t mock abused women. you clearly have no problem doing that to men and boys. but what is so shocking is that you think i have learned nothing from feminism at all, or rather that feminism is flawless, and there aren’t legitimate reasons for not supporting it, let alone questioning it. so i ask again, what exactly am i supposed to learn feminism?
in all seriousness, you need to grow up. lose the second grade antics, the victimology, and the unecessary sarcasm (as i saw from your response, you don’t really seem to like it when it’s directed at you, so perhaps you should take that as a cue to stop doing it), and stop pretending that any and every act done to offer the slighest assistance to any male is some attempt to steal from women.
and btw, i had enough nerve to get on the stand and testify about my abuse.
I don’t see how she’s lambasting you for putting effort into protecting abused males. In fact, it seems like she’s downright demanding it.
BUT not at the expense of Women’s DV shelters.
Look, let’s take it away from people…if you’re trying to save the Spotted Owl, and someone else is trying to save the Californian condor, the Condor people do not try to take money from the Spotted Owl people so that it’ll all be “equal”. They try to get their own money. And they don’t demand that the SO people place the SO second to the CC.
Same thing…it is not our responsibility to put our issue secondary to yours.
Thanks, Antigone. I tried to write a response to these twerpfaces earlier, and the computer ate it. So I gave up and went to hear the Symphony. Your response is better anyway.
P.S– Jaketik, if “growing up” means behaving the way you have here, sneering at not just feminist women but men who sympathise with the feminist cause, I think I’ll take a pass. Half the time you spend here writing, you are barely even coherent, and the other half you spend on straw men. The fact that you were abused doesn’t mean that you get a free pass for shitting all over this space. It just makes you someone who deals with his abuse by shitting all over a bunch of people he doesn’t even know. You call that being “grown up” ? I sure as fuck don’t.
Pasa, if you have been reading here for two years and can still pull this kind of shit, my advice to you is to spend a couple more years here rereading all the pieces that you clearly did not comprehend the first time, prefereably in silence.
And before this board I read the Ms boards, the NOW boards, the ACLU feminist boards and the AOL boards all of which caved due to infighting. You should thank me…the common enemy effect, ya know. All operated on the same assumption of male privilege and none ever showed the slightest inclination to prove it.
Alsis, I used to work a couple of doors down from a county mental health facility. There were more than the usual number of loons on the street even by downtown standards. They would approach me and beg for money and I’d look them in the eyes and ask what they wanted it for. The pat response was they were hungry and wanted to buy food. So I would sometimes ask them out to lunch. I eventually got banned from some of the local eateries that didn’t want me bringing in stinky homeless loons.
Thing is, loons are human beings whose lives are as valuable as anyone else’s. They beg from people who look past them. Even those who give them money look past them. This is what they deal with. So I look them in the eye and they so appreciate it and so open up. And what else was I supposed to do – go out to lunch with 3-piece-suited, burb-dwelling cups of vanilla boredom like myself?
I took pleasure in granting them the respect they craved but I also took a sardonic pleasure in listening to their stories. Loons tell great stories.
It is for this reason that I read gender issues boards. But I’ll tell you something alsis – when I asked a loon why he or she believes that Mars is made entirely of 1950s-style formica dinette sets, they would usually tell me. You, on the other hand, refuse to produce the proof you say you have to what is obviously one of your most ardent beliefs. I ask you to put it on display for the whole WWW to see. What could be better for you?
Yet when I ask, you shuck, you jive, you insult, you cast very unpleasant aspersions and, generally rant semi-coherently. For example, I ask for proof of male privilege and you say things like: “I mean, because you’re both sooooo sincere in your concern for poor and/or minority men. You couldn’t possibly just be using them as a club to badger middle-class White women with.”
See what I mean, alsis?
As your final thought to me you muster your obviously-considerable IQ and say “this kind of shit.” So, that’s that.
Well, here’s my final thought to you. I don’t believe you have that proof. Furthermore, I don’t believe you believe in male privilege. And that, alsis, means that you’re not a loon.
Jaketik said :
“are feminists helping the “poor,” which would include males, or are they putting all their resources into helping poor women, which clearly doesn’t change the overall situation of poverty by all that much, and has no affect, or perhaps contributes to, the rising murder rate of males?”
Even if we accepted your framing, how would putting resources into helping poor women cause more men to be murdered?
Pasa, a few posts ago, you were blathering about Jake Squid being a “religious fundamentalist.” If I were you, I’d think twice about running around seeing “loons” on every street corner, and start concentrating on the one in your mirror.
Certainly, I’ve considered that I like taking loons out to lunch due to birds-of-a-feather.
I came to think of feminism as a form of religious fundamentalism reading Lynn from the old Ms boards. Remember her? She was so repulsed by sins of the flesh that she felt compelled to hack off chunks of her own. Now, there’s a character.
She used to explain that radical feminism is the only legitimate form of feminism because it’s the only kind through which all the world’s events can be subjected to feminist analysis. Of course, when you start with a core truth (male privilege, patriarchy, whatever) from which all other truths derive, analysis is pretty darn easy; in fact, it’s automatic.
She used to say that “radical” means going to the root. But, it was the root truth, itself, that was not subject to analysis and, in fact, was jealously guarded therefrom. This, of course, makes it the furthest thing from radical; it makes it belief; it makes it religion. Take the fact that a group of people hold a belief in a core truth from which all other truths derive, throw in sins of the flesh, damnation and general zealotry and you have something very much like what most people think of as religious fundamentalism.
Like any good religious zealot Squid feels entitled to insult the infidel and thereby break the rules of this board. Oh wait! Those rules don’t apply to him. Never mind.
So, alsis, is male privilege your belief or do you have this proof you say you have?
Address my point, please.
Pasa, I’m missing why the Male Privilege Checklist does not count to you as proof. I’m missing why the perhaps hundreds of threads on this blog that you claim to have read do not count as proof. Sounds to me that like most trolls, what you want to play is a the customary game of tit-for-tat. “Women do it, too.” That is, if Jaketik was abused, the appropriateness of feminists building and maintaining shelters for other women is rendered null and meaningless. Note that when he started out here, he was proclaiming that feminism should prove to his satisfaction that it was egalitarian. Soon, he was launched on a barely-coherent tirade about how women were to blame because he had been abused, and since I wasn’t ready to coo and sigh and agree with him completely, I was obviously mocking the notion that men can be abused. So his concerns doesn’t appear to be other men’s sufferings at all. They appear to be about guilt-tripping women who care for other women.
This in itself is a clear-cut, and routine, case of privilege. A man has suffered, so of course he considers it his right to make women drop everything that they are doing and to come and fix what hurts him. He does not ask this of other men. He asks it of women.
You clearly have a huge personal stake in denying the notion that male privilege exists, Pasa. Even though it’s in front of you. Just as you throw about terms like “victimhood” or “sarcasm” as if you yourself didn’t initiate that behavior here. You don’t have any problem with wallowing in “victimhood” nor any trouble with using “sarcasm,” but you consider these things your male privilege. You define the debate and choose the tools, and then snigger at me because I won’t be sweet and cuddly and pat you on the head when you’re doing it. Again, you invoke your male privilege simply by dint of the way you pretend to conduct debate. One set of rules for you, another set entirely for a mere woman.
Considering some of the nutbars over in your MRA clubhouse (half of whom are probably just Dr. Evil playing sock puppet with himself), you really need to be careful about trying to write off feminism just because you have problems with Lynne. As for me, I’m more than happy to critically analyze racism and classism in feminism. I’m more than happy to go toe to toe with any feminist, radical or otherwise, who I feel is behaving like a jackass. However, I don’t see why I should do these things at your command so you can sit back with your popcorn and reinforce your belief that any criticism of feminism means the whole thing should be thrown out. I don’t believe that anti-feminists care a fig about racism or classism when the only time they appear to have any interest in them is in a context of “See, I told you feminism is icky !”
Lynne is crazy. It doesn’t follow that the initial clip in this thread is wrong. Feminism has made it possible for women in abusive relationships to improve their chances of escaping abusive homes alive and in one piece. Does that mean we’ve achieved Utopia for all humanity ? Hell, no. Does that mean I’m going to start berating feminism for not opening up one men’s shelter for every woman’s shelter ? Hell, no.
Despite your continual sniping at Jake Squid, I still fail to see how tagging him as a “fundamentalist” proves anything, except that you wouldn’t know a fundamentalist if one bit you in the ass.
Yo Alsis. I know it’s early Sunday mornin’, but ya’ wanna beer?
[passes premium micro-brew]
I don’t think I need one quite so much as do the good folk of Louisiana, Q, but– hell, why not ?
[clink] :D
The MPC doesn’t count as proof because the author says so. He explicitly says that the MPC is only to provoke thought and does not constitute a gender privilege balance sheet. He has declined to do one for his own reasons. The hundreds of threads on this blog don’t constitute proof for the same reason.
You want to conflate my concerns with jaketk’s so as to dismiss me. This is incorrect. For example, I couldn’t care less about male DV centers. That’s his concern and your straw woman as it pertains to me.
I haven’t used the word “victim” or any of its variations. And you, of all people, are calling me on sarcasm. I’ve posted here twice in two years and the sarcasm seems to just keep on chooglin’ here without me.
I have no personal stake. Like I said, I take a sardonic form of intellectual-lite interest in this. Do I see male privilege? Of course. Just as I see female privilege. I see people with privileges and problems and the biggest determinant is always the same – the view of the half-cup.
Jaketk pointed out that feminism is defined as a movement dedicated to equality between the sexes. Various people here, and feminists in general, say that they don’t have to concern themselves with instances in which men are disadvantaged which would seem to violate the movement’s basic purpose. Feminists respond that they don’t have to concern themselves with male disadvantage because, on the whole, women are disadvantaged.
Antigone equates feminism with people who seek funds for spotted owls (kinda like you equate men with rapists). As Antigone says, people who seek funds for spotted owls don’t have to concern themselves with whether the concerns of whale people are equally met. Of course there’s a difference – spotted owls don’t seek funds for spotted owls. People seek funds for spotted owls. In other words, people who seek funds for spotted owls are seeking to benefit The Other. Feminism is comprised of people seeking to benefit their own.
This means that feminism seems to want to portray itself as a Ship of High Principle with Sails Swollen by the Winds of Lofty Ideals while really being a self-serving interest group…unless, of course, women really are disadvantaged as a whole. If so, I’d think that feminism would be highly motivated to prove it. You said you have proof and, I think you have proof that satisfies you. That’s good. You’re happy and it takes nothing from me. That makes it a good thing. I’ll go back to reading. Thanks for responding, alsis.
Alsis: I didn’t know they drank micro-brew’s down south. Seems more like an edumacated Northern type thang. I was just offering what I had to make more room for the PBR. Hell, I figure even if I’m not down on the Gulf Coast I can still throw a damn righteous hurricane party!
[passes another micro-brew]
Yo, Pasa, Jake, run along back to your home board and talk about us evil “man haters” over here, because what with all the male privilage you have, there’s not a hell of a lot of work to do in your um, social movement.
Proof of male privilage? The fact that you spend your time here demanding feminists to build shelters for men who are battered, rather than doing it yourselves. Men being so accustomed to expecting women to wait on them, and all that.
As far as SYG, the last time I checked in, some of the women posters were leaving because of the unchecked misogyny on that board. Because even if they weren’t touting the feminist line, or they were doing the opposite, that wasn’t enough there. They had to actually sit on their hands listening to men vent on their own misogyny, which although I didn’t agree with their philosophies, is pretty outrageous. {click moment, perhaps?}
Having not checked out that place lately, I am heartened to hear that its moderator has cracked down on his posters(most of which, are probably various “alters” of his) to not say negative things about women.
both you and ampersand have said this. i asked this of him, but he declined to answer, but perhaps you will. when has this ever happened? since i’ve worked with male survivor groups for the last 3 years (since my second year of college), i have yet to see any example of this. can you provide me with an example of where DV shelters, rape centers, or therapy groups were provided for men at the expense of women’s shelters?
you do realize this works both ways? you pretty much rendered the “patriarchy” rhetoric moot by this statement. should men not focus more on their own issues and not support any women’s issues at all, since it would be of greater concern to them? afterall, it is not our responsibility to put our issue secondary to yours.
radfem writes:
really? can you show me where i suggested that? i can show you where i said i do it myself. perhaps you missed them.
i support groups like Stop Abuse For Everyone
i put my money into groups that provide services and forums for male victims of abuse
i speak at conferences about my experiences of abuse not only at the hands of my aunt, but a person who grew up in an abusive family
i spend three days out of the week volunteering to spend time with other abused children
if you check some of my earlier posts on this thread, there are a few more. so perhaps you’d like to retract your statement, as i clearly “do it myself.”
BritGirlSF writes:
i did not say “cause”, but “contribute.” not to bring about, but rather to act as a factor. secondly, the article isn’t speaking about adult men, but rather males between the ages of 14 to 23. that would means boys and teenagers, not men. since these services often turn away males who need assistance, and i seriously doubt that none of them would seek help, it’s very easy to see how that could contribute to the murder rate. they feel they have no means out, and yet here is a means of that, but they are being rejected.
as we have seen in schools, when you treat someone as secondary, they will often accept the role. in much the same way, by ignoring these boys and teenagers, those feminist-run shelters are merely verifying what the boys already think: they don’t matter. which, i might add, has not been disputed by anyone here.
now, this is not exclusive to feminism. this happens to these boys and teenagers across the board by just about everyone. ergo, i said the gender-exclusive aid perhaps contributes to the murder rate, most specifically by contributing to the cause of the murders in the first place.
alsis39, thanks for proving my point. when you are done taking pot-shots at me for speaking about my abuse, are you going to tell me what i need to learn from feminism?
Jaketik, you have been little else since your descent to this blog aside from tedious, rude, self-pitying and barely coherhent. I’m not interested in teaching you anything. Your blathering in the abortion thread would have told me everything I need to know about how much you desire to help any woman (and by extension the rest of society) –at risk to your precious wallet and obviously monstrous ego– even if this thread did not. If abused men and boys need to rely on the likes of you to give them a leg up, I pity them.
Furthermore, you have some fucking nerve claiming that anyone here is “taking potshots” at you over abuse. The person who arrived on this blog to take pot-shots from the start was you. In fact, I believe Jake Squid has mentioned on this board before that he was abused as a kid. Perhaps you would have found that out and had some meaningful dialogue with him were you not so eager to smarmily liken him to Ann Coulter. You wrote the book on potshots, so save your whining for someone who cares.
You simultaneously claim to care about men and boys, even as you shit all over feminists because you feel that it is women’s job to drop their work for abused women (and their kids, who are often boys, though you don’t seem to comprehend that) and tend to you. You claim to be doing all this hard work, and yet you have no clue how to start a shelter, and I assume, your MRA buddies haven’t been exactly eager to help you on your quest. Otherwise, I doubt you’d have time to play your bullshit games here;You’d probably be off helping, instead of venting your misogyny on feminists.
Mister, get over this idea of yours that we exist to be your handmaidens. Get over the idea that you deserve so much as one scrap of respect when all you wish to do with your experiences is to trot them out here in a futile attempt to guilt-trip feminists. Go to google and type in “Second Wave feminism” or “Domestic Violence Shelters” or the name of your local DV shelter and its board, for pity’s sake. If you are sincere, which I doubt, the research is out there for the taking.
If men were doing much of anything else, we would never have needed DV shelters, much less feminism, in the first place. Furthermore, it has long been my opinion that one of the reasons MRAs by the truckload wail at the top of their lungs about abused men and boys, and yet there are no DV shelters for men (other than a scant handful for men in same-sex abusive relationships) is because they hate abused men. A man abused by a woman or another man has been symbolically feminized, in the eyes of patriarchs. He has devolved to the level of a “mere” woman, in their eyes. He is thus the concern of women, not men. In a philosophy of gender roles where one’s only possible part is active/male or passive/female, there is no other possible outcome. You’re either a manly man who abuses, or you’re an “honorary” woman.
Why, your buddy Pasa up there himself just said:
Would you spend one-quarter the vitriol on his lack of concern for your abuse as you have on feminists ? Of course you wouldn’t. Pasa’s a man.
So, hey, “Thanks for proving my point for me.”
Qgrrl wrote:
Having grooved all weekened to Cajun/Zydeco, I’d like to think that the fine women in the Magnolia Sisters or Balfa Toujours would appreciate a good microbrew, but I will acede to your expertise. Haven’t gotten to visit the South since I was a wee pup.
radfem wrote:
But they’re such a diverse lot, aren’t they ? On one hand, you have Pasa proudly stating that while he supports gender-integrated gold courses, he doesn’t actually care about DV issues. OTOH, you have Jaketik whining about the evils of feminist “socialism” even as he wants us to direct our “socialist” urges toward healing his pain;This, after proudly proclaiming in the other thread that irresponisble women weren’t his problem and he didn’t have to spend his precious dimes on their health or family planning issues.
It could be one hell of a game of idelogical Crack-The-Whip, for any feminist fool enough to hie herself over to their home board with her arms held out. It won’t be me, though. I’d like to keep my arms still attached, all the better to hoist Qgrrl’s beer.
jake, thank you for the clarification. What threw me about you is that most of the men I know working towards setting up programs for battered men, do not show up on threads about feminists, and the battering of women, to berate them. The ones I know, if they turn to feminists at all, it is for information about resources, etc. After all, why reinvent the Wheel, and I don’t know of any feminist that has turned them down for that assistance. Never, have they asked feminists to put down everything they are doing, to focus on the needs of men. That is a tool that men have grown accustomed to utilizing under the patriarchal system.
But I stand corrected on your background.
Men as a gender, being second-class citizens? That will be the day….Unfortunately, we likely won’t live to see it, because some comet across the galaxy will probably come here and wipe us all out before that day arrives, if ever.
alsis said:
“Would you spend one-quarter the vitriol on his lack of concern for your abuse as you have on feminists ? Of course you wouldn’t. Pasa’s a man.”
Exactly, and all antifeminist men have gotta stick together against those evil women, after all…
radfem, i’m going to ask this yet again: can you show me where i asked feminists to drop what they were doing to focus on the needs of men?
alsis39, stop using strawmen and try to make a coherent argument that isn’t a personal attack. while i know ampersand would never reprimand you for it, and i’m fairly used to it, it is still a rather childish thing to do, and completely degrades whatever argument you think you’re making.
jaket, why on earth would I do anything to help you divert this thread away from violence towards women, to violence against men, hmmm?
Your presense and diversion of this thread speaks volumes more than your individual words so we both know there is no “smoking gun” phrase to pull out. That’s not the way MRA’s work. But they nag about specific phrases to divert discussion about the issues pertaining to women, further into discussion of men’s issues.
Now, I’d like to give you more time, but unfortunately, our police chief(who incidently himself was investigated recently for misdemeanor DV and not charged) has come up with a new way to stall my FOI request and I have a quota on how many diversive efforts by men I will put up with in one day.
jaket, the problem is that alsis has no need to divert your argument because you are making it for her.
jaketk writes:
Alsis writes:
If men held all the power prior to feminism, how could women have accomplished anything without their support?
Actually if women accomplished feminist pro-female aims all on their own without the help of men — sweeping legislative reform and changed social bias in a matter of a few generations — it stands to reason that they are quite powerful. Particularly when you consider the fact that, in the last two centuries, men have been impotent in regards to creating or maintaining anything equivalently pro-male.
I wonder which it is, are western men uniquely charitable or are western women uniquely powerful?
“If men held all the power prior to feminism, how could women have accomplished anything without their support? ”
—————————————-
This is a particularly well-loved strawman of the MRA groups….
“Particularly when you consider the fact that, in the last two centuries, men have been impotent in regards to creating or maintaining anything equivalently pro-male. ”
———————————–
Already created, and quite well maintained….even with the advances of feminists. Women have yet to create or maintain anything that is equivalently pro-female to the vast part of our society which still remains pro-male. And most of us won’t see that accomplished in our life time, unfortunately.
but it goes back to if men don’t have 100% of control, they have zero. All or nothing. And when they cry foul and want their “all” back, it’s amazing how successes made by feminists can lessen or even disappear. That is when you know, what gender still controls this society.
For one thing, if this were truly an equilarian world, we wouldn’t have men trying to twist a thread which is tied in some respect with misogyny into one that is focused on misandry. In fact, in most if not all feminist discourse or on any discourse which has to do with women’s issues on the Internet it is inevitable that some bored individual will come and drop the misandry term early on in the discussion.
I also find it funny when White men wail about how feminism is about the upper class White women, and then in the next breath, the truth comes out. They don’t give a damn if feminism excludes groups of women, THEY CARE THAT IT EXCLUDES THE INTERESTS OF MEN LIKE THEMSELVES.
Typhon, if it works both ways, what exactly is stopping you from starting a shelter for abused males ? Do you care about your brothers’ safety and well-being, or are you merely offended that a few more women can help other women increase their chances of being safe and well ? Never mind. radfem provided the answer quite nicely, I think. I doubt most feminists would feel personally diminished if the MRA whingers on this thread got themselves together and opened a shelter of their own somewhere. In fact, we’d be relieved that you’d have less time on your hands to come here and post this sort of self-serving tripe.
I wouldn’t. And I wouldn’t mind if this issue, but unfortunately, it arises most on threads addressing domestic violence that targets women, rather than on its own and it’s usually to hit feminists or women on the head for not focusing on the needs of men and their issues in a society which still allows and even favors men exercising the most power.
I have no desire to go to the Men’s Rights Forum, SYG or any other and lecture them on the issue of DV. I’m sure I would get banned soon after the entertainment value of flogging another feminist there died down. Yet, antifeminist men clearly feel that they have to come HERE and blame feminism for “failing” them. For one thing, in the middle of a thread where women are discussing violence against women, that’s tacky and it smacks of exercising male entitlement and privilage. The men who do that feign misunderstanding of what they are doing, but they still do it.
And actually, this kind of attitude tied in with a DV thread pertaining to women reminds us that no matter what good news there is about DV in some place, that it will probably never go away, until men don’t feel entitled to crash a discussion about issues pertaining to women, and making it all about their needs. After all, it’s men’s need to dominate and exert power, through physical, emotional, sexual, economical and psychological force to receive validation that they are truly men(because after all, if you can’t control your women, then you’re not really a man, you’re an assortment of female slurs or female terms used to slur men by calling them women) that runs through the threads of DV.
I didn’t say that although I know what you’re referring to when you say “gender-integrated golf courses.” I said that I support women playing in men’s tournaments and I do feel damned privileged to witness a phenomenal talent like Michelle Wie. Visit , a website made up entirely of men who feel similarly privileged. Here’s a quote from one of the first posts in the thread:
From that comment we might conclude that his patriarchal pig oppressor act can use some work. Or we might conclude that, like me, he feels privileged.
Can you show me a website where women are discussing Wie with even a molecular measure of the kind of insight it takes to appreciate Wie’s talents?
This is obviously a privilege enjoyed almost exclusively by men. Maybe we should add it to the MPC. How about this wording:
“Men get to appreciate the phenomenal talents of a female golfer but women are expected to worry about one little golf course in Georgia that exlcudes them and ignore the 15,000 American courses that welcome them.”
Note the phrase “are expected” is written in the passive voice so that it’ll fit neatly into the MPC. Guess what happens when you convert it into the active voice. What’s the subject? Who’s doing the expecting? That’s right…a feminist.
Sorry, link didn’t work…beyond my computer skills or IQ, as yet undetermined. The website is http://www.golfclubatlas.com. The thread was back about July 20.
radfem, it isn’t a diversion to ask you to demonstrate where i stated anything remotely close to the position you claim i have. that is simply a matter of clarification.
but i have another question. what makes you think that i am white? i certainly haven’t said that, so what would make you jump to that conclusion? secondly, when did i say i was a MRA? i certainly support men’s rights, as i do women’s rights, but i don’t join any political groups. i don’t like the idea of allowing someone else to make up my mind for me.
now, i don’t know how much you’ve read about second-wave feminism, but bell hooks did a fairly good job of demonstrating the racism she experienced from white feminists (i realize of course that this might surprise you, but this is one of the authors i read when i was around 11 or 12, along with dante, shakespheare, and my favorite author, anne rice). a great deal of feminism still remains in the hands of upper-class white women who aren’t really all that concerned with non-white and/or poor women. there has always been an element of racism in western feminism. to lay this at the feet of men is unfair.
Terrific, Pasa. Some men like to watch Wie play golf. I guess that proves that male privilege doesn’t exist and that women spend as much time beating the crap out of men as vice versa. Oh, and that feminists are selfish assholes for not throwing the doors of women’s shelters open to men. Thanks for clearing that up.
Pasa, you do know what a diversion is, don’t you ? You claim to have been reading this board for two years, so you must know how much it pisses off feminists when males show up and insist on pompous and irritating diversions of every last thread about particular feminist issues, right ?
You already said that you were excusing yourself from this thread, and you also loudly and proudly proclaimed that you don’t give a damn about DV. So why don’t you keep your word, lay off the diversions, and go back to lurking, eh ?
if you read the article, it goes into all elements of the murder rate, not just women. however, if one were to read the first couple of posts on this thread, one would assume the whole article was only about women. so you chose to ignore 2/3 of the article and only for on the parts about women. what i did was state that while feminism appears to have helped women, it did nothing for men, given that the murder rate for men, particularly poor men, doubled. so far, this has not been denied so much as it has been justified. had the article only been about women, i would not have stated anything. but the reaction to the article would be like you lamenting the deaths of the some 20 female soldiers in iraq, which is fine, but flat-out ignoring and then downplaying the other 1880 deaths because they’re male, which is not fine, and then justifying it by calling them aggressors and saying they should deal with it themselves, which is disgusting.
Perhaps that’s because only a dualist blockhead would argue that assisting women in abusive situations does nothing to help men. Fewer men end up growing up in abusive homes and perpetuating the cycle of spousal and child abuse when women and their children (some of whom are boys) can get out and find safety. Fewer women end up killing their abusive partners when they can get out and find safety.
To anyone but an entrenched misogynist, this would be a no-brainer.
What’s really going on here, it seems to me, is that you don’t want any woman or girl to be free and happy, because your boyhood was not free and happy. Excuse me if I don’t agree, and if I find your approach to be a piss-poor method of helping other men and boys.
I have no need to get in the last word. I don’t even mind if you take pot shots at my back as I’m walking out the door. You addressed me with a thought that interests me so I responded.
Alsis, you keep saying that while simultaneously using my stated indifference to that very subject to bait jaketk. You’re better than this.
My only issue is male privilege. It’s an issue that’s constantly brought up on this board whether it’s the original subject or not. I am not diverting.
I said it makes them privileged. Of course men are privileged. Everyone is privileged in an absolute sense. But when you say that Group A is privileged and make it obvious that it’s in reference to Group B then you are saying that Group A has more privileges than Group B.
You cited the MPC as proof of male privilege. The MPC is nothing but male privilege. Do you believe that men have all the privileges and women have none?
In post #77 Radfem described that very implication as “a particularly well-loved strawman of the MRA groups.”
So, Typhon and Radfem have a point. Feminists couldn’t have made the gains they’ve claimed unless women do have power and privileges, yet I’ve never heard a feminist describe them. I know you’re not willing to offer proof of overall male privilege but would you be willing to describe some of the female powers and privileges that apparently exist?
jaketk said:
if you read the article, it goes into all elements of the murder rate, not just women. however, if one were to read the first couple of posts on this thread, one would assume the whole article was only about women. so you chose to ignore 2/3 of the article and only for on the parts about women. what i did was state that while feminism appears to have helped women, it did nothing for men, given that the murder rate for men, particularly poor men, doubled.
Actually, the article was all about women. The lead paragraph summarized everything most important about the article: the fact that fewer women are murdered because they are able to leave abusive relationships. Everything after that is filler and supporting details to put the lead in context. It is basic news writing.
You are trying to associate the fact that fewer women are murdered with the fact that murder rates for men have risen. One has nothing to do with the other.
By focusing on the supporting details given in the article about the overall murder rates for men, you are dismissing the main focus of the article. You are trying to shift the focus of the article, and this discussion, to men. The article was not about men, it was about women and how feminism has helped them.
Pasa wrote:
Not really. I’m just trying hard to differentiate your schtick from Jaketik’s. One of you argues that women don’t care enough about men like him;That women’s first priority should be men like him, or else feminism is a fraud.
The other one argues that we have so many privileges ourselves and what we care about is of so little importance that it’s all just a fun game for you to pass the time with. What you both have in common is that you are both trolling and diverting. What you both have in common is that your tactics are obvious, overused, and unwelcome.
Pass the time, indeed. My screen name is Pasatiempo. Very good, Alsis. You got it all right except the word “just.” I’ve already explained that to you.
No, Alsis, you’re diverting as you did in the comment above. My only issue has been privilege, a common topic on this board and one first brought up in this very thread (post #19 to be exact) long before I came along.
I think the reason you don’t want to discuss male privilege is that feminists have nothing to gain and everything to lose by doing so. Male privilege is assumed in our society without critical analysis. The irony is how much feminists despise their greatest benefactor: chivalry.
Let me know if you’d like me to come back again like you did last time I left.
Pasa wrote:
P-A, are you up ? I think we’ve got your next subject title right here, if you can re-type the title with a straight face. I know that it wouldn’t be easy for me.
“…For if the differences between men and women were fundamental, if woman was indeed intellectually inferior to man (that much, at least, seemed proven to progressive thinkers)… Chivalry, some decided, need not disappear, even if women were inferior creatures. Indeed, it was argued that they now needed man’s condescension more than ever…
“The endless [turn of the century, artistic] recurrence of fantasies of medieval encounters between strong, fair-hearted males and cringing women who needed to be rescued represented the symbolic continuance of the mid-century cult of the household nun. The child-mother, the saintly virgin, needed the strong arm of her newly-grown son… woman was either a wicked witch or a helpless child whose tender arms reached out not in desire but in sweet gratitude for the brave, pylonlike chivalric constancy of her magnificent knight. Not all women were swept off their feet by the lure of chivalry. As Rosa Mayreder, a brilliant turn-of analyst of the psychology of men’s fear of women, pointed out…
‘Gallantry, that frivolous and hypocritical attitude, bestows upon women the mere semblance of pre-eminence in order really to push her back into that place among children and minors which masculine lordship is determined she should occupy…’ ”
–Bram Djikstra, Idols of Perversity
Could this be yet another piece to the MRA puzzle ? Perhaps women shouldn’t help women in trouble because it upsets the natural order established by the chivalric code: Men determining which women are virtuous enough to merit rescue. Chivalry, after all, is what brought us “courtly love,” (the right of a nobleman to openly lust after another nobleman’s wife as long as he couched it in poetry and didn’t actually screw her), and the concept of peasant women being available to gratify the sexual desires of noblemen outside the bounds of marriage.
Yeah, that’s the ticket. Uh-huh.
Seems like jatek’s position is pretty simple.
1. Feminism professes to be egalitarian and to address gender based disadvantages.
2. Men are murdered more often then women.
3. Unless one can argue being murdered is a form of privilage, it appears to be a disadvantage.
4. Feminists don’t address this gender based disadvantage. Jatek then concludes that feminists claiming to be egalitarian is potentially hypocritical.
The feminists on this thread have made the following responce:
* Women are not obligated to help men with their disadvantages.
Jatek has retorted that if women are not obligated to help men then why are men obligated to help women?
Since a mainstay of feminist belief is that men *are* obligated to help women with their disadvantages, and when they don’t they should be condemned as part of “the patriarchy”, Jatek’s point is significant. Why shouldn’t women be hoisted on their own petard? If it is justified for women why not men?
A further feminist responce to this point has been:
* Men’s disadvantages are insignificant compared to women’s.
This ties into a responce to my question, namely that a vast part of our society is pro-male. (Which is the opposite of explaining how feminists made the advancements they did, if men hold all the power and are uncharitable to women.)
I have yet to find a compelling argument for this assertion and yes I have read and responded to the male privilage check list. I would like to know of any additional proofs that exist for this assertion.
In the interests of debate, would any feminist step up and provide the strongest proof they’ve developed that our society is vastly pro-male?
And for those who need a bit of a refresher on the basic nature of proofs… you can’t start by assuming what you’re proving.
I rather think that posts #19 & #34 already covered this nicely. So did #50, and radfem’s comments as well.
Huh ? Typhon, are you also into this whole rah-rah-chivalry thing ? Your comment makes no sense. Just because a few hard-won gains are tentatively in place, it does not follow that men as a class are all swell people who were (or are) happy about women being able to get out of abusive homes.
Feminists did not passively await the charity and goodwill of men when they decided that DV shelters were needed by women. They worked hard, they dealt with hostility and rejection, outmoded laws, a huge demand for help without the means to satisfy more than a portion of all the women who needed help. Some gave up lucrative careers, some simply decided not to pursue those careers in the first place. All took on risks, both personal and financial. For you to claim that the very existence of progress negates the situation that first fed the need for progress is utterly absurd.
So you think that the article leading this thread is, what– fiction ? That the multitude of threads and feminist boards are all the product of some kind of mass delusion in the female mind ? Please. You want feminists to make you drink ? We can’t. We led you to the water already, all over this blog and all over the internet. If you want to shut your eyes and waste everyone’s time playing “NUH-UHHH” games, that’s your own problem.
Very good writing.
So, alsis, why don’t you go straight back to the beginning of this thread, just before the subject briefly became…
…
…when the subject was an article that was considered a cause for celebration among the feminists here. That article was written by DAVID. Now see if “P-A” can say with a straight face that DAVID placed a small reduction in female murders above a doubling in the rate of male murders for any reason other than c-h-i-v-a-l-r-y.
Re: egalitarianism.
I’m not sure how the posts you point out address the main point. If women don’t have to help men, why should men have to help women. And if men don’t have to help women, then on what moral grounds can you condemn the patriarchy? Afterall it’s only acting out a perogative parallel to feminists’. And is just as morally justified in doing so.
As for mass delusions… they have existed in history and continue to exist to the present day. Historically they are the basis of the worst human attrocities and they all start with the idea that one group of people has wronged another and thus are unworthy of charity.
So, again, what I want is some sort of coherent proof that men do indeed oppress women. The existance of a belief in that proof is not enough.
She’s right, ya know, alsis. So why did you refer to these posts?
We’ve already addressed these posts, alsis. These are the posts that make the assumptions, not offer proofs.
I’ve asked you to show me the proof of male privilege you say you have but you won’t do it. I asked you to merely tell me about some of the female privileges that Radfem says you have but you won’t. I offered a suggestion as to why you won’t and you rejected it all the while participating in a thread that celebrates that very thing.
Do you have anything else to share with me? Would you like to tell me once more how I only want to shut down women’s DV centers? Any more thoughts on chin hair?
Pasatiempo… I’m sort of confused by your second to last paragraph. You want alsis to tell you about her female privilage?
typhonblue Writes:
Pasatiempo… I’m sort of confused by your second to last paragraph. You want alsis to tell you about her female privilage?
It seems the trolls have taken over and are now discussing amongst themselves. Trolls trolling trolls. I like it.
[snort] Oh, mousehounde. You cynic. How can you say such a thing. ? Are you implying that Typhoid is behaving like some kind of disingenuous toady whose too lazy to move his/her mouse around this board and start clicking ?
You’re so mean, mousehounde.
Why, I’m absolutely positive that he/she’s so interested in truth or justice that he/she simply hasn’t yet noticed the helpful links along the right side of this board with such titles as “All Women Count” or “National Latina Institute For Reproductive Health.” In fact, I’m sure that he/she’s spent all night reading and getting edjucated and is now ready to turn over a new, un-trollish leaf.
Why, just imagine if there were a website somewhere that discussed— oh, I don’t know, the Super Bowl. Imagine if there had been hundreds and hundreds of threads, all clearly labelled, disecting in great detail various games and their actual outcomes. Imagine that a basic tenet of the board, stated over and over again for years, was that in 1974 Coach Cleats told his quarterback, Jerry Jones, to make such-and-such a maneuver following the halftime break and that this was a bad decision which ultimately cost the Tacoma Terriers their victory in the game. Thus the team owners were right to let Coach Cleats go.
Now imagine that a poster whom barely anyone knows from Adam/Eve suddenly pops in on the scene and starts –in a thread only peripherally related to the 1974 Superbowl– a monologue largely consisting of calls for him/her to be spoonfed proof of Coach Cleats’ badness as a coach. Imagine that said poster can produce only scinitillating dialogue when told that Coach Cleats’ badness is an established fact consisting of faux-intellectual variations of “Nuh-UHHHH !!!” Imagine if requests to go read the dozens of links relating to this subject also produced a hanger-on poster who could do nothing but parrot variation of “Nuh-UHHHH !!!”
Surely, mousehounde, you aren’t implying that the latter such person would be at worst an obvious troll, and at best a lazy boor who clearly had little else to do but suck up to Troll No. 1. That’s really, really mean. The least you could do for Typhoid and her buddy Pasa is offer them Camille Paglia’s cell phone number or that invite to the next IWF High Tea that you’ve been hoarding. Shame on you.
Anti-feminists love playing the “prove oppression exists” or “prove male privilege exists” games, because there’s no single, agreed-upon definition of “male privilege” or “oppression” that MRAs have to stick to, allowing them to implicitly or explicitly insist on definitions that cannot be proved. This is, of course, a variation on “assuming what you’re proving” – they create or insist on definitions that implicitly support their assumption that male privilege doesn’t exist, and refuse to argue on any other grounds.
It’s relatively easy to prove that the marketplace discriminates against women (albeit probably not to the satisfaction of extremist anti-feminists, but to most people’s satisfaction); that men occupy a vastly disproportional number of the powerful positions in government and industry; that in typical US society, women are more subject to severe male violence than vice-versa; etc. For that matter, a bunch of the items on the “male privilege list” can and have been empirically shown in academic studies.
However, since there is no agreement that all of that adds up to either male privilege or to oppression, none of those things “prove” male privilege or oppression in the eyes of men’s rights advocates. Nothing ever can. This game is rigged, and feminists are better off not playing it.