(Crossposted on Alas and on TADA. If you’re not someone I know as a feminist, and you want to write in defense of MRAs, please take it to TADA.)
In my prior post on a law that discriminates against fathers, which is about to be heard by the Supreme Court — so this is NOT an obscure or unimportant case — I quoted from a feminist-authored brief against the law. That brief was signed by almost every major feminist group in the US: The Women’s Law Project, NOW, Feminist Majority Foundation, the National Congress of Black Women, the National Council of Jewish Women, The National Council of Women’s Organizations, Legal Momentum, and a bunch of others.
There were many other groups I found that either submitted their own briefs, or signed on to the feminist brief: immigration rights groups, Asian-American groups, the ACLU, a whole bunch of international feminist organizations, Human Rights Watch, People for the American Way, and so on.
So why can’t I find a single Father’s Rights or Men’s Right’s organization that either signed one of the briefs, or submitted one of their own? If bucket-loads of feminist orgs can do it, why can’t even one MRA organization manage to stand up to fight against this anti-male law?
Only one fatherhood-based organization signed on, the National Latino Fatherhood and Family Institute, which cosigned the feminist-written brief. NLFFI is an extremely cool group, judging from their website, but they don’t seem to be a Father’s Rights or MRA group. (For instance, you won’t find feminist-bashing on their site, nor any claims that father’s are victimized by having to pay child support.)
I suspect a few things may be going on here:
1) The base of the men’s rights activist movement is mostly right-wing, which may have reduced interest in a father’s rights case that’s also an immigration rights case.
2) There’s no obvious way that this case can be used to further feminist-bashing, and feminist-bashing — not protecting men and fathers — is in practice the primary goal of most MRA and father’s rights groups.
3) They’re just plain incompetent.
As I’ve said before, why, oh why, is the men’s rights movement so worthless?
I’ll take door number two, Barry.
Because there is no actual men’s rights movement, only groups that claim that as their reason for existing?
Oh, come on, Jake, put up SPOILER warnings if you’re gonna ruin the surprise. Amp had me on the edge of my seat with his latest mystery here.
So most men’s rights groups are just a sham excuse for femanist-bashing? Gosh, I never saw that one coming….
One of the intellectual lights of the MRM has posted a rebuttal, in which he uses incisive logic to show the errors in my post.
Although I’m not approving his comments, let it be noted that I am “a fat worthless faggot” and “a big pussy.” (Hey, if I’m a pussy and a faggot, does that mean I’m a lesbian?)
Oh, which intellectual light is that? There are so many to choose from.
I think you’re missing another option there, Amp – many MRA groups ignored this case because feminists support it. Therefore, it is suspicious, there’s probably a hidden feminist landmine in there, and anyway the feminists will just use it for good PR, so ignore it and hope it goes away.
Has Glenn Sacks posted anything about this case? He’s the only MRA I can think of who is openly pro-LGBT rights and he regularly gets crap from other MRAs about that stance.
wow, I am definitely going for all of the above.
This is so not a surprise.
Wow, really? The “logical” rebuttal to this post involves the words pussy and faggot? Really?
Civil discourse is important! Debate is important! Agreement – not so much. Why is that so hard for MRA-ers to understand?
What’s so odd?
First of all, you need to consider case selection.
Feminist groups choose litigants that they like just like everyone else.) This is an immigrant (feminism tends to be pro-immigrant and pro-illegal immigrant) who is from mexico (feminism tends to be anti-NAFTA and feminists often blame many or even most of Mexico’s problems on the U.S.) who was deported for a crime of pot possession (feminists are often anti-drug-control, especially when it comes to marijuana.) He’s the ideal petitioner.
Which feminist groups would be signing on as amici in this case if it were a white German neonazi KKK member who was deported for illegally protesting an abortion clinic? The gender issues of the case would be identical; do you seriously think those groups would still be supporting it?
Obviously that is an extreme example, but it makes a simple point: Cases are almost never about a single issue. Cases have framing, and politics. Why would you expect a group, MRA or otherwise, to sign on to a case it doesn’t support? The only group that reliably supports its pet issue, no matter what the underlying facts, is the ACLU. (I love the ACLU.)
Also, did any MRA groups get asked? Amici briefs which are submitted in support of a side are generally done with the express consent or permission of that side. It’s perfectly possible to screw up a brief and make things worse. It is uncommon for an organization to submit a brief in favor of someone who tells them to piss off.
If the petitioner didn’t like MRA groups or didn’t want to accept their help, that is yet another reason that they would not be expected to be involved.
This post just hit Reddit’s MRA subreddit (Reddit has subReddits for *everything*)
http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/dpycd/antimra_blog_wants_to_know_why_arent_mras/
Good linkage, SiF. And, look! the MRA’s are using this to bash women and feminism:
Turns out this law would let the gold diggers steal even more money from admirable, upstanding men to use on lipstick, perfume and bon-bons. I hadn’t considered that angle.
I wonder why MRAs get criticized for bashing feminism and for misogyny? There really seems to be no reason for it.
Yeah.
As I think about it…
If we follow that line of logic, look what it does to the whole sex tourism thing! That would destroy it if foreign women could sue for child support for the resulting children.
How terrible.
G&W: Most of your argument seems to me to be similar to my listed #1 reason MRA groups might have given this case a pass.
It’s possible that MRA offered to sign on to one of the existing briefs and were refused. I’m not sure why they would be refused for that, though; if they signed on to a brief, they wouldn’t be offering their own arguments and they therefore couldn’t screw up the case. And it would obviously be beneficial, argumentatively, to be able to say that people from many different perspectives agree that this law is bad and shouldn’t stand (which is, I assume, one reason for trying to amass a long and impressive list of co-signers for a brief).
SiF, thanks for that link.
Jake, I think that same person may have posted in the TADA thread. (Well, actually, he posted on “Alas,” but I moved the comment to TADA).
I… what?
Was there an update to the
Castrating Bitch FeminaziFeminist Handbook and nobody told me?[scratches head in bewilderment]
OK, for the record, does “legalizing drugs” come before or after leaving husbands, killing children, practicing witchcraft, destroying capitalism and becoming lesbians in the priorities list?
I don’t think “legalizing pot” is a necessary part of feminism. It is true, however, that the majority of feminists I know (and lefties in general, for that matter) seem to favor legalizing pot. (Myself included.)
[Glenn’s very welcome comment has been moved to the thread on TADA. –Amp]
Elusis:
Anti-drug-control wasn’t the best choice of words. I don’t think that feminism as a movement necessarily wants NO drug control, but I think that feminism tends to fight against a lot of drug control, since it weighs the negative effects of control more heavily than do pro-control advocates.
Amp:
Politics. Antipathy. All sorts of things. And I’m not saying that they WERE refused; they might not have tried (though the same reasons apply.)
It’s nice to imagine that MRAs and feminists and everyone else would just throw aside any internal squabbles when a Good Cause presents itself, but it’s simply not always realistic.
Would you cosign Glenn Beck’s brief, if you and he happened to agree? Or would you hold off, knowing that the association might be a problem and that it would have basically zero effect on the case?
Over on The Debate Link,Glenn points out issue of his that feminists have signed on to and feminist issues that he’s signed on to.
You keep pushing this, “Oh you’re just saying/doing that because of your political persuasion,” narrative, and I just don’t think it’s as universally explanatory as you do. Cynicism is a good way to sound smart, but it’s not particularly enlightening.
—Myca