This email from a non-fan was so thoughtful I thought I’d share it, and my responses to it, with you all. This is the whole email, by the way. No, “Dear David” or any other niceties at the start.
1. Why do you represent yourself as a head of a creepy fucking child?
Because the “creepy fucking child” in the picture is me? It’s sort of my favorite picture of me.
2. How can you honestly believe that we live under a patriarchy, at least in modern western society? I mean, men hold no where near as much power as they’ve had in the past. Women nowadays have pretty much all the rights and opportunities that men have (hell, they probably have MORE rights, privileges and opportunities than men have).
Huh. How on earth could I possibly have come to the conclusion that perhaps men have more than their share of power in society today?
3. So what do you think of the Amazing Atheist?
Why don’t you just go and read what I’ve written about him? Do you not know how to use Google, or the search box on this page?
You two do have your similarities to each other: you’re both fat, have beards, wear glasses, are very opinionated, and both enjoy insulting the people you don’t like (feminists/MRA’s) and naturally attract a lot trolls from those respective groups. But, you two are on completely opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to feminism and gender politics.
Huh. How could that possibly be, with both of us being fat and wearing glasses? I’ll have to bring it up at the next meeting of the Bespectacled Fat Elders of the Internet.
Also, there is a bit of a difference between bullying people you don’t like (a la Amazing Atheist) and QUOTING WHAT PEOPLE ACTUALLY SAY (a la me).
And no, DO NOT bring up his sexual exploits, trying focusing exclusively on his merits as a video blogger, and as a person who gives his opinions on YouTube.
I don’t give a shit about his “sexual exploits,” whatever they are. And I don’t have much to say about his “merits as a video blogger,” because I’ve only watched a handful of his terrible videos. What I do know. from what I have seen from him, is that he’s a nasty, hateful, misogynistic asshole who bullies rape victims online and mocked a teenage girl who was bullied into committing suicide.
That kind of outweighs (get it? get it?) any fat solidarity I might have for him because of his fatness.
Hope that helps!
Yours, in fatness,
David Futrelle
EDITED TO ADD: My correspondent has responded to this post! Here is his reply. You may notice certain ironies.
That’s fine, go ahead and post all my emails to you on your website. All it’s gonna do is show how much of a colossal douchebag you are. And nice job on having your army of worms and insects crawl from the woodworks to attack me. Just goes to show how much feminists and the people who support them DO NOT deserve to be taken seriously, when all they do is stoop to personal insult and just linking to articles when someone questions them.
On the abortion thing, yeah that’s a problem, but how does it prove that’s there’s a patriarchy in western society? How do you explain the states that do allow abortion, how do you explain the modern western countries where abortions are legal? All it proves is that , yes, there are some states that continue to live in the dark ages and are run by assholes. How bout next time, try to actually answer my question instead of linking to an article and hoping that I’ll be satisfied. But then again, I guess that’s too much to ask out the modern-day feminist simpletons in society.
Oh yeah, and about the Amazing Atheist, he actually bothers to refute what the feminists. It’s not like he just looks at a feminist and says “haha your ugly, your fat, etc.” You on the other hand, stoop to nothing but personal insults. Pretty much all you do is find people you don’t like, hold them up and say “haha look at these people I don’t like, now point and laugh my personal army of woodworms.” You don’t even bother to explain why you think they’re wrong. It clear to me that somebody doesn’t know how to use the search feature on Youtube.
Woodworms?
I thought the bugs who eat wood were termites in English, no? Are there “woodworms” too? I’m googling, but is making me more confused =P
So either TAA actually has a fan or it’s a sock!
Is TAA 99% of his own fans?
“Woodworms” is probably just another example of MREnglish. They like to make up words.
Termites are definitely wood-eating little pests in Australian English; I don’t know what woodworms are. Could be another name for ’em or perhaps a USian critter.
Looks like it’s just a generic name for various wood-eating beetle larvae.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodworm
It seems it can also be a “generic description given to the infestation of a wooden item”.
I don’t mind being a generic description given to the infestation of a wooden item. Sounds destructive and ecological at the same time.
I’m also cool with being a beetle that eats decaying wood, if that’s their food stuffs, circle of life and all that (cue someone posting Disney songs)
We’ve got a generic critter that eats cardboard here. It’s called Maddie.
Lol, ours is called Tily. And she’ll also shred plastic, and sometimes wood.
Mads shreds furniture, so maybe she counts as a woodworm. Are there clothworms? She’s the giant furry beetle of downunder, anyway, currenly all wore out from chomping cardboard and having a snooze in her chair.
kitteh — up here we have moths that eat clothing as larvae, so I guess they could be called clothworms.
There is wormwood so I see no reason for there not to be woodworm.
Yeah, we have moths that do that too.
/).< welcome to middle earth, where wormwood has woodworms!
Guys, bring up google maps, put it on walking directions, to: mordor, from: the shire, enjoy.
Kitteh — and they look like worms, so clothworm works for me!
We also have an infestation of
” rel=”nofollow”>carpet beetles.
Lol, that’d be funnier if I wasn’t hoping they don’t migrate from my brother’s room into here. He has actual carpet beetles.
And not to jinx myself, but the beetle count is currently at zero.
Erk! Your house seems to be Bug Haven at the moment. We don’t get anything like that sort of infestation during summer here. Spiders, yes, but not a menagerie of other critters.
I will totally take the beetles over spiders, thank you!
And this is nothing compared to the stink bugs in Pittsburgh.
Or the summer of the mouse (creeping in my unscreened window). They’re adorable, until they’re making noise in your room in the dark.
Or the ants.
Ants I can do without, we’ve had mobs of ’em at work. Little idiots get into the water cooler and the kettle.
Beetles I don’t mind; we used to get crackerjack beetles in summer in our last place, much to Fribbie’s delight. I could do without swarms of ’em, though. At least that’s something about the spiders: the sorts we have only come one at a time.
Never had mice here, I’m glad to say. They do live at work, though.
We don’t have swarms of beetles, my top count has been 5~
But yeah, ants are stupid creepy little things.
How many beetles make a swarm?
Come to that, how many cats make a clowder or clutter?
Looking at how much of the floor here is covered in Maddie’s toys, I’d say “one”.
Pretty sure you need more than a half dozen beetles for a swarm. I’ll buy that one cat is (capable of making) a clutter.
Cats sort of multiply even when there’s only one. It’s part of their ninja abilities, I think.
It appears as if this writer hasn’t actually read anything David has written in the posts he submits here, considering a big bunch of them do contain refutations to what ever is being said. Not to mention that the blogs whole idea is, to my understanding, to make fun of misogynists and their ilk – there are plenty of more serious posters who do the debunking and responding part anyway.
Also, “TAA” has made several videos and other material mocking feminists, and when ever he does attempt to address their arguments, they usually are not from feminists (any woman saying things on TV =/= feminist) or just misrepresent the actual arguments. In some cases, he’s attacked radfems whom with majority of other feminists disagree with anyway. Not to mention it’s hard to take TAA’s things seriously when he has little to no understanding of anything related to feminism. He also has a habit of simply hand-waving his critics no matter if their points are valid or not. His sexploits have jack shit to do with the respect I or any people I know have – or in most cases do not have – for him – most aren’t even aware of them.
IT’s not like I’ve never heard him say or point out anything that actually makes sense, it’s just that these points have fuck-all to do with feminism (or most social issues for that matter).
And it really does not take a lot to find out how patriarchy affects the daily lives of westerners . Something that even MRAs should have noticed, considering that it’s harmful to men as well, all though in different ways. And that eradicating patriarchy would just result into a society that treats all genders evenly – something that MRAs, if they actually cared about what they claim to care about, should support.
Other than that, cute letter :3
One does not simply walk into Mordor. Get the driving directions.
I heard of TAA a long time ago. I watched one video where he said that he had never completed a book. I decided to stop right then, it was clear that he had the time and opportunity to read an entire book but had chosen not to do it, and then proceeded to brag about that. Why? I can’t think of a more profound way to announce “I KNOW BASICALLY NOTHING, DON’T LISTEN TO MY OPINIONS”. I have no idea how his fanboys can hear that and decide to keep listening.
This whole thing sounds like someone named shangi.
I’m sure a lot of them sound alike tho.
@skeptifem – gah, that makes him worse than the person I knew who said “I read a book once.”
I was just reading stuff about TAA tonight and I found another thing to be disgusted by. He has scammed his “fans” multiple times into donating thousands of dollars to the creation of websites which he half-asses and then abandons.
What a complete and utter piece of shit.
@Jessay, you are always late to the party! What is THAT?
Haha, I’m always playing catch up because I don’t check for a few days to a week at a time.
What is my being late or what is that video? I’m confused!
He bragged about not reading a book? WHAT? Why would? That doesn’t even? My brains hurt now. I totally get that reading isn’t everybody’s cup of tea, but the idea of bragging about not even finishing one book is so bizarre to me. But I’m a huge book nerd, so I’m biased.
This person just sounds angry that someone made fun of TAA.
Also:
On men sabotaging birth control (anyone surprised that studies suggest they do it more often than women?)
I know I’m only 25, but I’m pretty sure that I’m spectacled enough and fat enough to join this illustrious secret society. Do we get secret decoder rings? (this is the only thing I am willing to draw from the post because holy lord is your new penpal dense and silly).
Ohmigod, please tell me he’s also complained about Anita Sarkeesian “scamming” people. That would be hilarious.
Oh, that would be glorious! Poop, there’s no %The Amazing Self-Aggrandizer category =(
PS I keep getting recommended his vids on YT. Anyone know how to make this travesty stop? His face makes me want to kick flower pots.
@SittieKittie
Birth control sabotage is eerie.
Back in college I was with a guy who said, “I want to get you pregnant so you’ll be all mine.”
What happened back then blows my mind now because I thought very little of it at the time.
sarahlizhousespouse, yeah, it’s never talked about. I guess I’ve known that sort of threat happens in the back of my mind, but the cultural narrative is so steeped in spermjacking rhetoric I was honestly shocked when I read that story, and more than a little creeped/grossed out.
The idea that reading is “feminine” and not something “real men” do is actually one of the things about current gender roles that I think is genuinely hurtful to men, and contributes to a decreasing percentage of men in higher education. Obviously this has a lot to do with class as well; the “reading is for women” is mostly a working class/lower middle class male thing.
So, if the MRA was really about improving the situation for men in society, this is one of the memes they ought to target; that you’re less of a real man if you spend time reading books. But obviously the MRA will never realize that. They’ll just whine about how there are more and more women in higher education because the educational system have been, in some totally vague way, feminized by the feminists.
That’s so odd to me, the idea of reading being feminine. When I was growing up. I was told that I should stop reading so much because that’s what boys did and I should be more sociable, like a girl. (Not those exact words, of course, but that was the general message.)
I can’t help but feel unimaginably sad for anyone who denies themselves the joy of doing something because it might not fit to a specific gender role.
@ Jessay
Being late to the comment party! 😀
I don’t know if he has ever specifically complained about her supposed “scamming”, but he did make strawman-laden videos about her in the past. I don’t want to watch his videos to find out though, both because I don’t want to give him the ad revenue and also because his smugness just makes me want to punch something.
What I have read (from people that support his point of view, so I’m going to assume it’s true) is that he said she made herself into a Damsel in Distress by talking about all the harrassment that she got.
Given this fact plus the fact that the general excuse these people give for calling Anita a c**t is that she totally deserves it for being a scam, I’m going to say it’s highly likely that he also complained about her scamming the donors at one point.
@sarahlizhousespouse- That is effing terrifying. I’m so glad you got out of that situation. It’s especially scary given the percentages of abuse that start when the woman in the couple is pregnant *shudder*
@M Dubz
I wasn’t too worried because I had an IUD.
He struck me as being very unhappy and desperate to find happiness in another person, hence the frantic attempt to keep me, or anyone else, from leaving. The whole situation made me very sad, not because I felt guilt, but because I recognized how lonely he felt and how his actions drove people away rather than brought them closer.
He definitely criticized Anita, saying she was the ultimate damsel in distress or something for getting that money I think. I won’t watch his videos unless they’re reuploaded by someone else because he gets paid for them. Plus, after seeing a few a while back and wanting to rage-vomit, I just can’t stand watching him.
@tooimpurenangel I totally agree about how off putting his thumbmails for his videos which youtube tries to shove down our throats are. I commented on it on tumblr and he reblogged it, causing his fans to call me a cunt
http://amazingatheist.tumblr.com/post/53549955875/if-the-amazing-atheists-bigoted-views-didnt-keep-me
When I replied to how I’ve made countless arguments against his bigotry in the past, and he had nothing to say, I heard crickets. Like, yes, draw attention to the cheap shots made at you, completely ignore all actual debate. His tag on tumblr showed that to be a pattern of his.
Also funny how he brags about never reading books, because one of his money fishing expeditions was a request for fans to send him amazon gift cards so he could buy books for his birthday. Also funny because he’s vanity published three of his own. Why do I know so much about people I can’t stand?
I could be mistaken but from the way that guy writes and the strange try to evoke a sense of kinship through similar looks (overweight etc.) I think that guy is the amazing atheist. XD