Reading comprehension: a bit of a problem for the angry dude crowd. So in my post earlier today I wrote about a Redditdude who got so angry reading a relatively innocuous Forbes column by a WOMAN ON TEH INTERNET that he called her a “cunt” and threatened to murder people and got more than a thousand net upvotes. All based on a complete misreading of her article, of which he obviously only skimmed the first paragraph.
Well, now the Men’s Rights subreddit has gotten hold of the Forbes column, and they too are pig-biting mad – not so much at the column itself, which it’s clear not many of them have actually read, but at a straw column they’ve written in their heads which is nothing but EEEVIL MISANDRY.
To reiterate: Kashmir Hill’s column in Forbes notes that some people have come to regard people without Facebook accounts as somehow suspect in our hyper-connected world. Hill finds this a bit silly, and writes:
The idea that a Facebook resister is a potential mass murderer, flaky employee, and/or person who struggles with fidelity is obviously flawed. There are people who choose not to be Facebookers for myriad non-psychopathic reasons: because they find it too addictive, or because they hold their privacy dear, or because they don’t actually want to know what their old high school buddies are up to. My own boyfriend isn’t on Facebook and I don’t hold it against him (too much).
Note to the painfully literal: that parenthetical “too much” in the last sentence is what’s called a “joke.”
Naturally, Reddit’s Men’s Rights squad, not having read much beyond the sarcastic title of Hill’s piece (“Beware, Tech Abandoners. People Without Facebook Accounts Are ‘Suspicious.’”) has concluded that she’s an evil misandrist who’s demonizing men without Facebook as creepy psychopaths. Yes, in addition to getting the argument of her piece completely backwards, they’ve also decided that it’s all about men.
MauraLoona, who submitted the link under the misleading title “Men without Facebook: You’re suspicious and potential stalkers, creeps, and psychopaths” explains in a comment:
While the article uses gender neutral pronouns in some places, the message is obvious: This suspicion is directed at men.
I suspect this might be a case of xenophobia: “I am a woman and love technology, so if you’re a man and don’t share that love for technology, you’re suspicious.”
JohnTheOther, a virtuoso in the fine art of getting things wrong, offers this take:
Forbes, apparently is now in the business of creating boogiemen. No evidence of anything equates to evidence of sinister intent. What utter fear-mongering drivel.
And our old friend Liverotto concludes that when Hill says she doesn’t hold her boyfriend’s lack of a Facebook account against him (much), she’s just lying, like women do:
Yes, of course, she doesn’t hold it against him, that’s why she wrote a full article about people without Facebook being suspicious.
Women are just liars, that’s it, that’s all it is, liars and dissimulators, if you trust what a woman says you are naive.
MRAs really do live in imaginary backwards land, don’t they?
So, is C.C. in middle school or something? Or is this just MRAL being a douche yet again?
O_o
CC, you do realize that inserting words into a sentence does not mean that the sentence is as correct as the orignal, right? I hope you understand that…
And you’re racist. Surprise surprise surprise. Wonder if you’re anti-semetic as well.
I don’t care if you take me seriously. It’s not like I have any respect for you at the moment, so I have no reason to try to convince you of anything except that you’re here and being annoying.
So, I said something reasonable… but I must have been doing it because the blogger is a woman? Get over yourself dude, you are very poor at reading minds. It doesn’t matter if she’s a woman or if she’s sexist. If there’s a valid point she makes, I’ll agree with it.
Nope. I’m just pointing out that A. Racism has move evidence than feminism. B. They are almost identical.
Also: Great job at ignoring all my major points!
Today, I learned that paraphrasing people’s words in a totally nonsensical fashion is the same as having a valid argument. Also, Hitler.
So, I said something reasonable… but I must have been doing it because the blogger is a woman? Get over yourself dude, you are very poor at reading minds. It doesn’t matter if she’s a woman or if she’s sexist. If there’s a valid point she makes, I’ll agree with it.
(Saying zyklon b kills people when talking about a nazi is just as reasonable as talking about sexual standards (with no evidence behind them) when talking about a sexist, and saying she is “A-bit-over-the-top”.
@CC:
I didn’t ignore them, I attacked them all in one fell swoop by noting that you can’t just insert words into a sentence and come up with one that is as true as the original. Those were your “major points.” Unless you want to clarify, hmm?
And you’re doing it through logical fallacies. Congratulations! You are both wrong and a racist. ^_^
I didn’t ignore them, I attacked them all in one fell swoop by noting that you can’t just insert words into a sentence and come up with one that is as true as the original. Those were your “major points.” Unless you want to clarify, hmm?
(I already said what I needed to say. Go back to them, or run with your tail between your legs)
And you’re doing it through logical fallacies. Congratulations! You are both wrong and a racist. ^_^
(You can’t strawman an argument much more than that!)
Zyklon B AND Hitler. Feminism has failed. We may as well admit defeat right now.
Y’ever notice how the trolls that bring up racism in an attempt to make some weak rhetorical point always end up being for realsies racists?
Funny, that.
Ever notice how feminists dismiss all valid points as by either sexists, racists, or trolling, and how they can NEVER defend themselves?
Feminism is a straw house made of assumptions and bigotry, that falls to bits with the the wind of common sense.
@CC:
[cutting out the bullshit]
You do realize that I linked to an example of what I was talking about, right? Anybody else here have a good intro article on how sex workers are mistreated in their profession? I don’t have a good one on hand. (Seriously, CC, if you’re looking for hard data and good research, I’m not a good source for it)
I have concluded that CC is not worthy of my attention. But hissy fits are:
Hitler! Do you hear me? Hitler Hitler Hitler! All is lost! Feminism is doomed!
I, for one, welcome our MRA overlords, and I would like to remind Chancellor Elam that I could be useful in crushing the last pockets of feminist resistance.
@CC:
Given that I’ve read and responded to every post of yours directed at me and you still seem to think that I’m not addressing your real point, perhaps you could be courtious and clarify for me? /totallynotexpectinganything
Ever notice how trolls tend to demand evidence from their opponents, reject all recieved evidence out of hand, claim that no evidence was presented, make statements that clearly lable them as either a sexist, racist, or a troll, and then complain when they are called those things? Cause I have.
Don’t be a question sayer if you want to be taken seriously, dude, actually show some interest in what your opponent has to say.
I moseyed on over to zir blog on that second link…and it was a rant. A rant that I know I have felt after reading the 883,625,268,494th news story about a man who raped/killed/battered a woman he was dating and the reaction being “oh well she did XYZ to deserve it.”
And no, I am not exaggerating on that number:
Man kills girlfriend-google result: 31,900,000
Man kills wife-google result: 90,400,000
Man rapes-google result: 14,400,000
Man assaults girlfriend-google result: 46,600,000
Man assaults wife-google result: 5,990,000
So you know what? Zir rant makes perfect sense to someone who has been that angry because yet another woman was murdered by the person who supposedly was supposed to love her. That yet another little girl’s life has been snuffed out by a rapist who killed her because it was easier to hide the evidence. That yet another woman’s life has been destroyed by someone who enjoys the fact that he raped her and never suffered a day of remorse for it.
Your dogged insistence that we condemn this person for being angry enough to say something like this means that you want us to continually ignore zir reasons for being this angry. Because otherwise it means that you have to acknowledge that regardless of how over the top zir’s hyperbole was, zie has a point about the endless death and misery being meted out by one gender.
Oh I suppose I have to now do the obligatory “oh not all men are like that.” Which is true-like Kirby and David and Sharculese’s cases but it certainly is not in yours “conservativecrusader.” Because you are demanding we condemn this blog while flagrantly ignoring the vast amount of misogyny and violence in dozens of other blogs/reddit.
So piss off.
@CC:
From the post:
Amazing how the first couple paragraphs are completely and totally not calling those actions rape or like rape. It’s pretty frakking obvious.
tl;dr:
@Princessbonbon Disagree with feminism = sexism!
It would be nice if CC could figure out how quoting and paraphrasing work, because right now the only thing I’m getting from him is ‘blah, blah, HITLER!!!1!, blah, blah, FRIED CHICKEN!!, blah, blah.’ hint: If you want to be taken seriously, you might want to make your arguments in a coherent fashion.
… I’m getting a funny feeling that people are bored stupid with CC’s fallacious ranting… I can stop engaging if y’all want. It’s way past my bed time anyway. <(^_^)>
http://evebitfirst.wordpress.com/2010/10/07/a-rant/ Keep defending this hag. Feminists will white knight a woman or mangina to the death.