So our old friend Roosh Valizadeh seems to have fully embraced the Matt Forney school of misogynist internet celebrity, posting over-the-top offensive posts in a transparent attempt to gin up controversy and blog traffic. And it’s working: he’s brought an avalanche of well-deserved hate down upon himself. But don’t worry: he’s still got some supporters — not only on his own blog but in the Men’s Rights subreddit.
What you’ll say to yourself if you don’t read my piece right away
I‘ve got a nice long review essay on Michael Kimmel’s new book Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era up at the American Prospect. Check it out!
The standard MRA take on the gender wage gap is that it’s totally a myth disproved by SCIENCE. But now the gap is apparently a real thing again in MRA-land, or at least in the Men’s Rights subreddit, because a fellow calling himself mrwhibbley has figured out a way to blame it on the ladies:
For proof, I suggest you watch this completely 100% percent true and not at all obviously staged phony video below:
Let’s say you wake up one morning and you decide, for some reason, that you’d like to make it your goal for the day to get yourself banned from the Men’s Rights subreddit.
If you’re a feminist, it’s not hard. I managed to get myself banned there some time ago and all I had to do was … well, I’m not exactly sure what it was I did. Actually, I’m pretty sure I didn’t do anything out of the ordinary, Reddit-wise, other than argue with the regulars there. It’s possible I may have engaged in some light sarcasm. So maybe try that.
If, on the other hand, you hate women, all you have to do is … well, again, I’m not sure. Because earlier today, as one friend of Man Boobz pointed out on the Against Men’s Rights subreddit, a dislikeable fellow who calls himself sciencegod posted an elaborate, graphic torture fantasy to the Men’s Rights subreddit. I’m posting it below as a thumbnail; click to see it full size, but TRIGGER WARNING because it’s very graphic.
It got some downvotes, and the mods deleted the comment. But it didn’t occur to any of the mods, evidently, to actually ban this user from the Men’s Rights subreddit.
Because obviously anything he might ever have to say on the subject of Men’s Rights is much more worthwhile than anything I might ever have to say on the subject.
I asked the mods why they felt it necessary to ban me when they wouldn’t ban someone like sciencegod, and here’s the response I got back:
This is pretty much the answer I get whenever I ask them anything. I could ask them if they thought the sky was blue and they’d send me the same response and probably put something in the sidebar saying the sky was red.
Ironically, elsewhere in the Men’s Rights subreddit today I learned this:
A Voice for Men’s so-called “Honey Badgers” — its little super-team of female MRAs, led by blabby Canadian videoblogger Karen “GirlWritesWhat” Straughan — have a new theory about Anita Sarkeesian. And it’s a doozy.
Sarkeesian, you may recall, is a feminist cultural critic who’s faced pretty much nonstop harassment from misogynistic internet assholes since she launched a project to dissect sexist tropes in video games. AVFM has contributed, in its own special way, to this wave of harassment, with articles describing Sarkeesian as, among other things, a “moneygrubbing liar” and a “queen bee … girl interloper” in the world of video games; AVFM’s Dean Esmay also held her partially responsible, along with an assortment of other internet feminists, for the suicide of one Canadian Men’s Rights Activist.
The principals at AVFM have blamed her for — either inadvertently or deliberately — bringing this harassment on herself by going to 4chan and posting about her project. (As I noted in a previous post, there’s no actual evidence she ever did this.)
The Honey Badgers, for their part, are certain that getting harassed by 4chaners was part of her devious plan all along.
Like all professional damsels in distress, Anita Sarkeesian had to choose a good dragon. Just the right looming shadow to fall over her delicate and fragile sensibilities; just the right cackling stage-villain to inspire her cries of helpless horror.
She chose 4-chan. An internet forum known for it’s underbelly of foul-tempered and hair-triggered trolls.
Then, after accusing Sarkeesian of inviting countless rape and death threats upon herself (and only a portion of it from 4channers, I should add), the Badgers take their weird conspiracy theory one step further:
But we at Honey Badger Radio have noticed something… odd. The wave of so-called hate that Anita received from her carefully chosen dragon, wasn’t really all that bad.
Yeah. A year and a half (so far) of pretty much unending harassment and baseless criticism, complete with violent threats directed not only at her but at other women who have defended her — that’s nothing.
Compared to 4-chan’s usual scorched earth strategy–raizing [sic] everything to the ground and pissing on the ashes, Anita got a little singed, like she sat too close to a campfire.
So we have to ask… Did 4-chan white knight Anita? I mean, come on. Was that the best 4 chan could do?
Yes, that’s right. The Honey Badgers are accusing those who sent rape and death threats to Anita Sarkeesian … of “white knighting” her.
One of the issues that many Men’s Rights activists profess to be Very Concerned About is prison rape. This alleged concern translates into essentially zero actual activism beyond the occasional indignant reaction to someone making a terrible rape joke about men in prison. But then they’ll turn around and make similar rape jokes themselves.
That’s right: MRAs don’t only joke about rapes in which women are the victims. Like many Americans, sadly, quite a few MRAs seem to think that rape is an appropriate — and even sort of hilarious — punishment for men they don’t like.
This quote from the Men’s Rights subreddit was featured on the Against Men’s Rights subreddit a week ago, but I can’t resist reposting it here, since it’s such a marvellous distillation of Men’s Rights LOGICS at work.
That’s right: while we of course agree that women are all crazy bitches, we generally don’t like to say that sort of thing out loud, at least here in this subreddit, because our actual opinions are so foul they discredit us every time we say them out loud in public and the evil feminists cherry-pick our statements and reveal to the world WHAT WE ACTUALLY BELIEVE.
And jabberwockeysuperfly won himself 60 upvotes for that wondrous bit of SUPER STEM MANLOGICS.
Later in the discussion, our dear old friend Pecanpig clarified that even if there are some women who aren’t crazy bitches, they’re definitely a bunch of bad … oranges?
If you’re starting up a political movement and want to get the asses into the seats — and then out into the streets — it’s helpful to have a stirring manifesto.
So some Swedish movie theaters have decided to institute a new rating system to let viewers know whether or not the films they show pass the Bechdel Test — that is, if at any point in the film two female characters have a conversation about something other than a man.
Over in the Men’s Rights subreddit, a fella with the classy handle classypedobear takes strong exception to this terrible affront to human decency. His argument?
So A Voice for Men, classy joint that it is, “reported” yesterday that Elizabeth Vargas of ABC’s 20/20, who interviewed Paul Elam for a 20/20 piece that has yet to air, has checked into rehab in order to deal with her alcoholism. The general reaction of commenters there ranged from “ha ha” to “well, maybe once she’s cured she’ll see how oppressed we men really are.” Those aren’t exact quotes. The exact quotes are below.
![sillymod [M] via /r/MensRights/ sent 51 minutes ago We don't answer to you. You have zero influence through which to get a discussion out of us. Goodbye.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/sillymod.png?resize=521%2C124&ssl=1)
![jabberwockysuperfly 60 points 7 days ago (93|33) We appreciate your solidarity. However, please refrain from making statements like "women are all crazy bitches" regardless of how true it might be; feminists mine this subreddit in the hope of finding this kind of statement so they can use it to discredit this movement. permalink source save give gold hide child comments [–]lolyesok [S] 30 points 7 days ago (33|3) Woops, I'll edit that out when I get to a computer. permalink source save parent give gold [–]theskepticalidealist 15 points 6 days ago (19|4) They'll quote that too.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/crazybitches.png?resize=504%2C247&ssl=1)
![dejour 13 points 7 days ago (29|16) It's not true though that all women are crazy bitches. So she shouldn't be saying that. For me the point though is that some women are and the legal system and public shouldn't assume that women=good, man=bad. permalink source parent save give gold hide child comments [–]Pecanpig 5 points 6 days ago (8|3) Depends on individual circumstances, if you eat 10 oranges and they are all bad then for all intents and purposes oranges are bad, that can be true despite contradicting your own experiences with oranges or whatever.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/badoranges.png?resize=502%2C234&ssl=1)
