Feminism or death?
Here’s the entirety of a recent post by an MRA who calls himself Snark:
Uh, dude, I think you’ve confused “feminists” with “Daleks.”
Our new friend Fidelbogen thought this was such a brilliant idea he devoted a post to it himself, declaring:
Such economy, such concision. …
Really now, we wouldn’t go far wrong to make our rhetoric revolve around this above all, and very little more. The saying is deceptively simple, for it goes deep and reaches into many corners.
It puts them on the spot, and nails them there.
I knew Fidelbogen was a bit of a pompous doofus, but this is a whole new level of stupidity for him. I don’t even know what to say about something this idiotic.
Also, check out the comments to Snark’s piece. There’s something about potatoes you kind of have to see to believe.
Posted on September 22, 2011, in antifeminism, idiocy, MRA, violence against men/women. Bookmark the permalink. 1,516 Comments.
revapin, new people are moderated here.
ToySoldier’s capacity for misrepresentarion does not surprise me. Here’s an example in which he turns “not meeting my needs is a dealbreaker” into “respecting boundaries is her dealbreaker” presto change-o, right before your very eyes:
http://toysoldier.wordpress.com/2011/08/08/sex-sexism-boundaries-and-coercion
He’s a magic man.
Why does my ipod’s autocorrect turn revspin into revapin? Is that even a word? Better yet, it turns revapin into revspin now, too.
revspinnaker, your comments were in moderation for several hours because:
1) All comments by first-time commenters here are held until I approve them.
2) I was asleep. I do not monitor my website 24/7.
They are all up now.
Moewicus: If everything we know about child abuse shows that it has little to do with the ideas people hold, would that imply that “patriarchy” does not cause or contribute to abuse since it too is an ideology? My aunt believes that men perpetuate an oppressive system that leads to violence against women, the same as any other feminist. However, that is pretty hateful view of men, and a person who thinks that might become violent. On that note, I do not mind Rutee projecting her anger against men’s activists on me, but if she hates me that much it should please her to know someone shares her views.
Rutee Katreya: I do enjoy these kinds of discussions because it reveals how feminists think. I said my feminist aunt hurt me using feminism, and the feminist response was “That’s not feminism”, even though I never said it was. I find the immediate defensiveness and straw man arguments curious. Is it really that difficult to believe that feminist views might lead to violence against males? And I am sure you know a lot about shitty people.
Pecunium: Actually, the argument that my aunt cannot be a feminist because no feminist commits child abuse is a no true scotsman fallacy. Breivik does not identify as a men’s rights activist, and only feminists claim he shares their views, so there is no fallacy in pointing out that distinction.
Bagelsan: A good example of a feminist view that can lead to violence is the view that women are under constant threat of rape because all men are potential rapists. That paranoid view could cause a woman become violent towards men who approaches her. Many ideologies are universally and explicitly opposed to violence, and yet have had led people to violence, particularly political ideologies and religions.
Amused: Is it possible that if Scott Roeder were a pro-abortion atheist that George Tiller would be alive? If yes, then would that not suggest that Roeder’s anti-abortion Christian ideology played a role in his actions? It is curious that you claim that “people who believe themselves socially inferior also tend to feel less moral responsibility towards those who are socially superior” because that aptly describes the general feminist view about women.
Kollege Messerschmitt: Unlike feminists, I do not hold to “us versus them” dichotomies. Feminists do not show their desire for equality either. As for the other matter, I can claim I never said feminism supports child rape because I never said it did or that my aunt thinks it does. The proper question to ask is in what way feminism caused her behavior, to which I would answer that as a result of feminism, my aunt developed anti-male views and chose to proactively fight “patriarchy” by correcting her nephews. The difference between her and other feminists is only her methods.
Bostonian: I love the hypocrisy of feminists claiming they support and believe all victims of sexual abuse as they deny my abuse occurred. That hypocrisy, contrary to what Holly thinks, is why I do not support feminism. Thanks for demonstrating ye tagain how little feminists respect male survivors.
[i]ACK[/i]
ACK
Um, Toysoldier… I said my feminist aunt hurt me using feminism, and the feminist response was “That’s not feminism”, even though I never said it was.
Come on. Let’s not lob them softballs.
Thanks David. I must have posted here before because my screen name and icon popped right up. I guess it’s been a while. Moewicus, I guess we all put our own spin on things. I read the “dealbreaker” article and was suprised by the shear volume of responses. All of a sudden the politics of oral sex is a huge feminist issue. You may recall in my comments at the Toysoldier link you provided. I managed to change the subject the best I could to maternal child abuse and got Toysoldier to confide about his childhood rape. That’s not an easy thing to do and I commend him for it. And I agree with him that feminist influences have silenced the male perspective of child abuse, by leaving boys as victims and women as abusers completely out of discussions of domestic violence.
I respect male survivors. I do not respect people who lie and misrepresent people at every opportunity.
You are a known liar. You even lied in your post about this post. Everything you say is suspect because of that.
Actually, revspin, if you had entered your name and gravatar on any other WordPress blog, it would show up here automatically.
You say that your feminist aunt hurt you using feminism.
You also say that you never claimed her abuse was feminism.
Do you not see a contradiction between these statements?
ToySoldier, patriarchy is what enables abuse, not what causes it. Furthermore the proposition that your aunt did not sexually abuse you because of feminism is not the same as the proposition that feminism does not lead to excesses. I think every ideology has lead to excesses, including feminism. You think you have feminists in a double bind, but you are referencing a Straw Feminism of your own creation:
You are charging at windmills.
Ever heard of David K. Meller?
This crap is why I say you still need lots of therapy. You do not realize how messed up your aunt truly is.
Toysoldier:
No, he doesn’t identify himself as such, and I don’t think anyone here has labeled him an MRA.. But many of his views are indeed shared by many MRAs, and some MRAs have explicitly endorsed his views:
http://manboobz.com/2011/07/28/peter-nolan-anders-breivik/
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2011/07/global-echo-of-violent-misogyny.html
Other MRAs have offered justifications for violence:
http://manboobz.com/2011/08/02/angry-harry-violence-is-justified-but-dont-blame-us-for-it/
revspinnaker, if you post from a different IP address, you’re counted as a new commenter, so maybe that’s what happened.
@toysoldier, to return to my vegetarin example
You can’t just make baldfaced assertions of a causal link. Your opponents are not and will not accept that. You have to prove it.
You are misunderstanding Pecunium’s arguments as well:
Pecunium never argued that feminists can’t commit child abuse, Pecunium argued that child abuse is not a feminist act. This is like arguing that no vegetarian could commit violence vs. that violence is not a vegetarian act, to refer to the earlier analogy.
@Pecunium, the notion that queerness is inferior is hateful. The notion that queerness is a sin which harms the community or is an evil act (built into the notion of sin) is also hateful.
@revspinaker, citations needed. Also, please be sure to distinguish sexual and physical abuse for neglect abuse when finding those cites.
toysoldier: The imputation that I said your aunt wasn’t a feminist is a lie, because I have consistently said she was.
I have never said no feminist abuses. What I will say is that he being abusive isn’t a result of feminism, no matter what she might have told you, because there is no doctrinal theory of feminism, apart from men and women deserve to be treated as equals.
The same cannot be said of the MRM.
The MRM can claim Breivik doesn’t share their views; they are wrong. He quotes them, at length, with approval. They may not like the association, but it’s a lie to say he doesn’t share their views. It may be a stretch to say they share most of his, but he most decidedly shares their, and when we look at the response to things like Palmer, and Ball; and the writings of other MRAs who are out there looking forward to the gender war they see as inevitable, and the cricket chirps of dissent… the evidence argues there is more accord there than not.
Was your aunt a feminist? If she said so. Are there feminists who don’t self-ID as such? Yes, and the MRM is all too fond of saying anyone who disagrees with them is a feminist, by virtue of such disagreement. I, at least, am pointing at Breivik’s agreement when I say he is on the MRA side of the aisle.
And feminism doesn’t argue for, nor; as a movement, condone the abuse of children, be they boys or girls.
Bostonian: If feminists had respect for male survivors they would have welcomed us into the healing process 30 years ago. Instead they deliberately denied boys as victims and women as perpetrators. They then proceeded to castigate, humiliate and annihilate men & boys simply for being male. So let’s talk Matriarchal Oppression. Here’s something we all know; boys who are abused as children have no social resourses to heal and often grow up to lead toubled lives. That can literally mean trouble with the law. The majority of crimes committed by men are against themselves or other men. Sometimes those crimes are committed against “women & girls.” And that would be bad! So if feminists really want to stop violence against women, they need to start by ratifying Barbara Boxer’s Violence Against Children Act. That would show some respect for male survivors. And children.
P.S. Zombie: WordPress sounds pretty cool. I might get a blog to post Rep. Boxer’s Act.
Actual links to feminists doing that would be needed for me to believe that, RevSpinnaker.
I have heard male survivor stories, on feminist websites. No one casigated the male survivors. Ratifying Barbara Boxers Violence Against Children Act would also take the action of the Senate, not exclusively feminists.
We could, but you sound like you want to talk ab out something that exists. There is no matriarchy. Women do not possess sufficient power for this. What you’re talking about is the flip side to the narratives that make rape by men so easy to forgive, both socially and legally. As it happens, those narratives do also hurt the men they don’t apply to. I’m sorry for that. But they don’t mean that women control society in even the most broad strokes, to the detriment of men. It means Patriarchy hurts some men too.
‘campaigning for’, because I am a pedant, but yes, this sounds just peachy keen to me. Need to look into this at the local level for local democrat chapters. It’ll be as much a waste of my time as everything else has, what with being in Texas, but hey.
Yes, and technically Glenn Beck only asks questions. Come off it, nobody is this naive.
See, when we say MRA views may lead to violence, we can link to actual motherfucking violence that occured. You have “Someone who if she’d had serious power might have actually enacted misandry”. Color me fucking unimpressed, especially since feminism has done a lot more in general.
Yeah, if someone actually followed Daly’s worst shit, there’d be problems. It doesn’t happen, and won’t happen for a number of reasons that basically come down to “They’re about equal in popularity to actually punishing white people for the setting up of racist structures in the past and their maintenance of them today” and Daly’s fantasies of a misandrist world, while skipped over, are also not really endorsed.
I do. You assholes keep showing up even if I’m just trying to relax.
Yes, this is certainly true, but we can put forth at least some political capital towards it. It’s not actually an unfair demand.
Annihilate? Hyperbole much?
Or is this like that AHMO thing–annihilate, humiliate, mutilate, destroy–that football fans paint on their chests sometimes?
Toysoldier:
I would appreciate it if you would stop arguing against those straw feminists and their beliefs, and start addressing what the flesh-and-blood feminists on this very site are telling you instead.
Feminists see women as socially inferior, and that’s why they are fighting for equality?
What? Women being seen as socially inferior is the exact thing feminism is AGAINST! Do you even think about what you write?
It’s like if Anti-racists would say that black people are socially inferior.
This would also completely contradict any claims you made about what constitutes feminism. How can feminism be anti-male (according to you) if it views women as inferior (according to you)?
[Citation needed]
Seriously, where did anyone here say that feminists don’t commit child abuse?
It was said that feminism doesn’t SUPPORT or CONDONE child abuse in any way or form. Please stop misrepresenting and start addressing the things that were actually said.
People have commented on this already, but it’s just to beautiful not to quote again..
It’s not that I don’t respect male survivors. It’s that I don’t respect idiots who spew lies and misinformation.
I believe that what you told us happened to you, and I have much respect for the fact that you talked about it on an open space like this.
But I still think you are full of shit.
boys who are abused as children have no social resourses to heal
Not quite.
So if feminists really want to stop violence against women, they need to start by ratifying Barbara Boxer’s Violence Against Children Act. That would show some respect for male survivors. And children.
Agreed. But as Bostonian points out, there also needs to be action by, you know, men; many of which are decidedly anti-feminist. If you really want to help Baxer’s initiative, you might want to work on convincing them also.
Bostonian: I can’t provide links for personal experiences from 30 years ago but when I started speaking about child sexual abuse to women’s groups I was literally told I deserved it. Feminism has changed it’s tone since then, not from empathy and understanding of men, but for the fact the next generation of women were so turned off by the vitriolic angst driven animosity for men, they completely disassociated with “FEMINISM.”
darksidecat: I prefer citations to semantics. Consider this, according to the Center for Disease Control, American women kill more of their own children than any other mothers in the industrialized world. That represents a 25% increase since 1985. Yet not a blip on the domestic violence front.
That last should have been obliterate rather than destroy, my mistake. It is an awkward set of words and I filled in a better one.
But annihilate? Somebody gonna tell me when feminists started using White Phosphorous weapons?
Citing something actually requires citing it, not just stating information. As in, a link, or the title and journal information of a study.
And does anyone think that the US is the most feminist influenced country in the industrialized world? I don’t. I doubt anybody does. So you’re gonna have to connect the dots if you’re talking about the relationship between feminism and child abuse, rev.
So, RevSpinnaker, you spoke to women’s groups. Which ones?
I first encountered victim advocacy among feminist groups. All of them included male survivors and denounced female abusers.
Your spin on why feminists include male victims is not borne out in my experience at all.
darksidecat: I think some (not all) of the problems with trying to explicate RC doctrine has to do with inside vs. outside understandings.
Queerness isn’t inferior. I don’t go so far as some (whom I think are being evil; and completely distorting things), who say that homosexuals are especially beloved of God, because he gave them this extra burden to bear (and the doctrinal,and dogmatic errors in that are so many as to be several doctoral dissertations). Hell, as a personal theology (and there are a number of reasons I am a lapsed/fallen away member of the Church, but that’s a whole different subject, and not relevant to this one), I don’t see that the issue ought to exist.
But sin, in the RC doctrine is not an issue of evil. It’s an issue of not being completely obedient to God. One who sleeps in on a Day of Obligation, or eat’s “meat” on a fast day is as sinful as one who fornicates.
The larger culture in the US is much more informed by the protestant ideas of sin as “wilful deviations from God’s Laws and Commands”. Because protestant doctrine is one of personal acceptance/subjegation to God, to violate one of His commands is a much more damning (theologically) issue. Add the much greater emphasis on the Devil, and the idea that one who disobeys God is actively working against him (which so many of the more vocal Right Wing Religious espouse) and the background against which all homosexual condemnations exist is more than problematic.
Do I disagree with the Church on this? Yes. I think Peter’s vision on the rooftop was metaphoric, and said that “all which God has made is Good”. It wasn’t about all food being kosher but that no person is treyf/. I think the RC is getting there, not as quickly as I would like, but I also don’t think it’s correct to say they hate homosexuals.
I really think that, were the US not so religiously narrow as it is, and so culturally imperialistic as it is, the issue would be very different; because the Religious Right would not have so infected the American Catholics, and the sway they have in the politics of the Curia (which doesn’t want to alienate so visible a part of the Church) and so the US pathologies on homosexuality would be less affecting of the Church as a whole.
And I understand why you disagree, but felt the need to explain myself/how I see the Church.
Moewicus: Glad you brought up football. We could discuss the dominance of women in the teachers unions and question the underlying sexism of sports programs in public schools. Independant studies in Scotland and Japan both conclude women are more sexually drawn to pictures of men with more masculine even scarred faces when mensturating. Hmmm… The only place I was ever taught a “sport” whereby as a direct result of my behavior someone else may end up with broken bones, concussions, paralysis even death was in public school.
And the cheerleaders provided pagentized rectal display for the biggest males with the greatest potential for violence. Kind of like Mountain Goats and Lowland Gorillas. What was the question again? Where’s the violence come from? Think if we had cheerleaders for math and science. Cheerleaders to stop global warming…
Wait, so now you’re trying to say that women teachers make young boys play dangerous sports because scars are sexy?
Dude.
You might want to look at the gender makeup of who’s *setting* the curriculum and who decides what sports are ‘boys’ vs what are ‘girls’ ones – rather than, you know, the ones who just *implement* it.
Signed ~ someone who wasn’t allowed to play rugby at school cos she had a vagina.
As always, citations needed.
Um, where exactly did you go to school?
RevSpinnaker:
A quick search on Shakesville alone have me several article about harassment and abuse of boys, or how the media deal with (and often minimize) them.
• about sexual harassment at work
• sexual abuse of boy scouts
• about the problems of sexual predator registeries
• about clergy abuse
• about the problematic coverage of Tyler Perry’s sexual abuse by CNN (how his abuse by a man was called “molestation”, while the abuse by a women was called “seduction”)rep
• about the offensive and homophobic way a professional advice columnist replied to a male survivor of sexual abuse
I remember that there were several more articvles about sexual abuse of men and boys, like about how a talk show host called a 13 year old boy who was sexually abused by an older women “lucky”, or something along the lines, and who laughed even though the boy looked really uncomfortable and triggered, if I remember correctly. I think the boy was a musician?
I also think there was an article about female and male sexual abuse in the army. Feel free to browse the Today In Rape Culture tag, in case my examples aren’t enough.
@revspinaker, I do so hate to repeat myself:
.
@Pecunium
Disobedience to god is seen as bad/evil. What god dislikes are bad things, presumably, if one is presupposing a benevolent deity. Saying “we don’t hate you, god does”, just deflects responsibility for hate, it is still hate. And thinking that queerness is bad, unnatural, and/or worse than hetero models of sexuality is thinking we are inferior, and it is hateful. Saying that the only good sex is a certain narrow sampling of hetero sex is saying that those people and their sexualities are superior to everyone else, who has bad sex. Saying that it isn’t the worst of sins may be less hateful than saying it is, but it is still hateful. And don’t give me this ignoring history and blaming modern protestantism (which isn’t better itself still) for this, this is a longstanding issue that was around before the protestant reformation even occurred. They burned and drowned queer people before there ever was a protestant church, don’t give me this bullshit. Modern US “pathologies” on queerness are a direct descendent of historic Church rhetoric. The very first codified bans on queer sex in law in the western world were put on the books on the grounds of Christianity. Shit, the very term “sodomy” is derived from Catholic rhetoric. So don’t, as my mother would say, “piss down my neck and tell me it’s raining”.
blockquote fail, but it should still be clear enough
Zombie and Bostonian: You’re both right. Men do have to take the initiative about maternal child abuse. But I find women in general, not just feminists, are particularly adverse to entertain the discussion. Bostonian, 25 years ago I worked with some of the first men in the Chicago area to advocate for awareness of child sexual abuse of boys. We organized the first therapy groups for men at the Ravenswood Hospital, we did speaking engagements and panel discussions including a national DCFS Conference, the national Phyliss Levy Radio Show at WLS and a couple large conventions for survivors. We were the only men. We phone blitzed the Oprah Show to do a show for male survivors and she reluctantly did. I spoke briefly from the audience. She never seriously dealt with the subject again until last year’s “200 Man Show.” I also wrote articles for the Sun-Times, including one with Jeffrey Zaslow.
Moewicus: I did cite a source, go to the Center for Disease Control web-site, or the American Psychiatric Foundation among others… the stats vary slightly but they all say the same thing.
*gave me several article about harassment and abuse of boys *and men
*articles
Ugh, sorry tor all the typos.
It seems like my comment is on moderation because of all the links anyway, though.
Displaying one’s rectum sounds more like something someone would do for scientific reasons rather than sports… Maybe they WERE science cheerleaders after all.
darksidecat: Within the family, sexual abuse represents between 13% and 20% of the total of all child abuse. Of that 30% is perpetrated by females, relatives, trusted friends, babysitters etc. A large portion of child abuse is considered neglect, which is vague. Felony neglect sounds more like an oxymoron than a sentencing guideline. Casey Anthony was guilty of neglect. Look what happened, or actually, didn’t happen to her.
*for
Please provide actual citations (with links), RevSpinnaker.
I would also like to remind you that “data” is not the plural of “anecdote”.
But I find women in general, not just feminists, are particularly adverse to entertain the discussion.
…he says in the midst of a lengthy conversation about just that.
She was overcharged by an ambitious or public opinion-oriented DA and didn’t actually get nailed for the crimes she did because they were aiming too high, and double jeopardy protected her from the things she did do because she already went to court once. You should probably pay attention to your case studies.
Fairly busy atm, so can’t say much more than that right now.
Kollege Kat: Thanks for the cool links. I’m still pretty new to blogging and to be honest, I haven’t figured out how to import a link. Also, I could cite (link) reasonable statistics to have them rebuffed by politically mandated statistics. Like the one I heard on PBS’s “To the Contrary.” An “expert” said the number of men molested as children was 1 in 30. Even Oprah says it’s 1 in 6, and the CDC puts it even higher, close to 1 in 4. One in thirty, and no “citations” in the world will convince her otherwise.
And what have you got against anecdotes?
darksidecat: Disobedience to god is seen as bad/evil.
No. Evil is different from being less than completely attendant/obedient. Honest.
It’s, to draw a local analogy, much the same as saying someone who disagrees with an MRA hate men. There can be overlap, but the sets are not, of necessity, overlapping.
What god dislikes are bad things, presumably, if one is presupposing a benevolent deity. Saying “we don’t hate you, god does”, just deflects responsibility for hate,
And the Catholic church doesn’t say that. Some (too many) Catholics do. The Church doesn’t even say God hates murderers. The only people whom God can be said to hate, doctrinaly, are those who “blaspheme the Holy Spirit”, but there is no defintition of that. God, and apparently God alone, knows what He meant when Jesus said that.
There are Catholics who preach the lie, “We don’t hate the sinner, just the sin.” They are, per the church, in error (because one is not supposed to hate individual sins, but the idea of sin; that is of being in discord with God).
Being a homosexual is not to be in discord with God. Fucking outside of marriage is to be in discord with God. From the Church’s viewpoint my mother and Andrew Sullivan are equal in their sin.
The underlying difficulty is, in some ways, the irresolvable paradox of the Abrahamic religions, if God is all the good things He is required to be, how can it be that he made a world/universe in which there is evil.
And the problem of theodicy is convolute. Each religion has come to some form of living with/inside the quandary, and it’s really hard to convey to those who didn’t grow up in it what those understanding/rationalisations are and how they work for those inside them.
Are there a lot of catholics who hate homosexuals? Yes. Are they at odds with the actual doctrine? Yes. Will this change? I certainly hope so, and I do my little bit to bring it about.
As to the issue of pissing down your neck to tell you it’s raining don’t tell me what my church actually believes. Don’t, also, conflate my discussion of the present church, and the past.
Moreover, don’t try to take a universalist position on the issue of the Church’s attitudes to homosexuality, as it’s been consistent across neither time, nor place. We can, if you like, look at the views of the Romans and the Greeks (which were, in fact, a far cry from tolerant; it was fine to be the one who penetrated, and it was permanently sullying to be the one who accepted pentration; which is arguably the cause for the Church’s early stance against it; because to do something which makes someone else a permanent outcast from social equality was an evil, but I’m digressing).
The 17th century British views of homosexuality are the much more specific genesis for the US pathologies, and the modern pathologies of the US are all of our own doing; comparing us to Italy, France, Spain, all of which are much more Catholic (you know the religion you are specifically beating up on here) shows a very different social standing than one sees here.
So it’s not “The Roman Catholic Church” which is driving the bus of persecution, and sure as hell not the one doing it here; unless you want to tell me Palin, Bachman, Robertson, Santorum, etc. are crytpo-catholics.
And now I need to 1: go and be a bit more social with my family, and 2: cool off a bit.
RevSpinnaker:
You are welcome! Shakesville also has a tag called Patriarchy Ain’t a Picnic for Men Either, where a lot of examples of misandrist media portrayals of men and more are listed. It’s certainly worth the read. The comments are usually very supportive of male survivors, too!
RINN, a feminist organisation for survivors of sexual abuse and rape, link to 1in6.org on their information site about male survivors.
Here are probably the statistics you were looking for.
I don’t think you have to import links, you can just copy-paste it in if you want! I just like me some fancy HTML.
Well, I certainly don’t have anything against anecdotes! Anecdotes can be very interesting!
I just think that replies like
are not very reliable.
Look at Bostonian’s reply:
See? I have no doubt that both of your stories are true, but this is exactly why anecdotes are useless as evidence for general social trends. Your theory that you try to prove with personal experiences can easily be refuted by someone who has personal experiences that contradicts your’s.
” but the idea of sin; that is of being in discord with God””Being a homosexual is not to be in discord with God.”
Yet homosexuality is a sin? You are not being consistent with yourself. Ask the question, “if it is not bad, why does God not want people to do it?” The notion that something can at once be a sin, be forbidden of God, and cause discord with God is anathema to the notion that it is an equally valid and non-inferior mode of behavior. And the notion of sending people to hell directly condradicts the notion of not hating them. “You aren’t bad, but you deserve eternal torture” or “you aren’t bad, but doing what you do causes discord with all that is good” is nonsensical.
“Moreover, don’t try to take a universalist position on the issue of the Church’s attitudes to homosexuality”
I didn’t, I specifically said that it was a “direct descendent” not the same exact thing, but some of these ideas are actually pretty consistent throughout the history of the Catholic Church (such as non-procreative sex as dirtying and as social corruption). And, yes, modern protestent ideas do derive from traditional Catholic ones in this arena. Of course, they are also responsible for adopting and continuing it, but that does not absolve the Catholic Church from spending hundreds of years creating, building, and fostering this in order for that adoption to occur. And the fact that a few high Catholic percentage of the population cultures have managed to secularize parts of their state does not mean the Church does not still do this internationally as well (funny how places like Poland, or almost exclusively Catholic countries in Africa where a person can be jailed or even put to death for being queer aren’t your chosen examples).
“is arguably the cause for the Church’s early stance against it”
Only if the only people participating in the argument are so desperately grasping for apologetics straws that they can ignore the context of even new testament prohibitions which call for the death of “passive” partners as well.
You are defending calls for the murder of me and mine, Pecunium, and I don’t appreciate it. You are apologizing for thousands of years of ongoing brutalization, and I don’t appreciate that either.
Moewicus: O.K. so annihilate was a bit over-the-top. I was looking for something that rhymed. Character assassination was what I really felt when that woman told me I deserved to be raped as a child, in front of a large group of women we were invited to speak to.
darksidecat: I’ve seen the 1 in 6 site before, it’s linked from Oprah.com. It’s based on studies from the Center for Disease Control. That’s where I get most of my information. They have the most reliable, current and unbiased studies of child abuse. They are also the one’s who concede their own statistic,1 in 6, is probably very low. The reason groups like 1 in 6 have taken so long to form is because of feminist and media exploitation of child sexual abuse as a political device. “Child sexual abuse is the ultimate form of male oppression of women.” Boys were not politically correct victims at the time and were abandoned by the feminist dominated “domestic violence” socio-political system.
People throughout the two American continents, rather than just in the United States of America.
That’s fucking stupid. If you called a Chilean an American, they’d look at you like you were a god damn idiot. Which you are.
I thought that’s what our resident MRA trolls do when they pull “facts” out of their asses.
RevSpinnaker:
I assume your reply from 5:32pm was directed at me.
I got the link to the 1in6 site from RAINN. RAINN is a network that lists feminist.com as their first national partner.
You still claim that:
Rev, I am trying my best to assume you are arguing in good faith, and also that you are being open minded here.
I usually provide links when arguing for something. You can keep claiming that feminists are responsible for, or even endorsing, male survivors not being taken seriously.
This is not my experience at all.
My experience is, that feminists are fighting harmful gender stereotypes that lead to mainstream media using sexual violence against men/boys as punchlines or jokes. Every feminist I know/follow is against prison rape jokes. Every feminist I know/follow is against the media painting young boys being abused by older women as “lucky bastards”.
So why should I believe you, Rev? I provided you with several links from a feminist site that supported male survivors. You are not providing links. What you are saying utterly contradicts my experiences.
Why should I believe your claims?
You sure, bro? You do know most spanish speaking countries use “Estadounidense” for USian, right? Not “Americano”.
Shit, son, even Puerto Ricans use Estadounidense, in my experience, and they *ARE* technically US Citizens.
MRAL, not this “American” shit again, por favor.
This place has gotten boring. I’m leaving.
@Kollege Messerschmitt…
I live in Victoria, Australia, which is the only state in which male victims can access rape crisis services. Throughout the rest of the country male victims are rejected outright by these services and are often laughed at and called liars. Those services are almost always run by feminist groups and funded by the taxpayer.
I can only presume these are “different” feminists to yourself.
gwallon, do you mean rape crisis services generally, or the “Rape Crisis Centre”?
NSW Rape Crisis Centre provides a 24/7 telephone and online crisis counselling service to anyone whose life has been impacted by sexual violence. It is a non profit community organisation managed by a group of committed women. http://www.nswrapecrisis.com.au
This is a different organisation from NSW Health Sexual Assault Services, provided at hospitals and community health centres. The NSW Health P&P manual says in the introduction “Sexual assault occurs against men as well as women of all ages. Although women can commit sexual assault, research findings consistently report that 95-98% of offenders are male.”
Gwallan: It would unquestionably be terrible if male rape survivors in Australia could only access help in Victoria…but even a very cursory Google search seems to indicate that that’s not actually the case at all. This website appears to be a good resource to help you find rape crisis services for men in Australia: https://livingwell.org.au/Counsellingandsupport/Australiawidesexualassaultservices.aspx
And this organization also looks pretty helpful: http://easybizit.info/samssa
(Incidentally, both of those organizations explicitly identify themselves as feminist.)
Moewicus: Do not play semantics, and do not change the subject. We are not talking about excesses, but whether an ideology causes a person to behave differently than they would have had they not be exposed to those ideas. Feminists put themselves in a double bind by claiming that a gender-based ideology analogous to feminism can cause violence, while claiming that feminism itself cannot. I do agree, however, that feminist thinking is messed up, which is partially why I am not a feminist.
Futrelle: As I noted before, that two parties share similar views does not mean one caused or influenced the other. Likewise, that an individual member of a group agrees with another person’s views does not mean that member’s entire group shares those views.
darksidecat: I had hoped no one would break Godwin’s Law, but since you did, switch out Hilter with Germans and vegetarianism with Nazism. Do you honestly believe Nazism in no way caused Germans to be violent against Jews? I never stated that Pecunium made that argument, only that the argument was made. However, your misunderstanding highlights the problem: instead of addressing my actual comments, feminists resort to straw man arguments.
Pecunium: As I noted before, an ideology need only present a group in a negative light to prompt some of its members to lash out violently against the hated group. Feminism is not immune to this. Quoting from one person’s website is not the same as belonging to that person’s group. Feminists are all too fond of calling anyone who disagrees with them MRAs, by virtue of such disagreement. I, at least, distinguish between those who actually belong to a group and those who do not.
Bostonian: It is pretty easy to find examples of feminists refusing to help male victims.
Rutee Katreya: Actually, when feminists say men’s activism leads to violence they attempt to link some man’s random violence to the men’s movement by claiming the two share similar views. That is a classic association fallacy. If my presence on an online forum bothers you, I can only imagine how much worse it is for you when you look in the mirror and actually see an asshole.
Kollege Messerschmitt: I would appreciate if you stopped arguing against those straw MRAs, stopped misrepresenting my comments, and start addressing the things I actually wrote. Bagelsan wrote, “Feminism is absolutely about treating people of all sexes and genders with respect, bodily autonomy and humanity — if you do not believe in these very core criteria then you are not a feminist.” In other words, feminists cannot commit abuse. I will keep your personal opinions of me with my aunt’s and those of other full-of-shit assholes.
‘This place has gotten boring. I’m leaving.’
I believe that’s MRAL-speak for: ‘I haven’t managed to turn this thread into a pityfest all about me, so therefore it’s stupid. Nyah Nyah.’
RevSpinnaker: So now you’re talking to several feminists who’ve flat out contradicted everything you’ve said about feminists not taking male victims of abuse seriously. With anecdotes, which you seem to prefer, and also with links to articles in which feminists do talk about the very topic which you’ve stated they refuse to talk about. End result: Rape and abuse are horrible no matter who is the victim and no matter who is the abuser. No victims ever deserve it. Full stop.
So basically, your argument was just shot to the ground. Repeatedly and ungloriously. Care to rethink what you’re saying?
Toysoldier, I heard about the Mary Kay LeTourneau DJ event on feminist websites, all explicitly condemning her actions.
one in particular
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2009/05/child-rape-hilarious.html
and a quote from the above link
“It’s one thing to condone creepy schoolgirl fantasies (see: the poster for this very event, linked here, plus every fetish night in the world); it’s quite another to hold a party for a convicted child rapist who began grooming her victim when he was in the second grade. Would a nightclub have hosted a similar party for this guy, who raped three boys, between 6 and 10? Or this guy, 25, who raped a 12-year-old girl? Or this guy, 24, who raped a 10-year-old girl? Or the first two guys in this post–self-defense instructors who raped their female teenage students?
Of course not. And we shouldn’t give Letournau a pass just because she’s a sweet-looking white lady and her now-husband says he gave his consent. Victimization is victimization, even when it comes in a female (and thus non-“threatening”) package.”
Complete, explicit condemnation of the rape of the child in question.
Any MRA sites condemning the rape of children?
Any at all?
Since yours is not an MRA site, it does not count as part of the movement.
Also, you spend that thread on you own site shouting down one feminist who points out that there is no policy of child rape in feminism.
I will note that there are many, many posts by self identified MRAs which denounce age of consent laws as misandric, because it prevents them from raping young teenage girls.
Yaz: I’m not sure I was making an arguement to shoot down. I was merely recounting my experiences and not trying to convince anyone of anything. I was stating the facts that existed 25-30 years ago, during the genesis of harangue-banger feminism. I don’t deny, times have changed. You’re the one doin’ the rootin’ tootin’ shootin’. You’re right I must be wrong, the CDC is a Patriarchal Conspiracy. American moms are the best in the world, let’s see your stats to back that up.
Barbara Walters is the one who capitalized on Mary Kay LeTournau. Her whole angle was to exploit the question if the same rules about sexual abuse applied for boys. She pimped it right up to the big wedding day too. After Mary Kay spent a couple years in the slammer for love.
My question then RevSpinnaker is why you keep insisting times have not changed which you just did once again.
Rev, I’m sorry you had bad experiences with feminist organizations, but you say that was 30 years ago, and feminism has changed a lot since then. One important change has been the recognition of the harmful effects our cultural mores have on men. It’s the culture as a whole that treats women as harmless and men as tough, and so denies the possibility of female-on-male abuse, but feminists have done important work in trying to change this perception.
‘I was merely recounting my experiences and not trying to convince anyone of anything’ That seems disingenuous at best. You’ve recounted said experiences on several threads now with the underlying message of ‘American women kill their children and feminists don’t take it seriously’. Clearly you’re trying to convince someone of something. You’re not just idly speculating here.
‘ I was stating the facts that existed 25-30 years ago’
So nothing recent or relevent. Great. Yet you keep making broad statements about how feminists (not feminists of years past) refuse to take child abuse seriously, despite evidence to the contrary which has been presented to you. And which you seem to ignore. No one here, many of whom are feminists, have been anything but supportive of child abuse victims in this discussion.
‘You’re the one doin’ the rootin’ tootin’ shootin’. You’re right I must be wrong, the CDC is a Patriarchal Conspiracy. American moms are the best in the world,’
So…you are making an argument? Poorly and with wilted straw-feminists. But apparently you are arguing something despite your previous comment of moments earlier where you stated you’re not trying to convince anyone of anything. I was hoping you were arguing in good faith, but I’m starting to doubt that in a large way.
‘let’s see your stats to back that up.’
Following your example, I only need anecdotae from decades past. And hell, anyone can present anecdotes to back up pretty much any twisted train of thought.
p.s. Pro-Tip : Stop assuming everyone you meet on the internet is American. Guess what? We’re not.
Is that a situation of a feminist exploiting it or of the media exploiting it?
Fair enough. That’s pretty sick. Do you remember what group it was?
Like ToySoldier, you have a way of liberally interpreting what other people say. Who said the CDC is a patriarchal conspiracy, or that american moms are the best in the world? I already asked you why that’s relevant when the US is not the most feministic of the industrialized countries, but you went off on a tangent about how maybe women support football because they get horny seeing scarred faces. If you’re not going to stick with an argument then don’t bring it up in the first place.
Regarding the term “americans,” I am taking a Latin American History course right now and as I recall, one of the liberal constitutions of Mexico in the 19th century declared that criollos, mestizos and indigenous peoples would from then on be termed “americanos.” Also, one thing that stuck in my head from the movie Turistas is how the Latin American organ harvester referred to his victims: “norteamericanos.” I strongly suspect that MRAL is talking out of his pageantized rectal display.
Haec Dixit Spatio Papa