Breaking News from Imaginary Backwards Land: Atheists “worship at the altar of feminism.”
The Scumbag Privilege Denying r/Atheism meme.
Paul Elam has apparently become something of a comedian – though not on purpose. In his latest post on A Voice for Men, he takes on the atheist community for being too in thrall to (wait for it) feminism.
I’ll let him explain:
[T]hey are too religious. Yes, I mean that literally. For when you wipe away all the bombastic bellowing about empiricism and the strident mocking of those who choose a life of faith, what you are left with is a population of people that surrender their reason and cognition as though they were at gunpoint; that hit their knees as fast as any Catholic…to worship at the altar of feminism.
His proof? Several years ago someone at Atheist Nexus posted a link to a Men’s News Daily column of his, and – get this! – some feminists responded!
You can go here to see all the horrible things these evil cultish feminist atheists said. Like, for example:
I guess I’m a feminist, but I really like men and these are some of the things I love about them:
Protectiveness is a positive trait in men that women who want to have babies look for. We also like passion and some recklessness, but you won’t get me to admit that to my daredevil husband…..
Confidence; men usually have more of it and it is mostly a postive trait.
The ability to make decisions quickly.
Physical strength and endurance are helpful in many family situations. Ahem.
Penises. You have them, lots of us like them. I know it’s not technically a “trait”, but I had to put that in.
You can practically taste the man-hate there!
Elam, I should note, ignores that comment. No, what’s got his underpants in a wad is this comment:
The whole web site mensnewsdaily.com is a sad overreaction to the growing equality of women in society.
Evidently he’s been stewing about this remark for more than two years.
In fact, if you go and take a look at it, the discussion on Atheist Nexus wasn’t … really … all that feminist. Yes, several people criticized Elam and mensnewsdaily as “extreme,” but one of those people also criticized radical feminists as similarly “extreme.” Some of the commenters explicitly identified themselves as feminist; others explicitly criticized feminism. Nonetheless, the discussion somehow managed to be the politest conversation about gender I’ve run across online in a long, long time.
Seriously. Go take a look at it. Then consider how Elam sums it all up:
Apparently they can’t even handle 50 years of loud mouthed arts majors without drinking the Kool-aide and going brain dead. There was scarcely a voice among them that did not wallow in the ersatz enlightenment so common to feminist ideologues.
And then he moves on to whatever this is:
Feminism, as far as ideology goes, has been very effective at using human reproductive realities to co-opt other movements. In fact, from the American Civil Rights Movement to Occupy Wall Street, feminism has progressed without paying its own way, but rather by sending women in to other social arenas and wheedling men into supporting them. The Borg would be proud if they had emotions. Resistance is Futrelle.
Ho ho! Futrelle rhymes with futile! Sort of! Lest Elam and co. become too overwhelmed with pride for this clever wordplay, I should note that some junior high schoolers beat him to the punch back in the late 70s. Or maybe it was grade schoolers. I really don’t remember.
I’m less clear about the rest of his argument about “human reproductive realities.” Apparently it’s a fancy way of saying that dudes only support feminism so they can get laid. Another highly original notion.
Elam’s other piece of evidence that feminism has taken over the atheist community? PZ Myers.
He quotes this evil athio-feminazi ideologue arguing that if male atheists want to get more women involved in the atheist community, they should:
Learn to shut up and listen. Seriously. You want women to find your organization pleasant and interesting and worth contributing to? Then don’t form panels full of men trying to figure out what women want, talking over women who try to get a word in edgewise, belittling women’s suggestions with jokes, and trying to determine how We Well-Meaning Men can give Those Women what we think they want. You are assuming an authority and presuming that it is in your power to give it to the minority, when what you should be doing is deferring to that minority and giving them your attention, letting them speak and shape your organization.
God – or, if you prefer, Imaginary Entity – forbid that male atheists actually listen to women explain why they might feel unwelcome in the mostly male (and not particularly feminist friendly) atheist community.
You really think feminism has taken over the atheist community? Take a look at Reddit’s Atheism subreddit, where, recently, a woman who recently described how she had been raped was attacked as a liar and a slut in a thread filled with rape jokes. Or go back a little further to the Elevatorgate brouhaha, where an atheist blogger who politely mentioned in a podcast that she doesn’t really like being hit on by strange men in elevators at 4 AM drew the ire of countless angry atheist dudes, including Richard Fucking Dawkins himself? (In case you want to revisit that bit of nastiness, I wrote about “Elevatorgate” in several blog posts; here are some reactions from decidedly non-feminist atheists.)
This is a movement that “worship[s] at the altar of feminism[?]” Not really seeing it, dude.
But again, congrats on the whole Futrelle/futile thing. Genius!
Posted on February 8, 2012, in a voice for men, antifeminism, idiocy, misogyny, MRA, reddit, white knights. Bookmark the permalink. 407 Comments.
“Resistance is Futrelle”
Better than that fly poster, that’s for sure.
PZ’s statement, by the way, is how every in-group should treat every out-group. It’s fantastic advice. That’s why it gets so much pushback from MRAs.
Oh, right, because if Elevatorgate proved anything, it’s that the atheist community is overflowing with feminists.
I guess Elam just couldn’t sit on that knot in his undies any longer. Couldn’t he find more recent things to raise his blood pressure over?
I feel insulted!
As an atheist, I only bow to kittens.
Ask the menz to listen to women? now that’s just going TOO FAR!!! women got the right to vote what more do they want amirite fellas?
I’m a bit surprised that actual atheist feminists didn’t come up, but I suspect he doesn’t really know about them. And also they laugh at him and his ilk when they want to take a break from pushing back against more complex, less cartoony messes like Elevatorgate’s (still continuing) aftermath and the bizarre boy’s club mentality that’s depressingly common across atheism.
Once again, the MRAs talk about a movement in a way that makes it more attractive to me, but is also counterindicated by reality. Is there a word for this? I mean, I’d love it if the atheist community were solidly feminist and the government actually acted on feminist ideals, but neither is the case.
Elam is deluded or a fucking liar if he honestly believes that atheist communities are a hotbed for feminism. I’m an atheist and I have a huge problem with the rampant sexism in the various communities.
Yeah, the atheist community is rife with feminism. That’s why so many male atheists called Rebecca Watson a ‘cunt’ when she uttered those dreaded 4 words, “Guys, don’t do that.”
At least religious people have an excuse. Their god buddy tells them it’s okay to view women as lesser creatures than men. Atheists have no excuse.
So sorry you’re disappointed that the atheist community hasn’t told us atheist women to shut our big fat yaps and slink back in the kitchen. Maybe you should go to a ReasonFest and host a panel. I’m sure it’ll go over great!
Asshat.
Quick amendment to my above comment: Should have said “actual FEMALE atheist feminists.” PZ is certainly a feminist, but being a mangina chromosome-traitor and all, MRA’s probably react differently to him than to, say, Greta Christina or Jen McCreight.
PZ Myers really is a misandrist, though. He’s just a jerk. I don’t really have any strong feelings toward him, but he’s an arrogant jackass.
Well, PZ is a feminist, but no female feminists really came up at least. You’d think we’d at least have Rebecca Watson namedropped or something.
Doesn’t he teach Biology 101 at podunk dipshit university? Whoa there, don’t strain yourself, PZ.
I think it’s worth pointing out that ‘resistance is Futrelle’ was included in our make shit up about David Futrelle day that lasted several days.
Even when Elam tries to be clever he’s beaten to the punchline…
I’m laughing so hard at Elam’s assertion that atheist communities are full of feminists. I wish. Elam could find a way to say that sammich jokes are feminist. “See? These wonderful men think you’re good enough of a cook to make sandwiches for them. Only a misandrist would take offense to such a great compliment!”
Sometimes I fantasize about becoming a famous something just so I can pointedly snub people like PZ and have it actually mean something to them.
THANK YOU! This was the exact example I was going to provide, as well as the sixteen year old self-identified atheist girl who posted a picture of herself with her Christmas gift only to be deluged with “suck my dick” and “I’d hit that” comments.
It’s like that old joke about the Jew reading Der Sturmer.
Once again, the MRAs talk about a movement in a way that makes it more attractive to me, but is also counterindicated by reality. Is there a word for this?
Big Gay Disney World, IIRC.
It really is. Wow, women and children enjoy excellent social services, equality has long since been achieved, and feminism is widespread in atheism too! I’m so happy about this world I live in!
Unfortunately in the real world (trigger warning for link),
some atheists aren’t so amazing.
There is no current brouhaha in the atheist community where many men (and a few women) are falling over themselves to defend Penn Jillette’s use of the word “cunt” when talking about a female writer. No-siree. Not at all. Nothing to see here folks, the atheist community is a feminist utopia.
Or what was the other one? Something about a country-wide rave?
@ Lady Zombie- re: misogyny in theists vs. atheists.
The problem is, I think, that many atheists break away from belief in God without breaking away from the rife misogyny and other problematic attitudes that can make religion so poisonous (and I totally own that religion can be poisonous, as a religious person). They still get to be TOTALLY PRIVILEGED DUDES with the added bonus of looking down on people’s wordviews that they deem “illogical.”
I feel like the feminist theologians and feminist atheists need to hang out more. The more we coordinate the voices yelling against kyriarchal asshattery, the better.
Not that he is representative of the atheist community (thank fuck for that), but he has a large fanbase, is an outspoken atheist, and most recently has developed a bit of an MRA following.
May I present the bloated TheAmazingAtheist. On ShitRedditSays, we have this lovely offering by TAA. He goes by the name terroja.
“I will make you a rape victim if you don’t fuck off.”
Link text
Bravo, TJ. Keep it classy, shitheel. But there you go, Paulie boy. A feminist haven!
And of course we’re currently going through an internet argument with Penn Jillette and his wife about why it’s not at all sexist in any way to call a woman a cunt — and furthermore, that it’s not at all a complete overreaction to said woman’s rather mild article mocking the Super Bowl commercials. With atheist friends like these, who needs enemies?
“evil athio-feminazi ideologue” must go on my CV now.
At least it’s kind of refreshing that misogynistic atheists are up front about it rather than feeding you lines about “complementarianism” and that kind of thing.
(Now I kind of want to do a compare/contrast of atheist misogyny and fundamentalist misogyny…could be interesting…)
Oh is that what’s happening now? I’ve mostly avoided the atheist movement since about 6 months before elevatorgate. Oh boy, Jillette’s wife can be just like Comrade Physioprof (I believe that was the vile little scienceblogger who called Rebecca Watson a grade school level insult) and be one of the girls who wants into the treehouse.
@ katz- no, they feed you the evopsych bullshit instead. “We hunted the mammoth to feed you! And then totally didn’t pray afterwards! Nyah!”
But yeah, I think a project to take down religious and atheist misogyny could be really interesting!
Yeah, Jen covered it (and got into a Twitter argument with Jillette’s wife): http://freethoughtblogs.com/blaghag/2012/02/women-who-dont-amuse-penn-jilette-are-cunts/
And Amanda: http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/comments/the-total-and-obvious-non-sexism-of-penn-jillette
And I just spotted this post from Jen regarding the Amazing Atheist, and his diatribe against a rape victim (holy shit): http://freethoughtblogs.com/blaghag/2012/02/scratch-the-amazing-atheist-off-your-list-too/
Yeah, many women atheists have voiced their personal feelings regarding how “welcoming” the community is to them. Men in the community have tried discussing ways in which they can attract more women to the atheist community. It’s a known problem, so I just have to wonder what Elam is smoking here.
Rutee, I think you’re thinking of Abbie Smith, AKA ERV. I don’t read Comrade Physioprof, but I highly doubt zie would have been asked to join Freethoughtblogs, if zie had done something like that. (Or if zie had, I doubt PZ Myers, Greta Christina, Ophelia Benson, et. al. would be blogging there now.)
One commenter on Dispatches From The Culture Wars put it thusly: the world has a sexism problem, the (gnu) atheist community is just willing to talk about it.
People like Elam think the fact that Elevatorgate or Jillette are controversial is in itself unconscionable feminist tendencies. He won’t be satisfied with anything less than 100% acceptance of “back in the kitchen and make me a sammich” reactions to women in the atheist community.
At the risk of sounding like a ‘glass half full’ optimist, I would like to mention that even as an anti-feminist backlash is clearly apparent in the atheist community, it should also be seen as a good sign that the controversies like Elevatorgate and such were due to feminists *within the atheist movement* speaking out and taking back space within the movement, rather than feminism and the atheist movement being mostly non-overlapping groups, as was the case during the Repressed Sexual Assault Memories controversies in the 80s. Social progress is painfully slow but at least it exists. There can be only a backlash if there was something to backlash against.
I’ve grown so cynical that I suspect male atheists really don’t care if we have a larger role in the atheist community. They only want us around to hit on or some such shit.
Whenever an atheist woman presents at a conference or appears on camera or even writes a blog post, atheist men come out of the woodwork to comment on their appearance, not their message.
Look at how bad ZOMGitsCriss is sexualized. You don’t see this happening to the prominent male atheists.
It’s depressing.
STFU and listen is usually the best default action for us priviliged types, when we are speaking of anyone else’s experience but our own.
I don’t have an altar of feminism in my house. Would a gigantic Georgia O’Keefe painting suffice?
“Look at how bad ZOMGitsCriss is sexualized.”
I will say that I believe she deliberately invites it, unlike a couple of recent cases of teenaged atheist young women being sexualized – one for posting a picture of herself holding a book she was surprised and happy that her Christian mother bought for her, and another who posted a picture of herself imitating an emoticon.
And bringing up ZOMGitsCriss herself can be problematic, as her “Oh, the Feminism topic…” video shows.
Elam: “I like to think I view things objectively”
Haha, that’s a good one! Tell me another.
@Tabby Problem is, the level of sexualization of female atheists is pretty much at the same level. It’s either “look how hawt she is dood!” or it’s “day-um she ugly. Where all the hot ones at?” It doesn’t matter if it’s ZOMGitsCriss playing up for the audience or some 15 year old girl proudly showing off her book.
But again, I’ve grown too cynical to be considered objective at this point.
This comment to his stupidity is fookin’ brilliant.
http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/pfejx/i_love_how_the_whiny_feminist_morality_brigade/c3p2osy
I feel like ‘athio-feminazi’ should be spelled ‘atheo-feminazi.’
Haha. I’m such a huge fan of these DEEP RIFTS within the atheist community that people keep talking about. Each time a DEEP RIFT occurs, one more misogynist asshole who also happens to not believe in any deities exposes himself as a complete failure of a human being who needs to be shunned and ostracized from any civilized community.
a big ol’ reefer of delusion
@Pecunium
That was indeed brilliant! That’s the type of eloquent writing I aspire to someday, in order to express my utter contempt for MRAs and their ilk :D
Oh, you totally nailed it, mea culpa. ERV was the one who’s avatar on Scienceblogs was a dog and said those idiotic things.
I love how some morons on the Reddit thread are talking about how things like calling yourself “ICumWhenIKillMen” are “not comparable to slurs against marginalized groups” and “it’s just social parody”… but you know that those will be the very same people who loudly wonder why the aforementioned “privileged groups” (who are not abstract entities, but made up of actual human beings with feelings and emotions) aren’t rushing to join your side.
ilu PZ Meyers
That said, despite being a female atheist feminist, most people just rail on me for the atheist thing. I don’t spend a lot of time in atheist communities, though . . .
It makes me sad. There are crazies in every group, but for one that is openly trying to portray itself as more rational, the members can sometimes be really irrational. It’s somehow worse and mostly just makes me embarrassed for the ones who do it.
Comrade Physioprof is a sarcastic foul-mouthed science blogger but he did not insult Rebecca Watson and solidly came down on her side, in fact Physioprof has taken PZ to task a couple times for not being feminist enough. Abby Smith of ERV is the one who thought “Twatson” was a clever insult (and immediately removed from my blog roll despite the fact that when talking about science she’s a good writer).
Actually, Comrade Physioprof is basically a radical feminist. He doesn’t bother me much because a. you know, radical feminist, and no one takes them seriously, and b. he’s an absolutely terrible writer. It’s like Cartman blogging.
The fact that PZ Myers associates with him is very telling re. Myers, though.
I googled to find the joke about the Jew reading Der Sturmer, and now I’m stuck reading the whole wikipedia page on Jewish humor. Damn you, internet.
Kyrie, the exact same thing happened to me.
This blog is educational. I love it here.
I’m sure there must be a Jew conspiracy behind this strange phenomenon!
Take heart, weirdo. There are tons of misogynists in the Atheist, erm, movement. Believe me, I learned the ugly way.
I mean, I wasn’t attacked personally, just was witness to a shit-ton of crappy privilege-inspired behavior.
Yeah, Comrade PhysioProf is a dude who comments on I Blame The Patriarchy; say what you will about him, but I don’t think he’s likely to call someone Twatson.
And there’s nothing quite like reading a nice article on cognitive biases, looking into the comments, and discovering someone mentioning offhandedly “we know, of course, that women are attracted to men who ignore them.” >.>
@ozymandias42: There are literally billions of men ignoring me right now! They don’t even know I exist! I am so attracted to all of them, and it is exhausting.
“Resistance is Futrelle”: The Spearhead/A Voice For Men/The Men’s Rights Subreddit’s weird obsession with David and his sight really highlights how much of a non-movement the MRM is. When I check Feministing or Feministe, I don’t see posts dedicated to a site about mocking misandry, or references to the owner of such a site slipped into posts. Hell, I rarely even see anything about Paul Elam or any other MRM leaders.
The front page of Feministe currently has two posts about “He Man Woman-Haters” out of 11, with the other talking about Proposition 8, asexuals in the sex positive movement, defining rape (the only one that actually appears to mention the MRA), Uganda’s anti-gay laws, relationships, and Super Bowl Commericals.
Yet the MRAs obsess over a site that exists solely to mock them. Probably because there’s not much else to do when your movement consists of complaining online.
Ugh. I meant site, not sight.
THAAWWWW, someone’s been reading this blog religiously!
Yeah, I see I messed up with Prof. ERV is… well, pretty normal, really. Just another treehouse hanger-on.
Right, MRAL, the privileged were just chomping at the bit to help, when evil ICumWhenIKillMen scared them off. Grats on a new record for a flounce though.
Think what you want to think, Rutee, but if you’re not going to denounce people like “ICumWhenIKillMen”, you have permanently lost the right to ask non-feminist men and women to stop saying similar things, or to call out men/women who say similar things.
Oops.
“Nonetheless, the discussion somehow managed to be the politest conversation about gender I’ve run across online in a long, long time.”
I think that’s precisely what Elam hated about it. He’s ranted at length before about how polite conversation and intellectual debate as practiced by Farrell has gotten the MRM nowhere. He’d clearly rather prefer trolling and making violent threats.
I’m going to take a walk in the falling snow and cheer myself up.
Re: ICumWhenIKillMen – The policy on SRS is that oppressive jokes toward the privileged (and only toward the privileged) are encouraged. People say “cracker” and “honky,” they make jokes about dicks being ugly and people being dickheads, they make fun of straight people and cis people. The idea is to give privileged people an idea of what it feels like.
Reddit has entire communities devoted to making women feel the way that one username makes men feel. The SRS logic is: how are men going to know what that’s like if they never get a little taste of it?
@Holly:
I wonder how the MRAs would react if someone started a “Beat and Harm Men” subreddit.
There is a “Beat and Harm Women” subreddit? That’s not a joke? o_0′
Kyrie – r/beatingwomen. It’s not a joke.
I mean, of course it’s a joke, ha ha, get a sense of humor you uptight feminist. But no, it’s not a joke.
Kyrie: Yep. r/beatingwomen.
Holly: I dunno… that makes me uncomfortable. :/ I mean, cracker and honky are cool, whatever, but “dicks are ugly” jokes reinforce the patriarchy too and people really shouldn’t be mocked for their identities, regardless of what the identity is.
@Crumbelievable, people would think it was just HILARIOUS.
And I hope SRS realizes that “dicks being ugly” is in fact mainstream, so they’re being kind of redundant there.
Finally, Holly, my response? Meh. It’s some asshole on the Internet. All you’ve accomplished is to destroy your precious moral high ground. So, thanks, ICumWhenIKillMen! I’ll keep using the c-word, thanks for the implicit permission!
We’re also operating under the assumption that men are the privileged group here, which they’re not. I’m fine with the cracker and honky thing, that seems an interesting sociological experiment.
Ozy – It’s not something I participate in, because I try to be a little warmer and fuzzier than that, but I understand it.
I understand it because I’ve had so many conversations with straight white men–and I don’t even mean overtly bigoted people, I mean perfectly nice guys–who didn’t really understand what it was like to be an oppressed group because they had no personal experience with it.
There was a discussion just today on my blog between some straight white cis men who were claiming that “identity politics” is needlessly divisive and why can’t we all just be the same, and absolutely everyone who wasn’t a straight white cis man pointing out that they’d never been given the chance to be “normal,” that wasn’t an option they’d rejected but one they couldn’t have no matter how hard they tried to be assimilated and non-troublemaking. I don’t think these men were being disingenuous; I think they really had never had the experience of having an “other” identity that you can’t escape.
I don’t know how much man-hating jokes really give them that feeling (as opposed to just making them feel personally insulted, because they have no emotional box developed for “identity insulted”), but I understand the spirit of it.
Fuck ShitRedditSays. They can burn in hell.