How seriously does Paul Elam, head cheese of A Voice for Men, take the issue of rape? So seriously that he has proudly declared that
Should I be called to sit on a jury for a rape trial, I vow publicly to vote not guilty, even in the face of overwhelming evidence that the charges are true.
It’s in bold in the original, too. Evidently, the best way to fight against false accusations is to let the guilty free.
Recently, Elam has started a whole campaign, complete with its own little acronym and everything, to encourage others to follow his lead. In one recent post, he even seems to be suggesting (in a wink-wink-nod-nod sort of way) that his followers should lie about their beliefs in order to get on juries, just so they can Fuck Their Shit Up and, as he put it in a one word comment advertising the post on Reddit, “nullify.”
Now, in his original post on rape, it seemed to be pretty clear that his ire was aroused specifically by the specter of evil women lying about being raped by men. As he put it, justifying his decision to acquit the guilty,
Women lie about being raped, judicial politicians make careers off of putting away sexual offenders, and a brainwashed public cheers it all on. That so many of the men caught up in this are innocent doesn’t stop the grinding wheels of all this injustice for even a moment.
But before we conclude that Elam’s stance on rape is simply misogynist, I point you to a new post that suggests that he takes the rape of men just as (not) seriously as he takes the rape of women – to the point that he thinks it’s hilarious to make jokes about raping men. Announcing a radio show devoted to further discussion of his surreal atheist post from earlier this week, he says this about one famously feminist atheist activist who is also a dude:
Hopefully, before we are done [with the radio show], MRA’s of differing views will find more common ground, and PZ Myers will be limping to the drug store for some KY Jelly.
I guess on AVfM, making a rape joke about about a man is just peachy, so long as the man in question is someone you don’t like.
Stay classy, Paul!
(Thanks to Xanthe for alerting me to Elam’s most recent post.)
@Quackers:
It was basically:
Elam: “Here are some studies that show my side”
David: “Here are reasons why those studies aren’t very reliable, and here’s a whole host of studies on the same topic that show my side, and in addition here are words from the researchers of your studies claiming your side is wrong.”
Elam: “Your sources are from feminists, and therefore not worth discussing. Your opinion is just opinion, not fact like mine is.”
It kinda went downhill from there.
That’s pretty similar to how the Atheist Community pwned the “Race Realists” a few months back.
Even the sources of the “Race Realists” backfired on them.
Next time you debate with a prominent MRA David (if ever again) you should add a provision that you can each bring a bodyguard to watch your back and keep things fair in case somebody cheats. I nominate me! 😀 I can tank any trolling attempts while you deal with the facts :3
@David:
From Elam’s behavior, he was never interested in the actual debate, let alone finishing it. He was condescending nearly from start to finish, and just kept right on going when you dropped out.
In hindsight I can say that you were obviously peeved, and asking him to take down your side of the debate was a bit much, but honestly it seems like being in the same comment section as him would be enough to bring out anybody’s bad side.
What’s really telling, though, is that after you dropped out, you have articles popping up on AVFM like “David Futrelle- Covered in Pin Feathers and Clucking”
You can’t roll around in their shit and come out clean. 🙁
Next time you debate with a prominent MRA David (if ever again) you should add a provision that you can each bring a bodyguard to watch your back and keep things fair in case somebody cheats. I nominate me! I can tank any trolling attempts while you deal with the facts :3
YUSS!!!!!1111 GO AI ANGELWINGS!!!!
<(^.^(^.^)>
@Quackers:
I’m going by David’s first response in the debate, where he goes over the problem with the scale that Elam’s studies used, and the rest.
Sharculese | February 9, 2012 at 10:37 pm
i seriously don’t get how anyone could read paul elam and not after five minutes be like ‘wait a minute, this guy is totally bugfuck’
THAT, I don’t get : Lots of “moderate” MRAs (or “anti-feminists” as some like to be called) seem to keep holding AVfM up as some sort of moderate site, or somebody they like to read despite all their claims that Spearhead goes too far and they’re not like the woman-hating MRAs… o_O Even Zeta Male, who I kinda like (as a person, at least from what I know of him, which admittedly is very little and a couple interactions) holds Elam up and was super excited for Register-Her and Valenti being put there…
As for PAN…
I wouldn’t go that far. PAN has a website dedicated to stalking his ex-wife.
To my previous post, “say” was supposed to be “see.” My kingdom for an edit button.
@ami
The whole obsession with evil exes that so many MRAs have is so weird. Hands up anyone who doesn’t have at least one ex who they think is kind of an asshole! I’m thinking there won’t be many hands, from either men or women. But most of us just kind of go, oh well, that was a learning experience, and then move on. Most of us don’t make “my ex was a dirtbag” into a political movement.
“i seriously don’t get how anyone could read paul elam and not after five minutes be like ‘wait a minute, this guy is totally bugfuck’”
Someone pointed out to me that everything written on that site aims to whip its readers into an angry frenzy so that you’re just consumed with rag and unable to think clearly.
rage*
@Ozy I think you should make a NSWATM post about the rape”joke” from Elam because it’s attacking a prominent person, joking about rape, and Elam claims to care about men, so it’s all relevant to men and an example of how people think rape against men is funny, and joke about it. -_-
Plus, we’re talking about the MRM. I’m betting “My ex is evil” includes “expects me to support my children”. Or, god forbid, initiated a divorce/breakup while unhappy.
A lot of AVFM is really only capable of affecting deeply misogynistic people. I mean, the “Feminists are Nazis” article was so hilariously poorly written it literally doesn’t work unless you already agree.
Jackasses who think rape is funny don’t tend to restrict this view to just men.
Ami, the target being PZ Myers, unfortunately I can imagine a proportion of NSWATM commenters suggesting he deserved the rape joke to be made about him because he’s such a feminist mangina. 🙁
@Rutee:
” I mean, the “Feminists are Nazis” article was so hilariously poorly written it literally doesn’t work unless you already agree.”
Which article was that? I searched ‘AVFM + Nazis’ but didn’t find anything.
I’ve yet to see an MRA post/article that makes any sense if you don’t start from the assumption that women are evil, not oppressed, and lie a lot. It’s the definition of preaching to the choir.
I have an evil ex. I don’t hate her. I might have, in the throes of the break-up, but as soon as we weren’t in the same domicile, I got over that.
I even spoke to her politely the last time I saw her.
@CassandraSays:
That’s probably because they don’t care about actually arguing with feminists, since they’ve already decided that feminists do nothing but lie.
http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/where-is-the-counter-argument/
They don’t even seem to be trying to win over people who’re neither feminist nor MRA, though. There’s a huge mass of people who don’t lean one way or the other, or who’ve never even really stopped to think about social justice issues as related to gender, and MRAs seem to have decided that those people are the enemy too.
I don’t mean just Elam by the way (he’s already admitted to feeling that way). Most MRAs write from the assumption that anyone who isn’t an MRA is out to get them and in league with feminism.
It’s also tactic also used by Glenn Beck, Faux News and all those other wackjob extreme conservatives. It’s purposely used to get people to not think critically and not look at the entire picture. For example I hate the whole War on_____ headlines always used. Its just trying to get you emotional to either sell books, newspapers or sway you to believe bullshit.
@Crumbelievable http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/in-the-shadows-of-dachau/
Thanks. I thought I had read it before but couldn’t remember much about (for good reason)
Look at the 3-way break down that one guy gives:
feminists (evil conspiracy)
non-feminists (sheeple dupes)
MRA (hero/redpill)
Evidence against the feminist conspiracy is proof of the feminist conspiracy!
Mind, I know MRas are stupid, but that article is a favorite for being the laziest comparison ever. It draws no parallels at all and starts from an outlandish premise (Even a particularly sexist jackass does not think feminists will literally have him castrated). It simply does not work if you’re not already in full agreement with MRAs.
I laughed reading about they added someone to their register-her list for being part of the Rwandan genocide. Yes, no one cared about Pauline Nyiramasuhuko until some MRAs posted her name on a shitty Internet blog. Mission accomplished! Seriously what is the point of that?
re the debate with Elam: here’s how I presented the debate on the blogspot version of man boobz, with easier-to-follow links to the evidence and links to my explanation of why the debate fell apart, as well as to my post basically demolishing his final post in the debate.
http://manboobz.blogspot.com/p/not-so-great-debate-on-domestic.html
The whole thing was a bit surreal. Elam spent most of the time arguing with some imaginary feminist living in his head and only tangentially responded to any of my points.
I wish I had been a bit more zen in how I handled the whole thing, though; basically he was such an asshole I got pissed off. Ah well.
Xanthe: If they do I can ban them.
Ami: Already was planning a roundup post on News About Male Rape (also covering the Amazing Atheist, and an article about the rape of men in prisons), so I’ll throw it in there.
David:
I almost forgot how terrible the comments on your old blog were until I reread the ones in that post.
Elam really is a strange little man living in his own little world.
Elam spent most of the time arguing with some imaginary feminist living in his head
That sounds like the majority of the MRA trolls who post here.
My favorite post has to be this fidelbogen one manboobz.com/2011/09/22/feminism-or-death/. It’s like an advanced “How to be a Blowhard in 100 words or less” class
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARITnC80VhE
Well that was odd. Let me try that again
I laughed reading about they added someone to their register-her list for being part of the Rwandan genocide. Yes, no one cared about Pauline Nyiramasuhuko until some MRAs posted her name on a shitty Internet blog. Mission accomplished! Seriously what is the point of that?
So… Pauline is on the list because she incited troops to rape women?
I thought MRAs were totally into that shit. Now, she’s on the list?
…
Or are they trying to save face since Elam spoke a little too much. They just made themselves look even dumber by “registering” someone who is so far removed from any of this it boggles the imagination.
P.S. I don’t wish to pester you, David, but could you please make it so my comments don’t have to go through moderation anymore? I’m kind of regular around here now.
Didn’t NWO claim he’d be “right back” with tons of proof of… something?
so there’s a comment on that article from an MRA talking about TheAmazingAsshole’s debacle yesterday. Unsurprisingly he supports him and found what he said was funny, and says all MRAs have to back him up, stand up to the fempire’s censorship yadda yadda yadda.
I wonder if the sack of shit would feel the same way when he finds out the person TAA attacked was a male raped by a female. To be honest it wouldn’t surprise me if it did.
Also since his whole premise is the internet is supposed to outrage and offend you, then he’ll have no problem with Radfemhub and the Scum videos since that’s all they did. He’ll have no problem standing up to his beloved leader that they have as much right to say vile shit like everyone else online. He’ll have no problem when women online say that men suck…freedom of speech bro.
The dude’s last name is supposedly “Elam”? I guess it makes sense; he clearly IS a particularly backward kind of male.
All this talk about Paul Elam…
He has a daughter. I wonder if he would do all he could to keep a man who raped her out of jail. If not he’s a hypocrite.
Is his daughter so narcissistic that she is “semi-human” like most “western women”? Or does she know her place. Did Paul Elam teach her where her place was?
Paul Elam wrote an excruciatingly terrible article about a woman he counseled who was sexually abused by her father. His website advises men not to get involve with single parents as their children might want “local celebrity” and falsley accuse them of abusing them.
This is who Paul Elam is.
But enough about him, his “number two”, Johm [the other] doesn’t get anywhere near enough attention in my humble opinion. This guy is so unintentionally funny. Watch his videos – he looks like how I imagine MRAL will in a few years.
The really amusing thing is that, basically, AVfM amounts of about 8 bloggers and about 20 regular posters. And that’s it. That is the Men’s Rights Movement.
I think they may have simply taken their concept of ‘Good, Bad and Ugly’ machismo and taken it one step further into area of ‘The Bad, Ugly and Stupid’.
Yeah, they still don’t understand what censorship is, and have a fundamental ignorance of what freedom of speech entails. You get to make your nasty “edgy” comments, Amazing Asshole, and I get to say you’re a fucking bastard. Freedom of speech isn’t freedom from being criticized. I still get to criticize your ass.
Women just lie around getting raped….right…
There’s several comments about “rape survivors should just toughen up because they didn’t really get raped” on that Elam post now. I wonder if things will change when they realize they’re talking about a man who was victimized by a woman?
I’m really having trouble seeing any coherent position except “pro-rape” right now from these guys.
@Holly:
I really want to be the one who tells them… I really REALLY do… But you have to register for the site to be able to comment, and I really don’t want to have to do that…
Of course it’ll probably just result in a “He was a feminist, he probably learned to spout false rape accusations too.” Or something… Anything else would result in far too much mental gymnastics, even for them.
Kirby – Someone I know did tell them, Elam asked them for a link and they provided full evidence, so he can’t pretend not to know–we’ll just go from there.
This is the same dude who makes rape jokes about men. It is clear he thinks rape is just fine, and everyone who says otherwise is just mean to men.
Because he is the reasonable, nonviolent face of the MRM.
Elam’s weak-sauce response to finding out Lorrdernie is male:
In other words, it’s okay because TAA thought he was being misogynist, and it’s the thought that counts.
Also, rape survivors in general aren’t allowed to go around just talking about it.
Aaand another commenter is in with more helpful bullshit:
See, maybe he was gay, then we don’t have to worry about it! Besides he was probably a feminist, and then we really really don’t have to worry.
“A Voice For A Very Particular Sort Of Men, As Long As Nothing Inconvenient Happens To Them.”
Right…. If someone is raped, then when one finds out about it the “reasonable” thing to do is to start saying you will rape them again, and their rapist needs a medal, and you hope they drown in semen from the new rapes they deserve.
Because telling someone you’ve been raped is so abusive.
Elam is also lying about the comments. Yes, TAA deleted that reddit account, but reddit doesn’t delete the things that account said, just who said them. Anyone who want to see that Paul Elam is a Liar because (with the exception of the comment history for the username terroja) all the links Dave provided still work.