Reddit Shitlords Give Other Reddit Shitlords Prestigious Shitlord Award
Art borrowed from Casey Nelson of SeeBeautifulIndiana.com. (Click pic to go there.)
Today is an auspicious day. For the Men’s Rights Subreddit, which we often write about here on Man Boobz, has won the prestigious World’s Greatest Shitlord Award. Oh, sorry, I mean it won the Subreddit of the Day award on Reddit. Which is, in this case, pretty much the same thing.
Here are some highlights from the official announcement , which I am totally not making up. No, really, you can go look. Someone – that being XavierMendel, one of the mods of r/subredditoftheday — actually wrote these things. And meant them. I AM NOT BEING SARCASTIC THIS IS REAL HOLY SHIT.
The topic at hand today takes a generous turn from our amusing and lighthearted articles of the month. On this, the last day of January, we look at something a bit more worthy to be called an article. /r/MensRights comes up a lot across reddit and, indeed, across the world as being one of the few centers for men’s help. It’s often attacked, and is always the center of one controversy or the other. My questions reflect that. MensRights is, undoubtedly, the home of great activists.
Again. I am not making this up.
There were some people close to me that suggested I not run this article. That the repercussions of doing so would be unreasonably bad. Well, here you go, people. This is my way of saying that a good reporter doesn’t care. A good reporter reports. It’s not in my job to care about consequences.
I’m not sure that Mr. Mendel quite understands the difference between “reporting” and “asskissing.”
/r/MensRights. Never in our society could the uninitiated imagine such a place. A place where feminism is questioned, and our culture is deconstructed to find what it’s really up to.
Hahaha, what? I was not aware that feminism wasn’t ever questioned on the internet, or anywhere else in “our society.” I mean, it’s not like I run a blog that features nearly 500 posts detailing people attacking feminism on the internet, most of them nastily and ignorantly and sometimes using the word “cunt,” and the vast majority of them not on Reddit. And it’s not like this only barely scratches the surface of the subject.
/r/MensRights is one of the last fortifications of free thought to exist on Reddit.
Yeah, that’s why I was banned – not for trolling or harassing or calling anyone names, but for politely if persistently disagreeing with the denizens until then-moderator ignatiusloyola threw a fit.
“Surely you jest,” one might tell me, “when you mean they’re alone in this regard?” No, hypothetical 19th century British gentleman, I do not. I truly mean it when I say that. What other subreddit openly questions feminism? None spring to mind, and I make it my duty to catalog various subreddits. Most end up banned or run down within a month. Only /r/MensRights remains.
Reddit: Bastion of Internet Feminism.
Nobody can say for sure whether or not they’re correct in any single regard. It’s certain that, due to the laws of probability, they’re not correct in every regard. However, it’s also certain that they’re correct in most of them. Occasionally a wackjob or two will suggest that feminism is behind Cinnamon Toast Crunch (The taste you can see!™). The accuser latches onto those wackjobs to denounce the whole movement.
Yeah, it’s not as if comments suggesting that a man allegedly wronged in divorce court should turn to murder got literally dozens of upvotes in r/mensrights, or anything.
Oh wait, they did.
Yeah, it’s not as if Men’s Rights Redditors gave literally hundreds of upvotes to a post about a t-shirt suggesting that men could be convicted of rape simply for being in a room alone with a woman.
Oh wait, they did.
It’s not as if Men’s Rights Redditors regularly give dozens if not hundreds of upvotes to posts from unhinged hate sites like A Voice for Men or Angry Harry,or fall all over themselves praising an internet-famous female MRA who thinks that many abused women “demand” their abuse.
It’s not as if they think “spermjacking” is a real thing in the world that should make all men think twice about ejaculating in the general vicinity of women.
It’s not like … oh, you can find many, many more examples for yourself.
After claiming that “people have died” after being called misogynists, while “nobody ever dies after being called a misandrist,” Mr. Mendel winds up his speech with this stirring conclusion:
I support the struggles of people who are in bad positions. I respect it, in a way, for I have also seen great struggle. My struggle is not over, nor will it end until my death. For I struggle with something that will not go away through legislation or social change. The Men’s Rights Movement, however, struggles with something very changeable. Very malleable, able to be fixed within a generation if so desired. So I will support them, for they have a fighting chance. …
/r/MensRights is controversial for a reason. In the same sense as Jews of the 1890s, Irish of the 1850s, Hispanics of the 1350s, and many more. Each generation has their controversial improvement in society. We’ve gotten off easy so far, but we have to make it happen eventually. As far back as anyone living can remember, the table has been imbalanced in one way or another, favoring men or women. It’s time the table stays level for once. We need equality.
And that’s what /r/MensRights is trying to do.
Oy yoy yoy. There’s so much ridiculousness to unpack there that it makes me tired. I think I’ll go take a nap.
Mr. Mendel followed his stirring introduction with some questions for the denizens of r/mensrights. And there was some discussion. I can’t even. Not right now. I’ll get to all that in a future post.
In the meantime, Skepchick’s Rebecca Watson – who has been on the receiving end of r/menrights’ heroic activism more than once — has her own reaction to the Men’s Rights is the Subreddit of the Day announcement.
Posted on January 31, 2013, in a voice for men, advocacy of violence, all about the menz, antifeminism, dozens of upvotes, excusing abuse, FemRAs, GirlWritesWhat, grandiosity, hundreds of upvotes, misogyny, MRA, narcissism, oppressed men, playing the victim, reddit, spermjacking and tagged antifeminism, men's rights, misogyny, MRA, reddit. Bookmark the permalink. 1,090 Comments.
Yep, pretty much. I have an auntie-by-marriage like that, it was pretty funny having her lecture me about how I was setting back feminism every time I wore a short skirt as a teenager.
Not creaming butter and sugar might be my biggest pet peeve about American baking recipes! /utterly random aside
Oh god, my English classes. Memories…
Sometimes I got lucky. We got to read a poem about being Spiderman, or a sci-fi story about trying to kill each other, or something like that. But god, GOD did I tire of literary analysis. All the symbolism and crap made me want to tear my hair out. It’s fun if I’m doing it on my own, but doing it for a grade just sucks all the joy out of it.
Did turn me on to Shakespeare, though!
@ Actually you’re right, there are a few 50 and 60 something radfems who say similar things.
When a feminist starts to agree with a conservative it’s usually a good sign that she might want to rethink her position.
Cassandra — oh fuck yeah they end up coming full circle and colliding with conservatives, which, combined with my non-existence (or worse, blerg) makes me, well, extremely put off.
…American recipes don’t cream butter and sugar? Because I’ve creamed a fuckton of butter and sugar in my life.
Also I think there’s something related to confirmation bias going on, where a thing instinctively bothers you and so you try to come up with a political theory to explain why it’s a problem. It’s not an intellectual position, is what I’m saying, it seems to be more I don’t like seeing women in sexy outfits therefore that’s bad therefore since I’m a feminist there must be a feminist reason why I don’t like it therefore they’re harming feminism by dressing like that.
Katz
I think the recipes they’re referring to are American muffin and quick bread recipes (which I would say includes carrot cake). Those are the ones that in American versions usually call for oil in place of butter.
Can I take this opportunity to extoll the virtues of French butter? It is absolutely unbelievable for making pastry crust. No more lard for this girl!
American recipes seem to like using oil instead of butter. This one had me beating it in with the eggs and vanilla, so it ended up being a lactose-free loaf too – not that either of us have a problem with lactose, but good to know for future. I don’t mind creaming the butter and sugar, except in winter where the ambient temperature is just too low. When I was a teenager (because I’ve enjoyed baking since that age, I figure it’s because baking is more similar to chemistry, cooking isn’t), in cold weather I would do the old “hot water in the sink and cream the butter and sugar together with the bowl partly submerged” trick. Now I can’t be bothered and I just melt the butter in the microwave. I figure the butter will melt anyways during the cooking process, so it doesn’t matter.
I was under the impression, and I know we have a lot of Americans and Canadians here so do correct me if I’m wrong, that you call the cake mix “batter” when it’s all combined. From the few US recipes I have baked, the mix does seem to be a lot more liquid than I’m used to compared to NZ recipes. The former I can often pour into the tin, whereas the latter gets spooned in.
And I am *very* appreciative of cooking spray too, having grown up with using the butter wrapping to coat the sides of the tin.
What’s the difference between French butter and ?bog standard butter?
Cheatress?
(TRIGGER WARNING FOR SQUEE)
“What’s the difference between French butter and ?bog standard butter?”
Le French buttair, is bettair, mais naturellement! ;)
Quelle surprise LOL
Most American butter is salted, which isn’t really great for baking. Also the texture is a bit different somehow.
Before any Americans think I’m being a horrible snob I will concede that Clover butter is fine.
I don’t know whatakes it different, to be honest. I think it’s probably got a higher fat content. The result, though, is that pastry crust is incredibly easy to work with and madeleines and other delights come out tasting butterier. It’s unbelievable.
Plus you can choose between salted, semi salted and unsalted to out on your bread.
Even unsalted American butter isn’t as good. And don’t worry about sounding snobby, I’m pretty sure I’ve just taken the prize!
Hmm.. NZ butter is salted, but there are unsalted options available too. Is American butter orange, like the cheese I find scary coloured, or is it yellow? NZ butter is yellow.
Don’t worry, the butter is a normal color. Don’t get me started on cheese, though.
Please accept your prize of one internets!
I was thinking about this very thing this morning. One variation (US evangelism) of one branch (Protestantism) of one religion (Christianity) in the world, and some turdblatherers talk as if it means all believers in all religions, everywhere, ever. Not just organised religions, either, but all forms of belief that *aren’t atheism* (you can’t trust those fence-sitting agnostics). I swear, it’s like the mirror image of the fundies who think that the whole world in space is 1950s USA, or at least their impression of it.
And yeah – if the atheist groups were sooooo interested in women’s rights, would there have been the whole Elevatorgate* business, or Atheism Plus, or any of the other shit going around and around and around when people try to point out that too many of these guys aren’t exactly critical thinkers when it comes to matters like sexism and racism?
*Nixon’s greatest crime: fucking “gate” being stuck on the end of so many damn words.
American butter is yellow but it’s sort of less buttery? I’m not quite sure how to explain, it just tends to have less flavor. It almost tastes like margarine to me.
One thing that really confused me when I first got here was seeing a product that was labelled “cheese food”. What, is that what you feed the cheese so that it grows up to be big and strong?
Also, Monterey Jack cheese confuses me. It doesn’t really seem to taste of anything.
Again, before anyone gets mad at me, there is good cheese in the US! In fact Cowgirl Creamery (local) is pretty good.
Maybe we get our butter know-how from the Germans. Their butter kind of sucks, too, although it is invariably unsalted.
Seeing how I ate 3/4ths of a pizza earlier and am suffering for the lactose, I feel the need to note that I bake with butter and it never bothers me — I think the lactose breaks down at those temps, but don’t quote me on that.
As for American recipes and the lack of creaming butter and sugar, even when they do include butter, half the ones I see just seem to think you can throw melted butter in with eggs, sugar in with the flour and other powdered stuff, and mix it all up. And I want to cry for all the poor fools who just follow the directions!
Worst cooking either though was trying to make bread at rapist ex #2’s apt — I asked for the yeast, he poured it into the oil while I was getting the hot water…and insisted it had to work because he just couldn’t bear to have fucked up…hello red flags I ignored! (Also, hello stupid recipe!)
Montgomery jack tastes like nothing, pepper jack is one of the few things I’ll suffer later to enjoy now (clearly pizza also makes the short list!)
Have you ever tried CoJack? It is a blend of Colby (flavorless orange cheese) and Monterrey Jack (flavorless white cheese). Truly an abomination to the good name of cheese.
CoJack sounds awful. Why would you do that?
Speaking of things that should not exist, I recently had a slice at what bills itself as a gourmet pizza place and the pizza had cheddar on it. Know what happens when you melt cheddar on a pizza like that? A greasepit, that’s what. Not to mention it tastes all wrong.
Cassandra — omfgs, as a New Haven pizza snob, I can’t even begin to express how sorry I am! Should you ever find yourself in New England you’ll have to be taken out for proper pizza (I’d say I’ll take you out, but Pecunium is closer to NYC and ALL THE OPTIONS)
I mean, ffs, we are in the Bay Area! This is pretty much foodie central. How could any chef here be idiotic enough to put cheddar on a pizza?
Speaking of pizza, which is soooooooooooo much cheaper than it was when Pizza Hut was the only place seling it, this is the joint that tends to upset the xtians: http://hellpizza.com/nz/
This is the style of ad they have been using over the past ?2 years:
I am soooo glad I haven’t had breakfast yet, because thinking about greasy cheddar pizza makes me want to hurl. That is so utterly nasty.
Pizza roulette on the other hand? Sounds kinda awesome.
*backs into a corner since apparently all the food where I am is irredeemably gross*
Gotta say, though, I find it funny when Brits and Aussies dis on American food, since neither of your cultures are exactly renowned for their cuisine.
I wanted to go all Austen on their asses.
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman in possession of a pizza craving must be in want of some damn mozzarella.”
Ok it’s been 5 minutes and I’m still thinking about that revolting cheddar pizza. Did they use orange cheddar or was it actual cheddar? (Part of me really wants it to be orange cheddar for maximum gross-out value.)
It tasted like it was proper cheddar, I’m just not sure why they thought that putting it on a pizza would be a good idea.
Katz
No way! There is so much awesome American food. Parisians love them some hamburgers for one thing (as well they should) and no one disses pumpkin pie, at least not in my presence. Also, Frosties.
It also bemuses me when people act like anything that isn’t full of fat is automatically gross, as if fattiness was automatically correlated to tastiness. When Domino’s and snobbish foodies are agreeing, something is wrong.
Seriously?
Actually I found a really cool London food blog that was fun reading except that for some reason the blogger has gotten it into his head that American gourmet burgers are supposed to come on a brioche bun (which, OK, I can live with that) with melted Kraft cheese. I have no idea how he got that idea – he seems to think it’s a West Coast thing, but all the fancy burger joints I know don’t even offer that kind of cheese as an option.
Buddhism is not woman-friendly, regardless of it’s cuddly image.
An example from each of the major lineages.
Therevada: Women cannot be ordained. Theravadan “nuns” are laywomen who have taken 8 of the 10 monastic precepts and receive much less social support than “real” monastics. The lineages of nuns died out–literally–because the ordinations were much more complicated than those of monks and specifically required a certain number of nuns to be present. And now they’re all dead. Whoops, can’t make any more.
Mahayana: Women can be ordained but nuns are explicitly inferior to monks. The vinaya includes about 50% more rules for nuns than for monks. In particular, they’re governed by the 8 “heavy rules” which were the conditions for the Buddha allowing female ordination. An 80-year-old bhikkuni with the equivalent of a doctorate in theology must stand aside and bow to the 6-year-old boy who was ordained that morning. (These rules are also in effect for the other branches that have ordained women.)
Vajrayana: In the mythology of the introduction of Buddhism to Tibet, Tibet before Buddhism is envisioned as a demoness, with all that scary, rumbly female sexuality. The major monasteries of Tibet are viewed as pinning down that demon goddess. If she gets loose, female sexual energy does too, and that would be the worst. Various retellings of this myth are more or less misogynistic.
And of course, being a woman is considered an unfortunate waste of a human life-time and one prayer that one will be reincarnated as a man. Etc. Etc.
Yours,
A secular Buddhist
Is it possible to melt Kraft cheese?
Apparently so, since he had photos. He says he went on a trip to LA and that’s where he got the idea that all fancy American burgers must have that kind of cheese, and I can’t figure out where he could have gone to get that idea. So now a ton of Brits are probably reading his blog and getting the idea that if they don’t find and use that kind of cheese they’re Doing Burgers Wrong.
Yeah, I made the boyfriend try one on our last trip back. He was less than impressed. But I effing love Frosties. And then there’s barbecue, I don’t think even the snobbiest Frenchie would deny the greatness of southern BBQ (possibly because the name is French).
*&%^$#$ blockquotes!
Ok, I love Kraft mac and cheese, but that is *not* burger cheese!
Lol, is that why garden (cheese) burgers are so terrible? (Note to the meat disinclined, amtrak’s veggie selection is terrible, pack lunch or time a transfer around lunch)
My best guess is maybe he went to an In n Out in LA? I think they use the generic orange cheese. But, no offense to In n Out because they’re an institution, they’re not what most people mean when they talk about a gourmet burger.
BTW, liquid fats (oil) are for batters. Solid fats (butter, margarine, shortening) are for (non-yeast) doughs. If you use solid fats for a batter, you’ll just have to add more liquids somewhere else to get an appropriate texture so you won’t have to cut your muffins out with a cookie cutter, and that means an end product that is less moist.
The best of British: Dr Who and jelly babies! If anyone can let me know where I can get gelatine-free (i.e. vegetarian) jelly babies I would really appreciate it. I miss Bassetts.
In n Out doesn’t use brioche, to my knowledge, but that sounds probable in that, if you asked someone in California to take you to a great burger place, odds are high that you’d end up there.
In n Out is like a cult. It’s weird.
I’m going to do some hardcore mansplaining on a very controversial topic: butter.
Butter in Europe is usually made from cream that isn’t pasteurised. It does taste a bit better and has a much shorter shelf life. It’s also usually a bit higher in… butter (less water) so you should take that in to consideration when switching out butter for oils as oils are 100% fat. If your recipe calls for a wee bit of salt, as most do, I usually just use salted butter instead of adding a pinch because salt = salt and of course salted butter is going to last longer in your fridge. I refuse to spread unsalted butter on bread, because why? Salt is good for you, according to a study conducted by a herd of deer.
katz — eggs, though I don’t really make muffins from scratch (cookies are my thing)
But eggs are in oil recipes, too.
A friend of mine who fits the absent-minded professor stereotype in so many ways has been known to figure out how much oil to sub for butter or vice versa by figuring out the specific gravity (? Not into chemistry) of both, realising she’s burnt something else while doing calculations, and then calling her mum and asking for suggestions.
And, not to be grilling you or anything, but were you talking about cookies when you were saying that Americans don’t cream butter or sugar? Where were you running into this problem?
In n Out uses standard burger buns iirc. In terms of the brioche bun I have no idea where he got the idea of that being a standard West Coast thing.
Nope, unless stated otherwise, butter is made from pasteurised inputs. Not sure, but there could be a chemical alternative as pasteurisation is a heat/pressure process. The reason for this is listeria.
The whole thing is very Pratchett-esque, really. Apparently this guy went to a burger joint/a couple of them that had the brioche/generic orange cheese combination and decided that since he was on the West Coast and the burgers were tasty that must be how burgers are supposed to be done on the West Coast. And now he’s running around London blogging furiously about how various restaurants are Getting It Wrong by, for example, using cheese that doesn’t come in pre-cut slices.
Aussie food used to be pretty bland, but hasn’t been for a long time. It’s very much international since immigration opened up in the 70s. You’ll see pretty much every sort of Asian food here, or Middle Eastern, various African sorts, lots of European food, heaps of Jewish varieties, you name it.
I think the thing for me with US food is the sheer size of the portions and some of the combinations, especially sweet and savoury, but that’s my particular taste, nothing else. I enjoyed the food there, though finding not-hot food in LA could get tricky, lol. But I was very much at home trying Midwest food. OMG that chicken and cheddar soup was to die for …
Isn’t Sydney just as much of a hub for the whole Pacific rim cuisine idea as the West Coast of the US is? I’ve also heard that Chinese food is great in Sydney due to lots of immigration.
The Thai craze of the ’70s certainly didn’t die out there. Newtown’s King Street has three different restaurants named Newton Thai, two unaffliated ones called Thai La Ong, and the rest of the street that isn’t secondhand clothing or cocktail bars or bookshops or what-have-you is Thai cuisine at various price points and with various approaches.
katz — old recipes from the “let’s make this easier (by fucking it up)” era. I’m got a cookbook that suggests wrapping a turkey in tin foil before microwaving it, I don’t even know whee to begin on that wrongness!
Bad cookbooks in other words. Very, very bad cookbooks!
My Dad has good things to say about the food in Sydney, and he’s picky as hell.
Tinfoil in a microwave – genius, pure genius! :D
Oh and yes to specific gravity, you need it to (properly, in the most strict definition imaginable) convert volume to mass…but butter’s marked in volume (tablespoons) and Phil’s measured in the same units…I mean, I guess you could use it to figure out how volumes relate to each other, but there are conversion charts for that pair!
*has done way too much chemistry this week and can’t wait for that fish dewormer to arrive already*
…and I’m terribly sorry to mention worms and food in the same comment, pretend I meant gummi worms?
I just told Mum about that tinfoil-in-microwave cookbook.
“Maybe it was written by a microwave salesman,” she said.
I’ve actually done the tinfoil thing…not for very long, obviously, but nobody had warned me and it was my first time living alone.
On a turkey! I don’t think I’ve ever seen one under 15 lbs, that shit isn’t fitting in a microwave!
Best part? My brother started to say that a little tin foil is actually fine, before the TURKEY part dawned on him, and that I wasn’t talking about a few flecks you failed to properly remove.
@Argenti
What’s Phil? Sorry, no real chemistry knowledge at all and very little cooking knowledge here.
Kitteh — maybe!
Cassandra — I don’t even know what to say to that. On one hand, no one told you, so how we’re you to know; on the other, no one told you?!
That probably makes no sense outside my head >.<