How bad ideas get started: The “Apex Fallacy,” the “Frontman Fallacy,” and the murderer Marc Lepine
Would MRAs still be into the Apex Fallacy if boards of directors looked like this?
So some Men’s Rightsers are up in arms because the powers that be at Wikipedia just deleted a page devoted to a phony “logical fallacy” invented by a friend of Paul Elam. According to the now-deleted Wikipedia page, “the apex fallacy refers to judging groups primarily by the success or failure at those at the top rungs (the apex, such as the 1%) of society, rather than collective success of a group.”
In other words, it’s a convenient way for MRAs to hand-wave away any evidence that men, collectively, have more power than women. Mention that men hold the overwhelming majority of powerful positions in the worlds of politics and business, and, I don’t know, podiatry, and MRAs will shout “apex fallacy” and do a little victory dance. Rich and powerful dudes don’t count, because of poor and powerless dudes!
On the Wikipedia discussion page devoted to the question of deleting the apex fallacy entry, one Wikipedia editor – who voted “strong delete” – noted that
This is men’s rights activist astroturfing. The guy above [in the discussion] isn’t posting examples of its usage because they’re all on websites showcasing brutal misogyny and hateful ignorance, like A Voice for Men.
He’s got a point. When I did a Google search for the term, my top ten results (which may be different than your top ten results, because that’s how Google works) included posts on The Spearhead; The Men’s Rights subreddit; Genderratic (TyphonBlue’s blog); Emma the Emo’s Emo Musings; and a tweet from the little-followed Twitter account of someone calling himself Astrokid MHRA. In other words, five of the ten results were MRA sites, several of them with explicit links to A Voice for Men. (That “MHRA” is a dead giveaway.)
The top result, meanwhile, linked to a post on the blog of the delightful Stonerwithaboner, who doesn’t consider himself an MRA, as far as I know. But he’s still kind of a shit, and he did recently confess to being (as I suspected) the person who was going around posting comments on manosphere sites as David H. F*cktrelle, Male Feminist Extraordinaire ™.
So, in other words , I think it’s fair to say that the term “apex fallacy” has not yet achieved academic or philosophical respectability just yet.
The deleted Wikipedia page attributes the term “apex fallacy” to Helen Smith, a psychologist who is a longtime friend to A Voice for Men, and dates it to an interview Smith gave to the odious Bernard Chapin in 2008.
But the idea seems to be a simple reworking of a bad idea that’s been floating around in Men’s Rights circles for a lot longer than that.
Back in the 1990s, New Zealand Men’s Rights Activist Peter Zohrab came up with what he called the “Frontman Fallacy,” a notion he spread via the alt.mens-rights newsgroup on Usenet and elsewhere; the term has been widely adopted in Men’s Rights circles since then. As Zohrab defined the term,
the Frontman Fallacy is the mistaken belief that people (men, specifically) who are in positions of authority in democratic systems use their power mainly to benefit the categories of people (the category of “men”, in particular) that they belong to themselves.
So, in other words, if you mention that men hold the overwhelming majority of powerful positions in the worlds of politics, business, and podiatry, MRAs will shout out “frontman fallacy” and do a little victory dance. Rich and powerful dudes don’t count, because of poor and powerless dudes!
Like the extremely similar “apex fallacy,” this idea is rather too silly and facile to count as a real fallacy, but it has proven quite popular with MRAs. Looking through the google search results for “frontman fallacy,” I see links to a wide assortment of MRA sites using the term, including AVFM, Genderratic, Stand Your Ground, Backlash.com, Toysoldier, Mensactivism.org, Pro-Male Anti-Feminist Tech, Fathersmanifesto.net, Mensaid.com, and some others. Like “apex fallacy” it hasn’t made much progress outside the Men’s Rights movement.
What’s interesting about this to me is that this is not the only bad idea that Peter Zohrab has ever had.
Indeed, Zohrab had some extremely bad ideas about Marc Lepine, the woman-hating antifeminist who murdered 14 women at the École Polytechnique in Montreal in 1989.
While Zohrab, to my knowledge, never explicitly justified Lepine’s killings, he described the massacre in one notorious internet posting as an “Extremist Protest Against Media Censorship.” Of Lepine himself, he wrote
I bet you don’t know he wasn’t a misogynist – because you have been conned by the media (as usual). In fact, he was a Men’s Rights activist (albeit an extremist one), and one of the things he was protesting about was media censorship.
Zohrab went on to say that it was clear from Lepine’s writings – or at least writing alleged to have been written by him — that
he [was] against Feminists — not against women — he clearly states that he is protesting against various issues which are aspects of Feminist sexism.
Indeed, Zohrab seems not only sympathetic towards Lepine’s “cause” but seems to feel that he was being unfairly misrepresented:
The write-ups on Marc Lepine concentrate on character-assassination. They take things out of context, in the same way that fathers are slandered in the divorce/family court, in order to deprive them of custody or access. …
Marc Lepine was not only not sexist, as the media stated – he was actually fighting sexism!
Lots of MRAs love talking about the “frontman fallacy” or the new and improved “apex fallacy.” They don’t seem much interested in talking about Zohrab himself.
Like it or not, MRAs, this man is one of the leading figures in the emergence of the Men’s Rights movement online, and in the intellectual history of the movement, such as it is.
If I were a bit more paranoid, I might wonder if the emergence of the “apex fallacy” was some sort of an attempt as a rebranding, an attempt to push the “frontman fallacy” and its creator, the old, odd duck Peter Zohrab, with his embarrassingly sympathetic feelings toward a mass murderer of women, down that famous memory hole.
P.S. Don’t read the comments to that MensActivism.org posting, unless you want to get really depressed.
Posted on April 29, 2013, in a voice for men, antifeminism, dozens of upvotes, drama kings, entitled babies, frontman fallacy, men who should not ever be with women ever, misogyny, MRA, playing the victim, reddit, sympathy for murderers, terrorism and tagged antifeminism, marc lepine, men's rights, misogyny, MRA, wikipedia. Bookmark the permalink. 1,090 Comments.
@firsthoe
Your arguing style is appalling – no wonder you believe the “apex fallacy” is true.
hoe –
1. (n) A long-handled gardening tool with a thin metal blade, used mainly for weeding and breaking up soil.
2. (v) To use a hoe to dig (earth) or thin out or dig up (plants).
3. (coll) A reference to a running joke on a Manboobz post dating back to an erroneous use of “hoe” when the writer meant to write “toe”
4. (der) A tedious, humorless mansplainer who likes to go into other people’s spaces to argue with the voices in his head.
ho –
1. (n) offensive Derogatory term for a prostitute.
Get a grip, Joey.
Shorter Joe “If you do the logical thing and ignore the fact that the vast majority of judges, police, business leaders, and politicians are male, I think you’ll find that there is no societal tendency to empower men.”
Joe, sometimes a hoe is just a garden implement. And if you read back through the comments, you’ll see we’re tossing that word around because of a funny comment on a r/mr thread.
Also, reading back through the comments and reading the post itself would be a good idea because every single thing you’ve said has been refuted in advance.
Good day to you, sir.
Curses, I’ve been ninja’d!
@Lady Stark – Hahaha! Yeah, feminism keeps insisting that people who don’t subscribe to Feminism somehow don’t believe women are people. As though Feminism has some kind of trademark monopoly on that concept. Bullshit.
It’s just an out-and-out lie and a truly desperate effort by feminism to frame the debate as a division of the world into Feminists = Good and Everyone else = Evil.
@Ugh – And you’re stll desperately trying to pull the fame of debate into “disprove this random horseshit that Ugh just made up”. Not biting.
This is Joe, trying to join a conversation.
I masochistically had a peep at David’s reddit link, and noticed someone putting forward that Warren Farrell or “some other accredited ” mra write a defence of the apex fallacy. I would really love to see that. Love the “accredited”, too. That selective appeal to authority – when it doesn’t go your way, there’s a vast feminist conspiracy in academia; when it does, well, it’s from the highest authority.
Joe is so fucking annoying that I almost wish PEMRA was back
@Joe
I am not a feminist. Never really called myself one. Never took a gender studies class or cared to. I just hate misogynist scumbags. And I think women are people.
So put that in your butt and poke it.
Wut? Let’s not go there, Lady Stark.
@Joe
Where, precisely, did anyone here write anything like that? You wouldn’t know if they did, because you didn’t read the thread, you just came in to take a dump on the carpet.
Salon just published an article on MRA Earl Silverman.
The comments again are indicative of the culture.
@Ugh – Ohh, name-calling that insults short people! Nice one, hope you feel real good about yourself there. Hahahahaha. Truly weak.
I think you’ll find that your “argument” is irrevelant to the context within which Apex Fallacy is correctly employed.
Here is the correct context:
Wealthy Middle Class Feminist:
“Oh men have it so easy, they’re so powerful, waaaah, pay attention to me, gimme, gimme more power and privelege, because: feminism.”
Poverty Stricken Working Class Bloke:
“Nothing to do with me.”
@cloudiah – why on earth would I “read back through the comments”? Absolutely everything any Manboobzer has to say is summed up in the bleat of “Feminists Good! Men Bad!”.
Ah, would that be the same Warren Farrell who claimed that Laurie Dann is an example of women’s misandric violence in the same way that Lepine is a misogynistic killer? That guy’s a genius. He’ll make up anything.
Said by no feminist anywhere, ever.*
*The voices in your head do not count.
Wheeee! A meltdown! Let her rip, Joey!
Have you ever heard of intersectionality? Here’s how it’d actually go:
White middle class feminist: White middle class men have it easier than us based on their maleness.
Poverty stricken working class gall: Poverty stricken working class blokes have it easier than us based on their male ness. So do white middle class men based on their (white ness, if gall is not white), class privilege, and maleness.
@Lady Stark – sure, your not feminist, riiight. You’re nodding along on a feminist blog surrounded by hard-core feminists and your parrotting feminists catch phrases. If you don’t consider yourself a feminist, you have a shocking lack of self-awareness.
@gilly – see Lady Stark’s remarks. Also, your ridiculously overwrought analogy is ridiculous. Just like whoever the hell it was talking about “wiping your arse on the napkins”.
Whenever I hear anyone using those kind of stock phrases to describe: someone else talking, that person is instantly disqualified from any consideration of having anything worthwhile to say, because it’s clear that all they want to do is shutdown any opposition through insults.
Joe, It’s just not polite to not read the post and the comments before spewing your typical blather. It’s also very rude to completely misrepresent the content of the comments here as saying “Feminists good! Men bad!”
Are you angry? You seem angry.
@Joe
Haha what? Summarizing your position with “shorter Joe:” is not namecalling.
Also, it wouldn’t take any work to disprove me, and the splc. Just name an MRA who you read regularly who isn’t pro-rapist. I could do the same right now, off the top of my head, for any other movement.
Apparently there are no poverty stricken working class women. Good to know!
@Ugh
Summarizing is misandry.
Joey, remember? We don’t only look at the apex. We analyze its composition to highlight institutionalized privilege. It shows a trend And there are other areas in society in which men across all classes are privileged. The apex fallacy is a straw man when used by MRAs against the notion of male privilege.
But please continue your meltdown. It’s amusing and destroys your credibility.
I instantly disqualify anyone who doesn’t know how to use a colon.
OK, this is kinda clever and hilarious. (If you don’t want to scroll up, he’s responding to Ugh’s “Shorter Joe:” comment.)
So, like … sock? Has anyone said sock yet?
@firsthoe
Did you just say you have no interest in knowing what anyone on this forum thinks, and won’t bother reading it? What the fuck good is that? Do you always butt into the middle of discussions, having no idea of what anybody is putting forward, and tell everyone they are wrong? That’s a really fucking weird way of going about things
@Bee
idk. He’s not familiar to me, though I’m new so I’m sure I don’t have all the trolls memorized.
All I know is he’s really, really boring.
@gilly – Actually that’s pretty much all of feminism – it’s an appeal to the powerful (at the Apex) to give feminists more cash / power / privelege – because: oppression! / patriarchy! / whatever catch phrase of the day. And it’s worked pretty well. Feminists in the West have accrued oodles of power basically through endless complaining and demanding.
@Fade – Fail. You’re clearly not part of the poverty stricken working class because if you were you’d know that men in that class have way shittier outcomes / prospects / assistance than women in that class.
Does Joe only drunk post?
Hey everyone, here’s more evidence that women are privileged: http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/nisvs_sofindings.pdf
Hetero women are 24 times more likely to be raped than hetero men. Misandry! Female privilege!
@Joe
Citation needed. In what way to working class men have it worse off than women?
Joe’s here! This thread totally needed drunken incoherence.
Tom Dane should come over to this thread so he and Joe could arglebargle at one another.
Oodles of power? WHATEVER SHALL I DO WITH MY OODLES OF POWER, POODLES?
@Bee, yes, *that* Warren Farrell. I even wasted an afternoon of my life reading one of his excrable books. See, unlike firsthoe here, I like to know exactly what I’m arguing against.
@Hellkell
Did you see my comment where I grouped together all of Tom’s nasty bigotry? I feel like I’m only going to respond to him with his own quotes until he owns up to it.
That instantly reminded me of Arfenhouse.
I’m ashamed to say that I found that hilarious when I was 9.
“Feminists in the West have accrued oodles of power basically through endless complaining and demanding.”
Such as…what?
@Fade – Fail. You’re clearly not part of the poverty stricken working class because if you were you’d know that men in that class have way shittier outcomes / prospects / assistance than women in that class.
Can we see some citations on this? It sounds like you’ve pulled this from your ass.
I will admit, even though I know what “hoe” is a reference to, it makes me flinch everytime I read it b/c of what it sounds like.
I’ve noticed MRAs partaking in apex fallacy stuff themselves when I read their crap…namely that women throughout history were lazy and sat at home doing nothing while all the.menz worked in mines and ditches. Poor women who did as much labour did not and continue to exist in their world.
Thanks for doing this post David. Awile ago I looked up the apex fallacy to see if it was an actual thing, I got the same results a bunch of MRA sites…what a surprise.
I sn’t it also funny how when you mention Lepine MRAs will screech he’s not an MRA yet this longtime MRA Zohrab does?
An oodle is in fact the correct unit of measurement for power.
@Aaliyah – Any analysis done by any feminist anywhere is automatically suspect, due to obvious selection bias. So, I reject the entire feminist canon, including and especially “Male privelege” as conceived by feminists – it’s bullshit.
@Ugh – Hey Ugh, do you still fuck dogs? Do you Ugh? Or have you stopped fucking dogs now?
^This is the exact equivalent of the frame you are soooo desperately trying to push me into, and astonishingly! – I’m not going to engage you within this bullshit frame. Why are you surprised by this? No-one with even an iota of sense would step into such a blatant frame-up.
*continue to NOT exist in their world
Keep fucking that chicken, Joe.
Fade: I didn’t see that. Was it in the other thread?
Joe, come on, man give me some citations here!
Ugh didn’t mention dogs in zir posts if I remember correctly, so under no possible circumstances could that be imagined as a summary
Fade, re:hoe, fair enough.
That’s right, folks, he doesn’t need to counter your facts because since you’re a feminist any facts you cite are clearly feminist facts! It’s the classic ad feminazi fallacy.
@Hellkell
some shining example’s of Tom’s opinions
Men: occupy the top, bottom and middle of society
Women: occupy the middle and bottom of society
MRAs: MATRIARCHY!!!!!1
Now he’s going to say you’re accusing him of bestiality, hellkell. :D
See, if the patriarchy existed, there would be no poor or middle class men at all. And that’s real.
A feminazi stole my ice cream
Hahaha! Said the guy who came in without reading any of the previous comments on the thread and then immediately started flinging shit and telling people who was an was not going to be allowed to speak.
And, if that weren’t hilarious enough, oodles?!? Seriously?!?! Oodles!?!?!?!
Now your insistence on being the sole arbiter of all that which is serious and worthy of discussion has been given, shall we say, a whole new framing…
I guess Joe would prefer us to use an MRA critique of feminism. No bias there. Nope, no way, no how, no SIR.
That’s a really good summary! Except that part where you leave out that all of those women actually control the men at the top using their POODLES OF POWER.
Errr, I think he’s reached his booze threshold point.
cloudiah: yeah, Joe’s not too bright.
@Fade & Shiraz – just give away all your money and get yourself a shitty minimum wage job and go and live in some craphole sink estate / housing project. Then you’ll be able to observe first hand.
@Shiraz – hahaha. You’re serious?
What? have you had your eyes closed for the last 40 years?
Sorry, but if you haven’t noticed feminists in positions of power (clue: Secretary of State of the USA), feminists orgs funded with taxpayers mopney, feminist inspired laws etc. etc. etc. If all of that has passed you by? Nothing I present you with can possibly enlighten what is clearly your wilful ignorance.
@Joe
…
That’s not how a citation works.
One poodle of power.
Also, Joe, I bet you’d like this: http://artistryforfeminismandkittens.wordpress.com/2013/04/28/awesomeness-from-a-non-manboobzer/
Joe: why do you care? You’re not an American.
But, for shit and giggles, what feminist laws? VAWA? Because nope. And Secretary of State is a dude now.
Nope! I’m not talking about whether they are reliable analyses – although I believe they are, that’s irrelevant to my point. What I’m actually saying is that the apex fallacy, as used by MRA dipshits, is a straw man because feminists don’t only focus on how privileged the men at top rungs of society are.
What you have just said makes it almost impossible for me to take you to respect anything you say now. Your intellectual dishonesty and immaturity are off the fucking charts. You have the most stupid reason ever for rejecting feminist analyses. Good job. I hope you’re proud of yourself.
@cloudiah
Yeah its amusing how MRAs say feminists make up conspiracies yet all the men in power are controlled by shadow women with their vagina powers or something….we cant see them but they exist dammit!!!
Shorter Joe: WAKE UP SHEEPLE, I’M RIGHT! WHY WON’T YOU AGREE WITH ME, DAMMIT? WAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH *passes out*
Anything written by anyone anywhere is automatically suspect when it doesn’t reflect my beliefs, opinions, or experience of the world because it isn’t based on my beliefs, opinions, or experience of the world. So I will 1. throw a tantrum 2. insult people 3. ??? 4. profit?
Don’t forget MUSL1MS ARE COMING!!! THE C1A IS READING OUR BLOG COMMENTS!!!
Is that what that tingling is? I was about to call the doctor, but now that I know I’m just controlling world governments ith my vag, I’ll sit back and enjoy it.
@hellkell & shiraz – yeah, keep up those comforting lies. I have never posted on here after a drink, and I’m not doing so now. This was a lie made up by a manboobzer long ago, and propagated as another easy insult to be trundled out.
As for not being bright? I’m sure it’s clear to any neutral reader who’s smart and who isn’t out of the posters here.
Clue: the people desperately resorting to insults aren’t the clever ones.
@gilly – ” then immediately started flinging shit” aaaaand there you go again. Talking with words is not “flinging shit”. You are disqualified from any consideration as holding a meaningful opinion – because you come out with ridiculous stuff like that.
” and telling people who was an was not going to be allowed to speak.” Oh you can speak, but no-one with any sense will take you seriously, because: see above.
Wait a minute .. when you say “Shorter Joe,” are you referring to his morning height?
“just give away all your money and get yourself a shitty minimum wage job and go and live in some craphole sink estate / housing project. Then you’ll be able to observe first hand.”
Had a shitty minimum wage job before. Are you living in a “craphole sink estate/housing project”?
“@Shiraz – hahaha. You’re serious?
What? have you had your eyes closed for the last 40 years?
Sorry, but if you haven’t noticed feminists in positions of power (clue: Secretary of State of the USA), feminists orgs funded with taxpayers mopney, feminist inspired laws etc. etc. etc. If all of that has passed you by? Nothing I present you with can possibly enlighten what is clearly your wilful ignorance.”
Yes, I’m serious…citations needed. The last 40 years… what exactly about the last 40 years is suppose to be so obviously anti-man? Yep, there are more women in power these days, and that’s how it should be. You’re implying no women should be in power at all. Feminist orgs funded by taxpayers — you’re talking about Planned Parenthood, I suppose. That’s not a feminist organization, it provides health services for women — what, that’s sexists? Pfffft, you are a silly, aren’t you? You’re sentence structure is appalling, by the way.
“Nothing I present you with can possibly enlighten what is clearly your willful ignorance.”
Whew! I dare someone to diagram that sentence.
You presented total bullshit.