Erin Pizzey and the Canadian Elevator of Misandry
Men in Canadian elevators are sometimes also used as chairs.
Does anyone here understand string theory and dark matter and all that physics crap? Because I am seriously beginning to wonder if Men’s Rights Activists literally live in an alternate universe that only partially intersects with our own.
In the universe I live in, Canada is a lovely and somewhat uncannily polite country to the north, the home of Rush and Kate Beaton and, I’m pretty sure, a lot of bears. To MRAs it is a land under the bootheel of a radical feminist gynarchy in which men cower in elevators because they are deathly afraid of being accused of sexual harassment.
No, really.
I was skimming through an old interview with good old Erin Pizzey, A Voice for Men’s pet domestic violence expert, probably because she’s the only one who thinks jokes about eating “battered women” — you know, like batter fried chicken — are hilarious.
In the interview, she was telling Dean “Long Tie” Esmay about a speaking tour she’d made in Canada — a place she describes as “one of the worst countries in the world.” No, really. Here’s what she had to say about her harrowing ordeal:
I did a six week tour, with Senator Anne Cools, all across Canada. And there were some wonderful … uh, men’s groups, just struggling to keep going. And as we traveled and talked to men’s groups, we realized how terribly dangerous it is because it’s almost as though the entire government and the judiciary–the same people–had been infiltrated by very radical feminists out to get men. And I talked to people all the way across Canada. You know my mother was Canadian, and I’m half Canadian, and it hurt actually. See I was a child in Toronto, and my feeling as we went through is real fear. I remember I was working with Anne in the Senate and I walked in to the lift, and this man who was in the lift with me was cowering over in the corner. And I came out and I said to Anne, “What on earth was that about?” And she said, “Men are frightened. They just don’t know when they’re going to be told they’re sexually harassing somebody.”
I’ve highlighted several of the passages which I think may have entered our universe from the Bizarro Men’s Rights multidimensional wormhole of misandry.
But, seriously, what planet does this woman live on? Does she actually think something like this really happened? Was there really a man in an elevator with her who was literally cowering in the corner because he thought she would accuse him of some sort of sex crime? Was there a man there at all? Was there even an elevator? Is Canada a real country? THEN WHO WAS PHONE?
The 5 most ridiculous things causing misogynists to lose their sh*t this week
It’s the eternal question: do misogynists spend their entire lives looking for excuses to get mad at women, or are they so naturally enraged by any evidence of female autonomy that they can’t help but erupt in rage over the tiniest of things?
We may never know the answer to that question. What we do know: almost anything can provoke them, no matter how trivial it is, no matter how misguided their anger might seem to anyone who doesn’t actually, you know, hate women. Let’s look at some of the latest things to cause women-haters to lose their shit.
Vox Day: Smiling at women is for wimps
Total Alpha Dog. Er, cat.
You know how they say “smile and the world smiles with you?” Apparently, that’s all wrong, at least according to our dear old friend Vox Day (Theodore Beale). The fantasy author and human shitstain says this old saw needs a rewrite: smile, and the world’s true Alphas laugh at you. As Mr. Day-Beale explains:
Women say they resent it when men tell them to smile. And well they should. An instinctive smile, when one is not expressing pleasure or recognition, is a submissive gesture. This is why attractive women tend to smirk in response to the big goofy submissive smiles sent their way by lower status men.
And then, presumably, those sexy ladies will quickly excuse themselves and make a beeline for the nearest ALPHA fantasy author standing grimly in the corner, quietly judging everyone and thinking unkind thoughts about John Scalzi.
But what if you’re one of those big goofy smiling submissive dudes? How do you capture some of that broody Alpha magic for yourself? It’s simple: Don’t turn that frown upside down.
One easy way to increase your perceived level of alpha is to simply not smile at strangers. Instead, just reply with a nod or a pleasant word. One can be perfectly civil without grinning at everyone like an idiot, and it’s always interesting to see the difference it makes in people’s perceptions.
Just don’t overdo it, lest the ladies think you’re, for example, some sort of weirdo misogynist so filled with fear and loathing for everything female that you’ve actually set up an entire blog devoted to telling the world what an awesome alpha you are.
I’m not talking about walking around glowering; self-conscious anger is much worse than indiscriminate smiling. But women have always been drawn to brooding men, so rather than turning them away with a gesture of preemptive submission, give them something to which they can be drawn.
To be perfectly fair, though, this does work with most Bronte sisters.
Anti-AVFM Conference protest happening now in Detroit; see Twitter hashtag #NoMRA for updates [No Troll thread]
Protesters head to the Doubletree
Just a quick note to let you know that the protest against the AVFM Conference at the Doubletree in Detroit is happening right now. You can check the hashtag #NoMRA on Twitter for live updates. Here’s a Ms Magazine blog piece with more details.
I’ll have some thoughts on it all later.
Photo from @Katie_Speak on Twitter.
A Voice for Men’s Robert O’Hara rebuts misogyny charge with revelation that his mother is a woman
Relationships with women: “Complicated and oftentimes dangerous.”
Men’s Rights Activists continue to make strategic use of the media attention they’ve gained as a result of the Elliot Rodger killings. Yesterday, Al Jazeera America ran an interview with A Voice for Men’s “US News Director” Robert O’Hara in which he touched upon numerous important Men’s Rights issues, like the fact that he doesn’t hate women because his mother is one, and how it was totally an amazing publicity coup for AVFM to be singled out as a misogynistic hate site by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Let’s look at some highlights from his Q and A. (The block quotes are direct quotes from the man, the legend, himself.)
Open Thread for Non-Personal Stuff. No Trolls, No MRAs.
I had an interesting conversation recently with a woman on Twitter who told me that my policy of letting MRAs and misogynists comment here, at least so long as they’re not abusive, was keeping her and others she knew from joining in the conversation; she wanted a place to discuss MRAs where she didn’t have to deal with them.
I know a lot of the regulars here like engaging with the trolls and MRAs who stop by, but I’d like to create some space here for commenters who want to discuss the issues in a Troll- and MRA-free zone.
So I thought I’d try starting a new kind of Open Thread: A No-Troll, No-MRA, No-Misogynist, No-Rape-Apologist, No-Douchebag Thread to discuss the issues I cover on the blog and anything related to that: Misogyny, MRAs, PUAs, MGTOW, the “Red Pill,” and so on. Enjoy!
Oh, and if a troll wanders in, or if someone starts being douchey, ignore them and send me a note. I’ll delete their comments and ban them. No warning, no moderation, straight ban.
The Top 5 Worst Comments by DavidByron2 in the Men’s Rights Subreddit … This Week!
Unlike women, men have REAL issues to deal with. Like giant otters.
Anyone who reads the Men’s Rights subreddit on a regular basis knows that when you see the username DavidByron2 you are in for a treat. Well, a “treat” in the sense that discovering a flaming bag of dog poop on your doorstop is a “treat.” Like many Men’s Rightsers, he’s both smug and ignorant, a perfect example of the Dunning-Kruger effect in action.
But somehow he manages to be more than just another insufferable mansplaining rage-baby who spends all of his spare time ranting about a subject — feminism — he knows less than nothing about. No, there’s a kind of daft genius to his comments; I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried.
And so I thought I’d wind up this week with a small collection of the best –that is, worst — comments he left in the Men’s Rights subreddit this week. In choosing the top 5, I have confined myself mostly to those that got more upvotes than downvotes, because, seriously, the thought that there are actual human beings out there upvoting this crap is almost as amazing as the fact that there’s an actual human being posting it. And thinking himself quite clever and righteous for doing so.
Let’s work our way to the top starting with …
[Not All] Redditors agree: “In 99% of societal contexts such as going to office, going to the supermarket … etc, it is men who have to be continually afraid of women.”
They’re very sneaky, these gals.
Oh, Reddit! Need another reminder that on Reddit, whiny lady-hating man-babies can be found outside the Men’s Rights and Red Pill subreddits? Take a look at this lovely comment from occasional Red Pill commenter purple4th in Change My Views, which (the last I checked) had garnered nearly 150 net upvotes from the crowd there. Here’s the money quote:
[S]ocietal laws are so filled with misandry that in 99% of societal contexts such as going to office, going to the supermarket, going to the movies, etc;, it is men who have to be continually afraid of women.
That’s right, fellas. Women who worry about men harming them are all a bunch of big sillies. It’s MEN who should be worried Oh, sure those gals may look innocent, but don’t let your guard down for a minute lest one of them misander you with a false accusation of being too much of a dude! con
Purple4th continues:
As my investment banks’ Sexual Harassment presentation says, “It is harassment if she says so”. Period.
Really? I decided to look online to see if I could find any Sexual Harassment literature making that argument. A search for “It is harassment if she says so” in quotes returns only one hit on Google: Purple4th’s comment on Reddit.
In fact, the legal standard for sexual harassment — in the US at least — is not “whatever the hell a random woman wants to call harassment.” It’s whether or not a “reasonable person” would see the behavior as harassment.
But that’s how it works in the real world. MRAs and the MRA-adjacent don’t live in the real world.
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Thanks, AMRthroaway on Reddit for pointing me to this lovely quote.
The E-Day Concert that Wasn’t: The Canadian Association for Equality turns a PR disaster into a PR catastrophe
MRAs seem to think that they can spin their way out of pretty much anything. And on the internet, particularly in their own little echo chamber, they can kind of get away with it. It’s when they venture out into the real world that they run into some trouble.
Take, for example, the mad spinning that accompanied the implosion of the Canadian Association for Equality’s “E Day” concert scheduled for last weekend. CAFE, you may recall, is a Canadian Men’s Rights group that’s probably most famous for organizing a series of talks by Men’s Rights-friendly folks on Canadian campuses that, well, caused a tiny bit of a stir.
Oh, sorry. The group says that even though its “focus is currently on men and boys … [W]e do not consider ourselves a Men’s Rights Group.”
Anyway, so this non-Men’s Rights group decided to hold a concert on Toronto Island celebrating “Equality Day,” a holiday they made up just for the occasion. They found a venue, got some sponsors and even managed to convince a bunch of bands to sign on.
