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| The Ideal Woman, apparently. |
Freud asked: “What do women want?” Mel Gibson answered the question in that movie in which he could read their lady minds. I never saw it, but I’m guessing based on Gibson’s behavior since making the film that women want lots of drunken anti-Semitic tirades and verbal abuse.
Anyway, over at A Voice For Men, MRA elder Paul Elam doesn’t really give a shit about what women want. But he knows what they deserve, and what they don’t deserve. Which turns out to be shovels and love, respectively. As he explains in a recent comment:
We don’t need to teach young girls to marry for love; we need to put shovels in their hands and put them to work in ditches, digging their way to self sufficiency. We need to leave them to their own survival devices so that they can learn some humility …
But what we most need to teach young girls is that until there are social pressures established that place firm boundaries and limits on their hypergamous instincts, that they cannot be trusted with love, as women in this culture have been proving for 50 years … .
Keep shoveling, Paul.
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>Hmmmm… That's an interesting argument, Kave. With that logic, we can assume that the Spearhead, Angry Harry, A Voice for Men, GlenSacks.com are all literary accomplishments, since they have very VERY large audiences. Now, you've mentioned my blog – I didn't – and you compare a personal blog about my own experiences in this life to a blog written by professional writer who has nationally published in major publications? Okay. I expect for from him. I expect some analysis and argument, not "snark." BTW, I do love your writing. It's so, minimalist.
>They seem to assume that if only women would just shut up, look pretty and do exactly as they want, life would be perfect.That's my ex's problem. His new girl's hobby is gazing at him adoringly and thinking he's brilliant, and yet things have yet to improve for him. Must be her looks, hopefully the new haircut is helping.
>David, I have to ask … where on earth did you find that photo? It's brilliant! I'm trying to think of what happened on the set that day: Okay, we've got the sexy lady in a leotard and high heels and elbow-length gloves, we're all set for a glamor shot. Wait, wait–something's missing. Hey–who forgot the shovel? SOMEONE GET ME THE GODDAMN SHOVEL! This shovel-porn calendar isn't going to make itself!
>If this was a professional blog (like the HuffPost) then your criticism would be valid Miss Magdelyn. but this is not a professional blog and any money made from it goes to charity. And really, tell the people that David quotes to get new material, not tell David to do something different…they are saying the same stuff said in 350 BCE. Do you not think they should be updating what they are saying just a tad?Or are you an excuser of such bile?
>they are saying the same stuff said in 350 BCE.Plenty of the stuff said a thousand years ago is still around because it's true. Doctors still swear by the Hippocratic Oath despite the fact that Hippocrates himself has been dead for centuries. The fact that this stuff's been around since 350 BC doesn't, in and of itself, mean that it's wrong.
>vagrant, most of doctors do not swear by the Hippocratic oath anymore because it claims that abortion is murder, which anyone with any kind of biological training knows is flat out untrue
>Vagrant-so you are saying that you think that we should start exposing our babies if they do not suit us?They said that we should do that in 350 BCE.
>Vagrant-so you are saying that you think that we should start exposing our babies if they do not suit us?They said that we should do that in 350 BCE. Nope. What I said cuts both ways–merely because something's been around since 350 B.C doesn't in and of itself make it right either. The fact that people killed babies 1000 years ago doesn't necessarily make it right…or wrong, either. Same applies to the "misogynistic" stuff the Greeks or the Romans or Aristotle or whoever said. If you want to argue for or against it, you'll have to address something besides its "antiquity" or lack thereof.
>Vagrant, the point was "this was wrong then. It is wrong now. Get something different to say since it has been wrong for over two thousand years."
>bee, glad you like the picture. I usually just do simple google image searches, but I look and look until I find a really good one. I have no idea what the context of this one was. It's allegedly a picture of Natalie Wood, and it does look a lot like her — I think it probably is her. Beyond that, I have no idea. Just glad it exists! vagrant, I'm not sure what sort of misogynist arguments you think need to be addressed. Misogyny isn't a logical thing; it's based on opinions and assertions about how women are lesser than men. When Aristotle says that "the female is a mutilated male," there's no need to rebut it. The only people who would think that assertion was true would be misogynists.
>"this was wrong then. It is wrong now. Get something different to say since it has been wrong for over two thousand years." Again, as I mentioned above, the MRAs say the exact opposite–Hollenhund essentially told…I don't remember if it was Susan Walsh or somebody else ('d have to check), "the romans were right then, they're still right now, you feminists are arguing against ideas which have been conclusively proven correct for over a thousand years." The ancient Greek misogynists may be wrong, and by extension Hollenhund and his contemporary misogynist friends, but you'll have to give a good reason *why* they were wrong, and simply being ancient and/or greek is not really a good marker of wrongness (or rightness). This is not to defend either the MRAs or the ancients overmuch (I have little affection for the former and comparatively little knowledge about the latter), but I merely dislike seeing people disregard ideas based on their age.Misogyny isn't a logical thing; it's based on opinions and assertions about how women are lesser than men. When Aristotle says that "the female is a mutilated male," there's no need to rebut it. The only people who would think that assertion was true would be misogynists. Like I said, I'm not an expert on Aristotle, but I imagine he wrote more on women than just that one line. Why would he think "the female is a mutilated male" in the first place? You might not "need" to rebut a misogynistic statement; as always, you don't "need" to do anything on behalf of guests like me. Rebutting the reasoning behind such statements might be interesting, though.
>@magdelyn:"What you are doing here is mental masturbation."Ain't nothing wrong with masturbation, mental or otherwise.
>Same applies to the "misogynistic" stuff the Greeks or the Romans or Aristotle or whoever said. If you want to argue for or against it, you'll have to address something besides its "antiquity" or lack thereof.Fair enough. The opinions and assertions concerning women put forth as fact by Aristotle, and which were believed by not only the Greeks but also the Romans and others for a great many years, have been proven erroneous by advances in the sciences….and yet in many ways we still cling to some outdated assumptions, having long forgotten the reasoning behind these assumptions.Women were considered to be lesser than men because women could not produce semen, due to their body temperatures not being able to rise to a sufficient degree to cook their menstrual blood into semen. The seed that men produced in their semen contained the entire essence of a human being, soul and all, women contributed nothing more than the fertile soil for the seed to germinate and grow… they were the passive receptors of the male seed. And since it was only the male seed that contributed to the making of a human, women were the result of defective sperm taking root, so they're weren't considered exactly human and were not considered to have souls…. they were, for all intents and purposes, walking incubators, and wives were relegated to the dankest, darkest room in the home.Women were also considered to be lesser than men in leadership capability. Men were considered natural leaders and women considered natural followers. This revelation occurred to Aristotle when he observed bees and noted that the colony followed just one single bee, which he incorrectly assumed was a male bee.
>Vagrant-I have to explain to you how women are not inferior to men? And you see nothing wrong with that?I found this dissertation on Aristotle's view on the treatment of women. Maybe it will help.And it just reinforced my view that Aristotle is an ass.
>due to their body temperatures not being able to rise to a sufficient degree to cook their menstrual blood into semenI'm not much of a scientist, but didn't it occur to anyone back then to try to cook menstrual blood to see if it DID become semen?
>Cooking was a woman's job so probably not.
>Vagrant-I have to explain to you how women are not inferior to men? And you see nothing wrong with that?You don't have to explain anything to me. All I'm saying is that the age of an argument has nothing to do with its validity one way or the other.In any case, thanks for the dissertation.
>I'm not much of a scientist, but didn't it occur to anyone back then to try to cook menstrual blood to see if it DID become semen?It's amazing, in retrospect, how long it took humans to come up with the idea of testing theories rather than just pulling stuff out of our asses.Aristotle also famously argued that women were inferior to men because they have fewer teeth, which he believed was a sign of physical weakness and shorter lifespan. This idea was repeated for centuries before it occurred to anyone to check to see whether women actually do have fewer teeth than men. SPOILERS: They don't.
>I can understand your belief that simply because something is old does not mean it does not have validity. However what I am saying is get some new material instead of endlessly repeating the same old incorrect thing of centuries ago. Here is a court case that shows your point very well I think. The presumption of innocence is an ancient idea that has validity no matter how old it gets.
>One wit said that if he had let his wife open her mouth once in a while he could have realised he was wrong.
>Aristotle: OWNED by Bertrand Russell!
>One wit said that if he had let his wife open her mouth once in a while he could have realised he was wrong. I'm not certain that Aristotle was all that concerned about any of his wife's orifices, if you know what I mean. Not that there's anything wrong with that…
>I'm not certain that Aristotle was all that concerned about any of his wife's orifices, if you know what I meanYes, I know exactly what you mean, but one of the idols of the MRA/MRM seems to be blissfully ignorant of this well-known fact. Warren Farrell, in his "seminal" book The Myth of Male Power stated (in so many words) that societies have historically and universally condemned homosexuality because it is non-reproductive and does not provide an economic and protective security blanket for women.Yes, he puts forth his own version of history in order to support his contention that men are and always have been the powerless, disposable protectors of women.
>That's a pretty ignorant claim on Farrel's part. Ancient Greece may be the most famous culture to endorse widespread man-on-man action, but it was far from the only one. Certain Polynesian cultures looked favorably on man-on-man action as well, at least in the past. I have no idea about present-day Polynesian cultures because my senior thesis research didn't cover that ground.But Farrel's ignorance is telling. It's always amusing to watch these self-appointed cultural critics demonstrate that they have no real knowledge of any culture outside their own. And yet they feel perfectly comfortably applying their cultural standards to all of humanity.
>“It's amazing, in retrospect, how long it took humans to come up with the idea of testing theories rather than just pulling stuff out of our asses.”Why should anyone have to test their theories! It’s right because they say its right and, even after its proven wrong, it’s still right because they say its right. Religion makes that very, very clear. As do our poor, broken misogynist friends. /snarkSeriously though, we still do this. We still make shit up and believe it, without ever having done any research at all – largely because someone with some sort of authority, be it real (i.e. a politician) or manufactured (i.e. a “psychic”) – tells us we should. We’re hierarchical pack animals. That dude at the top must be right because he’s the dude at the top.