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My contribution to the Good Men Project debate over the Men’s Rights Movement — talking about misogyny in the movement — is up now.
Batman on an elephant says check it out.
We Hunted The MammothBucking the Backlash
We Hunted The Mammoth>
My contribution to the Good Men Project debate over the Men’s Rights Movement — talking about misogyny in the movement — is up now.
Batman on an elephant says check it out.
>Kratch: Sacks called on those activists to call the donors to the shelter. Whether or not they were belligerent, they were calling in an effort to get the donors to stop donating to the shelter. Instead of trying to raise money for a shelter for men, they were actively trying to harm the finances of a shelter for women. I'm not going to deal with the rest of your comment as it is, as usual, ridiculous.
>David, the theme of your GMP piece is that there is no activism in MRA. Isn't that punchline contradicted by your statement that MRA's are calling donors of a shelter to stop funding? Furthermore, many in the MRA movement believe that domestic violence shelters are anti-male propoganda. ( http://www.chronwatch-america.com/articles/4030/1/The-Domestic-Violence-Industry–Hateful/Page1.html )
>BTW, the thought that MRA's don't do any activism certainly is not true in my case. I was one of the organizers of the newly formed non-profit Erotic Service Providers Legislative, Educational and Research Project ( http://esplerp.org/ ) which will be filing suit in California to try to enjoin the enforcement of prostitution laws. I edited and the text of San Francisco's Proposition K for the proponent of the measure, and designed the petition (http://www.yesonpropk.org/). Prostitution laws are a direct attack against men. I am my cities bicycle and pedestrian advisory committee…just to name a few of the things that get me out of the house.
>Maggie, you really need to read a bit more carefully. As I said, the calls were "the closest thing" I've seen to an activist campaign. It was also not a terribly constructive one. How does trying to take money away from a shelter for women — mostly for women, it actually helps men too — help male abuse victims? As for your activism, well, that actually seems a lot more constructive. I think prostitution should probably be legalized, as do many feminists. I don't think prostitution laws are an attack on men, though. I think it's probably fair to say that you are not a typical Men's Rights activist, however.
>"And that’s a pity, because—if you set aside the misogyny of so many of those in it—the Men’s Rights Movement does actually raise some legitimate issues. Male victims of domestic violence really do deserve shelters and sympathy. The epidemic of prison rape deserves to be taken seriously, instead of simply providing an easy punchline to crude jokes. MRAs raise real concerns about the effects of circumcision. But they’re not likely to make any headway on any of these issues if they keep doing what they’re doing."Wanna bet?
>I volunteer as a medic on weekend night shifts, riding an NHS ambulance and helping injured/sick men and women receive emergency medical care and taking them to the hospital when necessary.I also go on the internet and attempt debate with MRAs who seem unable to do anything except mock feminists and call them names. I'm not denying that there are men's issues that need addressing, but these guys don't really seem to want to address these issues – they prefer to rant about how It's All Women's/Feminists' fault, and fantasize about a perfect world in which those uppity bitches will finally know their place.
>Amused: Disclaimer: You aren't even mildly amusing.Actually I find her extreme sense of entitlement and superiority to be highly amusing, as well as her ludicrous strawmen and her assumption that anyone who disagrees with her must hate women, evidence and ethics be damned.
>Ooh, did I hit a couple of nerves :)Gentlemen, I get your complaint, I really do. Why should feminists discuss the ways in which women's lives can be made better and safer? Instead, everyone should focus on what men can do for men and what women can do for men. Right? Why should anyone worry about laws being passed which deprive women of gynecological care and bodily autonomy, as well as laws that permit hospitals to refuse life-saving care to women, at a time when child support laws imperil men's inalienable right to fuck without a condom? Obviously, the latter is a much greater affront to human decency and the welfare of society.Meanwhile, why don't you explain to us all the ways in which you don't act entitled, and how you don't believe yourself superior to women, and how you don't assume that anyone who disagrees with you must hate men, evidence and ethics be damned.I will concede that there is one area in which you are superior to me, gentlemen: when it comes to amusement, though I may be anywhere from non-amusing to mildly amusing to you, YOU amuse me endlessly.
>Wow, you sure were quick to illustrate my point, as well as to demonstrate a warped understanding of how burden of proof works. This from someone who claims to be a lawyer, no less.
>Cold, why don't you also grace us with the MRA staple about "shaming language" and "ad hominem" comments? I totally get a kick out of you guys nonsensically spouting them fancy-sounding fifty-cent words and pretending you speak Latin. I want to hear that whole complaint about how feminists respond to criticism of feminism with personal attacks — how it's a "female" tactic, and how MRA's never respond to criticism of the MRM with personal attacks and you, know, shaming language. Like, you know, you and your buddy Jason TOTALLY didn't do it here. Go ahead, Cold, please — it would really amuse me.
>"Ooh, did I hit a couple of nerves :)"—AmusedYou haven't done any better with remarks like this. Of course, I slag, but I slag with flair and sardonic wit. Employ some creativity coupled with creative thinking and we'll talk shop.
>I'll use shaming language and ad hominem comments as I see fit; I won't do it just because you asked me to. If you really are a lawyer and not just pretending to be one on the Internet, then you have learned a bunch of Latin legal terms in law school which you use with regularity in court. So, by your twisted logic, you are constantly pretending that you speak Latin. By that same logic, anytime you go to a sushi bar and order "tekkamaki" instead of "tuna roll" you are pretending that you speak Japanese.Calling an idiot an idiot and a misandrist a misandrist may constitute ad hominem attacks, but they are not logical fallacies. Since most people are too stupid and/or lazy to actually read up on how logic works and on what defines a fallacy, they habitually use the term "ad hominem fallacy" even though there is no such thing. The typical feminist shaming language response combines an ad hominem attack with a logical fallacy, usually that of the red herring or the illicit metabasis. The thought of you frantically Googling for some help in understanding the meaning of that last sentence has already provided me with enough amusement to last me through the day. Thanks, and keep on amusing me.
>Cold: "If you really are a lawyer and not just pretending to be one on the Internet, then you have learned a bunch of Latin legal terms in law school which you use with regularity in court. […], etc."Actually, I don't give a shit whether or not you believe that I'm a lawyer. You MRA nitwits are so wrapped up in the fantasy that the world revolves around you, you constantly make the mistake of believing that people desire your validation. I will note one thing though: I mentioned that I am a lawyer once, in the context of a discussion where it was actually relevant: a discussion about an area of law in which I have expertise. Since then, you've dragged out the fact that I am a lawyer (or the allegation, as you prefer) every single time you address me or talk about me — which, of course, proves that this is something that really chaps your ass. Your angry rantings won't change what I am in actual reality — but they do demonstrate again and again how very fragile your ego is. If it's any consolation, I didn't choose this profession for the purpose of annoying you. Then again, who knows, perhaps that comment will offend you by its implication that it's not all about you.As for the practice of law — if you had any familiarity with it, you'd know that Anglo-American jurisprudence has been moving away from archaic medieval Latin and Old French terms for about 50 years now. Self-important lay assholes use legalese far more copiously than lawyers do, and always incorrectly. Oh, and another thing you learn in law school: a bunch of fancy-sounding terminology does not pass for a convincing argument. In fact, a well-known technique among lawyers involves writing the first draft of a brief or oral argument without any terminology, in plain everyday English, to see whether it actually makes sense and sounds convincing enough without all the frills. But of course, common sense is lost on misogynists.Oh, and, spouting fancy foreign verbiage for the purpose of self-aggrandizing — whether it's archaic legal terms or names of sushi — qualifies as pretending to speak a foreign language in a bit to impress people one believes to be dumb."Calling an idiot an idiot and a misandrist a misandrist may constitute ad hominem attacks, but they are not logical fallacies."Calling a genius an idiot, and a decent person a bigot isn't a logical fallacy either. Man, your understanding of logic stinks."Since most people are too stupid and/or lazy to actually read up on how logic works and on what defines a fallacy, they habitually use the term "ad hominem fallacy" even though there is no such thing."Since most MRA's believe they have an innate understanding of logic springing from their penis, as well as that Spearhead is a competent source of information on how logic works, they habitually make statements about logic that are nothing short of comedy gold."The typical feminist shaming language response combines an ad hominem attack with a logical fallacy, usually that of the red herring or the illicit metabasis. The thought of you frantically Googling for some help in understanding the meaning of that last sentence has already provided me with enough amusement to last me through the day."Oh, I bet it wasn't nearly as amusing as the image of you giggling with narcissistic excitement over your uncanny ability to string a bunch of fancy-sounding words together; the image of you slapping your knee: "Yesss! I got to use the word 'metabasis' in a sentence, finally! Also 'illicit'! I am such a genius, I have a vocabulary of no less than a hundred words, of which no less than thirty make me sound really smart in front of this feminist! Thanks, Spearhead! Bet she's gonna cry now!"
>Lawyers rarely use Latin in court anymore.With the spread of self represented litigants, it is considered unfair to do that to them so most lawyers are trained to use regular English.
>"Which is it, are we brutally conquering the legal system and stealing babies or just sitting around chatting?"Well, since MRAs are obvious cowardly liars, and know that they are, feminists will be accused of whatever will be most convenient at the time for MRAs to shit out some more cowardly lies and flaccid bigotry. This is the best they can do.
>And Amused – you're bleeding hilarious. Watching them squirm and try to puff up their chests to come off macho and intelligent is worth the prive of admission.I'm so very glad I rescued myself from MRA clutches before I became one of these useless whining liars.
>Cold or Nicko, here's a question for you. How can I get you to like me? I'm a woman in my late twenties. This cannot be changed. But let's assume that I am willing to change everything about myself that can be altered, to make it so that guys like you will admire and approve of me. Please, tell me – what do I have to do? How should I behave? Who do I vote for? What should I wear? What church (if any) should I join? Because I'm real interested – you claim to not be misogynists, and for now, I'll believe you. If you are truly not misogynists, then there must be some aspects of womanhood and femininity that you admire. I am passionately curious to find out what qualities you approve of in women. And while I can understand saying, "Don't do X," I'd prefer more proactive measures – tell me what *to* do, instead of what I shouldn't do.
>Kratch: "Is that choice for everyone? Or Just women?"I understand that you want a form of hormonal birth control for men. I think that's a good idea; I hope some pharmaceutical company is working on that problem right this second. The march has two objectives; to protest the erosion of Roe v. Wade and to support Planned Parenthood.Planned Parenthood provides medical care for men and women, it provides STD testing which keep both men and women from infecting their partners, it is the one of the cheapest places to purchase condoms, it provides education which gives men and women better control over their reproductive health and, therefore, over their choices. Also, rolling back Roe v. Wade is bad for men as well as women. I know that a lot of MRA's feel that it is unfair that they must financially support children they would have preferred aborted, I don't know how to address that. My preference would be a strong governmental support system into which we all pay a reasonable tax so the cost is spread across society and not placed just placed on unwilling parents, but that is very, very unlikely. We don't even want to fund schools for children who exist. That being said, making abortion more difficult to access is only going to make that problem worse. It leads to more children, perhaps unwanted by both parents, and those children will be legally entitled to more support payments. Finally, if you're asking about the right of men to choose to continue a pregnancy that a woman has decided to abort. I cannot see an ethical place from which that can be argued. From what I can see, giving birth in America is unpleasant, expensive, dehumanizing and increasingly unsafe. Access to contraception and abortion are less unpleasant, less costly, safer, and help maintain people's autonomy. You may have a different perspective, of course.
>> Since most people are too stupid and/or lazy to actually read up on how logic works and on what defines a fallacy, they habitually use the term "ad hominem fallacy" even though there is no such thing. I'm an expert on formal semantics, and my wife teaches rhetoric. Ad hominem is a fallacy, in "informal logic" [1].[1] Walton, Douglas (2008). Informal Logic: A Pragmatic Approach. Cambridge University Press. pp. 190 pp., cited on the Wikipedia page for "Ad hominem".
>I saw a news article that some pharmaceutical company in Indonesia is developing a male birth control pill – they're basing it on a plant that's locally used by men to prevent pregnancies. They've done animal testing and a small human trial, and now they're ready to move on to larger scale human testing. Good news, eh!
>Nick, if 99% of feminists never lifted a finger women wouldn't be where they are today. Women nowadays can now vote, work and go to college because somewhere along the line a woman fought for those rights. We've come a long way and we've still got a ways to go too.
>Personally, I just dick around on the Internet and draw cartoons all day.Lady Victoria, your question is one that interests me as well. As a woman over 30, I'm pretty sure I have no place in the ideal MRA world and should hie to an ice floe right now, but there may still be hope for you! As far as I've been able to discern, this is what a woman must do to be acceptable to MRAs:1. Do not work outside the home. Only evil man-hating career women have jobs, plus if you have your own income you'll have more power to cheat on your partner, instead of him cheating on you as is the proper way of things.2. Do not be a homemaker. It means you're just leeching off a man's hard-earned money, plus it's a fake job because everyone knows housework takes no effort and children raise themselves.3. Accept any offer of sex from any man who approaches you. Otherwise you'll hurt his feelings, which is worse than a million rapes.4. Never have sex. It makes you a slut. Also, any woman who has sex instantly contracts a million billion STDs.5. Do not go out with outgoing, self-confident guys. They're hateful "alpha males" and "bad boys."6. Do not go out with introverted, shy guys. They're hateful "manginas" and "white knights."7. Do not go out with women. Lesbians, eww.8. Don't spend any effort on your looks. Only shallow gold-digging bitches do that.9. Don't be fat, ugly, hairy, badly dressed, or visibly older than 25. Only gross lesbian man-haters do that.10. Don't be attractive. Women just do that to frustrate and manipulate men.11. Don't be unattractive. Women just do that to insult and annoy men.12. Never leave a man for any reason.13. Don't hang around boring a man and infecting him with your stupid girly girliness.14. If you get divorced, give your husband custody of the kids.15. If you get divorced, see to it that your husband doesn't have to do any sissy child-rearing.16. Never have an abortion.17. Never have a baby.18. Always pay your own way, support yourself financially and emotionally, and never ask a man for help with anything.19. But don't be independent. What are you, some kind of feminist?
>Cold or Nicko, here's a question for you.How can I get you to like me?Following the golden rule would be a good start.I'm an expert on formal semantics, and my wife teaches rhetoric. Ad hominem is a fallacy, in "informal logic" [1].I'm an expert in being right by virtue of baselessly claiming expertise, and my girlfriend teaches advanced sophistry. Ok that's not true, but seriously, the idea of ad hominem being a logical fallacy surfaced in the late 1800s and depends on the questionable idea that the same argumentative approach can be valid in some situations and a logical fallacy in others.[source 1=”http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~hitchckd/adhominemissa.htm” language=”:”][/source]Those of us who don't accept such a broad definition of "logical fallacy" and who prefer to define them as argumentative approaches that are ALWAYS fallacious don't accept the idea of an "ad hominem fallacy". Every legitimate accusation of an "ad hominem fallacy" is actually the combination of an ad hominem attack and a proper logical fallacy, expressed in the same sentence. There are also a huge number of groundless accusations of it where an ad hominem attack is correctly identified but no proper fallacy has been committed, at least not in that sentence. Amused makes this mistake frequently.
>@SallyStrange,Indeed, that IS good news! Seriously!I guess I'm just not very bright, because I can't seem to fathom how feminists, largely supportive of the birth control pill for women, are seen as deliberately hindering efforts to produce a birth control pill for men. Unless, of course, the more conspiracy-theory minded MRAs think that feminists publicly support birth control for women. while actually abhorring it in private, in order to lull men into a false sense of security so we can later "extort" child support from them.And just think of the other freedoms that await men once a male birth control pill is ready for market! No longer will they have to quit their job when they get married, be fired or forced to resign from work when they have a baby on the way, be banished from school if pregnancy results from the sexual intercourse they've had……. oh, wait……
>Oh, and, spouting fancy foreign verbiage for the purpose of self-aggrandizing — whether it's archaic legal terms or names of sushi — qualifies as pretending to speak a foreign language in a bit to impress people one believes to be dumb.How do you know it's for the purpose of self-aggrandizing? On wait, you don't, you just like talking out of your ass, which incidentally helps to ease my skepticism of you actually being a real lawyer. And yes, I hold a negative opinion of lawyers and of the legal system in general, since when was that a secret?Most people who use Latin terms use so for the purpose of PRECISION. English is a living language and the meanings of words have this pesky tendency to change over time. The use of Latin terms for important concepts is popular in many different academic disciplines precisely because their meanings are unlikely to change, Latin being a dead language and all.Again, when ordering a Japanese dish in a Japanese restaurant by it's Japanese name most people aren't trying to fool the waiter into thinking they speak Japanese; You would have to be an idiot to think that. What they are doing is called "being precise". An order of "miso ramen" is far less likely to be misunderstood than an order of "noodles in a broth containing fermented soybean paste".For someone who acts so superior you sure are ignorant. If you actually did go to college you might want to consider asking for a refund as they really did an awful job of educating you.Calling a genius an idiot, and a decent person a bigot isn't a logical fallacy either. Man, your understanding of logic stinks.Responding to a true statement with another true statement does nothing to demonstrate any lack of understanding of logic on my part, although it certainly would call yours into question if you hadn't already demonstrated it to be piss-poor.