The inhabitants of Reddit’s Men’s Rights subreddit seem to have developed a sudden crush on the authoritarian Chinese government. Why? Well, it seems that the lovable tyrants have decided to crack down on evil golddigger bitches. According to an article in The Telegraph, linked to in the subreddit,
In a bid to temper the rising expectations of Chinese women, China’s Supreme Court has now ruled that from now on, the person who buys the family home, or the parents who advance them the money, will get to keep it after divorce.
“Hopefully this will help educate younger people, especially younger women, to be more independent, and to think of marriage in the right way rather than worshipping money so much,” said Hu Jiachu, a lawyer in Hunan province.
The ruling should also help relieve some of the burden on young Chinese men, many of whom fret about the difficulty of buying even a small apartment.
Never mind that the lopsided demographics in China today — where young men greatly outnumber young women, making it harder for young men to find wives — are not the result of excess feminism, but the result of a toxic mixture of cultural misogyny and the authoritarian regime’s “one child” program. As William Saletan explains the logic in Slate:
Girls are culturally and economically devalued; the government uses powerful financial levers to prevent you from having another child; therefore, to make sure you can have a boy, you abort the girl you’re carrying.
The result? 16 million “missing girls” in China. Ironically, the skewed ratio of men to women gives young women considerable leverage in chosing whom to marry – and that’s what the Men’s Rightser’s seem to see as the real injustice here.
As Evil Pundit wrote, evidently speaking for many (given the numerous upvotes he got):
Wow. I’ve always disliked the authoritarian Chinese government, but for once, it’s done something good.
I may need to reconsider my attitude.
IncrediblyFatMan added:
China wants to become the next superpower and world leader. They aren’t going to do it by allowing the kinds of social decay that rot away at the competing nations.
Revorob joked:
If they brought that in over here, most women in Australia would be living on the street.
“Or,” Fondueguy quipped in response, “they could learn to work.”
At the moment, all the comments in the thread praising the Chinese government for this move (and there are many more) have net upvotes; the only comment in the negative? One suggesting that the Telegraph isn’t exactly a reliable source.
Speaking of which, here’s a more balanced look at the issue on China.org.cn that examines some of the consequences of the new ruling for Chinese women.
Let’s look at some of those. According to one Beijing lawyer quoted in the piece:
“[H]ousewives, especially those in the rural areas who have no job and are responsible for taking care of their families, will be affected most by this new change,” she said. “If their husbands want a divorce, they are likely to be kicked out of the house with nothing.”
Luo Huilan, a professor of women’s studies at China Women’s University in Beijing, agreed.
In rural areas, she said, men have the final say in family matters. All essential family assets, such as home, car and bank deposits, are registered in the men’s names, and women fill the roles of only wife, mother and farmworker.
“Their labor, though substantial, hardly gets recognition. Without a good education, they have to rely heavily on their husbands,” Luo said. “In case of divorce, a woman is driven out of her husband’s life, home and family, and finds herself an alien even in her parents’ home. No wonder the new interpretation of the Marriage Law has aroused concern among women.”
And no wonder it’s drawn cheers on the Men’s Rights subreddit.
OK, Larval NWO (aka Brandon), we get it. You are a weasel. Apologies to weasels!
@Lyn: I could actually talk to you. At least you try and see what I am trying to say. Make your opinion known without insults and even disagree with me respectfully.
And I can even see and understand the whole responsibilities/benefits comment.
Brandon: @Cynical: umm…adoption.
@Elizabeth: Ah Texas. Still adoption.
That, son, isn’t an answer to the question. That’s an issue of forcing someone to rear a child. You asked about bodily autonomy. Bodily autonomy is about being forced to bear the child; bring it to term, be pregnant
You asked, they answered, you were wrong.
Aw, Lyn, he likes you. Doesn’t that feel great?
Brandon, do you have any idea how patronizing, condescending, and totally off-putting you are?
Brandon: You say you are an equalist, but you also say you won’t work against your interests as a man. You then dismiss all the benefits you are presently enjoying (i.e. being able to live the independent lifestyle you presently enjoy; and think others who choose to get married instead are stupid for doing), and insist that until one issue becomes top of the feminist agenda, you won’t lift finger one to stop them.
Ever wonder why women have more of those part time jobs? It couldn’t be that they are denied the full-time jobs in favor of men could it? Nah… that would never happen.
Promotion bias could be attributed to men being more aggressive with asking/demanding raises or better learned negotiating skills.
It could also be that when women try to aggressively negotiate for promotions and raises they are seen as “demanding, and bitchy”.
Rutee: He was also dishonest about his actual reasons for opposing the draft. He made complaints about being forced to kill/die for the country.
Then he admitted to being a 19D, which is army speak for a Cavalry Scout. He spent years in the role of being forward of the FLOT (Front Line of Troops) in the FEBA (Forward Edge of Battle Area) so he could, Find and Fix, the enemy location, and the Tanks/Infantry/Helicopter Gunships/Air Force “Fast Movers” could come in and blow them away.
One does that by shooting at them, if one can safely do so.
So while he may have a moral objection to the draft, as a form of involuntary servitude, we can say it’s not that he is a Conscientious Objector, who will only serve in times of direct threat to the nation. He volunteered. He was one of A.E. Houseman’s, Army of Mercenaries only he tried to hide it, and dress his objections to the draft as moral in a way he thought would be more pleasing to his audience, while hiding his active willingness to kill.
Bullshit. Your ‘source’ linked to one utterly useless talking point (It’s not questioned that men dominate the most dangerous jobs; those aren’t the jobs that actually generate the real disparity in wealth between men as an aggregate and women as an aggregate, but nice try) and the second corroborates what I said about a gender gap in STEM hiring. It’s not an academic paper, it’s motherfucking popular reporting. Only one of these is important. You can’t actually look at data objectively, I know, but you didn’t link to a real source; you linked to a dude making assertion. I linked to motherfucking studies.
I know you have a problem with reality brandon. If you were still my target I wouldn’t call you out for the piece of human garbage you are. You are no longer the intended beneficiary. You are a slimeball who’s opinion is less than worthless to me. You may do what you wish, and claim what you wish, continuing with standard libertarian dishonesty as you are wont to do. I will continue to crush your stupid assertions. It’s abundantly clear you never wanted an honest discussion, why do you think I still care about you, specifically?
Brandon: I guess it is because you see the world as women and can’t possibly see how things could possibly affect men. If you have been a woman since you were born (no trans) then you just can’t even see what struggles and demands are placed on men…because you haven’t lived as one.
Dude, get over yourself. I’ve been a man all my life… this is such nonsense.
Brandon: @Lyn: I could actually talk to you. At least you try and see what I am trying to say. Make your opinion known without insults and even disagree with me respectfully.
Honestly… you’ve not earned much respect. Recall what I said about your tone, your buried content, and the way you engage in deniable slurs… I’m not the only one who see it, and it’s not winning you points.
You are getting more respect than you deserve, at this point. You move goalposts, refuse to look at evidence, dismiss what evidence you deign to glance at; and then say comparing a newspaper article to several actual papers is merely playing games with statistics.
You make declarative sentences, and then when they are quoted back at you, say you are having your words twisted. You tell people they have rights they don’t, privileges they don’t and you are the one suffering.
Then you get your skivvies in a twist because they use harsh language.
Aw.. diddums. They hurt your widdel feewings when they called you, the Cav Scout, a fucking idiot.
I guess it’s true what they say, the truth hurts.
@Hellkell: Yes, I am going to throw out all my former opinions and ask Lyn to marry me. We can have kids and she can be a SAHM if she likes.
Ya, it is really patronizing to disagree with people without hurling insults like stupid and idiot at people.
@Pecunium: Again…the institution of marriage is foolish to enter IMO. That says nothing about the people that enter it. I have issues with public education policies that doesn’t mean I hate teachers. I don’t like the wars being fought, that doesn’t mean I don’t respect the soldiers that are fighting it.
Maybe women like working part time work and they made that choice themselves. Is their any right answer that doesn’t blame men for every problem women face? Oh yea…anyone with a penis is wrong and an oppressive asshole.
Ya, and weak willed, introverted men are often called pussies…what is your point. Being demanding is the cost of getting promoted. What do you want more? Being called demanding or getting more money? There are no “consequence free” decisions. Every decision has its pro’s and con’s. Men that become managers often feel alienated from the staff that he was once associated with because he now has to tell them what to do and the same level of camaraderie is gone.
I wasn’t being dishonest. I joined the Army over 10 years ago because I didn’t have any direction in life and life was pretty boring. I thought being a Scout would be interesting and thrilling. Also, we were at peace when I joined so while I knew what the job entailed, we weren’t fighting a war.
Also, I voluntarily entered into that arrangement. There is a big difference between willingly accepting part of your job is shooting at people and forcing people to fight a war they think is immoral and force them to potentially kill people. My decision was of my own choice…I wasn’t coerced which is what Selective Service would be if the draft was instituted again.
Hellkell – ‘great’ isn’t really the term I’d use to describe it 🙁
Also, Brandon, thanks for the compliment about how comprehensible my argument was – but I’m wondering if you plan to actually respond to my points and agree and change your position or disagree? That might facilitate more of the productive debate you say you’re after.
Are you including DKM in your list? Because he is a White Nationalist who literally yearns for the day when most women are killed, leaving a small coterie as slaves/source DNA for a project to breed more submissive females.
Brandon, I was talking about your overall attitude. You really are a fan of selective reading. Also, apostrophe abuse.
@Lyn: Just that I can understand that women do have to actually deal with the nine months of pregnancy so they should get more of a say since it is their body that is carrying the child.
Personally, I think a lot of these issues will dissolve when a newer form of male birth control comes out. I think men shouldn’t completely rely on their sex partners for birth control and hopefully men will have an option soon. I think it would certainly get rid of men that say “She tricked me”…since you can just ask “Did you take your SpermKiller4000?”.
This will give men for the first time a way to control when they want to become a father. Thus it would be his own damn fault if he became a father when he didn’t want to.
I agree that there should be more contraceptive options out there – it would be great if we could all have more ways to avoid the unwanted babies thing.
The whole contraception thing is actually pretty fascinating – the fact that many women (mostly non-white women or women from lower socio economic groups) were experimented on with contraceptive pills that had epically awful side-effects, many underwent forced sterilisation (eugenics in the US – really uncool), single women were denied access to it, and that the focus on coming up with contraception for women was based on the thinking that women were sexual gatekeepers with all of the responsibilities and few of the rights – all of these things sucked and were based on anti-feminist thinking that wasn’t about bodily autonomy for women at all. I mean, the pill has been shown to decrease muscle-mass – can you imagine guys volunteering to use a contraceptive method that made building muscle harder? But making women weaker, that’s no big. Grr.
More contraceptive options for men would be a great thing! Although, men can use condoms now if you want to say “it would be his own damn fault if he became a father when he didn’t want to.”
Condoms can break and it just acts as a barrier. Contraceptives like RISUG actually destroy sperm. So even if the condom breaks…nothing. I still think they should call it SpermKiller4000.
The pill / implant can fail, too. Belt and braces is the way to go 🙂
This was your exact request:
I responded quite literally with a scenario that can happen-a man could take a woman in a remote area of the country, Texas for instance, and remove her travel options. Because she is dependent on him for travel, she lacks access to birth control (such as the Pill) if he refuses to take her to a clinic where she can obtain it. In theory, she could have an IUD that she obtained prior to this move but they can and do fall out. If he refuses to use a condom, she will get pregnant. He, once again, has control of the travel and therefore she cannot obtain an abortion.
That can and does happen. In fact, in the case of an abuser, the woman does not have to be in a remote place to lack access to transportation. He can also sabotage her birth control methods. Ergo, she becomes pregnant.
Because less then 20% of counties in this country lack an abortion provider, she could easily be in a section of the country where she is unable to get an abortion. And again, in the case of an abuser, the woman will not be able to escape to get the abortion.
So she has to carry a fetus for nine months-against her will.
You then responded with a flippant and dismissive response to a woman being forced to have a child against her will:
As if the previous nine months did not exist for this woman who is forced to have a child she does not want.
Then when I followed up with the fact that men have taken away from women reproductive choice by de-funding Planned Parenthood, you immediately complained I twisted your words when I responded exactly to what you had said with a real scenario and followed up with a case of policy being forced on women in New Hampshire. And posted links to back up what I was saying.
You were and are wrong about women not possibly being forced to have children against their will.
So how was what I said at all anywhere near “twisting your words” to mean something other then they do-what possible meaning besides pregnancy could “have a child” mean? And since when does public health policy not impact how a woman’s reproductive life will go? And finally, what kind of respect do you expect to get when you refuse to be honest in your debating style?
Brandon: A woman who is called a bitch is seen as, “difficult to work with” and doesn’t get promoted. That’s the point.
You made a big deal about the killing and the dying. You didn’t make it an argument about the actual problem of forcing people to give up years of their lives. You made it seem that you objected to the killing and dying.
But that’s part and parcel of the way you don’t say what you think your saying. You have insulted people who think marriage is a good idea. You’ve called the men stupid, and the women freeloaders.
You’ve said you agree with the ideas in that comic. The one that ended with calling feminists a bunch of foul names.
You’ve said you won’t help feminists, unless they put your interests ahead of theirs.
You’ve said you will never support anything you see as diminishing your present status, which means you are against most of the actual aims of feminism, since men have the preferred status in most of our society.
You’ve said, in the face of laundry lists to the contrary, that the only thing feminism has been good for is more men getting laid.
And you have, consistently, ignored any number of responses to things you’ve said, in preference to complaining that, in light of all that I just said people have been incivil to you.
They’ve not. Civil does not mean something which might be possibly painful to hear is never said. Civil means treating people as rational human beings. It means not insulting them casually (which you have). It means not misrepresenting their positions (which you have; you said I was defending marriage, when I was pointing out you are wrong about the possibility of replicating it with private agreements; because many of those agreements are only recognised/enforceable, if one is married).
In short, civil /= polite words. Civil = interactions in good faith/honestly performed.
I know you will say you have acted in such a manner. I disagree.
What a gem. Bodily agency is “retarded” apparently.
And Brandon I’m still waiting to hear how I, as a single woman, can order you to have a child? Do I have to do it in all caps to make it an official contract? BRANDON YOU MUST BE A FATHER like that? 😀
Of course! The magic of ALL CAPS can solve all Brandon’s problems! Marriage contract – small letters, register for the draft – small letters. Suddenly he has no obligations!
And BRANDON YOU MUST BE A FATHER is very difficult to read in any other voice than Darth Vader 🙂
Yeah, you can say that it’s unfair that a woman can force a man to become a parent while a man can’t do the same. But once again, Brandon is in denial about how mammals work.
This unfairness is more than mitigated by the unfairness of pregnancy. The uterus-bearer has to undergo the fatigue, nausea, discrimination in the workplace, forgetfulness, mood swings, ligament pain, heartburn, general physical discomfort of late pregnancy, changes in skin, hair, metabolism, inability to take most medications (it’s ragweed season, people, and all I can take is Benadryl and use a neti pot…I am about ready to murder someone), unwanted belly-groping by strangers, endless doctor’s appointments, invasive and possibly unnecessary interventions, not to mention the whole “giving birth” thing, followed by breastfeeding which is taboo in most public places and is not accomodated by most employers, but if you give up and use formula then you’re OMG the worst mother ever. The non-pregnant partner has to…what? Zie can be as supportive or unsupportive as zie chooses. Zie can be there for all the appointments and console the pregnant partner during crying jags, assist at the birth, change 50% of the diapers, take late-night bottle feedings, and be a good partner and parent. Or zie can do nothing at all. Zie has a choice, while the pregnant party does not. I can’t say, “I think I’ll opt out of having my feet swell a shoe size!” but my husband can say, “Meh, I don’t feel like going with you to the midwife this time” (not that he would, but he could).
So yeah, it’s not fair that cismen don’t have uteri. And it’s really, really unfair that the biological heavy lifting of reproduction is done by ciswomen (and transmen who retain their uteri). But guess which one gets Brandon all upset?
The one that he does not have total control over.
@Pecunium: As if male co-workers can’t be seen as “difficult to work with”. What do they do? They deal with it, fight with management or get a new job. Sometimes if you want to get ahead in life, you have to do unpopular things. What do you want everyone to do when someone gets promoted? Clap and cheer. Some will, some won’t. You can’t make people feel differently about you. What are you trying to change? Preventing people from thinking you’re an asshole or a bitch…ya, good luck with that.
Maybe I should have been clearer. Forcing people to pick up a rifle and shoot at people is immoral. People voluntarily doing it isn’t totally immoral since they are acting themselves without a third party forcing you to do it. It isn’t the draft that is the big issue…it is the government force that I disagree with. And the fact that men are the only ones required to sign up for Selective Service.
Again, if I criticized the Dept. of Education that doesn’t mean I think teachers are stupid. Yet again, I am repeating myself and this premise is being ignored. People have free will to do what ever they want as long as they don’t hurt anyone physically or deceive them. I also think parts of the Federal Government are flat out useless…that doesn’t make me un-american.
Get it…criticizing a system does not mean I am criticizing the people within that system. If people want to get married…so be it. It is not my place to tell them what to do. And when a man says “I’m married”, I don’t automatically think “You stupid twit”. It’s more like “Whatever makes you happy man”
And even if I thought they were stupid for getting married…that doesn’t make them stupid. It just makes that decision stupid. A persons intelligence isn’t based on one decision.
I didn’t call women freeloaders. I just pointed out that the benefits of marriage benefit women more so than men. This doesn’t really have anything to do with gender-neutral language in the law, but by observing the real world itself. If the marriage dissolves the breadwinner is sometimes forced by the courts to support the non-breadwinner. This process can be avoided in most states by not getting married (my preferred choice), marrying someone that earns roughly the same as you (not guaranteed to last forever) and you or your partner not removing themselves from the job market by becoming a SAHM/F
I also mentioned the comic was exaggerated and full of insults and that it wasn’t a complete representation. I was trying to make the point that if a non-feminist shared an opinion that goes against feminist dogma, that person is mocked (and not just on ManBoobz). As if feminists have a perfect world view and any criticism of it makes the criticizer stupid.
It’s not like I am actively blocking feminist policies. I am just one working class stiff that goes to work, hangs out with friends and my girlfriend, sleeps and does it again the next day. If some news headline made the claim “Women’s pay completely equal to men’s” I wouldn’t get in a tizzy and start complaining. I would just say “that’s nice” and get up and go to work.
My main point was that the feminist movement seems hostile to the majority of men yet they still want those men to vote, advocate and generally help feminists enact their policies. I find this contradicting and rather illogical. Why would men want to help an organization or movement that doesn’t want their input?
Civil just means to act in a mannerly way. It doesn’t mean you have to completely agree with everything that someone says. Sharing controversial ideas respectfully (e,g no name calling) isn’t the same as being disrespectful and uncivil. I have not called anyone here stupid, bitch, cunt or any other slur. If someone has inferred an insult from something I wrote…it wasn’t my intention.
I think you will disagree with me as well.