From Human Stupidity, an MRA blog rather obsessed with underage girls and the alleged evil of age of consent laws:
[I]f a 15 year old … can decide to have sex with a 16 year old … [h]ow come she cannot have sex with a 35 year old? Age discrimination by law?
Are you worried about manipulation of the tender 15 year old? I have a solution:
what about legalizing sex with underage adolescents, if they first undergo an hour of mandatory counselling and a 2 day cool off period? That should take care of this issue. This would guarantee safety for the 15 year old against being conned or manipulated. More safety that is offered to 21 year old tipsy Friday night party girls who may feel sorry for what they did yesterday
I think he might actually be serious here. Though it’s pretty clear he’d be happy with any excuse to make it legal for 35 year-old men to have sex with 15 year-old girls.
Hey! Vait, hy vas told der vould be cake!
Sounds like Brandon’s not going to be a major activist for feminism, guys, and I don’t know about you, but I’m willing to let this particular fish go.
*wipes hands briskly together, as if knocking off dust*
Just an aside, most feminists don’t envision patriarchy as a thing stamping on women’s faces forever. Rather, it’s a system that no individual came up with, but is instead a bunch of cobbled together approaches to men and women that are sexist – for example that men are always suited for breadwinning and women are really mainly good at childrearing. Oh, and that other ‘domestic’ stuff like cooking, cleaning and buying clothes, you know, essential life skills required to keep you fed, healthy and a comfortable temperature. Patriarchy has evolved over history and isn’t all that internally consistent.
So no, not an EVIL MENZ conspiracy, but a complicated collection of approaches to gender which serve to construct men and women as opposites, essentialise their differences as inherent to ALL men and women, and generally make everyone feel bad about not being exactly like the mythical ideal man or woman (which is supposed to match up with the genitals you were born with, or something).
Brandon there are plenty of male feminists. Most feminist groups do not reject men simply because they have a penis. As you can see we have many male supporters here on manboobz and many of us have supportive male partners/friends/family members irl. What many groups do have a problem with are individuals with huge amounts of entitlement and privilege telling them exactly how they ought to run things. Kind of like what you’re doing right now.
yeah… no, it doesn’t work that way.
I’m not asking for political favors from random idiots on the street. I’m asking for people who believe in equality to work for it. I’m not going to give you cookies* for working towards your beliefs. I specified that an actual ally believes in equality on their own. I’d be pretty pissed if a feminist told me “OMG AFTER ALL THE WORK I DID FOR THE GAYS THOSE GAY MEN WERE STILL MISOGYNIST”, because shit don’t work that way. Either you believe in equal rights, and you work towards it, or you don’t (Or do, but I’m certainly not going to do anything back randomly; I’ll accept a particular trade in political terms, but those are generally done between politicians, and I’m not familiar with activist movements trading favors between themselves when particular laws weren’t on the line. I’m not randomly going to work on your goals just because you worked on mine, quite frankly mine aren’t going to be completed in my lifetime and I have personal life shit too).
Just get the hell out and stop complaining. That you’re willing to make this threat at all, “YOU HELP ME OR I QUIT”, tells me you don’t really believe in these goals. Go fuck right off, I don’t give a shit. Any of your shit that’s on my list, I’ll work on, but I ain’t going to do shit for you that I wasn’t already going to.
*I’m pretty sure I’m in charge of planning the victory party. It’s not a reward though, it’s a celebration. Currently stuck between making one really fucking huge cake, to make sure there’s enough for everyone (Literally every person on the planet, because it’s not really victory if you’re not actually done), or making tons and tons of little cakes and pies and other pastries. Pretty sure the latter one lets me get party hats for everypony too.
@Molly: My philosophy is that of borderline hedonism. I work, save my money and invest, travel, date, and pretty much live the life a lot of men claim they want to live. I am working towards building a online business so I can earn money where ever I am. Possibly move to Thailand. It seems pretty well established, cheaper than the US and the beaches look amazing (cheap beachhouses!). I would get to earn a living, live in a foreign country cheap and experience something other than American culture for longer than a vacation.
So while my philosophy might be different from yours…I pretty much have my “ducks in a row” so to speak.
Women get equality, manginas get harems. Duh. Classic win-win!
Brandon, what’s that even have to do with what we’re discussing? XD
I mean, yeah, you can say “I’m a hedonist”, and pretty much stop there, because you’re basically saying “I’m in it for me”. But did you have to boast about your beach house?
I think it’s very important to this post and this discussion to point out that I’m thinking planning a trip to Alaska, because I really like the landscapes there and I have a friend who’s a firefighter in Alaska and I haven’t talked to her in such a long time and I’ve always thought that an Alaska trip would be a wonderful thing but I worry that logistically it might be hard to do in cold weather because I bet a lot of roads just close up there and I’d be stuck in Anchorage the whole time which would be boring so I might have to wait for next summer.
…Aren’t irrelevant details about my personal life a wonderful contribution to feminist discourse? Anyway, I refuse to support the feminist movement until some feminists get me a ticket to Alaska, otherwise there’s just nothing in it for me.
No, no, Holly, you’re doing it wrong! You’re supposed to take the fact that you have the money and leisure and business know-how to take a trip to Alaska and then *rub it in our faces*! Because that’ll show us how we’re wrong about feminism!
“As I said earlier, if the issue is economic or legal based I pretty much toe the feminist line.”
Wake up. The feminist bigots have written sexist man-hate into every law in the land. When your turn comes, do you think these bigots are going to spare you because you toed the feminist line?
Walk away from these fascists. The MRM both needs and wants you. We are fighting for equality, dignity, justice, and liberty.
The feminist bigots wrote sexist man-hate into traffic laws? Into zoning laws? Into livestock handling laws?
Dang.
…since when has anyone let a feminist write laws, anyway? I thought legislators did that, and God knows there’s not a whole lot of overlap there.
Hrm… last time I checked women weren’t allowed to have anything to do with law writing up for the first 100+ years of American history. Of course I just have a hate filled ladybrain. What do I know?
Antz, Brandon won’t join you unless there’s a definite benefit in it for him. I think you need to hurry up on the VR.
Also, I started a web business when I was in high school and am in the process of starting another. I save money, go backpacking, date, and basically live the life many vanilla people wish they lived. I often go to NYC just because I can, where I take part in orgies and discuss literature with beautiful women. You WISH you were me, motherfuckers!
@Lyn Just so we are clear my definition of patriarchy is one where fathers control their wives, children and home. This concept is practically dead. With the rise of single mothers, women in the workplace and family court’s making judgements in favor of women. I can’t really see a part of wives, children a home that a man controls legally. No-fault divorces further erode the concept of a patriarchy since marriage can be terminated easily and with no blame placed on either party.
Society can dictate “social norms” all it wants. You don’t have to follow them. I get a lot of flack from family since I refuse to get married and “settle down” but in the end, I live my life and not them. It is basically society giving you :”unwarranted advice” constantly. But you still have control over your decisions. You don’t want to get married…don’t. Don’t want kids then don’t. and so on and so on. Fuck what people think. I do whatever the hell I want (legally of course) and have to listen to friends and family suggest an “more traditional lifestyle”. I ignore them and go about my business.
@ClioPersephone: I am not telling anyone how to run their affairs. I was however pointing out a potential consequence of not being more inclusive to men and men that might not completely agree with feminism but only parts of it.
@Molly: I don’t have a beach house…I want one though!
Uh, I guess you can define patriarchy however you like. You can define patriarchy as a pathological dislike of ice cream. Or elephants! Doesn’t mean that that’s what feminism thinks patriarchy is, to that that is what feminism is fighting against.
I fucking love that picture of Bill Bailey. I know I’m not adding much to the conversation here, but seriously, the dude’s awesome.
What you were saying was that feminism needs to “do something” for men in order to gain their support. Quite frankly I don’t want support from anyone, man or woman, who only believes in parts of feminism. I feel the same way about all the movements I’m part of that seek equality.
It’s pretty straightforward, either you support equality or you don’t. You can’t say, “Well I agree that women should get a,b,c but they shouldn’t get/don’t need e,f,g.” That type of thinking just doesn’t work and you can see that in many movements throughout history.
@Anthony: Trust me, I am not appeasing anyone. I am not toeing the feminist line to win favor with feminists. I toe it because I actually believe women should earn the same if the same work is done. My comment to molly a while back talks about what parts of feminism I believe in and parts I don’t.
“An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile – hoping it will eat him last” – Winston Churchill
I think the MRM is still in it’s infancy. It needs to get it’s goals set up and shake out all the woman hating assholes. We need women Tony so when certain dumbasses start claiming women are like Pol Pot…that won’t help the MRM’s cause. I won’t be a part of something that openly attacks women like that.
Just like I agree with parts of feminism, I also agree with parts of the MRM. Things like anti-male bias in the media, fighting Title IX, Marriage, child support, shared parenting, boys are failing in primary schools, making government programs gender-neutral (VAWA), getting rid of the idea that all men are rapists, anonymity in rape accusations, combating paternity fraud.
Those are issues that feminists actively oppose or don’t really want to fight for. That is the MRM’s purpose. To take care of issues feminists don’t want to do. The MRM needs to focus on the issues and make the laws fair and equal without getting overly emotional and bashing women. Stick to the issues and not the emotions behind them.
Listen man, we need women period. We need them for reproduction, emotional support, to love and to see things from another perspective. So I have a big issue when some dumbass on some MGTOW site makes some claim that women are trying to turn us into slaves. I just can’t see my mother or girlfriend trying to make me a slave. Second, they wouldn’t be able to anyways because I wouldn’t put myself in a position where they could.
I try to see the good in everything and while feminism has over reached in certain areas it has helped men (probably involuntarily). Sex outside of marriage, made dating more casual, and cheaper and a host of other things. Don’t be a reactionary dude. Accept the world for what it is now. It is easier to change yourself than change the world. At least you can control yourself.
Those that don’t adapt…die.
Right, go fuck off Brandon. You believe in stupidity. Shit, you cited VAWA as something you want gender neutral, when it already *IS*. You are stone-cold stupid, and you deserve far worse than you’ve gotten on this site already.
But I knew you were stone cold stupid already, I suppose, you’re just helping make sure everyone else can see it too.
Really? What a novel experience. Society gives you unwarranted advice? You mean, like, totally unsolicited? Family tells you to settle down and have kids? I can’t imagine having to put up with things like that — social pressures to marry? Are you serious? It’s so far outside of my experience as a young single childfree woman I can’t even imagine it. Goodness! Societal pressure! Whatever is that like?
@Bagelsan: The point is I ignore it…I don’t go out and try and change how people think. I just filter it out. I don’t meddle. They can talk all they want, they cant make me sign a marriage license or impregnate my girlfriend. All they can do is talk…and I can ignore them.
Definitely involuntarily. Never forget that — despite the gains that feminism has made for men and women alike and the warm welcome that most feminist men get in feminist circles and the love and support that many feminists have given to men on an individual basis — feminists hate men.
But if you did impregnate your girlfriend — or someone else did — they could force her to carry it to term, or punish her financially and socially for not having your signature on that license before she got pregnant. How do you suggest she should ignore that?
@Bagelsan: Again, I never explicitly said feminists hate men. I did however acknowledge feminists getting the label of man-hater.
Also, advocating for womens rights benefited men to a certain extent, but I don’t think that it was in feminist plans to benefit men the way they did.