Ugh. No jokes this time, just an appalling little exchange on Reddit’s Men’s Rights subreddit. First, a Redditor called xbyiu offers some unsolicited, and pretty pig-ignorant, thoughts about SlutWalks. The basic thesis:
Personally, I think a lot of feminists just don’t care about rape victims. They’d much rather see women as a whole being a victim of the patriarchy and fight against that sort of abstract idea then deal with the reality of rape, which can be fought against with simple tips on how to protect yourself.
Hold on; it gets worse.
To this the r/mr regular EvilPundit replied (in a comment that, last I checked, had gotten three times more upvotes than downvotes):
I’d go even further, and say that many feminists love rape. For them, it’s a perfect way to demonise men in general.
If rape didn’t exist, feminism would invent it. In fact, feminism does invent a lot of rape, with its imaginary statistics such as “1 in 4”, and so on.
In other words, feminists don’t really want to prevent rape. But most rape is imaginary. So feminists are trying to not prevent something that doesn’t much happen anyway. Brilliant.
A note on the “1 in 4” thing: EvilPundit’s insinuation that it’s an “imaginary statistic” is a common MRA talking point. It’s not imaginary, but it’s not quite accurate either. The one-in-four number comes from a study conducted in the 80s by researcher Mary Koss: based on a detailed survey of college women, she found that roughly one in four of her respondent had been a victim of rape or attempted rape since the age of 14. This is often simplified – and distorted – into “one in four female college students are raped while in college.”
In fact, Koss’ survey found that one in eight college women answering her survey, not one in four, had been the victim of completed rape. Other studies have reported numbers not far off from this. The National Violence Against Women Survey, for example, found that roughly one in six of female respondents reported being the victim of rape in their lifetime.
The fact that some people have misrepresented Koss’ study doesn’t mean that her findings are “imaginary.”
I’m not even sure why I’m writing all this, given that as a feminist I presumably don’t care at all about rape.
Pic above taken from here.
EDITED TO ADD: EvilPundit’s comment has gotten some downvotes since I posted this, but it still has more upvotes than downvotes.
How brave of that boy to come forward. Kudos to him. Slut walk seems to be doing more for male victims of rape than MRAs ever did.
“I would love to see an MRA explain this delightful double standard.”
its in teh bible dagnabbit!!!!1 and its teh natural orderz of things!!!
Could have fooled me.
MARL, anyone calling women the names you do, hates women with every fiber of his being. You have not even been able to contain your hatred long enough to get a longer post approved.
I think Simon was reading a different thread, or reading this thread from a parallel dimension.
“I’m tempting to think this is just human hubris, probably rooted in a denial of our roots. Other primates like chimps don’t have such a harmonious relationship between the sexes, too.
Why should humans be different, maybe it’s just meant to be that way.”
Okay so why don’t we just go out in the forest and fling crap at each other then?
Lemme guess, you’re one of those people that believe we’re nothing but animals and should just accept it and not try to better ourselves right? I noticed this type is common among MRAs too.
Here’s the thing, actual animals don’t know better, humans do. Humans may be animals, we may have animal instincts, but we have the capacity to rise above certain instincts that cause harm to other humans. We have the capacity for ethics and to think up crazy notions of equality too. Notice also that there are no animals out there that purposely discriminate and are bigoted to other animals. They simply don’t know better. Humans on the other hand do. The ones that claim that they don’t, simply don’t want to. They’re just rationalizing being a douche by blaming it on our animalistic roots.
Animals kill, it is a natural instinct after all. Yet we as a society don’t accept it. Why are we more tolerant of things like sexism then? or other forms of discrimination?
Your types would honestly be better off forming your own society, away from people who are capable of making rational decisions to, you know, not be an ass to someone because of their gender or race.
How angry it must make MRAL to not be able to control everyone, everywhere, all the time.
MRAL: “I don’t hate women.”
Jack Torrance: “Wendy? Darling? Light! Of my liffffe. I’m not gonna hurt ya. You didn’t let me finish my sentence. I said, I’m not gonna hurt ya. I’m just going to bash your brains in. I’m gonna bash ’em right. The fuck. In.” (The Shining, 1980)
MRAL: If you don’t hate women, why call them “gashes”? I explained very patiently how that was related to a hatred of women.
I’m leaving.
I don’t hate women.
You know, posting such a blatant untruth while quite possibly convincing yourself that it’s actually true isn’t altogether unlike an accomplishment. That’s significantly more than I expected of you, MRAL. Well done, sir.
When I was at the Toronto Slutwalk there were a few women with signs saying “this is what I wore when I was raped, did I deserve it?” Their clothing style were each different, but it was a far cry from “sexy.” One was wearing jeans and a sweater, one sweat-pants, etc.
What someone wears has nothing to do with anything, and a lot of people missed the point. Rapist must be held accountable for their actions. Period. No excuses.
@Simon: *Giant eyeroll* Here we go again with this stupid bullshit.
Our “roots”? Listen pal, if you want to be true to your roots, maybe you should recall that we evolved from unicellular organisms that reproduced asexually. Perhaps when you feel like fucking a woman (if you are straight, that is), you just aren’t being true to your “roots”.
Three major reasons why we shouldn’t model our behavior on that of chimps:
1. We are our own species — a fact you are clearly forgetting. We have our own characteristics, our own behaviors, and our own evolutionary future. The fact that humans and chimps have a common ancestor doesn’t matter, because at some point in our history, our evolutionary paths diverged. Chimps went one way biologically and we went another. There is no more reason for humans to model our behavior on chimps than for chimps to model their behavior on humans.
2. People who complain about people not being true to their supposed “roots” (incidentally: you don’t understand evolution) are invariably selective about which roots we should be true to. You think we should model sexual relationships on those of chimps, but something tells me you wouldn’t want to live your life swinging from a tree, having feces flung at you, eating typical chimp diet or being deprived of the innumerable conveniences that civilization provides, including law and order. You don’t actually want to live like a chimp, do you? I bet not. So stop invoking “roots” as a justification for acting like a pig.
3. If you advocate evolutionary regression, I really don’t see why you pick chimps (apart from the fact that chimps aren’t our ancestors) as the point to which to regress. Why not more archaic animals? After all, contrary to popular belief in certain parts of our great nation that shall remain unnamed, the evolution didn’t begin with monkeys.
And speaking of hubris — pseudo-intellectual rationalization would be a prime example of it.
1: that’s called the naturalistic fallacy. 2: humans exhibit diverse societies. The notion that there is one way for society to be is to ignore human nature.
Yes, he does have a different system of values. A stupid system.
I’m not seeing the contradiction. Part of the point of pointing out that the way one dresses does not affect one’s chances of being raped is to counteract victim blaming. The other part of the point is that it’s true.
That’s because the notion of “involuntary celibacy” implies an entitlement to someone else’s body. In other words, the notion imagines some kind of obligation for someone else to give them sex. And yes, a bunch of men getting themselves angry about how women won’t give them sex is scary in its own way. I think there’s legitimate concern that people doing such a thing will rape someone and feel justified in doing so.
Anyway, I write you off as a fool who won’t absorb anything I say. Feel free to prove me wrong.
It’s funny how Simon can write a list of what he clearly thinks are shocking contradictions without any of them actually being contradictory at all.
“You say that we have to teach men, that how a woman dresses doesn’t give them the right to rape her.”
I don’t think this is actually the case, we’re more saying that no-one has a right to rape anyone. No matter what. Clothes, hair, that funny thing the victim does that you find endearing, or that made you angry…none of these things gives anyone a right to rape anyone.
Simon, not all men who can’t get laid become entitled, bitter and women-blaming. My boyfriend got his first kiss at 22 and is the sweetest and most reasonable– not to mention feminist– guy you could hope to meet. Entitled, bitter and woman-blaming is what we find scary, not celibacy. Entitled, bitter, woman-blaming guys who get laid a lot? Also scary!
If we modeled our behavior on chimps, each woman would go into heat for a brief period about once a month, at which point all the men in town would line up and have sex with her one after the other. I guess we could try that for a while, see how it works out.
That’s just your standard chimpanzees; bonobos have this whole complicated social structure based on who’s having sex with who.
So, only 6-15% of men self-report acts that meet the legal definition of rape, but of those, the average number of rapes is 5.8. So yes, it’s true both that rape is, at least, not uncommon, and that the typical MRM line of SLUT DESERVED IT! is not something that most men (or most people) seem to believe.
Or another way of looking at it is that there are many myths about rape that make it difficult to punish rapists and easy for rapists to get away it, that those myths are held in common among many in our culture, and that they tend to be the same shitty myths that MRAs like to trade in. And yet MRA misogyny transforms those myths into something separate from what other people believe. I dunno, Simon. It’s not that difficult to understand.
Hmm, you have this one a bit twisted. The men and women who say and think things like “How a woman dresses means that others have the right to rape her” should be taught that how a woman dresses doesn’t give anyone the right to rape her. Because the way a woman dresses does not give anyone the right to rape her; and furthermore, people in ALL manner of dress do get raped. Completely consistent.
Nah. I said that having access to consensual sex doesn’t mean someone isn’t a rapist. And … what’s an incel? In any case, no one’s scared of bitter MRAs (unless they are making threats of violence, I suppose — and make no mistake: some do). All that bitterness and blaming is just kinda annoying.
“If we modeled our behavior on chimps, each woman would go into heat for a brief period about once a month, at which point all the men in town would line up and have sex with her one after the other. I guess we could try that for a while, see how it works out.”
But then of course you know she’d be labeled a Slutty McSlut for doing so. Why though?? it’s in our NATURE!
If we modeled our behavior on bonobos, we’d fuck all the time, but we’d be ruled by a tight-knit group of older females. Don’t think the MRAM would go for that.
1/6 lifetime is common. The level of misogyny in the MRM, in general, is not.
However, their attitudes about rape *are* frightfully common. But we also mock the general culture for that jackassery.
Yepperoni. Both parts have to do with victim blaming. Rapists don’t generally care what hte victim was wearing; the general public always seems to. Both parts are aimed to reduce that. One says, “Even if it mattered what women wear, it still doesn’t mean those women deserve it”, the other “But really, it doesn’t matter, because women can be raped regardless and there’s no correlation between ‘immodesty’ and rape”.
Always with the cockocentrism.
I’m not scared of ‘involuntary celibates’ (BTW it’s not celibacy if it’s involuntary, generally; masturbation counts against celibacy). I just think that the bitter, entitled ones are fucking morons who should not ever inflict their jackassery on women.
WEll, you are stupid, it’s about what I expect.
He does, but they’re stupid. They’re about how MRAL gets to have sex whenever he wants, regardless of anyone else’s feelings.
They also don’t have the internet, central air conditioning, factories, cars, or fast food. Your ‘roots’, which aren’t really chimps but a common ancestor we share with them that is no longer extant (BTW your understanding of evolution is as poor as the Creationists’) are irrelevant. You have long since stopped caring elsewhere. Stop pretending that it’s an excuse for your inability to consider women people.
Doubtful. A number of other animals have reasonably harmonious gender relations, including primates. Also, again, internet. Technology. Naturalistic Fallacy someplace else.
Haha, animal rightser too? Crank Magnetism, ho!
Yeah, I think humans are more capable of thinking, reasoning, and self control. There’s some decent evidence supporting this conclusion. But you being an asshole isn’t just offensive to my ‘humanist prejudices’, because the way you’re being an asshole isn’t really doable by animals. It takes a human to offer pseudointellectual wankery as a bullshit justification for idiotic beliefs. Can’t get that out of an ape.
Clueless idiot ITT. I don’t really have the inclination toe xplain everything you just got wrong. Protip: As much as I hate the US, it isn’t the largest market because it actually does import all of its goods, and you undervalue a number of services and products that are legitimately produced in the US. You also don’t seem to understand that a service economy is actually possible (Go check out Ireland, off the top of my head, and India, while it’s not improving so rapidly due to a lack of EU Subsidies, is still doing a lot better for similar).
Lolzerbot, this is some crank magnetism of industrial strength! I can’t say I remember the last time I saw left and right wing lunacy combined so strongly!
Protips abound! First, Sharia Law is not now, or ever, coming to the US. It has not come to any european country. It has not, and will not, spread much further out. If anything, it is rapidly dying where it’s in strength. Second, Libya is not currently set to become a muslim theocracy. Third, Libya is doing its own fighting. The US, like the EU, has no desire to spend the money to conquer the place. Both lack the political capital. Our intervention is restricted to sending them recon satellite photos, and bombing targets they request. The latter is cheap and builds good will; the Libyans are doing their own on-the-ground fighting. So you know, not only are you wrong, but you’re wrong in racist ways, insinuating that black people aren’t capable of fighting for their own freedom.
As to the bit about the military… yeah, you really have nfc what you’re talking about? Half of us aren’t tough and don’t claim to be otherwise. Project less.
Lie less transparently.
Random but sorta relevant anecdote:
I found the guy in the photo on Tumblr.
He was dealing with assholes of the caliber who would say stuff like “Out of all the girls in the world, she’s bottom of the “girls i would rape” list.” (and yes that is an exact quote) Really calmly. Without even swearing.
So two things:
1) I now respect the guy in the photo more than any other single person in the entire world. No exaggeration.
2) My GOD there are people THAT nasty in the world? I don’t want to share a SPECIES with anyone who would say that. I don’t want to share a fucking PLANET with anyone who would say that. Jesus.
Hey David,
you really wanna stand by the Koss study. Hell, even Koss isn’t so cock sure anymore. Of those people Koss and her study deemed to have been raped, only 27% actually believed themselves to have been raped. To believe the study’s results, one would have to take a profoundly maternalistic view of women, disregard their own experience, and suplant it with “we know better” information. Doesn’t jive, no matter how you slice it.
Erl: 1 ml = 1cc, equals 3785.5 per gallon.
10 ml = .3 fl oz, or about .75 tbls.
Here is the stat on seminal volume: The average ejaculate measured in 1300
volunteers is 3.2 +/- 1.4 ml as reported in The Journal of Fertility and Sterility.
So the, rough, number of ejaculations required for one gallon(US) is 1082. To get to “gallons” a woman would need, more or less, 2164 acts of PIV, which ended in seminal emission.
One a day would take, more or less, 6 years.
And that means a lot of guys are getting a lot of action. If we are talking about the same guys getting all the action (the old 10 percent of all the men are getting 80 percent of all the sex), the numbers go up, because with repetition the volume decreases.
So I suspect our boy is talking out his ass, and letting his (admitted) hatred cause him to spew nonsense because he thinks it is a damning accusation.
Always glad to see my numbers tweaked and improved! I just dashed all of that off on wikipedia, so I’m glad to see that I was in, at least, the right order of magnitude.