So some MRAs are rallying around Herman Cain – not in spite of the sexual harassment allegations against him, but because of them.
On The Spearhead, W. R. Price notes that Cain has gotten a flood of new donations since the scandal broke. His conclusion:
The support for the conservative candidate suggests that the decades-old trend of male helplessness in the face of female accusations may be coming to an end.
Other Spearheaders are a bit more blunt:
It is refreshing to see a man (politician or otherwise) in the spotlight stand up and defend himself against a P.C. hatchet-job such as “sexual harrassment” when so many before him did the whiney-baby kiss-up “I was wrong” pandering while bowing before the golden hoochie.
Meanwhile, white and nerdy on Omega Virgin Revolt (yes, that’s a real blog) has actually put his money where his mouth is, sending along a donation to Cain.
I usually don’t bother with voting. Everyone running for most offices is either a liberal feminist or a conservative feminist. To me that is no difference. However, if Herman Cain is still in the running by the time my state’s primary happens (and if he is the Republican nominee) I will vote for him.
Herman Cain is now dealing with at least three women who are claiming that he sexually harassed them. Public figures who were accused of sexual harassment in the past didn’t take on their accusers directly, but Herman Cain did. He pointed out how what is happening to him is a false accusation. As a result of this Cain has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations in the last few days. One of those donations was my donation.
This may not seem like much, but this small act as made Cain more anti-feminist than all of the other candidates for president.
Notice that in white and nerdy’s version of the controversy, Cain has “pointed out” that he’s being falsely accused. Actually, what Cain has done is to deny that he harassed anyone. At this point, we don’t actually know enough to judge definitively whether the allegations are true — though the fact that the National Restaurant Association paid out tens of thousands of dollars to settle the cases makes me a bit skeptical of Cain’s denials. But apparently, in W&N’s brain, there’s not even a chance he’s guilty of anything other than standing up to the dirty feminazis.
One of the commenters on Omega Virgin Revolt is even more enthusiastic about Cain than the blogger himself. Jack writes:
If Cain becomes president, we might actually see an end to the incessant pandering to women by the mindless political class. It’s about time that a politician stood up and declared that women have responsibilities in life and are not entitled to a free ride. Cain might actually do that.
Over on Reddit, meanwhile, OffensiveBrute doesn’t defend Cain so much as he defends not giving a shit about sexual harassment:
I say even if Cain is guilty, who the hell cares? Sexual harassment is illegal, but not immoral. well not the kind that Cain is accused of anyway.
Skooma714 offers a similar take:
He didn’t even touch them. They probably hear shit like that on the DC Metro everyday.
They probably are over it. They want to get some paper and attention.
And, yes, both of these comments garnered some upvotes.
Of course, not every MRA out there is rallying around Cain. On Reddit, there are plenty of MRAs who are suspending judgment on the allegations, or who dislike Cain because he’s, you know, a right wing asshole. Over on The Spearhead, the only ones who seem to have an issue with Cain are those who, well, let’s just say that they probably also think burning crosses make great lawn decorations:
Black men are notorious for their sexual escapades, their testosterone being greater than that of White Men – as is their level of rape accusation. He may be innocent but he may just as well be guilty of a real indescretion.
I am happy to report that this comment got a lot of downvotes there; not every Spearheader is a raving Stormfronter. Of course, it says something about the general political and social backwardness of the site that those Spearheaders who are defending Cain from the crudest Klan-tastic racist attacks are doing so basically because they think he’s a credit to his race:
If the Blacks in America were like Herman Cain, this country would be measurably better for it and most of us would be hating on someone else.
But don’t worry: On The Spearhead they can still all agree on one central point – that women are evil, lying whores. As Keyster put it, in one of the most-highly upvoted comments in the thread:
What this indicates is that people are fed up with political correctness and the feminist/sexual grievance industry. …
In the new Femocracy you can’t date them, you can’t marry them and you can’t even work among them, without risking untold trouble for life. Is it any wonder men are distancing themselves from women, if not abandoning them altogether? How’s a man to know whether she has a “false accusation bomb” strapped to her waist or not? If you’re a man among women stay alert, you’re outside the Green Zone.
Will MRAs end up rallying around Cain in the way they rallied around Julian Assange and Dominique Strauss-Kahn? Or will something – his political views, his race? – prevent them from jumping on the Cain train? I guess we’ll just have to see.
Mmm, actually Cain did actually point-blank say “I have been falsely accused”. There’s several mainstream and newswires stories with that in the title alone.
I think you owe WN an apology.
Brandon said:
“@Philippa: And you just described at least half of male feminists. If you don’t think that a large majority of male feminists are just in it to get laid, you are probably delusional.”
Being a feminist, regardless of gender is a matter of belief and ethics. If you don’t hold those beliefs and ethics then you are not a feminist. Men who call themselves feminist because they think it will get them laid are merely manipulative, exploitative arseholes.
“I see the “male feminists” that love to comment on feminist posts. They always take the woman’s side even when the woman was clearly wrong. My all time favorite though is when they “apologize on behalf of all men”. Fucking gag me with a spoon! He should just chop his dick off and pump himself full of estrogen because he clearly wants to be a woman instead of a man.”
You know, there actually are men who value women as equals and parners, who respect our opinions, desires, skills and education and value our company as human beings. Indeed, almost all the men I know well, from my eighty two year old father, my husband of twenty six years, through my male friends and workmates all the way down to young nephew fit into this catagory. They are all prepared to call themselves feminists or feminist allies. None will apologize for any behavior but thier own, nor would I expect them to. All would laugh in your face if you told them that they were emasculated because they valued the women in their lives as equals and valuable human beings in their own right.
Also, a question: I’ve been married for twenty seven years at the end of November and have never had another partner and never been tempted to cheat. Every man of my acquaintance is well aware of this fact. I’m well and truly out of the market for any kind of sexual relationship outside my marriage. If what you say is true why are so many feminist men prepared to be friends with me? And I’m not just talking about hanging out, I’m talking about helping nurse me after my recent cancer surgery, cooking meals to help out, doing shopping for me, taking me to appointments, often at considerable inconvenience to themselves, sitting with me during chemo and lots of other kind, helpful things they did for me which they knew I would not reward them with sex. Sure my female friends helped too, but the men were no less eager to help. It kind of makes me wonder if you realize that non-sexual friendships between men and women actually exist. I think you seriously underestimate your own sex and that your attitude is more than a little misandrist.
“While I was in college, I bumped into a bunch of them as well. Most looked broken down and pretty beat up. I actually felt sad for them.”
That just makes me wonder what kind of people you spent your time with.
It seems to me that he’s pretty unambiguously done both, but this hardly seems worth quibbling over.
Not least because I don’t see how this detracts from the basic point that WN is proudly championing Cain specifically because of this controversy.
I don’t know about you, but my reaction whenever a very wealthy man is accused of sexual impropriety is to wait to find out the facts – not to immediately send him money.
In fact, I’m curious as to what would happen if it turns out that Cain is indeed guilty of sexual harassment. Will WN complain that his trust has been betrayed… or send him another donation?
Stating the obvious, that was aimed at AlekNovy, not Philippa.
I haven’t seen a lot of male feminists do the “I apologize on behalf of all men” thing. Most of them understand that apologizing on behalf of an entire gender is both goofy and meaningless.
Fictional male feminists on MRA sites, however, do it constantly.
Philippa:
Weatherby:
It’s such a weird attitude and it makes me sad because it implies so many things about the emotional responses of men that are totally untrue. Not all relationships between men and women need to involve sex and often they are no less important than those that do. Especially if one or both are in a committed relationship with someone else. Love takes many different forms and it isn’t always sexual.
All of my male friends knew that they would be rewarded by a deepening of our friendship, my gratitude and the knowledge that if they ever needed that kind of help themselves that I would be first on their doorstep and obviously that was important but I actually don’t think that motivated them. They just saw a friend in trouble and reacted on that basis alone. To imply anything else would be to seriously underestimate their motives and their emotional range.
Did the thought never occur to you that what you observed had less to do with women’s generosity (or lack thereof) than their wariness for their personal safety in that type of situation? I mean seriously, you, who is so paranoid about false rape accusations that you condone….nay, advise…. covertly videotaping sexual activity you might engage in with a woman or women who are not well known to you, cannot fathom a reason, save for lack of generosity, that a woman might not want to approach an (apparently) homeless man and give him coffee or money or cigarettes or whatever.
I guess that, unless she’s dressed like a slutty slut slut (by whomever’s standards) she has no reason to be concerned for her personal safety.
Oh, but all that doesn’t truly count as charity in the eyes of Brandon and NWO. Unless women are individually traversing parking lots, alleyways, subway stations, parks, etc., in search of men with dented tin cups to put pennies in, they are selfish bitches.
If all male feminists are in it to get laid, I’d like to hear Brandon’s explanation as to why I, an out-of-the-closet asexual, have male feminist friends. And don’t tell me it’s because they’re trying to get in good with my other female feminist friends, because none of my female friends identify as feminists to my knowledge.
I’m not certain Brandon has even considered the possibility of asexual people existing…
Probably not. After all, they don’t benefit Brandon.
KathleenB:
“…I have prescriptions coming up that I HAVE to refill, and I don’t know where the money will come from…”
Set up a paypal account and I will pay for this month’s prescriptions…assuming they are reasonable.
And how do you define “reasonable”?
hey magdelyn, i scrolled up to see why david said you were right about something, and i just wanted to say that nobody who likes faulkner can be all the way bad
@Sharculese: and i just wanted to say that nobody who likes faulkner can be all the way bad
Speaking as someone who has taught Faulkner and many many others to students, it’s possible for somebody to “love” the Faulkner they create in a way that is absolutely horrifying to people (and I’m a proponent of reader response and can give A grades to two very opposing interpretive arguments as long as each is well supported and qualified)!
Ditto William Blake. I still cringe at the last time I taught some of the “Songs of INnocence” and “Songs of Experience” and had a whole class telling me that the chimney sweeps were going to tell because they were evil because (EVIDENCE) they were black because they were covered with soot.
ugh. i kind of want to hear examples of the shit students said to you, but im also kind of scared.
Lets see… I am not in it to get laid.
I don’t agree with everything feminists say.
I am a feminist.
I am male.
How strange.
Everybody knows you don’t really exist, Pecunium.
Given his arguments during the whole illegal videotaping conversation I’m fairly certain that it’s never occurred to Brandon that there are men out there who can openly disagree with women, and not even try to “kiss ass” by pretending that they do agree with the women, and the women will sleep with them anyway. He seems to think that men’s options are either a. in a weak, cringing “feminist” way, or b. lie in a strong, manly way. The “not lie” option he seems to consider laugable, probably because if he himself didn’t lie women really wouldn’t sleep with him, given that he’d be saying things like “I’m considering taping you having sex without asking because I think you may falsely accuse me of rape, because women do stuff like that all the time”.
In sexistland, apparantly, bisexuals can never ever have friends that we don’t fuck.
@Sharculese: Be afraid, be very afraid.
I tend not to post specific comments by individual students on public internet sites because of a host of issues around student privacy, ethical behavior, etc. I might state some general trends from classes but not individuals (I once had a whole class that so hated SCott Momaday’s House Made of Dawn that although I loved it, I could never teach it again.)
It may also come as a startling revelation that there are quite a lot of women out there who actually prefer men who have opinions of their own and can defend them intelligently. And of course vice versa.
“It may also come as a startling revelation that there are quite a lot of women out there who actually prefer men who have opinions of their own and can defend them intelligently.”
No, obviously such women exist, but they’re not feminists, you see. Feminists only like men who have no opinions at all and who never say anything to a woman other than “yes, dear”.
Brandon appears to live in a particularly bad sit-com.
feminist men are totally capable of disagreeing with and debating feminist women. its just that we happen to recognize that, on the subject of the historical and modern treatment of women, women know a lot more than we do.