I’ve been following the Men’s Rights Movement for some time, and I’ve never been quite sure exactly what the major injustices faced by men are. I haven’t really noticed much to speak of in my own life, but evidently there are some and they are really, really bad.
Luckily, in recent days A Voice for Men has begun to clarify the issue for me. For example, AVfM Radio’s new theme song points out two of the worst injustices of all:
- Men having to hold doors open for ladies.
- Ladies wanting to marry us.
But these are not the only important men’s issues out there. In a recent post titled “A hard rains gonna fall: how hard is up to you” (clearly a reference to the famous song by Carly Simon), AVfM head dude Paul Elam spells out the most important issues of all in a set of bullet points. To save the beleaguered men of the world some important man-time I will summarize them for you here. Bullet-time!
- Thomas Ball’s suicide isn’t mentioned on Wikipedia because feminism.
- The Obama administration urged colleges to use the same standard of proof used in most non-criminal cases in their non-criminal disciplinary proceedings dealing with rape cases. Because feminism.
- Australia. Something about Australia. Ok, here’s the deal: Australia is very, very far away from me, like literally on the other side of the planet, and my eyes sometimes glaze over when reading about it. I’m sure whatever Elam is mad about is really bad. It might involve Koalas. Feminist Koalas. But that’s just speculation on my part.
- In India, where women are routinely harassed in public and groped on train cars, there are a tiny number of women-only train cars set up to cut down on the groping.
- In Sweden, a small group of feminists did a theatrical production based on/dealing with the writings of Valarie Solanas. It was performed in some schools.
- “Men constitute the lion’s share of combat deaths[11], workplace deaths[12], suicide deaths[13], and are afflicted with almost every known human malady and disease more frequently and more severely than women.” Obviously, the feminists are to blame, for their staunch opposition to women serving in the armed forces, and for their secret program of giving men girl germs.
- There are agencies dealing with women’s health issues. Clearly, men need to have just as many of their own agencies to deal with such male health issues as not being pregnant.
I hope my summary of these issues has been fair. As Elam has pointed out on a number of occasions, I am fat, so really nothing I do or say has any value. Plus, of course, I am a mangina. Just, you know, FYI.
In any case, these injustices have Elam plenty mad:
I am truly curious as to what festering, morally atrophied deviation of humanity could look at anything approaching this level of discrimination and suffering without becoming angry.
So mad that his metaphors all get up in each other’s business:
Whether it becomes a wave of social change, or a violent tempest of indignation and fury, the pendulum will continue to swing.
So there you have it. Naturally, Elam’s readers are grateful for his efforts to bring justice to the world by yelling about it online and trying to get people really, really mad at certain specific ladies without explicitly advocating violence against them. That’s pretty much how Martin Luther King did it, only with fewer references to “bitches” and “cunts” and not so many threaty remarks.
As Alfred E puts it:
Well said Mr Elam. May the harpies finally get a clue about their complete lack of compassion for men and boys all the while living in a gold box carted around by the prince.
Justice and compassion for all, except you harpies in your gold boxes! And also the rest of the bitches, cunts and manginas.
NOTE: That bit about Carly Simon above was a joke. Obviously the song in question was written by The Bangles.
Honestly MRAL, I have to ask you, what is it about “Problematic ideas about gender effect men and women in different ways, and what seems like a positive to one person if often a negative to another.” that is so difficult to grasp for you?
If someone tells you that being portrayed in the media as a barely functional appendage to the important characters feels degrading to them, maybe try taking them at their word? Instead of agreeing to disagree, how about agreeing that it sucks for everyone, but not in the same exact way?
Stop insisting your perception is the Correct One. This is not an either/or situation.
*[is] often*
“Chivalry” is no more genuinely valuing someone than a mobster genuinely values people they victimize with protection rackets. It’s not affection, it’s brutal social control.
Chivalry is basically the David K. Meller System of “Benevolent” Ownership.
Well, Dracula, the thing is feminists have no problem telling ME what’s what in pop culture, how WOMEN ARE NOT REPRESENTED, MEN GET EVERYTHING, etc. I disagree with the basic assumptions, frankly. Especially since I’ve been alive. The hero is often called upon to risk his life again and again for women. He mows down goons, unheralded because they are all male. A single woman being in danger is a big deal. This is my perception, and it’s just as valid as yours.
DSC, I see chivalry more as a butler/employer relationship. Are the butlers more important than the employers? I think not.
Someone has not read Robert Aspirin’s Phule series!
Right, except you repeatedly dismiss the validity of other people perceptions all the fucking time.
Uh, no. People are people. Everyone has the same value. That’s basic sense.
Are the butlers believed to be competent enough to make unilateral decisions for the employers, or believed to be more trustworthy with the employer’s assets than the employer themself etc etc?
And people telling you that you might be wrong about the underlying intent of the message is not same thing as telling you that how you feel is wrong. It’s saying there are some things about this you don’t get.
Chivalry seems more like the way people baby-proof their homes. You’re operating under the assumption that the target of you’re coddling can’t manage without your support.
Interestingly I think I heard somewhere that cultures with less negative sexism ALSO have less chivalrous notions as well. Which seems to show that the existence of such chivalry is the byproduct of misogyny rather than putting women on a pedestal.
But ONLY THE HERO GETS TO DO ANYTHING. The woman is in danger and she CAN’T HELP HERSELF. Even the most valuable of women-in-danger is an object–either a treasure to be protected or a target of violence—but she’s not doing anything. This makes her LIKE A CHILD, and, like Dracula mentioned, it degrades me.
Like I said before, this hypothetical movie is only one of the repeated messages I’m getting throughout the day, throughout my life, that tell me I’m not as competent as my male equivalent: not as strong, not as smart, not as brave. I get that every day. I do not want to be a valuable object. I want to be people.
And I am willing to meet you halfway here, but I’m not sure whether you read my previous posts.
MRAL? The other face of chivalry is this:
http://genderacrossborders.tumblr.com/post/14262840202/boys-toys-vs-girls-toys
How would you like it if this was the message you got—about your own mind and your own capacity to learn and develop—every day of your life?
“Koalas are awesome. They look so soft and peaceful, but get in between them and their eucalyptus fix and they will cut you.”
Actually, they will pee on you. This is their only defense mechanism, besides living really high up in trees. And their pee has an incredibly strong menthol smell, as you might imagine.
Australian fauna are so weird.
Voip, there’s only one hero out of many, many men who don’t matter. Every woman matters, all the time. It’s more the general message that I dislike. It’s an example of male disposability.
YOU wouldn’t have to be “chivalrous” if society assumed WE could take care of shit like grownups.
Every woman in the movie matters, because there’s only one of them.
They matter the way that the ring in the Lord of the Rings matters. The plot may revolve around them, but the women still don’t DO anything. They are toted around for the entirety of the movie. At least the men get fight scenes.
Also, the heroes are usually pretty consistent in terms of appearance- with some exceptions, he’s tall, between like 28 and 50, ruggedly handsome, and usually white. I am only one of those things. Therefore, I have to assume I am a goon, and don’t matter.
They’re also stoned pretty much all the time, AND their brains are unusually small.
Yeah, since there’s such a diversity in the type of women cast in Hollywood blockbusters.
Voip, there’s basically usually only 1 or 2 men in the movies that matter.
What is also obvious from the MRM’s bizarrerie is their chronic mischaracterisation of the cause of social problems, and targeting feminism as the evil conspiracy underlying them. Despite my new Manboobz title (see previous comments thread for details), there really is no conspiracy of feminism to deprive men of their rights in some sort of zero sum game that insists women can only be liberated by the enslaving of men. In reality, society at large – enforced mostly by both men and women – is responsible for the ways society enforces gender roles that hurt both men and women. Blaming all of the MRM’s woes on feminism and making rabid anti-feminist assertions just shows how irrelevant and out-of-touch these male supremacists are.
I wonder if a koala would taste like menthol.