Given the enmity towards women in general, and feminists in particular, that’s omnipresent in the manosphere, it seems logical to assume that most of the dudes lingering around MRA, PUA and MGTOW sites online would take a certain secret pleasure in seeing women suffer.
As regular readers of this blog know all too well, oftentimes the desire to see women suffer is not so secret: some MRAs and others of their ilk literally laugh at women getting cancer, declare that rapists should be given medals, openly fantasize about “beat[ing] the living shit” out of women, and tell feminists who complain about this sort of shit that they’re “so pernicious and repugnant that the idea of fucking your shit up gives me an erection.” (Those last two examples come from Paul Elam, one of the MRM’s most influential bloggers.) Still others send rape and death threats to outspoken women online.
But good news, folks! It turns out that not all manosphere misogynists want women to suffer. Why? Because suffering is an ineffective way to put women in their place. That, at least, is the argument of a fellow calling himself Höllenhund. In a comment on Susan Walsh’s Hooking Up Smart blog, he offered this argument:
Making women suffer wouldn’t achieve anything in itself – I’m pretty sure the overwhelming majority of the Manosphere would agree. Women are normally solipsistic and they fail to understand their own urges and don’t comprehend the connection between cause and effect. They’d never understand why they’re suffering in the first place.
So, basically, in his mind, women are dumber than dogs and thus harder to train. Even worse, the suffering women can sit down in the street and cry, and countless “white knights,” hoping to win their approval (and get in their pants) will rush to their aid:
Suffering only motivates them to fish for male sympathy (and thus investment) through crying and whining, to blame ‘ bad men’ for their ‘misfortune’ and thus play the game of ‘let’s you and him fight’. That’s how it has always been.
So making women suffer is largely pointless. I’d go further and say it’d actually be detrimental to men because it encourages white-knighting and intra-male competition. …
And some of the ladies even seem to sort of like it:
Not to mention the fact that many women actually seem to find some sort of twisted pleasure in suffering, that all this’d simply serve to justify more anti-male legislation and whatnot.
Poor Höllenhund doesn’t have much hope that women will ever see how totally terrible they really are
[T]he notion of making women ‘admit their faults’ is pie-in-the-sky as well. Again, I’m sure pretty much everyone in the Manosphere would agree. You have a bigger chance of seeing pigs fly.
If women are to recognize their faults in this SMP [Sexual Marketplace], they need to have a realistic picture of both their own sexuality and the SMP in the first place, plus they need to have empathy for beta males …
Er, you’re lecturing us about empathy?
Sorry, on with the rest of the sentence:
plus they need to be imbued with the sense of morality without which the very concept of ‘fault’ is meaningless.
And lecturing us about morality too?
I think we’ll sooner see Haiti become a dreaded military superpower.
I’d rather see that than live in a world in which women were so self-hating that they actually believed they were guilty of whatever unnamed sins Höllenhund attributes to them.
NOTE: I found Höllenhund’s comment because the blogger at Pro-Male/Anti-Feminist Technology cited it as a prime example of the sort of brave “truth telling” that will get you banned “on feminist sites that supposedly support men.” And yes, it apparently did get poor Höllenhund banned from Hooking Up Smart. I’m not quite sure how Susan Walsh, a traditionalist devoted to slut shaming in a thousand different flavors, counts as feminist, but that’s not the point. The point is: I’m regularly accused of “cherry picking” comments from MRAs. In this case, Mr. PMAFT picked the comment for me.
Yah, I’m not your mama. If you aren’t satisfied with the information given to you, then perhaps you should do something about that, like create your own.
Roscoe, because an agency serves men and women does not mean the shelter is mixed-gender. They have separate housing arrangements. A “co-ed” agency directs men to a men’s shelter. The shelter itself does not have a website because shelters have to operate in privacy.
I’m sorry we can’t find you more agencies that turn away all women, but… wait, no, I’m really not sorry about that at all, who the hell would that help?
http://gmdvp.org/
Just in case Roscoe missed it. Roscoe is still a liar and a fool.
MRAs are directly harmful to men in this matter by lying about the availability of help for abused men.
Yet another deplorable aspect of the MRM.
LOLLLLLLL. Awesome
Personally, I’d really love to live in a society where there is ample funding for women-only shelters, men-only shelters, AND gender-neutral shelters, and let the individual people seeking help choose which one would best suit their needs. In the meantime, I think having only gender-segregated options (and hotel vouchers for people who cannot use the available shelters, for whatever reason) helps more people than having only gender-neutral options, but I’d vastly prefer not having to choose either one. It’s like being asked, “Would you rather punch 50 people in the head, or punch 10 people in the head?” I want to punch no one in the head, but if I’m not being given that option, I guess I have to go with the option that punches fewer people. 🙁
If he’s not a liar, he’s certainly stupid, and rather demanding about wanting us to accept his stupidity.
” then perhaps you should do something about that, like create your own.
LOLLLLLLL. Awesome”
Seriously! They want feminists to take all the responsibility for the apparent lack of men’s shelters, otherwise they accuse us of hating men. They aren’t doing anything themselves aside from bitching on the internet.
I apologize, darksidecat. You are right that gender segregated shelters do not meet the needs of LGBT victims. It is wrong for women’s shelters to turn away trans women, and if any men’s shelters turn away trans men, that is also wrong. I agree it is a problem for lesbians to have their partners move in the same shelters where they’re hiding. It goes against the whole point of shelters for abuse victims and abusers to be housed together. Anyway, I am very sorry for not being inclusive enough for all types of victims.
Another possible solution is for communities to set up trailer parks for dv victims, just like how FEMA sets up trailer parks after disasters. Separate living quarters would allow anyone to live there, and bring in adult relatives, pets, or any other family members that would be excluded in the shelters we currently have. The main challenges would be that it would require heavy security, and it would be expensive.
Does the word marginalization mean anything to you? Also this is striking me as separate but equal!! (but you know its never going to be really equal)
You also ignore the fact that trans people are more likely to be victimized than their cis counterparts and you know that people aren’t going to be the most willing to let them in.
who wants to bet that despite the fact that everyone keeps trying to answer his questions no matter how many times he shifts the goalposts, our little troll is going to be on avfm within the hour whining about how he tried debate us but were just soooooo unreasonable
Jenn93 – They don’t just want us to create men’s shelters. They want us to create men’s DV resources that exclude women. Because if something helps men but it also helps women then it doesn’t count.
It’s toddler logic, and unfortunately it’s being applied to grown-up problems.
So being more inclusive is like punching more people in the head now?
@Polliwog: I think that’s a pretty good way to look at it It’s an area that is overall so starved of resources, and that is the real problem.
Well, what would you do, Jumbofish?
I don’t think “only gender-neutral options” is a good answer unless the funding/logistics exist to house each individual out of contact with all the others. Otherwise there’s no way of keeping abusers from following their victims into the shelter.
@jumbofish
i think you read that backwards. i think NOT being totally inclusive is supposed to equal punching people in the head.
@jumbofish
But isn’t this what the situation is right now wrt to having a men’s shelter and a women’s shelter? I mean, if you think that the situation is not working for those who fall within the binary then fair enough. It is my impression that gender segregation helps a majority of people, but it harms a significant minority as well. Therefore, I would think that the best solution would be to find a way to serve both communities, which is why I was suggesting that we have some shelters that can meet the needs of those who are being hurt by the current system,
I don’t really understand where you’re going with this. I thought the argument was about whether or not gender segregated shelters are useful. Why would having no gender-segregated shelters make it more likely trans people would be served, than having some nongender-segregated shelters and some segregated shelters? That’s a genuine question btw, I can’t think of a reason why but if I’m wrong then I’m more than happy to concede.
Hmm…
Seems like the best one can do is raise social awareness, first in particular niches, then to the wider public. While logistics/costs are an issue, the main thing is to talk about these particular issues, expose them to the daylight, and foster support through awareness/activism. Then we can focus on the building of gender-neutral shelters as one of the Big Projects, with a (hopefully) better system than what exists in the majority of shelters.
Granted, there IS discussion occuring right now, but that’s where we’re at right now.
I think it would be best in theory if gender-segregated shelters didn’t exist, because they’re going to create this marginalizing divide between services between binary heterosexual people and “everyone else.” But in practice it’s better to have that divide than to fail to provide services at all for some people.
I don’t consider shelters that let everyone into a communal living situation an acceptable alternative. That just exposes everyone to the danger of their abuser enrolling in the shelter and finding them.
Holly, why not just have a very strict policy on not allowing people who are in an abusive relationship with each other into the same DV shelter?
Personally, I’d really love to live in a society where there is ample funding for women-only shelters, men-only shelters, AND gender-neutral shelters, and let the individual people seeking help choose which one would best suit their needs.
This is what I’d like to see, too. There are good reasons why mens’ and womens’ shelters do and should exist, but there definitely need to be options for people who fall outside the gender binary and people fleeing same-sex abusers.
But the real question is what should be done in real life with limited resources.
@Snowy: I think it’s mainly the difficulty in enforcing those policies. An abuser who is trying to track down his/her partner is likely to lie in order to do so.
Because how would you enforce that? By the time the abuser’s been identified by their victim, they already know where the shelter is, and they can stake it out or break into it.
And I can’t think of a practical way to screen out abusers without bringing them to the shelter; have every resident come to the office to approve every new resident? It would be a mess.
And the previously alluded problem that if you don’t allow the abuser in, that’s tantamount to admitting that the victim is in that shelter.
(Sorry, ninja’d by Holly.)