Tom Martin, a former gender studies student at the London School of Economics, recently became a minor celebrity amongst Men’s Rights activists and other angry men when he sued his alma mater for alleged sexism against men.
He’s now had his case thrown out of court. Let’s go to the Camden New Journal for details:
Tom Martin, 39, who lives in Covent Garden, claimed he suffered “anti-male discrimination” while studying for a master’s degree in gender, media and culture at the world-famous university in Holborn.
Representing himself at his application for a trial at the Central London County Court on Tuesday, Mr Martin complained of a lack of men-only sessions in the university’s gym and the preponderance of posters in the corridors advertising services for women without the presence of similar materials geared towards men.
Mr Martin, who describes himself as a feminist, said “hard” chairs in the library were uncomfortable for men and that a “male blaming culture” was evident in course materials, which “ignored men’s issues” and focused on wrongs done by them.
Damn those misandrist chairs and their man-hating hardness!
The judge didn’t buy it, saying Martin’s case had essentially no chance of success. He threw out the case and ordered Martin to pay LSE’s legal costs.
Martin, welcome to reality.
On Twitter, Martin responded to the news by calling his critics “whores.” One of many examples:
But I was really discriminated against, you whores!
And, yes, his Twitter handle is indeed Sexismbusters.org.
EDITED TO ADD: Actual headline today on What Men are Saying About Women:
EDITED AGAIN TO ADD: Tom Martin has replied to this post in the comments. Some highlights:
My legal complaint did NOT involve a complaint about the seating. You have been misled by the press – The Times and the West End Extra/Camden New Journal both mysteriously got it wrong.
One year prior to joining the university, when visiting its library, I did complain, that the seating being hard created a greater disadvantage for men than for women, as men have considerably smaller weight-bearing buttock pads than women, and men are heavier too – so for men, on average heavier than women, have more weight bearing down onto a pad which is approximately four times smaller than women’s on average – according to a BBC documentary on the subject.
He then details his attempts to fight this grave injustice. Also, there’s this:
[S]everal comments here are confusing ‘whore’ with ‘slut’. A slut has sex freely, which I am all for. Freedom of association is the ultimate in humanity. A whore charges for sex. Even if a woman is a virgin, but is waiting for Mr Right to buy her something, she’s a whore.
It’s counter-intuitive, but a lot of professional feminists are whores. They expect the government and men to do them special favours. They make up stories to convince men and government to believe that we all owe women something.
But really, if someone were keeping a tab, then…
Women owe men five years pension.
Women owe men some National Service.
Women owe men some inventions.
Women owe men positive discrimination in university curricula.
Women owe men some child access.
It’s women’s round at the bar too.
For the whole thing, see here.
For more charming quotes from Tom, see this post on the blog Butterflies and Wheels.
398 comments! What I would like to do, is take some of these comments, as a case study in anti-equality anti men’s rights issues progress, missing the point, or misrepresenting the point.
I would like to invite David Futrelle to explain the thinking behind it, for the documentary in production.
Yes, mocking the anti-equality elements in the MRM makes perfect sense to me, but when someone is standing up for equality, as I am, David can explain why he thinks it beneficial to mock that too – if indeed, that is his position.
It comes across as delaying tactics from a position of privilege, or from a position of toadying up to those in a position of privilege – and in the world of gender politics – that would be cosying up to the women who run women-only feminism and ‘equality’ departments, and get paid for it.
It’s interesting, because not a single comment from anyone on this blog is supportive of my position, on anything, so everyone agrees, it seems – and I want to know what makes you all so certain you’re right.
Like on this hard seating issue (which predated the court case), I would say I’m definitely right, the EHRC and the library management and the BBC documentary would agree with me, and the inventor who designed satchels that go on the back of school chairs with a padded panel that flaps down to pad the chair – a winning invention on Dragon’s Den – but you are all so certain your job is to mock it. Okay, well, is there some kind of mob chivalry in play, where you spend your days getting things right, but when you get together on manboobz, it’s your chance to get things wrong for fun?
When someone is fighting for equality in gender studies, and when the defendants admit there’s no equality in gender studies, then which side are you on?
Dave can email me on [email protected] if he would like to appear in the documentary.
To be fair, you were all initially misled by the Times article and the West End Extra article misrepresenting the facts, and the documentary will be showing that, along with the misrepresentations of the BBC when they interviewed me on Woman’s Hour, so you are not alone in your tactics, and I wonder if that makes you feel a bit better about yourselves.
I imagined all feminists to be radicals, but when you get to know a few, its the conservatism and sheep-like herd mentality which is most off-putting.
As far as I can tell, there are only two ways for women to stop being whores according to martin. They are as follows: cease existing or create a parallel society where men and women have zero interaction.
AntZ, eat your heart out.
Martin, I’m pretty sure there are a ton of men who who jump at the chance to sit on hard chairs all day in a university. And how does hard chairs measure up to programs women are discouraged from entering because “childcare!”. When your explicitly asked how on earth you intend to suceed at your chosen vocation when its assumed that shortly after you start your career, you’re proper place is to drop everything for the needs of your children and your mates career, come and talk to me.
I think we can add “my documentary will show you” to “there’s a Harvard study from 2007 that I can’t find but totally proves my point” to the list of complete fails at proving a point. Martinizing, anyone?
Tomfoolery?
Doesn’t quite do it justice.
Tomfuckwittery?
So, Tom, since you’re back: How exactly is it that young Muslim girls, aged 12, who are about to be married off to a much older man, understand the “meaning of consent”?
And do you claim that if they have this understanding, that they are in anyway able to exercise the right to say “no”? You seem to be claiming that all they have to do to get out of forced rape is say no. Tell us how that works, exactly.
Tom, in case you didn’t got it, we’re laughing at the chair story because the fact that it is an example of discrimination or oppression show clearly how much you’re swimming in privilege and have, in fact, no notion of what those things are.
Secondly, if you wonder why nobody, including the court, takes you seriously, it might be because of your over use of the word ‘whore’. You define it in such a broad way that almost everybody – including men – fits in it, then explains why it’s bad in the most ridiculous way: your list of arguments is a list of lies and or irrelevant things. Why on earth do you believe that we should care that you find ‘whores’ boring?
Lastly, I would like to reiterate the question, already asked several times: can you give us the title of the BBC documentary you keep speaking about?
I imagined all feminists to be radicals, but when you get to know a few, its the conservatism and sheep-like herd mentality which is most off-putting.
Whereas “Hard chairs are uncomfortable.” and “All women are whores.” are examples of stunningly original thinking?
Here’s the relevant comment:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2011/09/tom-martin-on-whoriarchy/#comment-9896
AHAHAAHAHAH omg He is backkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk
You certainly seem to think you are so right yourself XDXDD
:
Comfier chairs would be nice but for everyone but I don’t see how its a “male only issue”.
It would have been such a beautiful flounce if it had only stuck.
Again from Butterflies:
Ophelia has censored my last post. It was a good one. I won the argument with it.
Nominated for Funniest Post in the History of the Internet.
Tom said: “I do have a book, on the way, based on some experimental psychology I’m conducting. As soon as I put this gender studies industry out of its misery, I’ll let you know.”
seranvali wrote: “And what are your qualifications in experimental psychology?”
I suspect that’s what this farce of his is, his version of experimental psychology. He’s in a program for six weeks, and then claims discrimination against him as a man, citing hard, unpadded chairs as being discriminatory to men. Most people think he’s being unreasonable and irrational; some even mock him. He will write a book on how feminists responded to him when they thought he was serious, when all along he was really pulling our legs and we were too stupid to realize it.
He wins!
Oh, Tom is also a rape apologist! Chocking.
You know, I sometimes read people saying “I can’t call myself a feminist, there is to much racism/transphobia/classism/… in feminism”. My theory is that Tom is trying to make all feminists ashamed of calling themselves feminists, by fear of being associated to him.
Perhaps someone should have strapped martins hands with a birch rod like they used to do in the old days when men were so much more sucessful? Wasn’t that one of the things tossed by the wayside when educating young women was taken seriously?
Or perhaps they should have used shaming language like “dunce” when he could only get through six weeks of a course, because they weren’t talking about how wonderful but hard done by men they are.
Here’s a hgint Martin, there is a problem with men getting proper educations and being sucessful in class! However, I think hard chairs or a course on feminism introduced to full grown men are what’s causing it.
Are NOT causing it, that is.
Comedy gold, truly. Too bad I’ve got images of some Tom telling some poor 12 year old girl, “see, all you had to do to get out of that marriage to that skeezy old dude, and the multiple pregnancies that followed, was say no. Silly little girl! But you’re a whore, anyways. And your mother, too.”
I still can’t get over his “I’m a feminist” stance. It’s like a parody of a parody of a self-parody
For those who have not been to the free thoughts blog link, Tom’s ‘winning’ comments were deleted because he got a challenge not unlike B______’s: all posts containing ‘whore’ or ‘skank’ were deleted. Not unlike B______, he immediately responded to that by posts containing the forbidden words.
What the hell would I support?
“Boy Tom, I sure am a WHORE for being a woman and occasionally receiving things! I better stop bein a WHORE now!”
If someone DID support you it would sound like sarcasm. You haven’t given anything non-hilarious to agree with.
Hey buttboy!
Whats that BBC documentary again? The one about the butts?
@Tom, Tom, Tom: I see you cannot stick the flounce!
OK, then.
I in fact spent very little time on the chair issue (though i’d love to see documentation of your claims about the EHRC and the BBC documentary–citation? scanned copies of materials from ERHC–can I assume that they have to provide access to documentation of their cases).
I spent a lot of time on some of your other claims and you totes ignored me which miffs my professionalfeministwhoreradicalcommiepaganqueer sensibilities.
Aso: can you show any proof of funding or contracts regarding either your documentary OR this experimental psychology book?
*crickets and june bugs chirping*
@Tom: Plus, don’t give yourself airs over the length of this comment thread–NWO our Troll of the year can easily generate 500 plus all by himself, and while 400 is not short, it’s certainly not the longest of the Manboobz threads. However, if you commit yourself to posting more and more entertainingly, then I’m sure you can, WITH OUR HELP, push the comment numbers up to at least 500. I’m on last day of spring break, so am willing to do my part.
What’s the reason you won’t engage with me–academics too scary for you?
lliathana, Martin is a! MAN! He don’t need no stinking whores help blathering on about himself or his privilege!
Sorry, that should have been Ithiliana…
My apologies on mispelling your name.