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.
Tom wants a more important role at the university. Specifically, a chairmanship.
But only if that chairmanship comes with a cushion!
@Xanthe: Yeah, I’m pretty sure politicians get padded seats in the UK just like in the US.
Clearly one of those privileges that we oppressed masses shall address when we rise up against them! Because padding or not padding is one of the MAJOR HUMAN RIGHTS issues of the 21st century (in all seriousness, the issue of chairs for students is a major problem–for years, my uni had those cheap little desk on the side ones that didn’t hold any large men OR women, were hard as hell, and miserable in terms of support, and yet students were sitting in them for hours a day).
But, it’s not just a man only problem, and I bet you real money I’d know what Tom’s response would be to larger women not fitting into teh crappy little scrunchy chairs.
Another reason I like teaching mostly online: I teach from my ball chair in my office.
Clearly, there are more women than men in college because of chairs!
@Kyrie: I agree!
NWO has clearly dropped out of the running since making Troll of the Year last year. DKM old, stale, boring, and posting less (heh heh heh). None of the newer ones are that good, but Tom here has real possibilities.
I know I’ve had a lovely time reBUTTing his limp little claims about feminism, the academy, gender studies, and all.
Ithiliana: Donna Haraway is AWESOME. I love the Cyborg Manifesto. <3
Tom: …Paul Elam? REALLY?
Men who complain about whores are just such morons. Why do they think women are primarily valued for their physical bodies and for the sex they can provide? Yes, women came up with a system that treats them like chattel and not people. Fucking dumbshit MRAs, it was men! Male heads of household who traded their daughters to form alliances with the male heads of other households. Access to pussy has been monetized for thousands of years, and these shitstains want to claim that feminists have anything to do with it.
Yeah, Paul Elam is totes in favor of equality. So much that he gets a boner thinking about fucking our shit up.
Go sit on a hard chair and fuck off, Tom.
P.S.–OT, but I still hate this new wordpress bullshit.
Holly: so clearly Tom and NWO are SOULMATES!
Although NWO does have the “state violence” that women can use any time they wish (I almost wish we did; I’d send my state violence teams to a number of state legislators STAT) that Tom lacks, and Tom does seem a bit more obsesses with WHORES than NWO does.
But really–nothing new at all (except the chairs! The chairs bit is PRICELESS!!).
Welcome to humanity!
OMG, we’ve found the arbiter of who gets to be part of humanity! THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING! Can you admit dolphins, please? And exclude corporations?
And here’s a kindred spirit for Tom. There are so few people who really care about chairs.
I wonder how Tom feels about male prostitution. Does he not think gay rentboys exist? Male strippers? The Chippendales?
@ithiliana …if you’re the one that posted the link to the JohntheOther getting his just desserts blog. THANK YOU. That was like sex.
Molly, I’m pretty sure in Tom’s world only women can be whores.
Yeh, good one!
The EHRC actually agreed with me, that hard chairs are inappropriate for a library, as they impact men more. When we consider that only 2 out of 5 degrees go to men, the gender gap widening, then anything we can do to make men more comfortable taking the academic route, the better.
Given that higher educational attainment increases life expectancy for men, and given that increased educational attainment in men also decreases their violence against women among other things.
Still, well done everybody for not getting it. In your world, that’s a win, right?
“Critical studies on Men (CSM)” is actually recommended in the core texts – chiming in with the overwhelmingly biased other texts, presenting men as overwhelmingly guilty for whatever gender dynamics, thus, excusing the continued freezing out of men’s equality debates – and the continued offensive against male participation and representation at university, as clarified by the Women’s Officer from the NUS, claiming men face no issues.
Now, are you people for or against the inclusion of men’s equality discourse or not?
(Cue patriarchy theory-adherent excuses).
And, are you for or against greater participation for men in universities?
I think it is time to separate the egalitarians from the prostitutes and their toadies.
http://www.avoiceformen.com/updates/tom-martin-vs-lse-court-date-set/
@MollyRen: Are the Chippendales still a thing these days? *goes to look*
Wow, they do.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chippendales
Ten million dollar hotel/lounge built for them in Las Vegas?
Do any women dance/strip/etc troups have that kind of oh I don’t know MONEY sunk into them.
Gargh.
So, Tom, what DO you think of the Chippendales?
They’re still a thing in Vegas, as a friend told me after she’d seen them a year or so ago.
@BoomBoom: You’re welcome! I did post to Meyer’s blog zapping John–I started reading over there because of the Manboobz regulars (especially links to MRAL getting pwned there), so I figured you all would like to see this post in particular. Meyers does snarky very very well.
I know this has been said already but Tom, why not? Is sex work not a job? Also, is it ok for men to do sex work or is it something that only women ever do?
I actually do agree with this. I was just riffing off of Tom’s absurd definition of prostitution, which included a virgin wanting a present. Sorry that wasn’t clear!
Fixed it for you!
PZed Myers, Myers! Only one E…
Deeply enjoyed watching “MatRiArchy-L” get ban hammered.
So, if we’re tabulating achievements and work over history by gender, don’t men owe women an awful lot for all those births? It is called labour for a reason. Along 9 months of development, and breast feeding, to boot.