So the New Statesman — a rough UK equivalent of The Nation here in the US — has published an awesomely snarky yet utterly accurate piece on the Men’s Rights movement, such as it is, including references to Man Boobz favorites Tom Martin and A Voice for Men. Read it! Some excerpts:
Like your arse, men’s rights are massive right now. Of course, this has been “a thing” since the Fathers4Justice superheroes first scaled a public building, reiterating in one fell swoop that irresponsible, life-endangering behaviour and silly costumes are not only newspaper-friendly, but are also not qualities many women look for in a potential birthing partner. Then we had Tom Martin suing the London School of Economics’ gender studies programme for sexism, one of his complaints being that the chairs they sat on were too hard and not suitable for the comfortable positioning of his goolies. Poor Tom.
…
A Voice for Men is essentially the EDL [that is, the Islamophobic English Defence League –DF] of the mens’ rights movement, positing as it does such statements as “a single mother is a woman who in most cases chose to have, or to raise a child without a father. This demonstrates terrible, selfish values”, and “fake boobs are a sexual advertisement. If your wife or GF wants them that means she’s seeking to attract heightened male attention.” It’s extremist, bitter, and encourages men to “not get fucked” by taping every conversation that they have with a woman, like a troop of paranoid angry, ninja spies.
Naturally, MRAs are up in arms about this horribly unfair completely accurate (and if anything rather understated) description of their “movement.” I added some thoughts of my own to the discussion on Reddit here. Here’s one of the responses:
Keep digging that hole!
EDITED TO ADD: The New Statesmen is going to have a whole week of stuff on Men’s issues. So stay tuned!
EDITED TO ADD AGAIN: On the Men’s Rights subreddit, the battle rages on, but alas I can contribute no more, having just been banned from there, apparently for mentioning The Spearhead too many times, or something. Separate post on that in a second. But in the meantime, here’s my favorite comment from the whole thread, from someone who apparently didn’t enjoy the New Statesman piece as much as I did:
If anyone knows of any sorority newsletter that reads like that New Statesman piece, please let me know, as I would like to subscribe to that newsletter and/or join that sorority, if my status as a mangina qualifies me for membership.
In the meantime, I have added The Vagenda, the online home of Rhiannon and Holly, the authors of the NS piece, to the “Antidotes to Boobery” sidebar.
People keep taking the phrase the wrong way though, like that one guy who thought it meant he was into bestiality. XD
Yaaay! More people who don’t spend all their time on the Internet will be learning about how fucking toxic the MRM is.
Happy:
I find it hilarious, actually. But I’m getting a PhD in history, so I know how much more benign this is than a lot of things humans do to animals/each other. Meeeaaanwhile, I, like Ozy, am smelling the distinct odor of deliberate derail.
Their eating habits are also flamboyantly grotesque.
My mom’s old dog, while on a walk, had to be forcibly restrained from eating rocks. I think he may have managed to consume some.
Oh sorry, it was hellkell who called you on this.
@hellkell
I was actually referring to the Erin Pizzey rationalization hamster thing, but now that I know the origin of “keep fucking that chicken” I am kind of surprised it’s an Internet meme and not just some old joke. Although, hey, the two aren’t mutually exclusive.
Hoooooly shit. Abuser’s Lobby at its finest, right here.
I’m now giddy with excitement for the coming week! Also, sorry that they keep wanting you to get cancer David.
I, for one, welcome our new chicken-fucking overlords.
VoIP, I am going to pretend that the history graduate student version of “keep fucking that chicken” is “keep going for that seventh consulship, Marius!” followed by belly laughs and backslapping, and I would appreciate it if you didn’t destroy my pleasant/cheesy delusion.
I think this guy has a tooth against Davids. 🙂
And you don’t need to read a book to be against Holocaust deniers, but you kind of need to know what’s in the book (or other sources of info, obviously) to call the author an Holocaust denier.
Anyway, I feel almost bad for the guy. How pathetic do you need to be to stalk a blog to try to make it look bad on arguments such as “go read what you’re talking about, then we’ll talk”. Almost.
We aren’t a hate movement! We just hope you die a slow, painful death!
Yeah. Ok. Sure.
David, I hope your liver is doing awesome.
I think MRA logic on the hate movement thing is pretty much “we aren’t a hate movement because we don’t hate everyone.”
As long as you only hate some people, see, you’re cool. And if you only hate people according to criteria then you might as well apply for sainthood.
Also my grandma died of liver cancer. 🙁
If it’s a dead issue about Cloudiah’s vid post, forgive me, but I would never assume cloud thought that was funny or condoned it, esp from what she/he/zie/ze wrote.
About the New Statesman. Yay! This should be great. I hope MRA madness becomes a more popular topic, and as it does I hope that writers make sure to be dead accurate quote to back it up so as not to fuel their victimhood brothers in arms schtick. But, I’m kind of excited.
I had a very very close friend that died of liver cancer leaving behind six kids, her youngest a six year old girl. She didn’t drink, either. If it was from anything she ingested, it was diet pills. She had started doing that a couple of years earlier. I’m still not over it. I haven’t seen Steel Magnolias, but I’m pretty sure our situation was as sad as people say that is, I’m still not really over it. Anyway, meanies on the internet…
Wow, liver cancer sounds awful.
David, I think you’re low-risk for it. But if you ever need any organs that I have two of, just text me.
My mother’s best friend, who was like my 2nd mother growing up, died of liver cancer. It is a terrible thing, and anyone who would wish it on another person is terrible at being human. I wish all manboobzers healthy livers forever.
On a less important note, I have a working hypothesis that the non-manboozer who is currently creating really stupid/worst kind of libertarian hamster memes is none other than antimanboobz/Vorpale. Who else is so closely monitoring this blog that they would have noticed David’s recent comment here: http://manboobz.com/2012/05/21/the-new-statesmen-publishes-an-excellent-precis-of-the-mens-rights-movement-mras-are-naturally-outraged/comment-page-1/#comment-156586
And raced over to create this: http://qkme.me/3pdxt1
Me thinks someone wants David’s attention, even if it’s negative…
I’m with you Happy. That video was offensive and fucked up and not funny. That shit may well go on at farms, as does animal slaughter and in other cases, animal cruelty, but there’s no need to film it, let alone perpetuate it on the webz for the general amusement of the moronic masses.
^
l
Says the pro eugenics person >.>
What a cute hamster! But what’s up with the statement, is there some misogynist out there who believe his “incel” status is due to a set of pancake nalgas?
Oh well I’m probably an equally evil person since I’m fantasizing about innoculating Mr. “I Hope You Get Liver Cancer” with the rustiest used rig I can dig out of a remote dumpster.
All kindsa wrong? I’ve seen liver disease take it’s toll on waaay too many people.
Cloudiah, who do we know that really wants our attention? I’m betting anti-manboobz is one of our former trolls.
He likes us! He really likes us!
Sandra, you’re will Happy because obviously everyone else here does think it’s funny and entertaining? Including cloudiah who put a fucking trigger warning on it? Please stop this crazy making. Maybe I’m way to sensitive to gaslighting, but it makes me uncomfortable people are pretending cloudiah condoned that when she clearly said it was fucked up and put a trigger warning and said we might not want to push play. What part of that was confusing?
*with Happy (“will happy”, where did that come from grrr)
Also did you agree with the part where she said that cloudiah posting that reflected badly on us all?
Is there moral outrage over a dog ineffectively humping a confused chicken?
“Is the chicken dead? No.” — I don’t think it’s even really injured, not worse than having to fix it’s feathers anyways.
On topic, wtf is with wishing cancer on anyone? And the piece that pissed him off really was understated, this bit could be about greenpeace or them (or probably plenty of other groups)
“irresponsible, life-endangering behaviour and silly costumes are not only newspaper-friendly, but are also not qualities many women look for in a potential birthing partner”
Or do they just not like being called silly? One would think they’d be used to be called much worse.
MRAs think: Woohoo! Someone’s actually paying attention to our bullshit! Time to copypasta some dimwitted talking points into the comments thread! I live for this shit!
MRAs write: I am appalled and disgusted by your biased and poorly researched article.