Men’s Rights Activists regularly complain that it is mostly men who serve in the armed forces, and that it is mostly male soldiers who are killed and injured in service to their country in wartime. MRAs also complain that, in the United States, only men have to sign up for the draft – though this is more of a formality than anything else, as the draft has been dead for decades and there is virtually no chance of it being resurrected any time soon.
MRAs love to cite the dominance of men in the armed forces as a prime example of what they call “male disposability,” and somehow manage to blame feminists for it all.
But it’s not feminists who are trying to keep women from becoming soldiers, or serving in combat. While some MRAs support the idea of women serving in the army, and having to register for the draft the same as men do, many others scoff at the very notion of women as soldiers, mocking their alleged female “weakness” and in some cases denigrating the service of women now in the armed forces as being equivalent to attending “day care camp.” (Not exactly.) These MRAs may complain that men bear the brunt of the costs of war. But they don’t actually want women to serve.
Not that it makes much of a difference, because the MRAs who do supposedly want women to share the same responsibilities as men aren’t doing shit about it. You know who is? Feminists. The National Organization for Women, while opposing the draft, has long argued that if registration is required of men, it should also be required of women. NOW has also opposed the ban on female soliders serving in combat. (Not that it’s easy to draw a clear line between combat and non-combat positions on the contemporary battlefields.)
Meanwhile, a group called the Molly Pitcher Project, made up of University of Virginia law students and headed by feminist law professor Anne Coughlin, is assisting two female soldiers who are now suing the Pentagon in an attempt to lift the combat ban.
Do you want to know who is opposing them – aside from the Pentagon’s lawyers? Take a look at some of the comments posted in response to a Los Angeles Times article on the lawsuit. Note: The quotes below are pretty egregious; some deal with military rape in a really offensive way. (Thanks to Pecunium for pointing me to them.)
These aren’t “cherry-picked” from hundreds of comments; these are the bulk of the comments that were left on the article.
Are any of these commenters MRAs? Maybe, maybe not, but certainly their misogynistic “logic” is virtually identical to that I’ve seen from misogynist MRAs opposed to women serving in combat. One thing they are clearly not is feminist.
If MRAs, or at least some of them, truly want a world in which men and women share equally in the responsibilities of military service (and both have equal opportunties for military leadership), they need to challenge the misogynists — within their movement and without — who argue that women simply aren’t fit for the battlefield. And they need to support the feminists who are actually trying to make a difference — instead of standing on the sidelines crying foul.
I don’t hold out much hope that this will ever happen. MRAs are much too enamored with their fantasies of male martyrhood.
@Ideologue
“Disclaimer: I’m not responsible for every word out of the mouths of everyone who believes in men’s equality, any more than I’m going to answer for everything ever said by someone who likes cheese.”
It might help if you, or any MRA, denounced the so called “lunatic fringe” for saying things like women’s voting rights should be removed, or that western women should be bred out of existence, or that women are incapable of feeling love. I–and pretty much everyone else on this site–will gladly denounce the Valerie Solanis’ as what they are…nuts. But since the MRM is so comitted to “bros before hos,” the lunatic fringe does nothing but arm your opponents in turning public opinion against you.
Yes, it is sad the way some men are treated in this country. We live in a world where nothing is fair, and most people will suffer at some point in their lives at the very least. We might take your claims more seriously if you devoted more energy to helping men, rather than slaying an imaginary strawman feminist, or simply voicing your disdain for women at every turn. We might take you more seriously if you didn’t refer to the majority of men as manginas.
We no longer need to live the life that biology dictates. Women, and men, have far more choices than they used to do. As a man, you are free to go your own way. You may have a relationship with a man if you so choose. You may marry a woman, or live with a woman, or date a women, or date many women, or sleep with a different woman every night, or even pay a woman to sleep with you, if you so choose. All of these you may do and most people won’t judge you a bit.
You do not live in a man hating society. The fact that you may have suffered in your life is not the fault of women. Perhaps it is the fault of one woman. Maybe you should talk to her about that.
What may appear as insensitivity, or a lack of concern, when it comes to your plight, on our part, is not. We don’t dismiss you, or mock you, or make jokes about you because we don’t care about men. It’s because we DO NOT ACCEPT YOUR PREMISE. And as you so earnestly cling to your premise that women or feminists hate men, despite reasonable arguments to the contrary, we can not help but find you ridiculous. But we also find you sad, and frustrating. And we hope that you get better, and can be happy.
The blog mocks misogyny. It is misogyny to not permit women to serve. Problem?
I just love it when admonishments about humanity come from representatives of a group that regularly calls for women to be beaten, raped and murdered to teach them a lesson about their clothing/behavior/et cetera. For every one of your sobbing divorced fathers I can find you ten who decided the better course of action was to murder the woman divorcing him and for every one of those divorced fathers I can find a hundred people like you making a hero out of him and saying he’s a warning of things to come. We mock you all because it is the only sane response.
I have no idea what DragonsBeHere is on about.
DragonsBeHere: How much do you wanna bet that none of those fools that boobies is quoting have even served? But then again, how many of the commenters here have served?
I want to address this, specifically, because it’s shaming language.
When married to I like that we all think we know what we are talking about, even when we cant know.
No, you can’t, and it’s not all that material, because the arguments being had aren’t about what it’s like. The argument is about who should be prohibited/permitted to take part.
No one (and I mean no one) knows what it’s like until they do it. There is a vast literature (going back thousands of years) about it, and that is a decent basis for getting an idea about what being in an army is like (and a lesser basis for being in combat), but that’s not the topic, and pretending that one needs to know what it’s like at the sharp end to have a valid opinion about who goes to the sharp end is nonsense.
DBH: If you think you can be trained to kill and do it for years, then come back and sell printers at Office Max, well Im afraid you are sorely mistaken.
Bullshit. You don’t really mean that. If you did you wouldn’t be pretending you know what you are talking about. Unless you are trying to tell us that you, from your vast experience as a soldier know that you, and your fellows are no longer fit to take part in everyday society.
Because I did exactly what you said. I spent a career in the army. My job was about getting people killed; by getting inside their heads and convincing them to betray their comrades. It was also about killing them one on one (because there is no “front line” even in WW2 the “front” was fluid and “cooks and bakers” were shot at).
If you really think those who haven’t seen the elephant can’t know enough to talk about it, shut up.
OT: Back from Pasadena. Had a pretty good time. Got to meet Katz (a pleasure,and I think I probably talked too much), and I’ll be in Canada in a couple of weeks.
But in the meanwhile, I ought to be able to keep up.
NWO
Skipping Aristotle as he’s been addressed already. I’m going to hope you’re intentionally misinterpreting how parallel sentences work, and try making it blatantly clear.
Not a parallel sentence structure because MRA logic isn’t logical:
“man-hater” : hates any man, any where, for any reason
non-”woman-hater” : likes some woman, somewhere, who perfectly follows my rules
versus the actually parallel:
“man-hater” : hates any man, any where, for any reason // does not like some woman, somewhere, who perfectly follows my rules
non-”woman-hater” : does not hate any man, any where, for any reason //
likes some woman, somewhere, who perfectly follows my rules
Or try the definitions everyone else uses:
misogynist (noun) : a person who hates women
misandrist (noun) : a person who hates men
Again NWO, please invest in a dictionary. Any reason you defined thought crime and then quote Aristotle and not Orwell though? And feminists would not be in favor of thought crime legislation (FFS do I really have to say that?!)
The pleasure was all mine. Merav is cool, too.
@MertvayaRuka
In my town recently a man shot his ex wife, ex mother in law, ex sister in law, and a 2 year old child. As you say, it happens all the time.
PP/FF/IR: “Disclaimer: I’m not responsible for every word out of the mouths of everyone who believes in men’s equality, any more than I’m going to answer for everything ever said by someone who likes cheese.”
Dude, you won’t even accept responsibility for the things you’ve done… e.g. PREGGO PUNCHOUT.
DBH: What Im describing is nothing of the sort, please dont put words in my mouth. The prosperity you are describing is a direct result of the war itself.
Horseshit.
It was a lot of things, no small part of which was guys who’d been in combat coming home, going to school and selling shit.
Like I said, if you really believe what you said above, you should walk the walk and stop typing about it.
No sir, and you are correct. In fact, Im glad you touched on it, I didnt think anyone here would. They absolutely have to be reintegrated. The whole “difference in mindset” thing, from my original post.
Please, tell me about the vast difference in mindset, the one that makes it so difficult to fit into civilian society again.
Do you agree, then, that we should leave the soldiering to the soldiers?
Tautology is tautological.
Ok, can someone explain Preggo Punchout for me? I’ll give you hugs 🙂
Fembot: Make of it what you will.
Thank you, Katz.
As to the use of “females”; yes that’s the one of the ways we separate the needed distinctions between the male and female soldiers; latrines, billets, etc. are designated as, “male/female”. As needed we refer to, male/female troops. It’s not that all soldiers are identified by adjective, but that as needed modifiers are appended.
It’s not how soldiers see women, it’s how we make the places in which difference is significant apparent.
Everyone should also check out his one and only other deviation, which is the following couplet:
Filed under Literature > Prose > Fiction > Romance, which for some reason is the part I can’t get past (along with the fact that a two-line poem is the only thing of his own creation he could upload to DeviantArt).
@Pecunium
Whats the party without you?
“Bullshit. You don’t really mean that.”
I do mean that. Care to read my other posts, or just reaching as is typical? If what you say you’ve done is indeed true, you prove my point that there has to be reintegration. Furthermore, and I truly am curious, are you claiming that anyone is capable of doing what youve done?
“Please, tell me about the vast difference in mindset, the one that makes it so difficult to fit into civilian society again.”
Ill let google do the work on that one 😉
google.com/search?q=ptsd
@Argenti
And so I swim in a sea of turds…
“Things around here are generally funny, lighthearted mockery…”
If only that were true.
“…or serious commentary on fandom things (eg LoTR).”
Just not Ancient Aliens, eh? Am I right, Rutee? It was a nice respite from the typical trite out of the likes of pecunium et al. I bid you adieu.
Average flounce. 5/10.
“If only that were true.” — maybe people would treat you better if you didn’t do things like:
Ill let google do the work on that one 😉
google.com/search?q=ptsd
Pecunium — I’ll pretty sure DragonsBeHere does actually mean to say that all veterans are unable to reintegrate into society (and conflating PTSD with “the vast difference in mindset” between soldiers and civilians, which is infuriating in its own right). And welcome back!
Crap, so now people with PTSD can’t be a part of polite society?
I mean, the effects of my rape, including PTSD, continue to suck. And very occasionally I can’t be around others. But your stupid fucking smiley face google search is contradicted by the realities of millions of people with PTSD who have to be and are a part of their communities, and is also kinda shitty and offensive.
Prediction – will not stick the landing.
Ok Ok, I know I said adieu and all that silly shit. (thx, katz, for the 5, and cassandra you are correct this time)
I am in no way trivializing PTSD, that certainly isnt my intention, I have only respect for our soldiers, please dont twist my words. Neither did I say veterans must stay out of society, just that reintegration was necessary due to the differences in mindset.
Fuck, you guys love your olive branches, a SoB needs to stay on his toes…
I’d like it if the Japanese could finally perfect making mech drones to send to war that could be remotely controlled by actual people- then we’d be able to leave all this gendered nonsense behind (and the casualties because dying in combat is bad!).
I’m really tired of the whole dick waving contest- I don’t want ANYONE dying for resource wars. As far as I’m concerned, a dead soldier is a wasted life unless we’re actively trying to stop the next Hitler or something. And I am personally of the opinion that we should do our best to NOT send people out into conflicts, regardless of their genitalia. If you’re qualified, it should not matter your sex or gender (and in some cases, I find it frustrating that there are weight limits because of the fact that there are a lot of big burly people who would be awesome soldiers but are too “big” to qualify).
There are no winners in war when it comes to the infantry. 🙁
“I am in no way trivializing PTSD, that certainly isnt my intention, I have only respect for our soldiers, please dont twist my words.”
Then wtf is the smilie doing there?!
“Neither did I say veterans must stay out of society, just that reintegration was necessary due to the differences in mindset.”
You did say that “the differences in mindset” = PTSD and that “If you think you can be trained to kill and do it for years, then come back and sell printers at Office Max, well Im afraid you are sorely mistaken.” — the combination implies that all veterans come back with PTSD and thus cannot reintegrate into society. No one said that you said veterans must stay out of society, but rather that you said they cannot fit into society again.