[TRIGGER WARNING: Discussion of child rape]
Tom Martin is one of the most prominent Men’s Rights Activists in the UK. He’s best known for a failed lawsuit he launched against the London School of Economics, charging the school’s gender studies program with, you guessed it, misandry. The case was thrown out of court this March, and Martin celebrated his defeat by calling a lot of people whores on Twitter and, I am proud to say, in the comments here at Man Boobz.
While Martin, known perhaps ironically as @sexismbusters on Twitter, is clearly more famous in the UK than he is here in the states, this peculiar crusader against what he sees as sexism has been celebrated (and his defeat in court mourned) by numerous Men’s Rights sites on this side of the pond. He’s been discussed many times on the Men’s Rights subreddit, where one supporter declared:
And he’s gotten write-ups on an assortment of other MR sites from The Spearhead to MensActivism.org to one Man Boobz favorite, the now-defunct What Men Are Saying About Women. On the website of the National Coalition for Men, one enthusiastic commenter gushed:
Finaly a real man with balls !!! Not like the rest of us . Tom is my hero .
But the Men’s Rights site that has given Martin the most support has been A Voice for Men, which featured Martin on one of its “radio” shows, reposted an article on Martin’s crusade from his website that seems to have been written by Martin himself (in the third person), offered updates on his lawsuit, and even publicized a recent public debate of his in England. The site has also encouraged people to donate to Martin’s legal fund.
One wonders what these supporters will make of some of the strange and awful things Martin has been saying in the comments here on Man Boobz in recent days. (There is no question that it is really him; he confirmed his identity earlier by emailing me from the account associated with his website Sexismbusters.org, and anyone skeptical of any of this is invited to contact him directly through his website.)
Most of the comments he posted here during his first commenting binge were rather risibly misogynist, frequently punctuated with his favorite epithet “whore,” a designation he feels is an appropriate one for 97% of all women and (he had recently added) for 98% of Man Boobzers of either gender. You can see here or here for numerous examples of Martin’s wit and wisdom – including his argument that hard chairs are discriminatory towards men and his now famous declaration that “female penguins are whores.”
His more recent comments, though, haven’t been funny in the slightest. Martin’s new obsession? Child prostitutes – and why they aren’t victims so much as victimizers, willing participants in an activity that makes them big money. Let me put another TRIGGER WARNING here. This is some of the most repellant material I have ever featured on man Boobz.
Here’s Martin’s opening statement on the subject:
The latest establishment scam in the UK, is to describe child prostitutes as “vulnerable children groomed for sexual exploitation”, then talk about them being “passed around” etc, without mention of the fact that these young people agreed to be whores, and are getting paid for it.
In a followup, he elaborated on this logic:
“Yeah, she offered me a job as a prostitute abroad, which would involve me receiving lots of money for taking cock, so I accepted, became a prostitute, and therefor, according to the official fem definition, this makes me a sex slave”.
Grow up!
Even a 10 year old knows, if someone is paying you for sex, that makes you a whore.
And when he talks about ten year olds here, he means this literally; in his mind, trafficked ten year old children aren’t really victims, but economic actors making an economic choice:
I stand by my statement, that child prostitutes know what they are doing, and therefore deserve to be called prostitutes, not victims.
A progressive European country (either Holland or one of the Scandinavian countries, I remember hearing), introduced in the late 90s, the legal principle of no arbitrary minimum age for consent, rather, the legal requirement to ascertain whether lawful sex had taken place was to establish whether the child or young person ‘understands the meaning of consent’ …
Now, if a ten year old is for instance [specific sexual act redacted] for money up front, then there is very much less question whether that whore understands the meaning of consent or not.
In another comment, Martin suggests that ten-year-olds who have been the victims of what some people insist on calling “real rape” would be offended by anyone thinking that ten-year-old prostitutes suffer from rape – when, after all, the child prostitutes have “agreed” to it.
From the perspective of a child who has actually been raped by an adult, how must it seem, to hear the victim-feminist establishment conflate child rape with child prostitution? The raped child remembers having no choice about participating in the sexual activity, of being forced, and then is asked to consider his or her fate or level of agency as similar or the same as that of a child who marketed them self for sex to an adult, took payment, then performed the act.
I don’t think the average 10 year old genuine rape victim would buy the manboobz style analysis that all child prostitution is rape … .
Questions of genuine agency are complicated, but not complicated enough to pass a 10 year old genuine rape victim’s bullshitometer I posit.
Oh, Martin doesn’t actually think ten year olds should be prostitutes. He thinks they should wait a few years, until they’re at least 14.
Should child prostitution from the ages of 13 up be legal?
Nope. I think that prostitution is a potentially dangerous profession for which a basic qualification in health and safety be required, like an NVQ – and that kind of course would not be attainable until after the minimum of secondary school years are completed, so aged 14, 15, 16, 17 or even 18 or more depending on the country.
The real problem, in his mind, is that young girls try to enter into the business when they should be in school:
States with child prostitution problems should be forced to get these children back into schools to complete their education, and child prostitutes who persist should be treated as school truants, a misdemeanor, and given the carrot and stick approach to get them back on the straight and narrow or go to young offenders institutions. If they want to be prostitutes when they’re old enough, then they can go to the careers advise officer, where the pros and cons of the profession can be laid out, and an application for the training course and license can be given.
Martin mocks the very notion that child prostitutes are being exploited:
Imagine you caught your underage 15 year old daughter on the game, what would you say to her?
“Okay darling, obviously you played no part whatsoever in choosing to be a prostitute yourself, so mummy’s going to help catch the nasty pimp who put you up to this, because what you need to learn is when 15 year old girls accidentally suck cocks for money, they should be compensated, with a bit of victims of crime compensation, and, not forgetting, the original £12 cock-sucking bonanza from the punter. That’s right sweety. Double bubble time. Pass me the phone. Now how does this thing work?”
Or… would you ground the whore for 6 months until she passes all her GCSEs?
Well, given that approximately 98% of manboobzers are whores themselves, I’m guessing you’re probably going to want to blame it all on MRAs.
So prostitution should be legal. But since prostitutes are very bad, they should pay high taxes for the privilege of plying their trade, to keep them poor and in order to repay society for the damage they do:
Prostitutes need to be taxed and licensed so heavily, rendering the profession a relatively poor way of making money.
Anyone who practices as a prostitute without the necessary qualification and license, can go to young offenders institute/jail – just like any other persistent illegal unlicensed trader would.
Anyone working on the sly as an escort, should be hunted down by the taxwoman, and if caught, given a huge bill for tax evasion, as well as a fine, and prison for not having a license. Unlicensed tax-evading prostitutes should be hunted down (which would be easy enough).
Anyone choosing prostitution should pay the highest taxes, and know why those taxes are so high – because of the damage prostitution does to the prostitutes and their customers and their environment and the society.
In a followup comment, Martin sees a silver lining in the form of all the tax revenues that prostitution will bring in:
If licensed hookers pay for a massive license fee and heavy taxes, then some of that money can be ring-fenced to research how best to get women (and girls) to renounce prostitution in all its forms, because let’s face it, a lot of housewhores and princess wannabes could do with a little economic activity-inducing work ethic therapy themselves.
Meanwhile, the customers of underage prostitutes – in other words, the child rapists – should be treated gingerly:
[M]en who pay money to have sex with child prostitutes should not be criminalized – but taken out of circulation and treated compassionately for their condition. I’ve heard that most criminal activity peaks with testosterone levels, in the late teens, but paedophillia is the only crime that increases in frequency as these men get older, indicating a growing pathology for them rather than just a typical immature criminal act.
He offers this final summing up of his twisted argument:
[P]edophiles who pay children for sex are not really rapists, because the child consents, then performs the act, indicating they understand the nature of the contract. The elder is still a pedophiles, but the child prostitute is still a prostitute.
If the child is enslaved – it’s rape, or too young or stupid to know what he or she’s doing – rape. But poor, and in need of food? Not rape. A choice. Unwilling to do other hard labour paying 9 times less than the prostitution route? Not rape. A choice.
He then extends his argument to the rest of the alleged 97% of women who, in his mind, are whores:
Whatever your age, follow the golden rule, of never taking money for sex, then prostitution will be eradicated. Only the prostitute can stop charging for sex.
And of course, that means rejecting courtship gifts, engagement gifts, marriage gifts, divorce gifts, and government largess also.
I don’t think many of you are ready to renounce prostitution in all its forms. …
I know a whore when I see one.
He even returns momentarily to his earlier assertion that female penguins are whores:
Someone or other here said I was anthropomorphising human behaviour onto penguin behaviour by calling penguins whores or something.
But the point is, being a whore, is an animalistic trait, that human females should not need to resort to, given they’re at the top of the fucking food chain already. Google “nuptial gifts” and you can read studies about various animals granting sex to those males who provide the most food, or even the most glittery non-edible trinkets etc, or in the case of penguins, rocks to build nests and shelter with.
I’m saying women are better than penguins, or at least would be if they renounced prostitution in all its forms.
I’m sure the women of the world will be happy to hear that Mr. Martin thinks they are potentially better than penguins.
I doubt many of Mr. Martin’s American supporters are familiar with his elaborate apologia for child rape. I would like to invite Man Boobz readers to show this post, or at least some of the more repellant quotations from it, to the proprietors of the various MRA blogs and MRA forums I have mentioned above.
I wonder if any of his supporters will be willing to renounce him publicly once they know what he has said here – and apparently in some recent public debates as well. Surely no legitimate “human rights movement” would want to be associated with anyone who spouts filth like this.
Define real.
“Define real.”
Not part of his cell phone?
I’m gonna go with “no”, then. The thing is, for all that he’s horrible shit head, it’s abundantly clear that Martin is primarily an amoral shyster. I don’t know if people are sending him money to produce these documentary experiments or not. But I’m fairly certain that if they are the money is going to blow and cheap booze.
Nobinayamu – I used to work on films too when I was young and stupid! My endurance record was something like three days straight in a tiny basement full of effects smoke. We were all kind of hallucinatory near the end–we lost all judgement and started going through with increasingly bizarre and dangerous ideas. Actresses were wandering around naked (not as sexy as it sounds) because they didn’t even bother covering up between nude scenes and we were handling and throwing around broken glass with our bare hands because we thought it would look cool on camera.
Good times.
I don’t wish I was nineteen again, but damn, I sure do wish staying up all night now felt like it did at nineteen.
As a person with Hashimoto’s Disease (no working thyroid), who has to take thyroid medication for the rest of my life (which is derived from dessicated thyroid BTW) just so I can fucking FUNCTION and not die from horrible diseases related to Vitamin B deficiency, feel like getting out of bed is a monumental and Herculean task, constantly feeling cold and clammy, bloating and gaining weight uncontrollably and otherwise spend my days in a thick, Silent-Hill like fog, I’d like to thank Tom Martin for yet again making fun of people like me who have severe issues with our endocrine systems (for profit), because HAHA, everyone knows that making fun of people with medical problems is TOTALLY COOL YO.
Except not, because it’s fucking INSENSITIVE AS HELL.
Man, why don’t you just crawl back into the cesspool from whence you came? Your poisonously putrid farting rambles make me want to vomit.
Speaking of bizarre and dangerous ideas, have you read Bruce Campbell’s autobiography? Lots of stuff in there about how the crew of “Evil Dead” nearly killed themselves a bunch of time out in the woods. High–larious.
VoIP – Bruce Campbell’s autobiography was the whole reason I ended up working on a low-budget indie horror film shoot in the first place! I read it and (at nineteen…) I thought that nearly dying out in the woods sounded like the funnest thing ever.
That’s terrible formatting. I’ve been drinking and dancing.
If Chins Could Kill? Great read.
“The thing is, for all that he’s horrible shit head, it’s abundantly clear that Martin is primarily an amoral shyster.”
I keep saying…he’s like a cross between a MLM huckster and one of those people who approaches you in public and asks if you’ve taken Jesus as your personal savior. It’s entertaining from a distance, but I hope he’s not actually bilking anyone out of money that could be put to better use elsewhere.
I don’t know, I kind of think of it like the people donating to George Zimmerman’s defense fund. If it’s a cause you believe in, fine. It’s your money. But don’t get mad when it’s revealed that he lied to the court and used it to pay off his Amex and Sam’s Club bills.
Cookies crumbling and all that.
We had one actual grip truck and then a couple of rented Penske trucks. The scary thing was that the guy who drove the grip truck was a huge stoner and it’s kind of a miracle he never crashed, because I don’t think he was sober once the whole shoot.
Also a huge stoner and drinker: the one “name” star we had on the shoot. (I can’t say who, but trust me, no one exciting. “Name” is in quotes for a reason.) He was also one of the worst human beings I’ve ever encountered. He wasn’t violent and that’s about all I can say for him. But he had the emotional maturity of a child who somehow got to his forties without ever once being told “no.” He would throw tantrums if people told him that blowing takes on purpose “so we’ll have a good gag reel” was not appropriate behavior.
One of his funnier foibles: halfway through the shoot, without asking anyone, he shaved his head. The makeup department had to put that spray-on hair stuff on his head and in some shots it’s very obvious that his head doesn’t actually have hair but is just sort of painted brown.
That’s the same reason I got into Civil War reenactment!
fuckin looooool
“That is until my buddy Colin actually hit a hotel during a three day walk away.”
Sleep dep is setting in or that’s hilarious, I can’t tell.
Oh, man that sucks. I also will not use any names for the “names” but I can say this: for the most part the bigger the star the better they behaved. They were patient, very protective of us kids and consummate professionals. The more “D-list” the bigger the shoulder chips, the worse the behavior.
i worked on a show where the star -fairly famous at the time- got trapped in a locker room for over an hour during a lighting set up. I was sent to find him and he couldn’t have been nicer about the whole thing. Compare and contrast with a day-player who pitched a fit every day about the sweet tea at craft service. I wanted to be like “Dude, we’re in the south. The carafes are labelled. Get the fuck over it!”
“Cookies crumbling and all that.”
I suppose you’re right. I just don’t like con artists on general principles. It is funny that not everyone seems to be picking up on that aspect of Tom’s behavior, since half the things he says are sales pitches of one kind or another.
“I also will not use any names for the “names” but I can say this: for the most part the bigger the star the better they behaved. They were patient, very protective of us kids and consummate professionals. The more “D-list” the bigger the shoulder chips, the worse the behavior.”
This is true for music too, in my experience. Gazillionaire rock star with a house the size of a castle? Usually pretty polite and friendly and easy to deal with (back around Christmas there was one who had to reschedule an interview multiple times, and he apologized profusely when I finally did talk to him). Singer from some shitty little band who’re lucky to manage a tour of small clubs with ticket sales at about 50%? Often rude, arrogant, and generally a pain in the ass to work with. After years of this I’ve developed a theory that diva behavior correlates very strongly with insecurity about one’s place in the pecking order.
I’ve never worked with any really namey names. I’ve only ever worked with D-listers who were trying to milk their “big fish, little pond” temporary celebrity for all it was worth, and no-lister local theater people/struggling model-actresses who were generally super chill and would offer to help carry equipment and stuff. It’s good to hear not all the “names” are asses.
…And with that, I have to go to sleep, even though I’m not making a very important documentary tomorrow. ‘Night Boobzerz.
Nobinayamu and Cliff, I may sound like as much of a doofus as that 22-year-old writer who wishes she were poor because it’s ~romantic~, but I kinda envy you guys. I mean, I’d hate my life while I was doing that, but it sounds like a hell of an experience.
Don’t worry; it’s funny. No one was hurt and the hotel was so thrilled to have a “real production” filming there, they took it about as well as they could. We ribbed Colin for a bit which led to some hilarious exchanges:
Locations Manager: Colin, you hit a building
Colin: It had it coming.
VoIP – Actually, it was pretty awesome at the time. All the movies turned out hilariously cheesy, and both financially and in terms of health and safety it was completely unsustainable as a lifestyle, but god, it WAS fun. There’s a certain pleasure in devoting literally all your waking hours to a totally consuming project, even if that project is also horribly planned and trying to kill you.
Still glad I’m working on a real career now, though.
Oh, I agree. Con artists are gross. If you’re working a serious con you could probably just make an honest living. And I also don’t get why people don’t see that about Martin. Maybe it’s because development is, at it’s core, a type of sales. And I also do commission sales so I’m fairly attuned to the tricks. But he’s just so fucking transparent about it.
That coupled with the incompetence just makes me shrug. If they get took, they get took.
VoIP – Cliff just said, literally, everything I was going to say in response. It was a blast. It was incredibly foolish. I had a great time. I probably took 3 – 4 years off my life. And I love what I do now.
I think the greatest thing I got from that part of my life -besides the stories- has been a near complete unflappability. People try to get under my skin and I’m just like “Whatever, dawg. I once had to single-handedly work lockdown on a two lane dirt road in rural Alabama to keep regular patrons from going into a famous honky-tonk that was famous for never being closed A black woman who, at the time, regularly wore platform chucks and Erykah Badu style head wraps. I’ve heard it all. Come at me.”
That’s an excellent summation.