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antifeminism I'm totally being sarcastic it's science! misandry misogyny MRA reddit the c-word whores woman's suffrage

Science proves the Men’s Rights subreddit to be totally not (completely) misogynistic

So apparently I’m way off base with this “misogyny” thing. For example, I have been under the impression that I have been finding misogynistic stuff in the Men’s Rights subreddit, like, all the time. With upvotes, and everything. But evidently I’m wrong.

Because now ignatiusloyola, one of the subreddit mods, has done a very scientific study that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that, well, whatever misogyny is there is officially not a big damn deal.

Ig explains his protocol:

I did a quick scan of the first 400 comments on the list (100/page, 4 pages in). I scanned for words like “cunt” and “whore”, and read the context of these. I looked for the words “woman” and “women”, and read the context of these. I looked for “suffrage” and “vote” also.

I found two comments that used the word “cunt”, one of them was used to describe men, the other to describe a specific woman. The only instances of “whore” were “attention whore”.

There were two comments involving the word “woman” that generalized women with negative stereotypes.

“Suffrage” and “vote” instances did not involve any context that suggested that women did not deserve the right to vote.

How a person defines “hatred of women”, either loosely (suggestive from context, rather than explicit) or strictly (explicit statements), it is pretty clear that out of 400 comments, very few are misogynistic.

Does misogyny exist? Yes. But it does not seem to be a significant contribution to r/MensRights. At best, people are seeing a few comments and focusing on their existence while ignoring the rest.

It’s a lot like that time Michael Richards did that standup routine, and everyone focused on that one word he said, totally ignoring all the other words he used that were totally not racist slurs. I mean, yeah, he said that word a bunch of times, but it still made up a very small percentage of all the words he used that evening.

So that’s that, then. Misogyny, officially not a problem!

Or that would have been that, had Ig not actually posted about his experiment to the subreddit he had just proved was, like, totally non-misogynistic:

Because it turned out that a couple of the fellas had an issue with Ig’s methodology. In particular, that stuff about female suffrage. Because, apparently, you can totally be against women having the right to vote and still not be a misogynist. As zyk0s put it (garnering upvotes in the process):

[T]here’s the matter of female suffrage. I really don’t see how suggesting women should not have been granted the right to vote is misogyny. It might be motivated by it, but not necessarily so, and treating it as such is akin to criminalizing holocaust denial: it’s censorship, pure and simple, and if [1] /r/MR wants to keep calling itself an open space where ideas are not silenced, that attitude has to change.

Our friend Demonspawn went even further(and got a few upvotes himself):

Suggesting that the government works better without the women’s vote is not misogyny. It’s an analysis of the facts and the consequences of allowing women’s suffrage.

Suggesting that women retain the right to vote without the corresponding responsibilities that men face is misandry.

So there you have it. The Men’s Rights subreddit doesn’t have a misogyny problem; if anything, it’s a hotbed of misandry.

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thebionicmommy
thebionicmommy
12 years ago

Watching Owly trolling now is like watching Favre’s comeback last year. Dude, it’s time to retire.

I agree. He jumped the shark a long time ago. So far, I’m thinking Steeldude is the best person for Troll of the Year 2012, unless a more amusing troll arrives.

Shadow
Shadow
12 years ago

Shade: That’s a 404 for me.

Is this street slang? /:)

Shadow
Shadow
12 years ago

@Kendra

Agreed, but he lacks the consistency that an Owly/DKM/AntZ in their prime had. Truly, it was the Golden Age of Trolls.

katz
12 years ago

…No. It means that when I click on Shade’s link, I get a “404: File Not Found.”

ShadetheDruid
ShadetheDruid
12 years ago

katz: Weird, try this one instead. The other one works for me, so maybe my computer/browser is being magical. 😛 http://onegirlgeek.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/know_your_paradoxes.png

(It’s the paradox poster from Portal)

Shadow
Shadow
12 years ago

@katz

Oh no, I got it. Was just being silly

katz
12 years ago

OK, that one works.

Falconer
12 years ago

I thought perhaps we should come up with some paradoxes tailored for Owly, but on reflection I realized that I cannot do it because I cannot begin to grasp his thought processes and therefore I could not hope to understand them.

Well, except for “not agreeing with Owly = mocking Owly.”

Cliff Pervocracy
12 years ago

Falconer : I think “a woman voluntarily helped a person once” would explode Owly’s brain, if it could ever penetrate through the thick protective layers of “THEY JUST SAY THAT BECAUSE THEY HATE MEN.”

katz
12 years ago

Yeah, Owly can’t even grasp “If the government is out to silence your opinion, how come you’re still here?”

ShadetheDruid
ShadetheDruid
12 years ago

I think the only way that would work is if we started agreeing with him completely, i’m not sure he could process that.

ShadetheDruid
ShadetheDruid
12 years ago

Hah! Thinking about it, that would be the perfect paradox. Owly is fond of “women always lie”, so what if one agreed with him?

katz
12 years ago

Hey, I’m bored, so I’ve got a question for everyone.

Dracula
Dracula
12 years ago

Yeah?

katz
12 years ago

Is someone declaring that he loves Comic Sans and intends to use it for everything in the future sufficient reason to unfriend him?

Cliff Pervocracy
12 years ago

Katz – YES.

Dracula
Dracula
12 years ago

Yeah, I don’t share in popular hatred of Comic Sans, but to use it for everything? Unfriend away.

Viscaria
Viscaria
12 years ago

It’s always interesting when people talk about “granting” the right to vote to this or that marginalized group. It’s always something “we” did; “we” allowed First Nations people to vote, “we” granted women suffrage, “we” gave the vote to black folks. As if the right to vote is something that belongs to privileged people, that they have generously chosen to share with everybody else. It’s therefore impossible to talk about revoking the cis white upperclass man’s right to vote, because it was never given to him, he’s just always had it. He’s its proper and original owner.

Falconer
12 years ago

@Katz — Yes, probably, with regret.

I’d caution you against people who love Papyrus, too, except I play RPGs and RPG companies apparently love it. There’s a GURPS book about Egypt (called, creatively, Egypt) and the title and all section headings are in Papyrus. And I love that book.

So, y’know, massive hypocrite ‘n’all.

Viscaria
Viscaria
12 years ago

Colon, semi-colon, they’re pretty much the same thing, right? Although that seems to be my only major grammatical error, which means that was one of my best Man Boobz comments in months. Guys, Steele is a better writer than me. But that’s okay.

katz
12 years ago

I tend to cautiously grant a Papyrus exception for things that are actually about Egypt. Then again, its really high median is weird-looking in any context.

Dracula
Dracula
12 years ago

Guys, Steele is a better writer than me.

Not remotely true.

katz
12 years ago

Guys, Steele is a better writer than me.

Don’t say that! Don’t even think that! And since when are grammatically correct blog comments the litmus test for one’s skill as a writer, anyway?

ShadetheDruid
ShadetheDruid
12 years ago

I don’t really have that many opinions on fonts, seeing as I only ever use two*, but I do know that using Comic Sans is to be avoided at all costs.

*Verdana and Tahoma, for reasons.. I have no reasons.

hellkell
hellkell
12 years ago

Is someone declaring that he loves Comic Sans and intends to use it for everything in the future sufficient reason to unfriend him?

YES