It was, perhaps, inevitable, and now it has come to pass: obviously fed up with Men’s Rights Redditors questioning his wisdom (and his tactics, and his general narcissistic assholery) on a fairly regular basis, A Voice for Men Supreme Leader Paul Elam has started up his own Men’s Rights subreddit – r/mensrightsactivists –in which he can summarily ban all ”armchair activists” and “white knights” and “people who disagree with him.” Yep, that’s right: he’s made like a Trotskyist banana, and split.
Elam has long had a fairly strained relationship with Reddit MRAs. If you search through his comment history on Reddit, you can see evidence of numerous meltdowns on his part, which occur fairly regularly whenever anyone challenges him on pretty much anything, even when they are otherwise sympathetic to his views. On his own blog, he responds to such criticism by quickly banning the critics; on Reddit, he has tended to respond with schoolyard insults, digs at the masculinity of his critics, long recitations of his many fine accomplishments as a dedicated armchair activist, and the occasional rape joke.
Clearly the final straw for Elam was the reception given to a post of his on the poster controversy I wrote about here. Some samples from the discussion. Builtbro offers a substantive critique of Elam’s badly worded posters:
HolyCounsel is a bit more blunt:
And then there’s this edifying exchange:
The massive numbers of upvotes for Elam’s critics and downvotes for his, er, rebuttals seem to be at least partially the result of an invasion from r/SubredditDrama. Still, Elam seems to take each and every downvote personally, so the 238 net downvotes on his “Kleenex” comment must have stung.
In his new subreddit, threads like these clearly won’t be allowed to happen. As Elam explains in his less-than-welcoming “Welcome” message to new visitors:
While dissenters and the blue pill public will be welcome to post links and comment, trolls and other annoyances will be summarily booted with pleasure. This is an MRA dominated zone.
A couple of things to consider: Dissent, especially that which serves to further the improvement of the men’s movement, is welcome and appreciated. But if you want to post here, as a supposed MRA, telling others what is wrong with their work, you better have some MRA credentials.
Inactive, armchair quarterbacks, are not allowed here, unless their posts reflect genuine concern for improving and supporting the MRM and respect for those actually doing the work. If you want to ask questions so that you can learn, that is fine. But if you want to question, just so you can tear down, and you are not an MRA, then it will be adios for you. I’d sooner give a feminist the floor than a back seat driver.
R/mensrightsactivists: Come for the Elam-approved opinions, stay for the bans! Indeed, Elam devotes as much space in his “welcome” message to explaining whom he’ll ban as he does to actually spelling out what the subreddit will ostensibly do differently than good old r/mensrights.
Of course, this is not the first time that some angry MRA or two has decided to start another Men’s Rights subreddit designed to appeal to more, well, belligerent MRAs. Reddit already boasts an assortment of such subreddits, all of them fairly sparsely populated, including Rights4Men, Male Studies, and FeMRAs, a more obnoxious alternative to the already sparsely populated LadyMRAs. There’s even another subreddit devoted to MRA activism; it goes by the name of, well, MRAactivism. (There may be several more, but I can’t remember what they’re called.)
The Men’s Rights subreddit has nearly 45,000 subscribers; Elam’s new subreddit currently has 49, which is no doubt why he continues to post links to his blog in the original Men’s Rights subreddit. Whether Elam’s new subreddit succeeds and splits the MRM in two, or dies an inglorious death, one thing is sure: there will be plenty of new material for me here at Man Boobz.
Excellent!
Also, on topic: I think sockpuppeting, harassment, and rape jokes are their idea of polite disagreement. I’d hate to see what they consider impolite.
Chuckeedee has graced us with some of his wisdom above; just let thru moderation.
Speaking of which, Chuck, I’m not criticizing Elam for banning Jeremiah and his ilk. That’s perfectly reasonable; indeed, that’s one of the very few reasonable things he’s ever done. But, dude, since when isn’t Elam himself an extremist?
In any case, what’s amusing to me is that (in addition to banning feminists almost instantly because he’s a coward that way) Elam gets steam-coming-out-of-his-ears angry when other MRAs of whatever political persuasion disagree with him in any way at all about anything or offer even the mildest criticisms of AVFM. He’s a narcissist and a control freak, and eventually he will alienate virtually everyone else in the MRM. Which will be interesting to watch.
God, I hate this half-smart, freshman-ethics-class bullshit.
“Isn’t it just shallow and short-sighted to treat two people differently, just because one of them was assaulted and the other did the assaulting? I mean, in the end, they’re just two people involved in a difficult situation, right? We need to find a holistic solution for both of them and you don’t get that way by creating these arbitrary abuser/abusee divisions.”
Chuck wrote:
Perhaps you should start a new movement. Your platform could be “I hate everyone, even you, even me!” I bet it will be very popular.
You know what else is? Hyphens.
Sorry, I couldn’t resist. 😀
I feel… feline. I wonder if there’s something going around?
So is heavily affected misanthropy.
We could call it MAM! The Miserable Asshole’s Movement.
haha, kitty!
Kitty! Assuming I did it right, anyway.
re:icycalm, I really can’t read more than a paragraph of his dreck without my brain starting to melt, but I got far enough to laugh at him calling someone else’s writing “mind-bewildering babble” with a straight face.
@jumbofisch: Brotherhood or the original?
Reading those quotes from pretentious wanker, I heard them in Tim & Debbie’s voice:
And further off topic, I think my rabbit might be in love with my cat. It sniffs cat’s bum and then crawls under his belly, repeatedly. Cat is not amused.
I refuse to fall into the evil, oppressive, kitty-archy. Muahahaha
But seriously, if TMF says you’ve gone too far, damn, you have reached a new low.
But, dude, since when isn’t Elam himself an extremist?
Let’s get our terms straight, David. Feminists, typically of the belief that women are wonderful just because they have vaginas, are extremists. And in the opposite corner to them are the masculists, typically of the belief that men are wonderful just because they have dicks. Elam is not a masculist. He has strong views. You can call him passionate or hard-line or a zealot or an arsehole or a crusader or whatever, and I can respect that you have your reasons for your views. And, if we give you the benefit of the doubt, he might even well finish up alienating much of the MRM. But he is not an extremist. In fact he is more mid-line, if hard-line, than any productive activist that I know.
So, by “get our terms straight” I can only assume you meant “allow chuckee to dictate the terms of the discussion based on shit he made up”.
Because seriously, not a word of that was based in reality.
Chuck, I’m pretty sure that by any reasonable definition of the term, someone who thinks that men on juries should vote not guilty when the accused is clearly guilty of rape is an extremist.
Also, I’m pretty sure that no feminists actually think that “women are wonderful just because they have vaginas.”
someone who thinks that men on juries should vote not guilty when the accused is clearly guilty of rape is an extremist
Presuming that we are talking about “real” rape, then yes, it’s an extreme view held by a person who does not fit my definition of extremist. Would Elam be serious, or is he being provocative, making a point, drawing attention to how unreliable our legal system has become? I don’t know. I certainly would never want anyone guilty of real rape to get off scot free, and I have trouble believing that Elam would, too.
Oh yes, “real rape”. As opposed to the kind that women make up just for kicks. Because you know how often that goes to trial.
Asshole.
I can’t even be bothered to engage with chuck’s delusional denial. Here, have a HuskySplosion.
I’m new here, and new to the phenom that is “Men’s Rights”. Now that I’m slightly familiar with this odious “subculture” I must ask, for the thousandth time, whether the internet is truly a good thing for humanity. I mean, all these pathetically angry frustrated men, getting together, hell, even finding each other in the first place, would’ve been impossible without the internet. And I come to the same conclusion, for the thousandth time, that the internet is only as good as humanity on its most cowardly and least ashamed day. I mean, we all know that 99% of the vitriol, and 95% of the words that “pass” between people on the internet would not ever be uttered in face to face communication. And perhaps the idea that people can get their vitriol out in a virtual realm is a net good for society, though that relies on the assumption that people are “getting it out” as opposed to “stoking the fires” with all this back and forth repartee. I know I’m not saying anything original here, but this Elam fellow, for instance, what would he be without the internet? Impossible to say, but fun to speculate.
Oh, and about the “Men’s Rights” thing — its obvious that all the anger they hurl at women is really them talking about themselves. THEY are completely unattractive to the females of the species (regardless of the over/under 25 thing). The only point to THEIR lives is to try to get laid and married, not necessarily in that order. The fact that THEIR emotional states and psychic well-being totally revolve around the reactions of some woman who actually barely noticed/didn’t notice them at all the other day at the coffee bar drives them stark raving bonkers, and so they pull a Karl Rove and declare the enemy is weak, and the enemy (remember, who doesn’t know they exist so can’t realistically be defined as an enemy) has no life! The enemy is sad and ugly and has no friends! Ummm, no Karl, that’s you. In fact, I bet you Elam is secretly Karl Rove! Remember that speech he gave during the ’08 campaign where he accused Obama of being “that guy” at the Country Club, who is all cool and hot and all the wimmin’ be on his arm, and he’s laughing and mocking everyone — specifically all the sad little pot-bellied, bald losers… like Karl. This subculture of sad little men who apparently have been so coddled that the worst pain they’ve ever felt has been the rejection of a woman, or worse, of a really hot guy they are secretly gay for (but not really gay for because that would require a conviction and boldness of a kind they are totally unprepared for).
Anyhow, all this is totally apparent to me, and so I am going to start a Men’s Rights subreddit, or whatever, where the first rule is that you have to upload an actual full body photo of yourself, holding today’s paper with its date showing, to prove that you are a real man and not a sad little loser hiding behing the internet to hurl your spite and pathetic “hurt” at the world. In short, you must prove you are, ahem, sexually attractive in order to join my he-man woman-haters club. How many members would I get? Negative 6,423 I’m guessing.
While unfortunately some feminists are transphobic as are many a masculinist, MRA, and neutral party, all the cool kids know that both the statement “women are wonderful just because they have vaginas” and the statement “men are wonderful just because they have dicks” are just transphobic bullshit and ridiculous definitions of what’s a man and what’s a woman.
Ever notice that the ones who engage in all this ridiculous cynical posturing are always the first to pull the “He couldn’t possibly have really meant that horrible thing he said!” routine?
I have to wonder who the fuck they think they’re fooling.
Fuck off, you miserable little roach.
Why are you here again? Could it be that no one in your actual life will put up with listening to you?
Sarah K: While I have no doubt that someone who would say statements like that are transphobic, I don’t think transphobia adequately describe it. Gender essentialist is far more accurate. It’s not specifically about who can be called male or female but is instead is about valuing one combination of gender and genitals above all others. That’s even more messed up than transphobia.
Noadi: Oh, yeah, it’s gender essentialist too; that’s a good point to make as well. It’s just also transphobic and I don’t think one or the other trait of such horrible statements is really worse than the other. When two close but different issues intersect, one doesn’t have to come out on top for both to suck.
Please excuse my shitty grammar in the previous post. One of these days I’ll learn not to write anything online when I’ve been up for 20 hours.