So there was a bit of ugliness over on the Men’s Rights subreddit the other day. No, scratch that; there was a giant explosion of ugliness.
A couple of days ago, you see, a Redditor with a nine-day-old account posted a story to r/menrights detailing the alleged ill-treatment he’d gotten at the hands of a vengeful ex-wife and an unsympathetic family court system. The story was filled with literally unbelievable details – among other things, he claimed to have been rendered homeless by the demands of the court, forced to pay $1000 a month in spousal support to his ex though she had a $60,000 a year job. Some commenters challenged the veracity of the tale – while the OP gave a case number in his post, no one has been able to find evidence that a case with that number actually exists. (The OP has not responded to the skeptics.)
But most of the respondents assumed the story was true. And why not? It seemed to reinforce every paranoid MRA fantasy of evil women and courts out of control. Despite its fishiness, the post got more than 700 net upvotes.
And that’s where the ugliness began. Not content to merely offer the man sympathy and advice, many commenters started talking murder, and some of the most violent comments got dozens of upvotes.
While these particular comments were deleted by the mods (you can find them in the comment histories of Volcris and graffiti81, where you’ll see they each got many more upvotes than shown above before they were deleted), other violent comments remained up, many of them receiving upvotes as well. Here are some screenshots of some of them.
Here’s PacoBedejo, with nearly two dozen net upvotes for a comment seconding the burn-them-and-kill-them suggestion.
Speaking of arson and murder, here’s ErasmusMRA offering a not-quite-endorsement of the terrorist manifesto of Thomas Ball, an MRA who burned himself to death in front of a New Hampshire courthouse in hopes that his death would inspire other men to firebomb courthouses and police stations in protest of allegedly anti-male courts.
Here’s wazooasiteverwas relating the allegedly true story of a friend who solved the problem of an unfair divorce settlement with double murder:
What a shock that the alleged double murder has given the kids a “bad impression” of their dad.
This comment from Synackaon’s directly advocating murder was downvoted and deleted. (You can still find it in his comment history.)
Yet this comment of his offering an only slightly veiled advocacy of violence remains up, and has gotten dozens of upvotes:
I didn’t get to this now-deleted comment in time to get a screenshot, though one Redditor memorialized its (alleged) content in a post on the Circlebroke subreddit:
TheIrish7 tries to avoid the charge of misogyny by not-quite-justifying gender-neutral violence:
Arx0s contends that if he were in a similar situation he would stop short of actual murder:
This strange and elusive comment from Syn_Ick seems to suggest that the Men’s Rights movement can’t succeed unless and until it becomes socially acceptable for men to physically assault women.
There are many more such comments in the thread; I don’t have have the time or the patience to screencap and post them all. You can find more collected in r/againstmensrights, or by going through the thread itself.
Now, not all of those advocating (or not-quite-advocating) violence or murder in this thread are r/mensrights regulars. But some of the worst comments come from one very active r/mensrights commenter who has advocated violence against family court judges in the past: Demonspawn. (I’ve written about his threatening remarks in the past here and here.) Here are some of his contributions to the, er, debate (Each comment is from a different part of the thread; click on the images to go to each original comment in context.)
Given that advocating violence is against the rules in r/mensrights, and that Demonspawn has been advocating violence fairly regularly for some time, you might wonder why he is still allowed to post in the subreddit. I sent a note to the Men’s Rights mods, and got this response from the top mod:
This gives you some idea of how seriously the mods or r/mensrights take the issue of violence.
The phrase “digging your own hole” comes to mind.
If you want to see what happens when people turn to violence to “solve” disputes with partners or exes, see here.
(Thanks to Cloudiah for the first screenshot and for pointing me to many of the other comments linked to here.)
“That truck-driver story is a great example of bullshit that takes only the tiniest bit of rational thought to see through, but they don’t because they want so badly for it to be true. I’m pretty sure there’s no jurisdiction in the US in which “wad of cash handed to your ex” is an acceptable method of child support payment.”
I actually found that story to be somewhat believable if you look at it in the context that ‘fat wad of cash’ or whatever was probably something like 50 bucks whenever he felt like it and that getting 90% of his take home pay was an exaggeration too
so basically what I’m saying is I believe that some peice of shit would kill the mother of his children over financial issues
There are currently 639 comments in that thread.
The vast majority express sympathy, and the vast majority condemn violence.
As you note, way before journalist David Futrelle was on the case, the subreddit was skeptical and investigating the case and calling it fake and asking for verification.
Now, you don’t post any stories about people in similar situations, and there are many verifiable claims of states demanding unachievable amounts of alimony and support.
And you don’t post any of the other more positive threads in that reddit.
You complain about mensrights mods, but you don’t bother complaining about SRS mods and how they brag of their abusive moderation policies. You don’t write about the abusive modding going on in /r/lgbt or in /r/atheismplus.
David, you are beginning to convince me you are either intellectually dishonest or incompetent.
You even write about how certain threads were deleted due to their ugly content, but still you complain of them.
hellkell: They talk like people who have never, not once in their lives, experienced honest-to-god violence. If they had, I doubt they’d be so flippant and cavalier about it.
Yeah. This is the way people talk about theoretical problems. Demonspawn is talking philosophical violence. He’s right, it’s always an option, but he’s wrong about the way it works.
After all, people who use violence, now, are at risk of punishment/death as a result, and he’s saying it needs to be done anyway.
But I agree, if they saw real violence, of the, “Civil War” sort, they’d not be so happy with it. It’s not romantic. There is a romance in it, but it’s a side effect.
Some guy, if there were 10 angry people upvoting your murder, wouldn’t you feel sort of unhappy? even if two had downvoted the idea?
David, when was the last time you wrote to condemn women that mutilate the genitals of their husbands, ex husbands, boyfriends or ex boyfriends OR condemn the general encouragement these women get in popular culture, on TV shows, on websites, on blogs, etc.
Go visit The Frisky and witness their pattern of “you go grrl” to women that mutilate their partners”
You’re a one note pony David, and it’s lame.
Hey Bored Stick, someone here is dishonest and incompetent. I’ll give you a hint, it’s not David.
Go start your own blog. You’re entitled to jack shit here.
@pecunium TOTALLY O/T but i’m worried about Zeppelin, my little hoggie (not so little anymore?) He’s 16″ long and i feed him 2x a week, 4-5 pinkies each time. Too little or too much?? I don’t want him to become a pinhead or regurge but i don’t want him to suffer hunger pangs and I worry cause right now, 2 days after his Wednesday 5 pinkie lunch, he’s digging all over his cage and climbing his branch and trying to escape.
How much did you feel your male hognoses when they got to be about 16″ long, if you recall…?
Dude… nothing more than him saying, “SOME GUY! You are right, I am a fraud and a waste of carbon who never did an honest thing in my life and the MRM is RIGHT!” would ever convince you.
You’re a lying sack of shit, with a passive aggressive pretense of disingenuous disappointment.
And we see it.
HEY DAVID WHY DON’T YOU WRITE MORE ABOUT NON-MISOGYNISTS ON YOUR BLOG DEDICATED TO MOCKING MISOGYNY
HUH
I’M TRYING TO HAVE AN ADULT CONVERSATION AT YOU WHY DON’T YOU DO WHAT I SAY
heidihi, people in divorce are often in terrible pain.
They may express wishes at a bar, or at a blog. They might be men saying I want to kill my ex. They may be women saying I want to kill my ex.
It’s a sad fucked up situation and doesn’t need to be exploited by anyone on any side.
The truth is out of 639 comments almost none of them when you do the math were encouraging this. It’s foul and unethical of David to focus on that instead of focusing on how the thread set to debunking the OP and condemning the violence.
*Some guy, if there were 10 angry people upvoting your murder, wouldn’t you feel sort of unhappy? even if two had downvoted the idea?*
Sure. And how should men feel when yet another woman cuts off a penis and gets public acclamations for it?
When was the last time David Futrelle wrote about that?
Bored Stick, no one gives a fuck what you’d like to see here. For someone so bored, you can’t quit us, can you?
The threads condemning what you’re mentioning exist here, if you can be arsed to find it.
“You complain about mensrights mods, but you don’t bother complaining about SRS mods and how they brag of their abusive moderation policies. You don’t write about the abusive modding going on in /r/lgbt or in /r/atheismplus.”
Are you comparing MR mods allowing a huge thread advocating mass murder with SRS mods posting pictures of cartoon dildos?
“Sure. And how should men feel when yet another woman cuts off a penis and gets public acclamations for it?”
This happened one time, and she apologised for making the comment, there is currently a huge thread in MR advocating mass murder
Also, SRS’s moderation policy is abusive? You make me lol.
Board Stick, did you visit David’s last link?
they. are. INSANE.
@some guy with a boring schtick
Care to be a little bit more specific than just “The Frisky”, like where in the site did that happen and why a “Celebrity Gossip, Relationship Advice, Beauty and Fashion Tips” site should be considered analogous to a purported human rights group like the MRAs, why you think once again that David has to write about what you want and, most importantly, why anyone should believe what you say when you have consistently misrepresented other things that happened?
Hmm, why am I suddenly reminded of my mum telling me that only boring people are bored?
A minor consideration amid so much horror, but how can they all be so cavalier about spending the rest of their lives in prison? Forget the poverty of minimum wage (and I’ve lived it, so shut up), what kind of poverty of imagination thinks that “3 hots & a cot” are some kind of a reasonable trade for never being outside again, never to ride a bike or walk along a stream, or lie on a blanket and watch the stars, or any of a million things that are so much better than BEING IN PRISON.
All to show “some bitch” what’s what?
I think they really have no clue.
Some Guy: “And how should men feel when yet another woman cuts off a penis and gets public acclamations for it?”
Gee, since none of us here do that…maybe you’d best spend your time elsewhere?
No one here wants men to suffer genital mutilation, jesus. Why don’t, instead of incessantly posting here, you write a blog about when you find instances of people calling for penis mutilation and decry it? Link me to your new blog. I’d read it! Although i’m afraid it would not be updated often, because i can’t find a single ACTUAL INSTANCE OF THIS REALLY HAPPENING RECENTLY and neither can you, apparently.
Yeah, jeez, there are only a few people advocating murder! What do you expect of us?
@jp, i think it’s because there is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so. I think, to them, their lives are already prisons, except of hatred.
It’s like watching a kid have a meltdown at nap time: “But I want to COLOR!!!!!! *sob* Why won’t you let me color?!!!!”
Fucking hell.
I read the Frisky pretty regularly for my gossip fix, and I can’t recall any time male mutilation was discussed approvingly. But I suspect there’s no link, since it didn’t happen. And even if it had, a gossip and fashion site is pretty different than a “human rights” movement.