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.)
For some reason, I now feel a compulsion to comment every day on AVfM to say “Why don’t you ever write about global warming? Huh? You’re so booooooooooring.”
jp: they don’t think prison will actually happen to them, it’s all theoretical. The reality of what they advocate seems to escape them.
Um, not if David’s stated purpose is to mock misogyny, dipshit.
And then there’s the whole getting raped, beaten and possibly stabbed parts that don’t sound like much fun either.
“Three hots and a cot” – yeah, except you’re sharing your cot with “Thor” the 6’8″ tall 300 pound heavily-tattooed biker who’s doing 5-10 for assault.
foul is the new vile
“Foul and unethical” is totally his version of “vile.”
lol, you owe me a coke, katz
Claire, dammit!
Seriously, did y’all read David’s last link? After I read about half the page, I had to shut my laptop. This post was suddenly too much to take. I gave my husband a hug and took him out for an ice cream.
erm, aren’t these the same guys who think that going to prison for rape–excuse me, “false rape”–is the absolute worstest thing evar?
I really think Dumb Guy Gored by a Tick is onto something. We should start making a list of all of the things David isn’t writing about:
1. low carb enchilada recipes
2. ancient Egyptian architecture
3. dealing with a fruit fly infestation
4. raising chickens on an apartment balcony
Er, those bear a passing resemblance to my Google search history.. Still, it is foul and unethical that David is not writing about these things!
Just out of curiosity, if anyone here has studied prisons, what’s the status of prisoners in prison for rape (of an adult), in terms of the other prisoners? I’ve heard many times that the general prison population’s attitude towards those imprisoned for raping children could best be described as extremely hostile.
I wish bored guy would comment more about boerboels. Why isn’t he? I am interested in them!
5. Depositing checks by smartphone: a good idea or not?
6. Religious views in Iran before and after the revolution of 1979.
7. Making copper wire jewelry.
8. Film noir.
9. Buying cosmetics that aren’t available in the US via eBay – good or bad idea?
10. Jeggings – suitable for work or no?
11. Cats and their tendency to chase invisible insects – why?
Some guy, did you ever become furious in algebra that teacher wasn’t discussing history? Ever throw down a copy of Fine Woodworking in disgust that there were no articles on the the latest news about Brangelina?
Come on now, who hasn’t done that at least once?
ZOMG heidihi, that is my favorite not-famous line from Hamlet!
And totally appropriate.
Most prisons have protective custody and segregation units where child abusers and pedophiles can be housed at their request. It is extremely restrictive and so most do not choose it. Different states run their systems differently, but for the most part there is very little unsupervised activity for high custody inmates. In any case, you are correct that the general population is hostile to baby killers and baby rapers.
It is not unusual for abusers to self destruct when their victims escape them. After years of blaming their wife and children for their abusive behavior they often genuinely expect the courts to agree with them that they have every right to abuse the people they own.
The reality check can be devastating to their world view and homicide is sometimes the result.
It may sound like hyperbole when these men say these things but considering how many do precisely what the MRAs advocate I am willing to believe that these men are quite likely to do precisely what they say they would.
David, I demand you post about the changes made to the Broadway musical Annie when it was adapted for the screen in 1982! Anything else is MISANDRY!
Well, yeah. There’s someone quoted above outright stating that using violence to solve disputes is just men’s biologically ordained way of approaching things, and that therefore it should be legal for them to do so, and the fact that it isn’t is proof that the legal system is biased against men.
What’s interesting is that these guys used to be more covert about ideas like that, while now they’re more willing to state them in public. The MRM is evolving, and not in a positive direction.
I dunno, I’m really pissed off that David has never written a word about the Great Vowel Shift.
Ignoring 650 year old transitions in the English language is misandry!
I was involved in a conversation recently about hollow threats. The kind of thing that people say that of course they never mean. “If my kid doesn’t start doing his chores, I’m going to kill him.” “If my asshole boss does that annoying thing one more time, I will put rat poison in his coffee.”
The thing is, yeah, sure. We don’t mean it, and everybody understands we don’t mean it, so no one takes it seriously.
But some people DO mean it. And the fact that we all participate in and ignore random threats of violence and murder and rape and arson means that the people who DO mean it:
1) blend in, so people don’t notice the real possibility of violence.
2) think it’s normal, and that their violent ideation is acceptable, so it’s even MORE unfair when they’re accountable for acting on their threats.
Which is why I try very hard not to make idle threats, and why I think it’s important to call people on it when they do.
(It’s kinda exactly like rape culture, btw)
A little late to the party here, but I’d like to nominate this statement for the coveted “All the Irony” award.
? 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
I think their visions of three hots might be as outdated as their views on gender relations. My knowledge of prison life comes mostly MSNBC’s Lockup but I’m pretty sure that depending on where you are, sometimes it’s two lukewarms and a bag lunch. Something tells me if you’re the kind of guy who’d burn your ex alive because you don’t like buying food for your kids, you might have more than a little trouble staying in the prison populations that get luxuries like exercise time in the yard and cafeteria access. Although maybe I’m wrong, and they’ve got it all figured out. Maybe they won’t be the guy in isolation eating soggy sandwiches delivered through a slot in the door with breakfast. Maybe they’ll be the guy with the dollar a day job and a hotplate, steam-heating a soggy commissary burger whenever he damn well pleases.