It’s hard to parody Men’s Rights Activists, because no matter how ridiculous your parody is, there’s a good chance that some MRA out there has already said, or written, or sung, something even more ridiculous already.
Not that long ago, a bunch of Man Boobz regulars set out to parody the bizarre, and often inadvertently surrealistic, posters that have been popping up on MRA sites like A Voice for Men and Artistry Against Misandry. It was hard, but I think some of us managed to come up with posters that were even uglier and less coherent than the originals. I especially liked these two, from (respectively) Cliff Pervocracy and Sir Bodsworth Rugglesby III.
But alas, we have been outmaneuvered by the all-too-serious poster-makers on A Voice for Men, who have managed to produce posters that make even less sense than our silliest parodies. Take a look at this one, which I believe is the work of an Australian MRA by the name of Roger O. Thornhill.
I mean, really. How can we compete with that?
This is an actual poster that some MRAs think will actually win people over to their cause. How, I’m not exactly sure. What exactly about a cupcake with a tiara is supposed to scream “men’s rights” to random pedestrians who might catch a glimpse of this poster wheatpasted to a hoarding while on their way to work?
For more of Roger’s fine work, see here and here.
Man Boobzers, can you do better?
Or, if you’re not up to that Herculean task, could you at least try to explain just what exactly you think Mr. Thornhill was trying to say with that poster of his?
EDITED TO ADD: I have been asked to contribute a poster myself. So here one is. You can find many more hilarious and incredibly ugly posters at ArtistryForFeminismAndKittens and, of course, in the comments below!
@Pecunium – women in the UK can give their kid up into state care / up for adoption at any time, thus severing all responsibilty for the child, including financial responsibility. As long as women have that – men should have the same effective right too. That is all.
You do believe in equality, right?
Yeah, well even people you don’t like (men) should have equality too.
Joe – if you can pay for the child, and you put them into foster care, guess what? You have to pay child support!
I’m completely for the idea that if a woman doesn’t want to raise a child, and the child’s father does, he should be able to – and the mother should pay child support.
@bewildered – congratulations on showing yourself up as genuine misandrist bigot. You just attempted to hand wave away genuine victims of domestic violence. You suck ass!
*sets humane trap on floor, waits for possum to step on the sticky surface*
Joe, men do have equality. If they are the sole caregiver they can put the child into state care. You won’t be able to have an adoption if the other parent doesn’t sign off on it though, which can be difficult when some people play horrible little games using ther children as pawns.
You’re right though. The one in seven dv victims being men is not a UK specific statistic.
@weeboy – Pretty sure that’s not how State / foster care works in the UK. I could be wrong, but I’ve never heard of that here, NZ law may be different.
Thank you Joe. I consider that a compliment coming from you.
@weeboy – no, that’s not equality, see: abortion. And the whole of the last three pages or whatever.
Anyway. Goodnight boobzers.
Thank God. Most boring conversation ever.
*Possum scurries outside the kitchen door seemingly unconcerned that he caused a ruckus. I celebrate with a snack and big glass of wine.*
@pecunium – I’ve never been great shakes at shooting, I’ll admit that, but there is a big difference between the American opossum and the New Zealand possum. Those fuckers can end up weighing more than ten pounds and are generally possessed by satan. Luckily we don’t get them locally any more, after the bird sanctuary was set up and every wild stoat, possum and cat within a ten km radius was poisoned.
Possums! My dog, from whom I take my user name, was just chasing one outside. It was bigger than the dog. But my fierce little guy showed him the what-for before I even saw what was going on.
Given that we were specifically talking about when the child was already born… Think it hurt trying to shift those goal posts?
God storm in a teaspoon that guy.
Thank you, driversuz, for making me appreciate my mother in law. She may well get an extra-nice Christmas present this year just as a thanks for not being you. My stepmother is also looking pretty awesome right now, comparatively.
The sad thing about Joe is that occasionally he almost hits on a real point, but then his argleragebargle kicks in and he misinterprets what he’s seeing and why it happened. Like the fact that men’s suicide rates go up after divorce. That’s a real thing that actually happens, and it’s a bad thing, but do you think it would occur to Joe that those men might be missing their “bosswives”? LOL no. On the idea that men should lend each other more emotional support in the wake of serious life events – yep, that’s a real thing that doesn’t happen often enough and needs to happen more. Now, let’s take a look at all the stuff that the MRM preaches about Proper Manliness. How much do you think that stuff helps in dismantling the idea that men aren’t allowed to show emotional weakness or ask for help? Can you imagine the average MRA giving his buddy a hug when the buddy was grieving a failed marriage? If a man turned up on an MRA site and said “I just got divorced and I’m sad and lonely and confused and I don’t know what to do now”, what kind of advice would he get, and would it be of the “it’ll be OK buddy, hang in there” variety or of the “grr women are bitches, evil bosswives, you should show that judge what’s what like Thomas Ball!” variety?
There are situations where men face actual problems. The MRM isn’t helping.
Damn, I really wanted Joe to make a poster. I was pretty sure the C1A would figure into it… I’ve only known one other person who could ping pong back and forth between jocularity and pure rage like him; he was an ex-Mormon turned atheist hippie actor, who wore a huge peace sign every day and was so full of barely masked anger that a bunch of us who had to work with him referred to it as “Bert’s not-too-underground river of rage.”
@CassandraSays: Nail on head, you hit it.
Ooooh, and there are some more posters — must go look!
I never had a possum story until this past summer when the feral cats my next door neighbor feeds had reached a population of approx 15, so I got some traps from the humane society to Trap-Neuter-Return them,
but in the middle of the night of trapping it started pouring rain, so I went out to bring in the traps, except I was sleepy and I didn’t check their contents very carefully for catliness. so the next morning I come downstairs to 8 cute feral cats and one really ugly feral cat who was really a possum. boy do they look scary!
Check it out guys, I tried my best but I fear it’s too coherent: http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t92/Lauralot/parodyposter.png
The posters are wonderful, and so are the posters.
That cupcake dealio has me stumped though, unless it is a bait and switch for the younger generation who grew up with birthday cupcakes at school.
That My-Son-Is-A-God screed driversuz left feels hinky to me. Like someone taking on a mom persona so they can write about themselves (the son) in a ridiculously flattering, matter-of-factly way. Or the son is total bunk, a fictional astand-in for all the worthy men who are too good for evil femininsts…a projection of how MRAs see themselves and fantasies about femininsts wanting them — but being denied the pleasure.
‘Cause if that really is a mom writing about her son, it’s kind of, errr, embarassing.
So the kids should suffer because their parents are poor? And if the kid was yours, and you chose to disown it, you’d really be OK with whatever then happened to that child, even if lack of government funding meant the child ended up hungry, uneducated, etc? You’re actually that emotionally cold, that if you had signed a piece of paper you’d just stop caring about the child’s welfare?
(This is actually an interesting side issue for me in the abortion debate – one of the reasons I don’t buy the “well just put the baby up for adoption!” argument is that if I did that I’d have no idea what ended up happening to the child, and if I brought a child into the world I would feel responsible for ensuring that child’s welfare. What if the kid ended up in an abusive home? I just wouldn’t be OK with not knowing for sure that the child was being well taken care of. So the idea that people want to go “well, I signed a piece of paper disowning the kid so it’s not my problem” seems appalling to me That’s an actual kid that you helped create – how can you not care whether or not zie is OK?.)
My neighbor Bob has traps in his yard for the squirrels and possums. He takes ’em across the highway and releases them into the woods. He borrowed Mr. HK once to drive him there when his car was in the shop.
That is only the tip of the “Neighbor Bob” iceberg.
Hot buttered hamsters!
(We eat them because we can’t stand how MRAs point out our Women’s Rationalization Hamsters. Which manginas also have because handwave.)
Psst the NZ possums aren’t native; they were introduced from Australia. Typical stupid stunt, don’t ask me who did it – they’re protected here, as native fauna, but a pest in New Zealand.
I should add I think they’re a helluva lot cuter than the American opossums. They do sound like Satan’s spawn when they’re on the rampage though. And they wear seven-league boots when they gallop across the roof.