So when I was poking around on Roosh’s Return of Kings blog the other day I ran across a guest post from someone calling himself Samseau accusing feminists of using racism to exploit men – that is, of expertly manipulating men of different races to fight one another instead of standing firm against the evil feminists and their evil agenda.
The post, while purporting to be somehow “above” the issue of race, is a muddled mess full of “white men have it worst” nonsense like this:
[R]acial infighting between American men wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the political consequences.
Women, if you haven’t noticed, do not fight with each other over racial conflicts. They might get angry over the past, but they are able to resolve all issues by agreeing on a scapegoat: the white man. Colored women will gladly forgive their white sisters, since, after all, it was the white man who oppressed women and minorities.
White men are the big, bad, evil masters, and as such, all females of different colors can agree to put aside their differences in order to bring the white man down.
Yes, he did indeed use the term “colored women.” Oh, but there’s more.
The election results show that decades of brainwashing young American boys has been an unqualified success. Rather than have boys be loyal to their gender, boys have instead been trained to be loyal to their race.
Little non-white boys at the tender age of 9 years are fed lies about how white male oppressors created their poor living conditions, while white boys are taught that they need to correct the injustices of their forefathers lest they be guilty with the indelible sin of white privilege. Female teachers use the appropriate shaming tactics on these young minds to imprint the intended desire for conflict.
All according to plan.
And more:
Men are pawns in the race game. Thus while American women feed themselves government largesse, jobs, university degrees, their husband’s money, and child support money, American men fight each other over table scraps.
But my favorite thing about this article is the little graph that Mr. Samseau made up to illustrate the REAL issues men face today.
Yep. Race is the least important issue, while “getting laid” is number one.
It’s a pretty revealing little chart, huh?
The comment section for the article – wade into this swamp at your own peril – is (predictably enough) filled with angry racists trying to explain why race really does matter. Others, meanwhile, seem upset that all this racism is getting in the way of the regular woman-bashing. Still others suggest that men of all races needed to understand the “root cause” of all our “multicultural problems.” That being … teh Jews.
My favorite comment of the bunch, though, has to be this, from Caliente, combining an astounding ignorance of history with some half-digested evo psych:
Btw the reason why there are practically no racist women is simple.
Males of mammals are territorial.
They naturally base they identity from bottom up: family,tribe,nation,race.And naturally react negative to males of different “tribe”.
Females at the same time are receptive to have sex with any males as long as they are alpha enough.
In 19 century whites fucked all the black women because they were alpha and they had recourses,just look at Brasil.Nowadays a feminist will be cheating on her white beta herbling with some black fitness coach because that is how her brain assumes alphaness.
Wow.
Glad we got that all settled!
Lol, freaked out the psych and got a lap kitty, I award you TWO internets for this feat!
LOL merci!
She was a well-dressed kitty too. Had a red velvet collar with fake diamonds on, and a registration tag, which suggests her people look after her properly. She was oldish, I think. Sat on my lap for about ten minutes, which was most distracting! 😀
The session went well, actually. I said I wasn’t happy with the way it went last time, and there seemed to be a push (intentional or not) to make me play devil’s advocate for my own life. Told him there are some non-negotiables and the fact that Louis is real and alive (“and in this room right now”) is one of them. Psych was apologetic and said yes, he had been exploring that path, because of his training and the state of most of the people he sees with unverifiable beliefs. I mentioned that the materiailstic default, the paradigm of our society, doesn’t help – hard enough to break when it’s your own experiences – and described a couple of incidents that were good enough verfication for me, which seemed to make some impression. So I think that’s sorted.
Aaaand now I must get moving, it’s a beautiful day and Himself and I are going to meander around the markets and parks and coffee shops. Have a lovely day/evening, y’all!
I’ve never had a good counselling session where the counsellor has gone out of the room. I have had good counselling sessions where we’ve talked.
The post hoc (much much later post hoc) funniest session I had was a couples one with 3rd abusive partner (who was psychotic, histrionic, and narcissist, and just plain horrible in the end) because we’d had a verbal fight, and obs it was All My Fault. So we went and saw this nice female (make work!) counsellor and he told her about the what I had done for the fight and how I had stormed out. She, of course, asked for the events leading up to that, which was great because I could say how he had treated me all weekend ahead of the fight, which was me at the end of my emotional tether. And then she tried to get him to see about how he could possibly think that a partner would have been okay with the treatment he had dolled out to me for that weekend. I think he thought she would tell me I was bad, and that I needed to improve my behaviour, or how the fight was All My Fault (MRA type stuff) and, of course, she didn’t. We left the session, I said how helpful I thought it had been and when was our next session? He said that he didn’t think we needed to go back.
His behaviour, obviously, did not improve to me.
Glad your psych listened and have a lovely day!
@The Kittehs’
I am so glad it went well! Good for you for standing up for yourself, as well. That can be incredibly hard when dealing with therapists in particular (or any kind of health professional). 🙂
Kiwi girl – him leaving the room was just because I’d mentioned the doctor who referred me to him is NOT my regular doctor (I only saw him that one time) and I don’t intend to make him so. Turns out the doctor I did want to see is leaving the practice, so my psych just popped out to get a list of all the GPs there and their particular interests as a reference for me. It wasn’t “counsellor leaves room” in any bad sense.
Some Gal – fortunately telling this guy what my boundaries were wasn’t difficult. He’s not intimidating or bossy, he’s very easy to talk to. Besides that, I’m not in a fragile state, or dealing with huge issues: it’s anxiety/stress that’s triggered by one particular thing, and I just need to desensitise myself to it, if I can (though the thought of starting that process is pretty uncomfortable). Main thing is that he gets it clear that Louis is part of the deal, and involved in the process, not something nonexistent I happen to find comforting.
Now I’m just hoping Ms Red Collar Kitty turns up again, though I daresay she won’t, because cats.
Oh Kitteh, that is good news. 🙂
It is! 🙂
Hi Folks
I discovered the phenomenon MRA yesterday and my head is spinning from the torrent of douchecannoery that I have seen so far. That post is one of the most bizarre examples of the angry white man syndrome that I have seen in a long time.
I must put in some historical facts about the idea that white women were not a part of the racist power structure. The was that was dismissed illustrates the racial schism that still exist in the feminist movement.
Despite the fact that white women had few of the legal privileges of white men they did benefit from the institutions of slavery and Jim Crow. The few white female abolitionists obscures the hundred of free black women and men who toiled in relative anonymity to end slavery.
First wave feminism has a deeply racist background that is ignored or denied today.
White women may not have been a able to own land but they could own slaves. Martha Washington owned hundreds more slaves than her husband and Martha Jefferson’s slave holdings built Montecello. Mary Boykin Chesnut was a South Carolina plantation mistress whose diary is rich resource on how white women used what power they had to make the black harlots that tempter her and many other upstanding white men in making making mulatto pickaninnies.
White women may not have had the full benefit of the law but when it came to the few white men who left their black concubine and his children any of his wealth they were quick to get that overturned in the courts. Amanda Dickson (who was a product of rape) was the only black woman during the antebellum era to successful defend herself against a lawsuit files by female relatives of her father (who raised her to believe she was white) and keep his fortune as his rightful heir. Her biography is called Woman of Color, Daughter of Privilege: Amanda America Dickson, 1849-1893.
Many can list the achievements of white abolitionist Harriet Beecher Stowe, The Grimke sisters and Susan B. Anthony but how about black female abolitionists like Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Maria W. Stewart, Harriet Jacobs, Mary Prince, Anna Murray Douglass, Mary Ann Shad Cary, Sarah Parker Remond, Frances Harper, Sarah Mapps Douglass, Eliza Dixon Day and Sarah Forten? There were also may black women who authored slave narratives and spoke at churches and white women’s groups about the horrors of slavery
Some may know about the role of Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass, but few will discuss how of black women were ousted by in the suffrage movement the appease white southern suffragettes. The National American Woman Suffrage Association espoused the franchise for white women only by 1890. The filibuster of the 20th amendment was finally broken when white suffragettes pointed out the fact that black male brutes were allowed to vote bur the flower of femininity (white women) we not.
The majority of Southern women supported lynching. Jessie Daniel Ames crearated a mixed race coalition to end lynching in the south partly based on the fact the hypocrisy that men thought they were defending white womanhood by lynching, raped black women and forced them into concubinage through the souther custom of Paramour Rights. This custom allowed white men to force black women into concubinage despite their willingness or marital status. Ames movement only lasted a few years and then petered out. The white race riots that left towns like Rosewood, communities like Greenwood in Tulsa and many others destroyed. The protection of white womanhood was often a pretext to destroy communities that were becoming prosperous or independent. Go to the Without Sanctuary website and look at the gruesome pictures and note the reasons why black women and children were lynched. The Scottsboro Boys were imprison and given death sentences for raping two women who need to defend themselves when they were hopping trains. This case became a cause celebre and illustrated the real power dynamics behind white women and black men.
Black women and second wave feminism will have to wait for another post.
I am sorry to be so longwinded but it really gets me going when someone who dismisses the fact that white women were indeed part of and supported the institution of slavery and Jim Crow. This a a great blog. I have been gobsmacked by the mentality of MRA and will be back to read more about this insanity.
Please excuse my typos in the above post. I have fibromyaliga and after another sleepless night I took some pain killers and am seriously wonky.
@eshowoman
Hello and welcome! I’m a fellow fibromyalgia sufferer and typing is a bitch. (I use a kindle to avoid the pain of a keyboard, but I think that increases my typos event without the painkiller-influence. 🙂 )
I don’t think anyone meant to dismiss white women’s role in supporting and advancing white supremacy (and, often, patriarchy). I am very sorry that is how the conversation came across. That shouldn’t have happened. What I believe we were trying to say is that white women lacked the resources to support and advance white supremacy to the degree that white men could. In other words, contrary to the MRA discussed in the OP, women were secondary and not primary. That is not to say that secondary support and advancement is okay or less detrimental, but that assigning primary blame to a group that was suffering under their own set of oppressions is wrong. White men, with their greater rights and influence, are the group primarily responsible for white supremacy. They were not, as stated in the OP, the victims of women. They certainly were not controlled by women to such an extent that they no longer bear responsibility for the establishment and continuation of white supremacy.
As far as I know, everyone here agrees on the deeply racist strains/roots in first wave feminism (and second and third, for that matter, feminism is still, sadly, primarily concerned with the status of middle class, white women, though hopefully that is changing.) I am very sorry if our conversation came off as ignoring or minimizing that racism.
Okay, this:
would be funny if I’d done it on purpose. (That should say even.)
Have you two had any luck with voice recognition or with Kindle’s swipe keyboard?
@katz
I’ve tried voice recognition and found I would get so frustrated I’d just start typing anyway. (More time with it would certainly help, but more time = more frustration in the short-term and personally, there always seem to be better things to devote my energy to.)
I like the Kindle keyboard a lot, but it is hard to type quickly with a stylus and hard to type well with my bigger-than-the-keys fingers. I like to think I’m getting better, but then autocorrect steps in (or “stepson,” thanks autocorrect) to try to “help” and it becomes hard to tell whether I’m still really bad or if Amazon’s dictionary is rather unfamiliar with English. 🙂
Interesting fact: I had to teach it “penis” and “vagina,” but it knew testicles. (Only the plural, though. Although it is possible I just forgot I already taught it that.)
I am a British born New Yorker who now lives in Southern Illinois. Word to text programs committ suicide when they try to digitize my voice. Thanks for the nice welcome.
The reason this topic gets my goat is because when I was in grad school some of my fellow classmated and the teacher to lesser extent tried to say that white wome were slaves just like black woman were. They were all feminists and the conversation got intense. I finallyshit the thing down by suggesting they all read some female slave narratives and then come back and tell me how chattel slavery was identical the lives of antibellum white women. I got the reputation for being difficult after that melee.
The Kindle keyboard also has the “swipe” feature, where you just touch the keyboard and move your finger from one letter to the next. Still puts you at the mercy of autocorrect, of course, but might be less fatiguing than typing.
@katz
I have the old school kindle fire (not HD), so I don’t get to swipe. 🙁 It is something to think about in deciding to upgrade.
Some “exercise” is good for the pain so what I have might actually be better for me (not for all of you who have to read it, though).
Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize the non-HD didn’t have that.
@eshowoman
Wow. Your grad school class was stunningly racist and really ignorant of history. I am so sorry that we reminded you of that. I’m also really sorry that your classmates and professor couldn’t accept your point without considering you difficult.
@katz
No apologies necessary, I didn’t know that the HD had it and that is really good to know. Eventually this one will wear out (they really don’t seem to be built to be used as often as I use mine), and I will have to weigh a lot if things in deciding whether to replace or upgrade.
eshowoman – welcome from Downunder! ::waves::
And thanks for all the book recommendations on here, folks. I’ve just picked up “The Warmth of Other Suns” from the library.
@ eshowoman
In that kind of scenario I’d say “difficult” is a compliment. Welcome!
Also, on the accent issue, I don’t really have the accent at all since I grew up all over the place, but I’ve heard that the new iPhone Can’t Do Scottish. Apparently Scots pronunciation completely fucks with the voice recognition software. And they weren’t even in Glasgow!
And now I’m imagining someone having to update the iphone’s software to include words like “gobshite”.