Ok, class project!
As regular readers of this blog know all too well, the manosphere has a rather distorted version of feminism. Indeed, MRAs, MGTOWers and other misogynists spend a lot of their timedoing battle against feminists of their own imagining, whose alleged beliefs only have a tangential relationship with anything you or I know as feminism. It’s not always clear if MRAs know they’re battling straw feminists or not, and I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to figure that out.
In the meantime, I’m trying to assemble a little guide to this straw feminism.
I’m wondering what you all think are its central tenets?
(Specific examples and links, to posts and/or discussion on this blog or elsewhere, would be great if you can provide them.)
Take a look at Kate Beaton’s amazing “Straw Feminist” cartoon if you need inspiration!
Ironically, the gang over on the Men’s Rights subreddit had a whack at the “straw feminist” question the other day. They didn’t do too well, with the OP basing his “refutation” of accusations that MRAs spend much of their time attacking straw feminists … on a list that incorporated some not-actually-real feminist quotes. (I factchecked a similar list of EVIL FEMINIST QUOTES here.)
Straw feminists think all men are rapists.
Straw feminists control the government and media. They’ve also set up a nice matriarchy for us.
Straw feminists think all men are dangerous, rapists, and abusers.
(MRA addendum: this is totally unfair and misandrist and [insert detailed, sickeningly gleeful descriptions of violence against said straw feminists as ‘punishment’].)
-Women are never responsible for anything.
-Men are only good for sperm and money. And once you have the sperm, you can get the money for free!
-Screw independence, straw feminists just want Big Daddy Gubmint to take care of them.
Straw Feminists are preventing the government from providing help for men who are victims of domestic abuse and rape!
Strawfeminists actually oppose equality because they aren’t prepared to get punched in the face.
(That is one way of looking at the DV post and of course the recent Reddit post, but see also responses to Rebecca Watson and “elevatorgate” for a slightly less physically-threatening version of this where people were basically claiming that equality for women means that either they must stop feeling threatened or that being/feeling threatened is just something that’s happens and really equality-minded women would STFU about it.)
@Creative Writing Student
Citation for yours: any discussion of Schrödinger’s Rapist in a non-feminist space or a space that allows trolls some latitude.
They’re in league with Teh Gayze to oppress and enslave all Real Men.
The DV industry is run by Straw Feminists to make Big Profits. (insert step 2: ???)
All rape allegations are false.
They rape men and spermjack them.
Strawfeminists want to ruin all male forms of entertainment: sports, videogames, action movies, other movies, sci-fi and fantasy like LOTR, other books, etc.
Straw feminism goes back at least 100,000 years.
Straw Feminists, with their SlutWalks, are encouraging women to walk around dressed like slutty sluts to tease poor menz boners but then refusing to service said boners!
The most consistent Straw Feminist “tenet” I’ve seen MRAs spouting is that male privilege is a kind of Original Sin of which all males are guilty at birth and which means that men must be “fixed.” Similarly, Straw Feminists think that all men are oppressors and that men are guilty of other men’s actions.
Straw Feminists also really don’t want women to be held responsible for anything they do. MRAs find this unrealistic: so unrealistic, in fact, that they think instead that women are responsible for things that other people do to women.
Shit! I forgot the most important form of male entertainment there is!
Strawfeminists want to ruin sex (and, related, flirting).
See: today’s Pandagon talking about how hard consent is to obtain according to some men ( http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/06/if-consent-was-really-that-hard-whiny-dudes-would-fail-at-every-aspect-of-life/ ), “elevatorgate,” discussions of banning harassment/harassers at conventions, discussions of “enthusiastic consent,” some discussions of prostitution (strawfeminists hate prostitution because they don’t want men to have real sex only the wacky strawfeminist version)
They’re the ONLY reason there are not yet sexbots.
Straw feminists want you to feel guilty for being a man (and probably also for being white and straight and cis and rich and american and and and). Straw feminists want you to apologize for having privilege because privilege makes you a bad person.
They exist to stamp out bonerful joy. Boners = oppression! And they hate elevators.
freitag, I just had an image of a boner and a closing elevator door then. Which is one way of stamping out bonerful joy, I guess.
Hmm, Bonerful Joy … a rock band?
Straw feminists want women to both have all the good jobs (despite being patently unqualified, because lolwomen) and leech off men/the government while eating bonbons. Simultaneously.
They oppress men by wearing clothes.
And they hate rock bands! Well, the ones with men in them, anyway.
Kitteh, that mental image is going to give me the chills the next time I go in an elevator. (Where I hopefully will not be an asshole to anybody.)
@freitag235
Strawfeminists love the fact that they have a monopoly on pussy and will do anything to protect it, obviously.
None of them have a sense of humor. They hate humor (or humour) in all forms that don’t involve castration.
They dream of castrating all men.
They hate sex.
@The Kittehs’
It sounds to me like the male equivalent of Summer’s Eve.
( http://summerseve.com/vcare/cleansing-wash since I don’t know how international they are)
Without them there would be no divorce, no divorce-rape (!!), no loss of child custody, and men would live in paradise. (Women, presumably, would be ecstatically happy as well, freed from the oppression of having to work or compete or otherwise have to act like people.)
Strawfeminists are sometimes all white, like when MRAs can pretend to give a shit about black men, but sometimes strawfeminists are mostly black, like when they are single moms living on welfare who only sleep with “thugs.”
Straw women don’t particularly like sex. That’s why straw feminists are trying to put a stop to the practice entirely.