Don’t worry, it’s not a video BY an MRA. It’s a video ABOUT MRAs. A little cartoon, to be specific, by Scott Benson, who has this to say about it on his Vimeo page:
A quick editorial cartoon about the intersection of self-pity, entitlement, rape, territoriality, misogyny and fear of women. You see it all over the place online in the form of Men’s Rights Activists (of whom there are a few reasonable non-misogynists), Men Going Their Own Way, Pick Up Artists, and dudes touting the “Red Pill”, because The Matrix is a good movie. Look any of these up if you have the stomach for it. These are extreme examples, but watered-down forms of these ideas are everywhere.
In lurking their blogs and youtube channels for a while, I’ve noticed that beyond the standard patriarchal chauvinism there is this deep fear of women – what they will do to me, how they will reject me, how they will use me, how they are changing society in a way that does not favor me, how they are making men into something I don’t like, how they are making themselves into something I don’t like, that they won’t give me what I want, and that they won’t give me what I think is rightfully mine. This goes beyond fear of feminism- this is fear of women at its purest. And that, to quote a puppet, leads to anger and hate. It’s sad.
Naturally, Benson had to close the comments to the video because of, you know, too much MRA.
He wrote more about it all on his Tumblr.
I was alerted to the video by various people, including Cloudiah, which reminds me to remind you all to go look at Cloudiah’s excellent Artistry for Feminism And Kittens blog.
I’m both touched by everyone else’s optimism and generosity of spirit and about 95% sure that it’s going to turn out to be undeserved in this case.
Is it optimism or is it baiting a trap? 😉
Plus there’s all the ninja exercises we’re getting in.
I’ll be over here with the big sword waiting to deliver the final blow.
I live in hope
I should clarify — I have pretty much no hope for lensman. I think he’s already shown himself to be extremely self-centred. I just thought I would point out why.
On the subject of the post, I just before heard my kids chanting, “I am afraid, I am afraid, I am afraid of women” in robotic voices in their room. And laughing.
Oh I fully realize I could well be wrong here, but I’m usually (too) inclined to give the benefit of the doubt. Also, self-centered =/= will turn out to be an asshole, by all the gods you’d have hated me, and rightly so, when I was like 19 (to all our younger regulars, y’all rock)…so yes, lensman may turn out to be an asshole (or even our “favorite” repeat troll), but hey, I’ve got time and nothing better to do.
Ok, not quite true, I have an EA shirt I intend to turn into a muscle shirt // tank top // whatever you want to call them that isn’t “wife beater”. But I’m not really in the mood to sew, also, haven’t decided how to finish the edges. Ideas?
I’m not sure there’s such a thing as too inclined to give somebody the benefit of the doubt. 🙂 If they end up disappointing you, that’s on them. It’s not your fault because you gave them a chance. I’m just getting crotchety in my old* age!
*according to MRAs
Oh, Abnoy.
The doubt is because you’re a lying liar who lies, and so we regard any claims about your origin with great skepticism.
David’s confirmation allows us to say, yep, you really are as horrible a human being as you claimed to be previously with your noxious homophobia.
…..you think you’re matching wits with us?
Pffffffffffffffff
Abnoy, no one’s saying filipinos aren’t smart, we’re saying you’re a misogynistic jerk.
Abnoy: Filipinos are great, my husband and in-laws are awesome people. YOU are an asshole.
Cassandra:
Amen. I’m already tired of him. I’ll get my sword and we can wait for the inevitable.
Tch, every person is a product of time and place and I make no apologies for how the milieu in which I was born and raised. In fact, where and when I’m from, I’m considered positively progressive (you can even ask that other aforementioned countryman of mine, he sounds like he grew up in a similar background). Furthermore, if you Westerners, especially those from the US, can find everyone else who doesn’t share your culture to be hilarious, why too, so can we (to digress, your PC oversensitivity is why males will always be the superior comedians, though to be fair, it’s also why males will always get into the violent trouble that females will not, but boys will be boys, so cest la vie). In addition, I’m not anti-queer, I’m just pro-straight. Did I ever say on this board that God(s) hate(s) fags or that homos will go to hell or that AIDS is divine punishment, like too many people in your own homeland? I’m generally a live-and-let-live type of guy, as long as you mind your own business when then there’s no reason to intervene, then I’ll keep the peace by holding my peace (which is far more than I can say for the postmodern killjoy feminazis of the white Western world who are virtually unchanged from the witchhunting puritans and the prohibitionist temperance movement among others). Finally, even borderline wittiness is enough to deal with a pack of half-wits.
Ye gods that’s a wall of text. Paragraph breaks help, dude – and while I’m sometimes guilty of this myself, run-on parenthetical sentences really don’t help the readability of your posts.
Anyway.
I feel like that should be some sort of yoof culture thing to do with music I don’t listen to or something.
This demonstrates that I am /very/ out of touch with my generation or summat. 😉
@viscara
You actually have a point. So from now a conscious effort shall be made to not use the highly egocentric words “I”, “Me” and “My”.
You are definitely right in being suspicious. The current subject is an unknown variable and should be treated with as much hostility and aggressiveness as possible until its intentions are made clear.
Back to the topic at hand…
It’s perfectly understandable to ban offensive language and jokes in special places where victims of offensive behaviour and sexual trauma congregate. You shouldn’t be making sexist and sexual jokes in feminist places for pretty much the same reason that you shouldn’t be making DUI jokes at a MADD meeting: it’s highly likely that those jokes will trigger painful memories and cause excruciating emotional pain to some very good people (in fact you shouldn’t be making any kind of joke there, period) . That’s basic human decency and common sense.
The problem arises when you actually want to codify this in law and public policy for all types of social interaction.
Let’s just say for the sake of argument that you and some friends go to a bar for and few drinks. You’ve had a few beers, you are getting buzzed and you decide to share a really funny joke about a drunk driver that you’ve read on the Internet in order to have a good laugh.
Right next to you, a person “X” is standing in line to order a drink. “X” recently lost a son in a “Drunk driving” incident about a month ago and is, understandably quite sensitive about it. Being behind you in line “X” can’t help but overhear the joke which triggers the crippling pain of loss inside and a breakdown occurs.
The management is called to deal with the situation. While you’re trying to calm “X” down, you’re informed that the bar follows a “Zero Tolerance to Offence” policy and you’re summarily thrown out, along with your friends.
OK, the example above is indeed a bit extreme and unlikely but you can already see the main problem with such laws and policies: what is offensive is subjective, something doesn’t offend you might be highly offensive (painful even) to somebody else and the only way to surely find out what is offensive when the other person is a stranger is to unwittingly cross the line and be subject to penalties.
To make matters more complicated, something that doesn’t offend someone now isn’t guaranteed to be inoffensive tomorrow or even a few hours later.
To point, the “Dick Joke Tweet” that Adria Richards sent on that fateful day, was published very early in the day, before she actually entered PyCon. Once she entered PyCon she encountered a company executive who make a highly sexual skirt joke. She complained to him and he brushed her off. After she probably encountered more “micro-agressions” at PyCon she bumped into the two men making dongle jokes (which were far more innocuous than the skirt joke) became offended and decided to act in a way she thought most appropriate.
All this is not said to lay the blame on Richards (or to completely absolve her for that matter) but to make people understand how something that doesn’t offend you at one moment (in Adria’s case dick jokes) can offend you the next under certain circumstances. Donglegate was a clear case of “straw breaking the camel’s back” and should be treated with compassion rather than malice, but it also highlights the other problem that “Zero Offence” policies have, namely that what someone finds offensive at a certain point in time is also highly variable and unpredictable.
Most importantly , you can never be sure if the other person who invokes offence to get you thrown out or censored is genuinely offended by what you say or has an ulterior motive. For instance, in the UK, the police has successfully invoked “Section Five” , which is essentially “The Ada Initiative’s Code of Conduct” codified into law, to shut down protests and arrest peaceful protesters. In Greece, the current regime is pushing for a similar legislation which will allow them to shut down blogs and news web pages which expose the corruption that happens behind the scenes – such laws already exist there for the press, which is why Independent Journalism is considered an oxymoron.
So, the very kyriarchy is pushing for these types of legislations, which should worry the feminist movement very much. And to make matters even worse for those who are not part of the kyriarchy, when you apply extreme political correctness in the proper context anything can be perceived as offensive (for example, someone can accuse the author of this comment for sexism because he used the word “period” in the third paragraph, at which point he decides to quietly go to his room and engage in self-flaggelation).
“Zero Tolerance to Offensive Behaviour/Humour ” might sound great on paper and might even be a good idea in places where you know it will cause problems for but when it’s codified in law and policy is highly problematic and leads to a version of human society that is quite frankly, knightmarishly sterile and offensive to human reason and decency.
…
Being an Auditor of Reality is seriously awesome!
Removing yourself from what you write and consciously forcing yourself to not use self-identifying pronouns actually makes you convey your message more efficiently and allows you to place a much greater focus on the actual arguments you’re trying to make.
So, seriously viscara, thank you!
Lensman – fighting for the right to make sexist jokes anywhere and at any time.
Biting sarcasm is biting! Only now do I see the error of my ways!
Dude, I told you why I thought you were being selfish. It’s not because of 1st person pronouns.
A lot of text just to say “I’ll make whatever jokes I want, suck it up.” Dude, if you want to be an asshole, fine, but try not to be so proud of it.
And now you see why my nym is Cassandra. Thanks for proving me right, lensy!
@titianblue
Uhm… Did you actually read the first few paragraphs? You know the ones in which I specifically agree with codes of Conduct under social settings in which basic human logic and decency instructs you to not behave inappropriately?
And since you obviously can’t understand what’s at stake here, let me spell it out for you:
The Slutwalks? Offensive! Arrest those scantily clad women!
Jezebel? Offensive! Fine them and bring me the head of Lindy West!
These kinds of legislations don’t just ban sexist jokes, they ban all sorts of speech that can be perceived as offensive in any way.
Anyway, as you are so fond of saying, it’s not my job to (further) educate you.
Go to http://reformsection5.org.uk if you’re interested.
The only difference is you can try to be better than the people who raised you/whoever gave you these awful ideas or not. people have free will, man.
Boys will be boys = bad parenting results in assholes.
Or
boys will be boys = I’d rather use tired gender stereotypes to justify my kid’s behavior than correct it
or
boys will be boys = if our sons don’t uphold the patriarchy, who will?
plz do not compare something for which there is no systematic power imbalances (drunk driving) to something for which their is (sexism, racism, w/e)
Gosh, compare this to clothing, and b) no one is saying arrest guys who mow the lawn with their shirt off, and c) SEXISM
gad.
like, this would be an example if a guy had a domestic violence joke on his shirt, it’d be similar to telling a bad sexist joke.
SYSTEMATIC. FORCES. OF. OPPRESSION
not some girl dressed scantily.
Those terrible bloggers, forcing society to enact their commenting rules across every single aspect of…wait.
Next search term – why do women always make fun of me?
I had NO IDEA such American stuff was popular in Greece.
@hellkell
which american stuff? I was kind of skimming XD
Slut Walks and Jezebel. I guess you’d know about them if you were ass-deep in the manosphere due to your shitty Goolge searching abilities. Otherwise, no.
Don’t you love the way “slutwalk” is always taken by misogynist morons to mean women dressed in their fantasy notions of sex-worker gear, rather than pointing out that clothing has nothing to do with whether one’s raped or not?