So WF Price of The Spearhead, who responded to my previous post criticizing his and his commenters’ appalling reactions to the Cleveland abductions with thoughtfulness and maturity (by which I mean a bizarre and weirdly racist personal attack on a commenter here), has now taken offense to a darkly satirical piece the Onion ran in the wake of the revelations of what allegedly went on Ariel Castro’s house for the past 11 years.
The Onion piece wasn’t funny, exactly, nor was it meant to be; it was pretty clearly the raw reaction of someone reacting with appropriate horror to the details of Castro’s alleged crimes, which seem to surpass even the worst “man-hater’s” vision of male depravity. Price, rather missing the point, sees the Onion piece as simple “feminist man-hatred” and suggests that it proves his point all along: that patriarchy is a lie.
The Castro brothers were neither patriarchal nor privileged; they were low-life predators from the bottom of society. Not to say that low-class men are all bad people, either, but men without privilege are the most likely to commit crimes, for obvious reasons. …
The myth of male power and privilege is just that, and the Cleveland case is one more pebble on the mountain of evidence that exposes it for a lie.
Empowering men in their families will not lead to more crimes against women and girls, but fewer.
Huh. So I guess if we make all men rich, and order the police to stop responding to all “domestic disturbance” calls, all our problems will be solved!
Never mind that Ariel Castro seems to have lorded it over his now-dead ex when he was involved with her, reportedly brutalizing and terrorizing her and getting away with it in part because he threatened to further brutalize her if she testified against him. He may not have had much power in the wider world, but he certainly seems to have felt quite “empowered” in his dealings with women and girls, and the “justice” system didn’t provide any justice to his apparent victims, even before the kidnappings.
And never mind that Price continues to refer to the “Castro brothers” although the police are saying that Ariel Castro acted alone.
Despite not knowing the basic facts of the case, Price seems to like the idea of using cases like this one to push his antifeminist agenda. According to him, his attempts to use the case to “refute” the feminist idea that
male privilege [is] tied to abuse of women … really enraged them, because how dare I use one of “their” cases to point out that they are wrong. From their perspective, it should be a sacred feminist right to use these incidents against men as a political bludgeon so as to coerce more concessions, more power, etc. Some went so far as to accuse me of blaming women and feminists for the kidnappings themselves (rubbish), while a few others sent me some hate mail.
But you know, I’m going to keep it up, because they do not have the sole right to the narrative when convenient tragedies occur. …
Feminists will doubtless use examples of outrageous crimes in an effort to remove more men from their families, thereby creating both more victims and more criminals. They will use examples like the Castro brothers’ kidnapping whenever and wherever they can. We must stop them from doing so, and we must not be intimidated by their feigned moral outrage when we speak the truth about their agenda.
Dude. if you think the reactions people are having to the Cleveland abductions — or to the terrible things you and your commenters have said about them — are in any way “feigned,” then I can only suggest that you may have completely lost touch with your humanity.
Once again, the Spearhead’s commenters lived up to their past standards of moral monsterhood, continuing to put the blame for Ariel Castro’s crimes (and pretty much every other ill) on feminism and women in general. Here are some selections. You’ll notice the one wishing death on feminists is officially “well-liked” by the commentariat there.
The only vaguely encouraging thing in the entire discussion? That Dana’s call for urban genocide got a couple of downvotes. To the two Spearhead readers who don’t think wiping out an entire community of decent people because of the behavior of one man is a good idea, I would like to say “thanks.” And also suggest that maybe you should stop reading The Spearhead.
EDITED: Added paragraphs about Ariel Castro’s alleged brutality towards his ex, and clarification that only he has been charged, not his brothers.
HuffPo is weird in that it initially presented itself as a leftist site, but as far as I can tell it’s now mostly a cross between the Daily Fail and a marketing site for wacky New Age “health” ideas.
Yeah, it doesn’t seem exactly like a leftist site to me. Someone I knew (an Alaskan who moved to New Mexico to get away from Palin) read a couple of things in my local paper, The Age, and was in ecstasies over it being “so left wing, even more than her beloved HP” – which boggled me a bit. I mean, The Age is leftish compared with the Murdoch rags that dominate the press here, but that’s the best you can say for it. Yet it seemed more so than HP …
They really did try to sell it that way initially, though. And as sort of a more intellectual alternative to standard news sites, which is even funnier.
I can’t figure out if Huffington is a talented con artist or if she really believes her own PR.
I guess if the news sites they’re comparing themselves with are of the Faux variety, the claim to being more intellectual might still hold up!
Also, it’s a trivial thing, but their page design makes me want to claw my own eyes out. It’s just so badly done.
Cassandra — trivial? An easy to use non-eye-bleeding website was one of my few requirements when college searching.
Tangentially, I should’ve gone to Hartwick. An art major without a degree is far more useful than a psych major without a degree — all that’s good for is frisking studies!
I just don’t understand how anyone can tolerate the shitty layout for long enough to read anything.
Australian universities all seem to use slight variations on the same (horrible) site, or at least the ones in New South Wales do.
From the [quoted part of the] OP:
Wouldn’t that be more of a dune?
Filter, schmilter, I read. And generally don’t comment. I find the Schadenfreude directed at Andrew loathesome. As for Isr3l/Pal3stine, everyone has a plan for us. As I have family in the Israeli Golan now, I am an agnostic and hoping for the least harmful eventualities. Syria is not Lebanon, it has the chemicals to hold the IDF at bay. Arab pride, an I
ncurable misery all of their own making, whatever colonialism stalks the Golan
The suitcase, or the coffin? “One settler, one bullet”? The usual thinky thoughts? And yes, policy on both si
Testy considering all I said was that I have thoughts. Namely that I’m Not Okay with my gov’n continuing to back Israel and their desire to shoot at unarmed people.
And yes, I fully realize Syria’s situation and the Israel/Palestine situation are different. Except they both involve shooting unarmed people. Which, to put it mildly, makes me have a sad.
In short, I don’t really care who settles where, as long as nobody’s shooting at each other. Or, at least, only shooting at other armed people.
But mostly I’m just plain not okay with my gov’n supporting Israel while they’re responding with firepower to people “threatening” in an unarmed manner. Nor with ignoring the Rohingya genocide while lifting sactions on Burma/Myamar. Or fucking up ALL THE THINGS in general.
Policy on both sides maximizes cruelty. And Syria’s pride, its consciously-constructed autarky, means that outsiders cannot do much good. And may do much harm–I am unimpressed with Israeli humanitarian efforts for Syria, as they exist in a gray area. Syrians will not admit going into the Golan for help, and Israelis will not admit going into Syria. Yet people claim things are happening.
1) I don’t know enough about the international politics of the situation to comment in any depth (as in Israel-Syria relations, international is a strange word, taken on a meaning far beyond “multiple nations interacting) — but I would think that only the most willfully ignorant thinks that gov’n admit everything they do
2) I’ve been up all night and it’s time for breakfast, and don’t really have a point to make beyond “shooting at unarmed people is never acceptable” (and my gov’n supporting anyone who does it is very much not okay)
It kind of depends which government it is. US/Canada the most traditional allies, Germany the most fraught, most of Europe really leaning on the issues of the territories but not willing to harm trade relations. Sociologists in the Territories and Israel know exactly how unarmed protesters get shot and so far Government of Israel has no interest in the personnel, policy, and institutional culture changes that could change that, or in withdrawal from the Territories or points of contact and unrest.
Sorry, I should’ve been clearer, kinda thought most of our nationalities were known (the regulars anyways) — “my gov’n” means the US. And yes, we are masters at fucking up ALL THE THINGS!
And now it’s time for breakfast.
All we have to do, in order to understand what would result from the “master-and-control” way of patriarchal life is to look at such an experiment undertaken in our times. http://flds101.blogspot.com/2009/05/flds-101-table-of-contents.html
Seriously. If you look at Mill’s “the subjection of women” from 1869 he writes that women, at the time in Britain, had no more rights than slaves. He points out that most husbands and wives ARE fond of each other and most women therefore IN PRAXIS are way better treated than slaves, BUT because they had no more legal rights, those women who WERE abused by their husbands were completely stuck in a 100 % shitty situation. So, it wasn’t the case that all and every husband back then were magically turned nice just because women had no rights – imagine that!
Then again, Mill was probably a major mangina for writing a book on feminism, so I guess you can’t trust his word on this.
Then again, he did have a girlfriend who was married to another man, so maybe that makes him alpha per definition? I don’t know, what MRA classification do the combination of “having a married girlfriend” and “writing a book on feminism” put him in? I’m a bit confused now…
@argenti
I’m somewhat off the grid, no tv, no newspapers, and the only internet ii s on my phone, and I do tend to be rather oblivious to what is going on around me, but it’s more because I’m poor and don’t work much. (I wish I could say it was because I’m a hippy commune type)
I had heard about that factory collapse but it’s too depressing to actively search for information on it.
And now the baby is awake so I have to go =^.^=
No, see if he were really alpha he’d not have had a girlfriend, just a string of one-night stands. He was a wanna-be beta.
doomkitt3n — oh I’m all internet news too. I just follow a bunch of bleedin’ heart liberals on twitter *said with affection*
Thanks Pecunium! From now on, when I lecture on the history of philosophy, I’m gonna include this piece of information when I talk about Mill: He was a wanna-be beta (and eventually successful since he married Harriet Taylor after her husband died – yeah, obviously no alpha would have done that, so, beta it is).
Total mangina.
@argenti yeah, I follow a few feminist blogs. I pretty much only get feminism news…
I read here all the time but don’t often have a chance to comment.
Not to mention that Harriet Taylor had a large part in writing that book.