More drama at A Voice for Men! Kristina Hansen — the excitable FeMRA videoblogger better known as TheWoolybumblebee — has been tossed off the good ship AVFM by Master and Commander Paul Elam for what he calls her “constant public conflicts with elements of our community.”
You can hear her side of the case in the video below. She claims to be shocked — shocked! — to find that Elam expected his contributors to toe his ideological line. And even more shocked to find him making generalizations about women — something, Ms.Bumblebee claims, that makes him no better than the feminists he criticizes!
Yeah, the trouble with ex-AVFMers is that they were dunderheaded enough to have signed up as AVFMers in the first place. (When we last met her here on Man Boobz she was returning a pair of misandric pants to the store, outraged that a tiny portion of the profits would go to help girls facing oppression in the developing world.)
Before you watch the whole video, though — it’s 14 minutes long — you might want some of the backstory. It’s long and messy, too, but I’ll try to keep it as brief as I can.
First, I should probably note the irony in Elam’s explanation for her dismissal, given that Elam himself is well-known for his own “constant public conflicts” with others in the Men’s Rights movement and the manosphere in general, having launched very public attacks on various others in the past — most notably on Pickup artists — and responding with intemperate anger towards pretty much everyone who even mildly disagrees with him about anything in public.
Heck, at one point he got so annoyed by people disagreeing with him on the Men’s Rights subreddit that he tried to set up his own Men’s Rights Activists subreddit where he could ban the people he disliked; it never took off and he abandoned it.
Elam’s pink-slipping of Ms. Bumblebee is doubly ironic, because one of the issues she’s been involved in “constant public conflicts” about has been MGTOW. (She’s not a fan.)
You might think that wouldn’t be a problem, as A Voice for Men has not exactly been on the best of terms with a big chunk of the MGTOW community for some time. The regulars on MGTOWforums, the biggest MGTOW hub, regularly refer to AVFM as “A Voice for Manginas” and worse; they’re especially offended that Elam lets women — sorry, “cunts” — post there. Elam has responded by denouncing the “MGTOW Forum Fuckwits.” The war of not-so-nice words seems never-ending; for some recent examples on MGTOWforums here and here — and in AVFM’s own forum here.
But Elam apparently still thinks he can somehow charm those MGTOWers who don’t already hate his guts, and he’s been making some efforts to get their attention lately — a fact that has not escaped his non-fans over on MGTOWforums, who have been decidedly unimpressed with his efforts so far.
So Elam was none too happy when Ms. Bumblebee started making videos attacking MGTOWers head on — videos which caused a little firestorm of controvery in the MGTOW world and got MGTOWers even madder at AVFM for putting up with such an evil “wench.”
Ms. Bumblebee has also been saying less than kind things about libertarianism for months on her blog, on YouTube, and on Twitter, where she bluntly declared it a “a cancer within the MRM.”
Turns out that was a bit of a faux pas. Though AVFM pretends to be “apolitical,” and has a few people associated with it who consider themselves liberal, most of the “big names” there — not just Elam but John “the Other” Hembling, and Karen (GirlWritesWhat) Straughan — pretty obviously lean libertarian.
Indeed, in a not-very-friendly comment on Reddit about Ms. Bumblebee’s departure from AVFM, Straughan suggests that she’s essentially a “a child … having a tantrum,” who doesn’t appreciate that the Men’s Rights movement is all about “free thinkers and John Galts.” (Yeah, she really did say that.)
She also accuses Ms. B of not reading enough E Belfort Bax — which is, I have to admit, the first time I’ve ever seen anyone accused of that particular crime in a political debate.
In case you’re not yourself a Baxhead, he was an opponent of women’s suffrage perhaps best known for his 1913 essay “The Fraud of Feminism,” a rather obscure piece of writing that’s having a sort of revival amongst a certain segment of the Men’s Rights movement. Indeed, A Voice for Men recently reprinted a portion of Bax’s essay with a glowing and altogether uncritical introduction by Elam himself.
It’s actually rather revealing. A Voice for Men is happy to republish the work of a long dead author who thought that women should be denied the right to vote. But a live woman who doesn’t agree with Elam about libertarianism or MGTOWers — over the side she goes!
Here’s her video. If you don’t want to watch the whole thing, you could just skip ahead to 5:20 to hear her express her astonishment that Elam would make sweeping generalizations about all women (say it ain’t so!), or to about 7:50 where she sets forth her basic complaint about AVFM and the way she says she was treated by Elam et al.
If you only have a couple of minutes, or limited patience for YouTube videos, at least listen to the excerpts of the testy phone conversation with Elam in which she officially learned she was no longer a part of AVFM; they start at about 10:40.
Ms. B has labeled this video Part 1. I don’t know how many more parts are coming. But I’ll certainly be watching.
For the masochists among you, Elam has put up the entire conversation he had with Ms. B — it’s half an hour long, and I listened to the whole damn thing. I assume he thinks it makes him look better and her look worse, but, you know, it really, really doesn’t. Unless you’re really into patronizing mansplaining and apologias for angry misogyny amongst MRAs and MGTOWers. He concludes by throwing a little fit and hanging up. Or maybe she hangs up. I can’t tell.
Ms. B., when she can get a word in edgewise, makes a lot of very good points in the call, bluntly and directly calling him on his some of his bullshit; it’s only when she starts going on about the evils of feminism that I remember how warped her worldview really is.
Alongside the video, Elam also posted the email he sent Ms. B dismissing her from AVFM, which confirms that he was indeed pissed off by what he calls her “divisive conduct” towards MGTOWers and all those John Galts of the MRM.
CUTTLEFISH!!! People, if you’re ever in Boston go to the aquarium. Their cuttlefish are all kinds of smart (well, all cuttlefish, but they have other cool shit like a deep sea tank with just a pale blue light so you can made out the nautilus critters without bothering them)
Also, an electric eel. Actually, ALL THE THINGS! The cuttlefish that decided to follow me is my lock screen on the iPad.
Ok, I just typed out eye and went no, *i*pad. I’m going to bed, my brain is done.
Thanks for all the fish 😀
We didn’t even have neon gloves – come to that I don’t recall if they gave us latex gloves at all. Just a plunge of the arm into cold salt water (they were fish from Port Phillip, the harbour Melbourne sits on). I think the cowfish were more curious than anything. The nipped my friend every time she fed ’em, but I didn’t get bitten by anything. Maybe fish do understand cat-related threats!
It was the sheer stupidity and cheapness of having the customer service staff expected to do the feeding when 1) none of us knew jack shit about fish and 2) we were doing in our full uniforms, during the day when there were kids swarming around, standing on a stepladder that put us well over head-height, and trying to reach arms-length into the tank with that long tong thingy to get the bottom-feeders. I could only just manage it and the people who were shorter had no chance. It was typical of the Museum cutting corners and being cheap.
Niters!
I’m going to try out the tai chi dvd I bought ages ago. Mum’s gone out, chance to do it in privacy!
@Argenti Aertheri
That’s ok. I’m getting tired and didn’t explain myself properly.
Here is a fishy for you:
http://ep.yimg.com/ca/I/yhst-15896368182214_2261_184372421
I have a terrifying memory of the Boston aquarium.
I was a child, and someone put a sea cucumber in my hands, and the cuke got frightened and regurgitated its stomach in my palms (that’s what they do). I didn’t speak English yet, and I didn’t know how to sign language the situation.
Other than that, seriously, the Boston aquarium is the best I’ve ever seen. Good memories (I love Boston).
Monterey is good too (and the one at UC Santa Cruz… taking Marine Biology in the Bay Area has interesting field trips.. counting a type of “sand flea” on a cold day… nice roads for motorcycle, but COLD!).
Plus boating or kayaking among the otters and cormorants at Elkhorn Slough. California is pretty amazing. (Other places are also amazing, in other ways. I’m just partial to California.)
I’d like to see more of California. I’d really like to have a longer visit to Yosemite. There are so many beautiful places in the US and Canada I’d like to see. Vermont in autumn, oooh the envy of those colours!
cloudiah: Me too. 🙂 The elfin forest in Morro Bay, Cabrillo Beach, Point Reyes, JOSHUA TREE!
I hear Joshua tree is amazing. Would love to go there.
That is literally the #1 thing on my list of things to do when I earn some money.
I love Julia Pfeiffer State Park in Big Sur, CA – it has a gorgeous waterfall. Mount Tamalpais up north is also very pretty. I need to hike there more.
@Kittehserf
Oh, I understand where you are coming from. When I used to read MRA shit, I never thought about how fucked up they sounded when they actually felt they should be able to hit women, even outside of self defense. You could imagine how jarring that was for me, when all I wanted was equality between genders.
But, I think that desire to hurt women is coming from the fact they aren’t doing anything to improve their lives. Let’s face it, the second an MRA gets some real money and realizes women don’t actually hate him is the second he stops being an MRA and stops blaming women for his problems.
Would you care to explain what you mean by this phrase? Cos not sure what you’re trying to say. Sounds rather like “women will appreciate them if they have money”. Or are you implying that men are only MRAs if they are broke? The former being misogynistic, the latter needing a citation.
I was actually trying to imply MRAs aren’t doing anything productive with the money comment or if they do have money, they are not using it to improve themselves. And with the second part, I was addressing the paranoid attitude MRAs have towards women. The way they post, it’s like they truly think every woman is out to get them.
I just think men are MRAs because some girl broke his heart, or he was abused by some terrible woman and now hates all women because of that. And my experience has shown me that if you are making your own life better (which means work), and don’t believe that everyone is trying to make your life hell, you don’t need something like MGTOW or the MRM.
I watched Paul Elam’s video where he exposes the entire skype conversation with Woolly. A few people pointed out on the comment section that he should’ve edited out the personal information (ie. children’s names and personal email addy) but in typical “Paul Land” this was quickly dismissed as ‘she should’ve known better.’ (insert creepy rape apologist banter here)
However, I think it’s hilarious that JohntheOther is on a bender about Facebook being Femifascist.
Let the good times roll.
I’d be very dubious about some douchecanoe MRA becoming a better person because he’s got more money. Is Elam broke? Are half these creatures broke? I doubt it. A misogynistic scumbag who wants rape to be LEGAL – as Elam does – isn’t going to become a better person just because he’s cashed up.
This idea doesn’t explain the millions of men who’re broke but don’t hate women, or blame their troubles on women, or want to beat and rape us. It doesn’t explain the wealthy or just comfortably-off men who do all those things – or the men with partners who do, as well, the ones in relationships that don’t give them the MRA “out” of being poor sad men who don’t get The Secks. It’s simplistic and still blaming women to say “he had his heart broken” or “he was abused”. Hello, not good enough. Is it okay when someone who was abused as a child then abuses other children? Is that an acceptable excuse? No, it isn’t.
And yanno … I don’t actually give a shit about what’s got these MRAs and MGTOWs into the state they’re in. I don’t care two hoots about their inner turmoil or their finances. What I care about is what they want to do to women, or to LGBT people, and what they actually do with their doxxing and their harrassment and violence.
These are men who want me and everyone like me unable to work, unable to get an education, unable to live independently of a man, unable to vote, unable even to have a choice in when or if I have sex or breed. These are men who want to commit violent crimes against half the world with complete impunity. These are men who admire murderers like George Sodini and Marc Lepine and say women need to be utterly subservient if we’re not going to DESERVE the same treatment as their victims.
Fuck them, fuck their sob stories, fuck their claims of ownership, and fuck excuses for them.
Yeah, that sounds an awful lot like “women only date guys with money, so once he gets women he’ll get some dates and stop being so bitter.”
And your attempt at explanation just sounds like women aren’t intereste in ordinary guys. A guy has to work hard to be interesting to women.
And some MRAs might be MRAs because they’ve had a bad experience, but some of them are like that because they are abusers and don’t like being told not to, or they are reacting very badly to being told that straight white men are not, in fact, special. Plenty of people are able to see “the person who hurt me” as an individual and not part of a monolith.
that should be “so once he gets *some money* “
@Kittehserf
I agree, but I know of 2 ex-MRAs who got over their hatred. One of them is a feminist now.
With this I mean that while most of them are misogynists, some of them don’t know where they’re at. Probably because they are just stupid teenagers or are mistaken about the real goals of the MRM (bashing women and whining, basically).
Seeing your privilege is difficult. I knew that I was privileged because I’m white and European, but I didn’t really grasp what this meant until I compared my situation as a pansexual woman to that of people of color. So I can imagine that someone that has all the privileged cards has to do some effort to empathize. Also, teenagers are not very good at empathizing.
Please keep in mind that I don’t think this is an excuse for misogyny, but I still have hope that some MRAs will realize they are part of a hate group and, eventually, stop being sexist douchebags.
I’m not saying that if they get money, they will get dates. Maybe I phrased it wrong, but the point is that MRAs don’t do anything for their own movement or themselves. I just said, “get real money” because hopefully, they would do something in order to get it. And good hard work can do wonders for people, even beyond the money earned from it.
I mean, really, who seems like a better person? A man who bitches online about women all day and doing almost nothing to improve their own lives or a man who hits a roadblock and decides to overcome it? Maybe I should get to the meat of my opinion of MRAs and just say that they are entitled brats who don’t want to work for a better life, not just financially, but emotionally as well. Maybe if they got a job or volunteered, an MRA would learn that maybe women aren’t evil from just talking to them.
Men become MRAs for the same reason whites join the KKK or rich people fund fascist/radically anti-left-wing parties. It’s a backlash reaction against losing their power over others. I’m willing to accept “a girl broke his heart” as an explanation if by “broke his heart” you really mean “dared being an actual person with her own life independant of his codependency/controlling personality, which eventually lead to a break up”.
Shits given for MRAs: Zero.
@neuroticbeagle
I’d love that. Mostly if I could get kitty cat ears and a tail 😀
Too tired to figure out if Detached is here in good faith or not, but:
Really rubs me the wrong way. I don’t think ‘good hard work’ can really do wonder for people, especially since I get tired of people telling me if I just try harder to do shit I wouldn’t be depressed…idk if this is making any sense…but that’s how it sounded to me. Maybe if they were working more they’d have less time to hate on the internet? But lots of people chill on the internet in their off time…just not seeing how ‘good hard work’ can help…
And, my unreasonable demands, cuz I wanna play 😀
1) A tail and kitten ears, just because.
2) A kitten.
3) A ball python, and my mom to be magically okay with me getting one (she hates cuteness).
4) no more patriarchy.
5) or systems that encourage other isms. (racism, ableism, homophobia, ect).
6) all of those pro-life USian politicians own up to the fact they just hate women, everyone laughs at them and they stop politicianing.
Wow that had 3 cute things to 3 bigger gripes…but if none of them happen I will be going my own way I tell you!
@kittehs
The hive mind will explode! I love summer! What ever shall we do?!!??!?!??!eleven
Though half the reason I love summer is that when my back was worse (still not better yet, but getting there :D) cold really hurt it, so any kind of heat feels good. Summer!