So over on the Men’s Rights subreddit, the regulars are engaging in a bit of self-reflection. Well, that may be a bit of a generous description on my part. They’re discussing the question “Are we fanatics?” Not surprisingly, they conclude that they aren’t.
Yet this is the most upvoted comment in the thread:
Those of you who have studied twentieth century history may have remembered Lady Hitler’s war on the Jews, the Romani people, and homosexuals; the Great Feminist Purges of Lady Stalin; the Cultural Revolution of Lady Mao. (Oh, wait, there actually was a Madame Mao, and she was a pretty evil gal, though she owed her power largely to her husband and was ousted shortly after his death.)
Moving on from all that war and starvation stuff, let’s return to that first sentence, since MRAs are so fond of blaming eeevil feminists for the draft.
The link in that sentence goes to a discussion of an organization called The Order of the White Feather. Take it away, Wikipedia:
In August 1914, at the start of the First World War, Admiral Charles Fitzgerald founded the Order of the White Feather with support from the prominent author Mrs Humphrey Ward. The organization aimed to shame men into enlisting in the British Army by persuading women to present them with a white feather if they were not wearing a uniform.
It’s worth pointing out that at the start of WWI, people of all political stripes and in all the countries involved were pretty gung-ho for the war. Even the big socialist parties of the day quickly forgot their pledges of international solidarity in favor of supporting their national war efforts.
So where do the evil feminists come in? Well, a couple of the most famous British suffragettes signed onto the White Feather crusade: Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst. And yes, they supported compulsory national service — though they supported it for both men and women: men would go to war, while women would be required to work in factories.
Of course, the Order of the White Feather didn’t represent all feminists at the time. Indeed, it didn’t even represent all the Pankhursts: Christabel’s sisters Sylvia and Adela were pacifists.
Even aside from all that blather about feminists being responsible for wars and concentration camps, it’s highly misleading to present the story of the Order of the White Feather as “proof” that feminists are warmongering all-male-draft-lovers. As a quick visit to Google will demonstrate, feminism has a long history of antiwar activism, dating back to the 19th century — when feminists first organized Mother’s Day as a protest of war.
But, hey, MRAs, if you want to invent your own mythological version of history, knock yourself out. You only make yourselves look like the fanatics you are.
Thanks to this thread in the AgainstMensRights Subreddit for pointing me to this most edifying discussion.
deniseeliza, just remember that we poor primitive females are inherently irrational. Who cares about logical consistency when you’re biologically incapable of it?
@ kittehserf – That’s awesome. I know a few people who are into crochet, and I’m always amazed by the creativity of the stuff they come up with.
Feminists at least acknowledge some of the shortcomings of feminism’s past. The mrm, by contrast, is currently desperately rallying around the uber serious “men’s rights” issue of asshats being able to make fun of rape victims and abused women on Facebook.
@Sir Bodsworth – I couldn’t believe it when Google came up with heaps of pics of crocheted bonbons. 😀
I wonder if anyone has crocheted Scented Fucking Candles?
@becausescience – not to mention that Joe and his ilk have to dredge up things from thirty, forty, a hundred years ago. The MRM is the abusers’ lobby now. Even when they say “Oh but that’s the fringe!” it’s laughable: how can an extremist fringe group have a fringe?
@Falconer, It is my absolute favorite piece of pretentious crap writing of all time.
THE BALLERINA IS THE STAMEN OF PRIVILEGE.
SCENTEDCROCHETED FUCKING CANDLEHilarious, Falconer.
Particularly coming so recently after Lee Rigby was beheaded in broad fucking daylight in London, by two jihadist terrorists. One of whom gave a chillingly calm speech citing a specific chapter of the qu’ran as one of his motives for that murder, to camera*, with the knives still held in his bloody hands. Just like every other jihadi terrorist that can get access to a video camers
It’s almost as tho’ you have no connection to reality at all.
Just like all the dimwits who try to hand wave the murder of Lee Rigby away as an “isolated incident” …handily ignoring the Lockerbie bombing, the 7/7 bombings, and several foiled attempts at mass murder including: the Shoebomber, the Pantsbomber and the attempted firebombing of Glasgow airport, not to mention the plot to attack an EDL demo (conspirators recently jailed)…
Here in the UK we are in the middle of “The Troubles” all over again, only this time it’s not between two sects of Xtians, but between jihadist nutters and well, everyone else who doesn’t follow the literal commands of the qu’ran and the exemplar of the hadith, i.e. all us infidels, and the tiny minority of outspoken secular/enlightened Muslims.
But by all means, Falconer you carry on pretending that isn’t happening. You daft bollocks.
(*Which video I’m sure you can still find and watch on the web, if you have the stomach to watch a murderer justify his evil).
An MRA history of the Pig War
The evil Canadian and American wimminz living on the San Juan islands were bored and so they egged the men on to start a war between the countries, because they wanted to watch men die. But the men were too virtuous to kill each other, so one of them shot a pig instead. The feminist-controlled governments of both nations sent troops in anyway. Once the womyn saw all those Alphas they decided to ride the cock carousel instead, but they spat on the men by making them engage in beta activities like dancing and picnicking. Some of the men were so humiliated they killed themselves.
The evil bitches kept things going as long as they could, but ultimately peace broke out*. The Kaiser, a REAL Alpha, ruled that the islands belonged to the Americans because the Canadians were a bunch of mangina beta losers.
*Monty Python – I only steal from the best.
[Note to everyone who isn’t a paranoid British MRA who lives on a boat]
DO NOT ENGAGE. PLEASE DO NOT ENGAGE. WE WILL BE SUBJECT TO WALLS OF TEXT ABOUT HOW WE JUST LOVE TERRORISM AND BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH.
Thanks for your consideration.
‘Mrs. Stalin, a highly cultured and intelligent woman, committed suicide. Stalin blamed her death on “romance novels.”’
Apparently riding the alpha cock carousel all the way to the top wasn’t as fulfilling as she’d imagined it would be. That’s what you get for gold-digging a tyrant!
MRA History – The Changing Role of Urban Spaces in the Nineteenth Century
Is… is that even a thing? It sounds kinda gay. Also possibly postmodern
Sounds like a plan, cloudiah.
“Feminists at least acknowledge some of the shortcomings of feminism’s past.”
Not in my experience they don’t.
And they most certainly never ask themselves the question that feminists always push on anyone who brings up men’s issues. Which is, of course, to paraphrase:
“How can you associate yourself with Movement A, which horrible people Mr. X and Mr. Y are part of??”
In contrast feminists are very happy to handwave away any horribleness on the part of other feminists, by resort variously to:
“Feminism is not a monolith”
“No true feminist”
etc.
“@becausescience – not to mention that Joe and his ilk have to dredge up things from thirty, forty, a hundred years ago.”
^^ this is particularly hilarious given that one of feminism’s mantras, used to justify anything and everything ever that might suit that particular feminist at the time is:
“You owe me, because Thousands Of Yearz of Oppreshunnz!”
and yet when anyone talks about even modern history – as in the 20th century, from men’s POV you dismiss it out of hand! Bwahahahahaahahaa!
Oh the hypocrisy!! XD
And by the way, if you think we’re short on examples of Horrible People who are Feminists today: look up all the campaigners who idolize evil murderer Jodi Arias – to the point they are selling T-shirts that support her!! Just for starters.
It never sodding changes.
Joe, shut the fuck up. You are dishonest and tiresome.
This is a fun thread. I’m for not letting it become the Joe show.
Okay, cloudiah, I’ll stop engaging after this one:
@First Joe, can you please link some of those feminists supporting Jodi Arias? Because I searched for “jodi arias feminism” and a few variations thereof, and all I got were MRA blogs like The Spearhead and AVfM claiming feminists supported her. I’d truly love to see some links to feminist sites who support her.
I haven’t been here in months and frankly Joe, you disappoint, what a dish-water dull argument.
Joe, name one decent MRA that has influence in the movement.
Sorry for doing my little dance, cloudiah. It’s just … C1A as a cypher is just fucking hilarious.
(sorry for engaging guys, I just have seen this claim so.often. lately and yet not a single link in support of it…since he was so eager to cite evidence of Stopes’ belief in eugenics, I hope he can provide some evidence)
Joe can keep Lockerbie right the FUCK out of his mouth, as I knew people on that plane.
Oh by the way @Kittehs Hope you and Mister are well.
And I am not the boss of anyone, it’s just that the histories were so much more entertaining, and we’ve been over this exact same ground with Mr. “I live on a boat because FEMINI5M STOLE MY ICE CREAM” before.
Has anyone written a history of the Spanish Civil War yet? I’m a bit behind!