The bad publicity bonanza for Men’s Rights activists continues — and it couldn’t happen to a worse group of people.
Yesterday, the Daily Beast published a long-awaited piece on the Men’s Rights movement, and it’s a doozy. If you’re a regular reader of this site, trust me, you’ll want to read the whole thing, like now. The piece, by R. Tod Kelly, is long — some 6000 words — but worth it.
It’s mostly on the money, but with a few notable flaws.
Here’s what it gets right:
1) It captures the pervasive misogyny of the Men’s Rights movement in general, and of A Voice for Men in particular.
2) In an extended section, it profiles AVFM’s John Hembling, and tears apart some of his most blatant lies — including the now legendary box-cutter incident, in which Hembling claims to have stared down a mob of 20-30 feminists brandishing boxcutters.
As Kelly notes:
Vancouver police records show that there was indeed an altercation in September of 2012 between Hembling and others seeking to tear down men’s rights posters. However, according to the police, Hembling was arguing with two or three people, not being accosted by a “mob” of any size. When questioned by the authorities, neither Hembling nor witnesses mentioned seeing any weapons. …
Curiously enough, Hembling actually videotaped the events and had his AV4M Radio partner Karen Straughan post it online. The discussion with the police has been conveniently edited out, but the rest of the video clearly matches police records and not Hembling’s story. There are only a few young men taking down Hembling’s posters, and the video shows them choosing to ignore him except when he engages them in conversation. One of the men is seen using a box cutter to take down the flyers, but at no time does he use it as a weapon, raise his voice, or threaten Hembling in any way.
Kelly found some troubling, er, discrepancies in another story told by Hembling. Kelly writes:
According to Hembling, sometime around 1995 he was on his way home at 2:00 am after working a night shift when he came upon [a sexual] assault in progress. He says he used his steel-toed boots as weapons to chase off the perpetrator. When the victim was too distraught to speak with him, Hembling says he contacted the police, waited until they arrived, and then quietly left without speaking to them. He says they later tracked him down at his home, where he gave a statement.
It’s hard to know whether this event actually occurred or not. There is no record—at least, not in the Vancouver police files—of Hembling being a material witness to a rape, and police blotters from that time period do not show a crime that matches Hembling’s description. However, this does not necessarily mean the event did not occur. Vancouver police did not fully computerize their data until 2002, and it is possible the police never reported the incident. Hembling claims the incident took place at a specific hospital, where he says he worked as a contractor for 18 months. The address he gives, however, is for a different hospital in a completely different part of the city. This raises the curious question of whether Hembling forget the name of the hospital he contracted with for 18 months, or whether he forget what part of the city he worked in for that same period of time. The real truth of the matter is anyone’s guess, because Hembling wouldn’t comment to The Beast on that or any other matter.
In other words: Cool story, bro.
3) Another thing the story gets right: it makes clear just how little the Men’s Rights movement does to actually help men — and how in many ways it can actually be terribly damaging to men who need real help. As Kelly writes,
the movement’s radicals might … do … immediate damage to those who most desperately need the MRM to succeed.
“When we talk about recovery from trauma and abuse, there were two things that helped me,” says Chris Anderson, executive director of the male-victim advocacy group Male Survivor and a sexual abuse survivor himself. “The first was realizing that I’m not alone; the second was hearing that recovery was possible.” Anderson is quick to dissociate himself from the men’s rights movement: “In [the MRM] people get that first message, that they’re not alone. I don’t know that they ever get the second message. And when they don’t get that second message, it turns into an endless feedback loop and eventually they say, ‘Oh my God, all of society is f**ked.’”
Indeed, Kelly writes:
It is telling to note that of the professional male-victim advocacy organizations I spoke with, every single one specifically asked that I not allow readers to think they were in any way related to the MRM.
But there are also some things that I think the article gets wrong.
1) I think it gives Men’s Rights activists way too much credit for their supposed good intentions. While there are some MRAs who do seem to be motivated at least in part by a sincere desire to help men, most of the MRAs I’ve encountered in the 3 years of doing this blog have clearly been motivated primarily by anger and hatred of feminists — and women in general. They don’t really seem to give a shit about doing anything to actually improve the lives of men — and the paucity of their accomplishments reflects this. In its relatively brief lifespan, AVFM has raised many hundreds of thousands of dollars. Has it set up any shelters or hotlines or helplines for men? Not a one.
2) It wildly exaggerates the importance of Hembling to the MRM — especially ironic given that Hembling has been more or less AWOL in recent months, producing only a few short videos and one article for AVFM.
3) It paints a picture of The Spearhead’s WF Price as a Men’s Rights “moderate.” Really? While it’s true that Price is not an AVFM-style hothead given to rants about “fucking your shit up,” his views are anything but moderate. This is a guy who thinks higher education is wasted on women, who blames the epidemic of rape in the armed forces on women, who celebrated one Mothers Day with a vicious transphobic rant, who once used the tragic death of a woman who’d just graduated from college to argue that “after 25, women are just wasting time.” He published posts on why women’s suffrage is a bad idea. Plus, have you met his commenters?
I was, however, kind of amazed to learn that Price is married … and to a feminist. No, really.
4) The article, while solidly researched, contains some small errors and simplifications that will no doubt give MRAs and others the excuse they need to dismiss the whole thing. Kelly refers to Reddit subreddits as Reddit “threads!” He refers to Matt Forney as an MRA! Oh no!
Still, whatever its flaws, this is an important piece, and one that tells a lot of truth about the Men’s Rights movement. Again — go read it!
neuroticbeagle, queen of the pictures!
Dear billswife:
You say that in the country where you are from, a site like The Spearhead would not be permitted. You also say that you come from a very “egalitarian” part of Europe. Can you tell me why a site like your husband’s would be banned in your home country?
Also, is it possible that after only a few months of marriage, you really don’t know your new husband all that well? Have you really read and scrutinized what he has written and encouraged other people to write?
You just seem terribly naive, and I hope you can handle what you’ve gotten into.
Naive, or lacking in empathy, or clueless …
Bill’s wife: if you read racial abuse, do you shrug it off because it doesn’t affect you personally? Or do you read it and recognise how vile and harmful it is?
If the former, well, you’re obviously empathy-deprived, or maybe just a racist too.
If the latter – good, props for being a decent person.
But that leads to the next question: if you recognise the harm done by racism, even though you are not directly hurt by it, why can’t you grasp that others recognise the harm done by misogyny – YOUR HUSBAND’S misogyny – even if we are not personally harmed by it?
Is it really too hard for you to grasp? Or is it safer and comfier for you if he spends his energy on his hatred of all other women, so maybe, just maybe, he won’t turn it on you?
Yanno, I’m seeing a sort of parallel with Sunshine Mary and various feMRAs here. Bill’s wife may claim she’s a feminist, but she’s exhibiting all the willful blindness of feMRAs who think they’ll never be victimised by their heroes.
If I am reading the situation right, she is in a particularly vulnerable position. Hope I am wrong. Ever since the Anastasia King murder here, I worry about these clueless young FSU gals who marry raging misogynists.
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2002/Apr/01/anastasia-king-the-hopeful-life-and-brutal-death/#axzz2iKxbmyi5
I do worry about the women who marry these guys. Someone capable of maintaining a site like The Spearhead has to have a lot of anger fueling them, and although it sounds like it isn’t being directed at the wife for now, angry people have a tendency to lash out at those closest to them, especially if the people closest to them fall into a demographic that they’ve already decided is out to get them.
La Strega – I’m not seeing anything to suggest Bill’s wife is very young, and I haven’t read about him off-site (ugh). She’s mentioned being a second wife and that “a few years ago” would have called his sort of attitude a deal-breaker, which suggests someone older – assuming she’s for real, of course.
I did just see this side-eyeing comment in her first posting:
“I’m very much a Warren Farrel type of a person when it comes to family / marriage issues.”
So, Bill’s wife, you think that fathers raping their daughters is hunky-dory and that the only reason the daughters are upset about it is if they’re told to be? That’s the Warren Farrell view of family life, y’know.
Say, Cassandra, was the Scottish troll you mentioned earlier today someone called Andy?
No, he had a weird name, can’t remember what it was.
You know, I’m not keen on the idea of pulling people’s feminist cards in general, but if you self-identify as a fan of Farrel and also as a feminist? I’m thinking you may not quite understand what the word “feminist” means.
(Or be identifying that way for strategic reasons – why else would she be commenting here if not in an attempt to drum up some good PR for her husband?)
Pretty much. There’s goodness knows how many ways of being a feminist, but nothing Bill’s wife has said so far fits any sort of feminist I’ve ever heard of. Farrell? Price-who’s-not-really-like-that?
This is, of course, assuming we’re not just dealing with a troll who’s a tad more subtle than most of them.
Yep, that’s my wife. As I told Tod, she will have her say on her terms whether I like it or not (I definitely wasn’t thrilled about these posts here).
She’s a good woman, and I love her. That’s all that matters to me.
Anyway, thanks Dave for keeping your peace on this exchange. I will keep that in mind.
Life’s long, and much better when you get to spend it with people who suit you well and keep you warm at night.
Maybe you feminists should think a bit about the fact that, as long as we are human, there will never be a resolution to this issue that doesn’t involve “sleeping with the enemy.”
OK, I think that’s enough here.
Bonne nuit
The “you feminists” bit is a little odd coming from someone who’s wife identifies as one, no? I guess that explains the “sleeping with the enemy” part.
How depressing. I can’t say I’ve ever thought of someone who I was in a relationship with as my enemy. That sounds like an unpleasant way to live.
Actually, I can think of several resolutions (I am assuming man = enemy of woman):
1.Not all people identify as one gender or the other, therefore sleeping with a non gender binary would not be sleeping with an “enemy”.
2.Not all women are interested in sleeping with men and not all men are interested in women.
3. Not all people are interested in sleeping with other people.
4. People may be interested in sleeping with other people they like, respect and would consider being a friend.
I am sure there is more, but these are just the ones I thought of off the top of my head.
And since I am the Queen of Pictures, here is Sleeping with the Furrinati:
http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/53/9a/c1/539ac1aac5348fdb65ba4cad80bf4130.jpg
Uh, what? Assuming you don’t mean this literally (that everyone needs to be in a heterosexual relationship), do you honestly think that the women here don’t have men in their lives that they care about? Not necessarily romantic partners, but fathers, brothers, friends, etc. If you actually read the comments here as closely as I read the comments at your site you would know the answer to that question and wouldn’t have to make assumptions. There are men who comment here as well as women, and people who don’t fit as easily into the traditional gender binary; we talk about issues that affect everyone.
But what kind of “enemies” are you talking about? I wouldn’t date or marry a woman who thought higher education was a bad idea for men, or who published posts on her blog suggesting that male suffrage was a bad thing.
So — switching the genders back — it’s a little hard for me (and obviously for others here) to see how your wife can reconcile her notions of you as the decent person she knows in real life with the things you write on your blog, which are pretty far from decent. Hence the puzzled tone of a lot of the questions asked of her.
Maybe you can learn a few things from her. I hope so.
I want to comment, but there’s too much cognitive dissonance.
(*internet hugs to Ophelia too*)
I also must mention that the Spearfront’s rather racist undertones. A lot of “Ladies Like The Coloureds” and once you go “coloured” you are ruined for all of mankind (Because clearly melanin makes us less human)
That’s not so much an undertone as it is a giant blinking neon sign.
@ Bill’s Wife, Indeed, the US has, for a long time now, been – on the average – more religious and more traditional than Europe. Part of this dates from the Puritans, and part of it from the social movement that swept America after WWII. Rosie the Riveter was supposed to go home and resume her ideal womanly role. For those who remember, it was a sort of national swoon. Even fashion took up the call – the Dior “New Look” in particular. We often have strong idea on how things ought to be, and can pursue them for both good and ill.
I don’t believe anyone is saying that the MRAs don’t have any real issues. Rape is wrong no matter who it happens to. Hunger and homelessness are sad too. I remember being brought to the verge of tears by a story in our local newspaper about a young man who was badly beaten up in a street attack, and who was subsequently refused care at a local emergency room and had to walk a few miles to another one. But his condition would not have improved one whit by calling women cunts. (his assailants weren’t even women). Keeping a woman out of college would not have changed anything for him. Firing all the women at the hospital would not have gotten him in.
There was a story in our local newspaper a few months back. A father without custody, and who was ordered to have no unsupervised contact with his toddler son, came to the mom’s home, forced his way in, pepper-sprayed the mother, and took the son. They were caught in Canada a few days later. Local MRAs showed up in the comments section, crowing about how there must be more to this story, and how awful the woman was to keep the dad away from his son, and how much the dad must love his son to take such a legal risk to be with him.
Then the rest of the story came out.
Like all couples in my state, this couple had started the divorce process with joint, shared custody. The child may live at one home but the other has complete access and joint decision-making. It is expected that the child enjoy the copious company of both parents. What changed that? One day dad showed up to be with the son, and disappeared with him. The son was kept away from mom, hidden for NINE MONTHS with no communication as to his whereabouts or welfare. The police closed in on them, and found dad and son hiding under carpets in a truck on the other side of the state. So, the judge got a frowny face and changed the rules for this couple. In other words, you have to screw up to loose joint custody and unsupervised visitation in my state, and screw up pretty badly.
But no, the man still had his defenders in the comment section. That is the MRA mentality that I find so scary. The facts of the case, even after they came out, meant nothing. Man=good and woman=evil is all they could see. Many of the MRAs still believe that 1950s style alimony is normally awarded. In my state, alimony is almost never awarded, and when it is it’s almost always very short-term, and this has been the case for over 30 years. My state’s laws are very typical of modern American divorce law too.
I can remember when hitting a wife would make people ask out loud what caused it. I was punched in church, and my clergyman said the same thing, only slightly more politely, in 1988! I can remember when female rape victims were universally reviled and suspected of hidden evil or sickness. These behaviors are the result of attitudes, and if MRAs want to change the attitudes that are adversely impacting modern men, they might want to take a page from the other side as to how to change that. Calling women names, threatening women, calling for our civil rights and freedom of movement and education to be rolled back, and fucking our shit up will not make the world a better place for men in the future. It will only make it more of an intolerant, knee-jerk thinking, victim-blaming jungle for us all.
” 2) It wildly exaggerates the importance of Hembling to the MRM – especially ironic given that Hembling has been more or less AWOL in recent months, producing only a few short videos and one article for AVFM.”
Isn’t he now actually getting paid by AVFM? Like, a salaried MRA?
@ kittehserf,
Re/ her relative age — I found some pictures of her on Facebook. Looked up their marriage record and her name is unique.
Yeah I’m a snoop. But yeah I’m pretty sure she’s younger than “Bill.”
Bill’s wife and everyone else interested: If you want a look at the Christian Patriarchy movement(s) in the US, I strongly recommend Libby Anne’s blog:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/
There you can find links to other blogs on the same topic, such as No Longer Quivering.
R. Tod Kelly just published a piece about his MRM research on his blog which is also interesting.
http://ordinary-gentlemen.com/blog/2013/10/20/take-two-red-pills-call-me-in-the-morning-the-sudden-and-surprising-rise-of-the-mens-rights-movement
I suppose it makes perfect sense that Price considers women to be his enemy. I don’t think of men as the enemy, so I can keep sleeping with them cognitive-dissonance free! I’m just not going to sleep with anyone who expresses really appalling views (like Price does), regardless of their gender.
I think Bill’s wide is from Czech Republic