So over in the Men’s Rights subreddit, the fellas are doing their best to address the burning Men’s Right issue of “date inequality,” or, as one recent poster put the question,“Hey feminists. How come men are still expected to pay for dates?”
I’m pretty sure that feminists aren’t the ones expecting men to pay for dates, so I’m not sure why feminists should be held to account for something they’re not doing, but in any case, the Men’s Rightsers don’t seem much interested in hearing explanations from feminists. No, they’re rather offer their own theories.
Enter a new convert to Men’s Rightsism called MrKocha, who enlists the aid of SCIENCE to offer his own explanation of this terrible date injustice:
I see a lot of problems with every day inequality between the sexes in mate interaction in various areas.
Attention, human female. Initiating mate interaction protocol.
First being, the average female has vastly different motivations in her mate selection. How much is nature vs nurture is up for debate, but I tend towards believing millions of years of evolution probably have left a significant mark there.
Huh. What are the odds that these millions of years of evolution just happen to line up with whatever regressive assertions about women — sorry, females — this dude is about to make?
Anyway her mate choice process often involves looking for signs of genetic fitness in male (attractive appearance, displayed dominance socially or physically, risk taking, higher social status), and weighing this against his ability to invest in her long term future: such as pay her dinner/bills). Paying for dinner displays two things: one a willingness to self sacrifice for women, and two the financial resources to continue to do so.
Let’s see. Human beings for the majority of their existence on this planet were hunters and gatherers. Even if we assume that men mainly did the hunting and women mainly did the gathering, the gathered food made up the bulk of the diet. So really, men on dates should expect women to bring them large salads in return for the carcass of a small mammal.
The second part of the problem is women also have a significantly stronger in group bias, to the point where considering points of view don’t immediately benefit females is actively more difficult.
Uh, I think you accidentally the sentence there.
The process of asking women to merely consider in the name of equality, whether there are social solutions to reduce inequalities between the sexes in mate selection scenarios commonly triggers a strong negative emotional response, that her ‘turf’ is under attack and whoever presents such a question is a threat.
Really? Lots of women have no fucking problem whatsoever with paying for dinner.
How women deal with this varies tremendously. Some experience a great deal of cognitive dissonance, denial, and explain away inequalities with whatever rationalization provides the most reassuring emotional responses.
Wait, are we talking about women or about MRAs now?
Some project their outgroup hatred upon whoever voices the opinion by attacking the individual with petty, poorly thought out attacks on their character.
He must be talking about MRAs, right?
Others, immediately jump miles past the idea of social equality being a noble (if potentially impossible goal), to the issue of consent, making accusations that somehow even considering the idea of more equality in gender relations is an attempt to violate consent of female mate choice? (MY CHOICE! DISCUSSION IS RAPEFUL!)
Um, how did we get from talking about dinner to talking about rape? Is he really suggesting that women have literally accused him of rape because he suggested they pay for their own dinner?
And finally, there do seem to a minority of women who are able to consider the issue rationally, even if it admittedly, challenges her immediate self interests and might be harder than other subjects to think about?
Wow, some women — albeit a minority — somehow manage not to be spiteful, narcissistic children! What a generous assessment of half the human race.
How to tackle the issue, when women potentially have 4 times the amount of in group preference, reinforced by feminist doctrine and a potential biological preference towards the behavior?
How is “getting dudes to pay for dinner” part of feminist doctrine exactly? I’m pretty sure The Rules isn’t a feminist manifesto.
All I can say is to continue to challenge any social doctrine that reinforces in group bias of women and praise women when they display the ability to think outside the spectrum of their immediate self interest even if ultimately there isn’t much other benefit to you?
Who’s a good woman for thinking outside the spectrum of her immediate self-interest? You’re a good woman for thinking outside the spectrum of your immediate self-interest!
Always try to keep in mind, that the negative responses, are basically a reflection of why the question is a valid one in the first place.
Exactly. Whenever women recoil in horror at some astoundingly misogynistic thing you’ve said, that just means you’re totally right!
In a followup comment, MrKocha returns to the notion that women love throwing around rape accusations, not only at men who argue with them about paying for dinner but at “sexually inexperienced men” generally. It’s bad enough that women aren’t attracted to these men, he argues, but
the amount of shame, condescension and hostility thrown their way is quite impressive.
It can range anywhere from rape accusations to golden ones like “I hope you never find someone and stay alone forever!”
Fun fact: each and every man on the planet earth, no matter how sexually experienced, was once a virgin. Somehow most of them managed to garner themselves a certain amount of sexual experience without being accused of rape and/or having women express the opinion that they should remain alone forever.
Assuming that McKocha is speaking from experience here, and assuming also (because I’m already disturbed enough by his comments) that the bit about the rape accusations is internet hyperbole, what exactly is causing all these women to get so angry at him?
I don’t think it’s the sexual inexperience. I think that maybe, possibly, it might be the fact that he obviously hates women?
Just a wild guess.
MrKocha started up a whole thread of his own to further discuss his scientific hypotheses about the human female and her mate choices. It’s called Females Oppressing Female Mate Choice. Because these evil females who put down sexually inexperienced men are also oppressing females who might choose to mate with these men!
Thanks to AgainstMensRights for clueing me in to the wonderfulness of MrKocha — here and here.
Women have boundaries, like all other human beings. The horror!
I’ve been harassed by a lot of dudes who seemed pretty delighted that it made me uncomfortable, so I’m not convinced that sex is always the goal.
I can relate. All of the people who harassed me when I was younger did it to make me feel uncomfortable and scared. And many of them got a laugh out of it.
Viscaria – good point. The little harassment I’ve received wasn’t about sex. I was thinking more about the sort of excuses the PADs offer for their behaviour. It’s more a power thing, but they’re not going to admit that. “Hey, I get a boner from making women uncomfortable or frightened, how dare you interfere with my rights!”
I used sodomy because I knew you guys would flip over it. You guys are too funny when you get riled up as a group.
Oh wow, MRA hates male tape victims, such a shock!
Oh, you made a casual homophobic rape metaphor because it would bother us! Well that’s much better then. Credibility as an ally to rape survivors: RESTORED.
Translation: “My reading comprehension sucks, and I can’t be arsed to do shit about it, but I do in fact obsess over everything I see here, and do my best to get it bass-ackwards.”
Like I said: Stupidity. NOT a disability. Park elsewhere.
Okay, diz, if you care about rape victims, as you claim, and about Dave (allegedly) being ableist, what’s up with using terms about rape to try to upset people – some of whom are rape survivors? You do know you’ve only succeeded in arousing contempt, and making yourself look like a pathetic little shit.
There’s no functional difference between a jackass, and someone who acts exactly like a jackass for shits and giggles.
Oh honey, you sure do lack reading comprehension. I’m not riled in the least. Just because you’re a fuck-ass, doesn’t mean I get all girly and flustered. You think you’re the first shit-stain to come in here trying to harass people? Hell, you’re not even the first turd I’ve wiped off my cherry Docs.
No shit it riled us up. It made me very upset, and I’m not even a victim of forced sodomy (or any kind of rape for that matter). That kind of language is disgusting. And we have folks here who were raped, some of whom are male.
The fact that you found our reactions funny should have prompted you to consider whether you were being an asshole, but nope – you just thought it was funny. Go pat yourself on the back. (And fuck off, too.)
Sorry, I didn’t mean to speak for everyone when I said “it riled us up”, but clearly none of us reacted to it positively at least.
I was riled all sorts of up.
No need to apologise, Ally. Anyway I daresay the flea’s leavings doesn’t know the difference between someone being riled and someone feeling contempt.
SHOES! More interesting than trolls any day.
I wish I could wear Docs, but the one pair I’ve had felt like they were lined with razor blades; I’ve never had my feet cut open by any other shoes.
I went to put on my new Converse boots this morning and they’d turned from burgundy leather to grey fur, like fluffy slippers. This is what happens when a cat with a thing for shoes gets hold of rough-surfaced leather.
What kind of sad loser trolls on Thanksgiving?
BTW, everyone, happy Turkey Day! Or in my case happy roast pork day.
(Mr C is doing the roast so I’m just waiting for it to be done for now.)
See, this is why I want a demographic investigation of MRAs. I’m convinced that there are a few who are older and divorced and bitter. The rest are 9 year old boys like dizzie here.
Dude, no one here flipped. At best there are a few who are annoyed that you made a mess on the carpet, but even they most likely expected you to do so. And, as a$$holes go, you’re pretty weak sauce. The worst you did was give folks a headache from rolling our eyes so vigorously at your completely obvious and ham fisted attempts at provocation. Get over yourself. Besides, isn’t it past your bedtime? Have your mom tuck you in, you are getting cranky.
Apologies to Ally and Viscaria if I minimized your feelings there. Not at all my intention, and I apologize.
Aw well I didn’t feel minimized at all 🙂 though I can’t speak for Ally. We all had different reactions I think, which is okay. I think the takeaway is that diz will gleefully throw rape victims under the bus if he thinks he’ll get some giggles out of it.
Nine years old sounds about right.
Ditz is a rape apologist. ¡Qué sorpresa! They all are. Their “compassion” is all pretend. And it gets conveniently misplaced when one of these shit-stains goes “Hey guys, I’m gonna go poke some feminists. Watch this!”
Or kel horrer as they used to say in the Perishers (memory test for really old Brits and Ozites).
RE: Alice
We’re not all jerks. Gah.
Nope! A lot of the multis I know are also on the spectrum. Shockingly enough, none of them have ever treated me like an object or created elaborate bullshit about paying for dinner.
Also, as someone disabled myself (though for different reasons)… just because I’m mentally ill doesn’t mean you can’t call me out on being an asshole. I mean, what the fuck? Why would I hide behind my own sickness like that?
RE: diz
I used sodomy because I knew you guys would flip over it.
This male rape survivor sure does appreciate that. Asshole. (Seriously, what do you THINK happened to me?) Yup, you sure do care about my feelings and my safety. Fuck off, pissant, and take your pearl-clutching self-righteousness with you.
And I actually am a bit upset, but diz is only a part of that. I know I keep hammering this home, but this is EXACTLY why I don’t believe these guys when they say they care about people like me. Diz was obviously way more invested in saying gotcha to feminists than actually considering my feelings about anything.
Gee, it’s almost like male rape victims are only fodder for their theories, rather than actual human beings!
LBT – that’s exactly what raised my eyebrows about diz coming on here, once it was mentioned he’s a ToySoldier fanboy – knowing how TS has abused you wipes out any of their claims to be supporting male rape survivors.
You’re not hammering it: it needs to be said.
I appreciate it, gillyrosebee. ^_^ This stuff almost never fails to make me upset.