Has the Men’s Rights subreddit found its Walter Mitty? Yesterday, a fellow by the name of Mrwhibbley won himself nearly 200 upvotes from the assembled Men’s Rightsers with a tale of terrible misandry at his local Panera Bread.
I am sitting at panera bread. I got here at 6am, when no one was here. After ordering, I took the only comfy chairs next to a nice fire place and started reading. Halfway through my meal two women came up and asked me to move because they wanted to sit where I was sitting.
Ok, but before you say that this didn’t happen, consider this: Only a few minutes ago a woman demanded my seat, and when I didn’t get up to give it to her she simply sat right on top of me. And by woman I mean cat.
I told them I would be done in about 10 minutes and they could have it them. The older woman (only about 35) said “a real man would be a gentleman and offer his seat to a lady”
That is exactly how those “older ladies” of 35 talk these days.
I replied politely that I understand her outdated view that feels women are weak and require special treatment, but that I believed that women are strong and independent and should be treated as equals.
That’s right. Mrwhibbley has installed a Reddit-comment-to-speech generator in his mouth, and can conveniently turn it on when he wants to recite a Men’s Rightsy talking point.
Immediately, another table about 10 feet from me filled with women (4 women over 70 years old) started chuckling. I initially assumed they were laughing at them women, but then one of them said “what ever happened to chivalry? In my day, a real man would have jumped up….and pulled out the chair for the lady. That man is an ass!”
Ah, yes, because all women, across all generations, are united in their goal of making men give up their nice comfy chairs by the fireplace at Panera Bread.
It was obvious that she said it loud enough for me to hear. I politely replied “In your day, you just got the right to vote, and were not treated as equals. Aren’t you glad you aren’t still in your day?”
Oh, snap!
Well, Mrwhibbley sure showed those old hens what’s for!
By the way, women in their 70s would have been born in the late 30s or early 40s.
Naturally. the assembled Men’s Rightsers applauded Mrwhibbley’s great heroism in standing up to the gynocracy.
But this isn’t the first time that MrWhibbley has had this sort of heroic confrontation with evil, privilege-demanding females, as one of the few skeptical Men’s Rightsers in the crowd pointed out. Only a month ago, he had a surprisingly similar showdown an an ice cream parlor with some teenage girls:
This is a rant. After a long day at work (6am until 3:30) without a break, I was tired and craving an ice cream. I walked in about a minute before a group of 6 girls about 16-18 years old. I ordered my ice cream and paid, and took it.
No misandric misandering so far.
while they ordered theirs, one of the girls commented loud enough for me to hear that a real man would have let a lady go first.
Oh no she didn’t!
Seriously. This didn’t happen.
I ignored them. Two other girls made other comments about my car and my clothes not being fashionable. Again I ignored them. A couple more goggles and comments under their breath that I didn’t hear. After 15 minutes I finished my ice cream and got up to leave. They said “bye loser!”
Imaginary teenage girls can be so cruel!
I decided the high road wasn’t working and said “You are not ladies, and you are to fat to be eating ice cream. Next time try a salad.” Felt good. They were insecure bullies in a pack and deserved to be spanked.
Naturally, the Men’s Rightsers congratulated him for his deft handling of these little misanderers.
So am I being too hasty in assuming that these little stories are fiction? I mean, strange encounters do happen.
Heck, a couple of months ago I was walking back from the grocery store at 1 or 2 AM (I keep odd hours) and a group of gay guys drove up in a convertible, stopped the car, and asked me what I was carrying in my bags. I awkwardly mumbled something about “a lot of different things.” This was apparently not witty enough for them. One of the guys repeated “a lot of different things” with a note of disappointment in his voice, and they drove off.
A few moments later, I realized I should have said “condoms and cat food — I’m having a party!” The first two parts of that would have even been true.
The difference between my story — which actually happened — and MrWhibbley’s — which almost certainly didn’t — is that mine is just a weird thing that happened, and which proves absolutely nothing.
The guys in the car had obviously just left one of the gay bars in the neighborhood and saw me with grocery bags, and must have thought this was sort of amusing given how late it was. So they decided to say something to me. This turned out to be more awkward than hilarious, as real life often is.
The story doesn’t reinforce any weird gay stereotypes — oh those gay guys, they’re always asking about groceries! — and doesn’t make me look like some sort of master wit with a perfect comeback, because I didn’t have one.
In MrWhibbley’s stories, by contrast, the women seem to have come straight from Men’s Rights Central Casting; they are misogynistic caricatures. And of course he always has the perfect comeback — or at least what passes for perfect on the Men’s Rights subreddit.
Another day, another battle with imaginary evil women. That’s the Men’s Rights movement in a nutshell.
The AgainstMensRights folks have been all over this one.
And of course there’s the brigade of Galtian supermen who are cheering for civilization to collapse because it’s the only way men will finally take back the comfy chairs at Panera Bread. This comment is my favorite:
Part of me never wants to see that day, being an avid hunter, firearm owner who regularly goes to the range as well as paintballing to get that ‘special’ experience, and someone who enjoys going old-school collaging, I think it would be great to finally see everyone who is left go back to their roots or on both knees and beg to come with those of us who weren’t spoiled, entitled little shits.
Yup, after the apocalypse those paintball skills are really going to come in handy. Actually, the collaging will probably be more useful. He can barter his artwork for eggs and such.
More reassuringly, even people on Reddit are skeptical that this story happened.
Shaenon: Those stories are so chilling that they ought to all begin with “Good evening, friends of the Inner Sanctum.”
David, I have to protest. It is not only women who sit on you when you refuse to get out of their seat! Indeed, my male stripy male roommate does this to me–and delays my dinner, to boot! (Because I can’t make myself kick him off.)
In pointless story time:
I had to count 39 cell suspensions with a hematocytometer today. That’s about 38 more than I really enjoy doing. I did enough that my fingers started hurting from using the counter.
I think I’m going to stall on doing this whole business again* until the post-doc on this project comes back, so I can share the pain with someone else.
* We need to do loads more samples, because we have five types of treatment, doing multiple doses for each, and it is a time course study, and preparing the samples for analysis is time-sensitive and time consuming. Basically, I can do two treatment types, six time points each in a run. I just don’t have enough time to do more. Each run requires around 5 days–I could overlap at the beginning and the end, but I also have to grow lots of cells for each run. So it is going to be a while before this damn thing is complete.
(I should mention that this is the second time I’ve done this without my post-doc, and he should be back sometime in the next couple of weeks–he didn’t seem to have given anyone the exact date–so I’m not really stalling that long. I did have some help last time, but he’s not really a cell guy, and since I staggered the prep this time, I did it myself instead of having him come in at four different times.)
Maybe he was doing an Elan Gale, (plane tweeter about ficticious woman). Don’t the redditors gets a little hyper with their upping buttons. I especially liked this: “Another day, another battle with imaginary evil women. That’s the Men’s Rights movement in a nutshell.” Yes.
He was mansplaying, wasn’t he?
I think we should refer to TMI like the case of the guy who was all angry and vengeful because he was fantasizing about spanking teenagers and couldn’t as “TMEw”, to distinguish them from TMI that’s funny/interesting/not nauseating.
OMG, karalora, emma, leatapp–youse gals had me in stitches.
I LOVE YOU BOOBZERS! <3
Regarding kevin11’s story of the bus ride incident; I have a couple of questions. Exactly what does body language indicating that you want someone’s seat look like? Also did you ever consider that your interpretation of her behavior could be extremely warped? I mean, of all the people on this crowded bus you were the only person this woman targeted? I mean she had to stand somewhere right?
I used to ride the city bus quite a lot growing up, in Milwaukee, which is a largish city. I recall from a young age just sort of absorbing bus ethics. If you are a regular user of public transit, this comes more naturally I suppose. I have given up my seat to people of all ages and genders. The best way to figure out if it is the right thing to do is if the person looks like they need to sit down. Body language is vague, but I mean like they are walking with a limp, their face looks pained, they are breathing heavily…it’s not rocket science. If you are able bodied and you purposely ignore the other people on the bus who are standing just so you don’t have to give up your seat, well you are just a total fucking dickbag. Besides, standing up on the bus is just kinda fun! (if you are able to that is of course).
Heh, mansplaying.
I live in Los Angeles, and lots of young men offer me seats on the subway. I’m 55, and usually I really don’t need their seats (but sometimes I sort of do because I have no car and have to carry a lot of bags and get exhausted,) but I appreciate the offer. Mostly I thank them and accept the seat, because it’s harder to explain that you really don’t need it. And people like to feel Helpful.
And I’ve often given MY seat up to older people, or younger women trying to navigate small children and/or lots of packages, or people who were obviously either disabled or feeling poorly.
It’s almost as if people just try to be nice to other people and offer a hand when somebody obviously needs one, regardless of Preset Rules.
On the other hand, the other night when I was waiting for a subway train and I encountered a young man sprawled across most of a seat on the platform, yes, I said, “excuse me,” and made him sit up and make room for me.
MISANDRY!
@marci
THANK YOU!! I thought I was the only one who felt that way. On the subway too. (Especially the subway.) It can feel sort of like surfing. At least how I imagine surfing must feel.
Not that it matters, but how would body language indicate that a person wanted your seat specifically as opposed to a seat in general?
@emma
Though I agree that sexual frustration (why won’t women do what I want them to do) plays a major role in MRAism, being a decent guy is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for having sex or being in a relationship. WF Price is married to a ‘feminist’. Paul Elam has a girlfriend that apparently supports him financially. Various PUA douches have sex at least fairly often.
being from not north america, I have no idea what Panera is. Nor why angry feminists congregate there to berate hapless enlightened men’s huma rights activists. Was there a memo I missed?
and can I add, Panera seems terribly full of angry feminists at 6am, I’m not a morning person, so is there an afternoon session to berate hapless enlightened men’s human rights activists?
Panera is a restaurant that sells bread and cookies and I think other stuff like sandwiches and soup? There’s one that I pass all the time but I’ve never been in. It has never stuck me as a hotbed of anti-male activity.
Panera is a good place to go if you want a tasty, expensive sandwich.
perhaps it’s a new radical branch of advanced patriarchy blamers that Kevin is valiantly rebutting
I’m loving this trend where the few complaints about women from MRAs that aren’t about sex are about their tushies being insufficiently comfortable in the correct chair, even if it’s only theoretical (ie. they were able to retain their comfy seat).
armchair warriors
I didn’t catch up with the thread yet, but I must say I encountered the attitude kevin 11 described a lot… despite being a woman. Mostly from white, able bodied, middle age, middle class women (and occasionally men) in hats. This experience left me incredibly prejudiced against said piece of clothing. :]
It is all part of The Plot™, you know. That grand conspiracy to keep all the manly menz out of those comfy seats they so desire in order to end civilization as we know it and establish the dreaded matriarchy..
Here is a visual representation of the matriarchy. Do not click if you are faint of heart, for it will surely inspire terror in the be-penised.
http://i4.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article822588.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/EMBARGOED%2520UNTIL%25208th%2520May%25202012%252000:01-822588
Shaenon, this is hilarious:
Paintballing and collaging. Yep, that’s the guy I want on my side when the Zombie Apocalypse happens.
Not that there’s anything wrong with paintballing or collaging, but to use them as some sort of evidence of extreme survival skills….