So I get periodic visits here from hostile and uninformed visitors demanding to know just what I have against those Men’s Rights activist-adjacent fellows who have declared themselves to be Men Going Their Own Way. Surely, they sniff, I can’t be really opposed to men living the lives they choose to live, independent of women? Don’t feminists encourage women to be similarly independent? You go, girls, and all that?
As a fellow calling himself Praetorian wrote:
Why are women so bitter towards men going their own way, without them
“John,” meanwhile, thought he detected some hypocrisy:
So, if a woman says she does not need a man in her life, she is seen as a strong independent woman. If a man says he does not need a woman in his life, he is seen as someone who has a deep hostility towards and/or profound distrust of women.
How convenient and how logical…………….
Happpily, the commenters here always put these misguided souls straight: we don’t object , in principle, to men “going their own way,” if that’s what they want to do.
But in practice, the men who classify themselves as Men Going Their Own Way don’t go anywhere; they stick around and stink the place up with their raging misogyny.
If you go to MGTOWforums or any other popular MGTOW hangout, you’ll discover that the regulars there don’t spend much time talking about the fabulous lives they’re leading on their own — the things they’re learning, the hobbies they’re pursuing, the experiences they’re having.
Nope. They spend virtually all their time and energy taking about women, and how awful they are. The typical MGTOWer spends more time thinking about women on any given day than the president of Planned Parenthood does. And what they think about women is awful. Just go through my MGTOW posts here for example after example.
You want to see some men who are really going their own way? Watch the video at the top of this post. These are guys enjoying themselves and not giving a shit what anyone thinks. They are AWESOME.
That’s what Men Going Their Own Way should look like. And I’m not even joking.
NOTE: I think I’ve posted this video before. I don’t care. Some people might not have seen it. EVERYONE MUST SEE IT.
And in cuteness:
http://media1.sulia.com/static/user_images/4/2014-02-03/df4a5b58-c025-4780-9822-cad4da9eb2b6.jpg
(Not my cats.)
That’s what I was trying to get at, regardless of what the law says there seems to be no general cultural sense that religion doesn’t belong in politics at all, which is really weird for most Europeans.
You’re right. I’m just so used to separation being used for legal battles, and not as a cultural ideal… I mean, did you hear about the case with the Buddhist student whose teacher took points off his science tests because he didn’t parrot Christian phrases on them?
@Ally
Gotcha. Is there a different word you’d like people to use? (just asking in case there is, for some reason in my weird mood I’m worried I’m coming off as hostile?idk)
Those arguments are so…baffling.
@Cassandra
And c. invading is just likely to make things worse for everyone :/
@wordsp1nner
I’m not the most articulate-y atm, but what you said makes sense.
Hadn’t heard :/
I’m not super picky, but I think “anti-Muslim hatred” or something similar is a much more accurate and useful term than “Islamophobia.”
That’s exactly the kind of shit I mean. If there was a true separation of church and state the teacher who did that would lose his job, and he’d probably never have tried it in the first place, but culturally most Americans seem to believe that it’s OK for religion to be woven into institutions in a really pervasive way, and it’s very disconcerting (and immediately obvious) for people who move here from Europe. And things like schools (and courts) are part of the machinery of the state, so why is that allowed to happen?
@Ally
Kk. Thanks for answering 🙂 I’ll try to use it in the future.
Here’s a summary of the case:
https://www.aclu.org/blog/religion-belief/if-you-want-fit-public-school-just-become-christian
Yes, the ACLU is suing.
On the topic of Ayn Rand, I had to read Anthem for school in seventh grade. I always suspected there was some financial shenanigans behind that, sort of like this:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-05/schools-find-ayn-rand-can-t-be-shrugged-as-donors-build-courses.html
Everyone in my class loathed that book and its author, so… maybe that spared the world some teenage objectivists. On the other hand, I did have to sit through part of Galt’s monologue as a prose performance at a speech and debate tournament. It was one of the two worst ones I ever saw–only rivaled by a boy who performed an excerpt from Catch-22 in a droning monotone.
I had to talk one of my own debater boys out of doing Ayn Rand as a prose performance, but at least I succeeded, and nobody outside of the team had to see it…
Just went and read it. Fuck yeah. I notice Lynn never bothered to come back and say whether zie was indifferent to all those strangers who didn’t benefit zir being killed on 9/11. What an asshole.
Nicely put, Robert R!
::waves:: Hi Fade!
lolwut
Also very nicely put, wordsp1nner. I could have so much in common with secularists in general, but oy, not the asshat atheist variety you see screaming on every frackin’ forum about how Christians are all this or that and liberal Christians are just as bad and blah blah blah … I have no fondness for much of Christianity, least of all the fundamentalist version as seen on soapboxes across the US. But the minute it gets to “ALL Christians” this or that, I’m just forget it, you are talking bullshit.
I mean, again, from a British perspective, religion doesn’t have to interfere in politics in as intrusive a way as happens here. I couldn’t tell you which denomination any of the more recent Prime Ministers belong to, because nobody cares, and it doesn’t influence their politics in as obvious a way as here. I went to a high school that had a hymn and a prayer in the morning assembly, but they didn’t expect the non-Christian students to pray or even bow their heads, just to physically be there because there might be announcements they needed to hear. I assume most of my teachers were Christian, but I don’t actually know because they never brought their religion into class, and they’d have been in trouble if they had. So the religion itself isn’t the issue, it’s the question of whether religion is assumed to be a private thing or a thing that people feel entitled to have reflected back to them in everything they participate in, and whether the state backs them up when they try to make that happen.
“I mean, again, from a British perspective, religion doesn’t have to interfere in politics in as intrusive a way as happens here.”
– As it been like that for decades already? There was once an official “Church of Engand” that was running the entire show, right? So how long has it been that religion and politics have been separated there?
” I couldn’t tell you which denomination any of the more recent Prime Ministers belong to, because nobody cares”
– Yeah its pretty strange how the personal religious beliefs of US presidential canditates becomes a main talking point in their campaigns.
“and it doesn’t influence their politics in as obvious a way as here.”
– I don’t know that their personal religious beliefs influence their politics so much as they have to claim they do during their campaigns for presidency.
” I went to a high school that had a hymn and a prayer in the morning assembly, but they didn’t expect the non-Christian students to pray or even bow their heads”
– So it was a private religious school? In US public high schools we don’t have hyms and prayers in the morning assembly. But at private religious schools they probably do.
” I assume most of my teachers were Christian, but I don’t actually know because they never brought their religion into class”
– Over here in the public schools teachers can get into trouble if they bring their religion into class.
“and they’d have been in trouble if they had.”
– So then why the prayer and hymn during morning assembly?
“So the religion itself isn’t the issue, it’s the question of whether religion is assumed to be a private thing or a thing that people feel entitled to have reflected back to them in everything they participate in, and whether the state backs them up when they try to make that happen.”
– Every Christmas season/winter holiday here in the States a supposed “war on Christmas” takes place. I’ve yet to see a Christmas tree get bombed so I don’t really grok what they’re on about.
(Points up)
It helps to read the previous comments before stating the people get into trouble for doing things that they apparently don’t get into that much trouble at all for doing.
Marie,
Here’s the Donahue interview where Ayn Rand (real name Alisa Zinov’yevna Rosenbaum) calls the Palestinians “barbarians” and “racist, primitive savages”. And oh yeah, she disses Feminism and says a woman should never be POTUS, even if she is qualified! And here she’s supposed to be all about “rational self interest” and “anti-collectivist”.
“did you hear about the case with the Buddhist student whose teacher took points off his science tests because he didn’t parrot Christian phrases on them?”
What?! Give me the link, please! What “christian phrases” did the teacher expect to be parroted on a science test of all things?!?!
Religion brain bleach:
My mom took out my late grandmother’s rosary and the cat started playing with them.
zombielady, thanks for all the links. I’ve read the Dawkins one and didn’t find any sexism or racism in it (from him) but was surprised to find UCL being sexist by “a university made a very dubious decision to let a fundamentalist Muslim speaker segregate the audience of a debate by gender”. That’s just inexcusable.
From the link Dawkins appears to be taking issue with the ideological tenants of Islam, not a race of people.
I don’t get what was so objectionable about a man asking Skepchick if she’d like to go back to his room for coffee so for me that’s a non-issue. Frankly, if the man was good looking and it happened to me, I’d be flattered and tell him “I’ll meet you for coffee tomorrow morning downstairs in the cafe.” If he was not good looking I’d politely turn him down.
However if female atheists collectively feel they face sexism at these conventions then I say they should hold their own conventions and make them bigger and better than the ones dominated by male atheists. In fact, why does it always seem to be men who are the majority dominant faces and forces of any “movement” (except Feminism)? Since many seem to be of the opinion that these spokesmen of the “New Atheist Movement” are making asshats of themselves, its probably time their mugs get replaced with the faces and voices of women.
I’ll read the Jillette link now since I’ve never heard of him/her. As far as Sam Harris, I’ve enjoyed some of his debates but if he’s promoting mass collective “profiling” of a particular group, I can’t abide by that.
Old Reader – I know Raw Story had an article about the teacher and the Buddhist student.
Eeee kitty!
Ceiling Cat’s devotees pray by playing with All The Things.
Trollolololol
I don’t get what was so objectionable about a man asking Skepchick if she’d like to go back to his room for coffee so for me that’s a non-issue.
Fucking hell.
Go and read the thread on Pharyngula where all this blew up.
You really seriously don’t get what this was about? RW had done a talk specifically about not wanting to be hit on at conferences
She had followed this with hours of general talk in the bar.
She said – at four oh fucking clock in the morning – that she was tired and going to bed.
This halfwit was present for the entire time.
He made no attempt to speak to her publicly.
He ignored her clearly and repeatedly stated views. He ignored her clearly stated wish to go to her own room.
He followed her to an enclosed space – a space where he could stop her getting out if he wanted to, a space where women often are assaulted – and used a phrase that is clearly and widely known to be a euphemism for “come and have sex”.
And you don’t see what’s wrong with this?
All she said was “guys, don’t do that,” in the mildest of rebukes in a vlog, and ever since she’s had rape and death threats.
That fucking scumbag Dawkins dismissed the very real dangers women live with in the West – dismissed a woman’s simple right to have her boundaries respected – with a condescending, ignorant rant that painted Muslim societies as some sort of barbaric Other.
Fuck your “if he was good looking” bullshit.
Cassandra, my spidey senses have been a-tingle about Old Reader, nothing I could put my finger on, but this – yup, troll.
Eh, I don’t think “New Atheism” is all that bad. I mean, we did get “Atheism+” out of it. Labeling all the people who come from such a background as being like Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, or even *shudder* TheAmazingAtheist seems incredibly unfair. :
I think this is probably a troll, folks. Zie has been pinging my trolldar from hir very first comment.
If not, still can’t be bothered to engage.
Would Atheism + have happened except as a reaction to the pervasive misogyny (among other things) of New Atheism?
The fact that Atheism+ happened is more of an indication that New Atheism has issues than a potential defense of it.
Maybe New Atheism should be renamed Atheism Minus.
Or in the case of its more obnoxious members, Atheism Negative, maybe.