You may remember the embarrassing spectacle a couple of months back when Warren Farrell asked the readers of A Voice for Men to help him pick out a cover picture for a new ebook version of The Myth of Male Power, the 21-year-old crackpot bestseller that more or less provided the, er, intellectual foundation for today’s Men’s Rights movement.
It wasn’t just embarrassing because AVFM is a noxious hate site that regularly calls women c*nts and whores and helps to organize informal campaigns of harassment directed at individual women. It was also embarrassing because all three of the pictures were sexualized images focusing on specific female body parts. You can guess which three, and you’d be right: tits, ass, and vagina (the latter tastefully covered in a merkin made of moss).
Well, Farrell ended up rejecting all of these images in favor of … a different picture of a woman’s butt. Yep, the screenshot above features the actual cover of the recently released ebook version of The Myth of Male Power. (You can see it in its full sized-glory over on Amazon.)
The implicit message of the cover couldn’t be clearer: men may seem to run the world, but women can control and exploit them through the power of their sexuality. Male power is undercut by … butt power.
Am I reading too much into a cover image? Farrell doesn’t really believe this nonsense, does he?
Well, in the introduction to the ebook, Farrell writes:
In case you’re wondering, “genetic celebrity” is Farrell’s term of art for any attractive woman.
But golly, you say, the fact that a dude feels “powerless” because he can’t have sex with every woman with a nice butt that happens to wander across his field of vision doesn’t actually mean that men are powerless or that male power is a myth. Well, Farrell has an answer to this as well. And by “answer” I mean, well, whatever this is:
Got that? I’m not sure there’s anything there to get; it’s nothing more than hand-waving to distract attention from the nonsensical nature of his previous statements. In case any Men’s Rights activist ever brings Warren Farrell up as an example of a respectable, “academic” MRA, you may wish to point out that almost nothing Farrell writes ever actually makes any fucking sense.
In the book itself, Farrell repeatedly suggested that male power can be undone almost completely by the sexual power of women. In one oft-quoted passage, he wrote about the effect that a “secretary’s miniskirt power, cleavage power and flirtation power” allegedly has on their male bosses. (Myth of Male Power, p. 21)
While that statement has earned a certain notoriety for its sheer ridiculousness, Farrell went further elsewhere in the book, essentially arguing that men are as addicted to female “beauty” as drug addicts are to the drug of their choice — and as helpless.
“Sexually, of course, the sexes aren’t equal,” Farrell wrote. “[M]any men feel ‘under the influence the moment they see a beautiful woman.” (p. 320, emphasis in original.)
This sort of temporary “intoxication,” Farrell argued, leads men into shackling themselves to these temporarily sexy tyrants for the rest of their lives — thus agreeing to support them (he suggested implicitly) even after they get old and ugly. (p. 85.)
In Farrell’s original book, this “argument,” such as it is, was merely one of many that he thought undercut the alleged “myth of male power.” Now, with the butt on the cover, he’s put it front and center. Or, more precisely, rear and center.
Warren Farrell, you’re an ass, man.
Oh, awkward segue here, I just wanted to show off the cover to the new edition of my classic book, The Myth of Human Power.
It will soon be available for one million dollars in cash in unmarked bills, upon delivery of which I will sit down and write it for you. It will probably be pretty short and not very convincing.
Budmin,
…and we’re back to you not making any sense. The system is not getting more hostile to you. It just doesn’t kowtow to you quite as much as it used to. Just curious, Bud. Do you also think that the system is getting hostile toward white and straight people? Has political correctness, in your opinion, run amok?
Budmin’s mostly boring but every once in a while something gold comes out.
“Mansplsining semi-literaturate asshole”
is one of those gold things. Should be the title of something.
Only men have to do all this? Well, thank God I’m not a man. That all sounds like completely horrible stuff I’ve never had to do.
@Malitia I’ve never been with a prostitute. At this point I’m terrified that I would end up like Lawrence Taylor and find myself arrested for being with an underage prostitute. It’s just not worth it. Not that there’s guilt its just that every story I keep hearing disgust the hell out of me. I have been to my fair share of strip clubs though.
@Sparky I’m not butt hurt I’m cynical.
Meybe because your only motivation is fear, it makes you angry that women can make chocices with a different motivation.
Why is there no stuffing left in this cat toy?
Was there any stuffing to begin with?
I kinda thought it was all improperly recycled paper bags, delivered by the malaprop man. Sure, the world is getting more hostel. At least most hostels have clean sheets! The snoring can get awkward…
And that’s bad because?
I’m sorry, I guess I’m supposed to cry because men are getting less and less allowed to keep women as dependent acessories and force them to marry in order to sustain themselves. A bloo bloo. I’ll call the waaaaaaahmbulance.
As opposed to, say, an underage girl ending up as a prostitute? You think YOU’re the one in a bad situation in that case?
Budmin, I’m curious. What would your utopia look like, in terms of gender relationships?
Molly Moon, I’m guessing the Handmaid’s Tale.
vaiyt,
You took the words right out of my mouth. He’s not concerned that he might rape an underage kid forced into prostitution. He’s worried he could be caught raping an underage kid forced into prostitution. He’s cast himself as the victim with more to lose in that situation.
..and it isn’t as if there is no way to figure out if your sex worker is of age or not unless you are trolling for the barely legals anyway.
Bud,
If you think that men have more to fear than women when it comes to sex and relationships and you think society is harshest toward doods, you are painfully out of touch with reality. You being dissatisfied with your life does not = the worst most horrible human rights violation ever.
You’re feeling down, and think that if the girl across the room gives you a kiss, you’ll feel better. But the girl doesn’t want to kiss you. Do you:
A.) Find another way to feel better?
or
B.) Punish the girl for not kissing you?
C.) Punish the girl then say she brought it on herself.
I think I can somewhat explain these doods who think society is being harshest toward them by being equal. They’re so used to the system catering to them, that that is what’s “normal” to them, and any moves toward ACTUAL equality are seen as biased toward the ones who were lower in the hierarchy. Equality IS a demotion when you started out on the top.
budmin… you didn’t, by chance, leave this note on a plane recently, did you?
http://www.cbc.ca/newsblogs/yourcommunity/2014/03/no-place-for-a-woman-westjet-pilot-slams-sexist-napkin-note.html
Yanno, since you like to give unsolicited advice to the wimmenz. And seem to resent women having careers because it has cramped your dating life.
I usually don’t have much to contribute here besides some occasional brain bleach.
Yeah, she should be fucking all those men for free! That’s basically your argument, right?
Sparky already asked you this and you dodged it, so let me repeat it: you’re saying sex workers who are victims of violence totally bring it on themselves?
Yeah, it’s amazing how many people are ~so concerned~ about sex workers. But only concerned enough to tell them to stop doing it; taking steps to make their work safer or condemning the people who endanger them is out of the question!
And I’m sure you’re the first person who’s ever said these things to hookergal…
When dealing with trolls, brain bleach is sometimes essential. This particular bleach looks very promising. Thanks!
Going to watch kitty, now!
Am I the only one who thinks that Budmin’s tale stinks of fish? A woman’s shelter where more domestic violence incidents happen than he can count? Really?
“False validation,” jfc. She offers services, her clients know what those services are and what they cost, and somehow she’s offering “false validation?” At what point is she misleading them? How? emilygoddess is right; it looks like you believe she ought to sleep with anyone who asks, as a duty.
But you just did. And have you any understanding of them? Do you actually know what they say and how they are applied, where you live? Or are you just as ignorant about them as you are about everything else?
You really are full of shite.
Cool story, bro’.
WOMEN AREN’T REWARDS, asshole. They’re people.
If you were wondering what actual objectification looks like, this is a fine example.
Um, if treating me as your equal is too high a price, that’s YOUR problem. Although I suspect you’re talking about actual financial costs, which would still be bullshit.
I just can’t with this shit. I was emotionally abused by a parent, so my childhood was often deeply lacking in things like intimacy and understanding, but I’ve managed not to turn that into a stupid conspiracy theory about how everyone in that parent’s demographic is oppressing me by making me want their love and not giving it to me. I mean, can you even hear yourself right now?
Did you tell the women that their abusers were probably just acting out because they weren’t getting the validation they needed? I bet they loved that.
And if we as a culture could move past our homophobic taboos on man-to-man displays of fondness, they could even get these things from other men.
Luzbelitx – thanks (re the curly sentence)! I was playing around with it and the sucked-into-a-black-hole bit seemed just right. 😀