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New Men's Rights Issue: Women attacking men while giving birth

Is this man in grave danger?
Is this man putting his life in grave danger?

Is there no end to the ways in which women oppress the men of the world? Over on A Voice for Men, Clint Carpentier reports – and I use that term loosely – on a heretofore overlooked form of anti-male oppression: the abuse of fathers in delivery rooms by women who are at that moment literally in the stirrups giving birth.

Yep, we’re talking about women who use 12 hours of labor as a convenient excuse to yell at, and sometimes scratch and bite, their husbands and boyfriends. Apparently, there’s an epidemic of women in labor cruelly attacking men from the comfort and safety of the delivery table.

Carpentier starts off his post by making clear that giving birth isn’t really the big freaking deal all the ladies think it is, anyway:

Giving birth is an amazing feat of zero skill, and it still amazes me. It amazes me that this is the epitome, the pinnacle, the supposed female trump card to all male accomplishments. A man lands on the moon with analogue technology and proves Galileo’s theory of air resistance, but never mind that, another woman gave birth, just as well as any other female animal on the planet. A man creates life in a petri-dish, but never mind that, some broad stole his sperm and created life herself.

Anyway, I’m not knocking the dangers of labor, men know all about the dangers of labor; there really ought to be a better word for giving birth.

And whatever alleged pain women undergo during so-called “labor” apparently pales in insignificance to the pain men suffer from being in their presence in the delivery room. Carpentier has managed to avoid this terrible fate himself – his wife went the c-section route, no biggie – but he has heard tales that would make your skin crawl:

I have … heard stories, have … seen the scratches and bite marks, on the fathers who braved the maternity ward. And these same brave men praise the bravery of the mothers of their children. They proudly display scars the mothers-to-be inflicted upon them during the ordeal.

I’m hoping these scars are only from fingernails and that mothers-to-be aren’t sneaking shivs into the delivery room.

Oh, also, sometimes women in labor yell really loudly:

Sometimes a father will reminisce amusingly about how he’d been temporarily deafened when she had screamed right in his ear for waxing sympathetically over her tribulations.

And apparently it’s only men who are the targets for this scratching and biting and yelling:

I hear these stories only from men. I know, men aren’t the only people comforting these women during birth; some women don’t have a man at the time. But what I don’t hear, are these stories from the female nurses, friends, mothers, sisters, etc, who are there to console and coach these single mothers-to-be. Why is it, I’m only hearing accounts of weathering physical abuse and injury from the fathers?

I don’t know, dude. Do you hang out with female nurses on a regular basis? Do you spend as much time drinking beer and shooting the shit with your wife’s female friends as you do with your own?

You see, if I am correct, and it is only fathers who suffer this abuse, then delivery of such injury is selective. I can see no call for it.

Really? First of all, you haven’t shown that this is abuse and not simply an accident. Second, how many of these female friends, mothers, sisters, what have you, were actually in the delivery room? Because that seems like an important variable to take into consideration before jumping to conclusions based on a dataset of some-dudes-allegedly-told-you-something-once.

In fact, fathers-to-be should avoid the maternity ward altogether, as they are obviously not welcome.

Really again? You imagine an epidemic of anti-male violence by women giving birth based on a couple of stories and a rather half-assed deduction you’ve made from it, and therefore conclude that 1) men should miss out on the birth of their children and 2) shouldn’t be there to comfort their wives as best they can during labor.

If birthing is license to mistreat, abuse, or injure a father in the witness of medical professionals, then what deterrent exists, preventing continued abuse in private? And for that matter, what indication is there that she doesn’t abuse him already?

Woah. Let’s just back up a little here. First of all, dude, you haven’t proven that “abuse of fathers” by women on the delivery table is actually a thing. You’ve offered only a few vague anecdotes – and these anecdotes don’t even make clear whether or not the alleged “ delivery of … injury” – gotta love that evasive wording – was deliberate.

Given the stress and pain of labor, it’s easy to imagine how a woman giving birth might accidentally scratch someone. Maybe the mother in question was holding onto her husband’s hand for support and dug her fingernails in a little too hard and left a mark. Maybe she flailed her arm backwards and accidentally scratched his face. We don’t know, because not only do you offer zero real evidence for any of your claims, but your second-hand stories don’t offer enough detail to know what was going on.

If endangering your own life once or twice provides license to abuse a man, what does that say about our society. Particularly when he endangers his own life as a matter of routine to support you?

Seriously? I know Men’s Righsters love to complain about the fact that many more men than women die on the job – though this complaining never seems to lead to any actual activism on the issue of workplace safety – but the fact is that most men, in the US at least, DO NOT WORK DANGEROUS JOBS. They don’t endanger their own lives “as a matter of routine.” They don’t endanger their lives at all by going to work, at least not any more than women do.

MRAs love to give themselves credit for bravery because they share a gender with a small number of men who do in fact work dangerous jobs. But I’m guessing there are not a lot of lion tamers amongst the Men’s Rights crowd. Somehow I’m thinking that most of them have jobs that mostly involve sitting on their asses in rooms entirely devoid of lions.

Anyway, if the overwhelming majority of men don’t endanger their lives by going to work, they endanger it even less by “braving” the delivery room. Men face no actual physical threat from women who are literally flat on their back, their feet in stirrups, in the process of pushing an entire human being out through their vaginas.

But, hey, women do sometimes yell rude things during labor, so maybe it’s possible that a few of them do scratch or even bite their husbands, though the latter seems like it might be a tad difficult logistically. Some might even do so on purpose. If so, there would probably be some evidence of this somewhere online, right?

Well, I searched for a while using every combination of search words I could think of. I found an assortment of disturbing headlines about men attacking women in and around maternity wards: Guilty: man who punched and kicked pregnant girlfriend outside Poole Maternity Hospital; Man charged with assaulting pregnant girlfriend, staff in hospital maternity ward; Man Throws Meat Cleaver Into Maternity Ward.

I found disturbing statistics about pregnancy and domestic violence, which often begins or increases during pregnancy; according to one 2000 study, some 324,000 pregnant women are abused each year.

On a somewhat lighter note, I found women wondering if it was normal to have a really itchy stomach after giving birth, and another person wondering “why is my bitch digging so much after giving birth[?]” (Don’t worry; they were talking about a dog.)

Amidst all this – and many hundreds of other irrelevant results – I managed to find one example of a woman scratching a man during childbirth.

On a page in which she provided all the gory details of her 28 hours of labor – along with numerous pictures of her newborn – one new mother also posted a couple of pictures documenting the scratches she’d given her husband while in labor. (I’m not giving out the link because MRAs. )

Brace yourself. Here’s one of the pictures, with the father’s face partially blurred out:

New father displays scratches his wife gave him during her 28 hours of labor
New father displays scratches his wife gave him during her 28 hours of labor

If you look very carefully you can see four faint scratches on his forearm. The blogger isn’t a native English speaker, but as far as I can tell from what she wrote about it, she didn’t give these terrible scratches to him on purpose.

The horror!

 

 

 

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jayemgriffin
10 years ago

Maybe I just have a shitty computer, but I can’t see anything wrong with his arm? And he’s also smiling? That’s… a pretty crappy example, dude.

leatapp
leatapp
10 years ago

MRAs really are some of the stupidest, most self-centered whiners of all time.

Louise McOrmond-Plummer

Right you are lea – I just posted this on my FB wall and called them “Whiny pukes.” I did say “fuck” top my partner a couple of times in the course of delivery. He’s never gotten over it, poor darling. Thanks David for the Sunday morning giggles.

damselindetech
10 years ago


..
.

I am underwhelmed.

Helen
10 years ago

Giving birth is an amazing feat of zero skill, and it still amazes me. It amazes me that this is the epitome, the pinnacle, the supposed female trump card to all male accomplishments.

I’m sure technology will eventually enable us to connect this guy up to a virtual experience machine which will allow him to experience a “normal” say, 28 hour labour (mine was 34 but I’m kind like that.) I just. cannot. wait for that day.

weirwoodtreehugger
10 years ago

On sitcoms women in labor are always yelling at their husbands and gripping their hands too hard. Everybody knows that sitcoms are completely accurate depictions of real life. Case closed. Giving birth is misandry. Especially when a woman is giving birth to *shudder* a girl.

Tanya Nguyen
10 years ago

I have to admit, most of the women i knew, were either lovely, or said things like “i’m never letting you touch me again”, or “this is ALL YOUR FAULT” or whatever, in some sense of trying to vent out in the face of 12 or more hours of labor.

and what is with MRAs thinking the world of work is so f’ing hard? made up stat, but like 99% of all jobs involve sitting on your butt in front of a computer, or selling someone something.

wordsp1nner
wordsp1nner
10 years ago

The “woman in labor hurts her SO due to pain” is such a common trope in media. When I was in middle school, I participated in rhythmic gymnastics, which requires incredible flexibility (which I completely lacked–I’m probably in the bottom quarter of flexibility). So I sucked, but had fun.

Anyway, at one tournament, one of my team mates asked for me to stand next to her so she could grab my arm for balance as our coach pressed her leg up (picture someone doing a standing splits, only a second person is pushing on the front leg). She ended up grabbing me pretty hard, so I said, “Hey, stop squeezing me! It isn’t like you’re giving birth.”

I never lived that one down 🙁

bodycrimes
10 years ago

Does he say how many kids he has? As in, has some woman kicked and punched him yet?

wordsp1nner
wordsp1nner
10 years ago

Also: long fingernails are nasty fucking weapons. I always have fairly long nails* (I don’t cut them, just wait for them to break, and they can get around a quarter of an inch long). I have been banned from thumb wars and Egyptian Rat Screw (grown-up slap jack, beloved by high-school debaters) due to mine.

I could probably break skin if I clenched too hard or if I wasn’t paying attention. Doesn’t mean its abuse, just means I should probably cut my nails if I ever give birth.

Except if I ever give birth, I plan to have them give me an epidural as soon as possible, so hopefully I won’t be in too much pain.

* Untangling knots, yo. Can’t do that without some traction.

contrapangloss
contrapangloss
10 years ago

http://youtu.be/Gw5ayibQ-E0

Yeah. Labor hurts. Blogger should try it, before blogger knocks it as trivial.

Cuz, ow.

contrapangloss
contrapangloss
10 years ago

Video isn’t of real labor, just a simulated one. No worries, folks.

wordsp1nner
wordsp1nner
10 years ago

Also: The current crop of biology undergraduates/doctoral students/young doctors is roughly 50% female. Even if the lead author on a paper (and there are two that I could think of that may be what he’s talking about when he talks about “creating life in a petri dish”, both of which involved creating 100% artificial genomes and placing them in, respectively, a bacteria and a yeast) is male, chances are there are women in the group. It isn’t uncommon to see 10+ authors on any biology paper, and that kind of work takes years and many, many collaborators, some of whom are likely to be female.

Incidentally, if it is the artificial yeast genome, which just came out in Science recently, some of that work was done by his undergraduate students, who are likely about half female.

Here’s an overview of the work:
http://www.livescience.com/44404-first-synthetic-yeast-chromosome-designer-genomes.html

And here’s a link to the article. It is behind a paywall, but you can see the authors. There are a ton, and I did in fact spot several female names.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/344/6179/55.short

jayemgriffin
10 years ago

Thanks, David. I see them now, but I’ve still done worse to myself by accident.

kittehserf
10 years ago

Number of (cis) men who’ve died in labour: none.

Someone should tell this latest MRA whiner jokes about squirrel-gripping. Then he’d really wet himself with fear.

As for that guy’s scratches – pfft. One time I’ve faced violence (my drunken brother) I gouged his arms so hard I had skin and blood under my nails, and my nails were short.

weirwoodtreehugger
10 years ago

I’ve definitely gotten worse scratches on my hands and arms playing with my kitties than this guy has.

thebewilderness
thebewilderness
10 years ago

If endangering your own life once or twice provides license to abuse a man, what does that say about our society. Particularly when he endangers his own life as a matter of routine to support you?

That is where I thought he was going. Men should be able to abuse women because they endanger their own life at work. Or at least some d00d does somewhere and that is n=more than enough justification.

zoon echon logon
zoon echon logon
10 years ago

I’ve definitely gotten worse scratches on my hands and arms playing with my kitties than this guy has.

Kitties are also misandry. They are the most misandry.

Skye
Skye
10 years ago

I’m actually sad to hear that he has a wife & kid.

Also, not only is labor a big deal, but so is being pregnant (women/girls can get all sorts of pregnancy related complications, some life threatening and many that have lasting effects).

Even without major complications, being pregnant is uncomfortable and difficult for many women. I doubt this dude would have such a cavalier attitude if he could get pregnant or give birth.

trans_commie
10 years ago

Giving birth is an amazing feat of zero skill, and it still amazes me. It amazes me that this is the epitome, the pinnacle, the supposed female trump card to all male accomplishments.

Says…who, exactly?

kittehserf
10 years ago

OT: is anyone getting a message about an untrusted connection here from Firefox? It’s come up just now when I’ve tried to go to other threads.

pipkin (king of the munchies)
pipkin (king of the munchies)
10 years ago

It’s no wonder that mra’s don’t get any time to do anything that might actually help some men.When they’re not online having a go at women (that’s putting it mildly) they’re online looking for stuff to have a go at women with.Guess it’s a slow news day for them,who new giving birth is misandry.
Also is that guy in the first picture expecting the baby to burst out of her stomach alien style?

hellkell
hellkell
10 years ago

Cool story, MRAbro.

I’ve had way worse scratches from the cats.

Lili Fugit
Lili Fugit
10 years ago

I’m on Firefox, I’m not getting that message.

I remember reading somewhere that the number one danger to pregnant women is their partners, followed by all of the many many complications of pregnancy, followed by childbirth itself. So… yeah. But some female yelled FUCK really loud while trying to push an eight pound human being out of her birth canal, and a male heard it, so misandry.

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