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The Chuckles Turned to Guffaws: AVFM conference Saturday wrapup

Janet Bloomfield PRs up a storm. Pic borrowed from r/amr.
Janet Bloomfield PRs up a storm.

Well, the AVFM conference is over. I thought I’d post links to some of the media coverage today. I’m not sure Paul Elam and co have quite attained the level of respectability they were going for with the conference. It probably didn’t help that their PR gal, Janet Bloomfield, kept posting about “whores” and then, during the final panel discussion, delivered a passionate defense of “doxxing.”

Anyway, here’s the press coverage today:

Men’s rights conference takes aim at feminism, by Adam Serwer, MSNBC.

Serwer presented a sardonic take on the conference, full of revealingly awful details. Some highlights:

What animated most of the speakers at the conference was feminism and how it needed to be defeated. …

At the conference, feminism was responsible for turning wives against their husbands, bleeding them dry in divorce proceedings and separating them from their children, levying false accusations of rape and abuse against good men, or creating an ever-present culture of hatred where men are vilified.

Though men’s rights activists who hosted the conference often say sexual assault against men isn’t taken seriously, the audience laughed when speaker Fred Jones mentioned his fears about his son being raped after being arrested in New Orleans.

“He’s kinda small and kinda cute, good looking, you know what I mean?” Jones said. “You know what they do with –” Jones cut himself off. But the audience laughed.

Barbara Kay, a columnist for Canada’s National Post, argued that …  [r]ape on college campuses … was a myth perpetrated by man-haters …

“The vast majority of female students allegedly raped on campus are actually voicing buyer’s remorse from alcohol-fueled promiscuous behavior involving murky lines of consent on both sides,” she said, drawing chuckles from the audience. “It’s true. It’s their get-out-of-guilt-free card, you know like Monopoly.” The chuckles turned to guffaws.

The First International Conference on Men’s Issues: Day 1, by Arthur Goldwag, Hatewatch

On the SPLC’s Hatewatch blog, Goldwag — who wrote that famous SPLC  takedown of the Men’s Rights movement — delivered up a surporisingly straightforward account of the first day of the conference. Some highlights:

A Voice for Men’s Paul Elam warned attendees to keep low profiles, lest they be harassed by protesters, and made much of the police presence he had secured. There were indeed uniformed policemen on site, and quite a few black-shirted security guards. There were camera crews from Vice and a number of reporters. But the only sounds to be heard outside the VFW Hall were chirping birds and the hum of passing traffic—there wasn’t a protestor in sight. I counted between 150 and 200 people in the hall. …

The Canadian Senator Anne Cools, who opened the conference, spoke at great length about how feminism has hijacked Canada’s family courts, quoting Blackstone on women’s rights, the song “Frankie and Johnnie” and even Euripides to give lie to the supposed feminist myth that women were historically oppressed. Frankie and Medea, she implied, both gave as good as they got. Erin Pizzey, the well-known novelist, ex-feminist, and founder of Chiswick Women’s Aid, one of the first women’s shelters, indicted the movement she had once helped lead as a radical Marxist plot to turn women against men, destroy families, and create a billion dollar social welfare industry.

My Experience at the First International Men’s Conference So Far, by Helen Smith, PJ Media

And then there was “Dr. Helen,” writing on her blog on the right-wing website PJ Media. Dr. H, one of the speakers at the AVFM conference, described her time amongst the MRAs as “quite a delight.” Indeed, her account was so chipper I found myself wondering if she had even attended the same conference as Serwer and Goldwag — or the conference I watched several hours of online.

The crowd of what looked to be about two or three hundred people were diverse and ranged from all ages to all ethnic backgrounds. There were more men there but almost as many women it seemed! … I was in awe and amazed at the great group of intellectual speakers and the audience who asked questions that were critically thought out and challenging.

Yeah, definitely a different conference.

She did have one worry, though: that other people were there to report on the conference besides her.

My only concern with the conference was the media that was present. It seemed that reporters from Time, MSNBC, GQ, and Vice.com were there. I got an uneasy feeling about a few of them though I suppose their stories could go either way, though I think I know which way to bet. There were a couple of women from Vice.com that we sat with at an appreciation dinner for speakers who seemed very nice but frankly, a bit clueless.

I’m guessing those women from Vice.com are a lot less “clueless” than Dr. H thinks.

See the AgainstMensRights subreddit for more discussions of the conference. I borrowed the pic for this post from here.

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Jo Cool
Jo Cool
10 years ago

Sorry, now I’m in the wrong thread.

contrapangloss
10 years ago

Yeah, Jo. Pizzey thread, for that one?

contrapangloss
10 years ago

Nitram, so sorry for the awful! Good grief!

My entire dad’s side of the family wouldn’t exist, were it not for an abortion. Great grandma aborted her first child in the later terms on medical advice because giving birth to it would have probably killed her.

She lived to have a bunch of other kids, later, who weren’t so risky, including my grandpa.

Judgy people rarely consider all possibilities.

jared
jared
10 years ago

@Argenti,

Thanks for the heads up on using the word “crazy” I’ve been through mental health issues my self and am thankful each day I have the ability to face this suffering world we live in with joy but it takes constant effort and vigilance.

You gave a good explanation how Elam can prey on vulnerable women looking for confirmation/affirmation to join his club. I guess blogs such as this one and other allies against a voice for men, can possibly help prevent women from being preyed on by Elam with all his charisma and slickness because obviously it appears he is on a recruiting mission to try to manipulate women to join avfm like you indicated, the more women the more Elam can point to the public that his group in not a hate group..

Btw I know I saw a comment of yours that you own and like fish. Well my partneris thinking of setting up an aquaponics system -he mainly eats all local farm organic food.and wondered if you had experience with any of it?

Jo Cool
Jo Cool
10 years ago

@contrapangloss Yeah sorry about that. I’m using my smartphone and I can’t see the entire screen at once so I get lost sometimes. Wish I had a proper computer.

contrapangloss
10 years ago

No problem, Jo!

I feel your pain. On a phone, myself, because I’m still trying to figure out how to get internet access at the home-base.

Biggest problem for me is the non tactile keyboard. I hi to instead of I so often… And then ‘hello autocorrect doing silly things!’

It just tried to make things bongs, up there, because the o again.

That would have been bad.

Jo Cool
Jo Cool
10 years ago

Yeah I hate having to thumb type on a touch screen as well, and auto correct is a nightmare

Lea
Lea
10 years ago

B,
Sorry. I didn’t mean to sound like I was correcting you. I was just complaining.

brooked
brooked
10 years ago

@Jared

I think Elam, unlike the vast majority of manospherians, can sort of give his bullshit the slight veneer of respectability, but I think you’re giving him to much credit by painting him as a cult leader with a growing following as opposed to an internet crank. The IRS should take a look at AVfM because Elam has seemingly even failed to correctly incorporate it, much less turn it into a proper non-for-profit. I’m guessing because he’d rather have supporters Paypal money to his girlfriend that he can spend as he wants and he’s too cheap to pay a lawyer and/or accountant to do things properly.

As tealily and countless others have pointed out this ramshackle conference, that pulled in 200 people tops, is underwhelming at best. I wouldn’t worry to much about Elam recruiting women specifically, sure there are some female anti-feminists who might jump aboard the hate train but irate reactionary white guys with remain his bread and butter. The honey badger r/feMRA has less than 500 members, as opposed to the near 100k on the main MRA Reddit.

Have you ever checked out Right Wing Watch or looked at the other groups SPLC tracks? There are plenty of extremists with grotesque hateful rhetoric and that isn’t going to change soon. WHTM isn’t an anti-MRA or anti-Elam website, it’s anti-misogyny, or anti-the new misogyny, to use David’s phrase. The more people who point out the MRA extremism, poor reasoning and palpable, virulent misogyny the better, but they aren’t the only game in town.

brooked
brooked
10 years ago

@Auntie Alias

Foreign Wars Bruce Post 1146 in St. Clair, Michigan, this weekend and over ONE HUNDRED attendees, from all walks of life — if by ‘all walks of life’ you mean: ‘middle-aged divorced white guys with anger management issues’ — came together in brotherhood to address the source of all of the pain and suffering and existential angst that afflicts MANkind.

Tee hee.

Binjabreel
10 years ago

Hmmm in psych, or (more specifically) advertising and p.r., circles I always encountered it as “drinking your own kool-aid”, i.e., starting to believe your own lies and propaganda.

brooked
brooked
10 years ago

More tee hee here.

Surprisingly, many of the speakers at Manstock, were women who came to validate the attendees fears for a modest speaking fee

Auntie Alias
Auntie Alias
10 years ago

I LOVED “Manstock”! It cracked me right up.

cassandrakitty
cassandrakitty
10 years ago

However, I find it equally appropriate for a man’s group to educate women that they create a lot of rapist through ever more casual life preference decisions like choosing to have a child out of wedlock or leave a marriage. I am sure women are largely unaware of the frequency with which they physically and emotionally abuse their male off-spring.

Two things. First, being mad at your mom is not an excuse for being a rapist. Second, people don’t abuse children accidentally, and anyone who thinks that it is possible to accidentally abuse a child is a very dangerous person and should not be around children,

schwadevivre
10 years ago

Just been thinking back to my days in the Science Fiction community in London in the 1970s. Back then using word of mouth advertising (at the One Tun) and fliers handed out at other conventions we arranged a 2 day event at a hall with 200 plus pre-booked registrations and about another 100 on the door. Additionally there were some 20 traders and 3 or 4 speakers per day.

It kind of brings Mr Elam’s organising abilities into sharp focus.

Unimaginative
Unimaginative
10 years ago

@schwadevivre, also the relative popularity of his “movement”. Not only are not all men like that, MOST men are not like that.

jared
jared
10 years ago

@Brooked

Good points and I’ll check out those watchdog sites. Like I stated all this conference hype may just blow over in a few days like no cared anyway. But this Elam guy is different. I am well aware that a lot of manosphere blogs have fallen by the wayside such as mgtow forums and usually these mra blogs eventually dissipate and fall by the wayside.

But this guy Elam is a corporate executive type guy that has some business acumen to raise money, persuade and market that is why he has probably lasted and is the only mra blog to have any so called “public activism” or conference. I understand your point why worry so much, but he is relentless, and tries to bully to any opposition. I understand your saying he is just an internet thing right now but this is a smooth operator who I have heard lives an affluent lifestyle and when someone is so greedy with power and money they could be dangerous.

He is and is looking to make a lot of money off this and also have status for his huge ego. His disciples over there apparently donate and fund him.. I guess we just got to see how it all pans out

jared
jared
10 years ago

I was also going to add it seems he is slick at persuasion inasmuch he was able to assemble and convince all these scholars from around the world to speak at his conference and be affiliated with avfm. Elam is insidious.

kiki
kiki
10 years ago

This is somebody trying his hardest to appear reasonable, to appeal to feminists and MRAs alike, and they are completely failing.

They’re like observational comedians who have never experienced reality as the audience sees it.

“Hey, so, you ever noticed how divorce creates rapists? Amirite guys? Hah? Hah?”

*Bewildered silence*

WatermelonSugar
10 years ago

New article up from the husband of the author of Men on Strike:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/06/29/gender-wars-women-men-reynolds-domestic-column/11705389/

So far, of the few articles that are published on the conference, the only two positives ones are from people with vested interest in the conference.

Tessa
10 years ago

@Justin

OK, your first paragraph was just the setup to make you appear to not be an MRA or a sympathizer. You failed at it by the way… Anyway nice try.

I think everyone agrees that the handling of rape culture by the Voice for Men crowd is unfortunate and self defeating. However, I did not get the impression at anytime that they endorse rape. What they were trying to address is the dangerous temptation for law enforcement and the education system to circumvent due process over a very emotionally charged issue given the poor handling rape has received in the past. While false imprisonment and false accusations of rape are arguably far less common than rape itself, the consequences of conviction can be more life impacting than the act so it’s important to get it right. Both victimization by rape and convict for rape or any sex crime for that matter are very serious things.

At first I was going to congratulate you on your use of the words rape culture, but then I kept reading and realized you don’t understand rape culture… And then you do some clever (not really clever…) framing of your argument. First you imply that rape is handled OK now by saying how things were mishandled “in the past”. So “now” the default is fair, and any added attention to rape by police or education is simply giving in to a “dangerous temptation”. In reality rape is being handled poorly NOW. As we speak.
Very very few rapists get convicted. A much much MUCH smaller percentage are wrongly accused (aguably? Really? Not arguably). This fact really shines a light on your next bit where you put the “life impact” of rape vs false conviction. Basically it’s the same scheme as above. By comparing the two, you are trying to put them on equal footing. Actually you try to put rape BEHIND conviction. Your end game of course is the implication that despite how few rapes are convicted (and the hugely small number of false accusations), it’s most important to err on the side of “it’s a false accusation” because “that has the most impact.” It’s so transparent.

The conference did present an interesting viewpoint in addressing their beliefs on the cause of rape culture as a cycle of violence stemming from child abuse and fatherlessness. This is a point worth making. It is not disingenuous for them to observe that women have agency in this environment. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, women are 3 times as likely to abuse children as men. Seventy percent of divorces are initiated by women (American Academy of Pediatrics) who in turn garner sole custody of children in the overwhelming majority of cases, and 40% of children are born out of wedlock. Women’s groups are never shy to educate young men about the fact that they do a lot of raping and rightfully so. However, I find it equally appropriate for a man’s group to educate women that they create a lot of rapist through ever more casual life preference decisions like choosing to have a child out of wedlock or leave a marriage. I am sure women are largely unaware of the frequency with which they physically and emotionally abuse their male off-spring. Of course, both camps deflect blame with flippant attitudes like “women invite rape” or “the kids drive me crazy” and “I don’t need a man”. Never the less, both camps need the criticism.

This is where you show you don’t understand rape culture. But scratching that, you use statistics this time to appear researchy and sciencey. Unfortunately it’s not in good faith. The abuse statistic you give is misleading and also it’s inaccurate to say 3 times “as likely”. And then your divorce and birth out of wedlock statistics are a non sequitur when talking about rape and rape culture. You see, in order for the divorce and wedlock statistics to mean anything, you’d need to show that rape and rape culture are increasing at a rate similar to the out of wedlock birth and women divorcing their husbands. Spoiler alert, they’re not. Rape culture is not new. This is all a means of blaming women for rape. If women would stay with their husbands or only have sex when married, then there’d be less rape. By linking rape with divorce and out of wedlock pregnancy, you not only reinforce women’s primary role as wife and mother, but you also remove blame for rape from men. Rape is because women just aren’t womanly enough. Same. Old. Shit.

The rest is just more “I’m not MRA but…”
But yeah… Justin, you’re not fooling anybody.

Argenti Aertheri
Argenti Aertheri
10 years ago

Regarding cults, and Elam. Yeah, being an internet crank takes away a good bit of the danger, except to his followers’ wallets anyways. But I would be hesitant to judge cult risk by numbers — yeah, Jones had a huge following, but Heaven’s Gate? Of about 50 members, 39 of them were found dead (looks like two suicides since then among the survivors) — tiny group, regulars here probably outnumber them (in fact, I’m sure we do, I haz survey data!) but that didn’t save any of those lives.

Is Elam that dangerous? No. More right wing this may cause that but I’m not saying to go do that, but you’d be a hero if you did, and straight up con job.

Save The Queen
Save The Queen
10 years ago

@Reynolds article

/blockquote But although the specifics were interesting, the thing that struck me most about the gathering was the palpable lack of gender tension. Men and women at this conference seemed to be on the same page, and the same team, in a way that seems almost surprising in these gender-divided times. Maybe that’s because gender-talk, long a female domain, is also now about men. As another speaker at the conference, Warren Farrell, said, women can’t hear what men don’t say. So it’s good that men are speaking up. As Farrell concluded in a Friday night dinner speech, the goal is “not a men’s movement, not a women’s movement, but a gender liberation movement.”

With men and women both talking and listening, it gave me some hope that perhaps we’ll see something new, and better, in the politics of gender. /blockqoute

I guess Reynolds was in bathroom when Pizzey called feminism an “Evil Empire” that had to be crushed for the good of love and society everywhere. And when pretty much everyone agreed with her assessment. And when Carnell dehumanized and essentialized all women as dishonest and vindictive baby-makers with his “Cupcake” motif. And when all the speakers at one point or another blamed women for, well, pretty much everything bad in the world. He must have been i the bathroom a lot,

This is what passes for a better conversation between men and women? In what alternate dimension? The snippets that I watched of conference (lawd help me!) did not give me the impression they wanted a dialogue with women at all.. Feminists are the enemy that have to be defeated at all costs.All women are conflated as feminists…when they act in ways that AVfM doesn’t like.

What dishonest piece.

thebewilderness
thebewilderness
10 years ago

jared, if the only people you persuade are those who already agreed with you before you persuaded them you cannot in any way shape or form be considered persuasive.

This really shouldn’t be that difficult to grasp.

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