So in my email inbox yesterday, alongside a nagging reminder from my dentist to schedule a checkup and my latest marching orders from the Gynocrat Central Committee, I noticed an email from an unknown correspondent with the intriguing subject line “The Holy War against Feminism.”
Clicking on it, I found an angry little manifesto from someone calling himself Mortago Black. It started off with a bold all-caps claim:
THE MENS REIGHTS REVOLUTION IS AT HAND.
The revolution will not be spellchecked.
But apparently, if Mr. Black has any say over things, it will be “liked” on Facebook: our manifesto-writer followed his bold headline with a link to a Facebook page – which, by the time I got around to looking at his email, had been taken down, probably because it contained stuff like, well, the rest of his manifesto.
Mr. Black continued:
The dawn of men’s rights revolution is fast approaching. We are rising to destroy the evil of modern day feminism. The lies, the bigotry, and the hatred of feminism must be erased from the surface of our earth.
We are sworn to our lives to wage a holy war of men’s rights against feminism.
Huh. You know, before starting this blog, I probably would have dismissed something like this as obvious trollery. But too many Men’s Rightsers talk exactly like this for me to assume it’s not for real. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be a troll, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if it was 100% real.
You will see my profile picture is the flag of the men’s rights revolution.
Wait, they have a flag now?
The 3 colors represent the heart and soul of our holy struggle:
You haven’t even specified what the “evil of modern-day feminism” consists of, and you’ve already moved on to the flag-describing stage?
Black: The black represents the darkness that is the evil of feminism. The shadow the oppression of feminist bigotry casts over the land, and the blackening of hearts against that which is good and just.
Ok, black = evil. No points for originality here.
Blue: The blue representatives man as society expects him to be, the role we have written for us, the character society forces us to play.
So, the Blue Pill? The Blue Pill is bad, right? Why are you giving 2/3 of the real estate on your flag to things you don’t like?
Red: The red represents the blood shed by fathers, husbands and sons of the past. It reminds us of the struggle and sacrifice we must be willing to make to destroy feminism.
Oy. Now I’m seeing why Facebook tried to nip your little revolution in the bud.
We shall cast this flag over the United States, and one day, over the world. We shall unshackle ourselves from the chains of feminist hate. We shall cleanse the world of this cancer, of this filth, of this plague, of this DISEASE that is feminism. We shall DESTROY those who seek to hurt us simply by virtue of birth. We shall ERADICATE the hatred and enemies of men.
Dude, hate to break it to you, but when you start talking about “cleansing the world” of the “disease” that is your enemy, you don’t sound much like Thomas Jefferson. You sound a lot more like the guy who wrote this:
[T]he discovery of the Jewish virus is one of the greatest revolutions that has taken place in the world. The battle in which we are engaged today is of the same sort as the battle waged, during the last century, by Pasteur and Koch. How many diseases have their origin in the Jewish virus! … We shall regain our health only be eliminating the Jew.
Yes, it was indeed Hitler who wrote that. Yes, I just compared you to Hitler. But you can’t call Godwin on me because you are LITERALLY USING A FASCIST TROPE.
If you find yourself, consciously or unconsciously, spouting rhetoric that sounds like you plagiarized it from Mein Kampf, I think you might just have to consider the possibility that, well, you might be the baddies.
Also, would it kill you to proofread your hate manifestos before you send them out?
EDIT: Added a bit more on the question of whether or not this is real or a troll, since I can’t tell.
@ Nitram — “Must they all be such terrible writers?”
I’ve often wondered this. All sorts of terrible ideologies have managed to turn out talented writers, artists and film makers to trumpet their praises. And yet somehow the MRM can’t manage to find anyone who can put together an effective poster or write something that doesn’t read like Dr Doom’s secret diary. It’s strange, is what it is.
Do you think Woody actually reads these comments sections?
Luzbelitx:
You totally nailed it with the *heartless* pervert distinction! ‘Cause it doesn’t sound to me like this guy much cares about safety, sanity or consent!
As for FetLife, I haven’t been around there as much lately as I used to; as with any large forum, there got to be too many internal debates/flame wars that I didn’t give a rat’s ass about one way or another, I got sick of receiving that many penis pics per day, and seeing still more boring het blowjob videos on their “best of” page. On the other hand, my BFF is using a lot of material she’s written in various debates on there in the book she’s writing about life as a trans person in a cis world, from fleeing her home country as a frightened, suicidal boy, to stepping out at World Pride as the tough, fierce woman she’s become. It’s going to be an awesome book.
So I guess you can get a lot, or very little out of FetLife, depending what you’re looking for. And to be fair, I *did* meet a lovely FWB on there, so it hasn’t been a complete loss for me! 😉
@piratejennie, I have now watched that cat vid 4 times in a row. I seriously cannot get enough.
Was it bad that I misread FetLife as FeltLife?
@Isabelle: thanks for posting the felting link as I hadn’t ever thought about how to make felt before, except where I have patterns to felt a knitted product after it has been knitted. I have some tutorials on how to make felted animals (small ones, that you needle felt) which I would like to try eventually (ha, you should see my project list) and that will be helpful in being able to make felt if there is no colour combination available that I want.
@winter walk
Thank you! I’ll definitely take a look 🙂
Also, even if you’re not “sure” this is a troll, it probably is, and you should note that.
O Woody, Woody, wherefore art thou Woody
Deny thy nature and refuse thy ideology
Or if thou wilt not, but fuck off
And I’ll no longer be bored to tears
@pallygirl
Your welcome 🙂 . I don’t know to what extend its true, but I read a while ago that felting is the oldest way to turn wool into a fabric. That’s the technique the nomadic Mongols are still using to make Yurt. The felting lady told me that its not that difficult. Basically, if you start from a whole fleece, you just comb the wool and its ready to be be turned into felt. I thing she was using Viking combs. And she was dying the wool as well.
Do any MRAs actually read David’s posts before criticizing them or are they just assuming that their inner rage will correctly guess the gist of what he wrote?
I think Woody should have to post 6 genuinely funny cat videos and then answer some questions to demonstrate basic reading comprehension of then post before he’s allowed to comment again.
BTW I just finished watching the World Cup game with a bunch of very happy Brazilians. Tense, but happy. Go Brazil!
As promised. I know it has nothing to do with the actual post, but…
http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/ccs-ajc/rr06_vic2/p3_4.html
http://www.sexassault.ca/statistics.html
http://www.womenshealth.gov/violence-against-women/types-of-violence/violence-against-women-with-disabilities.html
There are quite a few more I could find on Google, but I think that kinda makes the point. And now I can’t remember why I was making the point. I just remember thinking today i needed to look these up. God, I’m tired. Sorry if I’m babbling.
A troll telling us that we should notice that a maybe-troll is definitely a troll? Oh, internet.
Flying Mouse, Isabelle, are you on Ravelry? We have our own Mammotheers group there – Crafty SPINSTERS (yes it’s in all caps).
ROFL have you ever read the forum thread about “you know you’re a knitting geek when …” on Ravelry, pallygirl? Some hilarious stuff there: you just reminded me of my favourite, someone seeing a sign saying Yam Festival and getting all excited ‘cos they thought it said Yarn Festival.
(Please tell me that wasn’t you, I’ll be torn between falling off my chair laughing and dying of embarassment.)
Official word from an official moderator, Woody: go fuck thyself.
We collected some wonderful wool blankets that were somewhat the worse for moths, cut and sewed them into giant bags, then felted them down to purse size. Excellent project for our festival of trees gift shop!
LOL that one wasn’t me as I didn’t know about the thread. I also don’t think we have yam festivals in NZ – but I could be wrong. Ohakune has a giant carrot, or had, so nothing is beyond possibilty.
Must look at that thread when I get back from more shopping. On way home from friend’s place this morning, saw sale sign for the Waikiwi yarns factory, and now have lots of sock yarn, particularly white and black. There is a nice skulls pattern for socks on Ravelry that I have had in my library for some time…
Skull socks, cool!
Do you do the “I need this yarn even though I’ve no idea what to make with it” thing?
Yes, just like I buy the crochet/knitting magazine so I can guarantee access to the pattern even if I’m not going to make it for ages.
I see no shame in this. 🙂
I have enough 4ply to make this: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/cat-socks-2 and http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/selbudeath and probably even more.
@kittehserf
Flying Mouse, Isabelle, are you on Ravelry? We have our own Mammotheers group there – Crafty SPINSTERS (yes it’s in all caps).
What is Ravelry? I wish I had any talent with crafts. The little bit I know is because I had to have a good idea on what people were looking for. The diversity in the type of fleeces is quite amazing. The Icelandic had a wonderful fleece, the Cheviot, not so much. A long, long time ago I tried knitting, but could not keep the tension even. The end products looked like a spider had fallen in a bottle of rum. The sad part is that I know so many shepherds, I probably could get it for free as they can use extra hands at shearing time. And there is a small textile museum at a 20 minutes drive teaching classes from wool cleaning to weaving. At the moment my biggest craft project is turning a six months German Shepherd puppy into a good canine citizen.
Oooo look, a yarn where sales support children of killed servicepeople: http://www.yarnspirations.com/caronunited?utm_source=iContact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2014-07-04-CaronUnitedIntro-yarnspirations&utm_content=CaronUnitedIntro
I’d offer this as an example of how to do fundraising, to AVfM, but I don’t think Paul wants any competition for donations.
“Do you do the “I need this yarn even though I’ve no idea what to make with it” thing?”
That made me laugh. Jack, my hubby, had the same thing with wood. Thank goodness we had a barn where he could store it.
“At the moment my biggest craft project is turning a six months German Shepherd puppy into a good canine citizen.”
AWW! I hear they’re a smart doggie, so hopefully it’ll go easily. I know the mostly poodle puppy I “trained” did most of the work!
Skull socks!? Want.
They may have a flag, but the Men’s Reights Revolution won’t truly be ready to get underway until they have uniforms. And a song. And an official logo. And a Zazzle storefront.
And a coherent ideology, but hey. Priorities.
I feel they should bejewel themselves as well. Balljazzle.
Can someone explain to me how vagazzle ever became a term because it should be mons pubazzle or something similar. I despair of people calling pretty everything around the female groin area that is not a vagina, a vagina.