I‘ve been so busy with all the shenanigans surrounding AVFM and their little conference that I’m afraid I’ve been neglecting the good old Men’s Rights subreddit. Don’t feel bad, Men’s Rights subreddit, for today I took a few moments out of my hard-core semi-vacationing to pay you a little visit!
While there, I noticed the regulars discussing a terrible quandary that faces all modern men: “As a man, would you help a child in distress?”
Here are some of the answers that got upvoted:
![Screen Shot 2014-07-08 at Tue, [Jul 8], 14 3](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/screen-shot-2014-07-08-at-tue-jul-8-14-3.png?ssl=1)
![Screen Shot 2014-07-08 at Tue, [Jul 8], 14 1](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/screen-shot-2014-07-08-at-tue-jul-8-14-1.png?ssl=1)
![Screen Shot 2014-07-08 at Tue, [Jul 8], 14 4](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/screen-shot-2014-07-08-at-tue-jul-8-14-4.png?ssl=1)
Yep. Upvotes for a fellow who says he let a three-year-old boy literally fall out of a shopping cart and smash his head open because, oh no, some hypothetical hysterical mother might have accused him of child molestation.
The details of his story make so little sense I can only assume he’s making the story up — if he was walking past the bakery, how could he have been close enough to “reflexively grab” a child in a shopping cart inside the bakery?
I’m not sure which is worse, the thought that this guy actually let a kid fall and smash his head, or the thought that he made up a story about doing so in order to gain some internet points from MRAs. (Well, the former, obviously, but either way this is a mortifying spectacle.)
But not everyone got upvotes. Here’s a comment that got thumbs down from the Men’s Rightsers — along with a heavily upvoted reply:
![Screen Shot 2014-07-08 at Tue, [Jul 8], 14](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/screen-shot-2014-07-08-at-tue-jul-8-14.png?ssl=1)
Human Rights: You’re doing it wrong.
Thanks to r/AMR for pointing me to this lovely thread.
Lea, your trigger warning made me think of this.
MRAs are against trigger warnings–there is even an article up at AVFM about it right now. The argument, from what I was able to stomach, was essentially “fear breeds fear” and “get over it/having to read triggering stuff is just exposure therapy.” So. Trigger warnings are bad and stupid and pointless, even for people who had had trauma.
However, not helping children for fear of being accused of molestation, not helping women for fear of being accused of rape, not getting married for fear of divorce/unfair family court rulings and fear of the police for the sake of fear are totally legit and reasonable because WOMEN.
In the AVFM article, there is a mister who said he was a victim of rape and found the article’a claims offensive. The response? Resoundingly “man up.”
These reddit wankers are afraid of a hypothetical event that has likely never happened to them and likely never will. The response? Totally justified, breh!
Way to ignore victims EVEN WITHIN YOUR ON MOVEMENT in favor of vague and unfounded fear, MRAs.
I know why you don’t tell a woman you have a vasectomy.
So, she’ll think she can start a family with you. So you can tell her she’s so special you want her to be the mother of your children. There are certain women who find that sort of thing very romantic and there are people who do want biological kids with their partner and if you can’t give them that, it’s a deal breaker. Lie to them and they may spend years with you before they figure out your rouse.
I told on a relative of mine when his gf told me, glowing, that that had been “trying really hard” to have a baby together. He’s had a vasectomy years before they’d met. He smirked and told me to to shut up, but it was too late. The cat was out of the bag. He had lied to her to get regular, condom free, enthusiastic sex and to make her believe he was committed to her.
I’m such a party pooper.
In the AVFM article, there is a mister who said he was a victim of rape and found the article’a claims offensive. The response? Resoundingly “man up.”
These reddit wankers are afraid of a hypothetical event that has likely never happened to them and likely never will. The response? Totally justified, breh!
Unfortunately, not surprised. It’s like that video of the man saying he found his rape at 13 “hilarious” because “he had to” except “it wasn’t.”
Also, not getting how ‘call the police’ is too scary or too much work when someone needs help. 🙁
I know it seems rude if someone doesn’t acknowledge that you were trying to do something nice for zir, but the thing is that you’ve forced zir into a small-scale social contract that zie didn’t agree to.
If the door-holdee for whatever reason doesn’t want to acknowledge you, what is zie supposed to do? Go a different route? Stop walking and wait until you stop holding the door? You’ve created a situation where zie has to give you a nice response or be considered rude, even though zie did not choose to be in that situation.
In the case of door-holding, it’s pretty trivial, but it’s on the same spectrum as, say, being pressured to go on just one date with that nice boy, because he asked so politely about it.
Gah..where did my itals go?
Also, glad you spilled the beans on your relative, Lea. His actions seem pretty heartless.
Wow, this is disgusting. So I guess this guy would get high fives from /r/mensrights.
I think the stupidity of the men’s rights redditors has liquefied my brain. I just got a huge nosebleed. My garbage can makes it appear as if I’ve tried to clean up after a crime scene. There is a lot of blood!
Watermelonsugar,
Do they also tell that stuff to veterans with PTSD?
*gag* They probably do.
Human rights movement, my ass. They’re Misogynist Rape Advocates and victim bashers.
Okay, here’s the thing…
Imagine you are in a situation where you see a child in danger.
Imagine interacting with that child will CERTAINLY have profound consequences for you. Dystopian post-apocalyptic Thunderdome consequences.
And NOT interacting with the child may get the kid killed.
…
…
I know I have a kind of messed up view on these things, but, fuck it, for a kid? I’ll go do Thunderdome. And I’ll do it with my head held high, because I did it to save a kid, right?
…
…
“Just keep walking”?
Men’s HUMAN rights activists, in a nutshell.
WWTH:
Best nosebleed tip is to lean forward, not back, when you apply pressure. Better to have a house that looks like a crime scene, than have to puke up blood that you accidentally swallow.
Blood puke looks like coffee grounds. Nasty. Pooping it out isn’t any more fun, because it looks like tar.
Oh, and seconding Howard, all the way.
Skye,
Thanks.
It was not one of his finer moments.
@Howard Bannister: Precisely!
@bunnybunny
Well, some of us need a lot of practice to get it just right. Me, for instance; I’m coming out the other side of menopause and I’m still in the ‘practice’ phase! ;p
@emilygoddess
Who can I contact about a scented fucking candle waiver? Or do I just have to own up to being a bad feminist cuz I have a sensitive schnoz and hate the things? I’m willing to double up on the misandrist hard chairs; I have extras in the garage…
More OT now: I work as a retail slave and lost kids are a common enough occurrence that we all have to had to deal with them; men and women alike. Kids are like adults in that they have preferences and asking questions like ‘do you want to come with me to the front of the store so we can call your mom?’ and ‘do you want to hold my hand while we walk up there?’ generally does the trick. If a child says no, we can call someone else (we all wear radios at work) to do an announcement and guide the parent to where we are. I have never been afraid to help a child, neither is anyone I work with. These guys are the living pits.
Lea:
I loved most of what you posted, but this graf stood out as a bit wide of the mark:
There’s a few too many class identifiers in there for me to be comfortable with it. The entitlement you so accurately describe is also found in highly educated, financially successful, champagne swilling, freshly showered at the gym white guys in conservative suits and slicked back hair. They may be slightly more adept at hiding it in mixed company, but let’s face it–rednecks are not the majority of rapists on college campuses; that role’s filled by the sons of the middle-class and higher, who have a cushy life waiting for them outside.
The toxic, misogynistic stew of our society permeates all levels. I suspect you are fully aware of that, but the quoted bit could be read as cutting it more narrowly.
************
Samantha:
Quoting the whole thing precisely because I think this is a good demonstration of how bad ideas slip in with good ones. The first two quotes from the DL are genuine wisdom. The third… is a bit too broad. Obviously, it’s true in some cases, but taken at face value as a universal declaration, it would blame people who are victimized by real trauma and oppression for being unhappy with their state of being. I’ve seen it reworded fairly regularly by MRAs, in fact, who argue that rape wouldn’t be ‘so bad’ for the victims if feminists didn’t insist on telling rape victims that they had been assaulted (ie, if we went back to pretending that date rape isn’t as bad as street rape).
Crotchdumpling crotchdumpling CROTCHDUMPLING!!!! This is my new favourite word. Hambeast is also kinda awesome – is this a beast that eats ham? Or a beast made out of ham?
“I know I have a kind of messed up view on these things, but, fuck it, for a kid? I’ll go do Thunderdome. And I’ll do it with my head held high, because I did it to save a kid, right?”
This one’s for you Howard.
I know crotchdumplings is meant to be demeaning but it actually sounds kind of cute? Soft and kind of round and a bit squishy, like a dumpling, or indeed a baby/small child.
What I’m saying is that MRAs can’t even do insults properly.
Once they try to get creative and do an insult other than bitch, c*nt or whore they get kind of lost.
As for helping lost kids, I was once out shopping with my mother and grandmother, who weren’t paying enough attention when a little girl asked for help finding her daddy, so I asked where she’d seen him last and what he was wearing (I was maybe 14, tops, I wasn’t exactly skilled in handling small kids, but thankfully this didn’t result in “I DON’T KNOW!! *tears*”) — before I’d managed to decide if he was gonna show up, or we should go make an announcement, I damn near got deafened by her screaming “DADDY!!” at the top of her lungs. Daddy heard, came rushing over, thanked me, all was again right in the world.
Number of times it crossed my mind something might happen to me? Once, as I’d ended up separated from my adults in the process! (I hung out by the registers until they showed up, no biggie)
I am entirely sure my brother would do the same, though it might be more awkward for him since he’s a hairy Italian guy and kids act like he’s a living teddy bear. I can’t imagine either of us just ignoring a kid in need, ever. At the absolute least you can stay with them and call for assistance, or at least call for assistance — even if you’re terrified that if mom comes and finds her little one sitting with you you’ll be accused of horrible things, at least alert people capable of aiding the kid.
But I’m the sort who picks up toys when kids drop them while their adult is shopping and smiles at babies. I cannot fathom being so callous to a kid as to not even say “hey, you’re gonna get hurt climbing like that” loud enough for the adult to turn before climbing kid falls. To actually be okay when the kid does get hurt, because hey, at least you aren’t in trouble? Please, do get that vasectomy, you should never be in charge of any kid, ever.
This list is a perfectly shows the wonders of this brave new human rights movement. /s
And it really shows what they are really all about. They can go on and on talking how they just want to help men and boys, but that’s just empty words.
I’m sure that from time to time people looking for help with genuine problems they have stumble into manosphere. And there might (I never seen them but then I haven’t seen Bigfoot either. Maybe they both exist) be some moderate MRA that are doing their best to help men.
But largest % of MRA are in only for themselves. MRA (and similar “movements”) are just a place for rage filled, bitter and hateful people to hang together. And to validate each other’s hatred.
They don’t want to help anybody. They just want to sit and yell about how they have reasons to hate feminists and to demand that feminists prove that they don’t hate men, by helping the people yelling at them and attacking them.
About door-holding, I don’t have any problems with people holding the doors for me. And I’m perfectly happy to hold the doors for others too.
But there is a big difference between holding the door out of politeness / desire to help somebody and holding the door as a demonstration of your “chivalry”.
If you open the doors in the same way and with same (lack of) expectations to everybody (a little old men, mom with children, men with a dog, women carrying bags and yes somebody you find attractive and wouldn’t mind talking with) then you’re golden.
But if you will only open the doors to people you find “hot” and do it in hopes that they will give you their phone number / talk with you / go on a date with you?
And if you get angry when they don’t react the way you think they should?
Then the problem is really not with the door holding. The problems is with you.
As a man, I interact with kids I don’t know all the time. I smile or wave when a child catches my eye in public. Just today I caught a charging toddler by the wrist because her mother was too far away and panicking as the kid ran towards the open door of a shop. I have never encountered any accusations or anger, rather parents are friendly towards me.
Now if I encountered a distressed child when no one else was around, I might want to protect myself as well as helping the child, perhaps by calling the police immediately and identifying myself. A young child who had been attacked might give confusing testimony and I would want to minimise the chance of suspicion falling on me. But not helping? I can’t imagine even some of the nastiest people I know walking past a child who needed help.
Jo — you just reminded me of my funniest recent “accidentally helped a kid/parent” moment — Boston aquarium I was gawking at the big center tank (it’s huge, and a thing of wonder), when a kid came running down the circular ramp around it and nearly ran into me as I was paying no attention to anything outside the tank. The kid’s moment of pause gave the adults a chance to catch up.
Wonder what the misters would have to say? Can’t get lost staring into an aquarium because a kid might run into you and the parents blame you? They must lead miserable lives. (Anyone near Boston, go to the aquarium, they’re done with the renovations and that tank really is a thing of wonder)
And this is why the RNLI are my heroes (whilst MRAs are not):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-28249667
In case it’s not clear, that first photo – that is a man running off a boat into the sea to save a drowning child. On only his second shout.