If the Men’s Rights movement is looking for a celebrity endorser, I think I’ve found just the guy for them: the mixed martial arts fighter, and erstwhile porn actor, War Machine, currently sitting in jail on charges of brutally beating and attempting to kill his ex-girlfriend, porn star Christy Mack.
Men’s Rights activists should be able to look past these criminal charges; after all, as they remind us all the time, women are forever falsely accusing innocent men of all sorts of terrible things.
And in so many ways War Machine is perfect for them. An MMA fighter, he’s already only one letter away from being an MRA. A misogynistic asshole with rage issues, he’ll have no trouble fitting in with the Men’s Rights crowd. And, especialy important for a movement that has a lot of trouble getting any good PR, he’s a bit more comfortable on camera than the Paul Elams and Dean Esmays of the world, with experience on television (on the reality show The Ultimate Fighter: Team Hughes vs. Team Serra), and in seven films (albeit pornographic ones).
Best of all: he’ll need no ideological education from what A Voice for Men likes to call Fuck Shit Up University. War Machine – real name Jonathan Koppenhaver – is already an outspoken proponent of many of the Men’s Rights Movement’s core beliefs.
Consider these selections from a little Men’s Rights manifesto War Machine wrote a few years ago during a previous stint behind bars, serving time for felony assault after two bloody bar fights. His rant, which a friend posted to the internet, would fit right in with the sort of stuff we’ve seen regularly posted on the Men’s Rights subreddit, or The Spearhead, or A Voice for Men. I’ve bolded some of the Men’s Rightsiest bits:
The oppression of MEN is worse than oppression of Jews in Nazi germany, worse than the slavery of Blacks in early America…
There has always been the oppressor and always the oppressed. Before, it was blatant … NOW the oppressor has learned to disguise his evil. You can see man, but you can not see MEN. How easy it is to oppress a minority that is invisible to the eye! How genius of the oppressor! And what a better target too! …
Men challenge injustice from Government, MEN fight for their Constitutional rights, that are slowly being taken away every year. …
And they don’t just oppress us by making more laws and taking away more freedom, they are far more clever than that! Ask yourself what your REAL dream was?? If you gave up on this dream, why? Because of the brainwashing of the Government, that’s why! They taught you to “play it safe.” They told us a responsible man has ONE wife, a house, good credit, good job, and kids. How are you supposed to chase your dreams while maintaining all of that!?
Men are supposed to take risks and be aggressive! What accomplishments have ever come of a man scared to risk it all!? None!? Where would the world be? Still ‘flat!’ Still ‘Earth at the center of the universe!’
If any of you have your Men’s Rights Bingo cards out, I’m guessing you might already be close to scoring a bingo. We’ve got a comparison to slavery that could have come straight from the pages of A Voice for Men, a marriage-is-death-to-male-dreams rant that could have been borrowed from any MGTOW forum, and an evo-psych-esque argument that men are the true risk-takers and the world’s real innovators.
And I don’t think War Machine would have much trouble with Paul Elam’s “Bash a Violent Bitch Month,” either.
[I]t’s Christmas day and I’m laying in my bunk wondering “Why in the hell do American men get married!?” … If your wife is being a bitch you can’t slap her, if your wife is yelling at you, God forbid you yell back … Next thing you know it will be illegal to fuck your wife! LMAO! Maybe then, MEN in this country will get the fucking hint and MOVE! This country forces you to be a bitch!
In another online posting, War Machine touched on another Men’s Rights hobbyhorse, the notion that the justice system is stacked against men:
[L]ook at the prisons, they are FULL of MEN, not women. Are men “evil” and women not? Or do the laws target and attempt to restrict NATURAL MEN’S BEHAVIOR? How many of the HEROES in American history would avoid prison if they lived today? Davey Crockett? Thomas Jefferson? David Bowie? General Grant & General Lee? Shit, George Washington. … Laws target MEN and men’s behavior. Women want to bitch and cry about their rights and equality… LMAO! MEN are the ones locked away like animals, while women run free!
Someone might have to explain to War Machine that David Bowie is not actually a famous American HERO but a famously androgynous British musician who once recorded an album called “Heroes.” (Mr. Machine may be thinking of James Bowie, a well-known 19th century American frontiersman and slave trader, and the guy the Bowie Knife is named after.)
But other than that, he seems ready to go.
There is, of course, that whole attempted murder charge to deal with.
It’s true the Men’s Rights Movement has had few problems in the past rallying behind men with histories of violence. But War Machine might be a harder sell as a Men’s Rights hero. His alleged attack on Mack left her with a cracked rib, a ruptured liver, numerous broken bones, missing teeth and her eyes swollen shut. (See here for photos of her injuries; obviously this link is NSFW and could be triggering.)
While Mr. Machine denies attacking Mack, he joked to a TV host last year that if she were to leave him “I would just kill her” and get a tattoo saying “Rest In Peace” above the tattoo of her name he has on his neck.
And several hours after allegedly trying to murder her, War Machine tweeted this lovely message about his ex:
https://twitter.com/WarMachine170/statuses/497663075831787521
War Machine does seem to be at a low point in his life. Even aside from the charges he faces, and the time he seems likely to serve, his career in porn is almost certainly over. The “Alpha Male” clothing line he helped start wants nothing to do with him. Nobody but the prison system seems to want this guy.
In other words: Men’s Rights activists, this is your chance! War Machine may not be the, er, hero you want. But he’s certainly the hero you deserve.
But with that, I’m happy to drop it.
Trans lesbian here, again.
@BigMomma “Someone said why are we asking individuals to examine their preferences and not taking society to task?”
I did that, actually. I think the uncomfortable implication people have been glossing over is that individuals are part of society–even minorities. This kind of rhetoric seems to self-Other the Queer community, like we ourselves do not form a society, or that we don’t have a broader society interacting with us. It’s us vs. them with this kind of question.
To examine one means examining the other. No matter how self-aware you are, you’re still a product of your culture, as well as a product of your biology, so even if you identify a problematic pattern in others, and try to communicate that, there exists the very real possibility that you, yourself, have been informed by that pattern.
When it comes to sexual attraction of transfolk, there’s one thing to bear in mind. We’re exposed to boys and girls, strictly one or the other, from a young age. We’re exposed to varying details of sexuality in our development. We form a fairly accurate idea, early on, of who we’re attracted to… but we don’t learn about gender variance until later in life. That is something you have likely experienced, as an individual, because of expectations from society. So transfolk are usually cut out of the picture entirely during development, and the few times we are depicted in media… well, I’m sure ya’ll know the rest.
It’s like, if a girl starts out puberty thinking she likes boys, because that’s what media and her parents and her friends tell her to do, why is it okay for her to figure out she’s gay later on–what changes when we introduce transfolk into the equation? I’m genuinely asking. Is it because we’re doing it post puberty? Doesn’t make sense, some people have a mid-life crisis of realizing they’re gay (see the Premeire of Ontario. Oh, Canada effeminate man -> metro -> genderqueer -> trans”, though GQ isn’t always transitory and I don’t assume anyone calling themselves that has “yet to pick a side”. nonsense).
Also vis-a-vis the strap on thing… in my case, because it’s something lesbians actually do, it would likely just validate my sexual identity. I don’t know for sure, because I have neither a girlfriend nor a strap on, but picturing it in my head… yeah, imaginary!me is giggling from the irony, but still in to it.
And as I and others have said repeatedly, we are not just talking about discussions we’ve seen here.
Ack, looks like a portion of my comment was ate by the data vampires. I have to go to work, I’ll be back in a half day to discuss.
Coffee — true enough, and I didn’t even know that I didn’t have to “pick a side” until I was 27 or so — and queer politics are not new to me! By 27, the vast majority of people know who they’re interested in. And yeah, that being shaped by culture is damned likely, but rather unchangeable on an individual level. So, for me at least, when I say change cultural standards, not individual preferences, or anything with that dichotomy, I guess I’m more going for pushing the idea that trans people can be attractive and suitable partners and not the laughingstock media bullshit, as opposed to anything implying that someone, in particular, not an abstract someone, could be attracted to a trans person if…
Because asking lesbians to examine their preferences, well, they get that enough without getting it in queer circles too. Dicuss how we can work together to change things though? Always.
Honestly, parts of coffee’s comment still feel uncomfortably close to “your preferences would be different if your socialization had been different”, which a. you can’t actually assume that and b. even if you could, that doesn’t mean the person’s preferences as they are now can or should change. It feels like people really, really don’t want to accept the idea that hey, maybe some lesbians just plain do not like cock and that’s just how their sexuality is.
It’s much better than the version of this argument making the rounds on Tumblr, but I’m not convinced that it’s philosophically all that different.
Just wanted to say that I have been here for about 6 months, and I haven’t been reading or posting here like I was in the beginning because of several of the issues being presented in this thread. I can’t even believe all this has come up because it is exactly what I’ve been thinking and feeling for months.
I totally get that some people have been through hell and back and I am not opposed to providing support, but I really think that in-depth personal lives/problems should be limited to certain threads, or its own thread. I have my own trigger issues and it is impossible to avoid certain triggers when people are constantly dragging their trials and tribulations through most threads; to be repeated continuously every time a new troll shows up or a new member starts posting. I’m not referring to simple, short examples to illustrate a point. I’m talking about heavy, in-depth, step by step descriptions. I’m sincerely not trying to be insensitive, but people should have the option of participating in something of that nature. It’s too hard to avoid when it’s everywhere.
And speaking of triggers, I take 100% responsibility of mine and don’t expect anyone or any thread to cater to it. When something comes up that is tough for me, I leave, at least that thread. I really believe that it should be expected here that people take responsibility for their own emotional/mental health. It bothers me to no end to see people purposefully ignoring trigger warnings and then whining about how they are triggered and shouldn’t have read it. We’re all big people here and that shouldn’t be happening.
Finally, I know that it is very difficult for oppressed groups to deal with not being heard in this world.That said, not every topic is about every group of people, oppressed or not. An example would be a thread involving an MRA troll and their relationship/attractions to women. To insert, “What about (insert oppressed group that MRAs would not be attracted to) and derailing the thread is inappropriate. Most people realize that not everything is about them, but a few need to consider it.
Just wanted my say. Carry on.
I hadn’t even thought of the issue of personal comments in general threads possibly introducing triggering stuff that people might be able to avoid more easily if that stuff was kept to the personal threads, but that is an excellent point.
Well, I’m really glad things are settling down around here. Glad you’re staying Kittehs and Marinerachel. Cassandra, if there was going to be a backlash against you, I think at this point it would have already happened. What I’m saying is you should definitely stay 😀
I’m also learning a little bit more about why tumblr is so maligned. I only visit a handful of sites that I like, don’t have an account and don’t follow any social justice sights that have contentious arguments so I didn’t really know. I mostly just don’t have an account because I don’t like the format very much.
Whoever designed the format for Tumblr should be fired. Were they high?
TMI WARNING
Can confirm in my case that pretty much it. I knew I was different at some unspecified early age but knew I was a lesbian for sure by 10th grade. I didn’t date in high school and made a brief attempt at having a boyfriend as a freshmen in college.
The guy I dated was super sweet, attractive and we got along great to the point that I thought we had “chemistry”. The kissing was nice, but the one aborted attempted we made at sex was disaster for me because It was the first time I interacted with penis and, oh boy, it was a complete turn off and it made it painfully clear I had no interest in penises. Later that year I found I had a plenty of enthusiasm for vaginas and never looked back.
I’ve found men attractive but have no interest in getting naked with then because I have zero interest in their genitalia. I love a ton of things about women when I interact with them in life, but in bed genitals do matter to me.
Women who don’t like penis at all is pretty rare since most women are heterosexual and more women are bisexual then lesbian. This has led to all sorts of theories that their is something wrong with us, that we had bad experiences men or bad parenting (see gay reparative or conversion therapy for the fun details of those theories).
I know my fucking sexuality, it hasn’t changes in thirty years. I’ve worked through homophobia, including two suicide attempts, depression, anxiety and shame, and now have become comfortable with who I am. I wasn’t shaped by media representation of lesbian sexuality, because I grew up in the 1980s and other than a few books I furtively pored over, I saw barely any media representation of lesbian sex until after I knew I was gay. I saw more then all the generations of lesbians who came before me through out the world, but that’s not saying much.
So I’m not too enthused by strangers, often a whole lot younger then me, telling me I haven’t examined the “problematic patterns” in my sexuality. I don’t need people trying to shame me into some sham conscious-raising self flagellation. How about examining your homophobia and the misogynic ideas you have about there being a “correct” or “superior” way for women to describe their sexuality, to feel attraction and have sex?
Fuck you for your new spin on “love the sinner, hate the sin” and self-righteousness in policing lesbian sexuality.
This is part of the point I keep trying to make. In their zeal to protect one marginalized group (trans women) a whole lot of people are quite enthusiastically pissing all over the boundaries of another marginalized group (cis lesbians). This is not OK.
@WWTH
I agree that it was nice how things calmed down, so maybe my rant isn’t well timed but I was pretty set off by Coffee’s comments. I didn’t mean to resume the drama, but I don’t like being lectured about my sexuality (obviously).
I hear you and I respect your position, cloudiah.
I’m actually not quite happy to drop it just yet, though I am open to the idea that I’m coming into this long after other folk have maybe already been wrestling with it for a while and are tired and bruised and ready for it to be off the table. And I want to be clear that I’m not writing from a position where I feel I have it all worked out; I’m kinda still thinking in motion on this, and honestly my brain is working so badly right now that it feels like I am walking about in a fog. I’m not sure if I am being clear at all, because it seems like a twisted pile in my head that still really needs to be untangled and examined.
For me, the question at hand was not necessarily whether Ally’s position was being mischaracterized or not (although I take the point that she and you felt that it was), but rather the deeper assertion at play about authority and propriety. I am specifically concerned with the idea that topics are put out of bounds because of the sensibilities of those concerned will not permit any disagreement or even discussion, no matter how respectful (and no matter how the issues themselves call for thinking).
Yes, I acknowledge that some issues and ideas are deeply painful for some people, and yes I wholeheartedly agree that we have an obligation to be decent when they are discussed, AND ESPECIALLY that some stances are as close to indefensible as is possible to be. And I acknowledge that there some domains where experience does grant authority: I would never presume to dictate how someone should respond to trauma, or address the implications of systematic discrimination on their own lives and communities.
But that wasn’t what I read going on there. What I saw was one person taking the position that because an issue affected them, they got to dictate the terms of the discussion and to establish the propriety of all the other positions, even when it also affected those other perspectives, and then becoming incensed and resorting to what I read as pretty over the top assertions of fundamental bad faith in their reasoning (while I acknowledge that she felt attacked, I still can’t quite process the assertion that cassandrakitty was calling Ally either a rapist or a rape apologist).
I hate to make this about Ally when she’s not here to participate, but the difficulty I was finding was that it seemed perfectly reasonable (not to mention incredibly generous and in no small measure brave) to speak from her position as a transwoman and her struggles with social and interpersonal pressures, but that it felt highly problematic when she sought to dictate other’s experience (‘lesbians must be acting out of transmisogyny because I am clearly acting in good faith and from the pain of my experience and I know I mean well’) and then to assert that any pushback against this position could only be because of further transmisogyny.
The part I had the hardest time was the implicit idea (which was not incidental, it was repeated multiple times), that lesbians own experience of their sexuality and desire was up for negotiation based on terms imposed by the trans lesbian community. Yes, society is shitty when it comes to non traditional gender and sexual roles, but you get to negotiate your own, not those of others. Yes, you get to call yourself female or male or neither or whatever, according to your own understanding of your identity, and I would never presume, and would stand firmly by your side against anyone who tries to call that into question or shame you or oppose your construction on any lines but you do not get to dictate other’s identity.
Identify yourself as female (or male or pan or whatever seems most vital to you) if that’s how you understand yourself and I will face violence to stand in support of you. But you cross the line if you insist that because you are female, I am required (at the risk of shame and coercive, abusive behaviour) to find your expression of female-ness sexually desirable. Which is not to say that I might not; I personally am attracted to a whole range of types of people in general, but no one person has the right to dictate that I should, that I MUST be attracted to their version of that identity. We can talk about the complexities of desire (it is after all a fascinating topic) but you do not have the right to require me (or anyone else) to justify my desire to you nor are you permitted to shame me into conforming to your expectations or even your hopes for my desire.
Honestly, seeing people who’ve felt like they have to hold their tongues for a long time finally feel able to rant is making me feel a lot more inclined to stay.
Dear dog am I thick today. I usually can think and write pretty cogently and quickly, but I feel like I’m running uphill through molasses lately.
You’re good! I didn’t mean people shouldn’t get to rant when they need to. I just meant I was glad that a mass exodus doesn’t seem to be occurring.
Not being sexually interested in penises, or in a specific subset of women, is not “problematic”. People are allowed to have preferences and boundaries, even if those preferences and boundaries mean that they are not sexually available to other people. Women are not required to center our sexualities around making sure that we are potentially available to anyone who might be sexually interested in us.
@gillyrosebee, No, I think you were clear and it was a thoughtful comment, which I appreciate. I just disagree that she was trying to dictate the terms of the debate. Clearly people disagree with me, which is fine.
I do understand there is a segment of the trans community that argues this, and I agree that it is wrong. In fact more broadly, lesbians’ own experience of their sexuality and desire is not up for negotiation, shaming, or coercion by anybody. If I’ve said anything that implies otherwise, then I apologize and hereby issue a correction. (I don’t think I did, but just in case.)
^This.
What I find interesting is not just that straight men aren’t asked to have sex with trans women with penises whether they want to or not the way cis lesbians are. Straight women aren’t that I’ve seen asked to consider having sex with trans men who have vaginas. We are asked to fuck straight cis men we aren’t interested in. But not as far as I can tell trans men.
I do have to wonder if it’s some sort of penis supremacy that’s related to overall male supremacy in our culture.
At the risk of setting off the biggest firestorm in the history of this blog just as things are calming down, look at the socialization the people doing the demanding received versus the socialization the people who are not making demands received and you will have your answer.
No, cloudiah, I wasn’t getting that from you, I was objecting to that line of thought within the discussion and framing of the “cotton ceiling” and the sense (again, not specifically from you) that trying to discuss that underlying tension was off the table on pain of being declared a transmisogynist or a TERF.
So, no apology or correction needed, and I am personally much comforted by the ability to have a much lower temperature exchange on the elements of this that were problematic.
How about a nice game of chess?
Or would anyone like to share their wailing and lamentation at not being able to be at one of Kate Bush’s comeback concerts? I’ve decided to console myself with listening to ALL THE ALBUMS today.
I’m down for chess. Can’t promise I’ll be much of an opponent, since I’m sort of running on a massive sinus infection and spent all day binge-watching Leverage, eating cake and scribbling inane shadowrun related notes.
@cassandrakitty:
I… don’t get it. People socialized to expect their assumptions to be bedrock reality would be inclined to assume that other people’s boundaries are not boundaries ,but negotiable borders that might, with some poking and prodding, be amenable to some slackening of the importation requirements?
That doesn’t sound too off.
To be clear, I am not at all saying that women with penises are men with male privilege. What I’m saying is that our culture associates penises with being male and that is why in a patriarchy the penis is the one body part that must always be kept happy no matter what gender the penis haver is. Vaginas are not prioritized in the same way, again, no matter what the gender of the vagina haver is because vaginas in our culture = female.