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.
Re: the word TERF. I get why it is used, but I don’t use it. The majority of them are a) women (an oppressed group) and b) lesbians (an oppressed minority group), and they have repeatedly stated they hate being referred to as TERFs. For me, when any oppressed group states they consider a certain term a slur, I won’t use it.
Also, nobody should be threatening to kill people because of their political views, no matter how awful you think those views are. No, not even if the people doing the threatening are teenagers. Tumblr needs to stop that, and the adults who interact with those kids need to socialize them better.
Confession time — a poster here innocently misunderstood the term “misogyn-noir” (they didn’t know the true meaning) and said it sounded pretty. I then watched in horror as another poster jumped up their ass and told them they were a complete piece of shit for doing that. I should have jumped in and suggested the first poster just made an innocent mistake, but I didn’t. I was frozen. I didn’t know what to say.
*Hugs* if LBT wants them, and I’m really glad he hasn’t left.
Shiraz: I must have missed that, but I’m sure Ally went ballistic over it.
LBT: I’m so sorry to hear you’re not doing well. If you need anything, holler!
I’ve pretty much come around to that way of thinking recently, Puddleglum. Not least when I read one woman’s comment that her group is about centring women, and yes, by that she means born women, and their concerns. If those concerns don’t happen to be the same as trans women’s, that’s just the way it is, and they are not playing second fiddle to another group the way they have to all the time elsewhere.
I made the same mistake of not speaking up, Shiraz. Yes, the poster’s used of it made me cringe a bit, but it was an innocent mistake.
I think so, yes. Probably while announcing (again) she’s a womanist, not a feminist, y’all. (Anyone else seeing the word appropriation popping up here?)
Do you mean me? Cuz I did reply to that, but I tried to assume a good faith mistake and take my usual “can we not?” approach to my reply. I do recall Ally said something as well though, so you probably mean her huh?
And, um, Katz? Are you in California? Cuz, uh, I don’t know how to put this that won’t hurt, but axolotls are illegal in CA and NJ. Not that they’d survive in the wild there, so it’s weird, but yeah…I’m sorry.
Yes.
QFFT, please to tell Tea Party Republicans and those rightward of same on the political spectrum this.
I don’t remember who made the first comment about “misogyn-noir,” Argenti. I just remember Ally shredding the person who made the initial faux pas.
Shiraz, iirc, Ally brought up the term, someone said it sounded pretty, I tried to gently point out why they prolly shouldn’t be saying what they were, and then yeah, Ally replied.
And, predictably, I didn’t want her launching into me, so I kept my mouth shut, as it were.
Likewise, Argenti: I didn’t recall who else was involved, but of course it would turn into another installment of the usual All About show.
I don’t care where on the political spectrum people are, or whether I’m generally in agreement with them or not – if you’re issuing death threats over political disagreements (or, even worse, disagreements about what terminology is more correct) then you have jumped the damn shark and are in need of a “look at your life, look at your choices” moment.
Curious, isn’t it: someone who painted herself as the eternal damsel in distress sure had a lot of people afraid to say anything disagreeing with her.
Oh! Thanks for clarifying. 🙂
Jesus, we were both intimidated. Well, we’ll all do better next time. Night all.
Niters, Shiraz!
Okay, so obviously we need a way to address when you have a problem with someone’s behavior that neither sounds like you’re silencing them nor allows them to silence you.
(I’m not going to ask people to stop talking about Ally, because we need to share how we feel, but it would have been better if we could have talked about these things with Ally so that we could have gotten it all sorted and avoided a fight.)
Katz: I completely agree with you about fixing the dynamic, but I don’t think Ally would have listened to any constructive criticism. I’m not sure it could have been sorted without a fight.
I don’t know either; I do know that some of these subjects were breached with her before to not much effect. But she’s young and still growing and developing as a person.
Yeah, Ally was on an escalating pattern of behaviour here. More and more control of what people could say, more and more centring every last thread about herself, or drawing attention away from other people’s problems (you have cancer/are having an operation/lost your job? Yes but someone was rude to me today!) I don’t think it’s just that she’s young, or has had major troubles; I’m seeing serious narcissism there.
This thing where people are making excuses for that is part of the problem, honestly.
Very true. The habit of kindness and support for a victimised person made it hard for many – including me – to see for a long while just how manipulative that person was being. I was seeing what I could only call appropriation on some issues, and a whole lot of pushing boundaries. Centring herself in any comments about the attacks on Gaza, then popping up with a picture of a PLO terrorist as her avatar? That’s fucking creepy.
Remember Cliff’s post about the missing stair? That’s what was happening here. Let’s not let it happen again.
Eh.
Possibly! I’m inclined to assume a lack of positive affection elsewhere leading to a massive grasping of the few places where available. I’ve been there.
It sucks, and escalates. Appreciation is a hell of a drug.
Since this seems to have shifted into an airing of sort of thread, I’d like to issue a general apology if I’ve sniped at someone. I realize, thinking about it, that I’m never quite sure how to phrase possible objections, and might fuck it up astoundingly and get really longwinded and snippy.
Anyhow, I think some of the problem is a general overflow from the subject matter. We try yo be as great as we can, and we already have a position of opposition and derision against general MRA thought decisions, so other stuff might accidentally get the same sort of treatment by default.
Maybe we should add it to the glorious welcome package – “remember,
You Can Disagree”
The missing stair! Damn, yes, that is exactly what was happening.
Fibi, if you’ve ever sniped at me 1) I don’t remember it and 2) it’s no prob if you did ‘cos 3) it was either a misunderstanding or 4) I had it coming. But I don’t think you have, anyways.