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Men's Rights Redditor: Let's convince the world that we aren't violent by sending feminists bloody feathers

Hat of choice for the discerning Men's Rights Activist
Hat of choice for the discerning Men’s Rights Activist

Men’s Rights Activists have become known, not without reason, as belligerent assholes whose main forms of “activism” consist of harassment and threats.

One bold Men’s Rights Redditor known as El Rellok thinks he’s come up with a way to counteract this perception and deliver a powerful men’s-rightsty message at the same time.

He wants MRAs to send feminists … pictures of bloody feathers. No, really.

Now, to most people, getting a bloody feather in your email inbox would seem to be the digital equivalent of having a bloody horse’s head left in your bed. But in El Rellok’s world it is a rational and reasonable way to express “outrage” at feminist evil, and anyone who might possibly think otherwise is by definition unreasonable.

Let’s let him explain, because I certainly can’t explain how sending pictures of bloody feathers to someone you hate could be construed as anything but threatening:

The idea that men are violent, rather then the primary victims of violence, is being used to discredit men’s issues.

Well, actually, what’s being used to discredit the so-called Men’s Rights Movement is the simple fact that its members don’t seem to know how to engage in any kind of “activism” besides harassing individual women.

It is glaringly obvious that we need a method of clearly expressing unbounded outrage that cannot be construed as a threat by any reasonable person.

I don’t know that expressing “unbounded outrage” is really the most important goal for any activist movement, but the part about saying things that aren’t threatening sounds good to me.

Gentlemen (and ladies) i propose The Red Feather Campaign.

To paraphrase Groucho Marx, why a feather?

None here should be unfamiliar with the “white feather girls”.[1] , one of the most craven and deplorable pro war campaigns in human history.

In case you aren’t completely up-to-date with all Men;s Rights hobbyhorses, he’s referring to the Order of the White Feather. Founded in Britain at the start of World War I, this was a group of women that hoped to shame men into enlisting by presenting them with white feathers, a symbol of cowardice.

Though the White Feather campaign happened literally a hundred years ago, at a time when the general public in Britain and elsewhere was rabidly pro-war, and thought it hardly won universal support from the suffragettes of the day, MRAs like El Rellok have turned it into a symbol of the intrinsic evil that lurks in the hearts of feminists today.

The white feather campaign was about mens obligation to sacrifice to women, a socially imposed gender role. Feminists, while declaring their total reprobation for all gendered roles, continue to demand that men sacrifice for women by ceding anything described as privilege, regardless of whether the “Privilege” is earned, a “Privilege” at all, or whether a society without the thing described as a “Privilege” can be understood as just ….

Sorry, I nodded off in the middle of that. He finally gets to the point:

SO, I propose we return to them their feathers covered in the blood of the men mercilessly and ruinously sacrificed to their agenda.

Well, he doesn’t mean this literally – he means PICTURES of feathers that look like they’re covered in blood – but we’ll get to that in a minute.

We make this present with the following message.

“This blood is not your blood. To think it is, is a refraction only of your narcissism. This is the blood of men, sacrificed to females, by females, for generation upon generation. When you speak of sacrifice, before our eyes flash visions of bayonets, within our nostrils the waft of trenches, our ears recall the scream of artillery coming to shred our bodies. That is what sacrifice means to men; agony, suffering, death. This feather is a reminder of your inhumanity towards men, your lack of compassion and understanding, and your hypocrisy in declaring gender roles obsolete while commanding men to fulfill the most destructive of all gender roles, the gender who gets sacrificed.”

I dunno about you, but this is creepy as fuck. And more than a little threatening.

Why this tactic? First, the consistent theme seen presented by SJW/feminists is that men are “Violent oppressors who refuse to compromise.” This meme makes clear that it is not us being oppressive, and that the compromise being asked is not just.

Yeah, sending women pictures of bloody feathers accompanied by an over-the-top mini-manifesto charging them with narcissism and cruelty and blaming them for all the death and misery of war (and who knows what else) is definitely going to convince the world that you’re not violent creeps.

By turning the oppression meme around upon the feminists, it creates equal footing in the debate space.

Yes, that’s right, he thinks the way to win the debate is to quite literally argue “nuh-uh, you are!”

Second, it supplants the current “MRA send death threats” meme. MRA’s do not send death threats, MRA’s send pictures of blood covered feathers.

I’m sorry, what?

MRA’s do not send death threats, MRA’s send pictures of blood covered feathers.

That’s what I thought you said. You people really don’t understand how PR works, do you?

If your message does not include said feather, that was not an MRA, as anyone who understands the MRA position would understand the symbolism and necessity of the red feather campaign.

Yes, that’s right, a woman getting El Rellok’s unhinged message along with a picture of a feather drenched in blood is going to say, ah, yes, this isn’t a threat. This is a Men’s Rights meme, and a perfectly rational conversation-starter on the important topic of why women deserve blame for all the wars in the world because a small number of women in Britain in World War I handed out feathers to men who weren’t enlisted.

Third, it allows us to fracture the feminist movement and more clearly identify those feminists who actually want equality and are just being blind, from those feminists who are actually misanderist (i use that term hesitantly, but as i have not had time to create a new term to describe my view of this branch of feminism, so it is necessary). If we can separate the equality feminists from the misandarists, then we can actually start working with reasonable people to begin wide scale social reform on gender issues.

Trust me, any woman who sees your message as anything but the unhinged rantings of a possibly dangerous crackpot is not any kind of feminist.

Depending upon the response I get here, the above shall be sent to AVFM with a proposal for a “Feather Drive” asking submissions of drawings of bloody feathers we can then use.

This, El Rellok’s concluding sentence, is also the first sentence of his that makes any kind of sense. This sounds right up A Voice for Men’s alley.

In a followup comment, directed at MRAs who weren’t completely convinced that sending pics of bloody feathers is the best way forward for the troubled Men’s Rights Movement, he added:

OK, There are multiple people Doxxing and sending threats to feminists (and others). We need a way to signify that this IS NOT US. We need a way to signify this IS NOT US while still sending a reply of some form. Sending death threats is not useful, and no, sending a picture of a feather with a message clearly stating it is about mens sacrafice is a threat only to people who would percieve any responce at all to be a threat. So unless you are saying we just need to grovel before our new feminist over lords, tell me what the hell else we do. DO you understand the concept that feminism is not simply going to go away if you ignore them? We need a symbol representing male disposability, to counter arguements that we are privilege defending mysoginists. And it needs to be a historically poinant one, or its not going to stick.

Yeah, good luck with that.

Also, have you ever heard of spellcheck?

 

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contrapangloss
10 years ago

I didn’t know about the Pig war.

That is… hilarious beyond words. Also, really, really sad and kind of pathetic. But… hilarious.

“Keep your pig out of my potatoes!”
“Keep your potatoes out of my pig!”

5 warships, a group of infantry, and lots of sitting around later

12 years later, no actual shots fired except those at the pig…

Sad, but funny.

kittehserf - MOD
10 years ago

Well, I don’t know about all men. I have flashbacks to the Seven Years’s War, for some reason.

Pfft! I have flashbacks to the Thirty Years’ War, you whippersnapper, and I am a mere feeeemale!

… and I see I was long since beaten to that joke. Oh well, I’m leaving it there, any chance to throw in another bit of history.

What does this armchair warrior know of ‘agony, suffering and death’?

Hey, sitting around in an armchair all day plays merry hell with the hips y’know, and that guy’s back probably really hurts after a while.

Isn’t it obvious? A blood feather is blood on a typically white, absorbent object.

Therefore it clearly is a metaphor for menstruation.

Imagine how they’d shriek if someone sent them a picture of a used pad in response.

Nequam
Nequam
10 years ago

… wait, are they sending out actual feathers or picspam? I thought they were just email spamming, which is why I noted I’d probably laugh derisively and report it to my ISP.

thebewilderness
thebewilderness
10 years ago

Feathers are one of my favorite things to paint. However I paint the feather images on the silk not the images on the feather.

Belladonna993
Belladonna993
10 years ago

Therefore it clearly is a metaphor for menstruation.

See, he knew you’d go there. That’s why he was so careful to say that “this is not your blood.” You “refractive” narcissist, you!

kittehserf - MOD
10 years ago

Oooh, you paint feathers, thebewilderness? Have you any pics you’d like to share?

kittehserf - MOD
10 years ago

This seems an appropriate spot to post Cole the Black Cat’s latest video.

http://youtu.be/eBnpgWWS_Vg

thebewilderness
thebewilderness
10 years ago

I am sorry I do not at this time kitteh. All the pics are hard copy and the copy/scanner is daid.

Shaenon
10 years ago

feeeemaaaales

FEEEEEEEEEEEMAAAAAAAAAAAAALES

Matthew Cline
Matthew Cline
10 years ago

He recruited young ladies to hand out the feathers to any men in the streets who weren’t in uniform.The government had to issue a badge to civilians to identify them as doing war work, to spare them from this public harassment.

Pffft, who needs wimpy things like logistics? If every single man was on the frontlines being manly men then they could create weapons and food out of the thin air!

Boogerghost
Boogerghost
10 years ago

I don’t agree that the memes are threatening, unless they make it look like they’ve got your pet bird hostage or something, but they ARE bloody asinine, inaccurate, and irrelevant. Some poor Twitter user’s going to mention a movie not passing the Bechdel test and the response will be “YOU PEOPLE KILLED FRANZ FERDINAND! AND ALL THE JEWS! WHO WE ALL KNOW WERE PRIMARILY MEN!!” And even though it’s not phrased as insanely as that, I think the appropriated tone of pseudo-poeticness almost makes it worse.

Also, isn’t it pretty presumptuous of El Rellok to say anything not under the (bloody) wing of his cute little symbol campaign couldn’t possibly be from an MRA? If I were an MRA, I’d be like, “who put this guy in charge?”

@ (all above menstruation talk) lol

Nitram
Nitram
10 years ago

Regarding all things considered giving MRM more credence than deserved, I think it may be where they just don’t know better. I gave the movement the benefit of the doubt at first before figuring out what they were really about. Kind of like the CAFE concert managing to fool a few bands to play before they realized what “equality” concert really was.

Then again, I’m not a journalist for NPR doing a report so that’s probably not a good excuse for them.

Nitram
Nitram
10 years ago

Woops, wrong thread!

Bina
Bina
10 years ago

This blood is not your blood. To think it is, is a refraction only of your narcissism.

Oh, oh…a “refraction” of my narcissism, is it? Does that mean I get to fart rainbows and poop candy-colored marshmallows, like a real live unicorn?

This is the blood of men, sacrificed to females, by females, for generation upon generation.

Really? Why did they never teach us this in history class? Oh yeah: BECAUSE IT NEVER HAPPENED. But then, I guess these guys will never clue in to their real oppressors. Stooges of capitalism and imperialism (which are both overwhelmingly male-dominated fields) never do…

When you speak of sacrifice, before our eyes flash visions of bayonets, within our nostrils the waft of trenches, our ears recall the scream of artillery coming to shred our bodies.

Oh myyyyy. Nothing like the 101st Flying Keyboard Monkeys for high-flown rhetoric that shrieks and rains poo on the hapless masses!

This feather is a reminder of your inhumanity towards men, your lack of compassion and understanding, and your hypocrisy in declaring gender roles obsolete while commanding men to fulfill the most destructive of all gender roles, the gender who gets sacrificed.

Actually, that feather is a reminder of what’s in yer head. Besides fecal matter and smelly straw, of course. Dude, you’re a bloody featherhead. Is “El Rellok” Arabic for “Teh Stoopid”, perchance?

Belladonna993
Belladonna993
10 years ago

@Bina

I think I love you.

Bina
Bina
10 years ago

Awww >blush< thanks. Although I do think I may have insulted flying monkeys in there somewhere.

Belladonna993
Belladonna993
10 years ago

Well, you know, I read that book, and flying monkeys started out as really scary bullies. Except it turned out they were just slaves. So Dorothy gave their hat back. But in the original illustrations, it didn’t look anything like a fedora.

Bina
Bina
10 years ago

That’s right! How ironic, too.

A pity for this dude’s metaphors that keyboards generally don’t give off a horrifying smell reminiscent of wars past…although if I had to guess at the scent of his, I’d say it was a delicate bouquet of flop sweat, rage-wanked semen, and Cheeto dust.

Nova
Nova
10 years ago

@Katz: She was a Soviet army sniper. And an incredibly good one.

redpoppy
redpoppy
10 years ago

*sings* He stuck a bloody feather in his cap and called it Men’s Rights-aroni!

redpoppy
redpoppy
10 years ago

Actually….that cap should be a fedora. But that’s a lot of syllables for the melody.

Belladonna993
Belladonna993
10 years ago

@redpoppy Oh, you made me laugh (Bina did, too) too bad fedora just doesn’t scan there. Maybe we need more.

Fedora doodle went to Reddit
Just to ride a brony
Stuck a feather in his cap
And called it misandrony

(Misandrony is as close as any spelling El Rellok got, right?)

redpoppy
redpoppy
10 years ago

Hahah that’s awesome Belladonna. We need some sort of dumb anthem for them. Though many have already made some. I know kirbywarp has made a song or two. Or a poem or two. I rather like the comeback of “whoa there, brony-friendzoni.” Even though I rather like My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I just don’t really like the bronies so much.

marinerachel
marinerachel
10 years ago

I love misandrony as much as I love misandairy.

On Friday night while I was out for drinks with a gentleman he told me about his lactose intolerance and ice cream birthday cake. He ate it with lactase so there were no digestive fails. He became reckless though, “yolo” in his words, and after running out of lactase, continued to eat the ice cream cake. “Three diarrhoeas later” he said, it was found to have been a poor choice, even if it is the case you only live once.

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