Check out Margaret Corvid’s fascinating piece in the New Statesman on male sexuality and the appeal of misogynistic movements to sexually frustrated men. As a professional dominatrix who’s also a feminist, she’s acutely aware of the ways conventional masculinity restricts and impoverishes male sexuality.
When I became a professional dominatrix after years in the kink scene, I expected my kinky work to involve lots of spanking, whipping and bondage. And, to my delight, it has. But in the majority of my sessions, I am creating a space for men to explore areas of their sexual lives that society feels are unmanly; they come to me to be penetrated, to be used, to serve, to submit, to worship, to be taken. A client might have any or all of a bewildering array of fetishes, but they mostly come to me to experience something well outside the very narrow confines of what society says that it means to be a man.
Unfortunately, as she notes, Men’s Rightsers and Pickup Artists offer nothing to men who feel confined by these narrow notions of manhood; indeed, their definitions of manhood are both retrograde and restrictive.
One of the greatest tragedies of the men’s rights movement is that, in the end, its lessons serve only to drive men further away from what they yearn for. Pick up artist techniques and aggrieved entitlement are unlikely to help men achieve the goal of intimacy, but feminist values can teach them the skills to communicate with respect.
You’ll notice a few quotes in there from me, from an email interview she did with me as well as from my post Is the Men’s Rights Movement driven by the rage of the rejected? (I also discussed the issue in this post on the weird sexual undercurrents in A Voice for Men’s Facebook “memes.”)
@cassandrakitty:
Yeah, the commercials they used to run would go a little different with trolls.
ORKIN MAAAAN!
“Orkin Man, could you come over? The termites are really bad at the moment.”
“No problem, Ma’am, I’ll be right over.”
ORKIN MAAAAN!
“They’re right here in the basement, Orkin man!”
“Ah, the basement walls. Don’t worry, this shouldn’t take long.”
“Oh, no, not the walls. Just the basement.”
“What?”
*opens the door*
*GRWAAAAAAAWWWRRRR*
“Aaah! What the fuck is that!”
“Uhh, I thought it was a termite.”
“It’s the size of a horse!”
“Umm… I thought it was a big terminte.”
ORKIN MAAAAN!
*GRWAAAAAAAAAWWWWRRR*
“So, when can you have it removed?”
“No, no no no. Lady, you’re on your own for this one.”
“Wait what?”
“This ain’t in my contract. I’m out. I’m out!”
“But what about?”
“…”
*GWAAAAAWWWWWWRRRR*
“… Huh.”
“….”
ORKIN MAAAAAN!
I want one of those little machines with the spray nozzle that they use, so I can squirt trolls with it. Hell, we’ve tried everything else.
@GroundPetrel
Regarding the “beefcake men = female gaze eye candy”, take a quick peek at this: http://freethoughtblogs.com/lousycanuck/2013/08/22/hugh-jackman-for-men-vs-hugh-jackman-for-women/
It’s showing the cover of a woman’s magazine, with a clean-shaven, slim, smiling, neatly dressed Hugh Jackman, and alternatively, a men’s magazine with Hugh Jackman kitted up as Wolverine, shirtless, with rippling muscles as he scowls into the camera.
There’s certainly some women who like buff dudes, I won’t disagree with you on that point, but the incredibly detailed muscley guys are typically a MALE (power) fantasy, not a female one.
This sums up just about everything you’ve said so far.
You should try considering more and typing less. You Teal Deer mainsplaining is tedius.
@GroundPetrel
Men being uber powerful and muscular in games is NOT “sexualizing men”. It’s a male power fantasy. Again, please Google “false equivalence”
Men are NOT sexualized in games. Games are still very straight male-dominated so it makes no sense that men would be sexualized. (Mind, there are games that have sexy men in them, but again, that’s not the same thing as men being sexualized)
Not all people attracted to men find the “hulking muscular brute” sexy. Sometimes, it’s more terrifying than anything else to those of us who are attracted to men.
Tessa
Or Flynn Rider
http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Flynn_Rider
http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m96mf1hQnG1rux2aro1_500.gif
Hello! Thank You!
This thread is not one of my favorites.
As for the TERF thing… There are other words that are intended to be used for calling out problematic behavior (racist, sexist, etc), that have been used by assholes to try to silence people. See: “YOU’RE BEING SEXIST AGAINST MEN!!!” and “REVERSE RACISM!!11!!”
That said, I’m a little leery of TERF since it seems to be highly gendered. Sort of like “bitchy”. Yes, someone might be acting like an asshole, but the connotations behind that word make it innappropriate for use. And “transphobic” would work just as well for describing someone who’s actions have been genuinely transphobic or trans-exclusionary. IDK if it’s my place to offer suggestions, but perhaps the best way to deal with this issue on the blog is similar to the way ableist language is dealt with, calling folks out on using the term and suggesting that they use “transphobic” instead (assuming the person is using TERF as a “you’re being transphobic” thing and not a “You’re just a hysterical dumb woman and you need to STFU” thing).
Nor mine, brooked. Between the WTFery of the Corvind piece, the shrieking about us all being evil feminazis and TERFS and such crap, and GroundPetrel aka Mr Al wanking all over the place, it’s a thread that would do better consigned to oblivion.
I’m now imagining what it would be like to have GWAR living in our collective basement. Pretty sure it would be a lot more fun than playing Who’s That Sock for the billionth time.
Hi Deneezlisa
Thanks for that. I think my friend’s issue wasn’t with “proper” trans women but a fear of a non trans man *pretending* to be trans to get into a woman only space. Like you say, how does anyone verify? An interview? A physical exam? I don’t blame her for her ‘caution'(?). It’s ok for me to say “I’d welcome anyone ” I’m “privileged ” in that generally I don’t need to worry about violence (and I’m not talking in a statistical sense, I mean for practical reasons) and I haven’t had her experiences.
It is a tricky subject (more to say but flight just called!)
@cassandrakitty:
Ooh, Maybe we could have the basement be where we send particularly troublesome trolls. “Ok, we’ll let you say, just as long as GWAR approves.”
GWAR approves by nomming.
Guys….I have a confession. I like bearded Hugh Jackman better. That being said, the way that he’s emphasizing his muscles on the cover of that men’s magazine is definitely not meant to appeal to women, at least not in a sexual way. It’s just…not sexy. It’s him showing off how strong and ripped he got for the role, which is impressive. Just not sexy. And that’s coming from a woman who actually does find buff Hugh Jackman to be sexy. That pose is simply not a sexy one. It’s a pose meant to show off his arms and his pecs, the type that he might assume if he were win a bodybuilding competition.
I’d like to point out that Sarkeesian is a critic analyzing video games in terms of gender and not an activist trying to make online gaming or gamer culture less sexist. “All my gamer pals are super diverse” has zero to do with Sarkeesian’s work.
I’m not going to try to explain objectification to someone who says men are “eye candy” too, because life’s too short.
I was suspicious from the start and noticed that gp showed up right after right wingnut was banned.
What are the Al tells? Just out of curiosity.
ParadoxicalIntention:
They actually had a “hot man meeting” to create him? I wonder if that’s what they called it at the time. I’m picturing calendars in outlook with 3PM to 4PM set for the hot man meeting in room 4-G
cassandrakitty:
Huh… I didn’t realize GWAR was real until just now. I always thought he was a made up character from Empire Records.
Among other things, a preternatural inability to respect boundaries.
Not he, but they. The band. *sigh*
Is Mr. Al still living up to his original nym as an MRA? I thought all his socks were anti-feminist?
Also I think he should be low 20s now if I remember his age correctly… He was just a few years younger than me. Much more angry and bitter though.
GWAR was on tour recently! So yeah, real people, still exist.
Also the hot man meeting sounds like one of the few meetings I might not make up excuses to get out of. Not even for sexual purposes, I just want to see a bunch of straight dudes sitting around trying to figure out how to make a hot man character.
@ kirby
It’s so odd to think of you two as being close in age. Then again, Mikey was close to my age, so there’s that.
… I see. GWAR is a band. I knew this of course. I mean, how could you even think I’d mistake an obviously real musical group for some sort of mythological creature? That’d be absurd!
…
Yeah.
Mr. Al’s most famous tells were thinking he was physically hideous and unfuckable when in fact he was pretty normal-looking.
He claimed to have a grotesque eye deformity, but then he posted a picture and it just looked like a slight lazy eye.
And he claimed to face all kinds of hardship because of his height, when he was around 5’7″ IIRC, barely below average. He knew the difference between his “morning height” and his “evening height”. Once he asked if it was OK to quote his “morning height” when people ask how tall he is.
Another time he tried to sockpuppet as a woman, but gave himself away when he mentioned being all excited about seeing a bra in the dorm laundry room.
@Cassandrakitty:
Hey, imagine what it was like for me to be talking to a guy a few years younger in age but practically a decade younger in maturity? Especially when I was bright-eyed and new and thought the entire internet was way above my level?
It was real weird, and it makes me really curious what he’s actually up to these days.
Now I want to know what you thought The Gwar looked like. Pics, please!