If you’re a regular, or semi-regular, or even just an occasional reader of this blog, you need to stop reading this post right now and read Buzzfeed’s astonishing expose of A Voice for Men’s Paul Elam instead.
SPOILER ALERT: He’s an even bigger hypocrite than you think he is.
Here’s the link. Right here. Click on it now. Click. Now. Click.
If you need a bit more convincing: Buzzfeed’s long and meticulous examination of alleged “men’s human rights” activist Elam, written by Adam Serwer and Katie Baker, delves deep into Paul’s often sordid personal history, including his drug use, his numerous failed marriages, and the alternately depressing and infuriating story of the daughter he abandoned, who forgave and reunited with him as an adult, and who is now estranged from him again.
As Serwer and Baker make clear, the story of Elam’s life makes many of his most fervent claims about alleged female irresponsibility and the evils of the family court system seem a tad, well, ironic. As the two note, Elam.
preaches the gospel that men’s failures and disappointments are not due to personal shortcomings or lapsed responsibility, but rather institutionalized feminism and a family court system rigged against dutiful fathers, as well as a world gripped by “misandry,” or the hatred of men.
But his own story, to put it as gently as possible, does not exactly support this particular narrative. Serwer and Baker note that
interviews with Elam’s ex-wives and daughter and newly uncovered court records shed light on a man who, they told BuzzFeed News, has depended on and emotionally abused the women in his own life.
For example, although Elam compares the family court system’s treatment of fathers to Jim Crow, he abandoned his biological children not once but twice. Although Elam says that “fathers are forced to pay child support like it was mafia protection money,” he accused his first wife of lying about being raped so he could relinquish his parental rights and avoid paying child support.
His ex-wife [Susan] and his daughter said he has only been able to make A Voice for Men his full-time job because of the women who have supported him throughout his life. …
“He sits there taking all these people’s money and all he’s doing is sucking them dry,” said Susan. “That’s what he’s done all his life — to say it’s the woman’s fault, and not make men look at their own mistakes.”
Seriously, go read it. Here’s the link again.
We’ll talk more when you’re done.
I honestly can’t think of a scenario in which it’s moral to use physical force to make a 13 year old take a pill. Whether he was making a smart choice in refusing to take it is pretty much irrelevant. When you get to the point where you’re holding someone down to force-feed them something that isn’t going to literally save their life, you need to re-think your choices. That’s abuse in itself, spoon or no spoon.
As for this piece, I think it’s fair. He makes a lot of claims about the functioning of family courts and about the culture surrounding divorce, child-care, and abandonment in America. This is basically a case-study fact-check that shows it doesn’t always work the way Mr. Elam says it does. Many MRAs appeal to personal observations and experience to justify their positions. I believe Mr Elam does this fairly, although sometimes citing the experiences of his patients and followers rather than his own. It’s still relevant to see if his own story backs up his opinions.
I guess I should change my name now there’s two Orions. What would be good? Orion J? Orion in Chicago? Orion the Student? Orion, Essayist?
So did L Ron Hubbard.
What’s that got to do with the price of tea in China? Having suffered doesn’t magically make her right.
Moving on…
I really can’t wait to see how his loyal dupes are reacting to these articles. It’s almost enough to make me want to read the comments at AVFM…
Orion, since you were the first Orion, you could make that your title:
The Orion
The First Orion
Orion, Hunter-Gatherer of Literature (if you have to write a lot of papers)
Orion the Onion (if you really like alliteration/internal rhymes)
…I could go all day.
I’d be more worried about his goon squad than Elam himself.
Ooh how about Orion the Alpha?
Emily: that’s what I’m more worried about too. I don’t think Elam would be dumb enough to doxx and harass his own family but someone else might be.
Elam says that his ex wife wouldn’t let him take a paternity test and basically blames the whole fiasco on it, but would it have made a damn difference if he was proven to be the father? Would he have actually parented Bonnie and if so, did she dodge a bullet?
Reblogged this on Zarathustra the Serpent and commented:
“I don’t know how to respond to this article. It mostly fills me with deep sympathy towards the women that Elam’s exploited or abused over the years, but also pity for Elam himself. He’s even more pathetic than I could have imagined, and he lashes out with so much hate that it drives away those that were somehow capable of loving him. It’s just sad.”
-WithAZ
Considering he hit his grandson for opening the damned fridge, yeah, I’d say she dodged a bullet. And good for her for not letting him get away with that!
Even considering how long I’ve been around here, that was enlightening. For a man who rants about how many responsibilities men have, he sure has walked away from a lot of them. Fuck, he basically got his ever so desired “paper abortion”.
Paul Elam has not just said horrible things about women in general but has picked on individuel women and caused them real distress and even fear for their own safety. I have no qualms about this article whatsoever.
Thanks to David we’ve known what a fraud Elam is for a long time and I suspect a lot of his readers have known too but have been in some sort of denial about it. However, I don’t know how even his most ardent supporters could donate their own money to him after reading the article* and I don’t know how Elam could have the bare faced cheek to demand that they do.*
Could this be the beginning of the end for AVFM!
* I don’t know how they could but I suspect alot of them still will. (loved to be proved wrong)
** unfortunately Elam has bare faced cheek in bucket loads.
At first, I thought it was a bit cruel to involve Susan and Bonnie, even if it was voluntary on their side. While reading the article I felt like it was touching too many sensitive nerves and that I didn’t have the right to know those private things.
I know, it all served to the point of exposing Elam as the hypocrite (and scammer) he is, but that can also be done by exposing and debunking his harmful, dangerous, poisonous, disgusting, and obviously misogynistic “arguments” one by one (such as We Hunted The Mammoth does).
I still think it wasn’t necessary. I don’t know… maybe I’m being silly or naïve, but I still feel like I did something wrong by reading certain parts of that article.
I totally despise Elam, but it still made me terribly uncomfortable.
On the other hand, I just read his response and… he only confirms everything we already knew about him. Just blames everyone in the world, not a hint of self-awareness and responsibility. Disgusting PoS.
And I still don’t feel any better about knowing private things about him, Bonnie and Susan.
On the bright side, his own response exposes him for what he is.
I don’t know what the exact translation to this metaphoric saying is exactly like in English, but I’ll try: “From the mouth shall the fish die, for what comes out from its mouth, proceeds from its heart”.
I fear that the MRA horde might retaliate against Susan and Bonnie. I hope that doesn’t happen. From the comments on his public denial (sorry, “response”) it seems like a lot of them are happy to throw money at him and stand by every horrible thing he says and does, no matter the evidence in front of them.
Yeah, Paulie, good for you. I just love that smug dig of “after, and only after” — it makes it sound like women who don’t wait till the kids are out of the house before completing their educations are somehow bad mothers, or at least worse mothers than yours. Instead of being proud of her for getting a master’s, though, you sound pretty damn snide about the whole idea of mothers doing that at all. If that were my mother, I’d feel a bit guilty at having held up her educational and career aspirations, and also mighty proud of her for finally doing what she obviously wanted to do all along. I wouldn’t dream of making an antifeminist sermon out of it, though, as you’re clearly doing.
I also love the gratuitous slams in the second paragraph. When did a pacifist ever claim that ordinary soldiers “got us into Viet-Nam”? None ever did! Whether civilian or GI, all antiwar activists blamed the White House and the big brass at the Pentagon, not the common soldiers who went to fight. Anyone who claims otherwise has been watching too many fuckin’ Rambo movies.
And what’s with that “domestic slave” bit? If feminists who used to be unhappy housewives refer to themselves by that term, how the hell is it demeaning to others who are perfectly content to Hausfrau away? My own mother is a housewife, although in the early years of her marriage to my dad, she did help out in getting the family business going, and I was often babysat by my grandma, or the teenage daughters of my parents’ friends. I do not consider myself a deprived child for not having my mother near me at all times in my early years. And I don’t think that describing enforced housewifery as “domestic slavery” is demeaning to women in that role, either; to do so is to criticize the institution, not its victims.
But then, such distinctions are all lost on Paulie, who thinks it’s misandry and a sign of male subservience to be made to take medication to stop him pooping his pants at 13. Oh, the HUMANITY.
Something smells like bad faith in here.
Seriously, BuzzFeed interviewing his ex-wives and daughter isn’t even in the same universe as Elam making up bold-faced lies about and doxxing everybody who looks at him sideways.
I’m highly suspicious of that “wouldn’t let him” bit. He’s a grown man, he can damn well take a test if he wants. But he didn’t want to, and that speaks volumes. He was looking for excuses to up and leave, and he did.
And yeah, I’d say Bonnie dodged a very big bullet by having him out of her life while she was growing up. Can you imagine being raised by a mean bastard like that? A BIG mean bastard like that? Yikes.
@Delphi Ote:
Nah, that was just in the other thread (attention buzzfeed readers). I left you a response there.
I can see why some people are uncomfortable with this article, and it is very personal, but I don’t think it’s at all over the line, because it’s all so directly relevant — and contradictory — to the stuff he constantly talks about. If I were considering supporting AVFM as an institution, this is stuff I’d want to know.
And in terms of shaping public opinion, we need articles like this because they’re much more effective ways to communicate than dry facts and figures. Saying “the guy who claims that women lie about paternity to get child support lied about paternity to avoid child support” is a much more effective way to expose his claims as bogus than saying “studies show that fewer than 1% of child support cases involve false paternity.”
Yes… and it is clear he has had genuine problems, but instead of trying to actually tease out what is behind them (from what I’d guess, authoritarian/abusive child-rearing, economic woes, severe personal issues) he goes after women. Because women are a soft target, and maybe if we didn’t have so many rights the women he has abandoned wouldn’t have been able to do so well without him.
I had no problems with that article. I don’t really see how asking family members about their personal relationships with Paul Elam is in any way equivalent to doxxing or mudslinging. Just because his past happens to be so full of mud doesn’t mean that was the sole purpose of the article.
I think it was a useful article, it filled out the picture of who this guy was and what has shaped his toxic ideological worldview that he’s so forcefully trying to push onto everyone else. It was all relevant to what he thinks are important issues (custody, rape, fatherhood, etc.). I didn’t see any evidence in there of just mudslinging for the sake of tarring his good name.
Also I didn’t find the part about him “crying like a baby” to be shaming. That was one sentence I read where I was like, oh he has feelings? Interesting . . .
Two words, ponzi scheme.
So the guy is basically a con artist in addition to all the rest of the awful shit he does.
Morbidly awaiting the follow-up post from Elam himself. It would probably go something like this:
Already available for your perusal.
Elam is scheming, but it is not a Ponzi.
The dumbass arguments under the article are all worth it for the person who called it “not so much a hit piece as a ‘why are you hitting yourself’ piece.” Gotta love Esmay for getting on there to complain that the reporter only let Elam cuss at him for 20 minutes before giving up.
Agreeing with those here who say this article is fundamentally different than Elam’s campaigns of doxxing and harassment. Elam makes shit up about people and/or radically misrepresents things, and uses whatever he finds or concocts or simply thinks is true as fodder for harassment campaigns led by his own little army of assholes. Many of these people are not by any stretch of the imagination public figures. He went after one woman because she was caught on film at a demonstration (doing nothing but standing there) and because she make a joke tweet. “Big Red” has been harassed and mocked and threatened and turned into an internet meme because she yelled at Dan Perrins once at a demonstration and was caught on video. He went after another woman because he thought she wrote a blog bragging about trashing college applicatons from white dudes, even though it was obvious even to other MRAs that the woman had nothing to do with it. He’s malicious, vindictive, has no regard for the truth — and he has an army of assholes to do his harassing for him.
Also thinking that the “cried like a baby” detail in the story is almost the only humanizing detail of anything I’ve ever read by or about him.
I have to admit I also felt a bit uneasy with the article—I am 100% more comfortable with letting Elam make his own self look bad by continuing to say disingenuous, hateful, malicious things. He frequently contradicts himself, insults enemies and allies alike, issues threats, and overall does things that no traumatic background in the world could absolve him from. And of all the possible outlets to go digging for more info, Buzzfeed is—er—not the most reputable of them. I felt like the piece wouldn’t accomplish much besides put Bonnie and Susan (and probably the women who refused to comment, too) straight in the line of fire of doxx-happy MRAs. If Buzzfeed could find them, then so can 8chan.
HOWEVER…
While I still question the wisdom of the article, it is night-and-day different than Elam’s own harassment campaigns, or the Zoe Post, or other doxxing and dirt-digging campaigns. It didn’t require any MSPaint red circle infographics to draw imaginary connections between people and events. It doesn’t speculate on the particulars of Elam’s mental/emotional state, declare him to have a hidden agenda that nobody could have guessed from his words, or issue an urgent call that “this man must be stopped”. It doesn’t state that it is trying to scare or shame Elam into silence. It doesn’t call him evil. It actually brings multiple accounts to its story, drawing most heavily from the most sympathetic one, rather than hinging on the accusations of one embittered enemy. It involved no account hacking, spying, or other underhanded tactics; just interviews and publicly available information.
And—most crucially—they actually contacted Elam to get his side of the story. And it’s not Buzzfeed’s problem that he chose to swear at them rather than coolly declining to comment.
Additionally, Elam’s own history of divorce and child custody is actually relevant to his—uh, “activism”. It’s not like the ridiculous GG stuff of, “Oooooh, LW had relationship drama while also being a game developer.” It’s, “Um, guys, this dude doesn’t have a good track record on the thing he’s actually arguing about.”
Re: crying like a baby – I can’t think of a time I’ve heard the term used in a derogatory way, especially not when it applied to a scenario when one would reasonably be expected to cry (reunions / sad movies / overwhelming gifts / etc.). I’ve used the term of myself without any sense of embarrassment, personally.