So this is an … interesting reaction to that Buzzfeed piece about Paul Elam. And by “interesting” I mean “WTF?”
Over on The Spearhead — remember The Spearhead, home to some of the crankiest misogynists on the Internet? — our old friend WF Price offers a rather unique analysis of Elam’s life story.
Price admits right off the bat that Elam is indeed as much of an “asshole” as the Buzzfeed article makes him out to be, snarkily commenting that this fact “isn’t exactly news to anyone who has dealt with him personally, or read his articles.” And then he goes on to blame Elam’s assholery on feminism.
Wat.
Well, as Price sees it, Elam hasn’t exactly suffered for being an asshole. The fact that he basically got away with abandoning his daughter proves
that telling your wife and kids to screw off when your marriage goes bad is a better strategy if you’re concerned about yourself than trying to be a niceguy. What could be a more damning indictment of feminism than that?
Um, do you really want an answer to that?
Meanwhile, Price argues, the fact that Elam has had three failed marriages shows that ladies just love assholes. No, really. According to Price, Elam’s life story
proves that being an asshole doesn’t torpedo one’s prospects with women. Quite the opposite, in fact: Paul’s many walks down the aisle are testament to the fact that there’s something about the guy that contemporary women find appealing. Elam’s a major hit with women to this day.
Checkmate, feminism!
Price then works me into the equation, for some reason.
And I don’t write this out of envy; on the contrary, I think his popularity with women has probably been his biggest problem in life (Futrelle wouldn’t understand).
Price concludes with this, er, zinger:
So if feminists were to say to me that Paul Elam proves that MRAs are terrible people, I’d respond by saying “he’s the product of your philosophy, not mine.”
It will take someone more versed in formal logic to explain exactly what logical fallacies Price is committing here, or if he’s somehow come up with a new logical fallacy all his own.
In some ways, that’s not quite fair, imo. This is one of the very, very, VERY few areas I could ever see making common cause with MRAs over, in the extremely remote event that they ever pull their heads out of their butts for five minutes. For a lot of families, it really is hard to put together the same kind of income and quality of life on two totally equal, moderate-hour jobs. Scheduling becomes a nightmare, and the career ladder really rewards people who will put in 80+ hour weeks. People who do their 40 and go home on time are clearly not serious. So… couples tend to divide energies, with one going full-in on the big career and the other basically trailing behind to provide support and stability. You can get further that way, as there is like zero real support for genuine equality, esp. when there are little kids in the mix. The US provides shockingly little real assistance for families in that stage, imo.
what cheeses me off about the MRAs, as I mentioned before, is that they don’t respect the “trailing” spouse’s efforts and sacrifices, because it’s mostly icky women who do that stuff and anything women do is obviously not actually important.
Price, remember that you’re actually speaking to real-life feminists now. If you have questions about what those strange, otherworldly beings think about a topic, you need only ask. Rolling in with “feminists believe XYZ” ain’t gonna fly.
“Elam’s a major hit with women to this day.”
Is that some serious unintentional irony or a perverse wink-wink? Because “Elam,” “hit,” and “women” do belong in the same sentence (if his posts are anything to go by).
I really don’t follow Price’s argument other than it amounts to “women/ feminists are the root of all my problems.” But maybe it just my mangina addled brain.
I’m so glad WTF Price showed up to tell us what feminism’s goals are. I’d been really confused before now.
No, I’m not talking about “being hauled back to court,” because an American court would never, ever haul a man to court for not taking care of his kids. I’m talking about making a request for a visitation schedule. Any man who is not a serious danger to his kids will get one. Even convicted felons in prison get visitation rights.
That’s kind of funny. The court doesn’t recognize the category of “asshole.” If it did, most of the officers of the court would have it stamped on their record.
Maybe, maybe not. In these matters it’s he said she said. Men get a lot of latitude for skipping out on the kids, because they’re expected to use their time to make money and pay it to their exes, and feminists 100% support this in lobbying for family law policy. If you deny that’s what feminism is all about, you haven’t spent much time in committee, I dare say.
Eh, I know Dave accused me of a logical fallacy here, but I certainly didn’t make that one. I said that the current structure of American family law rewards men for (physically) abandoning their kids, and doesn’t punish them for it.
Sigh…
I wish I could ignore how the law actually works. Sadly, I do not have that luxury.
Often (maybe usually, but I don’t have the stats on this one), accusations of abandonment are retconning. In a lot of cases, women want their children’s father the hell out of their lives so they can move on. It isn’t so much a behavioral or “good father” issue as a biological imperative. Young women have needs just like young men. They want to find another man, or to build a new life with that option. The kids’ father just gets in the way of that, so they want him to go away. Very much so.
This is thinking from a rational middle-aged perspective. Most divorces occur among the relatively young — male early 30s female late 20s. Things get messy easily at that point in life. A lot of pople work it out later, but you can’t expect young divorcées to be such enlightened rational actors most of the time.
Don’t embarrass yourself here. Since when has an American feminist of any standing ever proposed a law to make child custody gender equal?
But you blame me, and I haven’t done that. I’m someone who didn’t take the low road, and I paid dearly for it.
And BTW, I have no use for MRAs, and I made that clear. I think they’re the mirror image of feminists, so where did I contradict myself?
Dude, where’s my citations pls?
I realise that the US can be a hellhole on these issues. I was thinking primarily of people whose jobs get in the way. Defence forces, FIFO and similarly time-disrupting mining industry type jobs, fishing and other jobs that take people away for weeks or months at a time. In this country cops, emergency and hospital shift workers actually have decent offsets with rostered days off and the like, so they’re quite capable of reasonable workarounds regardless of continuing marriage or after separation. I expect it varies a lot more across the various US states.
As for others who are expected to put in more than standard hours, that’s very much up to each employer, worker and their arrangements. Both my husband and I used to put in extra hours. I did it mainly by bringing work home a few times a week in busy times. Husband, being a manager type person, managed to score himself keys (and security clearance) to use the office at weekends when he needed to. I might add that husband used to cop a fair amount of flak for insisting on using flexible/ offset/ leave provisions to do his part with doctor/ school/ other childcare obligations. Other men might not find a way to do that, or might not be willing to put their career advancement at risk, whether it’s just for the time being or in any circumstances, ever. Others again may not have any way to do it at all unless they change jobs or industries.
What… What world do you live in? Because it isn’t mine. I can’t even argue with you. How often can I be expected to say “no, that’s wrong, that’s not how it works, what are you even talking about?”
I say this as a 25-year-old guy thinking mainly of young single mothers. The motivation is very straightforward… either be helpful or go away. What exactly makes this so out of reach of young parents?
Child custody is gender neuteral under the law. It just is. But courts are made of people who have to make judgement calls (which is why I’m so flummuxed at your denial that being an asshole could ever affect your court case… A judge is sitting there trying to accurately decide if you are fit for joint custody or visitation, how could your actions not affect the outcome?). Those people have historically been raised to believe that the woman’s role as mother is child care, so they have historically favored giving custody to the mother.
Feminists, in addressing and combatting those gender roles, act to make court outcomes more fair by getting rid of that bias.
Ok… and how does this counter my statement that you argue that being an asshole is rewarded by the American legal system (correction noted) by fixating only on monetary and temporal concerns?
“And you” isn’t directly implying that you are an MRA. It in fact puts you in a different category. And the text you’re responding to isn’t accusing you of being contradictory. So… huh?
Near as I can make out, from hearing them whine about women leaching off their husbands and eating bonbons all day, stealing jobs from men and then not even pulling their weight, or having the audacity to be single and collect wellfare/unemployment, MRAs want women to simply cease to exist except when they want someone to cook them dinner, do their laundry, and satisfy any and all sexual desires the MRA may have.
What makes you think I don’t know how to speak to “real-life feminists?” I’m from Seattle, for Chrissake. Probably 75% of the girls I’ve known identify as feminists (although I typically choose to not believe them, because they are generally decent people). Hell, even my sister calls herself a feminist, but I still love the little tow-headed scamp. 🙂
Visitation schedules are schedules decided by the involved parties and mediated by the court. So yeah, there’s quite a bit of leeway. The court may not guarantee some form of visitation in all cases, though. It doesn’t have to be serious danger either; it could be neglect, being absent for long periods of time, and so on, as I said before.
Being an asshole will make your spouse less amenable to your visitation schedule, and it’ll make the court less likely to judge you fit for a form of visitation, especially in the case of your absence. Visitation is not a “right.”
…
Feh, not sure why I’m bothering. We’re barely speaking the same language here. For instance, I honestly don’t know what you mean by “not taking care of his kids,” nor what divorce situation you’re using as your model. You’ve given me no reason to believe you have any idea how divorce works in the real world, or any indication that you’re interested in anything beyond your own strongly-held beliefs.
Go have fun doing… whatever it is you do. I’m done.
Bill,
So, what you’re essentially saying is that if you don’t like a woman, she’s a feminist. If she does something you perceive to be wrong, it’s a feminist act. But if you like a woman and think she’s a good person, she’s not a feminist. Even if she explicitly identifies as one.
That’s a really silly way to look at things. Apparently, you don’t know what feminism is, you just know that you don’t like it and it’s responsible for lots of very bad things. You don’t need any evidence. You just need truthiness!
But seriously, it’s not up to you whether or not a woman is claiming the title of feminist. Stop acting like it is.
Kirby, you should be glad it isn’t your world. I hope it never is. But at the risk of being caustic, I have to tell you that your experience is lacking. You don’t know how it works.
I always tell people who don’t know about these things to spend some time in family court. I don’t know if you have the time to do so, but if you really want to know how things work go ahead and do it. Court is open to the public. I’d recommend a few sessions to get a feel for it. Go from morning until lunch, or lunch until afternoon, for three sessions. You won’t come out of it knowing everything, but you’ll get an idea. Oh, don’t forget to check the ex parte and DV diversion programs. It’s a good way to get your feet wet.
BTW, please for the sake of your everlasting soul don’t ever become a family law attorney. You seem like a righteous young man, and that job will just suck it all out of you.
Emotions are as rational as our conscious minds, but they work in different ways, so perhaps I framed my comment poorly. The reason these seemingly rational prescriptions you set forth don’t work is that they are simplistic, and they don’t take all the variables of human aspiration and desire into account.
Child custody is gender neuteral under the law. It just is. But courts are made of people who have to make judgement calls (which is why I’m so flummuxed at your denial that being an asshole could ever affect your court case… A judge is sitting there trying to accurately decide if you are fit for joint custody or visitation, how could your actions not affect the outcome?). Those people have historically been raised to believe that the woman’s role as mother is child care, so they have historically favored giving custody to the mother.
OK, first, you’re bright enough to know that equality by the letter of the law does not mean equal opportunity or outcome. It can’t, because that’s impossible (I’ve been harping on this lately). Next, you fail to qualify asshole. An asshole by normal people’s standards who works as a lawyer, makes a couple hundred grand a year and wages war against his ex to keep his child support snd parental obligations to a minimum is admired by his colleagues for his success and tenacity. On the other hand, some poor, sentimental sap with a shitty job who cries because he misses his kids and can’t keep up with his child support is seen as a contemptible loser, and will be punished severely for his weakness. So who’s the asshole according to the court?
It isn’t because people were raised this way or that way — it’s the entire culture of their occupation and system which has been created to rip off people who are “dumb” enough to believe in the quaint notions of right and wrong.
Hoo boy…
This is fairy tale feminism. Where the rubber hits the road, it’s a different story. Like I said, spend some time in family court. See for yourself.
It doesn’t. But you suggest that my condemnation of these tactics is equivalent to feminists’ and MRAs’ use of them, and that’s wrong.
“Probably 75% of the girls I’ve known identify as feminists (although I typically choose to not believe them, because they are generally decent people). Hell, even my sister calls herself a feminist, but I still love the little tow-headed scamp”
So a woman can’t be a feminist unless she’s some sort of evil hellhound you’ve cooked up in your bitter brain. Poor wittle Bill and his wounded fee-fees. What does that make Kirby and me — he’s a young feminist, I’m an old feminist, so we can’t really qualify as harpies.
Or maybe it’s time for you to grow the fuck up and get rid of your ludicrous ideas about feminists.
Yes the court system sucks — and I say that as both a son-of-a-lawyer and as a guy who went to prison as a Vietnam-era draft resister. Get lawyers involved inm a custody case and you will wish to hell you hadn’t. That’s why however much it hurts you need to sit down with your ex and act like two adults if you can and work something out on your own so the court won’t have to. I managed it myself in spite of the fact that my ex was mentally ill and my former in-laws believed I had deliberated driven her to insanity. You played a significant role in creating those kid(s) and now your job is to stop whining and do your best for them
I genuinely wonder what makes certain MRAs more popular in their little bubble of babble than the average troll. They sure as hell don’t say anything new or different, just the same broken record of eyeroll-worthy talking points as any other. If they didn’t have different names, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference… And sometimes I still can’t.
suffrajitsu
His “backstory” boils down to: “I was a child who had a ‘crackwhore’ (his words) for a mother, and then I was adopted by this nice rich white family when I was four, and then I got into BDSM when I was a teenager because a domme coerced me into having a relationship with her when I was too young to comprehend what was going on. So, now I like beating women who look like my mother the crackwhore (who Ana supposedly looks like) and I’m ’50 shades of fucked up’ (again, his words).”
None of which makes any damn sense to me, nor does it excuse any of his shit behavior.
(Also I had to stop reading a sporking at chapter sixteen because Grey literally breaks into Ana and Kate’s apartment to rape Ana into submission. I was shaking and crying through the whole thing and I had to stop due to flashbacks.)
wordsp1nner
No kidding. “I don’t want to pay so much child support, so I’m going to deny my own children so their mother, the harpy, reduces the payments out of stress and need for cash to raise the children I won’t lift a finger to help! Ha! That’ll teach her what a loving father to our kids I am!”
ceebarks
Yeah, a lot of women do do the Stay-At-Home-Mom thing because it’s a necessity when the kids are younger, though it makes it harder for them to get back into the workforce when the kids are old enough to attend school during the day and she might want to go back to work. It’s definitely not without problems. (Especially when men like Paulie will tell her what a leech she is because she’s not earning her own wages, then turn around and get upset that she’s working all the time to earn wages and not staying at home with the kids and rubbing her husband’s feet when he gets home from work.)
However, if a mother or wife chooses to be a Stay-At-Home-Lady, that’s her choice, and that’s fine. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have its own battery of problems as well.
Glorious thing, choices are.
isidore13
Yeah, it’s like one day they’re saying that it’s not fair that women don’t work and stay at home and take care of kids, and then the next, they’re mad that women aren’t staying home and taking care of the kids.
We’re really damned if we do, and damned if we don’t when it comes to MRAs.
@Bill: I’m going to echo WWTH on something: You don’t get to decide who is and isn’t a feminist based on whether you like them or not. That is seriously the most reality-starved idea I’ve ever heard, and quite frankly, sounds gross coming from a man. I really don’t like it when men come in and step on women’s toes like that with their mansplaining bullshit. You don’t get to decide my labels, or anyone else’s for that matter. You only get to decide yours, and I only get to decide mine. Get off my tootsies.
It’s like you can’t fathom the idea of a feminist being a good person. The idea that someone believes in equal rights for all genders is NOT separate from being a decent human being, whether you like feminism or not.
Case in point: I think you’re being an asshole. That doesn’t make you a MRA simply because I don’t like them and think they’re assholes.
The only reason I would think you’re an MRA is because you’re regurgitating a lot of their talking points.
Bill, the basic problem you have is one of definition. It’s as if when you were young someone showed you a picture of a unicorn and told you it was a horse. So then whenever you see a horse, you say it can’t be a horse because it doesn’t have a horn in the middle of its forehead.
You say that the feminists you meet can’t be feminists because somehow you think feminists are evil harpies but then the actual feminists you meet aren’t evil harpies. But your definition of feminist can’t be wrong, oh no, it’s that all these women are wrong about being feminists. A little out of touch with reality is my diagnosis.
As I understand, most divorce cases never make it to court, so when you go to family court… you are seeing a pretty dysfunctional slice of the population to start with. Not surprising it’s depressing.
I’m not going to lie, you guys; I don’t really understand what Price wants here. Granted, it’s late and I’m slap happy. ELI5
Make child support a voluntary thing?
Stop dads Price thinks are bad from having visitation?
Make women stop referring to themselves as feminists unless they fit his 15 point checklist? Change the focus of judges from “welfare of the child” to “don’t stress Dad out, or he might freak out/bail?”
I’m thinking none of those things are going to work out.
Ah well.
“fairy tale feminism?” so, what’s your definition of “real, gritty feminism?” bill price? please, keep it a sentence short, because verbosity does not equal nuance, and i’m a dum-dum.
and how exactly will family court teach young, inexperienced, ignorant men like myself about feminism? are there court-appointed feminists that whisper nefarious secrets into the judge’s ear? because during my cousin’s custody hearing, i didn’t see one. he ended up living with my uncle, by the way, not with my aunt. not that this proves or disproves anything, but as someone whose family member went through that ordeal, i just don’t see the link between feminism and the courts’ supposed bias towards fathers in general, and the way you’ve been spinning it doesn’t coincide with what my family experienced.
granted, this is just one of many cases (which happened in canada. i’m not sure about american family law, if you do live in america), and you could say we’re very fortunate. still, that does’t really prove that feminism, in some way, is responsible for some of the injustices that fathers everywhere supposedly suffer. because if it is, then, by your arguments, my uncle was just a bit more feminist than his wife, and as a cable splicer who immigrated from the philippines, i’m not sure he had the time or the money to spend on gender studies before he came here to the great white north. he’s not a lawyer, he ain’t a rich guy. he’s the poor, worthless strawman sap you’ve been blathering about in the past few comment.
is he a mangina, by default, because the system sided with him?
Yeah, that “They can’t really be feminists because they’re decent people” line was very telling, and GrumpyOldMan hit the nail on the head.
Bill, either your understanding of feminism is flawed, or all your feminist-identified friends are wrong about what they believe. Are you really arrogant enough to believe the latter?
Now if there really was a mechanism that’d keep women from having sex as long as their child’s father is around, no family would ever have more than one kid. But I guess that’s playing out cold logic vs Biotruth.
@ParadoxicalIntention: I’m certainly not saying the backstory is a legit justification of his behavior, or even well fleshed out. I was responding to that Telegraph piece claiming Christian Grey was an example of how men were more objectified than women and pointing out that the fact that the author gave him a backstory and went out of her way to explain his behavior makes FSoG a weak example of male objectification, since he’s clearly meant to be a fully human character.
Hypothesis: “Feminists are horrible people.”
Data: “Most women I know in real life say they’re feminists. They are decent people.”
Conclusion: “The actual women I know who say they’re feminists must be lying.”
Masterful logic is assuming 75% of women I know must all be lying (for…reasons?) because it wouldn’t fit into my narrow worldview. Cuz when in doubt, throw out all data that doesn’t confirm your hypothesis.
Sounds like another case of “the only real feminists are the straw feminist illuminati in my head who secretly run the courts and the government and the tides and the phases of the moon. You’re not a real feminist cause you don’t match up to the ones I made up in my head.”
Thanks for the welcome package katz!
And as for the nonsense this Price guy is blabbering… I’m currently going through the courts as my ex wants full custody. I want shared custody. I can promise you now that the judges don’t give a crap about my feelings or what is fair to me. They don’t give a crap about my ex’s feelings or what is fair to him. They are only concerned with my son’s feelings and his best interests because, and I can’t stress this enough, A CHILD IS NOT PROPERTY!
Holy shitfuck, stop talking about kids like they are property that people own, Price.
And yes, family courts tend to maintain the status quo. If a father is the primary carer he is way more likely to do better in court than the mother. But in so many families the mother is the primary carer, hence the most frequent outcome.
http://imgur.com/cafSrU0
But with feminism, if by feminism you mean “equal pay for equal work” and “equality under the law”.