I‘ve said it before, but the imaginary feminists that Men’s Rights Activists spend their lives fighting bear about as much resemblance to real feminists as the imaginary Elders of Zion do to actual Jewish people.
But even by typical MRA standards, the meme above (from A Voice for Men’s Facebook page) is a doozy. It’s hard to say which of these imaginary feminists demands is the most ridiculous. That idea that feminists demand “the entitlement to rape men and young boys” or “the right to take money from men under any pretense?” Or that they want “20 men in prison for each woman who commits a crime?”
As ludicrous as these are, I think the most insidious of the bunch is the complaint that feminists want women to have “the right to intoxication with no consequences.”
No, feminists aren’t campaigning for women to be able to drive drunk with no legal repercussions. The “consequences” being referred to here are, of course, rape and other forms of sexual assault. Yep, AVFM is angry that feminists don’t think that women should face the “consequence” of rape if they go out to a bar on Saturday night. AVFM is angry that feminists want the actual rapists to face the consequences of their actions.
The March of the Straw Feminists continues with more AVFM memes from their Facebook page, below.
(Straw) Feminists want to take away funding for prostate cancer:
(Straw) Feminists like to make shit up, as this made-up example illustrates:
(Straw) Feminists demand that fire departments hire women wearing “sexy firefighter” Halloween costumes.
I … don’t even know what the hell the point of this next one is supposed to be. That it’s wrong to talk about the dangers of rape? That women can’t have successful careers and happy lives unless they have children? That … I give up.
At least this one is clear: DANGER! DANGER! (STRAW) FEMINISTS WANT TO CUT OFF YOUR FINGERS!!!!
You’d think the guy would have noticed. I mean, those finger-clipping shears are fucking gigantic.
For more, many more, straw feminists, check out the rest of the memes on AVFM’s Facebook page.
“For more, many more, straw feminists, check out the rest of the memes on AVFM’s Facebook page.”
Ugh. No thank you…
But then I checked anyway.
Ugh…
What’s the story behind the last image? I mean, the context of the actual stock photo? There’s a woman in a fancy dress who’s all disheveled and sweaty, and a man sitting at the front of a chemistry classroom and she’s chopping his finger off for some reason and he’s all “Okay, just get it over with.” What?
“20 men in prison for each woman who commits a crime”
Is that random men or men chosen by the woman? Need answer fast.
“Intoxication with no consequences” doesn’t sound so bad. Hangovers are a bastard.
Oh I see what the problem is, nobody has ever bothered to tell the MRAs that the rally chanting “What do we want? Infanticide!” is not the feminist protest. Somebody should let them know so they don’t look end up looking like a bunch of twits.
“Kill, maim and berate husbands”?
One of these things is not like the other, one of these things just doesn’t belong. Can you tell me which one is not like the other by the time I finish this song?
Others. D’oh!
So, for the curious and fact-minded, here’s the deal on the ‘Feminists (by which we mean Obama’s budget proposal) eliminated Prostate Cancer Funding’ poster:
I dug into the stories and found the evidentiary link, which goes to the CDC’s budget, here.
The pertinent quotes from that link:
So, there’s a kernel of truth, here. The CDC budget for both breast and prostate cancer screening programs has been slashed to nothing; however, while the ACA is picking up the tab for breast screening, it does not seem to be doing the same blanket approach to prostate cancer screening. This doesn’t mean it’s not covered under the ACA, but it probably requires a more conservative approach–your doctor decides if your situation and risk factors justify the screening.
Here’s the thing, though–false positives are a major issue in prostate cancer screenings. A not inconsiderable number of men go through a lot of grief because of overuse of screenings on low-risk sub-populations.
So a more conservative approach seems to be supported by the data we have at present. The CDC is also going to continue collecting data, which might indicate a change in policy is justified under the ACA in the future, but we’re not there, yet.
You know what’s interesting? I mentioned in the other thread that I’m reading a book for men recovering from incest and child sexual abuse. As far as I know, it’s one of the only big useful books on the subject out there by male survivors for male survivors.
And you know what? Very early in the book, it talks about the debt they owe to the feminist movement, and how overcoming negative stereotypes about gender, sexuality, and sexism is vital to the men’s survivor movement.
And unlike these chucklefucks, the guy who wrote Victims No More actually DOES SHIT. You know, throws therapy groups, and workshops, and lectures all over the world, so he can help men.
@Bina
It’s ‘kill’ because when you berate someone you’re actually maiming their self-esteem 🙂
You wanna bet this is the only time the MRAs feel anything like pity for nonwhite people?
Oh, wow. That finger-breaking… squick.
And I see they’ve gone back to the bloody logo, too.
Also, WHO LIVING IN THIS UNIVERSE WOULD THINK THAT RAPE IS AN ACCEPTABLE “CONSEQUENCE” FOR BEING DRUNK?!?!?
Sorry about that. Going back to email-lurking now.
Geez. You glance away from your chemistry notes for one second, because it’s hard to concentrate when you’re sitting on a hard chair. Next thing you know, you wake up in a bathtub full of ice, symbolically missing a foreskin (even though it’s really the tip of your pinky because this is a G-rated chemistry class) and there’s a note from someone named “Katie” instructing you to go die in a war.
A guy just can’t win.
It kind of sounds like MRAs wouldn’t mind having to sign up for the selective service if women didn’t have the right to vote. I really get the impression that they’re mad we can vote and use the specter of the draft as a thin disguise.
They listed “entitlement to rape men and young boys” and “unlimited sex with male students with impunity”? Really? They wanna go there? They want to talk about women violating the age of consent laws and supposedly getting away with it all the time when they’re the ones who think that of consent laws are oppressive to men who want to have sex with teenaged girls? When they have JudgyBitch arguing to lower the age of consent to thirteen in order to “protect” rich men from “predatory” thirteen-year-old “whores”? When they have Tom Martin arguing that ten-year-old girls forced to engage in prostitution are both consenting and predatory? When W.F. Price argues that feminists are oppressing teenaged boys by arresting adult female teachers who have sex with them? (And yes, I know that Price is not a contributor to AVfM and that he and Elam oppose each other routinely, but his view reflects that of many men who comment on articles about the latest female teacher arrested for having sex with a teenaged male student of hers to talk about how hot she was and how they wish that she’d taught at their school.) Do they not think that lowering the age of consent laws and allowing grown men to have sex with young teenaged girls will somehow protect teenaged boys from predatory adult women? Do they not recognize that lowering the age of consent will hurt these boys? Honestly, I can’t even fucking believe that they have the temerity to whine about feminists, who want the age of consent laws to stay in place and who argue against the men claiming that those teenaged boys actually had a great sexual experience with that “hot” adult woman, allegedly wanting the right to rape boys and have sex with impunity with their male students when they are, unlike feminists, are advocating laws that would also allow women to commit statutory rape with impunity.
And then they want to talk about how feminists feel entitled to rape men. Do feminists routinely jump all over men who accuse women of rape and then claim that those men are lying? Do feminists frequently go on and on and on about how drunk sex can never be rape? In short, do feminists ever engage in the behavior that MRAs engage in whenever they talk about individual female victims of rape and about rape statistics in general? And do the MRAs honestly not realize that the narrow definition that they’ve developed for what constitutes rape (at least when a woman is the victim) will make it virtually impossible for men who’ve been raped by women to see justice?
Somewhere, Margaret Atwood is nodding sagely at seeing her axiom confirmed yet again.
I followed the link and only found stupidity and implicit sexism.
@Buttercup Q. Skullpants
“…symbolically missing a foreskin… A guy just can’t win.”
Us men have several foreskins so we can stand to lose a few. Just last week I lost one of mine during a skydiving incident when my foreskin got caught on the static line.
It’s not all woe and sorrow being a man.
@ alaisvex
It’s always projection! “We want to do these horrible things to women, so feminists MUST want to do them to men! LOGIC!”
@Bina
I’m not at all familiar with Margaret Atwoods literary works — although I do know she won the Nobel Peace Prize in literature, and being a Canadian that makes me quite proud — so I’m not sure how to take that.
Dreadnought: Atwood’s the one who coined, “Men are afraid women will laugh at them; women are afraid men will kill them.” MRAs are the most perfect example of the first half, as well as being apologists for the conditions that create the second.
I mean, I guess it’s true that feminists want women to have the right to “berate” husbands. Just like how husbands have the “right” to ‘berate” wives. Obviously it’d be preferable that neither spouses berated each other, but seeing as “berate” literally just means “to scold angrily,” it’d be a pretty oppressive marital system if women were legally not allowed to raise their voices at their menfolk. But feminists don’t really talk about it cuz, well, people outside the MRA bubble don’t think very much about “berating” really.
It is true that our criminal justice system occasionally gives men harsher punishments than women, but 1) that’s not because of feminism, and 2) if MRAs want to talk about gender inequities in criminal justice, they’d have to be willing to talk about gender inequities in crime as well. It’s like how they often counter disproportionate rape and intimate partner violence statistics by going, “Oh, yeah? Well men are more likely to be the victims of violence if you include ALL violence, like murder and assaults!” That’s true, but the vast majority of murderers are also men, and the considerable majority of murders in the U.S. are drug and gang related. No, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t care about preventing those types of violence, but it’s disingenuous to simultaneously claim men are being victimized for being men and lionize a type of masculinity that glorifies violence as a sign of power.
[Note: I don’t mean this like when some whites deny institutionalized racism by crying “But what about black-on-black violence!” as there are lot of differences between the two–for one, (white) men aren’t automatically treated by cops like criminals just because they’re men, and also, despite Fox News’ claims to the contrary, black activists do in fact work to curb violence in their own communities, which is something the MRAs will never do.]
Rats. I was hoping “no consequences for intoxication” meant “no more hangovers!” and I was all, SIGN ME UP.
If that’s true, then feminists have been slowly losing that battle in direct proportion to them gaining political power and credibility. The march of progress has been to include women in the military, with the first law allowing women to be a permanent part of the military in the US passed in 1948, and women being allowed in units tasked with direct combat in 2013 (!!!). All we need to do now is either eliminate selective service or force women to sign up as well and feminism will have truly lost!
92% as of 2013, but whatevs. The big picture pay gap, where the amount all women are bringing home is less than the amount that all men are bringing home, doesn’t just include dangerous professions. In fact, I don’t believe many dangerous professions pay that well at all, comparatively. Many workplace-deaths are related to vehicle accidents, falls, or being crushed by things; construction, truck-driving, and farming aren’t exactly the most lucrative of fields.
Out of The Top 20 jobs with the biggest gender pay gaps, only one (police work) can really be considered dangerous. So if you’re talking about the small-picture pay gap, comparing only men and women working in a particular profession, the biggest gaps occur in non-dangerous fields. Are these guys going to argue that the fact that more men work in one dangerous profession should influence how much women are paid in another profession?
Anyways, barring that whole conversation, there are plenty of organizations dedicated to reducing workplace fatalities (OSHA, anyone?). Feminism isn’t required to also address it.
The right to vote is not predicated on ability to serve. Sure, the government won’t let you register as a voter while male unless you attempt to sign up for selective service, but there are a myriad of ways to not be eligible for that selective service and therefore not have to sign up, all based around reasons why a person may not be fit for duty.
Up until recently, being openly gay was one of those reasons. Up until 2013, being a woman was one of those reasons. Feminists would argue that that is bullshit. MRAs, who complain so much about only men being forced to go off and die for their country, would think that is a no-brainer.
It’s only recently that people are finally getting around to the idea that women can be soldiers. The law doesn’t move that quickly; I wouldn’t be surprised if women will end up having to sign up for selective service too in the future, if selective service is even still a thing.