As the news broke this morning that the Germanwings plane crash may have been a deliberate murder/suicide caused by the flight’s co-pilot, readers of the leading Men’s Rights website A Voice for Men were greeted by a post from site founder Paul Elam titled “A little blood in the mix never hurt a revolution.”
The headline on Elam’s post, a muddled mess that’s mostly a response to recent infighting amongst MRAs, recalls a disturbing post of his from several years ago titled “How to Build a Man Bomb.” (Archived here.)
Ostensibly a warning about the cost of ignoring male rage, it read a lot more like a threat.
[W]e are building a man bomb. And when this one detonates it could make the American race riots [of the 1960s] look like a Thanksgiving Day parade.
The misandric Zeitgeist, the system of feminist governance that most are sill loathe to acknowledge is about to head toward its inevitable and ugly conclusion, and the results of that will inflict another deep wound on the psyche of the western world.
The post continues on for some time in this melodramatic vein:
The ranking members of the matriarchy, like social terrorists, are partnering with and guiding government toward the inevitable explosion, and when it goes off they will be the first to point the finger at men, even at MRA’s, for the fallout.
It won’t help them, though. Because whatever tragic end this comes to, it will not be at the hands of MRA’s, but in spite of our efforts to prevent it.
All this would be a little more believable as a “warning” if Elam and other MRAs didn’t devote most of their energy to cultivating exactly this kind of male anger — and in some cases lionizing those who have acted out this rage.
The problem goes well beyond the few — on the fringe of even the already extreme Men’s Rights movement — who glorify misogyny-driven mass murderers like Marc Lepine or Elliot Rodger. Or those “Red Pillers” who declare that if they were going to kill themselves they would take some woman with them.
No, the problem comes when those in the mainstream of the Men’s Rights movement celebrate men like Tom Ball, a troubled father who set himself on fire on the steps of a New Hampshire courthouse in an attempt, as he explained in a lengthy manifesto, to inspire other men “to start burning down police stations and courthouses” to protest what he saw as a misandrist court system.
He followed this call to arms with instructions on how to prepare effective Molotov cocktails, and a lengthy plea to men to “finish the job” he had started:
There will be some casualties in this war. Some killed, some wounded, some captured. Some of them will be theirs. Some of the casualties will be ours.
Now, nobody wants to get killed. But let us look at your life. You are broke after paying child support. … Face it boys, we are no longer fathers. We are just piggy banks.
So you are not losing anything by picking up the Molotov cocktail. …
I only managed to get the main door of the Cheshire County Courthouse in Keene, NH. I would appreciate it if some of you boys would finish the job for me.
In other words, Ball was a would-be suicide/murderer who hoped others would do the murdering for him.
Ball’s manifesto was posted on AVFM’s “Activism” section for several years, taken down only after the Boston Marathon, and he was widely hailed by others in and around the Men’s Rights movement.
Helen Smith — an AVFM ally, the author of Men on Strike, and the wife of “Instapundit” Glenn Reynolds — wrote that Ball’s
statement is not the ramblings of a madman, it is the mission of a warrior in some sense. He was fighting for his rights and for yours, if you are male. He was trying to bring some urgency to the male plight in this country … .
She somehow neglected to mention that he was trying to do this by urging men to firebomb courthouses and police stations.
It’s striking how often MRA manifestos shade into vague threats of violence. One recent case, of many: Jeremiah True, the MRA-adjacent Reed College student banned from the discussion section of one of his courses after unnerving everyone in the class with his rants on rape, warned in one recent online manifesto that “[i]f you exclude me from the campus, I will rain hell down upon you all.”
True’s melodramatic insinuations of apocalyptic retribution might be amusing if declarations like these didn’t so often precede actual violence.
Unfortunately, when they aren’t making vague threats like these, MRAs are often found offering ingenious excuses for actual murderers. In an online discussion of the case of Chris Benoit, a pro wrestler who killed his wife and his son before hanging himself, AVFM’s Alison Tieman (a.k.a. Typhonblue) suggested that men who kill their families were men “backed into a courner [sic].” In the case of Benoit, she wondered
what horrific thing this woman did to this man to make him snap like this? I know, I know… “blaming the victim”. But I’ve seen too many “victims” grinning and pulling strings in the back ground to really feel sorry for them any more.
Her solution to male murder/suicide?
It’s obvious from this that men need to step away from women and start developing a male society outside of the auspices of women. That way they can support eachother when they get kicked out of female-society.
Murder/suicide isn’t the result of “misandry,” of evil wives “grinning and pulling strings in the back ground,” of men being “kicked out of female society.”
All too often, it’s the result of aggrieved male entitlement, of old-school “macho” attitudes that teach men that any sort of failure (from sexual to financial) is shameful and that anger is the only acceptable emotion to show the world.
Unfortunately, the Men’s Rights movement does nothing to challenge any of these toxic notions, all of them legacies of patriarchal thinking. All too often, MRAs celebrate them, helping to make the world a more difficult place for men, and a more dangerous place for women and children.
Male rage is not part of the solution. It is part of the problem.
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My previous post on the Germanwings Flight 9525, and one “manospherean’s” appalling response to it, can be found here.
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Oh Hi There, I don’t know if this is your first appearance in the WHTM comment section or not, but you sound like a classic concern troll.
Once again, there is no projection involved in re-stating the well-documented connection between aggrieved male entitlement and acts of mass murder.
And once again, David points out how the MRA rhetoric stoking and normalizing that sense of entitlement among men makes such acts of violence more likely. This is quite obvious and well-documented as well, and can be seen as objectionable only by those who are interested in muddying the waters and obscuring reality for whatever reasons.
It’s certainly your choice to deny the obvious and refuse to learn, but you have no case when you insist that others should follow you in it.
Keep on doing exactly what you’re doing, Dave. Before long, the MRM will not even need to respond to your drivel, you’re so ridiculous.
Aunt Edna, katz put it best in the comment directly before yours:
I agree with the argument; I’m not wild about the context.
Females do perpetuate this “macho” culture. when women start falling for sweet guys that fail alot without getting bothered then all men will be sweet and caring.
When will people like these stop reproducing? Well, thank god they complain about women not wanting them, that’s a good sign no one wants their children.
Alright, quick question for Oh Hi There: Are you also asking Vox Day to take down his article? If so, that’s fair, and to be honest I do think David might be jumping the gun a little bit. If not, you’re just concern trolling, and you can smeg off.
Dan
Depends on what you were responding to.
When you see someone making statements that indicate they don’t know the history or relevant facts, you can respond with questions and feed them appropriate references. I’m inclined to pretend that I haven’t discerned a political bias in many statements like this and give some plain unvarnished, statistics or other factual information. (I avoid political or ‘persuasive’ materials.)
otoh, when you see someone regurgitating propaganda and lies and they seem impervious to knowledge and reason, it’s a matter of personal style or choice how you respond. I’m inclined to go all schoolmarmy and show people their facts are wrong on the basis that even if they’re beyond help, some of the other readers might be reachable.
If you want to go for broke and tell someone like that that they’re despicable, be my guest.
M., I wouldn’t expect Vox Day or his comment section to be even remotely receptive to reason or capable of compassion.
You don’t think entitlement has anything to do with taking the lives of someone just because you can’t cope with the idea of them living without you? You don’t think there’s entitlement in taking a life that doesn’t belong to you, without asking, without caring whether that other person desperately wants to live? Not caring that their last moments will be filled with fear and horror?
That’s not “Love”. You don’t murder people you love. It’s never justifiable.
Men also beat their partners because they desperately want them to stay… It’s not “love”. It’s abuse. Men who kill their loves ones are committing one final act of horrific abuse and inflicting their own emotional problems on others to the point of fatal harm.
Most people who succumb to suicide die alone. Because most people don’t feel entitled to kill their loved ones, or a plane full of strangers. Even if someone justifies their actions as being an expression of “love”, love is not something you inflict on people. That’s still abuse.
Sorry, I just don’t believe in romanticizing this kind of disgusting tragedy.
I’m with AltoFronto. How is it not entitlement to kill someone for their “company?”
@Linax5
In other words, he feels entitled to their self-determination and even their lives. I don’t think that’s love in any sense as commonly understood, it’s treating people as things and not people.
Also, mental illness is not the same thing as treating others like objects for one’s gratification, yet using a descriptor like “sick minded” for murder-suicide conflates the two. This is inaccurate and perpetuates the already staggering stigma against the mentally ill, so such usage is generally frowned upon in this community.
From the comments on the “A little blood” article:
Do the MRAs see feminists the same way we see them?
I mean if we looked in the right places would we find they’d secretly been setting up DV shelters and helping suicidal guys all along and we just hadn’t seen it?
Only everything I’ve ever seen suggests that not only are they not doing that but that they have made explicit excuses for why not.
I also liked the irony of talking about the feminist agenda being in control of the narrative and in the same paragraph the possibility of the first woman president shortly as if this proved it.
How can you not see this – governments and corporations have the power right now, and women are ridiculously under-represented in both. First woman president – suggests it’s all been men until now, right? *sigh*
I think we’re at “women are in charge because they won’t give me blowjobs on command”, because I can’t see what other power it is they’re wielding over men. That’s logic that is.
You know, by MRA logic Paul Elam should really stop with all the “blood in the mix” rhetoric. I mean, a woman might take him seriously and decide he should, you know, not be alive any more. Which would be a tragic end and I’m sure they’d point fingers at feminists over it, but that’s what happens when ranking members of the patriarchy join forces with the government to guide us towards the inevitable explosion.
– Cyberwulf
Oh goddess. A woman killing men in venegance because of MRAs or because of personal bad experiences with men… the manosphere would EXPLODE. I doubt they would take any accusations that it really WAS MRAs/Men to blame as calmly as most of us ebil feminazis do when the finger is pointed at us… to many misogynists it would be the final evidence that feminists/women are literally DEMONS (or something like that)
He is encouraging men to commit murder/suicide. He wants them to do such horrible things to women that people will rush to find out what horrible thing women did to… deserve… it.
“Accountability” in this case is murder and for crimes never specified further than “Existing while female”.
He really believes that all men are as vile as he is. He knows some of his followers are. He’s talking some Jim Jones shit.
Who do I contact to report this hate speech? This isn’t vague. It isn’t satire. He wants men to murder women. That is a earnest attempt to incite violence against a minority.
Sweet Mother Teresa on the hood of a Mercedes Benz.
Sweet Jolly-fuck’n- Ranchers.
He encouraged men who are going through something as tough as a divorce to kill themselves AND their kids’ moms.
Here’s a tip MRA lurkers:
If you love your children you don’t murder their parents.
You are not a wallet. You are a parent. Parents are responsible for the care of their kids. That takes money. Get over it. Move on. You’re an adult. Act like one.
If Paul Elam saw you as a human being he wouldn’t be trying to get you to orphan your children. Your a pawn in his imaginary war. Not only does he want you to live on Ramen and send him more money than you spend on yourself or your own children, he wants you to die because he told you to. That’s the kind of creepy power trip that guys is on.
@friggindoc
Well, that sounds a little like extortion: “when you put out for us, ladies, THEN we’ll start being nice to you.”
Are you including yourself in this category of “sweet and caring” men? Because that doesn’t sound like the thought pattern of a nice guy. That sounds like the thought pattern of someone who sees women as a reward for male behavior, and is resentful that all the “rewards” are going to Macho Alpha Guys.
Women are not Skinner box pellets.
On a lighter note, I just wanted to drop by and tell everyone how much I love this community and appreciate everyone here (except the trolls of course). You’re all great people. xxx
@Buttercup
It did also sound like a vague “murders happen because women turn down nice guys, who then turn nasty and kill.”
Completely ignoring all the other reasons that (mostly) men kill others – and not just women as victims either. What, is the love of a good woman supposed to fix gang related killings? Were the Boston Bombers just poor little nice guys that wouldn’t have done it if they only had girlfriends? Are women freaking Helen of Troy now, each one of us, starting wars because we’re getting a little too close with “the wrong men”?
Yes I know I’m being hyperbolic. My point still stands: the idea that men kill because women reject them and thus the onus is on women to change, is utter fucking bullshit.
I love (no I don’t) how misogynists who fancy themselves nice guys tell us we should like sweet and nice guys. When we do like guys who we consider nice either the Nice Guy claims he’s really an asshole. Really what they’re saying is that “only me and other whiny entitled Nice Guys are good people. Because I said so!” They’re not mad because we don’t like nice guys. They’re mad because we don’t like them.
Then misogynists who fancy themselves alpha names tells us we like assholes because of biotruths. If we say we prefer men who are good, caring people. It must be because we’re cuckolding betas for money. Or we’ve been brainwashed by feminism and must be tricked and abused into sexing alphas. Or just raped outright.
No matter what type of misogynist is talking, they’re both saying the same thing. That we aren’t human beings who are allowed to state our own sexual or romantic preferences and follow those preferences.
Neither VD or the troll who dropped that turd are in a position to lecture us about nice guys. Saying “give us a blow job or we’ll kill you” is anything but nice.
With regards to Chris Benoit, brain disease seems to have been part of the toxic mix that led to his suicide and murder of his wife and child: he had chronic traumative encephalopathy that likely resulted from the sheer amount of shots to the head that pro-wrestlers all too often make. To speculate about what the woman did in the complete absence of evidence is beyond the pale.
@David NT
But that’s their constant narrative isn’t it? Whenever a man does something good it’s because of his own effort and ingenuity. When a man does something bad it’s because behind the scenes there was a woman who “made him do it”. If something bad happens TO a man it’s because of women everywhere and the collective gynocracy yada yada systematic male oppression and FEMINISM, dammit! Arglebargle!
@Oh Hi There
“I agree with the argument; I’m not wild about the context.”
What would be the right context for that argument, in your opinion?
Um. For some reason my phone autocorrected males to names. Huh?
BTW, let’s review the context, for clarity:
A presumably / allegedly suicidal male pilot deliberately steers a plane with 149 people on board into a mountain. MRA launch into their horrifyingly stupid yet predictable “if only sluts gave more blowjobs to Nice GuysTM, stuff like that wouldn’t happen” “explanation.”
David says, reasonably and truthfully, that the kind of rhetoric MRA use, one stoking male entitlement and anger and directly inciting violence as a “proper” response to men’s frustrations, makes such mass murder-suicides more likely than anything women do or don’t do. Because as Buttercup Q. cogently pointed out, it is not “women” that drive (some) men to do violent and despicable things (in cases where such a connection can be reasonably established or speculated about), but those men’s erroneous and harmful beliefs about women and life in general. And erroneous and harmful beliefs about women (and life in general) define the whole manuresphere. It’s pretty much all the manuresphere is, in case this may be somehow unclear.
In light of the above described developments, the context for David’s important post, in which he uses plenty of evidence to support his thesis, is absolutely appropriate. So much so that it has already created discomfort in MRA trolls coming here to lecture David about its inappropriateness without any reasonable arguments to back up their complaints. That’s because it shows the truth and, in doing so, hits just the right nerve.
Mmmmm…. Skinner box pellets…. Aughaughaugh….