Men’s Rights hate site A Voice for Men has a long history of fat shaming: apparently, like Roosh V and assorted other Red Pill douchebags, the good folks at AVFM consider the existence of fat women to be an assault on manhood, and possibly civilization itself.
Because that’s just the sort of human rights activists they are.
But even by AVFM’s low standards for logic, their latest little meme campaign against the evil fatties is a bit puzzling. Take the meme at the top of the page, found on AVFM’s Facebook page.
As an assault on “double standards” it’s a little odd, assuming that people find male employment and female thinness to be similarly sexually attractive. As an antifeminist “gotcha” — as I imagine its creator intended it to be — it makes even less sense. Feminists aren’t the ones telling men to “man up” and provide for women like the patriarchs of some imaginary golden age.
And if MRAs don’t want women to look to men for financial support, well, they could stop handwaving away the very real gender wage gap. And give up their endless attacks on child support as well as their fantasy of “financial abortions.” It’s hard to blame single mothers trying to raise kids on their own, often with inadequate or even non-existent support from the fathers in question, for thinking twice about dating guys who could end up demanding financial support themselves.
What makes the meme even weirder is that AVFMers don’t really want to give up fat shaming. So the overall effect of this meme is to … justify throwing shade at men who fail to live up to the traditional provider role that AVFM ostensibly opposes.
The meme below is an even more ironic variation on the theme.
Why is it more ironic? Because there actually are men out there interested in “dating” homeless women — and by “dating” I mean exploiting the desperation of young women living on the streets who are willing to trade sex for food, shelter, or drugs.
How do I know this? Well, aside from having heard stories from several women who were themselves exploited in this way, I know because guys aspiring to exploit homeless women keep showing up on this blog.
Several years ago, you see, I wrote about an incredibly skeevy post on Matt Forney’s old blog In Mala Fide touting homeless girls as a frugal alternative to pricey prostitutes. The author of the post, calling himself Advocatus Diaboli, suggested focusing on “freshly homeless young girls” with hippie inclinations, reporting that
a decent round of drinks, snacks, money for pot, a small necessary item of clothing, decent dinner with booze will almost guarantee you a good lay (or at least a couple of BJs).
Ever since I wrote that post, my blog has gotten a small but steady trickle of visitors who’ve found the site through Google searches for things like “homeless girl paid to have sex,” “homeless prostitutes,” and “how to get the homeless to have sex eith [sic] you.” These are all real examples from the past week; I see a handful of queries like this every time I take a look at my stats.
So congratulations, skeezy dudes, you’ve managed to overcome the prejudice against homeless people, with your boners.
Meanwhile, back on Facebook, AVFM is expanding its fat shaming crusade to include men as well.
In the United States, we should note, more than two-thirds of men (70%) are classified as “overweight” or “obese” — a rate even higher than that for women (57.6%). Apparently AVFM’s much vaunted “compassion for men and boys” only applies to 30% of them.
I don’t mean to be rude, but there are a number of AVFM staffers — male and female — who are themselves, well, “overweight” or “obese.” I wonder how they feel about volunteering for a site that regularly portrays people like them as little more than walking punchlines for unfunny memes.
There was a dude in the comments who was arguing that if feminists support Fat Acceptance, they should support Alcoholism Acceptance too. His reasoning was that “being fat is just as unhealthy as being an alcoholic.”
I’m not sure if he was playing devil’s advocate in any way, but I don’t think I need to explain everything that’s wrong with what he said.
@Marinerachel
[quote]Weird comparison, unemployment and obesity. One’s a physical characteristic. One’s employment status. [/quote]
It’s actually not that weird, and makes sense if you look at the context…
It was written in response to a news story about a woman who posted two profiles on a dating site. Identical, except for the pictures that showed her as fat in one profile and slightly chubby in the other. Aaaand surprise! The fat profile got half as many responses as the other. In other news, scientists believe the sun may rise tomorrow!
Just like non-obese/overweight women (or men too for that matter) are in general seen as more attractive than overweight/obese women, generally speaking, a man with a job, especially a good one, is commonly considered more desirable by women.
(Out in wider society that is. )
That’s why they’re equalizing the two.
The nuttiness starts when they claim that it’s feminists who are behind it all. Out in the extreme left where feminists usually come from, it would be considered Tabu to list a mans occupation or income level as desirable in a partner. Or at least to admit to it.
The idea that two people click on a personal level or emotional level is so foreign to men, it doesn’t even enter their radar. And that’s because they really really really don’t see women as human beings. They see them as sex-givers. It’s mind-boggling to live your life seeing other people only in that role but it’s the truth.
Men have this arbitrary idea that all women want status, a nice car or a good-looking guy. You can’t convince them otherwise. Then the more ambitious of them try to achieve that and still can’t believe they’re not being awarded the supermodel. It’s like personality or values or behavior don’t exist for them. To them, women are sex-givers and sex has to be earned by whatever means. Instead of seeing the whole person and working on a personal connection.
And then you show them 1001 examples where a not rich or not good-looking guy has a hot girlfriend and they still won’t change their mind. I mean at some point you have to admit you’re wrong.
Oh and what I’ve never seen is women harrassing a fat guy, or even like negatively noticing him. That’s because we don’t expect men’s bodies to be our business. Yet if there was a scenario where 10 skinny women and a fat women were at a place, the majority of men would make it their job to let the fat one know she’s not desirable, even though they were ten other skinny available women for them to talk to. Like they would spend their night debating the fat of that woman instead of talking to their desired hot girls. And a lot of them would be fat guys themselves. And then they claim to hate or ignore fat women, yeah right. Stop talking about them then.
Men like to go the lazy route that bullies love so much: put other people down to make yourself look better. Because actually achieving something in life is to big of an undertaking for them. The unemployed people I’ve seen are still less of a loser than those woman-hating, entitled, delusional assholes.
A group (which seems to be a PUA group) did an experiment where they set up a date via Tinder and the person was a lot heavier than their photo, both with men and with women. Not surprisingly, the fat women are treated abhorrently when compared than the men– even though the lady is very nice and the guy tries his best to be as unlikable (saying he only dates fit girls and hates kids and dogs!)–yet he still gets treated a lot better than the fat woman.
Female:
Male:
Um, a double standard is when you apply 2 standards to THE SAME THING. For instance sex: women must save themselves for one man but men can have all the partners they want, totes ok. 2 standards, one topic. Homelessness and fatness aren’t the same topic! They are experts on double standards! They even put double standards within double standards (women be a virgin but stop withholding sex)
God they are so good at embarrassing themselves.
I can’t see why we shouldn’t accept alcoholics. They’re people. Like everyone else, we certainly don’t have to want them as intimate partners (or, often the case with alcoholism, tolerate the harmful behaviour associated with it) but being a drunk doesn’t make it kosher for other people to treat you like shit, Alcoholics are human.
MRAs are confused. Every time they think they have a gotcha they…… well, they don’t.
What’s a financial abortion?
@machinerachel
I don’t think that’s what he meant. I think he meant that if we accept being fat as OK, we should accept alcoholism (the behaviour, not just the person) as OK. I had to point out to him that many people carry excess weight despite a healthy lifestyle and there is nothing more they can do, while drinking to excess is entirely a choice, even if it gets to the addiction stage. Alcoholism can and does hurt the people around the alcoholic, especially if they get abusive while drunk, whereas being overweight doesn’t. And being fat doesn’t affect ability to work or be productive, meanwhile alcoholism does. I think I’m flaying the point now, so I’ll stop.
Not to thread necro, but here’s an interesting interview with someone who has studied eating behavior for decades explaining why dieting doesn’t work.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/05/04/why-diets-dont-actually-work-according-to-a-researcher-who-has-studied-them-for-decades/
Of course, the comments are predictably filled with people ignoring the science and proclaiming that Weight Watchers or eating like a perfect saintly European is the magic trick to thin. People have clearly internalized the diet industry and media messages to such an extent that they are unable to process any contradictory information.
Once again, Futrelle, you have done your best to bend over backwards to wildly distort another’s message in the worst light possible to serve your ideological purposes.
My meaning:
Heterosexual men have a tendency to be attracted to young, healthy and comely women. Heterosexual women have the tendency to be attracted to ambitious and prosperous men. If it is in appropriate to shame women for being fat, it is equally inappropriate to shame men for lack of wealth.
Please don’t use my memes, anymore, David.
David Futrelle said
Why imagine, when there’s a link to a form to contact me directly on my blog? 0 points for doing your due diligence.
Francis, hon, I understood what your ostensible argument was, as you would know if you actually read my post with any degree of care. It’s just that it’s a little hard to take that seriously given AVFM’s long history of fat shaming — and your fat shaming in the meme with the fat dude.
There was nothing on your meme to identify it as being yours. A google image search only brought me back to the AVFM facebook page.
@Francis Roy:
The inappropriateness of shaming women for being fat is not predicated on men’s attraction to women. At all. In fact, countering stereotypical notions of “attractiveness” is what things like Big is Beautiful are all about! So your analogy fails immediately.
But hey, shaming people for being fat and shaming people for being poor are both bad, so at least you’re approaching the semblence of a good idea! You know? Got that… got that going for ya.
Francis,
Got any evidence that the women who are speaking out against fat shaming are making fun of low income men? If not, you’re calling out a double standard that doesn’t actually exist. That’s why your memes are mockworthy. Usually us “SJW” types are mocked for not being libertarian capitalists.
You do not have leave to call me by pet names.
I was pointing out that it is equally inappropriate to shame fat men as it is fat women. You have missed my point.
Now you know. In the future, when you see something of that style, check my blog, and if you find it there, please don’t use it. Considering that you’ve taken the time to misrepresent a number of my other memes, I know that you are aware of where to find it.
Your question is a catch-22. Are you looking for governmental statistics? If I present one or a dozen example, you’ll dismiss it them as extreme, fringe or too-small a sample size. If I point out my experience with a life-time of speaking to large women who make the claim that she won’t date someone because he isn’t prosperous enough, you’ll likely assert that it’s anecdotal evidence. If I were to hold a poll, you’d accuse me of loading it with MRAs.
I assume that as an honest person, you’ve likely met more than one woman who is both less than a fitness model and simultaneously holds men to some a standard of ambition or prosperity, greater than her own, and that the request for evidence is a poor choice of words.
Typically, what I mock are bad ideas, rather than people.
Kirbywarp said:
And the notion of shaming men for not being prosperous is not predicated on women’s attraction to men. Can we both admit that physical attractiveness and prosperity are both traits that have an effect on sexual attraction?
I’ve been addressing such things for a while. Note the date on this image.
I’m merely countering the stereotypical notion of “attractiveness” that is based on prosperity. Were I to create a series of posters to promote “Broke is Beautiful!” would straight women flock to poor men? Would it do anything for the destitute man’s self-esteem? Do you honestly believe that a media campaign can change someone’s sexual or aesthetic preferences?
What fails is the approach that this sub-section of society is taking. The notion that society’s mores are purely a social construct is just as silly as pure biological determinism.
First of all: aesthetic and personal sexual preferences change all the time. Which you would know if you had spent ten seconds studying the topic from an anthropological or historical point of view. Fat women have traditionally been seen as extremely sexually desirable as partners–the current vogue for supermodel types is extremely unusual and ahistorical.
But, in any event, fat acceptance/health at any size isn’t really about changing any particular individual person’s aesthetic preferences. Its about enabling people to feel good (male or female) about their own bodies. So in that sense the only thing it has to do with unemployment or poverty is that it is a form of group consciousness raising that is intended to help many people who temporarily or permanently share a characteristic work together to resolve issues relating to their own lives. You could see it as a kind of union crossed with support group.
Finally: its not your job to police the world or explain to other people (male or female) that they should accept shaming or second class status. No one has to listen to you and no one should because your viewpoint is so meanspirited, vicious and uninteresting. You have nothing to say on the topic in a literal sense because your work is vapid and tedious, and you have nothing to say on the topic because you don’t have standing to address other people’s lives and interests.
At this point I think ANY evidence of anti-fat-shaming women mocking low income men would be appreciated, Francis. Because I have no clue how people get the idea, apart from absorbing too much pop culture, that women are as fussy about their partner’s income as certain men are about the body weight of total strangers.
Francis,
What do you mean by large women not wanting to date men who aren’t prosperous enough? Because anti feminists are constantly making the claim that women care about money more than anything and that’s not reflective of anyone I’ve known at any point in my life. If all the women you know only value money and all the men you know only value physical appearance, maybe you’re just hanging around terrible people. Like MRAs. However, you haven’t defined prosperity so for all I know you’re talking about women who don’t find it attractive when a man is too irresponsible to hold down a job and prefers to live off the money and unpaid labor of the women in his life. You know, like Paul Elam. You could also be talking about conservative, traditionalist women who want to be homemakers. Those sorts of women want a prosperous man because they believe that it’s a man’s duty to provide financially. You guys are very inconsistent and hypocritical. You claim to like traditionalist women and think feminism is bad, you resent the trappings of traditionalism such as men being expected to be providers.
As for statistics, sure provide them. Provide a good study. Why not? I’m not denying that many men show a preference for conventionally attractive women and many women show a preference for men with a money or status. That’s what our culture socializes us to do. What I’m denying is that women who believe that appearance should be less emphasized in our culture are the ones who are materialistic and money obsessed.
If you think our culture should place less value on money, just say that. I’m not sure why that requires taking issue with fat acceptance.
BTW, that last meme you posted is also terrible. I have very large breasts. I don’t have them at you, it’s just my genes. I have cleavage in practically every shirt. That doesn’t mean it’s absurd to be expected to be treated like a human being. When it’s hot and humid outside I’d rather go outside in a tank top than my puffy winter coat. That doesn’t mean I’m asking for sexual harassment. Although maybe I’m missing something because I have no idea what’s going on with the check above the cleavage picture.
@WWTH
MRAs believe that women objectify men by seeing them as cash cows and not people. I think Francis is trying to draw a parallel, while throwing in a “if you don’t want me to stare why are you wearing that?” hint as well.
2aimai,
Every representation of fertility I’ve seen in old art involves a woman who is either fat or medium sized and curvy. It’s always hilarious to hear men argue that preference for thinness is some sort of biotruth.
The assertion that women will only find wealthy and employed men attractive flies in the face of the other MRA assertion that women routinely date unemployed, stoner, jerks in despite of “nice guys ™” who have steady jobs. At any rate the entire argument, such as it is, is ridiculous: both women and men find lots of different kinds of people attractive, at different times in their lives. That should be obvious: you can open your window and look out and see that for every crooked foot there is a crooked shoe and for every pot a top (as the Brazilians say). People are meeting, falling in love, and having sex–lots of them. Lots of ugly people, unemployed people, fat people, skinny people–all kinds of people find each other and strive to be happy and generous to the people in their lives. That must be double plus upsetting for people who have to tellthemselves an evo psych just so- horror story every night just to get over the angst of falling asleep alone.
Ooh, look the creator of the inexplicable memes has arrived to explain them!
Francis, you do understand that if people are looking at your meme and going “huh?”, that means your meme has failed, right?
@Francis
Uh, yeah. Your message is loud and clear: “Some men are poor therefore fat women are ugly. MISANDRY” It’s just that your message doesn’t make any fucking sense.