Some Green-and-Purple Pill wisdom from the Kotaku in Action subreddit, Reddit’s home for GamerGaters and SJW-haters:
H/T — r/BestOfOutrageCulture
Categories
Teaching people about slavery, tolerance will lead to destruction of “the heterosexual identity of men,” GamerGater explains
Chaos-Engineer said:
“The reason I’m asking is because a lot of people stumble into the Libertarian Fallacy here: That’s basically social pressure to believe that there’s no such thing as social pressure. If you’ve fallen into this fallacy, then when you hear someone criticizing a social system, you’ll interpret it as a criticism of you personally.”
????
That also does a nice job of answering my earlier “Haven’t read the replies yet, but have to say that it continually amazes me that so many people take critiques and analyses of systemic issues as personal attacks.”
@proxieme
“Help! I’m being oppressed by people educating others about the bad things some people did in the past! People who aren’t me and probably weren’t even related to me but also had a penis, like me! MISANDRY!”
@sunnysombrera:
But they did do all those things personally. You know, the same way they hunted the mammoths personally. Anything that one be-peened person does counts as having been done by all be-peened people, and if you knew enough evolutionary psychology you’d understand why. After all, if those deeds were committed by other people then it means that all the triumphs of white men over the centuries were also done by other people, and that leaves them with merely their own achievements to feel proud of.
Strangely this doesn’t mean that they feel the need to, you know, apologise for any of it having happened: they just want people to stop talking about it. Which is an ugly way of viewing moral responsibility.
@EJ
But if every be-peened person is personally responsible for what other be-peened people have achieved or done, then why is Not All Men such a staple of MRA discourse?
It’s simple: If a man does something good, then all men are responsible, but if a man does something bad, then only that one man is responsible. Inversely, if a woman does something good, then only that one woman is responsible, but if a woman does something bad, then all women are responsible.
(If we’re talking race troofs instead of gender troofs, replace “Man” and “Woman” with “White person” and “Black person.”)
@sunnysombrera:
Snarky answer:
I assume it’s for the same reason that the moment a GamerGater sends something abusive to Brianna Wu, they retroactively stop having been a Gater all along and were just an unaffiliated troll trying to get their consumer-rights movement in trouble. Which is to say, because shut up.
Analytic answer:
In my view, the reason why Not All Men is such a commonly used phrase is precisely because of this. Let me teal dear a little here to make the point.
There’s a regimentation aspect to male socialisation, in which men are expected to personally identify with a group and take its victories and defeats as personal ones. In the past this was probably useful to incite men to engage in tribal or nationalistic wars; nowadays it’s most immediately obvious in sports fans or in online discussions about international politics. If your champion won, then you personally have won. If your country did something right, then you can personally bask in the glory. The fact that it may have happened a hundred years ago or to a person you’ve never met does not make it any less personal.
(This may also be true for women. I don’t know. I have never been socialised as a woman.)
Of course, the problem with this system is that if you want to take credit for the good, you have to take the blame for the bad. This can get hard, especially when the bad is really, really bad. Humans aren’t good at thinking of themselves as having done bad things. This is especially true for humans who think of the world as being divided into “good people” and “bad people”, because placing oneself into a group labelled “bad people” is very difficult psychologically. As a result people tend to deal with this in one of two ways:
a) “That person wasn’t actually one of us.”
b) “That act wasn’t actually bad.”
Very often, when people feel they’re unable to make argument (b), they’ll end up constructing extremely elaborate mental gymnastics to justify argument (a). This can include Othering the perpetrators, digging into their background to find reasons why they were never “one of us” at all, or even claiming it as a false flag. However the most common form of argument (a) is simply a No True Scotsman defence:
“My group does not commit abuse, because anyone who commits abuse cannot have been a member of my group.”
This is why, in my view, people are so loud when shouting #NotAllMen. They’re trying to construct a worldview in which such acts are not committed by members of their own group and thus they are able to continue deriving identity and self-esteem from that group.
It’s important to understand that this is not malice: rather it’s an attempt by people to extricate themselves from a psychologically difficult position caused by an inevitable collision between socialisation, human psychology and the unfortunate reality of events. I have sympathy with their plight, and hope that one day they overcome their socialisation in this regard.
Lemme guess: It’s super-verbose, shows poor graphic artistry, is based on false premises, compares apples to oranges, misses the point entirely, and has that awful blood-smeary Nazi deathcamp logo of theirs on it?
I’m just left with the feeling that, if historical awareness and acknolwedgement of racism and sexism is going to destroy your identity, then it is a sign that you should destroy it and try to build it back on firmer ground and into something less fragile.
I wonder if there are theorists and activists working to explore non- and less-toxic forms of identity so that people don’t have to build their sense of self on a foundation of others’ oppression. I wonder….
Wouldn’t that be nice?
Bina:
It’s like you have second sight or something!
Baahahahahaha. That’s hilarious, given how many radfems I’ve personally met who were lesbian separatist types, with a burning desire to get away from men (and men’s power games) altogether. Even trans women count as men to them, because PENIS.
Hahaha. Or rather, a simple case of “You’ve seen one shitty AVFM meme, you’ve seen ’em all.”
@Scented Fucking Hard Chairs “It’s simple: If a man does something good, then all men are responsible, but if a man does something bad, then only that one man is responsible. Inversely, if a woman does something good, then only that one woman is responsible, but if a woman does something bad, then all women are responsible.”
Not to mention that if a woman does something good in a field that society has coded male/masculine it’s also considered bad by some of them cause she’s “stealing” oportunities for men to be manly and she’s “going against her nature”, and so it becomes a case of “all women are stealing men’s right to prove themselves as men”. So what was once an individual woman’s good act becomes all women’s bad act through reinterpretation.
@naira8:
That would be nice. I wonder if it would be possible to do it in a way that still gave people a sense of belonging to something with some history, rather than just a blank slate?
That’s an excellent analysis EJ.
@Moggie and Bina
Didn’t the creator of one if those AVFM memes swing by fairly recently to try and explain (badly) what the memes were supposed to mean?
I am loving the kokatuinaction subreddit!!! Threads trying to get The Times to correct their stories, anti-feminism just kind of thrown in there willy nilly, some dude posting about getting banned from wikipedia. Do they hear themselves???? I like this quote:
“I’m going to borrow Anita Sarkesians favorite word: The SJW mob is pernicious, because their manner of applying public harm is so putrid that people just want to get out of the way rather than risk getting any harm thrown onto themselves.”
Tip- don’t borrow Anita Sarkeesian’s words until you look them up in the dictionary first.
If a bit of true historical information can destroy it, then the heterosexual identity of men must be a weak and fragile little flower indeed. Too bad it grows in a big strong grown-ass man’s body capable of all sorts of mischief,
Bina
“Lemme guess: It’s super-verbose, shows poor graphic artistry, is based on false premises, compares apples to oranges, misses the point entirely, and has that awful blood-smeary Nazi deathcamp logo of theirs on it?”
http://media.giphy.com/media/HjPbLbmep2aJO/giphy.gif
The funniest thing about the complaints that white, straight, cis, able bodied, white dudes’ of average size are being shamed for their whiteness, maleness or what have you is that they are literally the only population in the US that is not shamed for their sexuality.
LeVar Burton said something on the Nerdist like, “Jordie was the only main character that was never shown in a sexual relationship. A robot could have sex, but a black man’s sexuality was too scary”.
It’s true. If you are anything but white, straight, cis and male your sexuality will be treated as gross, inferior or even immoral. It will be treated as a reason to look down on you.
These guys never have to face that (unless they like butt stuff). Instead they see other people standing up to these stupid double standards and feel threatened by no longer being considered the bestest people in the world.
Poor pitiful them.
@Lea:
That’s both interesting and true, and also makes me wonder. So much of traditional male socialisation urges men to take an extremely dominant position and portrays the concept of consent as being innately threatening; and yet AVFM internet propaganda always reminds me of nothing so much as femdom humiliation fetish pornography. In light of your point I might venture to suggest that there’s a strain of shameful sexual desire in the MRA thinking process after all.
EJ,
I think so. I think we can see a similar issue when men like that have fits over fat women being considered sexy. I think they insist that no one wants to have sexy times with fat ladies because if some men like fat ladies, they might be suspected to be some guys. That’s where you get guys who call their fat lovers “mopeds”. “It’s fun to ride but you wouldn’t want your friends to see you on it” It’s supposed to shame the fat woman, not the men having sex with her because they’re scared. They are afraid of her ability to turn them on. Even her humanity is erased. He’s supposed to just getting his by any means necessary (as manly men are supposed to do), which is often a complete lie.
For men like this not into fat lovers, the fear is different. In authoritarian thinking all that is allowed is mandatory. While a woman may have her sexual agency removed by a man in their minds, they are horrified that theirs might be taken from them. I think the fear of gay men and trans women comes partially from that mindset.
Both are also a form of femophbia even for straight men who do not prefer a fat or trans lover and are looking past the outer person and falling for the person’s personality. First off, that means he has actually listened to her and appreciated her as a human. If a man is attracted to anything other than a woman’s body, he’s not macho. Love? Respect? Emotional intimacy?Not macho. It’s supposed to be Beauty and the Beast, not Fabio and the Fugly Female. Women are to see past looks. Men are not.
…an romantic asexual or demisexual men? Super scary too.
With non-hetero men and trans women that fear seems to me to be more of being reduced to feminine status and the fear that gay men might treat them like they treat women (and they think liking lady cock makes them *gasp* gay). Again, the fear is that they’re status as a Real Man with the one true proud sexuality will be revoked by being made feminine.
I’ve heard straight guys say “If a gay guy were to hit on me I’ll beat his ass!.” As the most frightening thing they could imagine is being on the receiving end of what they think of as male sexuality, but is really harassment. Women need to take a “compliment”. They think they have to make a big deal about being violently enraged. Because man.
It does not sound fun to be them. So many straight guys are not scared of these things and do not think someone else’s body or sexuality is about them. (Or they are aware and working on it) They’re having so much more fun. In fact, it seems like we’re all having more fun than the guys buying into toxic masculinity are. You’d think they’d figure that out and if for no other reason try to get a handle on their issues.
A trans friend of mine was the super macho-est when people thought she was a boy. She played football, did back yard wrestling (with the folding chairs, ball bats wrapped in barb wire and the whole shebang). She got good at fighting. She still practices a few forms of martial arts, but most of her rough and risk taking behavior was to hide her true nature. She didn’t feel male, so she says she never felt like she was being manly enough to avoid detection. She was always trying to pass as a Real Man.
Her fear was warranted. These guys, not so much. However, I think they are motivated by a similar fear. There is no “Real Man”. So, how do you live up to something that isn’t real? You don’t. So, you try and try and get frustrated and blame other people for your failure. (Because Real Men don’t fail!)
I had a Christian friend once tell me she tried to live up to the perfect wife as described in the Bible. (I forget the passage, but it’s all about how she can juggle a farm, a business and a household while still being meek and pleasant for her husband.) Finally a pastor explained to her that that woman was not real. She was an ideal. An ideal created by a man. That was her light bulb moment. She’s much happier now because she does not feel like a failure as a woman and a Christian all the time.
These guys need that same kind of moment if they are ever going to feel comfortable with themselves.
*sung to the tune of Don’t Whiz on the Electric Fence*
Lea post-ed a wall of text
No one knows when she’ll com-ment next,
But they all know she’ll post a wall of text.
My apologies.
But… how is every guy turning gay a bad thing in MRA world? If that happened, they don’t have to deal with women to have sex anymore AND no more false rape accusations. Wouldn’t that be a good thign?
@Lea
Spot on. There is a huge sense of worthlessness of not being able to conform to the male stereotype.
There is also a huge amount of shaming that goes along with it. Because if you cannot conform to masculinity, that automatically means you are feminine. Aaaaaand of course, being called feminine is supposed to be a huge insult because femininity = weak/pathetic. This reminds me of an ‘interesting’ conversation (and the last one I had with this individual).
I asked:
“so if a girl acting masculine is a tomboy, what is a guy acting feminine?”
His response:
“A faggot”
Cthulhu’s Intern,
One would think. But then, who would they “ruin” and abuse? Who would they feel superior to? It seems like that’s the only pleasure they get out of sex that couldn’t be accomplished with masturbation.