Over on Boing Boing, Mark Frauenfelder has posted the excerpt below from A Love That Multiplies: An Up-Close View of How They Make It Work by Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar — yes, those Duggars — explaining how women “defraud” men when they dress in a way that men find exciting (in their pants).
This, sadly, is not exactly an original or even unusual notion in reactionary religious circles.
Indeed, a couple of years back, I found a rather scary post on a radically pro-patriarchal site called the CoAlpha Brotherhood in which one young man calling himself Drealm lamented that, as a man living “in a university town that’s overrun with young girls” he was literally “forced to stare at hundreds if not thousands of women a day, all of whom bring sluttiness to all new pinnacle”
Like the Duggars, Drealm thought that “a woman dressing provocatively and leaving a man in an unfinished state of excitement … is an assault on men’s sexuality.”
When women dress like this, he argued, he and other men couldn’t help but want to rape them.
[T]he only thing I want to do to a slut is rape them. … dressing like sluts brings out murders, rapists and sadists in men. … A society based on sluts, might as well be a pro-rapist society.
Reading back over this now, it’s all a bit too reminiscent of the thinking of Elliot Rodger. Indeed, after Rodger went on his misogyny-driven murder spree, one CoAlpha Forum member wrote that Rodger “would have been a true hero” had he only killed more sorority women; the site now adorns its front page with an homage to Rodger.
But it isn’t just those on the margins of the manosphere who think this way. In The Myth of Male Power, the 1993 book that essentially provided the ideological blueprint for the Men’s Rights movement today, Warren Farrell famously wrote of the “miniskirt power” secretaries allegedly had over their male bosses.
Farrell is a couple of decades older now, and apparently it takes more than a miniskirt to render him powerless these days. And by “more than a miniskirt” I mean less. As in no clothing at all. When Farrell put out a new eBook edition of The Myth of Male Power last year, he had his publisher put a rear-view shot of a nude woman on the cover, “to illustrate,” as he explained in an appearance on Reddit,
that the heterosexual man’s attraction to the naked body of a beautiful woman takes the power out of our upper brain and transports it into our lower brain
This sort of logic, like that of the Duggars and of “Drealm” from the CoAlpha Brotherhood, also conveniently takes the blame for (heterosexual) male behavior and transports it into the bodies of women. With the Duggars, we’ve seen exactly where this sort of logic can lead.
Farrell, much like the Duggars and the excerable “Drealm,” also seems to think that women commit a kind of fraud against men when they “stir up sensual desires” that they don’t intend to fulfill. As Farrell wrote in The Myth of Male Power, when a man pays good money to take a woman out, and she doesn’t repay him, as it were, with sex, she is in his estimation committing a kind of “date fraud” or “date robbery.”
Or even a sort of date rape. Farrell wrote that
dating can feel to a man like robbery by social custom – the social custom of him taking money out of his pocket, giving it to her, and calling it a date. … Evenings of paying to be rejected can feel like a male version of date rape.
Emphasis mine, because holy fuck.
This is what happens when your ideology makes women responsible for (heterosexual) men’s desires. Hell, it’s what happens when you make anyone responsible for the desires of someone else, regardless of gender or sexual orientation.
Your pants feelings are your responsibility. Not anyone else’s. Full stop.
Mark is more boring and annoying than the cousin Oliver episodes of the Brady Bunch.
Maybe the onslaught of willful stupidity is actually a clever bargaining tactic. Perhaps Mark is hoping that under enough duress, we’ll agree to the conservative dress code in exchange for his swift departure.
No deal, Mark.
Mark is so stupid he thinks Neil Degrasse Tyson is a boxer.
Alright, you know what, fuck you Mark. My body is my own, I will wear what I please, and by god I hope it offends and makes you uncomfortable. Men like you have haunted my life since the day I developed breasts, and I will return the favor in any way I see fit. And you can take your baggy tshirt and parachute into an active volcano for good measure.
@WWTH, would that make him the bunghole that Cornholio needs the TP for?
Mark is so boring that he thinks wearing beige slacks might be a bit too extreme.
Mark is the Scrappy Doo of this thread. People tune in, see that he’s here, and then go look for something else to watch.
@Alan – Raccoons you want? You CAN get them in the UK: http://www.preloved.co.uk/adverts/list/3363/other-pets.html?keyword=raccoons%20for%20sale They ain’t cheap, but cheaper than a flight and import license.
Some people are concerned about raccoons as feral populations – because they’re pretty fearsome and clever predatory omnivores. Anti-immigrant prejudice, I say. Personally I’d love to see a local population here in London to outcompete the foxes.
Meanwhile – back on topic – here’s a new and disturbing news piece on a social media campaign. In the Middle East there’s a “Be a Man” campaign which challenges the masculinity of those who don’t control what “their” women wear. For the protection of the women of course.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-32932003
Testosterone levels and sex drive… I dunno. I know I’ve got abnormally high levels of T and I’ve also got the ‘lesbian fingers’ that some say indicate extra T during fetal development. I do seem to have a high sex drive, but I can only know my own experience and how I feel. I’ve certainly felt ‘uncontrollable lust’ – as in I didn’t control the level of lust I felt, but I didn’t randomly do things to unwilling people. And more importantly I wasn’t ANGRY with the random objects of my lust – hot blokes just walking around in various states of dress. And even if I may have wanted to engage in sexual activities with them I didn’t blame them or want to hurt them or anything – not even the ones who are way too hot for my personal ‘sexual market value’.
There was an episode of Beavis and Butthead in which they tried to sue a classmate because she was sexually harassing them by being hot.
They failed. Because that’s stupid. Like Mark.
Obviously we should swap indigenous species because I love foxes and think they’re adorable!
(But seriously, don’t introduce species. It’s always a bad idea, no matter how lovable.)
And Mark:
Mark eats bread and water because he doesn’t want to tempt anyone with the smell of delicious food – he’s considerate like that.
@ runyyogi
Yeah, saw that thanks. Would love one (or two) but not sure how the dog would react. Ah well, maybe when I finally achieve my dream of having a donkey sanctuary I can find some room for them.
In the interim, a trip here might be in order. Just waiting for it to be vetted by SO [we’re not fans of zoos so have to check they don’t have any killer whales round the back etc. If it’s a pure sanctuary I’ll be allowed 🙂 ]
http://www.porfell.co.uk/items/racoons/
Mark, whose uncomfortable feelings are you expecting women to cater to, then, if not rapists?
@isidore13 his own feelings obviously, he doesn’t give a shit about the feelings of women whose freedom he’s trying to take away.
Mark is so boring that he only has the one record – “Anything Goes” by Cole Porter, recorded in his own voice, in Plainsong, which he plays on repeat, but only at a volume that’s on the verge of human hearing, because he doesn’t want to make anyone uncomfortable by playing music within their earshot.
Here’s the episode of Beavis and Butthead acting just like Mark.
https://youtu.be/xTLAOoMLG_s
Good freaking lord, are you really this stupid or are you just purposefully disingenuous? I honestly can’t tell anymore.
Unacceptable clothing is identified by having most/all people wearing that clothing while behaving unacceptably, and generally using that clothing as a prop in their unacceptable behaviour.
For example, if there was a rash of people wearing clothing embedded with two-inch long sharp pointed metal spikes and going around hugging people, causing injuries, society would probably go “hey wearing clothing with those spikes isn’t allowed.”
But dull metal studs, like the kinds you find on goth clothing and the like, would not be outlawed, because though they may LOOK similar, and possibly cause people distress, they are not and cannot be used to stab people. (Though it is possible cultural pressure would cause a drop in popularity of these studs, actually legislating against them would be out of line.)
And also, you cannot ban clothing that apparently ’causes’ people who are NOT the wearer to behave unacceptably, because PEOPLE ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR OWN FUCKING ACTIONS.
Ugh, I got sucked down the rabbit hole with that one. I don’t even remember why he brought that up. And I don’t feel like going back to re-read it all.
Even if the research did say that men have higher sex drives than women because of Biotruths(tm) (and it doesn’t) what does that have to do with the conclusion he’s trying to support? How do dress codes follow from that?
I don’t understand how men allegedly having a higher average sex drive is at all relevant to making just women cover up. Hello, gay men called, they said they totally exist and they get the hot pants feels from seeing other men.
Because women have lower sex drives are are better able to control themselves, it’s clearly up to them to change their clothing to better accommodate and placate the hordes of mindless, slavering animals that we call “men”, while men of course will have no dress codes imposed upon them whatsoever, because women can be expected to control themselves! It’s simply logic t it’s purest! /sarcasm
I admit, i skimmed the last couple of pages.
Is this what goes on here when I take my kids down to the park?
*peeks in to see if Mark is there*
Is he…gone? Really gone?
Probably not but eh.
@Kirby
You know, I don’t even like pandas.
They’re really stupid and lazy. You see, they actually are made and require meat and a varied diet to live, but they won’t hunt. They just eat bamboo because it’s there and doesn’t move. But, you see, bamboo sucks so much nutritionally wise they have to eats pounds and pounds of it every day to survive. And because they only eat bamboo, the mothers can’t produce enough milk for more than one cub even though it seems they have a lot of twins.
They also won’t fuck. Like, they have the sex drive of a rock. They literally have to put in panda porn to make them screw each other for 3 minutes. We’re amazed when pandas don’t need porn to bone, that’s who awful their sex drives are.
They are literally too stupid too live. The only reason why they’re around is because they’re cute, that’s it. And the worst part is that making sure pandas don’t make themselves extinct by being stupid and having no sex drive takes up millions and millions of dollars, money that could be put to species that actually WANT to survive and actual impact the ecosystem, like tigers, sharks and bats.
I mean, what do pandas contribute to the wild? Well, I guess they keep bamboo growth down, but you know, humans also eat bamboo. We probably eat more than pandas. We can take over that oh so important ecological factor when they’re gone.
I have to say, though, pandas are cute and without them we wouldn’t have Kung Fu Panda, but they’re just so fucking stupid and do so little, it’s just, you know, stupid.
@katz
We have foxes in America, you know. I have gray foxes where I live. And we already have imported red foxes, thanks.
No, no, wait, I forgot. Since women aren’t ‘visual’ like men are, having a dress code for men would simply be absurd! Women are attracted to money and power! Clearly the solution to this, to prevent women from getting uncomfortably hot under the collar, is to propose a maximum amount of money and power men can posses, and confiscating anything that exceeds this standard, which I will not specify but which should be obviously apparent to anyone. I mean, we all have to be considerate of the comfort levels of others! Men shouldn’t be allowed to flaunt their assets, lest women become uncontrollably flusterered!
And of course non-straight men and women simple do not exist, so we don’t need to think about accommodating them in any way!
/sarcasm, in case it wasn’t apparent.
Hey, maybe Pierre should be introduced to Mark the Ascetic.
Yo, Mark!
http://the-toast.net/2015/05/26/paintings-of-the-temptation-of-saint-anthony-that-fundamentally-misunderstand-the-concept-of-temptation/
That’s YOU, that is!
I know. One of the cutest is local-ish to me.
http://c4.staticflickr.com/8/7305/8933377954_b36c02baf4_b.jpg