UPDATE: This poster (apparently) isn’t an official AVFM poster, but they have endorsed it. See bottom of post for details.
Is the appearance of this poster at a Toronto train station an example of inadvertently terrible timing, or an act of astounding assholery?
The poster in question was spotted at Toronto Transit’s Ossington station yesterday, a day after reports of online threats against University of Toronto women hit the media. Classy, AVFM, classy!
Adding to the ick factor: As one Twitterer pointed out, the bus line that goes through the U of T campus connects to the subway at Ossington Station.
Even if the timing of this little poster campaign is purely coincidental, it’s a little hard to fathom how anyone associated with AVFM would think that the best way to recruit Toronto women to their cause would be to essentially tell them: “We have no respect for you and no understanding of feminism; we like to imagine you suffering; come join us for some epic mansplaining!”
But AVFMers seem to have perpetual troubles telling the difference between “brilliant PR move” and “shitting their pants in public.”
Twitter parody account @TTCwelps had what is probably the best response to the poster.
https://twitter.com/TTCwelps/status/642376748919746560
And here’s a reminder that not everything that starts out with the phrase “hey ladies” is automatically terrible.
UPDATE: Here’s an official statement on the poster from AVFM’s Facebook page. It’s a little … confusing, in that they’re not entirely sure if it’s one of their posters or not.
“Hey ladies,
Still unable to sling from rooftop to rooftop?
Mere human-powered punches not landing as well as your quips?
Able to pick up on red flags, but not sneak attacks?
How is not being a superhero working out for you?
Go to aradioactivespiderbitme.com”
… I’m actually wondering if that URL’s available, now that I’ve typed that out.
@Tara
As usual, they simply can’t keep their stories straight. They hate women who have their own money, and they also hate women who don’t have money. As long as it’s about hating women, they’re for it. I’m suspecting they desperately need women to depend on men for dinner and drinks, because having to pay for dinner and drinks is one of their favorite things to complain about.
Unless you’re Dean Esmay, in which case not getting married is fatal.
Who can be counted on one hand. Yeah, that’s a lot of women, all right.
There’s that word again…misogyny AND misandry, all in one ugly and mindless word. Because a vagina is truly the worst thing in the world to have/be!
Explain to me again what your bowel movement’s attraction for women is supposed to be. For that matter, what its attraction for MEN is supposed to be.
@dhag85
Yeah, their reasoning (and I use that term loosely) seems to be, “If feeemales don’t need men to pay for stuff, how am I gonna get laid?”
Those don’t exist.
How does it feel to be fighting a figment of your own imagination?
I just had sort of a funny thought. Imagine a woman who really is a 30 year old feminist, unmarried and struggling to find dates, and with serious financial troubles. Imagine her seeing this poster without having any previous knowledge of AVfM. What would she think?
First of all, the name of the website clearly states it’s for men, so she would probably assume she either misread it or there’s a typo.
But imagine if she really did go to the website, expecting to find helpful advice for a woman in her situation. Imagine the confusion when faced with the actual content of AVfM.
Like others have already pointed out, there’s no way in hell this poster is actually meant to convince any woman.
@Tara
Right? They’ve decided that it’s simply biofacts of human nature that men work and women freeload, so they despise women and men who won’t fall for that lie. But at the same time they seem to also hate this ‘reality’ that they’ve created for themselves. It’s almost as of they just want to be professional victims.
@bina
–a ton of women
—-Who can be counted on one hand. Yeah, that’s a lot of women, all right.
TECHNICALLY, depending on how many women and how much they weigh, he might actually be technically correct. If they’ve got maybe… hmmm… average weight of a woman is about 166 lbs as per google… I’d say as long as AVFM has 13 women, they do in fact have a ton of women.
Soooooo does AVFM have a ton of women? Well that’s still kind of debatable…
Well, it’s impressively legible for an MRA poster, I’ll give them that. MRA’s being able to make a poster that’s less than a thousand words with text that doesn’t blend or clash over the background is a feat.
The whole “You want some answers” thing reminds me of some religious propaganda. Scientology? I’m not sure.
@Gregory,
So, AVFM’s marketing campaign directed at women is basically to offer them husbands and free rent? Isn’t that, uh, kinda beta?
@Hipsterminator & Paradoxical Intention – Haha. Excellent. 🙂
@magnesium – Well, AVfM seems to think feminism is a religion – or some kind of proper noun, anyway – given that they’ve capitalized it. Then again, they also capitalized “Ladies,” and I don’t see any evidence of great respect for women in the poster.
Let me give it a try…
Hey A Voice for Men,
You randomly capitalize Nouns?
You find yourself asking questions phrased as statements?
How is lazy writing working for you?
Want some answers?
Go to http://bigwords101.com/ (the blogger/educator calls herself the Grammar Diva, which I’m sure is misandry somehow)
@Ikeke35
Well stated.
Maybe imaginative people are more able to imagine what it’s like to be in someone else’s position and so are less likely to want to lash out. And maybe bigots actually do have imagination but are blocking it–’cause that imagination won’t get them what they want, so it has to go. After all, babies have empathy. My mother, a neonatal nurse, said that if a baby starts crying in the nursery, you have to calm it right away. Because once one baby starts to cry, they all start to cry. Imagine a roomful of 35 squalling infants.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-JYKGyxd5H2Q/U7IRIsuKknI/AAAAAAAAAjs/eX0WobqXA7k/s1600/140628_5D3_8334_20.jpg
I think I just found the perfect illustration of MRA “love” and why no one would want it:
‘Course, Frank was singing tongue in cheek, and these guys, lacking a sense of irony, would interpret all of that literally. Including the creepy rapey-beastly bit the end, with no words.
I’m so confused by the intent of the poster.
Is a pick-up poster trying desperately to get some female presence into the lonely manosphere life?
Is it a poster saying that AFVM can actually help women out with the stated issues? How? Last I checked they were concerned entirely about the men.
Is it a satirical poster? It could very well be.
Or is it an incredible dull and lame attempt to disparage feminism while imparting nothing of substance?
So many options to choose. Why are the AFVM people so philosophical? My brain hurts.
Dude, I love what you do, Dave. I really do. But some days it’s hard to read your posts because they make my blood boil. And they hurt my head. I don’t understand how people can be this twisted around backwards. I don’t see why this is a hard thing to understand: if you’re an evolutionist, it makes sense to get along with people and keep the peace because peace ensures your progeny don’t, y’know, die. And if you’re one of the Christian MRAs, the Bible is pretty clear in its language that when man was put into a deep sleep by God, God didn’t just take a rib out of him to make Eve. Rather, the word that is used (tsela) means He took half of man and used it to make woman. So they are 50/50 partners. Simple as that. So you can’t be a Biblical Christian and be an MRA: the two are mutually exclusive. And I could go through SO many other sections of Bible, for example Genesis 3:15 vs. Song of Songs 7:10, Christ’s compassionate ministry to women, etc. etc.
My point is, it seems most of these goombas are either atheists arguing that they should plow as many women as possible to get their “alpha” on or Christians arguing that women need to “know their place.” Neither of those seem to be logically sound positions, nor does evidence seem to bear them up. So they don’t hold water. So why are so many guys taken in by this that we have lades like Sarkeesian being docs’d, Ellen Pao being run out of her job, and death threats being called in to female CEOs? What the actual heck, men? What the actual heck?
Something I’ve found helpful in my life, not that I’m an expert or perfect is the following:
http://data.whicdn.com/images/39517598/large.jpg
This is the thing that is, at least partly, the root of MRA toxicity. Would I be better off with even an “eh” marriage? Probably, but that doesn’t mean that the other person would be. Life is not always “I want, I want, I want!”. If I had to hurt someone to achieve my goals I’d have problems with it, while, well, I think we know what many MRAs (including whoever posted this) would feel.
Also, though it isn’t really a valid point (see below), it *can* be easier to afford permanent level housing (whether condo or house) in a couple because, from experience, I’ve found that two incomes/one housing cost was one of the biggest money multipliers you can find (and, in my experience, post-college roommate experience is essentially hanging a sign around your neck saying “Steal from Me!”). Having said that, it is certainly attainable to achieve this for a single person (male or female) and once your initial loan is paid off, still cheaper than renting (or paying the combination of lawyers and the joint property settlement in a divorce).
Sorry for the long post, but that’s how I feel.
Only some men. I can never get over that they explicitly reject the idea that their mandate should include all men.
It’s A Voice for Men, But Only Men Who Agree That Women Are Terrible, You Feminist Men Aren’t Really Men, And What Was Stop And Frisk? I Never Heard Of That Before Just Now.
A Voice for (Straight, Cisgendered, White, Middle-Class) Men Who Hate Women, Men Who Think Women are People Too, and Men Who Don’t Agree With Us.
But of course, AVfM mostly just hates women.
@wwth, you owe me a new keyboard and a new nose to replace the one I nearly destroyed with soda.
You needed to give a trigger warning for destructive snorting.
And I am just slightly less amused by the idea that they have any answers for single women over 30 at AVfM. I mean, do they really want a woman who is desperate enough to latch onto a man who hates women? (Or could it just be that the man who made this poster didn’t actually think what he was doing through? I know, ask a silly question …)
@Policy and Paradoxical Intention
A Voice For Men With Serious Issues
Concise 8p