UPDATE 10/25/16: If you’ve come here after reading about a petition to cancel screenings of The Red Pill, I ask you to NOT sign any such petitions. It’s just free publicity for them. Read more of my thoughts on the matter here.
Dear Cassie Jaye,
Congratulations. You surpassed your Kickstarter fundraising goal yesterday, more than two weeks before the Kickstarter campaign was scheduled to come to a close. You’ve funded the postproduction work on your long-delayed documentary on Men’s Rights activists, and then some.
But I’m not sure that the person I should be congratulating is you. Last night Paul Elam of A Voice for Men – the central subject of your film – was doing his own victory lap online. And no wonder, because he seems to be the real victor here.
In a post on his site that managed to be giddy and vindictive at once, he offered his congratulations to you, then, well, to himself. “Even though the victory goes to Ms. Jaye,” he wrote, in an awkward attempt at modesty, “I have the need to offer up some thanks.”
And then he spelled out why he thinks your “victory” is really a victory for him.
For the past six years AVFM has had mud kicked in its face by a corrupt, left-wing media. Bottom feeders like Adam Serwer, Jeff Sharlet and Mariah Blake have performed endless unscrupulous acts, directly lying to their readers in order to attack AVFM, this movement and me personally.
Their work was not just to harm me, or to damage a website but to make sure if they could that the message we carry never found its way to the larger public. Their intent was and is to paint an indelible stain on all of us so hideous that we would never be taken seriously by enough people to matter.
They have failed, and I can now predict that they have failed miserably.
In other words, Paul Elam thinks he and his friends in what he ludicrously calls the “Men’s Human Rights Movement” have bought and paid for a feature-length advertisement for them.
And it’s not hard to see why Elam – and the other manospherians who’ve rallied around your film in recent days — think this. After all, they are the ones who have rescued your film from oblivion by pouring tens of thousands of dollars into your Kickstarter.
And all it took for you to unleash this torrent of money was an interview with one of the sleaziest figures in right-wing journalism, Milo Yiannopoulos of Breitbart.
In the interview, posted on Monday, you complained that “I won’t be getting support from feminists. They want a hit piece and I won’t do that.”
There was more than a little bit of irony in the fact that you were saying this to a man infamous for his many hit pieces on so-called “Social Justice Warriors.”
You also complained about an intern on your film who, you said, “had a lot of crying attacks and emotional experiences. She claimed everything I was showing her was triggering her.”
A young feminist “triggered” and crying. This is red meat to the Breitbart crowd, and I have to assume you knew this when you told Milo this story.
To an outside observer like me, this shameful pandering looks a lot like a Hail Mary play on your part. Having failed to convince most potential funders of the film that you would present anything close to an accurate picture of the Men’s Rights movement, you told Breitbart what its readers – and the broader manosphere – wanted to hear.
And it worked. Men’s Rights activists, self-professed “Red Pillers” and other assorted antifeminists rallied around your film, and the money started flowing.
On Reddit, the moderators of the Men’s Rights subreddit “stickied” an appeal to donate to your Kickstarter to the top of their front page, urging MRAs to open their wallets in order to show skeptics that “we can take part in some actual activism and not just post stuff in here.”
Even the regulars in the violently misogynistic Red Pill subreddit agreed to help bankroll your film.
And it wasn’t just Men’s Rights and “Red Pill” Redditors who organized support for your film. One right-wing Red Pill blogger, notorious for his harassment of ideological enemies, pledged to match donations up to $10,000, describing your documentary as “the Movie SJWs Do Not Want You to See.”
Meanwhile, on her blog, AVFM’s “social media director” Andrea Hardie (an internet bully better known under her pseudonyms Janet Bloomfield and “Judgy Bitch”) not only rallied her readers around your Kickstarter but also set up a gofundme of her own, raising money in hopes that it would buy Breitbart’s Yiannopoulos a producer credit in your film. (I hope that is out of the question, even if she raises more than the paltry amount she’s raised for this purpose so far.)
And then there was Elam himself, on Twitter, calling on his followers to, in his words, “Help fund #RedPillMovie because fuck feminists!”
https://twitter.com/AVoiceForMen/status/658700057311506432
Accepting money from these people would seem to be a pretty clear violation of the principles you set forth in your own Kickstarter video, in which you declared that
in order to keep this film non-partisan, and respectfully show all sides to this debate, we won’t accept funding from organizations that inevitably have biased agendas.
Instead, you have chosen to take money from people who see your film as a chance to say “fuck you” to feminists. You have chosen to take money from the actual subjects of your film.
You are making a film about Men’s Rights Activists, funded to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars by Men’s Rights Activists. You are making a film about A Voice for Men funded in part by A Voice for Men.
Does that not trouble you at all? It should. In your interview with Breitbart, you noted that “films that support one side and act as propaganda do better than those that try to have an honest look.”
You said this, presumably, to set yourself apart from such propagandists. Now you seem to have cast your lot in with them.
Which I suppose makes sense, since the clips of your film that you’ve posted online so far look a lot more like propaganda than they do like any sort of honest look at the Men’s Rights movement,
I felt uneasy about your project from the start, concerned that you had been pulled in by the soothing but misleading rhetoric that MRAs spout when they are trying to sound more respectable than they really are, rather than on what MRAs actually say and do when the cameras are off of them.
But I knew you had a good reputation as a filmmaker, and heard good things from several feminists who knew you better than I did. So I held my tongue and tried my best to give you the benefit of the doubt, even when you posted clips from your film that portrayed AVFMers as heroic underdogs rather than the misogynists and malicious harassers that they really are.
When I wrote you a little over a week ago with some of my concerns, you assured me in the phone call that followed that the clips you had posted were only part of the story, that you were well aware that the MRAs you had interviewed were on their best behavior when talking to you, and that the real story of the Men’s Rights movement is far less rosy-hued. Against my better judgement, I continued to hold on to some kind of hope that you would live up to your reputation in the end.
And now, frankly, I feel like I’ve been played.
Unfortunately, it looks like you have been played too, much more spectacularly than I have. I suspect you are doing far more damage to your reputation than you even know.
One thing I have learned in five years of watching, and writing about, and dealing with, the Men’s Rights movement, is that if Paul Elam is happy about something, that thing is almost certainly terrible.
I suspect, sadly, that you will ultimately learn this lesson yourself, the hard way.
PS: In our phone conversation, you suggested that if you were able to fund your film, you might be able to finally film the interview with me that we originally had planned to do, but which fell through due to financial and other practical obstacles during the original filming of The Red Pill. At this point, I am sorry to say, that is completely out of the question.
That’s pretty rich coming from someone who wouldn’t even do his bit to stop Trump in a total hypothetical.
You know, after the Democrats swept Congress in 2006, everyone was talking about how the left needed to build bridges with the right. Now that Republicans are in control … John is still talking about how the left needs to build bridges with the right? How’s that work, exactly? When is it the right’s job to build bridges with the left? When is it the right’s job to stop being so fucking racist and misogynist and homophobic and transphobic?
@Valentine
I always make a mistake with ‘their’ and ‘they’re’. Yes, average people allow, even vote for, horrible things. But they aren’t always nasty themselves. They’re disillusioned, despairing, frightened or just deceived. They can be won over though.
Sorry, but no. If you poke a Trump supporter long enough, they’ll something bigoted. At bare minimum they were okay with the bigotry. Any self proclaimed leftist who makes excuses for them gets all the side eye from me. Because their agenda is invariably to stop discussion of any issue that isn’t brocialist approved. No thanks and fuck you very much.
Oh, and I just saw Annabelle Creation. Scary as fuck and only one male victim. Since John is all concerned about violence against men in movies, I thought I’d mention it. And recommend it to all horror fans.
Actually, horror is probably the best genre in terms of having lots of female characters with a wide range of personalities and who have agency. They often pass the Bechtel test.
@John
No that’s idiotic.
See these people have, through their blindness and lack of foresight, taken the pin out of a grenade. A grenade we warned them would blow us all up.
And then they did.
And then it did.
Now you are telling me I need to focus my efforts on convincing those people that not pulling pins out of grenades is important if I want to avoid the next one. In fact one of two things will happen, either pain of the explosion will convince them to be wiser in the future, or they have a complete inability to learn and thus I will never be able to reach them. My efforts are better spent elsewhere and I do spend them.
Because I read that article and trump has openly and brazenly betrayed each one. trump has
-Not done anything to help make police lives easier and has slashed Medicaid and harmed LGTB rights.
– Blatantly enriched himself and his friends at the cost of our debt and endangered the lives of our vets.
– Built nothing and done nothing for the coal industry that will help it stay alive.
– Hamstrung our fastest growing engineering industry (renewable energy) and tried to cut medical benefits for women.
– Flip flopped on almost every position he has ever held.
– Deported many more non-criminals and tried to hamstring legal immigration and messed with LGTB and transsexual ways of life.
– Again hurt legal immigration and done nothing for our safety. (Also this lady is pretty blatantly awful with her xenophobia and Christian nation nonsense)
-Acted more like a celebrity “Out for himself” then any leader we have had in the past and done nothing for our economy.
– Lied, used his position to funnel money to himself, potentially committed treason, and lost all the jobs he claimed to have saved.
– Clearly thinks he is above the law (Self Pardons) and again possibly sold us out to the Russians.
– Filled his cabinet with incompetent donors and again did nothing for economy.
– Hired almost no women, Muslim ban and well not sure why else she voted for him.
I don’t need to refute him. He has done it himself so if any of them still support him in spite of that, maybe they weren’t honest about the reasons or are unable to do enough critical thinking to ever be reached.
From John Devalle
No, we haven’t done that. You are reading things that aren’t even here.
I’m pretty damn sure that no one here advocates harming women, except some of the trolls.
You wonder why we don’t like “debating” your supposed “points”, when you keep making things up out of whole cloth.
This troll is boring and seems he didnt read back already what happen.
Also seems he doesn’t understand my point. There is no such thing as ‘average’ people. This is just something people say when they want to think that normal people can’t do a bad or terrible things. You making excuses, John. You justifying and trying to explain what happen is not so bad because it is ‘average’ people who allow it.
My mum tells one story of how my grandmother and grandfather went in Berlin and saw Hitler before give one speach. I believe my grandmother and grandfather are good people – but in her story my mum tells how they get convinced and think Hitler seem enthusiast and good for Germany. They just ‘average’ people. It doesn’t matter if they good or bad. Lucky they were not German,they can’t vote. Average people build horrible things because most people average.
Now you understand me? You trying to make it sound less bad because it average people that allow it. I don’t care how good was my grandmother and grandfather – if they german and if they voted for Hitler – they would do something terrible. Even if they do that thing because they believe his lies.
@ Valentine – yes indeed.
I believe something similar happened to my father, who became a Blackshirt (an English Fascist) at the age of 20 – in 1938, in England. He was briefly arrested in 1940, but then released and allowed to join the armed forces – I’m going to assume this means he was not considered dangerous, and also that he hadn’t gone around bashing Jews in the East End, either, as many of the Blackshirts did. But I can’t help wondering if he’d have stopped it if he’d seen it happening in front of him. Perhaps not.
He was, when I knew him (from my birth in 1960 to his death in 1974) a kindly man who never discussed politics (all I know about his later views is that he supported the death penalty, which I was against).
I’m told he regretted his early Fascism all his life, and after the war became a Catholic because Fascism had convinced him of the existence of evil, and he thought the church was the answer. But I don’t know that firsthand. He is remembered fondly by many of the people he taught.
He was lied to, of course. When he died, he had a book on his shelves (with the spine removed, so you couldn’t see the title) called “The Case for Germany” – with a note inside that it had been given to him by the author in July 1939. It’s one big lie – very interesting read with hindsight, which of course he didn’t have.
But that doesn’t excuse one single thing. It’s a very odd thought that, had the Germans succeeded in invading England, my mother would have been rounded up for forced labour and assassination (she worked at the Prime Minister’s residence: they were all on the list) and my father might even have been one of the guards…
All the very best to you, by the way.
@Bluecat
I think brother of my grandfather marry one Jewish woman who escape. She was German Jewish not Yiddish. She didn’t even know she was Jewish until men came. From her family only she escape i think.
Strange to think same man my grandfather thought so good would be one from who his brother rescue someone.
I believe my grand mother and father maybe feel shame for what they think before – but they die when i was younger and i never ask them about politics. Plenty of people you believe are good because they good to you but you will never know.
Your father sound fascinating – like someone from a stories or films.
And thank you))) best to you too!
Hey Valentine
We’re lucky we haven’t had to make quite the same choices as they did. But we have choices, too, of course, and the harms being done are real.
Your grandparents and great-uncle’s story is amazing. Did they get on well, do you know? Did the grandparents accept the brother’s wife?
Here’s another one from the same era: the grandfather of someone I know was a British prisoner of war, and the grandmother – an Austrian – was one of the prison camp guards! At the very end of the war, with organisation breaking down, they started an affair. She got pregnant – and the baby became the mother of my friend.
Bluecoat,
Yes my grandmother and the Jewish refugee were very good friends. I remember one family celebration, my grandmother and grandaunt were last to be alive and they sat together. I could see light in their eyes like i never seen before. My grandmother almost deaf and my grandaunt almost blind – but they talk together so clear and good – never did my grandmother talk like that with anyone, except my grandfather. Because they are same generation and they grow together in a hard times. At this time i didn’t know that my grandaunt is Jewish, i didn’t even know she is German, i thought Russian but with strange accent because she is old.
@Valentine,
There’s some very cool stuff going on over there. I worked with building up computer infrastructure there, so got to see some of the truly impressive operations systems they use. They treat it almost like a military operation, to be honest, in their jargon and terminology. No big surprise, to be honest. Seems to happen whenever you get a critical mass of dudes influencing a project.
I can’t see that though. I see this:
http://cdn.lightgalleries.net/4bd5ec0174be3/images/site_c_diptych-2-1.jpg
Endless seas of sand and mud. I grew up in this forest, and seeing it razed to the ground, the soil torn and destroyed, the biosphere turned to sterile silt and sand – it’s horrible. I thought I could handle that part of it, and I really couldn’t. Tire-churned mud as far as the eye can see. It’s awful.
http://d2ouvy59p0dg6k.cloudfront.net/img/original/a_opencastmine.jpg
The soil of a boreal forest is truly ancient, it takes thousands of years per inch to develop – and the soil there could be meters deep. The trees live for hundreds of thousands of years, growing incredibly slowly. Many of them would have been older than my country. They do a good job at reclamation considering the damage they do – they actuall barrel the soil and muskeg when they clearcut, and put it back when they’re done. But the roots are gone, the soil is unfixed, and the animals don’t come back. Just the birds.
Anyways, sorry for that! Talking about that place gives me the feels. I hope you’re able to help the 3rd Officer you talked about! I’m willing to bet that if you open up to her, she’ll know exactly what you’re talking about, and you’ll have a friendly ear.
That fourth engineer is a jerk. Your reactions to what’s happened are entirely normal and sensible. He’s just trying to avoid having to give you any consideration.
As for the actual discussion going on here? Eugh. I’m glad I stopped talking to Shapman. He’s assuming Dan’s a weakling with no life experience, bragging about how awesome he is, fantasizing about violence, and most laughable of all, he’s defined the stage of the debate so that it’s impossible for him to lose. He refuses to see the term “Patriarchy” as anything but what he wants it to mean, and he refuses to educate himself on what Feminism actually thinks. Not like there isn’t a century of frickin’ work on this or something. Thank you, David, for cleaning that toxic oil slick up.
There was a huge gathering of white supremacists carrying torches yesterday. They were on their way to a church, presumably to hurt the people inside. It was only through some brave individuals delaying them long enough to get those people out that nothing truly horrendous was able to happen. Just some protesters getting beat up while the cops stood idly by.
You’ll forgive me if my sympathy for the frightened middle class white Trump voter is at an all-time low right now, I hope. All of my sympathy is getting used up on the people they’re busy destroying under torchlight.
I understand. It is different because they destroy something to make their sea. Here, it is supposed to be empty and it is beautiful that way. I like when we go out and we don’t see no any land for maybe 2 or 3 weeks. But when you are in your place and you see it destroy I know you will feel heart broken ((( honestly, I think your photos are amazing and cool just because it is so big, but it is sad. My dad used to work for coal mining industry, in Siberia and other places. He has many photos like your photos – places and machines so big to understand, unless you stand next to them.
I talked with her little bit, but I am shy and say weird things, so we only discuss work. But I know if something serious will happen I will help her. 4th engineer actually doesn’t know what happen with me before on other ship – lucky that rumour didn’t transmit around the fleet – he just dicide from my behavior anyway something is wrong.
I am glad also that asshole is gone. Truly I feel sad for his children, what it must be like that he is their father?
John Devalle,
Are you paying attention to Charlottsville? You know those fucking white nationalists/supremacists wearing all of the cute little Nazi symbolism? Chanting their darling slogans? “Fuck you, faggots”? “White way or no way”?
Yeah. They’re all Trumpians.
One was good enough to plow into a crowd of protesters, killing one.
I am not going to appease these motherfuckers anymore. They can fuck off, an anyone who defends these assholes can fuck off, too.
@POM
John is still talking about how the left needs to build bridges with the right?
I’ve never talked about building bridges with the right, but with average people.
@WWTH
Sorry, but no. If you poke a Trump supporter long enough, they’ll something bigoted. At bare minimum they were okay with the bigotry. Any self proclaimed leftist who makes excuses for them gets all the side eye from me. Because their agenda is invariably to stop discussion of any issue that isn’t brocialist approved. No thanks and fuck you very much.
Oh, and I just saw Annabelle Creation. Scary as fuck and only one male victim. Since John is all concerned about violence against men in movies, I thought I’d mention it. And recommend it to all horror fans.
Did you look at the link I gave? Those women aren’t Trump supporters, two previously voted for Obama, one campaigned for him. You don’t understand, or don’t want to, why people who aren’t extremists came to vote for Trump. The same things happening in the UK and Europe, where, like in the US, the political class is regarded as anything from contemptible to criminal. Extremists are in power in Poland and Hungary, have a big following in Holland, Germany, Austria and France. I fear the next election in Greece may see Golden Dawn win power, and they’re worse than Trump. Countering their rise means engaging with those who are, or might, be tempted to vote for them. There aren’t millions of extremists, so something else is making them think about voting for them. Insulting them, wishing them harm, will push them further toward extremists.
As for gender violence in film, I said ‘action’ films.
Didn’t you pay attention to PeeVee’s post right above you?
White nationalists/Trumpkins just fucking murdered people today.
Seriously. Shut the fuck up and fuck the fuck right off with your “average people” bullshit dogwhistle that we all know means “prioritize the feelings of racist white people who fear and hate people of color and non-Christians.”
You think we’ve been hostile and aggressive before?
That was nothing. You will find that absolutely no one is going to have any patience for you today.
You really should apologize. But I’ll settle for you fucking off too.
Didn’t you pay attention to PeeVee’s post right above you?
White nationalists/Trumpkins just fucking murdered people today.
Seriously. Shut the fuck up and fuck the fuck right off with your “average people” bullshit dogwhistle that we all know means “prioritize the feelings of racist white people who fear and hate people of color and non-Christians.”
You think we’ve been hostile and aggressive before?
That was nothing. You will find that absolutely no one is going to have any patience for you today.
You really should apologize. But I’ll settle for you fucking off too.
@JS
No, we haven’t done that. You are reading things that aren’t even here.
I’m pretty damn sure that no one here advocates harming women, except some of the trolls.
You wonder why we don’t like “debating” your supposed “points”, when you keep making things up out of whole cloth.
Look on the comments on the thread about last years election. There are quite a number of messages expressing a desire that those who voted for Trump lose their jobs, homes and health care, adding in some cases that they’d have no sympathy for them.
@John Devalle
People were FUCKING MURDERED TODAY. But oh boo hoo, us wishing bad things for the people who voted to enslave, torture and murder anyone who isn’t white and x flavor of Christianity.
@Scildfreja
There was a huge gathering of white supremacists carrying torches yesterday. They were on their way to a church, presumably to hurt the people inside. It was only through some brave individuals delaying them long enough to get those people out that nothing truly horrendous was able to happen. Just some protesters getting beat up while the cops stood idly by.
You’ll forgive me if my sympathy for the frightened middle class white Trump voter is at an all-time low right now, I hope. All of my sympathy is getting used up on the people they’re busy destroying under torchlight.
The point being how to stop it.
John,
Fuck off. You are not wanted here tonight. It is not civil or polite to continue posting right now.
http://reactiongifs.me/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/fuck-you-middle-finger-peter-dinklage-penelope.gif
http://gif-finder.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Kristen-Bell-Middle-Finger.gif
@John Devalle
You are not welcome here. But please, do further display how false you are.
http://pm1.narvii.com/5751/b9e0a59ff763e0e0f61f34fb2166422769f8302c_hq.jpg
@Ooglyboggles
People were FUCKING MURDERED TODAY. But oh boo hoo, us wishing bad things for the people who voted to enslave, torture and murder anyone who isn’t white and x flavor of Christianity.
That’s hard to accept as the person most, if not all who are US citizens on this forum, voted for played her part in the murder of many more than that and doesn’t regret it.
http://edition.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/04/21/iraq.hillary/
“Obviously, I’ve thought about that a lot in the months since,” she said. “No, I don’t regret giving the president authority because at the time it was in the context of weapons of mass destruction, grave threats to the United States, and clearly, Saddam Hussein had been a real problem for the international community for more than a decade.”
And,
http://www.newsweek.com/clinton-hawkishness-revealed-her-emails-469351
During Clinton’s tenure between January 2009 and February 2013, the CIA conducted 294 drone strikes that killed 2,192 people, 226 of whom were civilians. (For the data, see here, which is based on averages within the ranges provided by the New America Foundation, Long Wars Journal and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.)
I suspect you wouldn’t be favourably disposed to a foreign politician who favoured bombing your country. Okay for a relative of an innocent killed by a drone in Pakistan to wish you harm? Politics is complex, and I don’t doubt that all here regret the deaths in Pakistan (still ongoing) and Iraq. A relative of those killed might see you so kindly. It does show that Clinton isn’t an answer, she’s part of the problem.
Yes we fucking understand why they came to vote for Trump. Because they’re scared of losing their jobs or their houses, and they’re willing to throw women, Muslims, minorities, Liberals, Guam, and anyone else their Dear Leader scapegoats under the bus as long as he promises he’ll protect them.
Just because they’ve got ~~economic anxiety~~ doesn’t mean they aren’t racist shitheads, too.
Everyone’s got ~~economic anxiety~~. Hillary won more poor votes than Trump, and guess what, she wasn’t calling for a Muslim ban or whining about “political correctness”, or blaming the Jews and POCs in dog whistles.
It’s simple. Hillary won the votes of the ~~economically anxious~~ who are also not racist shitgibbons. Trump won the votes of the ~~economically anxious~~ who are. The poverty excuse is just that. It’s an excuse from a group of people who are used to everything being about them, so the thought of other peoples’ ~~economic anxiety~~ being as important as theirs just doesn’t fucking factor in to them. The racism is their distinguishing fucking feature.
Fucking Period.