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Today’s amazing thing on the Internet: MRA Dilbert, a new Tumblr blog that mixes the art of Scott Adams’ Dilbert comic strips with Adams’ ludicrous, insufferable, and actually completely serious opinions on such subjects as women, women, and women.
It’s pretty awesome. I’m just jealous that I did’t think of it first.
“(Cis) Women’s behavior is celebrated! As long as it fits within narrow confines of feminine stereotypes handed down by sexist photoshopped media, doesn’t offend cisgendered straight men by making yourself not available to them, threaten their masculinity, or challenge them in any way.
Because if you don’t dress in a stereotypically feminine way, look like someone stretched skin over a Halloween skeleton, and wear enough makeup to cover up all your flaws, but not enough to look like you wear ‘too much’ by any random dude’s standards, then you’re nothing! Nobody! Less than Human!
And if you don’t make yourself sexually, romantically, and emotionally available to cishet men, then you’re worthless, because cis women serve literally no other purpose than to please men, serve as their housewives and trophies, and be men’s emotional dumpsters!
And if you dare challenge the Almighty CisHet Man on this, then you’re a dirty feminist, and you deserve to be harassed, beaten, raped, and/or murdered for your crimes against the True Humans!”
[/HEAVY SARCASM]
So nice to see that he really IS a Dilbert. Which is to say, a hapless, hopeless, feckless, fuckless, witless wonder of an office drone whose tie gets erections at odd moments.
(Don’t mind me, I’m just summoning the beast. I’m told he appears on other blogs to kvetch under a pseudonym whenever his name is mentioned and mocked. What follows is invariably much funnier than any of his ‘toons.)
At first I thought that was a real Dilbert comic.
Mr. Adams has always been fairly bitter about women though, so this fake strip isn’t too different from some of the comics he’s made in the past.
Let’s not leave out intersectionality in this topic. The reason white men like Adams consider women of color worthless, (and never mention them in these tirades) is that they are already assumed, by such men, to be sexually available, to any man who wants them. At the same time being vilified for being sluts and unfeminine at the same time. Yeah, the stereotypes are just all over the place.
The reason why these gender stereotypes for white women fascinate me so much, is because often these are sometimes the complete opposite for women of color. I was made aware of the controversy surrounding ” Slutwalks” and how there are black women who refuse to participate in them because they celebrate female sexual openness. The reason why they won’t participate is because women of color (the sexy Asian, the hot Latina, the Jezebel black woman) are already assumed to be sexually available sluts, so participating in slutwalks for us, would just be reinforcing nasty stereotypes. On the other hand it’s empowering for white women.
For example, look at the difference between how white female pop stars are lauded on the media for highly sexualized behavior vs. someone like Nicky Minaj who does the same thing,
Lkeke: Thanks for bringing that up! I’m not black, so I don’t know much about that lived experience, except through black feminists.
Oh, on an excellently great note:
Daniel Holtzclaw has been convicted of the rape of 8 black women by an all white jury. He’s facing a possible sentence of some 200 years.
When his conviction was stated in court he supposedly mouthed to the jury, “How could you do this to me?” And then bawled like a baby.
Normally I try to practice compassion for all beings, in that he is a sorry person who put himself where he is now, but I couldn’t muster up even a single ounce for him.
It’s sad that our bar is set so low, that when the court system acts the way it’s supposed to, we get a happy.
Lkeke35
Why do you think Mr. Adams considers women of color worthless?
Outside of his support of Donald Trump I’m not aware of any Mr. Adams holding any racist beliefs.
And what exactly IS ‘male behavior’ and ‘female behavior’ anyway?
Lkeke35: That’s a great point. The whole stereotypical “battle of the sexes” is implicitly a battle between white men and white women.
@Walter,
I think what Lkeke is highlighting is that to men like Adams, WoC are simply invisible, and therefore left out of their generalizations.
@Lkeke
I think it’s disputed that he either mouthed “how could you do this?” or “I didn’t do this.” Regardless of splitting hairs, I too feel no sympathy for him and in fact feel a little outraged that he dare throw a pity party for himself after the horrible crimes he’s committed.
Paradoxical Intention:
It’s the reason why I chime in occasionally. It’s not to point out that black women have it worse or anything, because this isn’t the Oppression Olympics, but to point out that misogyny takes a hell of a lot of different forms, many times the complete opposite for different groups of people, and often what offends white women isn’t something applied to WoC and vice versa.
A lot of the things talked about on here don’t apply to the life I’ve lived, but it’s fascinating to me as an example of how gender oppression works in different cultures, and is applied to different cultures.
It’s all oppression, but it’s all perfectly tailored to oppress each group of women differently, and the sad thing is, that shit works. What you end up with is every group of women using up all their energy fighting stereotypes instead of accomplishing goals.
This site has been very enlightening (and fascinating) for comparisons on how the opposite thoughts are applied to WoC. For example, if a black woman makes it clear she’s not available, (or if she’s merely fat), she’s assumed to be an asexual Mammy. By white men! Black men don’t quite seem to be that entrenched in that idea and don’t seem quite as furious about it, as white men towards white women.
Not being a white woman I haven’t experienced how plus size white women are treated by white men but this site allows me a glimpse into what it’s like to be a white woman who doesn’t fit their personal ideal.
Not to derail or anything. I just want to clarify why I find this site so interesting.
Snork Maiden
Women of color, really people of color, are invisible to a lot of white Americans. Even among many progressive circles. That’s not something unique to MRAs.
@Snork Maiden
Pretty simple. It’s all the grievances that mostly men commit (sexual harassment, sexual assault, catcalling, mansplaining etc) vs all the “grievances” that women commit, in their eyes (turning them down for dates/sex, dumping them, refusing to be submissive and quiet, demanding things like bodily autonomy and the right to control their own lives). The first list for men is apparently normal and perfectly fine but society turns it’s nose at it. The second list is apparently abhorrent and unholy but society tolerates it. This is my guess on what MRAs mean when they say that oft repeated line.
On a related note, Scott Adams has also expressed admiration for Donald Trump’s “strategic mastery” – which I think is code for “playing on the insecurities of racists.”
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/14/dilbert-creator-on-how-trump-is-like-the-founding-fathers-jesus.html
http://33.media.tumblr.com/605bb5be3a071643d8a50a410db6a1a4/tumblr_inline_nmr1k6oPQi1t5wl3j_500.gif
Because you raped people. Does he not understand that. 😐 Rhetorical.
But, yeah, I’m very happy this asshole got 200+ years in prison. Let this be a start of a trend and not just an outlier, shall we?
That clip of Holtzclaw bawling was satisfying as hell to watch, and I’m still enjoying the Schadenfreude. He honestly expected to get away with it simply because of the color of his victims’ skins. And because he had a badge and they didn’t. And because some (not all, just some) of them had prior criminal records. Fittingly, he got caught because one of the women he pulled over for “surprise sex” (read: RAPE) was completely innocent, no record, nothing. And he couldn’t believe there was such a thing as an innocent black woman. He just figured they must all be fair game, because black = criminal, in his vivid imagination. Whoops! Racist cop gets popped. Sorry, not sorry, sucka.
@Lkeke: Which is why I appreciate another view point.
Just like how feminism is around because there are women’s issues that need to be addressed specifically, there are also WoC issues that also need to be specifically addressed in their own discussions, and there are ways which sexism impacts WoC differently than us white ladies.
And I’m just going to quote this for truth.
Jackie, where did you get actual footage of me responding to that article about the rapist? Am I being watched?
Bina: That’s it! That’s exactly what I was trying to articulate in my own mind, but I wasn’t quite reaching it.It’s not that he targeted the most powerless people in society, figuring he’d get away with it, but the assumed powerlessness of ALL of his victims because they were black and poor. Then add any criminal record on top of that, if there is one. His racist mind couldn’t see beyond color.
And, if he truly said that to the all white jury, there was also the assumption that they would blindly support him because of his badge and because of their skin color. That, along with everything else, should be equally infuriating to white people. (The assumption, by bigots, that all white people believe in the worthlessness of PoC.)
And this does tie into the discussion above in that he believed that certain kinds of women, most especially poor women of color, can’t be raped. It is automatically assumed by a subset of men that, (like marital rape,) you can’t rape WoC, because they are always assumed to be available and have “no virtue” to protect.
This is the complete opposite for some white women (especially those who meet conventional standards of beauty) that their virtue must be protected by murdering black men. Of course I have since figured out, that a white women’s virtue can easily be revoked, I guess, if she does anything to displease a white man, thereby providing excuses for him to abuse and/or murder her.
These are links and thoughts that would never have occurred to me if I wasn’t a reader at this site.
I sometimes enjoy reading the Adams blog as a kind of anthropological study. “See how the MRAs and MGTOWs play when they think they are unobserved!” And some of his posts are interesting when he’s not being dickish (a scientific term, I believe). But I only found WHTM because of Adams link to the site, so I say “yay Scott Adams!”
I totally thought that the “Dilbert” cartoon was real.
Here you go, everyone. DRINK IN THE MALE TEARS.
http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s–EirB0SFc–/c_fit,f_auto,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/ivazvxsift4rmaoocqbd.gif
*a bat suddenly flies out from the corner of the room and out a window* Drat! I’ve been found out!
@katz
Mine cup runneth over from thyne male tears, Holtzclaw. uWu
I’m not that surprised by Adams’s views. When geek culture emerged in the 60’s and 70’s, it had some relationships with the counterculture and questioning social norms. But its major “texts” are thoroughly conformist and traditional. In Star Wars for instance, you have traditional gender roles, good vs evil, spirituality, etc.
Probably Star Trek is the only major early “geek text” that’s self-consciously feminist or left wing.