It’s always refreshing to see Men’s Rights Activists momentarily cease their grousing about the alleged evil and inferiority of women and take up the important issues of our time — like, for example, whether we men should rise up as one and take away women’s right to vote.
Canadian MRA Andrea Hardie — perhaps better known by her pseudonyms “Janet Bloomfield” and “Judgy Bitch” — is leading the way, starting up the #WhyWomenShouldNotVote hashtag on Twitter and following this up with a couple of blog posts arguing that women need to have the vote taken from them.
Why does Hardie think that women (presumably including herself) have collectively forfeited the right to vote? Mostly because they disagree with her.
Hardie starts off her case against women’s suffrage with a familiar MRA argument, declaring that
No draft = no vote.
Women should not vote, because they will never be subject, in any meaningful way, to the draft.
As they used to say on Laugh-In, “very interesting, but stupid.” So how silly is this argument? Let me count the ways:
MRA assertions to the contrary, voting rights for men aren’t tied to the draft.
In the US, (white) men got the vote a long time before the draft began in earnest in World War I. (There was a draft during the civil war, but it only accounted for a very small percentage of soldiers.)
Men did not lose the vote when the draft was abolished in 1973. Nor was the right to vote ever stripped from Amish, Mennonite, or Quaker men who were granted conscientious objector status.
When selective service registration was reinstated in 1980, the draft itself did not return, nor has it during the wars the US has fought since then. Barring an invasion by giant spider monsters from space, the draft isn’t going to return to the US any time soon.
And while failure to register could, in theory, lead to jail time, this law isn’t enforced, and it’s been literally 30 years since anyone has faced charges for not registering.
Not only that, but male-only selective service registration seems destined for the scrapheap of history. With women now being allowed in combat positions in the armed forces, we will almost certainly see registration extended to women — or, perhaps, eliminated entirely for everyone.
Hardie offers two other reasons why women shouldn’t have the vote; both boil down to the fact that women do things with their votes that she doesn’t approve of.
First off, women tend to support a more robust welfare states than men. Well, that’s not exactly how Hardie puts it:
Women will consume government resources until the state collapses. As long as women can vote, they will consume, whilst not producing those resources.
She also blames women for stripping away the defense budget and leaving the US defenseless. Admittedly, this hasn’t actually happened, but Hardie is so sure it will that she has decided that women need to be punished in advance for this terrible hypothetical crime:
Recall that women cannot be drafted. They do not think in terms of military sacrifice, because they will never vote for themselves to be sacrificed. When the money starts to run out, which department do you think women will vote to begin stripping resources from? Which department do they have the least stake in? The least ability to understand?
They will strip money from the Department of Defense. …
Women should not vote, because they will eventually cannibalize the military, leaving us all at the mercy of our enemies.
Hardie is also angry that other women aren’t as racist as she is; indeed, she fears that “European women” will be so welcoming to darker-skinned Islamic invaders that civilization itself will crumble. Again, while this is her underlying argument, this is not exactly how Hardie would phrase things.
We can see the effects of women wanting to be ‘nice’ in Europe. The demographics of modern Europe aredownright terrifying. Ethnic European women refuse to have children, yet turn around and welcome in migrants with birth rates that will inevitably spell the end of ethnic Europeans.
This is what the neo-Nazies like to call “white genocide.”
This simply can’t happen. The European nuclear arsenal cannot fall into the hands of radical Islam. It’s a death sentence for all of us, and one being written by women. As long as women can vote, the great liberal civilizations built by men are going to fall. …
Are we willing to sacrifice our children to rapists while women contemplate whether being ‘nice’ is all it’s cracked up to be?
At this point, it seems like the only thing separating Hardie from the white power gang is that she’s less willing to use ethnic and racial slurs than they are. Oh, and that white supremacists tend to think more highly of women — at least those with white skin, anyway.
Hardie’s grand conclusion:
Women have had the vote in the West for almost 100 years, and all they have done is vote to destroy and destabilize the world men built for us, while protecting themselves from the blood consequences. They have voted selfishly, rapaciously, irrationally and quite possibly, irrevocably.
Women should not vote. That’s not misogyny.
It’s self-defence.
If Hardie sincerely believes all the junk she posts, I hope she draws the obvious conclusion: that as a woman, she herself shouldn’t be allowed to vote. While Canada has not passed a law to this effect, she can certainly remove herself from the voter rolls.
And if women are as inherently damaging to politics as she thinks they are, then perhaps she should not be allowed to post her opinions on the internet either? Again, there is no law mandating that Hardie shut up, but she can voluntarily silence herself, before her perfidious womanhood does more damage to the body politik than it already has.
Ms. Hardie, if you really believe that women are this inherently wrong and evil, the only real option available is to DELETE YOUR ACCOUNT.
Why is Hardie arguing that the vote is tied to the draft? We don’t even have selective service registration in Canada.
Speaking of selective service in the USA, the threat of jail time for not registering isn’t the central issue, but rather the penalties that are actually imposed on young men who fail to register:
https://www.sss.gov/Registration/Why-Register/Benefits-and-Penalties
funny thing is even in countries like iran that we have conscription, voting has absolutely nothing to do with military service
I couldn’t tell who she hates more- herself or everyone
else.
I don’t understand why she thinks she has anything valuable to offer, since , you know, she claims to have vagina.
So I made this:
https://twitter.com/hashtag/WhyWhatsHerFaceHardieIsntARocketScientist?src=hash
It was petty, I admit. But also “true” since she thinks women can’t do science or logic.
Clearly that also applies to her, because vagina, except it doesn’t.
http://www.stuffmomnevertoldyou.com/podcasts/nasas-hidden-computer-women/
http://margotleeshetterly.com/hidden-figures-nasas-african-american-computers/
Even if generations of women hadn’t jumped through more hoops than their male colleagues, like taking extra classes just to get lower paid jobs, they would have done more for humanity on their worst days than whats-her-face-Hardie ever did on her best day.
They would have had to work to fail as much as what’s-her-face does. Thankfully they weren’t as stupid and lazy.
@Sascha Vykos
Yeah, she’s a hater. Sometimes you just have to speak up to haters.
some black men got drafted when they were deprived of the vote, and many served even during the time of slavery.
also, if youre for mens rights, you should abolish the draft, not reinforce it!
@dalillama
Well I don’t know about expatriates. All my colleagues are residents in Philippines. From my experience if it is a journalist writing in tagalog or reporting in tagalog they will use pinoy. If it is a filipino person asking to another ship on the vhf they will say pogi (meaning handsome but also filipino) when they are asking if you there are other filipinos there. And then other than that identify by island. Eg mindanao = bisayas, cebu = cebuan. Mainly from what I’ve heard to say Philippines/Filipinos is only for the benefit of non-kabayan (countrymen).
“At this point, it seems like the only thing separating Hardie from the white power gang is that she’s less willing to use ethnic and racial slurs than they are. Oh, and that white supremacists tend to think more highly of women — at least those with white skin, anyway.”
Ever heard the term “academic racism”? This is exactly how white supremacists get their message across without using explicit racial slurs.
Next up: NO, white supremacists do not tend to think more highly of women. What prevents you from wrapping your brain around the fact that these MRA idiots ARE white supremacists?
“Judgy Bitch” is one of them: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/1999/women-neo-nazi-group-world-church-creator-speak-out
They’re also big on historical revisionism. See Judgy Bitch on the Confederate flag: http://judgybitch.com/2015/06/25/hate-speech-the-confederate-flag-and-feminism/
“At this point, it seems like the only thing separating Hardie from the white power gang is that she’s less willing to use ethnic and racial slurs than they are. Oh, and that white supremacists tend to think more highly of women — at least those with white skin, anyway.”
Ever heard the term “academic racism”? This is exactly how white supremacists get their message across without using explicit racial slurs.
Next up: NO, white supremacists do not tend to think more highly of women. What prevents you from wrapping your brain around the fact that these MRA idiots ARE white supremacists?
“Judgy Bitch” is one of them: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/1999/women-neo-nazi-group-world-church-creator-speak-out
They’re also big on historical revisionism. See Judgy Bitch on the Confederate flag: http://judgybitch.com/2015/06/25/hate-speech-the-confederate-flag-and-feminism/
Not to mention… her entire schtick is Tea Party blather. Texas has already figured out how to curtail a woman’s right to vote: http://now.org/resource/voter-suppression-targets-women-youth-and-communities-of-color-issue-advisory-part-one/
Judgy Bitch isn’t just engaging in idle day-dreaming. The “men’s rights” movement isn’t just about hating women for the sake of hating women. It’s designed to give legs to Tea Party inspired anti-women legislation. And if anyone bothered to pay attention to the tea partying religious right, you’d note a parallel effort among evangelical fundies to demonize/otherize women.
Note also the following: “Libertarians get medieval on women”
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/201244104251611609.html
And Libertarian Cato Institute – Libertarian billionaire Peter Thiel on why women shouldn’t be allowed to vote (he also happens to be one of fundieTed Cruz’s major sugar daddies): http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/201244104251611609.html
Are we getting the picture yet?
I’d join you in that if you want company! My son loves to do walks for the charity Water Aid and a walk along the length of a river is perfect!
@ Valentine
That’s basically what I was getting at in my initial comment on the topic.
I actually agree with her, with a caveat:
1. Women deserve political representation.
2. Women do not have the instincts to conduct a defense policy.
From this follows that women need to be excluded or have a smaller vote on a certain policy area.
How to accomplish this is a matter of design for the political system.
David Futrelle,
Sounds like Andrea has a lot in common with Ann Coulter,
Ann Coulter: ‘Women Should Not Have The Right To Vote,’ But They ‘Can Still Write Books’
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/ann-coulter-women-should-not-have-right-vote-they-can-still-write-books
They could be friends.
> If Hardie sincerely believes all the junk she posts, I hope she draws the obvious conclusion: that as a woman, she herself shouldn’t be allowed to vote.
This is an obviously non-logical, stupid argument.
She says women vote left, and she wants to vote right.
So if she wants right-wing politics, she needs to keep voting right to at least cancel out the left-wing women.
The fact that you agree with Andrea at all on this is troubling. There have indeed been female warriors, so to claim that women as a whole do not have the instincts to conduct defense policy is nonsensical. Therefor It is even more nonsensical to limit their representation because of this myth. Its literally nothing more than sexism to assume that someone is less capable of defending themselves just because they happen to be a woman.
9 Female Warriors Who Made Their Mark On History
http://mentalfloss.com/article/59287/9-female-warriors-who-made-their-mark-history
Top 10 Badass Female Warriors
http://listverse.com/2008/03/17/top-10-badass-female-warriors/
Warrior women of the ancient world: 5 myths busted
http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/13/world/warrior-women-amazons-horsewomen-archers-history/
Amazon Warriors Did Indeed Fight and Die Like Men
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/10/141029-amazons-scythians-hunger-games-herodotus-ice-princess-tattoo-cannabis/
Citation needed.
I also wonder why a defense policy should be based on instinct. I would think that like any other type of policy, it should be based on facts. But that must just be my silly little lady brain talking.
No, because she has made it clear that she doesn’t think that women should be able to vote at all, and given the fact that she holds that position and she is a women herself, its hypocritical for her to be voting in the first place. Andrea Hardie cannot have her cake and eat it too. If women should be denied the right to vote on the grounds that they’re women, ( including left wing or progressive women ) than so should she on the grounds that she is a women. if she doesn’t like that, than she shouldn’t be advocating such a backward and misogynistic position. If what she believed were true, it would be wrong for her to be voting at all, since according to her own philosophy she shouldn’t be allowed to vote herself, and it should be obvious to anyone including her, as to why.
About that.
Golda Meier, Benazir Bhutto and Margaret Thatcher were all utter thugs on the world stage, happy to resort to violence whenever it suited them, and happy to cut deals with the most unpleasant of dictators as long as they benefitted from it.
Sibel Siber and Tatiana Turanskaya were out-and-out military warlords with no legitimacy except what they gained from the guns of their followers and the arms-length backing of major states (Turkey in Siber’s case, Russia in Turanskaya’s case.)
The great Indira Gandhi was hardly a pacifist. One could make similar comments about Yulia Tymoshenko.
Are Meier, Bhutto, Thatcher, Siber, Turanskaya, Gandhi and Tymoshenko not women? Did they not conduct defence policies?
@EJ (The Other One)
well according to her line of thought, they are exception like herself.
but i’m not sure how she describes the reason, a god-given ability or something acquirable like misogyny.
Gosh, it must be tough to be Janet Bloomfield. She has to deal with so much cognitive dissonance just being.
The funnest part for me is trying to work out whether or not she considers “radical Islam” to have been built by men too. Either it’s the fault of those European women for picking the WRONG men to run civilisation, after having being “given” the right to pick men… by men themselves… or radical Islam is somehow a feminised thing… Which I guess is what our old friend Hardchairs McPenguinWhores might argue…? And in that case, are the European women “picking” the Islamic migrant women? Using the power European men gave them?
What?
Luckily men have perfect instincts for defense policy. No nation has ever gotten into a horrendous military quagmire with a man at the helm.