Another HUGE VICTORY for Men’s Rights! Some guy on the internet told a woman that the term “mansplaining” is mean to men! And then he used the “c-word” a couple of times!
At first glance, this might not be seen as the HUGE VICTORY that it truly is, men’s rights-wise, but get this! The guy in question is the guy who made Minecraft! A VIDEO GAME that LOTS OF PEOPLE LIKE. Which makes his opinion on this subject really really super important, for some reason.
Naturally, the fellas who hang out in the Men’s Rights subreddit understand what a TRIUMPH this is for men’s rights. There are currently three posts on this WORLD HISTORIC EVENT in the subreddit’s top ten.
Over in KotakuInAction,the main GamerGate hangout on Reddit, the regulars are if anything even more AWAKE to this monumental achievement for all mankind. They’ve got FOUR posts on it in their top ten.
So let’s check out the Minecraft dude’s carefully reasoned argument, which he Tweeted out yesterday.
You can tell he’s totally right about this, and also quite BRAVE, because he got 3700 likes and retweets for it.
Persson went on to explain his PERFECT MANLOGIC in more detail.
Ha ha! Because this explainy thing that men do to women constantly but that women do to men pretty rarely is equivalent to calling car crashes “womendriving” because, ha ha, women can’t drive and are responsible for 90% of all car crashes no wait, that’s not even remotely true; the demographic group that is responsible for far more than their share of accidents is teenagers.
When one Twitterer suggested it might perhaps behoove him to listen to women on this issue, Persson quickly saw through this MISANDRIST OPPRESSION of men who want to talk pretty much constantly.
Actually, Mr. Persson, as I have learned from years of doing this blog, there is no possible way to shut up men who want to inform you at great length of their opinions about feminism and what women are doing wrong. You can ban them from your comments, sure, but some of them will keep trying to post comments for months if not years afterwards.
And certainly Mr. Persson felt no need to shut up. Instead, he kicked his MANLOGICAL STEM LOGIC up a notch by unleashing the ultimate tool in the MANLOGICAL STEM LOGICKING toolkit. I refer, of course, to the c-word.
Here he applied the MANLOGIC STEM LOGICKING directly:
But don’t worry, gals! He’s totally got your back! He’s an EQUALITYIST who’s all for equality between the genders and not for sexism at all!
Huh. Apparently being into “equal rights and against sexism” requires one to go around calling women the c-word, which is TOTALLY NOT SEXIST because sometimes men get called “dick” which is TOTALLY the equivalent of the c-word., I mean it’s not like the c-word is widely considered the worst possible insult in the English language or anything.
Luckily, we have a KotakiInAction commenter called DaedLizrad to Gatersplain to us why it’s totally ok to refer to women with that special word.
Why is calling a man dick acceptable but dropping the c-bomb(seriously your too cowardly to use the word outside a quote?) is so reprehensible?
Its likely to be because of gynocentrism, even if you feminists refuse to accept(or even entertain the possibility) that society cares more about women than men you cannot convince me that feminists, both female and male, don’t clearly value women more than men, that is why treatment of a woman in the same exact way as a man is considered more abusive, because you don’t care about men as much as women.
You sit there and defend a sexist word designed to shame men for speaking to women about any topic, it is only used to tell men to shut up, like it was being used to there against Notch.
You sit there using and excusing gendered slurs against men while clutching your pearls screaming “think of the women” to the same treatment aimed at women, you feminists are all gynocentric and you c*nts can f*ck right off with your double standards.
Meanwhile, fellow KiAer Saddex took a moment of his time to let us in on what “mainsplaining” ACTUALLY is:
The thing with mansplaining is that, just with religion, it’s an unfalsefiable hypothesis. There is really no way to prove that it’s actually a real thing. Sure, might be a couple of assholes out there, but isn’t that same with women as well? Are you sure that if a man, or woman talks condescending to you, that it must be because of your gender? What about your personality, or the actual context? Did you say something just before that would be considered stupid by other people?…
I am going to treat people who tries to convince me that mansplaining actually is real thing like I treat people who try to convince me that god is real. You can believe if you wish but I rely on proof, and the burden of proof lies on the believer. It’s so satisfying to know that these people act just like religious extremists, should be compared to those and that you can use very similar argumentation to debunk what they’re saying.
Yes, what better way to debunk those ladies who get mansplained constantly than telling them they’re irrational fanatics who are seeing things that aren’t there, and that they probably brought this totally imaginary thing on themselves anyway by being such, well, the c-word thing.
All in all, an outstanding victory for the forces of Men’s Rightness and Ethics in Guys Who Make Video Games Calling Women the C-word.
So this is proof that even if it’s a shiny billion dollar house and not your mums basement, spending too much time in an echo chamber is a bad thing. Be that echo chamber reddit forums or a bunch of people sucking up to you because you have money.
People need to go out into the “real”world, rub up against a wide range of people, get the edges knocked off of them & learn some things. I wish there was a minimum life experience requirement before people would be allowed online.
In another article on this subject, elsewhere on the interwebs, it was funny/sad to see guys shouting down women on the subject of mansplaining. I pointed out the irony, and was told I had nothing of value to add to the discussion.
MRA types: they may not all be morons, but they sure want us to think they are.
No Voscaria,
You say that, “One of the effects of mansplaining is that it reinforces the notion that women cannot ever be as competent or knowledgeable as the average man, even if they have specific training and expertise in the area under discussion.”
And I say to that, YEP! Sounds like a fine definition to me too. Excuse me while I have a cigarette, ta.
But to point to an explanation would require me to fall back on quite personal and so therefore anecdotal examples. Are you up for that?
I meant Hi and not No. ?
This whole thing reminds me of this gem from a few days ago
There are *plenty* of people (the privileged folk who don’t experience various forms of discrimination) who should shut up and listen to those who experience marginalization and oppression. This little shitpiston is the latest in a long line of guys who needs to sit down for a very long time and listen.
You’re welcome to share anything you feel comfortable with, Pol, and I will listen. Anecdotes would absolutely be valuable, as long as you don’t mind sharing them publicly.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-anW-qp4ypTM/VWrzuQVa3KI/AAAAAAAAACI/yoIwTd74Z5c/s280/how-can-mirrors-be-real-if-our-eyes-arent-real.jpg
Which is why I asked if I was understanding that correctly. I’d like to hear your anecdotes, though I’m not sure if I’ll agree that a woman can mansplain, given the nature of mansplaining.
@ Some Sort of Username
omg, classic.
@ chiomara
How come stuff in a mirror is switched left to right but not upside down? That’s what I want to know!
How’s things with the family btw, if you don’t mind me asking?
@Alan
Do you actually want to know or are you joking? I know that one threw me for a loop until I saw a good explanation.
Edit: I mean about the mirrors, not the family stuff.
@ kupo
I would genuinely welcome an easy to grasp explanation. It’s one of those things that just gets more mind boggling the more you think about it. And yes, I have done handstands and sideways things to try to get my head round it. 🙂
@Alan
If you look up at a mirror in the ceiling, it does show things upside down.
Thanks Viacaria. As an INTP person (scoff if you like Psych graduates) I have had a lot of people try to teach me on the ways of things. But as as been said, there is a difference between condecending and “mansplaining”. No doubt.
I claimed that there can be otherwise though. I have had women mansplain to me. But now the actual instances of this escape me! Could I be wrong? Maybe. But it is now well past my beddie byes time and I am sleepy. I am sorry that I could not give you the events that I thought I remembered.
Goodnight all. Although, these memories persist and they still rankle me. Like about which foot I needed to start my bicycle on for best power and how to interpret the Dewey numbers in the library and how to butter your toast and how to organise a pantry and how to chop vegetables and how to shine your shoes.
None of those things are very specific of course and don’t really count as anecdotes. But by god the impression that I was an idiot and needed a wise old head to instruct the little boy still sticks in my craw.
And if that was bad enough from women then dont even think about the goddamed men!
Let it go, let it go……
OT but re: a perinneal MRA talking point:
http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/senate/280767-senate-set-for-showdown-over-women-in-the-draft
Makroth said
I can’t even say that much about it; I simply just plain don’t get it.
I’ve watched Husbeast and his Beastlet play Minecraft together a lot and I see Beastlet play with their friends when they spend holidays/summer with us. I’ve even watched play thrus on YT and am still mystified. The best I can come up with is the appeal of it is that the game is what you make it?
@ IP
You know those experiments where they put a dot on an animal’s forehead to see if it has a sense of self? That’s pretty much what I look like at the moment.
@Tony – I know that I’ve been guilty of talking to (or, even worse, at) people rather than listening to their experiences and doing my best to take in and process their insights.
There’ve been plenty of times when I’ve wished that I could go back in time and shake my younger self…
…er, even if “my younger self” was only younger by a day, a week, or a month.
http://49.media.tumblr.com/17608293d2e16b8551ca7e3015213823/tumblr_nz3ds3S6Qq1sbqrlmo3_500.gif
As for what Pol said about whether women can mansplain, well that one seems obvious. Whether men can be mansplained to, I guess that seems a little more complicated. Normally I’d say it’s obvious too, but I shared in the first page about occurrences where I as a man have had morons mansplain things to me based on “perceived gender” so I might as well elaborate a bit. For an extreme example, about two months ago a woman gave me the “well actually” on why feminism was wrong. Make of that what you will. (also she thinks poor people, including herself and me, deserve being poor)
Pol’s social construct argument seems pretty valid in my own experiences, where people have talked to me in WILDLY different ways depending on a number of things, ie whether they did or didn’t know about me being a feminist man, sometimes over the course of the same conversation. My own gender identity being somewhat of a gray area might have played a good part in it though, so I guess there’s a bias here. But the point here is that their perception of my gender seemed to shift at certain points, leading to shifts in attitude that include a lot of other things too. Someone might suddenly start holding the door open for me whereas they didn’t do that two hours before when my hands were full carrying bags, advising me to drink something “softer” just two days after getting smashed together on absinthe, stuff like that (for context, those two happened just a week ago at a festival where the same people also explained to me the history of said festival even though I know the organizers personally, have worked with them in the past, and it was my tenth year there). Now it’s certainly nothing like the shift trans people experience but it’s still pretty revealing in my opinion.
Point is, seems to me like (in my own experience, again, and I know it’s biased) anyone can see their gender start being perceived differently based on a number of things, feminism being one of them, which can lead to a form of mansplaining. Like, feminism makes you a woman in some people’s eyes, go figure.
On a sidenote, I used to play a MMORPG where my username was fairly gender neutral but probably ambiguous (people kept grossly misspelling it as “Sophie”, just to give you an idea of how ambiguous) and new people in my clan chat (where my name was visible but my (male) avatar wasn’t) regularly took to explaining me the mechanics of a game I’ve been playing since 2004. Which seemed to be really fun for my female clanmates to watch, by the way. Especially considering that our top 3 players were females. So if anyone, especially a gamer, tells you mansplaining doesn’t exist, tell ’em to try and play any online game in similar conditions. They probably won’t change their tune because MRAness is disconnected from reality anyway, but hey, worth a try.
@EJ (The Other One)
Thank you 🙂 I hope my voice will find an audience.
Be the MRA you want to see in the world hahaha!
There’s also the thing where men get virtually all of the exposition and monologues (manologues?) in plays and films, and 60% of the speaking roles, and 85% of the lead roles. If you cut Princess Leia out of the original “Star Wars” trilogy, female speaking roles account for 63 seconds out of the total 386 minutes. (If you eliminate Aunt Beru, that number probably drops close to zero). Disney movies are even worse. Aside from the heroine/princess, everyone else that populates the world, from comic sidekicks to guards and shopkeepers, is male.
In professional settings, men are encouraged to expound at great length. Women, not so much. I’ve had two male managers who wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise, even in 1-on-1 annual reviews when we were discussing my career goals. Half a sentence out of my mouth, and they’d be off and running for 45 minutes, usually about something only tangentially related, or about why my career goals were misinformed, or why the concerns I brought up weren’t really concerns. And these were meetings dedicated to me. You can imagine what general work meetings were like.
Mansplaining, like “Don’t Be That Guy”, doesn’t apply to all men, but it’s a useful way of identifying who to avoid. Look for the people who are the most angrily offended, the most heavily invested in those behaviors as markers of masculinity, and the most vigilant about their right to engage in those behaviors. They might as well be wearing a sign that says “give me a wide berth, society”.
I should elaborate that I, too, think gender is an outdated social construct and happen to be an INTP. That doesn’t mean I don’t think gender isn’t “real”, it still affects people like how money isn’t real but still affects people.
I also find it funny that Pol doesn’t think gender is “real” but apparently subscribes to the belief that humans can be categorized into one of 16 different personality types. Might as well tell you I’m a Metal Monkey Leo with a lot of water in me or whatever.
@Hambeast
I’m guessing a lot of people just really love building things. Minecraft does give you a lot of freedom in that area. I’ve seen some pretty awesome things built in Minecraft such as a recreation of the Starship Enterprise or places from Game of Thrones. It does have a single player campaign but buiding stuff is huge part of the game. I guess i just can’t be bothered with that much gathering and building. I do enjoy a certain level of customizing my stuff in the games i play but in Minecraft it’s probably a bit too much for me to care about. Maybe it’s better if the Minecraft players here would share their opinions.
Here’s some pics:
http://static.planetminecraft.com/files/resource_media/screenshot/1302/Enterprise-A-5000_4579823.jpg
http://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/a39bbd4c7ed760a838c285a4b1d43886-650-80.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/pd1DrKw.jpg
http://static.planetminecraft.com/files/resource_media/screenshot/1313/2013-03-27_140720_5149049.jpg