By David Futrelle
Director Bryan Singer — best known for The Usual Suspects and a succession of X-Men movies — has been dogged for decades by rumors, and then outright accusations, that he preys on underage boys. On Tuesday, The Atlantic dropped a massive, extensively researched piece offering the details of some of these accusations, including the stories of four men who have never come forward before.
“Some of the alleged victims say they were seduced by the director while underage,” The Atlantic reports,
others say they were raped. The victims we interviewed told us these experiences left them psychologically damaged, with substance-abuse problems, depression and PTSD.
You might expect that allegations like these– suggesting that a powerful Hollywood director has been sexually exploiting and assaulting vulnerable teen boys for years if not decades — would arouse the fury of the internet’s Men’s Rights Activists.
After all, MRAs claim often, and loudly, to care about male victims of sexual assault, particularly when the victims are boys. And they do, in some cases: whenever news breaks of a female teacher preying on underage boys, MRAs are quick to pass on the news and to denounce the female perps as loudly as they can.
So I took a look to see what MRAs were saying about Singer on the two most prominent Men’s Rights websites — the Men’s Rights subreddit, with more than 200,000 subscribers; and A Voice for Men, no longer the big daddy on the Men’s Rights scene, but a site which still retains some lingering influence.
Turns out they really weren’t saying anything at all. Here is a listing of every single Men’s Rights subreddit post devoted to Singer’s case in the last four years.
As you can see, there are only five posts in all, which have collectively earned 36 upvotes and inspired a grand total of seven comments. Seven. (A post that discussed male victimization in Hollywood more generally got a bit more attention than the posts about Singer in particular, but many of the comments were from men complaining that female predators weren’t getting as much attention as Singer and Kevin Spacey.)
In start contrast to the utter lack of interest in Singer or his victims, a post about the meme below, which has been up for less than 24 hours on the Men’s Rights subreddit, has garnered nearly 3000 upvotes and inspired 254 comments.
A Voice for Men, meanwhile, has published absolutely nothing on Singer, ever.
This sort of selective interest in male victims of sexual abuse — a 4-alarm fire when the perp (or accused perp) is a women, a bored sigh when the villain is a man — is rather typical of MRAs.
In a post last October, I noted my surprise at discovering that the Men’s Rights subreddit had literally never discussed the horrifying case of former Iowa youth basketball coach Greg Stephen, who had then just pled guilty to multiple child exploitation and child porn charges after admitting to sexual exploiting some 400 boys. (A post about his case went up on the subreddit after my post was published.)
As I noted in that post, it’s almost as if the Men’s Rights movement isn’t about helping men or boys at all but is rather an excuse for a never-ending tantrum about the alleged evils of women and feminism.
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just wanted to say: I think Sarah Beattie is awesome, and that “meme” possibly explains why she’s been mentioning having people reporting her posts on IG to get them taken down. ?
cw: domestic violence
…
Note, this does not excuse d.v. committed by women!!! In addition to being a numerically small subset of victims, (this from “Angry White Men”), the victims of domestic violence perpetrated by men tend to have vastly more serious injuries than the victims of domestic violence perpetrated by women.
The book had some statistical analysis to back up the conclusion, showing the severity in terms of cost and of rehab time. Kimmel’s metaphor was (paraphrasing, here, my memory is shit) “… battered men go to the E.R.; battered women go to the morgue.”
OT, in case anyone is feeling in the need for some good news: Angola just decriminalized homosexuality and banned discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/01/23/angola-decriminalizes-same-sex-conduct
Presumably, this would include anyone refusing to bake a cake for a gay couple.
“Estro-Terrorism” is the name of my future post-menopausal, post-punk band.
As for whoever made “You Can Do Better, Ladies” — You Can Fuck Right Off, You Humorless Git.
About all these bozos have convinced ME of is that MRAs and other right-wingers are one big abusers’ lobby, and that they start teaching boys to be abusive to any and all vulnerable people, from the earliest possible age. They don’t give a damn about male rape victims (particularly if they were victimized by another male); they do give a damn about giving males an untrammelled right to rape whomever they please, be it women, little girls, or boys. And to swap insults with fringe-weirdo hoteps and smirk at indigenous drummers with an undisguised air of superiority when they’re not hollering about how “it’s not rape if you liked it” to random women in Washington.
Honestly, a facepunch joke is the least of their problems.
@Weird (and tired of trumplings) Eddie
They think they’re fully entitled to all things they want. Karate kid and Star Wars told them they’d win the girl just for existing.
And somehow they never mentally or emotionally progressed past the differentiating between fantasy and reality stage of development (which most people do at age 7). They think movies represent reality.
Since the government blocked pro-anorexia sites a long time ago, they really need to get rid of this (far more) deadly online affliction as well.
@weirwoodtreehugger: chief manatee
Men do die sooner than women on average. Thank you mother nature, eventually these idiots will die. First.
In my experience this is very true. I’ve notice the men abused by a female spouse are abused mentally and verbally rather then physically. Depending on what is counted as physically as stealing or hiding medicines is a pattern that I’ve seen repeated. Then of course gaslighting about the stolen medications. All of this leaves scars on a person’s mind but male abusers do tend to leave physically ones. For me the movement of my left arm will always be limited. Others aren’t so lucky.
After all the pain and experience I went through I had figure out why it happened. The internet is a beautiful thing that allowed me to connect to self help and people with similar stories. When I realized how wide spread it was I had to fight back. to quote doctor who basically
” And do you know what you do with all that pain? Shall I tell you where you put it? You hold it tight… Til it burns your hand. And you say this — no one else will ever have to live like this. No one else will ever have to feel this pain. Not on my watch.”
I still go to these schools ever fall and talk to new students. I still hear stories that keep me up all hours of the night. more then once my fiancĂ© has found me drunk and crying. MRAS that claim to care about the abuse young boys go through infuriates me. If they carried they do something about. I’ve seen grown men claim that they can’t do anything to help when a 16 year old girl with little resources found a way to.
@Lainy
You’re a hero. If I believed in god I’d say ,”god bless you,” or, “you’re doing the work of god.”
I don’t believe in god, and now I’m mad at religious people for creating all the most meaningful ways to thank someone.
Maybe the literature police…ahem…enthusiasts can offer one up? đŸ™‚
Sorry I don’t know the name(s), but there are so many creative monikers on here I have not come close to yet memorizing but one or two.
@Katamount
No cops at Pride. ACAB
The Trump administration just changed the guidelines of what constitutes domestic violence. Emotional and financial abuse no longer count. Only if there’s a criminal assault does it count. If MRAs actually cared about male victims, they wouldn’t be supporting Trump. Because a lot of male victims are under that no longer counting umbrella.
@Jones
That’s alright. I believe in god so saying that does mean a lot to me.
They keep trying to take us a little further back each passing day.
@Lainy
They take us back to a place that didn’t actually exist as remembered, and wasn’t that great if in any way it did.
I don’t like to assume people believe, because I don’t, but I’m glad my heartfelt thanks got across as intended.
I must say your actions have my upmost adoration. Not many religious people go forth in the world and put the very best of their religious beliefs into practice.
Many of them voted for trump, instead.
Another interesting point from “Angry White Men”, in the late 70’s (please don’t quote me on that date, my shattered memory again…) there began to be a drop in the number and percentage of women who died from domestic violence trauma. There wasn’t a drop in domestic violence, the drop in the death statistics was due to the marked increase in the number of battered women’s shelters opening up!
As for Sarah Beattie and punching the maga-hatted teen, yeah, I don’t like it, but I remember a politician a while back who TOLD his supporters to do shit like that, and the maga-heads made him president….
@ Bina:
as even a cursory study of ’bout any social justice issue will confirm.
@ wwth:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/01/trump-domestic-violence-definition-change.html
(actually, I may have gotten this link here….)
@Lainy; @jone:
Here’s an accolade for you: Lainy, may your tribe increase!
1. This is an allusion to the poem “Abu Ben Adhem” by Leigh Hunt; although it portrays a Sufi holy man’s vision through a heavily Christianized filter, the line is theistically neutral when detached from context.
2. I’m defining your “tribe” as like-minded people, inspired by your example; whether you choose to birth any of them personally is up to you.
@Full Metal Ox
Thanks! May your tribe increase as well (with or without your direct contribution).
@Jones
I understand your disdain from the church and religious people. I understand that horrific acts have been committed in the name of god. Many have lost there way. Others (and let me be quite frank) are no different then terrorist from other religion who perverse scripture in order to justify the slaughter of innocent people. The bible, the Quran, the Torah, are scripture about love. When something holly gets past down to human beings it gets messy. It gets changed and altered to fit selfish agendas. Jesus himself cried out to god to forgive those who were hurting him with his dying breath. That was his teachings and they have been twisted and added on to since his passing. He was a man that was full of love and forgiveness. An ever growing rage at mistreatment of others. With that rage he acted not with violence but with compassion and love. You don’t have to believe in god, it’s alright not to. He believes in you.
@ Lainy:
I believe the three worst things we invented are money, metal weapons, and church… not spirituality, “church”;… not religion, “church”.
The problem with all three of these things is that they are extremely efficient when we use them against each other.
Spirituality is my connection to the spirit as I understand the spirit
Religion is your connection to the spirit as I understand the spirit (I hope you see the difference)
Church is the social capital I have to enforce my understanding as the only understanding
@Weird Eddie
I don’t agree with the church myself with the way it has throughout history tried to dominate and force itself upon others. I’m not part of any church myself. This threat however is not about religion, it’s about the sexual abuse of young boys. I brought it up because Jones brought it up. Churches today even still do horrible things and I believe they’ve lost their meaning much like claiming oneself to be a Christian has. You can claim the word but if you don’t do Christian things like be charitable and merciful the word loose it’s meaning. I hope this doesn’t derail the topic. I’m also sorry if I’ve made anyone angry.
… prolly everyone here but me has seen this, but I just watched it….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ic7RNS4Dfo
…
DOUBLE-YOO… OH… CHUCKED-INTA-TH-AIR-N-BATTED-OUTA-THE-WORLD… DOUBLE-YOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
well, computer me all outa here…
since the link didn’t show the thumbnail, it’s Katelyn Ohashi’s gymnastics routine at the Collegiate Challenge competition in Anaheim, California.
content warning for unbelievable skill, phenomenal talent level and frickin’ steel-bending STRENGTH!!!
@Lainy
@Full Metal Ox
I don’t blame religion for the fact that there are a lot of shitty people in the world who do horrible, shitty things.
I don’t even choose not to believe, I just don’t. I’d be a liar if I acted like I did. If there is a god, they probably would not like that (I don’t wanna assume god’s gender). đŸ˜‰
I like extraordinary evidence a lot. I see religion as a snapshot of a particular time, forever unchanging with the world around it. And much reactionary suffering has resulted from people believing they should adhere to very old advice from very dead people whom produced a sticky narrative a long long time ago.
Or at least they believe that other people believe that, thus providing them with a convenient excuse for tyranny.
If people wanna believe in god or religion, that doesn’t mean they’re backwards in my view. I could be wrong for all I know, and I’m not about telling people what the right choice for their life is.
The “anti-religion” crowd is rife with vile misogyny at any rate, which is ironic considering it’s reflection (and maybe origins) in religion.
Many of the most awesome feminists I know somehow reconcile religious misogyny in a woman-positive way, and that’s certainly more mental gymnastics than I am motivated to do.
When I was growing up, the church my family went to had classes for teen girls all about how to respect male authority and submit to your future husband.
That pretty much explains conservatives, or at least a vocal portion of them. It might also begin to explain why I’m not one of them.
If this reads as condescending, I do apologize. That’s not my intention. If it reads as preachy, that would be sardonic.
I have a lot of respect and love for many religious people, but not for the institution itself.
Spirituality, as far as I know, separates us from other animal species.
What I generally agree with is that it’s a system of self-policing, a holdover from the time when we lived in smaller tribes. Even when we weren’t being watched by other humans, it was and is always helpful to imagine that our actions may potentially have crucial and long-standing impacts. It’s vital to our survival as a race of primates that we measure our actions against how they may affect those in our community.
It’s a critical part of an advanced consciousness to be sure. Our ability to be compassionate may be the primary reason we live as the dominant destroyer…ahem…species today.
Not that compassion is directly akin to a spiritual sense. My understanding of spirituality is that it is synonymous with a sense of deeper meaning to life, which I’m lucky enough to get when I study astrophysics.
I love me some space. There are no mgtows there.
Sharing this for everybody who needs to remember why they keep facing pain for the sake of others:
Carol S. Pearson, The Hero Within
Back when I was chair of my university department*, I assigned an office to a graduate student who would share space with a female. The department secretary warned me the guy had an unsavory reputation. So I wrote a letter and gave it to him in person. It said that there had been allegations of misbehavior with females, that I was not judging the truth of those allegations, but if any allegations cropped up on my watch, I would take action.
Nothing happened. Then one day I was reading the paper, and saw their wedding announcement! A few years later, I met the woman, who was again single.
* My term was cut short when my Reserve unit was sent to Bosnia. At the time, we had an abysmally incompetent chancellor who used a funding model from some exoplanet or other. So we STARTED each year in an impossible deficit. It took the combined resources of several nations to find something more aggravating, but not by very much.