We Hunted The Mammoth
Just wanted to let you all know that Man Boobz has just passed a milestone of sorts: FIVE MILLION page views. Thank you, loyal visitors and annoying trolls alike! No, seriously, thank you!
We’re also just a handful of NWOslave screeds away from 180,000 comments. Which is actually even more amazing. Thanks again, loyal readers, for making the comments here so entertaining and educational. And thanks again, trolls, for giving us so much more material to work with.
Yep, that’s right, the “clopping” sound of high heels are a form of “street harassment.” I found the screenshot above on a promising new blog you can find at MensRightsActivism.com. Yep, that’s right. Evidently it never occurred to anyone in the Men’s Rights movement to lock down that domain name.
Oh, this little Reddit screenshot is good too:
How exactly does saying “consent is sexy” mean that male consent is taken for granted? How is it that 59 people thought that comment deserved an upvote?
I can’t answer either question, but there’s lots more hilarious and appalling stuff where that came from, mostly from the Men’s Rights subreddit. It’s going in the “antidotes to boobery” blog roll.
So, yeah, I’ve added ads to the site, at least on a trial basis. I’ve avoided them in the past to avoid cluttering up the site, and because ads don’t pay all that much, but times are a bit lean here at Man Boobz manor, and with the traffic this site now gets – we recently passed 4.5 million views – ads won’t make me rich but will definitely help. Hopefully they won’t be too obtrusive.
A couple of requests:
I don’t get paid unless people actually see the ads, so if you’re using ad-blocking software, please consider disabling it for manboobz.com. (If you’d rather not, maybe consider a donation? Donations are always welcome here.)
And if you want to help me make a few bucks more, and spread the word about the site in general, don’t hesitate to use the little “share” buttons below each post. Share on Twitter, on Facebook, on Reddit, or anywhere else you can think of. Some of you already do this, and I appreciate it a great deal.
One other thing: WordPress handles the ads; I don’t have any say in the specifics of what gets put here. Let me know if you see any weird or inappropriate ones.
So let the great ad experiment begin.
Regular posts will resume Monday. Unless I get really inspired and magically find some time to post before then.
It’s time for a little vacation. I will be out of town for about a week starting today, and, like this cat, spending as much time as possible staring out at a large body of water rather than my computer screen. Oh, I’ll still be putting up posts every day — well, I’ll try to — and keeping my eye on the blog. But I won’t be checking up on comments quite as often, or responding as quickly to whatever is going on in the manosphere on any given day. If you need to get in touch, email me.
UPDATE: I have no reason to believe that the harassment alleged by Kyle Lovett — which I discuss below — involved anyone even tangentially connected to this site, or indeed that it ever happened. The “evidence” he provided only showed that he got traffic from a link on this site. He never provided any evidence that the alleged harassment occurred or that, if if did, it was perpetrated by anyone who found his site through my site. The rest of my piece still stands.
The other day, a commenter here linked to the blog published by one of the moderators of the Men’s Rights subreddit. Kyle Lovett, the mod in question, says that not long afterwards, someone contacted his workplace saying that he was a member of a “hate group.” Claiming to be concerned about his safety, he temporarily hid his blog. And stepped down as mod.
Lovett says he suspects that this person who he says contacted his work is a Man Boobz reader, and has now provided evidence that seems to back up this suspicion. If Kyle is indeed telling the truth about the harassment, it was a Man Boobz reader who contacted his workplace. (There is no evidence it was one of the regulars here, merely someone who was reading the comments in that one thread. Nor am I completely convinced that the alleged harassment happened; Lovett has lied about things in the past.)
But if the harassment happened let me be blunt: That’s not cool. I don’t like that sort of harassment when it’s directed at feminists, and I don’t like it when it’s directed at MRAs. As Rebecca Watson once said, in a different context, “guys, don’t do that.” Seriously, DON’T DO THAT.
All this said, Lovett and other MRAs are acting as if the link to his blog here was in some way equivalent to “doxing” – that is, tracking down the personal information of someone posting anonymously, and posting it online, for purposes of harassment..
It isn’t. Kyle publishes his blog under his own name, and he regularly posted links to it on Reddit. It was no secret that he posted on Reddit as Qanan, just as my real name Is no secret.
I’m not sure why it’s necessary to point this out, but I will anyway: If you publish things on the internet under your own name, people will indeed connect your name to these things. There is absolutely nothing wrong with posting a link to someone’s blog. No one here advocated harassment in any way.
Needless to say, the indignation on the Men’s Rights about this is hypocritical, to say the least. MRAs harass feminists all the time.
A Voice for Men, the worst offender in this regard, has published the personal information of feminists, and once put out a thousand dollar bounty in an attempt to find out the identity of one feminist who had been posting anonymously online. AVFM head Paul Elam talks about “stalking” feminists and on his radio show gleefully discussed the prospect of not only revealing the names and addresses of women he considers evil, but also their routes home from work. He orchestrated a harassment campaign against one commenter here, which led to people contacting her workplace in an attempt to get her fired. There are many more examples.
Meanwhile, today on the Men’s Rights subreddit, one commenter’s call to harass a woman got two dozen upvotes from the regulars:
Guys, don’t do that.
EDIT: I have added a few comments in the post above to highlight my concerns that the alleged harassment may be a fabrication; I will remove these comments of Lovett provides proof, publicly or privately, that the harassment occurred.
[NOTE: COMPLETELY REVISED WITH ACTUAL USEFUL INFORMATION THIS TIME]
A number of commenters have been getting the error message “”You must be logged in to make
a comment from that address” when they try to comment.
This is because WordPress has made a change to how it handles comments. Here’s their explanation:
Now, if someone tries to comment with an email address that’s attached to a WordPress.com account, they’ll need to sign into WordPress.com before they can comment.
If commenters have forgotten their password they can request a reset:
http://wordpress.com/wp-login.php?action=lostpassword
If you don’t have a WordPress account, this shouldn’t affect you.
You can contact the WordPress people if you’re still having problems. Or, presumably, switch to using a non-Wordpress-linked email. (Which will send you to moderation for your first post.)
Thanks to Viscaria for the info.
EDITED TO ADD: Some people are still having trouble even with new emails/accounts. If anyone has any advice, please let me know. Or contact WordPress at the linky link above.
A couple quick things:
Due to recent increases in trollerly, I’m being a bit more cautious about whom I let comment freely here, and while I will let new commenters post, I will be keeping them on moderation until I’m convinced they’re sincere, and not creepy abusive assholes, etc. In general I will be a bit quicker on the moderate/ban button.
EDITED TO ADD: If you’re a new commenter and want to be taken off moderation more quickly, email me with some info about yourself so I know who you are. (This info will be kept confidential.)
If someone is acting egregiously in the comments, please email me about it.
And generally, keep safe. Be careful with personal info. There are angry assholes everywhere.
On a happier note: Remember that thing about Sandra Fluke and her (allegedly) lesbian fingers? PZ Myers has torn apart the dubious science behind relative-finger-length-gaydar.
