Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
There’s been a recent upsurge in the drive to recruit men to feminism, and it doesn’t seem to be related in any way to the Hobby Lobby nonsense (video auto-plays). Oftentimes when there’s a sudden increase in the fevered pitch of something it’s difficult to figure out — as we see in the case of soccer — if that’s an increase in supply or in demand. Or neither of those. Or both. In this case I’m inclined to think it’s a combination of supply and demand, but leaning toward demand; the feminists are trying harder to recruit men to their movement. But then again, it’s likely that they’re trying harder all of a sudden, because they’re finding it easier to do all of a sudden. That would mean supply.
As you can see from that first link up there, it seems a lot of male feminism has to do with figuring out what the female feminists are saying, and emphatically agreeing with it without thinking about it.
Avoid playing the Devil’s Advocate. It’s a really good way to get into arguments, but not a good way to start productive discussions. Read the commenting policy on blogs and websites you want to comment on. Most of them are in place to create a safe, troll free space where blog participants can express ideas and opinions freely without being attacked. There are plenty of other spaces where you can play Devil’s advocate all you like so you can leave these ones alone.
After reading that, you don’t need to know a lot about feminism to figure out this is no place for a man. You just have to know something about being a man. “Productive discussions” come from an echo chamber? Laughable. No really, it is, I’ve seen feminists try to do this. After the “Hooray, we all agree with each other” moment, it looks like the dog catching the car. They don’t know what to do next. They don’t know what they have here — a good idea, or a really super-duper cool idea? How to gauge, how to assess? You can’t. Best you can do is vote on it, and everyone agrees on it, so that gets you nowhere. It’s a sad, sad sight to see.
It is the exact opposite of the process by which a week timid little boy becomes a tower of masculine strength as a man. The echo chamber provides “a safe, troll free space where blog participants can express ideas and opinions freely without being attacked.” It is a shelter from disagreement, be it reasonable or other. The ideas that emerge from the echo chamber, like Pajama Boy, show all sorts of signs of having never been challenged. Among my favorites: Skimpy clothes on good looking women. It shouldn’t happen, ever, because it “objectifies” and “exploits” women, unless it’s a school or some other setting that will piss off the conservatives, and then the rallying cry is that there shouldn’t be any “slut shaming.” In other words, feminists really have no idea how to react to this. Every now and then in the echo chamber, one of the un-attacked will meekly offer up the question “How do we feel about that?” Which, I think, cuts straight to the heart of the matter: Feminism is not about covering up good-looking women, or letting schoolgirls prance around in denim-diapers, or women voting or having private conversations with their doctors or chasing careers or enjoying any sort of “choice” about anything at all. It is about collective thinking.
That, too, is antithetical to being a man. To being a strong man, or a desirable man as Captain Capitalism points out:
This is why, when a woman asks you what color to choose for the carpeting or the furniture, she gets honked off when you reply with “Whatever.” It comes from evolution and instinct. It’s got to do with what the two sexes bring. Women bring the oven, men bring the recipe. So what’s the recipe? How is it different from another recipe? That’s the true male contribution: His signature. Goes for everything. Medicine cabinet in the bathroom, carpet color, how the family computer is configured, what’s in the kitchen junk-drawer, what kind of coffee gets brewed in the morning. If living with a man is like living with any other man, that would mean the woman is expecting something from the relationship she is not going to be getting. It means the dude isn’t bringing anything. For her, it’s frustrating, boring and a turn-off. She’s instinctively wired to avoid this, and in the earlier years when a suitor is facing the instinctive screening process, the truth of it is that’s what’s being screened. Genetic weakness, physical weakness, mental weakness, but those are distant seconds to: The ordinary. Women are wired to avoid the generic. That’s what’s really going on. They don’t crave disagreement, they crave identity.
It’s burned into our culture, and other cultures all around the world. Kids get the Dad’s last name. There’s a reason for that, and it isn’t just because men want it that way.
This thing about “Agree with her about everything,” like much of liberalism, simply doesn’t work. It is a cause, as well as a symptom, of dysfunction (hat tip again to Gerard).
Seriously — have you seen many of these self-proclaimed male feminists? When I see all these sullen dorks standing like political prisoners holding their “I NEED FEMINISM BECAUSE…” signs, I wish that one of them could be honest and say they need feminism because they’re not naturally attractive to women.
I therefore posit that in at least some cases, male feminism is a mating strategy for men who aren’t getting laid on the virtues of being men alone. So they switch gears and attempt to get laid on the merits of proclaiming to be feminist “allies.” The “allies” thing is all lies. It is a sneaky way of trying to appeal to women by loudly proclaiming that you hate the type of guy who normally appeals to women. I believe the most reasonable explanation for the very existence of the modern “male feminist” is rooted in evolutionary biology: Calling oneself a male feminist is a deceptive and despicable little shame-dance, a pathetic self-puffing mating ritual that beta male lizards do to garner even a scrap of female attention.
It’s like going to some pro-marijuana rally because you know someone there is going to have weed. If you hang around enough girl feminists long enough and claim to be a feminist, sooner or later one of them will fuck you…maybe…right?
As is the case in many other walks of life: Receiving greater approval by way of disguising your distinguishing features, is a loser’s game. It would be futile even if it worked, which it usually doesn’t. The thing to ask about it is, what if it did work? Noodle on that one a little bit; you “earn” approval by pretending to be something you really aren’t? Where’s that get you, exactly? Same thing it got you in Grades K through 5, right? A bunch of friends who aren’t really your friends. See, this is supposed to be the benefit of public school. You were supposed to figure out that this isn’t a winning plan.
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I always love the feminist schizophrenia on sex work. Take strippers. Stripping is empowering and women shouldn’t be shamed for being strippers. Men who patronize strippers are chauvinist misogynist jerks who objectify women. Apparently stripping is great, as long as no man enjoys it.
- cloudbuster | 07/03/2014 @ 07:52