Because the guy making these profound arguments is making them because he sees the DDOS attacks on FTB, SC and FF as “an opportunity for constructive dialogue.” On Ed’s page, because Ed just longs for constructive dialogue about why the DDOS on his blog network is totally understandable.
Ron B. Rown While I’m still learning about the MRM, from what I’ve come across, I think I would qualify as an MRA. But that doesn’t mean I hate women. I don’t. I’m pro equality, but anti-feminism. I’m anti-feminism because the movement’s equating so many of the evils of the world with maleness (Patriarchy). I reject the feminist culture of scoffing at and ignoring the issues and perspectives of straight white cis-gendered men (“ohh, teh poor menz”; or the privilege card when such a man offers an opinion contrary to that of a given feminist or minoriy group), while simultaneously claiming to be for equality, social justice and pretending to be the ultimate progressive authority on gender issues. I reject what I see as a tremendous amount of groupthink and hostility to dissent among many feminist communities, and the demonization of any dissent as misogyny, ignorant privilege, etc. I reject the perpetual victim culture that is feminism. The hair-trigger oversensitivity of so many feminists to any perceived slight. The culture makes my skin crawl. I don’t think that women don’t need advocacy. There are legitimate women’s issues. I just reject the feminist movement as a particular means of women’s advocacy. I also think that there are many very important men’s human right issues. I think both are important.
Ron B. Rown (Sorry for the mini-essays. I just view this as an opportunity for constructive dialogue. Perhaps a silver lining to the unfortunate circumstance of some assholes taking down these websites)
People amaze me.
This guy hates the thought that his privilege might not be held in high regard by the unprivileged.
That’s like saying that he’s for curing cancer, but opposed to anyone working on finding a cure. He doesn’t seem clear on what feminism is. As soon as he said “I’m pro-equality”, he said, literally, “I’m a feminist”.
… unless he was talking about equality for anything but women.
“I reject victim culture” = “Shut up, victims”.
I think he is completely blind to his privilege. That is not difficult to do because there is nothing in every day life that even remotely tells you you have any privilege. I know because I was there.
What I find more difficult to understand is how you can remain blind if you actually read what is written on those sites and even allow for the possibility that you may be missing something. I guess that it is because you can’t feel your own privilege and you resent anyone telling you about your wrong perspective. Especially since they’re not real skeptics.
I read all those facebook comments and I feel like I need brain bleach. Ron couldn’t name one “legitimate” issue women face today. He kept coming back with, “Well, there’s this but IT’S WORSE FOR MEN!” He claims he’s left leaning and pro-choice, yet gripes that women have “veto power” over abortion, so I don’t think he fully understands what the word “choice” means. He then goes on to deny the existence of a wage gap by citing a study that compares full time workers to part-time in a deliberate effort to obscure the gap. When he’s continually pressed for an issue that women face today, he eventually replies, “What more do you want?” So, I guess that’s it. Women have everything they could possibly want in society, time to pack up this whole feminism thing, right? Oiy.
Contact the state police in whatever area he lives, DDOSing is a crime and most jurisdictions now know enough to deal with it.
Come on y’all, Ron’s not a misogynist, bitc–pardon me, I mean “women”–are just inferior to men. They’re not involved in politics and science and stuff because they’re bad at that sort of thing and also they mysteriously take time off to do things. I can’t think of what women might be doing, but I’m guessing it’s not very important!
Jean @4
You’re probably right. It’s more likely Ron B. Brown hates the concept of privilege because he doesn’t feel privileged and therefor it doesn’t exist.
I reject what I see as a tremendous amount of groupthink and hostility to dissent among many feminist communities, and the demonization of any dissent as misogyny, ignorant privilege, etc
I find that some elelments within the feminist movement are tremendously hostile to dissent and somtimes unfairly demonise it.
http://www.thenation.com/article/178140/feminisms-toxic-twitter-wars#
He also made a mistake of equating patriarchy with maleness. The problem with patriarchy is that has narrow definitions of maleness. Patriarchy is really bad for women but it is certainly not a good thing for men
Ah, the tell-tale calling card of the standard issue MRA. I define “patriarchy” as all men are automatically always in charge of everything ever. I’m a man. I’m not always in charge of everything. Therefore there is no such thing as patriarchy (as I’ve defined it).
This is the same guy who, on Ophelia’s previous post, was quoted saying
I nearly commented re that sentence on that post – what, people who just happen to fit the culturally approved model for their gender annoy you just because they fit that model? Aren’t you more annoyed by the existence and propagation of the models themselves? Aren’t there models for both men and women, so aren’t both oppressed (in different ways and to differing degrees) by societal expectations? – but I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume the sentence was badly worded.
The existence of those models, expectations & stereotypes is an integral part of patriarchy (as I understand the term anyway). If patriarchy could be even partly translated as “men rule and subjugate women” he’d be justified in rejecting such a childish idea. It’s equally childish to oppose something without bothering to find out what it is you’re against though.
no. read feminism 101.
I laughed. I mean, really? He’s got the plurality of almost any media speaking for him, and he whines that this particular set of spaces doesn’t defer to him as much as he’d like?
Jacob Schmidt (#13)
And he makes that complaint just one sentence after he gives a completely incorrect definition of “patriarchy.” Why shouldn’t feminism ignore the perspective of people who are too ignorant to understand what they’re talking about?
What evidence is there that this person is DDoS’ing? The tile is certainly suggestive and many would consider this click bait unless you have evidence that you know who is behind disruption to this site and others.
Also, I think it is despicable to then provide a link to him on a social network when the atmosphere is so hostile.
Right off the bat, it’s clear that he hasn’t actually spent that much time looking into what feminism is. If he had, he’d know that “maleness” and “patriarchy aren’t synonyms.
This seems to be a common problem with the people criticizing feminism; they don’t have a clue what it is. They tend to get their information mostly from other people who don’t have a clue either. When they engage with feminists, they get hyper-defensive and refuse to listen to what’s actually being said.
E.g.
The “issues and perspectives” of men aren’t being ignored. However, when a man pretends to know more about the issues and perspectives of women than the women actually involved, then his opinion is ignored and rightly so.
This is privilege. He’s so used to having his opinion taken as the gold standard that he just can’t wrap his head around the idea that there are some subjects where maybe’s there are other people whose opinions are more relevant; that maybe on this subject he’s not the authority; that maybe he ought to just shut up and listen for a change.
@ 15 – what? What are you talking about? I didn’t say he had anything to do with the DDOS.
None. What evidence is there that anyone is accusing him of it?
Btw, this might be the moment where you realize that actually reading the post you’re commenting on drastically reduces the risk that you’ll look like an idiot.
“I’m anti-feminism because the movement’s equating so many of the evils of the world with maleness (Patriarchy).”
Wow. How does one manage to fuck up that hard?
Ophelia:
I wondered about that too, but I think I understand. ALulz is saying that the title to the post implies that Ron Brown is one of the DDoSers (his reason is one of their reasons). Even though it took me a minute to figure it out, I think there’s merit to the claim.
I completely disagree though with ALulz’s opinion that the atmosphere is too hostile to link the man to his own words. I read the whole fb thread, and the mocking was deserved, and served with an equal helping of rational debate. IMO mocking is fair especially when in response to regurgitated rhetoric and unanswered questions.
@ 18 LykeX
Well there’s the comment by Marcus @6 (which nobody else challenged).
Jean
Yup. This is why I rather like the analogy of fish not thinking about water – they just swim in it. But then we’ve all seen fish desperately flapping about when they are out of the water they’re used to. They need it.
People oblivious to their own privilege/s of whatever kind seem to react the same way. The big difference of course is that, unlike fish out of water, people who recognise their own and others’ privilege won’t die from the experience. Their faffing about as though it’s the end of the world is just that. Faffing about.
@Silentbob
Well, obviously Marcus @6 is mistaken. I think that was cleared up by Ophelia @17 that she wasn’t accusing Ron of anything of the sort in her OP.
@Silentbob
But it seems that ALulzyApprentice was specifically criticizing Ophelia, which did nothing of the sort. If it was meant as a criticism of Marcus Ranum, I’d say it was quite poorly phrased. Perhaps I could have been more precise myself, too.