Internet Lunatics - RadFems, PUA's, MRA's, MGTOW's, etc.

Maybe I missed something earlier in the thread, but (1) I think people ought to take notice of the drop in sexual assault rates, and (2) that doesn't mean it's not still a problem worth working on by organizations like RAINN.

I think there is such a thing as "rape culture," and it's awful, but it's surely on the decline. Examples of mainstream media trivializing and joking about raping women were commonplace 50 years ago, not so much now.

The biggest "rape culture" problem today is the way prison rape is tolerated and treated as a joke. And that is something feminists and MRAs should strongly agree on.

 

Should being the key word there. Especially since it's quite possibly one of the single easiest forms of rape to fight out there because prisons are autocratic and prisoners get so little say in anything. Talk about low hanging fruit... unfortunately even when it's adult guards taking advantage of minor prisoners there are still people who will argue that it just doesn't count if the victims are male. Human stupidity will, as always, find new and inventive ways to disappoint us all. Thankfully there are those as well who argue against that kind of facepalm inducing dumb.

Also, trying to get a big picture look at the cost in human life all of this has, I looked up overall death rates and was... surprised... to say the least. Our murder rate is only ~13,000 a year. Shocking not just for how low it is compared to what the media would have us think, but because it's also just under 1/3rd of our suicide rate of over 38,000 people a year.

As a nation we are obsessed with our homicide rate. You would think that losing three times as many people to suicide would be even more important to us.

 

The conventional wisdom is so hardened around the "ever-more-dangerous-world" fallacy that a 20-year decline in murder rates doesn't even register.

 

Sanity.

 

I don't even know what DSM stands for.

 

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual? Dancing Spaghetti Monster?

 

Is it any more worrisome than not having democratic republicans? liberal teabaggers? heterosexual gays? It's only worrisome if you believe that feminism holds a monopoly on morality; That not accepting feminism, or worse, opposing it on anything is enough in and of itself to render something as "bad". If on the other hand you believe morality is independent of political alignment, if you believe it's possible to disagree with feminism's political actions or ideological claims and still be "good" then why is it worrisome at all?
The question is basically: Can someone (or something) disagree with feminism and not be "bad"? If the answer is no, then you have what is tantamount to a religion.

Exhaustive negative proof is impossible but I can say that rejecting both as defined by most of feminism is part of the hard core (note: not "hardcore") of the mainstream MRM.
Rape culture defined as having an epidemic of rape, rising rape rates, near exclusively male->female gendering, and a culture which widely tolerates, encourages, or condones rape is rejected by the MRM. Aside from the empirical reasons there's also the problem that evidence against rape culture is ipso facto considered evidence of rape culture, making it impossible to disprove.
On the other hand Rape culture defined as our deplorable culture surrounding prison rape and "men always want it/women need to refuse it" dichotomy would be accepted as a definition if you absolutely have to use the words "Rape Culture".

Patriarchy we've already been over a billion times. The MRM's position is that that both genders are trapped in toxic gender roles which damage both of them in different, although sometimes overlapping, ways. If ever there were something the MRM and Feminism could agree on a good chunk of Toxic Masculinity is probably it. The norm of a hypermasculine extroverted ultrastoic whose personal worth is purely determined by money and sexual success/female approval is beyond dysfunctional. Where they differ is in the MRM's idea of an equally Toxic Femininity existing. Women who act masculine and men who act feminine are penalized by society.

Likewise oppression exists for both genders in sometimes different and sometimes overlapping ways. Women to some degree have a glass ceiling. Men have a glass cellar. Women are overvalued to the point of pedestalization. Men are undervalued to the point of disposability. Women are seen as pure and good and only every the victim to such a degree they literally get away with murder. Men are seen as predatory and malevolent and only ever the perpetrator to such a degree they sometimes can't go out in public with their own children without harassment. Female sexuality is overinflated as a desirable commodity. Male sexuality is overinflated as a dangerous threat. Women are objectified as their sexuality, men are objectified as either danger or their usefulness and profitability. A lot of these are each half of the same problem, male hyperagency and female hypoagency.

There are people who claim to be feminists and yet believe in the MRM as well but because of the vitriol they receive from other feminists they're few and far between, often winding up joining the MRM completely. I've also seen some feminists who follow the general theme of "You aren't patriarchs, therefore you qualify as oppressed" but it doesn't seem to be a remotely mainstream or organized branch of thought and usually winds up with a lot of caveats and contradictions. It's... messy.

[/quote]There are feminists who support men's rights/liberation.[/quote]
"Feminism is men's rights too"
There are a lot of feminists who say these things, but what about the real world actions of feminism? We've been down this road several times before, and at this point all I've got s an insightful quote from someone else who put it better than I can:

 

Look at the last two lines alone, he links to RAINN and then makes further claims that contradict even RAINN's inaccurate figures. It's classic outrage porn, a less vitriolic version of what gawker's clickbait machine puts out every day. Articles like this aren't about the facts, they're about keeping the echo chamber going so nobody has to actually bother with the facts. And they all follow the same rough pattern; they all have the same basic inaccurate statistics, make the same basic claims, and repeat the same basic instructions of self-flagellation or excoriation depending on the author and audience's genders. The persistent belief in a given narrative in spite of all facts and evidence is, essentially, religion. And if Rape Culture as this author describes it is a religion then articles like his are its prayers.

Think about it. It fits. We've got everything in here. Guilt, excoriation, self-flagellation, original sin, and supplications.

 

As I said, sanity....

 

Rape culture is where every year one of the local high schools divides the male and female students up for a week, sends the female students to a self defense class, tells them to watch their drinks while the male students spend a week playing basketball.

 

<<<< Feminist who also sees many of the core goals of MRM as being laudable and consistent with feminism.

 

+1

 

I went from cutting myself as a teenager to surreptitiously drinking cooking wine to feminism. Don't be like me, children.

 

Is there a culture of rape?

1 in 5 American women report surviving rape or attempted rape.
1 in 6 American men report being abused before the age of 18.

Those are some significant numbers and yet, there remains a general culture where the abused are subjected to things like:

What were you wearing?
Were you drinking?
You were asking for it.

etc.

Why are we teaching young women how to avoid rape and not teaching young men not to do it?

To be clear, I do not agree with the idea that just because I am a man, I am part of the problem. That is wrong headed. I do recognize that all women have been subject to harrasement at one time or another. Regardless of the numbers dropping in reported crime, there still exists a fear based on percieved threat (if not actual physical threat). There needs to be much work done on this front and it involves both men and women working together to create a culture that does not dimisnish the impact of sexual assault on the victim, regardles of gender.