A Response to John Dias who is an administrator at antimisandry.com

Hello visitors.

I recently got a flurry of misogynistic/antifeminist comments (um, unposted here by me, needless to say!) from men associated with the antimisandry.com site. I also got this much more respectful comment:

John Dias said...

I am an admin over at AntiMisandry.com. Are there any questions you would like to ask, rather than just making deductions? I extend my hand to you; please ask away.

Sunday, November 16, 2008 1:50:00 PM EST.

I informed John that, in fact, my questions had been posted over there, and they were not responded to, but were instead by-passed so a few men could rant on in antifeminist and misogynist ways INSTEAD of responding. But I don't assume each administrator over there reads everything, so John may never have seen my q's.

Below is the paragraph I posted over there, with its original questions separated out, and in bold, so as not to be missed. I have welcomed John Dias to answer them here, respectfully and sincerely. I await his reply.


I began by responding to a strange comment by an anti-misandrist man called "cybro" in which he said something about "indians". But the discussion, on my end, was focused on whether and how misandry shows itself socially, and includes issues that negatively impact American Indian women. Anything in brackets is material I have added here today at A Radical Profeminist, hopefully for clarity!!!

OK, enough already! Here's the comment:

I think we all know what happened and is still happening to Indigenous people all over the planet: white men and our values, industries, and institutions are killing them, genocidally. And white men are also systematically raping Indigenous women. See this for more:http://www.indiancountry.com/content...1096415046

What is your humanitarian response to these atrocities?

In what institutions, in what social venues, in what regions of North America, in your view, do "women rule over men"? I am eager to hear your answer.

As for where men get to speak like this: have you looked at the pornography industry in the last thirty five years; men have been putting down women there in every conceivable way, degrading women, raping women, pretending to rape women, cumming on women's faces, gang-banging women, treating women of color like sh*t in particularly racist and misogynist ways.

[So, John, I'll restate the question: Are you familiar with the content of online industry-produced "heterosexual" pornography? And would you describe the content as misogynist, not misandrist, unless it is dealing with the stereotypical portrayal and abuse of men of color?]

Often and routinely over these many years, the pornographers (I'm here I'm talking about the big fellas: the white corporate pimps, not someone at home alone or with a partner using their webcam) make feminists and feminism the targets of this scorn, contempt, and defamation: that's a multi-billion dollar a year industry.

I ask this in earnestness: can you name for me one multi-billion dollar a year industry that promotes (accurately) the perspectives of radical feminists?
Because I can't, and I've looked.

Practically every woman I know has been seriously harmed physically, emotionally, and sexually by a man or by several men, often within their own families of origin: I'm not a youngster, and this means dozens and dozens of women, just those women to whom I am personally connected. One woman friend was molested by three different men over one summer when she was nine years old. Another woman was raped by her father, older brothers, and male cousins when she was a girl. My female dental hygienist was murdered by her ex-boyfriend; he came to her home when she was alone and killed her. I also know boys who have been raped or molested or assaulted by men: again, their numbers are in the dozens, but approximately half as large as the population of females harmed by men in these ways.

Do you know even five women who have been charged with rape, incest, child molestation, criminal battery, women who have detained boys or men in their basements as sexual slaves, women who have trafficked in boys and men for the purposes of sexual gratification, at the expense of the humanity of those so used and abused?

I see men treat one another like sh*t often, beating each other up outside of bars, shouting and threatening each other: white men threatening and discriminating against men of color; heterosexual men bullying and beating gay men.

I'm curious why you don't see men as a significant population of man-haters. [That's a question.]

I honestly (I'm being entirely serious here) know of not one single woman who hates men. Not one. I know women who fear men, based on past experiences; I know women who fight for justice for women, for women to be free from rapist culture, from pornographic culture, from a dominant culture in which Indigenous North American women can be raped by white men without any recourse. I can't "reverse" this phenomenon and match it to reality.

Could you name the social experiences, on a large scale, that lead you to see the world this way?

Regarding your use of the term "feminazi": Given social-political reality, aren't white men "the Nazis," and women of all ethnicities more like "European Jews" than the other way around?

In what sense do feminists in North America control the media, run state police forces, direct the military, and form an unfathomably inhumane dictatorship, as Hitler did?

What sense does it make to call any feminists "Nazis"? Please explain this to me. (Thank you.)

How have you been harmed, personally, by women?

I look forward to your response. Thanks for engaging on this topic. I appreciate your willingness to keep the dialogue open.

Julian

[NOTE: the above was posted on July 24, 2008 11:13 AM at antimisandry.com. John never responded to me there. There were no extended hands... until now.]

This Advocate Cover is so Damned Racist and Heterosexist

I never have had any confidence at all in The Advocate speaking for a majority of queer folks, who, btw, are not white. This is not to say the magazine is "all white". It isn't. But it is a pro-liberal, pro-corporate, pro-consumerist magazine, promoting a sadly and predominantly dominant cultural and political agenda that won't benefit hardly anyone but possibly the most privileged white gay men.

Once again (and again, and again...), the assumption is made, as in the cover's saying, that all the gay folks are white, and all African Americans are heterosexual. WRONG.

I may write about the content of the article as well, but just wanted to get this stupid Advocate cover posted, while it's fresh.

As for the subtitle on the cover, "The Last Great Civil Rights Struggle", I address this comment to the white male author, Michael Joseph Gross:

There are several "last great civil rights struggles" going on, and many human rights struggles as well, one of which is to radically challenge heterosexism and homophobia. Fighting white supremacy, anti-Black racism, and other forms of racism, are still "Front and Center" in the struggle, if you care about humanity. So too is the fight against male supremacy and misogyny, Western cultural and economic imperialism, and ecocide. And each of these struggles is intricately intertwined, overlapping, or synonymous in the experience of many human beings.

For those who don't know it, what is now often termed "Queerness" has its roots in civilisations, societies, and communities that were and are not white-majority or European. And in many societies that have since been seriously and detrimentally impacted, if not destroyed, the "queers" weren't seen as odd or peculiar, as we are now in white heteromale supremacist Amerikkka.

Here is a resource page, and as the disclaimer says, an imperfect one at that, with a list of African American same-gender loving writers. It's a good starting point for self-education, if you are among the people who are white and who also conjure up an image of "white people" when you hear the term lesbian and gay community.

19 Nov. 2008 UPDATE! Queerty's site has an analysis of the Advocate cover article, with a handy pie chart!!!



Let's give the last word to conrad who posted a comment following the Queerty critique:

No. 6 · conrad

this is identity politics at its worst and ugliest. im so tired of lots of white folx saying gay is the new black, as if there arent any queer black people (that bare the brunt of both white supremacy and homophobia)…

Bayard Rustin anyone?

Fuck the advocate.
Posted: Nov 13, 2008 at 9:06 pm
END OF POST.

To Any Woman who is involved intimately with a Misogynist Man: Take This Test for Validation

There is a test [here] one can take to find out if one is in bed with, in love with, or married to a misogynist heterosexual man. That first link was to page one of a five page article. Here are the links to page 2, page 3, page 4, and page 5. Please note, at the end is a link to another quiz to find out if you are in an abusive relationship.

Note: at the end of page 5, there is a place to rate the article, one through five stars. Click on star 5 if you found this article very useful. And check out the misogynists comments below that! It's tough for misogynist men to be identified accurately, for they have so many systems, structures, and strategies in place to never be held to account.
END OF POST.

Dutch Men-Wanting-Rights Group fought to rape children without consequence to the men

From this webpage http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/outcry-over-launch-of-dutch-pedophile-party/2006/05/31/1148956392681.html

Outcry over launch of Dutch pedophile party



May 31, 2006 - 1:05PM
Belgian child rapist Marc Dutroux.

Dutch pedophiles are launching a political party to push for a cut in the legal age for sexual relations to 12 from 16 and the legalisation of child pornography and sex with animals, sparking widespread outrage.

The Charity, Freedom and Diversity (NVD) party said on its web site it would be officially registered today, proclaiming: "We are going to shake The Hague awake!"

The party said it wanted to cut the legal age for sexual relations to 12 and eventually scrap the limit altogether.

"A ban just makes children curious," Ad van den Berg, one of the party's founders, told the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper.

"We want to make pedophilia the subject of discussion," he said, adding the subject had been a taboo since the 1996 Marc Dutroux child abuse scandal in neighbouring Belgium.

"We want to get into parliament so we have a voice. Other politicians only talk about us in a negative sense, as if we were criminals," Van den Berg told Reuters.

The Netherlands, which already has liberal policies on soft drugs, prostitution and gay marriage, was shocked by the plan.

An opinion poll published today showed that 82 per cent wanted the government to do something to stop the new party, while 67 per cent said promoting pedophilia should be illegal.

"They make out as if they want more rights for children. But their position that children should be allowed sexual contact from age 12 is of course just in their own interest," anti-pedophile campaigner Ireen van Engelen told the AD daily.

Right-wing lawmaker Geert Wilders said he had asked the government to investigate whether a party with such "sick ideas" could really be established, ANP news agency reported.

Kees van deer Staaij, a member of the Christian SGP party, also demanded action: "Pedophilia and child pornography should be taboo in every constitutional state. Breaking that will just create more victims and more serious ones."

The party wants private possession of child pornography to be allowed although it supports the ban on the trade of such materials. It also supports allowing pornography to be broadcast on daytime television, with only violent pornography limited to the late evening.

Toddlers should be given sex education and youths aged 16 and up should be allowed to appear in pornographic films and prostitute themselves. Sex with animals should be allowed although abuse of animals should remain illegal, the NVD said.

The party also said everybody should be allowed to go naked in public and promotes legalising all soft and hard drugs and free train travel for all.

Reuters
END OF POST.

Pedophilia?! What's LOVE got to do with it?

copyright 2008, by Julian Real. All Rights Reserved.
An alternate title for this piece is "When Love is Hate".


The above photograph is of child rapist Kevin Smith. For more about his crimes against humanity and for the source of the image, see here.

As a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, I can tell you from experience that "love" (in any form) didn't have anything to do with the intentions, feelings, desires, and actions of those who abused me. To call my abusers "lovers of children" is, well, a tad off. And yet this is the term many English speakers have settled on as the most accurate or responsible term for such perpetrators. Bear with me through the next bit: I promise you, this post is not entirely a lesson in etymology!

Let's contemplate and compare the following Greek-rooted U.S. Anglo-English terms such as Philadephia, anglophile, misogyny, misanthrope, and philanthropy. The ones beginning with "miso" mean, varyingly, showing hatred for, or the hatred of. "Phile" means one who loves or a lover of. "Pedo" is the Greek root in English terms meaning child.

As is known well by now, in the West, it is white heterosexual or "sexually conflicted" men who are the vast majority of perpetrators of incest, child molestation, child rape, and other forms of gross sexual exploitation and assault against children by adults, incidents or acts of the misnomer "pedophilia". This is confirmed in and by police reports, Internet news and online predation/pornography/sexual slavery networks, and in criminal and civil trials.

A recently "outed" group of offenders has been white European-affiliated Catholic priests and other Christian clergy-men. They are but one population of heterosexually-identified men who are child-rapists. Such clergy-men have begun to carry the stigma of of being child sexual abusers, with institutional support for them doing this serially going right up to the Vatican, in the case of Roman Catholic priests. What is less often reported is priests' abuse of girls and women. For more, see here and here.

Those of us who are out as gay are not off the stigmatic hook, however. Many non-gay people still think "gay" is synonymous with "child molester". This is, how to say, curious, given the statistics. (This is not to say that being a gay man means one cannot sexually abuse a child, only that there is no social, historic, or statistical reason to conflate the two terms.)

Heterosexual men do not want to be caught or stigmatised as child-rapists, so they have conveniently scapegoated gay men as THE perpetrators of children. But if you want to probe the mind of a serial child-rapist, by all accounts the heterosexual father knows best how to manipulate and force young children into being part of traumatic and scarring sexual acts that are done only for his pleasure and satisfaction. The rape of daughters and other girls under the age of five by heterosexual fathers, or straight step-dads or father-figures, is THE most common form of young-child sexual abuse: children age zero to five. If you see a heterosexual dad out with his daughter, you would be more likely to be correct in thinking he's a "child molester" than if the girls is out with a woman of any sexual orientation, or a gay man. (It's well past time for the stigma to get closer to its source.)

As we know, mis is a prefix meaning "hatred of"; philia (or philos) is a prefix or suffix meaning "love of". Gyn refers to women; anthro to humans; "adelphos means "brother". Philadelphia, alas, is the supposed City of Brotherly Love, even as white man systemically and historically, often with the help of a racist police force, hate on African American men (and women) there.



With both terms, Philadephia, and pedophilia, we can see that terms do not always mean what they say.

A "pedophile" "ped·o·phile (pěd'ə-fīl', pē'də-),(or in UK English, paedophile), according to the American Heritage Dictionary*, is a noun, meaning "an adult who is sexually attracted to a child or children".

The same source presents the following information:
ped·o·phil·i·a (pěd'ə-fĭl'ē-ə, pē'də-)
n. The act or fantasy on the part of an adult of engaging in sexual activity with a child or children.
ped'o·phil'i·ac (-āk) adj. & n.

*The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.

The Online Etymology Dictionary describes the origins of the term pedophilia as dating back to
1905, from Gk. pais (gen. paidos) "child" + philos "loving." First attested in Havelock Ellis. Derivative noun pedophile is first recorded 1951.

The most obvious question is this: why aren't we calling incest perpetrators, child molesters, other child rapists and sexual abusers, including Internet child pornographers and pimps, the term "misopedics? Misopedia is THE term that means the hatred of children.

Alleged feminist "male-bashing" is not the same as the actual bashing of women by men

In this post, I will try to make one thing clear: if we add up all the verbal "male-bashing" things feminists are alleged to have said, it would amount to less than the vapor of one drop of water if compared to the deep oceans of contempt and physical bashing men have demonstrated on the minds and flesh of women over the ages.

I have been witnessing, for years, men making the most absurd claims about what one feminist or Womanist said, that is apparently equal to what men do to women. Lately, I've noticed that such absurdities are proclaimed by reactive, histerical antimisandrists, who, if they actually do read what feminists write, they then overreact to and grossly misinterpret certain styles and phrases found in a few comments by those women, usually written to other women, by the way, not "hurled" directly at men. To the extent that such men make truth claims about "women bashing men", these ridiculous men must be called out.

Over the years, Women's Liberationists, of various ethnicities, sometimes dare to speak in angry tones and in cynical styles about the men who hurt women and, more especially, against the male supremacist systems men control. The harmful effect on men as an oppressor class is not even measurable, in part because the harm is not real. Women such as Andrea Dworkin have spoken about male supremacists without first asking His Honor for permission to speak, without toning down her rage, without soft-selling the atrocities men do. Far more than men realise, she has done this with superb sarcastic humor. Given that antifeminists have no sense of humor, these men have chronically and woefully misunderstood this and many other forms of pro-woman speech by women. Some men actually think that the women who speak in such "rude" ways about men actually do harm men, as a group, and that these women also do further harm--beyond speaking, that is, to men individually and as a gendered group. This line of reasoning is absurd.

To whatever extent any feminist, Womanist, or any other woman has spoken out angrily or sarcastically to one man or many, that activity doesn't in any way compare, in degree, quality, or consequence, to what men say and do to women.

In reality, men speak hateful things about women, and mean them, and do them, to actual women. In reality, for example, men bash women with words and fists.

I have seen men, online, collecting statements written by women which appear to be "proof" that women are just as (or more!) hateful of men as men are of women. This is just a part of what constitutes the giant pile of liberal and conservative white men's bullshit.

I recommend reading this commentary very carefully. It is but one example such men wave around excitedly exclaiming "here's proof that feminists hate men" and then open a desk drawer, take out an inked stamp, and slap the moniker "male-bashing" on the document before it is filed away along with all the other seemingly poisonous speech acts.

For "speech-as-bashing" to be a form of significant harm, for it to manifest as one form of gendered or raced oppression, it has to do both of the following:

1. Hurt someone or a group, demonstrably.
2. It must be one action that is part of larger systems of actions and customs, institutionalised, enacted systematically, over time, by one group identifiably socially dominant over another group such that the latter group is socially and politically subordinated by the former.

Hurtful or mean-spirited verbal and physical aggression among peers, such as among white men, among women of color, among men of color, or among white women, is, as feminist Flo Kennedy coined, a form of "horizontal hostility".

This, this, and this is debasing, politically degrading harm to women (and, in some cases, also to men of color) by white men in words that dovetail with the realities of woman-bashing (beating), the rape of women by men, the economic exploitation of women by men, the sexual enslaving of women and girls by men, as well as the genocidal destruction of women whose cultures are under attack by Western white civilisation.

This is not significant harm.

Many men confuse virulent systemic debasement of women--using physical force and hateful speech--with this sort of post by one woman about one man. Note what she didn't say to him. Note the self-restraint in her behavior. She did not harm this man in any way. She does address, to the reader, not to that male caller, that what he was doing was making her feel very irritated, in part because of how many times men have approached her in such an arrogant, self-important, bossy, and obnoxious manner. (This is important: her anger is built on social experiences with men. Men's anger at women is taught to them by white male supremacist advertising, pornography, cultural practices, and social value systems.)

Here's a refresher for what points have been made so far. Misogynists consider these two vastly dissimilar experiences somehow equal to one another:

--a member of an oppressed class stating negative opinions, feelings, or critical analysis about someone from her oppressor class, because that person has behaved oppressively and in full accordance with the privileges and entitlements afforded members of the oppressor group.

--a member of an oppressor class stating negative opinions, feelings, or critical analysis about a whole group of people based on a few pieces of writing, never acted out beyond being spoken aloud or distributed, against social custom and religious code, such as at a rally or in a photocopied document.

Anyone who confuses those two phenomena is deeply out of touch with reality, and what constitutes oppressive harm.

For a list of the kinds of harm women systematically endure from men, see here. (Note there is no comparable list of what women unrelentingly and endemically do to men, privately and publicly, as a matter of custom or as a form of social control which, as a consequence, results in women achieving social dominance over the men of their own ethnicity or economic class.)

I hope that the point has been made: feminists' or Womanists' angry or disdainful verbal expressions, not to men, but among one another, such as on blogs or in books, is not the social equivalent to men calling women all manner of misogynist-racist terms, often while also violating and assaulting them physically.

Antimisandry.com: An Introduction

Here's some information about an online community who call themselves "antimisandrists" (people who are opposed to the hatred of men).

The age range of its members is charted here. The entire list of members is listed here (there are seventeen pages of member names with a bit of additional information about each one).

As one reads through the site's many pages, one can see that one of several sore spots for "antimisandrists" is their claim that the degree to which women do harm in the world is not sufficiently reported. They have no facts to back up such claims, however.

From where I stand, I see harm women do to other human beings: white women do harm to women of color; wealthy women do harm to poor women; too many women hurt themselves; white women hurt other white women; women of color hurt women of color; some women hurt children in relationships, but statistically--and in real life, men harm children more often and more severely, including by raping their daughters and other girls; and women are fully capable of being hurtful to men in relationships in many ways, because, as many of the comments at that link express, men are human too.

No post at A Radical Profeminist indicates that men are not human beings or are destructive human beings (collectively) in any innate ways. Unlike many men, for example, I do not agree that rapist men are rapists inevitably or naturally. Every feminist I have ever known has argued against the theories of Randy Thornhill and Craig Palmer--that men are inevitably going to be rapists. Men disagree with the feminist position that men are human beings, capable of being very humane. Men keep insisting, in various ways, or behaving as if "I had no other choice". Why aren't you going after those men who malign you, antimisandrists? I hear and have heard men, often, call one another many demeaning names, gender specific ones, that allude to the fact we know what we men do, to women, to children, and to one another because we have to prove we are "real men" or to regain status lost in other arenas, such as economically or racially.

I am opposed, for example, to men calling men who are abusers terms like "monsters". Men are human, even if we have behaved or behave horrendously and atrociously to other humans. Ted Bundy was a human being. So was Adolph Hitler. To think they weren't is to not understand the depth and breadth of what being human can mean, in practice.

I disagree with comment 8 of 10, at the site linked to above, linked again here. That comments reads: "Ofcourse men get Hurt. They don't show it though, they should though".

I understand that commenter to be saying men don't express our hurt (but ought to) in non-aggressive, non-violent statements such as by saying "I'm hurt" or "When you did that, it hurt me very much." I hear her wishing men did just that. JUST and ONLY that.

What men (not ALL men) DO instead, is smash women in the face, throw them across the room, break their bones, stab them, punch them in their pregnant bellies, murder them, rent women as prostitutes and abuse and kill them, denigrate, humiliate and degrade them, and, all the while, blame "women" for one bad relationship with a woman. What men do instead is join groups like "antimisandry.com" devoted to promoting ridiculously false ideas about feminism and feminists, all the while pretending Western white male supremacy, domination, and cultural-economic imperialism isn't a real force aggressively and callously destroying women of all ethnicities, men of color, many children, and the Earth and its other creatures.

The Western white male-dominated world I've lived in my whole life does systematic sexualised violence (read: harm and hurt) to all groups of women and to men of color--because they are women and men of color. Women, nowhere, do systematic, sexualised, violent harm to men of their same ethnicity or race or economic class. And no group of women harms white men, systemically, structurally, and endemically.

I hope that the predominantly pale male human beings over at antimisandry.com will move themselves more into reality, so that they might better attend to their own wounds humanely, without inflicting injuries on women and the Women's Movement that has been working for a long time for women's (and men's) human liberation from white male supremacy.