Kate Harding: Fuck you, men’s rights activists

Feminist activist Kate Harding has a blunt and appropriate message for all those scummy “men’s rights activists” whose actions expose them as little more than women-hating jackholes:

Fuck you, first of all, for making it nearly impossible for decent men struggling with abusive partners or unfair custody arrangements to get the help they need and deserve. You have forever tainted those issues with your rage-filled, obsessively anti-woman horseshit, to the point where it's become difficult for any rational, compassionate person to trust a man who claims he's been screwed over in family court or abused by a female partner, even if he has.

That's right—I fully understand that those things happen. I fully believe that men in those situations deserve help, and I know they're generally less likely to ask for it than women are, not to mention less likely to find help there for them when they do go looking. I get how our society's ridiculously rigid ideas about masculinity mean that men are brought up to believe needing help will make them look weak, especially if it's a woman who's terrorizing them. I know those same suffocating standards also encourage men to stifle strong feelings and any nurturing tendencies, which deprives them of the right to experience the full range of human emotions without shame. That completely fucking sucks! You know how I know all that, and why I think it sucks?

BECAUSE I'M A FEMINIST.

[…]

Fuck you for showing up every time women speak, especially about rape and abuse, and trying to make it all about you. Fuck you for derailing threads about the victims of Marc Lépine, a man who screamed about his hatred for feminists as he murdered fourteen women and injured many others, because you also hate feminists and want a fucking cookie for not killing anyone. Fuck you for making rape and death threats against young women who dared to protest a speaking engagement by a man who thinks little girls would enjoy being raped by their fathers if it weren't for society telling them it's dirty. Fuck you for whining about how unfair it is that women might wonder if you're a rapist when you approach them out of nowhere, while completely ignoring how unfair it is that women feel the need to be on guard all the time in public. Or that if we relax and behave normally—drinking, dancing, dressing however we want—you will be the first motherfuckers in line to blame us for getting ourselves raped.

That felt good just reading it. There’s nothing like letting loose every now and then and expressing exactly how you feel about the suppurating polyps who make any real discussion about inequality impossible.

Fuck MRAs very much, indeed. And anti-Freethought Blogs/Atheism Plus crackpots, while we’re at it – they’re merely different manifestations of the same general slime.

(via man boobz)