Despite the best efforts of those who seek to maintain the male power structure, women have been, as the song goes, "doing it for themselves." But this progress created a serious backlash from those who seek to maintain the male patriarchal power structure, the demise of which was lamented by Bill O'Reilly. The backlash, documented by Susan Faludi in 1991, continues today with constant attempts to role back reproductive freedom and resistance to equal pay. And, in the alternate reality of the right wing, there is no war on women. Rather, it's nasty feminist bitches who are making life miserable for American men - a position promoted by Fox News hosts who validate those who say that it's the women who are intolerant. So who better to articulate this position than anti-feminist Suzanne Venker who, on Fox & Friends, once again attacked feminists and in so doing, defended those who think rape is just a feminist fabrication. Nice
Recently, feminists protested a conference sponsored by a Voice for Men. The Southern Poverty Law Center describes this group as part of a hateful "manosphere" dedicated "savaging feminists, in particular and women, very typically American women, in general." The group's founder, Paul Elam, describes feminism as a "social malignancy." The recent conference featured stuff like a power point program with a slide of an underage Miley Cyrus with the caption "quit objectifying me. You're being rapey." At the conference, a female supporter of men's rights, Barbara Kay, said that accusations of rape, on college campuses, are a "get out of guilt free card" for promiscuous women. This sentiment is reflected on a poster, advertised on the conference website, which says "Just because you regret your life's choices, doesn't mean it's rape."
So one can see why women's groups might want to exercise their freedom of speech to protest this gathering; but on Monday, Fox & Friends' Elisabeth Hasselbeck provided the Fox message that it's the women who are being intolerant. The feminist bashing was also reinforced on Tuesday's Fox & Friends which began with Anna Kooiman reporting that, OMG, some feminists compared the conference to a hate group. As the chyron dismissed the issue by infantilizing it, "Girls against boys, feminists protest men's rights conference," Clayton Morris asked "are the angry feminists proving that they're waging a war on men by being so intolerant?" He introduced Suzanne Venker, niece of uber anti-feminist Phyllis Schlafly, who believes that women should be submissive to men and that, yes, there is a war on men who are now "second class citizens." The Voice for Men website has the interview video which is described as "Suzanne Venker on the conference the fascists tried to stop."
Morris asked Venker about these "professional feminists as doctor [Ablow?] calls them" who are "outraged over this group of men getting together to talk things like finances." He added that there were women at the event. Of course, he didn't mention the feminist bashing and rape culture denying elements cited above. The Cavuto marked chyron asked "Muzzling men, are feminists waging a war on men?'' as Venker praised the feminist hating group as diverse. She laughed about how the feminist claims"couldn't have been more opposite." To Kooiman's scripted question of "why are they acting out if that is the case," Venker went on a rant about how feminists "blame men for all the social ills." She made the absurd claim that men's rights guys just want to solve problems. The chyron reinforced the message, as Fox Fact, "War on Men, are issues facing men being pushed aside?"
Clayton Morris asserted that "it's a whitewashing of gender" and whined about how he had been "slammed" for saying that "genders are different." Morris is lying - he said that it is "emasculating" when women make more than men - a comment for which he apologized. He followed this by encouraging us to "embrace biological differences" not "whitewashing which is what these feminists want to do." Venker then totally misrepresented what the feminists object to and what the men's right's people are really all about. She made the bogus men's rights claim about domestic violence going both ways because "women own the dialogue." (Both ways with 85% of domestic violence victims being women) Encouraged by Morris, she provided the website for the awesome Voice for Men.
Funny, Voice for Men's mission statement supports "peaceful acts of civil disobedience" but they are all upset about those who peacefully protested their conference. It isn't feminists who are playing the victim on Fox & Friends which, once again, underscores that the war on women is very real.
Check out MSNBC's Alex Wagner's segment which provides the other side of the story, not permitted on "fair & balanced" Fox News!
An international conference on men's rights?
The first-ever annual International Conference on Men's Rights was held in Michigan, where women were often described as "privileged"' and "narcissistic." Lizz Winstead, co-creator of The Daily Show and co-founder of Lady Parts Justice, joins Alex Wagner to discuss.
When men cheat on their wives and girlfriends with younger girls, are they wrong for doing that? Are they entitled to a, “Get Out of Guilt Free” card? This, to me, is a major problem with the whole, “Men’s Rights” issue and how it has gotten so out of control. Are men literally not capable of committing crimes against women? If I cheat on my wife, is she committing a crime by not being as young or as pretty as I’d like? Are they ACTUALLY stating that men should get away with, pretty much whatever they want? Because it honestly seems that way…..If you have a rebuttal, I’d sure love to hear it.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to read Elliot Rodger’s Manifesto once again……REALLY GOOD IDEAS that I think these groups could get behind.
And we wonder why women hate us all so much.
Double standard much Fox? Seriously, are they trying to get women to tune out, or do they just not have enough women watching to even care about them as an audience?
Heaven forbid that young men should suffer when they make a “wrong choice” and have sex with a girl who’s passed out and can’t very well give consent.