/atheism/ - Atheism

First of all, use Archive when linking to this shit.

Let's go over this crap.

>’s rights”, a code word for opposition to women’s rights (usually women’s right to be free of violence, to be autonomous in their sexual and relationship decision-making, and to be treated as equals in education and labor ), is a popular topic on Reddit, and recently the forums dedicated to it decided to survey their members to get a demographic picture of them.

I think the Men's Rights movement is as dumb as feminism as both movements miss the key point of advocating for the same rights for both genders no matter what but even I know that's not the goal of the MRM.

Interesting how the article used "women's rights" rather than "feminism". Possibly because the latter term has gotten itself a bad name or because the author wants to villify the MRM as much as possible. After all, how horrible does it sound to be against "women's rights", especially "right to be equals in education and labor" etc.

> Stephanie Zvan has a summary
The name links to FreeThoughtBlogs. Into the trash it goes.

>>6346

>Most of it is unsurprising. As with most reactionaries, MRAs refuse outright to admit that they simply oppose equality

Most of what Mens Rights people complain about is INequalities. Inequality in court and sentencing for crime, inequality in the definition of rape that excludes female on male rape, inequality in safety nets such as homeless shelters or places for victims of domestic abuse to go to. Etc.

>and come up with half-witted, belabored rationales for why positions and beliefs that functionally serve as opposition to equality are somehow not anti-equality. With MRAs, they insist that women’s gains towards equality are instead women’s gains towards dominance, allowing them to treat every move towards equality as an infringement on their rights.

It would be nice if the author was able to list some actual examples rather than be as vague as possible. Then again, the closest thing the author did list was shit that isn't even relevant in the first world. Mens Rights Movement is trying to stop women from being equals in education? Are you sure you're not talking about Islam?

>>6347

>The survey reflected that, with most MRAs arguing that women are the dominant sex, socially and legally, in American society. No big surprise there,

"MRAs are agianst equality!"

A few sentences later

"Ha! No surprise that females are DOMINANT in these areas."

"nor is there any shock that they are nearly all—98%—white. (Probably 99%, since the “other” category, I suspect, was white people who snootily declare they don’t see race.) They were all conservative, too, with 84% identifying as “strong conservative” and another 11% identifying as “independent”, which is, like “libertarian”, a code word for a strong conservative who thinks of himself as an iconoclast. (Another 2% were just plain “conservative”, bringing the likely number of conservatives to 97%.) No surprises there."

More assumptions and trying to skew the data. Independent doesn't mean Conservative. Hell, Libertarian doesn't mean Conservative. The author's final estimation is based entirely on her own biases.

>>6348

Unfortunately I'm unable to access the google doc all of this information supposedly came from so I cannot verify for myself if this data is accurate or not.

"However, there’s a couple of things that stand out. This big one is that, unlike most other men who fit their profile—white, conservative, misogynist, paranoid"

None of the questions on the article you linked to had anything about if the questioners are misogynists or paranoid. Again you insist on throwing in your personal biases right with the actual data or in an attempt to further skew the data to your favor.

>—the MRAs of Reddit were not drawn to the Christian right, even though that’s the most obvious place for such young men to find community (including women that are amendable to being married to misogynists) and a place to channel their misogyny that is more politically powerful than a bunch of dudes ranting on Reddit.

The poll took place on Reddit. The same website that had /r/atheism as a default subreddit for most of its existence. And you wonder why so many people there are atheists?

Atheism+ also made a lot of godless people very weary of if not openly against feminism.

It's not surprising in the last that so many of them are atheists.

>>6349

> On the contrary, 94% of them defined themselves as having no religion. 94%, folks. That’s more than any other group outside of an atheist conference that I can think of Svan had a good explanation for that, which is that MRA is the only real home for people with a combination of distaste for religion and hatred of women:

People who are sexist don't need to be religious sure but they also don't need to be part of any movement either. That isn't to say the MRM is sexist but the author is once again making assumptions and false equivocations. If you're an atheist and are against feminism, you're an MRA!

It's bad logic.

>When you think about this, it isn’t that surprising. Religious men don’t need to look to the state to give them dominance. They can just claim it comes from the bible and talk about women’s holy duties.

The MRM or atheists aren't looking to the state for dominance either.

>>6350

>I think that’s certainly part of it, but I will also add that there’s also a strong difference in aesthetics and focus between MRAs and the Christian right. While the Christian right is chock full of rape apologists and hostility to equal pay, they do tend to put a much larger bulk of their energies to opposing abortion and contraception access, and to excuse this, they are swift to pretend that they care about making men stand up and take responsibility for children they conceive by marrying the mothers. Indeed, the Christian right spouts a lot of rhetoric about how it’s good if women use pregnancy and guilt to trap men into marriage, and claim women aren’t doing enough of it. MRAs believe women oppress men by getting pregnant, and therefore want women to do less of it. (Also, the Christian right is more accurate in believing women do very little of this, whereas MRAs are just paranoid and making shit up.)

I have no idea what the author is trying to say here.

MRMs don't want women to get pregnant because they think they do so just to trap them? Strawman much?

From what I've seen, the issue is mainly:
1. Reproductive rights for men and that they shouldn't have to pay child support if they did not intend to have a child.

This is an issue for anyone who was lied to about protection. either holes poked in condoms or "Yeah I'm totally on the pill" or something similar.

Another way to view this is economically. Kids cost a lot of money. Individuals rather than the MRM itself might be more inclined not to have kids.

Overall though, there's been nothing I've seen from MRAs about not wanting women to have kids. I suspect the author is talking about the first guess I made in which case that's a gross oversimplification and an outright strawman.

>>6351

>This fundamental difference of opinion matters, as does the way that the Christian right continues to look down on the long hair/beard look and heavy porn consumption, which I also suspect is an issue here driving MRA-types away from using religion as a justification for their misogyny.

It can't just be that several MRM people…don't believe in the existence of God due to a lack of evidence or anything. No, they just want to be sexist!

>The other sort-of surprise is that they are really young.
>17-20: 2,605 or 87%

17-20 is hardly "really young". A lot of these issues are generational to begin with. This SJW wave of political correctness from the far left has occurred mainly over the last two generations while the generations before faced more conservative censors.

For then a chunk of a generation to be on the forefront of fighting against a specific type of censor that mainly affects them and things that they feel closer to (video games, for example) than older generations is to be expected.

>I’d like to say I’m surprised, but I’m not. First of all, you can just tell. There’s a lot of posturing about sex and women amongst MRAs that is eerily reminiscent of the “bags of sand” joke in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. More importantly, I’ve spent a lot of years having self-identified MRAs come at me online and so I’ve noticed a sea change in who adorns themselves with that moniker. It used to be mostly middle-aged men who are furious that their wives were allowed to divorce them and were angling for political power over the lives of ex-wives, and blamed feminism for their problems when they should be blaming themselves and their inability to relinquish control. Now it seems like it’s mostly young men who are largely motivated by anger upon discovering that there’s nothing they can do to obligate a woman to have sex—much less a relationship—with them, and instead of investing in personal change that makes it likelier women will want to, they instead spend hours online trying to minimize rape and sexual harassment as a kind of broad revenge against women.

More assumptions and strawmen. Oh, I'm sorry. Strawwomyn.

Also excellent job of brushing aside the issue of sex and youth.

>>6352

>Subsequently, the points of obsession have moved from being angry about child support to being angry at anyone who suggests that sexual harassment is the fault of harassers.

Assumptions and strawman. I could technically reply to everything she said with those three words.

>The big question here is where do they go when they age? MRA blogs and forums have been around for awhile, so where are the older ones? They’re clearly growing out of it.

How do you know? Again, the data itself seems to imply that it's a generational thing and that this is an issue for the current generation.

>I’d like to say they are going to grow up and grow out of misogyny, and hopefully some will. Unfortunately, I do think a large chunk will probably just drift into the Christian right and abandon their atheism.

The ignorance of this author is astonishing.

>>6353

> You get a little older and start craving an orderly house and stop feeling oppressed by shaving and showers.

I'm willing to say that literally no MRA has ever seriously said that shaving and showers oppresses men. Assum-you probably get it by now.

>The possibility of having a wife who indulges you with regular sex,

>The possibility of having a wife who indulges you with regular sex, housework and nightly cooking starts to sound much better than the hamster wheel of hitting on women out of your league and getting rejected and turning online to blame feminism. Church starts looking better. Marijuana starts getting boring. Being anti-abortion and anti-contraception starts feeling like a more effective way to punish women than running around defending sexual harassment online.

This person seems to think that being a misogynist is all these people care about. That no other political issue would take precedence over it. That people would be willing to abandon all other political and philosophical ideals just for the sake of oppressing women.

It's absolutely absurd and there's no logic behind it.

>(Not that you have to give that up if you convert to Christianity.) You don’t even really have to really commit to religion in order to become a more mainstream conservative. Half the Jesus people never go to church anyway.

No data for this.

>You just have to shave your beard and say you love Jesus

There's nothing about having a beard that conflicts with modern conservative christianity.

>>6354

>and next thing you know, you’re plugged into a community with more power than your old one, and one that might actually provide eligible women to marry.
>So that’s my prediction: Most of them drift off from MRA into the Christian right, or just generalized Republican politics. They start developing Southern accents even if they live in California or Massachusetts. They get married and start caring less about sexual harassment and more about how that Sandra Fluke lady must be a dirty little contracepting slut. They stop being atheist MRAs and start listening to Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.

I'm not going to dignify the last bit of mindlessness with a response.

>Because of this, I see no reason for organized atheism to worry one bit about these guys.

I certainly am not worried because if I had to choose between being an MRA and being a feminist, I'd be an MRA in a heart beat. Your article alone shows that your side has no worth with how poorly you've represented EVERYTHING and is unable to come up with a proper criticism other than "DEYS MUHSOGGUNUSD!"

>I don’t see them as lifers. Converting to Christianity, either avidly or just in name, is the most logical path for someone who resents women and wants to punish them,

Y-y-yeah it's Chri-christianity that's against women! N-n-n-n-n-nothing about Islam h-here! I'm pwogwessive!

>but also doesn’t want to live without sex or vacuumed carpets for the rest of his life. Feminism and atheism are much sturdier companions, and that’s where the investment should go.

Thankfully people's political, sociological, and philosophical views don't have to be regulated by this twat. The entire article was terrible and had the objectivity of…well….any other internet feminist really.

>>6356
That M&Ms argument is dumb as fuck. I can only imagine that during actual conversations about rape, its causes, and prevention that some thick rimmed glasses wearing my little pony haired hipster stands up and blubbers out "Imagine a bowl of M&Ms…!"

>This is exactly what feminism wants you to think.
Indeed it's what feminism wants me to think but feminism is not why I think that. What people need to do is focus on the idea that by virtue of being human we all have should have the same rights and freedoms and then focus on things on an individual level for every dispute. No "He's clearly in the wrong because he's a guy" or "She can't talk about straight relationships because she's gay" or any of that crap.

>Inb4 b-b-but MRM does that
Supposedly so does feminism

>BTW, c40eae you just wrote several walls of text responding to a complete propaganda piece. You know why they were making the irreligiosity a big deal? Because women are much more likely to be religious than men, and feminism is largely built upon instilling a fear of men in women. Pic related.

Actually the reason the person the writer of this article is responding to made such a big deal is because that person was on FreeThoughtBlogs, an atheist blogosphere.

As for this person, it's clickbaity.

>>6358
>What people need to do is focus on the idea that by virtue of being human we all have should have the same rights and freedoms and then focus on things on an individual level for every dispute. No "He's clearly in the wrong because he's a guy" or "She can't talk about straight relationships because she's gay" or any of that crap.
That's fine and good, but how is it possible to change cultural prejudice without addressing the specific ways we look at certain groups of people? One of the major things the MRM talks about is the ubiquitous tendency to see men as being disposable and only important so far as their utility. You can't get rid of that by saying "guys everyone should be equal." Most people are on board with that idea, but have incorporated into their worldview a value system that places men as inherently less valuable than women. This is mostly a matter of outdated survival strategies; the more uteri you protect, the better the chance your group will survive. It only takes a few men to repopulate after losing a shit ton of soldiers in a war. But we've developed all kinds of beliefs and norms that reinforce this, like the "honor" of battle (i.e. sacrificing your life so the rich and powerful can get more resources). What we define as masculine is almost exclusively about sacrifice, like how women have the option to have a career if they want but selling the best years of your life and giving a huge chunk of the revenue to your wife and kids is expected of men. Just telling people that we should all be equal doesn't address the cultural narrative surrounding manhood that most people have internalized.

Sounds like feminist rhetoric right? But seriously, does that not make more sense than complaining about sexy characters objectifying women and contributing to rape culture? I'm telling you the reason most people and probably you think lowly of this kind of critical evaluation of cultural norms and belief systems is because feminism did its best to poison the concept. Assuming you're an atheist, surely you apply a similar logic to religion, right? Why would gender roles be different?

>>Inb4 b-b-but MRM does that
>Supposedly so does feminism
Again I'll ask: how is repeating the mantra that we should all be equal address any of this? That's something feminism does, but it's just a red herring to distract people from the real ideology. Frankly it strikes me as a facile attempt to superficially endorse a set of values without actually doing any legwork to reach those purported goals. And by the way, no, the MRM tends not to explicitly advocate equality except when prompted or accused of misogyny. That's just kind of assumed because almost everyone agrees on that very vague point and fighting for the rights of disadvantaged people is just a logical consequence. Going out of their way to say "We want equality for all" would be a bit like saying "We think slavery is bad." It's redundant at this point. Doggedly repeating that sentiment is subconsciously pretty suspicious to a lot of people for that reason - it suggests that they don't actually agree with it but try to camouflage themselves to be more palatable to the general public. MRAs I've seen more often make a point similar to the one I just did than to spontaneously say "we're for equality", and even then it's usually in response to being accused of hatred or supremacist ideals.

>>6348
>"Ha! No surprise that females are DOMINANT in these areas."

Is English your first language or are you just incredibly stupid? She was saying that it's no surprise that MRA's think that women are the dominant sex, not that it's true.
The whole article is the authors own opinions, that's kind of the point. She didn't conduct the survey, she's just commenting on it. The librarian assumption comes from the fact that most of the MRA's in the survey were for legalizing pot.

>If you're an atheist and are against feminism, you're an MRA!

Except the survey was conducted on self identified MRA's, so yes, they are MRA's.

>None of the questions on the article you linked to had anything about if the questioners are misogynists or paranoid.

Again, it's the authors own opinion. It's not a scientific journal. Anyone who has ever read any MRA shit would know that they're generally misogynist and paranoid. The same people who deny this under the guise of "not all MRA are misogynists!" are the same people who hate feminism because "all feminists are reverse sexist!"

>>1. Reproductive rights for men and that they shouldn't have to pay child support if they did not intend to have a child.

And yet, women who did not intend to have the child end up being the ones who have to raise it anyhow. Ever wonder why single mom's are so common while single dads are so rare?
>reproductive rights
When have men had their reproductive rights limited? Men do not get pregnant, they aren't the ones who have to ruin their bodies by carrying a baby to term and giving birth.

>>6362
>Is English your first language or are you just incredibly stupid?
It is mine but I can tell that it's not yours. Unless you really are that dumb.

>Again, it's the authors own opinion.

The author placed her opinion among the actual answers. If I asked a bunch of atheists what gaming console they play, it would be very unprofessional to say "Atheists are PS4 users and stupid!!!"

And of course being straight from GamerGhazi you have no proper reaction images, not even one of a simple facepalm, so you find the strange need to link to the first ever post on /atheism/. Good job, son.

>And yet, women who did not intend to have the child end up being the ones who have to raise it anyhow.
I've never argued against that however with women there's several options to avoid having children. There exist various forms of female contraception. Even then on top of that women have the ability to get abortions.

>Inb4 hurf durf some women can't get abortions
That's an issue in of itself but that does not make what's being discussed not an issue.

Go back to Tumblr, small fry.

>That's fine and good, but how is it possible to change cultural prejudice without addressing the specific ways we look at certain groups of people? One of the major things the MRM talks about is the ubiquitous tendency to see men as being disposable and only important so far as their utility.

And how exactly does the MRM try to fix that problem other than bitching? Do they make works or promote works that value the life of men

>I'm telling you the reason most people and probably you think lowly of this kind of critical evaluation of cultural norms and belief systems is because feminism did its best to poison the concept. Assuming you're an atheist, surely you apply a similar logic to religion, right? Why would gender roles be different?

Never once have I argued for any sort of gender roles traditional or otherwise. My entire point is to put aside gender roles. My solution would fix your problem. Your solution however would not fix mine.

>Again I'll ask: how is repeating the mantra that we should all be equal address any of this? That's something feminism does, but it's just a red herring to distract people from the real ideology.

It seems no different than what you've been doing this entire time. The reason such a statement must be repeated is because people don't actually follow that. Both you and the feminists are looking out for only one demographic of people.

It's atheism taken to near nihilism
no absolute truth, rightwrong
must take what you want/need
zero sum game
must take from women without giving more than you get
have to resist women taking what you have
cuz they're self interested like I am try to get more than they give

Loving relationship works best when you give all you can of yourself expecting nothing in return. It's the truth, fellas, deal with it.
I'll get called beta for saying it.
y'all mras buncha cold hearted mufuckers

>>6367
lolwut

>>6367
Seek help, Statuefag.

>>6387

Gonna same fag real quick.


I can already predict the response "well I just don't like the label, I'm a egalitarian/equalist/whatever". Well fuck you, you're part of the problem. Just like the pussy atheists who call themselves "agnostics" because they're afraid of choosing a "side" or being confrontational. You're not helping any, you're not looking at a problem and doing something about it, you just enable those who wish to keep the status quo. Egalitarians haven't got shit done. Simply stating "I think everyone should be equal" doesn't raise any issue, as I'd assume most civilized people would already agree. The problem is sometimes social norms can blind people to issues. Love 'em or hate 'em you have to admit the MRA's have raised a lot of awareness for their cause in a relatively short time. While I am an egalitarian by description, I do not take it on as an exclusive title. When I mention the MRM or MRA's, people who don't know anything about it look it up. It puts issues in their mind they might not have thought about (like american's and circumcision). Advertisers don't give a shit what you think of their commercial, as long as you remember the brand they were successful. As long as the MRM can bring these issues into the light to be discussed, I'd call it a success.

>>6389
You seemed so reasonable but then you decided to samefag

>Well fuck you, you're part of the problem.
You're either with us or against us femin-I mean MRM people!

> because they're afraid of choosing a "side" or being confrontational.
No one's afraid of choosing a side. It's possible to look at both sides, see they're missing the point, and then formulate their own position that you think will better handle the situation.

> you have to admit the MRA's have raised a lot of awareness for their cause in a relatively short time.
They've done nothing that egalatarians have not. Raised awareness. Good job. Have a gold star. However that's not exactly doing anything at this point. It's the bare minimum.

Again it seems there's noting that the MRM can do that my solution cannot and also do better.