Protesting Warren Farrell at University of Toronto

I have noticed something: that even Americans who seem to hold "free speech" rights so dearly become very upset whenever someone exercises those same rights but express opinions counter to their own. Nowhere is this more apparent on college campuses. Who said "The only thing that cannot be tolerated is intolerance."? Interesting indeed, you could spend a lot of time trying to deconstruct that semantically.

But I recall when feminists first began speaking on college campuses, they were met with loud and at times violent protests outside their places of speaking. Now they are the ones doing it.

The faces change, the topics change, but the phenomenon remains the same. Possibly because, by and large, people don't change much. That's the problem. We're not evolving in terms of wisdom. But I do have to acknowledge the protesters are young and easily swayed to hold opinions they may not otherwise hold. Undoubtedly the protest was engineered by WST profs, etc. When I went to college, we had a few profs who were known for instigating protests (or trying to). They had formal relationships as "faculty advisers" to certain student groups, or sometimes not. The profs wind them up and then set them loose for the police and campus security to deal with. And, they get paid by the same university to do it! Nice work if you can get it!

"Feminism has a long history of misandry as shown in the video, "Los Misandry" at Youtube. The result of decades of feminist lies and propaganda has been an institutionalization of misandry, leading to a witch-hunting of males as shown in the video "Witch-Hunting Males" at Youtube. :-/"

"When I went to college, we had a few profs who were known for instigating protests (or trying to). They had formal relationships as "faculty advisers" to certain student groups, or sometimes not. The profs wind them up and then set them loose for the police and campus security to deal with. And, they get paid by the same university to do it!"

Yep, and if you question their viewpoints, or try to present any counter opinion those people immediately try to label you as "right wing," or a "Republican," no matter what your views, or party affiliation is. At the root of most of those male-bashers I've encountered is a deep seated affiliation with radical Marxist-feminist organizations, striving to create all kinds of societal disruptions. Yes, colleges and universities are their nesting ground and their spawning ground as shown in Marxist Valley College

is that parents are paying lotsa $$$ to get their children a good education. anywhere you go and ask educated people about what qualifies as a good education, in part, it is always characterized by an understanding of what free speech and exchange of free ideas are, especially in university settings.

notice how radical feminism and socialism/communism/fascism all viciously hate the free exchange of ideas. dumbing down to the lowest common denominator seems to be working for them, as far as gaining support from the ignorant young.

educating young people about men's issues furthers the rape culture? this is way beyond any known logic i see, and probably just another attempt at misdirection. again, university settings are where young minds listen and judge for themselves, and not have hate groups protest violently and try to stop the dissemination of ideas. maybe the truth about mens issues threatens them in some other way?

You can say what you want in Belgium, the Netherlands, etc. Belgium has much better equal rights for fathers than most countries whereas Japan and Israel still have explicit ant-father laws. Denmark has been rated the happiest place in the world to live, and the most depressed place to live was Japan, where men in particular are dying of suicide and depression at alarming rates. I've been an active MRA for over 10 years and I get tired of hearing MRAS say socialism is anti-male. *Some* socialists are anti-male, just as some conservatives are anti-male. But there is nothing inherently anti-male about socialism. It was the socialist party in Belgium that *recommended* having a bi-locationsl joint custody presumption in the law.

yeah, keep selling that tripe about how good socialism is because your earthly deity says so. i watched the old soviet union and eastern europe collapse under the weight of it. it works good, until you run out of other people's $$. china would have collapsed too if not out of desperation they morphed into some version of capitalism. however, they still aren't a free people, are they? no, communism/fascism always naturally attaches itself to it. socialism produces nothing. no reason to. equality into poverty really isn't our goal here. the only system that has worked, and worked for every society it has touched is the American one. not some bastrardized version of this one or that one that didn't work. its the socialism of free stuff now that is dragging our economy down. there is no other direction for it. down, down, down. giving people free stuff just leads to more free stuff, and once started, trying to stop it is pissing into the wind. feminism is always there because it also involves a love of other people's stuff.

MRA's problems stem from corruption and greed within the system, not the system.

tired of hearing the truth? ts. that's called free speech, and like i said in the post above, you true believers always hate free speech.

btw, for my $$, you can add islam to that list. u.n. meeting today on trying to force us not to speak badly of their prophet, and of course the obamanuts will be in full attendance.

Hi Matt- You said:

"But I recall when feminists first began speaking on college campuses, they were met with loud and at times violent protests outside their places of speaking. Now they are the ones doing it."

I was around and in college when this stuff got started and I don't remember any loud and violent protests on campus about feminists. They were welcome and on my campus they aligned themselves with the radicals and blended in. Most of the reaction I remember was more like "eye rolling" or privately making fun of them and most of this was in the general population rather than on campus. Can you share some examples of these loud and violent protests?

The basic difference now is that there was, and always has been, a cultural mandate to care and provide for women while now there is no, and never has been, any cultural mandate to provide for men. This is one underlying reason that the average person spontaneously recoils from the idea that men need services and experience pain and suffering. We are fighting a very different battle now than was fought by the early feminists who basically had a downhill slope.

Dave you can spew your own tripe and bullshit by using exreme communist examples to say socialism is bad. But you say nothing at all about Belgium, the Netherlands, etc. Denmark was voted the happiest place to live. You didn't respond substantively to one thing I said other than calling it "tripe" and citing extreme political examples like Russia. You're full of shit yourself Dave.

Both communism and capitalism evolve toward socialism or they collapse. Far left communism restricts freedom too much wheras far right capitalism allow corporate greed to control everything while the gap between rich and poor widens like in Mexico to the point where there is hardly a middle class. We probably wouldn't even have a middle class in the U.S. without the socialist policies from the 30s.

"MRA's problems stem from corruption and greed within the system, not the system."

An underregulated capitalist system PROMOTES "corruptin and greed" so as to neglect the rights of workers, mostly men. No surprise to me that most union workers and black men vote left, not right.

"tired of hearing the truth? ts. that's called free speech, and like i said in the post above, you true believers always hate free speech."

No, saying I'm "tired" of hearing nonsense doesn't mean I hate free speech at all. It's part of my own free speech to call something nonsense and say I'm tired of hearing it. I could say the same to you for caling my position "tripe." IMO it's your position that's bullshit. That doesn't mean I'm denying your free speech. That's MY free speech. It's always amazing to hear right wingers wine about "free speech" anytime someone simply disagrees with them like I did.

I am no political expert, but I always thought that socialism is that everyone participates and everyone shares, but it makes it difficult for one person to really get ahead as everything is a "group effort". It leads to high taxes and those tax revenues go on to provide public services to the society in which it serves.

From free online dictionary:

"socialism: a general term for the political and economic theory that advocates a system of collective or government ownership and management of the means of production and distribution of goods. Because of the collective nature of socialism, it is to be contrasted to the doctrine of the sanctity of private property that characterizes capitalism capitalism, economic system based on private ownership of the means of production, in which personal profit can be acquired through investment of capital and employment of labor.
Where capitalism stresses competition and profit, socialism calls for cooperation and social service."

I saw another definition that described it as everyone contributing their best effort and sharing the benefits.

From what I can tell Socialism would be good for those who are weaker/less productive and bad for those who are stronger/more productive.

Since men tend to be the bigger providers, more competitive, harder workers, etc, I would conclude that the concept of socialism would be bad for most men.

Since men make the vast majority of homeless adults, manual labor workers, and job deaths, and are less likely to have health insurance, I would conclude exactly the opposite.

Unlike communism, socialism allows private enterprise except on major human needs like health care, education, and utilities, which are socialized. The U.S. is pretty much the only advanced nation that doesn't have socialized medicine. Even Taiwan has socialized medicine. Germany is at the top of the economic food chain in Europe and has socialized medicine just as the others do. There are different degrees and forms of socialism, just like other forms of government. Some work better than others and it's always a matter of balancing. But they tend to evolve toward what we're seeing in the NOrdic countries. Some socialist leaning countries like Sweden are very anti-male, whereas others like Belgium are very good to men in many ways. None of them are perfet. But I don't buy the argument at all that socialism is inherently anti-male.

As an MRA I don't go into politics until other MRAs start spewing politics themselves. Usually it's a right winger putting down socialism. That's when I do reply. I never start these arguments but I reply. By spewing your politics you divide the movement and turn off potential joiners. Liberals like Alec Baldwin, Bob Geldof, Warren Farrell, Glenn Sacks, and myself have publicly talked about men's rights for a long time. To turn off the more left-leaning people by spewing politics is one of the stupidist things one can do as an MRA, and 95% of the time it's a right wing MRA who does nothing as an activist except yack, the internet, a "yacktivist" as I call them.

If people like that want to divide up the men's rights movement by spewing politics, rather than uniting, so be it, I'll do just that. But I won't be the one who starts it.

some examples of socialism in our (u.s.) society.

social security: implemented to provide a safety net for Americans in old age. it had a surplus of many billion$, that is until president johnson listened to groups like the naacp who convinced him it was all government $$, so they just took it and put in an i.o.u. (gov. corruption). now we have record numbers of people drawing checks from it that have never contributed a dime (people corruption).

gov. welfare: very long list here. everything from food stamps to monthly checks to obama phones. every month there is a new record broken for receiving these benefits. some sectors have been on these benefits for generations. last week it was reported that the average family receiving gov. assistance was getting $60k, on average. this socialist program is destroying the future of millions of Americans (government and individual corruption).

corporate welfare: giving out large tax breaks and (recently) handing out large chunks of $$ to companies deemed as deserving. personally i see nothing here but more government and industry corruption, especially in deciding who gets what.

i don't know much about the politics/economies of some relatively small countries like denmark, belgium and the netherlands. i really doubt they have the same type demographics as the u.s. also, i'm pretty sure they don't have an open border with millions of poor, uneducated people pouring in and demanding unearned benefits. we are more on the scale of the former u.s.s.r. or china for comparison purposes. they failed for the same reasons we are failing. its simple human nature. people will not work hard, make super new inventions and create wealth in a system that controls commerce and hands out rewards equally(?) to everybody. competition drives success, indiividually and governmentally - always has, always will.

thus, 'socialism works well until you run out of other people's $$$'. (margaret thatcher)

btw i consider myself to be a libertarian. gov. works best that does the least needed to perform those assigned functions as listed in our founding documents.

the proof is everywhere that some form of capitalism is the best system of wealth creation to ever rear its monied head. every country that dropped its old system after wwII and embraced capitalism took off like a rocket, economically. japan, phillipines, west germany, and many more. these capitalistic economies still drive the world's economy. even a purely socialist state like china finally had to embrace capitalism to survive. europe right now is reaching critical mass. in short, they have long since run out of other people's $$, and then tried to just borrow their way back into happiness.

Your right, Marc A. I wont go on, even though I have many strong opinions. It's best if we keep this site focused on MRA.

However I feel the need to at least respond to socialist medicine. I am a registered nurse and my sister is a cardiac nurse. Many patients travel from Canada to the USA to receive medical care as they know they will receive prompt and quality care compared to what their socialist system will provide. Even Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams came to USA for his heart surgery (Norway leaders have also traveled to the United States for care). People that can afford better care will travel away from the socialist medicine. The poor people will be stuck with it, but everyone will be stuck paying for it. There are other ways to care for the poor and uninsured without forcing everyone into socialist medicine. IMO, both the rich and poor will receive better care if it is left to private industry.

When the counties own policy makers wont trust their own care to the system they implemented, that should tell you how bad it is. Just like politicians don't send their own kids to public schools.

Marc,

The substance of your comment "You're full of shit yourself Dave." violates the standards of the site. You are allowed to criticize comments and even to use serious, intense language to do so. But you are not allowed to attack another poster personally. A phrase such as "you are full of shit" constitutes a personal attack.

You get two warnings; this is the first. The second results in a suspension from the site in terms of posting rights for a week. The third is a ban from the site.

I am sending you a link to this post.

Kris, that is no argument at all against socialized medicine. Yes when you make health care based on profit then you'll have some of the best doctor but tons of people unable to afford them, so of course the rich in other countries will come to the U.S. That says nothing about the scores of people in those countries who are getting very *good* health care and who would not otherwise have it if it weren't for socialized medicine. In the rate of breast cancer deaths is the same in the U.S. as in countries with socialzied medicine but the doctors in the U.S. order twic as many tests, which are unnecesary and raise the costs of health care. My grandparents in France are conservative and well off and they used to fear socialized medicine and make all the same arguments we hear in the U.S. but over time they realized they actually pay less because they don't have the huge co-pays, deductables, or loss of their homes and savings when their insurance caps out. There is a reason why all other advanced nations have socialized medicine.

Yes, Social Security is imperfect and needs reform, just like everything. But it provides security to billions of elderly people who worked all their lives, and it helps the economy by giving those elderly something to spend. We would have a much bigger problem without it. It has helped create a middle class which stipulates and helps the economy.

Regarding the size of denmark etc., the point is that socialism is not inherently anti-male, as Belgium has presumed joint custody, Holland has battered men's shelters and allows sex workers and marijuana (most post smokers are male, BTW), etc.

The immigration problems in the U.S. are largely caused by our foreign policies and "interventions" and funding of pro-U.S. dictators and preventing governments from providing basic social safety nets. Watch "Harvest of Empire." We don't have a huge number of Canadians coming here illegally b/c Canada provides for its people (and by the way, is quite large), whereas Mexico is far more capitalist and that's where most illegal immigration is coming from.

Dave said" "people will not work hard, make super new inventions and create wealth in a system that controls commerce and hands out rewards equally(?) to everybody."

Try going to Holland and look at how hard people work. Small businesses thrive. Their unemployment rate is LOWER than in the U.S. Germany is at the TOP of the economic food chain. Your argument is baseless.

Dave said: "Socialism works well until you run out of other people's $$$'. (margaret thatcher)"

No, in fact socialism fosters small business and jobs because it creates infrastructure and provides for skilled labor. Study Holland. In the U.S. there is such a shortage of skilled labor that some corporations have a buunch of jobs available that they have trouble finding people to fill. Holland on the other hand INVESTS in education and job training and consequently has a good economy like Germany. And by providing a social safety net they prevent homelessness (compare Cuba's and Holland's homeless rates to the U.S.) and foster spending at the lower level which stimplates the economy.

Davee said: "every country that dropped its old system after wwII and embraced capitalism took off like a rocket, economically. japan, phillipines, west germany, and many more. these capitalistic economies still drive the world's economy."

Yes and the ones that did well over time were the ones that evolved more toward socialism, like Germany, which drives the economy just as much and is doing better than other countries. Phillipines is still very poor and has a huge gap between rich and poor. men in Japan are miserable b/c of the demands of the workplace and are dying from suicide and depression at higher rates than anywhere else in the world. Japan also denies unmaried fathers any custody rights absent mom's consent.

Dave said: "even a purely socialist state like china finally had to embrace capitalism to survive."'

China is communist, not socialist, and yes they have to capitalize in Hong Kong and elsewhere to survive, and they also provide health care there. Using commmunism as an example is no argument against socialism. It's just citing an extreme.

Dave said: "europe right now is reaching critical mass. in short, they have long since run out of other people's $$, and then tried to just borrow their way back into happiness."

*Some* of Europe has, and has not. Germany is doing very well. So is the Netherlands, with lower unemployment than the U.S.

Calling my opinon "tripe" is the same as saying I'm full of tripe. I'll reply the same way if I hear that. Cut me off if you want.

I wasn't suggesting that feminists were *categorically* being protested against at every turn the same way we can pretty much count on the sorts of events Warren Farrell had to be met with such a "welcome", at least until further notice. Usually they were part of a bigger movement around "radicalization", such as with the anti-anti-communist movement (ie, the movement to stop things like the House Un-American Activities Committee from running roughshod over anyone they felt like, or requiring students or faculty to sign ideological pledges (which to this day still is going on, if you can believe it; see here and here as examples). But in looking over what I originally wrote, I see I didn't fully convey my thoughts as I had framed them. I def'ly do agree that if any given crowd of people is asked who they are going to protest violently against, if indeed they must choose one, a feminist speaker or a men's rights speaker, I am sure 99 times out of 100 they will pick the MR speaker, at least in the current state we're in.

No Marc, it is not. As I have said before to other posters, stating that someone's given idea is "stupid", for example, is an attack on the idea. Saying that the person who wrote it is stupid is an attack on the person. (You could have told daveinga that his idea was "shitty" and that would have been fine.) In the same vein, telling someone "*you* are full of shit" is an attack on the person.

I won't "cut you off" as long as you refrain from personal attacks, regardless of my opinion of how you are handling this particular situation. There's only one rule to be enforced on this site: No personal attacks. As long as you're not doing that, you or anyone else can say whatever they want. This isn't like a feminist web site where they toss people off simply for expressing the "wrong" idea.

"keep selling that tripe about how good socialism is because your earthly deity says so" isn't a personal attack? Well I think it is. So you may as well cut me off now in advance b/c I guarantee you I'll respond to insults with insults, and with my socialist leaning MRA position I'm sure there will be lots more insults. I say that especially since you somehow think I'm not "handling the situation" well, when I think I'm handling it very well.

... you are free to debate and criticize other ideas as much as you like. Just don't attack others personally. I read through the previous posts and daveinga said things to you in a patently undiplomatic way but did not attack you personally. It's a fine line and one where I err on the side of caution. "You're full of shit yourself Dave." however definitely crosses the line.

Since your first such posting you haven't said anything else like that so no, you don't get "cut off". As I said before, the only way you get into the penalty box on MANN is if you use personal attacks on others and if after being warned to stop, do not. In that regard, it's entirely up to you.

If you object to my decision regarding your post, feel free to send an email to the admins address and my fellow admins and I can discuss it. If they think my decision to hand you a yellow card was wrong, they can tell me so. Otherwise, it is what it is.

Kratch,

I never debated Marc's point re the topics (socialism, etc.) he was discussing. I told him to stop using personal attacks like "You're full of shit", and that's all. Also, see: http://news.mensactivism.org/node/20129#comment-26757

At this point I am done dealing with this particular thread, unless someone starts writing things that constitute a personal attack again. Marc has received the warning against personal attacks. If he objects to it and thinks it was unfair, he knows what he can do to seek redress.

having watched throughout my lifetime these 'isms' come and go in different societies, it has been my observation that although each is somewhat different in its economic and political frame work, some always seem to gravitate toward each other.

communism/socialism - it is being argued today that communist china is now more of a socialist china than communist, due to its gravitation toward capitalism. this move toward capitalism was born out of necessity and probably infrastructure failure. pure communism has proven over and over again to be a failure. people don't try to scale the walls of communist countries to gain access to their free stuff. they typically run out of it very quickly. i went on one of china's many dating sites and believe me, the women there are desperate to get out of that nightmare. same goes for russian and ukranian sites.

i remember the u.s.s.r.'s killing fields in front of their walls as well. communism/socialism (however you want to brand it) sucked the very life and soul out of those people behind the iron curtain. fascism saw no prettier demise. the moose's own people (italians) hung him upside down in the public square, once their nightmare was over.

germany has moved toward socialism, as has most of europe. it looks to me that most of the rest of the european union is dragging germany down with it. imho, making generalizations about the german people being more industrious than their neighbors doesn't help europe solve its problems. i'm just wondering how long the more capitalistic/energetic countries will continue to prop up their less industrious neighbors, before it all collapses? if not for germany and its resources (people and industry), they would be there already.

even though we can see these countries self-destruct under the weight of socialism, the u.s. appears to want to follow in their footsteps. to me, it just looks like europe, in different clothes. the real workers vs the shirkers. how long will the real workers continue to augment the obama phone slackers?

I've been avoiding this site quite a bit because of how political it has become recently, because I feel and I'm sure others do to that our political beliefs are being attacked in some kind of attempt to blur men's rights with other aspects of either party.

Good find Kratch, you exposed feminist intolerance. Of coarse we already knew this fact but the video really makes the truth resonate. The men attending the seminar showed great restraint and maturity by not engaging these hysterical women. This is a victory for us. The MRA movement is based on logic while the feminist movement is based on hypersensitive melodrama. I hope the feminists trolling MANN take the opportunity to see themselves in action. Expecting them to be embarrassed by such childish behavior is probably too much to ask for.

I understand how you feel. Politics (ie, political party affiliations, etc.) eventually creep into any discussion around sociological matters in a country wherein sociological agendas get mixed with political ones. The ideal wherein there was a gov't and it was meant to do just a few things *for* the people and otherwise should buzz off and leave the people in peace did not last long. In fact I imagine it was already pretty much done shortly after the US Con'n was drafted.

Any assembly of people that has a set of rights or obligations given to it by another group of people (in this case, the people of the US giving the gov't a set of both for the administration of law and order as well as the protection of enumerated liberties) eventually start to exercise that power for their own purposes, sometimes just (as when they sought the end of slavery) and sometimes not (as when for example the Nazi party, duly elected by the people, started rounding up anyone with the temerity to disagree with them on anything and ship them off to labor camps-- surprise!).

There can be no doubt, looking at the history of women's rights pursuits, that feminists have aggressively sought the patronage and protection of governmental forces to further their agenda, whether it be for the pursuit of defensible ends (the right to vote, etc.) or indefensible ones (e.g.: pursuing the notion of establishing gender quotas regardless of qualification or the justness of the matter, restricting repro. rights pretty much to women only, lobbying courts to deny fathers the same consideration as mothers, etc.). They seem to have no problem involving themselves with politicians to get what they want-- and it has and continues to work very well for them. If MRAs think they can sit back and watch this and avoid getting into the ring themselves, well, it won't be a winning strategy. I don't like it either but then there are a lot of things I don't like about how the world works and I can't do much about those, neither-none.

I don't like arguing political party affiliation or who's-on-what-team any more than any other person who, by and large, decides who to vote for based on who he thinks will screw up the very basics of governmental administration the LEAST (alas, that is what it has come down to for me, since at the moment, we don't have anyone even talking about men's issues much less trying to put them into the national discourse). But to live in a republic (such as it has become, buyable and sellable by whoever has the most cash, thanks to the Supreme Court in its Citizens United decision), and to be talking about sociological matters like men's rights that are part and parcel of men's political rights too (the right to be truly presumed innocent in a court of law, for example), there is just no avoiding it. And indeed, some political matters that on their face have nothing to do with men as such do have a great bearing on men's well-being, such as workers' rights to seek damages for unnecessary exposure to dangerous circumstances that led to injury. Indeed, without things like the labor movement (which frequently didn't mention men in particular), the lives of many thousands if not hundreds of thousands of men over these past 80+ years may have been saved or spared injury because of what was done as progress to improve working conditions was made. The history of the labor movement is easy to completely overlook since, like electricity and modern plumbing (again, thanks to the ingenuity of men), we have always seemed to have the benefits of it to enjoy. But like 'lectricity and indoor flush toilets (again, the man to thank for this: Sir John Harington, not Thomas Crapper as many believe), we'd miss it if we didn't have it.

I read these comments and wonder how many of us are from different countries. I've always liked the global diversity of MANN. Over the years, I've discussed gender issues with people from Canada, England, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, Germany and India. I also enjoy the diversity from Americans who live in different states. I'm from NY and will challenge anyone who thinks they can find a better slice of pizza :)