Here are a few things I ran across recently:
One is an article on Tasers and how they are designed to target the gentials, and of course that means men’s gentials because those are external. At durations longer than 5 seconds Tasers can inflict 3rd degree burns.
The police aren’t shy on using them on girls either, apparenttly. That link notes another in which the police tased a 10-year-old girl at the behest of her mother. She wouldn’t get into the shower, apparently. Kids these days.
Then there’s this article in the Vancouver Sun, in reference to male students facing a buzzsaw of opposition to opening a Men’s Centre on campus, to compliment the Women’s Centre which is fully funded at three time the level this new center would be. this psychologist, Nancy McWilliams, gives us a new term:
“injustice collectors.”
While we normally associate narcissists with thick-skinned males, this contrasting type of narcissist, often female, is known for being “thin-skinned” and “hyper-sensitive,” extremely vigilant to the chance they may be being slighted. And complaining when they are not the main focus of attention.
I couldn’t help but be reminded of this new clinical type of narcissist when I read Sun columnist Pete McMartin’s piece on the furore at Simon Fraser University over the student council’s attempt to open a small “men’s centre” for guys struggling with various issues.
In modern academia, where roughly 60 per cent of students are female, the self-styled victims and their champions couldn’t conceive of men needing support for their particular problems and pain.
And here’s article linked in the one above, about that Men’s Centre. The injustice collection just drips off the behavior the writer describes.
The Vancouver Sun is as mainstream a publication as it gets. That tells you that these issues are becoming mainstream.
Here’s one about Indentigene, which reveals paternity fraud.
Here’s a good article on circumcision. What I like about this particular article is the way it frames the question in specifically Jewish terms.
I am going to be busy in California for the rest of this week and all of the next – scattering my dad’s ashes, doing odd jobs around my mom’s house, visiting relatives and just generally spending some time in the homeland. Consider this an open thread and don’t tear the house down while I’m gone. I’ll be checking in now and then.
Update:
Scattered my dad’s ashes on Baker Beach, right under the Golden Gate Bridge, on the ebb tide, just as he requested. I spilled them out onto the sand where the waves would come up and get them, patted then one last time, and stepped back. Well, it was an ebb tide, so that meant the waves were further and further back with each wave and it took a long time. Every seventh wave or so came way up and pulled some more back into the ocean he loved so much. Eventually only a trail of bone fragments remained. A friend who had come along said “Stubborn, even now.” My mom went up and scooped them forward into the foam, and the next wave took them out. It was ceremonious without being a ceremony.
So that’s done.
I’ll still be gone for the rest of the week, checking in routinely.
- The Woman Card - May 2, 2016
- Frat boy bachelorettes and the invasion of gay bars - April 15, 2016
- “Not my kid….” - February 22, 2016
by 
Ginko,
My condolences….
here’s an interesting article, less males now have drivers liscense’s than females…
http://news.yahoo.com/more-women-drivers-licenses-men-us-181947996–finance.html
Ginkgo – Blessings to you and your family. Beautiful description of spreading the ashes.
“Stubborn, even now.”
I spent much of the night at emergency with my step father who had fallen on his face and broken his nose, couple of stitches too. After several hours my wife and I were able to take him home. He has parkinsons and had been drinking, hence the tumble. When my wife tried to take his arm to help him walk he quickly pulled it away. After reading Ginkgo’s words this morning that image instantly came to my mind. I get it.
“Stubborn, even now.”
My condolences Ginkgo, beautiful description of the waves.
The next time a die-hard feminist tries to discredit the argument that feminism can go too far, I’m going to point them to that article about the men’s centre.
Sure, sure, she/he will likely respond “But those are a fringe”, or “They’re not feminists”. Well I say to them “Hey, you said feminism isn’t a monolith.” and leave it at that.
The level of paranoid, knee-jerk hostility about the Men’s Centre is amazing. There was never any indication it would be a “frat house” (not that there’s anything wrong with that). And of course it’s blatantly sexist to assume that men are any more inclined to homophobia, sexism, racism or classism than women; check your privilege, upper-middle class white academic feminists!
“less males now have drivers liscense’s”
How many men in prison? How many have licenses stripped due to debt? How many homeless men? How many disabled men?
gwallan-or for that matter, how many men under 25 find it impossible to afford the higher insurance premiums?
anyways-and this is political-but one thing I’ve been thinking….
If there is one ethical thing the manosphere can do for young men-that would be to resist their disposability. Not to enlist in military service or law enforcement. Let a corrupt system starve. Look at that General Betrayus asshole-he can’t even cover his tracks using a public email like gMail-how many men have died because of his incompetence-how many innocent civilians? Yeah, democrat or republican-they’re all corrupt….
“it’s blatantly sexist to assume that men are any more inclined to homophobia, sexism, racism or classism than women”
I’ve seen nothing in my experience as a bisexual male to indicate that women are less capable of homophobia (or perhaps heterosexism would be the better term here) than men. It might be more overt from men, but in some ways that’s better. Sometimes, I’d rather deal with someone calling me a “fuckin’ f*ggot” to my face then someone pretending to be supportive but secretly finding my existence disgusting.
Paul,
I’ve heard that female pornographic actresses won’t work with guys that have been w/ guys even though many of the womyn have been with womyn.
Purportedly that is because gays have a higher rate of STD’s however everyone in that industry is supposedly tested….
It’s kinda like the scene in Full Metal Jacket where the guy brings hookers to the marines and the one hooker is all “No, Black guys toooo beeeeg.” Is that racism?
@ Stoner; Paul
“I’ve heard that female pornographic actresses won’t work with guys that have been w/ guys even though many of the womyn have been with women.”
And some women prefer bi men. Or don’t care.
I’m sorry to hear of your father’s passing, Gingko. 🙁
I hope you’re back among us soon! I was sort of wondering where you’d gotten to.
Thanks, TB. He died last year and we noticed his birthday was coming up and figured this was an appropriate time.
He died after a long illness and it was a release, and it gave him time to settle some matters. He had been molested/rape by a priest or priests when he was a young teenager and he left the Church, but towards the end he started taking Communion again. He relaized the Church didn’t own God. OTOH he never stopped tormenting his very churchy younger sister, most cruelly by never letting here even know why eh was treating her like that. Scorpio is no one to fuck with.
I mis him a lot, especially now with a great-grandson I cna’t show him, but mostly I grieve over wondering if he ever felt really appreciated as a father and family man. That was his chief joy in life, despite having a pretty distinguished career as an oceanographer and engineer. But then I look at how grateful my son is, not expressed in saying anything but in his actions. That grandson, for instance. So maybe my father really did feel appreciated and thanked.
The rest of the trip has been comforting, visiting my mom’s side and seeing familiar places.
“And some women prefer bi men. Or don’t care.”
yes, Typhone I should’ve prefaced that with NAWALT….
@ Stoner
Bi guys get a lot of shit from women. I won’t deny that.
I’m not bi, BTW, not that it matters….
I really don’t care to see guys hugging each other or being “closer” to the guys n my life though….
I guess where I have a stake in this is I really want to break free from traditional masculinity and that doesn’t mean wearing tutu’s…
Here’s a real life example-I got a polite lecture from the manager at my job today. He basically said I could make a ton of money if I was willing to work full time. I don’t like being tied to a desk-it’s painful for me. He even said that I produce and to keep it up. Though the guys I work with don’t seem to respect my life choices. A woman wouldn’t have to justify herself if she worked part-time. No one ever used the “man-up” phrase. I started when the company was a start up and they only offered part time. Most the new peeps are full time, I’m an artifact from the old days but kept around cuz “I produce.” I don’t like it there, even had an opportunity to leave-wound up staying because of the flexibility–many other things suck about it. One of the guys was saying he got visitation rights for his kids-7 days on 7 days off, after 10k in legal fees.
Yeah, another guy was telling me I’m basically at the age where if I start earning good money, I’ll be a catch. Truth is I really don’t have much interest in marrying the chicks who passed me by for the past ten years and being the provider. If it is all about the money, I’d rather just save some cash and take myself on a sex vacation in Amsterdam. Yeah, but if I have to work more hours, then fuck that shit…
Off topic op…
In case we forget that magic CAN happen sometimes…
A young man discovers himself. It’s a moment of perfect beauty.
Jonathon & Charlotte
Apologies for linking to facebook. I can’t view the videos through the TV show’s website because of my location.
My condolences, it sounds like a beautiful ceremony. My grandmother was laid to rest in a similar way from the valencia island lifeboat in Kerry.
Hi, Peter, thanks.
I think more and more people are opting for cremation and this type of scattering. Ours was a non-ceremony that was quite solemn and ceremonious. The gift of Anglsicanism, perhaps, or just California Zen.
It was also illegal in a very public place – Baker Beach is where they take all those pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge from underneath – but then it was just as public for the guy who was nude sunbathing illegally too.
Ginko:
My condolences as well.
Nothing more to say, really.
Thanks, Clarence. Thanks.
My condolences too, Ginkgo, and good on you for coming up with something special for him.
This seems to be the nearest thing to an open thread going on, so I thought I’d bring this up. As you’re probably aware, I’m from Northern Ireland, and as part of the Good Friday Agreement, it was decided, and we all voted, that paramilitary prisoners would be let out of prison and Sinn Féin, the IRA’s spokesparty, would be involved in the power-sharing devolved government. This has, as you’d expect, led to some unpalatable situations.
For example, a Sinn Féin minister, Caral Ni Chuilin, appointed Mary McArdle as her advisor. McArdle was convicted of being involved in the murder of the daughter of a Catholic judge in the 80s when she was 19, although she wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger. She’s now playing damsel in distress for all she’s worth it, because she says a Unionist politician, Jim Wells, called her a murderer (he says he called her a “monster advisor” and won’t apologise). Ní Chuilin has said this is “anti-Catholicism, sectarianism and misogyny”. Here’s the story in the Belfast Telegraph.
Now it strikes me that it’s a bit rich that someone convicted of involvement in a murderer and only released on licence as part of a political deal should be playing the victim over a bitter word – and if the misogyny card is going to be played here, then it’s clearly on the way to losing all force as an accusation. Criticise a woman for anything, and you’re a misogynist. Yeah, yeah.