Air Date: 05/12/2013
Show Intro (written by Alison Tieman, Narrated by Karen Straughan)
For those who don’t know, Bronies, portmanteau of “bro” plus “pony” are adult male fans of the children’s show “My little pony, friendship is magic.”
If the title of the show wasn’t a clue, the show is aimed at young girls. It has a lot of colour, it stars an almost all-girl cast and of course, ponies! Although it does have adult appeal with an intentionally more sophisticated subtext to it’s plot and character interactions.
Despite this, Bronies have been called pedophiles, fags and creeps.
Whatever men like, society seems to have an epithet to hurl at them for liking it
If it’s feminine, then they’re fags and pedos; if it’s masculine then they’re wife beating rapist neanderthals.
It’s almost like men don’t have a right… to their own time.
Join us tonight as we discuss Bronies and the Man Shaming Game.
Show Intro (Written by Alison Tieman)
If you’ve watched our intro ad you’ll know that Bronies are adult male fans of the show “My little Pony, Friendship is Magic.”
The show itself has a subtle sophistication that will most likely go over the heads of most young viewers… like all good stories aimed at children, there’s something to appeal to adults as well.
So it’s not a huge mystery why there might be an adult fan base for the show. It is girly, yes, but it’s also sweet, and kind and positive and has remarkably well-concieved characterization and plotting.
However Bronies come in for a lot of shit.
A Lot.
In an article on the feature length animated My Little Pony Movie, Equestria Girls, the toronto sun interviews one Jennifer Gillbert. Ms. Gillbert, a suburban mother and thus obviously the arbiter of what is acceptable in human interaction, explains she feels “uncomfortable” in a theatre full of grown men watching a children’s show. Uncomfortable.
Another woman on a youtube comment thread opines that the movie adaptation is a brony wet dream, alluding to the stereotyping of Bronies as only having a sexual interest in the show.
In fact commentator after commentator on youtube vids, reddit, forums, article comment sections concludes that bronies are fags, pedophiles and creeps.
Now let’s set Brony shaming aside for a moment.
In January of 1993 a news conference was held in Pasadena California. At that news conference, reporters were informed by Shelia Kuehl of the California Women’s Law Center that a study done at Virginia’s Old Dominion University three years before indicated that hospital admissions for domestic abuse rose 40% after football games in which the Washington Red Skins won.
Apparently men were beating their wives in a monstrous fugue brought about by beer, potato chips and the bitter regret of their home team losing a game.
This lurid factoid sparked an avalanche of hysteria that still pops up today.
It’s of course, completely false. There is no association with the Super Bowl and wife beating and as far as anyone knows being a male football fan isn’t actually a marker of being a wife beater.
The latest shame-craze around the Super Bowl is, of course, sex trafficking. All the signs are in that in ten years it’ll be discovered to be a complete hoax as well.
Men who like football, don’t lack for masculinity in the popular imagination. Yet male fans of that pastime too, come in for their share of shame, guilt, sexualization and demonization.
Now let’s set the Super bowl aside for a moment.
In 1674 Several thousands of the buxom good women of London drafted a petition to coffee houses, this petition was called “The women’s petition against coffee.”
In it women accused men, including their husbands, who wiled away the hours chatting over a cup of brew of being impotent, frivolous and effeminate.
In particular, they demanded the closure of coffee houses because imbibing joe apparently made joe incapable of doing his duty to king and country.
To quote the buxom good women, quote “we find them not capable of performing those Devoirs which their Duty, and our Expectations Exact.”
In other words, men shouldn’t be able to drink coffee because coffee left them unable to preform the in the sack.
Talk about sexual entitlement.
Now feminists will say that Brony shaming is a symptom of what they call femmeophobia… essentially their theory that we hold girly things in lower esteem than boy-y things.
However we also shame men for liking traditionally masculine pursuits or… just neutral ones.
We shame bronies because My Little Pony is feminine, sports fans because sports are macho and in the past… coffee drinkers… because coffee is… caffeinated?
Anyway, the point is that the only common denominator is that these are men choosing to do what they want with their own time.
It isn’t the femininity of bronies, the masculinity of sports fans or the… caffeination of coffee drinkers that’s the issue— no matter what pastime someone will figure out a way to shame men for it.
It’s the fact that men aren’t being useful.
And that’s blaspheme.
Welcome to this week’s episode of honey badger radio, I’m your host Alison Tieman and with me today is Della Burton and Diana Davidson who hopefully will remain with us as her power is cutting in and out. Karen won’t be able to join us tonight as she’s busy mudding walls or slapping down tile or doing something with saws. She’s dead to us now.
I’m passing the mike over to Della now to bring us the latest development in community news, Della.
Community News Written by Della Burton
In the feminist tradition of substituting censorship for debate, a copyright violation complaint citing the Digital Copyright Millennium Act (DMCA) has been filed against Men’s Issues vlogger Victor Zen in response to his criticism of a feminist vlogger’s work. As a result of the complaint, the video has been taken down, and Victor Zen can no longer upload anything over 15 minutes long to his channel.
A similar attack was made against Karen Straughan’s channel last year in an apparent attempt to gain her personal information including home address. In this case, however, the goal appears to be silencing Victor Zen’s criticism of youtube channel Mariam Talks. To counter this, several other men’s issues vloggers have hosted mirrors of the targeted video, and another video which he has been unable to upload due to its length. Anyone wishing to host mirrors of either of those can find links to them in the lowbar of Victor Zen’s video “Copyright Strike Response.”
Alison Tieman’s Topic Bite(brief commentary)
The definition of masculine
There’s a phenomena I’ve noticed over time. Men get involved in activity or interest or even fashion trend and women ignore them for a time till they notice that what they’re doing is cool. Then women take it over and men are shunted out the door. Men then go on to invent some new idea and enjoy it until women decide they want it.
Rinse and repeat.
Essentially what we code as masculine, and by we I mean society in general, is pretty much synonymous with “things women aren’t interested in yet.”
Bronies are doing the opposite of what’s usually expected. Instead of women adopting a male pastime and, to be frank, usually cooping and colonizing it. Bronies are men adopting a female pastime.
Which means bronies may actually be threatening female privilege. It’s female privilege to go into an interest, expect your comfort to be catered to, and gradually take it over and have it then be judged as feminine.
It’s certainly something very different entirely when men do the same back to women.
Comment of the week(James Huff, HBR show producer):
Bronies are getting it becuase any time a man manages to escape norms that are expected, especially making themselves “untouchable” by certain societal convenventions, it makes those trapped in the system really fucking bitter.
Bronies can usually escape the every other feminist trap having to do with masculinity…..and you can’t fucking have that. Bronies rank right up there with MGTOW, maybe worse. Can’t have that..got to keep those menz on a goddamned leash.
Show Post Script
In an interesting twist, Honey Badger Radio was trolled by 4chan’s My Little Pony board.
Here are links to screen shots of the ensuing fracas.
In summary, they came out of the gate hating, but then we seem to have won them over. Which may be even more terrifying.
Thanks for your kind attention and we hope to join us for the next episode of Honey Badger Radio!
- Badger Pod Nerd Cast 5: Hannah vs. The Bear - July 22, 2014
- Honey Badger Radio: Men’s issues conference–An orgy of misogyny! - July 10, 2014
- Honey Badger Radio: Elliot Rodger, the new face of the men’s rights movement? - May 29, 2014
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[…] Last Week’s Show notes(with link to trolling screen shots) […]
the corset killed titanic passengers
april 14th 1912. rms titanic accidentally collided with an iceberg and sank leading 1500 women children men officers and crew to their deaths. the accident itself due to excessive speed and inefficient safety precautions was a tragedy and one of the few times women and children first meant literally condemning the men to death. it caught the attention of the world and you could actually say people were outraged. frequently in the mra it is brought up as the idea of female privilege in conflict with male privilege. both then and now people felt that women must be saved and if men died it was the lesser of two horrible outcomes. there is an oversight i think some people are not aware of.
i should hope i am the kind of person who could not sleep at night knowing an infant drowned to save my life. regardless of opinion if its possible to save a child most of us would. getting the children off the ship was a priority. now some or most children though they can walk can’t care for themselves. it would be pointless to sort passengers by who is a mother and who isn’t so all of the women should go with the children.
the reason the titanic is mentioned in the mra is because i have not heard allot of stories about evacuations to avoid disaster and death where women and children first was applied and the end result was directly the death of a group of men. the implication was that the patriarchy deemed women were weak as were children and their chances of surviving were nil. i believe that is exactly what happened but not for the same reasons people think.
as most of us know at the time most women wore corsets. clothing at the time was not simply shopped for at walmart. pick your size try it on if it doesn’t fit return it or exchange it for something else. clothing back then had to be tailored by the milliner or dress/suit maker for the individual wearer. sleeves needed to be snug against the wrists. skirts were styled to be broad at the seat covering the legs down to the shoes. ankles had to be covered. the waists were slim with a notable bust then followed up to the neck which also had to be snug.
to keep this shape women wore a corset which binded there midsection accented their bust and complimented their figure. the idea was to have a desirable shape and allow their clothing to fit. but we all know some if not most tugged a bit tighter so they could fit into that special dress and keep that figure they obsessed with.
few would remember the custom of opening doors for women, helping them in and out of cabs cars carriages boats staircases or leading a woman by the hand across unsure terrain or whatever isn’t flat ground. almost nobody remembers the customs associated with woman’s daily routine such as taking tea refreshment naps or a woman’s privilege to be late to an engagement. the stereotype was that women were biologically weak or lazy. not true. it is my theory that the corset and the burdens that came with wearing one became the norm for how women behaved and were treated by their men or polite men in society.
for starters the corset compresses the ribs and midsection of the womans body. this interferes with the woman’s breathing. women and girls were discouraged from running or excessive movement. due in part because wearing the corset its is easy to get winded and be short of breath.
in addition the material acted as insulation bringing up a womans body temperature with an already thick layered outfit. remember all those silly umbrellas? women needed to keep out of the sun when outdoors. during the 1900s there was no central air conditioning and lighting a house depended on candle light. on average it took many candles to light a room. combine that with the number of warm bodies in company a womans body heat was 30% higher than normal. remember the silly fans women carried? there was a reason for those too. women were desperate for something to cool down and ironically couldn’t even benefit from their own sweat. these outfits hugged the body locking in heat and sweat was kept warm.
on top of that a woman was easily dehydrated. wonder why they drank so much tea? the clothing taped the water out of a human body like wearing a trash bag. henceforth the custom of offering visitors tea from the getgo and referring to snacks as refreshment. refreshment is damn right. while origins are compressed and pushed around the corset depleted energy and disrupted digestion. a woman’s diet had to be cautious.
in spite of all of these shortcuts to make the outfit barbible women were prone to fainting and could become sick easily. just like avoiding exsertion women were encouraged to avoid stress racy topics or politics. men were told not to talk about these things in front of women and the stereotype followed that it was because women don’t have the “know-how” men do.
the corset also played hell with the ability to move. helping a women in and out of a car and the like was not solely because that is how you treat a lady. women had to be mindful of their footsteps and skirt as the corset made falling easy and difficult to avoid injury when they hit the ground. a man had to be ready to catch a women if she fainted for the same reason.
having it already awkward to walk women also wore shoes with higher heels that also made falling and injury there from easy to happen.
then there was the titanic. back then it was a given that in an emergency situation that women needed special attention. the corset was i think the biggest part of this. with the above mentioned a woman’s ability to save herself was hindered by her outfit. most of us know when a ship starts to sink it doesn’t go strait down. at least depending on the nature of the damage causing the ship to take on water usually one side of the ship, it becomes heavier than the other making the ship do what is known as listing. in the early stage of the evacuation a ships list isn’t dramatic. you wouldn’t even notice it unless you had a ball to let role across the deck or a bubble level instrument.
as the evacuation proceeds and the need to leave the ship becomes more urgent the ships list is noticeable. decks walkways gangplanks catwalks staircases and otherwise flat services are not so flat anymore. eventually even those who wear average shoes and comfortable clothing must climb across bulkheads or objects bolted to the deck to get to safety. try doing that with a corset heavy clothing and awkward shoes and being told all your life not to exert yourself.
in simple english its best to get those people off of the ship first or have them trapped on deck to die or risk the lives of others trying to save them or holding up the evacuation all together. i believe women and children first was more of a practicality standard than a stereotype that men don’t matter as much as women. though at the time and now some thought that was exactly what it was. although i can’t argue that very well do to the numbers involved.
Passenger category
Number aboard
Number saved
Number lost
Percentage saved
Percentage lost
Children, First Class
6
5
1
83.4%
16.6%
Children, Second Class
24
24
0
100%
0%
Children, Third Class
79
27
52
34%
66%
Women, First Class
144
140
4
97%
3%
Women, Second Class
93
80
13
86%
14%
Women, Third Class
165
76
89
46%
54%
Women, Crew
23
20
3
87%
13%
Men, First Class
175
57
118
33%
67%
Men, Second Class
168
14
154
8%
92%
Men, Third Class
462
75
387
16%
84%
Men, Crew
885
192
693
22%
78%
Total
2224
710
1514
32%
68%
as you can see among the number of men who lost their lives second and third class make the highest death count aside from the crew members. we can assume this was partly because of class discrimination racism and or statistically the majority of those passenger groups were single men traveling alone. we may never know the real reasons were for the rules that caused so many people to die. the reason why the titanic is such a unique situation is because the accident itself was motivated by greed of the owners having the ship run at high speeds in hazardous waters. unpreparedness: in the fact that believing the ship couldn’t sink or was immune from disaster: it didn’t have enough lifeboats for all aboard.
in the interest of men the accident caused outrage in many countries and in reaction maritime travel regulations were changed to avoid a repeat of the accident.
Is no. 31 actually real? This one sounds made up more than gender-flipped?
Never let a perfectly serviceable and useful tragedy get in the way of your global soap box. The all important credo for the One Valuable Woman and her One Good Man.
Just for the record, Futrelle does not think he need live up to his own standards. It’s ironic watching him squirming as he tries to disassociate himself from the radfem who published his writing, after he worked SO HARD to try to make Eliot Rodger an MRA so he could use him to slander the movement. If simply saying things Futrelle didn’t like made Rodger an MRA despite a complete lack of any connecting association, what should it say that Futrelle is read and celebrated by a gendercide-advocating Radfem?
https://twitter.com/AVoiceForMen/status/478511887248683008
https://twitter.com/AVoiceForMen/status/478503657374089216
https://twitter.com/Jackbarnesmra/status/478513439887724544
Calling things Eliot Rodger read “MRA speech” to paint the MRA as the cause of his outburst is A-OK with the author of the blog formerly known as Manboobz… but when it’s demonstrated that a radfem who wants to kill all men and any women who disagree with her reads HIS blog… well, that doesn’t mean anything, does it?
Feminists and accountability go together like oil and water.
Just reading this now..so many interesting analyses, but you helped me accidentally find some great “porn” from the 1600s!
I had to look up the text of the Women’s Petition against Coffee, I think I heard about the petition in the passing years back, but just found it on wikisource.
And I was stunned to read this passage, I had to re-check that it’s not a fake, not a spoof, not someone’s idea of a joke, but no, this is from the real Wikisource…this is how the good Christian upstanding women phrased the problem of the men not being eager for sex:
When they returned from the coffeehouses, the men “come from [the coffeehouse] with nothing moist but their snotty Noses, nothing stiffe but their Joints, nor standing but their Ears”
Seriously! http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Women%27s_Petition_against_Coffee
“Moist” men? Precum I guess..It was hilarious to read that sentence. The word “dildo” also appears as a verb in the text, and they speak of ” Ancient Priviledges of our (female) Sex”
But on a more serious note, can you imagine the reaction of say, Jezebel or the mainstream media if today (when we are much more comfortable with the subject of sex..supposedly) and if a group of men today had a petition complaining about a women’s club saying:
“When the women return home, they come with nothing moist but their snotty noses..”
How much outrage there would be! How dare the men complain at all, and how “misogynistic” and “objectifying” of the men to criticize the women’s not being “moist”! How many times would the word “misogynistic” appear in the outrage pieces if the genders were reversed? Are we to believe that these women from the 1600s were completely “enslaved” by the men, completely their “property” just scares and terrified and helpless?
These women complaining that their men arrive back home “with nothing moist but their snotty Noses, nothing stiffe but their Joints, nor standing but their Ears” sure sound like an entitled view that as far as a gender “owning” the other, they sound like they think they OWN his genitals. I know what it would be called if genders were reversed: “that sounds very rapey” and misogynustic to the extreme.