So It's Come to This, Has It

You know what posting format I am way sick of?--The point-by-point refutation, also known as the fisk. Sadly, some items still require it, like the post I termed "an avalanche of stupid" here. (I don't really feel like linking it again.)

Fine, let's just get this over with:

Have you noticed how many women think they can use the internet to make threats against toddlers, flash their tits, and air their dirty laundry in public, all without repercussions?

Yes, Mom. I mean--no, wait, this is just ludicrous. I could be here all day just unpacking this sentence.

I've noticed how many people think they can use the internet for all kinds of behavior I don't approve of, whether that's trading hentai collections or fantasizing about giving bloggers they don't like a Dirty Sanchez or--listen, there's a whole lotta nasty out there. A WHOLE lot. I'm not about to link to it here, but there exists on these internets an entire blog written by a convicted pedophile and serial child killer, and not only that, there are entire sites devoted to analyzing the weblog output of said pedophile and murderer right before he, you know, abducted more kids and tortured, molested, and killed one of them before finally being caught.

It's horrible, I'm sorry I ever saw it, and I wish I could unsee it, but here's the point I want to make about it: Number of posts moaning about how many men behave badly on the internet, arising from the actual, not threatened, deaths of children? Oh, that number equals ZERO.

And why is that? It's because we don't, as a rule, blame men as a sex for the acts of a few of their most depraved members, that's why. And we don't do that because it doesn't make any sense to do that, any more than it makes any sense to blame "women" for the actions of one fruitcake psychology professor.

As for the rest of this sentence, I confess I am just all like, "Whaaaaat?" Why is the wife of the right blogosphere's main cheerleader for porn upset about women baring their breasts on the internet? My head hurts and I need a drink and I can't even have one because it's six in the morning and my drinking at this hour would only swell the ranks of WOMEN BEHAVING BADLY ON THE INTERNET, all without repercussions (unless you count my subsequent and sadly inevitable hangover), and heaven knows we can't have that.

About those repercussions, though: What repercussions should they face? Deb Frisch is out of a job and will hopefully VERY, VERY SOON be out of our thoughts and our lives forever, because hands up who's sick of this loon? I for one am very sick of this loon. Get off the stage, Deb. Oh, wait; looks like she already did. Repercussions delivered and received, then.

No, I quite understand Frisch deserving repercussions. I don't understand what in the hell repercussions we're supposed to bring down upon the titty-flashing women of the internet, and I'll bet you anything an anonymous poll of heterosexual guys on the internet would only yield responses like "Encourage them to flash more titties."

I have read that women are often afraid to comment on blogs because they do not want to stand up to criticism. However, it seems that there is also the opposite extreme: those women who think that they can say and do anything and no one is supposed to take notice or hold them accountable.

It would be easy here for me to make a "men do it, too" argument, but that's a trap I'd like to avoid for the moment. The better argument would be that someone needs a refresher on the hasty generalization. For kicks, though, feel free to substitute other subsets of the population into that paragraph--"African Americans," "homosexuals," "Catholics,"--and watch the fallacy leap out at you, wrestle you to the ground, and do horrible things to your faith in humanity.

I keep wanting to add that I'm not sure women who pose semi-nekkid on the internet really believe "no one is supposed to take notice," but that damned fallacy keeps throwing me to the ground and it really makes typing difficult.

My guess is that these women feel so ineffectual that they do not believe anyone would take them seriously, kind of like when a woman slaps a man, it is seen as funny since she is so "powerless."

For crying out loud, which women? You appear to be conflating Deb Frisch and some exhibitionist whom I don't even know and I . . . hey, you know something, people, I hate to be melodramatic but I CANNOT WORK UNDER THESE CONDITIONS. And by "these conditions," I mean "conditions in which I am not even sure who or what this writer is talking about."

So let's make this easier and assume it's Frisch, because I'm already tired of coming up with synonyms for knockers. Except, no, I can't even take that cop-out, because this post isn't about Deb Frisch behaving badly on the internet, it's about 51% or 52% of the population (I can never remember the exact figure) behaving badly on the internet.

And I swear on the Bible that I have no recollection of ever meeting any woman or man who thought a woman slapping a man was funny. I have met too many people on the internet who think that putting scare quotes around a word is the same thing as making a relevant point.

On the other side, there is the possibility that these nutjobs have such a sense of entitlement (reinforced by society) that they can get away with saying and doing anything.

There's also the very real possibility that Deb Frisch hears voices in her head. Guess which possibility I favor? Guess which possibility there's more evidence for? And don't make me bring up Occam's Razor. I hate having to bring up Occam's Razor. It's so this-one-time, in-1997, on-Usenet, I-got-in-this-flamewar-on-alt.rec.whatever with-this-guy, and . . . .

Luckily, people are catching on to these nutcases and taking action-- for example, the professor who threatened Jeff Goldstein's toddler lost her job.

So we're all happy now, I trust, and I will never again have to go to Right-Leaning Blog A and hear about how Deb Frisch is So Typical of The Left, nor will I ever again have to go to Left-Leaning Blog B and hear about how Wingnuts Are Such Hypocrites--right? Right? Please tell me I'm right. Please, somebody, anybody. Because otherwise I'm going to second the suggestion that we all put the internet down for its nap now.

Oh terrific, we've come to the really bad part:

Good for Goldstein for standing up for women's rights everywhere by holding this woman accountable and not letting her off the hook--maybe women will learn that their actions are not as ineffectual and powerless as they would have others believe.

Attempting to follow this logic for too long would make me at least half as crazy as Frisch. Of this I am certain. I must tread carefully.

Here is someone who stood up for women's rights everywhere.

Here is someone who stood up for women's rights in Iran.

Here are some who stood up for women's rights in Africa.

Here is someone who stood up for women's rights in South Dakota.

And I could go on--oh, how I could go on--but all the people I listed took action to increase women's autonomy and they did so at considerable personal risk to themselves and THAT is what I call making women less "ineffectual."

Women aren't children. Women don't need old what's-his-name to "hold them accountable" in order to "learn that their actions are not as ineffectual and powerless as they would have others believe." In fact--and I know I keep returning to this theme; forgive me--but in fact, what are you even talking about here?

I mean, I know that if all you read are Christina Hoff-Sommers and Cathy Young, it might be tempting to conclude that feminism is all a great con orchestrated by badly-behaving women who want, however perversely, to make us all believe that they're powerless; believe me, I'm very familiar with that gender-feminism-as-victim-cult notion. But I'm familiar with it because that's what antifeminists keep telling me feminism is, not because that's what I see when I read just-plain-feminists. Being a just-plain-feminist these days is like having people come up to you all the time making absurd, easily disproved statements like, "You're purple."

"No, I'm not," you answer.

"Yes, you are," they say.

"No, really, I'm not purple. I'm not sure where you're getting--"

"Oh, you're definitely purple. I can't believe you can't see how purple you are!"

"But I'm NOT purple. Look, here's a mirror. I'm checking, and, nope, not purple."

"Boy, they've really brainwashed you good, haven't they?"

"What?!?"

"You're totally purple and you don't even know it. The feminazis did quite a number on you, my friend."

Anyway, listen, this isn't hard: Saying this guy's handling of Frisch constitutes "standing up for women's rights everywhere" is positively Orwellian in a "Freedom is Slavery" sort of way, and as I cannot believe that anyone would be so stupid as to be Orwellian on accident I am just going to assume that it is being done on purpose. And that is an appalling way to diminish and demean the real, measureable achievements of those who actually DID and DO stand up for women's rights everywhere.

I'm sure that Roya Toloui, for example, would be pleased to know she's in the company of a guy who's so utterly freaked out by women disagreeing with him that he has to imagine them sitting on cucumbers just to revive his ever-flagging sense of manhood. I'm sure that was totally worth her being tortured to learn. Thank you, Dr. Helen. Thank you so much for standing up for women's rights everywhere. Sweet fancy Moses on toast*, but you've got a nerve.

And for those who suffer from a sense of entitlement just because they are women?

You mean the overly made-up dolls who complain about those nasty feminists emasculating men all the time, even as they're swapping stale "10 Reasons Why Cucumbers are Better than Men" email forwards with each other? The ones who never learn how to change a tire because some man will be happy to do it for them, just so long as they remember to always leave the house with their hair done and their lipstick on? The ones who simper and flirt with men and then joke later with their girlfriends about how eeeeeeeeeaaaaasssy it is to wrap men around their little fingers, like taking candy from a baby? Those women? The ones who come over here and lecture me that Men and Women Are Different?

Oh, why am I by now positive we are definitely not talking about those women? That would make too much sense, because that's where I see a definite sense of entitlement. "I'm a girly-girl who really knows how to handle a man, so, like, men should give me stuff." Never mind how insulting it is to men to treat them like problems to be HANDLED; in the minds of these women, they're the Real Ladies and I'm just some nasty dyke feminist who hates men. (But just catch me kissing the internet toads they do in order to build a little traffic. Just catch me.) And yet I suspect that in Dr. Helen's eyes, I'm the one with the sense of entitlement regarding my sex, because the feminists, you know, they are all about the hard work for nothing and rewards for free.

Maybe a dose of reality will help those women realize what men have always known

--because they've always run shit--

--freedom and justice requires people to be responsible for their own actions, regardless of gender.

I swear, reading this conclusion makes me wish a feminist actually had written a defense of Deb Frisch's behavior from a feminist perspective, JUST SO THIS MISERABLE POST WOULD FINALLY MAKE SOME SENSE.

In the interests of completeness I should note that the post now has an update in which the good doctor clarifies the breast-baring business, but it's a whole lot of hearsay-ish "This is my interpretation of events" and I'll be honest, by now I don't trust this person to give me a coherent summary of the sun rising.

Suffice to say that ostensibly, the REAL problem is that this flasher of the headlights is discriminating against men in the classroom, and worse, she thinks posting pictures of her ta-tas will somehow get her out of the trouble she's in, the trouble she's in for discriminating against men in her classroom, because . . . uh . . . yeah, we're back to entitlement again . . . good gravy . . . look, the update makes no sense either. Can you just trust me on this one? Okay.


*Basically stolen from here, except I like it better without butter.