The growth of MRA's

[BasilFoulTea]

I thought this article is a sobering and scary one.

This is what women are up against. These groups are a direct result of some men being so outraged by their relatively small loss of privilege due to the gains of feminism, that they are prepared to kill and injure to get revenge on women.

We haven't yet got groups like these in the UK. But we will have, maybe in a decade or so. When women line up with MRA's who come to troll these boards, they should be aware of the nature of the monster they are feeding.

On that note I'm off to bed but it's not because I'm posting and running, it's because it's late so will be back tomorrow if anyone is interested in discussing this.

[ComradeJing]

Jesus...

"All he had done, he said, was smack his 4-year-old daughter and bloody her mouth after she licked his hand as he was putting her to bed. Feminist-crafted anti-domestic violence legislation did the rest."

He smacked her and made her bleed because she licked his hand.

Cunt.

[ComradeJing]

SGM the article discusses these groups and the complete and utter woman hating shit they spout. It certainly wasn't agreeing with them so it isn't quite as upsetting as it sounds from the quote.

[GeekCool]

Wow, what a read. So sad yet incredible the delusions these groups have.

[ButterPecanMuffin]

The really sad thing is, that if you read more on the Thomas James Ball case (he's the guy who hit is 4-year old daughter and made her mouth bloody), there are some flaws in the family court system in some states that do need sorting.

For example, the reason why Ball committed suicide, is that he was going to be jailed for non-payment of child maintenance and his ex-wife's legal fees.

Yet the reality is, Ball had been unemployed for over two years, and that would mean he had no money coming in. Different states have different rules, on how long someone will be paid unemployment benefit concurrently, but the maximum is two years (the average is one year). You then can't claim again for another year.

Ball was told if he showed at the next court date, without the money, he would be jailed until he paid up. However, that is utterly ludicrous, because how could he be expected to get the money to pay, if he was stuck behind bars?! Better surely, to give the guy some help to get a job, and then he could pay.

Ball accepted he owed the money, he never said he wouldn't pay, in fact he wanted to pay, but he couldn't at that time.

The issue with Ball hitting his daughter sickens me, so please don't think I'm a fan of his, because I'm not. I just think the details you find if you look further into his case, do highlight some issues that need to be addressed with the US family court system.

However, the importance of these issues get lost, when men like Ball try to get their point across in such violent and misogynistic ways.

[MoChan]

If that was the case, then his problem was with the legal system. Not women, or feminists. The legal system.

[ButterPecanMuffin]

That's what I've just said isn't it?

[MoChan]

But he directed his anger at women, didn't he? Otherwise he wouldn't be mentioned in an article about war-on-women? Did I misunderstand something?

[SmellsLikeTeenStrop]

He's become a bit of a messiah figure to those who hate women and wish to see a return to the old status quo. In the article they quote the MRAs as saying he 'sacrificed himself for their children'. It's all a bit weird really.

[ButterPecanMuffin]

He directed his anger towards the system and women. He was angry at the system because he thought it was stacked in favor of women, and he was angry towards women (especially his ex-wife), as he believed they take advantage of the system being so "stacked in their favor".

I believe there were a handful of areas where he valid concerns about the court system, but the way to deal with that, would have been to enter into dialogue about it.

But of course, this is my beloved America, where sadly too many people have the gung-ho approach.

[ButterPecanMuffin]

If you want to read Ball's "last statement" in full, you can do so here:

freekeene.com/2011/06/16/thomas-james-ball-self-immolated-in-protest-of-the-justice-system/

Be warned, it's very long, and also there are some disheartening comments being made at the end.

[Chocobo]

right - so this man smacks his young daughter in the mouth hard enough to make her bleed (over some silly harmless mucking about). The court says he can see his children if he attends counselling so instead of doing that he refuses and tries to fight it out through the court.

Am not sure why he could not have complied with the court whilst campaigning against the system and any perceived unfairness - that way he would have still have been able to see his children or am I reading it wrong?!!

He mentions in his last statement (a lot of which I admittedly lost the will to read) that he wants to change the system to stop his children from being fucked up by it when they are adults and then sets fire to himself. Yes because that is not going to fuck them up more is it?!!

And this man is being a lauded as a hero by MRAs? What a load of bollocks to put it plainly.

[sunshineandbooks]

Apologies in advance for the long post.

I actually have some compassion for Ball. Reading that 'last statement' it seems obvious to me that the man had completely lost all grip on reality. I suspect that his MH problems probably began as a result of his military experience and was tipped over the edge by having the system he thought he was defending (when in service) suddenly hold him to account for his unacceptable behaviour towards his daughter. The fact that he took his life in such a violent manner is truly tragic.

However, while I feel compassion towards him, I find it disturbing that a platform is being given to someone with obvious MH difficulties who advocates such extreme violence.

His account is perception and opinion. It is not cold, hard facts. His statistical analysis is flawed in multiple ways, but even supposing it were true, what argument is that supposed to make? That families should stay together even in cases of domestic abuse because the alternative is poverty for everyone? If his argument had been that the state doesn't do enough to enable different family structures to support themselves and therefore needs to change - including making child support payments more reliable and perhaps suggesting insurance to cover periods of unemployment, it would make a lot more sense. But that's not what he was saying. Basically, he wants the state to keep out of family relationships and encourage people to stay together regardless of what goes on behind closed doors.

His use of language reflects male privilege and misogyny. He belittles his ex-wife's ability to think for herself and considers himself the king-pin for the family unit. He almost has a god complex, and there is a direct link there I feel with his later action of setting himself on fire. It's a shame the letter was not seen beforehand, as any decent human being reading it would have instantly recognised that this was a man who needed help; not a martyr for a righteous () cause.

The idea that the whole system is designed to screw his life up is tragically sad and attests to his state of mind. While there are many convincing arguments for why we should reform family law both in the UK and the US, the idea that the 'system' will fabricate problems with a father in order to make money is just so far out there I don't know where to start. They have enough real cases to contend with that they don't need to start making them up.

I suspect that given the incredibly strong correlation between domestic abuse and child abuse, and the fact that very few offences of either type are ever reported in the first instance, the professionals at MFS probably suspected that more was going on than the incident that brought the family to their attention in the first place. Whether or not that was the case, none of us know, but his refusal to co-operate speaks volumes, none of it favourably.

I can see how he descended into such a pit, but Ball moulded himself into a victim. Indeed, in some ways he was a victim - someone whose MH was spiralling so out of control yet no one noticed. But that victim mentality is not a healthy perception of reality.

I am not privy to the full details of the case, but his refusal to accept responsibility for his actions and his belligerence towards the system suggests to me that the judge may have suspected Ball was guilty of deliberately avoiding avoid paying child support.

A very quick google on Ball's case brought up this:

Seth Harp, a retired Georgia senator and former member of the state's Child Support Guidelines Commission told MSNBC.com that incarceration was used sparingly, and only really for people who are found in willful contempt.*

"You can't get blood out of a turnip, but you can put the turnip in the cooler," he said. "And in 34 years of doing this, it's amazing, you put someone in the cooler and the money seems to come."

Don't get me wrong - jailing someone who clearly does not have the means to pay but is willing to is wrong. That's an attack on the poor and not dissimilar in principle to the idea behind the Victorian debtor prisons. It's an issue that should be tackled but it is entirely separate to the question of family law and domestic violence. I can't see why someone's inability to pay means that the police should drop their policy to always arrest in cases of domestic abuse.

I'm concerned that a man who thinks it is perfectly acceptable to 'bloody' his daughter's mouth and advocate extreme violence against those who disagree with him is considered an appropriate figurehead for any sort of campaign. Let alone one that that argues that family law treat fathers unfairly. Any movement who lauds Ball as a hero for the cause rather than a tragic, disturbed individual clearly has ulterior motives and couldn't give a damn about children's rights or victims of domestic violence.

[Chocobo]

sunshineandbooks I love reading your posts. I always think they come across as well considered and thought out - I always end up thinking I wish I had written that :)

Actually I think Ball said in his statement that he could have got the money, which he admits was not a huge amount, for the hearing but chose not to.

[Beachcomber]

I agree with what sunshineandbooks said but I suspect I have less compassion.

This man quite clearly has MH issues but he also demonstrates hyper-masculinity, a massive sense of entitlement and misogyny in his statement. Many of the usual MRA traits are there; comparing being accused of DV as akin to being a Jew in Nazi Germany, it is always everybody's else's fault and never his, a sense of right to be violent towards his family, a delusional belief that men are equally victims of DV as women, etc.

He also appears to be a pyromaniac what with the Molotov cocktails and the way he killed himself. Quite obviously a dangerous and unstable individual. Possibly due to his military career - which just goes to prove what we all already know, patriarchy hurts men too.

Choosing not to pay maintenance you can pay, and refusing court ordered counselling, and then complaining that the world is against you and won't let you see your kids, just smacks of the usual MRA bullshit.

No wonder they think this guy is some sort of hero/martyr - and that says a whole lot more about the MRAs than it does the court system or anything else.

[Beachcomber]

Aah I see he complains about men not being allowed into women and children only shelters, and compares this to racism.

He thinks that the women in these shelters will become paedophiles and have sex with the male children there because they are being denied a good sexing from a grown man.

My compassion is decreasing with each paragraph I read.

[GeekCool]

Thank you sunshineandbooks. Brilliant post :)

[sunshineandbooks]

Thanks for the nice comments.

The whole thing is almost a tragi-comedy in terms of its deviation from reality, apart from the fact that the kind of people who hold Ball up as some sort of hero are dangerous, and that's not funny.

[Beachcomber]

These sorts of people remind slightly of football hooligans - they're not in it for the football, they're in it for the violence.

With MRAs they aren't in it for justice or rights, they're in it for the feminist hating.

Everything is the fault of feminism and feminists (and mothers).

[ButterPecanMuffin]

familyrights.us/news/archive/2011/june/thomas_james_ball/

I'm slowly losing the will to live.

Plus some of the other articles on this American Family Rights site have left me dumbfounded.

[sunshineandbooks]

I think what really irritates me about a lot of the MRA groups is that they all seem to insist on labelling themselves as family something or other or father (so implying family) when what they mean is men's rights. They clearly don't care at all about children and have only contempt for women, so why use the word family? Anyone who thinks a man who beats up the mother of his children or who refuses to pay child support is a man with family values is a fuckwit IMO.

[KRITIQ]

I don't know if I have the stamina to read the links posted, but may have a go with a stiff cup of coffee later.

The thread just reminded me though that the MRA phenomenon isn't actually new, but perhaps we're more aware of it because the internet makes it easy for them to spew their bile here, there and everywhere and harder to avoid "encountering" them and their cheerleaders in internet discussion spaces all over.

Nearly 20 years ago, I was working for a feminist organisation and we regularly got random phone calls from someone who purported to be from the UK Men's Movement. One of them even rang up when I was doing a radio programme during the phone in section to have a rant. I was younger and probably a bit naive, not thinking about my own personal safety or that of colleagues, but with so much info out there in cyberspace, I'm much more wary about what a few blokes with Mt Olympus sized chips on their shoulders can do.

Suppose what I'm saying is that very vocal, campaigning misogynists have always been there. I don't know if there are more of them or they are more influential now, but we certainly do seem to encounter them more frequently and are probably more aware of them.

[BasilFoulTea]

The thing that became clear to me when reading that article, is that what men's rights groups are fighting for, is the right to abuse the women and children they live with, without being held accountable for that abuse.

I really do think that that's what it all comes down to and the reason they hate feminists and feminism so much - feminism was the only political movement, which actually painstakingly showed the systematic nature of male violence against women and children, none of which any other movement did. The socialist movement was aware of discrepancies in status, but it really didn't touch the violence issue in any major way at all AFAIK. So of course, these abusive men see it as feminism's fault, that they are no longer allowed to punch their children in the mouth without the state stepping in to tell them that that's not allowed. And they feel outraged by it - like it's a real attack on their basic human rights, to punish them for doing something that they're entitled to do and only some silly passing fashion, says that currently, they're not allowed to.

They want to make sure that they regain the right to hit us and our children, whenever they like, without that having any negative consequences for them whatsoever. I don't know why it never dawned on me before. The real outrage, apart from the money and control, is being expected to keep their violence out of their homes. They feel it as a total infringement of their freedom.

[mcmooncup]

You are so right Basil. And it scares me a little

[KRITIQ]

Yes, sadly I think you are right. I would put them in the same category as race hate groups or anti-semitic hate groups - people who believe they are superior and have a right to exercise their privileged position over those they see as inferior by any means necessary.

In a similar way, you'll always get some people saying, "well you know they have a point. . . " and picking up on one bit of something they've said that doesn't seem ridiculously extreme while somehow managing to sidestep the great swathes of bigotry and nastiness all around. I've heard that often in discussions of support for the BNP. I've heard similar in discussions about men's rights organisations.

Speaking of which, I seem to recall last time I checked the "UK Men's Movement" website (and that was nigh on 10 years ago,) it only took a few clicks of links, and their links to reach websites for far right, which supremacist causes. There may be more connecting some of these extremist groups than just their shared over inflated sense of entitlement.