Don't Get Me Wrong, I Love Dogs!

Whenever the topic of gender came up, my old boyfriend, Paul, used to assert that,  "Men are dogs."  Our ensuing argument always followed along the same lines, with me protesting, "Not all men are dogs!  You're not a dog."  "I am a dog," Paul would counter, "because I am a man.  And all men are dogs."  (By insisting that men were dogs, Paul was claiming men were slaves to their dominant, hormone-driven instincts.  Or something like that.)  After a few rounds, I gave up trying to convince Paul to take a more evolved stance on the matter, and after a couple of years, boredom and frustration with Paul's distorted logic and lack of sophistication took its toll, and I broke off with him.

Whether comparing men with dogs (or rabbits), or women with hamsters (or chickens or snakes), barnyard analogies render any argument meaningless.  They are simply ways to "dehumanize" the other so that you don't have to treat them as individuals with unique qualities and experiences worthy of consideration.  While it's true that humans, like wolves, are pack animals, as any (reputable) social scientist will tell you, to understand the origins of our own behaviors, we are better off studying the higher primates, i.e., chimpanzees. (I'm a bonobo myself.)

And yet-- and yet--

Today I found myself wondering if Paul wasn't right.  Men in groups can certainly act like dogs in packs.  I have four (male) dogs myself.  Each dog, on his own, is a sweet and distinct individual.  As a group, however (Anyone say "kibbies?") they form a howling, snarling mob bent on chaos and destruction, impervious to either reason or protocol.  

Roosh recently got a couple of e-mails which he reproduced in part in his forum.  Apparently they were from a male friend of one of the "conquests" Roosh had described in a book.  What the sender's messages lacked in coherence and literacy, he made up in sincerity.

Sample of what the "white knighter" wrote to Roosh:

"I hope you [Roosh] feel bad for what you did. You betrayed her.... Do you ever think of the consequences you create when you do this? What pain you create?...  I believe this is a form of terrorism towards other countries and to the people you have hurt already. Terrorism is defined as creating terror in people and that is what you do when you write about your conquest. It is the woman's fault too, to fall for your game and they have had a choice to sleep with you, but it is not fair to them that you write about it without their permission...What you did to her was uncalled for.  You scared her... When you write your books, please warn them or at least send them a book so that way they can take steps to prepare for the shame you might bring them. .. to be published in your books of accomplishments with women would make any woman feel cheep, used, and disgraced..."

These tidbits are the bones that Roosh throws to his troops, who slavishly leap into the fray like... well, like a pack of dogs.  A grindingly predictable thread follows, in which the Roosh's minions deride the "beta orbiting" e-mailer's masculinity and dignity (for protesting the treatment of his friend), and lavish praise on Roosh, All Hail to the Chief, etc., ad nauseum.  In this way, Roosh uses a "threat" to the Group Think to reinforce his own authority.  He's very shrewd that way (part of why he's scary).

Ironically, the "hive mind" of females is a persistent trope among misogynists.

I can only hope that on some level, some of of these Rooshites realize:  Hey, he [the victim's friend] has a point...  Maybe it's not very manly or heroic to exploit women that way...  I wouldn't like it if it were my sister / my friend / my daughter Roosh was exploiting sexually and monetarily. .. 

(While some manosphere bloggers do concede that Roosh isn't the type of guy they'd want their sisters to marry, they don't seem able to take empathy any further.)