Dear Matt,
This post is in response to your recent attempts to write humorously about a topic we can all agree is loaded. Yeah, I mean both of your rape "satires", not just the one you quickly took down and "apologized" for.
I can see you're struggling with the genre, so I thought I'd helpfully link you up to a writer you'll recognize, Lindy West, who wrote a brilliant piece about How To Tell A Rape Joke.
Oops, my bad! I know how much you dislike feedback from women females on any subject whatsoever (especially if the subject is women females themselves), so let me link you instead to a male masculine comic you might relate too. Like you, Louis CK is bald, pale, pudgy, and has built a stellar career on charting his trouble with girls.
Louis CK has done several bits concerning rape but this one is my personal favorite. (In case you don't "get it," the "butt" of the joke here is the girl and / or rape culture itself -- yet women find it as funny as men do.)
Enjoy!
La Strega
Or so says Matt Forney, in response to a comment I left on his blog giving his most recent post a C-.
"Herds of rabbits???" I wrote in imaginary red ink in the imaginary margins of his unimaginably weak essay. "Logic?" "Over generalizing!" and "Please support this assertion."
I know, I know: quit picking on Matt Forney! He has enough problems, especially now that half of Portland Reddit is about to tar, feather, and ride him out of town on a rail. And God knows I have enough grading to do without taking on another recalcitrant student; it's not like I'm getting paid by the head.
Yet I can't help laughing. Cancer! Really? In typically hyperbolic, manospheric fashion, Matt will never reach for a fly-swatter when he can fire his really big cannon.
Now I realize I'm not just some overworked, underpaid, ineffectual frump with a crummy M.A. Rather, I am a curiously powerful, even dangerous creature, part of a vast malignancy invading the highest portals of learning, stealthily inserting the tentacles of feminism and liberalism into every nook and cranny. The horror! The horror!
In fact, when I say that I "toil in the basement of academe," even that's a stretch: I teach remedial English in a community college (or, as one wag put it, "13th grade with ashtrays"). Which means that going to the manosphere for recreational reading is, for me, a kind of busman's holiday. It also means that Young Matt greatly overestimates my Power to influence young minds, either for Good or Evil.
Trust me, had I such powers, my students would recognize comma splices by now.
Cancer is no joke, of course. At the moment, I have four-count 'em-four friends
who are either in treatment for, or in remission from, cancers of various lethal sorts plus two peers who have died in the past two years (I really don't have many friends, so that is a lot.) And since everyone in my circle is aging at an even faster rate than I am, "cancer" is likely to become an ever-increasing presence in all our lives. Bummer.
"Everybody's dead or dying and I don't feel so well myself," as my mother used to grimly chirp -- before she died too.
Back to grading essays! I am twenty down, fifty to go. Each essay takes at least 15 minutes to read and mark: you do the math.
I hate to link to one of Roosh's posts, cuz I know it just gives him more hits, but the videos from Romania are pretty funny, especially the one where he wanders around a half-empty subterranean shopping mall looking for girls. All I can think about is, He's paid a thousand dollars to fly to Europe and he's in a deserted underground mall? WTF? I'm not sure what I'd be doing there, but I'd definitely want to do it above ground, in daylight, where I could actually see something.
In one video he is a guest on a local TV show, sandwiched between two lissome Romanian girls, and being thrown questions in broken English that are meant to show the audience what a perfect tool he is. I'm pretty sure he realizes they're making fun of him, but he is just so damn happy to be on camera he can't stop grinning. (It warms my heart to see Roosh smile, but when he laughs, he exposes his teeth and tosses his head back, so that one can't help but picture a braying donkey.)
Again, I don't know what I would wear if I were invited to appear on Romanian television, but I'm sure that whatever it was, it would be clean. Maybe Roosh's faded t-shirt and peculiarly unflattering jeans are freshly laundered, but they don't look like it. There he is, complaining about what slobs American women are, and look! He's showing the Romanian public that American men are equally slobby. I don't think he's doing American guys any favors over there. And what's with the crotch shot? He has spread his legs just as far apart as he can, like he's saving a seat on the bus for a friend who's getting on later. It doesn't even look like a comfortable posture.
Oh God now I sound like his mother. And we all know what Roosh thinks of his mother.
In his favor, Roosh is definitely showing a flair for comedy in these videos. Maybe he can get himself cast in a European sitcom, playing himself ? I'm serious! It could happen!
One of these days I mean to visit Toronto, because until recently I had heard nothing but rave reviews of this sparkling, multicultural cosmopolis. My parents visited Toronto when I was a teenager. They returned with a beautiful Indian scarf for me (which I still cherish) and praise for the sophistication and civility of its residents. A friend of mine used to date a Canadian lad. Unfortunately, when he sold his Toronto condo and moved to Edmonton, she kind of lost interest...
The only person I've run across to say a disparaging word about Toronto was Roosh, who had a recent, spectacularly unsuccessful weekend there, unable to persuade one single lady to return to his hotel room for a sip of flavored vodka. (I know, flavored vodka? Blecchh. But apparently that's what all the cool club kids are drinking.)
Apparently, he is still stinging from his defeat.
Roosh was offended by a young Toronto lass' words in response to his negativity about "game" in Toronto. (Read her entire post; it's quite funny.)
Roosh observed that "Girls are more excited about getting late night food than having sex."
Emilia: "Could not agree more. Everytime my friends and I heard the song “Gasolina” we changed the lyrics to “Pizzaiola”. The Diana. The Americana. OOOOOhhhh Vittoria. No sex beats a late night slice."
This made me chuckle. It also made me recall the great Southern wit Florence King, who once wrote, "I've had sex and I've had food. And I'd rather eat." Never were truer words spoken. And the older a woman gets, the truer they become. Which explains Food Porn and my own ever-expanding waistline.
Roosh also wrote that "Girls [in Toronto] cock block more than anywhere else in the world.
Emilia responds: "Girls don’t cock block. If a girl wanted to fuck you,
she’d fuck you. Even with seven of her friends yelling at her to stop,
she will proceed with no caution. I’ve literally had to owe my friends
money for sleeping with people they hate. I’ve had friends run out of
cabs and go back to people they were dragged from."
I nod my head vigorously in agreement. I hate to tell you how many guys I had sex with that my girlfriends warned me about. (Did I listen? Never! Were they right? Always!)
I'll admit that due to my advanced age, the term "cock blocking" is new to me. Back in the day, we just called it "being a good friend."
Roosh also complains, "Buy a girl drinks or she loses interest."
Emilia says, "I don’t know
how to say this without sounding shallow but here’s the truth: whatever
you’re talking about, we don’t care. Something about sports, something
about your job, maybe you have a dog, we don’t give a shit. Less talkee,
more shotsee."
I mean really, Roosh (and his lame-ass followers): Do you expect intelligent, attractive young women to fuck you stone cold sober? Men like you should fucking worship at the shrine of Dionysius.
Anyway, I guess Roosh has declared Toronto off-limits to his acolytes, which is nothing but good news for the ladies of Toronto.
I haven't read Matt Forney's blog much, mainly because when he isn't trolling for hits with outrageous posts, he's really, really boring.
He's an acolyte of Roosh, and religiously reviews everything Roosh writes, but never writes about his own adventures putting "game" into practice. He comes across as the prototypical "forty year old virgin." He seems deeply cynical about politics although he leans toward libertarianism. He is very interested in the male-bonding aspect of being an MRA, and his writing about the need for male friendship is his most original and poignant. His current preoccupation is how to make a living as a blogger. Good luck!
For a while he was working in the oil fields of North Dakota before he did a mini-Jack Kerouac and hitch-hiked to Portland. I understand that Williston is about the worst place in the world for horny guys (with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia). But my burning question to Matt is, Why Portland?
For a guy who really hates social liberals and radical feminists, Portland seems an odd choice indeed.
Why don't these lonely guys move where the odds are more in their favor?
If you are an introverted, deeply conservative guy who wants to meet women, why leave the midwest? Why not head for, I dunno, Wichita or Tulsa? Why not join a fundamentalist church (where there are loads of pretty, virtuous girls who are busting to become full time home makers for some traditional, manly-man)?
If you want a woman who looks and comports herself like a bimbo a starlet, why not take up pimping photography and move to Los Angeles?
If you are a guy who is only attracted to women with <7.5 body fat, join a coed sports team or start running marathons.
If you don't like dissolute women, stay out of bars. (Hint: Bars are where barflies hang out.) On the other hand, if you believe only drunk women will "bang" you, but hate gold-diggers, stay away from the clubs where "venture capitalists" and attorneys hang out.
If you yourself are overweight, quit whining that only fat chicks will date you. Or perhaps entertain the possibility that equity of physical attractiveness is a good predictor of long term stable relationships.
If you know in your heart-of-hearts that you can't compete for top-drawer "talent" but refuse to "settle," well, instead of zipping off to Moldava, why not save your pennies and occasionally treat yourself to a really high class call girl?
My point is, to sit around and complain about the dearth of models in your basement is pretty silly, isn't it?
.
Here he goes again! Roosh performs a "brutal take down on a budding feminist" who has dared to write in her school paper about the MRM in disparaging ways. (How does Roosh find time to scour the editorial pages of small provincial college papers, anyway?)
So the "brutal take down" starts out with a bucket load of sarcastic vitriol, the gist of which seems to be a dismissal of her views on the basis that he (Roosh) is no more an MRA than he is "a merman."
You see, Roosh is not an MRA -- oh no! Anyone who has read his blog(s) knows that Roosh is vastly superior to the typical "passive" MRA, mostly because, about five times a year, he manages to get himself laid. How silly to conflate misogynistic MRAs with misogynistic PUAs. Shows how much those dumb "feminists" know!
"Thank you, Paige, for your opinion piece about Men’s Rights Activism. In particular, thank you for using fallacious arguments to suggest that because you don’t care for the mission and the tactics of some MRA’s, MRA’s are a farce. Thank you for demonstrating that hasty generalization, straw man, false equivalence and other lapses of logic are not limited to men alone. Thank you for demeaning what many men perceive to be an inherent violation of bodily autonomy and integrity by dismissively saying that it’s not as bad as the “very real issue” of female circumcision. Thank you for grudgingly acknowledging that some MRA’s aren’t a complete waste of time and, as self-appointed Spokeswoman for Feminism, deigning to give me permission to advocate for those things that you believe should be important to me as a man. Thank you for making it clear that it is ok for a member of one gender to tell another gender what to think. Thank you for misrepresenting feminism as a unequivocally, schism-free homogenous quest for good, unlike fractious and controversial men’s rights, and that it is acceptable to define a civil rights movement by an outsider’s perception of its basest members. Most importantly, thank you for demonstrating the self-righteous ignorance and arrogance that drives much of the anti-feminist sentiment that you observed in many of the groups you wrote about. I also would like to pre-emptively thank you for misunderstanding this comment as an attack on women and feminism in general, rather than a criticism of the vapid and condescending nonsense you somehow had the temerity to publish."
But then? It's like the man cannot help himself. In the end he just has to "go there," delivering his customary coup de grace by attacking the girl's physical appearance. This time he cannot bring himself to call her "ugly," he isn't quite that delusional -- so he settles on calling her "fat." Then tacks on a condescending remark, that she can thank him later for his advice to hit the gym.
First of all, Roosh, you realize that when you tell women they are unattractive to you, they mostly react with sighs of relief? The last thing any girl, fat or thin or in-between, needs is to have to fend off the advances of a sociopathic loser.
Second of all, Roosh, do you even recognize what the word "fat" means, anymore? Has every woman with half a brain and a voice that demands to be heard become "fat" by default?
As a genuinely fat person, I am dismayed by the use of this word to describe people who are thin. As a fat person (fat baby, fat girl, fat woman, and fat crone), I reckon I have rightful claim to that word.
You wanna know what a fat arm looks like? I'll send you a picture. It will give you a real frisson of disgust, and if you tell me that my upper arms resemble "bleached hams," well, I'll laughingly concur.
Readers know Roosh prefers women who have been professionally posed, made up, have long (and "big") hair, and/or photo-shopped to the nth degree, but still... that bicep he has circled doesn't look plump, or even flabby, by any normal medical or aesthetic standard.
In short, this girl is in no way "fat." Au contraire, this is a girl who is very young, quite slender, and perfectly lovely to look at in every respect, by any conventional standard.
Sorry if I seem to be beating the point to death, but if she is fat, then what am I? Nothing?
Never mind. I didn't want to go there, Roosh, but you made me, you made me say this: this young woman, purely on the basis of physical attractiveness, is so "out of your league," that it makes your whole post laughable. Your arrows have rubber tips. The only way a girl that looks like this would go home with you is because she was (1) poor, and (2) thought you had some money (in other words, if she weren't North American), or (3) was forcibly abducted (and please don't take that as a viable option).
I'm sorry to say this, Roosh -- but YOU MADE ME. YOU MADE ME SAY THIS!
I'm not alone in recognizing the black thread of melancholy that runs through Roosh's writing, that "tugs at [one's] heartstrings."
(One of his followers, Delicious Tacos, is sad too; however, his superior writing skill, sense of irony, and higher degree of self-awareness actually gives his blogging some pretension to literary merit.)
How can I feel sorry for someone whose views I find so thoroughly repellant and even downright evil? Well, what can I say? I cheered the mob on during the Iranian Revolution of '77. I rejoiced at the downfall of the corrupt Pahlavi Dynasty. Yet I still wept for the Shahbanou as her husband died in lonely exile of cancer, and she lost two children to suicide. I even find pathos in reading about the last hours of Hitler and Goebbels.
I'm sorry that some people were ever born, yet their suffering and demise bring me no satisfaction: only further sorrow. See, I am sad, too, and in that respect have everything in common with every human on the planet.
In his video posts Roosh wears a plaintive expression and projects a low affect. He occasionally clutches his head or his hands and looks down before locking his eyes on the camera. He seems to emit a faint sigh as he launches into the sermon du jour. The burden of his vocation weighs heavily upon his narrow shoulders. Posts are often prefaced with mild physical complaints about his surroundings or health (and his travel guides demonstrate an uncommon obsession with the state of his bowels or the cleanliness of local toilets). I don't think I've seen him ever laugh, or even smile, in these posts. His body language suggests that addressing his minions is rather a trial, more obligation than opportunity. The backgrounds (often kitchenettes) suggest cold, stark, clean but inexpensive accommodations, empty as the life that inhabits them. One commenter has observed that Roosh would look utterly at home posing for Unhappy Hipsters.
A lot of readers, including his own fan base, speculate what will happen to Roosh in the next decade. I don't think anyone foresees a happy ending to this story. Once he was a young guy who probably seemed, on the face of it, to hold a lot of promise, at least to his parents. But the chances of picking up his pre-Roosh identity are dim. Because of his notoriety, no U.S. company can ever hire him. It is likely he would even have trouble trying to legally change his name.
Will he finally cross the line and be convicted of rape? Will he be murdered by one of his victims, her friends or family members, or a vigilante group?
Perhaps he will emigrate to another country, but once his true identity is revealed in the process (and because he has relatively few assets), most countries will consider him undesirable. Even if another country accepts him, he is unlikely to enjoy the lifestyle of a permanent expatriate, for as much as he complains about the "corruption" of American culture, he writes with even more contempt of, and less insight into, others.
In my girlfriend's parlance, He's really screwed the pooch, and I don't see any way out. In the immediate future, he'll continue to milk his current roles as PUA guru and feminist provocateur even though he is only marginally successful at the former pursuit and widely mocked at the latter. At any rate, time is running out, which is what most of us begin to understand in our thirties. While a 33 year old hitting on club girls is pushing the socially-sanctioned limits of adolescence, a 40 year old doing the same thing is a universal object of ridicule.
