M>w was created by Dick Masterson, aka Dax Herrera (DM/DH), a brilliant satirist (and programmer/marketing guru) who tickles my fancy when he - as a member of Dicktastics - tickles the ivories:
He may or may not believe everything he writes: that's not for me to say. Most of his posts are so outrageous I tend to believe he's just taking the piss out his readers. But . . . and this is true of many of the posters . . . he has some really good points in all of that hilarious ranting.
I think some posters are rabid women-haters, but not all of them, and perhaps not the majority of them. Many of the posters are sick of certain aspects of our culture they believe - and they could be right about - unfairly benefit women. Many are annoyed with feminism and its precepts, and in that I can agree with much of their criticism.
I am not a feminist; I am a humanist. As my singular friend STV has said: "this is the hard planet..." It's not tough just to be female or black or gay or an immigrant or disabled or mentally ill or etcetcetc. It's tough to be human. While I understand certain groups have had less power in society and seek to come to civil equality, and while I immensely respect that effort, ultimately the goal should be promoting HUMAN rights. As Robert DeNiro said in the movie Brazil as he pumped shit into the obnoxious repairmen's airtight contamination suits: "We're all in it together."
Anyway, back to what I'm supposed to be talking about [Any reader will know this about me soon: I digress like a mudslide down a hill in rural South America, towards an impoverished village in a valley at the bottom. Unlike that, I do eventually get back to where I started. Appreciate any patience you can spare.]
Many of the posters generalize, which is intellectually sloppy, but has some validity: there is truth in cliche and also in stereotyping, whether we have the courage to admit it or not. But many times it's too broad [dumb pun not intended] to be wholly True. This plays back into humanism, which seeks to understand human nature - in all its glory and grace, and in all its ruin.
Here is one of my favorite quotes, by dead philosopher Baruch Spinoza:
I have laboured carefully not to mock, lament, or exercate but to understand human actions...
This is why I spend my time on a site many people think is rabidly misogynistic:
-I'm honing my writing; the topics and the likely posters' reactions challenge my abilities to write coherently.
-The mind-set fascinates me. It's like I'm a cultural anthropologist, learning about a different way of living. By that analogy, I'm not whatsoever implying the men on the site are more primitive and I'm more advanced/intelligent. Some are dumbasses, but the regulars are obviously smart and reflective (reasoning), even if I don't always agree with their contentions.
-Oddly, it helps me be a better person. Like how posting on Facing the Facts while still recovering from Borderline Personality Disorder helped me grow even more: when faced with all the pain of the SO/family members of people with BPD, I had to look at myself and take responsibility for how my actions hurt my own loved ones. I chose to see the anger that permeated the site as justifiable, and that people suffering this trauma have to work through this stage and to claim for a time the status of victim (as long as they can move out of it eventually, in their own time, because otherwise their hate will inevitably and inexorably poison their souls.
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