Not too many people have read my post on Atheism+ yet, but already I have received some very energetic feedback. Nate Thomas sent me this message via facebook and agreed to let me post it here in its entirety so we can have a public discussion about it. I'll withhold my commentary for a later post so he can make his argument without interruption (other than to note that this was a response he wrote to some other "A-plussers" that he forwarded to me).
Nothing wrong with [men] asking for equal social justice: leaving our genitals alone at birth, being handed equal prison terms, being afforded the same opportunity to available mental and healthcare, not restricting men's sports in the name of "equal number of athletes" (see Title IX), not being vilified (nearly always wrongly) for being male. It's that sort of thing.
The feminists of yesteryear fought nobly and hard for social justice, something with sticking power, something with substance. Today's feminist movement looks to control men as a sort of payback it seems and to only paint them as horrible members of society unless they're willing to suck the tit until their death, and making basic social orders difficult for men to access so that some women may reap the benefits (custody battles, WIC, government programs, healthcare). This whole war of genders is out of control. If we afford one aspect or right to one gender, then the other must indisputably also be included. It's a simple equation, really.
"Male privilege" is an illusion. Men and women are on different ends of the same spectrum so each side can make equal argument of "privilege" to the other. Crimes against men by women go largely unreported or further pursued by law enforcement. Unsubstantiated crime allegations against men is also notably high. Crimes overall against men are exponentially higher than that of men on women. Men are humiliated in movies by women, but never the other way around -- that would be -- gasp! -- sexist! Genital humor is always at the expense of men, not women. If a man doesn't protect his family, he is a coward; but if a woman doesn't, she's in distress. If a man commits suicide (which is 3x higher than women) he's a coward. If a woman does it, it must be illness. If a woman is scantily clad, sitting on a car, it's rape-culture objectification, but if David Beckham launches his tightly-hugged member across a billboard it's savvy and acceptable. The double standards in America concerning our genders is disturbingly exceptional. Healthy white males are the least protected class in America, so this "privilege" garbage is meaningless rhetoric.
People need to accept that certain genders excel at different tasks, and that if there is a social stigma or issue for one gender, it likely hits the other gender in just as remarkable a nature.
To claim that MRAs are assholes is nothing shy of demonstrating the ability to be shallow, caused by the callousness of being told that to think otherwise makes you inferior and a sexist, much like in the same way when someone disagrees with a political stand made by Obama, that person is labeled a racist, rather than someone merely having a different political view.
Men and women are not -- and never will be -- equal. Sexual dimorphism is what evolution produced for us, and because we're just moving away from the tree tops, we're not very close to a single unification of equalness.
(And I can't think of one movement within atheism that took a stand on MRA. You are, however, confusing that with this sexist-inspired A+ with which I KNOW you have to be intimately familiar. A couple of bloggers wanted a little more clout in the community, and on the successful run atheism has been having in America, they decided to attached their lady bits on the heels of atheism's success. But you have to agree even THAT is stupid. Atheism is nothing more than thinking life is a natural byproduct of biological and cosmological occurrences that were not transpired by the power of a god. To attach anything more to it is without merit. MRA isn't anti-female, by the way. )
The failure of A+: http://thunderf00tdotorg.wordpress.com/2012/08/26/a-atheism-plus-for-a-third-glorious-age-of-total-agreement/
A atheist woman's perspective on MRA: http://www.youtube.com/user/girlwriteswhat
Dispelling myths of men and women:
http://www.youtube.com/user/manwomanmyth
-Nate Thomas
Edit
My response post is finally up. Link
If Nate Thomas ever crawled out of the cave in which he lives in order to spew this shit in the presence of an actual human being, instead of hiding behind the comfort & anonymity of the internet, I might give half a fuck about what he says.
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