Male Sexuality, Un-Demonized

Commercial sexual services are a feature of every human society, a fact which suggests such services address basic human needs transcending cultural boundaries.

However, in feminist influenced cultures, including our own, a persistent and shrill narrative continues to denounce the existence of this area of commerce, and the consumers of commoditized sex, using hyperbolic language such as "the commercial rape industry" or equating transactional sexual encounters as innately violent.

Sexualized imagery is similarly condemned with claims that sexualization of women de-humanizes them or dis-empowers them. All of this narrative wielded by feminists in service of the goal of characterizing male sexuality, and the human needs of men to feel desired as pathological, perverse, or criminal.

Understanding breeds compassion, and so, within the theoretical framework of the Compassion for Men Movement, we begin with an examination of one of the most demonized aspects of men, their use of the services offered by the sex industry. This series is a joint project by Johntheother and TyphonBlue who contributes article content at AVfM, Genderratic  and co-hosts AVfM Radio along with JTO and Girl Writes What 


Surveys of men who seek gratification through commercial sex services – either porn, or prostitution, or lap dances or any other commercial sex showed that rather than men seeking sexual gratification as rutting animals – modelled on the Dworkinian view of men as subhuman; men's motivation to seek commercial sex is based on the human need to be recognized as desirable. 

This runs contrary to the populist notion of male sexuality as debased, inferior and pathological.
Socially, men are expected to validate women's value as objects of sexual desire by exhibiting attraction, affection, and deference, but at the same time, men are also expected to weather a culturally normal climate of pre-emptive rejection. 

Further, men must pass tests of fitness, financial and physical, to ‘prove’ the worth of their desire. All of these expectations validates the feminine fantasy of hyper-desirability; desirability beyond the humanly possible.


The self validation of women and girls by rejection of positive male attention is expressed in hundreds of small, socially normal gestures and practices. De-escalation of male initiated social contacts. Two messages or more required for a single call-back. Voice message left, but only a text message returned. All these variations on ‘playing hard to get’ reflects a normal social protocol in which men, on whom the onus has always been to initiate social contact, have to make a more overt effort than that which is returned, even when the woman in question desires that contact. This establishes a climate in which men automatically assume a low level of ongoing social rejection. This is normal across our culture, and masculine complaint can be easily punished through the censure of “wimp”, “sissy” and similar minor insult. 

Feminine attire which puts secondary sexual characteristics on display is standard in casual clothing as well as evening attire or less formally “party clothes”. The obvious purpose of such clothes being to amplify the wearer's overt feminine sexuality and command attention. Conversely, although all men are expected to respond with positive attention, only those passing the feminine test of high status or conspicuous wealth are allowed to express their stimulated attention. This is the social levy exacted, but only returned to those males overtly demonstrating their utility as dispensers of upward social mobility and feminine access to resources. 

Men expressing the attraction or desire socially assumed of them also risk censure if such expression is mis-timed, too overt, or for any reason, not reciprocated.
This elaborate, confusing dance becomes much simpler in the lens of manufacturing hyper-desire. The more obstacles a man must overcome to express his desire the more the woman feels desired by the man.
Romance novels can be reduced down to a simple formula in which female desirability inspires grandiose acts of self-sacrifice on the part of the male.

The men in romance novels are ‘eyeballs and actions’, empty ciphers that exist only to illuminate the hyper-desirability of the female protagonist.
In fact this whole system, from shaming of male sexuality as debased through the expectation that men weather rejection without end in order to manufacture hyper-desire for women to it's vetting of which men are allowed to desire—excludes men from a fundamental human need—developed through eons of evolution as pair-bonders—the feeling of being desirable.
In discussions of female sexual objectification for the purpose of marketing to man, the usual language describing imagery of women usually refers to “tits and ass”. 

However, research from the Center for Behavioural Neuroscience in Atlanta[3] shows that depiction of the feminine gaze is key to male attraction to such images. It is, in fact, the sexual agency of an attractive woman, as expressed through a direct gaze towards the male subject that lights up the male’s reward response system. [4] When an attractive woman is presented as a ‘sex object’ her gaze averted and herself unengaged with him—his reward system is unresponsive.

To put it simply, men look at porn to feel sexually desirable. Men pay strippers to get positive, sexualized attention from women. Men use prostitutes to feel like whole sexual beings.
It is, in fact, the basic human need to feel not only loved, but sexually desired turns out to be what drives the use of commercial sexual services by men. Most women are aware that being a woman does not detract from their sexual desirability; most men are acutely aware that being a man most certainly does. In that context male sexual fantasies revolve around male sexuality simply being desirable.

 Porn can be likened to the fantasies of an impoverished developing nation—it’s people imagine a world with abundant and plentiful food. Romance novels are, on the other hand, the fantasies of a prosperous nation—sprawling McMansions, yachts, vacations to the Caribbean.

In this context the social censure against men’s self medication for the psychic wound inflicted on them by women’s thirst for hyper-desirability is just as morally bankrupt as a prosperous nation sneering at the ‘base and animalistic urges’ of an impoverished nation for food and clean water.
We starve men, then shame them for their hunger and then when they reach for what little food is within their grasp, we smack their hand away.

[1] http://www.genderratic.com/p/745/stripping-and-original-male-sin/
[2] http://www.cbc.ca/q/blog/2012/01/10/why-do-men-go-to-strip-clubs/

[3] http://www.science20.com/news_articles/gender_and_porn_where_men_and_women_look_first

[4] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOY3QH_jOtE&feature=player_detailpage#t=2743s

TyphonBlue teamed up with JtO to examine the human needs motivating men to seek services in the sex industry, from pornography to prostitution. TB is a Canadian social commentator who writes about the state of decay in the relationship between the genders in our culture with a focus on men’s vulnerability and women’s agency.

Feminism as a wrapper for psychopathy

Make the personal political. That's a term I searched on Google as I began to write this – and I did that search to get an idea of how much currency it still has, whether it is still a significant part of modern feminist rhetoric.

I thought it would have been buried, obsolete, no longer in use, and out of fashion. I though, surely, they cant still have left that out in the open for me to come shine a bright light on.

Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. That one's not a feminist motto, its a quote from the science fiction author Robert Heinlein, but it applies as well now as it did in the 1960's

And sure enough, my search for “Make the personal political” turned up dozens of feminist web sites. So what does this mean. Well, Erin Pizzey, when she was interviewed said:  "what it really means is, you take your personal damage , and one of the things that was very obvious in those early days of the women's movement – how many of the radical women leaders of the movement themselves, had really disturbed backgrounds, and were very very violent. And you make that political. So if my dad's a shit, all men are shits. If you say that, you can do almost anything you like"[1].

I didn't rely on just what Erin Pizzey said tho, the highest ranked search result from google turned up this:

“In feminist terms, the ‘personal is political’ refers to the theory that personal problems are political problems, which basically means that many of the personal problems women experience in their lives are not their fault, but are the result of systematic oppression” [2]

Skipping forward to the opening of the next paragraph:

"The theory that women are not to blame for their bad situations is crucial here [...] Understanding that our oppressive situations were not our own fault — were not, in the parlance of the time, “all in our head” — gave us a lot more courage as well as a more solid, real foundation on which to fight for liberation."

That's pretty clear, it means that whatever a feminist does is not her fault, it's your fault, and mine. Her problems, they're not her fault, nope, they're yours and mine. The consequences of a feminist's actions, including violence or the proxy initiation of violence – nope, she's not responsible. It's your fault and mine, once more.

This is the logical framework of a psychopath. The idea behind “the personal is political” is a framework of exemption from personal accountability for sociopaths and psychopaths, whether they are directly violent or otherwise.

What is there that cannot be excused by such a rationale?

I will suggest that if a large enough fraction of the public can be convinced to buy into this idea, then literally anything can be both excused and rationalized as a correct cause of action. This explains, for example, why the radical-hub blog entry which called for a long term program of eugenics to eliminate males from the human race – has resulted in no serious repercussions for that author, or for her publisher.

This explains why a recently well know radical feminist on youtube whose videos advocate universal worldwide castration of men, and murder of those who refuse – she has weathered no serious repercussions for advocating the forced mutilation of half the world's population.

She's also advocated the murder - ( and I note, she uses the word murder, I'm not paraphrasing from any euphemism on her part ) she advocates the murder of all physically handicapped people, and She advocates the extermination of all men and boys.

And what negative consequences have this murder advocacy brought her? None that I know of.

Her personal damage – and I don't know how any sane person can see her without seeing problems, but her issues are not her fault, and not her responsibility. And her psychopathic enthusiasm for mass murder and universal mutilation – well, we'll just pet her on the head and say “there there” because the personal is political.

Feminist organizations claim it is nothing more than the “radical notion that women are people”. Setting aside the absurd idea women being people was ever a radical notion, maybe what's meant can be gleaned by applying the principal of:

Expressio unius est exclusio alterius.

The latin dictum commonly referenced in law, which translates to:

"The express mention of one thing excludes all others"

The radical notion that only women are people comes closer to explaining the rhetoric and the accumulated results of a half century of feminist activism.

It explains why there is minimal to no significant opposition from liberal feminism when it comes to public rhetoric from the radical end of the camp on matters of mass murder of men. Those same liberal feminists who are energetic in their opposition to radical feminisms positions on legalized prostitution or the prohibition on porn. Talk about exterminating men though, all I hear is crickets.

If men are not humans, at least, if they're not thought of as humans, it's merely an academic concern when discussion turns to killing them all. A 4000 word diatribe calling for a long term program of eugenics used the phrase if we can do it with corn, men ought to be easy.

Chloe Angyal, writing for the Age.com.au in australia published an article on June 9 with the title

“Thank feminism for an ever-improving line of fathers”[4]   This is the language of a livestock breeder.

And feminism – pretty clearly, is not a synonym for psychopathy or sociopathy. Those two psychological conditions are recognized as pathologies and individuals exhibiting the behavior we'd characterize by such terms treated with revulsion. Feminism is not the same thing. To start with, it has a large and ever growing body of literature defending it, and entire departments of most universities dedicated to acculturating thousands of men and women to a belief system which in it's effects, looks like sociopathy, or psychopathy.

However, as much as we are now, and continuing to become a more and more deeply feminist acculturated society, It is not correct to say women are all simply psychopaths, or emotionally arrested toddlers. At least, they are neither of those things, until through indoctrination, upbringing and reinforcement – we make them into such creatures, and we make men into something like this too. This is why the distinction between “applied sexually selective psychopathy” (feminism)  and women. One of those two things is a group of people, and the other is an ideology. But, its an ideology the purpose of which seems to be to excuse and to advocate mass murder, the suppression of human rights of non conformists, and to excuse criminal, and violent criminal behaviour by true believers, and to increase the social damage, the anger, and pain in society to an asymptotical point.

And that's why no matter how many times it is screamed, or typed at me, and at others who opposite the dysfunctional, violent and psychopathic ideology we all know by the name feminism, I refuse to do what they keep telling me to to do, which is to indulge in the hatred of women, or gay men, or lesbians, or ethnic minorities, or anyone else based on a facet of their identities. And to listeners who might wonder – the nearly continuous torrent of accusation – the one which goes

you just hate women, you just hate women, you're a misogynist, your just hate women.

I used to think that was projection – you know, projection onto me of the reality that feminists actually hate women, which is why they keep trying to ban them from doing stuff.

Now I have a new hypothesis – the chorus shouting "you just hate women, you're a misogynist, you just hate women, they're trying their best  to convince .

Maybe, if they shout loud enough, and long enough – maybe we'll break down, and do as we're told, which is to hate women, because that would fit in perfectly with their narrative, and it would excuse and justify the ongoing marginalization of men in society.

I've always been bad at doing what I'm told. So I doubt it.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhliqceyoL8

[2] http://mindthegapuk.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/the-personal-is-political/
[3] http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/thank-feminism-for-an-everimproving-line-of-fathers-20120608-201dd.html

The article above is the text of a monologue presented on AVfM radio on Thursday 14 June. In the radio show announcement, which included the title: "is feminism just psychopathy dressed up fancy"

Dr. Eff, a contributor on the AVfM web site, and host of the Dr Eff show on AVfM radio - posted the following observation in the thread of the radio show announcement.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, defines psychopathy as indicated by three or more of the following:

1/ Failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest;

2/ deception, as indicated by repeatedly lying, use of aliases, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure;

3/ Impulsiveness or failure to plan ahead;

4/ Irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults;

5/ Reckless disregard for safety of self or others;

6/ consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior or honor financial obligations;

7/ Lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another;

Hatred, confusion and honesty

It wont surprise most readers that criticism of, or opposition to the ideology of feminism is met, usually by a predictable array of imputations of malice and ad-hominem arguments.

By far the most popular version of this is the claim is: “you just hate women” or: “you're a misogynist”.

Depending on who utters this puerile accusation it might be meant seriously, or it might be offered as a derailment of whatever is discussed. However, it is based on a particularly common failure of understanding. This is the unexamined belief that women and feminism are the same thing. Clearly, they are not.

While many offering this lazy and ignorant accusation likely do so to attempt to shame or silence or force rebuttal, changing the topic, some gender ideologues may be legitimately convinced that disagreement with, or opposition to feminism is identical to hatred of women. The following content addresses this apparent confusion.

The remainder of this article is written in simplified language. This has been done in an effort to be accessible to gender ideologues, and to others who may suffer learning disabilities, brain injury or other cognitive malfunction.

Feminism is not a group of people. It is an ideology.
That's a thing formed from ideas.

Many intelligent and thoughtful people oppose the ideology of feminism.

Feminists, those who believe in feminism, are people.
But they are special people, convinced the ideas of feminism must be true.

But even though feminists are people, who they are, and what they think are separate things.

Who you are is your identity. You cannot easily change this.
What you think are your thoughts. Your thoughts change all the time.

This is true for other people too. People's ideas and people's identities are not the same things.
Some feminists pretend their selves and their ideas are the same thing. To them, disagreement with their ideas is the same as hatred of themselves.

Of course it is harder defend an idea than to cry out : “you hate me”.

Some feminists like to do what is easier, so they become skilled at saying “you hate me”.

They are good at this, and many observers have forgotten that their crying is fake.

They make an awful racket, and they have been doing so for many years. This ruckus is quite disturbing to everybody else.

Many other people also like to do what is easy.
For them, it is easier to give in to children throwing tantrums than to correct their error.
This is the error in which disagreement is the same thing as hatred.

By contrast, some people don't want to do what is easier.
They prefer to do what is right.
When cranky children say: “you hate me” these individuals don't take the easy way out. They don't simply give those children whatever they demand.

Unlike things formed from ideas, women are people.
They are human beings, like you, and like me.

Hatred of people based on their identity has a special word. That word is bigotry.
Because they are people, hatred of women has a special word too. That word is misogyny.

When that word is used to describe disagreement with ideas, it is used incorrectly.

Pretending disagreement is the same as hate is a trick. It is a trick to cultivate shame, or to silence those who disagree. This trick is easier than forming logical arguments around an idea. Sadly, this trick is dishonest and lazy.

Some people are in love with their own ideas. These people know that there is a difference between themselves and their ideas. But they do not defend their ideas.
Instead, they pretend disagreement with those ideas is hate against themselves.

Some people are so much in love their own ideas, they become confused.
This confusion causes them to mix up what is themselves, and what is an idea.

When faced by disagreement, these people become angry and upset. For them, disagreement with an idea is the same as hate against themselves.
This is because they have mixed themselves up.
They have forgotten that themselves and their ideas are not the same things.

For these people, pretending disagreement is actually hate diverts attention away from their ideas.
It sometimes even distracts others if those ideas are not very good.

Bad ideas can be sheltered by distracting those who disagree.
Claiming “you hate me” or “you hate women” is dishonest and lazy, but it works well as a change of topic.

Some people who play this game of distractions are filled with hate.
Hate, for them, is a special kind of fear.

Those people filled with fear and hate will hide themselves behind their game of pretend.

So, they say those who disagree with them are also full of hate.
This is easier for them than being honest.
This game also gives them an excuse to play the role of victim.


When they talk, it sounds just like this:
 you just hate women!  you're a misogynist!

To adults, these people seem to be nothing but dishonest and tiresome liars.

Thank you for your kind attention.

On becoming cowards and snivelers.

In Early 2012, the American retailer JC Penny hired comedian Ellen Degeneres to be their principal spokesperson, and in the language of corporate advertising – to represent what that company presents as their values. As much as I find corporate posturing to be generally saccharine and transparent, Ellen Degeneres really does seem to be a genuinely nice human being, who, in her own words stands for: “honesty, equality, compassion, kindness, treating people the way you want to be treated, and helping those in need”.

The possibility that anyone would be frightened or intimidated by Ellen seems far-fetched, but apparently some people are terrified, as a project of the American Family Association called itself One Million Moms (with 40,000 members) attempted to have JC Penny fire Degeneres by boycotting them. The JC Penny accountants determined that more than 40,000 Americans thought One Million-Moms were a bunch of morons, and JC Penny stood behind Ellen and told the anti gay organization to go fornicate themselves. And everybody laughed about the joke, except perhaps, for 40,000 ahem, moms.

This organization tried again when JC Penny advertized a sale on Father's day, featuring two male actors as presumably gay fathers – apparently motivating the million moms to further publicize JC Penny. There was even some speculation that the apparently anti gay organization was created by JC Penny to generate publicity for the retailer. Much amusement was had by all.

And then along came a group of very well funded arbiters of right and wrong who slapped a label on One Million Moms parent organization the American Family Association, ensuring nobody would ever have to consider another word they said. Let it be known henceforth that the American Family Association is a hate group.

And thus, cowards and intellectual weaklings are spared the heavy lifting in addressing an easily refutable argument, that “the gay lifestyle” is as harmful as second hand smoke. And yes, that really is part of the AFA's argument against acceptance of gay men and women. By labelling them a Hate Group, the AFA are effectively silenced, and nobody even noticed that the entire exercise by the SPLC, those deep pocketed arbiters of right and wrong employed the simplest logical fallacy to do so. The Ad-Hominem argument. By attacking the speaker, rather than their argument. It is dishonest and cowardly, and almost all of America fell for it. However, the oppositional position towards gays and lesbians taken by the American Family Association is a logically weak position, easy to refute, without the recourse to the trickery and dishonest cowardice of logical fallacy. Surely, the public are not such intellectual toddlers that they must be sheltered from the use of their own reason.

Im aware that this might be regarded as an unjustifiably optimistic view, given the current erudite state of mainstream media. And this is also a part of the problem. Mainstream commenters on the political right habitually refer to their colleagues across the isle as “the far left”, while those on the left (note the absence of exaggeration) refer to their right-leaning colleagues as “the extreme right”. In each case, the superlative “extreme” or “far” serves to discredit whoever is described. However, doesn't this characterization of excess equally diminish those using it to undignified whining sissies? The urge to silence, rather to to address an oppositional argument is cowardly and totalitarian.

So, while it is easy to heap pejorative on those so threatened by a differing point of view, labelling as a means of silencing, this is lazy, dishonest and fearful. This is why, within the much maligned men's rights movement, one particular group opposed to the human rights of men and boys are regularly described as eugenics enthusiasts, rather than as a “hate group”. Enthusiasm for eugenics is informatively descriptive of that group's published position, and invites public attention to that position, rather than simply rendering them silent by application of a label.

The abject failure of some in the sphere of public discourse to address arguments they oppose, and the demonstrated preference to label, as a tool of censure is a poor indication of intellectual courage in those employing such rhetoric.

Unfortunately, on all sides of public discourse, this appears to be increasingly the popular approach. And as we quietly agree that whoever we disagree with are boogymen, we become a culture of cowards.

Addendum: Apparently, a particularly depraved and futile male feminist has demanded that a video by Bernard Chapin - currently featured on AVfM be removed by me, along with my apology for allowing it to be posted. A more timely example of the cowardly, totalitarian urge to censorship could not have been planned. Bernard's video stays up, and anybody who disagrees with him is invited to stand up on their hind legs and field an argument.