“Misogyny can also come through failing to give women the benefit of the doubt.”

The purpose of “The Feminist Dissident” is to give feminists a chance to speak directly to my audience, and my audience to debate the issues with them in a civil manner. To read previous entries, click here.

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Misogyny among MRAs (Part II)
By Hari Narayan Singh Khalsa

Once Glenn referred to the “one in four” claim by feminists as “hate statistics”, and with some reflection I think I understand why he used that phrasing.  There is some recent research based on the legal definition of rape that supports the one in four hypothesis. 

There is also evidence that the rape rate is closer to one in six.  That feminists consistently use the higher proportion shows a selectiveness in favor of political advantage that one expects of an advocacy group.  The problem is that political support for victims is not the only thing at stake. The issue of rape deeply affects how society views men as a group; automatically supporting the most onerous demographic picture of rape shows a callous disinterest in giving half the population the benefit of the doubt.  It is misandry.

Misogyny can also come through failing to give women the benefit of the doubt. For example, Angry Harry’s assertion that in most rape cases women are lying, for instance–see http://www.angryharry.com/esRapeBaloney.htm.  His spectacular twists of illogic heartily mock the idea of allowing women, half of the human race, the benefit of the doubt. Unquestioningly interpreting “unfounded” (as in no evidence) as “lying,” is a less extreme way of assuming the worst of women, but it still inflates the false accusation rate from about 8% to a third. 

Rape is of course not the only issue where this lack of consideration happens.  It seems that many MRA’s, or at least a few very vocal ones, assume women go into marriages intending to divorce and take the man’s money.  That is not a credible idea and only serves to obscure the actual causes of the high divorce rate. Realistic alternative explanations that look at men’s and women’s expectations for marriage would be more useful. 

Related to the ubiquitous predatory gold digger idea is the one about women being spendthrifts.  It seems clear that the majority of husband/wife household purchases being made by the woman is as likely to show that women direct a lot of necessary household spending as that women drain household finances frivolously and are alone responsible for the ecological doom of the planet.

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