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It's hard to find good coverage of this issue but it seems like it might have major repercussions: http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/christie-blatchford-ruling-in-twitter-harassment-trial-could-have-enormous-fallout-for-free-speech http://www.thestar.com/news/crime/2014/01/09/gregory_alan_elliott_frustrations_boil_over_in_twitter_harassment_trial.html http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/christie-blatchford-the-twitter-trial-of-gregory-elliott-is-becoming-much-like-twitter-itself-shrill-and-uber-sensitive http://metronews.ca/news/toronto/448441/alleged-harassment-over-twitter-leads-to-criminal-charges-for-toronto-man/ Depending on the source, Elliott is either being targeted and silenced for holding views that are in conflict with those of young feminist activists or he was actually stalking and sexually harassing young women online. Either way, this could be the first case of someone going to court for social media harassment. What I find curious is that the accusation of sexual harassment only seems to appear in the Metro version of the story. Based on what the Post and the Star report, it seems like Elliott's comments were relatively mild and he is in fact being targeted here. Unfortunately, it seems like most of the coverage of this story is coming from sources that I am reluctant to trust, such as MRA groups. Anyone have info or thoughts on this? Edited: added link to Christie Blatchford's piece from last week

I found this immensely funny, but other people probably won't understand the full context. Apparently, the Social Justice Warrior (SJW) infiltration of the mainstream media has gotten to the point where the BBC has now achieved Poe's Law. Poe's Law: "Without a clear indication of the author's intent, it is difficult or impossible to tell the difference between an expression of sincere extremism and a parody of extremism [by other extremists]." http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe%27s_Law So I'll give some context, an 20 year old British male from York by the name of Godfrey Elfwick created a parody twitter account of Social Justice Warriors. https://twitter.com/godfreyelfwick Godfrey's twitter profile describes Godfrey as a "Demisexual genderqueer Muslim Atheist. Literal good guy. Itinerant jongleur. Pronouns are Xir, Xirs Xirself. Filters life through the lens of minority issues." If that isn't obvious enough of a parody, I'll list some of the tweets by Godfrey: "Don't want to be labelled a rapist? Then respect women's boundaries and remember that consent can be revoked at any time. Even after sex." "Remember #FreeSpeech and #HateSpeech are synonymous. Your right to offend stops at my right to not be offended." "It's a sad fact that as a trans-black person I suffer worse bigotry and abuse than most other black people. #Racism #WrongSkin" "I used to identify as #atheist as I don't believe in God but when I saw how racist the movement has become I converted to moderate Islam." "I was born white but realized later in life that I was #WrongSkin and transitioned mentally to black." "I have #HIV and I still donate blood. If people are too bigoted to accept it then they shouldn't have lost so much in the first place." "Universities should be places where the correct topics are discussed with the correct people in the correct environment. #Feminism" "If you're a straight man and you don't find #BruceJenner sexually attractive since he became a woman you're transphobic" "Men will be men. Thank god I'm a transwoman so it doesn't apply to me." Anyway, the BBC's Angela Sheeran saw one of Godfrey's tweets: "I've never actually seen #StarWars but the fact that the bad guy was all black and ate watermelons was unbelievably racist even for the 70's" And believing that Godfrey is a SJW with the 'correct opinion' (and unable to distinguish between parody and a true believe of SJWism), she invites him (or should I say xir?) onto her show to discuss the recent star wars trailer. Here is a brief clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EabGCJ9rm4w The full 'interview' is 8 minutes long and includes Angela Sheeran rambling on about how Frozen is sexist, terrifying and treats women as sex objects.

We need a thread to discuss the terrible plague of Manspreading that is infecting our society! Btw, the above statement is sarcasm (I probably have to say this or Michael will delete this thread). What is manspreading? Apparently it is this: Or this: Yes apparently men are spreading their legs too much when riding transport. Not only does this take up more space, but according to leading 3rd wave feminists and social justice warriors it is a form of pecocking and men imposing their patriarchal dominance on females by presenting their junk. This is apparently such a problem that New York City has made manspreading illegal. Not only that, but arrests have been made. Now of course the cops are primarily arresting blacks and latinos, and they make arrests at midnight when the buses are primarily empty, but that's just a minor detail. http://countercurrentnews.com/2015/05/nypd-is-now-arresting-people-for-manspreading-their-legs-too-wide-on-subways/ To combat manspreading, feminists on tumblr and elsewhere have been publicly shaming men in cities such as London, New York and Toronto for manspreading via taking pictures and posting them online. In all seriousness, feminism has long passed the point of 'fighting for equality' and now because fighting against the patriarchy for women's rights is the raison d'etre for so many people, they have to make up problems. Dear 3rd wave feminists (male, female or other) and SJWs, you may not have noticed this but men have these things called testicles. They are male reproductive organs that are located between the legs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testicle. Due to these organs, it is extremely uncomfortable not to have your legs somewhat apart while sitting if you are male. Not only that but there is an issue of stability. Men have a higher centre of gravity. Due to that, they have a greater moment of inertia for a given mass https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moment_of_inertia. Not only that but men have smaller hips relative to their body mass compared to women. To compensate this and to avoid falling on those around you, one needs to have legs somewhat apart while sitting on a moving vehicle. This is not only an issue for men but for women that have greater upper body strength and relatively slim builds. I can understand complaining about manspreading if someone has their legs like 180 degrees apart, but 30 degrees apart? Seriously? Has our society become so misandric that we have to publicly shame men for existing and having testicles or higher centers or gravity?

One of my biggest issues with using the term feminism to describe a position of gender egalitarianism is that it is an inherently ungender-neutral term and therefore it doesn't make sense to use it to describe a gender neutral position. People who identify as feminists often support gender neutrality. For example, using police officer instead of policeman, or using gender-neutral pronouns. However, if gender neutrality is important then should this not also be applied to feminism itself if feminism means gender equality? Another advantage to using gender egalitarianism over feminism is clarity. There are many different kinds of feminism (1st wave, 3rd wave, etc.) and feminism can mean pretty much anything from gender egalitarianism to misandric hate ideology. So if you tell someone you are a feminist then this can lead to confusion, where as if you tell someone you are a gender egalitarian, there is no confusion. Another issue with using feminism to describe a position of gender egalitarianism is that it subconsciously puts emphasis on a single gender rather than all genders (men, non-binary individuals, etc.). As a result, this can lead to people who would otherwise support gender egalitarianism to dismiss gender issues when they disadvantage a gender that is not female (see men's rights thread that Kimmy started for a list of some men's rights concerns). Lastly, since Feminists frame Feminism as desirable and Patriarchy as undesirable they associate female with desirable and male with undesirable. This perpetuates traditionalist gender roles and male disposability. It also sends a continuous subconscious message to males that they are undesireable (a form of micro-aggression), which can lead to males losing self-esteem and eventually committing suicide (males have 4x as many suicide victims as females). If one promotes gender neutrality, male should be equally desirable to female. So please, don't be a feminist against patriarchy. Be a gender egalitarian against traditionalism.

I am stealing the title for this topic from an article written by Kaity Cooper for the site rabble.ca. This is a great topic to start off this new section and I hope it clears up some misunderstandings about why women are proud to be 'feminists'. She makes some great points to try and explain why we still need feminism more than ever and comments on the smear campaign against feminism, especially from women: "The #WomenAgainstFeminism phenomenon on Tumblr, wherein women post photographs of themselves holding signs that state why they do not need feminism, like, "I don't need feminism because my self-worth is not directly tied to the size of my victim complex," is one example. Or the recent Time magazine article which included "feminist" in a list of annoying words that readers could vote to ban from public discourse. Or the public distancing from feminism exemplified by celebrities like Lady Gaga and Katy Perry, who, for better or worse are role models for young girls. " BTW, Times magazine later posted an article apologizing for including the term 'feminist' in the list. Here are some facts related to the under-representation of women in Canada. The UN Annual Human Development Index for 2012 revealed that inequality in Canada is actually growing. After falling for a decade, rates of domestic violence have now flat-lined. In 2009, the rate of self-reported spousal violence was the same as in 2004. Reporting rates have not improved over the years. Victims of domestic violence are now less likely to report an incident to police. Ninety-six percent of CEOs in Canada are men Among Canadas elected representatives, men outnumber women four to one New forms of misogyny - Girls are facing new forms of sexism in their daily lives. Cyberbullying, the sexualization of women and girls in the media and the trafficking of women and girls for sexual exploitation. Male voices outnumber female voices in Canada's most influential print, broadcast and online news media by four to one I will end this OP on a question Kaity asks: "Given what we know of women's profound impact on the success of various entities, how can organizations justify their exclusion?"