Solosam, you are a lazy liar

The BBQ Pit
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So in this charming thread, a dude posted a story in which a woman got on an elevator with him then spent the elevator ride cowered in a corner clutching a bottle of pepper spray.

Solosam posted repeatedly about how, in those circumstances, he would have defended himself against the woman He said:

This sounded like bullshit, so I asked him for a cite to this law.

Here was his response:

So I look at his cite. Notice how his cite ends on the word “or”? There’s a reason for that. He left off:

In other words, he snipped the exact part of his cite that applies to this situation–and that makes it clear that the mere carrying of a weapon does not constitute assault.

Why did he leave that off? I think it’s clear to everyone: because he’s a lazy liar. A liar because this is a classic lie-by-omission. Lazy because he didn’t even bother trying to find a different cite that doesn’t require snipping in order to avoid disproving him.

There’s plenty of other insane misogyny in his posts in that thread (and the posts of several others). But this bit of dishonesty was more blatant than I’m used to, so hey, Pit time.

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There is also this…

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That MRA crap and doctored and biased cites made it difficult to acknowledge the real disappointment some men might feel from being unfairly profiled. The hysteria and hostility is aimed at the wrong people, IMHO. It isn’t women or feminists who are to blame for sensationalized stories of crimes against children and women. We are, as a whole society, more moved to outrage when weaker or more innocent victims come to harm. Pedophilia is front page news; gang violence or other crimes among equals isn’t as shocking or as likely to sell papers.

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I found the misogyny from that thread from the usual suspects suffering from nice guy syndrome or old virgin syndrome vastly more offensive.

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Certainly so. Not sure if it says something bad about me that I’m willing to pit him over the lying but not over the misogyny, but there you go. I think the lying was more cut-and-dried; even bigots gotta recognize when someone is lying, right? right?

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MRA? Somebody wanna clue me in?

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I think it stands for Mens Rights Assholes, but I’m not sure.

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Men’s Rights Activism. It’s been an ever-growing thing over the last decade or so, but within the last few months, the winners over at Reddit have picked up on it and started trolling the web something fierce. So, there’s been a huge upswing in that nonsense, even around here.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s certainly a place for folks to defend the rights of men-- particularly in regards to family court situations and other stuff that is terribly unfair to men-- but the whole “movement” has nothing to do with the rights for men. Rather, the bigger goal of MRA is to try to attack feminism. Either these folks are epic trolls or they really do see rights as a zero sum game. And whichever side we land on, the result is a whole lotta stupid.

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I don’t think so and my post wasn’t meant as a criticism of you.

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MRAs attack feminism when feminists attack men and seek to deny men rights. It’s feminists that treat rights as a zero-sum game. MRAs want a presumption of joint custody? Feminists are against it. MRAs want to allow VAWA funds to be used to research male victims and want shelters to provide services for men, rather than being forbidden by the state from doing so? Feminists are against it. MRAs want to maintain a presumption of innocence in college rape cases, feminists are against it. MRAs want those who can be proven to have made malicious false allegations prosecuted, feminists are against it. MRAs want the right to choose whether to be a parent? Feminists are against it. MRAs want ewqual treatment before the law? Feminists are against it. It’s feminists that spend all their efforts on claiming treating men fairly would somehow harm women, not MRAs.

On the other hand I’ve never come across an MRA that wants to take rights away from women. Not even abortion rights, in fact, and that’s the most controversial “right” women have.

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I thought solosam would be the **one lone nut **who won’t come down here and defend his stance. Hmmm.

I’ll just check this one right off your list: use whatever modern magic or miracle of medicine that prevents sperm from coming in contact with eggs. Or abstain. Don’t want to be a parent? The choice is allllllll yours.

Don’t be shy, **blindboyard **, whip out the name of the Reddit hero dejour: Warren Farrell. Don’t give any thought to that throwaway quote Farrell was credited with years ago, something about “no one ever talks about the positive effects of incest”. It’s eyebrow raising, but it’s not even the worst or most embarrassing of his rants.

“I am often asked why men don’t get as worked up as they might about women—particularly poor women—having to use their bodies as prostitutes. Because most men unconsciously experience themselves as prostitutes every day—the miner, the firefighter, the construction worker, the logger, the soldier, the meatpacker—these men are prostitutes in the direct sense: they sacrifice their bodies for money and for their families.” So…men have no career choices, then?

“Unemployment to a man is the psychological equivalent of rape to a woman” Farrell has a habit of reducing rape and sexual assault of women by making false equivalencies to employment and court proceedings.

“Trust me” from a man is laughable; “trust me” from a woman is the law." Yeah, because the law making bodies in America have been primarily staffed by women since the country was founded, right?

The MRA movement may have had legit complaints initally with regards to the justice system and inequality in stereotypcial gender roles, but thanks to Farrell and his appeals to the lowest common denominator (the frustrated, lonely guy with time to kill online) it’s an impotent mob shaking their fists back and forth at the women who decline to service them. It’s a joke about to become a meme that will completely undermine any headway the initial charge had made prior to Farrell.

It’s a shame that very real issues of inequality and an imbalance in power are buried under mounds of Farrell’s impotent bullshit. There’s no dialogue with that bitter, frustrated Reddit army shouting at women for failing to service their needs. With Farrell sputtering at the helm, it’s hard to take the real concerns of equality in the justice system seriously.

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Maybe the lone cashew would like to come in here and clear things up?

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There’s not really anything to clear up.

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I am actually on solosam’s defense on this one. Look, the law essentially says that you commit assault by doing either “a”, “b”, or “c”. So solosam was basically arguing that this situation applies to “b”.

Basically, it doesn’t matter if he left out “c”. All the law says is that if you do a, b, or c, then you have committed assault. Whether this situation does apply to “b” or not is a different debate. But the fact that solosam left out “c” is irrelevant because he is arguing that the woman clutching a pepper spray bottle applies to situation “b”.

In other words: it doesn’t matter if the situation in question does not apply to “c”; all you need for it to be considered assault is for one of the letters to apply. In this case, solosam is arguing that this situation applies to “b”. Whether I agree with him or not is irrelevant; the point is that he can ignore “c” if he wants to, because this law states that if a person does “a”, “b”, or “c”, then he/she has committed assault. So even if the person does “b”, but not “a” or “c”, then he/she has committed assault.

Because he can for reasons explained above.

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I’m too lazy to read the linked thread at the moment, but I found the idea of ‘defending’ one’s self by trying to disarm someone with a bottle of pepper spray in an elevator remarkably funny. I assume they must not have seen the movie Devil or considered what would happen when pepper spray is used in a tiny, enclosed space.

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If his theory is correct, then “c” is unnecessary, because the mere fact of openly carrying a weapon constitutes assault. Why would the law specify that open carrying plus begging is assault, if open carrying by itself is an assault?

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Actually, yes, I think you’re right. If simply carrying a weapon was classified as assault, then there would be no need for “c” to specify that the weapon-holder must also be impeding another person, begging, or accosting.

Good point.

Honestly, in my opinion, I think it would be an overreaction to cite “b” against someone for just carrying a weapon. I think that’s why “c” is there, so that openly carrying a weapon must also be accompanied with begging, accosting, or impeding for it to be classified as assault.

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I think it’s so cool that you brought that straw man over from the other thread. Wait, keep telling me what I believe again-- I want to hear more.

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I know, it’s a good thing we have men like him around to explain our motivations to us. I never would have guessed!

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Neutral party here…but in reading this, it does say b or c, not b and c