Mysteriously, they felt they might not be safe in their gatherings designed to strip the protections against violence from others.
24 comments:
Dedicating Ruckus
said...
I must say, I'm rather disappointed with the level of your commentary here.
Roosh is not, in fact, a "pro-rape activist". If you read the words of the man himself — what seems a decent courtesy to afford even your worst adversary — you find that the article in question was a parody, if perhaps one in poor taste. As anyone not a progressive, you will of course be familiar with the progressive media's tendency to lie shamelessly and outright about their political enemies, in hopes that onlookers will not bother to check the veracity of their smears. In your case, it seems to have worked admirably.
Indeed, even if he was a "pro-rape activist", this could not reasonably be construed as being any threat to anyone whatsoever. Rape is, in fact, a felony, and the chances of passing a pro-rape law anywhere in Western civilization are comparable to the chances of a snowball in a blast furnace, in the center of the sun. Even if it were legitimate consequentially to silence political activism due to its noxious contents, "pro-rape activism" would hardly be on the list of greatest dangers.
And, even disregarding all of the above, the purpose of these meetings was not to wave signs, or lobby legislators, or otherwise petition the government in any form; it was to converse over drinks. It is an odd philosophy that holds that anyone you sufficiently dislike is to be banned from conversing with others, or from bars. Roosh stepped on no toes and violated no rights in the course of organizing this; it was done on his own blog, addressed to those who read it voluntarily, without any hint of threats or harassment directed at anyone. His only crime is to hold political opinions considered impermissible by progressives, which inspires them to enormous efforts in smearing him to anyone else who will listen.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
Is this truly not even remotely troubling to you? Are the rights of free speech and free assembly simply not important, so long as those infringing them are not actually the federal government? Or would you even have stopped at that? Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?
I must say, I am rather disappointed in your comment. If you are as supportive of free speech as you say, then surely you have no objection to Grim (or me, as I completely agree with him) criticizing this person. Or are free speech and free assembly so unimportant so long as it's not your ox being gored?
The fact of the matter is, he IS advocating for the "legalization of rape on private property". Pretty it up how you like, but that is the end goal. Regardless of how unlikely it is that he will achieve his goal, his goal is still repugnant. And some of us choose to exercise our free speech (on a platform which, last I checked, Grim is paying for, not you) saying that we find it so.
But you asked a question I would like to directly respond to: "Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?" Absolutely not. That would (in fact) be an abridgment of free speech. But you'll note, that didn't happen. No one here has called for his arrest, or other form of government sanction, and your assumption that we would indicates how very little you know of Grim or the commenters in the Hall.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
One of these meetings was allegedly to be held in a city not too far from here, and I was intending to go and converse with the supporters in person. I'm somewhat disappointed that they have chosen not to assemble for drinks.
Machiavelli says that courage is the supreme political virtue. Whatever this group's goals are, they won't attain the first of them if they carry on in this way. I find it remarkable that they represent themselves as carrying the flag of manhood, even "kings"!, and then act this way. Frankly, it's surprising to realize they might be old enough for drinks.
I certainly do not condemn either you or Grim for criticizing Roosh. I criticize him myself, though for his character rather than his politics.
Rather, I criticize Grim for believing without verifying the commentary published by progressive media, a notoriously mendacious institution as a whole, regarding an individual who they fear and hate. The links he provided in his original post come from RawStory, which is currently featuring on the front page the headline "Ronald Reagan pointlessly packing heat as president only makes sense in gun nut fantasyland". It should not be difficult to discern the bias here, and greater skepticism would be advised in the future.
I repeat for emphasis: The progressive media are lying. Roosh is not a "pro-rape activist". He does not advocate the legalization of rape. He wrote a parody article some time ago, and this gave the progressives an opening to smear him. One might criticize the tastefulness of this, or the tactical acumen, but it is not, in fact, a legal or a moral crime. Yet it is for this that we are expected to find it admirable that his detractors attempt to silence him, a year later and in an unrelated matter, by massive threats of violence.
As regards free speech, I will merely note that the practical consequences are very similar if the response to speaking an unacceptable view is police appearing and throwing you in jail, or an Internet lynch mob appearing and getting you thrown out of your job. For most ordinary people, either consequence is sufficient deterrence to prevent them speaking their mind.
@Grim:
I also am disappointed at Roosh's decision. If for no other reason, than that watching the response to this would have been a valuable gauge of what degree of commitment both he and his opponents can really achieve.
It was always futile, I think, to ask the followers of Return of Kings to be an interesting political force on their own. Regardless, I think had you met with them, you would perhaps have found them not so demonic as the progressives paint them — if likely still disappointing.
Normally, I wouldn't care what the PUAs and various Alpha manhood bloggers are talking about. But when their community backs Trump and starts interfering with corrupt political power, it gets beyond merely talk.
he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
All he has to worry about are Leftist engineered Swatting and SJWs, the latter being the weakest of the Left's active ops branches. Wait until the Alpha gamers start getting mixed in with the real fighters, the wet work artists. One artist up against another artist.
Even Trump has to deal with more than merely the SJW agents.
As for Roosh, I know him peripherally from VoxDay, and did not know at the time of Grim's blog post that he was starting up an op. Of course I can figure out why he was doing so, to counter SJW encroachment on the property and homes of his supporters. But he chose a wrong timing and context for it, since legalized rape in homes would also apply to Islam. And you do not want to be mistaken for an Islamo sympathizer at this point in time or space. Or any other time for that matter.
Roosh's OPSEC is... not really up to snuff, however. One of the benefits of computers and online being C4 tools is that they are easily accessed by cellular organizations. But it also means that any order from top down, is easily intercepted and deciphered.
I find it remarkable that they represent themselves as carrying the flag of manhood, even "kings"!, and then act this way.
I remember back a few years ago, around Atlanta, a Tea Party group was organizing on some streets, and then some guy (probably a Democrat) drove up, pointed his gun at them, and told them to get out of here. The Tea Party had previously, in that region of Georgia, refused concealed carry amongst their protesters. They changed that policy soon afterwards. And this was a group of old women.
Anti Leftists and the anti Left coalition, will need more guts and stones than this Return of Kings business, if they wish to continue in this war against the Leftist alliance. Maybe that's why as Democrats and those born to the Democrat decadent culture, they like Trump so much. He's their kind of person, because that's how they grew up, with megalomaniacs being their sugar daddies, their only way of survival.
If it is up to Pamela Geller and Sarah Palin to justify themselves against attacks on them, I see no reason to lower standards for Roosh. If he cannot defend himself against the Leftist media attacks and psychological warfare, what use is he in this war?
If he can't get his allies and buddies to prop him up a defense good enough that at least I hear about it, then that's his problem and weakness. His supporters and others in that game culture like to criticize Palin and Geller and other women like them for being weak, when failing to resist Leftist propaganda.
I see no reason why I shouldn't turn that vendetta right around at the stone throwers. Let's see how they handle the Left's attacks. Let us see indeed.
I certainly do not condemn either you or Grim for criticizing Roosh
In rebuttal, your own words: "It is an odd philosophy that holds that anyone you sufficiently dislike is to be banned from conversing with others, or from bars." "Are the rights of free speech and free assembly simply not important, so long as those infringing them are not actually the federal government? Or would you even have stopped at that? Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?"
Now, you may claim that these were not directed against Grim himself (the use of "you" making such a claim highly suspect), but regardless, the point is the same. Similarly, Mr. Valizadeh may claim to have been writing "tounge in cheek" but given his other writings, I think this is just like Jon Stewart's constant "clown nose on, clown nose off" act. When he gets heat for his writings, "it was just a parody". But when taken as a whole, it is of a piece. And yes, I am familiar with his writings.
And let's settle this once and for all: As regards free speech, I will merely note that the practical consequences are very similar if the response to speaking an unacceptable view is police appearing and throwing you in jail, or an Internet lynch mob appearing and getting you thrown out of your job. For most ordinary people, either consequence is sufficient deterrence to prevent them speaking their mind.
Free speech is the right to speak your mind without sanction from the government. Period. It is not freedom from consequence, it is not freedom from criticism, it is not freedom from disagreement, and it is not freedom from rebuttal. If you lose your job because of what you write (and assuming you are not a government employee), then that is perfectly within reason. After all, your employer is not bound to keep you as an employee regardless of how much revenue loss your presence causes them. Any claim to the contrary is ridiculous. Ask the Dixie Chicks about the consequences of free political speech. Of course, at the time they cried that their rights were also being trampled. But that doesn't make it true for them either.
As for these "threats" you speak of, if there were bomb threats made (as happened with some of the Gamer Gate meet-ups) those are illegal, and the correct response is to notify the authorities. So too with death threats or general threats of violence. All of those are illegal, should be reported to the authorities, and followed up on.
And for the record, if Anita Sarkeesian was cancelling an event because of vague "threats" my advice and any sympathy would be exactly the same. If you have actual threats, whinging about them but not notifying the authorities buys you no sympathy from me. Cancelling your event citing such threats only buys you empathy from me if you've also reported those threats. Otherwise, I just have your unsubstantiated word that threats were made. And finally, I must agree with Grim's assessment. If they wish to style themselves as "alpha-males" and "kings", perhaps standing up against vague threats instead of acting exactly like the kinds of feminists they deplore might show more courage than crying about people being mean to them.
I accept the fair criticism that we should have looked for his original posts instead of trusting the media's characterization of them. If you will help me locate the particular articles you think characterize his position most fairly, I will post links to them.
You can start your position from here, Grim, if you wanted to know more about him. Generally, my instincts and reviews are very accurate. 2001 would be when the pick up artist community started up and spread, via reverse engineering due to computer geeks and nerds in certain forums and various other grassroots orgs they setup later. An insider book from one of the founders, gave some clues, which I might have mentioned at VC many years ago.
I have my own sources, and do not rely upon the Leftist propaganda branches nor even blogger links.
Roosh is closer to the Men Going Their Own Way side of the alignment. The Men's Rights Activists, the MRA, is closer to the ones lobbying the government for favors and benefits, taking tactics from the Leftist feminists, which Cassandra has mentioned more often as an example of men's rights scene. Roosh mentioned on his site, that his philosophy differs enough from the Men's Rights Activist side that they don't particularly work well together. And I can believe that, given my triangulated sources.
Out of all the regulars here, it might be safe for me to say that I am the most sympathetic to MGTOW or people of that political/philosophical persuasion. So all the things I say, is consistent with that pov as well, it includes it.
VoxDay has been continually mentioning John Scalzi's example about "pretending to be a right wing rapist" when he was attacking Sarah Palin or other conservative women like her, for some time now due to VoxDay's own career encounters with Scalzi at their SF organization. Former SFWA for VD. So Roosh, even though he might have wrote his article "How to Stop Rape" by doing a satire mimicking A Modest Proposal, should have known how people who adhere to Alinsky's protocols would use it for.
True, VD had only recently broken away from the SJW dominated SFWA and then began writing his own books about SJW tactics and forming his own independent book publishing house, but Roosh, given his background, should have figured out how the Left would have used that post of his.
If Roosh had taken a position close to my own, when people were talking about how to "end rape in the US Army", it would have been harder to constantly bring up this subject over and over again by the Leftist psychological warfare branches.
Roosh has been on several hostile to semi hostile media stations. He knows very well by now what the Left's media contraption does to people like him. He merely doesn't focus on countering it as much as say... author of Monster Hunter International does.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
I doubt that the movement backing Roosh or what he has motivated to generate, will stop at this point.
Centralized control is outside the question, that's what was called off. Individual meetups using cellular, non centralized C3 or C4, still exist. If the group Grim noticed in Georgia wants to continue the meetup, they will have to organize and setup communications, online or offline, and a venue to host them. People are free, even still, to do that in the US.
Roosh is too well known to the Leftist alliance, the SJW feminist wing, and is calling down fire on groups he associates with. Perhaps he noticed that mistake of his.
And of course, if "mob violence" is what American... males fear at this date in time, perhaps they need to find someone to train them up in the old martial arts and ways of fighting first. That could come before, during, or after their training sessions in "Game". I have an entire list of organizations and people I know who I have full confidence in, as trainers and cadre instructors. Of course they are in my head, not written down or copied.
Males tend to be monomaniacal, in the sense of being focused on what they are focused on. It's difficult and generates resistance when people are told to drop what they are doing and adopt an entirely alien other culture or set of beliefs.
Even in martial arts, the contest between weijia and neijia, is eternal. MMM, kickboxing, speed fighting, that's weijia, external power source. A firearm's power source is external, external to the human body at least, but the accuracy needed to control that power is internal, in handling recoil and trigger pulls. Without horsemanship, it's difficult to combine the concepts together.
So people who have something that works for them, a set of skills, they tend to keep with that, until it fails them. And in martial arts, usually external arts "fails" when a young person tries to fight an internal art user that can actually apply the internal power to techniques and counters similar to the way point shooting and hip shooting worked for the master marksman of America. Only then, do the young students realize that their path might have been mistaken.
Well, the problem here is that you are portraying as opposed "skill sets" two arts that are better analogized to developing good taste in fine food on the one hand, and binge-eating to 400 pounds on the other. Except, of course, that the only harm you do in binge-eating is to yourself.
Doing a bit more research and reading and it looks like this issue has gotten a lot more popular than expected, due to the Leftist organs.
As for skill sets, conversation abilities, NLP, and H2H skills are not diametrically opposed. Different skills can be stacked on top of each other or gathered.
It used to be they had a limited number of skills to choose from, since their goals were pretty ego and self orientated. Now a days, it is different. It has progressed and mutated to a certain degree, Grim. They could never have gotten this big or popular or setup their own self run communities online, otherwise.
So long as they were talking about improving themselves, that had a limited utility in the war the Left wages against humanity. But once they speak of higher goals, of political and cultural goals, they become useful, in the strategic sense. To me, if not to anybody else.
It has always somewhat amused me that women who (as I do) counter silly feminist oppression rhetoric with the observation that men are one half of humanity and the world works better when men and women support and understand each other and men who make the same argument when confronted with silly MRA oppression rhetoric are accused of the same thing: being suckers.
Grim often playfully accuses me of being a Kantian. And that's probably a fair characterization: in a world full of people with conflicting needs, desires, conditions, challenges, etc., the only "fair" way I can think of for ordinary people to treat each other involves establishing broadly just general rules and then applying them as evenhandedly as possible.
The problem with much of the Game crap is that at its heart, it's deeply immoral.
I completely approve of men controlling their own sexuality (and by that, I mean not letting their appetites rule their minds). And I think it's healthy for both men and women to be centered and confident: insecurity and neediness aren't attractive to the opposite sex.
But when Game - as it so often does - leads to men treating women in a blatantly manipulative and contemptuous manner, I'm going to call it harmful: just as I would call it harmful if I saw women teaching other women to use sex to manipulate men. I never realized until I got on the Internet that there was this deep well of fear and anger towards women. Nothing in my real life experience of men prepared me for that.
I have come to believe that the modern world actively makes it difficult for young men to get a handle on their emotions (one of the most powerful emotions for young men being their sex drives). Traditional masculinity has always focused on the idea discipline: of suppressing emotion (or at least subordinating it to the will). Modern masculinity, if there is such a thing, seems not to recognize the value of self discipline at all (which in today's veritable feast of temptation is just bizarre).
Sex is an ancient and powerful force. It affects men and women very differently, and it's hard for me to think of a more destructive thing than for society to constantly bombard young people with the one thing they desire above all else without teaching them the value of self restraint.
But when Game - as it so often does - leads to men treating women in a blatantly manipulative and contemptuous manner, I'm going to call it harmful: just as I would call it harmful if I saw women teaching other women to use sex to manipulate men. I never realized until I got on the Internet that there was this deep well of fear and anger towards women. Nothing in my real life experience of men prepared me for that.
Feminists have been using sexual strategies to destroy women as well as men, for some time now. This creates blowback, backlash, like constantly killing a native population's women and children does. The Muslims occupied Spain and did exactly that to the Castile and former Visigoths, and Spain became a very violent culture, even after pushing the Muslims out. Adopting cruelty and slavery, from their former overlords. Even in victory, cultures learn from their enemies, especially since they had to learn in order to defeat their enemies.
I see the natural and inevitable reaction to the Leftist alliance's use of strategic weapons against humanity, as being on the same level. They learn from the Left, because that is who they have fought all their lives. It is the one culture they have the most contact with, even above and surpassing the American "mainstream" culture of the 1970s.
It is a product of the failure of the previous generations, to deal with the problem of the Left. That kicks the can down the road, much like WWI and social security kicked the can down the road. Somebody else will have to deal with it sooner or later.
Sex is an ancient and powerful force. It affects men and women very differently, and it's hard for me to think of a more destructive thing than for society to constantly bombard young people with the one thing they desire above all else without teaching them the value of self restraint.
The previous generation failed to deal with that problem, because they ignored it and treated the Left like clown cars that were powerless and worthy of ridicule. The newer generations do not take kindly to their elders lecturing them on what should be done now, given the failure of the elders. If an elderly martial art fought a young one, and lost due to incompetence or lack of skill, the young ones would not respect the elder as much either, since the elder would lose much face.
There is no such thing as society, of course. Only cultures that dominate and sub cultures that are dominated by those above. There is a hierarchy, but there is no utopian society to dictate what is Right or Wrong, that is the failed morality of the previous generations. The Conformity of those who Obeyed their Orders, which inevitably lead to the social revolutions of the 1960s, the Islamic invasion of Europe, and various other happy coincidences. No society, only individuals and families who aggregate individuals. Cultures that aggregate families, and sub cultures that are lower in the power curve than other cultures.
Or alcoholism. I've spent a lot of time lately on a site called MyFitnessPal.com, where people chat and encourage each other about their fitness routines. There's a large contingent I'm very comfortable with, who post what they're doing and what results they're getting, then compliment and encourage each other. There's also a sizeable group whose approach is to moan about how they're surrounded by temptation every day and no one is supporting them enough, then look for validation in their failure. "I need friends to motivate me!" "I don't know why my doctor can't explain my weight gain!" I'm reminded of the sort of alcoholic who thinks the whole world has to hide the booze for his benefit; it's the burqa approach, and the PUA one as well.
It's a comforting thing to learn that one's locus of control is oneself. I can think of few human conditions that are likely to improve if we can't keep that in mind.
It's a comforting thing to learn that one's locus of control is oneself. I can think of few human conditions that are likely to improve if we can't keep that in mind.
This is a general comment (so, not aimed at you). But I cannot tell you how tired I am of the "blowback" excuse. X is doing something harmful or wrong, but it's not X's fault because feminists (or The Left, or the Bugaboo of the Day) did something wrong first, and X's bad behavior - oddly, not directed at feminists, but rather at all women - is therefore completely understandable and in fact, the fault of "feminists".
This is exactly - EXACTLY - the argument Ta Nehisi Coates' uses in his writing. Yes, blacks are doing some very harmful and destructive things. But it's not *their* fault - it's blowback causes by white racism and slavery! Never mind that their harmful actions aren't even directed at white racists - that doesn't matter.
Basically, this is the same argument small children use, and its moral sophistication is about at the 5 year old level: "But Johnny was bad first!"
OK, but adults are responsible for their own actions. No one can make us do things we know to be wrong - in the end, *we* decide how we will act.
One of the recurring thoughts I had whilst reading Coates' book was that if women were to buy into his idiotic premise, we would hate all men. We could very well (stupidly) make a similar claim: for generations, women have contributed to the creation of wealth and prosperity by bearing and raising children and helping to build families (the basic building block of society). I believe the work I did for over 20 years - running our home, raising our sons, taking care of the house and the yard, deciding how my husband's paycheck would be spent, paying bills and taking care of a million things so my husband did not have to worry about them - made him more successful at work. Had he had to do these things, he would have made less money (and quite possibly, our sons would not have been raised right, as absentee parents or hired help aren't going to put the same love and effort into parenting as a full time mother).
But I would never make such an argument because I don't view my marriage as an adversarial partnership in which each partner keeps score. We both sacrificed for the good of something larger than either of us: our family.
What bothers me about a lot of that Game nonsense is the essentially selfish nature of it. It's not concerned with anything larger than sexual self gratification, and therefore I don't believe it's manly (or even, really, adult in any sense I recognize).
And a guy who writes books called "BANG [fill in the country]" is likewise not someone I could ever respect or take seriously. That's just juvenile behavior: I can't think of any other way to describe it.
Although I have little sympathy for the underlying argument that PUA enthusiasts make about what's wrong with women, I'd have no problem with their announcing that they've encountered some behavior in erotic relationships they don't care for, and they're taking appropriate steps to ensure they'll never get stuck in a relationship of that pattern again. I'd do the same myself, and often have. Where I move into "soggy disgust" territory is where the argument becomes, "Some/all women secretly want to do this to some/all men, therefore I am going to engage in a lifelong campaign to heal my wounded psyche by behaving in a childishly manipulative and vengeful fashion against women I've just met and know nothing to speak of about (but with whom I'm still so helplessly obsessed that I need to have anonymous sex with them as often as possible, and then write about it at length while snickering and reveling in their humiliation)." Evidently they believe this reflects poorly on the women they encounter in life. Fer cryin out loud, yer not 17 any more. Grow some bark. And quit trying to meet women in bars.
Yes, quit trying to meet women in bars and then feeling disillusioned when they don't conform to your ideal picture of a woman: one with "old fashioned" morals (who will - inexplicably - sleep with any guy who uses the right pickup line).
Sheesh. And some folks think *womyn* are emotional and illogical :p
24 comments:
I must say, I'm rather disappointed with the level of your commentary here.
Roosh is not, in fact, a "pro-rape activist". If you read the words of the man himself — what seems a decent courtesy to afford even your worst adversary — you find that the article in question was a parody, if perhaps one in poor taste. As anyone not a progressive, you will of course be familiar with the progressive media's tendency to lie shamelessly and outright about their political enemies, in hopes that onlookers will not bother to check the veracity of their smears. In your case, it seems to have worked admirably.
Indeed, even if he was a "pro-rape activist", this could not reasonably be construed as being any threat to anyone whatsoever. Rape is, in fact, a felony, and the chances of passing a pro-rape law anywhere in Western civilization are comparable to the chances of a snowball in a blast furnace, in the center of the sun. Even if it were legitimate consequentially to silence political activism due to its noxious contents, "pro-rape activism" would hardly be on the list of greatest dangers.
And, even disregarding all of the above, the purpose of these meetings was not to wave signs, or lobby legislators, or otherwise petition the government in any form; it was to converse over drinks. It is an odd philosophy that holds that anyone you sufficiently dislike is to be banned from conversing with others, or from bars. Roosh stepped on no toes and violated no rights in the course of organizing this; it was done on his own blog, addressed to those who read it voluntarily, without any hint of threats or harassment directed at anyone. His only crime is to hold political opinions considered impermissible by progressives, which inspires them to enormous efforts in smearing him to anyone else who will listen.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
Is this truly not even remotely troubling to you? Are the rights of free speech and free assembly simply not important, so long as those infringing them are not actually the federal government? Or would you even have stopped at that? Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?
I must say, I am rather disappointed in your comment. If you are as supportive of free speech as you say, then surely you have no objection to Grim (or me, as I completely agree with him) criticizing this person. Or are free speech and free assembly so unimportant so long as it's not your ox being gored?
The fact of the matter is, he IS advocating for the "legalization of rape on private property". Pretty it up how you like, but that is the end goal. Regardless of how unlikely it is that he will achieve his goal, his goal is still repugnant. And some of us choose to exercise our free speech (on a platform which, last I checked, Grim is paying for, not you) saying that we find it so.
But you asked a question I would like to directly respond to: "Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?" Absolutely not. That would (in fact) be an abridgment of free speech. But you'll note, that didn't happen. No one here has called for his arrest, or other form of government sanction, and your assumption that we would indicates how very little you know of Grim or the commenters in the Hall.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
One of these meetings was allegedly to be held in a city not too far from here, and I was intending to go and converse with the supporters in person. I'm somewhat disappointed that they have chosen not to assemble for drinks.
Machiavelli says that courage is the supreme political virtue. Whatever this group's goals are, they won't attain the first of them if they carry on in this way. I find it remarkable that they represent themselves as carrying the flag of manhood, even "kings"!, and then act this way. Frankly, it's surprising to realize they might be old enough for drinks.
@MikeD:
I certainly do not condemn either you or Grim for criticizing Roosh. I criticize him myself, though for his character rather than his politics.
Rather, I criticize Grim for believing without verifying the commentary published by progressive media, a notoriously mendacious institution as a whole, regarding an individual who they fear and hate. The links he provided in his original post come from RawStory, which is currently featuring on the front page the headline "Ronald Reagan pointlessly packing heat as president only makes sense in gun nut fantasyland". It should not be difficult to discern the bias here, and greater skepticism would be advised in the future.
I repeat for emphasis: The progressive media are lying. Roosh is not a "pro-rape activist". He does not advocate the legalization of rape. He wrote a parody article some time ago, and this gave the progressives an opening to smear him. One might criticize the tastefulness of this, or the tactical acumen, but it is not, in fact, a legal or a moral crime. Yet it is for this that we are expected to find it admirable that his detractors attempt to silence him, a year later and in an unrelated matter, by massive threats of violence.
As regards free speech, I will merely note that the practical consequences are very similar if the response to speaking an unacceptable view is police appearing and throwing you in jail, or an Internet lynch mob appearing and getting you thrown out of your job. For most ordinary people, either consequence is sufficient deterrence to prevent them speaking their mind.
@Grim:
I also am disappointed at Roosh's decision. If for no other reason, than that watching the response to this would have been a valuable gauge of what degree of commitment both he and his opponents can really achieve.
It was always futile, I think, to ask the followers of Return of Kings to be an interesting political force on their own. Regardless, I think had you met with them, you would perhaps have found them not so demonic as the progressives paint them — if likely still disappointing.
Normally, I wouldn't care what the PUAs and various Alpha manhood bloggers are talking about. But when their community backs Trump and starts interfering with corrupt political power, it gets beyond merely talk.
he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
All he has to worry about are Leftist engineered Swatting and SJWs, the latter being the weakest of the Left's active ops branches. Wait until the Alpha gamers start getting mixed in with the real fighters, the wet work artists. One artist up against another artist.
Even Trump has to deal with more than merely the SJW agents.
As for Roosh, I know him peripherally from VoxDay, and did not know at the time of Grim's blog post that he was starting up an op. Of course I can figure out why he was doing so, to counter SJW encroachment on the property and homes of his supporters. But he chose a wrong timing and context for it, since legalized rape in homes would also apply to Islam. And you do not want to be mistaken for an Islamo sympathizer at this point in time or space. Or any other time for that matter.
Roosh's OPSEC is... not really up to snuff, however. One of the benefits of computers and online being C4 tools is that they are easily accessed by cellular organizations. But it also means that any order from top down, is easily intercepted and deciphered.
I find it remarkable that they represent themselves as carrying the flag of manhood, even "kings"!, and then act this way.
I remember back a few years ago, around Atlanta, a Tea Party group was organizing on some streets, and then some guy (probably a Democrat) drove up, pointed his gun at them, and told them to get out of here. The Tea Party had previously, in that region of Georgia, refused concealed carry amongst their protesters. They changed that policy soon afterwards. And this was a group of old women.
Anti Leftists and the anti Left coalition, will need more guts and stones than this Return of Kings business, if they wish to continue in this war against the Leftist alliance. Maybe that's why as Democrats and those born to the Democrat decadent culture, they like Trump so much. He's their kind of person, because that's how they grew up, with megalomaniacs being their sugar daddies, their only way of survival.
If it is up to Pamela Geller and Sarah Palin to justify themselves against attacks on them, I see no reason to lower standards for Roosh. If he cannot defend himself against the Leftist media attacks and psychological warfare, what use is he in this war?
If he can't get his allies and buddies to prop him up a defense good enough that at least I hear about it, then that's his problem and weakness. His supporters and others in that game culture like to criticize Palin and Geller and other women like them for being weak, when failing to resist Leftist propaganda.
I see no reason why I shouldn't turn that vendetta right around at the stone throwers. Let's see how they handle the Left's attacks. Let us see indeed.
I certainly do not condemn either you or Grim for criticizing Roosh
In rebuttal, your own words:
"It is an odd philosophy that holds that anyone you sufficiently dislike is to be banned from conversing with others, or from bars."
"Are the rights of free speech and free assembly simply not important, so long as those infringing them are not actually the federal government? Or would you even have stopped at that? Would you have cheered Congress in passing a bill of attainder for him?"
Now, you may claim that these were not directed against Grim himself (the use of "you" making such a claim highly suspect), but regardless, the point is the same. Similarly, Mr. Valizadeh may claim to have been writing "tounge in cheek" but given his other writings, I think this is just like Jon Stewart's constant "clown nose on, clown nose off" act. When he gets heat for his writings, "it was just a parody". But when taken as a whole, it is of a piece. And yes, I am familiar with his writings.
And let's settle this once and for all:
As regards free speech, I will merely note that the practical consequences are very similar if the response to speaking an unacceptable view is police appearing and throwing you in jail, or an Internet lynch mob appearing and getting you thrown out of your job. For most ordinary people, either consequence is sufficient deterrence to prevent them speaking their mind.
Free speech is the right to speak your mind without sanction from the government. Period. It is not freedom from consequence, it is not freedom from criticism, it is not freedom from disagreement, and it is not freedom from rebuttal. If you lose your job because of what you write (and assuming you are not a government employee), then that is perfectly within reason. After all, your employer is not bound to keep you as an employee regardless of how much revenue loss your presence causes them. Any claim to the contrary is ridiculous. Ask the Dixie Chicks about the consequences of free political speech. Of course, at the time they cried that their rights were also being trampled. But that doesn't make it true for them either.
As for these "threats" you speak of, if there were bomb threats made (as happened with some of the Gamer Gate meet-ups) those are illegal, and the correct response is to notify the authorities. So too with death threats or general threats of violence. All of those are illegal, should be reported to the authorities, and followed up on.
And for the record, if Anita Sarkeesian was cancelling an event because of vague "threats" my advice and any sympathy would be exactly the same. If you have actual threats, whinging about them but not notifying the authorities buys you no sympathy from me. Cancelling your event citing such threats only buys you empathy from me if you've also reported those threats. Otherwise, I just have your unsubstantiated word that threats were made. And finally, I must agree with Grim's assessment. If they wish to style themselves as "alpha-males" and "kings", perhaps standing up against vague threats instead of acting exactly like the kinds of feminists they deplore might show more courage than crying about people being mean to them.
I accept the fair criticism that we should have looked for his original posts instead of trusting the media's characterization of them. If you will help me locate the particular articles you think characterize his position most fairly, I will post links to them.
http://www.rooshv.com/bio
You can start your position from here, Grim, if you wanted to know more about him. Generally, my instincts and reviews are very accurate. 2001 would be when the pick up artist community started up and spread, via reverse engineering due to computer geeks and nerds in certain forums and various other grassroots orgs they setup later. An insider book from one of the founders, gave some clues, which I might have mentioned at VC many years ago.
I have my own sources, and do not rely upon the Leftist propaganda branches nor even blogger links.
Roosh is closer to the Men Going Their Own Way side of the alignment. The Men's Rights Activists, the MRA, is closer to the ones lobbying the government for favors and benefits, taking tactics from the Leftist feminists, which Cassandra has mentioned more often as an example of men's rights scene. Roosh mentioned on his site, that his philosophy differs enough from the Men's Rights Activist side that they don't particularly work well together. And I can believe that, given my triangulated sources.
Out of all the regulars here, it might be safe for me to say that I am the most sympathetic to MGTOW or people of that political/philosophical persuasion. So all the things I say, is consistent with that pov as well, it includes it.
VoxDay has been continually mentioning John Scalzi's example about "pretending to be a right wing rapist" when he was attacking Sarah Palin or other conservative women like her, for some time now due to VoxDay's own career encounters with Scalzi at their SF organization. Former SFWA for VD. So Roosh, even though he might have wrote his article "How to Stop Rape" by doing a satire mimicking A Modest Proposal, should have known how people who adhere to Alinsky's protocols would use it for.
True, VD had only recently broken away from the SJW dominated SFWA and then began writing his own books about SJW tactics and forming his own independent book publishing house, but Roosh, given his background, should have figured out how the Left would have used that post of his.
If Roosh had taken a position close to my own, when people were talking about how to "end rape in the US Army", it would have been harder to constantly bring up this subject over and over again by the Leftist psychological warfare branches.
Roosh has been on several hostile to semi hostile media stations. He knows very well by now what the Left's media contraption does to people like him. He merely doesn't focus on countering it as much as say... author of Monster Hunter International does.
In response to this — this utterly licit, wholly inoffensive plan to allow members of an online community to meet in person — he received massive threats of mob violence. Aimed at preventing him and those who read him from meeting privately over drinks.
I doubt that the movement backing Roosh or what he has motivated to generate, will stop at this point.
Centralized control is outside the question, that's what was called off. Individual meetups using cellular, non centralized C3 or C4, still exist. If the group Grim noticed in Georgia wants to continue the meetup, they will have to organize and setup communications, online or offline, and a venue to host them. People are free, even still, to do that in the US.
Roosh is too well known to the Leftist alliance, the SJW feminist wing, and is calling down fire on groups he associates with. Perhaps he noticed that mistake of his.
And of course, if "mob violence" is what American... males fear at this date in time, perhaps they need to find someone to train them up in the old martial arts and ways of fighting first. That could come before, during, or after their training sessions in "Game". I have an entire list of organizations and people I know who I have full confidence in, as trainers and cadre instructors. Of course they are in my head, not written down or copied.
That could come before, during, or after their training sessions in "Game".
"Instead of" would be a still better option.
"Instead of" would be a still better option.
Males tend to be monomaniacal, in the sense of being focused on what they are focused on. It's difficult and generates resistance when people are told to drop what they are doing and adopt an entirely alien other culture or set of beliefs.
Even in martial arts, the contest between weijia and neijia, is eternal. MMM, kickboxing, speed fighting, that's weijia, external power source. A firearm's power source is external, external to the human body at least, but the accuracy needed to control that power is internal, in handling recoil and trigger pulls. Without horsemanship, it's difficult to combine the concepts together.
So people who have something that works for them, a set of skills, they tend to keep with that, until it fails them. And in martial arts, usually external arts "fails" when a young person tries to fight an internal art user that can actually apply the internal power to techniques and counters similar to the way point shooting and hip shooting worked for the master marksman of America. Only then, do the young students realize that their path might have been mistaken.
Well, the problem here is that you are portraying as opposed "skill sets" two arts that are better analogized to developing good taste in fine food on the one hand, and binge-eating to 400 pounds on the other. Except, of course, that the only harm you do in binge-eating is to yourself.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/comments/4467cn/the_world_is_scared_of_men_congregating_red_pill/
Doing a bit more research and reading and it looks like this issue has gotten a lot more popular than expected, due to the Leftist organs.
As for skill sets, conversation abilities, NLP, and H2H skills are not diametrically opposed. Different skills can be stacked on top of each other or gathered.
It used to be they had a limited number of skills to choose from, since their goals were pretty ego and self orientated. Now a days, it is different. It has progressed and mutated to a certain degree, Grim. They could never have gotten this big or popular or setup their own self run communities online, otherwise.
So long as they were talking about improving themselves, that had a limited utility in the war the Left wages against humanity. But once they speak of higher goals, of political and cultural goals, they become useful, in the strategic sense. To me, if not to anybody else.
It has always somewhat amused me that women who (as I do) counter silly feminist oppression rhetoric with the observation that men are one half of humanity and the world works better when men and women support and understand each other and men who make the same argument when confronted with silly MRA oppression rhetoric are accused of the same thing: being suckers.
Grim often playfully accuses me of being a Kantian. And that's probably a fair characterization: in a world full of people with conflicting needs, desires, conditions, challenges, etc., the only "fair" way I can think of for ordinary people to treat each other involves establishing broadly just general rules and then applying them as evenhandedly as possible.
The problem with much of the Game crap is that at its heart, it's deeply immoral.
I completely approve of men controlling their own sexuality (and by that, I mean not letting their appetites rule their minds). And I think it's healthy for both men and women to be centered and confident: insecurity and neediness aren't attractive to the opposite sex.
But when Game - as it so often does - leads to men treating women in a blatantly manipulative and contemptuous manner, I'm going to call it harmful: just as I would call it harmful if I saw women teaching other women to use sex to manipulate men. I never realized until I got on the Internet that there was this deep well of fear and anger towards women. Nothing in my real life experience of men prepared me for that.
I have come to believe that the modern world actively makes it difficult for young men to get a handle on their emotions (one of the most powerful emotions for young men being their sex drives). Traditional masculinity has always focused on the idea discipline: of suppressing emotion (or at least subordinating it to the will). Modern masculinity, if there is such a thing, seems not to recognize the value of self discipline at all (which in today's veritable feast of temptation is just bizarre).
Sex is an ancient and powerful force. It affects men and women very differently, and it's hard for me to think of a more destructive thing than for society to constantly bombard young people with the one thing they desire above all else without teaching them the value of self restraint.
Heh... I was just thinking that one way to describe what I'm talking about would be that it's almost a form of moral obesity :p
But when Game - as it so often does - leads to men treating women in a blatantly manipulative and contemptuous manner, I'm going to call it harmful: just as I would call it harmful if I saw women teaching other women to use sex to manipulate men. I never realized until I got on the Internet that there was this deep well of fear and anger towards women. Nothing in my real life experience of men prepared me for that.
Feminists have been using sexual strategies to destroy women as well as men, for some time now. This creates blowback, backlash, like constantly killing a native population's women and children does. The Muslims occupied Spain and did exactly that to the Castile and former Visigoths, and Spain became a very violent culture, even after pushing the Muslims out. Adopting cruelty and slavery, from their former overlords. Even in victory, cultures learn from their enemies, especially since they had to learn in order to defeat their enemies.
I see the natural and inevitable reaction to the Leftist alliance's use of strategic weapons against humanity, as being on the same level. They learn from the Left, because that is who they have fought all their lives. It is the one culture they have the most contact with, even above and surpassing the American "mainstream" culture of the 1970s.
It is a product of the failure of the previous generations, to deal with the problem of the Left. That kicks the can down the road, much like WWI and social security kicked the can down the road. Somebody else will have to deal with it sooner or later.
Sex is an ancient and powerful force. It affects men and women very differently, and it's hard for me to think of a more destructive thing than for society to constantly bombard young people with the one thing they desire above all else without teaching them the value of self restraint.
The previous generation failed to deal with that problem, because they ignored it and treated the Left like clown cars that were powerless and worthy of ridicule. The newer generations do not take kindly to their elders lecturing them on what should be done now, given the failure of the elders. If an elderly martial art fought a young one, and lost due to incompetence or lack of skill, the young ones would not respect the elder as much either, since the elder would lose much face.
There is no such thing as society, of course. Only cultures that dominate and sub cultures that are dominated by those above. There is a hierarchy, but there is no utopian society to dictate what is Right or Wrong, that is the failed morality of the previous generations. The Conformity of those who Obeyed their Orders, which inevitably lead to the social revolutions of the 1960s, the Islamic invasion of Europe, and various other happy coincidences. No society, only individuals and families who aggregate individuals. Cultures that aggregate families, and sub cultures that are lower in the power curve than other cultures.
Or alcoholism. I've spent a lot of time lately on a site called MyFitnessPal.com, where people chat and encourage each other about their fitness routines. There's a large contingent I'm very comfortable with, who post what they're doing and what results they're getting, then compliment and encourage each other. There's also a sizeable group whose approach is to moan about how they're surrounded by temptation every day and no one is supporting them enough, then look for validation in their failure. "I need friends to motivate me!" "I don't know why my doctor can't explain my weight gain!" I'm reminded of the sort of alcoholic who thinks the whole world has to hide the booze for his benefit; it's the burqa approach, and the PUA one as well.
It's a comforting thing to learn that one's locus of control is oneself. I can think of few human conditions that are likely to improve if we can't keep that in mind.
It's a comforting thing to learn that one's locus of control is oneself. I can think of few human conditions that are likely to improve if we can't keep that in mind.
Word :p
Ymar:
This is a general comment (so, not aimed at you). But I cannot tell you how tired I am of the "blowback" excuse. X is doing something harmful or wrong, but it's not X's fault because feminists (or The Left, or the Bugaboo of the Day) did something wrong first, and X's bad behavior - oddly, not directed at feminists, but rather at all women - is therefore completely understandable and in fact, the fault of "feminists".
This is exactly - EXACTLY - the argument Ta Nehisi Coates' uses in his writing. Yes, blacks are doing some very harmful and destructive things. But it's not *their* fault - it's blowback causes by white racism and slavery! Never mind that their harmful actions aren't even directed at white racists - that doesn't matter.
Basically, this is the same argument small children use, and its moral sophistication is about at the 5 year old level: "But Johnny was bad first!"
OK, but adults are responsible for their own actions. No one can make us do things we know to be wrong - in the end, *we* decide how we will act.
One of the recurring thoughts I had whilst reading Coates' book was that if women were to buy into his idiotic premise, we would hate all men. We could very well (stupidly) make a similar claim: for generations, women have contributed to the creation of wealth and prosperity by bearing and raising children and helping to build families (the basic building block of society). I believe the work I did for over 20 years - running our home, raising our sons, taking care of the house and the yard, deciding how my husband's paycheck would be spent, paying bills and taking care of a million things so my husband did not have to worry about them - made him more successful at work. Had he had to do these things, he would have made less money (and quite possibly, our sons would not have been raised right, as absentee parents or hired help aren't going to put the same love and effort into parenting as a full time mother).
But I would never make such an argument because I don't view my marriage as an adversarial partnership in which each partner keeps score. We both sacrificed for the good of something larger than either of us: our family.
What bothers me about a lot of that Game nonsense is the essentially selfish nature of it. It's not concerned with anything larger than sexual self gratification, and therefore I don't believe it's manly (or even, really, adult in any sense I recognize).
And a guy who writes books called "BANG [fill in the country]" is likewise not someone I could ever respect or take seriously. That's just juvenile behavior: I can't think of any other way to describe it.
Although I have little sympathy for the underlying argument that PUA enthusiasts make about what's wrong with women, I'd have no problem with their announcing that they've encountered some behavior in erotic relationships they don't care for, and they're taking appropriate steps to ensure they'll never get stuck in a relationship of that pattern again. I'd do the same myself, and often have. Where I move into "soggy disgust" territory is where the argument becomes, "Some/all women secretly want to do this to some/all men, therefore I am going to engage in a lifelong campaign to heal my wounded psyche by behaving in a childishly manipulative and vengeful fashion against women I've just met and know nothing to speak of about (but with whom I'm still so helplessly obsessed that I need to have anonymous sex with them as often as possible, and then write about it at length while snickering and reveling in their humiliation)." Evidently they believe this reflects poorly on the women they encounter in life. Fer cryin out loud, yer not 17 any more. Grow some bark. And quit trying to meet women in bars.
And quit trying to meet women in bars.
Yes, quit trying to meet women in bars and then feeling disillusioned when they don't conform to your ideal picture of a woman: one with "old fashioned" morals (who will - inexplicably - sleep with any guy who uses the right pickup line).
Sheesh. And some folks think *womyn* are emotional and illogical :p
Talk about a biased selection process.
And quit trying to meet women in bars.
Ahem! I will have you know, I met my wife in a bar. But then again, I highly doubt anyone would call us particularly "old fashioned" either.
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