Regardless of how it started, it’s seemed pretty clear to me that the alt-right has been a very deliberate vehicle for the radical right to recruit young people for quite some time now.
The damning thing is the alt-right is very occasionally right. This one stuck out at me:
> I trained myself to freeze my facial expression into something neutral so that when I countered Sam’s remarks—“Feminists keep divorced dads from seeing their kids” was a favorite—it would seem as if I’d actually considered his perspective.
A big chunk of the alt-right is precisely divorced dads drawn in, or people drawn to their stories, and the insane racist, sexist, and other baggage comes along. Much of the far-left is precisely people drawn to horror stories from LGBTQ members or African Americans who join a community and bring along similarly insane baggage for the ride.
I'm pretty convinced that unless the left manages to find a way to dive into alt-right ideology, with an open mind, and bring in the very few sane pieces, and change their opinions about the places that their reasoning is wrong, the alt-right will be able to keep recruiting.
> “Feminists keep divorced dads from seeing their kids” was a favorite—it would seem as if I’d actually considered his perspective.
Except that feminism actively derides both the gender norms that say mothers are better caregivers and the US court system's bias against fathers in child custody rulings. There is literally decades of literature and other sources on these points.
A old, common talking point and accusation is that feminism is equivalent to female supremacy, and antifeminist groups recruit men who feel emasculated by women[1]:
> A second set of texts presents varieties of the contemporary masculinist response. Like its earlier incarnation, contemporary masculinist response is split between efforts to dislodge women's supremacy in the private sphere and support for men who are "wounded" in the struggle to exude an aura of masculinity in the public sphere.
> Men's challenges to women's perceived parental monopoly come from men's rights groups such as the Coalition for Free Men, Men's Rights International, and Men Achieving Liberation and Equality (MALE), as well as numerous fathers' support groups. These groups often deny that men have power in society, arguing that male supremacy is an illusion, along the lines of the illusion of the chauffeur: "he's dressed in the uniform and he looks like he's in the driver's seat," noted Warren Farrell, "but from his perspective someone else is giving the orders" (cited in Woldenberg 1986, p. 10). Masculinist texts claim that women and men are "equally oppressed" (Baumli 1986) and rail against perceived institutionalized female privileges, such as exemptions from the draft and advantages in alimony, child custody, and child support (Goldberg 1976; Haddad 1979). One critical review of these texts summarized their claims as follows:
> > Men, they say, are emotionally and sexually manipulated by women, forced into provider roles where they work themselves to death for their gold-digger wives, kept from equal participation and power in family life, and finally dumped by wives only to have courts and lawyers give all the property, money, and child custody to the women. (Messner 1986, p. 32)
>Except that feminism actively derides both the gender norms that say mothers are better caregivers and the US court system's bias against fathers in child custody rulings. There is literally decades of literature and other sources on these points.
But a feminist was the originator of the idea that women should get primary custody of children[1], and the National Organization for Women opposes joint custody[2][3], and highly patriarchal societies such as Saudi Arabia generally give default custody to the father (Saudi Arabia just changed the law last year, and now mothers get primary custory[4])
I would say that the idea that "gender roles, not feminism, is responsible for default custody for mothers" is by far the most commonly debunked argument amongst the men's rights community.
This reply or at least the first source cited is a little disingenuous; modern feminism (mostly third wave and left-wing) rejects the doctrine of essentialism used by second wave feminists. Most third wave feminists are highly critical of gender essentialism (for instance on trans issues which for them must deny essentialism) to the point where you and the person you're replying to are speaking of totally different movements. It would be like saying that science can't explain the motion of the planets - but of course it can, if we're talking about the majority of scientists after Newton. The boy's hate for feminism should not right extend past the 19th century women named in the article.
If you don't believe me when it comes to what modern feminism actually believes I'd be happy to walk through a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article to make the point. Most modern feminists do not support the tender years doctrine.
> If you don't believe me when it comes to what modern feminism actually believes I'd be happy to walk through a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article to make the point. Most modern feminists do not support the tender years doctrine.
No need! Just point me to the testimony at any senate hearing where any major feminist group stood up for equality in family law or in domestic violence law. Or an endorsement of a reform law moving those towards equality.
As far as I know, most U.S. states (34 of them) reject the tender years presumption in the first place. Furthermore, there are different approaches to feminism; liberal feminism propounds formal equality, which is generally rejected by other approaches which favor more radical solutions. The issue becomes vanishingly small when it turns out that most men opt for joint custody when it comes to the choice, and this is only of the very small number of custody trials in court - the vast majority are settled out of court.
And it's a mistake to characterize opposition as only being legal; if I said I was against murder, would you only believe me if I prosecuted a murderer, or campaigned for the death penalty?
What if feminists had other (bigger) issues to fight in the name of gender equality, which would be better for them to direct money? What if they don't believe that "standing up for equality" in the way you think makes much sense compared to writing and educating in society? We can already see this at work in other areas of feminism; a great number of feminists believe that pornography is harmful, but few seek legal means against it.
You seems to have a strong opinion about what current Feminism movement stands for, so let me ask you a quick questions on their views. What is the majority opinion on who is more likely to initiate physical violence, men or women?
As far as I know, prior to Brown v. Board, most states (50 of them) legally gave equal rights to blacks and whites. The reality was different.
Joint custody is not the same as equal custody. Courts will almost always assign joint custody, but rarely equal custody and almost never primary custody to the dads, at least where I live. That's not tender years presumption; that's simple sexism. Typical arrangement is 3 nights dad, 4 nights mom.
That, in turn means a massive windfall for the mom.
In the cases I know which were settled out-of-court, the men were told, in essence, they had little chance at equal custody due to gender and sexism by the courts. In at least two cases I know, the dads were the primary caretaker before the divorce.
Virtually all the men's rights groups lobby for default equal custody. A majority of the opposition comes from feminist groups.
The majority of men in this situation voted for Trump over Clinton, and believe it or not, would still vote Trump over Warren, despite agreeing with Warren on quite literally everything else.
> Except that feminism actively derides both the gender norms that say mothers are better caregivers and the US court system's bias against fathers in child custody rulings.
Among people who call themselves feminists there are both people who strive for equality (and better relations) between the sexes and those who are striving for better conditions for women only.
Many self-proclaimed feminists probably wouldn't consider bias against fathers in child custody rulings a major issue. And those who don't concern themselves with men's rights are likely to alienate men in their quest for better treatment of women.
As much as I appreciate the abstract, theoretical perspective, the reality on the ground is different:
1) Many courts assign default custody to women, almost no matter how bad a mom she is.
2) In liberal, feminist blue states, assuming both parents have equal incomes, the Dad will often pay about a third of his income post-tax to the mom in child support. Assuming the dad was a good parent, the de facto default custody split is quite often 4 nights mom / 3 nights dad, so expenses are essentially equal. The Mom has twice as much money as the Dad
3) If the Mom remarries, her household income will than be several times higher than the Dad. Dad keeps paying the same child support; spouse's/household income doesn't factor. The Dad, at this stage, is unlikely to be able to successfully remarry, given new socioeconomic bracket, or even be all that good a caretaker.
4) The Mom, for the most part, has almost all the tools to continue a pattern of abuse after divorce as before.
Like it or not, these laws came to be from a very active divorce lawyer lobby parading feminist groups in front of legislatures. Nice, abstract texts don't do much against actively lobbying for the opposite.
That pattern continues across the board. It's not abstract. We have a Violence Against Women Act. When men call in for domestic violence, they typically get arrested for having been assaulted. We don't have a Domestic Violence Act. Schools are incredibly sexist to parents -- the mom is the default parent. That's all thanks to very active work by women's groups.
As you might guess, that leads to a small surge of alt-righters, and a bigger surge of Trump voters. Want to know why Trump won? I know a large number of registered Democrats, otherwise as far left as you might imagine, who held their noses to prevent electing someone whose campaign was quite literally handing out "woman cards."
The author's son is far from unique here.
Separate-but-equal had a similarly nice theoretical perspective of equality, and a similarly not-so-nice reality of one side being treated well, and a second side getting the shaft.
Until and unless feminism can start to act for equality (rather than write nicely cited academic texts), it's likely the alt-right will just continue to swell.
I've never seen a feminist testify for equitable family law reform.
