Bring your own canary…

Two years ago my manager Michael had an online argument with an Uncle Tom called Josh Olson over his defense of Otep’s Menocide. Most of this exchange took place at Otep’s site, and on his part ended with Michael  writing that Olson was a waste of time. Unfortunately, right after that Otep decided to write a comment defending the song, and by then of course we weren’t listening anymore.

As part of the process of re-posting at this site the articles that I had at Porky’s Place, I ended up at that Otep’s site and finally bumped into her comment. The fight is long over, but my tolerance for irrationality is not so I take a look at her response below. As a left winger I find it worrying that people on my own side of politics are so demonstrably illogical – one would think they could keep their inner Glenn Beck behind  close doors, but alas no.

“OTEP Says:

May 31st, 2009 at 9:59 PM

Ye gods, I love this. I was hoping for a good laugh today – and I got it.”

In other words, your views are laughable because I say so, not because of any evidence I may have to present.

“You represent your side so well, Mike – a bunch of ninnies and sissies and crybabies with the intellectual capacity of a rancid sack of rodent shit.”

Note the usual “MRAs are whiners” meme, along with language that is meant to both infantilize and demean the group, as opposed to bothering to present evidence as to why we are wrong. As for  intellectual capacity, it is hard to take such criticism seriously from someone who so far has presented no actual intellectual argument, only cheap tricks.

“The song you refer to is from my first album released in 2002 and focuses on those who rape, mutilate, and intellectually enslave.”

This is quite clearly a lie, and an easy one to prove as the lyrics concentrate on men, men, and men. At this point Otep has gone from being tricky to just plain lying about the facts, rather like going from being CNN to  being FOX in the blink of a handful of  words.

“So, you’re saying that you support those behaviors and that I’m wrong for denouncing them? Wow.”

I didn’t say such a thing, but let’s keep in mind that all she has to offer are ad hominems of  different colors – this one seems a deep yellow. There was a time when I would have bothered to say “nay” to her accusation, but I no longer care what her ilk think.

“I also wrote a song that strongly condemns MOTHERS who murder their children (ooooh, I must hate all women too).”

Unless the song was about killing all women, as opposed to simply “condemning” a particular subset of women, it can not be compared to a song called MENOCIDE, which by its very title implies men as  a group, not a subset of said group. It is not after all called, BADMENOCIDE, or SOMEMENOCIDE, and at no point do the song’s lyrics make a distinction between different subsets of men.

“But you needle-dicks don’t care about truth or facts or any of that — oh no! it would destroy the sympathy slide you mongrels ride on your way to sucking Rush Limbaugh’s sagging man-teat.”

Note the all too common attack on MRA penis size, which apart from its purely insulting intent may also be taken as a metaphor for not being manly enough. Funny how the so-called progressives fall back on traditional notions of masculinity when it suits them and eschews them when politically convenient. As for the sympathy slide, I only wish there was such a thing – maybe then we would see some real progress – as long as it didn’t lead to Limbaugh’s teat, or Jon Stewart’s for that matter. This assumption that I must somehow be a member of the right makes me wonder if she even looked at the site before commenting. On the other hand, if you want to discredit someone with the lefties at her site, there is no better way than accusing them of being a Limbaugh fan so this may simply be another lie…

“Josh is right. You are completely pathetic but in a very comedic way. You even use a video of me and my MALE band performing at OZZFEST — a festival that is dominated by testerone and machismo — to prove that I hate ALL men?”

You don’t have to like men to work with them. I’m sure there are many misogynists working with women, even when those women aren’t writing the music that’s made them stars. As for hating “all” men, there are always exceptions to the rule, but such exceptions don’t stop one from hating the group while liking or tolerating some of its members. I, for example, hate feminists but am quite fond of jerking off while looking at pictures of Naomi Wolf, though I’m not sure that’s the same thing…

“Seriously? Wow.”

No, the whole thing has been a hoax!

“The sad part is you don’t even realize the absolute, unrelenting failure of your own argument.”

Apparently neither does Otep or she would have been able to offer more than puerile insults and irrelevant statements.

“It would be easy to pity you and your poverty of spirit, but I prefer to follow Josh’s example …. and LAUGH.”

Remarkable that someone who writes songs about wiping out half the human race would accuse anyone short of a Nazi of “poverty of spirit, but hypocrisy and dishonesty are common bedfellows, especially amongst feminists.

There you have it, a nice selection of gibberish with which to while away one of those days when you’ve woken up too late to bother going out anywhere..

You know, a couple of years ago I would have relished doing such an analysis, but this time it just felt like a bit of a chore. Most likely this is because the majority of people don’t give a toss about logic, hence such an effort is largely fruitless. Indeed, a lot of people will see Otep as having won this simply because she got in most of the ad hominems, all of which makes me think I should drop any attempts at rational argument and simply stay in “mocking mode” all the time.