[Remember when MRA's actually tried to maintain the pretense that they don't want to be paterfamilias? FSTDT remembers]

On our recent post concerning abortion, one of the commenters brought up one of the most common feminist arguments, which goes something like this:

Men oppose abortion, birth control, etc., because they really want control over women.

The same idea is applied to domestic violence, divorce, child custody, and just about everything else that might be disputed between a man and woman. Every time there is something that men and women don’t see eye to eye on, it’s an issue of the patriarchy wanting control.

This idea is very clearly reflected in domestic violence theory, perhaps best exemplified by the “power and control wheel” dreamed up in the fevered imagination of the creators of the Duluth Model domestic abuse program. Leaving aside the fact that many of the supposed controlling behaviors detailed on the wheel are probably more commonly practiced by wives than husbands, such as playing “mind games” and using the children to get what one wants, there is a catch in that denying being abusive makes one an abuser. So, according to the Duluth Model, if your wife calls you an abuser, you can deny it all you want, but that just confirms your status as an abuser, which subjects you to state control.

The New York Model for Batter Programs takes control a step farther, and imposes indoctrination sessions on those referred to the program. Additionally, it is a punitive rather than rehabilitative program, but cloaks this to some degree through a stated mission to change society. It is not only men that are subject to control through this particular program (and not all men ordered to attend are convicts, nor are all who have been convicted guilty), but all of society, which is clearly seen by directors as diseased and in need of change. To accomplish its goal, the NYMBP enlists the assistance of courts, the police, judges, social workers and others involved in coercive occupations. Clearly, this goes beyond the control that even the most criminally deranged husband could hope to impose on a wife.

When it comes down to it, it’s pretty clear that feminists are obsessed with the idea of control, and they’ve made great strides in controlling men. Simply living under the same roof with a woman puts a man at the mercy of an army of agents of the state, and with a simple phone call a woman can put him under scrutiny that could last for years and have consequences for his entire life. This goes far beyond anything men have ever practiced under so-called patriarchal society, which for all its faults never was comfortable with interfering in domestic matters. For example, in older American or European society, could a husband ever have called the police to force his wife into an indoctrination center? He would have met with laughter or disbelief. In fact, even if a wife had beaten or cuckolded her husband, this would have been considered outside the bounds of the state’s role. Only murder, wounding or possibly grand theft would have prompted any intervention on the part of the husband. In fact, as today, wives frequently absconded with the children, and men were left to their own devices to find them. Patriarchal “control” over women was mild indeed.

Contrast that to today’s reality, where if a man absconds without his children there are numerous state and federal agencies dedicated to tracking him down and forcing him to pay her. Lord help the man if he tries to take his children — he’ll be hunted down like a rabid dog.

The reluctance to actually control women carries over into even the most fervent supporters of what feminists would call the patriarchy. Anti-abortion activists kill an abortionist every few years, but has there ever been a case of one killing a woman who aborted her own child? Perhaps it is this aversion to controlling women that gives feminists such a sense of entitlement and contempt for men. They know in their heart of hearts that these so-called patriarchal men are actually simply their agents in controlling other men, and use them accordingly, hence the dark, hidden alliance between feminists and social conservatives that has emerged to clamp down on men from time to time.

The control impulse feminists ascribe to men is, like so many of their other issues, an example of projection. There is nothing feminists want more than to control every single aspect of their relationships and society. This is not a very masculine tendency, as men prefer a more dynamic rather than static environment. Men’s natural genius is is suppressed by heavy-handed control, which leads to stagnation, apathy and inaction. The economic failure of Communist societies demonstrates what happens to men under oppressive, controlling regimes: they tend to become depressed and sluggish, and engage in dissipation rather than constructive pursuits.

The patriarchal control impulse is a pure fabrication, and more accurately describes feminist psychology than masculine behavior. Men are generally less obsessed by control than women, and they don’t even come close to feminists, who would reverse Pinocchio and turn us all into puppets if they had their way.

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[Bonus quote from the comments, hoo boy did this age poorly when he dropped the mask a few years down the line]

Yeah, it’s crazy how they imagine this control when it doesn’t exist.

I’m not controlling of women at all. The last thing I want to do is spend all my time riding herd on women. I simply don’t want the job. This has a lot to do with why my marriage failed — I just got tired of having to deal with things for my wife, who expected me to “take charge” in each and every situation, which is a hell of a lot of work for a husband. Me, I’d rather women handled things themselves most of the time, but I guess that’s expecting too much.