Monday, January 29, 2001

Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW)

A measure of sadness washes over me when I reflect upon the changed meaning of MGTOW, which now seems to stand for the marriage strike and curtailing any influence a woman may have over a man's life. It's not that I disagree with men on the marriage strike (I myself am not married and have zero intention of ending my bachelor status) nor do I disagree that men ought to have their spidey-senses tingling at all times to limit the harm women can inflict in our gynocentric society. No, the sadness is over the lost meaning behind MGTOW, which was and still is the most beautiful "solution" to men's problems within our culture. The key to MGTOW's philosophy is in its simplicity, which can be evidenced in The Men Going Their Own Way Manifesto.

The goal is to instill masculinity in men, femininity in women, and work toward limited government!

By instilling masculinity in men, we make men self-reliant, proud, and independent.

By instilling femininity in women, we make them nurturing, supporting, and responsible.

By working for a limited government, we are working for freedom and justice.

Women having "other qualities" is not interesting to men because we don't need them! Femininity will be the price women pay for enjoying masculinity in men!

This is the aim of "Men Going Their Own Way".

By holding this point of view, we are helping other men and, more importantly, we are helping boys grow up to become men.

This goal is to take away everyone's "right" to vote on other people's affairs thus rendering it impossible for political organisms and ideologies to impose their personal will on everyone else. It is not about reinstalling patriarchy or revoking female voting rights or making socialism illegal. It might have this as a side effect - but not directly and not as a political ideology. Only the future will show what happens and by going our own way we are preparing men and boys for that future.


It really is pretty simple, isn't it?

It is not concerned with "ending gender roles" if it is about instilling masculinity in men and femininity in women. Just the opposite. This plays beautifully into the whole bio-mechanics and social-dynamics sphere that many refer to as "game," a term I hate, but a subject that is key to understanding the issues with any real clarity. As Pook tells us, women are attracted to masculine qualities, not feminine ones, just as the reverse is true of men being attracted to feminine qualities. In our culture, propaganda has been force-fed down boys throats almost since birth that for boys to emulate feminine qualities is "good" while their masculine qualities are "bad." This carries on further into relationships and marriage, where men have been brainwashed into believing that if they "embraced their feminine side" that it would make them more endearing to women, and thus be able to get along with them better.

Of course, this is the exact opposite of what actually works. If men embrace their masculinity and wear it proudly, their relationships with women will improve as well. The same goes the other way, that if women embrace their feminine strengths, rather than competing to see if she can be a better man than her husband, many other problems will begin to solve themselves. As many in the game community will attest to, it is not the masculine alpha male that gets charged with domestic violence, but rather it is usually the SNAGS (Sensitive New Age Guys) who've embraced their feminine side and in doing so repulsed their woman to such a degree that she begins to hate him, and then starts leveling domestic violence charges against them as she enters into a destructive spiral, intent on destroying her family. Instilling masculinity in men and femininity in women may not be the solution to everything, but it is the lubrication which makes the solutions work better.

Working for limited government is, I believe, the ultimate solution. The less the government is involved in our personal lives, the more we will be forced to make our personal lives work for ourselves.

Think of two people, a man and a woman, alone out in the woods. They will soon come to depend upon each other willingly and along with willing dependence, so will come the effort to make the relationship itself work. A cabin will be built and they will both enter into the roles they are best suited for just out of necessity, as was always the case in the history of the world. If one betrays the other and leaves, they will both suffer. I firmly believe that if relationships are to work over the long run, a certain level of co-dependency will do more good than a gajillion psychologists giving more of their sage advice. The closer we can get to that idea of a man and a woman alone in the woods depending on each other for their given talents, the better off everyone's relationships will be.

MGTOW is not about raising money to fund lobby groups. Lobby groups exist to pressure the government to create more laws, and to force others to do that which they would not choose to do of their own accord. That is growing government, not limiting it.

I love watching Ron Paul in debates because of his simplicity. Whenever someone tries to challenge the guy, he stops and says, "Well, what would the Constitution say?" and then he goes with that, and his answer is pretty much bang-on every time. The same idea can be applied to the issues of relationships simply by asking, "Is there a way to do this with less government rather than more? And if so, is it simpler?" If the answer to those questions are yes then it is almost assuredly the better solution.

For example, much of the Men's Rights Movement (MRM) is focused on the plight of divorced fathers and the shrieks for shared-parenting are deafening. Shared-parenting though, is pretty much asking for the government courts to take 100% custody of the child and then dole out baby-sitting duties to the parents on this day and that day. If one parent loses a job and needs to move across the country to find employment, he will have to beg the court for permission to relinquish his duties to shared-parenting. Such a person has thus surrendered their right to move freely about the country. What if the two parents decide to follow vastly different religions? Well, the court will decide whether the child is to be Jewish or Muslim, not the parents.

Furthermore, when shared-parenting becomes the norm, a woman's only way to get on the current alimony/child-support gravy train will be to claim abuse as the reason for her getting sole custody, and the amount of men falsely accused of abuse will rise. While I don't have statistical evidence of this (yet), I have had a phone conversation about shared-parenting with someone involved in the movement a year or so ago, and he did admit to me that in places where shared-parenting was becoming the norm, false accusations of abuse are also rising. It only makes sense that if you offer financial incentives - windfalls, actually - for making false accusations, that false accusations will increase and men will pay the price. Whatever the government touches, it turns to shit, just like Midas - minus the gold.     

So, is there an easier solution than shared-parenting?

Yup! There sure is! It is called marriage 1.0, or patriarchy. Although, it doesn't need to be called that in order for it to work. It could be called the "Tooth Fairy Surrogacy Contract" for all I care, so long as it resembles the characteristics of marriage 1.0. In other words, the children of a marriage (or a Tooth Fairy Surrogacy Contract) are the property, or are under the custody, of the husband. No ifs, ands or buts. If the woman wants to leave, nobody will stop her, but the children stay with the husband. If women don't like that idea, then they are more than welcome to revel in their single-motherhood, and get knocked up by a thug at the local biker bar. In marriage 1.0, children of a marriage were the property of the husband, and children born out of wedlock were the property of the woman. No government mandated child-support, no nothing. Just basic, simple property/custody rights. Were they married? The kids are his. They weren't married, the kids are hers. The "owner" assumes all liability and expenses. End of story. No need for much of government at all except for a court to determine whether they were married or not, and thus deciding upon "property" or custody rights. (Hey, that's just how the Founding Fathers wanted things!).

And do we know that this minimal government system of child custody will work? Yup again! In fact, there are thousands of years of evidence for it right in our very own culture, up until around the 1860's when the divorce rate was less than 2%. (Custody laws changed in favour of women in the 1870's and by the 1920's, the divorce rate had sky-rocketed 700% to around 15% of marriages ending in divorce. It has only risen about 300% since then - think about that.) In this situation, both men and women have the ability to meaningfully have children, and also, it would do wonders to lower the divorce rates, as the discussion about who has presumed custody (what kind of "marriage" you want to have with princess) will reveal a lot to both parties before, not after. And if a man goes ahead and signs up for being a Kitchen Bitch in Marriage 2.0, I have little sympathy for him. He knew the risks, took them, and if he loses I will cry about as hard for him as for those who lost at the casino. They weren't robbed, just willfully stupid.

The best solution is always the one with the least amount of "government touch."

I'd like to discuss MGTOW more in the future, as well as touching upon how the "philosophy" of MGTOW is also the perfect solution to stopping the Marxist Dialectic. There is so much "good" about MGTOW that it is a shame that its meaning has changed and these other aspects have been forgotten.

In the meantime, here is the rest of the MGTOW Manifesto for you to read. I challenge you to find even the word marriage in there, let alone "marriage strike." I can find no fault with the philosophy in it. It truly embodies what I believe.


It is important for men to have a practical approach to implementing our strategies.

PRIME STRATEGIES FOR ACHIEVING OUR GOALS

We have 3 main strategies:

1. Instilling masculinity in men by:

- Demanding respect for men
- Serving as good male role models
- Living independent lives
- Fighting chivalry

2. Instilling femininity in women

- We will hold women equally accountable to men and ignore and shun those who refuse to take any responsibility for their own circumstances. Thus we induce women to take a complementary position with men instead of a competitive position, as is now the case.

Feminine qualities we want from women:
- Nurturing
- Supportive
- Responsibility
- Respectfulness
- Honesty

3. Limited government

In order to be independent of society, and live within it, while at the same time work for limiting governmental influence upon our daily lives, men will:
- Go Their Own Way
- Support other men
- Legally reduce any taxpaying
- Truthfully act out any duties in accordance with their conscience
- Use any rights to the benefit of other men as well as themselves


It is those 3 strategies that come together in one.

MEN GOING THEIR OWN WAY
This is the logo:






Every man supporting this idea is welcome to use the logo in this or similar contexts.

What we do as activism or the way we behave personally are the main tactics.

- Use of a logo which symbolizes the strategy.
- Run one or many web-sites and fora that promotes this.
- Run one or more web-sites which tells the truth about feminism.
- Provide stickers, T-shirts, etc., with various statements such as "Chivalry is dead!".
- Writing articles supporting our product.
- Producing music promoting our product.
- Hold international events and local meetings.
- Establishing men's clubs.
- Boycotting certain products.

You will basically be alone doing this. There is no organization supporting you. You just go your own way and do what you believe is right. You are never obligated beyond your own conscience. True masculinity is also about accepting the rights of other men and not letting them down for any short term personal benefits.

The men's movement does actually cover a much larger picture. By instilling masculinity in others, as well as yourself, you will actually be improving the lives of everyone, including women and children.

IF IT’S NOT RIGHT, GO YOUR OWN WAY!

Take care brother!

The MGTOW logos and the MGTOW Manifesto are public domain, explicitly designated so by their creators (the men of MGTOW) to be used by anyone for the purpose of promoting MGTOW. May 1, 2006


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