Now, I generally don’t even notice this kind of thing. However, every now and then something sets me off. In this case, the Pink Mafia finally got to me. First there was the whole Komen affair, then the Obamneycare vs. the Catholic Church birth control flap, and then a whole series of “look, see how bad it is?” bills proposed to show us men exactly how terrible our stance on birth control and abortion is. Each of these cases has been followed by a violent wave of explosive stupidity vomit on Facebook.

I don’t mind people having different opinions. In fact, I like a good debate. Long time readers will have a good guess as to how I stand on these issues (against abortion, don’t care about birth control – but don’t want to be forced to pay for it, and against stupid bills). But I acknowledge that there are some decent arguments on the other side of these issues. There’s a secular case to be made for the pro-choice side (it’s weak, even when purely secular, and I think so-called Christians who are pro-choice are suffering from massive cognitive dissonance). There’s definitely a secular case for birth control (weaker than it’s generally made out to be, but not that bad). And… ok, there’s really no case at all for stupid bills or the stupid legislators who propose them.

I’m not talking about people who are genuinely arguing their side. I’m talking about the explosion of true stupidity that many are putting forth as arguments. It’s bad. Really bad. The total and complete lack of even a semblence of logic is truly stunning. I know, many in this corner of the blogosphere are going to ask me what I expect from a bunch of women. But really, even so… it’s this bad?

It finally got to me a few weeks ago, so I posted a link to one of the stupidly retarded bills and pointed out exactly how stupid and retarded it was. The surprising thing was how many friends I had who basically joined in and agreed. Thank God there’s some sanity left in the world. However, I had a couple of commenters who couldn’t let it go. One was my brother Wilson, arguing the pro-life side with all the skill of a dung beetle trying to use a wet noodle as a surfboard on the wake of a dying otter (that might even be a tad generous). The other is the new wife of a friend, arguing the pro-choice side with slightly more skill…

Until she wanted to deploy the, “Sorry if this is sexist, but men don’t even have a say in this,” card.

Friends, this is a classic Feminist move. It is not a valid argument – or at least (as you should point out to them) it’s no more valid than saying that she should get her ass back into the kitchen and shut up. It’s not really an argument at all. Rather, it’s a ploy intended to shut down argument. You don’t have any right to argue this. You aren’t capable of logic and reason. You don’t have any reason to try and protect your children or the children of society. You, in fact, are subhuman and should bow to her obvious superiority.

So I did the only correct thing – I shut it down and pointed it out for what it was.

Fast forward a little bit, and she’s posting a new argument on her own Facebook wall. I drop in and post a relatively innocuous comment (although it was, very definitely, in opposition to her position). OK, it was slightly snippy, but really and truly only a little bit.

A few hours later, I found myself de-friended and that comment had been deleted.

This, my friends, is a classic example of the “Don’t hit me, I’m a girl” ploy. As usually deployed by Feminists, first she picks a fight. Then, when she realizes she can’t win, she flees from the debate. In person, the appropriate response is to shut it down and call it for what it is. On Facebook? I’m leaning pretty hard toward ignoring it. I’m kind of tired of reading her rants anyway, and, of course, saying anything about it in a public forum just comes across as petulant. Her husband is a good friend of mine (good friend is putting it mildly; I was a groomsman in his wedding, and he would’ve been one in mine except that he couldn’t get leave from his deployment to Iraq), and he’s a bit of a hot head. But I’ve long since learned how to deal with his kind of temper tantrum – be the rock, and let the storm rage around you. It’s a technique that works equally well on women, children, and overly-emotional friends. Besides, once he calms down he’ll know (deep down) that I was right, even though he likely won’t admit it for fear that it’ll interrupt the pussy train.

But she’s not my wife, so as far as I’m concerned she can suck it. I’m going to get on with life.

Readers of the original post will recall that Clark’s wife earns between two and three times what he does. On top of that, Clark has a kind of soul sucking job for the state government. Soul sucking enough that when he first started it I told him that if he was still there in 20 years I was going to come kick his ass.

Quite understandably, Clark is starting to get fed up with this situation. Last spring he decided on a totally new career trajectory. This summer he started taking classes toward a new degree at one of the local state universities. Sounds good, right?

Not so fast. Clark’s new “calling” (a word he seems to use completely differently than the Catholics do) requires massive amounts of extra schooling just to break in. There is so little overlap between his current degree and his new interest that he’d have to take enough classes for a bachelor’s degree that it would be almost like starting over completely. Also because of the lack of overlap, he can’t really just jump in and go for a graduate degree. He’d have to take enough pre-requisite undergrad classes that it’s more or less the same. So we’re talking about basically three years of schooling if he went full time.

But did I mention that he’s married and has a daughter less than one year old? If you’re guessing that full time schooling isn’t happening, you’d be exactly right.

Oh, and his new “calling” won’t actually pay any more than he’s currently making. In fact, it might pay less. Now, in some cases that can actually be fine. Recall Roissy’s third commandment of poon: You shall make your mission, not your woman, your priority. If your income is low because you’re truly following a mission or calling, your woman very well might put up with it. In fact, under the right conditions it can be even more alpha than out-earning her.

But there’s a reason that I’ve been putting “calling” in scare quotes. No offense to my friend, but he’s been completely fooling himself here. The day we sat down for lunch and he outlined this plan he gave me some spiel about what his pastor outlined as necessary for a calling. Some mumbo-jumbo about where opportunity, means and desire overlap. Frankly, I think it’s bull. A calling is really simple: it’s what you feel you have to do, even if it’s a royal pain in the ass or nearly impossible. You know, when you’re called. Not when it’s something you maybe might wanna do if only you had the opportunity and means.

I (nicely) told him so, and gently hinted that this was an awful lot of schooling. Then I went home and told my wife that there was no way he’d be finishing it.

I saw Clark a couple of weeks ago and he’d finally acknowledged this truth. Unfortunately, this revelation came after he and his wife moved back to the town where they went to college together so that he could go back to school. She took a faculty job – a sideways move, maybe actually a backwards move in the long term. They’ve spun it to everybody else as if it’s a great career move for her, but he was rather honest with me (at first) about it really being so that he could go to school. Now they’re stuck in a tiny apartment down there, trying desperately to sell their house. Yeah, in this economy. Clark managed to transfer his current state job down there… only now he has a really long commute on top of a soul-sucking, low paying job.

Wait, did I say there was good news here? Well, there is, a little. First, Clark is finally seeming to realize that not all is right in paradise. He hasn’t exactly admitted it to me, but you can see it in his body language and hear it in his voice. His choice of words is letting it out, but only if you know to look. So at least he’s finally starting to see that something is wrong. Also, this move has seriously upset the nice, pretty SWPL life that they had. The net effect of that, at least in the short term, has been to make his wife infinitely more bearable. Some people just really don’t react well to money, and are just better people when they’re not very well off. Sadly she appears to be one of them.

The better piece of news, though, is that he’s looking into other career options. Right now he’s got himself convinced on one path that he probably also won’t stay on. There’s a good bit of schooling there as well, and the program itself is very competitive for admission. But it would result in a terminal degree (not a PhD, but the equivalent in this field) and a salary competitive with his wife’s. I don’t think he’ll stick with this plan, either, but at least he’s now thinking along somewhat more practical lines.

When they moved, I told Hermione that there were very good odds of Clark getting divorce papers in his stocking. Now that they’ve been there a few months, I think he’s got a bit more time left before that comes – but I still think it’s coming. Based on some things he said to me at our last meeting, I think he might even be open to being baby fed some Game concepts.

We shall see.

OK, I talk about my family enough on here and it’s probably starting to get confusing. So to help everybody keep score, it’s time to make up some names. I’m the second of four children. I have an older sister and two younger brothers. For the sake of argument, let’s call them, in order, Hillary, Leonidas (me), Chewbacca (how the hell is that not in the spell checker?) and Wilson. Chewie’s got his own issues, but his marriage isn’t [Editor: This was a typo.] a lot better off than Wilson’s, so we’ll leave him alone for the moment. And Hillary… good lord, where would we even start. So today it’s Wilson.

For those who have seen it, Wilson gets his pseudonym from the movie Sky High, in particular the character of “Ron Wilson: Bus Driver” played by Kevin Heffernan. My brother looks and acts just like him, only he’s a teacher instead of a bus driver because in the real world we have teachers unions.

OK, I’m picking on my brother a bit. I actually feel kind of bad for it. Let’s set the tone for the whole discussion right here. My wife, some of our old friends and I were sitting around one night two or three years ago discussing some of the douchetastic things Wilson and his wife had done when one of my friends just said, “The sad part is that we’re all sitting around here talking about Wilson as if he’d died.”

See, Wilson used to be kind of cool in his own weird and twisted little way. He was always a little dork who tried way too hard, but he really did have his own unique sense of style. Unique enough that if I described it here it would be a dead giveaway to anybody who knows me, so I can’t really give too much detail. It was weird, but it was silly. The important people thought it unique and interesting, the losers thought it contemptible and those people you have to just get along with because they run everything found it tolerable because, well, it was just too silly to really come down on him for.

His whole life he’s had a problem knowing when to shut his damn mouth, and it’s gotten him into a lot of trouble. But for most of those years he was a really good natured kid, just energetic and mischievous. Then he met Emo Bear, his future wife (the name is a riff on the Care Bears, and it fits).

First of all, Emo Bear was a rebound relationship. A high school rebound relationship. We’re already off to a bad start. Worse, I later found out from a mutual friend who went to school with him that she basically was laying in wait to ensnare him when the other chick dumped him – probably for the crime of being way too beta, which is what killed all of my high school relationships, too. On the other hand, she’s probably spent a good bit of time on the cock carousel since then, so it’s not a total loss (although she was much cuter than Emo Bear).

Emo Bear is the living definition of a Spoiled American Princess. First of all, her mother rules the home she grew up in. Her father is an extremely beta engineer who lets himself get walked all over. And Emo is their first child and only daughter. On her best days when she was still in her prime years (the late teens), she was a solid 6. Her ego thinks she’s a 15.

She didn’t really bother me at first because she puts on a decent outward appearance of just being shy rather than aloof. I’m shy, so I got that – or thought I did. The first thing that bothered me was that Hermione and I would try to set up double dates from time to time and they’d always flake on us. Then the one time they did show up, instead of seeing a slightly edgy comedy that we had originally discussed, we ended up going to see a kids movie. For her. OK, slightly annoying, but not too bad yet.

Then came the first family Thanksgiving she showed up for. For reasons that are too complicated to go into here, Hermione couldn’t make it and instead ended up stuck with her parents right smack in the middle of their excruciating divorce. Their Thanksgiving consisted of ham sandwiches. Our Thanksgiving consisted of watch Wilson and Emo Bear ignore the family all day because they were too busy making out in another room. Oh, and this was the first family event she’d bothered showing to as well. Despite being significantly younger and scared to death of meeting my family, Hermione had driven across four states with me to go to Chewie’s wedding. Emo was a no show, and without very good reason (a trend that has since grown).

She continued to ignore family events, but every event with her family was super amazingly special and they just had to go. This struck me as a bad sign. So not too long later, I pulled Wilson aside and basically said, “Hey dude. She’s totally not making any effort to involve herself with your family, but dragging you to everything for hers… I just don’t think this is a good sign. Just be really sure you know what you’re doing.”

Oh, she didn’t like that when word got back to her. I was trying to break them up, oh I’m so awful blah blah. Which isn’t really true. At the time, all I really meant was what I said: just be really sure.

But a lot more unfolded after that. I met with some people from their church to go see a movie at one point, and quickly vowed, “Never again.” Can we say C-U-L-T? There’s some behavior there straight out of the brainwashing handbooks. Separate the subject from any family and friends who aren’t a part of the church? Check. Denigrate any other source of information they might get? Check. Make sure that all of his new friends are from the church and properly indoctrinating him? Check. Ensure that all members know that they and only they are the truly saved and everyone else is damned? Check. Emo Bear and her family unconsciously (it had to be unconscious because none of them is bright enough to do it consciously) picked up on the same techniques and used them to isolate Wilson even more.

And they’re really not that bright. This is the girl who, after spending more than two years working toward an education degree (she later dropped it down to something else because that was too hard) of all things had to have Wilson quietly explain what a labor union was one afternoon while we had a political discussion at my parents’ house. And she probably really is the smart one out of her family. It’s pathetic.

The drama escalated over the years. They still barely showed up at family events, using the flimsiest of excuses to get out of them. But then my brother lost his job (before he was a teacher) because he took off of work to go to her great-grandmother’s (whom he had never met) funeral in another state despite being out of sick days. Um… no shit they fired your ass, bro. And damn my luck for just happening to be there the day you told Dad about it.

When Hermione and I got married, Emo Bear through a shit fit at our rehearsal dinner and stormed off. It wasn’t a very good storm off, though, because hardly anybody even noticed. I’m pretty sure she was pissed off that we were getting married before her. They’d had to postpone their wedding three times because Wilson couldn’t get a job. The two of them tried to leave our reception early to go to a “going away” party for their minister. A man who was being forced out of the church because his wife committed suicide after she found out he was having an affair. Oh, and then he showed up at the church within weeks with his mistress.

She set her own final wedding date on Wilson’s birthday. He just went along with it with that dopey grin he’s always had, not realizing (or just tolerating, I’ve never really been sure) that she’d taken away the only day he had that was really his and made it all about her. She was a total bridezilla at her wedding. Most of my extended family didn’t show, mostly because the two of them had made so little effort for family events. Oh, and because none of them like her, either. But it’s better that they weren’t there. She and her family were jaw droppingly rude to my own family the whole weekend.

My parents have noticed all of this as well. They have the admirable habit of going to ridiculous lengths not to say anything negative about anybody (and I mean ridiculous; they take it too far). Even so, it slips out with her on occasion. But they never had the balls to tell either Wilson or Emo to their faces that their behavior is unacceptable. Instead, they just get pissy and take it all out on their other children. As far as I know, I’m the only family member who’s ever had the balls to say anything directly.

Which has led to the other problem. In her eyes, I’m the alpha. There’s never been anything direct, but I’m damned sure that it’s causing issues. My brother’s got his head so far up her ass that he won’t listen to or think anything she doesn’t approve of. He caves on everything. Beta to the core. So beta that I’d call him an Omega if he hadn’t somehow managed to father a child by her. And here I come, the only one in the family who won’t put up with her shit. You can guess the effect that has.

But dammit, I don’t want it. For one, it’s my brother. I would never go there. For another… ew, just ew. Remember when I said that at her best she was a solid 6? That was a few years ago. Now she’s a little rolly polly with a body that looks like a Chinese dumpling. I wouldn’t fuck her with your dick, even with 10 condoms on. But it’s launched some sort of female competitive instinct that’s caused her to be all kinds of annoying to my wife. Great, just great. But I’m still sure as hell not going to back down and start acting like a chump.

You might think that because she’s so fundamentalist in her religion that their marriage would still have a decent chance of working out. I doubt it, though. Her family doesn’t like him and never has. She has no respect for him. And why should she? He caves to everything that she wants. He’s a school teacher in a time when schools are laying off teachers. We know that the school district he works for is about to announce layoffs. It’s been in all the papers. Yet rather than waiting until the announcements, they’re about to buy a house. Rather, I should say that he’s about to buy her a house, because I’ve got money that their marriage doesn’t last a decade. If he does get the pink slip there’s a decent chance it won’t last the summer. Sure, she’d have a pretty hard time trading up. But her family’s there ready to step in and convince her that just about anything would be a step up.

The worst part of all is the way they talk baby talk to each other even when other people are around. I heard it for the first time a few years ago when he was talking to her on the phone. Among my friends it has now been dubbed as his “gay man voice” because that’s exactly what it sounds like. Which is one reason why I roared with laughter when I read the following on the Château this morning:

Any man using baby talk with his woman should lop — or rather, daintily snip — his balls off and mail them to a scientific lab to be studied under an electron microscope for possible application in nanotechnology.

Amusingly and sadly all at once, that is my brother.

I want to help my little brother, but he won’t listen to anything I say on this topic. Indeed, he ignores almost any direct advice I give him now. I’m certain it’s because he wants to spare himself the fight with his wife over it. But it’s a little sad, because he still kind of hero worships me (his big brother) and picks up indirectly on the things I say and do. So for now I just wait on the sidelines, ready to hand him a copy of Athol’s new book when it comes out and point him over to Roissy.

I’m waiting for the explosion to come now that I’ve stopped putting up with her shit. I’m waiting for my father to tell me that it’s not my place to be treating them that way. I’m not looking forward to explaining that no, it’s his place to do it and he’s falling down on the job. But it needs to be done. What I’ve listed here is only a brief summary of the major items that I remember. She’s been at this for years now, and the tally is huge.

The really sad part is that after learning about Game it’s become so obvious that she’s desperate for a little bit of alpha treatment. She wants to be put in her place really, really badly. If my brother would just grow a pair, she wouldn’t be anywhere near as intolerable (she still wouldn’t have been worth marrying). But I just don’t see it happening until the cold hard reality of divorce court bites him on the ass. You can’t save everybody.