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Anti-NoFap Article

Discussion in 'Porn Addiction' started by Deleted Account, Nov 14, 2018.

  1. kropo82

    kropo82 Fapstronaut

    There's so much to say about this article, but let me start about Girl on the Net. I do not agree with what she says at all but I think there is something in her argument.
    Girl on the Net and I spent a while debating the article on twitter and although neither of us shifted our position one inch I was left thinking that she had an interesting viewpoint. Here's how she summarised her position:
    1. I have no problem with you if you don't want to wank/watch porn/orgasm! That's absolutely your choice! You do you.
    2. I *do* have a problem with some of the harmful ideas peddled by the anti-wanking movement.
    3. It is a fact that many anti-wanking tropes ('semen retention makes you more powerful!' 'refraining from masturbation will make you stronger/more focused/better with women!') came out of movements that were misogynist/homophobic/racist (pick-up artists, reddit's redpill, etc)
    4. Laying the bigotry that is woven through much anti-wanking narrative to one side, there are also the claims that are downright weird bullshit. i.e. someone on this NoFap Reddit thread thinks abstaining will give him a 'deeper and fuller voice'
    5. Some just say they want to give up porn because it's distracting them from their studies, or they think porn is misogynist. But others on the same thread say they're not wanking themselves because they 'know fapping is bad for us' or 'to be a better person.'
    6. And some? Well, some have much more bigoted reasons for choosing to give up on wanking (here she references some awful anti-semitic tweets posted in reply to NoFap)
    7. While it's possible to discuss the pros/cons of abstention as a personal choice, I don't think it is possible - or responsible - to discuss anti-wanking *movements* without acknowledging bigotry. (She references an article by David Ley here)
    8. This is not to say that anyone who abstains from wanking is a bigot. It's laudable that you want to shut bigots out of your movement, but if you want to do that properly you need to acknowledge that they're knocking on your door.
    It's that last point that's the clincher for me. I think she's wrong, but I can see why she says that.

    One of the problems, I think, is that NoFap is seen as an anti-masturbation site and so we are seen as part of the anti-masturbation movement, perhaps even a key part. Therefore if the anti-masturbation movement is full of political nutters then it's reasonable to see that as our problem. It is not at all surprising that people see NoFap as an anti-masturbation site, even active members here think it is. For example, here's how @GhostWriter rebuked me on another thread
    Yet the site itself is clear about this. Here's what we say on https://www.nofap.com/about/
    Or here's another quote from NoFap's twitter account
    Although those quotes are both public they are just not taken on board by people, even many people who are active members here, so how can we expect outsiders to get it?
     
  2. kropo82

    kropo82 Fapstronaut

    The thing that bothers me most about the article is near the end. The writer quotes a porn site who explain how
    There is no attempt by the journalist to wonder if commercial pornography sites might have a vested interest in undermining us, she just quotes them.

    As @DogDaysOfLife said
    When I look at the porn industry and the NoFap site I know which one is anti-woman, and it is not us.
     
  3. DucksInARow

    DucksInARow Fapstronaut

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    Hilarious how people who dedicated their life to combatting stereotyping end up doing exactly that with an entire and diverse movement. She sounds terrified of any male who advocates personal power, like we are all going to abuse it because of our gender. Stereotyping again. Probably spends most of her time on twitter arguing with adolescent boys and concludes that all men are like that.
     
  4. Slick Willie

    Slick Willie Fapstronaut

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    Feminist like frail and submissive men. They hate masculinity and testosterone. Its like sticking garlic in a vampires face to them.
     
  5. #troll

    Fappers justification- masturbation is healthy, it reduces the chances of prostate cancer and ...

    Nofap- enjoy your erectile dysfunction then motherf***er
     
  6. outlander.9

    outlander.9 Fapstronaut

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    They generally don't though is the thing, or if they do they cheat on those guys. Most hardcore feminists I've known are all about hooking up with rough guys who dominate them and don't play their stupid games but it's ok guys cause it just means she's "sex positive"
     
  7. Ridley

    Ridley Fapstronaut

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    @kropo82 wow! That's awesome that you had a conversation with her about it on Twitter. Just to be clear: I wasn't trying to make her look like "the enemy" or anything like that. I just didn't think she was the proper person to be interviewing about this subject, and that the author of the article leaned on her way too heavily as a source of information when she didn't have a lot of relevant information to contribute to the conversation.

    I actually think Girl on the Net is just fine, especially after reading the points you listed from your conversation with her. I don't think she's crazy or anything like that. She's just a person. I just don't like the way she was used in the article, so I guess you could say it's really the author who interviewed her that I have a problem with.

    This is really the only one that rubs me the wrong way. In what way does this community not acknowledging that there is bigotry in this community?

    Here are two quotes from this forum's posting rules. I know that not every community member reads these rules, and certainly not everyone respects them. However, that could be said about literally any forum on the internet, so I don't think that it's a criticism that uniquely applies to this community.
    Not only does this quote express a zero-tolerance policy on blatantly attacking users due to difference of opinion or moral values, but it also explains to prospective users how they can get in touch with the moderators of the forum so that the behavior can be dealt with as efficiently as possible. In what way is that not acknowledging that, sometimes, users are disrespectful? In what way is that not shutting bigotry out of our community? What more could the moderators and creators of this community do to address blatant attacks on users over differences of opinion or moral values?

    Again, what more could the creators and moderators of this community do to demonstrate that we do not tolerate attacking people based on their gender, race, sexual orientation, or membership of a particular demographic? In what way is this quote not acknowledging that some of the people "knocking at our door" are bigoted? This quote is basically saying: we know some people on the internet carry their bigoted ideas with them wherever they go, but we have a zero-tolerance policy on that type of behavior in this community.
     
  8. We do not have to accept Girl on the Web's definition of misogyny. That's the problem with leftist feminist types like her, is that they think they are the unquestioned authorities on what sexism, racism, fascism, etc. is. The definitions they use are always infinitely broad. And anybody can play the game she and them play. I can argue that Girl on the Web is endorsing a sexist viewpoint against men. She is expecting that men talk and act like women, that is the implicit assumption. Men need to be "civilized", their speech and behavior needs to be "policed". And if we then accept that she is the sexist, what does that mean we do with her, according to her logic?

    By the way I would not recommend people on here go visit her site! Lots of potentially PMO triggering things on there
     
  9. Z.e.n.o

    Z.e.n.o Fapstronaut

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    This site is a big threat to the porn industry. Like healthy practices are a threath to the pharmaceutical industry. So the counterattack based on no sense is to be expected, really big attack. No users paying, no income!
     
  10. The fact is there are misogynists who have posted here and some still post. Here are some examples of misogyny on this forum: The guy who said the reason he does NoFap is because he hates women and whenever he gets an urge he thinks about how much he hates women. The guy who said women should have sex with him and cook for him and do nothing else. There's that one member who say the majority of women are s***s. Then there this of member who said the majority of women in the world are cum stealing w****s. We then have the member who has no problem with going on SO journals attacking them using vulgar and rude terms. The member who talked about his wife using word c**t. There's a number of member who have blamed women for their lack of self control and seem to have no desire to take any responsibility. Women have been harassed by male members via PM. Most female members are scared to go anywhere except the women section or the SO section.

    You may not think all of what I've described is misogyny but I think you'll being ridiculous if you say none of what I described is misogyny. Yes, the majority on here are probably not misogynistic but if you think misogyny doesn't exist on this forum you're living a fantasy.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Nov 18, 2018
  11. DucksInARow

    DucksInARow Fapstronaut

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    Vis a vis this site - Whats the bigger threat and problem?

    1) A minority of keyboard warrior misogynists

    2) The porn/masturbation epidemic affecting mainly men (and arguably itself the cause of much anger and emotional disregulation)?

    Perhaps my main gripe with 'feminists' and militant liberals is their stunning incomprehension of scale, proportion and priority (often done wilfully so, in order to accumulate and wield power by thought policing).
     
    Last edited: Nov 16, 2018
  12. Ridley

    Ridley Fapstronaut

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    None of that stuff is okay, and I don't think any of the forum creators or moderators think that's okay. If I ever see someone behaving that way, I report it because I know it's wrong and it's not what this community is about. I know I'm not alone in that, either. The people you're describing are not representative of this community as a whole. Nobody is denying that some users are spreading some pretty bigoted and misguided ideas around here, but I think it's pretty clear that this type of behavior isn't welcome on the forums and is dealt with appropriately when reported.

    I haven't seen anyone in this thread deny that people sometimes make misogynistic posts on this forum, so I don't think anybody is living in the fantasy you're describing.

    I guess, my question is: what are we to do about it? The current system allows us to report misogynistic posts directly to forum moderators (the forum posting rules clearly state that misogyny is not tolerated on the forums) and, in my personal experience, every time I've reported material like that, it gets removed as soon as the moderators see it. Sometimes, the mods even post a message in the relevant thread, explaining why the reported post was removed. What more can we do?

    If the current system of reporting, warnings, bans, post deletion, and a clearly explained zero-tolerance policy on misogynistic posts in the forum rules is not "dealing with the problem", then what is?
     
    Last edited: Nov 16, 2018
  13. DucksInARow

    DucksInARow Fapstronaut

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    I'm for mild interventions by moderators. Most misogynists and racists etc are usually bullies who feed of taboo or forbidden societal norms. Thats why I stress mild (unless you just want to feed it). In many cases simply ignoring is the best policy.
     
    Deleted Account likes this.
  14. Ridley

    Ridley Fapstronaut

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    I understand the idea of not feeding a troll / bully, so I think we're on the same page there.
    What would you consider a mild intervention? Let's say I see someone make an obviously racist post in a thread. If I don't respond to that person at all, just click the "report" button on their post, and write a brief message to the moderators explaining why I think it's not in accordance with the forum posting rules, and then the moderator either
    • removes the post from the thread, explaining that it's not in accordance with forum posting rules.
    • bans the user from the forum if the offense is extreme (like revealing the identity or address of another user) or if the user is a repeat-offender.
    Is that too invasive, or does that fall under mild interventions by your definition?
     
    Christian Fox and kropo82 like this.
  15. DucksInARow

    DucksInARow Fapstronaut

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    I think those are completely appropriate responses. We could argue forever the nuances. The worst you can do is get into a flame war with them.
     
  16. Ridley

    Ridley Fapstronaut

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    Right, then I think we're on the same page about the best way to deal with bigoted posts in this community.
     
    DucksInARow likes this.
  17. SpoonDog

    SpoonDog Fapstronaut

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    I'd never posted on any internet forum until I came here as most of them seem to be full of trolls and negativity, and it's not worth the hassle. No forum is perfect but the overall tone here is positive and supportive, which is another reason why this article is so disappointing. I do think that a few years from now, porn addiction will be far more widely recognised and articles like that one will look laughably out of date and be discredited.
     
  18. I would agree that some of those are examples of misogyny, and in my original post I said "yes there are misogynists on this site". But again, this is a porn recovery website, so I think it's fair to say that everyone on here, including you, have harbored misogynistic attitudes towards women at times

    And I think @DucksInARow has the perfect perspective on this:
    Since the author of the New Statesmen article, and Girl on the Web, outright dismiss our porn addictions, what are we to them but just a collection of misogynistic, alt-right, incels? We are guilty by association, including you.

    Again, instead of accepting by default that the only place the sexists are is here on this forum, how about we throw it back at the dismissive misandrists. They are hypocrites and should be exposed as such
     
  19. outlander.9

    outlander.9 Fapstronaut

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    Not to make light of it, because in truth you are absolutely right, but I think that some of that stuff is just gonna come with the territory.

    Don't get me wrong, there's some things Ive seen here so far that really should be policed better...Particularly the issue of guys creeping on the women here, that shit is super lame and at it's best its horrifically cringey seeing a bunch of guys invading women's recovery logs to beta-orbit and desperately dump compliments at them. Not cool and probably not healthy for dudes having this problem to be constantly reading about issues involving female masturbation.

    But as to the passing rude and general weird or resentful attitudes about women that a lot of guys have here? It's not always ok but it's kinda to be expected that guys hooked on porn are going to have these issues to some degree, and this ought to be a good place to work thru it. Needs work but honestly to get real upset about it though is like going to a meeting for heroin addicts and being mad that people smoke cigarettes. Just my thoughts.
     
    Deleted Account likes this.
  20. I just think we shouldn't pretend that misogyny doesn't take place here. Bottom line is if you've quit porn yet are hating women you still have PAM.
     
    Jennica likes this.

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