“Don’t hit girls, unless they won’t stop hitting you.” That’s the advice my mother gave me when I was getting ready for my first day of school.

“Or if they’re your sisters and they deserve it.”

That’s the way I was raised by a mother who — sorry Dad — dominated the household. My education in the politics of gender started early. I was the only boy among 4 kids, and also the youngest. I grew up in a small town, and my grade at school had an almost perfect 3:1 ratio of girls and boys. I learned very early on that a girl can hurt you physically, and that they’ll probably beat you at most things. In short, I learned that the only difference between men and women was a matter of anatomy; that equality was a reality and that it was something I should respect and promote.

My further education would take a few years, until shortly after I graduated high school. It was then that I was informed by a helpful group of Radical feminists that I was a cancer upon the earth.

In one of my many ill-advised career moves, I wrote a relationship column for a third rate lifestyle website that pimped my columns out to MSN and paid me not one cent extra. Shortly after filing an article with an innocuous title like “5 things he likes in bed” or “3 ways to keep him interested” my inbox was filled with responses from members of a militant feminist forum. The more colourful items included death threats, but most simply highlighted my involvement in the patriarchy and how I was personally contributing to rape in the Middle East.

It’s an interesting theory, but as far as I could tell, I was a college student making $25 an article and living in my parents’ basement, hardly a titan of industry. I didn’t remember a trip to the Gaza Strip, but what with the Internet and all, I guess I could have been involved without knowing it. Those clever modern feminists had smoked me out.

This continued for a few weeks until I set up an email filter to catch anything containing the words “pig,” “asshole” and “chauvinist” — a surprisingly reliable combination of watchwords.

Of course, I know that it’s a good thing for women to get the vote, and I believe in wage equality. I say maternity leave for everyone with a set of ovaries. Hell, buy a cat and I’ll vote to give you three months off with pay. I say hooray for natural beauty campaigns and, much like Sir Mix-A-Lot, when it comes to females, Cosmo ain’t got nothing to do with my selection.

I also understand that feminism has a proud history of campaigners, organizers, protesters and militants. Without extremists the movement could never have accomplished so much. I know that Nellie McClung was a stand-up lady, and she did good work, but I have news for all of the wymyn (sic) out there; Nellie McClung would spit in your mouth if she met you.

The problem I have isn’t with the movement, or even its members, for the most part. The cause is ongoing and there are definitely atrocities happening both around the world and in North America. It’s an important cause, made into a farce by it’s worst members.

Radical feminists not only devalue the entire cause, but they turn a meaningful pursuit of basic human rights into a witch hunt, the target of which is anything with a penis.

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image: Sizemore/Flickr