>Delivered-To: a-infos-en-outgoing@???
>Subject: (en) Canada, Quebec anarchists protest masculinists crashing=20
>Indymedia website
>From: martin dufresne <martin@???>
>To: a-infos-en@???, demers.yannick@???
>Sender: worker-a-infos-en@???
>Reply-To: a-infos-en@???
>Date: Sun, 6 Jul 2003 09:46:57 +0200 (CEST)
>
> ________________________________________________
> A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C E
> http://www.ainfos.ca/
> http://ainfos.ca/index24.html
> ________________________________________________
>
>Masculinists crash Indymedia web site - Administrators refuse to take
>action - Profeminist anarchists call boycott in protest
>(Montreal, July 6, 2003) - Over the last two months, the 'Centre for media
>alternatives - Quebec' (CMAQ) - an Indymedia Web site created during the
>Quebec 2001 Summit of the Americas - has become the host of a massive,
>continuing attack, waged in its French-language pages by Quebec men's
>rightists, or 'masculinists', who take advantage of Indymedia's "open
>publishing" format. These antifeminists hammer away at CMAQ's constituency
>and principles with blatant disinformation hoax news stories, endless
>insults, vile personal attacks, open threats and negationist 'theories' of
>gender oppression, systematically presenting men as victims and women -
>especially feminists - as their 'torturers'.
>
>CMAQ (www.cmaq.net), a long-time platform for news and analyses put out by
>Quebec's
>progressive community, had been up to then a forum of dynamic information
>and
>constructive discussion about various themes close to the heart of the=
Left:
>Third World struggles, anti-militarist resistance, feminism, etc.
>
>Confronted by feminists and profeminist anarchists outraged about this =AB
>battering of feminists and of women's struggles =BB, CMAQ administrators=
have
>so far stuck to an ultra-liberal position, refusing to cull from their
>website even the most extreme lies, defamation and character assassination.
>They claim Indymedia rules forbid this (although some articles and comments
>have indeed been pulled, at the defamed party's request or for being
>unauthorized 'doctored' reposts). They have even chastised a feminist=
critic
>for lack of moderation in protesting CMAQ's current cooptation by te Male
>Lobby (http://sisyphe.levillage.org/article.php3?id_article=3D540).
>
>After weeks of ineffectual posturing by CMAQ, a full boycott has finally
>been called by Yannick Demers, of Men Against Patriarchy, a Montreal-based
>anarchist affinity group: "The situation is the following : CMAQ's =AB
>submission queue =BB and =AB dungeon =BB, easily accessible sets of web=
pages, are
>just brimming with masculinist hate propaganda. Many 'softer' masculinist
>contributions even make it to CMAQ's Analysis section. And the author of=
any
>progressist message about gender issues become an immediate target for a
>blitzkrieg of negationist and hateful sexualized comments."
>
>"Indeed, writes Demers, it has become practically impossible to raise=
gender
>issues on CMAQ without being shouted down with intimidation and insults.
>Several women have stopped given up on this site after being assaulted in a
>venue that used to be one of the most supportive of feminist struggles.=
Many
>women and men are organizing with all their might in attempts, unsuccessful
>so far, to get CMAQ to remedy the situation.=BB
>
>After spending months waiting and pleading with the men's rightists to just
>leave, CMAQ administrators are now acknowledging that they have a problem
>and will meet in coming days to look for better ways of implementing their
>principles and putting an end to their site's invasion. They invite=
comments
>about the problem at info@???.
>
>The spread of masculinist hate propaganda via the Internet was recently
>discussed in a groundbreaking SWC report that had the National Post and=
men'
>s rights yahoos screaming bloody murder, especially on CMAQ. The report's
>author is interviewed at
>http://sisyphe.levillage.org/article.php3?id_article=3D533
>
>For more info: Martin Dufresne, Montreal men Against Sexism,
>martin@???
>Yannick Demers, Men Against Patriarchy, demers.yannick@???
>
>
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