MGTOW and women’s adult agency

By John Hembling (JtO): A few days ago, while working with a female friend, I encountered something entirely new in my experience. An explicitly non-feminist woman who, as far as I can tell, has abdicated her own personal agency.
My friend and I had been flirting with one another. Neither of us had any intention beyond verbal exchange. By itself this isn’t noteworthy, except where personal agency and my own MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way) practices overlap.
For the uninitiated – this unwieldy appellation refers to a subset of the Men’s Human Rights Movement (MHRM) consisting of men who actively reject many of the social requirements and obligations of normal masculine identity, on the grounds that such norms are self-destructive, and conform to an inequitable sexual hierarchy.
As a MGTOW, I maintain a ledger of those of my female friends and colleagues who are allowed to enter private space with me.
This might need a bit of explanation. The culture we are all presently living in increasingly promotes the idea that women are endlessly victimized. Sexually, socially, economically, and by men. By the patriarchy.
This idea was encapsulated over a decade ago in a remark by the feminist, ACLU board member and civil libertarian Judith Levine.

“men [are] so powerful that they can ‘reach WITHIN women to fuck/construct us from the inside out.”

Left unstated, but clearly implied is the idea that women are weak, helpless, and lacking volition or agency over their own lives. Whatever a woman does, whatever the outcome, she owns no responsibility. This is also central to the presently populist idea that a woman choosing to having sex while drunk is incapable of making any such choice. Indeed, a woman who participates in a sexual encounter after a couple drinks is a victim. She’s a rape victim. The man, similarly drunk who also made a choice to join the sexy times isn’t a victim. Nope, he’s a rapist.
If you think this is profoundly stupid, like I do, you probably also think women are fully sentient, capable and self-determined adults, like I do.
But our feminist culture keeps saying, albeit indirectly that they’re helpless, weak, feeble minded, and inferior. And this is why, when a woman says she is victimized, maybe raped, maybe sexually assaulted, or possibly just scared – our culture moves to destroy whatever claimed, perceived or imagined menace, malefactor, or malevolent man might plausibly be responsible. The mendacity of this idiotic ideology exceeds imagination. But this is where we all live now.
It’s also why, as a man going his own way, I require a statement of personal self-ownership from any female friend or colleague before they will be allowed into private company with me.
“I, the undersigned declare by my signature that I am an adult, acting with all the self-possession, agency and volition of a fully realized person. In contrast, I state clearly and forcefully that I am not an object, lacking volition or will, or acted upon without my own agency or intent. I also express by my signature that I do now, and may in future enjoy the company of this ledger’s owner, including potentially private and adult social intercourse, and any incidents of note may also be documented by me in this ledger.”
But my friend, by her own choice, can’t sign that statement.
I had suggested to her that I would not invite her over for a cup of coffee, on the basis that she might mistakenly interpret such invitation as for nothing more than a cup of hot coffee.
She responded with the suggestion that checking out the second hand stores in my neighbourhood could constitute a date, also asking whether I am married.
I don’t date, but it would have been pointless and rude to say so.
But am I married? Recall, neither of us has any actual intent of getting naked.
So naturally, I asked if we were about to have a sordid, sexually depraved and inappropriate encounter.
From her: “Goodness! Is that an option?!?!”
In other circumstances, it might have been an option. I don’t know. I won’t be a party to anyone violating a trust relationship,
Here’s where it becomes a bit complicated.
My friend is married, which, by itself doesn’t mean what it used to. “It’s complicated” is more than just a social-media personal status update. I don’t have a wife, or even a girlfriend, in any recognizable sense of that word. But that doesn’t mean I have no sexual relationships with select friends whose genitals happen to fit neatly together with my own. However, those are relationships of trust, unconventional as they might be.
What I don’t do is lend myself to the violation of a trusting relationship – whatever term it’s called by.
As matters turn out, she’s not simply married, she’s in a relationship in which she is entirely financially taken care of by her husband. Indeed, according to her, because she is completely financially supported, her commensurate obligation is to provide sexual access to her husband, whenever he wants.
Reading a book? That can wait. Making a sandwich? That can wait. However, it’s a bit more complex than that. In fact, My friend’s identity is not her own. Her identity, and it’s expression, including her sexual identity apparently is to be expressed only at the discretion, and with the permission of her husband.
This, by the way, is not some archaic manifestation of female-crushing oppression. She’s a highly intelligent, capable, witty individual. She’s connected and has considerable influence in her own professional sphere. This strange lack of self-ownership is a choice she has made about how she lives her own life. She has chosen to defer her own self-expression, and her own agency and volition, into the hands of somebody she has arranged to have pay all her bills. What she conveyed to me was not just the simple and common statement that she is part of a monogamous relationship. She made it clear that she by her own choice doesn’t own responsibility for her own decisions, or her own sexual expression.
Her husband, the guy with the wallet, and yoked plow-horse that he is, might even be a happy beast of burden. I hope so.
But since on-demand sexual access, as well as determination over her expression of sexual and personal identity is the commodity exchanged for complete financial support. I did a little math, while writing this article. I’ve had to make assumptions, obviously, such as the value of their mortgage. Let’s assume for argument’s sake, it’s $ 600,000 over 25 years.
That’s 87 dollars per day. If we double that to allow for clothing, and other living expenses – we’re still only looking at 175 dollars per day.
Maybe I should make my friend an offer for a day of mutual entertainment..
But here’s the problem. If she and I were to go antiquing, or used-bookstore-hopping, or have a simple cup of coffee, I would require her signature in my ledger – asserting her own adult agency.
But she cannot, in all honesty sign that document. She is, by her own choice, a non-adult. She doesn’t possess her own independent autonomy. As a MGTOW, only women who are fully autonomous, self-actualizing and volition-owning agents of their own identity are permitted into my personal life.
She has disqualified herself from signing my ledger. As such, she is not allowed into my private company. Too bad.

I, the undersigned declare by my signature that I am an adult, acting with all the self possession, agency and volition of a fully realized person. In contrast, I state clearly and forcefully that I am not an object, lacking volition or will, or acted upon without my own agency or intent. I also express by my signature that I do now, and may in future enjoy the company of this ledger’s owner, including potentially private and adult social intercourse, and any incidents of note may also be documented by me in this ledger.
Name:
Date of Birth:
Driver’s Licence:
Today’s Date:
Signed:
Witnessed:

Source