Recommendation: The Red Pill

“I spend months learning about infant male circumcision, but it only took me watching a five minute medical training video to convince me this is a barbaric practice that needs to stop.”
Cassie Jaye

The documentary “The Red Pill” got an interesting history. A filmmaker who had to look for outside funding, because apparently, no one of the usual sources was willing to fund a documentary that does just what a documentary should do — listen to all sides. Wikipedia provides some background:

Funding

Director Cassie Jaye initially struggled to find financiers who did not have “an agenda.” She mostly encountered people who believed the men’s rights movement was a “disease that shouldn’t be given a fair hearing.” Jaye got the film “off the ground” with her own money as well as money from her mother, a co-producer, and her boyfriend. After it became known that the film would not condemn the men’s rights movement, Jaye was unable to find funding to cover the cost of the movie from traditional sources. She instead started a campaign on the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, which she called a last resort. The Kickstarter project promised to be a “fair and balanced” look at the men’s rights movement. The effort was strongly criticized by some feminists and received support from Breitbart News columnist Milo Yiannopoulos. In the end, the campaign exceeded its goal of $97,000 as well as two stretch goals to raise a total of $211,260.

Alan Scherstuhl’s review suggested that many of those providing funding for the film may have themselves been men’s rights activists, thereby creating a conflict of interest. Jaye has said that the suggestion the film was funded by MRAs (men’s rights activists) is “a common lie that keeps spreading.” One of the largest pledges to the film was by Mike Cernovich, who pledged $10,000 to the Kickstarter project. In a blog post he stated he was “not funding The Red Pill to help MRAs” but that the film will “help all men, and all women, and all children.” Cernovich does not identify as an MRA. Jaye stated that “our five highest backers … are neither MRA nor feminist. I would say three out of five of them didn’t even know about the men’s rights movement, but wanted to defend free speech.” She also stated that the film’s backers and producers would have no influence or control of the film.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Red_Pill

The resulting documentary is well worth watching — and supporting by buying the movie/ticket.

Personal highlight for me was Messner’s comment that some fathers only seeking equality as fathers after a divorce, but they weren’t equally involved in housework and childcare before. Just how blind can this person be? When I think about men at work — sure, some go for a career for their own gains, but many work excruciatingly hard because the work provides their family, esp. their children, with more opportunities than they could otherwise have. It is the way man men show, rather: demonstrate through their behavior, that they love their children. And then, after a divorce, this is suddenly seen as a negative? Give me a break.

Very interesting documentary, very well edited, and a very interesting case of getting your creative project funded despite opposition by the mainstream.