In my recent article about Zach Rosenberg, I took him to task for telling his four year old son that he was a rapist because the boy tried to steal a kiss from a girl and she did not like it.
I realize, in a sane world, I would not need to write a follow up to that article. Zach Rosenberg is a nut case, emotionally abusing his child. End of story; no more needs to be said. Right?
Wrong.
After tweeting this article to Zach I got an email from him. It seems he knows enough to be concerned with labels, as long as they have an impact on him instead of his four year old.
I present you the email, unedited, in its entirety:
Name: Zach Rosenberg
Email: XXXXXX
Message: Hello Paul –
I’m not here to fight. I read your article about me, and in the spirit of men speaking about men’s issues, I appreciate your opinion. I don’t want to argue about what I said or meant. I don’t even want you to take your piece down. The only thing I’m asking is that you take out the lines about me being a child abuser. I know that you feel that way, but you mention that you’d like for that line to “Google better” and that’s my issue. I’m a writer. I’ve written about all sorts of men’s and father’s issues. And yes, one of my outlets is the Good Men Project, which I realize isn’t popular with the MRM.
But man to man, I’d like for you to consider this. Regardless of any other issue, I still need to feed my family, and as you know, if something like “Zach Rosenberg is a child abuser” is out there, it’s not necessarily bringing a conversation about men’s rights or issues forward – it’s simply damaging my character. Your readers are calling for Child Protective Services to take my child away, and I think that’s extreme. I understand your stance and opinion – but I think if your readers knew more about me, they’d see I’m not a child abuser. I work hard to support my family, I spend tons of time with my son, reading to him, playing with him and teaching him about life. It’s not logical that simply mentioning the word “rape”, not even drilling it into him, but simply mentioning it – with clarifications and a conversation attached – can outweigh the four years of other time I\’ve spent with him. (Sorry, I just realized I said I wasn’t here to fight – and I’m not, I’m just standing up against the claims that my child should be taken away, which are admittedly not your claims).
If you’d like to continue a conversation about this – or even on your site about the issue, I’m open to that. I read A Voice for Men from time to time, and though I don’t always agree with the sentiments, I feel like it’s a necessary voice in the MRM. If we could explore the topic more in a constructive way, I’d appreciate that.
I also have a piece going up soon about how boys and men are victims of rape and sexual assault too – stemming from the larger conversation I’d had with my son involving boundaries, standing up for himself, and talking to teachers if another child is touching him inappropriately. I hope that you’ll return to read that one when it’s up.
In the meantime, please contact me and let’s talk – [email redacted]
Thank you.
So there you have it. Zach is concerned about his image. He does not much like being called a child abuser in a high profile venue. It’s a pretty strange concern, in my book, for a man that had no problem calling his little boy a rapist and then blogging about it on a major website.
Oh but of course, Zach is not really so concerned about his own image. He is concerned that being called an abuser of his four year old son, which he clearly is, is “…not necessarily bringing a conversation about men’s rights or issues forward…”
Oh yeah, I hear ya, Zach, it’s all about teh menz.
I’ll be honest here. I know sociopathy when I see it. It is the little details that give it away; like calling your preschool son a rapist and using that to gain favor with an audience of misandric scumbags. Like objecting to being called on what you are doing and refusing to acknowledge how obviously wrong it is. Like thinking that being called a child abuser is damaging to your character, but abusing your child isn’t. Like using the son you just fucked over as a bargaining chip to get people to feel sorry for you and back down from the truth.
The devil, and in this case, the douche bag, is in the details.
Even though I find Rosenberg to be nauseatingly transparent, I was willing to cut a deal with him, for the sake of his son. But it had to be about the boy, and not about Zach.
I wrote him back almost immediately with an offer:
Hello Zach
First, let me say that this is not personal toward you. But you did, whether intentionally or not, cross a line of abuse, both with your son and with all boys. It was truly wrong, and needs to be corrected.
Still, I think that everyone deserves chances to correct mistakes. Have GMP remove that post and issue a a public statement that you made a mistake as a father in what you did. If you do that I will remove that post. But as long as you stand by those words I am going to stand by mine. I was a counselor for two decades. I have seen the results of all forms of abuse in the wrecked lives of people that came into my office strung out on drugs and/or drinking their way into an early grave. I can tell you that this kind of treatment of a child is, in my professional opinion, highly abusive.
Again, that may not have been your intent, but that is, in your own words, what you did.
The choice here is up to you.
Regards,
Paul Elam
I would have honored this, even if it had pissed off my own readers, if he was willing to do it. I figured that if Zach and GMP were willing to admit, even if just by removing the article, that calling little boys who try to get a kiss from little girls “rapists,” was a really fucked up thing to do, then everyone would win. Zach could learn from his mistakes. Lisa Hickey would end her promotion of child abuse, and a few thousand man hating bitches would have one less piece of misandric filth to post on their Facebook pages. I never heard back from him and the post remains up.
My offer is irrevocably withdrawn.
There is a temptation here to put this matter to rest with some sort of armchair analysis of Zach Rosenberg. Perhaps we could explore, as TyphonBlue would, how he is treating his son like an adult sexual competitor instead of a little boy. We could discuss the possibility that Zach is projecting his own self-loathing form of gender politics into the psyche of his young child. Or, we could assess the continually deteriorating state of The Good Men Project and speculate that even Tom Matlack is cringing at the bilious garbage that is now staining the pages of that website.
None of that stuff, true as it all may be, matters though. I saw everything I needed to see the moment I read that a father had called his four year old son a rapist for the simple, innocent pursuit of some acceptance.
And now I have watched that same father plead for the sake of his own image, holding up that same son like a pawn, while he stands fully behind the abuse he has already committed.
I can’t think of anything else I need, or even want, to say.
