> Men's rights have been denigrated to the point my younger male (Western) friends are Andrew Tate fans because there isn't anything else left.
OMG, yes. The MRM has successfully redefined the men's movement to be regressive not productive. Any discussion of men's issues has to refer back to this body of worthless propaganda. But you know, we don't actually have to take the bait. Just as that scientist doesn't actually have to debate vaccines with jackass Joe Rogan. If he wants to learn something he can read a book like a normal person.
I don't pretend to have all the answers, but here's a few points off the top of my head.
* Intersectional feminism is a powerful frame. When we look at the places where sexism and classism intersect, for example, then we can begin to explain the fact that the vast majority of homeless people are men. We can see ways that careerist academic feminism fails those who don't have such constraints. And we can see how popular working class feminist movements can benefit from the research that more privileged feminists have had the freedom to do.
* Men who are open to feminist critiques don't often do the research. We don't read feminist authors. We don't know the history of the struggle, nor of men's role in feminism. Second-wave feminism started with consciousness raising groups. Maybe we men could do some self-educating and soul searching.
* First world feminists need to accept leadership from feminists in poorer countries. There is so much right going on with feminism in places like Mexico. These men and women are confronting millennia of machismo. How do they do it? We should know.
* Men need our own organizations. Who are the groups working on paternal rights? I don't know. Are there any? Can we start one? If the MRM is about whining about feminism. A real men's movement could be about actual organizing. We used to hand out anti-circumcision flyers at 24th and mission. We got some weird looks, but even the MRM has carried on the work we started in their ineffective pissy way.
* Feminist men need a popular social media presence. We have ceeded the space to reprobates and literal criminals. Rather than engaging in tit-for-tat with MRM people, we should address regular, reasonable men who might be open to us if we made a reasonable effort. We need to accept that we have dropped the ball and that that the growth of the MRM is significantly our fault. We were too quiet.
* That said, what I don't think we need are sites like "We Hunted the Mammoth" which are about ridiculing the MRM. This is an example of stooping to their level. When we engage with the MRM, we neglect our organizing. They know this, which is why they constantly bait us into making it all about them. Similarly democrats fail by harping on all the stupid things republicans do. We should be focused on our own failures and solutions. Let the idiots argue amongst themselves.
* Feminist men need to be able to critique other feminists. The movement gets plenty wrong. We need to feel free to call that out even when doing so invites blowback from other sectors of the movement. In the past, feminist men were too afraid to confront bullshit in the movement. We deferred too much to women. That needs to stop.
When MRM people bring up straw men like "Why are there no domestic violence shelters for men? See? Feminists hate men." Feminists often respond, "Feel free to get to work cleaning up your own mess." So let's do that. Let's get to work. We're way behind, but there's no time like the present.
> Intersectional feminism is a powerful frame. When we look at the places where sexism and classism intersect, for example, then we can begin to explain the fact that the vast majority of homeless people are men.
Maybe I don't have the background needed, but I don't follow. How does intersectional feminism explain that the vast majority of homeless people are men?
Under traditional patriarchal gender roles, men are seen as self-sufficient, and women as dependent. When men fail to be self-sufficient, they do not tend given the same level of support as women who are expected to need help. Add class relationships into this mess and low-class men are left to rot on the street. Our oligarchs see all poor people as disposable tools. So it's the intersection of gender and class that results in more homeless men. This is an example of a negative result for men under patriarchy.
Keep in mind, that women at the same level of risk may not be on the street, but that doesn't mean they are safe. Women at risk are often preyed on by exploitative men and take refuge from the street in unsafe housing where survival sex and abuse is common. That may be a step up, but perhaps not by a lot.
Intersectionality is also informative when understanding the reaction many poor men have to the line that "men have privilege over women". Poor men don't feel privileged, even if they do enjoy higher privilege than women in the same economic class. But compare Joe Schmoe to Sheryl Sandburg, and it's the CEO lady who has the relative privilege, even if she's much lower status than the Zuckerbergs of the world.
Intersectionality is also the basis for critiques of "White feminism" where relatively privileged women dominate the discussion for women as a whole.
I've read with an open mind through all your line of replies. In the end though it summed up to making it about women and feminism. You forgot this entire thing was supposed to be about men.
Right wing MRM a la Andrew Tate is for sure a scam and toxic extreme. But you can easily find such examples in feminist circles as well. Exaggerating in one direction does not justify exaggerating in the other.
You've derailed the conversation about boys and men needs and made it about women, feminism, intersectionality, etc. That is the reason I am down-voting all you replies.
> When men fail to be self-sufficient, they do not tend given the same level of support as women who are expected to need help. Add class relationships into this mess and low-class men are left to rot on the street. Our oligarchs see all poor people as disposable tools. So it's the intersection of gender and class that results in more homeless men. This is an example of a negative result for men under patriarchy.
and interpret it to be "about women and feminism".
You've cherry-picked one thing out of many replies. I do not want to see feminism, intersectionality, patriarchy, class, women, etc in a discussion about boys' emotional needs. Take your philosophy and politics in topics about these issues, there's plenty of them.
Intersectionism, patriarchy and class absolutely have a part to play in boys' emotional needs. I believe trabant00 explained this pretty well. It reads a little like you've seen some words that you instinctively disapprove of and dismissed the whole argument as a result. That attitude is troubling, as it disregards various social pressures on boys.
It disregards the fact that, as long as most men and women remain heterosexual, there's no divorcing social pressures on one from social pressures on the other, because these will at some point become indistinguishable from the same thing.
Feminism has trod this ground before, with political lesbianism and lesbian separatism. The results of these experiments are not such as to suggest they are worth repeating, which hasn't stopped that from happening in the form of last decade's unsurprisingly abortive "MGTOW" movement.
I'm really struggling to parse your first sentence as it's too convoluted. Are you predicting that men and women will have the same social pressures in future? How does this challenge the idea that feminism may overlap with men's issues today?
Perhaps it would help if I gave a tangible example of how e.g. the patriarchy links to male emotional troubles. Patriarchal norms include the stereotype of the male as a strong, unemotional provider type. As a consequence, parents discourage boys from showing emotion. Thus, boys do not learn to accept, validate and maturely process their emotions.
I'm agreeing with the claim that there can be no serious distinction drawn such that the concerns addressed by feminism are disjoint from those which should be addressed by a masculist movement constituted on grounds of actually addressing men's problems rather than nucleating around a festering contempt for women, and supporting that claim on the grounds that so long as most men and most women remain heterosexual their concerns are necessarily and intimately intermingled - what affects men affects women and vice versa, by virtue of women and men spending their lives together. The implicit conclusion is that it is therefore absurd to imagine that a men's movement which constitutes itself in opposition to feminism can ever be capable of materially improving the condition of men overall.
Thanks. That was still pretty convoluted but I think I'm with you. I agree on a conceptual level but only partly agree on a practical level.
On a conceptual level, the fundamental problem is harmful gender norms. Both movements must challenge that.
On a practical level, the way these norms manifest is very different. Women face more sexual and domestic violence and expectations around care-giving. Men face more emotional suppression and expectations around career.
There are some policies which I believe would dramatically benefit both genders. Equalising maternity and paternity leave, for example. It's absolutely bonkers that men may only be able to take a week or two, given that they might want to spend more time bonding with and caring for their newborn, and their partner might have had a C-section and be house-bound for weeks to come.
There are other policies which target one gender more than another, but I believe are still needed. Women-ony refugees, or workshops for building boys' emotional intelligence, for example. I think I would have benefited as a teenager from messaging that it's ok to accept and explore my emotions. I didn't really get that from home.
Yes of course, my attitude is "problematic", says your intersectional feminist neo marxist ideas. Because I can't have a conversation about men without all that shit popping up.
The patriarchy is successfully being attacked from all directions. Intersectionality is stronger than ever. Class is as fluid as it's ever been in the history of man kind. How do you explain that men issues are getting worse and worse in these conditions? It looks like feminism is not helping the gender it is not about. But that can't be, right? Feminism is for everybody, hence the gender neutral name and constant praise and support for men. Ooooh, that's it, I got it now. I'm the problem. Silly me.
And if all of the above is too wordy for you: get off my gender problems lawn with that toxic shit. Go eat it on a feminist topic and call it strawberry vanilla tasting for all I care. Just don't get too close to me cause your mouth stinks.
I appreciate you feel strongly about this but there's no need to resort to insults. I've never suggested that you're the problem, just that I'm troubled by the offhanded way you dismissed a whole avenue of exploration.
One thing I will say is that whilst some social attitudes are improving, society hasn't come very far in fundamentally challenging the norms and prejudices it hoists on men and women. In England and Wales, 1 in 4 women have been raped or sexually assaulted. Literally a quarter. I know that as men we our own unique set of issues, such as high rates of suicide and substance abuse. But I look at that statistic and am concerned at what it says about the safety of women in society.
> am concerned at what it says about the safety of women in society
HN, being text only, makes it difficult for some people to understand the topic. It's men. The bigger, uglier sex, with a penis and two testicles between their legs. Try to imagine the picture.
See, if I dismiss a post because it's off-topic then it's "troubling". If I address it head on you start with "arguments" and bring the discussion to women. The point here is not to argue, it's clear that the topic is men's problems. There is no room here for women and feminism. And if you wonder why some men to go to MRM it's because of people like you. They can't have a discussion in peace without feminism intruding, so fuck feminism and everybody who pushes it everywhere. It's not exactly rocket science.
After multiple interactions I personally think the extremes deserve each other. Bash your heads in, cancel each other, get each other fired, kill, maim, the worse the better. After the massacre is over the rest of us can finally have dialogue in peace.
Again, please avoid insulting and wishing violence on others. It certainly doesn't help you look like the less extreme, if anything it's what risks derailing the debate.
How I would describe what's happened here:
* corinroyal explains how some concepts which overlap with feminism has helped him understand men's issues
* You dismiss his comments because of the mere mention of feminism
* I point out that this is unfair and argue the case for the overlap being worth considering.
* You repeatedly dismiss any mention of feminism and make various unfounded claims as well as aggressive and violent comments towards me.
With all due respect and love, I think you'd find it helpful to think about why any mention of feminism is threatening to you. I'm not interested in pursuing this if you make any further aggressive remarks.
Feminism is the movement that seeks to free both men and women from traditional gender relations. Feminism isn't the term for the women's side of a war between the sexes. It's an intellectual framework that offers tools and analysis to understand and dismantle the patriarchal system that harms us all.
If you read my post from that perspective, you'll see I'm very much talking about men. Perhaps this is easier for me as a gay man to understand since the harms of patriarchy are VERY clear to me.
Out of my ass opinion is 'the patriarchy' views low status men as completely disposable.
Also in any unfair exploitive system you'll see victimized groups attack other victimized groups instead of going after the system and those that directly benefit from it.
That doesn't explain anything. The same should be true about women, in fact more so. What we see here though is it would seem women are privileged in that domain.
> Men's rights have been denigrated to the point my younger male (Western) friends are Andrew Tate fans because there isn't anything else left.
OMG, yes. The MRM has successfully redefined the men's movement to be regressive not productive. Any discussion of men's issues has to refer back to this body of worthless propaganda. But you know, we don't actually have to take the bait. Just as that scientist doesn't actually have to debate vaccines with jackass Joe Rogan. If he wants to learn something he can read a book like a normal person.
I don't pretend to have all the answers, but here's a few points off the top of my head.
* Intersectional feminism is a powerful frame. When we look at the places where sexism and classism intersect, for example, then we can begin to explain the fact that the vast majority of homeless people are men. We can see ways that careerist academic feminism fails those who don't have such constraints. And we can see how popular working class feminist movements can benefit from the research that more privileged feminists have had the freedom to do.
* Men who are open to feminist critiques don't often do the research. We don't read feminist authors. We don't know the history of the struggle, nor of men's role in feminism. Second-wave feminism started with consciousness raising groups. Maybe we men could do some self-educating and soul searching.
* First world feminists need to accept leadership from feminists in poorer countries. There is so much right going on with feminism in places like Mexico. These men and women are confronting millennia of machismo. How do they do it? We should know.
* Men need our own organizations. Who are the groups working on paternal rights? I don't know. Are there any? Can we start one? If the MRM is about whining about feminism. A real men's movement could be about actual organizing. We used to hand out anti-circumcision flyers at 24th and mission. We got some weird looks, but even the MRM has carried on the work we started in their ineffective pissy way.
* Feminist men need a popular social media presence. We have ceeded the space to reprobates and literal criminals. Rather than engaging in tit-for-tat with MRM people, we should address regular, reasonable men who might be open to us if we made a reasonable effort. We need to accept that we have dropped the ball and that that the growth of the MRM is significantly our fault. We were too quiet.
* That said, what I don't think we need are sites like "We Hunted the Mammoth" which are about ridiculing the MRM. This is an example of stooping to their level. When we engage with the MRM, we neglect our organizing. They know this, which is why they constantly bait us into making it all about them. Similarly democrats fail by harping on all the stupid things republicans do. We should be focused on our own failures and solutions. Let the idiots argue amongst themselves.
* Feminist men need to be able to critique other feminists. The movement gets plenty wrong. We need to feel free to call that out even when doing so invites blowback from other sectors of the movement. In the past, feminist men were too afraid to confront bullshit in the movement. We deferred too much to women. That needs to stop.
When MRM people bring up straw men like "Why are there no domestic violence shelters for men? See? Feminists hate men." Feminists often respond, "Feel free to get to work cleaning up your own mess." So let's do that. Let's get to work. We're way behind, but there's no time like the present.