The Men's Rights Movement: I Just Don't Get It.

[Lemonvariable72]

Do you fuckers even read what was said in this thread about equality?

Could you clarify?

[LastPoet]

Could you clarify?

Read the thread from the beginning again, specially Tiberius & Syn's posts.

[Zazzy]

@Zazzy
I'm sorry but your assertion that women are somehow less violent then men is bunk. While women do have lower violent crime statistics what I would invite you to do is talk to a local high school princple. My experience is that girls tend to as much as boys do.

I was a public high school teacher for 10+ years, and I've been working in public high schools off and on for the past 6+ years during grad school, and that's total BS (unless you're in a gang school, and then it's just BS and not TOTAL BS). Girls fight NOWHERE NEAR as much as boys do.

Infact when girls would fight, it had a tendency to get more viscious faster .

This may be true, but since they physically fight way less, it's a moot point.

The reason for that is because when men fight one on one there are rules your expected to adhere too.

That's not a sexist statement or anything.

[_xenu_]

. Lesbians can be refreshing because with straight or bisexual women, I always have to wear a certain face.

I hope someday you will realize how horribly misogynistic that sounds.

My apologies, it certainly wasn't meant that way. There's just no sexual element in that situation which can make such friendships fun. But don't pretend you don't act different around a potential mate. Everyone does, not just me. Tbh, I'm not entirely sure where you're coming from with this.

[Lemonvariable72]

@Zazzy
I'm sorry but your assertion that women are somehow less violent then men is bunk. While women do have lower violent crime statistics what I would invite you to do is talk to a local high school princple. My experience is that girls tend to as much as boys do.

I was a public high school teacher for 10+ years, and I've been working in public high schools off and on for the past 6+ years during grad school, and that's total BS (unless you're in a gang school, and then it's just BS and not TOTAL BS). Girls fight NOWHERE NEAR as much as boys do.

Infact when girls would fight, it had a tendency to get more viscious faster .

This may be true, but since they physically fight way less, it's a moot point.

The reason for that is because when men fight one on one there are rules your expected to adhere too.

That's not a sexist statement or anything.

What its now sexist for me to refer to part of a gender role that men are expected to adhere to? Because that's what it is part of a gender role on the part of men, the same thing that many women rightly fought against. All I was stating was that it exists and it has a effect. But yet claiming the fact threat women are less violent is sexist especiy when it is not true.

[Bipolar Bob]

I hope someday you will realize how horribly misogynistic that sounds.

My apologies, it certainly wasn't meant that way. There's just no sexual element in that situation which can make such friendships fun. But don't pretend you don't act different around a potential mate. Everyone does, not just me. Tbh, I'm not entirely sure where you're coming from with this.

What you are saying is that with straight and bisexual women you have to put on a façade, that you believe it is normal for you to be fundamentally dishonest with straight and bisexual women. That you do not trust them or yourself enough to just be yourself. You have targeted a certain group of people to be dishonest with.

That is not only misogynistic but I could see it as self-loathing and misandristic.

[Zazzy]

What its now sexist for me to refer to part of a gender role that men are expected to adhere to? Because that's what it is part of a gender role on the part of men, the same thing that many women rightly fought against. All I was stating was that it exists and it has a effect.

Yep- women just fight dirty because there are no rules for them like there are for boys. Show me your data.

But yet claiming the fact threat women are less violent is sexist especiy when it is not true.

Dude- YOU'RE WRONG ABOUT THIS.
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/cri...s/table-33
(for some reason, the links button is not working for me right now)
Just ONE calculation from that table- violent crime, shows current FBI statistics at women committing 19% of violent crimes last year. But I guess that's not less violence, huh?

[bladevalant546]

@ Optimistic Misanthrope:
Point taken. There have been some women warpigs. They're a minority, but they've been responsible for much conflict.
@bladevalant:
I have to think about your take on patriarchy. I don't think anyone consciously thinks they are propping up a patriarchy (with the exception of my horrible uncle and his ilk), but they are (WE are) aften doing just that. Women have been as guilty as men of supporting patriarchal ideas- feminism is largely about owning that responsibility and losing that mindset. Do we need a new word for it? Maybe. I still think every time you turn on the TV you can still see the old patriarchal archetypes at play (although we've added new ones that do portray men poorly as well).

I also don't believe that educated women of means are oppressed in the field of reproduction. I think any given man has fewer reproductive rights than I do. But it's a classist argument. Poor, uneducated women remain oppressed reproductively. And frankly, class is important in this entire discussion. If you want to see real old-fashioned patriarchy in action, visit some poor rural Southern areas. It's like the last 200 years never happened for many women there. Much of what we're discusssing here we're doing from a privileged vantage point.

I'd like to know what terminnology you think is more appropriate than "patriarchy," since it may, in educated circles, be a word whose time has come and gone.

*edited for spelling

Reasons I disagree with the term patriarchy is that 1.
a form of social organization in which the father is the supreme authority in the family, clan, or tribe and descent is reckoned in the male line, with the children belonging to the father's clan or tribe. 2. a society, community, or country based on this social organization. I just do not see that definition and how it applies in the government or systems of power. With that said, this is only applicable in the context of the modern era. However, I live I Louisiana and I see what you are referring to in regard to reproductive rights. So again it another extreme that we need to address. I will summarize simply with this, we need to use logic, reason and rationality here, and choose what’s best for both sides not just one side for real solutions to take hold. I think the best word to describe what is happening today would ne Monetary Feudalism. If you do not have a lot of money you are irrelevant to them and having power. Money is the defining part in intuitional inequality in today’s current world.

Thanks for the question i think it is a fair discussion.

[FlyingNarwhal]

There are certainly areas of cultural bias against men- we agreed on several of them.
If you see this cultural bias as tilting toward men in such a way that they are a fundamentally oppressed group, you seem to be unaware of the world I live in. Who is oppressing all these men- sending them to war, causing them to work in mines, etc. Women? I don't think so. If you are oppressed, then you are oppressing yourselves. This is not women against men.

This has never been women against men, I have never made that claim. I have not been trying to argue for who carries the blame of male oppression, just that there is male oppression. But again that you think that that is the point I am trying to make is indicative of part of the problem I am talking about. I'm not trying to call you out, I'm just trying to show you the thought process being made here. I have never once blamed the problems men have on woman at all in any of my posts. But because I am saying that men aren't afforded certain rights equal to those of women, it is immediately thought that I am somehow trying to blame women or devalue the rights and progress that they have made. I want women to be afforded their human rights as well as men.

The oppression of women was and is not as simple as just men oppressing women. Women oppressed other women as well, hell even today there are women that are pro-life and believe that it is a woman's duty to serve her husband and raise the children. And we have a similar scenario with men. I'm not blaming you for it, I'm just asking that you recognize it and help us rather than remaining ignorant to the problems we face.

Each culture has adopted gender roles that we end up blindly following and blindly expect from the opposite. One of our biggest problems as men when it comes to our gender role, is that our lives are considered expendable in comparison to women. Like I mentioned previously 99% of casualties of war since the start of civilization have been men and the United States conscription policy still requires that only men register. That is a huge inequality, and an oppressive policy. It is a "men only" specific rule that directly effects our survival. World War II was not just a holocaust for Jews it was a holocaust for men as well. Pretty much every war is a holocaust for men. We go to kill other men and be killed by other men. But it is not thought of in those terms. Because after all, men go to war.

So you don't like how I disagreed with you. Your experience is so alien that I'm not sure we can see eye to eye. I didn't call you delusional, however.

I have no problem if you disagree with me. I got thick skin, I can take it. What I didn't like was that this is what I wrote:

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We are an oppressed group though. Again we are so oppressed that we don't have the option most of the time to say we are without facing ridicule. When the chips were laid out and gender roles assigned centuries ago, men didn't just give women all the bad chips and kept the good ones for themselves. We took a good amount of bad chips ourselves.

Since the beginning of human civilization who have all of your soldiers been? Men.
The draft which the U.S. still has in place conscripts only one gender. Men.
Who first? Women and children first.
Who gets trapped in mine shafts and work in higher risk jobs. Men.

Compared to the lives of women, our lives are considered lesser.

Even as progress for women has been made (which I'm all for) progress for men has remained stagnant. Women can now work in what would be considered traditionally male careers. But how many men do you see working in early childcare, or become stay at home dads while the woman works? Not too many, because although women have been supported to venture into those non-traditional careers, men are still being shunned to do the same.

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And this was the response I received:

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Well, if this is the world you see around you, I'm not going to convince you otherwise, but it's a different planet than the place I live in. Good luck with that.

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I gave you key examples of inequality towards men and without giving any reasons to do so, you dismissed it. If you want to disagree with me by all means do so, but do not fail to back up your response and call me asinine for it.

I see that you don't like me saying you're full of it. I am not saying you can't express yourself. I'm saying you can't always expect to express yourself without some pushback, especially when you seem to be claiming that women as a group are oppressing men as a group- which IS an asinine claim.

Again disagree with me on whatever grounds you wish I am fine with that, but do not put words in my mouth. I dare you or anyone to go through the posts I have made on this thread and find where I said that women are oppressing men or that women are to blame for the oppression of men. If you can find such a claim that I have made, I will immediately concede. But if not, then stop acting as if I am.

And you're dead wrong (although I appreciate your confining this to Western culture). Are men less oppressive than they used to be? Yes, and they're far more enlightened in the educated areas of the US. But if you're saying that men don't oppress women anymore, or that women have turned the tables and now oppress men, you're just wrong. Women should NOT turn a blind eye to inequities in media portrayals, or reproductive issues, or war issues. But they are not responsible for these as a group systematically trying to keep men down.

The average man does not keep a woman down anymore. Like I said, there are still a few assholes out there and yes, some of them may be in positions of power. But your run of the mill Joe Everyman is compassionate to the rights and thoughts of women.

And again I would like to point out, this is the third time in your post that you have alluded to me believing that women are keeping men down.

This is not a women oppressing men argument, this a gender roles argument.

But it's not a competition anyway. Areas of inequality don't have to be equal in numbers to be wrong. 1 in 6 boys sexually assaulted is not as many as 1 in 4 girls, but it's still way too fucking many. And a vanishingly small percentage of those assaults are by women. MEN are abusing boys and men, as they abuse girls and women. MEN send men to war. MEN are predominantly judges who favor women in court decisions (30% of judges are women). Physician, heal thyself.

Do you seriously realize how close minded that statement is? I understand that quite a few of the problems men face are in fact perpetuated by men, but real change cannot take place until the whole of society recognizes the problem and acts together. Women could not rise like they did by themselves, it required the help of everyone, men included. And now men face difficulty when it comes to certain rights and cultural attitudes and we also need the help of everyone, women included. Are you really going to turn your back on us?

Again, part of any movement like this is learning how your own group is participating in its own subjection and rejecting those tendencies- like bra-burning.

Then what are you arguing with the MRM for? This is exactly what they are doing!

Instead of bitching about how oppressive women are, think about how to fight the real oppressors in our world: culturally ingrained stereotypes set by a patriarchy that has no place in a modern culture that strives for equity, and people themselves who participate in and prop up these stereotypes, partly because it suits them, and partly because they're brainwashed. All of us do this, and all of us have a responsibility to re-educate ourselves and others around us.

This is the fourth time in this post that I have been told that I think women are oppressing men. I feel like I am repeating myself over and over again. I am not anti-woman. I am not anti-feminism. I am simply advocating for my rights and the rights of other men.

The section I bolded is exactly what I am trying to accomplish. Which brings me to the root of the problem that I have been trying to address with you. All I have been arguing for, is that just like there are ways in which women are slighted there are ways that men are slighted as well. I am not trying to say women are the reason for that or even that we have more problems then women. Just that we got problems too.

And I made a challenge earlier that anyone could look through my previous posts and try and find any response I made where I blamed women. And you will not find that post because it does not exist. So then why am I being labeled four times as someone that blames women? Because like I stated in my first post on this thread, if a man advocates for his rights or speaks his mind on any inequality he feels that he faces, our society dictates that he must then hate women. That is one of those stereotypes that you were talking about, that has been ingrained on to society's psyche.

[Bad Wolf]

What its now sexist for me to refer to part of a gender role that men are expected to adhere to? Because that's what it is part of a gender role on the part of men, the same thing that many women rightly fought against. All I was stating was that it exists and it has a effect. But yet claiming the fact threat women are less violent is sexist especiy when it is not true.

Men are more violent. It's because we have more testosterone. Testosterone causes aggression. Aggression leads to violence. Its nothing to be ashamed of or anything. We are products of evolution, men are naturally more aggressive and so more likely to be violent.