‘Andrew Tate is a symptom, not the problem’: why young men are turning against feminism
‘Andrew Tate is a symptom, not the problem’: why young men are turning against feminism
Teachers describe a deterioration in behaviour and attitudes that has proved to be fertile terrain for misogynistic influencers
Teachers describe a deterioration in behaviour and attitudes that has proved to be fertile terrain for misogynistic influencers
“As soon as I mention feminism, you can feel the shift in the room; they’re shuffling in their seats.” Mike Nicholson holds workshops with teenage boys about the challenges of impending manhood. Standing up for the sisterhood, it seems, is the last thing on their minds.
When Nicholson says he is a feminist himself, “I can see them look at me, like, ‘I used to like you.’”
Once Nicholson, whose programme is called Progressive Masculinity, unpacks the fact that feminism means equal rights and opportunities for women, many of the boys with whom he works are won over.
“A lot of it is bred from misunderstanding and how the word is smeared,” he says.
But he is battling against what he calls a “dominance-based model” of masculinity. “These old-fashioned, regressive ideas are having a renaissance, through your masculinity influencers – your grifters, like Andrew Tate.”
“A lot of it is bred from misunderstanding and how the word is smeared,”
The same could be said about "communism" and "socialism". The words have been turned dirty, such that people shy away from what is objectively a good thing when done honestly and to the letter of the principle.
Kind of like Critical Race Theory. If properly understood and applied, people would benefit from the knowledge and empathy.
I bought the actual book because it was on sale and because I thought it would be hilarious to put out on my coffee table for when my conservative dad came to visit my house. I also figured I'd try to read it, because I should be informed about what it is so that I can argue for it, right?
Holy shit, it's a lot of dense legal theory. I knew it was graduate material, but the book is a collection some of the most complex ideas, studies, and legal theory that I've ever read. I'm not going to lie that I won't even make it a third of the way through it.
Anyone who argues that CRT is being taught in elementary schools and is being used to brainwash children hasn't seen how high-level the material actually is and has no idea what they're talking about.
In reality, the material is not that controversial. What I have read of it has been quite unbiased.
I know very little about CRT beyond some very general idea so idk if there's a point to call it that specifically, but the naming choice is so bad that the first time I read it I assumed it's some nazi thing and had 0 doubt about it.
Funnily, Capitalism could work too but I don't expect billionaires to be honest or have any principles apart from hoarding for themselves.
give it 50 years and the arms race of language will have its own sub arms race
you'll coin a politically charged term, someone will coin an antonym, the original will shift to change the subject, the antonym will change to match the new, someone will point out the process and both sides will deny its happening
Granted, Lemmy is a relatively safe place to do it, but bold move, walking out into public and describing Communism as "objectively good".
To be fair, the term "feminist" was highjacked by the radical feminist movement. They very much do not believe in equality, their motto is "kill all men"
I think it's easy to see why that would turn people away. Hence why I describe myself as an equalizer, not a feminist.
Edit: my statement was very reasonable and I'm willing to engage in discussion about what I have witnessed. If you think I'm pushing an agenda or trying to convince others of anything, feel free to check my post history. However, if you accuse me of pushing an agenda or lying or anything else, you are engaging in false faith and will be blocked. I have a long history of supporting women's rights, as evidenced by several posts I have made. But I will not stand for being accused of being a right winger.
do you think it makes sense to distinguish between the kind of radical feminism you're talking about, and the dry academic stuff that's also called radical feminism by the people who are engaged in it at least?
it's tricky, i can't deny there aren't spaces which are predominantly women where a bunch of unfair or negative stuff about men is said.
thing is, radical, which in math is another term for getting the 'root' of something, like a square root, and also means like 'fundamental' does have more than one meaning. when you use it, that's one use of the word which makes sense, another which is the one i first learned and the places i go to use to describe themselves is rather dry academic, philosophical, and artsy (artsy in the way which is confusing as heck to me) and they are also radical.
so often i am confused because it's not as though when you use the word you're making anything up. other commenters will likely treat you like you invented that use of the word, people always police language. it'd be way nicer if we could understand each other better i really think you and i and the commenters which probably gave you a downvote all have way more in common than not.
So much misinformation.
Communism kind-of smeared itself. Everywhere where communism has been tried on a national scale, it has become authoritarianism.
Maybe it would be a good thing if done to the letter of the principle, but just like Libertarianism or Anarchism, it seems to be incompatible with human nature, at least so far.
But, socialism isn't even a foreign idea. A lot of US institutions are socialist. The mail delivery is done by an arm of the government. Streets are paved by the government. Firefighters are government employees. The water delivered to your house is almost certainly by a government-run entity. People retiring without having saved enough are taken care of by the government. There's medicare and medicaid.
A full capitalist system would have nothing done by the government that could be done by a business. No FDA, Pinkertons instead of Police, most army functions handed over to private contractors, every road privately owned and maintained, etc.
I agree with just about everything you've said. Communism has had too many failures that have affected too many people, the word is tainted.
To grossly oversimplify it, capitalism is the way of business and trade, while socialism is the way of society and governance. The two things are separate, but the issue we have is that businesses are dictating policy to governments in their exclusive interest, rather than the other way around with governments focusing on the overall good of society.
If you don't want to parent your own son, there is someone out there willing to do it for you. They will not do a good job.
This is a really great point, but notably in this article there's a guy trying to "do it for you" with at least good intentions telling young men about feminism.
IMO, he's doing a pretty terrible job of it though. You're not going to reach tate followers by telling them about feminism.
And yet, it's not like anyone's child will grow in a bubble decoupled from society; people like Tate can influence even "parented" young men due to the disproportionate amount of reach they have. And it's not like they would know better, they are kids after all.
damn, good way to put it
In all honesty, 3rd wave feminism chased away a lot of male allies. Like a whole lot.
But I don't think that's what led to Andrew Tate, that is no failure of feminism.
Andrew Tate is the product of hyper capitalistic individualism being held up in all forms and media and real life as 'the ideal lifestyle', a rich, aggressive asshole that has enough clout that most people can't back them down.
The Tates, Trumps, Elons of the world are having their day because our current generation conflates wealth with competence.
And it's going to ruin our world.
That said, feminism as it stands now is far more welcoming and inclusive to men than it has been in 25 years and I applaud the change.
I'll probably be downvoted to hell.
TLDR: If your legs are broken and you treat one and ignore the other you'll fall eventually. That's women's and men's rights. True equality is unachievable without both being fully recovered.
Full achieving women's rights while putting minimum input into issues men face. Rarely ends well for either. High suicide rates, homelessness, alcoholism, etc. Those who try to find hope turn to their jobs, religions, and terrible role models.
Both sides have them but most people ignore the truth. People like Andrew Tate become influential because the underlying problem is ignored. More bad role models (BRM) will pop up until you treat the cause instead of the symptoms.
It doesn't help that theres plenty information including studies that highlight the problem and proves the points made by BRM.
This is reinforced by several instances where someone wants to bring awareness to the Men issues being harassed, facing death threats and etc. This also happened when the first and only DV shelter for was opened. The staff and everyone involved faced a huge backlash that they ended up closing it.
I know it isn't much, but you should look up Hasanabi interviewing Tate. He gets clapped and his reactions pierce through that tough guy, strict father model persona of his, and it's glorious. I was in Romania recently. I should've paid him a visit to taunt him.
The less I consider this man the better my general outlook on humanity is, and it's pretty fuckdamn low these decades so let's not add more erosion to that tiny bitter flake remaining.
I actually things those people are the last straw of that system. They are the final product of this system and everyone hates it, sooner or later. Your average traditionalist will not recognize himself in Tates lack of manners nor will the liberal capitalist due to his authoritarian tendencies. He is the final product of a terminally ill system and the full displays of all of its flaws. I'm quite hopeful since his downfall because it likely means people will move on from that system
Oh no my friend, it's going to get much, much worse. There is no 'he is brutal enough as leader', there is only 'who can be more brutal and have the power to get away with it.
I wish I could believe in your optimistic view. In my experience the first part is right, but instead of everyone hating it, they will double down because NOW it's part of their identity and you don't threaten someone's identity. People will move mountains to keep their worldview intact.
I actually agree.... We simply ignore the needs of men who are suffering. When was the last time you read a story about a male domestic abuse victim who WASN'T laughed at.
Or like how Google has a doodle for international women's day but never international men's day. Not to be dismissive or insensitive to women's issues, but I've seen boys and young men talk about how little things like that give them the impression that their thoughts and feelings are not valid.
There are ofc men's issues still like how the overwhelming majority workplaces deaths are men or how more men die from suicide than women. Men are more likely to be homeless than women etc
The sexes are supposed to compliment one another. Not compete against one another. We can acknowledge that there are issues for both sides while still being sensitive and respectful.
I think there's a lesson in there about teaching people that weren't around for the formation of a movement about why targeted movements exist.
It's not just with kids but with people that are tuned out... I think too many people fall through the cracks into white power, toxic masculinity, incel groups, etc because on the surface the questions are of course...
"well why don't I have a support group for X? what makes that group of people special? why do they get their own day?"
Like yeah, if nobody's ever explained what women have historically faced to you, feminism and girl power are especially strange concepts to confront.
Maybe having a more positive masculinity movement actually wouldn't be a bad idea just to help people that are feeling a little lost and prevent them from finding "answers" in the wrong places(?)
do you know if there is one for movember? i always felt that international mens day wasnt really popular because it wasnt 'themed' if you get what i mean. during movember in high school the girls would get those like moustache cutouts and wear them and it all raised awareness for men and boys and there was funding for like, i think it was prostate cancer?
There's more to then even that. Fight Club predicted it. Mass media pushing this expectation onto young boys, but then as teenager and young adults, they have no outlet for machoism. No wood to split, no animals to kill for food, no fascists to kill(yet). Hollywood pushes the Action Hero, and neglects the Science Hero and the Guile Hero.
BTW, isn't it sad that the stand-in for toxic masculinity in fiction is still more positive then real life toxic masculinity symbols. But fiction has to be believable.
so yes men do get laughed at for this kinda stuff, by men and also by women. when men do it, i noticed it doesn't bother me as much truthfully.
i'll say when i'm in more women-friendly, radical feminist spaces (journals, magazines, irl events) there really isn't this negativity around. something like the scumm manifesto does say stuff that can be hurtful or seem hateful (i'd agree it is hateful; i'd also agree it's completely justified and rational given the circumstances) and honestly so much of the tension seems to me to be due to the online nature of this stuff.
are there women-only spaces where a bunch of negative things about men are said? obviously, and i can't for the life of me figure out why it's held to a different standard than other groups outside of the patriarchy being the explanation.
i think treating and seeing women as equal is accepting there are women who have awful takes. women as a group will be like many other groups, they might appear homogeneous and their's a wealth of differences between them.
i'm ok believing some men are toxic, as am i for some women, what i don't do is share that opinion with others if the circumstances aren't appropriate. i think that's where "think before you act" or "think before you talk" comes in.
The leaders of the movement are publishing this shit though. It’s not fringe if it’s the leaders of the movement.
Heterosexual intercourse is the pure, formalized expression of contempt for women's bodies.
Any man will follow any feminine looking thing down any dark alley; I've always wanted to see a man beaten to a shit bloody pulp with a high-heeled shoe stuffed up his mouth, sort of the pig with the apple; it would be good to put him on a serving plate but you'd need good silver.
That’s Andrea Dworkin for you. Even though she’s dead, her followers still run the show.
This is the same argument as with "All Lives matter". Why do people have to be against feminism to talk about issues men face? Because that is what I am seeing. On Lemmy or even Reddit, I didn't see people laugh about male domestic abuse victims. But literally every discussion about it had misogynistic and anti-feminist comments.
The difference between All Lives Matter and this is that there really are gender-specific issues affecting men, and from their side, they feel as if they were All Lives Matter-ed. Think of it as not backlash to feminism, not a zero-sum game. Boys are just now getting to be against feminism because both the mainstream and idiots like Tate tell them that that's what this is about, and they have no better ways to cope with it.
Because historically bearing rare exceptions, the Feminist Movements have largely been anti-male, anti-trans, and anti-gay (Unless it's lesbians of course)
Seriously look into the Vagina Monologues, it's considered THE definitive feminist piece... in it a woman and a man having consensual sex is considered this great tragedy, but an older woman turning a CHILD into a lesbian by traumatizing her with sex (I know, that's not how that works, but it's how the play says that works) is said to be a good thing.. even including the line "If it was rape it was good rape"
The Feminist Movement simply aren't the good guys (no pun intended), even if we do owe it for Women's Liberation
Well, the male domestic abuse victim is probably laughed at, because he is the strong powerful man and should therefore not be able to get abused by the weak woman. The same for male rape victims: man like sex and always want sex and therefore they can't be raped, because they like it. These stereotypes are a problem and feminism is trying to get rid of them. It will take some time to redefine the societal picture of man and woman.
I don't think we ignore the needs of men. They're just sometimes overshadowed because of other pressing matters like not being able to afford a roof over your head or to feed your family, then whose more likely to get into substance abuse? Men, trying to provide for their families but the debt is mounting and school is basically unachievable. Work wages are stagnating inflation is rising because the corpos have us all by the balls. Is there a culture that tries to pigeonhole men to bottle up their emotions in America? Absolutely. I just think the greater fight is improving these lychpins of society, and we can do that and also address men's problems, but in a lot of ways, aren't women's lack of equality a big part of men's problems in the first place? If women were paid equally and treated equally by men and other women, and society as a whole, they could take care of themselves better, provide more for their families, not feel like they have to choose between a family and a career, etc etc etc. All of it is inter-related dammit. I do get what the person in the original article is trying to say. I just don't think that they did a particularly good job of expressing it in a relatable way.
People hyperfocus on the 1% of crazy feminists instead of the other 99% who are actually normal and reasonable. Sadly that 1% are doing more harm to the public image of feminism than good.
We live in an age of twitter screenshot outrage and that pathetically emboldens some peoples beliefs so the root cause really is social media. Nothing more nothing less.
The only time I ever hear about that 1% is from the conservative propaganda machine, or MSM rebuttal. They hold zero power outside of the conservative cinematic universe.
At this point I consider it nothing more than manufactured outrage.
I really dislike the way you're portraying feminism as a brand and trying to assign responsibility onto individuals for the public perception of that brand. It's not the responsibility of any woman to convince men that they deserve rights, that they deserve fair political power and representation. If someone is dissuaded from supporting women's rights because someone said something they didn't like or agree with, that person is a misogynist and unlikely to have ever actually supported women's rights in any meaningful capacity.
The caricature of the "crazy feminist" is also in and of itself misogynistic, and is used to silence feminist activism all the time. Not that there aren't legitimate extremist parts to the movement, particularly in the 60s 70s and 80s when feminism had yet to make many major strides towards female liberation. Just that the label is often used to dismiss things like the pink tax, the wage gap, and discussions of rape culture and intersectionality.
i think the cool stuff the suffragettes did would be labeled way more negatively now. the civil disobedience was rad.
I really dislike the way you’re portraying feminism as a brand and trying to assign responsibility onto individuals for the public perception of that brand
Feminism is a brand in the same way civil rights are. There's a reason why MLK succeeded where Malcolm X failed, Gandhi successfully took back India, Obama won the 2008 election, etc. This all has to do with how they're perceived to people not part of their movement. Without a good brand none of these movements would have ever succeeded. And yes it is up to the leaders and each individual member of these movements to uphold a generally good perception. Thinking otherwise is ridiculous. You have to win over the population, always.
It’s not the responsibility of any woman to convince men that they deserve rights, that they deserve fair political power and representation. If someone is dissuaded from supporting women’s rights because someone said something they didn’t like or agree with, that person is a misogynist and unlikely to have ever actually supported women’s rights in any meaningful capacity.
In an ideal world no, but we are not in an ideal world. If someone is a mysgonist what is so wrong with sitting down with them and discussing topics like normal human beings and showing them why that's wrong? Just completely shutting them out like how you're describing is exactly how you embolden an opposition group. Imagine someone on twitter was actually just simple minded and based their opinions on one tweet and didn't actually hear the other side properly? A lot of people like that exist. And if your attitude is "oh they're misogynistic and never cared so I shouldn't even bother" then you're just digging your own hole.
The caricature of the “crazy feminist” is also in and of itself misogynistic, and is used to silence feminist activism all the time. Not that there aren’t legitimate extremist parts to the movement, particularly in the 60s 70s and 80s when feminism had yet to make many major strides towards female liberation. Just that the label is often used to dismiss things like the pink tax, the wage gap, and discussions of rape culture and intersectionality.
See what I, and I'm sure many others dislike is the way you derive misogyny from a simple example. A lot of people simply don't see anything wrong with calling out the "crazies" of a group. Am I islamaphobic for calling out terrorists? No. Am I anti-christian for calling out the Westboro Baptist church? No. Am I misogynistic for making fun of clearly unhinged people on twitter? No. Extreme examples of course, but you get the picture. The instant jump to misogyny when genuinely crazy, unhinged, insane feminists get made fun of is ridiculous. Like I said, >99% of feminists are completely normal and sane. There is nothing wrong or hateful for calling out the crazy people in any group.
As a (formerly young) man myself, I can say with experience that boys are gullible. If something just had a veneer of plausibility, then that was good enough for me!
Still, this hit hard, because it’s so true:
He says [about boys]: “It’s not showing that emotional weakness. It’s also the expectation to always be right. Like you are not able to show that you can fail; that there’s more shame in doing something and making a mistake than there is just sort of sitting it out or dropping out.”
He stresses that many of the men he deals with have positive attitudes to women and feminism, but he says some can feel they are being stereotyped, or blamed for others’ actions.
I faced a lot of pressure to be “tough” and “perfect” (I’m not sure where that pressure came from. My parents weren’t the problem). I also misunderstood that feminism only means fairness and equality. “Fortunately”, I was trying to control an anger management issue, and I only recently realized that the experience had the side effect of teaching me that imperfections are normal and nothing to be ashamed of. Being fair was, well, only fair, so although I didn’t notice it, I never had an issue with basic feminism. I didn’t know much about it, but I wasn’t against it, and recognized that guys who were proudly anti-feminist were almost always jerks that I didn’t want to emulate.
I think a lot of it comes from schools, and in particular physical education and competitive sports. There is nothing wrong with competitive sports but the attitudes around it in schools can be so toxic, and in particular it can be used to create hierarchies. The idea of being good at sports and that being masculine was something I certainly experienced a lot at school. Also people who weren't as academic but thrived in sports were lauded.
My school had various sports teams and clubs, and fuck all academic activities. Sports aren't toxic but the attitudes around them can be, and particularly adults who feed in toxic attitudes and values around it.
i mentioned in another comment in this thread; i like physical activity, just not intense sports (even 'amateur' or 'casual' floor hockey/basketball was intense), would like it if there were more options. i just ended up working out and that was good for getting the physical activity i needed. it's only, i wanna do stuff outdoors sometimes and there aren't as many convenient options as a gym.
He is a bad response to a real problem, as is the toxic misandrist movement that seems to pull people away from productive feminism these days.
But as long as reactions to these extreme positions keep us from discussing the underlying problems or reasonable solutions to them, we’ll never find any real solutions.
If you read online about current discussions regarding nature VS nurture, people are actually influenced more by a combination of peer pressure and media/cultural influence than their parents.
Sadly this also means that it's unlikely that, as a parent, you have much of a chance to work against those influences.
I also blame CBC and other supposedly legit sources for giving this fuck air time and even asking him about the Israel/Palestine war as if his opinion matters.
Also so called journalists like this who remove all responsibility from Tate for being a rapist piece of shit
So Andrew Tate is a human trafficker scum of the earth, and we are trying to combat his message. That's alright, I agree, he's not a disease but a symptom.
Tate is taking an existing problem, which is the fact that young boys feel left out by society at large with feminism being mainstream. Don't get me wrong, go and empower women, but when boys have "a growing sense that somehow they must be mistreated and hated because they are boys and men" and "some can feel they are being stereotyped, or blamed for others’ actions", and things like “My son is reluctant to go to school due to bullying by a group of girls, he feels that there is a big power difference in schools, where boys are always punished, not listened to, and not believed.” happen, then that's a problem separate from the problems that feminism wants to solve.
Telling boys to help solve women's issues in response to them telling you they have problems of their own is what's causing this. And it's either you listening to them, or it's going to be people like Tate or Trump.
Don’t get me wrong, go and empower women, but when boys have “a growing sense that somehow they must be mistreated and hated because they are boys and men” and “some can feel they are being stereotyped, or blamed for others’ actions”, and things like “My son is reluctant to go to school due to bullying by a group of girls, he feels that there is a big power difference in schools, where boys are always punished, not listened to, and not believed.” happen, then that’s a problem separate from the problems that feminism wants to solve.
The Me Too movement opened a lot of eyes to just how widespread sexual violence against women is. And how women see men, justifiably, as threats until proven otherwise.
But as the person who is perceived as a threat and isn’t, that doesn’t feel good. Thinking that my gender makes me a horrible scary monster would definitely fuck a boy up.
The Me Too movement opened a lot of eyes to just how widespread sexual violence against women is. And how women see men, justifiably, as threats until proven otherwise.
But there is another truth not mentioned: Males who were victims of sexual violence and rightfully thought the MeToo movement would help bring that to light as well were instead ridiculed and thrown out. Male victims of both male and female sexual violence are still not heard, which should have been part of the movement's focus. The recent reminder post about the man who tried to found a shelter for male victims but ended up broke and his efforts ignored and eventually disbanded should have been a strong ally for the movement, so the push for feminism rings somewhat hollow for those victims, even as they do support the message presented, but will not benefit from the movement's successes.
I remember reading a post once that pondered on why there are so many gentle giants, why a lot of naturally tall muscular men seem so chill.
A gentle giant on the chain responded "it's because you're taught from a very young age that if you pop off and lose it there's a really good chance you're going to kill someone"
I think men need to understand they are threats, in general it's not their fault they're threats, in general nobody is really expecting them to go ape on anyone, but ultimately men are threats.
The problem isn't new at all either. Someone on the right, just figured out how to create the incel culture and weaponize it. It's sexism all the way down on both sides when there shouldn't be sides at all. It's the culmination of the social construct known as gender.
Bingo. Well said
I see feminism as a logical first step towards true egalitarianism. As in: the patriarchy is/was a real thing, and women are/were impacted. Modern feminism is in some ways an over correction (but as a movement is completely justified). Hopefully future societies will bring the needle closer to even/fair/just than ever, and we are currently witnessing temporary (but significant) backlashes.
Edit: not sure why downvote? I clearly acknowledged the importance and validity of feminism, while sharing my opinion that an egalitarian society is the goal state, where all persons are respected regardless of what they are. Is that not the goal? To live in a world where specific groups don't need to fight for rights, visibility and respect?
Not the person downvoting, but my comment was mostly about that boys and men do experience their own problems, and they are not being listened to. I am specifically saying "feminism is all good, but has nothing to do with this, and does not even aim to solve this".
You then went, "well yeah, but first feminism before we get there". It's like as if there was a piece about feminism and someone went, "First we have to solve climate change, then we can talk about women's issues!". The problem is that men are getting left behind. Not with rights or visibility or anything like that. It's more about having a voice, ideals and support.
The point is, this is not about feminism. Feminism is not a be all end all answer. And people keep pretending it is.
YouTube Algorithms, facebook Algorithms, etc. make them all publishers responsible for their content.
the algorithms just rewards "shocking" content; it generates conversation.
I forget who I heard it from, but some bigger YouTuber mentioned that when talking to someone at YouTube about "the algorithm" and the person who worked at YouTube suggested rather than always thinking about it being the algorithm that drives what's popular, that it's the users who engage with that content. In the "line goes up" capitalist mindset, the algorithms at these companies are really just designed around engagement, and keeping people hooked. The "algorithm" is just what it thinks the audience wants.
And while I think a lot of us would like to think better of ourselves, I think we all have a strong tendency to engage with ragebait, and "shocking" content. Which wouldn't necessarily be a bad trait in a pre-internet world. But in the world where the shareholders always need the line to go up infinitely, all of our media gets filled with the garbage that makes the line go up the most.
In the short term, we can all try more to engage less with the kind of content, showing the algorithms that we don't actually want that content.
In the long term, we should probably de-couple our media from the infinite-growth investor-first capitalism that has formerly-respected publications writing articles about what 5 random people said on Twitter that they can ragebait people into engaging with.
People also need to be responsible in what they choose to believe though.
Yes but…I try ink media literacy is something that isn’t necessarily intuitive. It can and should be taught in elementary and secondary schools.
That's true but unregulated internet access at a young age exists
Engineering controls are always the most effective way to limit contact with harmful substances.
True, but imagine if we gave everyone an automatic weapon and told people they need to be responsible for what they choose to shoot. True, but we probably shouldn't have given out so many weapons.
It's a terrible metaphor, but there's an intersection between personal, collective, corporate, and technological responsibility that we need to consider, and it's hard to articulate in a few sentences. IMHO we're all in an ouroboros of thought and action, internally and externally.
If you do that, kiss the Fediverse goodbye.
Not necessarily. If it only applies to sites with algorithmic feeds (i.e. specifically ones that serve individualized streams to each user based on what they specifically have liked in the past), companies who choose to be in control of what content they show are held to account and smaller platforms are safe.
I feel like a lot of people confuse feminism for straight up misandry. #killallmen? #maletears? These were started by so called "feminists" but this is the definition of misandry.
And people wonder why young men don't like feminism when this might have been their only exposure to it.
George Orwell, before he wrote 1984, wrote a treatise on the weaponiziation of language. It seems like he was right to warn people.
To clarify my post: the thought of what the word "feminism" or "feminist", etc could be twisted into, reminded me of Orwell's treatise, and how someone could easily get it in their heads that feminists have an overarching agenda to feminize everyone,. I'd imagine this is especially true for young boys,/menn. The anti-trans and anti gay movement or has pretty much always been framed that way, like the existence of them is going to affect Cis people or some other nonsense that is most assuredly a talking point of the alt right and GOP,. This becomes even easier to achieve if bad actors are being depiberately obtuse to manipulate a populace of young and misguided men, who've been left by the wayside by earlier generations who have regressive, "fuck you, I've got mine" attitudes.
And how much of that is actually created to stoke anti-feminist attitudes?
Almost none of it is created to stoke anti-feminist attitudes, but it is certainly spread to do so.
There was this great tumblr post a couple years ago that I can't seem to find anymore about how when feminists spread phrases like 'all men are trash', even if in context it doesn't seem offensive or bigoted, people who dislike feminism will spread it to people offended by it without the additional context and say "look, see! Feminists hate all men! They hate you! Why would you as a man want to help people who hate you unconditionally?!", and unfortunately the people most vulnerable to that type of manipulation are teenage boys, who aren't exactly likely to seek out the context that's been removed
However much is intentionally inflammatory controlled opposition, it will never catch up to the work of people like Dworkin, Solanas, or more recently Julie Bindel.
There are plenty of established, respected feminists, who you could never in a million years claim are a psyop, whose work is taught in academia on a regular basis and whose contents would immediately get me banned off of most social media platforms if I were to swap the genders they're talking about and post an excerpt.
And this is just the theory aspect.
Let's not forget the revolutionary additions to the legislative side of things like the primary caregiver standard, or the Duluth model for domestic violence.
There is a reason "feminism" is not called "egalitarianism".
Yes more modern waves have put some token effort into at least presenting a path for men to improve their lot in society, but let's be real, conservatives do that for women too, it's hardly in good faith and it's fundamentally useless because the focus of the ideology isn't to improve the lot of everyone.
It can't be, because it starts from the presupposition that men's lot is the best lot, and women's needs to catch up to men's.
Even when it nominally factors in facts like men being expected to put themselves in harm's way and die for society it also handily blames men for making the choices that, for instance, lead to war, and it implies that therefore it's not as important because the fact that the person sitting at a desk sending men to get shot on the front lines also happens to have a penis somehow makes it less problematic.
So yeah, there's plenty to criticise.
Feminism has some very valid complaints, hell, a lot even, but there's also a shitton of reasons why your average man can look at your typical feminist and ask himself "why the fuck would I ever side with you?"
☝️👏👏
The mis-characterization of feminists into "feminazis" started with Anita Saarkesian. I remember gamers coming after her hard during gamergate for literally no reason at all. If you go back and watch old Feminist Frequency episodes she wasnt saying anything insane at all. They were all solidly rational observations about the way women were portrayed in games.
The term feminazi began long before gamergate and the movement was a genuine protest against the relationship between game studios and the people pretending to be journalists and honest reviewers.
I watched as the incels and right wing nut jobs rolled in and made it about who Zoe Quinn was fucking. What people don't remember is that she was a narcissistic sociopath who ruined anyone who crossed her and got actual feminists chased off the internet. Reframing the debate to be about slut shaming allowed the incels and the faux feminists to hijack any meaningful dialogue and all the reasonable people distanced themselves from the issue.
Oh no some people were mean on the internet, better throw out all of feminism!
As we all know what small numbers of people on twitter say defines entire groups, that's how we know all gamers are nazis...
I think slacktivist corporate feminism is an easy punching bag which makes it an easy case to dismiss the message.
That and with internet allowing every village idiot a voice, it is very easy for someone to say something incredibly batshit insane which becomes a punching bag for the rest of the people.
I get the basic idea of "slacktivist corporate feminism", but can you give me some specific examples as I'm very interested in this idea.
Not OP, but:
Susan G. Komen pink on everything once a year, #girlboss, 9000 stock photos of women being women at business, bragging about a high percent of the company being women while all of the top 10% earners are men, making a Big Deal about international women's day on social media while quietly fucking with insurance to drive up the cost of women's healthcare, etc. etc.
I really think that tate is an imbecil, and his fanbase are just being manipulated.
It is sad to see that boys think that this idiot is someone who deserve attention.
Is it really that hard not to be a fucking cunt?
For a teenager, yes. That's why this is important.
If men and boys are finding current models of masculinity to be difficult - which is what Tate et al prey on - perhaps they have more in common with feminists. The patriarchy harms everyone.
It's actually not all that difficult to respect women. Which will work well in 99% of scenarios.
The other 1% are interactions on the internet which has a tendency to magnify the weirdos. The "you gotta do this and this and this to even go on a date with me" types are internet weirdos. Most women aren't actually like that. But it's the internet, so a woman saying "just respect me as a person, and we're cool" isn't going to gain traction in the algorithms.
So guys like Andrew Tate are weirdos that gain traction as a reaction to the the other weirdos.
Go outside, touch grass, respect women as people, and everything will be alright.
I think the difficulty stems from the growing disparity in wealth. As it continues to grow, fewer women are available for most men. They just gravitate towards the top.
It's why we have people like Andrew Tate having sex with literally thousands of women while regular men kill themselves.
contemporary feminism (and the wave immediately before) have done a lot more for me than how men have told me I 'ought' to act. fine, I'm not as manly or a man as far as some are concerned. what is really annoying is the apathy and close-mindedness of most of these men who interacted with me negatively.
asking a few questions is enough to make them emotional (which is fine when they do it and not ok when others do it in a way unlike their own) and more intensely emotional than nearly all women i've interacted with. that too is fine, it becomes a pain when i'm taken to be some kind of enemy or other by standards it seems like they cannot apply to themselves.
i want to say they are gaslighting, only, i really don't think it's intentional. there's a genuine misunderstanding and that's annoying as heck.
Instead of emancipating from dehumanising and rigid gender norms for men, it seems like these Tate fans and red pillers and sigma, alpha men are trying to turn back the clock.
You want to tell them: "Stop, you are running into the wrong direction!"
It's the same misunderstanding about 'alpha wolves', they believe that a powerful self-actualized person is one who acts like wolves driven to mental illness by captivity.
So much of our media glorifies the 'hypercompetent power broker' image, the 'great man' concept of Napoleon's image that in many circles if you do NOT idolize that radioactive image as a goal for self-transformation, you are considered irrelevant and weak.
It's all regressive, it's all a response to stress and shrinking opportunity.
Humankind only got to where we are now by cooperation, almost zero humans today are truly self-sufficient, yet these chucklefucks think the only worthy person is one who takes advantage of everyone around them to their own self-benefit.
It is literally the polar opposite of what has lifted man out of naked apes in the savanna.
'return to monke' is a really terrifying meme if you understood the emotion it harnessed and the direction it flings it.
In that respect ("this is a problem") yes, we have commonality with feminists.
But then, feminists will say "you men need to sort your own shit out", which is not at all helpful. We need help. And if you're refusing to help us, while also ridiculing us for needing help, well is it any wonder men don't identify as feminists?
There's sill a ton of 'rugged individualism' propaganda to dismantle before they are comfortable enough with their masculinity to admit that everyone is at least a little bit gay. I mean I personally know of at least two redneck 'good ol boys' that ended their own life than face the fact that sometimes boys can be cute too.
And that's not even mentioning the fact that some states still accept the 'gay panic' defense.
Hypermasculinity has never been a natural aspect of human nature but to the patriarchy it is the ideal man. To become that you must mutilate yourself in a way that erodes empathy and trust in others.
And many, many men have actively taken that psychic self-mutilation. So many to the point that they are proud of their bleeding wounds.
Yeah
I’ve always felt like these things are cyclical in a way - just in that people are constantly rebelling against the last generation.
When I went to high school in the early 2010s there was this huge movement of like… positivity and sunshine and wellness and feminism and good times for all. Bob Ross was on everyone’s mind and Pharrell’s “Happy” blasted on the stereo, people wore really bright and mismatched and often gaudy outfits.
This was seemingly “in response” to that mid 2000s emo/grunge/depressed aesthetic which was very dark and moody. And now, in response to that 2010s positivity we seem to get this really jaded, “actually, feminism sucks and becoming a ‘trad catholic’ is chic” movement.
It’s annoying, and I’m sure we’ll see an opposite shift again in 5 years.
I’ve always felt like these things are cyclical in a way - just in that people are constantly rebelling against the last generation.
That implies that it's somehow a natural cycle, but this is dangerous because it ignores and "Laissez-faire" the fascist propaganda that is blasted deliberately into our global society. It started with fox news and talk radio where funding from fascists helped spread "misinformation" and now continues on social media, where the same funding takes place. The strategy behind this funding is that fascism works when socio-economic circumstances get worse and worse, and allow further exploitation.
Additionally, controversial viewpoints are rewarded by more engagement and clicks - and so become part of the strategy of AI algorithms.
You should absolutely not assume it gets better on it's own, without enough people pushing back against it and without the rules of how the system is allowed to work being changed. Gen Z is just as susceptible to propaganda as Boomers.
Yeah, but I think a lot of it is just high schoolers trying to be different than the last generation. I don't think that Fox News was in charge of people getting really into Bob Ross 10 years ago.
weird cause I got really depressed around that time because I was an unemployable highschool dropout during a recession so I fucking hated that happy song.
Same bro. I thought about suicide very often and leaned heavily into substance abuse. What a fun time.
I respect your thoughts on this as they're very fleshed out and sound like something that could be accurate, but the big problem i see is that your experiences in high-school are extremely biased by your age and limited experience with the wider world at the time. I'm not singling you out btw, because my saying this is based on my own self-reflection of earlier years. Before you are fully integrated into society and also, your frontal lobe is literally still developing until you're in your mid twenties, it is hard to assess the state of things imo. There is definitely a capitalist/media centered cultural zeitgeist that pervades everything, and I'm sure has profound effects, I just can't buy being able to fully grasp it in highschool or earlier. I look forward to your reply.
I hear you, I just want to reiterate that the discussion at hand (from the OP down) is specifically talking about that specific high school age bracket, which is why I’m invoking it so much. Culture is obviously going to be different between age groups, and a lot of that difference is imo a direct “opposition” of that previous group.
Just very anecdotally, I remember seeing a goofy little post, very clearly made by a gen-z individual, stereotyping millennials as this kind of chronically depressed, down on themselves type. Which I thought was kind of funny. Even something like the “trend” of “being depressed” the next generation will recognize and (consciously or subconsciously) change their own behavior based on it.
I don’t think there’s too much to say. I am largely just spitballing on a pattern I’ve noticed at least with fashion and “aesthetics” in that age group over time.
Appreciate the conversation as well. I’m new on the site and it really is like night and day compared to trying to have a polite little conversation on Reddit.
Jeez, you must have gone to high school in a rich neighborhood
For most people 2009-2015 or so was an impoverished hellhole. Everyone was recovering from the great recession. Societal outlook was fucking BLEAK.
A big problem - for ages now - is, that young men just don't have fathers. There's a male around, often, but these are rarely "fathers" that convey a whole picture of a male person. I grew up without one, and I can tell you, how confusing that can be. You attach yourself very easily to ideas other male persons have. Thinking for yourself is another skill that's kinda rare, not only today, it was at any time. It's hard to navigate these years.
Hm I don't understand, could you explain? I had a different experience so it's a bit difficult for me to get. My dad wasn't around until a bit later and by then I didn't respect him all that much. My mom raised me and told me to be nice with my dad and show him affection, otherwise I wouldn't have interacted with him as much. I think I've taken on characteristics from my mom as a result. What does it look like for someone to have a man or masculine kind of person around?
Generational trauma is a motherfucker and until enough people break the cycle we're stuck on this rollercoaster of periodic facism.
This is the reason for a very brief period of time, in my late 20s, I almost fell for Jordan Peterson's schlock. In my opinion he's the more dangerous one. I am a pretty level headed person and was then, but because of my upbringing I was vulnerable. Tate can suck eggs in hell though.
They also are looking for a place to belong. Incels need love too
If you cannot name, let alone quote, a single piece of feminist literature, are you really against feminism, or are you just railing against your own fucked up projections?
Against, in my opinion, because you hold women back even if it is unwittingly.
But they’re also far from unreachable. Ignorance has a solution.
Since Parent choice is apparently all the rage, I demand that my children and their peers all be taught The Second Sex by 6th grade or so.
Andrew Tate himself is absolutely a problem, that doesn't preclude there from also being other, related, broader, problems. Usually, when you see an argument in the form of "X thing (small, defined, addressable) isn't the problem, Y thing (large, nebulous, intractable) is the problem!" Then what is happening is someone is re-framing the debate from a cognizable issue to an unsolvable issue, to defuse any actual action. It's a great tactic!
I agree about the tactic, but I don't feel this particular article aims to use it (though I concede the wording of the title is a bit clumsy). The final paragraph clarifies the clickbait (as it happens nowadays):
“There are already three or four influencers jockeying for position if he goes down,” he says. “He’s a symptom, not the problem.”
Lack of actually good and well-known male role models leads to scum filling the vacuum. Disproportional push in favor of girls and to the detriment of boys is also to blame. Doesn't look like it's gonna fix itself anytime soon though.
Role models
Boys traditionally are taught from a very young age that uncompromising, and 'unfeeling' toxic males are what we need to look up to. So that's what they gravitate towards. It's a whole other discussion about unburdening and unpacking toxic views in men that is the core issue actually at play.
Disproportional push in favor of girls and to the detriment of boys is also to blame.
Women pushing for equal rights isn't to blame for men not unpacking their own toxic baggage. If no one is standing up for boys look at the men. It's not girls' fault that no one is trying to reachout to troubled boys. The ones who are reaching out are toxic gross assholes like Tate or Rogan who are using these boys as a means to line their bank accounts.
Doesn't look like it's gonna fix itself anytime soon though.
Social inequality is never going to fix itself. There isn't a single issue in the world that is going to just fix itself.
Women pushing for equal rights isn’t to blame for men not unpacking their own toxic baggage. If no one is standing up for boys look at the men. It’s not girls’ fault that no one is trying to reachout to troubled boys. The ones who are reaching out are toxic gross assholes like Tate or Rogan who are using these boys as a means to line their bank accounts.
Feminism when women have issues in society: "Men, you must fix this! Or else you are an evil person!"
Feminism when men have issues in society: "Ew, sort your own shit out, loser males"
Gee, I wonder why fewer men are identifying as feminists nowadays
Men benefit significantly from feminism, through the breakdown of male stereotypes, and the expansion of how normative masculinity is defined. Not that benefiting cishet men is necessarily the most important thing in the world, but the idea that feminism puts men on the losing end of some zero sum game is simply wrong.
Honestly it could not be more clear in my own experience. There is a ton of diversity in the human experience, and the masculine experience is part of that. You deny your own freedom when you put yourself and others in a conformity pigeonhole. And you additionally deny yourself access to this diversity of experience when you do it to others. But I also kind of understand why this nuance is initially lost on children, and suspect that experience plus education will help immensely.
My current and previous job were traditionally not open to men. So I'm quite thankful feminism works to break down such gender norms, and it absolutely benefited me.
I'm not going to list my specific jobs for privacy reasons, so here's a list of possibilities instead:
- -Nurse
- -Elementary School Teacher
- -Emergency Dispatcher
- -Wait staff/servers
- -Flight attendant
- -Full time parent (often called 'stay at home')
Education is where we all in America are going to lose this battle. looks at the GOP
Most things come down to people don't want to unlearn things. Con-men like Tate pick up on that empty void for young men since there isn't much guidance and lead them down the wrong path. It isn't the end of the world to learn the way you're brought up thinking may have been bad or harmful, and do better in the future.
Sometimes the symptom can also be the thing exacerbating the problem and much worse of an issue than the root problem
Any teachers here that want to share their stories - like does this sound exaggerated or more realistic do you think?
How about 5th graders that are hard at work using YouTube pickup artist techniques to start ‘dating’ girls. It is the bane of the playground and the source of many tears. Their parents didn’t seem to care.
The parents probably were the ones watching it to begin with.:-P
I see this on my school campus quite a lot. When the male teachers direct students from using an exterior door, they usually just say ok and then around. When the female teachers are on duty and day the same things, they get verbally abused. If I'm out there with the female teachers, there aren't any issues.
Sadly, this is even an issue at university. As a lecture assistant I will just get ignored or not taken seriously by some groups of young male students. They will talk loudly, ignore my request to not talk during lecture or exercise. My male colleagues don't have such issues and it angers me more each year...
what a pain, sucks to hear that. do you think it is more common in like your field of study or is there not too much difference? i took cs classes and found a lot of the younger guys louder and obnoxious compared to those in my chem or bio classes (bio was majority women, chem was sorta equally spilt, obviously excluding other genders, it was not something i was really knowledgeable about the time and ignored)
Or, why I can’t get laid.
While feminism is far from perfect, especially smaller circles that want to have unfair divorce rights for women or whatever, people like Andrew Tate are both the problem (as in, spreading the classic incel rhetoric) and the symptom (why young adults and teens follow people like him).
Though not only him, but also a lot of right-wing youtube channels are pushing false narratives in order to get outrage clicks and to radicalize people against things like feminism. You have youtube videos that say how "feminism is trying to ruin men" or "crazy feminists want to remove sexy girls from video games" or "feminists don't care about men", and given the amount of right-wing youtube videos that get hundreds of thousands and not millions of views, a lot of people do believe it. In reality, however, men do have issues and feminists are acknowledging them and are trying to do something about it (for example, toxic masculinity being responsible for male loneliness for instance), but also things like patriarchy, discrimination and so on.
Hating feminism and/or women isn't going to solve male loneliness. Actual societal-level change, something that feminists are striving for, is the answer.
Yeah I see a ton of comments on youtube that are obviously from troll farms but it hardly ever gets called out. In their minds those are real thoughts people have, maybe they don't always agree but the next time they have a shit thought they think its not as extreme.
So in other words, it's working. Russia has done an amazing job at mindfucking the states I would fucking clap if it wasn't so dumb and lame
Isn't that headline just rage bait? Or is that just incompetence?
From my experience, men who follow feminism get pats on the back while men who ignore feminism get laid.
The issue isn't the men. It's what women value. Men just do what they think will get them laid.
This comment is somehow both extremely misogynistic and misandrist at the same time.
Men and women deserve respect. Men and women are responsible for their own actions. These two statements should not be controversial
Literally nothing about my comment said or implied that men or women do not deserve respect or that either aren't responsible for their actions.
Might be an over simplification, LMAO 😂 But I do think you're right to an extent. Some of the loudest 'feminists' can be pretty negative towards men. While I've found most real feminist to be good people fighting for equality, they often don't seem to want to stand up to these women. I don't know if they fear they will be perceived as antifeminist or what. But it ends up with conversations of gender sometimes entering the 'take your lumps' territory if you're a man. Like, "Thanks for taming the rapist inside you, but us ladies have it covered." Where as being around women with strong traditional values, it can be really sad that they don't respect themselves, but at least they respect you. In moments of selfishness it can feel so good to bask in that respect, even if it's not deserved.
I think pretty much any political movement has the magnetism to attract people who hate the other side. But when the other side agrees, you win. So maybe make your cause hospitable for anyone who wants to further it.
It's statistically true that (and yes this is a bit different but still relevant) women are generally not willing to be in relationships with Conservatives so idk
Wow, from my experience men get laid for being feminists. If you still truly belive that the patriarchy and the status quo are fine, women can tell and see right through you. If you believe the patriarchy is good for you as a man, you are wrong. What women really want is a person who understands and can have healthy relationships with not only their female partners but all relationships they have with other people. The patriarchy discourages these healthy relationships.
so you're saying the motivation behind the male population's acts and their believe system is based on their hormone system?
I doubt that...
Is feminism so fundamental that it’s news when a bunch of incels turn against it?
Men are turning against feminism because the supposed benefits they enjoy have been disappearing for decades. Women by the very statistics they used to promote feminism now have advantages in many areas. The "patriarchy" that once existed is well and dead but feminist would never accept that they are in the privileged position now in many ways. A simple example that many boys learned when I was younger is the boy scouts. Girls are allowed to join the boy scouts but boys are not allowed to join the girl scouts. Boys are told this is done in the name of equality but it doesn't take a genius to see that if girls are allowed to have their own dedicated social groups but boys are not and must allow girls into every aspect of their life that is not equality. It's giving girls privileges that boys don't have.
Feminists will throw tantrums like the old fire alarm trick and call men sexist if they speak about men's rights. They will violently and illegally resist any threat to their attempted domination of discussion about gender rights. Some of the comments here show exactly that kind of mentality. Feminists want to be the only ones to speak and frame issues and essentially own the entire concept of gender equality. Men who want to talk about divorce, child custody, domestic violence, treatment at schools, and so on are immediately branded as sexists who must hate women. Feminists aren't and never will be uncomfortable admitting to their own privileges and the very definition of the word is rights for women. People who are for equality of the sexes are called egalitarians not feminists.
These comments, if viewed objectively, are a great example of why men are turning away from feminism. You have that woman saying "men cause all the problems in the world" then you have another person saying "I don't see where feminists ever make men's lives difficult" and you have the male feminist saying "men who are sick of being insulted if they bring up men's issues just hate women." Collectively feminism and it's impact on and impression given to men is extremely negative. The majority of feminists can't even begin to listen to the issues men face without immediately either trying to one up them or dismiss them as being incels, sexists, or some other derogatory term.
My personal view is that women did indeed have a lot of valid grievances in the past but those are mostly resolved now. However, feminists are unwilling and by definition incapable of doing anything other than continuing to ask for more for women. There will always be more that could be done for any issues women face collectively. The problem comes when feminists are also unwilling to see how the world has changed over the last 50 years and acknowledge their own progress and how it has shifted things.
Boys today will typically have entirely female teachers their whole life. They will told endlessly that women are oppressed and deserve equal rights. Yet they will also see any "safe space" for men infiltrated by women and criticized by women as problematic whereas girls and women will maintain their own in group spaces free from criticism. They will hear stories from older men about the supposed "patriarchy" actually favoring women in terms of the court systems, schools, and workplaces. They will eventually experience the same for themselves. They will see all the statistics about things like women graduating college at higher rates, earning more money, living longer, having lower suicide rates, and so on. They will see the media focusing on women's issues endlessly while ignoring men are often in worse places by the same statistics. A big example being suicide and workplace deaths. When female suicide ticks up the media runs articles declaring it an issue requiring urgent examination and often concluding in some way that men are behind whatever is bothering women. When something like 99% of workplace deaths are men they won't hear a peep about it from feminists but they will constantly hear about the pay gap which is often explained away by women simply choosing careers that don't pay as much, not working as many hours, and so on. Men will hear things like women are the true victims of war because their husbands die. They will consider that men are still subject to the draft. Men are still required in many ways to uphold masculine roles even by feminists.
They start asking questions and the response they get is vitriol. Any attempt to refute any of this, say that maybe things aren't so biased in their favor, that maybe women are the ones who have a lot more privilege in western nations they will be insulted, their lives will be threatened in terms of systemic or social punishment, and so on.
I remember learning that more men are raped than women if you include prison rape. I suggested to my now wife that she ask her feminist Mom about that and her Mom told her, in private, that it's good men get raped in prison because they deserve it. If a woman is open minded enough to actually listen to men and challenge feminists in the same way men challenge them they will get the same exact hateful or vitriolic response and start to understand men's perspective.
I challenge any feminist here to take up an issue that men bring up often and earnest attempt to debate in favor of positive reform for men with any of their feminist friends. Just as a simple academic debate concept where they are taking the "pro" side of an argument they might find distasteful personally. I'm not talking about picking an issue men face that feminists have decided is okay, I'm talking about the issues that men bring up which result in them being insulted. Pick one from these comments as an example. They will likely be shocked at the response IF they engage honestly. Once women step outside the box of solely advocating for women and only advocating for men within a framework of how men should change in ways that women approve of they can quickly learn for themselves why boys and men are turning away from feminism.
Everything you just said is due to the patriarchy and is toxic masculinity.
- every feminist in this thread.
You're completely right though. Men and boys have issues and there are a lot of people out there that have already made their mind up that the problem is men and will use any evidence or stories and manipulate it into it being mens fault and feminism being so great that is has no issues.
It honestly reminds me of the creationists arguments of old.
Boys are getting the short end of the stick and they look around for anyone, absolutely any person that is in their corner that is willing to defend them. They then find Tate. If boys had the support, the lack of orginal sin of being male, and more equal world (instead of just women's issues being addressed) they wouldn't give a shit what Tate has to say.
I bet destroying all that straw felt great.
All I see is a whole lot of pandering toward people who don't like feminism because they don't want to admit men are largely responsible for a lot of problems in the world.
And I'm sure some of you dumbasses will prove my point by trying to argue with me about it in the comments. I'm not gonna capitulate to the same people who largely ruined life for everyone for the existence of our species just so women can get the rights they were entitled to in the first place, nor will I give you the fight that you want.
Yes, you probably did find the feminazi they're denigrating. I don't care. Those feminazis are right.
Woah there megalia 🤏, calm down.
Dumbass #1 proving me right ☝️
See how he only responds with an insult hoping to goad me into a shit fight? This is what men do when anyone tells them the truth about how they really are. Because men are the problem and they know it.
Watch him continue down here 👇
Every single day I see a new reason why I am glad I pulled my daughter out of the hell that is public middle school and put her into online school.
She told me yesterday that boys got into fights in the hallways almost every week. There were definitely fights between kids my middle school, but usually not on school grounds, almost never during the school day, and not constantly for sure. This isn't some low income, underfunded urban school, we're in a small city in Indiana.
On top of that, the couple of friends my daughter had in that school vaped and smoked weed. They're between 12 and 13. Sure, I tried a cigarette at 13, but one cigarette. I didn't smoke weed until I was a junior in high school.
What the fuck is happening in our schools?
I just wish more parents, especially of girls, had the option to do what we did. We're lucky that we can survive (just barely) on a single income.
Just be careful that you don't "over protect" your daughter, and she ends up going off to college, and now with vastly more freedom and a spectrum of influence needs to "keep it on the rails". I have seen home school kids lose their shit when that time comes, as they never had to negotiate the gradual increase in both that level of freedom and influences on the way. I think of it much like the Amish Rumspringa ("rite of passage"), in that they go from a sheltered version of the world, to a much wider open one.
She has always been given a large amount of freedom and we have accepted her for whatever she wants as long as she is happy and healthy while she is in our care. We have never forced her to do anything she didn't want to do unless it was necessary (getting a vaccine for example). The only restrictions we have on her is that she has to get up for school on time, she has to finish all of her school work, and she has to do at least one extracurricular activity of her choice. Initially that was girl scouts, then she chose drum lessons, and now, after a couple of years, she just started drawing lessons.
And in terms of social things, we have also been very open with her. When she was younger, we made sure she knew about birth control and STDs pretty much as soon as she asked where babies came from. It turned out to be less of an issue since she's only interested in girls, but we want her to know she can choose to have sex if she does it safely. We've also been extremely honest with her about drugs, about how there are addictive kinds like heroin and non-addictive kinds like weed and that the drug war is bullshit and that she is hearing a lot of propaganda. In fact, now that I can oversee her health classes (and social studies classes) I can directly say, "this is not true. They are lying to you." That's also a great asset when it comes to social studies. She's covering modern conflict in the middle east right now and I have been able to talk about things like American imperialism and Israeli apartheid (and now genocide) when the texts have been lacking- although they have been surprisingly good overall, if a little dated. And I doubt she would have even been covering that topic at all in her public middle school.
Damn, only a fight every week? They’re daily at my kids’ middle school. And not just the boys.
Every person I know who was home schooled is socially incompatible and I hope you reconsider your decision for your daughter's sake. Public school is hell but so is the rest of life after it, you can't shelter her forever.
And boys fight, it's part of growing up. I don't know how you went to a public school and fighting wasn't common.
We had a bridge not too far away for our "real" fights. Strangely, the formality kept things more civil.
Though there was one time a kid got literally thrown over the side of it. Water underneath so he was fine, but still was kinda crazy.
If you have a designated fighting bridge, someone will get thrown off. It's one of those universal rules of fighting bridges.
You had less drastic options than to pull your kid out of school, such as girls only school. I think you jumped the gun on this one.
First of all, there is no girls-only school in this town. The only private school is a Catholic school. My daughter is an atheist with Jewish heritage.
Secondly, my daughter was so severely bullied that she actually had developed anxiety to the point that she had trouble going to a lunch party at the house of an old high school friend of mine with about 20 people in it. She was starting to get suicidal. She broke down one day and told us she literally could not go to school one more day because she was so bullied that even the bullied kids bullied her.
Thirdly, you have no fucking idea what we have gone through to try to help our daughter make it through school and not end up severely scarred without the school doing a thing.
Fourthly, I sincerely hope you never are in the position we've been in with a suicidal 13-year-old.
But sure, judge me for doing what's best for my daughter, especially since she's so mentally healthy now that she was able to tell some girls from her old school that were harassing her at the roller skating rink to fuck off. She has never had that much self-esteem. She's also never had as many friends as she has now.
She's in a state-funded program with really good teachers and she's getting a great education. I must be the most abusive parent ever.
