Understanding Feminism (Women: Your opinions)

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Quick question, which men's movement are you a part of?

Me? I am not, formally, a part of any of them. However, I have a list of some of the more common branches of the movement at the bottom of this page.

<sigh>
Getting the ad-hominem off the table first, no: I'm still friends with all but two of my exes, and neither of those were very involved relationships; I'm currently dating a very nice man (NOT a "Nice Guy," but a good man). For the record, feminists tend to have pretty damn good sex lives and fulfilling relationships.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 102856.htm
Furthermore, I have a brother and a father whom I love and respect.
The difference between your analogy and mine is that women, at least, blame the actual source of the problem rather than deflecting onto some sort of cold-war-esque traditional enemy, like some old general still whining about the Commies. Feminists look at violence against women, GLBT people, people of color, the poor, etc, and say, 'Hey, we should end the system (the kyriarchy, by modern terms) wherein one party has so much more social capital than the other that they can basically do what they want with impunity, teach our kids not to hit each other, and work against poverty and class stratification.'
MRAs, on the other hand, look at men being the victims of violence, primarily at the hands of other men, and say, 'Those God-Damned feminists! they ruin everything!'

Nominalist; you keep talking about controlling for age. This is nonsense. All it means is ignoring those parts of the data that don't support your position. Besides which, even when you do control for age, the data still shows that men are the overwhelming majority of violent crime victims.

HereComesTheRain; wow dude, way to come in and prove my point about MRAs. I mean, seriously man, you're coming across as aggressively anti-woman here, rather than simply anti-feminist.

LKL; for real? Did you seriously just say that? Anyhow, the point still stands. Whatever the reason for it (and I'd argue that it has a lot to do with the way boys are conditioned from a young age to believe that their lives have less worth, and that their pain means less, than that of girls) the majority of violent crime victims are still men, which doesn't exactly support the idea that men are privileged.



Anyone else see how entirely unreasonable both sides of this argument have become? How neither can bring up a legitimate complaint without it turning into a "who's got it worse" pissing contest? This is why I do not associate myself with either. This is why I advocate abandoning both feminism and masculism.

Last edited by mds_02 on 26 Jul 2012, 3:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't think you are reading the data accurately. For example:

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/229133.pdf

Do a PDF search for: Total Violent Victimization by Gender: BJS and JLKH, NCVS 1973-2005

Notice how the gender gap has continued to narrow.

Uh yeah, just did that. And, in recent years where male and female victimisation rates are closest, men are still about 1 1/2 times as likely as women to be victimised. So I'm kinda having trouble seeing your point.

Or maybe I should apply your logic to another scenario. The wage gap has narrowed over the last 30 years or so. Using the same logic you're using, that means it is no longer evidence that women are disadvantaged in the workplace.

The only information I can provide is empirical evidence. I did so.



Fortunately, that is increasingly the case.

No. You haven't only provided empirical evidence. You've also drawn conclusions that your own evidence does not support. You've cherry picked the bits of data that support your position, while completely ignoring the vast amounts of it that don't.

All I can say at this point is that if you are an actual sociology professor, then the academic world is even more f****d than I thought.

I'm gonna stop arguing now to protect my own sanity.

Wow, such sweet words. You can't imagine how much credibility you have now gained.



I agree. Trolling must be tiring after a while.

I was expecting it from the beginning.

Like I said, polarising. It's much more fun to sit back and watch it happen - I knew the thread would dissolve to this point eventually. That's why you have to get in on the good bits early before it reaches this level.

Given the sorts of arguments that you consider credible, I'll take that as a compliment.

I see you have not lived up to your promise to end the conversation for your own "sanity," as you put it.

If you look at one single aspect of culture, you could claim that a gay black paraplegic woman with AIDS is privileged.
There are absolutely aspects of current culture that disadvantage men: just off the top of my head, I think that women should have to register for the draft along with men (note that MRAs whine about women not having to sign up for the draft while simultaneously sneering at women in the military and trying to keep current female soldiers off of subs, off the front lines, etc), and men who choose to stay home with their families should not be looked down on by society at large (neither should women who choose to stay home, but men get it worse). None of those things change the fact that, overall, women still face more gendered disadvantages than men do.

Violence is a particulary troublesome part of our culture, but most of the problems with violence that men face are the remnants of the patriarchal, macho culture that feminism is trying to demolish. Violence against men (and violence in general) is NOT, as the MRAs want to imply, caused or exacerbated by feminism.

Well said. How does violence by men against men even register in a criticism of feminism? The only legitimate criticism I can think of, is that feminism doesn't address this issue well enough--but that's just part of reality. No one has infinite attention, resources, and time to address every issue in the world. And personally, I would assume that feminism has actually done more to address the issue of male violence than any other movement. Edit: I should amend that to say any other major modern movement--except maybe the anti-war movement. But really, my point isn't that feminism addresses male violence against men more than other movements, but that it has absolutely no conflict with this issue. And male violence against other men really doesn't suggest that men are somehow underprivileged in regard to women....or that men have equal privileges to women because more men tend to commit violent acts towards other men.

It's hard to be anti-woman when you've been dating one for 4 years. Where's your wife or girlfriend, sweetie pie?

""HereComesTheRain"]Your peer reviewed studies are correct, however, the premise you got from those peer reviewed studies is offensive and inaccurate. It's akin to saying "If a woman doesn't want to get beaten, she should avoid dating men who are poorer than her".

Hey, what I said is true. Women who date men from lesser socioeconomic levels do raped and beaten more often than women who stay within their own socioeconomic class.

But then if I said the following, I'd be accused of blaming the women for being victims. And you'd be right. It's because nobody asks to be a victim.

Therefore, you're a tool. Lemme guess, your ex boyfriend broke your heart and you act this way."


"Getting the ad-hominem off the table first, no: I'm still friends with all but two of my exes, and neither of those were very involved relationships; I'm currently dating a very nice man (NOT a "Nice Guy," but a good man).""

What's the female version of the Madonna-whore complex called again? Anybody?

"For the record, feminists tend to have pretty damn good sex lives and fulfilling relationships.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 102856.htm"

I think MRAs have large penises and can bound 400 foot buildings in a single bound!

In reality though, feminism doesn't foster fulfilling relationships. Quite the otherwise. Case in point, more men are "humping and dumping" and refusing marriage. The rate for marriage is at an all time low, and men aren't even bothering to "get the milk for free" anymore (grass eaters in Japan come to mind). We just buy it from the local vending machine when needed. Your study is complete bunk. After work, I'll grab you the statistics on marriage,

"Furthermore, I have a brother and a father whom I love and respect."


Good for you. Do they know you believe that men "ask" to be victims of robberies, assaults and murders?


"The difference between your analogy and mine is that women, at least, blame the actual source of the problem rather than deflecting onto some sort of cold-war-esque traditional enemy, like some old general still whining about the Commies. Feminists look at violence against women, GLBT people, people of color, the poor, etc, and say, 'Hey, we should end the system (the kyriarchy, by modern terms) wherein one party has so much more social capital than the other that they can basically do what they want with impunity, teach our kids not to hit each other, and work against poverty and class stratification.'
MRAs, on the other hand, look at men being the victims of violence, primarily at the hands of other men, and say, 'Those God-Damned feminists! they ruin everything!'

No, here's how us MRAs see the system: Violence is violence, no matter what party is committing the violence. It's unfair that one sector of society is punished more severely for the same crime than another sector of society. We also think that we're being viewed as wallets and warm bodies for wars rather than people. Your shaming language tactic aside, The difference between my analogy and your Vietnam war era protestor mentality is that mine actually is based on statistics and fact while yours is based on feeelungs.