How Feminism Hurts Men

[drunkenshoe]

How Feminism Hurts Men

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/micah-j-m ... 66733.html

Yesterday somebody on Facebook told me that feminism elevates women at the expense of men, that its agenda to validate women emasculates us guys.

He was right.

For men, the rise of feminism has relegated us to second-class status. Inequality and discrimination have become part of our everyday lives.

Because of feminism, men can no longer walk down the street without fear of being catcalled, harassed, or even sexually assaulted by women. When he is assaulted, the man is blamed -- the way he dressed he was "asking for it."

Because of feminism, there are no major Christian conferences about how to act like men, where thousands of men can celebrate their manliness and Jesus (and perhaps poke fun at female stereotypes).

Because of feminism, church stages and spotlights are often dominated by women. Men are encouraged to just serve in the nursery or kitchen. Sometimes men are even told to stay silent in church.

Because of feminism, women make more money than man in the same jobs.

Because of feminism, it's hard to find a movie with a heroic male lead anymore. Most blockbusters feature a brave woman who saves the world and gets a token man as a trophy for her accomplishments.

Because of feminism, women's professional sports are a massively profitable enterprise where women are globally idolized. Men only appear briefly, before commercial breaks, when they're objectified for their bodies.

Because of feminism, all birth control is covered for women without question or debate, while men have to fight to get insurance companies to pay for their Viagra prescriptions. When men do speak up about this, leaders of the "family friendly" right wing labels them "sluts" and "whores."

Because of feminism, the male body is constantly under public scrutiny. If a man appears topless on TV, it's a national scandal resulting in huge fines and boycotts. Bloggers regularly write about how we need to be more mindful of the ways our clothing choices tempt women to sin. Satirists insist that shorts "aren't really pants" and then men should cover up because "nobody wants to see that."

Because of feminism, men are not represented in the White House, and women hold over 80 percent of the seats in Congress. When a man runs for office, his physical appearance and clothing choices are discussed almost as much as his policies and ideas.

Because of feminism, men must fight for a voice in the public sphere. In issues of theology, politics, science, and philosophy, the female perspective is often considered default, normal, and unbiased. Male perspectives are dismissed for being too subjective or too emotional. When we speak up, we are often dismissed as angry, rebellious, subversive, or dangerous.

But stay strong, bros.

One day we'll all be equal.

Whatever you do, don't read Jesus Feminist. It's full of ideas that will continue to oppress and harm men -- ideas such as "women are people too" and "the dignity of and rights of women are as important as those of men".

This article originally appeared on RedemptionPictures.com.

How sad. Brought tears to my eyes.

My favourite part:

Because of feminism, men must fight for a voice in the public sphere. In issues of theology, politics, science, and philosophy, the female perspective is often considered default, normal, and unbiased. Male perspectives are dismissed for being too subjective or too emotional. When we speak up, we are often dismissed as angry, rebellious, subversive, or dangerous.

:rollin:

[Sargon The Grape]

...please tell me this is satire.

[Sargon The Grape]

#-o

[Hakurei Reimu]

Anything can be carried too far. Feminism is right now in the transition between a constructive, progressive movement and the distaff counterpart to male chauvinism.

I'm with Thunderf00t on this issue. The guy has been accused up and down of being a pro-rape misogynist, but having watched, listened to, and understood his videos, you find out that he's actually quite evenhanded on the subject, and his arguments are well thought out and sensible. What he sees is a political movement that is on the cusp of turning into a cult, of turning toxic, of turning its heads into unassailable gurus and literal yes-men, and instead of eliminating the oppression simply shifting that oppression from women to men, and he's calling bullshit on it. And the icing on the cake here is that when rebutting him, TF's opponents can't seem to stop strawmanning his points.

[Hydra009]

Because of feminism, the male body is constantly under public scrutiny. If a man appears topless on TV, it's a national scandal resulting in huge fines and boycotts. Bloggers regularly write about how we need to be more mindful of the ways our clothing choices tempt women to sin. Satirists insist that shorts "aren't really pants" and then men should cover up because "nobody wants to see that."

Policeman.  Hero.  Fashion pioneer.

Certain men felt so lost that they started to dislike their own gender.

What we need is a media campaign to promote a healthy outlook on masculinity:



Eating red meat, not exercising, and owning a gun = manly

-Billion dollar cosmetics industry (40yr old women trying to hold it together)

Yeah, because that's a really recent trend that completely coincided with feminism.

[Poison Tree]

I saw that linked article last night and thought it was fairly clever and funny.

More generally, thought, I think that "feminist" is one of those words that means so much that it doesn't mean anything (even more so that "atheist"). Like "atheist", "feminist" covers people/groups with a wide range of views who can have differing views on many topics and, especially, different tactics.

For example, a while back I saw a lot of "feminists also don't want you [men] to loose custody of you children and have to pay child support/alimony, either" floating around the internet; as if feminists have strong party discipline and all agreed to vote along party lines. Obviously the reality is much messier. I've seen self-described feminists argue against the presumption of equal custody, saying instead that the woman should be the default primary custodian unless the father can prove he deserves equal rights. I've seen (especially from younger and communist feminists) claims that courts giving custody and child support to women is an example of the patriarchy oppressing women by removing them from the workforce, eliminating economic freedom and forcing them to depend on men (both the man paying child support and the male-run/patriarchal courts and government). I've also seen many more nuanced positions in between.

All to often when I see people talking (either good or ill) about "feminists" they sound uncannily similar to "atheists are genocidal maniacs, just look at North Korea and the Soviet Union"

[Hydra009]

All to often when I see people talking (either good or ill) about "feminists" they sound uncannily similar to "atheists are genocidal maniacs, just look at North Korea and the Soviet Union"

Both ideas are similar in that most people don't have much of a problem with the core concept, but the term itself comes with all sorts of baggage and generates strong emotional reactions.

It's funny sometimes to see people say that they aren't a feminist and then describe their position with the textbook definition of feminism.

[Poison Tree]

The gender pay gap is a complicated issue and how the gap is calculated can make a huge difference. Take that Swedish study: "Women between 20 and 64 years old currently have a 77-percent employment rate, compared to an 83-percent rate for men." Was the difference in employment rate figured into the pay difference?

Swedish women take 76% of parental leave (I'm guessing it is higher in America), I'm certain that decreases their earnings, both directly from lost hours (at least in countries/jobs without payed leave) and likely makes them somewhat less likely for advancement that year.
I've seen some studies that claim that single, never married, childless women make slightly more than men* in the same field with the same education (*I some said simply "men" others "single, never married, childless men"; I even saw the same study reported both ways).

I've seen it claimed that each child "costs" a woman a 7% pay reduction, so the US average of 2.06 children would be 14.42% pay reduction, more-or-less half of the pay difference.

Women tend to be more likely to take low-wage jobs.

I've seen claims that when these factors are accounted for the pay gap drops to 5-7% or even 1-2%--still a problem (hell, if I were the CEO of a big company and could reduce labor cost by 2% I think I'd employ only women), but not on the same level as a 30% difference.

Should we encourage more men to take (equal) parental leave (or more responsibility for the upbringing of their children, generally)? Absolutely--I hate it when a man says he is "babysitting" his own child. Is a major reason women end up in lower paying jobs because "nurse and teacher are "women's work" while doctor and lawyer are "man jobs""? Probubly.

[Jmpty]

As a stay at home dad, I guess I'm on the cutting edge of.......whatever.

[Poison Tree]

What does women tend to get low paying jobs mean?

For the sake of argument, pretend every STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) worker gets payed exactly the same, and every pre-college teacher gets payed the same (as every other pre-college teacher). If we looked at STEM employed women, they would get payed the same as STEM employed men, and teacher employed women would get payed the same as teaching employed men.

However, STEM jobs pays good salaries and teaching pays like crap. STEM  jobs tend to be dominated by men (roughly 80% men in some specialties) and women are over-represented in pre-college teaching. So if we look at men vs women based only on age group (which, based on what you posted, is what the Swedish study did) then men would out earn women, even if everything else were the same, because men make up a larger percentage of well payed STEM workers and a lower percentage of low payed teachers then women do.

It's about paying one group of people one salary, but paying other doing the same job less on purpose, because she has a vagina. There is really nothing complicated about this.

Some of it* actually is as simply as equally qualified women getting payed less then men in the same job. However, some of it is men and women working in different paying jobs/fields at different rates. Some of it is women taking more time out of the workforce to raise children and care for elderly family members. Some of it is women being more likely to work part time jobs, with fewer hours and lower per-hour pay than full time jobs.



*the US Department of Labor/CONSAD Research Corp says that

There are observable differences in the attributes of men and women that account for [. . .] between 65.1 and 76.4 percent of [the gender pay gap] and thereby leave an adjusted gender wage gap that is between 4.8 and 7.1 percent.
 

instead of the raw gender pay gap of 20 to 30 percent.

[Plu]

On the topic of pregnancy and maternity leave, I'm going to have to take the side of the businesses this time... if someone is going to take 3 months off, I'm going to have to train a replacement to do your job anyway... if that replacement person is at least as good as you are, I really don't see much of a reason to hire the old person back, who would then have to enter another retraining period to get back up to speed. (Obviously if they aren't as capable it's a different story)

And the same reasoning holds when hiring... if I can pick between a guy and a girl who are equally qualified and are paid the same, I'll take the guy because I'll run less risk of them having to leave for 3 months to have a baby.

These things impact businesses, and businesses run on money, so it's obvious you can see them reflected in how they treat their different workers. Even as someone who believess in equality, in this area sometimes they simply aren't equal when it comes to making business decisions. You can call that unfair, but it's simply calculating the biological risks you take when hiring someone.

The fact that I don't want to make the above decisions plays a major part in why I do not want to be caught dead in a management or business role, but I find it hard to blame someone who is hired to make as much as possible for making decisions that will generate the most money... and those can certainly look unfair to women. And lots of other groups of people. That's what you get when you build an economy and company entirely around making money.

[Sal1981]

I usually differentiate between feminists and "feminists" that are radical. Women's Suffrage is clearly the former, but people that deride Men's Rights movement are the latter, in my mind.

It's a complicated issue, with bad apples on both sides, but I find it to be leveraged against women in most parts, so radical "feminism" isn't so surprising given the frustration of dealing with at least ten times as many male chauvinists than female chauvinists.

[Jason78]

For the sake of argument, pretend every STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) worker gets payed exactly the same, and every pre-college teacher gets payed the same (as every other pre-college teacher). If we looked at STEM employed women, they would get payed the same as STEM employed men, and teacher employed women would get payed the same as teaching employed men.

However, STEM jobs pays good salaries and teaching pays like crap. STEM  jobs tend to be dominated by men (roughly 80% men in some specialties) and women are over-represented in pre-college teaching. So if we look at men vs women based only on age group (which, based on what you posted, is what the Swedish study did) then men would out earn women, even if everything else were the same, because men make up a larger percentage of well payed STEM workers and a lower percentage of low payed teachers then women do.

How do you propose making STEM subjects more attractive to women?  I'd love to see more women in my profession but it's a total sausagefest out here.

[Plu]

How do you propose making STEM subjects more attractive to women? I'd love to see more women in my profession but it's a total sausagefest out here.

Step one would be a cultural shift where people don't tell their daughters "don't touch that, it's dangerous, why don't you play with dolls instead?"

It's ridiculous how many parents treat their daughters like vulnerable little dolls and their sons like indestructable machines.

But good luck with that. It's going to take a long time, especially when grandparents get involved. (I should know <<)

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I want to comment here, but the conversation seems to be veering in 40 directions at once at times..
I do know the women in my family have never accepted traditional female roles of daintiness and all that gibberish. They are and were always willing to stand up for themselves, have careers and not run around like helpless, breakable dolls.
Still there is that part of my brain that likes dainty, helpless breakable dolls even though I know it to be unrealistic.