They’re seen as deserving of sympathy; men aren’t. Massacre all the men in a village and rape the women, and the rapes will be (rightly of course) called an atrocity, while the massacre of the men will barely be remarked upon.
And thousands of years of men being treated like expendable assets whose lives are worth nothing. “Traditional values” aren’t good for either gender.
According to this (pdf), 96% of the homeless are male.
Whilst the government spends in excess of 300 million for Women’s shelters (for rape, abuse etc), there is no equivalent for men.
93% of deaths whilst working are men.
More men than women die from cancer and HIV/aids, whilst gender specific cancer research funds (i.e. breast cancer vs prostate cancer) are more than double for women.
Not to mention forced selective service.
Now, I’m not saying that this all means men are being oppressed, or that they’re getting it worse than women. In fact, I agree (more or less) with pretty much everything you’ve said. But it’s important not to look at this issue as a dichotomy. Men and women get shat upon by society. It happens in very different ways, but to say that only women get it bad is disingenuous.
I personally think we have to stop this stupid battle of the sexes and actually work towards real equality. This can’t be done whilst feminists are pointing the finger at men and saying we’re to blame for all the world’s problems, and that we’re some sort of privileged class. And in any case, you don’t solve the problem by dismantling that privilege (regardless of whether it is real or imaginary) you remove it (and the perception of it) by putting everyone on the same level.
Wtf are you talking about? Barely remarked upon? What are you smoking?
I’ll just note that the cancer research issue is a very recent turnaround; historically, medical research has heavily favored researching men only since women are “weird” biologically - which has really fucked over women in terms of medication research until not long ago.
And I agree that we need to work toward equality between men and women, and that includes confronting ideas like wondering why it is that women keep getting themselves raped if they’re so strong these days and how if they’d only dress modestly, no one would grope them.
Also, we’re comparing breast cancer funding to prostate cancer funding. The 10 year survival rate of prostate cancer is 98%. The 10 year survival rate of breast cancer is 75%. If prostate cancer reaches Stage IV, it’s 29% survivable. If breast cancer reaches stage IV, it’s 15% survivable. These are not equivalent cancers. Breast cancer is far more deadly.
My figures came from cancer.org except for the 10 year breast cancer stat which came from cancerresearchuk.org (I can’t easily link from my phone, but they were among the first Google results).
No; it’s heavily favored using men for guinea pigs since human experimentation is dangerous and people didn’t care as much if a male test subject died. Twice as much money is spent on female-targeted medical research in general as on male-targeted research; but males were used as experimental subjects whenever that was an option because people didn’t care nearly as much if they got sick or died. They only started to change that when it became clear that men and women are different enough that it wasn’t working well, and have predictably had more problems with people getting angry over harm to the new female subjects.
The problem I always have with these issues is that it’s relatively easy to frame any issue in any worldview of systematic oppression you care to. This is why so many Christians believe that they’re persecuted or that there’s a War on Christmas. Now, in many cases, such as the one I just mentioned, they’re clearly ridiculous deflections.
However, for some reason the idea of Patriarchy became in vogue, which is basically the concept that any and all societal gender issues can be framed solely in terms of discrimination against women, even if that specific issue primarily affects men. Now, let me get something straight, I think in general most of these feminist claims are legitimate, I just don’t think the cries of “misogyny!” or “woman’s problem!” are particularly useful in a lot of cases. Take the idea that only men can be conscripted (in the US). Most feminists object to this being a men’s issue because it “stems from” viewing women as weak. I don’t disagree that the issue comes from viewing women as weak or in need of protection, but I still disagree with the general underpinning, why? Because regardless of any super-double-triple-secret misogyny that contributes to it, it still means that in case of war and draft men are the ones that end up shot, and even though women being viewed one way contributes, I think the way men are viewed as semi-expendable is also an issue.
Again, I don’t disagree that it’s perfectly valid to bring up the fact that society views women as weak and therefore in need of coddling. It’s true. I just really find it silly when we talk about male babies being neglected more, or conscription, and it’s a grievous sin if we don’t talk about it in terms of a woman’s rights issue. They are women’s issues, but they’re not solely women’s issues, and I’d argue that a lot of them aren’t even primarily women’s issues.
No, I don’t think women don’t have problems as a class; no, I don’t think men are worse off than women, and I think in general women are worse off (as a class) than men. I just think that it hurts the cause of feminism (much less society as a whole) when we go and cry foul when things that overtly damage men aren’t talked about solely in terms about how they kinda-sorta covertly relate to some negative view of women. Yes, a lot of these things have hidden impacts on women, there’s no denying that for any gender issue, but even if you focus on some of them in terms of just an issue that damages men (while acknowledging without making it the focus that it can hurt women) – if the issue is solved it’s solved. I think it makes people less amicable to feminist causes when they see a bunch of people railing against how it’s really women being oppressed by less attention being paid to male babies (or whatever) when the most clear and present issue clearly affects men primarily, and it’s terrible that it turns people away from women’s rights issues.
Overall, I just think it makes more sense to approach issues in terms of “these are gender issues; this one affects men, this one affects women, they both implicitly affect the other gender a little too, now how do we solve them?” Instead of focusing solely on “these are gender issues; how can we solve this woman’s problem that tangentially affects men?”
Women who point their fingers at men as being the source of all problems are not feminists. A feminist is a person (female or male) who believes in economic, social, and political equality for both genders.
I came from a generation of women who were very often brought up to think they were weak. We were taught that we were aggressive if we won a tennis match against a male, if we talked a lot on a date, if we asked a man out, or scored higher on an exam. Most often, it was a matter of faking being weak. “Ladies don’t run ever.” We learned it from our parents and from each other until the mid 1960s.
In high school, we couldn’t take shop or auto mechanics. When we went to college, not only were dorm assignments by gender, but the women’s dorms were locked at night. We could sign out to go to the library until about 9:00 pm on weeknights, but we always had to be back in the dorm locked up tight to save us from men I suppose. We couldn’t even wear pants or jeans on campus unless we wore a coat over them and were on the way to the gym or the tennis courts.
So the handsome guys with lots of girlfriends never rape strangers?
Breast cancer is not exactly gender specific. I have often thought that those pink October ribbons should have at least a little blue on them. And only in recent years have studies shown that females usually have some different symptoms from a male during a heart attack. After menopause, a woman has the same chance of having a heart attack as a man. Female heart attacks were frequently undiagnosed in the ER because there wasn’t enough data on the differences.
It may as well be just women, we’re talking 1/8 (12%) of women vs 1/1000 (.1%) of men. Yeah, it happens and people should know that it CAN happen, but it’s not like 45% of people with breast cancer are men and some great truth is being ignored or anything. It really is a pretty negligible amount.
I don’t understand how, in a thread about women being raped, the conversation turns to what poor souls men are and what incredible oppression they put up with.
Yes, prostate cancer is important and needs attention. This proves that women should stop being sluts and getting themselves raped?
Look, there is no male equivalent to being told you should behave a certain way to avoid rape. There is no adequate analogy. Women are raped by men they know. The only statistically sensible way to avoid rape is to avoid men you know. Any other advice is slut shaming.
Is this a no true scotsman argument? Are you saying feminists cannot argue in this way? Women who have have done this, in almost every discussion I’ve had on the topic that I can think of have been self described feminists. Who gets to define who is a feminist and who isn’t anyway? They always claim they’re for all the things you’ve mentioned above too, so what’s the criteria?
I personally don’t like the term. It has the wrong prefix. Stick ‘human’ in there instead and we’re good to go.
I’m aware it affects men too, but as Jragon says it is only a tiny percentage. It’s possibly analogous with with the discussion on rape - it can happen to men too, and does. But the discussion is largely based on women being the victims (and for the most part, quite rightly so).
What are you trying to suggest? What have his looks got to do with anything?
Has that even happened? Who has described men as ‘pour souls’?
The thread was about poor little old men being opressed and shat upon by society since the OP… it was never about women being raped.
I actually thought the thread was a parody the first time I saw the title, and even now I can barely believe that it was asked in earnest.
Seriously guys… I’m a gay guy so maybe I’m speaking out of my element here, but women take PLENTY of responsibility for sex… in fact, pretty much ALL of it. Complaining about how unfair society has been to men for reasons A, B and C is kind of like complaining that your mocha soy latte was 10 degrees too hot as if it’s a serious problem, all the while women are routinely getting splashed with burning hot coffee and being told to dress differently so that they won’t get burned.
[quote=“drewtwo99, post:92, topic:643341”]
The thread was about poor little old men being opressed and shat upon by society since the OP… it was never about women being raped.
I actually thought the thread was a parody the first time I saw the title, and even now I can barely believe that it was asked in earnest.
/QUOTE]
Thanks, I feel the same way. I had actually decided not to come back to it because I find it so disgusting, but I just couldn’t help it. Then reading about all the poor men and how hard they have it was a little too much.
Notice that the mortality of prostate cancer is higher than all other cancers except breast and lung, and breast is only slightly “ahead”. In terms of how many people are killed by it, there’s no meaningful difference between prostate and breast cancer.
Notice also that men are much more likely to die of all cancers of that list other than those only women get, and for some reason pancreas.
Even with breast cancer, although that link doesn’t show it, men who get it are massively more likely to die from it.
“Women have always been the primary victims of war. Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.” – Hillary Clinton
Men being victims isn’t something society wants to hear about, so it gets ignored. Some people even find it “disgusting” and refuse to listen.
Do you care to provide some sort of evidence that massacres of men are occurring and barely being remarked upon while the abuses women sustained is the primary subject of focus? Or just a random quote that you think proves that.
Yes, I definitely agree. The question in the thread title is pretty ridiculous, and more than a little bit offensive. But I’m still trying to figure out how I (and others) have painted men as oppressed, in fact I explicitly said that it isn’t the case. But hey ho…
The closest male equivalent is being told to behave in a certain way to avoid a false rape accusation.
I’m sure it happens, but its uncommon to hear men advised to avoid having sex with strangers or emotionally unstable women to protect themselves from this crime. Or even warned against having sex with people who have a high incentive to lie about having consensual sex (like married women). I have never heard of guys blanketly warned about being more selective in who they take home, as a way of protecting themselves from crime.
But if a woman admitted to picking up random men at bars and taking them to her place just to talk, I can imagine lots of people wondering how she could be so irresponsible, foolish, and naive.
So let me see if I’ve got the overall theme of this thread correct.
Posit: Women need to take more responsibility for sex. While this was not clearly defined in the OP, apparently, “taking responsibility,” means consenting, clearly and loudly.
Rape victimizes men too, somehow.
If women dress more modestly and do not leave their homes after sunset, they are therefore taking more responsibility for sex.
Or something.
Actually, I have no idea what the OP was trying to assert, nor what this thread is about. Except women are evil, dangerous sluts and blame men for everything.
I, for one, apologize if my more recent longer post read like I was blaming women for rape or that it wasn’t primarily a woman’s issue. I was addressing the hijack and not the OP directly (which I’m pretty sure most of us can agree is pretty ridiculous). I was talking about the general theme that comes up (at least on the internet, I don’t encounter many in person feminism conversations) that any time a problem that affects men comes up, it has to be framed in terms of women. At least by modern feminist theory.
Rape, itself, is a primarily female problem. I’ve heard some MRAs conclude otherwise because rape statistics exclude envelopment, or whatever, but I’ve yet to be convinced of that (also, most MRAs are obnoxious). Even if the actual stats are equal, women still have the unique problem of being blamed for their own rapes.
I probably shouldn’t have addressed the hijack. It was rather… ironic to start addressing how people re-frame and hijack issues that affect men in a thread about a primarily female problem, apologies.