If you’re an outspoken man, and disagree with the feminist consensus, Dominic Falcao writes, there’s maelstrom coming—but it’s OK to be bewildered.
I recently read an article by Hugo Schwyzer on why he resigned from the GMP. The article was depressing because it suggested to me that people of differing ideological stances cannot work in the same publication, especially not on gender topics. Since I read it, I’ve also been concerned to work out why so much internet discussion on feminism is dedicated to the elaboration of tactics used by each side to “derail” one other. Each new article posted is followed by a vicious comment war, trolls unintelligible from the naive but for Bright’s Law, and the tactics being used appearing to get filthier by the day.
And I am beginning to realize why. Someone I respect recently reminded me that “the biggest problem we have to address is the fact that feminism, as much as anything else, is a way of thinking about things, a way of critiquing and a way of analyzing things.”
I suddenly realized why it is so important to me to be right, and why I will do anything to stay on track. The case is best illustrated by an event which has given me cause to feel a level of empathy for Tom Matlack.
♦◊♦
I don’t even know how it happened. I just sort of became aware of sexism. As a mixed-race kid growing up in London I had been preoccupied by racism and other forms of discrimination for most of my life. University introduced me to people who noticed these things and stridently made others aware of them: the arbitrary lack of a women’s football team, the overwhelming lack of female performers at local gigs, the absence of female democratic representatives on our student union. This was something illogical, irrational, arbitrary: something I objected to and was eager to change. This was something, which once brought to my attention, hovered just in front of my eyes regardless of what I was looking at.
Of course, I started talking about it. Repeating the observations of my feminist friends, adding to them with my own insights as I discovered my own ability to uncover these rotten bouts of illogicality nestled insidiously into the framework of university life.
I, perhaps foolishly, started a feminist website. It seemed the obvious thing to do—there was no-one talking about this stuff in public. And then? The most surreal intellectual experience of my life. There was a group of people who believed very much the same things as I did, who hated that people could not see gender inequality even when it manifested in the most blatant manner, who loved talking about it and who campaigned for change.
But they were so incredibly hostile. I wandered around like a newborn horse, stumbling home to read reams of esoteric feminist academia to work out why anyone would be so angry that a man was trying to affect change on feminist issues. I felt I had to defend the idea that men could be feminists, I felt that I had to go on a crusade about the tone of arguments used in debates, I felt, and I expressed those feelings.
I have to be right because when I talk about these issues it is too important to be mistaken and risk being wrong about my own identity and manner of perceiving the world. These are debates in which we swap observations about each other. Where perceptions of other people really come out. It is not because I have a “genuine fear of being challenged and confronted”—in fact, I go out of my way to have my views challenged. (How else will I know I’m really right but if for the fact that nobody is able to persuade me otherwise?) No. It’s not this.
♦◊♦
I have come to the conclusion that it is because it really is a mindset that has roots deep within our identities. And for men, it’s so much harder than most women seem to appreciate. It is a two-step process of realizing that parts of your personality that you valued and which are useful to you are genuinely harmful to society: we are (blamelessly) toxic, and it is then rejecting those pieces of yourself and persuading others to do the same. It involves realizing that you are born into a dominant position, and giving it up. Men involved in feminism have to preach their own deconstruction.
So when Hugo says that “one of those childish things adult men put away is the need to deflect, belittle, or exaggerate women’s anger,” it does serious damage to the self-esteem of men who are brave enough to admit that they have had their feelings hurt. Tom is labelled childish for being confused and hurt by the strength of views against his position, about the personal tone of the attacks. He expressed thoughts from a place that most men don’t access in public—and was reminded with force why this is so.
I have two constructive conclusions. Firstly, I do not think that the idea of the “angry feminist” is a myth. I think it is a necessary truth. Secondly, the man who is “hurt” by feminist anger needs to be taken more seriously. If you want change, then you will have to accept emotional honesty from men, one part of which will inevitably be bewilderment at the whirlwind of gnashing words that decimates those who disagree with the feminist consensus. And there will always be disagreement; it’s what comes just before understanding amongst those with curious minds. I agree with Hugo on one point: I think that the “grown-up virtues of self-control, responsibility, and manifested empathy” are incredibly important, and it is the lack thereof which shows when the tone used is heavy-handed enough to be labelled “wrath.”
I have one final musing. Hugo’s argument assumes that all feminists criticised for getting angry are women. Without this assumption, lines like “It’s a key anti-feminist strategy … it forces women to become conscious caretakers of their male peers by subduing their own frustration and anger. It reminds young women that they should strive to avoid being one of those ‘angry feminists’ who (literally) scares men off and drives them away” simply don’t make sense. I don’t know if Hugo thinks that female feminists are the only ones who get angry, or whether he thinks that they are the only ones criticised for getting angry—but I assure you, neither of these things is remotely true.
—Photo alexbrn/Flickr
for men, it’s so much harder than most women seem to appreciate…. parts of your personality that you valued and which are useful to you are genuinely harmful to society
Speak for yourself. My personality isn’t harmful to society. You assume all men have something toxic inside that needs to go, just because (taking you at your word) you do.
This is a mistake. Most men aren’t like you, we don’t have anything wrong with us — at least, not anything that feminism could fix, or has any business trying to change.
The point is that we don’t get to choose, the toxicity stems from multiple centuries of oppression. Check what I think about Male Privilege now here – http://shrillblog.co.uk/2012/check-privilege/ my thoughts have moved on a little.
x
All hail Hugos’ replacement!
“And for men, it’s so much harder than most women seem to appreciate. It is a two-step process of realizing that parts of your personality that you valued and which are useful to you are genuinely harmful to society” Correct me I’m wrong, but are you suggesting that only men should be expected to desconstruct their own gender role in terms of how it harms others. Men acknowledging their privilege is vital, but if women aren’t willing to take the same brave step then its rather meaningless. If re-examining gender roles is harder for one gender than the other it… Read more »
Both do need to re-examine, but I’m a feminist – I believe that women are oppressed in many ways – please don’t ask me to justify this here, but it follows from this that it is largely the role of the oppressors to de-construct; changes for women are of a different kind, I think of these as equally taxing, but not necessarily painful, they are more like reconstruction, a building up.
“I believe that women are oppressed in many ways – please don’t ask me to justify this here. . .” Why not? It should be easy to do if it supported by data. How about explaining in what way educated western white women are oppressed? Do you believe that they are more oppressed than undocumented immigrant men or black men in general? I know many educated white women who don’t believe they are oppressed, and don’t behave as if they are oppressed. Do you contend that they really are oppressed but just too stupid to realize it? For example, my boss’… Read more »
So women just need to be built up properly while men need to be broken down and rebuilt properly?
My only problem with your line of thought here is that you seem to have all men neatly categorized as oppressors and all women neatly categorized as oppressed. I don’t think that’s going to cut it when it comes to getting rid of the dangerous ideas that men and women have. There is some reconstructing and deconstructing that needs to be done on both sides.
Would it be fair to say that male privilege – if it exists at all – is so small you need a microscope to find it? Because if someone asked me to name some privileges that eg. rich people have over the poor, I could do that in about one half a second or less.
DB, I have raised this issue a number of times and have consistently found that no one who claims that male privilege exists that is willing to quantify it with any real data, especially when asked to compare white women’s “privilege”, and eve more expecially in comparison to minority males.
I also dislike the idea of male privilege, it’s easily the hardest thing for men joining this discussion to grasp – that’s a lot what my article was about. But I don’t dislike it because it’s wrong, I dislike it because it is true. In terms of what male privilege is, I found these sites helpful – http://www.amptoons.com/blog/the-male-privilege-checklist/ and http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com/2008/02/09/faq-female-privilege/. Obviously neither of these have “data”. A lot of feminism is based on personal experience. Data will have difficulty measuring the bias in a certain situation if it is not accompanied by deep statistical evidence describing a situation. This objection… Read more »
“ But I don’t dislike it because it’s wrong, I dislike it because it is true.” How do you know it to be true without objective data? You believe it’s true because amptoons.com and finallyfeminism101.com say it is? Those are your sources? If your argument has facts behind it, you could cite any number of .gov sites as data sources. Have you ever done any actual research based on data from .gov sites? With views based on personal impressions of experiences, you have merely an opinion of a relatively small minority. Clearly nothing to establish anything credible. “Data will have… Read more »
First some corrections (because your response was a systematic attempt to mis-interpret me – I did not (anywhere at all) suggest women were the only oppressed group. I did not suggest that women were no more aware of their environment then children, and if I did, then I also suggested that most men were too. In the same sentence I made other direct comparisons. One could easily say that I made out that children were aware of their environment as adults. Neither interpretation gets to the idea that our relation to a certain concept may remain unknown to us without… Read more »
“First some corrections (because your response was a systematic attempt to mis-interpret me – I did not (anywhere at all) suggest women were the only oppressed group.” Where in your comments did you state that men were oppressed? “I did not suggest that women were no more aware of their environment then children, and if I did, then I also suggested that most men were too.” Where did you state that men were were no more aware of their environment than children? Let’s review: I said this: “my boss’ boss runs a $1.2B business but doesn’t believe that she is… Read more »
*correction – someone being successful does not mean that they are NOT in other ways oppressed
I am going to reply to your links about male priv. 31. I can ask for legal protection from violence that happens mostly to men without being seen as a selfish special interest, since that kind of violence is called “crime” and is a general social concern. (Violence that happens mostly to women is usually called “domestic violence” or “acquaintance rape,” and is seen as a special interest issue.) When in recent history have men asked for legal protection from violence that happens mostly to men, because with the exception of sexual violence, all other type of violence happen mostly… Read more »
I just read that second link you provided. And all I can say is WOW, another feminist site that just changes the definition of a word to suit the writers POV and then goes on to justify that definition.
It is absurd that men cannot be feminists. Unfortunately some women get so absorbed into feminism that they think all men are a threat, and not the asset that men can be. I have always tried to include men into feminist discussions, and if given a fair chance, there are many men who are willing to join the cause.
Great article!
Well said
I agree – I wrote about it a while back; http://shrillblog.co.uk/2011/lived-experience-men-feminists/ I don’t think it’s the case that feminists necessarily view men as a threat, but that some strands have as a theoretical basis the idea that members of an oppressed group are best positioned, in terms of their unique experiences as members of that group, to lead their own struggles. In this rendering of the discussion, men cannot be feminists because they have no experience as women. Empathy is said to be an illegitimate argument for male creative participation – there are so many women with actual substantive experience,… Read more »
Well, his position is beginning to erode because some of them FINALLY visited his blog and read about some of his “accomplishments” like, hey, trying to murder someone.
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Can we end the idea that hugo is some great example of feminism? As much as i would love to have hugo be the representative of feminism because it would probably mean feminists looking like idiots but i must point out that on feministe.us there are few comments that would appear to show Hugo less qualified than what he claims to be. The support that he claims to have that justifies his prominence is quite fragile at this point. And the criticism of him is circling around the “blogoshpere” (i felt like vomiting as I wrote that word). I think… Read more »
So on to the Frontman Fallacy itself, your 2nd assumption. You claimed, The frontman fallacy is a strawman argument and is generally accepted to be so. Btw you don’t actually mean a strawman here do you? You’re just saying you think it is wrong? A strawman argument is one that attacks a statement not supported by the other side. But the Frontman Fallacy attacks one of the most utterly basic concepts of feminism, namely “the patriarchy“. The feminist concept of “the patriarchy” is (1) men run the world, (2) men do so for the benefit of men and to the… Read more »
The feminist concept of “the patriarchy” is (1) men run the world, (2) men do so for the benefit of men and to the disadvantage of women and (3) all men are guilty because of the patriarchy. The first statement is true… The second statement is the one that the Frontman Fallacy says is false. You agree that men rule the world. This, established, you give as a reason that women are not ruling the world because they are doing other things. Maybe I am changing the subject, but I think this is still an interesting question – why are… Read more »
Would you expand on varying types of leadership as well? Women do lead tribes, families, and have lead countries. Do women lead differently? Is it easier for a woman to rise through the power ranks in a highly militaristic society/culture that might value physical strength and domination more than collaboration?
If women are doing other things, is it possible that they find the style of power and leadership required in the US (lets say) exceptionally unappealing? These are questions I ponder late at night. Don’t have any good answers yet.
Dominic, in our discussion on representation, there are two assumptions you are making. (1) that if women don’t have 50% representation it must be caused by discrimination (2) that if women don’t have 50% representation it must be bad (in particular that it must cause discrimination against women). The 2nd assumption is called the Frontman Fallacy. “The Frontman Fallacy” is a term I invented myself. What happened was that someone on the Usenet newsgroup (i.e. discussion group) alt.mens-rights asked for help in devising a term. The term was to encapsulate the wrongheadedness of a common Feminist assumption. This was the… Read more »
I hit the “Post Comment” button too soon … Men, in general, aren’t to blame for women’s oppression. Yes, there are idiots everywhere, men and women. There are violent men and gold digging women, both of whom make our lives miserable. However, the feminist movement benefited greatly, not by getting rights for women, but by taking them away from men. It became a zero-sum game for them. So today we have women proudly saying on day-time television how awesome it was for some woman to cut off her husband’s penis because he wants a divorce. And the women proclaim on… Read more »
I’d like to add to your list, Transy. We need to put to pasture the idea that when men are hurt, especially by women, that they are less of a man if they speak out on it. That if they are raped or sexually assaulted, again especially by women, they deserve to share their story without telling them they’re “Lucky”, how “Men are the majority abusers”, that they’re still at the top of the power ladder regardless of their pain, or have their story scrutinized and twisted by non-believers into blaming them for the incident just like we abhor anyone… Read more »
The entire issue is that feminism blamed men for the supposed oppression of women. Reality is far from it. Men did not oppress women. Survival did. In the pre-industrial world, the human species’ primary objective was to survive. The female was able to produce children to help with that survival. Because she was closer to her children, having given them birth, than her husband, she was in a better position to raise them. This took 18-19 years of her life. She had to produce more than one child to ensure survival of the species. Add to that the absence of… Read more »
“the arbitrary lack of a women’s football team, the overwhelming lack of female performers at local gigs, the absence of female democratic representatives on our student union. ” Allow me to help you with this. 1. Creating a college level sports team is expensive. It can be a lot less expensive if the sport is popular and people support it. You not only need talent, investment, but also a fan base. Fans want to watch the best players play. Fewer women want to play football. Fewer people want to watch women play football. And yes, women are not as dynamic… Read more »
There are no MEN’s football teams or WOMEN’s football teams. Football is a co-ed sport. Women are free to try-out for any football team, and a number of women have made college team rosters.
Jean Valjean – Just to clarify, and address some Differences between USA and UK: 1) when Dominic uses the term “Football” it means Soccer! 2) The Operation of Sports in UK higher ED is nothing like the USA. You don’t get to a UK university on a sporting scholarship – they don’t exist. You do not have the College Sports Scene as in the USA – there is no equivalent of the ‘Big Ten Championship’ or other forms of warfare! P^) 3) You don’t need big money to have a female Football/Soccer team, just players, maybe coaching and the facilities… Read more »
Hat tip to Quiet Riot girl: Helen Lewis in New Statesman clarifies and narrows the bucket list.
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/helen-lewis-hasteley/2011/12/feminism-women-rights
‘The battles that remain involve telling people — often, but not exclusively, men — that I don’t like things they like, and I wish they didn’t like them either.”
Maybe she does not speak for all of feminism, but nonetheless, I do appreciate her honesty. The job will be done when men are much more like women. It’s refreshing to read such blatant stupidity catering to the comforts of the fairer sex.
Feminism does indeed need to justify its existence but I’ve never met a feminist who was willing to concede that.
Well, it’s kinda easy to understand Marie. You see, when anything remotely good or connected with “girl power” happens, then feminists pose as a single, unified group.
Of course, when something bad happens then suddenly they are not united, there are many fractions, etc.
What is “the feminist consensus?” Which feminists are you talking about: 2nd-wavers, standpoint epistemologists, lesbian feminists, women of color feminists, womanists, xicana feminists, riot grrrls, sex-positive feminists, anti-porn feminists, liberal feminists, marxist feminists, etc.?
I’ve noticed that a lot of GMP writers assume feminists are a homogenous group, that one of us speaks for all of us. I don’t know a group of feminists who has really come to a consensus about anything (ie. name a feminist issue and I can think of feminists who sit on any and all sides of the fence)…
Would you tell off anyone who says “feminism is about equality” the same way?
Seriously, this whole debacle has left me wondering if I really want to participate in gender anything these days… I like Tom Matlock and what he writes, he brings a great deal of insight and empathy to mens issues. Some of the things he’s written about are so far outside my experience that it requires some real thinking. Okay, so the part of his article where he explains that his friend totally caves to his wife is disturbing…I wonder just how toxic that relationship has become and whether his wife is abusing him. There were some unflattering words to a… Read more »
Yeah, Hugo was a joke, and I’m glad he’s gone. He can take the angry people with him who demand that they bludgeon us over the heads with their definitions of how we make ourselves better rather than us being able to define it for ourselves.
This article makes a case that in order to be good men we should all embrace the cognitive dissonance (Orwellian doublethink) required to believe in feminism’s patriarchy theory.
No thanks.
I agree with you-and I think the same thing applies with some of the attitudes some racist activists have against anyone who is white, including victims of other “isms” such as sexism and heterosexism. Next time you hear someone label all white people as “racists” (not that you do) remember how this feels and remember this can apply to many groups, and that there are many kinds of privilege-just b/c you are disadvantaged in one way doesn’t mean you (and me) don’t have privilege in other ways.
i’m really interested in all of this. men need be constructing their own responses to patriarchy and i’m starting to realize that this is what it is going to look like. i would argue there isn’t a man in patriarchy that hasn’t been either complicit in misogyny or actively participates; pro-feminist or not. there needs to be room for reflection, insight and redemption. i have a son so for me, it’s essential. i’m also intrigued by how people have conveniently shifted away from Matlack and his behaviour and focused on Schwyzer. Matlack was the culprit in this internet shit storm,… Read more »
“. i would argue there isn’t a man in patriarchy that hasn’t been either complicit in misogyny or actively participates; pro-feminist or not.”
What do you mean “a man IN patriarchy?” Is it a club in which one may gain membership? Or, do you mean that all men are IN patriarchy, which would mean that, according to you, we are all guilty of misogyny?
So all men are bad. What about women? Are they all good?
If Tom was the culprit then the feminists who went after him (including Hugo and Marcotte) would have stayed silent and simply not played along right?
Wonderful piece — insightful, measured, and perhaps the best examination of the feminism debate on GMP. As a contributor to GMP, I have been very upset not only by the needlessly vitriolic comments on the feminism pieces and Twitter exchanges, but also by the attacks on GMP itself. So I very much appreciate the civility of your comment.
oops — I mean civility of your article.
I go out of my way to have my views challenged. (How else will I know I’m really right but if for the fact that nobody is able to persuade me otherwise?) That is a creditable attitude to have if you really have it, but it is singularly rare in any feminist, and in fact completely unobserved by me. Your account comes off as a little disingenuous to me, because you don’t even mention any of the critics of feminism. In fact I get the impression that you are only talking about being challenged by other feminists. Surely if you… Read more »
when I say there was no-one talking about this stuff in public I was talking about what appeared to be the case to me at the time on campus, in campus media, among campus societies. Whilst it may be true that feminism dominates the gender conversation, it is certainly not true that the gender conversation in general is particular loud or well-attended. It certainly isn’t shrill enough. The frontman fallacy is a strawman argument and is generally accepted to be so. The low presence of women in positions of representation is an issue for many reasons, and representing other women… Read more »
The frontman fallacy is a strawman argument and is generally accepted to be so. Saying “it’s generally accepted that you are wrong” is not actually an argument at all. You do understand that, right? I am trying to figure out if you are being sincere or not. Who? Who do you find that disagrees with you? You made a claim and I am testing it. You just went through a debate over keeping York SU a gender discriminatory body where you backed the discrimination and others did not — but I don’t see any opposition on your web site. Where… Read more »
David you’re good at this. But you ignored the argument I put in – namely that if women are not being selected for positions of representation, if there are few “front-women”, then half of our candidates are being arbitrarily discriminated against. And this is bad (excuse me for repeating myself), because I assume it to be true that some women may make good leaders, may make effective representatives, may make brilliant front-people. It is a waste of talent, and a sign of arbitrary prejudice. It is a sign that we are not efficient in our selection processes. It is sign… Read more »
Thanks. I am good at “this” but I hadn’t really started. I was trying to figure out if you’d been exposed to any anti-feminist criticisms. Testing the waters. I didn’t mean to be rude. I was just rather surprised when you claimed to have engaged with critics. From your web site it looks like where you are at is the level of trying to argue that men can be feminists. That suggests to me that you are associating with some extremely sexist feminists. Worse than average anyway. But you are standing up for yourself, so I applaud that. I guess… Read more »
Excellent work Mr. Falco. I’m quite pleased to see the writers on this site coming over to an increasingly moderate point of view on gender relations and I love seeing that you all are becoming brave enough to critique feminism despite the condemnation that you’ve received and will no doubt continue to receive for it. Keep up the good work and the unique insight on gender and feminism and I’m sure that this will become an increasingly popular website.
I have to say, I’m really impressed.
“I do not think that the idea of the “angry feminist” is a myth.” Obviously. Who claims it’s a myth? I’m not an MRA, feminist, or any other group that focuses solely on the issues of a special interest group, as if other humans don’t matter, as if only men, women, or even minorities have problems in life, and “the others” have it made. No offense but how ridiculous. I personally find ways to help whomever seems to need it the most in a given instance. Women don’t only need it, nor do men, nor do kids, nor do minorities.… Read more »
Naaah. They had almost identical ideological stances. So it’s not depressing at all. It’s just another day on the internet. Or… if it says anything it says something about the fragility of feminism these days to any hint of criticism. Even accidental and unintended criticism by someone on the same side, someone who believes the same stuff and someone (Tom I mean) who just isn’t into arguing all that political ideological stuff to begin with.
Dominic I am intrigued by your post and comments. It articulates much, but I do fear that there is more at play than just Gender Politics. I do agree with how you succinctly summed up so much when you said: “Firstly, I do not think that the idea of the “angry feminist” is a myth. I think it is a necessary truth. Secondly, the man who is “hurt” by feminist anger needs to be taken more seriously. ” You make two basic observations that resonate with so much with what is happening socially, and even being amplified via the Cyber-Spheres.… Read more »
The European equality situation is not much different from the US supreme court in it’s approach to the 14th amendment’s guarantee of equal treatment. Equality of gender only works one way for these bodies. For women and against men. They will sometimes act when the discrimination against men is especially blatant but they will never act if the discrimination simply favours women. For example quotas for women are a clear example of sex discrimination which gets a big thumbs up and as you say there are a proliferation of women’s committees and women’s departments up and down government on both… Read more »
“The European equality situation is not much different from the US supreme court in it’s approach to the 14th amendment’s guarantee of equal treatment.” There is a certain level of difference in that US law is open to interpretation – and that long slog to the supreme court. ECHR Clause 14 states it very clearly; “The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or other status.”… Read more »