This is a comment by bobbt on the post “Magic Mike: Something Much Worse than the Objectification of Men“.
“Men would never get together to see such a movie [as Magic Mike] with the genders reversed because it would be labeled ‘sleazy’ by the gyno-centric press. Anytime women perform erotic stimulation for men it’s considered immoral so we just sneak into such places and hope we’re not recognised. When you reverse the gender however, it’s considered ‘good, clean fun.’ Just another example of the double standard we all live under.”
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“Our research contradicted this perception. Although mothers more frequently get primary physical custody of children following divorce, this practice does not reflect bias but rather the agreement of the parties and the fact that, in most families, mothers have been the primary [*748] caretakers of children. Fathers who actively seek custody obtain either primary or joint physical custody over 70% of the time.” Two questions. 1. This says it’s a reflection of agreement. How much of that “agreement” is actual agreement that that is the best arrangement and how much of that is “I better not fight too hard” or… Read more »
@ Sherwin Arnott Unlike Eric I don’t think there’s any real difference between equality of outcome or equality of opportunity. What you are calling the “Reverse-the-Gender” test is simply a statement that people should be treated equally in circumstances where they are similarly situated. Nothing to do with gender actually. That’s also the legal standard because this stuff has been through the courts many times. Now you talk about impact as if that is not a part of what we are saying but of course it is. That’s why a law to restrain people who have a deadly contagious disease… Read more »
Given the track record, the probability of this comment showing up is about 0.2
I find the word patriarchy offensive and even oppressive. It puts you on the defensive and in the position of responsibility before the discussion even starts. It also has the effect of clearing women from any chance of being held responsible for anything that happens. With such an imbalance there’s no way you can talk openly and hope for mutual empathy.
It’s also logically incoherent as it assumes that the ruling class would set up a system under which it has a higher mortality/illness rate.
Life expectancy is not a contra-indication of patriarchy. Even in Afghanistan, which I believe every one here would agree is patriarchal, women have a longer life expectancy (see for example the CIA fact book on death rates in Afghanistan).
You are conflating two different meanings of that word. The academic anthropological term which is defined in terms of fatherhood is the non-offensive meaning. Afghanistan might be a patriarchy in such a sense — I don’t know. You don’t mean that meaning (in fact you just told us that patriarchy has nothing to do with fatherhood). You mean the offensive meaning of the word that has anti-male associations. For some reason you insist on saying you have a “duty” to keep using that offensive word despite knowing that it makes you look sexist. Since that meaning of “patriarchy” is basically… Read more »
Sherwin, I would take your point seriously if social justice organizations didn’t try to use health disparities as evidence of power structures in other situations. There are widespread assertions throughout the social justice community that argue the lower life expectancies of African Americans are evidence of a power structure that works against them. See, for example, this campaign: http://unfaircampaign.org/health-disparities/ This is the hypocrisy of social justice: the evidence only “counts” when it helps your argument. It’s not actually about doing research to find the “truth” it’s about finding evidence that matches your preconceptions. Either life expectancy is an acceptable indicator… Read more »
Excellent point Mike.
It’s also interesting that the much greater likelihood of blacks over whites to be victims of violence or incarcerated are allowed to be metrics to show racial oppression, but not when men are much more likely to be victims of violence or incarcerated over women.
Most studies show that the male disadvantage in criminal sentencing is about equal to the black disadvantage in criminal sentencing. How does that gel with the theory of male privilege?
Hi Mike L, I’m not saying we shouldn’t care about health indicators. I actually do think we should care about health indicators. But I’m saying that a single health indicator can’t, by itself, demonstrate whether a culture is patriarchal or not. I agree that we can’t cherry pick evidence. That’s why I claimed, and still claim, that gendered death rates, by themselves, do not contradict or confirm that a particular culture is patriarchal. I think we should look at a wide range of indicators. And I think it’s super valuable to rely on good data by experts in their field,… Read more »
Sherwin, I’ve worked in the field of economics for years. I’ve spent those years watching great studies by great economists get dismissed by social justice adherents when they don’t go the way that the social justice adherents prefer. One great example is the Harlem Children’s Zone. The school system literally put into practice everything that economists had been saying for years: no teacher’s union was allowed and teachers could be fired at a moment’s notice, teacher compensation was merit-based, the focus on instruction was breaking the toxic culture children learned at home, parental behavior was modified (example: parents were required… Read more »
That’s funny. You are holding me to a standard of evidence that I am meeting. But you are not subscribing to the same standard of evidence.
Given your tragic life experience, and your choice of anecdotal examples, you’ll forgive me for being unconvinced by your point of view.
Sherwin, I’ve provided at least two concrete examples (life expectancy and the Harlem Children’s Zone), complete with references, citations, and a link.
You have provided nothing but snark. It’s pretty clear what’s going on here.
“Life expectancy is not a contra-indication of patriarchy. Even in Afghanistan, which I believe every one here would agree is patriarchal, women have a longer life expectancy”
That’s exactly his point. And yet “patriarchy hurts men too” is considered by many feminists to be a derailment technique, rather than an integral part of the discussion. Heck, even if it were an integral part of the discussion it’s often accompanied with the qualifier that such hurt is rendered irrelevant by male power.
In what sense is the term “Patriarchy” accurate? It’s a gynocentric term which focuses solely on the ways in which society has advantaged men in the past and disadvantages women while completely ignoring any disadvantages for men or advantages for women. Yes, the society of the past dealt with women in a paternalistic way, but it was far from oppressive. Even women’s suffrage is superior to men’s suffrage. Men’s right to vote was given based on conscription whereas Women’s Suffrage came at no cost (and at the very moment more women wanted it than didn’t). This makes me a conditional… Read more »
I just absolutely reject that anyone on this thread, who is actually espousing the use of the concept of patriarchy, myself included, thinks that patriarchy is absolute or total or the only social just issue. It’s a little frustrating, for me, to read these four recurring unsound arguments over and over again: failed argument number one (strawman) premise: patriarchy = x premise: x is not real conclusion: therefore patriarchy is not real failed argument number two premise: patriarchy is not the only issue premise: if patriarchy was real, it would be the only issue conclusion: therefore patriarchy is not real… Read more »
Sherwin, You start your statement that people are using strawmen arguments by attributing to you a definition of patriarchy you never stated, then arguing against that for the “win”. There is no conjecture necessary. You stated up thread: “I think it makes sense because of the direction that power and privilege flow in terms how folks are racialized. So men generally have a responsibility for the impacts that men have on women, because of the directionality of power.” You state that power flows from women to men. You seem to be specifically stating that if one were able to weight… Read more »
Okay I’ve been popping in and out of this conversation, and I’ve mostly been out for the last couple of days…but I’d like to add a quote about patriarchy and feminism by bell hooks from the article Sherwin linked to: It is no accident that feminists began to use the word “patriarchy” to replace the more commonly used “male chauvanism” and “sexism.” These courageous voices wanted men and women to become more aware of the way patriarchy affects us all. In popular culture the word itself was hardly used during the heyday of contemporary feminism. Antimale activists were no more… Read more »
How would you test if a society is patriarchal and what would be minimal requirements for the hypothesis “this society is patriarchal” to be considered falsified?
Good question! I do think it’s falsifiable, although I’m not sure I would know where to start laying out the criteria. It would be a huge project – I wonder if anyone has taken this up?
Sherwin,
it shouldn’t be a good question, but one with an easy answer. If you don’t know the criteria, then you don’t know what the sentence “This society is patriarchal” means.
If there are no known criteria the discussions about patriarchy become unproductive;
people are just stating the facts, that support their position and claim, that those facts, that support the other position, are not important.
Because of all this ignorance, I think one should abstain from vague terms like patriarchy.
It kind of reminds me when Thaddeus actually asked for a definition from Hugo Shwyzer when he used a term Hegemonic Masclulinity. Hugo never did answer the question. http://www.hugoschwyzer.net/2011/03/14/monday-link-love/ If you can’t prove that we’ve egalitated past patriarchy and male privilege, then how do you know you’re not falsely advocating warring against something that has been put to bed? (Sherwin and Heather) I would suppose the first answer to pop into most people’s minds would be: Because I can still see the evidence of it. And that’s where things get tricky. Because here we see that not only is patriarchy… Read more »
John D,
Why are you repeating statistics that I’ve already shown to be false? You need to defend your claims, or accept the links to the evidence that I provided.
Seriously frustrating.
You’re right Sherwin. Arguing against opinions is *very frustrating*. I feel your pain, as I feel that is what I have been doing this entire time. I must have missed your link. I’m assuming you are referring to the wage gap? If you were not referring to the wage gap, I’m guessing you will still find this information interesting. In the spirit of good faith, here is some of the evidence I have collected on wage gap studies. ht tp://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,2015274,00.ht ml women outearning men ht tp://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/6622521/Harriet-Harmans-costly-Equality-Bill-wont-do-anything-for-women.ht ml UK wage gap also caused by women’s choices ht tp://www.consad.com/content/reports/Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pd f The largest… Read more »
This comment is a follow-up to a much longer comment I made to you Sherwin displaying proof that the wage gap is mostly an anti-male bogeyman and not about anti-female discrimination. I didn’t want to reply to myself, because when I do that the comment gets disconnected and ends up at the bottom of the page. My point is this. If feminist theorists can take men and women’s life/balance choices and so horribly distort who is being oppressed, then why should I have any faith in your “evidence” which amounts to little more than your own subjectivism? In my above… Read more »
Agree and disagree. If you require me to lay out the criteria for falsification for any term I use, I would probably balk. I’m not sure that’s a fair standard for online conversation. I haven’t demanded that you provide criteria of falsification for “falsifiable”, for example. 🙂 I do think that falsifiability is important. And I do think it’s possible to do this for “patriarchy.” Just because I don’t want to do this, doesn’t mean it can’t be done, or that I don’t know what it means. I reject that. I do get that you think that “patriarchy” is vague,… Read more »
A lot of that list was just overlapping. I didn’t see anything on the list where women had less power and most things women had more. Women definitely do better on health (including longevity), education (including literacy but that’s basically the same) and money which together are the usual calculation for quality of life used by the UN. Women do way better on violence (there’s no point listing separate crimes separately, but as it happens they’re raped less than men too), and although I’ve never seen any data on “threats” I assume its in the same proportion to actual attacks.… Read more »
If you think that some of this is vague and unimportant then I understand why you don’t understand male privilege.
Like what? What’s the worst thing you think I called unimportant? Most of it was so vague I couldn’t really tell what you meant. What can you possibly come up with that even remotely compares with the major issues facing men today in the USA?
Man: my kids are being taken from me
Woman: well so what? I think women are being shown in an unfavorable light on TV. That’s far more important.
Get serious.
Sherwin, David didn’t express a sentiment that he found the things unimportant, he rebutted your points and showed how many of the things on your list actually hurts men in very real very measurable ways equal or more than women. Rather than just dismissing his rebuttal as expressing an opinion, I think things would progress a lot more if you were to debate his ideas, rather than dismissing his idea as a complaint or sentiment. If you really believe those societal issues affect women more, and believe evidence is on your side, then displaying it in a convincing way should… Read more »
If you don’t see anything on this list where women are systemically disadvantaged, that’s a problem. Here’s a link the US census bureau: http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/law_enforcement_courts_prisons/crimes_and_crime_rates.html
Some of the data you will find here will substantiate some of the claims that have been made about, for example, the number of men in jail in the US. I find this appalling, by the way.
But some of the data here will make it obvious that women are worse off in some obvious contexts, like for example, rape and intimate partner violence.
But those figures are not based on surveys they are crime stats. That means they don’t even try to measure the actual rates of the incidents but only those reported. They actual measure discrimination against men by proving that crimes are taken far more seriously when they happen to a woman. Your stats only show discrimination against men. Look at the survey data and you will see men are raped more often than women and are victims of DV at about the same rates. Despite this as you point out ironically, the huge amount of discrimination means male victims are… Read more »
Sherwin, In the 60’s women who were beaten by a loved one were too ashamed to come forward. Feminists fought for these women, by convincing those in government to execute anonymous phone surveys to get at the truth. And that truth was shocking. To me, it seems a step backwards for those who profess to know all about gender dynamics to want to go back to crime stats. http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/pdf/NISVS_Report2010-a.pdf This 2010 IPV survey from the CDC is very interesting. On page 42 and 43 the following “last 12 months” incidence for sexual violence are: (title, female, %, est number of… Read more »
You also skipped what MRAs would probably list as the three most important men’s issues which would be the fact that it’s so easy for a father to have have his kids taken from him, the fact that men have no reproductive rights and the fact that men are thrown in prison more than ten times more than women are because of the vast amount of prejudice against men in law courts.
I think it’s good to add more criteria to this list. I would probably disagree with you about the evidence regarding these issues, but at least we agree that these criteria could be added to the list.
If your thesis is that “society x privileges men and opresses women” those are probably the wrong criteria to back it up with. In the few countries that have even come close to examining all of those criteria equally for men and women, women have better luck in almost all of those areas.
This isn’t to say that there aren’t areas which women do worse in, or regions where it’s highly diadvantageous to be a woman, but it’s far from a simple case of men having it good and women having it bad.
The folks that do that Gender Equality Report every year could learn from this. That report that looks at various areas of development in different countries (several dozen) and how they measure up in terms of gender. The focus is on these areas to see if men or women are doing better in them. This report lists areas in which men are doing better than women and counts them as a minus against that country but then doesn’t count areas where women are doing better than men. How can you work towards gender equality when you’re actively ignoring one side… Read more »
Luckily that’s not my thesis.
“Male privilege” is pretty integral to the concept of patriarchy. Or was that not what you were defending?
Yes, I’m happy to talk about male privilege and patriarchy. I think they are meaningful terms that contribute to fruitful research.
But “society x privileges men and opresses women” is not a fair characterization of what I’ve been getting at, nor would it be my thesis if you asked me to state one. But you would know that if you had been reading the comments.
For the U.S.A, the UK, and Australia (most common stats I read). This list to me seems like some favour men, some favour women, neither really being above or below the other. Leadership positions favour men, health favours women. Wealth favours men although the flipside of that is homelessness also favours men from what I’ve seen. Men are more often the victims of violence, women are more often the victims of sexual n domestic violence however that gap is closing rapidly and in some studies it’s 50:50ish. Literacy rates I believe men fail on, college education men fail again so… Read more »
I’m a man. Please explain to me how “leadership positions” favour me. Please explain to me how my being forced to earn money while a woman spends it favours me too. And you’re wrong about sexual vioence. It isn’t increasing for men. The rate of it being reported or people being aware of it is getting better. That means that the issue of sexual violence has always favoured women over men. Always. But explain to me why sexual violence is worse than being murdered or being beat up please. I don’t believe there has been a study on paid vs… Read more »
Let’s also add to the list:
– parental gender preferences of infants
This thought provoking economics paper published in the Journal, Review of Economic Studies, found that fathers show a statistically significant preference for male infants: http://emlab.berkeley.edu/~moretti/sons.pdf
Since men have no say in abortion or any post-conception rights, I really don’t know what the point of that is. You have to be able to exercise a preference in order for it to affect others in some way. If there needs to be an addendum to Archy’s list, I would say it’s the lack of reproductive rights and parental rights for men. Many studies show loving fit fathers are the greatest indicator to child well being. A recent study even showed that father disapproval / support actually has more of an impact than mothers. And yet our country… Read more »
Well heck…John D somewhere here you made a comment about an incident with Hoff Summers and a discussion about gender and how it was originally stated that the men interrupted more, so they must have dominated…..but it turns out the women were talking like 70% of the time, so then you came to the conclusion that really the women dominated the discussion. (I can’t find that comment, but I’d like to reply to it). Here’s the thing…but assuming that because women were speaking 70% of the time that somehow disproves the concept that men were enacting male privilege by interrupting,… Read more »
John D, I get that you might disagree with me that men have a systemic advantage, or what I have called male privilege. That’s your opinion, although I think it’s an empirical question. You have overstated my case somewhat – which is understandable. What I have been referring to as a direction of the flow of power, or the power gradient, can be sometimes very subtle. Sure, sometimes it’s very obvious and conspicuous. But even a subtle effect over a lifetime, or over hundreds of millions of lives, can be super important, which is why I bring it up on… Read more »
Sherwin, You acknowledge male oppression, and that’s great. Considering that we are delving into an area in which we are both talking about our world view, things are necessarily going to be centered around our personal world views of gender and society. You seem to think that in aggregate men have greater privilege than women. I don’t. From what I see things are closer to a wash. Women have historically had their choices stolen and roles removed. I agree. I don’t know about you personally, but many people have never thought about the following addendums to that narrative. A) that… Read more »
John, I think you are making two separate points here, and I’d really like to separate them out for discussion because I find one to be much more convincing than the other. Your first point is a brilliant insight that just doesn’t get used enough: women have played a large role (possibly the dominant role) in shaping their own place in society. One of the great insights of behavioral economics is that power relationships are often not clear-cut. When someone hears “landlord-tenant” it is often assumed that the landlord has power and the tenant does not. Yet we see myriad… Read more »
Mike, First, thanks for your comment and the props on the 1st point. Your takeaway on the 2nd part of my post wasn’t even close. I’ve never stated that men were more oppressed (that’s the role of the other camp, those who want to state women are more oppressed than men). Honestly, I think it was about equal in terms of being damaging, but in hugely different ways. Men were socialized to self-sacrifce and to risk their lives, women were socialized to have fewer choices and be treated like children. I think both were equally oppressed in different ways. My… Read more »
I just wanted to chime in on the oppression bit here. There is no shortage of people that will list out all the ways in which men are harmed and then argue to the final breath that men cannot be oppressed as men. They will lay the oppression at the feet of everything ranging from race, to size, to class, to religion, to sexuality. But they will be cursed before saying it’s because they are men. Honestly, I think it was about equal in terms of being damaging, but in hugely different ways. Men were socialized to self-sacrifce and to… Read more »
John D,
There is no “other camp” here that denies that men are sometimes oppressed, or who claims that men are always the oppressor. Who is this bogeyman that you keep referring to?
Sherwin, it’s people who subscribe to sites like RadFemHub, a website you admitted visiting (and agreeing with!) up thread.
@Heather: I take your point about kyriarchy being relatively unknown. But that’s a strength, there’s an opportunity to define the word in such a way that it excludes notions of absolute culpability of any one group. I can’t see the word “patriarchy” being redeemed or cleaned up.
@Peter. Even “kyriarchy” is tainted by it’s association with feminism. It’s just not a very useful concept anyway. I mean if you want to know who runs a country it’s not rocket science. It’s the rich. It’s not “white men” and it’s not “the abled” or heterosexuals. It’s the rich. And the rich come in equal numbers of men and women, because rich men marry young and leave money to their widows. And rich people have equal numbers of sons and daughters. Kyriarchy even minus the taint of feminism would be a silly theory that stands opposed to class warfare.… Read more »
David, even if you’re right, rich folks are more likely to be able bodied, heterosexual, upper class, white men. That’s not rocket science either.
And where can I read about kyriarchy being opposed to class consciousness? It seems to me that workers will be better organizers if they have an understanding of different kinds of power and oppression.
Again this is negatively stereotyping minority groups and then using that stereotype to attack them. Let’s take the gender example which was the one you got wrong of course. Most of the rich are women, not men (not much difference but women are the majority of society as a whole and women tend to live longer and inherit their husbands wealth especially as wives tend to be younger, sometimes a lot younger). Btw whenever someone goes on about how many congressmen are male ask how many of the spouses of congressmen are female. Your logic here says that because most… Read more »
I could be wrong about this, but most of the rich are not women. Show me some evidence.
I think there was a source in The Myth of Male Power. You ought to read a copy. How about you show some evidence btw? Since it is your claim that men have the money.
And if a gay man went to see the movie, would that be “sleazy” because he’s male or would it be “good clean fun” because he’s looking at men?
One lame part of such gendered double standards is that they break down quickly when you expose them to sunlight. Or logic.
The problem with the ‘social’ definition (as I have heard some call it) of patriarchy is that they are essentially making up the definition as they go along and instead of creating a new word, they found a “nice old bad word’ and attached it to that and in essence attached the historical context to it as well. That is bad faith imho.
Wow, I’ve been reading through the comments and I’m really getting that “patriarchy” is inflammatory for folks. That’s interesting to me. I appreciate that lots of people have been trying in different ways to say why. And it’s definitely helping me to understand some of the range of public sentiment around the word. One concern I have is that some folks are underestimating it’s value in academic research – not just anthropology. For example, if you do a google scholar search for “patriarchy in America, economic theory” you get thousands of hits. Same, if you do a google scholar search… Read more »
The reason I do not give up the term is because of all the work you cited in which the term was used descriptively and usefully. RadFemHub types have hijacked it and use it (and other terms like privilege) as a way to attack people. That doesn’t indicate a problem with the term itself, but with the way some people are using it.
Um, I just went and checked out RadFemHub and I should disclose that, from the little I read and scanned, I think I’m kinda sympathetic to their messaging. That might put me at odds somewhat with what goes on here. But I like this Good Men Project and I’ve very much enjoyed this vigorous discussion. These are such hard issues to talk about and compared to other online venues the discussion here has been admirably earnest and heartfelt. So awesome to meet you all.
Alright well that’s something of a problem. First, and foremost, RadFemHub is transphobic…I mean really transphobic. They don’t even recognize that trans-women are actually women. That’s bad. For this discussion what’s relevant is that a lot of their opinions are pretty damn man-hating. They do use words like “privilege” and “patriarchy” as a source of attack and hatred against men. One of the women there has a site in which one of the graphics talks about how “consent culture” is actually part of the patriarchy. The routinely suggest that trans* individuals are part of the patriarchy. It’s not good. It’s… Read more »
Oh. You called it. I went back and read more and there are definitely some problematic claims being made. So interesting! I had no idea that particular strain of transphobia existed. Although they do seem to be making some advances around this issue. There is a video on their lead article where Julie Bindel speaks at length about trans issues and reflects on her mistakes, apologies and new thoughts about trans issues.
Sherwin: Carole Pateman is a feminist scholar who wrote extensively on the concept of patriarchy from a feminist point of view. One of her notable quotes on the subject is from her book: The Sexual Contract “The patriarchal construction of the difference between masculinity and femininity is the political difference between freedom and subjection.” The above is the standard feminist meaning of the word patriarchy. Under this meaning, the construction is erected by class men and its intent and impact is to subjugate women. Carole Pateman focuses in on the philosophy of Locke and Hobbes (British white philosophers) and their… Read more »
http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/ IMHO a really good explanation of privilege except the author left out the single most important factor when determining how ‘easy’ life is and within his analogy of World of Warcraft. How much money you have OR in the game of real life, what CLASS you belong to. Because IMHO a POOR straight white male is going to have a much harder time in real life than a rich anything. That is the biggest problem I have with the concept of so-called male privilege, if you throw race/class into the mix it pretty much wipes out everything else so… Read more »
Not to mention that privilege isn’t really a numeric value. For instance a rich-straight-white-male with cerebral palsy might have little difficulty obtaining food or shelter but significant difficulty socialising or interacting with society in other ways. The “difficulty setting” allegory is ridiculously simplistic.
AMD, and Peter Houlihan,
So we all agree that there are many intersecting dimensions of privilege and oppression, and that it can be very complicated and contextual. But can’t we hold variables constant in our comparisons? And if we do, won’t we find that men, by and large and in the long run, have a systemic advantage, albeit sometimes subtle, over women?
Sherwin:
I’m not convinced by your argument that men have edged women out. As has been shown you are so ill versed in the ways that men are harmed that I don’t know why I should trust your conclusions.
You seem to be operating on a belief system basis more than evidence.
For the record, I also think that “gyno-centric press” is wrong. 🙂 Where is this gyno-centric press? http://www.4thestate.net/female-voices-in-media-infographic/
I’m reading between the lines, but I’m guessing “gynocentric” in this instance was referring more to the media’s portrayal of men and women than whether the media consists of men and women.
Hey Peter. That’s a plausible reading. Do you think the media puts women in the centre in their portrayal of men and women? Do you think the media is “gynocentric?”
On social issues, a million times yes. War on women, the worry over women’s rights etc far far outweighs the worry over men.
I think though this was meaning the parts of media that were gyno-centric vs all press is gyno-centric?
So let me get this straight. You think that the mainstream media, which is mostly made by men, and is mostly men talking, writing and editorializing, is women-centered. Interesting. I don’t buy it.
Not all media, I said social issues such as domestic violence, hell any “rights” based media. There is plenty of male-centric media however the rights or issues of men are rarely discussed. I see at least 10-100x more said on women then men in media for anythign to do with major social issues. Hell take a look at afghanistan n how much is said about how terrible it is for women, yet the lack of discussion around the men who have to toe the line or face serious reprisal. Take a look at the discussion of rape n abuse, the… Read more »
Yep, in some areas (one of which is victimhood) female is very much the default.
Huh. Maybe I’m still misunderstanding you. Is the fact that victimhood is a “female” media issue a good thing for women, on your view? Like, when I hear you say that the media is women-centered, I think that you mean it’s too much about women and overlooks mens interests. That seems to be the implication in bobbt’s comment.
That’s part of what I’m saying. TOO MUCH of one and not enough of the other will create a bias in peoples minds and often it’s a bias of man = perpetrator, woman = victim. This is ultra extremely toxic to the fight against abuse because it allows a large portion, up to 1/2 of abuse to go without much notice. There is often a justification of ignoring the issues men face because “men have power” “women’s issues were overlooked for 1000’s of years”, etc, and quite frankly I am surprised even by major anti-violence campaigns that turn a non-gendered… Read more »
Sherwin: Actually that link you posted is a PERFECT example of gynocentric media. They are only discussing womens issues.
False. By that twisted reasoning, any analysis that demonstrates a male bias in media will be gynocentric on your view.
O.K., here’s my final word on this (hopefully it doesn’t get ‘moderated out’). Joanna describes this movie as “A 110 minute sausage fest” . It’s poorly written plot wise, the acting isn’t all that great, but it does have lots of ‘Beefcake’ (Which is the reason youall went to see it anyway). And to that I say, enjoy yourself, have a great tiime! But PLEASE, lose the double standard! If you want to ‘gaze’ at the pecs, abs, and yes , the ‘bannana hammocks’, go for it! Actually, I read that this movie cost something like 7 million to make.… Read more »
Are you kidding me? You’re saying that it’s OK to say that the word “patriarchy” is offensive but adding “so please don’t use that word” is somehow against the rules? Isn’t that inherent within the concept of what the word “offensive” means?
And why on earth is saying “please don’t use that word” a bad thing anyway? Can you point out what rule that breaks please? I really have no idea whatsoever how that is in breach of the rules.
Right let’s see if I can explain what I think she means. You can talk about why something offends you personally. You can talk about your own, personal perspective and why you think a word is a problem. However, asking someone to not say a specific word is imposing your opinion on someone else. Patriarchy is not commonly understood to be offensive…it is not a slur against an individual or a group of people.
Can you explain to me why you seem to want to use words which you’ve been told are offensive to the people you are talking to? I just don’t understand that. An appropriate response by you would be to say something like, “OK I didn’t know that some people find that word offensive. I haven’t heard that before. I’ll try to just use a different word or phrase to describe what I mean.” Which was almost word for word what Sherwin said. Instead it’s like you WANT to keep saying that word. Why? I honestly would like to know what… Read more »
Right let me try to explain with an analogy. I’m from the U.S. and I live in the U.K. People use the word “fag” as slang for cigarette. Do I freak out? Do I even care? No, because they are not using that word offensively or at all related to the way it can be used offensively. The word patriarchy was not created as and is not commonly used as a way to demean and/or oppress individuals or a group. Objectively speaking it is not an offensive word. If you (anyone) has had personal experiences with that word being used… Read more »
I disagree that the word “patriarchy” isn’t often used in a way which demonises men. I know you don’t, but I’ve seen others do it often enough. As to whether it’s “objectively offensive,” I’m not sure exactly how you define that, but I think it’s been mired in enough dirt to become unusable in the way you probably intend it. This is completely godwinning it but what the heck, it’s a useful (if extreme) comparison: The swastika wasn’t born as a symbol of hatred, the majority of it’s use (clockwise or counterclockwise) has been as a symbol of peace and… Read more »
Eh…and yet you say it’s more comparable to the swastika, and I say it’s more comparable to the British use of the word fag. I don’t think the hate-driven use of the word is widespread enough to make it comparable to the swastika. Right like…the Nazi’s might have been a minority, but the reason it’s changed the meaning so much is because their use of the symbol has permeated the majority of mainstream culture (precisely because their actions were so horrendous). That doesn’t apply to words like privilege and patriarchy. Also, for the record, I am not saying that anyone’s… Read more »
I did say it was an extreme comparison, and I was a bit hesitant to use it. :/ The point I was trying to make is that when you use the word “patriarchy” alot of your audiance are going to hear “men are the root of all evil,” which I’m guessing isn’t what you’re trying to get across. Maybe we need new words for this stuff?
The problem with something like kyrarchy, is that it’s not widespread enough for people to understand what is meant. And the thing about the word patriarchy is that it is accurate. I mean, any other word we come up with that becomes widespread to explain the social and political system we have is going to end up being used as an attack. Any word we come up with to explain how some groups in our society benefit and avoid disadvantage just by being in that group (privilege) is going to be used as an attack by some people. Ya know?
The problem with something like kyrarchy, is that it’s not widespread I don’t think we need either. There is no conspiracy of powerful rulers keeping one gender in place. Other than institutional discrimination like quota or conscription, there is no need to think of it as a class issue. Most if not all gender imbalances are down to circumstances, biology and just plain habit coupled with unawareness. Even institutional discrimination is usually a consequence of those habitual residues. The women and children first policy, for example, is not some feminist conspiracy trying to raise women’s value over men. It’s a… Read more »
So you are denying my experience and the experience of other men here. I’ve told you that you are being offensive and you respond by demanding that the word isn’t offensive. Insisting on continuing to offend me. This is part of what I mean when I ask if you believe men have the right to hold a different view of the world than yours. You are on a men’s board, about getting men to tell their experience of the world, and men are telling you about their experience, and this word is offensive and you are denying their experience. You… Read more »
Okay, let’s see if I can explain this. I am NOT denying your personal feelings or experience. I am saying that your personal experience doesn’t create a mainstream interpretation of words like privilege and patriarchy. I tried to explain with the analogy to the British use of “fag,” that the CONTEXT of a word is important.
You feel the word patriarchy is offensive…personally. That’s valid. I acknowledge that is valid. But that is a PERSONAL feeling that is not based on the common understanding of what the word patriarchy means.
I agree, at personal level, I dont see any problem in recon the negatives that word imposes you. But you should also be aware that not everybody shares the feelings as you, and for the most people its actually harmless. But I do agree with you on the political use by some feminist faction. Thats immoral!
I don’t think I agree with the fag / cigarette analogy or the swastika. They are both too far removed from comparable. In the first example Heather, you are walking into a foreign culture and (if you voiced resentment) would be imposing your view on a totally normal and harmless word. Crossing cultures makes you an island of decent against normal behavior. That’s not a far analogy to the P word. Many many feminists have tainted the word patriarchy and turned it into a (possible) smear against men. In the other example, the swastika has been too widely marked as… Read more »
Actually, I never said I wouldn’t use the term ‘patriarchy’. I actually think I have a duty to.
Sherwin: Carole Pateman is a feminist scholar who wrote extensively on the concept of patriarchy from a feminist point of view. One of her notable quotes on the subject is from her book: The Sexual Contract “The patriarchal construction of the difference between masculinity and femininity is the political difference between freedom and subjection.” The above is the standard feminist meaning of the word patriarchy. Under this meaning, the construction is erected by class men and its intent and impact is to subjugate women. Carole Pateman focuses in on the philosophy of Locke and Hobbes (British white philosophers) and their… Read more »
No, I haven’t read Carole Patemen, so I want to be cautious about how I respond. My first reaction is that at least that brief definition (I’m not willing to concede that it’s the standard feminist meaning) seems better than the dictionary definition that was posted earlier. Nor have I read very much of Locke and Hobbes.
“The patriarchal construction of the difference between masculinity and femininity is the political difference between freedom and subjection.” Good then Sherwin – we now agree on a working feminist definition of the word. What remains perplexing is that this system of oppression and subjugation seems to be managed by an incompetent class of oppressors – possibly ex- Enron management. When you objectively review the “impacts” (as you like to do) of the patriarchal system, you cannot help but honor the amazing benefits bestowed on society over the last several thousand years: patriarchal medicine, agriculture, science, technology, freedoms, human rights etc.… Read more »
Hah, Patriarchy is often used as a slur against men. The original definition is fine but that doesn’t mean it’s not used as a weapon, a slur, a silencer, etc. It’s also a trigger word or close to it, you can see that plain as day anytime it’s used on this site and the reaction to it.
“Right let’s see if I can explain what I think she means. You can talk about why something offends you personally. You can talk about your own, personal perspective and why you think a word is a problem. However, asking someone to not say a specific word is imposing your opinion on someone else. Patriarchy is not commonly understood to be offensive…it is not a slur against an individual or a group of people.” FAIL. The standard for offensiveness is not the intent of the speaker but the way the listener takes it. do you somehow think there is any… Read more »
Patriarchy does not denote fatherhood.
Nah, you’re right, it only denotes male leadership of a family with children…yep no father there. /sarcasm
That’s not what it denotes either.
I understand and I agree that one should not control language. However, using words like the patriarchy makes it very difficult to reach common ground and discuss anything. It gives women the moral high ground while implicitly accusing men. It’s like a universal trump card.
I’m not surprised many people are so comfortable hanging on to the word given how much leverage it gives them.
By all means go on using it, but you cannot reconcile that with the goal to find mutual empathy and open discussion.
In a comment above you say:
“It also has the effect of clearing women from any chance of being held responsible for anything that happens.”
But here you say:
“It gives women the moral high ground…”
If the first sentence is true, women aren’t treated as adults, not being seen as responsible for anything, but then the moral high ground in the second sentence is quite useless, as it is the moral high ground of a toddler.
my comment above was directed at Diesirae..
Whoops, I just noticed that there is some concern about the term ‘patriarchy’. I’m not sure what to say about this. I use it to describe the culture we live in. It’s a well established term in academic circles. I guess I’m interested to hear from folks why they might think it’s offensive?
Here are some links to resources on patriarchy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarchy and http://londonfeministnetwork.org.uk/home/patriarchy and bell hooks! http://imaginenoborders.org/pdf/zines/UnderstandingPatriarchy.pdf (PDF)
Well there’s two different words or meanings. If this was a discussion about anthropology I wouldn’t object. So the academic meaning I don’t mind. But 99% of the time (as here) it is used as part of a discussion on gender. The word is usually used as a prejudicial attack on men. It refers to a conspiracy theory that society is secretly run by men and that men are to blame for the evil in the world. The concept is used to justify sexism against men in a “men have it coming to them anyway so who cares if they… Read more »
Hey David, I’m appreciating this exchange. Thank you for listening too! I think you’re right to say that it’s good to avoid jargon. Sometimes I can get in the habit of using jargon to sound authoritative – which is so bad. The result is that I can sound like a pompous douchebag!
But. And this is a big but. I think it’s important to speak openly about the direction of privilege and power in our culture. And in the context of gender, this has a name… 🙂
If talking about that stuff is important then that is all the more reason to avoid words that will cause people to be offended and just switch off. Frankly I would love to have a proper discussion on some of the feminist buzzwords but it is hard because there’s so much anti-male sexist baggage associated with the buzz words and also because there’s often a lot of dogmatism along the lines of “accept everything I say or you hate women”.
It’s impossible to tell if there is any real substance underneath all that.
David, no one’s saying that you hate women if you don’t accept everything. That’s an unrealistic extrapolation. That may be how it FEELS to you, but that is NOT happening on GMP. So leave that argument for the places that people are actually doing that to you.
Kyriarchy tends to be a less volatile term I think. It’s the closest I’ve seen to what society is, I feel patriarchy places way too much emphasis on gender and not enough on class/wealth but I am no expert.
Archy, Thank you for introducing this term – I’m liking it. I didn’t know what kyriarchy is but the more I read the more I think it’s a cool concept. It appears that it doesn’t contradict or eliminate the term patriarchy. Instead, kyriarchy is an extension of patriarchy, or gender oppressions, with other forms of oppression. It is an elaboration within intersectional theory of the concept of patriarchy — it extends the analysis of oppression beyond gender (as in traditional feminism) to sexism, racism, economic injustice, and other forms of dominating hierarchy in which the subordination of one person or… Read more »
I think it’s good because it allows for more emphasis on class/wealth vs just straight up men have the power. I feel it allows for the seperation between being an average man, and being a wealthy man, the latter having a tonne more power than most men. It’s one thing I see that people dislike about patriarchy, is the male name of it + the lack of emphasis on how much wealth gives privilege. I feel patriarchy is too simple a description for a highly complex system.
You forgot to mention “internalized misogyny”, which is just like regular misogyny, except the “perp” is a woman. With the implication that only men are “really” misogynist, and a woman who expresses misogynist attitudes merely got them from a man or the patriarchy, and is therefore not responsible.
I wish I were making that up.
“Whoops, I just noticed that there is some concern about the term ‘patriarchy’. I’m not sure what to say about this. I use it to describe the culture we live in. It’s a well established term in academic circles. I guess I’m interested to hear from folks why they might think it’s offensive?
Here are some links to resources on patriarchy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarchy and http://londonfeministnetwork.org.uk/home/patriarchy and bell hooks! http://imaginenoborders.org/pdf/zines/UnderstandingPatriarchy.pdf (PDF)”
Thanks for the unbiased and credible links. I’ll be sure to check them out to learn more about the patriarchy.
Let me try that again.
Double Standard : 7 of which only one woman.
Not a Double Standard: 12 of which two men.
So I tried counting how many men and women are saying this is a double standard (favouring women) vs how many are saying this is just something men have had for a long time.
MenWomen
Double Standard61
Not210
With 12 commentators I couldn’t place for a total of 31 commentators (wow, a lot).
Look, I have no problem with ,as Joanna put it, “110 minute sausage fest”. Go see it, enjoy it, hey, bring you’re vibrators along if you want. Just do me a favor and can the ‘Outrage’ over women being objectified. I’m older than probably all of you so I remember ‘Feminist’ setting up picket lines to protest stores that sold Playboy or Penthouse. Claiming that it was pornography that objectified women. When asked about Playgirl magazine, they had no comment!
How cool is this! I’m about to be ‘Moderated out’ of my own article!
As has been explained, comments can get held for moderation automatically. Just please be patient as us moderators aren’t working 24/7.
Very cool!
What article is that , bobbt?
O.K. , so article isn’t the right word. What is it Blog, Bleep, Tweet, Twirp? Maybe someone more internet ‘savy’ can tell me.
I don’t know about this one. Aren’t movies where women are stripping/naked/performing for men just about every movie ever? Sure, perhaps the focus isn’t necessarily the female strippers perse (and at least this movie allows these men to be legitimate people) but it is taken for granted that men wouldn’t see a movie about women, plus there’s so much objectified women in movies already that it would probably be boring. Go to a movie store and take a look at the covers – always some naked woman (usually with her head out of frame) placed strategically as the ambiance to… Read more »
Exactly. Just about every rated R movie or television show I’ve seen always features a strip club with scantily clad women, but you never really see men in all of this–except maybe True Blood, but supernatural creatures tend to be more open about their sexuality in this television show anyway.
What movies might that be? I don’t get to the movies as much as I used to so maybe I missed the ones you’re talkind about. It just seens that every movie lately (especially the Rom-coms like ‘The Vow’) include a gratioustious ‘Sausage Shot’. The movie ‘Wild Things’, although it was provacative and somewhat disturbing ( since the sex was supposly with underage girls) it wasn’t at least graphicly shown. The ONLY graphic scean was Kevin Bacon’s gratiously shown ‘half boner’ in the shower scene( although I still can’t imagine another guy coming up to me in the shower to… Read more »
There are a several, Beverly Hills Cop, From Dusk Till Dawn comes to mind pretty quick. Wasn’t Porky’s a strip club? I can’t remember. A lot of it has to do with the idea that strip clubs are seedy so you’ll see a lot of them in cop type films. Castle actually had a male strip club scene in season 3, kind of a different twist. Maybe I know a bit more about these things than I should.
Bachelor Party had Nick “The Dick” because it was a foot long “and then some” when the bachelorettes went out not that it happens often in rated R films, but it does.
I dont know about that. I see lot of movies, but I admit I rarely see a naked woman in it, or at covers. So I cant say I agree with you. Maybe old 80’s or 70’s movies but right now, nude women they are kinda rare. Unless you are referring to porn movies.
The Blurpo,
Let’s set aside the gender comparison of “how much skin” is showing, for a moment. Do you think women are more regularly sexualized in movies, than men? If so, do you think the amount matters? Does frequency matter?
That depends on how you define sexualized. In 300, the actors had to go through a boot camp to give them the ripped look. You would think that if I went to war I’d want to cover as much as possible with armor. Was this sexualizing the male characters? Stripper is a job just like any other. Do movies that portray female strippers even in the background sexualize women? Women complain that female super heroines display more of themselves needlessly, but then acknowledge that women have a need in society to look good so the costumes could theoretically be seen… Read more »
Colette Wedding: “I don’t know about this one. Aren’t movies where women are stripping/naked/performing for men just about every movie ever?” “Go to a movie store and take a look at the covers – always some naked woman (usually with her head out of frame) placed strategically as the ambiance to the important people (the male characters, and maybe a female love interest)!” OK let us test these hypotheses. Let us go to the internet movie data base site and check their list of the top 250 movies. I propose to start at the top and proceed checking the movies… Read more »
I love this idea. I would love to see more data on media representations of women in movies or on movie posters or covers, etc. I’ve dabbled in this a little and part of the challenge is setting out clear criteria to start so that another observer would make the same calls. But it would be totally interesting research. This kind of movie review could totally form the basis for quantitative research. Testable hypotheses for the win!
@ Colette Wedding,
“men wouldn’t see a movie about women,”
Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, Ultra Violet, Underworld. I’m fairly certain guys saw Erin Brockovitch, A League of Their Own (which I saw), etc.
It depends on the movie.
“but it is taken for granted that men wouldn’t see a movie about women”
I’ve seen PLENTY of movies with women as the lead roles, with their clothes on too. The Help was good, a huge amount of drama movies I can’t remember the name of (I find it hard to remember names of most movies). Please don’t generalize about what men will and won’t watch, especially when discussing a topic of double standards…it’s a bit silly.
Colette writes: “Aren’t movies where women are stripping/naked/performing for men just about every movie ever?” I would hypothesize that fuel used to keep men oversexualized is actually beneficial to women and damaging to men. Men constantly needing approval from women, puts women in the place of power in terms of doling out what men need (or are lead to believe we need). Look at the post on genderratic “how a flaccid penis can save the world” for more information about how men are prodded to always simply be defined down to an ever-ready to be erect penis (and how it… Read more »
Interesting points. I think I agree with you. Definitely I agree that the portrayal of violent masculinity is too common. That kinda reminds me of Schroeder’s concern for the portrayal of masculinity in her review (even though it wasn’t particularly about men enacting violence).
In other words (in movies at least), it’s not a matter of necessarily reinforcing violent men, but rather all violence against men (by whoever) is funny. I remember on glenn sacks webpage there was an article which detailed a commercial. It was for the Nevada Water Authority and it wont TBS’s 2006 funniest commercial of the year. An old woman walks up to a house in which 5 or 6 sprinklers are watering the lawn (which is revealed to be a water conservation day). The man answers the door, and the old lady kicks him in the balls. Then the… Read more »
I just read the original article and the comments there, or at least most of them. I think this particular comment glosses over the importance of a double standard. We have different standards for male conduct because we live in a patriarchy in which the vast majority of violence, and sexualized violence, is perpetrated by men. So the Reverse-the-Gender test works for scrutinizing men’s behaviour, but can present a false positive when making judgements about women’s behaviour. That said, I haven’t actually even seen the movie…
Even taking that into account that still does not explain why they are held to different standards. It should be about people’s actions, not who they are. I think that one of the big problems people have today is that they put so much focus on the “who” that it’s like they think that somehow takes precedence over the “what”/”how”. bobbt’s comment points out how men’s behavior is being called bad not because of what they are actually doing but because of who they are. Sure the reverse gender test may work for scrutinizing the behavior of some men but… Read more »
Hey Danny, I think you’re making sense. I do think motives are important. But we also need to get past looking at individuals and look at the systems and patterns in place. And, I think there are lots of different kinds of equality. And I think that’s why we need to have different standards. I think when we live in a culture that is not gender equal, then we need to aspire to be wise. And fair. Most people agree that fairness, like balance, does not mean symmetry. By that I mean that sometimes an asymmetrical approach to a problem,… Read more »
I don’t understand how affirmative action relates here. Affirmative action tries to reverse a prior discrimination. What discrimination are you talking about that is being reversed? The banner quote is talking about the discrimination against men whereby under the equivalent circumstances as the Magic Mike movie is for women, men would be called sleazy. But that’s a prejudice that has always held isn’t it? Men’s sexuality (outside marriage) has always been called out in that way. Porn and prostitution have always been seen as immoral. Until recently the same has been true for women. Nowadays it’s OK for women but… Read more »
The affirmative action example relates, I think, because it demonstrates how the Reverse-the-Gender test, which Bobbt relies on to make the point, doesn’t apply in all contexts. So, for example, given the power gradients and the flow of violence in the culture we live in, there is a very different meaning for women to get together to watch a ‘sexy’ movie than for men. Bobbt’s comment glosses over these differences by applying the Reverse-the-Gender test, in a way that affirmative action does not. I don’t know. Does that make sense?
No it makes no sense at all. The Reverse-the-Gender test is a basic application of what it means to be fair and just and “equal”. To treat people the same regardless of the circumstances. To put yourself in other peoples shoes. You don’t throw that out lightly. And even affirmative action is quite controversial for that reason. But the reason unequal treatment is allowed with affirmative action is because of a tightly bound pre-existing issue which can only be addressed adequately with unequal treatment in the reverse direction. You can’t just say oh well equality is not big deal after… Read more »
False. You have definitely taken what I’ve said far beyond my interests. I claimed, and still claim, that having different judgements for different situations is important. Logic tells us that when we apply principles to importantly different contexts, we get different inferences. So we get different judgements, whether we are talking about men or women. That also includes, by the way, someone’s brilliant suggestion to include orientations, racializations, economic status, etc. These change the context in significant ways. It’s not sexism to pay attention to the importance of gender. Actually, I would argue that it’s sexism to not pay attention… Read more »
A meta question. Can you understand that from our point of view what you are saying just looks like straight up sexism? I am not trying to persuade you in this comment, OK? I am saying can you understand our side of this debate enough to get what it looks like from out perspective? I am not asking you to agree or anything. I am asking you to empathise / understand. (1) You’re saying men and women should be treated differently which is a prima facie case of sexism. (2) You can’t really explain to us why it shouldn’t be… Read more »
@David Ede Byron: Hey, thanks for putting it that way. Helps me understand. And to answer your question, I totally get that having different standards of judgment for behaviour of different genders, can look like sexism. In practice, in our cultures, it often is sexism.
So I’ll try to think of more examples to try to illustrate my position.
This last exchange between David and Sherwin reminds me of some feminists fighting for the right of women to go topless anywhere that men do. There are some feminists that fight for true equal legal rights for women to those of men, regardless of the greatly different cultural context. The simple fact is that breasts are considered sexual in the USA. To simply change the law without first changing the culture means that women going topless are doing something completely different to men going topless. I personally feel that you need to change the culture before you can change the… Read more »
Okay, some of you have been very clear that you think absolutely equal treatment is the ONLY way forward. Let’s call this kind of equality The Absolutely Equal Moving Forward Principle or TAEMFP. Here’s my hypothesis: I don’t think that you’re as interested in absolute equality as you think you are; I think most people have an instinct for a more dynamic fairness IF they can see the problem. Here’s a thought experiment that I’ve devised that might press on your intuitions: Imagine that you are a new human resources manager at a company, Blerg Widgets. You discover that a… Read more »
I hear that 80% of human resource managers are women btw. I find the scenario a bit problematic because… basically you’re saying that the company has been breaking the law. Do you really want to work for a company like that and one that (presumably) expects you to continue to break the law? Also do you want to work for a company that has some sort of freakishly bizarre attitude towards women? It’s an unrealistic scenario because it would never happen but if it did you might be best running out the door without notice. And why on earth would… Read more »
“I don’t think that you’re as interested in absolute equality as you think you are. “ No, the difference is that I don’t believe in discrimination, no matter how the victim is. I stand for equality, including in employment practices, in adherence to federal and state law. The scenario you laid out defeats your argument that equality is the wrong.. Employment law is something I know about. Here’s how this would work in your scenario. The HR Manager doesn’t usually make hiring decisions. Their job is to ensure that the company adheres to federal and state law and internal HR… Read more »
Sigh. Okay. Hey, you keep mentioning that managers are mostly women these days. Do you have any links to data on that?
About 70% of HR Managers are women. I already explained what their role is in hiring and ensuring compliance to state and federal workplace discrimination laws.
http://www.personneltoday.com/Articles/28/02/2011/57376/is-hr-really-a-womans-world.htm#.T_9ax5FQQk4
Um. Fail. You realize that the stat you just quoted is wrong, right? According to the link you sent, only 70% of CIPD members are women. That’s big time different than saying that 70% of HR Managers are women.
Wrong again. CIPD is an HR organization. It says: “HR has long been perceived as a female-orientated profession, and women do in fact account for the majority of its workforce. According to the CIPD, roughly 70% of its members are female.” Forbes.com:”Forbes cited HR Manager as a “best paying job for women” in 2011, with over 70 percent of the profession dominated by females.” A study done by the OPM said this: “Since 1969, the gender composition of HR occupations has changed dramatically. In 1969, women represented only 30 percent (5,181) of employees in these series. By 1989, female representation… Read more »
@Eric Gaby M: Did you know that the article you linked to is British? Why didn’t you quote the part that says this: “The report also found that women in HR face a projected 107-year wait until their take home pay is equal to that of male colleagues.” Here is the data: http://www.xperthr.co.uk/blogs/employment-intelligence/2011/04/the-uk-hr-profession-is-758-fe.html This data also shows that in Britain: – the best jobs in HR are held mostly by men – men make significantly more than women on average in HR But I am willing to concede that women make up a majority of the Human Resources workforce, even… Read more »
Sherwin,
I would love to hear you explain the rationale behind your advocacy of violating federal and state law employment discrmination laws.
You obviously believe that discriminating against men should be legal and encouraged. You are not alone. Other feminists who agree wiht you. It would just be good to hear a clear argument.
Eric M.,
No, I have not advocated for breaking any state or federal laws. I am willing to discuss the morality of certain laws. That is why I mentioned that both the Supreme Court of the US and the Supreme Court of Canada have defended various affirmative action practices.
No, I do not want to defend sexist discrimination of men. I do care what the criteria for sexism is. You and I disagree, among other things, about what constitutes sexist discrimination.
I worry that you’re not reading my comments in good faith.
Sherwin, “@Eric Gaby M: Did you know that the article you linked to is British? Why didn’t you quote the part that says this: “The report also found that women in HR face a projected 107-year wait until their take home pay is equal to that of male colleagues.” It was not relevant. You challenged whether the vast majority of people who enforce EEO laws (HR Managers) are women. I proved that they are, in England and the US. I only deal in facts. “Here is the data: http://www.xperthr.co.uk/blogs/employment-intelligence/2011/04/the-uk-hr-profession-is-758-fe.html “This data also shows that in Britain: – the best jobs… Read more »
Eric M.
Sigh. It’s the research you pointed to. If you’re willing to accept one of their conclusions and not the others (that men are advantaged even in a field where women make up a higher percentage of the workforce, that strikes me as a problem and we’ll probably not have much to talk about.
“f you’re willing to accept one of their conclusions and not the others (that men are advantaged even in a field where women make up a higher percentage of the workforce, that strikes me as a problem and we’ll probably not have much to talk about.” Where did they say that “men are advantaged?”, using the word “advantaged?” They didn’t, YOU did. What strikes me as a problem is your advocacy of discrimination against males. One of the things that seperates you and I is that I am against sexism and discrimination, period. Even if boys or men are the… Read more »
” So, for example, given the power gradients and the flow of violence in the culture we live in, there is a very different meaning for women to get together to watch a ‘sexy’ movie than for men.”
No, you personally have a different opinion (which is your right) but there is no different meaning. It’s simply sexist to claim that it’s
its wrong for men but right for women.
Just to clear, I’m not saying that “it’s wrong for men but right for women.”
I am saying that even if it is wrong for men, it doesn’t automatically follow that it is also wrong for women.
That might seem cagey to you, but it feels like an important distinction to me.
If and when-ever women are on the short of that “important distinction”, it ends up being called discrimination, and rightly so, because it is – no matter who the victim is, though. That’s where this logic fails.
This is the same logic that failed during the civil rights movement and when women were fighting to gain equal legal rights. Fortunately, many people realize that discrmination based on gender or race was wrong, that no one should be favored or penalized simply based on their race or gender. The principle of equality is not complicated.
To me individually and institutionally the only way forward is to threat people equally. At institutional level I agree on the idea behind affermative actions. But the way how their are implementet leaves me unsatisfied. Because they seem more to be kinda a political compromice rather than a effective measure.
I totally get that. It’s messy and difficult to act in ways that feel fair and wise to everyone. Actually Malcolm Gladwell has an interesting chapter in Blink about gendered hiring practices at symphony orchestras. They positions used to be very gendered because it was believed that women weren’t as good as playing some instruments. When the unions were able to implement blind auditions – literally hiding the people behind curtains – the hiring committees were absolutely astonished to discover that they were selecting women for some positions that were historically held by men. Unfortunately, just like in science, there… Read more »
I agree Blurpo. Aff action is a bandaid. If colleges (or employers) get less able candidates in minority races, or women, or men (which seems to be the case in college these days) then primary schools need to be reformed from the ground up to give a great education to everybody, and/or to engage everybody.
Of course, a large component of this is the childs home environment and that is another issue with another fix.
There is no distinction here. I don’t hire men over women because of gender, or vice-versa. Period. That is illegal, per federal and state EEO law.
Philosophy about gender has no place in determining who should get hired or what they should be paid. It should be based on the work they produce, both in quality and quantity.
Actually, I think that equality might be more complicated than you’re giving it credit for.
No, equality it’s a very simple concept. Ask MLK.
Trying to justify discrimination is so 1950s/early 1960s, and is what complicates things.
There are several varieties of equality, both philosophically and practically. Each will supply different inputs and judgements about gender fairness and what constitutes discrimination. For example, there is opportunity equality, outcome equality, process equality. People sometimes distinguish between equality and equity.
Here is, for example, a helpful description of the difference between equality and equity.
I meant to place my comment made July 16, 2012 at 7:16 pm here instead of above.
Oh I get what you’re saying. And I think this is one small problem I’ve had when talking to people about the systemic vs. the individual. It seems like when it’s all said and done the systemic is declared to be more important than the individual. In that example you give it comes off as saying that since certain conditions are not met we can ignore that man’s experiences and say that woman has no responsibility to be aware of any impact she may have on him while at the same time saying that regardless of that woman’s experiences we… Read more »
Hmm. I think I see what you’re getting at. But we may disagree more than I originally thought. I think we both think that the systemic and the individual are both important. So that’s all good. But perhaps you are more interested in intentions than I am.
I am much more interested in impacts than intentions. The road to heck is paved with good intentions, as they say. What really matters is impacts. I’m not saying intentions don’t count – they do. But impacts matter more.
No it’s not that I’m interested in intentions to a major extent. It’s that for all the talk of impact when it comes down to it people have no problem dismissing one impact totally in order to highlight another. Even to the point of dismissing one’s intentions and putting someone else’s in their play.
I so agree with you, Sherwin. Thanks for the fantastic distinction.
“If a man is walking down a sidewalk at night and a women, that he doesn’t know, is walking in front of him on the sidewalk, I believe the man has a responsibility to be aware that he might be impacting her. He could cross the street, or lag behind or go around and speed ahead. But walking directly behind her could be impactful because of the culture we live in and because of the deep patterns and social realities that we are surrounded by.” Here’s a can of worms for ya… Imagine adding “black” before every time the word… Read more »
Ha ha, yeah, that’s a good thought experiment. That is a can of worms! But I think it makes sense to bristle in that context. I think it makes sense because of the direction that power and privilege flow in terms how folks are racialized. So men generally have a responsibility for the impacts that men have on women, because of the directionality of power. I think. But the same sort of responsibility does not extend to the context you have suggested because the flow of power is not analogous. White folks, by and large and in the long run,… Read more »
When a woman crosses the street to avoid a man, the man is not thinking of the power hierarchy. He simply sees a woman afraid of him.
The thing is that in most of the examples of women clutching their purses or crossing the street are trying to avoid black MEN. The cliche is not about black people, its specifically about black men .
What I get from this is: being afraid of a black man = racist.
-being afraid of a man in general = just common sense.
But women are the ones with power over men in that situation. If you don’t take account of the situation then your argument is reduced to an unprovable faith in the fact that no matter what, men are always in the wrong, never mind the facts ever. The word for that is “prejudice”. The Supreme Court had a case maybe 40 years ago about a man trying to get into a college and he was refused because he was a man and it was a women only college (it was a nursing college). Many on the court made your argument… Read more »
David, simply because there are individuals who aren’t in power and some individual women are does not invalidate the existence of patriarchy as a system that creates systematic advantages. We all know that the most oppressed/disenfranchised groups of people in this country are black men and undocumented workers. So there are men who aren’t in power. But their existence doesn’t invalidate patriarchy, which generally looks white and benefits white men. Again, that is changing, no one is saying it’s going to always be that way. And just because patriarchy existed (and still does to some degree) does NOT mean that… Read more »
Patriarchy = father is head of household. OR are you just redefining the word to suit your purpose while attempting to keep the historical negative connotations of the word. That is disengenious (sp??) at best.
Joanna, you continue to gloss over the fact that white females, on average, enjoy greater protections and privilege than any other demographic. The only other that even comes close is white men.
I can substantiate this statement with facts, if you doubt this.
There you go again with that ‘Male Privilage” senerio. I’ve had my right knee replaced, my right arm is held togeather with titanium screws, my left rotator cuff isn’t torn, but in the words of my doctor, is ‘shredded’.I just had another 30 stiches sown onto my arm where i had some skin torn back. I figure this brings the total to somewhere between 500-600 stiches in my lifetime (I had over 300 in one incident). Oh, also, I went to a wake last November for a co- worker killed on the job. By my rough count, that makes 6… Read more »
Got it. So shitty. I just heard that a guy died dumping gravel yesterday close by. I think what you’ve said is a good reality check for those of us sitting behind desks.
I would understand if you ignore this, but I don’t think that talking about male privilege discounts your experience, or any other guy’s experience, of having a definite lack of privilege. I would also understand if you ignore this, but I’m interested to know what kind of work that you do.
I work in Heavy construction. You know, the ignorant people who build the buildings, roads and bridges that the smuglysmart people and the poor oppressed (like joanna) drive across each day in your 50K suv’s on your way to a brutally hard day at your computer keyboard.
Cmon bobbt, what’s with the attack on Joanna and the assumption she drives a 50k suv? For all we know she could have faced far tougher situations with finances than you and has a 100dollar “beater” car. I understand your anger but don’t drag people here into it. I think you’re also underestimating the level of stress office workers can get and the energy they use…
Archy: Bobbt’s comment might have been over the top, but in my opinion Joanna’s use of the sentiment of male privilege is an attack upon men. The ideas of patriarchy and male privilege are simply narratives. They are not proven. Futhermore, they are used to bludgeon men and women into believing that sexism against men is okay (would the unconstitutionally discriminatory VAWA have been passed if the idea of male privilege wasn’t so prevalent, or the anti-male text in the Affordable Care Act?) The idea of male privilege is total horse crap. Even when men make more than their wives,… Read more »
Except you are making a huge assumption that IMHO is wrong, men are NOT (in canada) by and large higher up in the power structure. Most men (although a few do) have virtually no power in canada same as most women don’t either. We don’t live in a patriarchy in canada, fathers are not the head of household anymore. Women do the vast majority of the spending, they get custody the vast majority of time in divorce. WOMEN control the family unit. Patriarchy = father is head of household.
“Women do the vast majority of the spending, they get custody the vast majority of time in divorce. WOMEN control the family unit”
Are you implying that Canada is a matriarchy?
Sherwin writes: “And men, by and large and in the long run, are higher up the power hierarchy than women in our cultures.” Sherwin. I feel like there is something you’re not getting. Women may not historically had an equal role in creating the culture or law, but they have had an impact. Even when women didn’t have the vote, they still had a very large impact on the men around them. Look at the white feather campaign during WWI. England needed more recruitment, and a general thought up the white feather campaign. This consisted of women handing men in… Read more »
Hi John,
Read my lips. No one here is saying that “men have all the power”. No one. Certainly not me. So just put the exaggerations away and let’s keep working through your examples and numbers. I’ll look into the numbers you’ve presented and try to respond. Is that reasonable?
Okay the first stat you present, without citation, is on-the-job deaths. You claim 95% of on-the-job deaths are men. Here’s some data that says otherwise: http://www.statehealthfacts.org/comparebar.jsp?cat=2&ind=59.
According to this data, 58% of on the job deaths in the US are men. So that’s a majority, but not a huge majority. That’s 900 men per 100,000 and 643 women per 100,000. Where is your data claiming 95% of on the job deaths are men?
That page doesn’t mention on the job deaths.
“Causes of death include all ICD-10 codes.” Sure you linked the right stats? Looks like the deathrate for all people, not just on the job. I’ll link Australia’s, ht tp://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/[email protected]/Lookup/4102.0Main+Features20Jun+2011 “Of the 111 people who died in workplace incidents in 2009-10, the vast majority (95%) were men.” As for suicide rates, how’s this? ht tp://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suicide_rates/en/ (per 100,000) AUSTRALIA Year:06 Male:12.8 Female:3.6 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA Year:05 Male:17.7 Female:4.5 Deaths by violence: Men: 17.9Million Women:3.8Million War and Civil Conflict Deaths: Men: 6.3Million Women:1Million Self Inflicted Injuries: Men:11.7Million Women:7.9Million (Worldwide the gender gap closes a bit however in the US and Aus… Read more »
Hey Archy, I think you’re right – I did link to the wrong job stats. According to http://www.cdc.gov/ the work related deaths are mostly men. But you’re also right that the work related deaths is relatively small: only 4.8 men per 100,000 in the US. So that’s even less than suicides – like half as many. Huh, it’s interesting that male suicides appear to be mostly by gun. And even though female suicide attempts outnumber men’s, the tool of choice is poison which is far more likely to fail. Wow, 31,000 people died from firearms in the U.S. in 1998.… Read more »
I didn’t see him discuss rape, etc. Here are some for a personal safety survey in Australia. I am unsure though if they count females forcing men to penetrate in this study though, it’s one area that I don’t think is really thought of sadly. In fact the CDC stats are the first time I heard of them being counted. ht tp://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/Lookup/by+Subject/4125.0~Jul+2011~Main+Features~Victims+of+violence,+harassment+and+stalking~5110 http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/NISVS/index.html has the latest data for the U.S on sexual abuse/violence, and domestic abuse that I’ve seen. Remember with this one that forced to penetrate isn’t classed as rape, and the majority of male sexual abuse is via… Read more »
No one on this thread has said that 99% of men are rapists.
If you’re claiming that the gender ratio of abusers is getting close to parity in intimate partner violence, without any citation by a credible source, you are making a claim that contradicts contemporary, evidence based, best practices, without being willing to demonstrate it.
I think we should just agree to disagree. Peace.
Sherwin writes: “I think you’re right – I did link to the wrong job stats. According to http://www.cdc.gov/ the work related deaths are mostly men. But you’re also right that the work related deaths is relatively small: only 4.8 men per 100,000 in the US. So that’s even less than suicides – like half as many.” Do you think if roughly 4800 women were dying per year and only about 200 men that feminists would feel that this should be a discussion about gender? Or do you think they would talk about how insignificant this is, because the death total… Read more »
Considering most people view rape as forced sexual intercourse, then forced to penetrate logically is rape. By this logic considering 1.1% of men and 1.1% of women were raped or forced to penetrate, and 79.2% of the abusers for those men were women then 40% of so of rapists in a 1 year time period were female. 40% female and 60% male perpetration is a huge closing in the gender ratio gap compared to the often spouted statistic of 99% of rapists are men you here on many sites. That is what I was referring to. Tables 2.1, 2.2 in… Read more »
Okay Archy, One last reply from me and then that’s it. I won’t be replying to the other guys. You can find me at my blog if you want. You can also post back to me here and I will be happy to read them. The difference between a peer-reviewed and published meta-analysis and an annotated bibliography is really important. The summary you quote is itself evidence that the author is misrepresenting the issues, since if you actually look at the individual studies, they are about a really wide range of issues. So the claimed sample size of 371,600 is… Read more »
Thank-you for the comments. I appreciate the knowledge gained, it’s good to know that the 371k study has it’s issues. I respect your opinion, hence why I asked so many questions:P and I read the other guys as well. I find statistics vary so much so I try not to have 100% faith in them, hell next year there could be a totally different study which finds a very different conclusion to a study I read the previous year. I’m just glad that people are reading them and there is a growing effort to ensure men aren’t slipping behind in… Read more »
Sherwin: I may have come on a little strong, but when people *seem* to be basing their worldview on assumptions and narratives *and then* advocating change based on those improper assumptions–well heck I’m not going to shut up. I may have been a little bull-headed when I stated that you willfully ignored evidence of male oppression. But, you *do* seem ignorant of it whether willfull or accidental. You have some very interesting detailed studies (and I would say borderline esoteric–you never bothered to prove monopolizing a conversation = power. Is a man on a date trying to qualify himself talking… Read more »
The second statistic you present, without citation, is suicides. I have found some data that corroborates your claim that 80% of suicides in the US, 2005, were men, here: http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suicide/country_reports/en/index.html
This data is based on 11 total suicides per 100,000 in the US in 2005. So this data is less significant than the on the job deaths.
I don’t think you understand what the word “significance” means here. These are deaths. They count them all. It’s not a random sample polling.
I was wrong about suicides being less than job deaths. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 5000 men in the US died on the job in 1998, or about 4.8 men per 100,000. More men died from firearms: 26,000.
Here’s a paper that was published in 1990 in the New England Law Review. It’s explicitly about gender bias in the legal system, and it’s the work of a committee that was commission and sanctioned by the Massachusetts Supreme Court: http://www.amptoons.com/blog/files/Massachusetts_Gender_Bias_Study.htm They concluded that in child custody cases there is in fact a gender bias. But the bias favours men. We began our investigation of child custody aware of a common perception that there is a bias in favor of women in these decisions. Our research contradicted this perception. Although mothers more frequently get primary physical custody of children following… Read more »
“It looks like the claim that John D keeps making about gender bias favouring men in custody cases following divorce, is false.” Your paper only applies to Massachusetts unless I am blind, what about the rest of the country? Where are the rest of the studies? Are the people that comment here n at other places about being lawyers and seeing the bias themselves just trolls or is there a real issue? The SHEER volume of fathers rights groups, comments about people losing custody and the courts bias to me suggest there are some major issues to be dealt with.… Read more »
Really? Your comparing peer reviewed research that includes a national survey, to a Herald Sun article? Really?
You’re implying gender bias doesn’t happen. I posted an article saying it does happen. Of course you could always play the high road and ignore my question by stating you linked a peer reviewed study, but how about answering this question. Why are there so many voices talking about a gender bias? Why can I easily find cases where a man loses custody through fraud and the wife gets zero punishment? If you want to close off that’s fine by me, but I wanted to know specifically why this happens. It’s on topic as the topic is gender bias in… Read more »
And why are you changing the topic? The issue, that you and John D brought up, was custody rates? The link you provided is about a much specific and complicated issue? So your response to my having done the work to actually find peer reviewed data, is to provide a link to a single case that’s reported in a newspaper tabloid.
I think I’m done with this “conversation.”
Sherwin, I couldn’t find one instance of that article stating 51% of fathers get primary physical custody in the link you provided, despite spending about an hour looking. Should I declare your stat false too? Why would you be “finished”? So far, you’ve found 2 of 3 stats that report of male harm are correct, and only found that 1 stat *may* be dubious. If you like very large surveys, then maybe you will like this one: This 4 state 46,000 divorce study shows that women initiate divorce 70% of the time and do so largely because they know they… Read more »
Sherwin, I’ve been banned from amptoons simply for talking about male disposability. I’m not sure I would trust any references you lifted from his sight. This from the census: http://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p60-237.pdf On page 2 on the bottom left: “Demographic Characteristics Mothers accounted for the majority of custodial parents (82.6 percent) while 17.4 percent were fathers, proportions statistically unchanged from 1994.” I have another link I’m trying to find that I posted in previous comments on tgmp, but can’t currently find which has an 8 state break-down of which gender wins primary custody. While it varies from state to state, it typically… Read more »
Sherwin, The report you cited states that: “Our research contradicted this perception. Although mothers more frequently get primary physical custody of children following divorce, this practice does not reflect bias but rather the agreement of the parties and the fact that, in most families, mothers have been the primary [*748] caretakers of children. Fathers who actively seek custody obtain either primary or joint physical custody over 70% of the time.” It however goes on to say: “Reports indicate, however, that in some cases *PERCEPTIONS OF GENDER BIAS* may *DISCOURAGE* fathers from seeking custody and stereotypes about fathers may sometimes affect… Read more »
Hey Sherwin, Since you asked for it, I went out and searched for a noteworthy source. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/mvsr/supp/mv43_09s.pdf This is from the NCHS National Center of Health Statistics. A subdivision of the CDC. This report is on divorce. If you scroll to page 24 Table 17, you will see that the total for 1989 for all 19 states reporting is 319,695 divorces. Of these custody was decided for some 128,507 children. For the 19 states in 1989 it broke down like this: Husband 11,186 Wife 92,330 Joint 20,183 Other 1704 Combination 3104 (I presume this means some combination of multiple custody… Read more »
@ Sherwin “and the fact that, in most families, mothers have been the primary [*748] caretakers of children.” That’s not gender bias in custody cases, but men working longer hours isn’t a valid reason for them to be paid more? “Fathers who actively seek custody obtain either primary or joint physical custody over 70% of the time.” So in some of these cases women get joint physical custody also, but this is supposed to favor fathers? “Reports indicate, however, that in some cases perceptions of gender bias may discourage fathers from seeking custody and stereotypes about fathers may sometimes affect… Read more »
@ Sherwin I got off the bus and started walking home one night. I could see 4 guys loitering on the sidewalk in front of one of the trouble buildings in the neighborhood. My first thought was to cross to the other side of the street. Then I thought, why should I? A weird calmness came over me and I started walking towards them. As I got closer I could see 4 more guys on the front porch of the building. My eyes hit each one noting where they were and making calculations. How long do I have to take… Read more »
It’s admirable that you faced your fears and found it empowering, but you also apparently had a realistic expectation of being able to defend yourself if the situation warranted it. I doubt you would feel the same sense of empowerment if you were 5’1, weighed 120 lbs and were 4 months pregnant. “Facing your fears” sounds good in print, but just as you were approaching the situation while making calculations of how you would dispatch the other men (should things turn violent) as a contingency, many women use crossing the street as their contingency plan- because of basic size/strength differentials,… Read more »
Yeah, I bet John doesn’t have to worry about getting groped walking down a crowded stairway in a dress…
The way a large karate-trained man experiences the world is going to be different from how a 5’1″ 113lb. female will experience it….those 4 guys would have said something much different to me!
“Yeah, I bet John doesn’t have to worry about getting groped walking down a crowded stairway in a dress…” I’ve never worn a dress (nobody can prove otherwise 🙂 ), but I have been groped by women when I was younger mostly in the upper body, but once in the groin. One time I was practicing in a park and taekwondo is very areal. I’m usually grounded when fighting so didn’t do it much in the dojang or any fights I got into. Sometimes you just want to fly. I didn’t realize that 3 girls were watching me. When I… Read more »
@ Leia
Nope he just has to worry about the possibility of being attacked, weather it’s for the items he’s carrying, a certain “look” he gave his attacker or just because the attacker/s wanted to.
It’s pretty fucked up to assume he won’t get groped because he is a man, when he has said before he’s been groped by women. A lil bit of sensitivity wouldn’t go astray Leia, I know you may want to believe are far more vulnerable in public but the reality is men are FAR more likely to be attacked randomly in public. And yes we do get groped, I’ve had female friends grope/sexually assault me, I’ve had men do it in a class room even. I’ve been punched at a club, had verbal abuse against me quite a bit, etc.… Read more »
Leia writes: “Yeah, I bet John doesn’t have to worry about getting groped walking down a crowded stairway in a dress…” Way to not get a point. If I remember correctly, John A is an athlete who was juicing. The simple fact is the overwhelming majority of men do not making being the top dog physically a priority in their life, but the overwhelming majority of men (from what I have seen) have faced instances of having to be “on guard” against being beaten or attacked. Men are the targets of 80% of stranger violence. Even thugs seem to know… Read more »
My instructor always said that if you go into a fight thinking you’ll lose, you’ve already lost. Once I started walking down the sidewalk, losing never entered into my mind. It doesn’t mean that I would have won. That just means it was no longer a consideration. Every person from the dojang is the same way. Sometimes people see it as arrogance. It’s not it’s just acceptance. Here’s the situation what should you do to overcome. I understand what you mean. I’m only 5′ 7″ and couldn’t gain weight for much of my life (ladies, please don’t hate me) until… Read more »
Actually, true story, I’m at a party with a group of people that I haven’t seen in a while. They’re all remarking about the weight I’ve lost (About 50#) and the muscle I’ve ‘swapped’ (About 15-20#) when a woman I know(not really that well) comes up and starts rubbing my chest saying how she likes it. I tell her her chest is quite nice and would she be all right with me rubbing it? After she steps back and says “excause me!”, I tell her “Hey! At least I asked permission first!”
I believe you. It’s happened to me and I’ve seen it happen to other guys. It doesn’t happen to me much now because I’ve been out of kick boxing for about 25 years. I’ve stopped weight lifting for at least 15 years and I’ve added about 20 pounds of fat. Women feel entitled to a feel. I’ve had one woman poke me in the stomach and another pat me there (on two separate occasions) expecting to get that jelly bounce, but instead encountered something harder under the fat. I’m surprised I still have some of that impact resistance I developed… Read more »
I’ve had men n women grope my “manboobs”, the police actually said that’s sexual assault. No one bats n eyelid at it, I was very tempted to grab the women back n see if they liked it but…you know, a man doing that would no doubt cop a lot of shit over it. The fact it was so humiltiating meant I was fucked either way, if I complained about it I’d get shit for it, if I pressed charges, I’d get shit for it, if I grabbed her back, I’d be a molesting bastard n hate myself, and get shit… Read more »
@ Sherwin “Hey Danny, I think you’re making sense. I do think motives are important. But we also need to get past looking at individuals and look at the systems and patterns in place. And, I think there are lots of different kinds of equality. And I think that’s why we need to have different standards. I think when we live in a culture that is not gender equal, then we need to aspire to be wise. And fair. Most people agree that fairness, like balance, does not mean symmetry. By that I mean that sometimes an asymmetrical approach to… Read more »
Ah, ye olde “patriarchy”, that facilitator of all things misandrist. Judge us, castigate us, silence us, we are all just patriarchs after all.
We live in a patriarchy. Do you disagree? That doesn’t mean we are each, individually, patriarchal – we can distinguish between the system and the individuals in the system.
Since patriarchy = father is head of household, then NO we don’t live in a patriarchy
Hi Sherwin, Congratulations, you appear to be popular here on the GMP. So you’ll have to define what you mean by patriarchy. HeatherN below prefers a narrow understanding of patriarchy as a culture that favors selecting men for positions of power where power requires masculinity but masculinity does not beget power. Conversely, Janet Dell below prefers the strictly literal definition of patriarchy as “father = head of household” reducing the concept to impotent semantics. I’d wager that others might prefer a far reaching understanding of patriarchy as a culture that subjugates its women to extract privileges for its men, yielding… Read more »
Keep in mind, that “positions of power” include “head of household,” in my definition. The concept of men as actors and women as individuals to be acted upon, for example, is also part of patriarchy. The social narrative that the nuclear family is the best and that marriage is ideal to ensure paternity, is also part of patriarchy. However, they aren’t required for a patriarchy….they’re just part of the patriarchal systems in western culture.
yes thats also how I learn about patriarchy. The holyness of the marriage and the patriarchal structure of the family. I am catholic, at least from cultural background, and we have the holy father ‘the pope’ not a holy mother 😉 . The word patriarchy its older than feminism, the application even older than the definition itself. So even if they have hijacked it for me at least, I cant see it as offensive.
Someone already pointed out most managers are women nowadays, so in your “patriarchy” most of the rulers are female. Now it’s time to point out that most families are headed by women, not men, in your “patriarchy”. Do you have a third examples of “positions of power”? Perhaps being homeless is a position of power? Or maybe being in jail is a position of power? Or maybe dying years earlier shows how powerful people are? Or committing suicide? Or dying in a workplace accident? Or perhaps the fact that women account for over 80% of consumer spending really shows how… Read more »
Managers are not quite in charge. Most CEOs are men; most politicians are men. Most people who have gained a lot of wealth are men. Whether most families are headed by women or men is culturally specific…and I do not know the current stats for how many people live in traditional homes versus more equity-based homes, versus women-headed households. I do know our cultural narrative is that it is “natural” and “normal” for men to be the head of the household. Your second paragraph is indicative of the following misunderstanding: I’m saying most people in power are men. Most men… Read more »
Following a divorce, it’s considered “natural” and “normal” for the woman to get full custody in over 90% of cases (in Canada full custody is 90% for women vs 4% for men, and men have to prove the mother is unfit to even stand a chance at gaining custody – mothers only need to show up, regardless of pre-divorce arrangement, or how good the father is at parenting).
She gets to be head of household then, doesn’t she?
You know what, I absolutely love going to strip clubs with my buddies and objectifying women to the max. And I am not ashamed of it.
Thank You Magic Mike.
Sure, but your understanding of patriarchy can exist without the assumption of monotonic or universal male privilege. For example, a culture that expects men to act and assumes women to be acted upon will both selectively oblige men to sacrifice life, liberty and treasure on behalf of the culture and reserve selective judgement for the actions or inaction of men as the case maybe (as David deftly pointed out). I don’t actually oppose your assertions, but I don’t recognize this as patriarchy, I recognize it as a mutual exploitative system of control called the gender binary. Rather in my mind,… Read more »
Great point stranger.
You make excellent points, but you miss the point entirely. Your theory fails to blame men for all the problems of society so it must be invalid.
lol. I literally laughed out loud when I read that. Thanks for the laugh.
Hey Random_stranger, I feel kinda obligated to keep posting and writing back, in part because I haven’t even seen the movie – which feels a little like cheating. I won’t post a one sentence definition of patriarchy. But I like this description: Patriarchy is the term used to describe the society in which we live today, characterised by current and historic unequal power relations between women and men whereby women are systematically disadvantaged and oppressed. This takes place across almost every sphere of life but is particularly noticeable in women’s under-representation in key state institutions, in decision-making positions and in… Read more »
“We live in a patriarchy. Do you disagree?”
Yes, there is – in places such as Afghanistan, under Taiblan rule.
But, there is no patriarchy in the United States of America. If there were, my boss, her boss, and her boss would not all be women.
That is a misunderstanding of the word “patriarchy.” The term does not mean that all people in power are men. On the very basic level it means that the majority of people in power are men. It means that the system is set up in such a way as to normalize the idea that the people in power will probably be men.
“That is a misunderstanding of the word “patriarchy.” The term does not mean that all people in power are men.” That is how it’s being used here, and that’s generally the implication. The entire concept is consistent with Taliban rule but certainly not the reality of everyday life in the United States of America or any other western country. How is the system “set up in such a way as to normalize the idea that the people in power will probably be men?” Who “set up” the system? Does my 3rd level woman manager who is a millionaire by now… Read more »
Everyone set up the system…people…social systems are created and perpetuated by everyone (until people attempt to change them). And your one experience of of having many women bosses doesn’t negate the way the system is set up. The majority of federal and state-level politicians are men; the majority of Fortune 500 CEOs are men; the “nuclear family” is still very much the norm.
The entire concept of patriarchy is consistent U.S. and most European countries systems. It’s also consistent with more oppressive systems. It is not one-size-fits-all…just like the term capitalism is not one-size-fits-all.
“Everyone set up the system…people…social systems are created and perpetuated by everyone (until people attempt to change them).” Wrong. I haven’t set-up any such “system.” I go to work, do my volunteer work, and take care of my family. I have no control over who has whatever you consider “power” to be. “And your one experience of of having many women bosses doesn’t negate the way the system is set up.” My “one experience” is shared by several hundred of my colleagues, since half of the senior management team, and the general manager are all female. “The majority of federal… Read more »
I’m with HeatherN on this – not convinced by Eric’s counter arguments. The U.S. and Canada are patriarchies. Even ignoring the accumulation of wealth, or current average earnings, or representation on corporate boards or in political office, I still believe there is loads of evidence that the cultures we live in are patriarchal. Take, for example, basic human conversations. It’s well established that speakers of higher social status will talk more than speakers of lower social status. And this maps directly onto gender in mixed gender groupings. All things being equal and across large numbers, men will talk more than… Read more »
Sounds like confirmation bias to me Sherwin: You read something, the started to see it in your life that you didn’t see before….Have you ever considered confirmation bias.
I’m not presenting my experience as the argument. It’s only a personal reflection following an argument.
“I grew up believing that women talk more. But that’s false. Once I started to read about this, I started to notice this in my personal life and family. So knowing about this has helped my relationships. Which is cool.”
This is what you said. You stated that MEN TALK MORE, because you stated that women talking more was false, because you read about it and started to notice it in your life. An almost perfect example of what janet called confirmation bias.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
Hi AMD. I am a huge fan of thinking about confirmation bias. Big fan. But my argument about social status and gender precedes my personal reflection. You can ignore the personal reflection if you like. But you will still have to respond to the argument in the sentences before it.
Men talk more? As in words per day or what? In my experience women talk more than men, but they also talk differently on average. But I think what defines who talks more tends to be the groups dynamics, 10% men and 90% women favours more female speech that I’ve seen, 10% women and 90% men favours males. But then it also depends on the position of those women, a female CEO might have a large portion of the speech. Maybe you experience a different life to me but I mostly see females talk more, men tend to use fewer… Read more »
Archy, The research says that in mixed gender groupings, men tend to talk more. This correlates with status, since the speaker with the most status tends to talk the most. So that’s a pretty clear cut case of a power differential favouring men. This finding was interesting because it was part of a meta study reviewing 56 studies on gender communication. Hyde and co-authors found that there is a striking amount of gender similarity in regard to communication. One exception was when it comes to the amount of talking, in part because this relates directly to social status. See Hyde… Read more »
Where abouts? I live in Australia and see men n women talk in mixed gender groups fairly evenly in some areas, but others I see far more women who will speak much longer than men (eg phone). Anecdotal evidence of course so I was wondering if it was limited by culture, area, etc. Interesting link, seems in certain areas women hold more power and others men have more power. Just for clarity and me being half asleep and thus can’t read for shit, did the studies show that men and women communicated very similarly and that the effective communication was… Read more »
“studies have found that you can reverse the “men talk more” pattern, or at least reduce the gap, by instructing subjects to discuss a topic that both sexes consider a distinctively female area of expertise. Status, then, is not a completely fixed attribute, but can vary relative to the setting, subject and purpose of conversation.” How do you know that men have more status and that it isn’t the case that in the public sphere things are simply considered to be distinctively masculine? If sports or politics (foreign policy and war being aspects) are viewed as distinctively masculine (whether they… Read more »
Archy, I’ve provided links and citations to peer reviewed research and some summaries of it. So when one of the conclusions of this research is that men have more social status and tend to talk more in mixed gender groupings, then I think that you and I have warrant to believe that. That meta-analysis was based on something like 60 independent research projects. And, regarding the quote you’ve provided from the research, I agree with the authors that status is not a fixed attribute, and that it varies based on the context. But that doesn’t contradict their other conclusion, that,… Read more »
“What is it about this meta-analysis, of so many research projects, that you find so troubling that you are unwilling to accept it?” I haven’t rejected it, I am just curious if it varies by culture, area, etc. I also wonder if one gender communicates more effectively in some areas, less usage of filler words etc. I question everything, keeps my mind sharp. If that is what the researchers have found then that I guess is how it is. I’ve noticed differences which has made me question how fluid it is, but on the average as you say it can… Read more »
Just noticed that you have a link to a meta-analysis as well. I’ll take a read.
Wait, this isn’t a peer reviewed meta-analysis. It’s an annotated bibliography. And I’m just reading through and checking the sources and of the three sources I’ve checked I’ve already notice three errors in the annotations. I promise to keep looking through this, but I don’t promise to respond to it.
No problems. It’s a huge amount of data to read through. There are stats taht can prove men are more aggressive, others can prove women are more aggressive. My best guess is both genders can be aggressive with no clear view of which commits the most abuse in relationships, only that women tend to be injured more and that it’s far more acceptable for men to be abused in public. The reason I keep these stats on hand to post is to remove the absolutely stupid gendered view of domestic violence. Currently the hyperfocus on female victimization and male perpetration… Read more »
Sherwin writes: “Take, for example, basic human conversations. It’s well established that speakers of higher social status will talk more than speakers of lower social status.” That reminds me of a story Christina Hoff Sommers relays in her book “Who Stole Feminism”. Sommers joined a debate on gender at a college with several other speakers. At the end the announcer/time keeper stated that the women speakers had been interrupted many more times by the male speakers than the reverse. A student contacted Sommers and said he timed the debate. The female speakers had controlled about 70% of the speaking. In… Read more »
John D, Luckily we don’t have to rely on the anecdotal evidence that you have presented of a single debate. We have access to numerous studies and an important meta analysis about the way men and women talk in mixed gender groupings. The book you site, by Hoff Sommers, was published in 1992. It appears to have received reviews that were extremely critical of her over-reliance on anecdotal evidence. That’s ironic. But, for the record, Hoff Sommers is a feminist. Actually I’m somewhat interested to read her book despite the repeated criticism it has received. But lets flash forward to… Read more »
Just want to draw out the last part of that quote:
Just from what I see in my grad class, which is mostly about 70% female, many of the conversations were started by me. It wasn’t like I jumped at the chance when an instructor asked what our impressions of the weeks readings were, I paused just like everyone else, but realized that if no one answered the teacher would realize that we didn’t actually read what we were supposed to and probably would get quizzed on it. I would skim the readings to pick out a main topic. It would spark a discussion that people would join in on. It… Read more »
Sherwin: And this is where I think feminism doesn’t dig deep and broad into the evidence. In my experience a lot of feminist theorists only dig in evidence where they will find paydirt to confirm their theories. What you are describing is a power dynamic. I have been to parties where the people with the most to say (and most interesting stories) are the elite. People who have taken vacations around the world in every major continent. This was overwhelmingly rich men. This isn’t a gender dynamic, it’s a power dynamic. Also, at those parties those who speak 2nd most… Read more »
No heather, it means father = head of household that is what the word means.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/patriarchy?s=t&ld=1031
Look it up
Some words have multiple definitions depending on context. For instance, in the context of anarchism I gather “chauvanist” is used to describe a war-monger, whereas in the context of feminism it’s used to describe a man who is sexist to women. I do agree that the word and concept of “patriarchy” is problematic, but insisting on a particular definition when it doesn’t hold that meaning for many people is putting the horse before the cart a little.
“But, there is no patriarchy in the United States of America. If there were, my boss, her boss, and her boss would not all be women.”
I would say that the USA is transitioning from a patriarchy to a matriarchy, at least for the white populace. The majority of the black community, in the US, is already operating under a full blown matriarchy,with all the poverty and family issues that brings.
Google – The Garbage Generation – for an exploration of how important it is to have household’s headed by fathers. It’s better for the children, society and ultimately civilization.
@sherwin: really , seriously…Did you actually mean to write that. You are trying to claim that because violence is mostly done by men, that excuses any behaviour by women. BTW, you do realize that most of the violence commited by men is against other men right?, what would your so called theory say about that.
Hi Janet. No, I didn’t say that women’s behaviour is absolutely excusable. I *am* asserting that we need to have different standards for assessment. I do realize that the vast majority of the violence that men experience is perpetrated by other men. This fact contributes to the claim that we need to have a gender analysis to best understand our culture, and that we need to have different models by which to understand the behaviour of men and women.
So, who gets to define those “different standards?” Who should these different standards favor?
Moderator Note: Edited to remove personal insult.
Good questions. Also, what do we hope to achieve by having different standards? Big questions. I want a fairer society with less violence and more room for gender variation, for a few. I think that’s why I am so appreciating this conversation about gender roles. The more we talk about gender and wake up to gender patterns, the more able we are to explore gender roles and shift them. I find it exciting, and I find it an exciting opportunity in feminism. We can remake masculinity. Hah, that sounds like a tagline: “Making masculinity better, since 1910.”
I don’t understand your position. Assuming we live in a patriarchal society, in a society which is ruled (mainly) by men, is male centric and is set up to accommodate men. If we have different (based on gender) standards in this society, shouldn’t we expect that those different standards will be made (mostly) by men, will be focused on the male perspective and will accommodate men?
Hi Alberich. Cool question. Let me cautiously reframe your question in my reply. Assuming we live in a society that has a power gradient that favours men, then we can’t fix it by flattening this context and simply ignoring the power structures. We can’t pretend, in this case, that we can start from scratch and try to make genders equal. We work towards gender equality and gender freedom, not by being gender-blind, but by trying to see gender as much as possible. Is that a fair response?
Sherwin, thanks for the response, this topic is a pretty crucial and interesting question, which seems at the basis of many rifts between gender egalitarian men and feminists, thank you for bringing this up at the beginning of this thread. You didn’t really answer my question though. You are saying, that if we want to reach gender equality, we can not treat the genders as equal, this might be true or not, but even if treating the genders equally does not lead to the desired result (gender equality), it does not follow that an alternative (like having a “good” double… Read more »
I think you might have answered your own question. No single social institution constitutes the net affect of our society. And no single individual constitutes the net affect of our society. So, yes, we are fallible. But with diligence and caution we can do better than the culture we find ourselves in.
Does that answer your question better?
Sherwin: “But with diligence and caution we can do better than the culture we find ourselves in.” The question is not so much if we can do better by employing a double standard, but if we are likely to do better with a gendered double standard. You seem to distinguish between us and our culture, but what is our culture if not the sum of our views and customs. Now back to the main question: “Should we employ a gendered double standard, if we want to achieve gender equality (all presuming we live in a patriarchal society).” You didn’t provide… Read more »
@ Alberich: I think we agree on some issues. Obviously I’m not going to speak on behalf of all feminists, lol, but I do believe that challenging gender stereotypes is generally a feminist mandate. And I’m not sure about the other examples you gave but I think mansplaining is a very effective concept at challenging gender roles. It’s something I mentioned below that “who talks most?” is a question of gender and social status, and it’s evidence of male privilege, and yes, gender stereotypes, in our cultures. So I like the concept of mansplaining as a way of identifying and… Read more »
The assumption that our society is patriarchal, implies that we (the society) have a patriarchal bias. When we create different standards for men and women, I would expect our biases to be reflected in those standards. If these our (our societies) standards were not patriarchal, wouldn’t this be an evidence for our society not being patriarchal? I suppose if you mean feminist patriarchy then you’d have adequately disproven it with that line of reasoning. However, in reality when and to the extent that men are in charge they don’t have compassion and sympathy for other men, but instead exhibit discrimination… Read more »
David Byron: “I suppose if you mean feminist patriarchy…” Yes, I meant patriarchy, as in my understanding of the feminist usage. “…then you’d have adequately disproven it with that line of reasoning.” I don’t think so, but it seems to pose some questions about the nature of patriarchy, that I haven’t seen sufficiently answered yet. “It’s just that feminist notions of the relationship between men and women are ridiculous aggressive.” This is true only some feminists, I think. What I see as very common among feminists, is a view of genders which seems “patriarchal” (using their own definition), and that… Read more »
A “fairer society” cannot be achieved by promoting discrimination. That’s been tried before and it has never worked. You haven’t explained how this (so-called) “power gradient” favors men.
Just as it is entirely possible to recognize race without being racist, it is entirely possible to recognized the sexes (not be gender-blind, if that’s how you are using it) without being sexist by discriminating against one sex or the other.
Disagree. It is possible, and possibly essential, to recognize how we’re racialized in order to be effectively anti-racist. [can of worms] It’s not racist to notice how people are racialized. On my view, the best anti-racist strategies are to notice racialized power gradients and talk about them. All of the contemporary research is telling us that the majority of people’s behaviour is subtly and not so subtly, often unconsciously, racist. Try as we might to not be, we usually are – it’s usually a question of how much not if. That means we have to try harder, obviously. But it… Read more »
“Power gradients.”
More mumbo jumbo. But, feel free to talk about it all you want. You havent’t offered any evidence to support discrimination. I’m anti-discrimination. Period. End of sentence.
“I’m a white dude. That comes with privilege.”
So does being a white chick.
Yes. We both agree that it’s important to oppose discrimination on the basis of gender or racialization. But we disagree on what the criteria for that it. Can you agree with that?
I’ve stated my criteria to oppose discrimination which is simply to oppose it always, with an exception for affirmative action under narrow circumstances. You’ve not stated your criteria. You’ve just said that sometimes you think it’s a good idea to discriminate (other than affirmative action) and haven’t said much about why, except presumably this example of condemning male sexuality but not condemning similar examples of female sexuality, that kicked the conversation off. What troubles me is that your justification for that was so broad and vague that I think you might be willing to apply it almost everywhere. I mean… Read more »
@ David Byron, Our argument began when I claimed, and still claim, that you cannot rely on the Revers-the-Gender Test without also being attentive to context, which includes gender and power and other forms of oppression. If I am right then the reason and thrust behind Bobbt’s comment is misguided. Do you understand this? You don’t have to agree to understand it. I’m defending a principle – it’s not vague, but it is broad. That’s why it’s a principle. I’m happy to restate it in another form: genders are constructed differently in our cultures, and that means that the impact… Read more »
Discrminating on the basis of either is what we worked to defeat. I am against both. It’s not a complex issue whatsoever.
Sherwin writes: “I *am* asserting that we need to have different standards for assessment.” It seems to me it’s this kind of thinking that ultimately leads down the road to the huge disparity in sentencing we see when troubled mothers or fathers kill their children. When mothers do it they’re: A) troubled/sick B) one of the victims and C) need help not punishment. When fathers do it they’re A) evil and B) need to be put to death/locked away for life. No, I disagree. We need one standard, not multiple standards. The personal is political and this mode of thought… Read more »
What if I used different words. What if I said, when we apply a better standard of assessment, we get different judgements when we are assessing different contexts? Here is a really concrete example. Have you heard of the Bechdel Test? Lots of films fail the Bechdel Test. That is crappy for the gender portrayal of women. Because so many films fail the Bechdel test, the accumulative affect is huge. Frequency does matter, because frequency changes the real world impact. So let’s imagine the male gendered counterpart to the Bechdel Test. We could call it the Bechdel-M Test. If a… Read more »
It’s not hard to come up with a pro-male test like the Bechdel Test that actually has a more universal rate than the Bechdel Test does. These days most films fail her test. In fact Warren Farrel came up with such a test himself in the 70s ten years prior to the Bechdel Test being formulated. He stated (in “The Myth of Male Power“) that because women are valued so much higher than men in our society you never see a movie where a woman is killed if she has appeared in at least three scenes. You might see scores… Read more »
great point. I also remember in that book Farrel pointing to the commercial in which a couple have been shipwrecked on an island. The woman wishes she had coke (or pepsi forget which).
I actually remember this commercial.
The man sees floating on some wreckage the beverage in shark infested waters. The man bravely jumps from wreckage to wreckage narrowly missing a buss-saw shark fin which cuts the wreckage in half to secure the beverage and bring it to the woman.
Farrel pointed out that this commercial works because apparently a man’s life is worth less than………………..a coke.
perhaps is exactly the double standart in the society that create so much violence? I mean if people get treated like human beins and not old rusty stereotypes (men and women) in my opinion, that will solve great deal. Because society and culture dont have anymore excuses to shut you down (you are not a lady, be a man ect) so you can freely be what you like, and freely state how you feel. Withouth people trying to silence you, because you are not conforming to your cultural role. Im a big fan of equal threatment, thats the ONLY way… Read more »
Part of that has to do with female sexual predation not being recognized prior to about 12 years or so ago. Females sexually exploiting males were not recognized as exploitation (Mrs. Robinson). Should this recognition impact the way the sexual double standard is currently viewed?
Yeah, that’s wrong. It was recognized…just viewed differently. Women being sexual predators was viewed through the lens of women trying to corrupt an innocence.
I think some of it was recognized and viewed differently. The older woman/boy was viewed as corrupting the youth, but more favorably like initiating a boy into manhood. Female adult predation against adult males and female minor predation against male minors was not recognized at all until about 12 years ago. I remember a discussion on a feminist site that said something along the lines of men are now being raped by women as if that didn’t happen in the past. It would be terrible if that was one of the gender barriers that feminism broke down, but I think… Read more »
“I remember a discussion on a feminist site that said something along the lines of men are now being raped by women as if that didn’t happen in the past.” I remember a discussion on a feminist website saying that trans-women are really men infiltrating womyn-only spaces. My point being you can’t take what is said on a feminist website and then extract that onto other feminists or onto mainstream society. Anyway, on to the main point, which is the assumption that an older woman corrupting a younger man was actually more like “initiating a boy into manhood.” That’s also… Read more »
Really, if somethings not reported to authorities, does that mean it didn’t happen? Because that’s what happened for years in the case of female sexual predetors. Even today when ones caught, charges are usually downgraded to mistameanors. Case in point, a New York City highschool teacher was caught having sex with HER student in a motel in New Jersey (this makes it a Federal case) Since she was Videotaping it and police seized the tape, She pleaded guilty. her sentance , 4 MONTHS PROBATION! Imean, I’d get real jail time if I bought a 6 pack of beer for that… Read more »
I disagree women predators were and imho still are viewed thru the lens of “women never do anything wrong”.
Why am I supposed to care about this? Why do folks like you think that the ‘why’ matters more than the ‘is’. I don’t care WHY things are the way they are – that doesn’t make and difference when it comes to how they affect me. Only the way things are, the ‘is’ of it, actually affects me. As a result, this kind of statement comes off a bit like an apologia. As if we aren’t supposed to care about the double standard because of ‘patriarchy’. As if women aren’t perpetuating that double standard, because… patriarchy?. At some point, I’m… Read more »