Comment on Why is the manosphere on the rise? UN Women sounds the alarm over online misogyny
Fedditor385@lemmy.world 2 days ago
It’s quite simple, gender equaliry should stand for equal opportunity for both genders, but it’s not. I only see women being pushed into places with traditionally male majority, but not men being pushed into places with traditional female majority. And worst of all, equal opportunity should not mean we will hire a less competent woman that a more competent men, to fill out some 50/50 quota.
This is exactly the result of abusing gender equality.
It blows my mind how comments that don’t fit the narrative of the liberals get down voted to doom and canceled, by the same groups that want “equality”, but only if it’s their definition of equality.
I’m all for equality, which is why I can’t stand left-wingers or right-wingers. They’re all full of shit.
Personally, I don’t mind seeing when comments are heavily down voted. If an opinion is unpopular, that’s ok, especially in some areas where you generally know there’s a likely bias in the audience.
What annoys me is seeing comments removed / silenced by mods when the comments dont align. If the comments calling for explicit violence or using overt slurs, by all means censor. But many online spaces will eliminate even respectful / neutral comments simply because they aren’t in line with that narrative.
Point in case. The moment I mentioned it, the down votes started pouring in.
Humanity has lost the capacity for critical thinking and civil communication.
Explain how you can cancel a comment ?
I only see women being pushed into places with traditionally male majority, but not men being pushed into places with traditional female majority
Genuinely curious, got any examples of “traditional female majority places” that masculine individuals cannot enter/participate in?
Daycare, men who work with children in general. It feels like taboo, and I assume it’s because the general opinion seems to be that men that want to be around children are most likely pedophiles. I never heard of a program to include more men in daycare.
Excellent example, and I sincerely appreciate you engaging in good faith discussion!
I agree that being masculine should by default not be a barrier - social or otherwise - from working with children.
How do we begin to change that as a society?
Although I can’t think of the solution myself, I also don’t see how advancing equality for feminine individuals would hold back equality for masculine individuals.
As mentioned in another comment, a lot of these problems seem to stem from the enforcement of dated gender norms.
This is one where I think the ball is very much in the women’s court.
I’ve seen a trend of vertical videos of fathers playing with their children, with a caption similar to “my latest ick.”
Millennial men are the most engaged cohort of dads in living memory, and women have responded pretty poorly to this.
Thank you, I am actually shocked by such positive feedback, as I never expect anything positive in online discussions :D
Well, there is not much that needs to be adjusted in traditional values. Or, to put it lightly, that was never the problem to begin with. In traditional roles, both genders use their advantage to the max, and it has worked for millenia.
The issue is that there is a smaller % of both genders, who wish to do something “out of the norm”. Men who want to work in childcare and women who want to drive trucks. That small % should be able to do so, without discrimination. That’s it. That’s all to it, why this entire woke thing blew up. We should preserve the traditional roles as they have proven themselves to work effectively, but we need to adjust it to be flexible for things that don’t fit in the traditional norms.
From somewhere came the narrative that men are gatekeeping women from all important positions, and women in fight for their rights to be equal went the same route to basically gatekeep men in the name of equality. And now we are in this weird limbo where the genders seem to undermine each other whereever they can.
Not OP, but positions like nurses or teachers are very female dominated. It’s not like males cannot reach those positions, but there are social obstacles to that. To make an example from my country, in Italy primary school teachers are > 90% female. I believe in kindergarten they reach 97 or 98%. This is also partially the result of strict gender roles than discriminate both men and women in terms of caring for children (I.e., women are de facto forced to do that, men are pushed away), which then reinforces the social practice of women doing all the caring jobs.
This is IMHO a problem for both men and women, but probably it’s not from the same perspective as what OP meant…
The difference is that, typically, the lack of women in male-dominated fields is due to them being actively pushed away from things they want to do, while the lack of men in female-dominated fields is due to those fields being less prestigious/well-paid (often due to being traditionally female) and them not wanting to pick them in the first place. But when they do decide to enter those fields, nobody’s actively trying to stop/discourage them.
Superficially there may seem to be similarities in circumstance, but the amount of agency men and women have to enter opposite-gender-dominated careers is vastly different.
It’s the same in female fields, it’s not just prestige. Men face increased scrutiny when working with children. Male nurses are expected to perform the more physical parts of the job almost exclusively.
There are 2 issues here that are being mixed.
One is women not being allowed to positions of power. The other is with women being underrepresented in certain fields (e.g., stem).
The second issue is what I am talking about and I don’t think at all that men “choose” not to try certain careers in the same way women don’t “choose” not to study stem and pursue stem careers. For both, social pressure and expectations, an existing field dominated by the other sex with all its implications are factors of discrimination. Strict gender roles are damaging for both men and women, and this is a perfect example.
And how are women pushed out of “man jobs”?
And how are we fixing that?
Is it bosses that aim to have male coworkers turning down women? How is that different than bosses wanting artificially 50/50 turning down men?
Is it not being represented in advertising? How is that different than what happens now. Where most advertising displays just women? Or if there is both a man and a woman, the woman is usually centered in the picture or doing a more important/powerful role.
By “encouraging” women in the workplace, what you see is things being done to men that you complain was done to women.
Better paid jobs are usually more risky, competitive and harsh with short deadlines, that why the are paid more than jobs where you can just do your shift and happily go home like daycare or teaching. It happens that men simply naturally want the adrenaline and excitement that comes with the first because they want to prove themselves.
If you look into history, men where those that went hunting which can be dangerous, while women were those who collected berries and nursed children, not much danger there.
As a man, I actually thing women are crazy for not wanting to keep being a houswife a thing. It’s like being the CEO of the house. WFH guaranteed, you are the one making plans and deadlines, minimal stress, and you have probably enough spare time to do whatever you want as a hobby on the side (unless you have small children). I truly don’t see the downside, I would thrive in home improvement and gardening…
positions like nurses or teachers are very female dominated.
I’m sure it varies from country to country, but in the US women could not study medicine until the late 1800’s and the US Army did not allow female physicians until 1940.
It’s not unlikely to think we have many people today who were alive before women practicing as physicians was common place.
I’m convinced it’s less of a matter of a group “dominating” a space but rather being pigeonholed/forced into it due to a lack of options, and these circumstances have impact that are still felt to this day.
I’m not sure about Italy but in a lot of the US becoming a school teacher requires a college degree and has wages that do not keep up with the cost of living.
You can look up articles of teachers losing their jobs for doing sex work or provocative modeling to earn extra income because their job does not pay enough.
Doesn’t seem like that big of a win? Unless I’m missing something?
I’m sure it varies from country to country, but in the US women could not study medicine until the late 1800’s
In Germany at the moment around two thirds of medicine students are women and I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the similar in most western countries.
Like another comment stated about Germany, even in Italy medicine faculties have a majority of women today as well.
I agree that in general teacher jobs are not glamorous or high-paying, but it’s still a very important role in society and we can still discuss how it’s a problem that there is an effective (social, mostly) barrier for males accessing (lower level) education jobs.
I do believe that this is essentially another symptom of a wider problem related to gender roles.
And it started from that valid criticism and then takes the viewer on a tour by various faces and influencers to pull them into more and more into right-wing territory to radicalize them. Once in that box, they’re not getting out again. It’s a right-wing conveyor belt.
I only see women being pushed into places with traditionally male majority, but not men being pushed into places with traditional female majority.
As a positive counter-example, I’d like to give a shoutout to German childcare. In 2022, 17.9% of under 20yolds, 12,6% of under 30yold childcare professionals were men, contrast with 2% among 60 and older. There’s been an active effort both from the professional organisations as well as operators to increase the ratio, right-out masterplanned it, and they’re making strides. As a side-effect: Plenty of young female childcare workers now don’t feel weird at all about wrestling with the boys. Not that “boys need movement because their gross motor skills develop before fine motor skills” was unknown back in my days but the vibe was either “grandma watching you build wood block towers” or “grandma watching you at the playground”.
There is nothing that needs or requires 50/50 nor is there any benefit to society by forcing it besides being able to say “now it’s equal”. Childcare should ideally be 30% men and 70% women because women are natual caretakers and excell at emotional and social tasks. Men are needed there to provide strict authority for kids when they are not behaving well and for developing skills such as sports, engineering and emotional reslilience.
Your first sentence is completely sensible, the rest is completely toxic and also BS gender roles. Don’t project your emotional and social incapacity on me.
If my wife were to tell my kids “wait until your father comes home” a) they’ll get off 110% scot-free because they already suffered enough dread and b) she’ll get an earful. Ideally, though, of course, you’ll date someone emotionally and socially mature enough so that won’t be an issue.
Also please explain: Women are good at emotional stuff but then you need the man to do the emotional resilience thing… what? I know plenty of women who I’m pretty sure could beat you up, work with plenty of brilliant female engineers, and are you accusing me of not caring. Am I just pretending to care about people? Does caring about people not come natural to you? Maybe that’s a thing you should mull over.
You went into extreme edge cases to prove your point. Of course both genders can do both, but why would I want to put the burden of getting the kids in check with my wife when I am supposed to be the man in the house? Will I just put the burden on my wife and say “hey, you are mature and strong and independent - handle it and let me get a beer”.
As for the emotional part - women can teach kids empathy, men can teach kids not to cry immediately if you fall down once. Both are emotional aspects but they are exactly the opposite aspects and complement each other. Kids do need both. Women happen to be better at empathy, and men tend to be better at regulating emotions.
flamingo_pinyata@sopuli.xyz 2 days ago
I feel like a Cassandra since I was warning about this for years now.
The gender equality narrative got too focused on excluding men specifically, instead of including the less represented gender in each profession. Somehow the idea was that men are privileged in the system and women oppressed, while the truth is that both men and women are oppressed.
Divide and conquer was a small step away from that point.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
As a man, I’ve never been made to feel excluded in any way whatsoever.
zaphod@sopuli.xyz 2 days ago
Every once in a while my uni has some interesting events (at least based on the description), public announcement sent to everyone, and the last sentence has almost always been some form of “women only”. There is usually no gender neutral equivalents to these events and they’re done in the name of gener equality. So I very much feel excluded by gender equality.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 day ago
Oh no, a place you couldn’t go as a man?!?!? How could you ever survive?!?
dhork@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Same here. However, I suspect you and I are not zero-sum thinkers, and can conceive of a future in which both men and women can apply themselves to their full potential.
But it seems like a key part of the counter-movement to gender equality is based on the notion that every time a woman gets a job, they aretaki g it away from a mkre qualified male. It seems to be built on a mountain of insecurity more than anything else.
hanrahan@slrpnk.net 2 days ago
That may be, but you are not all men ? So some have.
There have been several cases here in Australia where men have been denied access becase they are men and taken it to court… and lost, I suspect that’s sort of what the person posting is referring to. Theres a carve out in the law to allow womens only spaces.
Now, whether you agree with the ruling of the courts or not, is to some extent ilrrelevant to the discussion (the courts are notionally after all just following the law) because gender equality then isn’t about what’s on the tin and that’s when you get push back.
arararagi@ani.social 2 days ago
I like how you were down voted for it. Hell there’s a free online course in my country right know that is not open for everyone, it says in the description that anyone can apply for a chance but only women will be allowed to participate.
FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au 2 days ago
When businesses commit to having a certain percent of employees/managers/board members/etc be women, that means it’s at the exclusion of men. Maybe you’re not in the category of men who miss out on jobs and promotions simply because they need to hire a woman instead of a more deserving man, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.
You can’t commit to “diversity” without taking away opportunities for progressives natural enemy, the straight white males.
zaphod@sopuli.xyz 2 days ago
Honestly I think examples like this are counterproductive, the average man will never be considered for one of these positions, nor will the average woman. It is useless to get angry at such a situation and it only serves to engage people in the “gender war” which only serves to distract you from the real issues which are almost completely class issues. Instead of getting angry that some woman “took away” the job of some man who was “more deserving”, you should get angry that that person is most likely getting paid a hundred times more than you and will cut your job in an attempt to make the company appear more profitable.
GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
So if a company traditionally had 10 men employees and now has committed to having gender equality, you see this as 5 jobs where men are no longer considered, rather than it historically being 10 jobs where women weren’t considered?
orbular@lemmy.today 2 days ago
I think there is nuance here. My understanding is that there is a very small but loud percentage of women that want to exclude men. When DEI (inclusion of less represented individuals) is encouraged, it’s often cut down by “only the most qualified should be hired”, detracting from the core topic which is bias. Most of the discourse around privelage was to help understand that men aren’t actively oppressive, but many are blind to the ways in which they contribute to the oppressive issues due to cultural programming. In parallel to what we’re seeing with protests - inaction is not helpful. Those that are privelaged are more likely to be able to change the minds of those that are actively oppressive. TL;DR privelage is just the ability to apply peer pressure.
rikudou@lemmings.world 2 days ago
Same, I’ve been saying it for a decade that the current anti-men direction can only mean that young men will push against that and not in a nice way.
Well, guess who was right? Feminism has come all the way from something great and noble towards utter shit.