This is a sentiment often repeated by manosphere influencers and there’s no actual tangible evidence it exists and I think that’s the real issue.
This is why I feel there is such a disconnect. I just have to open TikTok to see this, so if researchers are not finding evidence then I’m very curious how that’s possible. Heck, you just need to look at the same masculinity influencer content they are talking about to see it, because it’s not just them making shit up from nothing - they will often use clips of misandrist women to get their point across. So they basically find the evidence for you.
Why has no one here said “links”?
People here just talk in circles instead of providing concrete support.
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 3 days ago
TikTok is incredibly algorithm driven and ultimately driven by the content you consume and interact with. When you go online and “see something everywhere” you have to look at it under the lens of what’s being targeted at you, vs what you encounter in more neutral spaces. When you open TikTok, the percentage of misandrist content you encounter is not representative of all content on the internet. No matter how niche or rare any given subject is, your algorithm will find it and server it to if it thinks you’ll engage with it, positively or negatively.
My TikTok contains zero misandrist content. In order for the researchers to experience what you experience, they’d have to build an algorithm profile tailored to that content. But that would be useless, because it would prove nothing. It’s a question of “Is the world full of misandrists out to get men” or “have the men surrounded themselves with misandrists”.
You have effectively done the latter. Now when I say this is “your fault” I don’t mean to say that you’ve gone and done this on purpose. The algorithms have a heavy hand to play in this of course and that’s a real issue. But at the end of the day, how the algorithms target you is a result of your engagement and behavior. The more you rail against your perceived world of misandry, the more the algorithm is going to inundate you with it. “Society” hasn’t done this to you, nor have women as a group of people.
The only way to try and approach this objectively is to minimize algorithmic influence and look at the saturation of this content in a more controlled setting. How often do you see misandry appear in content not specifically designed for you to experience it? That’s where you start to see the truth of the matter.
tias@discuss.tchncs.de 3 days ago
You’re straying from the point which is that this content exists, is widespread, and is ultimately the root cause. This isn’t hard for a serious researcher to see if they could just be bothered to sit down with the people they are “researching” and actually discover what their online life looks like. Whatever opinions you have on my personal life and choices are irrelevant. The reason I brought my personal experiences up is that I think they are representative and an obvious reason why men seek their refuge in masculinity influencers. You can criticize them all you want, but as far as I’m concerned that only underscores my point.
The misandry is also not limited to algorithm-heavy outlets like TikTok - when I talk about media I mean all social media including Facebook, Reddit, Instagram but also old media such as newspapers. When the #killallmen and #ihatemen hashtags were popular on Twitter the women promoting it were given their own columns in newspapers and a platform in podcasts by national state radio, at least here in Sweden. One popular “feminist” profile, Natashja Blomberg, would for example publicly say “I wonder if it’s a daughter or an abortion” when she was pregnant. She garnered support and was platfformed both by prominent political party leaders and news outlets. She was given her own column and given space in podcasts, where she could complain how disgusting she found her own son to be and how nobody is interested in what men think.
You can’t just let this go on for years, without being challenged, without offering alternative positive messages, and believe that men will just shake it off. They’re turning to these influencers because they were pushed there. I whole heartedly disagree with your assertion that the problem is in somebody’s head, but even if it is, society has a responsibility to help those people and it doesn’t.
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 3 days ago
The content does exist, but there’s no evidence it’s widespread and it’s definitely not the root cause. It looks widespread to you because you’ve surrounded yourself with it, and you were enabled to do so because of the abundance of manosphere content that you’re engaging with.
And to be clear I’m not criticizing your personal life. You are living the life you’ve chosen and I’m not passing judgement on it. It’s just perfectly representative of the fact that the problems you’ve explained that you’re facing were directly caused by decisions you made for yourself.