Mens' rights movement

I think we've seen this poster before.....

i think that's rather unfair actually

X-post.

No not you! The post at 1803

Buffy thanks for your time and patience. Sorry about the rant, I just can't abide snide arrogance. I hope your cold gets better soon.

Good luck with the forum; you do a lot of good here.

To add to my previous post about a spectrum from specialist to majority, I should add that I have a personal prejudice and am quick to temper on one issue. I find that some specialists are a little too proud of their own learning and quick to dismiss the experiences and observations of those they consider beneath them. Given that their expertise by necessity exists within a silo, this leaves them dangerously myopic. It also perhaps suggests why many normal folk find it difficult to relate to their ivory tower pronouncements.

Just a personal view admittedly, and one informed by being bullied and belittled by these people in the past.

Oh dear. Have we got to "western women are not oppressed" already? We've had women being more privileged than men, "oppression" is too strong a word, what about women in Saudi Arabia and now empirical evidence. What a combination!

Hi Petula - absolutely. One doesn't have to go far or scratch the surface deep to find appalling examples. But, is your example empirical evidence of oppression against women solely for being women or does it suggest that men can be violent wankers? Or are those two so overlapping as to be the same? I'm not sure. Men are also violent wankers to each other after all and let's not even start on lesbian relationships!

Sorry, I tend to think aloud! I apologise if anyone's offended by that.

"'Oppression' seems a strong word when you look around you"

maybe

certainly for my own current situation, but i don't have to look very far to see oppression beyond that

and look at the relationships section of MN

I meant to add: get well soon!

Buffy thanks again and I totally agree with the conclusion of 1634. In terms of doing something, I think there are probably another two ends of another stick: some people (like yourself I suspect) will work long and hard on the finer detail of these matters - you will be in the minority. The majority, meanwhile, or society at large if you will, will not share the depth of those insights not spend so long upon the issues. This majority need to be gently nudged in the right direction (leaps being made where available!) and for that a broader, shallower and more accessible version is required that tallies with the lived experience rather than academic conclusions. This perhaps is at the crux of MRAs? These are real people in the real world too and maybe there is a disparity between their experience and what they read when they read feminist theory? I don't just mean MRAs though (that was an effort to stay on topic . But people at large. Could I suggest that people at large may not relate to a binary framework of oppression? A first-glance outsider's view of Saudi Arabia maybe? Yeah, ok. But here? 'Oppression' seems a strong word when you look around you.

Petula ITA about analogies.

Buffensian

Reading these discussions on FWR makes me feel like my brain is doing a workout (in a good way)

sorry, i didn't think you were and my response was a bit self-pitying! i was genuinely agreeing with your and buffy's points.

the other problem with analogies of course is you can get bogged down in an argument about how an analogy is wrong and how to tweak it etc, which distracts from the original problem

Sorry Petula I wasn't criticising you and I thought your expansion of Buffy's analogy was brilliant.

Buffy I agree re where intersectional started. It just seems to have devolved into tumblr shorthand for no class analysis.

You should totes write a paper about transitional and destination theories. It would be a new era of Buffensian thinking.

i do know what you mean flora. i'm still learning so much of this.

Buffy I agree with you. I also think we can't conclude from the fact that there are three dimensions that we are all simply individuals or our situations are down to random luck. Unfortunately some intersectional analysis has had the effect of erasing class analysis.

Dervel it's hard to say anything about that individual situation, especially the marginalisation by his ex. Not sure what you mean by "the situation was very much weighted against him to start with" let alone "of course".

It is not uncommon for men to be more hands on when separating because they were doing so little during the marriage.

FloraFox I think you are absolutely right, and I think MRAs such as they are would head rapidly in the right direction if there was a laser focus devoted encouraging hands on fatherhood at all stages.

However it is not always so simple, I have a fair few male friends who are separated dads and actually none of them seem to fall into the MRA category inasmuch as they have all seem to have reasonable setups with their exes.

However one of them was very much marginalized by his ex as soon as the kids came along. As much as he wanted to be more hands on he was given very little opportunity.

He I think is more hands on since separating ironically. However of course the situation was very much weighted against him to start with. It's also worth mentioning he hasn't demonized his ex to me in the least, and speaks particularly highly of her especially as a mum.

Now of course the preceding paragraphs are classic what about the men? So I truly neither demand nor expect anyone to engage on this point. After all this is feminist board so it is right and proper that is not the focus. However I think society in general does need to engage on deconstruction of gender roles and not just in the minds of traditional patriarchal mysogynistic types but everyone (myself very much included) for everyone's benefit.

I suspect one day I'll sign up to some MRA forum somewhere, and make the point there, but I expect I'll have quite an uphill journey.

hope the medication gets you through the worst of it

i should add to my analogy, that drain-cleaning is a necessary and worthwhile job, but it has low status in this case