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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Is he being unreasonable? "Women's rights were won at the expense of men"

174 replies

Rainbowshit · 25/03/2023 21:08

twitter.com/billybragg/status/1462076809542094854?s=46&t=AjtjSItRj-kgZwRzL-pdy

So says Billy Bragg. Is he being unreasonable? 🤬

OP posts:
ChocSaltyBalls · 26/03/2023 11:58

Rainbowshit · 25/03/2023 21:20

@Albiboba Rainbowshit
To quote Germaine Greer. "Women have very little idea of how much men hate them."

I think they know.

I really didn't. It's becoming very clear to me now. Feeling quite distressed by the hate shown recently towards women just wanting to speak.

What’s worse is when it comes from other women. There are quite a lot of women like this on a FB group I am on. Dick pandering handmaids.

Chrysanthemum5 · 26/03/2023 11:59

Men didn't lose rights they lost privileges and it says a lot about Billy Bragg that he thinks that was an issue

NeverDropYourMooncup · 26/03/2023 12:05

VickyEadieofThigh · 26/03/2023 11:46

The equivalent - for those saying "Well, he's right in a sense..." is to ask if you'd agree with someone saying "In America, black people's rights were won at the expense of white people's"?

This is the point at which Morrissey fans turn up and make excuses for his whining and ranting.

There's just something about middle class white men who were popular in the 1980s...

EggyBreads · 26/03/2023 12:06

He's coming across as really hard of thinking.

User135644 · 26/03/2023 12:14

EsmeShelby · 26/03/2023 11:58

Men didn't lose the vote when women got the vote. And they still have single sex spaces.

Most men didn't have the vote either.

Nanny0gg · 26/03/2023 12:14

VickyEadieofThigh · 25/03/2023 21:13

When someone shows you who they are, believe them.

Bragg is a misogynist arsehole and he's just given us absolute proof.

His persistent defence of males' rights to take what they want from women is underlined - right here.

^^This

And he called out KJK for 'allowing' Nazis at her rally but not a word about the abuse she had to deal with from trans 'allies'

EsmeShelby · 26/03/2023 12:18

all men had the vote before women got the vote. And none of them lost it because women got the vote.

Mark19735 · 26/03/2023 12:28

Rainbowshit · 26/03/2023 11:01

@Mark19735

(even though, patently and demonstrably, sex does and always has mattered hugely in most professions).

Could you explain which professions sex matters in please? I can think of a few where sex matters but most?! Really?!

Men are biologically just the right people to be CEOs, doctors, scientists, mathematicians?

That's quite a leap - from me saying sex matters, to you concluding that men are better suited to being CEOs. I never said that.

But then, I expect you know I didn't actually suggest that and you just wanted to keep the conversation going as a gambit, perhaps?

But, seeing as you asked (and totally off-topic, by the way - but you are the OP so I guess it's your thread):

Airline pilot. Training costs of £200k plus. Starting salary is subsistence wage. Probability of a male trainee being able to amortise those costs over a 40 year working life - X%. Probably of a female trainee doing the same - Y%.
Y is almost always lower than X. Because, you know, evolutionary factors, hormones, teratogenic risks of long-term exposure to ionizing radiation at high altitude, other reproductive health factors, e.g. jet lag and changes to circadian rhythms, challenges with nursing babies whilst away etc. Then, for good measure, add in the differences in how men and women age, the differing likelihoods of contracting long-term sickness that affects suitability for work at altitude such as osteoporosis etc.. Followed by the requirements to maintain flying currency and recency to maintain an Air Transport Pilot's License, and the costs of simulator time, check flights, and lower first-time pass rates that accompany skill fade, etc. And that's before you factor in the societal factors such as extended periods of maternity leave, the stress of being a parent to a young family whilst working in differing time-zones from one day to the next. Bottom line is there are biological and social reasons why female pilots will on average have a shorter career in the cockpit than male pilots. The economics of how pilot training is funded means that only the already very wealthy would consider it a sensible economic decision. As a result, women account for about 5% of the world's commercial pilots. Sex matters.

I used Airline pilot because a) I know the industry well, but also b) specifically because it has better understood biological factors than other professions. Hopefully not too many people will take issue with that. But you can substitute any profession that has high initial and mid-career training costs borne by the individual (post-graduate qualifications, MBAs, etc.) and the same financial asymmetry will apply. And you can also substitute any profession where "nights out of bed" is a significant factor - offshore oil and gas engineer, naval architect, firefighter and you'll see similar imbalances.

If you take a more generous and broader definition of 'profession' to include 'the trades' the roles where numbers of men dominate increases further. Forestry, construction, mining, electricity generation and distribution, waste and waste water treatment, heavy industry ... all dominated by men. These jobs are dangerous, dirty, difficult (physically) and most often, done by men. It's in the clean, safe, steady, indoor jobs (CEOs, finance, medicine, academia and education, public sector administration) where women have been beating down the door and claiming for themselves the 'rights' to access these roles (and quite rightly, too). But I stand by the comment you took umbrage to - in most professions there are clearly identifiable factors (e.g. numbers of applicants, duration in role, reasons for leaving the industry) where sex differences between men and women explain any observed differences in the numbers of men and women thriving in those roles. Because sex has always mattered. It's taken TRAs to make the women who liked the useful fiction that sex didn't matter (when it came to getting better pay and cushier jobs) realise this.

ditalini · 26/03/2023 12:32

User135644 · 26/03/2023 11:47

"Don’t you think men said ‘what about our right to single sex spaces?’*

That's the point he's making. Male only spaces and clubs were challenged.

Men have single sex spaces when they need them, or when it's important for the reasons tbey were set up : eg gay men's spaces to socialise together and express their same sex attraction, mental health groups.

Some of these are under attack actually in the name of inclusion by......transmen. Funny that (not really funny).

gogohmm · 26/03/2023 12:43

@Mark19735

The other factor with airline pilots is that traditionally a fair number come from the armed forces which until fairly recently had heavy restrictions on female recruitment, this is changing but the time lag in relation to then leaving to become commercial pilots and the stigma against women being in the military (in most roles women are equal to men!) means that there will be an unequal number of female military pilots feeding commercial aviation.

CuriouslyDifferent · 26/03/2023 12:49

Male here - he’s been a weirdo since the 80’s when I first encountered him.

I’m not exactly sure what we lost by women gaining anything…. Doesn’t it actually enhance our partnerships if your partner is able, capable, empowered, takes accountability and responsibility. Doesn’t society benefit from a system where we all get to choose what our individual paths look like - as long as it’s not at the expense of another’s chosen path.

my only bugbear, is that i do know some parents who would rather be SAH, and can’t.

Bragg is a moron.

monsteramunch · 26/03/2023 13:00

@User135644

Most men didn't have the vote either.

But they all had the right to vote before women did.

And they didn't lose their right to vote when women were given the right to vote.

C8H10N4O2 · 26/03/2023 13:03

CuriouslyDifferent · 26/03/2023 12:49

Male here - he’s been a weirdo since the 80’s when I first encountered him.

I’m not exactly sure what we lost by women gaining anything…. Doesn’t it actually enhance our partnerships if your partner is able, capable, empowered, takes accountability and responsibility. Doesn’t society benefit from a system where we all get to choose what our individual paths look like - as long as it’s not at the expense of another’s chosen path.

my only bugbear, is that i do know some parents who would rather be SAH, and can’t.

Bragg is a moron.

That was my experience of Bragg at that time. The "big" man, knew exactly what was right for everyone else.

The whole thing is a false equivalence ignoring that women moving toward some degree of equality does not pose safeguarding risks to men and claiming that safeguarding for women is a "privilege" which must be surrendered for the sensitivities of what IME is overwhelmingly middle class white men who are gender non conforming (or find it a convenient stick to beat us with).

NeverDropYourMooncup · 26/03/2023 13:03

CuriouslyDifferent · 26/03/2023 12:49

Male here - he’s been a weirdo since the 80’s when I first encountered him.

I’m not exactly sure what we lost by women gaining anything…. Doesn’t it actually enhance our partnerships if your partner is able, capable, empowered, takes accountability and responsibility. Doesn’t society benefit from a system where we all get to choose what our individual paths look like - as long as it’s not at the expense of another’s chosen path.

my only bugbear, is that i do know some parents who would rather be SAH, and can’t.

Bragg is a moron.

I have the feeling that what they think has been lost is the feeling of being God's Chosen Ones, made in His own image and therefore the only perfect humans compared to the serpent loving, apple carrying, formed from an offcut like the crappy mini pancake at the end of Shrove Tuesday, females created purely so Men had somewhere to put their penises and to sweep up.

Socrateswasrightaboutvoting · 26/03/2023 13:07

minou123 · 26/03/2023 11:39

A PP asked "did men lose the right to vote - No?" but missed the fairly obvious point that after women's suffrage was achieved, men's votes only accounted for 50% of the theoretical maximum votes cast. Oh ... and men also, eventually, started losing their "right" to single sex spaces (e.g. Royal & Ancient Golf Club, St Andrews etc.).

That's was me @Mark19735

It's not me that missed the point.

The fact that men's votes only accounted for 50% after women's suffrage, doesnt mean they lost the RIGHT to vote.
Men lost the PRIVILEGE of being the only sex to choose which political.party should be in government.

Braggs twitter is about RIGHTS not privilege.

Oh.....and, if you think women protecting themselves from sexual assault and violence is the same as men wanting to have drink in a golf club, you need to seriously rethink your life choices.
Sit the fuck down.

+1

User135644 · 26/03/2023 13:11

ditalini · 26/03/2023 12:32

Men have single sex spaces when they need them, or when it's important for the reasons tbey were set up : eg gay men's spaces to socialise together and express their same sex attraction, mental health groups.

Some of these are under attack actually in the name of inclusion by......transmen. Funny that (not really funny).

Agree, Bragg and his ilk are idiots but I think there is a fundamental point that single sex male spaces were under attack for a long time by feminists even recently (even if it was just male only 'gentlemen' clubs).

Safe spaces for women should be a given.

Rosula · 26/03/2023 13:17

Well, yes and no. Women's views now count as much as men's in elections, so governments have to worry about protecting women's rights; we're taking jobs that previously would have been done by men, but in many cases if women didn't do them there would be a major shortage of labour; they can no longer expect to keep everything we bring to a marriage financially as well as what they bring; they can be divorced against their will; if they are, they won't automatically get custody of the children, and if their children live with their mother they will still have to maintain them; they can't sack them for the getting married or getting pregnant, or for rejecting their advances; they can no longer get away with abusing, attacking and raping women.

But the point is that that is just redressing the balance - it is taking back rights that women should have had all along, and arguably that men took away from them. So, the final analysis is that he's talking nonsense, which we all knew anyway.

SallySunrise · 26/03/2023 13:19

When you're accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.

But also. Prick.

McSlowburn · 26/03/2023 13:25

He's completely right and not being unreasonable either.

McSlowburn · 26/03/2023 13:26

As in, it's a necessary thing.

MagpiePi · 26/03/2023 13:39

Albiboba · 25/03/2023 21:14

If one gender are taking 100% then they are going to perceive it as a “loss” for it to go to 50/50. But it’s not really a loss but no gender, or race has the right to an upper hand.

Do you mean things like where women are demanding half the spaces in men’s sports and men’s prisons?

Men have ‘lost’ the rights to things like rape in marriage, owning women and all their property including children. I’m doing a literal MN sobbing and shaking for those hard done by blokes.

loislovesstewie · 26/03/2023 13:51

BB was recently photographed with sex workers who were campaigning for better contracts. I think we can draw our conclusions.

loislovesstewie · 26/03/2023 13:52

Actually it was strippers. Just to be clear.

smileladiesplease · 26/03/2023 13:56

He's really dim no idea why anyone gives the little prick air time

jellyfrizz · 26/03/2023 14:11

Wait, so rights ARE like pie?