“Men have to fight in wars and do the protecting and heavy lifting”

[DogEar]

So says a male colleague as he monologues about female privilege.
I’m rather sick of it. I’ve moved offices over this but can still hear him droning on about women - the lazy entitled part of humanity.

I’ve argued - men fight in wars, do the protecting, do the heavy lifting, because this is the patriarchy - this is literally what has been created by men. He argues back harder, so I, and others in the office, have given up, yet he still drones on.

Apparently women can do nothing without men. Totally ignoring the many women who have had their inventions and discoveries stolen by men and not had any credit, including writers, composers, artists, scientists, astronomers, etc.

I recently read a convincing theory that Einstein’s work was largely carried out by his first wife, Mileva Einstein-Maric, who was his intellectual superior. I guess this is something we’ll never know, but at the very least she supported his work heavily, but very few know her name or her involvement in Einstein’s work.

If women need protecting it’s from men. If we go to war it’s men behind it (or a tiny number of women within a patriarchal society). Heavy lifting? If it’s so heavy I can’t lift it I can involve a friend, job sorted.

YABU - women owe men a debt of gratitude, we are so privileged (if you choose this option please explain why) and couldn’t manage without them.

YANBU - men fighting in wars, men protecting women (from men) are not female privileges.

Of course men are on average stronger than women, and the upper ends of the male and female distributions are different which is why most sports need to be divided by sex.
But in most people's everyday lives this doesn't matter much, less and less with increasing mechanical aids. There's nothing in most people's jobs nowadays which needs much muscle strength, more that requires manual dexterity... and mental abilities including working well with a team which this bloke clearly hasn't mastered.

Tell him to go to war then

Lots of men are biologically stronger than lots of women

But that doesn't mean Bob in accounts who hasn't done any sports since he left school 20 years ago and thinks it's hard work mowing the lawn is going to be stronger than Emily Campbell

In the same way, no matter how hard Emily Campbell works she's probably never going to be as strong as Hafthor Bjornsson

So no we shouldn't have male athletes who have actually trained competing in the women's section, but that doesn't mean every man is faster and stronger than every woman.

And regardless this was to do with women hunters I think? They did exist there is proof. Perhaps they weren't as fast and strong as the men but that doesn't mean they didn't exist.

I am not going to war, neither doing heavy lifting, about protecting not sure how yall going to protect yourselves if there were only women on this planet.

Leave alone being able to procreate the biological normal way etc. One of these threads which will break many gentle women's hearts in seconds 😂

You can show him this link.

https://it.usembassy.gov/ukrainian-women-fight-for-their-countrys-future/#:~:text=Women%20lead%20on%20the%20front,a%20member%20of%20Ukraine's%20Parliament.

Tell him during 1000BC we were a Goddess worshipping society and there was no conflicts or wars.. so he can stick that in his pipe and smoke it! War is a massive Willy waving activity and it pisses me off.

Maybe men could stop starting wars? Maybe they could stop being aggressive to other men and women.

Pretty sure I can manage my own heavy lifting 👍

Its almost like men create a society which enables them to be valuable. Crazy I know.

Women out perform men in ultra marathons.

Also hunting probably wasn't wild boar and hears, it's much more likely to have been rabbits, birds, squirrels, fish.

There's not point killing a bear if you don't have refrigeration or a huge number of people to feed.

A while ago I read, Letters of a Woman Homesteader, it is literally letters from a widow with a young child to her former employer.

She thinks noting of taking her toddler on a horse for a few days camping in the wild. We don't think of women 100 years ago having the independence to do that.

Who are we protecting ourselves from if there aren't any men? Lions and tigers and bears? Oh my.

I don't believe in the patriarchy.

We live in a good society - especially compared to history and other countries.. if that was all due to a male dominated society then let's thank men..

Anyway- they guys sounds like an idiot. Ask him if he's able to protect you and if he has a sixpack..

2 women a week being killed by men
97% of women sexually harrassed
20% of women sexually assaulted (that we know of)
35% of fathers not paying CM when they are obligated to do so

Yeah I'm going to hold off thanking men at the moment tbh

Does he have a female partner ?

Who are we protecting ourselves from

No one is really serious about getting rid of men. We are just tired of men like the one the OP works with saying that we are privileged, lazy and entitled.

Do you feel privileged, lazy and entitled in your 'gentle woman heart'?

Tell him to look up the Kurdish resistance against Isis in Syria, large numbers of female led groups. I'd like to see how he'd fare in front line combat against the most brutal and medieval theocratic regime known in recent history.
Dickhead.

What do you mean by the first sentence?

Assuming you live in the UK, your parliament has only 35 per cent female representation and has formal mechanism for that minority of women to take maternity leave.

*no formal mechanism

The only thing most women may need protection from is men !

When I meet people like him (mostly on Twitter but also IRL I ask them what regiment they were in and when did they serve - maybe we overlapped.

Always, without exception, I get deafening silence in return

The number of non-combatant and combatant casualties in war are roughly equal. This has remained constant for as long as records have been kept.

Ask him if it's more privileged to be killed huddling with your children or having been given equipment and training and sent to fight?

Hunting and gathering cultures still exist. Majority of their daily calories? Provided by women. Hunting is unreliable, digging roots and picking berries? That works every day.

Sure, perhaps we can't deadlift the same weights, but that's what tool use is for.

Much like the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers quote - women do everything men do, but with a child clinging to their leg.

There were definitely conflicts and wars in 1000 BC. Archaeologists have dug up the mass graves from them. They’ve even dug up mass graves from massacres of Neanderthals from 30,000 BC.

Athens, city named for Athena, the Goddess of War and Wisdom, was one of the most aggressive and war mongering city states in Ancient Greece. 1000 BC they were expanding and embarking on colonisation.

So whether a god or goddess is worshipped, wars still happen.

But probably not the best example to use as women can leave whereas men over 18 can't unless exempt so plays right into his hands!

I don't think either extreme is particularly helpful. Men in the Ukraine were all expected to stay and fight, risk their lives or being taken prisoner by the Russians which might be worse. All women able to leave although obviously not all did. I don't know why that is automatically expected but I don't think it means women don't have a right to complain about other things that they find unfair.

I think if we all came together and recognised each others issues and worked to put them right we would achieve more.

Do they choose to fight or are they told, "You will stay and fight." Because that seems to be the difference. Men are just expected to be happy to risk their lives and of course some of them are, in my family going back to WWI and II they were all volunteers with some lying about their age to go while still children but some aren't and back in those wars would be given white feathers and even imprisoned. If they went and couldn't hack it many of them were stood against a wall and shot by their own side.

So it all comes back to the woman's fault. Great.

Don’t you have an HR department that you could report this shit too. My company would be re-educating him sharpish! Which is why a bit of “woke” in the right place is a very positive thing.