To think it is actually mostly men?

[Nolpp]

Maybe I didn’t get the memo in the past but in the last year or so I’ve been so bitterly disappointed by make behaviour. I look back and wonder if it was always this way but I’m only just noticing. I think part of it is I recently became a single parent and so I’ve had more dealings with men than I would usually, as I’ve had to speak to insurance companies, take car for MOT etc. Obviously I did some of these things before and I know women also work in these places but overall I am having more interaction with men.

Examples…

Driving. Whenever a car is right up behind me it is ALWAYS a man driving. I drive at the speed limit, not under, so presumably they think speed limits don’t apply to them.

I recently donated to a sponsorship for cancer research, an old school friend, quite literally not spoken in over two decades. He then messaged me to thank me for the donation and followed it up with a question about sex and positions he can do after his surgery. Why would anyone think that’s ok?

A colleague, well respected in his industry, tells me when drunk on a night out that he wishes all women conformed to the way of the 50s and stayed at home. He wasn’t joking.

In Sainsbury’s a week ago, a man grabbed my arse in a queue, I was shocked and stepped to one side, didn’t know what to do and said get the fuck away from me. I was next up for the till and the man behind the till said he does it to everyone !!! What the actual fuck? He did follow up to say they had tried to ban him from the shop. I cried in the car afterwards, it was awful.

Waiting for the baby changing unit in Mc Donnalds. A man eventually emerges, mutters sorry but he couldn’t wait, and looked sheepish. He wasn’t unwell, he was downing a Mc flurry when I came out.

Around 7 years ago I used to date someone who had recently got a job as a Judge in the family courts. He was very young to have got this job and in part it was to do with his father being a judge in the same court. Anyway one day we were talking about how money is worked out in a divorce and he said ‘it’s disgusting, women expect to be paid out after staying at home doing nothing with kids for fifteen years, so rather than getting a job of their own they steal the x husband’s pension.’ I am ashamed to say I laughed and agreed with him. I had a good job with no interest in giving it up so I felt I was compatible with this man who I now see was a bit of a monster.

I honestly feel like men make up the bulk of shit behaviour. It probably sounds dramatic but I actually feel sad about it, genuinely sad. And embarrassed that it’s taken me until this late in life to see it.

Yes, I know it’s not all men.

Rant over.

My husband actually confronted his boss and couple of other senior colleagues once because they were being misogynistic idiots on a work trip.
He subsequently missed out on a promotion and was eventually pushed out - which he didn’t even mind that much. I‘m proud of what he did, but did it prompt his boss and the others to ‚do better‘? I doubt it.

Oh here we go, the defensive aggression.

I could go through and copy and paste every piece of anti male rhetoric in this thread but I don't have all night. I mean literally a minute ago I saw a post saying she can't 'parent the maleness out of her son'
Is that what we need to do? Like some kind of exorcism, forced castration perhaps?
Of course you don't care about anti-male rhetoric you are a woman that hates men.

And 'tone deaf' ha! Just in case you hadn't noticed, you are in AIBU, a board set up purely to answer the question 'am I being unreasonable?' and trigger debate. If people only want sympathetic posts and a head stroke there are plenty of boards for that.

That's because he's a good guy & he tried. This is all they can do.

My Husband is always calling certain men even though he has a lot of good mates. One of his friends has just had a stroke and the golf friends had a charity day to raise money for the friend and his partner. He has been so proud about it and very emotional. They aren't all bad.

I've also seen lots of male kindness at work when we lost a colleague.

I could go on but I've probably outed myself with this username.

Why don't posters just say what they want the good men to do to help. Give them something instead of calling the women who live with them. We want to help.

I think there is an almost DARVO-esque situation going on sometimes whereby some women justify their disdain for men by saying "oh, they hate us females sooo much."

Meanwhile the average guy is like "uhhh, you what?"

I'm a bit confused about your last comment, explain.

Nah I think some of us have had abuse leers and grim comments shouted at us by random men in the streets just too many times to not see a pattern…

That poster was clearly saying her son is aggressive to her and others, despite her parenting.
What do you suggest she does? Tell him he's just one of the small minority of violent men?

Men need to own this shit. Personally a good start would be some basic policy things. Making "inciting hatred of women" illegal and banning it so toxic men like Andrew Tate/ Roosh V/ Jordan Peterson can't make a tonne of money and influence teenagers by being misogynist. Make violent porn illegal. Make age verification necessary. Make porn hosting companies legally responsible for their content and shut them down when they are hosting videos of rape/revenge porn.

Men need to start challenging misogyny when they see it, so it becomes socially unacceptable to make misogynistic jokes/grope women etc.

None of this will happen because most men just actually don't care. They either opt out (I'm not like that, it's a tiny minority of men, why should I suffer for their actions) or they benefit from the status quo and like it.

Meanwhile women don't get the option to opt out and have to live in a world where we are treated as second class to men in a myriad of ways.

Agree with all that Adam I would add lock down porn so only available to over 21s.

And as a case in point, today's headline:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66982160

Only men do this. Its disgusting and those of you saying "it's a small minority of men" are basically accepting dead women as collateral damage to misogyny.

@AdamRyan why are you ignoring my question. What do you want the people who are misogynistic to do to help?

@AdamRyan missed your last post. Will read.

It doesn't matter what posters say though because you aren't listening to them. Every man I know would protect a woman if they were being mistreated by another man.

Yes, I completely agree with you, and unfortunately I notice it more and more too the older I get.

As an aside, I work in a patient facing role, and it always amazes me how often women phone to book their husbands appointments. I wish women would stop doing this - we are not a man's secretary or PA.

Surely he has lunchbreaks that he can call in, the same as women do? Or he could call before or after work? It really bloody annoys me, and perpetuates the idea that we are the little woman whose purpose in life is to look after their husband.

Obviously I'm not including men who have health conditions or genuine reasons why they can't pick up a phone.

Well firstly, to listen. Properly listen when women speak of their experiences, with your focus on what they are saying rather than on planning your own defence.
For a lot of good men, tbh, once they've done that and accepted it and have a genuine desire to help, they find their own way.
They may challenge sexism when they see it, they may use their vote to support candidates who campaign to try to make the world safer for women. They might use their own power and privelege to uplift women to places where they can be heard and have influence, rather than passively colluding with male gatekeeping of these positions.
Its not about 50 year old Nigel being expected to take on 6 huge young misogynists when he's only 5' 6" and 9 stone. That's just a trope wheeled out by men who want to pretend there's nothing they can do.
There's plenty men can do that should lie easily within their personal comfort zones and doesn't earn them a beating. Maybe you could also think of some things now I've got you started?

That poor kid. Doesn't surprise me at all to read this wasn't the first time she'd been targeted by her male superiors, and the crap way it was handled the first time influenced her decision not to report her boss, her feeling like she had nowhere to turn. And yet women not working in the armed forces and the fire service and the police in greater numbers is somehow held against them by some posters on this thread, some sort of ringing endorsement of men??

This girl wanted to serve her country, to protect it, defied convention and expectations to do so - and instead of being respected for that by her male colleagues, she was treated like prey.

For me it was the Amber Gibson case which just proved to me it is NOT 'a tiny minority of men'. She had to be rescued as an infant from an abusive father, then as a teen was raped by a different man, then sexually assaulted and strangled to death by her own brother, and THEN - somehow this seemed like the worst thing of all - her corpse was found by another, completely random and unrelated passer by, who chose - instead of raising the alarm - to sexually molest her dead body and then hide it under a bush. Then went home, and got on with his life.

She was 16 when she died.

If anyone can tell me of a single case in this world of a male who has been so consistently abused, degraded and dehumanised by multiple unrelated women, who has had such a short, brutal and utterly victimised life at the hands of the opposite sex, I'd eat my damn head with my hat on it. If anyone can find me a single case of a woman convicted of sexually abusing the corpse of a total stranger they happened upon while out for a walk, likewise. How can people see a story like this and NOT recognise that the major danger to women and girls in their daily life is men? And how can you acknowledge that and not want it recognised and dealt with? And how can you possibly chastise women who want to protect themselves from this sort of depravity?

Maybe you could also think of some things now I've got you started?

Patronising.

I'm a woman by the way.

Perhaps if the thread had been about what men and women can do to help rather than pointless comments about how shit men are and slagging women off who are in good relationships with one.

I find it informative and it would help people understand how to make things better.

D you think any of the people in Stephen Corrigan's life, if asked, would have for a second imagined that if he found the body of a dead teenager in the park he would sexually molest and hide it? Do you really?

Do you think if Emma Pattison had thought for a minute her husband would shoot dead their seven-year-old daughter and her before turning the gun on himself, she would have been in that house with him?

The thing about dangerous predators is they don't wear a badge. How often, when a man is convicted of doing something utterly horrendous, does everyone interviewed - his family, his neighbours - say "oh well yes, it was only a matter of when really"? It's almost always "I can't believe it, it's such a shock, he seemed such a nice man/such a good father/so quiet and retiring". People don't look to see, so they don't see. But likewise, when the light is actually turned on these men's lives, there is almost always a trail of activity which led up to the ultimate act that gets them caught/prosecuted. People can convince themselves of anything, rather than see the truth - that a lot of men are either deliberately or opportunistically predatory.

But why should those women behave in a way you deem acceptable if making appointments for their husbands doesn’t actually bother them?
Given that trying to make an appointment usually means being put on hold and having to wait for a (long) while, maybe it is easier for them to make the call?
Maybe they work from home/ work part time/ don’t work at all?

Posters on MN often make it out as if most women carried the mental load for the whole family while working full time.
While that’s certainly true for some, it’s not always the case.
FWIW, I know several families where the woman happily stays at home or works (very) reduced hours and lets her husband be the breadwinner.

I do think that several different issues are being lumped together on this thread - some posters talk about actual male violence, while others just list everything that bothers them about men.

I don't think I'm being niave to think my Husband is not going to shag a dead body if he happened to come across one or the family pet.

But you said "every man you know". You know a lot of men. Statistically it's very unlikely at least one of them isn't a rapist or abuser. As in vanishingly unlikely.

Fwiw before a relative was revealed to be sexually abusing his adult daughters, I would NEVER - literally never in a million years - have imagined this was something he would do. Obviously his daughters were the victims, but his wife was utterly devastated as well - she had no idea, none. I spent a lot of time with the family, and thought they he was a completely normal person - if anything a bit dull. But this was going on for years.

You really, honestly, do NOT know what someone is capable of. The fact you think you do is exactly how these things happen. Noone would get away with sexual abuse if they went around being obviously creepy (except maybe Jimmy Daville or someone equivalently powerful). That incident in my own circle brought that home to me hard. The Amber Gibson story just confirms it. Men can do utterly appalling things to women and still give every impression of being a normal, decent man. Women too can hide their true selves; it's just very, very unlikely that when revealed, that true self will involve rape, incest or sexual abuse at anything like the same rate that this occurs with men.

@herewegoroundthebastardbush you are right. I shouldn't have said every man I know. I meant every man I spend time with who I'm close to (because I like them).

@herewegoroundthebastardbush I also understand what you are saying that nobody can be 100% sure. I meant that I'm pretty sure if I was out with them and a women was being mistreated then they would help her. If they didn't, I would be very angry with them.

You are being naive to think your husband somehow exemplifies all men.

And unfortunately lots of women (myself included) have the experience of thinking their husband is a "good one" and then finding that in fact they were just very good at hiding their misogyny.

I really hope that doesn't happen to you, in my opinion the fact it hasn't so far your good luck.