Are the majority of men good guys?

[Musings32]

(nc incase outing)

There was a discussion in my place of work today which has really got me thinking. Some of the men in work were talking about how the vast majority of men are really good men, treat women well, step up properly as fathers and husbands and are completely dedicated to their families and kids etc and it's only a small minority of men who aren't or who justify abuse/ cheating/ not parenting presently enough or act in otherwise disrespectful ways towards their spouse/ family/ women.

I was actually really surprised at how many of the women in work agreed with them because I would have said the majority of men tend to let women and children down in lots of ways and can be really harmful or unreliable.

Personally I haven't had good experiences with a lot of men throughout my life and my marriage taught me that you can think you really know and trust someone and still not know what they are actually capable of- that someone can love you but still be profoundly selfish and justify anything to themselves. I also work in a field where I see the worst of people in general a lot of the time, and it's noticeable that male violence and abuse tends to be more prevalent. I then thought maybe my own experiences and line of work are skewing the picture so I thought I'd poll it to see what others think, maybe to either (hopefully) give myself a reality check or to know I'm not crazy!

So:
YABU I believe the majority of men are "good" men
YANBU I believe "good" men exist but are in the minority

This absolutely. At best the "good guys" are passive. How many men have a friend in their friendship circle who they banter about being pervy or letchy. Give them a name like Pervy Pete think women are fair game for him but draw the line of him being left alone with THEIR girlfriend.

The Daniel sloss story is an example of this yet I don't know many men at all that has resonated with because again passively most men don't think it's their problem. Unless it's their daughter or girlfriend/wife. Many men quickly change their viewpoint of not all men when they are telling a daughter their view of boys she may date or spend time with. Suddenly it is all men and all boys.

I'm certainly not hearing any men discuss any of that
So you conclude that they approve of it and would do the same given the opportunity?

What good men would want to have anything to do with a woman with such thoughts?

I think the majority will cheat if they think they can get away with it
This is how silly as any comment from men that would say to each other 'I think the majority of women would accept e tra money from another man if they could get away with it'.

My man a good one. So is my son. My husband divorced because his previous wife cheated on him. I can definitely say that neither of them would have any interest in a relationship with a woman who believes that the majority of men would cheat given the chance or that they are shit because they don't choose to discuss how crap their fellows are when they get together to relax.

Good men prefer the company of women who judge them for twho they are rather than biased generalisations.

Wow, so many 'my DH is a good man but does x,y and z horrible/useless things' on here. I guess that's the low bar right there.

At 50 I'm completely over men, I know a few who appear 'good ones' but then everyone I've been with appeared to be a good one - until they weren't. And i had to wait 20 years for one to show his true colours so you really never can be sure.

I think Mumsnet is skewed because women don’t come on here and say how wonderful their husband or partner is.

For me - I had a wonderful dad, a fantastic husband and I am bringing up a son. So my answer is based on those interactions. But no, I don’t think the majority of men are bad

I think most men I’ve encountered, especially romantically are good people, but have bad traits. Bad / annoying / frustrating traits don’t mean you’re a shit person - I always think I must have some bad traits too. ‘Nobody’s prefect’ and all that.

The abusive, sociopathic men - I think they are in the minority, in the grand scheme of things.

In relation to how this conversation came about - it would be an odd dynamic for men to make that statement and all the women gang up together and say ‘NO! ALL MEN ARE TRASH’ in a workplace setting. I can imagine they agreed as it avoids conflict / sour dragged out discussion

How on earth would anyone know if the majority of men (or indeed women) in the world are good or bad?

And I wouldn't use MN as your barometer as a lot of people (usually women) will only come on to a public forum if they have something to complain about (usually men).

From personal experience I must have been lucky as I have had many great men in my life including my DH.

But I would say that the majority of people in general are good. It's just that we only really ever hear about the bad ones! Nobody makes the news for being a really decent person...

The Daniel sloss story is an example of this yet I don't know many men at all that has resonated with because again passively most men don't think it's their problem
You mean men are selfish and more focused on themselves? Humans just like animals are selfish by nature. Women included. Do you find it outrageous that women don't focus on the fact that suicidal rates are significantly more prevalent in young men? How disgusting that women go out together and prefer to talk about how men are shit rather than discuss how they could volunteer for charities that help young men.

I am amazed how totally deluded some women can be genuinely believing they are so much better than their counterpart, the counterpart they pick to have children with and raise future boys with. Thankfully, they are a minority in the real world!

As Father's I think the vast majority are disappointing. I only know of one man who I can think of who has 100% pulled his weight and done at least half of the grunt work with raising his DC and that is my best friends DH. My own EXH had very little to do with our DC when we spilt and he met somebody else, our young adult DC barely see him now. I am recently out of a 2nd marriage having found him on a dating website yet he insists he is a 'good guy'. There is good and bad in both sexes but it seems far more men than women can walk away from their DC without too much guilt. Yet alone the violence experienced by women at the hands of men. Shame really, far better off single.

Plenty of women are exactly like that too.

At 50 I'm completely over men, I know a few who appear 'good ones' but then everyone I've been with appeared to be a good one - until they weren't
And maybe they say exactly the sane about you!

I'm going to go ahead and reverse the question:

Are the majority of women good gals/girls?

I'm not trying to be goady, I'm trying to keep balanced. Because that sort of question does invite a lot of vitriol from women who hate men which then leads to the discussion being totally one-sided.

My ex is a deeply abusive man. The world thinks he's a great guy but he's one of the most dangerous men you could meet. I know 2 policemen, 1 is a violent bully at home, the other is just common or garden sexist, another guy is seen as a pillar of the community but his wife has told me how awful he is to her behind closed doors, I know there's a rapist out there who got away scott free...I'm just not seeing much evidence of it being rare.

To the outside world, my DH is just about perfect.

Everyone thinks he is kind, caring, thoughtful, does lots around the house, is an actual 50% parent. He treats me well, he cooks for me, affectionate, lovely....

He still cheated on me whilst I was pregnant with DD2.

There will never be a day where I do not think the absolute worst of men.

Yes, I do generally think the majority of women are good.

It is why we make up a small percentage of crime committers.

Ffs

How about facts and evidence? That's how people know. Domestic violence, rape, sexual assault, who owns the power, use of prostitutes, sex tourism, prison numbers, porn consumption, pay gaps, CEO numbers...Hard to argue with actual data.

Unfortunately not. You only have to spend a small amount of time on this site to realise that there’s very few good husbands and good men out there. I think most of them put on the facade of being good but given the opportunity they’ll treat women horribly and try and get away with the bare minimum

The other thing is, how do they know that their mates are 'good guys'? If 1 in 5 women are abused in their lifetime then say 1 in 10 men are domestic abusers. If a man has an average of 150 Facebook friends and two thirds are men, he will know 10 people who do or have abused their partner. And these abusers will never admit to it in public. They're often good company and charming and generous. Which is one of the reasons that women stay with them as they think no one will believe them, that people will believe the nice friendly guy who is upset that his wife 'went crazy'. No one is going to say 'I give my wife the silent treatment any time my wife goes out without me so she has learned its not worth it'...they'll say 'Sarah isn't a big drinker - she prefers to stay home with the kids'. They won't say 'I sulk so much when my partner doesn't feel like sex that she feels forced into saying yes', they'll say 'I have a healthy sex life. They won't say that their partner is in debt because they don't let their wife have access to family finances, despite not helping with the logistics for their disabled child which means she can't work. They'll say 'Sophie's bad with money. So it's minimising the whole issue to say that all the guys they know are great husbands and fathers - there is absolutely no way they can know this. And it's statistically impossible that none of them are close friends with men who are really awful to their partners

I know a man who worked while his wife was a SAHP. He thought that gave him free reign to stay out whenever he wanted. He went out drinking and taking drugs a couple of nights a week, football on Saturdays, lads holidays for any friends major birthday etc. He cheated. He was absolutely blindsided when she left him. He genuinely considers himself a great husband and father as he earned well and coached one of his sons rugby team once a week

Yeah, most of the women I've worked with were exactly the same . .

Majority are not perfect, but are merely human.

humans make mistakes!

In my experience I have met more 'bad' men than women, men who will cheat lie ect.

But I've also met many women who did the same.

To meet a 'good' man who matched your expectations is a rare find.

I’m not convinced of that in the slightest.

Yes, we make up a smaller percentage of offenders but we are also physically weaker and unable to actually overpower a man to the point of doing them serious harm. There is also the fact that men are typically too ashamed to admit they’ve been attacked or hurt by a woman, and therefore don’t ever consider making a report or even telling a friend about their experience.

Why do you believe women are fundamentally all that different to men in terms of how “good” they are, out of interest?

I can only base my opinion on my own experience and the lens of what I know of my partners, couple of generations of men and women in my own family and friends. I’m sorry your experience is different, and you’ve clearly been in some awful situations but I didn’t say it’s rare. I said from my perspective those men are in the minority. We’re talking in the thousands out of the millions of men in this country. For instance, there have been about 40k convictions in 2024 of violence against women (we know that this is likely to be higher because of evidence or reporting) but in relation to 30 million men that actually reside in the UK - I would say that is a minority. We do have to also consider the absent dads and the men that aren’t abusive but do nothing to share workloads as that’s what OP has specified, but again, I couldn’t sit here and say all / bad majority of men.

The majority of people are "good". Otherwise society just wouldn't work.

Most men, just like most women, are perfectly normal, boring, bill paying, trying to do their best with what they have, type of people. A strange thing has happened to society over the past few decades. We have lost sight of the differences between men and women. This is mostly an us problem. Men have never really done this, but we seem to have changed our thinking and expect men to act and think like we do. This is clearly a nonsensical point of view. But it's so deeply rooted in most workplaces and schools that we (women) just don't see it anymore. Then we are all shocked and surprised when we see man behaving like men.

Men were never the child rearing types. They will quite happily work 12 hours a day, breaking their backs to pay the bills, but changing nappies just isn't their thing. And it never was.

Most men a great. And we would be fucked without them.

I'll wait for the pile on . . .

My ex is a deeply abusive man. The world thinks he's a great guy but he's one of the most dangerous men you could meet. I know 2 policemen, 1 is a violent bully at home, the other is just common or garden sexist, another guy is seen as a pillar of the community but his wife has told me how awful he is to her behind closed doors, I know there's a rapist out there who got away scott free...I'm just not seeing much evidence of it being rare
My neighbour is a nurse. Her patients love her, but in her house, she is a bully. I hear her scream and shout at her husband and kids every night. She bullies me her neighbour, always finding something to complain about, threatening to report me although I do nothing wrong.

From this experience and a handful si.ilar ones, I think women are inheritantly bullies......

And what about all the threads from women bitching about other women, ghosting their friends, sending nasty messages to their MIL or DIL? The women who block their kids from seeing their dad or who move in random men after a couple of months and let them live with their small children?