"Not all men” replies are ridiculous

[GarlicFound]

Generalisations exist for a reason. There's no need to point out that there are exceptions. When you want to highlight that your comment's universal, you say "All children", for instance. Generalising to "Children" implies "Children in general, for the most part, usually".

Everybody knows this. So there's no need to specify "NOT ALL MEN" each and every time anyone makes a general observation about men, goddamit!

You don't say "Not all dogs [have four legs]" or "Not all ice-cream [is cold]".

Having a penis doesn't make you especially vulnerable to generalisations. So grow up, please, and accept that YOU or your DH are not "all men" - general comments aren't intended to single you out. And if you feel like they are, you're a bit thick, not to mention narcissistic.

As far as violence goes, men pose an even bigger danger to other men. It's surprising so many are keen to downplay this. Men also rape men, and men get beaten up by male partners.

Women make easier targets for violent men, of course.

This is a good point.

Oh, dear, should I have said Not All Men pose an even bigger danger to Some Other Men, Not All Men rape Some Men, and Specific Men get beaten up by Some Male partners?

Or do we only have to qualify 'men' when we're talking about them harming women or children?

Lol you literally report a statistic that women commit at higher rates than men.

For emotional abuse, prevalence rates were high, averaging around 80%; 40% of women and 32% of men reported expressive aggression

Emotional abuse in intimate relationships: The role of gender and age - PMC

If you say it in capitals, it must be true!!!!

Agree

Often means, not most men

Surely it depends on the subject, how the post is written and the contents of the post. I Icould say “men love footballl”. While it would obviously be factually correct to reply to with “not all men”, there’s not much point because hopefully it is fairly obvious from the context of my post that I am not trying to say “100% of men” plus it is not derogatory.

if I said “men treat women badly” that would be a whole different matter and it would be entirely reasonable to reply witb “not all”

Erm - they're reporting as victims.

FYI, "Expressive aggression" is defined in the same paragraph as name calling. I would expect that to be fairly even.

I generally agree OP.

Generalizations are an important part of language (and our ability to organize and function in a complex world). We don't need to caveat all generalized comments with "Not all" or "I know its not 100% but..." or "I don't mean every..." because every sane and rational person knows that "men " or "women_" is a generalization, or an average, and the speaker didn't mean all.

But I would say that this issue isn't only annoying when men are used. Just that this is the case most commonly seen on here for obvious reasons.

Personally I find it annoying when you make comments about children, boys this or girls this and you get "well not all girls!!!!" yes I know. but just like with male violence, there are gender based differences that mean more girls on average (to a lesser or greater extent) will do/think/like/act in a certain way. or the same with boys.

The generalization police come to all sorts of topics.. what ever they feel sensitive about.

That being said, there earlier in the thread their is a conflation between representation in crime statistics and representation in the population (divided by gender)

As has been pointed out:

90+% of violent crimes were committed by men
=/=
A majority of men are violent.

70,000 men did a bad thing (out of 4 billion)
doesn't prove that a majority of men are bad

Likewise the posters who have listed all of the (mostly) minority groups of men who think bad things or admit to wrongdoing. There is a tendency to add up these percentages. 15% think this, 30% think this, 20% think this, 56% think this.. and then assume it = all men. When the data can't show this because the high likelihood is that these groups overlap. And being a man in one immoral group, makes it far more likely you are multiple.

Does any of this mean that we shouldn't generalize when it comes to safety? No... of course not. It doesn't matter if it is all men, as long as it is enough, the safe course of action is to act as if it were "any" man. (E.g. not walking home alone at night, not going alone to a mans house that you don't yet know/trust) etc. etc.

Both of those can be, and are true.

The majority of men are (somewhat) decent. If they weren't, society couldn't function in the manner it does.

But We are also right to be fearful and act as if the majority are bad (generalizing), because it makes no difference whether it is actually a majority or not, when one bad man can ruin many lives.

Nor all men. But effing hell, it is too many of them.

The majority of men are part of the problem.

A man who turns down the opportunity to rape an unconscious woman but not report it as in the Majorca case.
The multiple ‘normal’ family men who took part in rape Gisele Pelicot and the ones who turned down the offer of raping her also didn’t report it.

Even then those men who did take her and got caught made excuses “I’m just a family man, her husband said I could rape her so I thought it was ok”

Which do we think is more verbally threatening? An angry woman, or an angry man? Which sex causes more actual, serious harm? Who is more likely to inflict injury? Who is murdering who at a higher rate? Who commits more physical and sexual violence?

In that study:

"Women were significantly more likely to experience physical or sexual IPV and abuse of power and control alone; the prevalence of physical IPV alone was 13.3% for women and 5.8% for men, while sexual IPV alone was 4.3% for women and 0.2% for men. Women were less likely to report verbal abuse alone, and the prevalence of psychological IPV alone was 12.1% for women and 17.3% for men, respectively."

In addition, you can see insights in this study of adolescents:

"Boys and girls reported similar frequencies of overall violence, but girls reported experiencing more moderate and severe forms of violence along with more acute physical consequences. In terms of reactions, over half of boys reported “laughing” in response to physical IPV, and a third of boys ignored it. A third of the girls reported defending themselves against IPV, and 40% cried. Girls were much more likely to perceive assaults against them as serious with damaging physical and psychological effects. Boys perceived less negative impact on themselves and the relationship. The data suggest much of girls’ violence against boys may be to defend against sexual aggression."

I always think it comes from a place of fear that their Nigel might in fact act like a misogynist when she's not there.

The statistic shows that an unacceptable level of men rape women

You are showing yourself up with your posts.

embarrassing really

I always was of the attitude that most men are decent. I’m now approaching 60 and I have a wonderful decent husband so I know many many men are decent but I’m starting to think far more men, if given the opportunity and anonymity are nowhere near as decent as I used to believe.

As more cases come out of abuse against women and children and we see the numbers of men involved and the types of men involved, I’ve sadly come to belief that many men given the opportunity in circumstances would not be even close to what I considered decent.

whether it’s by actively being involved or by being a facilitator or by turning a blind eye or by having the attitude that it’s not that bad oh that it’s partly her fault or 100 other justifications

90+ % of violent crimes are men

…and this neatly illustrates the problem. Because it doesn’t mean that 90% of men are violent.

So when generalisations are made along the lines of ‘men are violent’, it’s perfectly valid to say ’not all men’.

Try this….

Most shoplifting is done by women. Women are thieves.

…do you not have an impulse to point out that NAWALT?

To extended the malteaser analogy further...
Box of 10:
1 has glass in (causing you physical harm)
3 are 100% poo inside (severe psychological harm/sex assault)
4 have varying levels of poo mixed with biscuit (misogynistic views)
2 have trace elements of poo only (probably from having to hang out with the others in the box)

Yet these men manage to get partners who hang off their every pore

Taking away from crime stats to just the everyday experience, I think a lot of it is driven by fairly low expectations of men overall and different understandings of what 'decent' means, if I'm really honest.

And many men and women have both absorbed those.

So you get women on here who talk about their husband being one of the good ones, thus acknowledging that many aren't. I know several men who I'd consider as being some of the good ones - as well.as many more who aren't! But it depends what metric women are using. If their base expectations of men are low, then their acceptance of what qualifies as 'decent' will similarly be low.

A lot of our society is immersed in misogyny. Not in the outright hatred of women but in applying expectations to men and women very differently. A lot of women have also internalised the misogyny and it makes some women very uncomfortable to hear men criticised.

I suppose the simplest example.i have is when avoiding rape is discussed. When it's suggested that women don't go out alone after dark, don't catch public transport alone, don't get drunk, watch what they wear, consider how their behaviour will be interpreted etc, its largely regarded as a positive and common sense as a means of avoiding rape. But when its reversed and people pose hypothetical solutions such as well maybe men shouldn't go out alone, mbe men shouldn't go out after dark, maybe men should avoid using public transport etc, it's feels disproportionate, unreasonable and oppressive. It feels instinctively wrong.

If this is true, how do your explain FGM? And countries where men are legally permitted to beat their wives? Porn? The popularity of Andrew Tait? The gender pay gap.....

If the vast majority of men are "decent" why are crimes against women, large and small, so prevalent as to be essentially woven into the fabric of most if not all societies

Your dog and ice-cream examples do not help your argument as dogs do have 4 legs and ice cream is cold 😂

If the vast majority of men are "decent" why are crimes against women, large and small, so prevalent as to be essentially woven into the fabric of most if not all societies

It's the 'woven into the fabric' element I was referring to, too. A lot of people.just don't see it bcause It's so normalised.

So the burden of responsibility falls to women to avoid it rather than men to not do it.

Exactly. This.

As a demographic, men have always held power over women. Humans enjoy power, so men don't want to disadvantage themselves by relinquishing it, and the patriarchy and physical strength mean that men are the ones who almost always ultimately hold the power over both an individual woman, and women as a demographic.

Whether or not men choose to use that power to inflict harm or control women, and to what extent they do so, will vary - from Afghanistan-levels, to Norway-levels. But that imbalance of power always impacts negatively on women to some degree, shaping our societies, and all men benefit from that - and I think most men will use it, even if only in subtle ways.