Still confused about patriarchy

[PixelZing]

What's the feminist take on the fact that, even if we live in such patriarchy, the attention given to issues affecting men/boys is insignificant compared to the same attention given to issues of women/girls?

The list of such issues seems pretty long to me (paternity leave, family court bias, domestic abuse shelters, unequal sentencing, workplace fatalities, due process for false accusations, under-representation in HEAL, men's health funding, suicide rates, homelessness, ...) so I'd say there is plenty to advocate about.

(and BTW I don't even understand why we clump men and boys in the same category, wouldn't be more humane to put boys in the same category of women/girls, since they are affected by similar problems that affect girls?)

would you really expect a society with patriarchal power structures to prioritise male DV shelters?

im not saying anything about whether all vulnerable people deserve our protection, rather I’m asking about the priorities of a patriarchy?

It's just the blinkered/biased view which a lot of feminists have that irks me sometimes.

Like, this narrative about the poor woman giving up her beloved career whilst the man gets to revel in the delight of management meetings. It's never the man taking on the financial stress for the rest of his life while his wife gets to take it easy even once the kids are at school. It's always "well, my husband loves working so it suits us both". Never once the slightest suggestion that perhaps he feels he has to live up to the expectations placed on men.

Now of course one reply might be "well, yes, the patriarchy hurts men too" but what's never mentioned is the female privileges that a fair number of women benefit from. It's always about the financial insecurity of 'relying on a man' rather than forging your own career.

The problem with this perspective is that's it's a typically white middle class feminist perspective. Because most feminists are white and middle class lol. If a women is working in a poorly paid job with few prospects she doesn't really have so much to lose by shacking up with a successful guy. Certainly she has much to gain.

I sometimes look at dating profiles out of morbid curiosity and there's a not insignificant number of women saying things like 'you must be financially stable/successful with your own house'. Now, nobody wants a cocklodger but when you have a care assistant making such lofty demands you have to question whether they themselves are likely to be 'financially successful' and own a house.

It's clearly not a case of a successful businesswoman looking for her equal in many of these cases. And let's be real....if a bloke started saying things like "don't message me unless you own your own house"....well, he'd be getting zero dates lol.

Fact is, an unambitious or not particularly bright woman can still enjoy a quality of life that an unambitious man almost never will. A drop dead gorgeous bloke on minimum wage might get a few shags but he's unlikely to marry a successful MC woman in most cases. However, plenty of the middle class girls I went to school with are now working extremely part time in non-career jobs and still somehow living what most people would class as a pretty privileged life. Could it be the 'successful' husband they found? 🤔

I'm not even talking about 'gold diggers' here. I'm talking about the fact that a woman who wants to stay at home will obv seek out men with a more traditional mindset and that's a privilege men aren't privy to.

A lot of feminists don't like these types of women/marital setups so they do their best to pretend they don't exist but then get all snarky when a poster says she 'wants to be a homemaker'.

And judging by the frequent 'DH not happy about me wanting to stay PT' threads it's clear that a lot of men don't actually enjoy the supposed privilege of shouldering the bulk of the financial responsibility.

i don’t have a lot of time to reply, but patriarchy affects men and well as women, for example, by expecting them to conform to quite rigid definitions of masculinity and to suppress emotions. So the things like greater levels of suicide could possibly because of a society which is less open to men discussing their feelings and seeking help because of patriarchal expectations around masculinity.

Family court bias and paternity leave - to the extent that this exists, then it is because of gender roles which expect women as the sex who carries and gives birth to babies to be the default carer which has historically been the case. And to be fair, many, many men are happy with this until they realise the court might uphold the status quo when they separate. As a feminist however, I am more concerned with the financial and professional inequalities which women face as the default parent and from longer maternity leave, childcare costs, and not being able to progress in their jobs as a result of childcare responsibilities. There are many statistics which show that it is women who are more likely to be in poverty because of caring responsibilities.

And so on. I am a mother of a son and a daughter. They face different challenges in life, yes, but only one of them faces systematic gendered inequality because of their sex.

Not that I'm in any way 'siding with men'. It's just that we hear about male privilege all the time and there's a fair bit of evidence out there that most women don't really like the man bashing element of feminism even whilst acknowledging that there are issues around male violence etc.

What got me thinking about the stuff in my above post was an old thread called something like "you're lucky if you don't have to work". Loads of posters were agreeing and saying they'd love to be ladies that lunch. A fair few posted and said they indeed felt privileged to have successful enough husbands to not have to work FT.

There were a few women saying they'd love to be able to work but couldn't due to illness or caring responsibilities etc. Others saying they loved their job. However, like we say 'not all men' the same is true here of women. Not all men are violent, but there are more violent men than women.

Not all women are ladies that lunch, but there are more ladies that lunch than lads that lunch.

It was actually a different thread in which I first saw the above discussion linked. Somebody was talking about the privileges of both sexes and they collated all the comments from the other thread. I'll see if I can find them to illustrate my point.

And this isn't meant to be an invocation to raise the feminist battle cry lol. I'm just trying to explain why I've become disenchanted with much feminist ideology over the years.

@LastRoIo

I'm just trying to explain why I've become disenchanted with much feminist ideology over the years.

Such as? What feminist ideology don't you like?

OK, here are quite a few posts you'll NEVER see a man make. All from the linked thread (not collated by me I'm afraid, I just cut and pasted the post). They were posted in response to people saying that these types of women don't really exist much outside of stereotypes.

One must surmise that if there are this many posting in a solitary mumsnet discussion then there's likely a not insignificant number of them in society.

"My sil is 44, rich and has NEVER had a job, lucky her! She has no trouble filling her day and has a great life."

"Dp earns the money then gives it to me. Why would I feel oppressed?"

"I haven't worked in 8 years and bloody love it! I got to go shopping without ds today and have a long lunch with a friend. Going to the gym now."

"My friend is married to the son of a billionaire and sometimes I have to block her on social media because her life is one long holiday."

"I dont work, I was able to be a sahm with my sons, both in 30s now. I lunch, dressmake, walk my dogs for miles, spend time with friends and family etc....I also volunteer for a small homeless charity, something I am so passionate about, being literally close to home. I feel totally fulfilled!"

"My DSis married a very high earner and has never worked a day in her life."

"My DH works 80 hours a week for a signficant amount of money, which allows me to be a SAHM and indulge myself, allow me to do all of my volunteering and my hobbies."

"I work just a few hours a week in a job I love doing, I don’t have to work for financial reasons. I’ve accidentally ended up with a really high earning DH. I enjoy having lots of time to myself, I have hobbies, an amazing spa membership and an extremely fortunate to have some really good friends whom I’m able to see nearly every week."

"My SIL is lucky enough to not have to work due to DB’s income. She has nice things, goes out for lots of lunches."

"I'm a SAHM who has teenage children and is fortunate to be married to a high earner so I haven't needed to work since having kids. We do have a lifestyle that most people would find impressive."

"I choose not to work. DH works really long shifts and odd hours so can be out of the house either days or nights, with each week being different. When the kids are grown I'll go and get some post-sahm work. Maybe in a shop, factory, cafe or something similar."

"The funniest post was Monday morning when she started by posting “it’s going to be a long week, hoping the nanny isn’t late” followed by “anyone know a place I can get nails done, not happy with the place I’ve been going as I think they overcharge and wanting a day to pamper myself a bit.”

"I feel lucky that I don't need to work. I am not getting any benefits because dh earns enough."

"I'm lucky in that I didn't have to carry on working."

"I am lucky enough not to work and stay at home with my son, as DH is a high earner. I feel extremely grateful for this every day, and try very hard not to take it for granted."

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3764425-To-think-you-are-very-lucky-if-you-dont-have-to-work

>> expecting them to conform to quite rigid definitions of masculinity and to suppress emotions

I often see feminists point to "emotional suppression" in men as a hallmark of toxic masculinity but as a man I don't even have a clue what it means. Is it avoiding crying in public? Because crying is involuntary and most people (men and women) don't want to cry in public.

And why feminists, who also in this thread say that helping men is not their priority, seem to spend quite some time blaming men for "suppressing their emotions"? Do they care that much about men? (I suspect the motive is another one...)

And BTW more than 90% of men who committed suicide did seek help

https://www.menshealthforum.org.uk/news/suicidal-men-do-seek-help

Sometimes the help is ineffective, or sometimes their problems are simply unsolvable.

What gets me is when feminists say that men need to step up and organise themselves but then actively fight against them doing this.

A good example was when male students at York University tried to organise an event to recognise IMD and it was subsequently cancelled due to several hundred protests, many from members of the feminist society. And ironically one of the members of the uni's diversity committee had already raised concerns that men were under represented in both the student population and academic staff, with the data showing that women had a much higher chance of being appointed.

The official line for cancelling it was something about it 'reinforcing structural inequalities'. And worst of all a male student had committed suicide several days prior.

The uni gave a statement that their focus was, and would continue to be, the addressing of challenges faced by women.

Here's another example. Feminists protesting a talk by Warren Farrell about such things as male suicide. This is a guy who spent three years on the board of the National Organisation for Women lol.

If I remember rightly, they deliberately mis-contextualised something he said. I can't remember the exact quote but it was quite clear what he meant when I read it. Basically, something about non verbal cues when dating. That part of the excitement can be when somebody rejects you superficially but clearly wants you to try. Otherwise known as 'playing hard to get' which most of us will be familiar with as a concept.

One guy is like "two of my friends committed suicide one after the other and I thought this might help me understand it". A feminist then pretty much interrupts him to say "well, feminism offers lots of spaces to talk about mental health for both men, women, and non binary people". A bit of a head scratcher when they were actively blocking people from entering an event about male suicide! 🤔

“If a man ignoring a woman’s verbal ‘no’ is committing date rape, then a woman who says ‘no’ with her verbal language but ‘yes’ with her body language is committing date fraud. And a woman who continues to be sexual even after she says ‘no’ is committing date lying,” wrote Farrell in a 1993 book.

No, not quite what you said. Actually equating male rape with women changing their minds. Ugly misogynist. I still wouldn’t have protested but I can see why they did. And his being elected to the National Organization for Women just proves the old truth, when men tell you they are feminists, beware. They are either predators, slimy turncoats, or they want all the limelight and the rewards.

Framing that as mean feminists trying to stop a nice man talking about male suicide is just lying. I was going to call it disingenuous but it’s plain lying .

Women who don’t work and have rich husbands by choice are part of the patriarchy. The patriarchy is about power. Anyone who has read mumsnet will have read about those relationships failing. When it does, the financial hit of divorce will land most squarely on the woman. The amount of men who want fifty fifty care of their children is very high and usually granted. Again, if you read mumsnet frequently you will see that family courts rarely even take into consideration abusive and coercive control when making these decisions. The power in these relationships is firmly with the high earner.

You seem to see relying on a man as an unfair privilege of women. Take this to the extreme to see how ludicrous it is - would one of many wives in a harem be privileged because they lived in luxury? Of course not - the privilege and power are in the hands of the man who can afford to have the idle wife/wives, and that is the patriarchy at work.

What mumsnet has taught me is that power divisions within households are still uneven at lower incomes. Where one partner works full time and the other (usually woman) part time, and the part time worker takes on the vast majority of unpaid labour, the part time worker often has much less free time than the main earner. In addition, due to the increasing likelihood of divorce (which has been shown many times to disproportionately affect women), these full time earners then split the bills proportionate to income, without placing any price, or more importantly value, on the unpaid labour of the lower earner. The woman, often due to financial necessity of childcare, finds herself with less money, reduced job prospects and living as a second class citizen within their own home.

This inequality is invisible to the outside world, but I am very grateful to mumsnet for opening my eyes to it and have been raising my daughters armed with this knowledge.

OK, I've re-read Farrell's comments so I'm not paraphrasing something I read a decade ago.

I'm still of the opinion that (as is often the case with these intellectual slanging matches) feminists have willfully mischaracterised his comments to fit their agenda.

You've kind of done it yourself tbh, although possibly you didn't read his comments properly.

You said that he is 'equating male rape with women changing their minds'. He's not doing this at all. What he's talking about is the disparity between what people say and what they mean, for want of a better explanation. How human interaction is not always 100% transparent and often relies on tone and context.

The feminists protesting him have claimed that he called date rape 'exciting' - this is exactly what one of the women in the video says. They are suggesting that he literally believes that raping a woman is a fun pastime.

Anybody with an ounce of common sense can see that this is not the case. It's actually pretty reprehensible IMO to wilfully misquote somebody on something like this as it's the kind of thing that can result in somebody being physically assaulted or their family being terrorised - painting somebody as a rapist is not dissimilar from spreading rumours that they're a paedophile as both invoke strong reactions.

What Farrell is talking about is the somewhat perilous topic of 'token resistance'. He argues that we need a more nuanced understanding of sexual relations between young people.

The quote that has famously riled feminists is the following: “If a man ignoring a woman’s verbal “no” is committing date rape, then a woman who says “no” with her verbal language but “yes” with her body language is committing date fraud.”

It's clearly an analogy and he is saying that both statements are ridiculous. I'm pretty sure he also said something else like "I'm not talking about literal rape where a woman is held at knifepoint" so it's clear he isn't talking about physical rape. He's talking about the twisting of language/theory to arrive at a conclusion that doesn't actually reflect reality - kinda hard to explain.

So, if two people are in bed and one says "no, I don't want to have sex", then obviously the other party is getting into pretty rapey territory if they ignore this and continue. However, if a man asks a woman if he can buy her a drink and she laughs and says "absolutely not! What kind of girl do you think I am?" this is inviting a playful exchange where the man might be expected to respond with a witty comeback.

I totally empathise with these types of interactions as somebody who likes confident men. It's entirely possible for a man to be respectful but also a bit cheeky and I've had several relationships that have started from these types of playful encounter. The key is emotional intelligence and I wouldn't generally be attracted to a man that didn't possess this attribute.

Is it a bit of a minefield of a topic? Absolutely! I'd probably be extremely wary of publicly discussing it as a male given how quick people are to misquote or cherry pick soundbites that sound damning when presented out of context. However, this discussion took place over 30 years ago in the early 90s before the days of cancel culture and tone policing etc. The guy was actually quite ahead of his time with the whole 'language of consent' thing even if I don't agree with all his points.

I don't really think it works to try and reduce the nuance of human interaction into a set of immutable 'rules'. It's all about the context and it's abundantly clear to anybody of even remotely sound mind when somebody is saying "no, I don't want to sleep with you" and meaning it.

I mean, c'mon....are feminists really this socially inept? I can't decide if they are or whether it's the more plausible situation that they've used semantics to shoehorn the discussion into a logical fallacy that just isn't really reflective of reality.

We're led to believe that a man must say something like "I'd like to have sex with you ma'am....is this proposal viable?" and the woman must respond with either enthusiastic consent or a firm rebuffal. I mean, fuck me, it's like a Monty Python sketch. 😂 Nothing would turn me off quicker!

I've never had a man ask me if he can shag me and I've never had any difficulty communicating my feelings. I've kissed men before but had to say no when they tried to escalate, and any man that doesn't stop at this point knows he's crossed a line. At this point it's not really about 'educating' the individual as the issue isn't a lack of understanding, it's a wilful decision on his part to trangress.

I find feminists are so often incredibly intellectually dishonest. Same with MRAs, TRAs, and most ideology based 'movements'. It's not usually about considering all perspectives and making an informed decision on where you stand. It's more often about having an immutable belief system that is all to often immune to logic and trying to find ways to undermine the opposition and 'win', even if this involves misquoting or misrepresenting their points. Most of us can't be arsed with this shit.

I don't generally have time for these types of individuals. I base my judgement on conduct not theory and will usually align more closely with an ethically sound male than a batshit insane female tbh.

The women in that video are all kinds of frothing, blue haired lunacy. Absolutely bonkers. 😂 You won't convince me otherwise. And don't even get me started on "men, women, and those that don't identify within the binary". You're still a man or a woman regardless of what you identify as.

@LastRoIo

I find feminists are so often incredibly intellectually dishonest.

I can't believe you're still banging on about 'feminists'. You mean women. You don't like women.

will usually align more closely with an ethically sound male than a batshit insane female

Colour me surprised. You'd rather align yourself with men? That's surprising for a misogynist.

To try and offer a more constructive take on it, I would rather see less of this infantilising navel gazing and a more adult approach. Men don't need to be 'educated' to ensure they don't rape somebody by accident. Most men understand consent perfectly well. The deviant ones that rape women do it for reasons entirely unrelated to a misunderstanding of 'the rules'.

Trying to set out some sort of 'rulebook of engagement' isn't going to stop men who don't give a shit about consent. We need to recognise that some men display abberant behaviour and we need a suitable deterrent, which is of course difficult as the burden of proof is the issue.

But feminists are many times taking a completely counterproductive approach to it in many cases IMO. I live in the Midlands and I remember when Warwick Uni started introducing 'consent classes' for men. One guy objected to this as he felt it was patronising (I'd probs feel the same way!) and he posted a photo on his social media with a sign saying 'this is not what a rapist looks like'.

Now it was certainly a bit of a provocative approach but I couldn't side with feminists either on this one. The guy was hounded out of lectures by feminists shouting 'rapist' at him and he was physically threatened around town by other men who'd been told he was 'a rapist'. I think he had to quit his course in the end and no doubt this will follow him around for years. He was not in any way a rapist and was just trying to say "look, most of us get this stuff".

But feminists usually don't care about the impact on individuals so long as they get to bang their drum. It really is the opposite of debate and free speech in many instances and that I feel is why the vast majority of women now actively state they don't identify as feminists.

Lol, see my above points about cherry picking and trying to undermine 'the opposition'.

I don't dislike women at all. Given that the vast majority aren't feminists nowadays I'm actually more representative of them than most feminists. You don't speak for 'us'. You speak only for yourself and most of us don't agree with this divisive mentality. Most just can't be arsed to get involved.

It seems to me that the actual group you dislike is “student activists”. I believe earlier in the thread, someone asked, “Which type of feminist?” And it was never answered. Student activists of all ilks tend to be pretty badly behaved - whether this is sign of the times, or a case of as it has ever been, I’m unsure.

The fact that you are more willing to place this behaviour as being down to their feminism, rather than their age seems quite pertinent.

It's a bit like how a TRA will shout "transphobe" at anybody who doesn't agree that a man can change into a woman.

A misogynist is somebody that doesn't like women. Not somebody that disagrees with feminists. Otherwise 93% of women in the UK would be misogynists. 😂

You don't like women, it's pretty obvious. You don't even know what feminism is. You're even referring to women as hysterics. You're a common or garden misogynist.

You don't know what feminism is. I've already disputed your 93% bullshit stat but you're cheerfully ignoring it while banging on about blue haired, batshit women. You're regurgitating manosphere nonsense.

A fair point. But all this stuff they're spouting about the patriarchy is feminism 101.

And I thought we were supposed to 'challenge poor behaviour within our own demographic'? Or does that only apply to men?

What is feminism 101?

<waits to be ignored because the misogynist doesn't know>

I don’t think the mumsnet breed of feminists (mostly 2nd wave, Germaine Greer type) would actually see the blue haired university brand (3rd wave Emma Watson type) as their demographic, to be honest!

Here's your 'bullshit stat'. Conducted by the feminist charity Fawcett Society no less.

I was indeed mistaken in saying '7% of UK women'. It's actually 7% of Britons and you'll be happy to know that a whopping 9% of women identified as feminists in that study. 😂

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/only-7-per-cent-of-britons-consider-themselves-feminists/&ved=2ahUKEwiX9q3gt9KMAxUoUUEAHUGKGuwQFnoECCAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw3TRb832Jw0z10As7sI3KLg

Here's a new one hot off the press from last month. Posted by by 'The New Feminist'. It's interesting that 83% of Brits agree with 'the belief that men and women should have equal rights and status in society' but only 35% identify as feminist. It's almost as if the general consensus is that feminism isn't about equality!

New YouGov poll reveals only 35% of Britons identify as feminist

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=thenewfeminist.co.uk/2025/03/new-yougov-poll-reveals-only-35-of-britons-identify-as-feminist/&ved=2ahUKEwiX9q3gt9KMAxUoUUEAHUGKGuwQFnoECFYQAQ&usg=AOvVaw3C_z-e9HJ1_xiW175DtXbz

Or that most people haven’t actually done their own research into the matter?

In keeping with your 'research', neither page is available.

What's a feminist?