Why are feminists so threatened by the MRA movement?

[LaVoixDeLaRaison]

When I was at university, the Gender Equality society (of which I was a member) chose to rename itself the Feminist society, arguing that the only way equality could be achieved was by focusing on women's issues. This led some other students to set up an MRA group, which was met with some resistance from the feminists. On this very board I see commenters angrily referring to MRAs as if they are all members of an evil homogeneous group.

Isn't it possible that men and women both suffer oppression from society in different ways? That the levels of this oppression are not necessarily equal, but are still important if we are to achieve equality? I often see feminists agreeing with certain 'male issues' (e.g. media stereotypes, elevated male suicide rate), but suggesting that feminism has other priorities, and if they want to do something about these issues then they should make their own groups. Why do they get criticized when they do exactly that? Better still, wouldn't feminism be better off if it didn't alienate so many men (and women, focused on a wider range of issues, and stopped pitting the sexes against one another?

OP? Is that you?

LMFAO @Gin

"Lived experience" and "ad hominem" are terms with epistemological significance

OP.

Poirot is Belgian though!

Oh shit! Looks like my knowledge of fictional detectives is about as good as my knowledge on how to do feminism to men's satisfaction

I did an image search for "debate cat" and this came up. Which is... you know...

BuffyBotRebooted
Thanks for clarifying, I understand your grievance. I wasn't trying to say that lived experience was unimportant, so apologies for coming across like that. The specific argument I was making was partly influence by lived experiences, as well as objective content. I chose not to disclose my own lived experiences, because I'd already made my argument based on other sources. Therefore, I felt that personal comments about me were irrelevant to the discussion. Isn't that fair?

TheOriginalSteamingNit
I provided some examples off the top of my head about where I felt men might be disadvantaged compared to women, but it was by no means an exhaustive list. I can go into more detail if you'd like, but I didn't want to stray too far from the original query, which is why feminists had such a problem with MRAs.

LOL, a breaded cat? Funnz and lolz Gin

It was the distance between your point and the top of OP's head.

I was indeed going for the manly wisdom meme. Clicked on wrong one because I'm bleary eyed and snotty.

However, even through the snot I can see that all the many difficulties MRAs talk about facing, the terrible discrimination and lack of rights, are in fact being fought against by feminists. Feminists fighting to bring down rigid gender stereotypes that fuck us all over. The problem for twats like you MRAs seems to be that in order to actually benefit from this they would have to look within and do some critical self reflection, give up some of their own long held privileges and challenge themselves.

But they don't want to do that.

Cause, you know, effort.

This has been answered numerous times

Because MRAs threaten feminists with violence. I'm not sure how much clearer that can be

The response to the original query, that is

Also, your talk of maintaining anonymity online shows that you either don't know, or are ignoring the depths to which men will stoop and the lengths to which men will go, when it comes to threatening women.

And I have no desire to put myself through that to prove a point that you would be able to see if you just have looked at the news.

The fact is that the patriarchy damages men, in ways that you have already used as examples, at the same time as it oppresses women. We are working on the issues that affect men because they are held in place by the same things that oppress women in our society. MRA (in my experience) are not interested in dealing with the patriarchy, in my experiences, they want to keep the privileges that come at the expense of women in the patriarchy.

The issues that affect men are issues that I find abhorrent. The fact is that women are facing so much worse and it seems to be more urgent, in my eyes.

Please respond sensibly and actually say something instead of just typing words that sound good in your head.

I think this sums up the OP's intentions:

Please respond sensibly and actually say something instead of just typing words that sound good in your head.

Absolutely, faux intellectualism on the OP's part.

BuffyBotRebooted
Can you provide examples of where I've been condescending? Obviously I believe that my opinion is correct and yours is wrong (and I'm sure you believe the opposite), but I've tried to argue my perspective in a mature way, without resorting to name-calling.

Yes obviously the power dynamics are relevant, did I suggest they weren't somewhere?

PetulaGordino
I've been threatened by a feminist before, but I don't feel that all feminists are terrible people, especially since I identify as an equity feminist myself. There are bad apples in every bunch (admittedly lots of them in certain MRA groups, but don't let that stop you from finding the non-threatening ones).

I like this one, for when we're getting into debates about (lack of) lived experience.

Good apples are hide to find in the MRA ocean of arse holes.

I think its up to you to point me in the direction of the nice, non rape-threateney MRAs.

I'm waiting.