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?

i was refuting the page you linked to junking the '1 in 5 women have been sexually assaulted' stat - which from my, and every woman i know's experience is actually an underestimate, not an overestimate as that page suggests (and as a woman, I am almost certain that the author will have been assaulted herself). At no point did I say men can't be assaulted, or that men being assaulted is better than women - I was simple refuting the information on the page.

Your reply was textbook derailing - a paragraph about a completely different point entirely.

You also miss the point on expectations. If I grow up, and all the women around me are SAHM or cleaners, or dinner ladies, and most of the men work in offices, then I assume that that's how it should be - I don't need to have official restrictions, society has put them in my head for me.

Oh and as to things being equal - how often do you think 28 year-old men worry about going into an interview and how they're going to dance around the (sometimes hinted, sometimes a lot more direct) questions about whether they intend to have children soon? How many men get asked about their childcare arrangements? How many small business owners happily announce on the internet that they just won't hire women of child-bearing age. That is the patriarchy - the laws can say what they want, but people (men) will act as they choose

"If feminists care about war, why haven't they do something about it to show their opposition? Perhaps they could congregate around some kind of major military installation for nineteen years, maybe seventy thousand feminists at a time. "

Such a shame they didn't do anything like that. I would have joined in when I was a young woman if they had. They could have called the gates by different colours........that would have been nice..........

if a man feels he wouldn't be a suitable parent he always has the option of opting out of PIV sex

and no feminist has ever had a son, either

manlyalmondcakes - I have just read up on Greenham Common to find out WTAF you were talking about. Fucking awesome! Thank you for pointing me towards that, I had no idea.

I feel my IQ dropping, having read those Reddit responses.

So he is Bif.

He has some very odd ideas even for an MRA.

That's the point that is always missing Petula.

I also like the number of poster over there who proclaim "I used to be a feminist, but.....". I'll eat my hat if any of them were really and truly a feminist .

yes sorry, was for the benefit of lurking MRAs

(hears the distant spluttering of MRAs contemplating the idea of not being entitled to PIV sex)

Hi all,

Thanks for all your reports. We're going to remove this thread shortly as we have some doubts about the OP.

Oooh, which of you is garlicMN? Very brave.....

Annie- did you really not know about Greenham Common?

It is absolutely amazing how women are just erased from history............

Oh, please don't delete the thread! It doesn't matter who the OP is- the discussion is so valuable and useful!

I'm not from the UK, Hakluyt, so it's not unreasonable that I wouldn't have heard about it. But yes, women do get horrifically erased from history.

And MNHQ, I agree with those saying please don't delete this thread. Or ban the OP. It would just be proving his point.

I haven't RTFT but what is MRA?

MRA = men's right activist. But it doesn't really mean that anymore as it's been subverted by people who want to troll feminists.

So the thread hasn't been zapped after all?

I agree with leaving the thread now. The OP got his arse handed to him and the arguments on here from MNers are really valuable. I haven't absorbed them all yet.

Hang on, this was no longer accepting messages?

@TravelinColour

Remove? But so much here that is useful surely?

We do understand where you're coming from - but since this thread has been linked to on the MRA Reddit forum, it's likely that it will attract a lot of attention from MRA trolls, which is the last thing we want on FWR (we'd imagine you'd find it pretty annoying too), so we think it's best if this thread is removed.

You could leave it for 'reading' but not allow anymore posts?