Men bashing

[PirateQueenie]

Hi all,

I don't have a real purpose to this thread other than to just voice my confusion and possibly hear some other opinions.

I would identify as feminist - although for want of a better word, I would rather say I'm an egalitarian. I enjoy reading these threads, and comment on some. But what really disheartens me is all the man-bashing Ive seen. I have a male partner who is my world ♥ wonderful male friends and family members, and when I read some of the things on here I can't help but feel very defensive of the men in my life.

Is this the new wave of feminism? Or am I missing something? When I was growing up (with my mum as an avid feminist), I never heard "men this" or "men that" it was always about how women can strengthen and empower themselves WITHOUT putting men down.

Oh dear has a *random poster' defied etiquette? Well I post on MN regularly and have already posted on this thread. Like many posters I changed my name regularly so I can not be identified in RL.

God forbid you come on FWR and are not in the clique. Random posters! How shocking! I would think new voices might be welcome.

The "suck cock" comment is regularly used on FWR. I was making a generic comment. If I was being specific would have name checked.

It's difficult to find the right tone though - if you are too polite you are passive aggressive and part of the patriarchy - if you aggressive you are a 'newbie' who does not understand the etiquette. Perhaps it's best just to stay quiet?

Bollocks is the "suck cock" line used. Links to specific posts or it didn't happen. You're just making shit up.

^The "suck cock" comment is regularly used on FWR. I was making a generic comment. If I was being specific would have name checked.^

Eh?!

Women often post on here in times of trouble with men, but you do not hear about all the other times when their lives with men are going well.

One thing I am afraid I have found out from mumsnet is that child abuse and rape are far more prevalent than I had realised and I have never had the impression people were making their stories up.

I've NEVER seen that here before.

Perhaps it's best just to stay quiet?

Perhaps it is, if you're going to peddle shite.

Mousse Maybe you could start a 'Why is FWR so Cliquey?' thread - stop you derailing from the 'man-bashing' theme

Maybe we need a 'baby feminists' board, for those of us who are not there yet. You non people pleasing experts may well be right, and may well long for reasoned debate with your peers, but some of us just waking up and smelling the coffee folk aren't quite ready for you. Could you let us babble quietly in a corner, with just occasional input from the grown ups? I need to work things out through reading and talking, not just reading. That way you don't have to get irritated by our ignorance, and we can work things through without being put right quite so sharply.

Hmmm, the only frequent "suck cock" comment I see on this board is that delightful tweet from Danielle Muscato. That gets mentioned quite frequently, because it's a pretty contained example of the things that are wrong with TRAs

Each of the boards on MN that I spend time on has their own feel and tone, and it's just basic netiquette to observe the established protocols, surely? At first, at least.

I doubt many new posters rock up on the Litter Tray, tell everyone that they are doing cat ownership wrong, accuse everyone of being nasty when no-one agrees that it's very irresponsible not to neuter / spay an urban cat, then decide they are all being ridiculous because dogs are better anyway.

Sparrowhawk thank you for understanding the context of my post and articulating it better than I could have done.

Just rowing back a bit, why should Twisty not have banned men from comments on her blog? Seems to me like she had every right to decide whose comments she'd welcome. It's not like THE MIGHTY RECKONS OF MEN are generally unavailable.

Because MrsDB, not including men is mean and horrid, or something.

There were men who posted on it (according to people who also posted on it, I can't say for sure) which suggests that men who got booted off it acted like spunk trumpets. Who can say?

I think you're right about the sport of debating with feminists guardian. Wrong choice of word in my post, because it implies something quite different from what I meant.

pickleme, I think you might be picking up on my post, but I don't think you really need to? I don't mean at all that people shouldn't participate until they are fully fledged experts (that would rule me out for a start ). If someone has come here with a good-faith, genuine "help me understand this thing about feminism" post, then 9 times out of 10, they get great input. It's when people are being snarky or obtuse or lumping all feminists together in one great big man hating bundle that frustration sets in. Get stuck in, you'll be fine.

The men come and debate for fun, for pleasure, for academic or idle interest.

They forget that we're here because it's our life.

It would be terribly rude to head onto a forum for a chronic condition and berate the people on it for not explaining more about their condition, not being nice at your opinions (that they've probably heard 100 times before), perhaps being a bit short with answers or suggesting reading matter. Most people would support the people on that forum not wanting to get involved if they didn't want to.

Feminists though, they're just meanies when they won't do all of that.

Would you say the majority are not decent and respectful?

Yes, I would.

Lonny this is a genuine question from someone who hasn't ever really felt oppressed or thought much about it (probably it wrongly) but your comment
"Feminism isn't about making men and women the same though. It's about liberating women (as a class) from oppression. "
I understood that feminism WAS meant to be about equality? But maybe it is the same thing as being liberated from oppression? Honestly it all confuses me.
I have a lovely father and husband but sometimes see parts of them that are stuck in the 1950s in their attitudes - so is that a societal problem- that we still raise (and treat?) men differently like we did until fairly recently - when they did have all the power, jobs, authority, money etc? I do believe that there are still remnants of that remaining. And maybe that won't change until the generations born in the 20s (our grandparents) and 40s (our parents) have died off and the older generation of women and men are those born in the 70s 80s and 90s who have different ideas about gender roles, parenting, workplace roles etc?
I also have a young son and I'm more concerned about raising him "right" than I am about my daughter. Since with her I can relate to what she will come across. But with my son I don't know what pressures boys face to be "hard" or whatever .
I just want him to be kind and respectful (especially to women) and also not feel he has to be macho and hide his feelings.
My husband said to him the other day about something he was upset about (and not said maliciously but again said as this sort of comment is societal habit) "oh don't be a girl about it" . I immediately told DH that comments like this and the "man up" type thing were not permitted. Creating a negative connotation about not only being female but showing emotion is unacceptable to me. DH agreed and hadn't really considered it that way. But imagine all the dads who always say that sort of thing to their sons because that's what they learned from their dad.? So generations of boys grow into men thinking it's bad to show emotion or be sensitive and bottle up their feelings. And then even more with peers having to act cool and macho when as women traditionally we talk to one another and support out friends. I don't know much about it but isn't there a huge statistic about male teen suicide. ?

Lastly, and I really don't mean any offence when I say this- but I also think that many women don't like to say "I'm a feminist" because the meaning has become all muddled in society and actually thrown around as an insult to describe rabid man haters. So even though yes as a woman and mother of a daughter I believe we should be equal and not oppressed I wouldn't say "I'm a feminist" because of the negative connotations.
So how can we change this perception of that word to make it a positive? And I know many here do think it's positive but I'm saying in the media etc it's given negative connotations to be "a feminist"!
Hope that all makes sense and I don't get flamed as I'm genuinely curious and interested to learn

Thanks pooch. Still a bit too robust on here for me though, but I want/need to learn and this is the place so I'm having to toughen up. I get that women have been socialised to be nice, and absolutely hate the imbalance that brings. I think we need a metaphorical shallow end for people who are still scared off by confrontation, and haven't learnt to tolerate it yet.

I'm not great with confrontation, either, pickle. But I'm getting better at standing my ground for things I really believe in. I was very much raised to defer to my elders and betters, and to be polite over being truthful, and it's been a real challenge to confront that.

matt, some feminists believe that the goal is equality, and some believe it's liberation - there isn't a party line that you have to adhere to. The trouble with the "equality" line, is that it can tend to blur over the ways in which women are disadvantaged - in the UK, we broadly have formal, legal equality enshrined in law, and yet the wage gap persists and nobody ever asks a man how he manages to "have it all"...and it's also used as a way to stop women talking about women's issues by centering ways that men feel that they're not "equal" - with regard to children in divorce and so on. So a lot of feminists prefer to talk about liberation.

I wonder if it might be worth you having a think about why you have these negative associations about the word "feminist"? You're right in that it's often used as a term of abuse, and given negative connotations - but why is that? And do you think it is accurate and fair? From my perspective, it's a tactic used when people don't like what feminists are saying, to shut us up. What would you be afraid of people thinking of you if you said you were a feminist?

Feminism is a 'dirty' word because it suits men for it to be a 'dirty' word. What better way to scupper women's liberation than to make women themselves reject the movement working for that liberation?

The negative connotations of feminism are nothing to do with perception. They're to do with the fact that feminists look men in the face and say 'I won't accept that.' Men's response, of course, is to say that feminists are abrasive and shrill man haters. This is a very effective way of putting women back in their box because women are so strongly socialised to be polite and quiet and not upset anyone. Men control the narrative, they get to say what's positive and acceptable. Why would they be positive about a movement that will reduce their privilege? Of course they're going to send a very strong message that they disapprove. But here's the thing - do women have to listen to or accept their disapproval? FUCK NO.

Suffragettes, who fought for your basic right to vote, were painted as unstable, unnatural, even monsters. Their lives were threatened. They had to have the courage to ignore that and just keep on fighting.

And any fucking way, given that men kill two women every week and rape 85,000 women a year it's a Bit Fucking Rich for anyone to complain that women aren't positive enough, isn't it? I mean, come the fuck on.

So even though yes as a woman and mother of a daughter I believe we should be equal and not oppressed I wouldn't say "I'm a feminist" because of the negative connotations.

I don't really care what people think. And I think the idea that feminism should be "nice" is a very misognynist one.

I know that sounds a bit abrupt but it's not meant that way.

I agree that the word feminism can start the eye rolling.

I lurked on the feminist boards for months before I posted. Because it is fairly intimidating. A lot of well-read women with strong conviction.

I only started posting after reading about the IOC trans guidelines. Because it struck at my core.

From listening, reading, wondering, I suddenly had complete conviction (about that particular issue).

I still wasn't aware of the analysis behind feminism, though.

But because I could see the rank misogyny in the trans issue, suddenly I was seeing an extreme form of what feminists were calling oppression. It was like being on a fast track course to feminism 101. The trans issue was was microcosm of what they were all talking about.

Suddenly everything slotted into place. I got it.

There were still things that I wasn't sure about. But armed with this new vision, I can connect dots quickly. I have a roadmap.

So now I'm quite happy to call myself a feminist. To tell my peer group, family etc. If I ever get a negative reaction, it always serves to reinforce my conviction. It just adds to it.

to all the people who feel like newcomers!

expat
Being on the side of the underdog, fighting against the 'powers that be' to change the Status Quo, means fighting against all the traditions, pasttimes, popular pleasures and sense of order and 'rightness' that socially reinforce the Status Quo, to which the majority have become accustomed and attached to. In other words you are not going to be popular.

When you point out injustice or inequality, it will feel abrasive and irritating to the majority who just want to get on with life as normal. All the businesses who make the greatest profits from that inequality will be hugely threatened and go into overdrive using all their financial, political and public clout to oppose you.

You will be called a trouble-maker, a killjoy, insane, and if you are a woman you will also be called ugly, shrill, in need of a good fuck, etc, in order to silence you and stop you being able to change things.

In other words - being an agent of change and an underdog at the same time means that you will be stereotyped, insulted and widely misrepresented.

All the insults, stereotypes and fear-mongering about feminists are just part of the fact that we have been huge agents if change - you should take a look at some of the unflattering cartoons about Suffragettes at the time.

Some people naively think feminism needs a new name or a re-brand, but in reality the only way feminism can be popular is if it doesn't challenge the status quo, but instead reinforces it ie- it is not actually feminism at all.

I just did an advanced search for the term 'suck cock' and I call bullshit. There are a lot of threads about how to give a BJ.

Expat38matt There are 2 types of feminsism, Liberal and Radical. They have a different approach. There are some good answers here;
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/2919058-Different-feminism

If you are concerned about men bashing perhaps its because you are unaware of how women are being bashed, and resisting the bashing they get.

The suck cock thing is never directed at other women. I've only ever seen it used as a euphemism for attention seeking men.

It's a fairly well used online phrase to encompass men who demand your time, attention, agreement, and that you acquiescence over everything they say. It's just euphemistic short hand for what they are demanding.

And a very effective. Particularly if they are pontificating over something they deem intellectual and over your head, when clearly it's just a demand to be listened to.

The I have sons so I can't hate men argument reeks.

It's even worse than the I have a black friend so I can't be racist argument.

I say worse because the gender of your child is out of your locus of control and the strong parent-child bond means that they are usually the exception rather than the rule.

I happen to be surrounded by incredible women. That doesn't make me any less sexist or misogynistic, it's my own behaviour determines that.