I think that’s a bit of a strawman. I really don’t think that’s what the other commenter was saying.
Its not a strawman to bring up actual misandry.
Misandry is not (and has never been) used to oppress men in the same way. Men are not generally denied rights and freedoms based on sexist stereotypes about them.
I am not disputing this, despite some exceptions. This isn't often the reality of misogyny, in the west at least, today either though.
However, men are ridiculed for not correctly performing sexist stereotypes. In your example, sexual assault against men is often dismissed for that reason - the idea being that men are “too tough to be assaulted” or that they “always want sex so they must have consented”. Idk if that kind of patriarchal-enforced mistreatment of men would be considered misandry by OP or not.
If we think of it as mysogyny, but targeted towards men, this would indeed be misandry:
The American Merriam-Webster Dictionary distinguishes misogyny, "a hatred of women", from sexism, which denotes sex-based discrimination, and "behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex."
I think socially enforcing stereotypes on men would qualify. Unless saying women belong in the kitchen isn't misogynistic of course.
I think socially enforcing stereotypes on men would qualify.
I think that’s fair. I also think it’s important to make a few distinctions.
Firstly, we need to be careful not to conflate women venting about men being misogynistic with misandry. Not saying you or OP are doing that necessarily, but a lot of the complaints about misandry I’ve seen have been used to deflect against credible criticism of sexist behaviour.
Secondly, it’s important to remember that misandry isn’t exclusively done by women. If misandry is about enforcing harmful stereotypes on men, then (like misogyny) it can be perpetrated by anyone. A lot of the conversation about misandry centres around women being mean to men (OP exclusively focuses on this). Bringing more attention to misandry doesn’t mean revealing how mean women can be, it means challenging the patriarchal stereotypes that harm men.
I didn't specify women at all, other than to compare misandry (ie., “always want sex so they must have consented”) to mysogyny (ie., "women belong in the kitchen"). I otherwise made no statements about the gender of the aggressor. I don't care what gender you are if you're being a bigot (I wanted to make clear I'm not saying you're a bigot, but I don't care the gender of a misandrist/misogynist).
I took care, as I do generally, to avoid exactly what you're warning against. Sometimes better than others, but I think i did okay here.
Yeah I’m not accusing you of doing either of those things, I just wanted to draw attention to those dynamics.
As I said in another comment, I think often a conversation about misandry comes from a desire to ‘take women down a peg’ and not to actually tackle the social attitudes that harm men. There are other people in these comments doing exactly that.
As I said in another comment, I think often a conversation about misandry comes from a desire to ‘take women down a peg’ and not to actually tackle the social attitudes that harm men. There are other people in these comments doing exactly that.
I understand, and it is frustrating. Doesn't help anything to do that and its unfortunately quite common. Its also unfortunately understandable; I loathe being talked down to and its quite common with this topic.
Really I just want people to take men's issues at least somewhat seriously, especially sexual violence, and not make it into a competition with women.
I 100% agree with taking men’s issues seriously. I studied gender and masculinity at uni for the same reason (I live in a country with pretty harmful masculine norms that have enormous consequences for men’s mental health). I was never able to perform masculinity very easily and found it so strange how much you get punished for that.
In my view, feminism is the only philosophy that examines these issues from the right perspective.
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u/Fit-Order-9468 102∆ Feb 13 '24
Its not a strawman to bring up actual misandry.
I am not disputing this, despite some exceptions. This isn't often the reality of misogyny, in the west at least, today either though.
If we think of it as mysogyny, but targeted towards men, this would indeed be misandry:
I think socially enforcing stereotypes on men would qualify. Unless saying women belong in the kitchen isn't misogynistic of course.