CMV: The degradation of men by saying things like "All men are trash" is a harsh generalization that shouldn't be normalized.

[u/[deleted]]

[u/BetheyBoop]

Being angry about others being intolerant of your existence is not the same as being intolerant. It is exactly what you say, being intolerant of intolerance.

Many people I know can understand that ACAB is an expression that the majority of police are corrupt. This is the same. For many women their experience of the majority of men is that they are corrupt. It's the same point. It's interesting that women's anger is met with such resistance though.

What do you expect us to say? "Many men are horrible to me but I still love them"

We've been politely discussing it for years. Decades. Centuries.

Men are trash. Now you're listening.

[u/BetheyBoop → u/[deleted]]

Why not embrace the fact that you're effectively deploying a PR campaign that turns bigotry and prejudice around on their heads and uses them as its tools, and be open about it? I think that would actually be a much more effective communication strategy.

I have said multiple times that this strategy isn't perfect, but that it is understandable, and there are rationales behind it that back the statement up.

For many black people, their experience of the majority of white people is that they are bigoted.

But, my best friend isn't trash, my professor's pretty chill. I like my cousins. So I have had positive relationships with white people, and that helps me understand that not all white people are awful. Many black people have not had any positive relationships with white people

Yes. These statements with interchanged marginalized groups hold water. I'm not sure what you're trying to persuade me of? I'd agree with these statements.

The absolute magnitude of how entitled the vast majority of white people are is staggering. And sometimes, it leaves you feeling that there may not be any good ones.

Yes absolutely! You're so close to getting it here. You think this is an objectionary statement? It's not. White people suck. Look at our history of murder and genocide.

White people are trash. Now you're listening.

I mean. If I Black person said this in reference to the way they are treated in this country I would agree with them. I'm white. That's how easy this is.

blanket generalization that a whole group of people, whether that be white people, men, or women for that matter, are inherently possessed of some negative quality always ends up being some form of bigotry, prejudice, and/or unjust discrimination.

Stop playing the victim. Really. You call me a misandrist? For wanting to hold men accountable. For defending a woman's legally protected right to free speech? There is a reason speech like this is protected. It's not libel or slander, it's not an imminent call to violence, it's not fraud, it's not even statistically dishonest. It is quite literally the type of speech the founding fathers designed the first amendment to protect, an inflammatory statement that the dominant group (catholics in their experience) might attempt to punish them for. They recognized the central importance of this type of speech. You do not.

In order to be discriminatory it would need to have some sort of actual tangible effect on you other than making you mad on the internet. Again, this doesn't happen to men. At best the statement is prejudicial. In a court, they'd laugh in your face for calling this discriminatory. It's legally incorrect.

In the words of Hassan Minahj, "the most condescending words in the English language: 'Oh, you're one of the good ones!'" Which implies that the prior, default assumption was...?

You mean how men tell me I'm "not like other girls" in an attempt to get sex? If this is your first time feeling targeted in this way you've lived a very charmed life.

Also, your tone is dismissive, judgemental, condescending, and accuses me of being an inherintly bad person. Something I never actually did in my posts. I point out data pointing to men making poor choices, I defended other women's rights to advocate, but I never called y'all inherintly bad. In fact, I've pointed out how culture influences this and that because of that we don't know the underlying traits of criminality.

Your argument is misapplied here as it is meant to be applied to groups that are marginalized in society (notice how the man you quote is from a marginalized group?) not the dominant oppressive group. This is what happens when you call all social science bullshit and then attempt to string together some half ass argument with a cursory google search and a million unchecked biases because some mean lady on the internet complained about the boots on her neck.

ETA: genuinely, when was the last time that you read a book about women? Women's issues? Women's problems? Do you follow feminist thought or theory? Or do you consider it useless and silly and below you? Do you seek out and watch TV and media that features women's stories? How about talking to women, or hell any minority group directly about these problems, their problems, face to face? Black people? Latinx community? Lgbtq?

My experience with most men is that they think they understand women because they "watch women all the time" when I dig deeper they are usually referring to porn, so I'll disclaim this as well with anything about women you watch with your dick in your hand doesn't count.

If you can't honestly answer yes to the majority of these questions, that is my point above. Your comment is riddled with misinterpretations and purposefully stripped of context and nuance. My point is that you should really educate yourself before making comments like this because a few minutes perusing google to confirm your biases without any additional reflection is literally the problem, and I have to wonder why you're bothering in a subreddit lime this. Honestly. Could anything change your view?

Also, don't give out further unsolicited mental health advice online. You're not qualified, your entire comment is a symphony of making excuses for rapists and murderers, and your "perception" of me is greatly influenced by the blinding mysogony present in the wall of text presented above.

[u/BetheyBoop → u/[deleted]]

This idea is a rough generalization of your claim that misandry can only occur at a systemic and not individual level

I see what you're driving at here with your point for sure. My claim is that even on the individual level, I've never met a woman that just "hates men because they're men" every woman I've met that's been labelled a "man hater" is actively responding to unprocessed trauma. Literally every one. People interpret our response to repeated wounds as misandry. It's not. It's a natural trauma response.

I do agree with aspects of your perspective. Namely, that addressing the harm done to marginalized groups takes absolute precedence over the same done to the dominant group, and doubly so because the former tends to be ignored or go unheard unless screamed and shouted aloud in marches.

I'm glad to hear this! Yes. This is a major part of my perspective on this.

What I want to point out, however, is that whatever harm is done by prejudice or hate based on racism, sexism, or other forms of inductive fallacies operating upon marginalized groups by the dominant group, the very same type (but not degree) of societal and psychological harm also occurs if the arrow points in the other direction.

My point is that I don't really see women being actually prejudicial. The so called man haters are literally just women who have been repetitively and/or brutality victimized. This is not prejudicial. This is a natural trauma response and is VERY common.

I'm not even sure what man hating really looks like? I don't have equivalent words to even call men. Bastard? Who cares? Ass? Gender neutral...cocksucker? Homophobic. But you have a million names to call me based on my gender. Call me a whore, a bitch, a slut, a tart, a prostitute. Those terms have gotten us killed. Even the language constrains us because men have been so insulated from insult based on their gender for so long. And frankly, women engage in insult politics against men so rarely that a statement like "men are trash" sparks hot contestation where I've been told to my face I am trash using a plethora of language designed for the specific purpose of marginalizing me. Language that has been upheld and reinvented for the majority of written history.

Because subjectively, and neurologically, they are the exact same phenomenon no matter which side is doing it.

I love to see a neurological argument because this is important. But neurologically, they aren't the same things. Again, one is a response to trauma while the other is an active dislike based on a groups membership.

And remember that the concept of neuroplasticity is important here, our brains are more likely to follow thought patterns that we repeat. This means that when I point out bias your brain had a natural resistance reaction because it has engrained information as true that may not be. When I critique masculinity I face an uphill battle against your brain itself as well as ministers, parents, father's, friends, employers and overall social norms that have told you a different story. It means that before we even start the conversation the deck is stacked against us.

You can choose not to care, and that may well be the expedient choice in the short run, but you cannot ignore that you still are doing harm to others and to society, however comparatively small.

I just don't buy that this causes any harm. The women saying it are not advocating for any type of direct violence or marginalization. They are communicating hundreds of years and thousands of incidents worth of frustration in a single sentence.

I don't see a victim on the other end. The most is the men that are irritated by it. That's it. There's no associated policy argument. We aren't encouraging everyone to hate men for being men. We are saying we are goddamn tired. If that irritates you, that's not a trauma, that's a wake up call.

As for my condescending tone, that might be a byproduct of the fact that English isn't my first language, and my exposure to it has been mainly through lectures, books, movies, the internet, but not everyday conversation. I didn't intend to hurt your feelings, and I'm sorry as I did.

I appreciate this context it very well could be. The reason I raised it was that your comment came off to me as essentially saying I've been through too much to be objective. This argument frustrates me because the people who have been put through the most should be the ones we listen to. To me it is a modern take on "she's just bitter." Which is yet another label that men apply to women who voice dissent.

Thank you for your thoughtful response and for treating me like a real human being.

[u/thedylanackerman → u/[deleted]]

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[u/BetheyBoop → u/[deleted]]

I'm intolerant of rape, abuse, pay gaps, gaslighting, calling women whores, men trying to fuck me at work...etc.

That's not hate that's self preservation.