I just stepped down as moderator from all five of the subreddits I used to moderate over on Reddit. I just can’t ethically justify continued activity on Reddit, and especially free volunteer labour for an openly greedy company that is engaged in scummy behaviour, forcing mods to open protesting communities or be demoted.
So my online activism for boys and men is now focused here and on Mastodon. And I am welcoming everyone coming over from Reddit, especially from LeftWingMaleAdvocates, the sub I put in the majority of my time and effort as a mod.
Let’s build something good here, as we did previously on Reddit. It appears we have a wider reach here, so let’s debate in good faith and with civil manners.
Here, in this magazine (i.e. community or subreddit in Kbin-speak) we wish to discuss and spread awareness of various issues that disproportionately affect males.
We believe men are not being well-served by either side of the mainstream political spectrum. We oppose the right wing’s exploitation of men’s issues as a wedge to recruit men to inegalitarian traditional values. But we also oppose feminist attempts to deny male issues, or shoehorn them into a biased ideology that blames “male privilege” and guilt-trips men.
We have no objection to the genuinely egalitarian aspects of feminism, but we will criticize feminist ideology wherever it is inegalitarian and/or untruthful, especially now that it holds institutional power. Too often feminism has promoted a one-sided “equality”, dismantling male advantages while exploiting, reinforcing, preserving, and downplaying female advantages - particularly in cases involving alleged abuse.
In practice this means that most of us are politically homeless. The natural home for male advocacy should be the left wing, which professes to be explicitly egalitarian. But in modern practice, men’s issues are habitually ignored, denied, or even opposed.
We seek to address male issues without falling into the traps of an impossible return to the past or a disastrous sexism. Men and women have equal value, and we need to work together for a better future.
Re: your stance of feminism and its role in the betterment of the lives of men.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable to suggest that the primary problem at the core of most issues facing men today is the narrow, unrealistic, and frankly unhealthy image of masculinity that our society expects us to strive for. And I have to imagine that the (or at least a) goal of any sensible male advocacy group would be to push back against the notion that a man who doesn’t meet this single societal ideal of manliness has failed to be a man.
However, I also don’t think it can be dismissed as coincidence that so many of the words used to belittle men and boys who behave in ways they’re not “supposed” to imply femininity.
“Don’t be such a pussy.”
“That guy’s a little bitch.”
“Haha, he cried like a girl!”
Would you not agree that one of the most powerful ways to go about robbing these types of sentiments of their power over young boys is to help feminists destigmatise simply being a girl or a woman? Most issues facing men aren’t because women are being given advantages, but because men face the disadvantage of not being allowed to adopt roles or attitudes deemed beneath us — just as women are not allowed to adopt roles and attitudes deemed beyond their place.
I firmly believe that feminism, if truly successful, will allow men the freedom to be who and what they want to be because “masculine”/“feminine” will no longer equate to “good”/“bad” or “strong”/“weak”.
How could feminism in any way give men “the freedom to be who and what they want” when they portray men as the problem? Feminism is toxic to healthy masculinity and healthy gender relations.
Friend, I think you’re already falling into the “us vs them” mentality. We should be able to separate the loud, misandrist, “men are the problem, women are the solution”, feminists from the “we’re equal before the law, but I still perceive inequality and something should be done about it”, passive feminists.
That is what is done to MRAs who were just saying “men have issues too, here are some” and being labeled as misogynist, radical, dangerous, and incel (which also shouldn’t be an insult, much less one exclusive to men).Each community has their loud, obnoxious members, but they shouldn’t be representative of that community unless the community is mostly loud and obnoxious itself.
As such, I’d like to challenge your view that feminism is the problem and propose that it has much more to do with tradition and religion. Men and women alike face irreconcilable gender roles, prejudice, and traditional and societal obligations, that lead to their oppression:
- men should work, women should clean
- men and women should make children
- men should not show emotions, women are too emotional
- men should protect women, women are the damsels
- a man should sleep with a woman, a woman should sleep with a man
The issue is much deeper than simple “women say men are the problem, which is the problem”. Tribalism, identity-politics, and myopic, single-viewed, unidirectional thinking is toxic.
We do not say that women are the problem. But we also disagree that men are the problem.
We need to address traditional gender norms in an egalitarian way. We support freeing women from them. But we must not forget about freeing men also.
That means we can’t accept misandry from any movement that claims to fight for gender equality. And that unfortunately leads us into conflict with feminist ideology and feminist praxis.
I think you are conflating men as a group with men as individuals. I think Russia is terrible, but I’ve met many lovely Russian people.
While I can’t speak for feminists, I think when they say “men are the problem” that’s shorthand for a system that generally pays men more, expects them to take on less domestic responsibilities, allows them to vote away women’s rights, and all of the other longstanding injustices.
The government of Russia ≠ the people of Russia. Men are just a gender. There is no government of men. When you say “men are the problem”, you are talking about individual men and men as a whole.
Society also expects men to earn more and ties their value to how much wealth they have. Women play a part in this too just as men do. It also expects men to take on more responsibilities outside of the house.
There are as many injustices against men as there are against women. What happened with Roe v. Wade being overturned is terrible, but when it happened people actually cared for women’s wellbeing. Including myself.
Where is the outrage over any of the injustices that men face (the draft, male genital mutilation, exclusion from homeless/DV shelters, family court, etc.)? There is none, because when women are victims of injustice people care; conversely when men are victims no one cares.
At worst, feminist literature will try to ignore male victims to make DV seem like a gendered crime, taking away services from men, and make out so-called male victims as abusers in disguise (like the book “Why Does He Do That?”).
The government of Russia ≠ the people of Russia. Men are just a gender. There is no government of men. When you say “men are the problem”, you are talking about individual men and men as a whole.
Obviously you are technically correct, but I still think many feminists use “men” as a shorthand for the broader male-dominated system. If I say “I love the way women smell” I really don’t need to clarify that I probably don’t mean all women in all situations, it’s kinda obvious.
Where is the outrage over any of the injustices that men face
That’s a logical fallacy. There probably should be more outrage about those things, but that doesn’t change the initial situation.
Obviously you are technically correct, but I still think many feminists use “men” as a shorthand for the broader male-dominated system.
And that shows their bigotry, which we are calling out.
Where is the outrage over any of the injustices that men face
That’s a logical fallacy.
No, it’s not. Calling it a logical fallacy is bigotry. Outrage over any of the injustices that men face is a human rights issue.
How do you / did your community feel about the MensLib community?
I appreciate that they try to highlight some male issues. But they subjugate them to feminist ideology, which I think is the wrong approach. They control the conversation very tightly and do not allow general criticism of feminism (especially the widespread misandry), nor specific topics such as legal paternal surrender. For that reason I consider the MensLib sub “controlled opposition”. Even tho many members may have the heart in the right place, there is a high degree of self-censorship going on. Or you find yourself, as I did, quietly shadowbanned.
Thank you for sharing your viewpoints (side note, this is my first time really reading reddit in a while and it’s crazy how many accounts have been overwritten or [deleted]). I was active in the early redpill community, years ago, and watched in horror as it got taken over by right-wing protofascists. So I’m a little gun shy when it comes to men’s spaces. I think, getting meta for a moment, there’s something to be said for policing your own community a little over-zealously to keep out the misogynists…but then again, there’s also something to be said for being honest in your beliefs, even if that means alienating an ally (like feminists).
I’ve subscribed and I’ll keep a close eye on this community. You’ve got a difficult job; there’s a lot of angry, misogynistic men and angry, misandrist tumblristas in the fediverse who would love to take over the discussion.
Hey brother
I’m in a similar boat as you, and watched TRP go from “this is info men need to know, and soon” to religious conservative grifters, and similarly upset about it
And then watching menslib and others get setup so men could talk in “approved” ways
But all of that makes it even more important to me not to abandon other labels to grifters. It just makes it easier for them to dissipate any momentum we might accrue for social change.
If the moderation is bad, it’s a lost cause. The mod here removed a couple of comments I had calling out blatant misogyny, while leaving the misogyny. This space is doomed. I’m not wasting any more effort on it.
I have removed comments for personal attacks, as per our rules.
Where is the misogyny? I mean, it is possible I may have missed it, as I am human and fallible. But make sure to differentiate feminism from women. Feminism is an ideology, not a gender. Attacks on women as a gender will not be tolerated.
So, if you want to call out bad behavior here, call out the specific statements (“That statement is misogynistic” or “Saying that is bigotry”). Do not use personal attacks (“You’re a misogynist” or basically any form of “you are X”) as they will be removed.
Like I said, I’m not wasting more effort on it. I do still think you have good intentions and I still wish you luck.
That’s your good right, of course. But I’ll take that as “it was moderated correctly, and there is no actual misogyny that I can point out”.
