svenskbitch #sexist reddit.com

This is what I do not get.

I am not a Republican. I am against Trump. I do not support Black Lives Matter. I am against Israel's actions in Palestine. I condemn Russian invasion of Crimea.

But I think I am fully able to speak to my opponents and come away with sympathy and understanding of their position WITHOUT changing my own basic stance. I can condemn Israel's behavior and at the same time understand that they are acting based on an understandable conviction that they are in a state of war. I can oppose Russia's annexation while understanding the complex history behind it and the Russian fear of Nato encroachment and the need to regain the respect they feel they lost lately. I can loathe the Chinese massacre at Tianemen square, while also seeing that they were a symptom of liberalisation compared to the Mao period and that the alternative might well have been full-fledged civil conflict.

My point is this: Why have we not seen one single instance of a feminist looking into the MRM this way, coming out with a nuanced understanding while remaining a feminist? Not the radical kind, of course. This is particularly baffling because MOST of our interests are complementary: more rights for fathers, more investment in men's health, better education of boys, sympathy for male DV victims - all benefit women both directly and, through the men they love, indirectly. To me, the single most important factor behind the wage gap is that women take the main responsibility for children (before that, they now outearn men): fathers rights, shared custody (a feminist issue in Sweden, but vehemently opposed by NOW), paternal leave, and more male teachers would certainly free women up to focus on their careers and free men to be with their children, something perhaps not all of them want, but those who do face formidable obstacles (house husbands outside perhaps Scandinavia tell stories of daily ridicule and flagging respect from their wives).

Why in the world is that? Why is every person I know of who have taken a serious look at men's rights converting, although sometimes in spirit only, to MRM? CHS? Warren Farrel? Cassie Jaye? Are there other parallels I am missing? The only one that comes to mind for me are, say, KKK and neo-Nazis and maybe extreme right-wing religious fundamentalists in the US - those would indeed burst the limits of my tolerance. And of course, as a gay man, I am too personally invested to tolerate homophobia, although I also find most homophobia to stem from lack of interaction with gay people and be skin-deep - but then there are people like someone here telling me to take my ass cancer (sic) and fuck off (not that I take anything on such a forum personally; someone like that clearly has issues that have nothing to do with me).

3 comments

Confused?

So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!

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