What I have learnt living with white women as a South Asian man

Kuato2012 · 2021-10-28T18:04:24+00:00

Also one said how she prefers women's poetry bcos 'men get weird about it'

There are several things one could respond to in your post, but this is the weird thing that jumped out at me. There are tons of excellent poets who happen to be male, and I have no idea what aspect of their maleness would "get weird about it."

Crane, Shelley, Wordsworth, Keats, Yeats, Frost, Whitman, Gibran, Byron, Tennyson, Coleridge, Basho. Everyone should at least give those guys the old college try, IMO. And I'm sure there's a whole fuckton I've left out of that list.

Shit, all of you know a little Tennyson, whether you know it or not. "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all" and the phrase, "nature, red in tooth and claw," are both his (from the same poem, in fact).

DanteLivra · 2021-10-28T16:21:12+00:00

Discrimination, generalization and hate is tolerated when it comes from a woman.

They are not all like that but the best thing to do is to leave those that are alone, live your life and find meaningful friends who won't hate you because of your gender. It's sad but this is 2021.

hottake_toothache · 2021-10-28T17:56:55+00:00

Learn from these experiences. What you are observing is real life, not media spin. You should not feel any more hesitant to judge women than women feel in judging men.

Skirt_Douglas · 2021-10-28T17:13:46+00:00

How did you end up living with all of them? Did any of them already know each other?

They sound like basic Gen-z white girls with nothing but trendy internet-fed thoughts, I don’t think you should be more prejudiced because of this, but it definitely should inform on the kind of women you’ll want to avoid. It’s entirely possible there is a racial element to the way they are treating you. When you are allowed to openly hate men, you are also allowed to be openly racist as long as you disguise it as misandry.

Any plans to move out soon?

Neveah_Hope_Dreams · 2021-10-28T20:15:49+00:00

Why are you living with people like that? They don't care about you and are not respecting you.

BloomingBrains · 2021-10-29T05:38:35+00:00

I noticed some of the same themes you're talking about when I was in college. I talked to all kinds of women though, not just white ones, and I'm white, so it definitely seems to be a gender thing and not so much race. Of course, not all of them were like that, more like somewhere between a half three quarters if I had to guess. So I am generalizing a bit, but its hardly all. I want to be clear about that.

Anyway, the initiating conversations and reciprocation thing is definitely what I can relate to most. It got the point where it was very frustrating, boring, and exhausting to put so much effort into being sociable but not getting anything out of it. In fact I almost gave up and stopped talking to women entirely because of this. I'm not expecting women to fall in love with me instantly of course, but if someone asks you "What's your major" or "what are your hobbies" and then answers without returning the question, its just rude. Ok sure, if it happened once or twice you might think "maybe she's having a bad day or something and wants to be left alone" but this was near constant. If I had acted on that assumption daily then I would have basically had to turn myself into a social exile. It's easy to see how a frustrated and lonely guy might begin to think most women are frigid and/or lack social skills, but that isn't the case at all, because you'll see them being perfectly social with other guys.

So I think you hit the nail on the head when you talked about it seeming like such a burden when a guy says hello. The sense I got was one of entitlement, like "Why are you even talking to me, don't you know your place?" As if its somehow an attack to say hello to someone who isn't interested in you even though you'd have no way of knowing that. It's such a weird mentality. I just don't understand it because if someone talks to me who I'm not interested in, I won't ignore them, I'll enjoy having a pleasant conversation if its a pleasant conversation, and if they asked me out but I wasn't interested then I would politely decline. It's as if it has become normal to only view male/female social interaction through the lens of sex, which, aside from being inherently misogynist, probably came about because of Tinder and hookup culture. The sense I get nowadays is basically like its considered passe` to actually expect cordiality before going straight into hypersexual flirting.

And then you throw in the element of rape sensitivity and the halo/devil effect, basically making it so that people are hyper aware of male aggression but only from sub 20% males, even though they're actually less dangerous, and well, that's why things are such a clusterfuck.

just_some_dude_blah · 2021-10-28T18:21:56+00:00

Honestly those women do not represent most women at all. Ur rooming with the lowest of the low. Change apartments. Ignore them. U dont have to speak to them unless you have to and vice versa.

T_Nightingale · 2021-10-28T22:03:24+00:00

Just know that most women aren't like that but together if one acts like that, since humans are social animals, they might all follow their lead. Just find the right friends and housemates.

StarZax · 2021-10-28T20:27:44+00:00

Looks like you got no luck, 4 gals and none of them seem nice

To me it does look like you really found some extreme cases, those are pretty rare but they exist. Do you live in the US ? Because I live in France and it could be different even tho it always does tend to look more like USA over time, I don't feel like feminism took a place as big as it does in the US ... not yet

Anyway, that's pretty bad, don't hesitate to try to meet other people and just don't give a fuck about them. If I were you I would give what I would receive. No matter what efforts you'll do, they'll still be the same.

What you can do is confront them about all that and ask questions. Why are they so mad at you, why are they like that even tho you tried to be very nice to them, etc etc ... it just depends on you. I tend to confront people in order to feel better because I don't want people to feel good if they do stupid shit that makes me feel bad.

Just don't forget that obviously, not all white women are like that. Tho there are already way too many in my opinion. Still doesn't mean it's fine to act defensively or be misogynistic because of that.

Also, what kind of responses did you get from r/mensrights ?

liz_lemon_lover · 2021-10-29T09:06:45+00:00

Woman here, giving you my opinion. The most important thing is to judge every single person as an individual. Do not think of these women as a group and start attributing their behaviour to all women. Your language honestly is already a little worrying but that could just be it's hard to interpret things in text. Hopefully you will continue to meet women from all backgrounds and can make individual assessments of them. Also, as a man you have no idea what it feels like to feel unsafe for just having a vagina. Women fearing for their safety in public for just being a woman is real and it fucking sucks.

Patient_Gas9560 · 2021-11-01T07:01:48+00:00

South asian

living with white girls

Oh boy... I'm a south asian male living in the UK too. Oh my, trust me they don't dislike you for being a man. It's because you're brown. Brown men have a disgusting stereotype of us being perverts and sexual predators (racist stereotype from the british btw), and because you are a man they will more or less bash you with this racial stereotype under the guise of them being wary of men.

Bryan_Side_Account · 2021-11-01T17:41:14+00:00

I am a white man that has had similar experiences with female roommates and other mostly-women social settings.

I’m at the point where I’m starting to view some of the behaviors you mentioned in your post as red flags - making fun of “masculine” interests, viewing works of art as “lesser” because they were made by a man, etc.

(I will grant that SOME men legitimately do make works of art that objectify women, but those works of art should be critiqued on their merits rather than because of the gender identity of their author.)

The thing I can understand is feeling unsafe in public spaces. I have heard enough horror stories from women in my life that I believe that women genuinely have a harder time navigating public spaces alone.

Title	What I have learnt living with white women as a South Asian man
Author	rochesterslim
Upvotes	83
Comments	30
Date	October 28, 2021 4:13 PM UTC (4 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/qhqhhd/what_i_have_learnt_living_with_white_women_as_a/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/what-i-have-learnt-living-with-white-women-as-a.1081323 https://theredarchive.com/post/1081323

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