I had a (mostly) great conversation with one of my best friends the other day about gender issues. She is a self prescribed feminist. I told her what I felt that feminism ignored (mens issues) and that they are hypocrtical about it, and she agreed. We went on a long rant about SJW/Tumblr Feminists and how they are the low of the low when it comes to anything on the internet. She even said she constantly calls out other feminists for denying misandry, or silencing male rape victims, prison court sentences, homelessness, and she even protests in favor of a ban on circumcision. I was so happy.

I even asked her what she thought of "patriarchy" as an intellectual concept, and she said those who try to view it through a lens of oppressed group vs oppressors are wrong and don't know what they're talking about, and that its simply meant to be a description of society in which each gender has expected gender roles, that come about through survivalism, as well as antiquated cultural norms, and that they restrict men and women in different ways. (Sounds a lot like the MRA's analysis of things, as opposed to "men have been in power foreverz" and "women are always victims"). I was Ok with her if she wanted to call this patriarchy, because at least her understanding of it was more in tune with reality.

However, when I tried to bring up the MRM, and MRA's, she vehemently tried to correct me and was like "They are a white supremacist group and they want to rape all women" and she was like "You do not want to associate with them, even if men's issues deserve to be talked about. Real feminism is what you need, it's just been tainted by radicals, it's really about helping men too". I know she means well and her words and actions are about helping men too, but ugh, it's just frustrating trying to convince people of the MRM.

I tried to explain to her that the movement is not that, and that the "rape threats" were either 4chan, radical feminists themselves, or a very small fringe group of the MRA, to which she said "I don't believe you". I eventually gave up because she was so emotionally attached to this issue that it was pointless for me to defend the MRM anymore.

How do you guys feel about this? Feminists have done a very good job of painting us as radical sexists/a hate group. I wish there was a better way to combat this, because it's seriously holding the movement back from going mainstream.