If we could talk about our stories, would it be way more common

OddSeraph · 2024-06-13T03:38:32+00:00

Not only do we not share our stories, but a bunch of us unfortunately don't recognize assault or harassment or abuse when it's happening to us.

angry_cabbie · 2024-06-13T03:54:09+00:00

About a decade ago, a buddy of mine at the time opened up to me about a situation with his ex. She had ended up screaming at him and throwing porcelain plates towards him during an argument. He was scared, but kept himself calm and tried to grey rock and diffused the situation. Said ex, was one of the more academic feminist women I've known, personally. He had opened up because I was struggling with leaving my own abusive relationship. He wanted to show he understood.

A few years later, he became one of the most stereotypical White Knight male feminists who would actively argue against the idea that women might lie about abuse, actively arguing against the idea that women could perform abuse, etc..

More guys need to talk about it.

Same buddy turned me away from progressive circles. We're not buddies anymore. He talked to a mutual friend about how confused he was that I was more about class issues than race issues. After all (his words), we were both white guys who's dads worked for the government as we grew up. Obviously we had the same opportunities in life.

My dad was retired from the Army when I was five, then worked as a trailer park court manager for awhile, until his poor health ate up my college fund and killed him. His dad was a lawyer, son of a state judge, who helped pay for his son to go to music college to pursue his dreams.

Just to show what type of actual fucking idiot this guy was.

PrettyText · 2024-06-13T07:28:50+00:00

It's also: 80% of suicides are men.

So men are absolutely suffering. But mainstream culture is hyper-fixated on women's issues (which yeah, are real) but aren't focused on men's issues at all.

For example, if a man cries and a woman leaves him over that, that's a heartbroken man. Or if the woman gets the kids and half his stuff in divorce, that's a heartbroken man. But usually these types of suffering are just handwaved away.

LoganCaleSalad · 2024-06-13T07:16:52+00:00

I think so & I honestly think we should & keep going regardless of push back. Start our own version of me too & watch them squirm as the receipts come out. Wonder how many participated in harassment campaigns against innocent men while actually abusing/harassing some guy themselves?

If we shared all the ways women have traumatized us & treat them like they treat us, with fear & paranoia wonder how long it would take for things to change?

rump_truck · 2024-06-13T11:37:05+00:00

I think a big part of the problem is that a lot of guys don't have the vocabulary to share their stories in a way that other people get. I've noticed that a lot of men refer to any sort of relationship problems as having a crazy ex. Those problems can be physical abuse, emotional abuse, or something as mundane as having incompatible needs in a relationship. I think the common term, plus the last group watering down its usage, results in a lot of people dismissing cases of literal abuse as "just another guy who doesn't want to listen to what his partner wants."

oncothrow · 2024-06-13T09:02:58+00:00

I was just thinking about this actually.

Someone raised a question of what do men possibly have to fear from women.

So I recounted my own story from an abusive relationship. No lie, she accused me of deliberately trying to distract from the true issue of IPV against women and trying to "flip the script" on abuse.

In an AskMens thread.

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskMen/comments/13eokqe/in_your_opinion_what_is_the_most_stupid_and_wrong/jjr9o4s/

There is a strong and almost visceral reaction when we tell our own stories. It's not part of the narrative, it HAS to be silenced.

cjheart1234 · 2024-06-13T12:01:15+00:00

I'm pretty sure if every man who spoke out about his encounter with psychopathic/narcissistic women, we'd have our equivalent of the #MeToo movement. Every man I know has been abused by a woman. Every single one.

Of course we can't do that because of #MeToo; they'd say we are just DARVO-ing.

Charming_Gift7698 · 2024-06-13T11:31:11+00:00

I think with sexual harassment a lot of men and women do the same thing: touch sexually without the other persons consent. But we only recognise when men do this. Maybe it’s that people are more accepting when women initiate it without directly asking for consent but the act is still the same and we should call out women when they don’t ask consent because we shouldn’t let them get away with the mindset that they can just do that

lemons7472 · 2024-06-13T15:42:19+00:00

Yeah It’s accepted that men don’t have any stories of women physically harming them…well more like in the way of “NO you don’t ever deal with that” since that’s always the response from people you get once you do tell your story or bad experiences with women, it doesn’t fit the accepted narrative belief that women don’t harm others, only men do. Damn near every dude has a story of a woman assaulting or hitting them just because the woman knows she’ll get away with it.

ChaosCron1 · 2024-06-13T20:56:00+00:00

Is this a safe space? If so, I'd like to share a story.

A while ago, while I was attending middle school, my first "real" relationship ended up being extremely toxic. I was emotionally abused for 6 months. "Don't stick your dick in crazy" is a pretty useful adage as my over-hormonal puberty brain fell completely into this manipulation due to promises of sex and intimacy. She was older and used that to her advantage. The toxicity expressed itself whenever any issue arose. She couldn't handle negativity and her mental health was weaponized against me. I can't stress this enough, children under a certain age should never have to worry about if someone close to them is going to kill themselves. The threat of suicide was always present in our relationship, and that was stressful. I realized pretty early that I needed to get out but the fear of her dying had me stuck until the school year ended.

This, of course, isn't the end of the madness.

After ending the relationship, she stalked me for a long ass time. Then I found out that she was telling people awful rumors about me and that a lot of these rumors started while in the relationship. I was able to successfully get a restraining order but the damage was done. Some of these rumors completely destroyed my reputation. I had to move schools just in order to receive a "fresh start". Not only that, but my relationships and dating life have been a complete mess after this. Due to this, I have these deep-seated insecurities that caused more problems than not. I've been taking a two-year break from dating after letting a woman take advantage of me during a terrible spot and ruining my relationship with a good friend; she was his girlfriend.

Regardless, I don't feel like I can blame anyone but myself for my bad behavior.

Having a break has made me realize that the most important person to take care of is myself. I will help others because that makes me feel amazing. I will never think that I deserve to be a horrible person and that horrible things should happen to me ever again if I can help it.

If society were to be more open, if it were to be acceptable and if we were to talk about it more, how much more common would these kinds of stories be?

I might be optimistic but I think if men were allowed and encouraged to talk about domestic violence and taken seriously then we'd actually see domestic violence be taken more seriously as a whole.

SlyPogona · 2024-06-13T14:27:24+00:00

It's crazy, everytime a man opens up about their sexual life with a steady partner it always comes up how they do it even when they don't want to because that one time they didn't feel like it the women would accuse them of cheating and make a big fuzz, it's so stupidly common that i'm sure at least half of this sub has experienced it.

PuckFugget · 2024-06-13T15:29:13+00:00

I think it comes down to being willing to tell those stories both in our own spaces and outside of them, regardless of how they're taken, as well as being more cognizant of harassment/assault as it pertains to the male perspective.

SomeSugondeseGuy · 2024-06-13T17:36:46+00:00

Anti-male folk often like to cite studies that say that the overwhelming majority of rapes are committed by men, even rapes against other men. I say anti-male folk - this is usually done out of simple ignorance.

Now, this claim is technically correct - but only if you use the definition for rape that is most commonplace, which explicitly excludes male victims. In short, you have to manipulate the data collection process in order to be able to make such a claim. Of course, this is what the majority of studies do.

However, these studies usually do include rape against men - they just use different terms for it - such as in the case of the CDC, whom uses the term "made to penetrate" to describe a time in which such occurs. Notably, rape against men became illegal in the United States in 2013, and this is the CDC specifically using a different definition in order to artificially deflate the number of male victims, but I digress.

If we go to the Census, or decode the statistics put out by the CDC and do some math to get the actual number of male victims of female offenders and compare it to female victims, the number of rape victims that are male victims of female offenders goes from 1 in about 40 victims to roughly 28% of total victims of rape. Please understand that this is the lowest estimate.

Meaning: For every two stories you hear from women, there is at least one male victim of a female offender who has chosen to remain silent.

Almahue · 2024-06-13T19:57:59+00:00

People just don't understand that humour tends yo be a way of venting.

Quoting a comment I made the other day:

I always find it funny that a man will joke about their SO degrading, controling, isolating and/or hitting him and the first reaction is often, somehow:

“you ingrate pos, shut the hell up"

But rarely:

“... Dude, are you ok? That's abuse!"...

... it's facinating, to say the least

Men already talk about this all the time, it's just never taken seriously.

Hugeknight · 2024-06-13T16:45:09+00:00

You can, but literally no one wants to hear it, try with your close ones first, and look how they will react, the rolled eyes, the accusations of over reacting, or being told to get over it, some people will literally ignore it as if you've never said even said anything.

SpicyMarshmellow · 2024-06-13T21:16:04+00:00

I think it's really difficult to do, for a bunch of reasons, but I think it's one of the things we're missing most. It's hard to make progress on a social issue when you keep it abstract and data-oriented. Women gain a lot of traction by telling their stories, and we need to do the same.

leroy2007 · 2024-06-13T23:39:02+00:00

I’ve always thought we could really use a male version of “The Vagina Monologues”. Most men have stories about how women have mistreated them but are gaslit to high hell whenever we try to tell them. Have you ever noticed that the label “Manosphere” gets used to derisively dismiss men when we try to tell our stories, yet there’s no female version of that label (a la Femoshpere). It’s just called “the internet”

Blauwpetje · 2024-06-14T08:34:41+00:00

Men not sharing their stories and their stories not being heard is not traditional; it’s part of feminist culture. Singers, from the Everly Brothers to Bob Dylan to Jim Croce, sang without hesitation about being treated badly by girls. Novelists wrote about it. Even (earlier) Ruth Rendell novels are literally teeming with especially emotionally abusive women. Only lately it has become impopulair to address the subject.

Omnivorax · 2024-06-13T13:38:35+00:00

Society's attitude is different if you're a man. I was drunk at a party in college. A woman I was not interested in followed me into the bathroom, took her top off, and started trying to make out with me. If you reverse the genders, that's sexual assault, but I was told I "got lucky".

Granted, this was in the 90s, but I don't think things have changed that much for men, have they?

Blauwpetje · 2024-06-14T07:14:43+00:00

No doubt I’ve been in a very abusive relationship for more than ten years. A woman who never kept appointments or promises, who didn’t answer when I called her out for her behaviour, who said ‘What am I supposed to say?’ when I wanted an answer, who never gave me any permission to get angry, which included talking just a bit louder when she maddeningly irritated me, which left the dirty work of putting boundaries to the behaviour of both her daughter and the son we had together to me, who doubtlessly thought herself very sweet and non-violent…

Before I met her, it had taken me decades to attain a little assertiveness and courage to get into conflict with others. After we separated, I had to start all over again and maybe now, after twenty years of being single again, I still feel her influence.

Content_Lychee_2632 · 2024-06-15T14:10:54+00:00

Most times when I try to tell a woman I’ve also been the victim of sexual violence, I’m disbelieved or told I’m speaking over them. Even if my experience is more relevant to the discussion, I.e., I have been trafficked, so my experience on that is much more relevant to a human trafficking discussion than somebody who was assaulted once by a friend. But I have been told to shut up in those circumstances. I have countless stories, hundreds, but it seems no one will listen.

Few_Sink_7386 · 2024-06-19T03:50:32+00:00

Yes, most Men have bad experiences with Women. However, the severity of it is questionable. You should also remember that an unhealthy amount of Women lie about their experiences for various reasons (including unironically for sexual fetish). Men should speak up more and women's accounts should be questioned more.

PrimaryPineapple946 · 2024-06-13T17:36:39+00:00

Do these things that happen to men effect them as badly as they do women? Ive been groped by women, made jokes about my appearance by women, discriminated even, but i do wonder if my experiences hurt as much as women’s. I don’t know the answer. I don’t know how vulnerable i feel compared to a women when these thing’s happen. I also don’t know how much social outrage effects these things. Women are told being felt up or objectified is terrible and abusive, so does that make them feel worse when it happens? Does the opposite happen with men. Men are told it’s nothing big, so it doesn’t effect them as much. I don’t know the answer, but sometimes when I’m reading on this group i definitely do wonder how comparable our experiences are

Appropriate_Cash_890 · 2024-06-13T14:46:11+00:00

I mean whose stopping men from telling these stories. If there are men who are free to talk about how their worst experience is being rejected by a woman, I don't see what's stopping men from talking about more serious topics.

flkathryn · 2024-06-13T19:52:09+00:00

Im three comments in and already it’s bs. Sorry, but if we are discussing, lets say, child abuse, it totally derails the entire subject to inject, lets say, animal abuse. Every human being is or can be victims of abuse but men are a privileged group and women are definitely abused by men much more often than the reverse. To state otherwise is disingenuous. The majority of lawmakers are men. The majority of medical studies totally ignore womens bodies. Women are still earn disproportionately less than men in the same field at the same jobs. Im a white woman and my feefees dont get hurt at all in a discussion of racial discrimination because I know Im privileged. I dont weaponize my privilege and I wish it werent a thing but it is. And feminism is all about equal treatment societally, not elevating one gender over another. Ive got news for you guys. Since you are in the majority you can do plenty about your own advocacy, you dont need women or any other marginalized group to help you out. But look closely at where most of the violence and discrimination originate. And to say “left wing” doesnt serve men is completely insane. The left is trying to brand itself as inclusive, but there are still more men in higher places enacting policy that ignores women for the most part so get outta here with that crap.

Title	If we could talk about our stories, would it be way more common
Author	Richardsnotmyname
Upvotes	130
Comments	70
Date	June 13, 2024 2:07 AM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/1denwwf/if_we_could_talk_about_our_stories_would_it_be/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/if-we-could-talk-about-our-stories-would-it-be-way.1521384 https://theredarchive.com/post/1521384

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