Why Do People Automatically Assume Pointing Out Male Issues Means Being Against Women?

MelissaMiranti · 2026-08-12T05:29:55+00:00

Because the easiest way to mark someone as an enemy is to say they treat women badly.

Punder_man · 2026-08-12T06:29:14+00:00

Its all deflection and projection..
Especially from feminists who claim "Equality is not a zero sum game" all while dismissing or downplaying men's issues... usually by blaming the issues we as men face as caused by "The Patriarchy" or "Toxic Masculinity" or simply "Other Men"

There's also this idea that in order for men's issues to be discussed / looked into it means taking away attention or resources from women's issues.. (But remember, Equality isn't a zero sum game!)

ReasonableDoubt_0726 · 2026-08-12T06:15:12+00:00

It’s a defence mechanism of their beliefs that everything is worse for women, nothing bad happens to men, all men are misogynists.

Basically the saying is true. Bigots are ignorant.

AGoodFaceForRadio · 2026-08-12T05:21:01+00:00

We tend to use others as a mirror: when we look at them, we see ourselves. Feminism focuses on women’s issues and it is anti-male. So when men’s issues are brought to a feminist’s attention, it’s easy to understand how they could confuse that with being anti-woman.

There’s also a healthy dose of good old-fashioned deflecting going on there, too.

akaKinkade · 2026-08-12T05:44:17+00:00

A combination of projection and conflating. Everyone is guilty of focusing on the worst examples when discussing groups we disagree with and there are plenty of misogynistic people with very toxic takes on men's issues. Then there are plenty of feminists and feminist theories that are very anti-man. They project their own zero sum attitude and lump any advocacy for men as inherently anti-women. When it happens online the conversation turns ugly and eventually the misogynists DO show up and the people making the accusation pat themselves on the back for their insightfulness without even realizing that they never actually addressed the issue and that the people they were initially arguing are not the ones saying offensive things.

Argumentium · 2026-08-12T07:28:15+00:00

Her response also doesn't even make sense. There are multiple marginalized groups in society, yet we still help as many as we can regardless of who "has it worse" instead of just giving up and going "Welp, this group is more marginalized than all of you, so we can't help the rest of you."

Yet for some reason many people take this approach when it comes to men's issues, which is usually them simply not caring about men's issues and rationalizing it away so they don't feel guilty about ignoring it.

asklepios7 · 2026-08-12T07:45:36+00:00

They want to preserve the narrative that women are uniquely victimized and oppressed—primarily by men—because they believe that acknowledging men’s issues would divert attention and resources away from women’s concerns.

The_Warruner · 2026-08-12T09:06:29+00:00

Because feminism is anti-men, so when they hear someone trying to treat men like humans, it makes them think you are anti-feminist and being anti-feminist in their mind is being anti-women.

SomeSugondeseGuy · 2026-08-12T15:07:03+00:00

Because feminist patriarchy theory relies on the idea of women as victims and men as oppressors.

Pointing out the fact that men have legitimate grievances with how society treats them goes against that theory.

TheRealMasonMac · 2026-08-12T07:15:09+00:00

It’s called strawmanning.

You might be interested in my post on this kind of stuff: https://www.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/1unhxw1/how_feminism_maintains_unfalsifiability_which_is/

MyKensho · 2026-08-12T14:20:40+00:00

A lot of reasons. In complete contradiction to the notion of widespread misogyny, most of the population has a pro-women bias. Among a plethora of other related research, papers like this have found that the population is generally significantly less sympathetic to men who fall behind.

https://academic.oup.com/jeea/article/23/6/2212/8112864

I would put forth the assertion that we simply are more likely to infantilize women. And no group is more guilty of this than feminists. So when men fall behind, there's a false assumption that they're misusing their greater capacity for agency.

AbysmalDescent · 2026-08-12T14:37:16+00:00

Because 60 or so years of feminism, and complete silence from men(outside of MRA groups), has convinced the world that men have no issues, that women are universal victims, that women are oppressed by men(even when by every measurable metric, it is the other way around) and that any kind of empathy for men is an inherent betrayal against women. Misandry is the norm, more than it ever was.

Plus-Meaning-7484 · 2026-08-12T11:42:52+00:00

Because when we talk about women's issues in Parliament it has to be at the expense of men's. So they assume we want to do the same.

danclaysp · 2026-08-12T09:27:24+00:00

Because it’s a cheat code to instantly winning any discussion. It instantly deletes your argument and all rebuttals via strawmanning and henceforth all arguments become void as they’re just in service of justifying your implicit misogyny… boom.

sunyata150 · 2026-08-12T18:26:06+00:00

Men are portrayed as threats who have hyper-agency. Woman are portrayed as victims with hypo-agency, To raise men's issues is seen as sympathizing with the source of the problem.

I would suggest looking into the research for these:
- empathy gap: woman get more compassion and empathy who are both victims and perpetrators than man.
- instrumental harm (IH): when it comes to inflicting harm on men and woman for the sake of the greater good men show little bias. Woman on the other hand are significantly more likely to inflict harm on men for the sake of necessity and personal gain than other woman.
- woman are wonderful effect: People in general are more willing to accept woman are more intelligent, competent and moral than the other way around.

When those are combined together its not the least bit surprising we get these kind of outcomes.

Agreeable_Noise112 · 2026-08-12T09:14:24+00:00

If it means being against them then so be it .why do you care about their feelings too much?

My_Legz · 2026-08-12T10:06:21+00:00

Because part of being treated badly for men is to be treated badly by women. That is just a fact and it is advantageous to shut that down as fast as possible

knowtheledge5 · 2026-08-12T11:19:34+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-sum\_thinking

intothewild72 · 2026-08-12T16:18:08+00:00

First, male and women? Seriously? Feminists would rip you apart in any other subreddit if you used men and females in same sentence.

Answer to your question is: because its zero sum game. Every piece of resources spent on male issues is something that feminists want to put towards their own goals. Resources are power. Feminists have power and they are very loud. So their narrative is mainstream and gets resources. They must keep yelling, so risk of those resources being reallocated to male issues is mitigated. It's normal project managing strategy for risk management.

They can't risk that men who actually pay majority of taxes start to ask uncomfortable questions. Like maybe, why do we spend double the money on women health issues compared to men health issues.

Especially if feminism is about equality

In same way as "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" is for people and really democratic. Just in case, it's not, like at all. Same goes for feminists. They may use word equality, but they do define equality as situation when women are ahead or have it better, and inequality when women are behind or have it worse. That's usual tactics they use, they redefine every existing concept they use, to fit their agenda better and make sure that spice will continue to flow.

They used an analogy of someone getting hit by a bus vs getting a scraped knee.

Yes, their whole movement is built on fallacies. Nothing surprising here. There is excellent post in this sub about it, go check it out. https://np.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/1unhxw1/how_feminism_maintains_unfalsifiability_which_is/

I sympathize a lot with the issues women face

Of course, we are just human, we have empathy. What I do not sympathize with is resources diverted by lies. As society we should spend money on issues based on how serious those issues are, not by who yells louder.

dreamyangel · 2026-08-12T05:55:31+00:00

Some men who are heavily depressed, handicapped or traumatized can behave problematically.

Might might it be drunk driving, hitting their partner, screaming at people at work, commit sexual aggressions.

If you start describing them as complex people with limitations, not entirely responsible of themselves as their own psychology is out of hand (nobody is a stoic machine that can act as it wants), you will be seen as justifying their acts.

The current concensus is to force men to be responsible, even when they need help more than anything.

The implications is so strong that it affect everyone, even teenagers and people struggling with depression. If you fail you are responsible for yourself. It's sort of a halo effect.

TSSalamander · 2026-08-12T07:59:46+00:00

Conflict theory brain. Men are aristocrats women are pesants. what suits the aristocrat must obviously harm the pesant.

Solid-Savings5362 · 2026-08-12T15:43:22+00:00

Feminists say that equality is not a zero sum game but make it one lol.

Altruistic_Emu4917 · 2026-08-12T18:31:10+00:00

Because feminism isn't about equality, but dominance over men. It survives because it sees men as the eternal oppressor, who always has an advantage in every situation.

And they used the propaganda machine of the State and social institutions to drive the point home.

diagnosissplendid · 2026-08-12T15:32:48+00:00

Hegemony.

diagnosissplendid · 2026-08-12T15:35:17+00:00

Once upon a time I went to a meeting of the Green party and had a really disappointing time explaining a policy the party's conference had agreed on that year to some uncomprehending locals who were very concerned about badgers. I explained my unhappiness to a friend, who uttered words I will never forget:

"They don't have to be bright to be in politics."

That's essentially it: stupid feminists construe everything as a battle of the sexes, clever feminists realise that a win for one can and often is a win for all.

Global_Estimate7021 · 2026-08-12T16:35:03+00:00

Because "what are you going to do? cry like a woman?"

EsraYmssik · 2026-08-12T20:33:27+00:00

If I were being cynical, I might note that projection is a thing.

If I were being cynical, I might propose that some persons promoting Women's Issues may not be advocating FOR women, so much as AGAINST men.

If I were being cynical, I might further propose that such people assume that YOU are doing the same thing. Ie not advocating FOR men, but AGAINST women, just as they are but inverted.

If I were being cynical...

Ill-Software8713 · 2026-08-12T11:53:41+00:00

A lot of people do interject into
discussion of women’s issues about men’s in a way that doesn’t seek
To expand the subject but dismiss those of women’s.

Everyone wants to be heard, have their pain acknowledged, and even their interpretation affirmed. But quite often people aren’t humble and are more panicked to vent than create space for mutual recognition.

Even interpersonally, how many people want to be heard first and apologized to before they’ll clam down. And do they then make the effort to acknowledge your view?

Some women, like many men, are jacked by their emotions and will escalate readily more so than seek common ground. Often people’s frustration with past experiences will bleed into present interactions. And even feminist spaces have long been subject to not talking about men enough and in many cases shifted focus in a way that loses its emphasis on structural relations that are detrimental and undermine people freedom.

So, high emotions, past experience of dismissiveness and feeling ignored. This then becomes overgeneralized to situations where well intentioned discussions may then be derailed. Or some men I think use male issue rhetoric genuinely in a way that is just critical of feminism and not masculinity so it blows up ideologically.

My thought is that one has to do better than buckle under the expected miscommunication and such, try to bridge things where possible by articulating where shared interests are. Basically talk about how the world impacts men, and then throw something in about how that same reality structurally impacts women and it’s not dismissed. Doesn’t have to be the main idea of the analysis, but often the state of men is the other side of the coin for women because the same structural relation produces systematically two different trends on average.

Langland88 · 2026-08-12T20:40:00+00:00

From what I have gathered, no matter how much we say it isn't a zero sum game, the Left will always view everything in the lens of zero sum game. It's a sad reality and I wish we could have a different mindset but sadly that's not the case.

hottake_toothache · 2026-08-13T17:55:59+00:00

People don't care about men, and so they consider talking about male issues taboo and obviously distracting from the people who do matter (women).

AigisxLabrys · 2026-08-13T23:49:38+00:00

They think of it as heresy.

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UwU_numba2 · 2026-08-13T02:27:22+00:00

Because a lot of people have the mindset of "You can only care one thing at a time." and with something like this, a lot of people will try and use men's issues as a way to discredit women's issues. So people will have a kneejerk reaction to these sorts of things, plus people will try and play the "We have it harder than you" card which is sadly common everywhere in life.

Gayfunguy · 2026-08-13T14:01:44+00:00

These "feminists" have a scarcity mindset where attention is finite and all attention must be theirs. And being small minded they dont see that other people have other priorities. If they are not obsessing over 'women have it the worst' every moment they may actually see thats not true. They need to convince themselves becuse they are constantly presented with the benifit women get on a daily basis. And also men suffering and not all being privileged. It creates cognitive dissonance.

ManufacturerNo1478 · 2026-08-17T03:26:23+00:00

It's just the way the world is.

Title	Why Do People Automatically Assume Pointing Out Male Issues Means Being Against Women?
Author	Man_Against_TheWorld
Upvotes	234
Comments	63
Date	August 12, 2026 3:30 AM UTC (1 week ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/1vm2vn3/why_do_people_automatically_assume_pointing_out/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/why-do-people-automatically-assume-pointing-out.1632664 https://theredarchive.com/post/1632664

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