Is there such thing as "male privilege" and what are some examples?

GlassTwiceTooBig · 2017-12-06T18:23:55+00:00

It's one side of the grass-is-always-greener mentality that a lot of feminists have. Other people in this thread are going to say that there's female privilege too, and they're right. The problem is that it's impossible to quantify male privilege and female privilege in a way that makes them measurable against each other. Men don't like their disadvantages, and women don't like their disadvantages. Both men and women take their advantages for granted, because unless they changed their gender at some point, the one they were born as is the one they've always had the advantages of.

Men do have advantages. We're generally physically stronger and bigger, we don't bleed out of our crotches for a quarter of each month, we're generally better (through nature or nurture) at muting our emotions for the sake of getting what we want, and society treats us differently because of what people generally want from us.

The trouble arises when people want all of the advantages of each gender without any of the disadvantages, reciprocal or not. One of the common ways that people think they can get those advantages without the disadvantages seems to be to try to get other people to change, which is like steering a cruise ship as a passenger with no access to the rudder. Unless you can convince everyone to help, it isn't going to happen, and convincing everyone to help is going to be almost impossible unless it overtly benefits everyone.

As for men being oppressed by women and women being oppressed by men, to a certain extent in first-world countries like the US and the Great Britain, the amount that you get oppressed probably has more to do with how you allow society to treat you than it does with immovable social forces standing in your way. That's where moral agency comes in. If you're a woman who doesn't think she can be in a STEM field because it's biased against women, the first step is actually trying. Starting out by thinking it's impossible and acting as such is the surest way to guarantee that you won't get a STEM job. If you try because that's what you want, and find that you're being passed up for a job based on what's between your legs, then you have something to complain about. If you don't try in the first place, though, that's on you. That comes from what's in your head. As a guy, I could say "I won't become a teacher because men are often viewed as pedophiles if they work with kids", but I wouldn't know that for sure unless I tried. It isn't society telling me I can't, it's me saying I can't. Someone can complain about not getting a STEM job all they want, but one thing that you never find is someone who complains about not getting a STEM job because of the perceived social barrier who has actually tried to get a STEM job. In fact, if you ask someone who works in CIS or most tech jobs out there, they'll probably tell you that they'd hire women if any actually applied for the positions. The problem is that very few actually do. Whether that's because of self-imposed limitations, or a genuine lack of interest is anyone's guess, but with the current hiring climate and focus on diversity in the workplace, the few women who do apply tend to have a leg up, even against slightly more qualified men for the same positions.

BlueOrange22 · 2017-12-06T18:12:56+00:00

I leave it that vague because I can't think of many areas where men have an advantage in society. The only things I can think of is that women have to pay more for health insurance than men for the same reason that men have to pay more for car insurance.

Actually that changed a few years ago around 2010, now women pay the same for health insurance. Men still pay more for car insurance

Overall, its overwhelmingly no. And certainly not in anyway that follows the feminist theory or definition of it. Economically men are more likely to be homeless and unemployed, men die younger yet get less healthcare and health research, men are punished more harshly in the court system, men have higher pension ages and subject to conscription, male victims of domestic abuse are discriminated against, homeless men have less resources, boys fare worse in education at all levels, laws allow or ignore hiring discrimination of men, etc. So overall, no, there is no male privilege in the West.

If I had to come up with anything, I could maybe think of two valid points, and neither are discriminatory but rather social trends.

The first is changing your last name after marriage. I wouldn't want to do that, and it's still mostly the norm for women to have to do. But of course this isn't a law and completely optional, many couples use both names with hyphens now. So it's a social norm rather than discrimination.

The second is athlete earnings. Male athletes earn more than female athletes. However, once again, this isn't discriminatory because it's not written in law, it's just how supply and demand work. More people watch male sports, so male sports make more money. Even women are much more likely to watch male sports teams, so male sports teams make more money. It's worth noting that women's sports leagues often have less games per year, and even if tennis, female players play less sets.

So in terms of legal discrimination and privilege, none exist for men, and the two I points I listed aren't even half of a percent of male disadvantages.

RaptorsCdwoods · 2017-12-06T21:08:58+00:00

I heard a transgender man (I don't know how this shit works so he was a woman but is now a man), make a video talking about how he has male privilege but was super vague throughout the entire video and finally at the end of the example gave an example where people asked him to pick up boxes that were heavy. So apparently physical labor is male privilege.

Mr_MRAnarchist · 2017-12-06T18:00:46+00:00

the only one I can think of is where men can not wear a top in public but women can't.

Of course an exception to this is when a woman is breastfeeding (which is legal everywhere) and not many women I know would go jogging with no top.

everything else is just apex fallacy

Lethn · 2017-12-06T17:46:41+00:00

If feminists can't even give specific examples and the ones they do get frequently debunked then I don't think there's any harm in calling the whole concept bullshit. About the only one I can think of that has any kind of remote credibility is the treatment of mothers when it comes to employment opportunities, but even then, there's a legitimate reason for that as we know and it's because employers are having to weigh up whether they should have to deal with all the craziness involved with that especially when they might have to bugger off at a moments notice if they're looking after a child for example.

The onus is on them not us to try and prove that male privilege exists in the west because they are the ones who bring it up frequently. Meanwhile, you ask MRAs about the kind of shit women have and you could practically make up a database with various statistics about issues they frequently benefit from at the expense of men.

People have forgotten how to debate and how scientific evidence and reasoning works, when somebody makes a claim, they are the ones who have to prove it. It is not down to the rest of us to try and prove their bullshit wrong and that is how you know feminism operates on the same principles as religion because scientists have to deal with the exact same bullshit when arguing with creationists.

DirtAndGrass · 2017-12-06T21:13:06+00:00

I that the problem is that "intersectionalism" is maliciously used. It is meant to be a tool to analyze what systematic benefits YOU (yourself) may have over others. Instead it is used, to judge others based on stereotypes.

Ie, " I'm a man and probably have an easier time developing physical strength" VS. "those people are men, and are thus more violent"

girlwriteswhat · 2017-12-07T16:48:44+00:00

Men and women are perceived differently. Women are more neotenous than men are (in general), and that affects the contexts in which they will be taken seriously.

Neoteny (boiled down) is the retention of child-like phenotypical and behavioral characteristics into adulthood. What we perceive generally as a more masculine face is better described as a less neotenous one.

Women's neotenous characteristics: Higher forehead, smaller chin, rounder jaw, softer/smaller body, less body hair, no facial hair, longer eyelashes, larger eyes, fuller/softer lips, higher vocal pitch, more productive tear glands/smaller ducts, etc. In terms of visuals, you could call describe it as being "cute".

It's a chicken and egg argument as to whether women are more protected because their neoteny causes us to want to protect them or whether women are more neotenous because our greater impulse to protect them made neoteny work to their benefit. I'm guessing it's both--a kind of feedback loop where neoteny bolstered our existing desire to protect women, leading to ever greater neoteny over generations as the most neotenous were the most protected (and they are rated the most sexually attractive by men, cross culturally, which would mean better reproductive success).

Cuter individuals are perceived by people across cultures as "nicer", less intimidating, more trustworthy, etc. This is the case even when you take the same male face, alter it subtly to "masculinize" or "feminize" it, and ask people which of the faces evokes more trust.

However, there are downsides to this. Like I said way up at the top, neoteny affects the ways in which people will take you seriously, and the ways in which people will interpret identical actions.

There's some research indicating that lower vocal pitch is considered more authoritative by people, particularly regarding big, important stuff. You want to sell soda or candy, you choose a woman. Things like homeowner's insurance, you get a guy with a deep deep voice to pitch your product. I watched an interview with one of the most sought after female voiceover artists, one of the few who got hired to shill "big, important stuff", and her vocal pitch was very low for a woman.

People will respond to a man's commands faster than to a woman's, likely because of the vocal pitch, but possibly also because of his less child-like features. One study showed this tendency regarding response to command (in terms of deeper voices) existed across age groups, from octogenarians to babies.

In a negotiating situation, a man might come across as tough and unyielding, while a woman might come across as petulant or bitchy.

If sympathy and protection are what you want (to be taken seriously when you have a complaint or are in danger), women are privileged. But if you want to be taken seriously in other ways, you may have to work harder. You may even have to masculinize yourself.

Just imagine this woman playing the role of Ellen Ripley. I bet you can't. Sigourney Weaver seems to have hit that sweet spot of an attractive woman whose facial features (and vocal pitch) were just masculine enough to pull off the role--a role that was originally written as male.

The lead role in the movie Salt was originally written for a man. When they brought in Angelina Jolie, they had to rewrite the entire script to make her believable in the role. Jane Lynch is kind of famous for being cast in roles that were originally written for men, but she's again got a masculinized quality to her that would cause her to be taken seriously in those roles.

One thing I will say is that women face a unique conundrum when it comes to being taken seriously in the ways men are--in order to do it, they sometimes have to sacrifice their sexual attractiveness. Men don't have to do that, because being taken seriously in those ways dovetails with what women tend to find sexually attractive in men.

I made a choice years ago to forego makeup in my videos. I never used much--eyeliner, mascara and untinted lip balm is all I ever wore--but I actually found that I took myself more seriously without it. I asked myself what was more important to me--to have people listen to what I say and consider me an authority, or to have people think I'm pretty.

I suppose this is a very complicated way of saying it's complicated. But yes, I believe there are some male privileges, within certain contexts.

On the other hand, even those privileges are double-edged. If you're going to be taken more seriously when selling homeowner's insurance, you're probably going to be taken more seriously when you're coming at someone with a knife (in which case, they'll be more inclined to shoot you, which is difficult to describe as a privilege).

EricAllonde · 2017-12-07T06:10:19+00:00

I keep asking feminists for an example of male privilege that isn't just the result of hard work, drive and calculated risk-taking. They've never given me anything. Our government broadcaster even put on a show called, "Is male privilege bullshit?" and invited a bunch of feminists on to push the concept, including the repulsive misandrist Clementine Ford. None of the feminists could provide a single example of male privilege, other than the confused-looking trans man who claimed, "People laugh at my jokes more since I became a man". That's it!

AloysiusC · 2017-12-07T07:00:42+00:00

Feminists told me that men being forced to sacrifice their lives for women was male privilege because apparently it makes men feel capable.

Was that the sort of thing you were thinking of?

KingRobotPrince · 2017-12-07T07:39:16+00:00

I believe there is male and female privilege. It's generally pretty minor, IMHO, and a lot of it seems pretty natural. There is often equality that affects both men and women (not all of it is negative, we are after all different).

One of my biggest issues with "feminism" is that it generally seeks to remove male privilege and make women equal with men in everything (it's now gone beyond equal and turned into revenge feminism but that's not quite the point), but rarely does it address any areas where women have privilege or where they have an advantage over men.

Many "feminists" follow the doctrine than men are so privileged, that "the patriarchy" is so powerful and that women are so oppressed, that their focus is solely on pushing women ahead and men back. It is not enough that women are empowered, men have to be disempowered to bring things level.

Obviously, since they view men as holding so much power, they aren't likely to admit or want to give up areas where they have more power.

Also, another mind trick is to say "well women only have that advantage because of the patriarchy, so if we fight that things will be better for men as well. Which, since I believe a lot of this is natural, will not work IMHO.

I would imagine they might believe that, once the patriarchy is done away with, a man who is 25, living with his parents and working in a whole foods store is prime marriage material if he is attractive and nice (as a woman is now), but I don't think that if we lived in some kind of utopian "non-patriarchal" world that women would stop wanting men with money and power.

The natural privilege that women have would not go away simply because the natural privilege (it's not even privilege really, it's just difference) that man have is forcefully removed.

Basically it's all bollox and it's all about power not equality.

2017-12-11T22:17:31+00:00

Men have the privelege of not being cat-called and harassed when they walk down the street. Most men feel a lot safer than women do when they walk home at night. If they are nervous, it is usually because they are scared of another man mugging them (not a woman), they are not usually thinking they are going to get raped.

Men have the privlege of most media being made for their male gaze. They have a fair representation of their sex on screen. Male characters are not objectified as women are. Men are not held up to ridiculous beauty standards. They don't often see weight loss adverts aimed at them, they are not told to diet, they are not told to wear makeup or shave their legs.

They see their sex represented on TV in all shapes, sizes and ages. Women on TV are mainly young and slim. Most female celebrities have had plastic surgery, even the ones that don't appear to have done so. This gives women false ideas of beauty, and men too. More young women and girls are developing eating disorders and depression because of the pressure to look a certain way. Yes, men go through this too, but the figures show women suffer far more than men when it comes to this.

A topless man isn't the same as a topless woman. Most shows and media are catered to the male gaze. Both a topless, muscular man and a topless woman are male fantasy. Men are not objectified, but shown to be powerful and strong. Naked women are there to be sexualised.

Men make laws to control women's bodies. It is easier for a man to get a vasectomy than it is for a woman to have her tubes tied. Many countries have men making laws to ban women from having abortions.

Men can be accused of sexual assault by multiple people but still become the president of the United States. Men can abuse women but still be adored - Johnny Depp, Chris Brown etc.

Men can expect women to do the majority of the childcare and housework, even when she is working just as many hours as he is.

Men can downvote this comment and laugh at feminazis, because they have no idea what oppression actually is.

Badgerz92 · 2017-12-07T15:23:53+00:00

"Male privilege" in the sense that feminists think all privileges belong to men does not exist. There are individual issues that men are privileged on though. One would be male leaders having their opinions more respected than women.

However, we've fixed most of the major inequalities that benefited men (in America). Men used to get paid more for the same work, now they don't. Men used to be the only ones who could vote, now women can vote. So there isn't a lot of male privilege left whereas women still have a lot of privilege and inequalities that favor them. In developing countries of course there are more examples of male privilege still.

alclarkey · 2017-12-07T17:51:39+00:00

I can piss my name in the snow.

honorshall · 2017-12-06T20:44:13+00:00

Male privilege definitely exists, but so does female privilege. Men are privileged by institutions, women are privileged by social empathy.

When talking about this, people always make two cognitive errors: A) presuming that the abstract "male privilege" applies to EVERY SINGLE MALE, and B) presuming that there is only one privileged group at all in the big picture.

Finally, and this is tangential to your question, but I believe the whole discussion of male privilege in media is designed to get people distracted with gender politics and scapegoating, ignoring that most of the problems faced by men and women are caused by decisions that benefit the rich.

Convincing women that "all men are privileged" is an easy way to keep them from identifying and directly confronting the genuinely over-privileged members of society.

fungo_bat · 2017-12-07T00:12:51+00:00

I honestly do not think there are anymore, TBH. I mean in the thirty years ago, maybe. Now the coin has flipped.

Woman claim they make less than men in the same job. They don't quantify that with, longevity, performance or the man may have a specific desired skill set that commanded higher pay.
If man and a woman commit the same crime with similar circumstances, in many instances the man will get a harsher sentence.
In the universities, woman are given more preferential treatment. A professor might do more after hours to help a struggling female student over a male.
Woman have a higher chance to move up in careers like aviation in attempts to even the gap between male and female pilots.
If a female accuses a male it almost always is treated as if she is telling the truth. If it is the other way around the male is more scrutinized.
In the work place females are allowed to be more emotional and get away with outbursts without penalty. Man does it, he could written up.
Females can get away with behaviors at work that if a man does it, it would immediately be grounds for inappropriate behavior or sexual harassment. If a bunch of girls are gabbing about the hot guy they met at the club over the weekend they are not treated the same if a group of guys are doing it.
Men are less likely to make a harassment complaint against a female over the vague policies. If a woman awkwardly stares at a guy, he isn't running to HR immediately. It is certainly more like the case if it is reversed.
Men are more likely to be arrested in domestic violence even when defending themselves to a the woman attacker.
In the military standards are sometimes lowered to ensure woman succeed. I seen this in pilot training. Woman would get way more slack for their performance compared to guys. A woman to be washed out would have to basically prove they could not fly a plane.

I am not seeing it on a large scale. If there is vocation or profession that leans more in favor of men. Its probably small and nebulous compared to the bigger picture.

Jammersault · 2017-12-07T03:13:45+00:00

Not to take the piss, but stand up to take a leak! Juvenile joke, apologies!

secondclassguy · 2017-12-07T06:16:51+00:00

I always thought that was being born rich

2017-12-07T16:48:23+00:00

Every individual male or female black or white has their own privileges and disadvantages.. It all boils down to their personality and overall life situation.

A black female and a white male for instance.. Most people would assume the white male has a clear advantage here.. But now take this into consideration..

The black female is from a very wealthy family in Nigeria who sent their caughter to study at a prestigious private college as pre-med. Her father is an oil businessman and multimillionaire. l

The white male is from a desolated old rust belt city in Ohio. The son of an abusive alcoholic father and a drunk mother. Grew up working class/poor. He worked as a dishwasher since he was 15 and saved money for 10 years working shit restaurant jobs and living in slum apartments so that he could afford to go to community college debt free at 25.

Obviously the black female here has the "privilege"

Our society pretends that every single white male just gets everything handed to them. A job, a business their father started, a new car for graduating college, etc.. That is so far from the truth and "privilege" is really a class-based phenomenon but also unique to the individual.

2017-12-07T17:09:21+00:00

No.

In every aspect of life in first world society women are in a better position than men. Legal, societal, whatever. It's only when you step into non western countries where women aren't treated fairly at all.

Isellmacs · 2017-12-07T17:27:08+00:00

Privilege is one of those newspeak words that has a different meaning that makes it confusing to understand to the uninitiated.

Privileges are usually advantages that you earn. In social justice, a privilege is a disadvantage somebody else has that you don't, based off nothing you've done and is unavoidable.

The basis of privilege is white privilege, and it comes from rich and sheltered white college students being so sheltered from hardship they don't understand what it means to be black and poor. Like, literally don't understand because they are so sheltered. Male privilege is an adaptation of that concept that there are disadvantages women face that men don't understand because they don't experience them. Which inspires the phrase "check your privilege" which is a call to self examination where one isn't fully grasping the situation because there are issues invisible to them.

In modern feminist usage, male privilege isn't something your guilty of, or something you did. It's not something you can atone for or receive forgiveness. It's effectively an original sin and its often used as a leverage in order to close the "power disparity" between the genders. It's like if somebody stole $50 from a woman. You weren't the one who did the stealing, however, you owe her $100,000 for being a male, so its justified to ask you to pay her back $50 of that debt. It won't cancel the debt, but it'll narrow the (perceived) gap slightly.

Things like pregnancy and periods are examples of male privilege; we don't have these downsides that women must suffer through. It's not our fault and we have no control over it. The only thing we can do is to proffer up compensation in other ways out of obligation.

Feminists like the acknowledgment of male privilege because it means you acknowledge that you owe her that $100,000. Even if you aren't paying it back now, you've accepted that you are in debt and that gives her social power over you.

_Human_Being · 2017-12-07T19:25:58+00:00

Well there are certainly patriarchal societies around the world (Saudi Arabia comes to mind). In America, only 9% of people think that there are advantages to being a woman compared to 42% who say there are advantages to being a man. That would point to maybe some underlying 'privilege' that isn't immediately apparent.

Personally, I remeber watching a video on YouTube where a woman photographer was walking through a city when some men 'invited' her to come into house to 'take pictures of them'. She cringed and laughed it off before walking quickly away. My thought was : "Why didn't she just go in the house and take pictures of them?" Then it dawned on me that life isn't that simple for women.

Anyway, like I said, I can't point to any obvious 'privilege' at the moment.

tyrhgyt4453645 · 2017-12-08T01:58:29+00:00

I have a pretty good example- The women in my life usually can not get refunds on products or services while I always can, this also can come into play with haggling- think demanding a free month of service from your cell phone provider for over charging you or getting the best price on your car, getting refunded a late fee on your credit card or disputing a charge that was not you- these things are easier when you are a man.

Its just morse socially acceptable for a man to argue about money and bad service then a woman and be taken seriously- when women do it they seem just bitchy and hysterical, but when a man does it he is taking charge and being alpha.

I see this a lot. The only time it plays out in the opposite is in a restaurant, women can complain or demand very specific orders and there is no issue but if a man does it he is seen as pretty rude or crazy

tldr- Its easier to get your money back or get a cheaper price for things as a man because you will be taken more seriously.

Sunlglftbk · 2017-12-08T03:45:57+00:00

Agree that both genders have certain privileges. Couple examples that I've heard, ability to go out with out fear of physical attack, expectations regarding personal grooming standards, expectations regarding child birth and raising children especially in terms of careers, probably more that I've heard but can't think of them right now.

cloverboy77 · 2017-12-08T07:13:31+00:00

There is only one metric which counts. Longevity. Women live an average of 6 years longer than men in western countries. The divide is even larger in eastern European countries, to the extent that in a few of these countries men, as a group, are basically dying right around retirement age. Where do you think all the money they earned over their lives goes??? What would be the actual per capita dollar amount in extra economic benefit the average women will extract by virtue of living that much longer? Yuge. We would have to add up 6 more years of old age security, cpp, social security, other public and private pensions, calculate the cost of all the extra medical care they will get, figure out what the different aggregate averages for each gender is in regards to amount of time spent working/investing in society compared to amount of time spent pursuing personal, individual goals and enjoying leisure (these ratios would serve to quantify how much more beneficial to society as a whole is each unit of work the average man does compared to the average contribution per unit of work for a woman since she will necessarily extract much more in the way of time, energy, resources, and labour from society for her own salutary benefit), calculate what all the significantly more time and opportunity after retirement to enjoy fruits of one's labour (as well as the labour of dead men in the form of their savings, pensions, material goods, etc) is actually worth and attach a number to for clarity, etc, etc, etc. Women not only extract much more by virtue of living longer, many of them get a nice big tasty expensive free lunch to enjoy at their discretion when their husbands die. Men rarely get to eat at that buffet.

If you really think about it women receive one massive free ride after another by living that much longer than men and the total of that disparity is simply enormous. Any superficial anachronistic "privileges" we may be said to have we pay for and then some. Literally.

McGauth925 · 2017-12-08T13:57:51+00:00

I love male privilege. That's where guys are bad because they're not discriminated against. Whereas women have actual privileges - things that they can do that men would be condemned or arrested for - or be much less severely punished for. I can't think of anything that a man can do that a woman can't - go shirtless at the beach, maybe. And, I have no doubt that women would rather go topless at the beach than have men be willing to pay them to see their breasts. Women just hate that shit.

MGTOW. Don't plan on women for anything at all.

konous · 2017-12-06T22:30:54+00:00

Well,

Generally speaking I have seen in the work place, and witnessed my own mother's tireless efforts to actually get recognized for their and her work.

My mom is now one of the executive Sue Chefs of the Orange County Convention Center and basically the one who makes certain everything works the way it should. She manages an entire Convention Center that does multiple super conventions every year, week after week and she makes certain that everything is where it needs to be on time.

She's basically a God tier real life RTS player. I'm pretty sure she's actually played Star Craft too, so, there is that.

Problem is, she didn't have a culinary degree. It took her twenty years of working in this Convention Center, sometimes filling in the work of her other bosses for years without their pay. Her bosses were eventually fired, or they quit due to stress, sometimes within days of starting to work there.

For the idea that work or value should be based on the merit of the worker, my mom literally worked her ass off for years doing the work of men often twenty years her senior, and still managing to find time to be a Mom to me.

Various jobs I've worked have all had hot girls in them, but one of my old one's the manager of the place literally walked up to one of the hostesses and said "I got 300 dollars in my pocket. What are you willing to do for it?"

He got fired on the spot of course, but guys do do this kind of shit to women on the job.

Girls get a lot of sexual advances, and while yes it is up to the man to often initiate discourse, a lot of dudes just frankly pick the most derogatory way of going about it, especially on the job.

Mind you, this is the service industry, which is way more sexist on the whole than a lot of others, especially down in Florida.

PIG_CUNT · 2017-12-06T19:23:18+00:00

Male privilege exists but is mostly physical things. For instance, being naturally bigger, stronger, faster, taller etc. Not having periods or giving birth and such.

There are other minor things like men being able to go topless in public places as well though.

Title	Is there such thing as "male privilege" and what are some examples?
Author	SnugglesMcFluffkin
Upvotes	49
Comments	73
Date	December 6, 2017 5:08 PM UTC (8 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/7hzet7/is_there_such_thing_as_male_privilege_and_what/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/is-there-such-thing-as-male-privilege-and-what-are.909834 https://theredarchive.com/post/909834

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