Preface

Before I go into the meat and potatoes of this point, I want to make clear that I really love this subreddit. I love the idea of a left-wing space for Men's issues that allows everyone to speak frankly on men's issues and feminism and how they might intersect. I'm pretty far left-wing and for the most part, I feel right at home in this sub.

My Problem with r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates

The statement "men suffer under patriarchy too" is a statement that disproves the validity of the patriarchy theory. It's doublethink and self-contradictory

I've always found it kind of baffling that the same people who will denigrate men for saying "not all men" will in the same breath say "not all feminists"

Patriarchy theory conditions men to accept abuse from women and to view themselves as less important than women

The on-going battle against male sexuality: We need to address the elephant in the room

At the time of writing this, 4 out of the 10 most upvoted posts from this week on this sub dealt with/dissecting some aspect of feminist thought or theory (as perceived by the author -- feminist ideas tend to be unspecific, almost by design). While I have absolutely no problem with a thorough breakdown and assessment of feminist thought, only one of those (the last one) comes close to a well-thought-out breakdown, the rest read like rants/venting about the hypocrisy/problematic actions of feminists.

This isn't particularly bad/problematic in a certain context, however, I think this sub has a myopic focus on attacking/breaking down feminism, instead of highlighting the way right-wingers and conservative lawmakers actively act against the welfare of men.

New Law in Utah

A new law in Utah will require the biological father to pay half of the pregnancy-related medical costs.

No, I'm not joking.

This cost includes health insurance premiums and hospital birth and was signed by Republican Gov. Spencer Cov last month and is expected to take effect on May 5th.

To give you an idea of what the mindset of the proponents of the bill:

Supporters of the legislation say it will lessen the financial burden of pregnancy for women and increase responsibility for men who father children

Republican state Rep. Brady Brammer, the bill's chief sponsor, said this year that it was part of an effort to increase the "responsibility for men in the bringing of life into the world," according to The Salt Lake Tribune. It was not explicitly intended to lower the frequency of abortions but has prompted debate over abortion access as it could have that effect.

"Oftentimes there's this battle between pro-life and pro-choice, where some of the pro-life positions really turn into a perception that it's just anti-abortion," Brammer told the Utah House Judiciary Committee in January. "I kind of got sick of those things, and I thought, 'What could we do that's really a pro-life thing?' ... And so that's where this bill came from."

(Emphasis mine)

There are plenty of critics of the bill

Karrie Galloway, president and CEO of the Planned Parenthood Association of Utah, said in a statement that "while we appreciate that this bill highlights how expensive it is to be pregnant and that many women struggle to cover the costs of their health care, we feel there are better ways to support pregnant people and families."

"People who become pregnant should be able to determine for themselves what is best for them without legislative interference, compromising their privacy or bureaucratic hurdles," she said.

"I worry that an unscrupulous and abusive male may say, 'Hey, I have this duty. You can't escape me. You may not want to collect it, but I need to be tied to you in a way that you don't want because I have to discharge my duty,' " King said, though he also said he believes there should be more expectation and accountability for men "who are quick to spread their seed and not think they have to be responsible for the consequences."

(Emphasis mine)

Including r/politics

Yes, these people are fighting to increase the "responsibility" of biological fathers by legally mandating that the fathers must pay to alleviate the financial burden of pregnancy because of a belief that men are quick to spread their see and not think they have to be responsible for the consequences.

Instead of making abortion access easier, more affordable as their constituents want, and increasing reproductive freedoms for both men and women, Utahn's religious elite opted to sprout the misandric message that men are fundamentally irresponsible, unaccountable, and are "quick to spread their seed".

What's missing from the Discussion

What is also missing from the discussion, something that I think a lot of people don't think about is how this could increase incidences of reproductive coercion, a type of abuse that already affects men disproportionately.

Approximately 8.6% (or an estimated 10.3 million) of women in the United States reported ever having an intimate partner who tried to get them pregnant when they did not want to, or refused to use a condom, with 4.8% having had an intimate partner who tried to get them pregnant when they did not want to, and 6.7% having had an intimate partner who refused to wear a condom

Approximately 10.4% (or an estimated 11.7 million) of men in the United States reported ever having an intimate partner who tried to get pregnant when they did not want to or tried to stop them from using birth control, with 8.7% having had an intimate partner who tried to get pregnant when they did not want to or tried to stop them from using birth control and 3.8% having had an intimate partner who refused to wear a condom

(from page 58)

Here is another study that came to the same conclusion.

In the United States, 9.7% of men and 8.4% of women experienced any RC by an intimate partner during their lifetime. Men reported more commonly than women that a partner tried to get pregnant when the man did not want her to; women reported higher prevalence of partner condom refusal. Examination by race/ethnicity revealed that non-Hispanic (NH) Black women and men had significantly higher lifetime prevalence of both RC types than all other groups; in the last 12 months, NH Blacks had significantly higher prevalence across the board than NH Whites.

(emphasis mine)

(These were the only two reports that I could find on google scholar about the actual prevalence of reproductive coercion because it is typically assumed that this type of abuse can only impact women).

Not only is this a male issue, but it is likely an intersectional issue between both 'black' and 'male' identities.

Also, there is a really good r/MensLib post on the subject (I know some here aren't the most friendly with the sub -- I have my own issues too -- but every now and then I stumble into some great discussions on important topics)

While men are more likely to report that an intimate partner tried to get pregnant when they did not want or tried to stop them from using birth control, women were around 1.5x more likely to report an intimate partner who refused to wear a condom. I read this report maybe dozens of times to make sure I didn't misinterpret it, but it seems to be what it is. This is pretty alarming because if you google this, you find shit like this where not only are there no articles about it happening to men, most of the results on the page aren't even gender neutral

As the emphasized sentence said, it likely that even though men experience RC more often than women, they also underreport the incidence which means that the gap is likely even more severe than is counted.

I don't think it's hard to imagine this law being used as another way to abuse the reproductive and social power 'unscrupulous' moms (read: abusers) have over men especially given that even when men are raped, they still have to pay child support.

The Political Problem

The most frustrating thing about this is how men are completely excluded from the conversation about rights, freedom, and responsibilities and how little information there is about reproductive coercion because most people just assume IPV of any kind must affect women more because of historical narratives.

These are the very same narratives that allow conservative politicians to talk about being pro-life while seeking to curtail both male and female reproductive freedoms and for liberals to vote limp-fishedly (the vote was nearly unanimous) without thinking about the harm that it could do to intimate personal relationships and even how it goes against the desires of their own voters.

Conclusion

I know this likely reads like a rant against conservatives/Republicans/right-wingers in the US.

If it does, good, that's what it is meant to be.

I think conservatives are just as anti-male or even more so than the most gynocentric feminist, especially since they often pay lip service to men's rights in an effort to 'beat the libs' while criticizing men for not fitting their idea of manliness.

Because of this, we should certainly spend more time pointing out laws, cases, statistics, biases in research that negatively affect men (we do this quite a bit already) instead of dissecting down and understanding feminism. There are feminists who are interested in egalitarian ideas of men and women being equal in a way where men's issues get proportional attention, however, conservatives advocate traditionalist ideals that hinder, hurt, and cripple men's freedoms and wellbeing.

Our society has never been in "favor" of ensuring the rights, liberties, and welfare of men so much so that the first men's rights activist was a socialist, not some reactionary conservative.

Men's Advocacy is first and foremost progressive.