This may be a bit of a ramble.

On another website I grew a following and became somewhat infamous for speaking up against the popular feminist narrative and becoming an advocate for men's rights. It became important to me after some experiences in college, totally unrelated.

I noticed that while many of my peers would get called misogynistic, chauvanistic or told that their opinions didn't matter by feminists on the site, it was a lot easier for me, as a woman, to say the exact same things and be able to have the views expressed be considered more seriously. I managed to reach across the aisle even and get some feminists to support our point of view. I made plenty of feminists very mad too and was blocked by many, many top writers.

As it stands, one problem I always ran into was with male feminists. Male feminists could frequently be more aggressive than some of the female feminists. I find many of the views of feminism infantalizing of women in general but some male feminists appeared to take it to the extreme. They oftentimes felt the need to explain to me what it's like to live in the world as a woman, as though that's not what I've been doing every day. Their revisionary explanations oftentimes painted the female experience in a very vulnerable, meek, and dependent light that I resented. I do not like to accuse anyone of "white knighting" because I think that term is oftentimes used against men who just disagree with...well right-wing points of views in favor of a woman. But in that case it could come across that way, like some male feminists were on sort of a power trip where feminism made them feel that they were needed to be the protectors and saviors for women, rather than just acknowledging our capability. Not all of them of course, some male feminists were lovely.

Because I was one of the most well-known men's rights advocates I always wanted to be able to advocate for men's rights while avoiding being condescending, or demeaning towards the men I was trying to advocate for. I didn't want men to feel like they were pitied or assumed incompetent. I also didn't want to take the tone many male feminists took with me, by aggressively telling me why I need feminism.

My main advocacy centered on topics like male domestic violence, male rape, etc because those are my areas of expertise and research. But at the same time, that meant I often clashed with male trad-cons who made statements mocking, belittling and dismissing the notion that men could be raped by a woman. It becomes exceedingly difficult to hear rape apologist arguments for extended periods of time. It also made me feel incredibly conflicted because "dammit, men needs men's rights" isn't that different than "dammit women need feminism".

Male circumcision was one of the most difficult topics to discuss. I don't think male infant circumcision should be allowed except in the rare cases of medical necessity. But anytime that I brought up being against male-infant circumcision there were frequently tons and tons of men who would respond disagreeing with me because they were circumcised and liked it. There was always kind of a perceived undertone of "what would you know about male circumcision, you're a woman" But at the same time it didn't feel right to be silent on the topic either. I usually tried to find examples of men who discussed things like being unhappy with their circumcision, looked at intackivist resources and put men's opinions front and center.

Then when I wrote a comment to discussing how it is sometimes difficult to be a woman discussing the topic of male circumcision one guy viciously ranted at me about how circumcision is women's fault and how dare I sit in privilege and express difficulty discussing the matter.

I guess I felt that as a prominent female men's advocate it was easier for me to reach across the aisle, or get feminists to actually listen to my point of view and consider the merits of men's rights in various areas. At the same time it placed me at a disadvantage when debating men's rights with other men, because I didn't want to come across like I was telling men what was best for them. I tried to counter this as much as possible by quoting men's experiences and trying to stick to subjects I was most knowledgeable about and therefore felt most confident advocating in.

I know it was very common among the female anti-feminists to feel like male feminists could be extremely condescending, vicious and patronizing towards us. And for that reason I struggle to always hit as hard or be as confident in some men's rights narratives I craft because I don't want to take that kind of tone to men who disagreed with me.

Is there a good way to approach these discussions as a woman without coming across either like I pity men, because I want to highlight their strength, and also to take a stand for men's rights against trad-cons and other men without coming across as..."womansplaining?"