Confused about the perception of Men's Rights

nagballs · 2013-11-04T19:12:35+00:00

I think the reason for all the "hate" is that this sub, and the movement itself, is that its largely comprised of men who have been wronged, or believe they have been wronged, by the law, women, or feminism in general.

There aren't a lot of people that will acknowledge, admit, or even know that men are being discriminated against at all, and a large amount of people that do know this are people that have seen or experienced it firsthand.

Because of this, a lot of the members of the movement may hold some deep-seated resentment for the things that have happened to them, me included, and that is completely understandable. Couple that with the fact that people will actively deny that your problems have any merit, or that your problems even exist in the first place, that can really take it's toll on your psyche.

Resentment can breed hatred, and that isn't healthy. And there isn't really a real solution to dealing with the problems men face, especially when you're part of a group with virtually zero lobbying power fighting against a multi-million dollar organization with a large amount of governmental power.

Thus, creating the circle of: Man, this shit sucks>nothing is being done about it, lets try to get the word out>your problems aren't real>fuck off, yes they are>That was hateful, you're a misogynistic hate group>no, we're just pissed>HATE GROUP!>no one will ever listen to us>man, this shit sucks.

eDgEIN708 · 2013-11-04T19:18:49+00:00

One of the issues I think affects this perception the post is the fact that feminism has done quite a lot of good for women, but has also led to overcompensation in many areas, or else disregard for equality when it doesn't suit them. As a result, many of the issues MRA's discuss can very easily be portratyed as something that is meant to negatively affect women.

For example, something like 97% of workplace injuries and deaths involve male victims. When you try to speak out about it, a lot of times all people hear is "we want more women to get hurt", when that's really not at all the point.

When you look at the situation, affirmative action is the standard in every industry except construction and other dangerous ones. Those affirmative action lobbyists didn't fight harder when the industry said "we don't want affirmative action because men are better". But the second this issue comes up, the response is "you misogynistic shitlords just want more women to get hurt!" Not all feminists are this way, clearly. I'd say not even most are this way. But the vocal minority will scream that kind of thing from the mountaintops.

It creates a perception of this group which is completely warped by the fact that historically the feminist movement has indeed done some good things, and as a result most people think that their opinions should be valued without questioning them for themselves and looking at the issue with an open mind.

It makes me happy to hear that when someone intelligent and reasonable takes a closer look with an open mind, you can look past all that misandry and see that you're dealing with people who want to take steps toward actual equality.

insaneHoshi · 2013-11-04T18:40:48+00:00

While this sub is generally good, there is some retarded shit that occurs. I think some times this sub mimics a lot of shit that feminism does while at the same time criticizing the same thing about feminism.

I swear this sub focuses more on feminism then men's rights. Just read any post where something had happens to a man and count the comments until feminism is blamed.

This thread for example, look at how many blame it on teh feminists, preferring to blame an outside force than to acknowledge any problems with this movement

Edit: also mr needs to treat the women the same in some cases. Mr is for presumption of innocence in rape cases right? We should apply that to all the female accused rapists as well

Edit2:

To prove my point we have this delightful comment by u/fukuaneveryoneuknow

> TL;DR: go fuck yourself you feminist sympathizing concern trolling piece of fucking shit.

I rest my case

perfectdesign · 2013-11-04T23:05:58+00:00

[permanently deleted]

DukeMaximum · 2013-11-04T17:10:32+00:00

Keep in mind that they said the same things early about feminism, and other civil rights movements. Lots of ugly insults were thrown by those who were comfortable with the status quo, even women, just as insults are made now with Men's Rights. We have the added hurdle of there being a segment of men who see Men's Rights not as a social movement towards a more gender-healthy society, but rather as justification for their misogyny, just as there are women who use feminism to justify misandry. It really is to be expected, and it shows how far we have to go to achieve true gender equality.

2013-11-05T00:24:07+00:00

It's natural for people who don't realize men are lacking any rights to think that MRAs are just male supremacists. The fact that most MRAs are anti-feminism tends to encourage this idea, since many people don't understand that feminism and women are not the same thing.

CosmicKeys · 2013-11-04T23:08:52+00:00

As the MRM grows it will become more structured, more professional and gain a better public face. Notice how well an advocacy group like CAFE is recieved, community groups aren't afraid to fund it and funding for these issues is huge.

People are so sensitive to attacks on women sometimes they'll genuinely percieve equal treatment as misogyny. That doesn't mean backing down on equal treatment, but it does mean you have to know damn well you'll be shredded if you ever do step over the line into misogyny.

baskandpurr · 2013-11-04T18:02:13+00:00

I have also noticed a lot of negative attitude toward the MRM in the sub recently. There's been quite a lot of a debate about tone argument. I find that to be an extension of the usual attitudes that men have to live with. People argue that MRA's should moderate their behavior, their language, their attitudes and their opinions because women might be offended. This is exactly the problem we are trying to deal with; the assumption that men should sacrifice for women. That men's opinions are less important than women's feelings. Why is nobody asking women to moderate their behavior, their language, their attitudes and their opinions because men might be offended?

Besides, 'hate' is very subjective in this context. A feminist will probably consider that you hate women. I might have said things that you consider hate, I have no idea. People interpret 'hate' the way they want. Actual hate is extremely rare in this sub and it gets buried in downvotes. It's about how much criticism of women you will allow before you decide to call it hate.

Sharou · 2013-11-04T20:58:31+00:00

Ok I am confused. I almost never see misogyny in this sub. Why are people in this thread talking like it's a problem? Do I somehow just miss all the misogynistic comments?

Pete638 · 2013-11-04T17:39:22+00:00

From what I can see, the reason the MRM is regarded as "misogynist" is because to a lot of feminists, the mere acknowledgement that there are some areas in which women have an unfair advantage is itself misogynist.

2013-11-04T20:14:00+00:00

One major aspect that rarely gets addressed is both the good and the bad that humor plays in discussions. Almost always, someone over-exaggerates or uses hyperbole to accent their point or drive home their disdain for their opposition in a comical, snarky or derisive way. Many people who are passionate about their cause tend to take it exceptionally seriously and have no sense of humor about the issue or else they find that joking sounds less intelligent and takes away from the seriousness of what they are trying to get across. This happens from every side of every topic I have ever seen on reddit, this sub included. Of course when someone has no sense of humor about their passion and somebody else jokes or poo-poos it as unimportant or silly, then that first person is going to get mad and start name calling, raging or making snide comments about the other's intelligence. This of course feeds the trolls, accelerates the hostilities and becomes a full fledged flame war. And that is where the real hateful comments come dancing in. The main thing to remember is that rads are not going to be convinced to change their thought process, therefore, discussions are made to convince the undecided, middle ground readers. To do that, you really need to walk the fine line of getting your message across in a convincing manner, yet not coming across as an uptight extremist.

And that is what I think this sub does rather well. /r/mensrights discusses the topics, makes it's points, has a few laughs in between yet polices itself enough not to cross over from the shades of grey humor into stark black and white that radfem subs do, where everything is either NOT TO BE JOKED ABOUT or JOKED AND RIDICULED AS CRUELLY AND MEANLY AS POSSIBLE (because that's how they think the men do it.)

This sub is as far from a hate group as it gets. It is much calmer and less over the top than 99% of other subs out there. But let's face it folks. In the World of Reddit, anyone who doesn't jump on the Poor Minority Du Jour Bandwagon is going to be labeled part of a hate group no matter what. No sense losing any sleep about it.

2013-11-04T22:09:58+00:00

The perception is not a reality.

romulusnr · 2013-11-04T23:10:01+00:00

I dislike being branded, labeled, pigeonholed, stereotyped, and dismissed because I subscribe to and sometimes comment on /r/MR. I consider myself a objective gender egalitarian and find that sometimes /r/MR has some valid material. How some of the regulars and more vocal types who tend towards the misogynistic or at very lest sexually bitter (and I'm no saint) treat those valid materials is another matter. I dispute that the SPLC has branded a forum a hate group. For starters, it's not a "group" at all in any sense of the term. It's just a place with a theme. But for another, it does everyone a disservice to dismiss, invalidate, laugh at, belittle, discount, deny, reject, one-up, and overall ignore some valid issues that men do face, whether they be historic or post-feminist, whether they be rooted in patriarchy or not, or whether they be as severe or dangerous as those (also valid issues) women face. When a car is driving off one side of a bridge, the answer is not to drive it off the other side. But to suggest this is to be a misogynist in some interpretations, and I reject that completely.

its_all_one_word · 2013-11-05T00:25:50+00:00

I think this is the most hostile subreddit I have ever subscribed to. If the topic were not as interesting as it is, I would have unsubscribed within the first month of being on reddit. Thank you for taking the time to show fellow mensrights subredditers that a lot of the behavior on this subreddit is unacceptable.

warspite88 · 2013-11-05T04:32:32+00:00

If what is being done to men today was being done to women, you havent seen hate or painful frustration the likes that would cause. Men have every flipping right to HATE feminism and more and more people will as they wake up to feminism's wicked truths. What you should be encouraging men to do is not direct the hate towards women because together we must destroy feminism and bring a balance to society. men cant do it alone and they certainly wont do it by hating women which they dont... if you see some men post angry rants well judge that individual not the MRM judge the MRM on what it does.

Number357 · 2013-11-05T07:03:56+00:00

most people don't realize that a Men's Rights movement is even necessary.

When people wonder why we're so anti-feminist here, this is a huge part of it. The notion that "men are privileged" and so we don't need our own movement comes from feminist theory. The idea that MRMs are just whining about losing our privilege comes from feminist theory. Feminism is the #1 reason why people still don't acknowledge that the problems facing men and boys are just as serious as the problems facing women and girls.

perfectdesign · 2013-11-04T17:08:34+00:00

I don't know that female supremacists will ever stop being disdainful of men's rights, as they tend to direct the public perception of men's rights, but as awareness increases and more people are reached to see it is just about equality, that perception and its impact will hopefully be diminished.

(I used to be a 'feminist'. Now I'm an 'egalitarian'.)

2013-11-04T18:27:31+00:00

I still have trouble admitting in to people I know that I am subscribed to this subreddit. Its like im ashamed of trying to make the world a more fair and better place

HolySchmoly · 2013-11-04T17:35:25+00:00

Now that feminism has prevailed, the dominant paradigm has men dominating women as a class. We are a paradigm shift. We define power differently for one thing. But for those still in the old paradigm men's rights can only be about keeping women down. It's not. It's about true fulfillment of the original demand for equality. This time we want equality for men too.

golemsheppard · 2013-11-04T20:35:19+00:00

The Men's Rights Movement attracts a few loud mouthed misogynists who yell from the periphery, just like the Feminist movement has its fair share of misandrists. Inevitably we all come across the user who upon stumbling into a well documented and articulate discussion of Selective Service Act, responds with "Yeah, fuck cunts." Any group that wants to be taken seriously needs to be able to police its own fringe. I am glad to say that we do that fairly well.

consumer_of_fungy · 2013-11-04T22:25:47+00:00

There was a description of Jesus written by Publius Lentulus that described the manner Jesus conducted himself with:

"He rebukes with majesty, counsels with mildness, his whole address, whether in word or deed, being eloquent and grave. No man has seen him laugh, yet his manner is exceedingly pleasant; but he has wept in the presence of men. He is temperate, modest and wise...and he never seemed to have any doubt that we can follow him."

Whether you believe in Jesus or not isn't the point I'm raising, it's the manner that Jesus held himself which is of most importance. This behaviour is something I think all men that strongly support MR should adopt, and promote.

SchalaZeal01 · 2013-11-04T18:08:42+00:00

calling out /r/mensrights for being a misogynist place

Misogyny is the act of disagreeing with women.

Beyond that, the word means nothing. It's been re-appropriated to be a "thought terminating cliche," like "terrorist," or "sinner."

When I hear the word "misogynist," it only tells me that the person who says it, and the people who nod in agreement, need all of the patience and calmness I can muster in order to lead them out of the darkness.

rightsbot · 2013-11-04T16:52:17+00:00

Post text automatically copied here. (Why?) (Report a problem.)

2013-11-04T19:57:02+00:00

I think it stems from a misunderstanding about a few things:

What we are about. Many outsiders look at us and think we are against their cause, and therefore are bad people.
The definition of "misogyny." I feel that instead of a critical understanding of what this term means... we simply see a flood of shaming tactics being thrown at us in an attempt to censor our views. One of the main shaming tactics used is "misogyny."

marc52055 · 2013-11-04T23:15:48+00:00

The best think we can do is to advocate for gender neutral solutions, like shared parenting legislation.

microActive · 2013-11-05T00:23:52+00:00

This is a natural phenomenon of any social movement. Even the Civil Rights Movement had its radical roots.

http://socialistworker.org/2008/02/22/radical-roots-civil-rights

There have always been hateful things that will spur from social movements. The hope is that the just will come on top. There will always be some "collateral damage" per-say, but we can contain if we are meant to evoke social change, just like MLK did.

2013-11-05T03:43:11+00:00

It's really simple; if there wasn't a need for a men's right movement then there wouldn't be one.

I haven't read anything prior to the 1960s in any country that had a men's right movement, because there wasn't a need because at such times there was a real powerful patriarchy, but in the modern times the patriarchy is the cat's paw for matriarchy something to be pointed at so the observer looks in the wrong direction for where the real power is held like magic!

The truth is that all the laws, societal benevolence(Free college, homelessness, societal acceptance to do whatever) are biased towards males while in female favor, and they're all put on a pedestal, and rightfully act like the princesses that society thinks they are.

The MRM, at least for me, is one that makes all the laws one of equality, one where men are socially accepted, like women, to choose how they want to live, equal child custody, and granted the same social benevolence that women have like when a man is raped, homeless, wanting to go to college. It's a movement for equality more than anything else unlike feminists who only care about the advancement of women, that openly mock men's rights, and pass laws detrimental to men.

So, yes, there is a lot of resentment towards an organization that's anti-intellectual, and that the best that it can do when being shown time and time again that their facts are wrong is to cry patriarchy, and call us all either sexless, or rapist sexists.

Basas · 2013-11-05T13:39:29+00:00

I am frequent /r/mensrights visitor, but I do not consider myself MRA. It is really difficult to understand why so many people (or any people at all) can think funding feminist organisation is a good idea. How can organization focusing on only one gender problems solve discrimination?

I can see it going from bad to worse when MRM organizations will start seriously competing for resources. I'm sure it won't be about equality any more (some say it already is not).

whatsazipper · 2013-11-05T02:26:06+00:00

You guys are going to get demolished if you don't stand up for yourselves. Caving to concern trolls or anyone trying to tone down your movement is a one way trip to irrelevancy.

The people who oppose the MRM go to great lengths to suppress you. They will never 'tone down' their methods. It's quite obvious that you not only get overt hositility and slander, but also infiltration disguised as an attempt at making the movement more palatable. In reality, this merely neuters your effectiveness.

Too_Many_Cats · 2013-11-04T19:05:32+00:00

This sub makes a some good points, and I'm very much in favor of egalitarianism, but if you haven't noticed the occasional female-bashing, you have been reading with some interesting glasses on.

The Men's Rights sub has the same problems as Feminism does at the extremes.

Sevion · 2013-11-04T22:22:28+00:00

To go along with what /u/insaneHoshi said, we should realize that MRM can be just as full of autistic morons as Feminism.

Simply for saying that we should calm down and actually read the comments made by the feminists I was called a "concern troll" and a "feminist loving shit stain."

The thing about pointing out the shortcomings and hypocrisies from within a group is that the group turns against you. It's like a living organism in that when there is a particle identified as foreign (whether it is or not), the entire organism tries to completely annihilate that particle.

MRM, Feminism or whatever else has both its good and bad sides. I am a firm believer in equality and not supremacy when it comes to sex and race. The true men's and women's rights movements should shoot for equality, not supremacy. In general, no one sex is better than the other, but we have to realize there are differences (in both physiological and psychological ways).

TL;DR Forget about the MRM and create a PRM. People's Rights Movement with distinctions between male and female physiology and psychology while pursuing equality rather than supremacy.

willmaster123 · 2013-11-05T00:57:29+00:00

Got into an argument on this subreddit with a bunch of people claiming that abuse from woman to men is worse than men to women in THIRD WORLD COUNTRIES.

These are countries in which 95% of women believe in domestic violence against women, and it sickens me to think that they could honestly believe that. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_violence)

I think that women face more misogynistic problems than men do, but that doesn't mean we cant admit that men also face different misogynistic problems from women.

dazmo · 2013-11-05T04:40:51+00:00

Interestingly there was a lot of disdain for women's rights as well when they first started.

hugged_at_gunpoint · 2013-11-05T05:41:56+00:00

This sub reddit isn't as much a movement as it is a sounding board for people to rage against feminism (rather, their perception of feminism). Until we grow out of our petty obsession with the opinions of a few extreme feminists, we won't win any friends to our cause.

pmanpman · 2013-11-05T08:41:10+00:00

This is the second time I've commented on a thread here and I'm only here to post a link. I came once, with an opinion that in some things, men have an advantage and that women are better at some things than men. I got downvoted out of the thread for wanting equality and not male dominance.

I cop a lot of hatred on FB etc. because I speak out against sexism against men, but here, it's not acceptable to view a woman as a possible superior at anything.

This place sadly is slightly misogynistic. It shouldn't be, and I'm sure the majority of people aren't misogynists, but there are a vocal minority that sadly are.

2013-11-05T16:25:34+00:00

Posts like this one: http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/1pyafu/within_seconds_like_sharks_men_were_circling/ and the comments on it do nothing to improve the perception of /r/mensrights NOR should it. That is seriously disappointing. As far as /r/mensrights is concerned, I'm going my own way.

luxury_banana · 2013-11-05T07:43:42+00:00

It's almost entirely propaganda from very mainstream-thinking feminists who have this idea that men are "privileged oppressors" and therefore deserve any and all ill-treatment, or that somehow all men are part of the elite top 1% of CEOs, bankers, politicians and the like and can't have problems.

Try bringing up the issues and see the kind of responses you get. For example bring up that genital mutilation against girls is illegal but not genital mutilation against boys. Bring up paternity fraud and how men who are proven to not be the father are forced to pay anyway. Bring up the issues and see the response you get. Try it.

hugged_at_gunpoint · 2013-11-04T22:07:42+00:00

Eh, the people calling this place 'misogynistic' are mostly ideologically opposed to it -- which is to say, their claims, while possible honestly believed, have are not factual, but are instead the product of cognitive dissonance.

For instance, if you were raised to believe that feminism is the belief that men and women are equal, then you will simply refuse to believe any criticism of feminism whatsoever, and will instead assume (without any evidence whatsoever, and more disturbingly, without any guilt whatsoever) that the people here are saying these things simply because they are misogynistic.

Plus, a lot of lefties just hate with the passion of a thousand burning suns anything to the right of them (and more bizarrely, anything more than one degree to the left of them as well), and as the typical man is much more likely to be a conservative than a liberal (by 3 to 2), they simply see this as a larger part of their ideological war against conservatives -- and by default, against men.

2013-11-05T10:24:34+00:00

The "men's rights" label will never be respectable. The best we can hope for is to highlight the toxicity of feminism enough so all but the most blatant of fem-bigots abandon it.

Irl I think "mras" would be best calling themselves egalitarians or humanists or something else non gender-warrior-y.

Opress-O-Matic · 2013-11-04T22:42:12+00:00

There are dumb people that don't realize what the movement is about, and there are shills. That is all.

2013-11-05T01:52:26+00:00

What's to be confused about?

The democrats installed themselves and have censored any speech that disagrees with their views by categorizing it as hate speech. It's all written in “1984."

phatphace · 2013-11-05T03:07:08+00:00

The points raised in this forum often position women and feminism as the sole causes. In my experience, however, men are equal perpetrators in reinforcing the thinking behind our issues (i.e. men are inept at child rearing, playing with young children is weird, men can't be raped, men can't be physically harmed by women, emotions are for pussies etc). To me, these notions have always seemed as patriarchal as they are anti-men.

We shouldn't be so steadfast on positioning women as the only cause of our issues. A lot of these women-hating traits would disappear if it were discussed more that these outmoded, marginalising ideas are just as readily held by both genders.

Further to this, there many posts that are simply anti-feminism. One highly upvoted submission essentially points out the faulty logic in one feminist redditor's comment, then proceeds to say that its representative of all feminism and imply that reddit in fact looks less favourably on men than it does on women (which, even if it were true, would just reinforce my initial point since the majority of redditors are male).

I think to rid ourselves of this misogynistic banner, we must begin acknowledging our complicity in the paradigms we fight as opposed to pinning them down to the opposite sex. Otherwise, we run the risk of encompassing those who generally hate women and are anti-feminism along with the well intentioned. And its these on the extreme ends of the movement whose views will penetrate any reasoned points we create.

fukuaneveryoneuknow · 2013-11-04T21:07:45+00:00

Oh fun, yet another concern troll post.

I'm done.

There's got to be better MRM communities than this feminist sympathizing , loving, shit hole filled with head up their ass dullards like OP and the majority of the commenters here.

Fuck every one of you.

2013-11-04T23:58:42+00:00

To be honest when someone says misogyny my brain turns off.

blatentmisogynist · 2013-11-05T06:27:47+00:00

I'm just anti women. They should know their place as second class citizens.

Title	Confused about the perception of Men's Rights
Author	perfectdesign
Upvotes	380
Comments	258
Date	November 4, 2013 4:51 PM UTC (12 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/1pvtl5/confused_about_the_perception_of_mens_rights/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/confused-about-the-perception-of-mens-rights.1159657 https://theredarchive.com/post/1159657

Comments