i desperately need people to realize there's a difference between "women need to coddle (cis) men's feelings even when they're being misogynistic uwu" and "we shouldn't tolerate misogyny but actively keeping men separate from women and treating them like they're inherently dangerous to women is only going to worsen the problem (and also this mindset causes IMMEASURABLE harm to nonbinary, trans, and intersex people, who are already incredibly at risk right now)" and i need people to realize that NOW

So here is my problem with the "by virtue of being a man, you have to make your peace with the fact that some people will be uncomfortable with you, and thus you have to make yourself a safe person"

I've heard the same thing about being black. A lot of people have taken my very presence as hostility. I have had people escalate situations just because I am present as a black person in front of them. Before, and after transition.

You know what the problem with bending over backwards to make other people comfortable with your presence even though you haven't actually done anything to them besides breathe the same air?

It's never enough. You can be One Of The Good Ones for ages and at some point you will fail your Good One inspection and people will turn on you at the drop of a hat. People who you thought you had a good rapport with. People you thought were your friends.

I have *experienced* this, both online and in person.

The onus is on everyone to be safe people to be around. Singling someone out and blaming them for daring to share a demographic with someone else who has caused harm isn't cute when people do it to me because I'm black, and it's also not cute when they do it because I'm a man.

People are uncomfortable about my blackness all the time. I didn't magically stop experiencing racism when I started taking testosterone. So it's absolutely wild to me that people think "well, you know, with what you look like, some people won't want you around" is going to fly when I was explicitly taught *not* to tolerate that shit by every single one of my black relatives.

Someone doesn't like that I'm occupying a space? Well I'm not hurting them, so that's a them problem and not a me problem. That's how I've learned how to exist as black in white-majority spaces. Why do you think you can change the demographic and get me to agree with you?

Similarly scrolling past a post that was effectively "trans mascs should sit down and shut up and let other people do the talking" and I WISH that I was exaggerating but the post did literally use the phrasing "you need to sit down and shut up" and here's the thing.

Every single one of the women in my family whether they consider themselves feminists or not taught me to never tolerate someone telling me to sit down and shut up and let someone else talk over me. That my voice is my power, and that I should never let someone take that power from me.

Why do you think I'm going to tolerate it now?

Okay, but black people (and any other oppressed minority) don't benefit from a system of privilege and culturally-imbued sense of superiority and entitlement. Men do.

So long as patriarchy is the hegemonic social system, men have an obligation to undermine it, and respect the lived experiences of those harmed by it.

I don't know how this interacts with the trans man experience. Messily, from everything I've heard. And I'm not gonna pretend that I have a solution. But I definitely know that telling a world full of women and other people imperiled by patriarchy that they're wrong for being on the defensive around men ain't it.

Are trans men not an oppressed minority who are oppressed, socially undermined, and imperiled by patriarchy on the basis of their gender identity?

Yes, which is what makes this so complicated. You have a victim of the patriarchy (trans men), with the core identity of the patriarchy (men). So here we are, caught between people who have very legit reasons to say "men, yes all men, make me uncomfortable and nervous", and men who have every right to be called men and not seen as any different than any other man if that's what they want, but who I think a lot of us don't consider to be part of the system of patriarchal oppression.

And yeah I don't know what to do with that.

Sincerely and seriously, I do. And it's not that complicated.

You just have to be nice and polite to people you're talking to who are being nice and polite themselves. That's all!!! That's the secret!!!! That's literally it!!!

If a cisgender heterosexual whilte able-bodied neurotypical rich man is being nice and polite to you, you be nice and polite back. That's the secret! That's all it takes! All you have to do to not perpetuate the cycle is not be nasty! Not be the origin of nastiness! Regardless of who it's towards!

Like, all "but all those identities add up to super privilege" means in this context is that this person is less likely to be nice and polite to you. And that other people are less likely to recognize when they are in fact being nasty. But that has NO IMPACT when they are, actually, sincerely, being normal!!! If they're being normal you should be normal right back!!!!*

*not "normal" as in "cis hetero etc" but "normal" as in "we live in a society", I'm sure you know what I mean from actually living in it every day. Think of the most normal interaction you've ever had with a cashier you were buying something from, where it was frictionless and the transaction was successfully concluded and maybe you gave each other a smile and felt a little better about life because of it for a minute after. Like that.

The secret to managing intersectionality is TO HOLD EVERYONE TO THE SAME STANDARDS. You should not perceive the exact same interaction differently depending on who it's with. Like sincerely if you're hearing the same words and seeing the same actions / body language, IT'S THE SAME INTERACTION. A black man standing on a sidewalk watching a dog on the other side of the street is performing the exact same action as a white woman doing the same. It should be perceived and reacted to the exact same way.

If someone's following behind you at night, it doesn't actually matter if it's a man or not. If you're worried, speed up or slow down so they pass you or fall behind. If they stick with you, THAT'S WEIRD REGARDLESS IF THEY'RE A MAN OR NOT. If they pass / fall behind, THAT'S NORMAL AND THE INTERACTION IS OVER REGARDLESS IF THEY'RE A MAN OR NOT.

So like... you actually don't have to. Do anything special about the very special intersectionality of trans men? Just be normal @ them. Treat them in a way you understand to be basic decency that you'd expect of anyone towards anyone. The idea society we're all working towards is one where everyone is always expected to act like that. So just... do it?

pretty sure this one is about me (girlbot666) - first of all im not a radfem. second of all sorry but are y'all people of color? do you sincerely think men of color don't have access to male privilege or oppress women of color? andrew tate is literally half black ffs.

as a woman of color i am telling you men of color have institutional power by virtue of being men. they have a vested interest in maintaining the patriarchy even though white people often weaponize it against them. like you guys do not understand intersectionality at all

I feel like you are using “patriarchy” and “male privilege” interchangeably when they are different things.

Male privilege is the advantages benefits that men have by virtue of being men.

Patriarchy is the entire social mechanism of oppression. Male privilege is a tool of patriarchy.

A man can both have male privilege but also be oppressed by the men in power above him in the patriarchal system.

next time a person of color says "white people aren't oppressed" i want you idiots to reply with "ummm ackshully, gay white people are oppressed for not producing white babies for the white-supremacist patriarchy so it's kind of homophobic that you would say that :/" and tell me how that goes for you

You’re free to address an argument you disagree with instead of making up something that nobody said and just arguing with yourself.

?? did the anon in this post not literally say it was racist of me to say that men aren't oppressed

It IS racist to say men aren't oppressed, because then you're claiming racism doesn't exist for men of color and no men of color are victims of racism. Racism is used to oppress people of color in the USA. But if "men" aren't opposed, that includes men of color. Therefore, men of color must be immune to racism.

All those black men in prison? Totally not a result of systemic racism, because men aren't oppressed, therefore black men don't suffer from systemic racism.

So yeah. Claiming men cannot experience oppression is racism. It's also ableism and antisemitism and homophobia and transphobia, etc.

Men belong to oppressed groups. Men can be oppressed.

again, next time a poc says "white people aren't oppressed" i want you to use the same logic to tell them they're being homophobic and tell me how that goes

Claiming white people can't be oppressed IS homophobic. White queer people exist. It's also ableist and antisemitic etc. White people aren't immune to oppression just because we're white.

That wasn't hard.

see how you had to change it from "white people aren't oppressed" to "white people can't be oppressed" to stomach saying it. i know you'll never concede anything to me at this point because you've doubled down too hard for too long but there's no way you haven't noticed the hoops you're jumping through when you could have just been like "yeah my bad i wanted to highlight how certain kinds of men are oppressed but i don't want to imply that men don't categorically oppress women or that hatred of men is a systemic force, I'll be more careful with my phrasing next time." and you wouldn't have reached whitesplaining racism to a woman of color territory. anyway men are oppressors white people are oppressors cis people and straight people and able-bodied people are oppressors, not oppressed. i guess I'm racist and homophobic and ableist now for saying that or something idk

If a person of color says "white people aren't oppressed" they are factually wrong.

White people can be oppressed. White people are often oppressed. I'd wager the number of white people who have some form of marginalization far out numbers the number of white people who do not.

Is that untwisted enough for you?

i think in part the crux of our disagreement is that you are thinking of "white people" and "men" as individuals whereas I am thinking of them as social classes. as a social class, white people and men are not oppressed, they are oppressors, and i maintain that. and i think it is important to not make sweeping statements when you are talking about men's individual experiences of oppression for disability or race or what may have you, and not men as a social class. The logical conclusion of that language is a world full of oppressed people and no oppressors. and if none of us have true institutional power, all of us are powerless to help each other.

as you said, the majority of white people are oppressed, just for some reason other than their whiteness. but if it then logically follows that "white people are oppressed", then how are we supposed to hold them accountable for the racist systems that benefit them? this is the exact same logic many many white conservatives use to deny that they have institutional power - "how could i possibly oppress people of color? i grew up homeless, i am disabled, etc. i have no power". while you haven't gone quite that far yet i see you making a logical leap from "men sometimes suffer due to patriarchal norms" -> "men are hated by people in power" and i fear you, or others hearing you say this, will take that to mean that really, men might have power over women who check all the same oppression boxes otherwise, but most men have no true institutional power. does a poor black man have access to power that a disabled wealthy white woman does not? the answer is not "neither of them have power, the patriarchy hates both of them" but that they both have the power to oppress each other. i hope this helps you understand my frustration with your language better, because i feel like you are fixating on validating the pain of marginalized men and imagining me as some mean "radfem", without really hearing my concerns about accountability (and losing sight of the fundamental misogyny of the world we live in, given that you far more readily expressed "men are oppressed" then "white people are oppressed" (which you still will not type out as a stand-alone statement)).

I'd also like to share a really excellent article that is adjacent to the topic at hand! it's written by a trans man, and it's about reconciling transmasculinity and feminism. it doesn't purport to "agree" with either of our interpretations of patriarchal oppression, instead it takes a bird's eye view of why this conversation is so difficult in the first place. you probably won't find it satisfying (which you'll see is kind of the point) but it is hopefully insightful:

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/690914

Yeah, I think language and how it's used is the big confounding aspect here. Because I think we both agree that as classes, men and white people and cis people and abled people etc definitely have privileges related to being cis, or white, or men, etc!

But "men" can also mean individuals. And unless people specify "I'm talking about men as a class" there's no way to differentiate.

Personally, to avoid such confusion, when I'm talking about systems of oppression, I use the name of the system. I don't say "men are X", I say "the patriarchy is X".

Because I think if you try to assign privilege to groups of people based on class, it gets really hairy really quickly. Personally, these "classes" break down almost instantly the moment you begin interrogating them.

There isn't a monolith "man", there isn't a monolith "cis people", etc etc. Because classes are made up of individuals. And when you try to generalize upwards from the individual to the class level, you inevitably have to make statements that simply aren't true for every individual in that class, at which point the function of the class is weak at best.

I'm not saying talking about people as classes has no purpose! I talk about cis people as a class and trans people as a class all the time.

And I also don't think it's a 1:1 across every single possible identity. Some identities can give you privilege sometimes and in other cases the same identity can make you marginalized.

I'm trying to think, and I can't imagine a situation where a cis person would be oppressed for being cis. I can think of situations where men are oppressed for being men, though, cases where a person's manhood is an inseparable part of their identity and their oppression. I can't think of a situation where white people are oppressed for being white. But I can think of a situation where a straight person would be oppressed for being straight.

I think identity is just complicated like that. And branching off of that, having privilege and being oppressed aren't mutually exclusive.

So I personally don't think you can take a class of person, like men, and say "men as a class are not oppressed". Because "men" isn't really a coherent single class in the first place, it's a bunch of subclasses, and even on the tippy top level, it's a false statement unless you tack on "men aren't oppressed for being men" - but even then, that's sketchy at best because again, when you take intersectionality into account, some men's manhood is an integral part of why they're oppressed.

---

So, as for "how to we hold [them] accountable".

I'm going to speak on this from the perspective of someone who is afab and trans among other things.

I don't see any point in holding privileged individuals accountable for the actions of systems of oppression, especially when those systems usually hurt those people, too. I don't know if that's what you meant, because again, language is so imprecise, but it feels like you're saying, "that poor disabled white man must be individually held accountable for the harms of white supremacy and the patriarchy" and that just seems... pointless, unfair, and impossible? If that's not what you mean, I apologize.

Yes, individuals benefit from these systems. Yes, I think individuals should become aware of that, and it'd be nice if they'd join me in the fight to take down those systems. But "held responsible" on the individual level? No. Because being born privileged is not a choice, therefore it is not something someone should be "held responsible for".

That seems to be coming from a place of considering privilege something inherently "bad" that has be be atoned for? Again, if I'm getting the wrong vibes, I apologize.

Someone else said the following so I'm borrowing their words here, but basically, there's more than one kind of privilege. There's privileges that are things that just happen, and there are privileges that exist due to systemically created inequality.

So like, white privilege? That's not a thing that should exist. That's a privilege we created ourselves, and it's a privilege that would cease to exist if we eliminate white supremacy. Yay! That'd be a good thing!

But like... people with 20/20 vision have privilege, too. That doesn't mean we should go around stabbing everyone in the eyes, lol. Abled privilege a lot of times is just a thing people have based on how they were born and even if society were a perfect utopia, we'd still have disabled people (because a perfect utopia is not one that runs on eugenics thanks). What we can do is dismantle systemic ableism and create a world that is as accessible as possible.

So yeah. I don't think all individual cis people need to be "held responsible" for systemic transphobia. Do I think there are specific individuals and organizations and businesses and governments etc who DO need to be held responsible for upholding these systems? Yeah, absolutely.

But Maggie down the street who's never been anything but kind to me is not responsible for and does not need to held responsible for cishet society oppressing trans people.

I support Men’s Rights

I support the right for black men to interact with the police safely and without fear for their own life.

I support the right for trans men to use the correct bathroom without fear for their safety.

I support the right for bi and gay men to marry and adopt kids and donate blood.

I support the right for disabled men to have access to facilities and services with their disabilities accommodated respectfully. 

I support the right for immigrant men to be treated with respect and be given full protection under the law. 

I support the right for Jewish men and Muslim men to be able to practice their religion in peace without bomb threats and hateful vandalism against their places of worship. 

Of course I support men’s rights. I’m just confused as to why so few “Antifeminists” do as well. 

So something doesn’t qualify as a men’s rights issue to you unless the men who face it are primarily disadvantaged due to their racial or other minority status? No mention of issues faced pretty much universally by all men in our society?

Are you suggesting that men’s issues dont count unless they impact white, straight, cis able bodied men?

I never said that, did I? But there are issues men face specifically because they’re men. When we talk about men’s rights, we should focus on issues that we collectively face, not things that a mere subset of us face and which would be better addressed by other movements.

So basically you dont want to focus on anything that doesnt impact white straight cis dudes? No intersectioanlity here i see.

No, because I don’t want to focus on anything that only impacts e.g. white men, for the same reason. It makes the most sense to put the most effort into advocating for things that affect all of us.

MRAs don’t have to co-opt the civil rights movement, the LGBT rights movement, etc. in order to be valid in its own right.

Let me try to explain it. Supporting men’s rights is when you are wanting to stop things that are negative towards ALL men BECAUSE they’re men. All of he examples above are better suited for Civil Rights, LGBT, and religious freedom respectfully. But those things have nothing to do with them being men, so they aren’t men’s rights.

“These issues only impact minority men, so they aren’t my concern.” Well doesnt that just show where your priorities are. Telling.

That’s not what I said and you KNOW it’s not what I said. If you’re going to reply, don’t be so dishonest in it.

“ those things [Issues that impact minority men] have nothing to do with them being men, so they aren’t men’s rights [so they aren’t my concern]. “ 

Tell me which part is SOOOOOOOO dishonest?

@julietta-dream

white feminists who just fail to acknowledge racial disparities in their feminism are so frustrating tbh 

you can’t talk about the representation of women in media completely unconnected from intersecting spheres of domination like race, class, religion, imperialism etc. it’s very obvious when they clearly have not at least attempted to be aware or understand the experience outside their own.

you just can’t talk about women’s issues as if it’s monolithic, without recognising that how women may be oppressed by the dominance of men takes different shape and form because of all these other different factors. like…my great-grandmother was not forced to be the demure housewife or something. she had to bust her ass working low-paying jobs because she lived in a British colony where non-white women were labour. Not sipping tea and forced to wait at home for their husbands. Yes, she was expected to have kids. But her marginalisation economically wasn’t so much lack of financial independence but being forced to work poor-paying jobs AND juggle raising kids. It’s a different experience. Not that being forced to be a housewife isn’t also a big problem and oppressive in its own way, but…it’s about recognising misogyny and the experiences of women took on different dimensions for various reasons.

In Soviet Union, from its very start, the norm has been for women to work AND do housework. "Housewife" was not a thing that was allowed, and the idea that men might actually share the burden of cooking&cleaning while women shared the burden of ~production~, just kind of didn't come up.

It stays that way now, too. The woman is the work horse that can come from 8 hours job and then also cook, clean and take care of kids, while the man is a fragile flower who after same just lounges with a newspaper or in front of the TV because ~he's tired~. Or goes to ~hang out~ with his friends. (Women aren't really supposed to have those)

Sexism takes many forms.

white feminists needa learn that wearing wtvr u want just doesnt stop at crop tops and shorts. let desi women out in salwar kameez. let muslim women out in hijabs.let african women wear caftans. let women of color out in public without getting harassed.

here ya go save urself from the sad white edited version

There’s this thing about being brown and being Asexual that no one really talks about. Despite the fact that many claim to know that people of color are continually fetishized and hypersexualized since we’re young, they don’t seem to grasp the toll it takes on us when you add asexual to that equation. The amount of racially charged acephobic comments I’ve received since I’ve come out are far too many. Being Latina does not mean I want to submit to all your disgusting fantasies, being Latina does not mean that I’m supposed to want sex, nor does it mean that I’m supposed to be good at having sex. People of color are more than you’re horribly disgusting view of us.

Not to mention the fact that no one ever talks about the racism within the Asexual community either.

“I never would’ve thought you were Asexual”, yeah well not all of us are thin white kids with some immature obsession with cake. The exclusion of aces of color in this community is far from disheartening, it’s disgusting. My people should not be pushed to the side so that even more white people can be represented, people of color should be one of the most prominent voices in our fight for visibility and pride. People of color have always had higher chances of harassment and attack, this is no different if they’re Asexual.

Being Asexual is not exclusively for white people, and everyone needs to open their eyes to that fact. We’re here, and it’s about time we get the representation we deserve.

cis straight people honestly it’s extremely inappropriate for you to take sides on intra-lgbt issues, our arguments over strategies or priorities or which of us are or aren’t sellouts to the oppressor class (that’s you) or anything remotely in that vein… i wish i didn’t still have to say this but apparently i do

#i don’t care if it’s my side you’re taking or not just stop be silent#you don’t get to casually agree that whatever subset of us are resisting your oppression wrong

Also applies to different subgroups of LGBT+. Just coz you are a lesbian doesn't mean you get a voice in trans stuff, and just coz you are trans doesn't mean you can tell aces what to do. Regardless of how many other oppressed groups you belong to, if you don't belong to this specific one maybe hold your precious opinion back and fucking listen.

allosexism

Allosexism, therefore, refers to an ideology privileging people who are sexually attracted to other people, and prejudices arising from that ideology.

So without touching the rest of this, I’m just going to come right out and ask, exactly how are homosexual people sexually privileged?  Before you can even begin to bandy about allosexism, you must first demonstrate how having sexual attraction is something which privileges ALL people of ALL non asexual orientations.  And, if this IS something you can demonstrate then you have to explain how it does NOT apply to gray and demi people, as they DO feel sexual attraction.

I just.

This is why ~sexual supremacy~ is a dumb as fuck concept, and I just wish people in the asexual community would stop trying to make it a thing over and over again.  There is no privilege for experiencing sexual attraction.  There is only one sexual attraction that is privileged in this society, and it’s the hetero kind.  This is an immutable fact about society that you cannot deny, and it’s really infuriating that so many people seem to be intent on the casual dismissal of how homophobia affects homosexual people in order to bandy about concepts to apply to homosexual people that don’t actually apply at all.

If I tell my coworkers I’m gay the will not treat me less awfully if I assure them that my gayness is totally sexual.  If anything I will get MORE shit for it.  Because homosex is especially disgusting and awful.  Homosexual sexual attraction is not privileged.  Allosexism is YET ANOTHER version of the homophobic tripe that is ~sexual supremacy~.  Just.  Please.  Stop.

I don’t think anyone is claiming that all allosexuals are privileged over all asexuals in all situations, or even that asexuals are more discriminated against than homosexuals, over all.

I’d say discrimination exists against both homosexuals and asexuals (and any other sexual minority), and that the form and level of discrimination in both cases can vary depending on the specific situation, the people involved, etc.

Here are just a few examples of times I, personally, have experienced allosexism:

Yes, there are definitely some communities and situations in which there is more discrimination against homosexuals than asexuals, but there are also definitely cases where the opposite is true. The existence of homophobia and the existence of allosexism are not mutually exclusive.

Unfortunately, I’m about to run, but regarding the allosexism and homophobia, can I jsut say:

It’s called intersectionality.

 intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality intersectionality intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality  intersectionality 

got it?

Privilege is not a binary; it’s not as simple as being privileged or being not privileged. For example, I can be at the same time privileged for appearing white, yet oppressed for being a woman - these two identites will affect me differently, but they do not cancel each other out, nor does one trump the other - instead, they intersect.

And the same goes for someone who is sexual, but not heterosexual: They can simultanously be privileged by allosexism, but oppressed by heterosexism. And again, one does not erase the other or cancel it out - instead, they intersect.