Privileged Backlash: Myth and Reality

[Cannot think of a name]

Funny that the more dangerous jobs in the workplace is actually because they're excluding women from those very same jobs.

Perhaps if you're using a very loose definition of excluding that plays into societal stereotypes and cultural rules (women don't work in MINES/etc.). Is there some evidence of companies actively excluding females from dangerous positions? Because this seems like more of a social consequence of gender roles prevelance (much as men taking those same dangerous jobs and being 'disposable units' as Ostro- asserts) than an active conspiracy.

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

[Ostroeuropa]

Perhaps if you're using a very loose definition of excluding that plays into societal stereotypes and cultural rules (women don't work in MINES/etc.). Is there some evidence of companies actively excluding females from dangerous positions? Because this seems like more of a social consequence of gender roles prevelance (much as men taking those same dangerous jobs and being 'disposable units' as Ostro- asserts) than an active conspiracy.

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

And this applies to the prejudice men face also. Except I'm not blaming one particular gender for doing it, nor claiming one genders suffering is worse than the others.
While feminism approaches each gender inequality with a mindset of "The women are being oppressed" which leads to false-positives and general bungling on a number of issues, a gender abolitionist or gender egalitarian approach will be "Gender roles are oppressive."
Some feminists also act this way, but then needlessly add "But mostly to women.", which simply isn't true in the western world, and again prejudices them toward each issue with a mindset of "It's the women losing out."

Women not applying for jobs in dangerous industries?
Must be them being oppressed.
Couldn't be that Men are indoctrinated to disregard personal safety while women are indoctrinated to be extremely paranoid about it. Couldn't be that industries that women enter into very quickly have health and safety standards set because women aren't disposable, but men are.
Couldn't be that males are told not to complain about their personal problems, nor to seek help from others.
Has to be the oppression of the womenfolk, amirite?


If you can find an industry with a disproportionate death toll and find me female job applications being shot down at high rates, that's a different matter. What we actually see is women simply do not apply, and in industries where they do apply, standards are quickly set after people decide "This women dying shit is totally uncool!" It's attitudes like yours that casually ignore or dismiss the problems men face that lead to this kind of shitty set up.

[Cannot think of a name]

Can you link this problem directly to an issue of women's attitude toward men? If we somehow improved the way women treated men specifically in society would this situation improve? Or in fact can you provide this statistic that controls for actual representation? Moreover, does approaching issues of women in society in any way hinder or prevent anyone from dealing with issues of violence, stress, and abuses in the workplace?

In short, can you in any way make this random unsourced factoid feminisms problem?

Did the internet do this to you, where you have to put everything in its proper place on a top ten list and then debate rabidly about the positions of items 4 and 6? There is no 'more or less or equally'...they are separate issues and I do not rank them on a scale to make sure I'm properly more or less outraged at a thing to justify my positions.

That, right there, that's the kind of slippery desperate bullshit that makes these things so utterly unconvincing.

It's a problem with societies attitude to men. I'm not blaming one gender. I don't think feminism is equipped to deal with the problems facing us with regard to gender politics, so it isn't their problem, and i'm not trying to make it their problem. I'm pointing out that they cannot claim to be in favor of gender equality as their entire set-up ignores these problems.

Does it? Does it really? First of all, I don't necessarily feel that every movement in the world has to worry about every problem in the world in order to be valid. I don't know how that logic follows. And all you've said is that it's about the attitudes towards men, but while you have been adamantly asking for sources for other people's suppositions you haven't provided any to even back up this claim. "More men die in the workplace", without context or a source, that could mean a lot of shit. It could be physiological, it could be that there are a larger representation of men in jobs that have a high risk (the fact that men are 'expected' to do those jobs is the flip side of the coin of 'women not being able' to do those jobs...insisting that they phrase it in such a manner as to include me too is kind of childish. I do not see anything within the feminism movement, despite the hyperbole and freaking out, that insists that they only want improvements as long as there is no benefit for men), it could be a lot of shit. It could be something that improves when we no longer see one gender as the wards of the other.

This is a tenuous grasp, this random factoid that more men die in the workplace, that I'm afraid doesn't really condemn feminism in the same way that not taking a lot of second amendment cases doesn't condemn the ACLU.

I don't see feminism getting in the way of confronting this issue and in fact see accomplishing their goals as helping remove one or many of the contributing factors.

Sorry, outrage still denied.

[Neo Art]

Sorry, outrage still denied.

Well that's hardly fair. What are our teenbopper friends to do if there's nothing to be outraged over? Read a book?

You know, it's funny, even before this thread hit NSG, a few days ago, when I realized my chart making stalker was like..16 years old, I thought about hairball, and those who tend to support him in his little crusade against all things with a vagina.

I wonder what it says for your position if the vast bulk of your ideological supporters are highschool boys. Actually, that's not true. I know exactly what it says. It says your position is one typically found attractive only to those who have the mindset and faculties of 15 year old boys.

[Ostroeuropa]

It's a problem with societies attitude to men. I'm not blaming one gender. I don't think feminism is equipped to deal with the problems facing us with regard to gender politics, so it isn't their problem, and i'm not trying to make it their problem. I'm pointing out that they cannot claim to be in favor of gender equality as their entire set-up ignores these problems.

Does it? Does it really? First of all, I don't necessarily feel that every movement in the world has to worry about every problem in the world in order to be valid. I don't know how that logic follows. And all you've said is that it's about the attitudes towards men, but while you have been adamantly asking for sources for other people's suppositions you haven't provided any to even back up this claim. "More men die in the workplace", without context or a source, that could mean a lot of shit. It could be physiological, it could be that there are a larger representation of men in jobs that have a high risk (the fact that men are 'expected' to do those jobs is the flip side of the coin of 'women not being able' to do those jobs...insisting that they phrase it in such a manner as to include me too is kind of childish. I do not see anything within the feminism movement, despite the hyperbole and freaking out, that insists that they only want improvements as long as there is no benefit for men), it could be a lot of shit. It could be something that improves when we no longer see one gender as the wards of the other.

This is a tenuous grasp, this random factoid that more men die in the workplace, that I'm afraid doesn't really condemn feminism in the same way that not taking a lot of second amendment cases doesn't condemn the ACLU.

I don't see feminism getting in the way of confronting this issue and in fact see accomplishing their goals as helping remove one or many of the contributing factors.

Sorry, outrage still denied.

i don't have an issue with feminists campaigning for their issues. My problem with them is that they continually try to shut us down when we try to campaign for our issues.
Source for death statistics:
http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfoi_revised11.pdf

[Cannot think of a name]

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

And this applies to the prejudice men face also. Except I'm not blaming one particular gender for doing it, nor claiming one genders suffering is worse than the others.
While feminism approaches each gender inequality with a mindset of "The women are being oppressed" which leads to false-positives and general bungling on a number of issues, a gender abolitionist or gender egalitarian approach will be "Gender roles are oppressive."
Some feminists also act this way, but then needlessly add "But mostly to women.", which simply isn't true in the western world, and again prejudices them toward each issue with a mindset of "It's the women losing out."

Women not applying for jobs in dangerous industries?
Must be them being oppressed.
Couldn't be that Men are indoctrinated to disregard personal safety while women are indoctrinated to be extremely paranoid about it. Couldn't be that industries that women enter into very quickly have health and safety standards set because women aren't disposable, but men are.
Couldn't be that males are told not to complain about their personal problems, nor to seek help from others.
Has to be the oppression of the womenfolk, amirite?

It's weird to complain about a persecution complex with a persecution complex.

I feel like this is people in a room that's filling up with water and there is someone going, "Look, the water is coming through this grate right here, and if we just-" and then getting interupted by going, "Hey hey hey, let's not start blaming grates for this problem, the grate is getting drowned in the water, too. Let's just say that the water is filling the room and start using this bucket."

I don't feel threatened by recognizing historical biases and how they effect modern perceptions because that helps me understand where they come from and how those attitudes inform others we might take for granted.

If you can find an industry with a disproportionate death toll and find me female job applications being shot down at high rates, that's a different matter. What we actually see is women simply do not apply, and in industries where they do apply, standards are quickly set after people decide "This women dying shit is totally uncool!" It's attitudes like yours that casually ignore or dismiss the problems men face that lead to this kind of shitty set up.

Is it really? I mean, can you actually make that case instead of just suppose it?

[Occupied Deutschland]

Perhaps if you're using a very loose definition of excluding that plays into societal stereotypes and cultural rules (women don't work in MINES/etc.). Is there some evidence of companies actively excluding females from dangerous positions? Because this seems like more of a social consequence of gender roles prevelance (much as men taking those same dangerous jobs and being 'disposable units' as Ostro- asserts) than an active conspiracy.

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

I agree completely, and that was probably a poor word choice (read: I dun' fucked up but I want to make it sound better).

The problem comes however, once again, in the perspective. To run with the dangerous jobs example, Tahar and Ostro- seem to be making the argument that both male and female roles exist and are the results of their own sexist 'base' of thinking, whereas some amount (probably a minority, but a loud one) of feminists seem to make the argument that all of these roles are the result of female gender roles and men are privileged by their roles. Which, in some (probably even many) cases is entirely true (historically especially) but also ignores that this causes problems for men as well (such as prison sentence differences, custody battle losses, the draft, and littler stuff like the societal role they're put in of being the people who should have dangerous jobs).

[Cannot think of a name]

Does it? Does it really? First of all, I don't necessarily feel that every movement in the world has to worry about every problem in the world in order to be valid. I don't know how that logic follows. And all you've said is that it's about the attitudes towards men, but while you have been adamantly asking for sources for other people's suppositions you haven't provided any to even back up this claim. "More men die in the workplace", without context or a source, that could mean a lot of shit. It could be physiological, it could be that there are a larger representation of men in jobs that have a high risk (the fact that men are 'expected' to do those jobs is the flip side of the coin of 'women not being able' to do those jobs...insisting that they phrase it in such a manner as to include me too is kind of childish. I do not see anything within the feminism movement, despite the hyperbole and freaking out, that insists that they only want improvements as long as there is no benefit for men), it could be a lot of shit. It could be something that improves when we no longer see one gender as the wards of the other.

This is a tenuous grasp, this random factoid that more men die in the workplace, that I'm afraid doesn't really condemn feminism in the same way that not taking a lot of second amendment cases doesn't condemn the ACLU.

I don't see feminism getting in the way of confronting this issue and in fact see accomplishing their goals as helping remove one or many of the contributing factors.

Sorry, outrage still denied.

i don't have an issue with feminists campaigning for their issues. My problem with them is that they continually try to shut us down when we try to campaign for our issues.

You know, every time this is pointed out, it usually ends up being some dude doing this same old anti-feminism nonsense with that thin veneer of 'mens gots problems too...' And I don't have any urge to take that anymore seriously than the drunk chick at the bar who has decided to take her rage at her own bad decisions and call that feminism as an actual feminist.

Source for death statistics:
http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfoi_revised11.pdf

It's a PDF (really, you couldn't have found a website?) so I'm going at this afterwards. Plus, you know, I was actually asking you to source your assumptions not just that it's a thing...but whatever, it's a start.

[Ostroeuropa]

i don't have an issue with feminists campaigning for their issues. My problem with them is that they continually try to shut us down when we try to campaign for our issues.

You know, every time this is pointed out, it usually ends up being some dude doing this same old anti-feminism nonsense with that thin veneer of 'mens gots problems too...' And I don't have any urge to take that anymore seriously than the drunk chick at the bar who has decided to take her rage at her own bad decisions and call that feminism as an actual feminist.

Source for death statistics:
http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfoi_revised11.pdf

It's a PDF (really, you couldn't have found a website?) so I'm going at this afterwards. Plus, you know, I was actually asking you to source your assumptions not just that it's a thing...but whatever, it's a start.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/04/29 ... 79850.html
^In response to your first one. It's just one example of plenty. (For context, the funding decisions were opposed by some feminist groups. Not all, but passive non-action and allowing the brand of feminism to oppose the funding is bad enough.)

Which assumptions, sorry.

[Neo Art]

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

I agree completely, and that was probably a poor word choice (read: I dun' fucked up but I want to make it sound better).

The problem comes however, once again, in the perspective. To run with the dangerous jobs example, Tahar and Ostro- seem to be making the argument that both male and female roles exist and are the results of their own sexist 'base' of thinking, whereas some amount (probably a minority, but a loud one) of feminists seem to make the argument that all of these roles are the result of female gender roles and men are privileged by their roles. Which, in some (probably even many) cases is entirely true (historically especially) but also ignores that this causes problems for men as well (such as prison sentence differences, custody battle losses, the draft, and littler stuff like the societal role they're put in of being the people who should have dangerous jobs).

The problem stems from people who attack the concept of male privlidge because they have either have a completely unsophisticated notion of what the phrase means, or they're so intellectually dishonest that they're willing to make themselves seem less intelligent by pretending to not know what the phrase means, and have equated "privlidge" to mean "can suffer no ill consequences what so ever" rather than what it actually means, and what any reasonably intelligent person understands it means, and what any reasonably intellectually honest person admits it means, which is "is of the class that gains the advantage of systemically structured sexism in our society".

Thus they point to various disadvantages men face (and some of them are a fucking reach, how long is it until someone mentions lifeboats and holding doors?) and proclaim to anyone who will listen "see? men have problems too, there's no such thing as privlidge!" as if anyone was making that argument in the first place. Except the adults in the room recognize that there's a fundamental difference between being privlidged, and being immune from any blowback from the societal sexism.

And the problem, the fundamental problem with these "voice for men" MRA groups is not, and never has been, that they work towards solving men's issues. The problem is that they find these examples of problems men face, and they champion them as some sort of argument against the idea that sexism exists. They cling to these perceived slights and claim that their existence negates "privlidge" or, even more radically, try to argue that it's WOMEN who are the advantaged class.

THAT is where the MRA movement gains all its rightful criticism. Not that they care about men, but that they are, fundamentally, childish. Because they're incapable of accepting that privlidge doesn't mean no disadvantages ever. And I call it childish because that's exactly what it is. It's an exercise in absolutes. And adults do not deal in absolutes. You know who does? Children. Children deal in absolutes. Adults are better than that. We're more capable than that. We're more understanding of nuances.

And the fundamental failure of the MRA movement is that they seem unable or unwilling to do that. And my fundamental dislike of the MRA stems from my unwillingness to treat grown ass men as children. I treat them like adults, I recognize they're adults, I hold them to the standards of adults.

If I believed they were no better than children, I wouldn't hold them to adult standards. But I owe them enough respect to recognize that they are capable of being adults. Which means they're capable of adult sophisitication. Adult nuance. Adult understanding. I recognize that they're capable of all of this.

And accepting that they are capable of thinking, reasoning, and acting like adults, my criticism of them stems from the fact that they've clearly chosen not to. And in the end, that's what the "MRA" movement is comprised of. Little boys, and grown men who choose to act like little boys.

My criticism isn't that MRA movements address issues affecting men. My criticism is that the MRA movements aren't the least bit interested in addressing those issues like adults. And I don't spend my time listening to the complaints of children, and adults who want to behave like children. Why the hell should I?

[Cannot think of a name]

This is a problem in perception. This notion that it is an active conspiracy, that there is some powerful man-cabal running this whole thing, that sort of 'Captain Planet' idea that this is all done purposefully while someone in a suit rubs his hands and cackles. That a hiring manager actively excludes women with the express intent of 'keeping the women folk down' instead of just acting on the same set of assumptions and prejudices that have been ingrained in society for generations often without even realizing it because they are so normative and would likely continue on unless someone pointed out they're happening. Like when you don't notice you're tapping your foot.

I agree completely, and that was probably a poor word choice (read: I dun' fucked up but I want to make it sound better).

The problem comes however, once again, in the perspective. To run with the dangerous jobs example, Tahar and Ostro- seem to be making the argument that both male and female roles exist and are the results of their own sexist 'base' of thinking, whereas some amount (probably a minority, but a loud one) of feminists seem to make the argument that all of these roles are the result of female gender roles and men are privileged by their roles. Which, in some (probably even many) cases is entirely true (historically especially) but also ignores that this causes problems for men as well (such as prison sentence differences, custody battle losses, the draft, and littler stuff like the societal role they're put in of being the people who should have dangerous jobs).

This has two parts for me.

First, it smacks of the 'what's in it for me?' kind of attitude. That the only way I'm supposed to give a shit about inequality is if I can find a way to ultimately make it about me. Therefore we scour the gender-role landscape and find ways that it is harmful to men and then pretend that no one else gives a shit about those kinds of things when that really isn't evident.

Second, despite the relative danger of these positions and, as has desperately been characterized as the 'disposability' of men, these are still advantages in that it is more acceptable for men to take those risks and thus those employment opportunities. But I find this a sort of tenuous connection because I don't like the idea of a disposable workforce and men or women have nothing to do with that. I don't like the 'acceptable risk' notion of things like mine or drill workers, and that we should be factoring in the human cost in a much more serious way when we regard these industries.

I don't see addressing any of that as a gender issue. I don't feel left out as a man if we're not super focused on the fact that it's mostly men in this job and instead focused on the fact that in the 21st century we have to sustain our standard of living based on sending workers down a hole with slip-shod safety regulations. I don't see how feminism holds any of that back, nor do I feel that it has an obligation to address it in order to become relevant. I do think that we need to adjust perceptions about gender roles to allow these opportunities (which again, should be safer) to women, but I don't think you get there by convincing men that they don't have to prove their manliness by taking them...I don't see how that opens up the opportunities.

I mean, unless you're arguing that no one should take those jobs. Which, again, might be an argument I'm willing to get behind. But adjusting men's urge to take the job isn't going to adjust representation until you get to the part about women are acceptable candidates for the job. But since we're not allowed to be specific about what we're talking about we can't acknowledge that the water is coming from the grate.

[Ostroeuropa]

have equated "privlidge" to mean "can suffer no ill consequences what so ever"

Thus they point to various disadvantages men face (and some of them are a fucking reach, how long is it until someone mentions lifeboats and holding doors?) and proclaim to anyone who will listen "see? men have problems too, there's no such thing as privlidge!" as if anyone was making that argument in the first place.

The problem is that they find these examples of problems men face, and they champion them as some sort of argument against the idea that sexism exists.
Because they're incapable of accepting that privlidge doesn't mean no disadvantages ever. And I call it childish because that's exactly what it is.

Find me any post where I've espoused any of these beliefs.

[Ostroeuropa]

I agree completely, and that was probably a poor word choice (read: I dun' fucked up but I want to make it sound better).

The problem comes however, once again, in the perspective. To run with the dangerous jobs example, Tahar and Ostro- seem to be making the argument that both male and female roles exist and are the results of their own sexist 'base' of thinking, whereas some amount (probably a minority, but a loud one) of feminists seem to make the argument that all of these roles are the result of female gender roles and men are privileged by their roles. Which, in some (probably even many) cases is entirely true (historically especially) but also ignores that this causes problems for men as well (such as prison sentence differences, custody battle losses, the draft, and littler stuff like the societal role they're put in of being the people who should have dangerous jobs).

This has two parts for me.

First, it smacks of the 'what's in it for me?' kind of attitude. That the only way I'm supposed to give a shit about inequality is if I can find a way to ultimately make it about me. Therefore we scour the gender-role landscape and find ways that it is harmful to men and then pretend that no one else gives a shit about those kinds of things when that really isn't evident.

Second, despite the relative danger of these positions and, as has desperately been characterized as the 'disposability' of men, these are still advantages in that it is more acceptable for men to take those risks and thus those employment opportunities. But I find this a sort of tenuous connection because I don't like the idea of a disposable workforce and men or women have nothing to do with that. I don't like the 'acceptable risk' notion of things like mine or drill workers, and that we should be factoring in the human cost in a much more serious way when we regard these industries.

I don't see addressing any of that as a gender issue. I don't feel left out as a man if we're not super focused on the fact that it's mostly men in this job and instead focused on the fact that in the 21st century we have to sustain our standard of living based on sending workers down a hole with slip-shod safety regulations. I don't see how feminism holds any of that back, nor do I feel that it has an obligation to address it in order to become relevant. I do think that we need to adjust perceptions about gender roles to allow these opportunities (which again, should be safer) to women, but I don't think you get there by convincing men that they don't have to prove their manliness by taking them...I don't see how that opens up the opportunities.

I mean, unless you're arguing that no one should take those jobs. Which, again, might be an argument I'm willing to get behind. But adjusting men's urge to take the job isn't going to adjust representation until you get to the part about women are acceptable candidates for the job. But since we're not allowed to be specific about what we're talking about we can't acknowledge that the water is coming from the grate.

If you don't address the problem of men feeling the need to prove their "Manliness" by taking absurdly dangerous jobs, they are going to try and do it by taking part in other dangerous activities. That does not solve the issue, it simply removes it from the workplace.

[Neo Art]

have equated "privlidge" to mean "can suffer no ill consequences what so ever"

Thus they point to various disadvantages men face (and some of them are a fucking reach, how long is it until someone mentions lifeboats and holding doors?) and proclaim to anyone who will listen "see? men have problems too, there's no such thing as privlidge!" as if anyone was making that argument in the first place.

The problem is that they find these examples of problems men face, and they champion them as some sort of argument against the idea that sexism exists.
Because they're incapable of accepting that privlidge doesn't mean no disadvantages ever. And I call it childish because that's exactly what it is.

Find me any post where I've espoused any of these beliefs.

It's almost like you believe I can't follow things like implication, and draw logical conclusions from inferences.

Again, you might be stuck thinking in terms of absolutes, do not apply such deficiencies to me. I'm quite capable of thinking like an adult.

[Ostroeuropa]

Find me any post where I've espoused any of these beliefs.

It's almost like you believe I can't follow things like implication, and draw logical conclusions from inferences.

Again, you might be stuck thinking in terms of absolutes, do not apply such deficiencies to me. I'm quite capable of thinking like an adult.

Can you find any post that implies I hold these beliefs.

[Battenburgia]

"men are dying much more than women in the workplace."
"Because women are excluded from the jobs!!!!" <- Casually ignores that this thoroughly implies that it is acceptable for males to die at work, but unnacceptable for females to.

Doesn't imply that at all

For example, take mineworking. Women in Great Britain were not excluded from the mines because people thought it was unacceptable for them to die alongside the men, they were excluded when prim Victorians found out that they were working in trousers and topless, which apparently, "made girls unsuitable for marriage and unfit to be mothers"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mines_and_Collieries_Act_1842

[Cannot think of a name]

And adults do not deal in absolutes. You know who does?

The Sith! Only the Sith deal in abs-

Children. Children deal in absolutes.

Dammit, I suck at this game...

[Ostroeuropa]

"men are dying much more than women in the workplace."
"Because women are excluded from the jobs!!!!" <- Casually ignores that this thoroughly implies that it is acceptable for males to die at work, but unnacceptable for females to.

Doesn't imply that at all

For example, take mineworking. Women in Great Britain were not excluded from the mines because people thought it was unacceptable for them to die alongside the men, they were excluded when prim Victorians found out that they were working in trousers and topless, which apparently, "made girls unsuitable for marriage and unfit to be mothers"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mines_and_Collieries_Act_1842

Historically that may have been the case. I don't think it is the case any longer.

[Cannot think of a name]

This has two parts for me.

First, it smacks of the 'what's in it for me?' kind of attitude. That the only way I'm supposed to give a shit about inequality is if I can find a way to ultimately make it about me. Therefore we scour the gender-role landscape and find ways that it is harmful to men and then pretend that no one else gives a shit about those kinds of things when that really isn't evident.

Second, despite the relative danger of these positions and, as has desperately been characterized as the 'disposability' of men, these are still advantages in that it is more acceptable for men to take those risks and thus those employment opportunities. But I find this a sort of tenuous connection because I don't like the idea of a disposable workforce and men or women have nothing to do with that. I don't like the 'acceptable risk' notion of things like mine or drill workers, and that we should be factoring in the human cost in a much more serious way when we regard these industries.

I don't see addressing any of that as a gender issue. I don't feel left out as a man if we're not super focused on the fact that it's mostly men in this job and instead focused on the fact that in the 21st century we have to sustain our standard of living based on sending workers down a hole with slip-shod safety regulations. I don't see how feminism holds any of that back, nor do I feel that it has an obligation to address it in order to become relevant. I do think that we need to adjust perceptions about gender roles to allow these opportunities (which again, should be safer) to women, but I don't think you get there by convincing men that they don't have to prove their manliness by taking them...I don't see how that opens up the opportunities.

I mean, unless you're arguing that no one should take those jobs. Which, again, might be an argument I'm willing to get behind. But adjusting men's urge to take the job isn't going to adjust representation until you get to the part about women are acceptable candidates for the job. But since we're not allowed to be specific about what we're talking about we can't acknowledge that the water is coming from the grate.

If you don't address the problem of men feeling the need to prove their "Manliness" by taking absurdly dangerous jobs, they are going to try and do it by taking part in other dangerous activities. That does not solve the issue, it simply removes it from the workplace.

First of all, I believe that notions of 'manliness' and the hindrance on society including risky behavior has been part of the feminist narrative, though then it's often characterized as 'women trying to nutter men and turn them into women' so you can't win for trying.

Second, we're sort of sliding off the problem here, aren't we? Are we concerned that men die in the workplace or are we concerned with risky behavior? If it's risky behavior why did it take us three pages to get their through the workplace, what did that have to do with anything or feminism in general? How does solving that address the issue of men dying in the workplace?

This seems a little desperate, kind of just throwing out the first reaction, can you make this a bit more concise?

[Neo Art]

This seems a little desperate, kind of just throwing out the first reaction, can you make this a bit more concise?

Hey pal, if you were a woman, and this was 1937, you'd have first dibs on any lifeboat you wanted on the steamship!

[Ostroeuropa]

If you don't address the problem of men feeling the need to prove their "Manliness" by taking absurdly dangerous jobs, they are going to try and do it by taking part in other dangerous activities. That does not solve the issue, it simply removes it from the workplace.

First of all, I believe that notions of 'manliness' and the hindrance on society including risky behavior has been part of the feminist narrative, though then it's often characterized as 'women trying to nutter men and turn them into women' so you can't win for trying.

Second, we're sort of sliding off the problem here, aren't we? Are we concerned that men die in the workplace or are we concerned with risky behavior? If it's risky behavior why did it take us three pages to get their through the workplace, what did that have to do with anything or feminism in general? How does solving that address the issue of men dying in the workplace?

This seems a little desperate, kind of just throwing out the first reaction, can you make this a bit more concise?

Part of the reason men suffer disproportionate fatality rates is their lack of concern for their own wellbeing, due to complaining or thinking about that kind of thing being seen as unmanly.
Dangerous jobs as perceived as "manly" jobs. If we make the job safer, without addressing the masculine attitudes and male gender roles, we'll end up pushing the problem elsewhere where to be a real man you now need to do some other kind of stupid and dangerous thing.
It may be part of the narrative, but the complete lack of action is telling. Any reasonable person would think "We have two obvious workplace discrepencies. a 3% pay gap, and a 97% death gap (in some industries. Across the board it's more like 90-97). Man, that 3 cents per dollar sure is fucking important. Better devote lots of time and campaigning to that." is a ridiculously stupid position.

Do you suppose for a single second that if women were dying at this high a rate that feminists would devote as much of their time and propoganda to the pay gap?

[Benuty]

This seems a little desperate, kind of just throwing out the first reaction, can you make this a bit more concise?

Hey pal, if you were a woman, and this was 1937, you'd have first dibs on any lifeboat you wanted on the steamship!

Well to be fair if you were
a) old
2) Disabled
3) Pregnant
4) A woman
5) A child

You probably wouldn't be on the list of casualties in an accident at sea.

[Tahar Joblis]

The problem stems from people who attack the concept of male privlidge because they have either have a completely unsophisticated notion of what the phrase means, or they're so intellectually dishonest that they're willing to make themselves seem less intelligent by pretending to not know what the phrase means, and have equated "privlidge" to mean "can suffer no ill consequences what so ever" rather than what it actually means, and what any reasonably intelligent person understands it means, and what any reasonably intellectually honest person admits it means, which is "is of the class that gains the advantage of systemically structured sexism in our society".

"The" advantage, you say. As if systematically structured sexism presents a singular and definite material advantage to one sex over the other. Which is grossly incorrect and a serious oversimplification. Which is why describing men as a "privileged" class is sloppy logic.

"Privileges," plural and specific, are not a problematic conception. Some people have privileges that others do not. I have certain privileges for certain reasons. For example, I have good health insurance because I work for a university. I am not going to deny that there are certain privileges associated with memberships within certain classes.

Real privileges are always specific; and always contextual. There are, for example, a large number associated with being white in the United States. To identify whites as a generically "privileged class" in that context is not especially problematic in most contexts within the United States, because the privileges associated with being non-white are small in the US, and the disadvantages associated with being white are small in the US.

It is still fundamentally inaccurate, and there are situations in which assuming a white person is enjoying a net benefit from being white are inappropriate. It's a sloppy logic, in other words, that leads us to divide people into discrete classes and identify a privileged and an oppressed class over each dichotomous division; sloppy logic that provides a good approximation in some cases, but still sloppy logic.

This is especially problematic in the dialogue over gender, because female and male privileges are usually both non-trivial; there are few contexts in which men and women have anything resembling a unidirectional division of privilege and disadvantage. To say, generically, that someone is defending male privilege is to invoke a deliberately vague concept with minimal correspondence to anything meaningful - the difference between talking about privileges and Privilege^TM is enormous.

Thus they point to various disadvantages men face (and some of them are a fucking reach, how long is it until someone mentions lifeboats and holding doors?) and proclaim to anyone who will listen "see? men have problems too, there's no such thing as privlidge!" as if anyone was making that argument in the first place. Except the adults in the room recognize that there's a fundamental difference between being privlidged, and being immune from any blowback from the societal sexism.

And the problem, the fundamental problem with these "voice for men" MRA groups is not, and never has been, that they work towards solving men's issues. The problem is that they find these examples of problems men face, and they champion them as some sort of argument against the idea that sexism exists. They cling to these perceived slights and claim that their existence negates "privlidge" or, even more radically, try to argue that it's WOMEN who are the advantaged class.

]THAT is where the MRA movement gains all its rightful criticism. Not that they care about men, but that they are, fundamentally, childish. Because they're incapable of accepting that privlidge doesn't mean no disadvantages ever. And I call it childish because that's exactly what it is. It's an exercise in absolutes. And adults do not deal in absolutes. You know who does? Children. Children deal in absolutes. Adults are better than that. We're more capable than that. We're more understanding of nuances.

Do you know what's an absolute? The dichotomous logic of Privilege^TM and claiming that one sex has a systematic advantage over the other; when the reality is substantially more complex and substantially less unilateral.

And the fundamental failure of the MRA movement is that they seem unable or unwilling to do that. And my fundamental dislike of the MRA stems from my unwillingness to treat grown ass men as children. I treat them like adults, I recognize they're adults, I hold them to the standards of adults.

If I believed they were no better than children, I wouldn't hold them to adult standards. But I owe them enough respect to recognize that they are capable of being adults. Which means they're capable of adult sophisitication. Adult nuance. Adult understanding. I recognize that they're capable of all of this.

And accepting that they are capable of thinking, reasoning, and acting like adults, my criticism of them stems from the fact that they've clearly chosen not to. And in the end, that's what the "MRA" movement is comprised of. Little boys, and grown men who choose to act like little boys.

My criticism isn't that MRA movements address issues affecting men. My criticism is that the MRA movements aren't the least bit interested in addressing those issues like adults. And I don't spend my time listening to the complaints of children, and adults who want to behave like children. Why the hell should I?

The movement in question is not any less absolutist in its complaints of disadvantage than feminism. (Indeed, being that it has come after feminism, many MRAs would appear to acknowledge that being female bears disadvantages as well as advantages. I know you feel I am the ur-MRA here on NSG; and I certainly acknowledge that women face disadvantages for being women and also feel action is required on those subjects. Acknowledging men are harmed directly by sexism is not uncommon among feminists; advocating direct action to address those issues isn't.)

So why do you feel it's ok to treat grown ass women as children, in your own turn of phrase?

[Cannot think of a name]

First of all, I believe that notions of 'manliness' and the hindrance on society including risky behavior has been part of the feminist narrative, though then it's often characterized as 'women trying to nutter men and turn them into women' so you can't win for trying.

Second, we're sort of sliding off the problem here, aren't we? Are we concerned that men die in the workplace or are we concerned with risky behavior? If it's risky behavior why did it take us three pages to get their through the workplace, what did that have to do with anything or feminism in general? How does solving that address the issue of men dying in the workplace?

This seems a little desperate, kind of just throwing out the first reaction, can you make this a bit more concise?

Part of the reason men suffer disproportionate fatality rates is their lack of concern for their own wellbeing, due to complaining or thinking about that kind of thing being seen as unmanly.
Dangerous jobs as perceived as "manly" jobs. If we make the job safer, without addressing the masculine attitudes and male gender roles, we'll end up pushing the problem elsewhere where to be a real man you now need to do some other kind of stupid and dangerous thing.
It may be part of the narrative, but the complete lack of action is telling. Any reasonable person would think "We have two obvious workplace discrepencies. a 3% pay gap, and a 97% death gap (in some industries. Across the board it's more like 90-97). Man, that 3 cents per dollar sure is fucking important. Better devote lots of time and campaigning to that." is a ridiculously stupid position.

Do you suppose for a single second that if women were dying at this high a rate that feminists would devote as much of their time and propoganda to the pay gap?

I have to admit I feel like I'm being shown a magic trick by a kid who is just learning magic and all of the redirections are super telegraphed.

Because we're back to what essentially lies as an unanswered question in one of my first responses, where we're asked to properly rank our outrage and I just don't see that as a valuable course of action. Should we follow that logic out, every time I stub my toe before I can yell about how much that sucks I have to properly rank the suffering in Darfur down to people who have lost their legs or were not born with them, starving children, labor conditions in the factory that may or may not have made the thing I hit or the shoe I was or was not wearing before I'm able to get down "Dammit my toe hurts who put this bullshit here."

Also, as a fully functioning adult member of society I am able to hold multiple things in my mind at the same time and consider them separately or together in certain points of juxtaposition without having to disregard one for the other. For instance, at the moment I'm able to hold this conversation, make Star Wars jokes, listen to a Suspense marathon on internet radio, and contemplate whether I want to admit I'm awake now and make food or pee...all at once without having to assign arbitrary importance to any of it.

Not to mention the sloppy notions of 'how much' someone cares about something that seems entirely reliant on subjective measures that couldn't at all be colored by any preconceived notions.

[Neo Art]

Also, as a fully functioning adult member of society I am able to hold multiple things in my mind at the same time and consider them separately or together in certain points of juxtaposition without having to disregard one for the other.

Get your own material.