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Good news for men about gender relations
If you are a man, the subtitle of this article might raise a laugh. What good news could there possibly be about male-female relations, right? Feminists have ruined them for all time, correct?
I have to tell you that for a while I felt like that, too. When I became fully aware of how men are disadvantaged in gender relations by what I have named 'strategic disempowerment' (SD), I was sure that there was no way out and I felt ... well, disempowered.
Before I go on to tell you some ways that I have found to not feel helpless in the face of the onslaught of feminist's belief in the superiority of women, I'd like to describe some of the phenomena associated with
SD.
Double standards to disempower
SD is used by some (not all) women in order to boost their self esteem, and probably to gain power over men, or a man. It is sometimes used consciously, and sometimes unconsciously, but at all times it is backed by the woman's belief system. At the root of SD are beliefs that women are superior to men, that men owe women, and that women are oppressed by men (see my article Twelve Great Myths of Feminism, which addresses these false beliefs). The women who are most likely to engage in SD tend to be those who have accepted the persuasive, convincing myths of feminism.
The basic method of SD is the use of double standards. Many of these involve the most deep-seated of all human feelings, sex, because it is there that all human beings are often most sensitive and vulnerable. It's in the area of sex that the most leverage can be attained for increasing one's dominance, whether the woman is trying consciously or unconsciously to disempower. However, not all of the tactics used by practitioners of SD involve sex or sexuality, so we mustn't be too quick to overlook other areas of engagement by these women.
Let's take a look at some of the disempowering tactics these women use. It should be noted at this point that many of the tactics have gained wide enough currency for them to have been enshrined in legislation in many Western nations, where a concerted effort has been made over many years by feminist activists. In fact, much legislation is clearly disadvantageous to men, and it is possibly because many men also have accepted the myths of radical feminism as outlined in my aforementioned article.
Oppressed minorities syndrome
The double standards that are the engine of SD are many, and may be schematised in terms of what feminists label unacceptable, and what they label acceptable. These examples always involve permission for women to do one thing, and the denial of permission of men to do the same.
The effect that occurs when a man is subjected to an SD tactic is identical to that suffered by any disempowered person. Wherever one class, caste or section of society enjoys privileges denied to another, the latter group suffers feelings of powerlessness, shame, guilt, hurt and confusion. The results are well documented in the study of disenfranchised and oppressed minorities around the world, and include suicide, drug abuse, alcoholism, ill health and a host of other factors. These factors, by the way, are exhibited by males far more than females. (Unfortunately, men's health, despite being in a more parlous state than women's, is drastically less funded than women's, so research is thin on the ground. Nonetheless, enough exists for us to know that men are experiencing symptoms akin to those associated with underprivileged groups.)
More research should be done in academia to explore my hypothesis that men share with indigenous and other disenfranchised groups a common set of underlying causes leading to congruent syndromes. While anecdotally it is clear that there is a female hegemony in many fields, such as health funding, family law, anti-discrimination legislation, and so on, what is not so clear is what can be done about it, nor what role men play in allowing and even facilitating it. Again, it is a field ripe for research, but one suspects that funding bodies and academic institutions would be loath to risk persecution under the very tactics that we are discussing.
It should be noted at this point that the effectiveness of the following tactics of SD lies in the following methods: discriminatory interpretation of legislation; withholding of affection; withholding of compassion; shaming and other emotional abuse; verbal abuse; private vilification; and public vilification. At all times, however, the most effective element in the table below is the frustration experienced by the person or group who is forbidden to do what the other person or group self-encourages.
The psychology involved here is simple: SD sets up a paradigm of 'to the victor the spoils'. The selfish child who has an ice cream gains further victory by flaunting the victory of eating ice cream in front of the child denied permission to eat. Similarly, ruling castes who have expropriated material wealth from oppressed minorities maintain their high status not only by owning wealth, but by making their wealth conspicuous.
In both cases, and in the case of SD, the frustration engendered in the oppressed actually disempowers them further, and often leads to self-harm rather than militant action against the oppressor. The child slips into depression and feelings of being 'less than'; the oppressed minority accepts an inferior status, and disintegrates with drink and drugs; the frustrated man thinks it serves him right for being a 'mere male' and slowly self-destructs with self-hatred and unhealthy behaviours.
Some examples
Many feminists play on this to their advantage, as
most Western men now know. Take, for example, an incident that happened to me
a couple of days ago, but which is fairly typical and common enough in
essence.
I was in
a supermarket checkout queue. Just ahead of me was a woman, 40-something, who
was being served. Next to the cashier (a young woman), was a young male
supermarket employee who was struggling to get a plastic bag from about 20 or
so that, in the manner of supermarket bags, were stuck together. His
difficulty arose from the nature of the items, and perhaps his youth. However,
the woman being served had another explanation, one that is rather predictable
from a feminist.
"Men
can never do fiddly things," she opined. "They haven't the fingers
for it." The cashier smiled and the young man blushed and fumbled
further.
I wish I had
said something to soothe the young man's embarrassment at being so
deliberately and uncaringly humiliated by the customer, but as my male readers
will appreciate, I have a sense of honour and did not wish to shame the
customer as she had shamed the lad. Also, I confess, and male readers will no
doubt empathise, a reason other than a sense of duty and propriety was at play
in my mind. I didn't criticise the silly statement because to have done so
would have, from my experience, almost certainly occasioned some kind of
illogical, ad hominem, under-the-belt answer from the woman, and I've
developed a strong and self-protective antipathy to being attacked while my
hands are tied by the cords of reason and ethics. Meanwhile, as I could detect
from my peripheral vision, the woman customer tried to gauge my reaction, but
I maintained as inert a look as possible.
Do you have any
sexist graphics like these?
I'd be grateful to receive them from you.
Naturally, my mind was not as blank as my face. The
rejoinder that came to my mind was something like "You're so right;
that's why the great engravers, watchmakers, jewellers, brain surgeons and
tailors of the world have always relied so heavily on women to do the 'fiddly
work' on their behalf."
This customer's comment, of course, is hardly a hanging offence, nor
should it be. However, the significant fact is not that a woman made a fairly
lighthearted, however insensitive and unkind remark. The significance lies in
the fact that were the genders involved to be reversed, the offence at the
remark would have been labelled 'sexist' by any feminist present, and quite
possibly an escalation of offence would have occurred. In Australia,
litigation has been successful for such infringements.
Imagine what hissing would come from the teeth of a
feminist had she heard a man try to embarrass a young woman with a statement
such as "Women can't add up. They haven't the brains for it", or
"Women can't sing, they haven't the voices for it".
Being a mere male with an inferior sense of decorum
and honour, I restrained myself, while the female customer walked off with an
delusional air of victory.
Here's another fairly typical example. Led by feminist theory, it has
become egregiously fashionable to denigrate fatherhood. This is done in many
ways, such as the wild inflation of statistics of male parental faults, but
sometimes by more anecdotal techniques. I had to shake my head recently when I
heard a woman praise her father for not having brought her up to do
"boys' stuff" (she had no brothers and she was pleased that her Dad
didn't treat her as a surrogate son). She was just as emphatic about this as
those many other women who rail against their fathers for not sharing
"masculine" skills such as car repair. Thus we have Rule 1 of
strategic disempowerment: Disarm the enemy by forcing him into a no-win
position.
A table of examples of SD tactics
Hiss!! 
Condemned by SD practitioners
–
guaranteed always to raise a hiss and a sneer | Purr!! 
Promoted by SD practitioners
–
guaranteed always to raise a laugh and a cheer |
| Advertising which contains graphic representations of females naked. | Advertising which contains graphic representations of males naked. |
| Men's magazines that contain soft-core pictures of women. | Women's magazines that contain soft-core pictures of men. |
| Men's sexual fantasies, needs and behaviours. | Women's sexual fantasies, needs and behaviours. |
| Advertising which shows women as sex objects. | Advertising which shows men as sex objects. |
| Conceptions of God as male. | Conceptions of Satan as male (never female). Promotion
of 'goddess' worship. Denial and vilification of the masculine corollary. |
| Use by men of the term 'girl' for woman. | Use by women of the term 'girl' for young woman and 'boy' for man (eg, "Let's go, girls"; "I need a night out with the girls -- you go out with the boys"; "Look at those toys for the boys"). |
| Men going to prostitutes, female escorts and so on ('sexist, male chauvinist exploitative behaviour'; 'it's all about power and not sex'). | Women going to male prostitutes, gigolos, and so on ('getting in touch with one's sexuality'; 'exploring the wild inner woman'). |
| Advertising that shows women as incompetent. | Advertising that shows men as incompetent. |
| Men being attracted to younger women ('sexist'). | Women being attracted to younger men ('liberating one's sexuality'). |
| Parenting instincts, when felt by females. | Parenting instincts, when felt by males. |
| Sensitivity and nurturing emotions, when felt by females. | Sensitivity and nurturing emotions, when felt by males. |
| Jokes about women. | Jokes about men.* |
| Comments about the dimensions of the female genitalia. | Comments about the dimensions of the male genitalia. |
| Use of taboo words for female genitalia as abusive swear words. | Use of taboo words for male genitalia as abusive swear words. |
| Generalised criticism of women. | Generalised criticism of men. |
| Male assertiveness. | Female assertiveness. |
| Women crying publicly. | Men crying publicly. |
| Male participation in defence forces. | Female participation in defence forces. |
| Men-only clubs, etc, must be picketed, closed down and/or opened to women, even if centuries of tradition are at stake. | Women-only clubs, etc, are to be promoted, and preferably paid for by public funds: on-campus 'women's rooms'; women-only swimming pools; "women's shelters" etc. |
| "If a man lashes out in defense or frustration, he is told that he is angry and should be responsible for his actions, is chastised by society, forced to take an anger management program and must suffer the consequences of his actions." Source | "If a woman lashes out in anger she is told that she was defending herself or was frustrated and requires the sympathy and support of society and is not responsible for her actions ..."
Source |
| Movies in which men are violent and anti-social. | Movies in which women are violent and anti-social (eg, Thelma and Louise) |
| Boldly aggressive male rock singers. | Boldly aggressive female rock singers. |
| Video clips showing men toying sexually with women. | Video clips showing women toying sexually with men. |
| Imagine the repercussions if one was reckless enough to refer to a group of women by saying "the room was just full of oestrogen!" | Often heard: "The room was full of testosterone!" This is apparently criticism, not praise, and acceptable to feminists. |
| Men talking to their friends about their female sex partner's physical attributes or 'performance' in bed. | Women talking to their friends about their male sex partner's physical attributes or 'performance' in bed. |
| Men having interests outside a relationship, or a space of their own such as a workshop or shed, which are always denigrated as sexist. | Women having outside interests and "a woman's room". |
| Relationship commitment by women. | Relationship commitment by men. |
| Men speaking for institutions must only be called 'spokespersons', never 'spokesmen', thus removing a significant part of their identity. | Women speaking for institutions may be called 'spokeswomen' as well as 'spokespersons', thus enhancing a significant part of their identity. |
| Use of male-gender terms generically. | Use of female-gender terms generically.§ |
| The word 'housewife'. | The word 'househusband'. |
| A male 'partner' or spouse going out and not saying exactly where. Men often feel they have to bend over backwards being quite detailed about their lives and even private thoughts. | The woman in a relationship is typically supposed to just say "I'm going out" and for the male to inquire is sexist. It is considered progressive for women to be very private, reactionary for men to do so. More power-vampirism. |
| Artificial vaginas are sold in the 'sex toy'
industry, and these are criticised by feminists as dehumanising sexual
objectification of women. | It is common for feminists to extol the
virtue of dildos and vibrators. |
| Insults about a woman's clothing is sexual
harassment. | Insults
about a man's clothing is office fun.** |
Have I missed something?
Or can you add to my examples, eg, violent-women movies?
I would love to hear your examples of SD.
So ... what's the good news about gender relations?
I know, it seems that in recent decades men have
taken such a beating and experienced so much disadvantage, that to speak of
good news sounds like a pipe dream. But no, men are not powerless against this
onslaught and I would like to share with you some of my insights.
Insights like these have even been noted by people
whom one would not expect, such as Doris Lessing, the
British feminist author, who said at the Edinburgh Book Festival, on August 13, 2001:
I find myself increasingly shocked at the unthinking and automatic rubbishing of men which is now so part of our culture that it is hardly even noticed. We now have pretty much equality at least on the pay and opportunities front, though almost nothing has been done on child care, the real liberation … I was in a class of nine- and 10-year-olds, girls and boys, and this young woman was telling these kids that the reason for wars was the innately violent nature of men. You could see the little girls, fat with complacency and conceit while the little boys sat there crumpled, apologising for their existence, thinking this was going to be the pattern of their lives …This kind of thing is happening in schools all over the place and no one says a thing. It has become a kind of religion that you can’t criticise because then you become a traitor to the great cause, which I am not. The most stupid, ill-educated and nasty woman can rubbish the nicest, kindest and most intelligent man and no one protests … Men seem to be so cowed that they can’t fight back, and it is time they did.
Source
To be continued (this page under construction)
« Index of Articles on folklore and other topics
Some quotes
Quotes above by Jack Kammer
"Let it not be said, whenever there is energy or creative genius,
'She has a masculine mind'."
Margaret Fuller, American feminist and revolutionist, born on May 23, 1810 (I
agree wholeheartedly; nor let it never be said that men have a 'feminine side'
– PW)
"... the word
'gunman' denigrates all males, because it implies that only men go around killing people with guns. This is just like the word
'chairman', which Feminists say discriminates against (all) women, because it implies that only men chair meetings. The whole policy on sexist language originated as an academic argument. The point is that, where it suited Feminists, it has been implemented in the real world."
Source
"The language of Gender Politics is overwhelmingly the language of the Radical Feminists. It expresses mainly the reality that Feminists feel that they experience. It speaks only for their world, from their point of view. They, with their Women's Studies Departments, their Feminist-dominated media, and their Ministries of Women's Affairs ..."
Source
"If the advertising folks ran commercials featuring women the way they show men, there would be a national protest."
Source
"Feminists, having created a massive victimology out of the alleged oppression of women, have arrogated the right to speak for all women and created an 11th Commandment: 'Thou shalt not criticise women'.
No other group or ideology can claim immunity from criticism in the way feminism does, or rubbish its critics by accusing them of hating half the human race ...
What I have suggested is that men are in certain ways oppressed. Feminists, claiming a monopoly on suffering, do not like this. Nor do they like the fact that, by advancing a plausible case, people like us have had an effect on public opinion. We must be shamed into silence."
Source
"Psychologically speaking, nine out of ten women will take nine out of ten men in a fight to the finish, not with direct, head-on aggression, but with guilt, shame and blame ... As men we need to learn how not to be vulnerable to women when we shouldn't be."
Philosopher Sam Keen, author of Fire in the Belly
"10.00am: It's a busy day so the boss asks me to fetch a cappuccino from the cafe downstairs. I think to myself, If I were a woman I could refuse to do it." Source
"Men's greatest weakness is their facade of strength. Women's greatest strength is their facade of weakness."
Source
"Some stations avoided words (such as 'actress'), that Feminists object to -- but they continued to use sexist words like 'gunman', instead of gender-neutral alternatives, such as 'gunperson' ..."
Source
"What do you call the story of a spouse who has hot sex with a stranger while the other spouse is dutifully out of town with the kids? Well, that depends. If the cheating spouse is a man, it's another woeful tale of men's selfishness and irresponsibility. If the cheating spouse is a woman, it's The Bridges of Madison County, a best-selling 'romance', hugely popular among women."
Source
"I believe that women are the more spiritually advanced sex."
Erica Jong, Washington Post, December 6, 1992
"Is dying seven years younger than women insignificant? Is dying of prostate cancer while the lion's share of medical funding goes to breast cancer research insignificant? Is committing suicide at four times the rate of women insignificant?
"I'm a whiner. I refuse to remain silent about my own or the pain of other men. What of it? As a whiner, I'm in good company. Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were whiners. And we masculists are whiner. Every single one of us.
"We'll be whining when we shut down the Selective Service Administration with its sexist requirement that only men must be willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. We'll be whining when we shut down the hospitals that mutilate the genitals of male infants. And we'll be whining when we shut down the divorce courts that sever the sacred bond between father and child."
Source
"As far as I'm concerned, men are the product of a damaged gene. They pretend to be normal but what they're doing sitting there with benign smiles on their faces is they're manufacturing sperm."
Germaine Greer, Australian
misandrist, (from a news report dated November 14, 1991)
"The car company Nissan recently placed advertisements in women's magazines for a car called the Micra targeting younger women who make up 70 percent of the cars buyers. The heading was 'Hate Male'. The advertisement encouraged women readers to write in and get sent postcard pictures of a man who had been compromised by a women after he had borrowed her car without asking. The pictures are: A man bent in agony holding his crutch, a mans jacket in tatters with both the arms cut off, a male watch being fried in a pan, a man sleeping with half his hair and beard cut off, a women holding a can of opened dog food behind her back and in the background a man is sitting eating, a paper clipping lying on a table of the Bobbitt case entitled: a night to dismember, and a book with the last few pages cut out." Source
"What if the butt of all the jokes took on another identity? Consider the following fictional exchanges:
"It is so hard to get decent employees."
"That's because you keep hiring blacks.""I just don't understand this project at all."
"Well, a woman explained it to you, so what did you expect?"
"I can't believe he is going out again tonight."
"Oh please, all Hispanics care about is sex."
All of these statements are offensive, and would rightfully be objected to by advocates of fair representation in the media. However, put the word 'man' or 'men' in place of 'blacks,' 'woman,' and 'Hispanics' in the above sentences and they're deemed humorous."
Source
"...men's history may well be the neglected subject today. Even though men dominate as the actors of history they exist largely as asexual figures. They are not recognised as fully dimensional beings, taking into account the complexity of male sexuality."
Source
"'Why test on poor defenceless little animals when they could use my husband?' Imagine if the ad had said 'wife' instead." Tiger, Lionel, The Decline of Males, Martin's Press, NY, 1999, page 1, referring to a Body Shop window advertisement. Source
"I believe that women have a capacity for understanding and compassion which a man structurally does not have, does not have it because he cannot have it. He's just incapable of it."
Former US Congresswoman Barbara Jordan
"Heterosexual intercourse is the pure, formalized expression of contempt for women's bodies."
Andrea Dworkin
"When a woman reaches orgasm with a man she is only collaborating with the patriarchal system, eroticizing her own oppression..."
Sheila Jeffrys
"Men who are unjustly accused of rape can sometime gain from the experience."
Catherine Comins, Vassar College Assistant Dean of Student Life; Time magazine
MALE: ... represents a variant of or deviation from the category of female. The first males were mutants... the male sex represents a degeneration and deformity of the
female.
MAN: ... an obsolete life form ... an ordinary creature who needs to be watched ... a contradictory baby-man ...
TESTOSTERONE POISONING: ... Until now it has been though that the level of testosterone in men is normal simply because they have it. But if you consider how abnormal their behavior is, then you are led to the hypothesis that almost all men are suffering from "testosterone poisoning."
From A Feminist Dictionary, ed. Kramarae and Treichler, Pandora Press, 1985
More
______________________________________________________________
* Jokes about men
I intend to post on this site an overview of anti-male sexist jokes that circulate on the Internet. At least 80 per cent of sexist jokes posted to me by friends and strangers (mostly women) are of an anti-male nature. If they were similarly anti-female, no reasonable person would send such jokes to women (indeed, to do so in most Western countries could result in prosecution, vilification, loss of employment and other penalties).
This prime example of SD, by which men are not only silenced by the double standard, but then held up to ridicule that they may not reply to, is worthy of intense investigation by sociologists. Unfortunately, most schools of sociology are breeding grounds of Strategic Disempowerment that continue, falsely, to claim that sexism is primarily enacted by males against females. My article will, I hope, do a little to redress that situation.
§ Eg, "When a baby enters the world, she simply exists. She knows how to be." Awakenings Ezine: Issue 31: Temple of the Soul!
**
“Men are more likely to be sexually harassed in the workplace than women, according to academic research.
“Behavioural scientists Dr Don Hine and Roberta Martin from the University of New England also found that men had greater difficulty coping with sexual harassment and were more likely to quit their job because of it than women …
“‘We found 88.7 per cent of males had experienced a form of sexual harassment in the past year compared to 82.5 per cent of females,’ Dr Hine said.”
Source: Men “more sexually harassed”
