Andrew Tate isn’t creating these young men out of well adjusted people.
Young men today face a mountain of issues with zero sympathy from the people or institutions around them. And grifters prey on these men.
Having grown up in the “teach boys not to rape” era of progrssive rhetoric, it’s actually insane to see all these people just insist being in a guy’s world is all sunshine and rainbows and all these men are just awful people falling of their own accord.
Young men get told some pretty damaging things growing up, even from progressive people.
Everyone has problems, lots of people are coming of age all kinds of fucked up, and we can’t fix this by implying it’s all their own doing.
You just revealed a lot more than I think you realize.
Climate change isn’t part of the discussion.
No one is trying to blame anyone in this context.
We’re talking about cultural issues that are tied in with the mental and emotional growth of people.
So very much hate and malicious intent is created by unstable people brought up to sincerely believe that what they do and believe is right. Often this is due to some religious indoctrination, though other reasons exist. Few are those who are truly evil at their core. In another group we have the confused and the uncertain trying to just exist in a world that is often cruel and unfair. As they grow and in moments of extreme vulnerability they reach out for answers.
As an online community one of the healthiest activities we can do is talk about these things. Express that shit is hard and offer encouragement and positive, safe places away from conmen and manipulators, as much as we are able. To do that we need to focus where we can.
Young men today face a mountain of issues with zero sympathy from the people or institutions around them. And grifters prey on these men
Idk, I don’t feel like young women are really offered any kind of safety net or support system that isn’t being offered to boys.
it’s actually insane to see all these people just insist being a guy’s world is all sunshine and rainbows and all these men are just awful people falling of their own accord.
This is the thing, I constantly hear how awful young men are being treated. I don’t ever really hear any specific reasoning that can’t be explained by other means other than sexism against men.
Imo this is one of the first generations of young men, especially young white men, that weren’t born on third base. The men’s right movement is a reactionary movement that’s just upset about being placed on an equal footing, and then falling to achieve the same results of previous generations of young white men.
That feeling of slowly rolling a stone up a hill all day as others unbound by such heavy burdens briskly walk by is the same feeling poc and women have experienced in this country since it’s inception. You aren’t being treated worse than everyone else, it’s just that equality feels like prosecution to those who have traditionally lived charmed lives. Welcome to the jungle, I hope you learn to enjoy your stay. I think the affectations of the moneyed class have ended, they have decided they don’t have to keep up the charade. We’re all the same to them now, and will all be exploited as such.
Ignoring the issues people face becuase they come from what you determine to be a “privileged” class is just another form of bigotry.
Young men don’t stand to benifit from the same patriarchal systems we do, nor do we stand to benifit from the patriarchal systems our fathers did. And even if it did, one privileged doesn’t nullify the issues faced by other inequalities such as race, wealth, class, ability.
The issues they face are real reguardless of what privilege they have or are assumed to have.
Equality should be about giving every individual a fair chance at life regardless of who they are or what they came from. Not some team sport where “one side” must be crushed under to goosestep of self proclaimed progress seekers.
Ignoring the issues people face becuase they come from what you determine to be a “privileged” class is just another form of bigotry.
Simply stating that the problems are not intrinsic to being male is not ignoring the problem.
Young men don’t stand to benifit from the same patriarchal systems we do, nor do we stand to benifit from the patriarchal systems our fathers did.
Who is we? What I’m saying is that young males are not being hurt anymore than any other demographic, they just aren’t culturally inoculated to it, and so they think they’re worse off.
And even if it did, one privileged doesn’t nullify the issues faced by other inequalities such as race, wealth, class, ability.
I never claimed it did?
issues they face are real reguardless of what privilege they have or are assumed to have.
Like? As I said, I keep hearing these blanket statements attesting to unique issues, but no one claims what they are or how they occur.
Equality should be about giving every individual a fair chance at life regardless of who they are or what they came from.
Do you think that we are living in some sort of post scarcity society? If there is an elevated class, its only means of elevation is to stand on the heads of it’s "equal"counterparts.
Not some team sport where “one side” must be crushed under to goosestep of self proclaimed progress seekers.
Lol, and those who stood on our heads suddenly proclaimed themselves victims. How do you think they stand elevated if not by crushing down the competition?
It’s only goose-stepping when the boot is on your face, when its someone’s else’s face they’re told to turn the other cheek.
Nobody is arguing for “elevation”, nobody in their right state of mind anyway, and I’m not asking anyone to turn their cheek to anyone wrong doings done to them. However, when it’s men who feel wronged you ask them to turn the other cheek. Man up. Deal with it.
The fact of the matter is it’s exactly this dogmatic rejecting of men that pushes them towards people like Andrew Tate. If the progressive zeitgeist refuses to listen to someone, they will follow anyone else who will. We shouldn’t tolerate the intolerant, but if we truly seek to defeat it we must understand it and treat the systemic issues that cause it to arise. It’s not the romantic ideal of the rebel taking down the empire in a victorious display of self-satisfaction, but it is the method that gets lasting results.
I’ve never stood on anyone’s heads, least of all yours. I’d appreciate it if you could at least treat the next generation with the same respect.
I think validating the claim that young men are specifically being treated worse than others in similar demographics is a tacit validation of allowing them to maintain their hierarchy.
However, when it’s men who feel wronged you ask them to turn the other cheek. Man up. Deal with it.
I can’t control how people feel? If someone feels wronged, but can’t explain how or why, am I supposed to genuflect in agreement? If two people are struck in the face, and only one of them cries, should I ignore the stoic? We should be improving the lives of all young people, not just the ones who shout about it the most.
The fact of the matter is it’s exactly this dogmatic rejecting of men that pushes them towards people like Andrew Tate.
I’m not rejecting that young men face problems, I’m just claiming they don’t face any problems more dire than anyone elses problem in the same demographics.
You just interpret that as rejection because you don’t empathize with the others.
We shouldn’t tolerate the intolerant, but if we truly seek to defeat it we must understand it and treat the systemic issues that cause it to arise.
And we do that by being more concerned about the problems of young men than others?
It’s not the romantic ideal of the rebel taking down the empire in a victorious display of self-satisfaction, but it is the method that gets lasting results.
What do they want, what are you willing to give them? According to the men’s right movement, their problem is that women are too free to turn down their advanced, women are too educated, no one wants to be their trad wife, and that there’s just too much competition in the job place because of things like affirmative action.
If that’s their problem, I don’t care, and I don’t really feel like he needs to validate their opinion.
I’ve never stood on anyone’s heads, least of all yours. I’d appreciate it if you could at least treat the next generation with the same respect.
You are an individual…we are talking about socioeconomics. We are talking about the systemic abuse that’s affected every demographic in America besides white men since the inception of this country.
Do you think the golden era of American history that the men’s right wants to revert to was shared by everyone in the country? That black families were able to afford a spacious house and take care of a large family on one person’s income? No, that was only a possibility for certain demographics. White men were given free home loans from the government, black families were sent to the projects, and women weren’t even able to open bank accounts.
You aren’t worried about the next generation, you’re only worried about the next generation of young white men.
Progress isn’t a competition, there need not be losers. We can acknowledge two things being bad at the same time. As we type there are children being forced to mine toxic cobalt with no protection just so we can have these electronics to argue. How can we argue our lives are any bad compared to them? Might as well put off anyone’s progress until we finally beat out the modern salve trade. It’s a unproductive way of thinking.
Do you think a newborn “white male” as your oppressor too? Someone who has never had the chance to do anyone wrong? Must they really be subject to your scorn?
And what of the white men today? If they gain nothing from your progress, then why must they be concerned with it? After all you seem to think that white men as a class have the ability to crush others with their privilege. How could we expect these people to work in the interest of a movement that only seeks to take from them indiscriminately? And wouldn’t it be natural for them to simply follow the example that you have given them? Be wrathful, spiteful, hateful, boil down human beings to their perceived class, do anything to get a win for their own group. Hell just look at the news, abortion rights are being repealed in America. This is happening in real time, and I promise you neither of us are happy about it.
Socioeconomics can say whatever it wants about groups and demographics and “numbers this” or “numbers that”, that doesn’t change the fact that we are individuals in a world of many other individuals. Privilege, true and quantifiable privilege, is always relative and we should listen when people tell us about their problems, since it will encourage and empower them to do the same.
We can together to build a world that’s better for everyone, but that requires that we don’t waste our lives away trying to hold each other down out of a need for revenge. Every step we take for ourselves or our own perceived group is a step backwards, and it’ll be our children who will have to make up for that. Do you care for the next generation, and what you’ll leave them to deal with?
Progress isn’t a competition, there need not be losers. We can acknowledge two things being bad at the same time.
Then why do you insist that we divide class solidarity among gender? Why not advocate for improving life for all young people instead of insisting that men’s problems take priority?
As we type there are children being forced to mine toxic cobalt with no protection just so we can have these electronics to argue. How can we argue our lives are any bad compared to them? Might as well put off anyone’s progress until we finally beat out the modern salve trade. It’s a unproductive way of thinking.
Lol, what kind of rhetoric is that? Children in other countries work in cobalt mines, so it’s okay if American kids work at McDonald’s…
We are talking about equity in our own country, we are talking specifically about whether young men in the west are really experiencing more or worse problems than their counterparts.
Do you think a newborn “white male” as your oppressor too? Someone who has never had the chance to do anyone wrong? Must they really be subject to your scorn?
Lol, we are talking about sociology, not an individuals psychology. I don’t scorn individuals for being a part of any class, but i do scorn individuals try and preserve the class hierarchy for their own benefit.
And what of the white men today? If they gain nothing from your progress, then why must they be concerned with it?
That’s the thing, when we protect the most disadvantaged class we help protect every other class perceived as better than. This is a foundational to ideologies like feminism. If you can’t charge a disadvantaged class with some accusation, then there is no fear for the classes perceived to be more valuable.
This is one of problems with labeling white men as the most disadvantaged class. If we spend all our effort protecting A class that doesn’t really need protection, then we are leaving people actually in danger out on a line.
After all you seem to think that white men as a class have the ability to crush others with their privilege.
Do you think white men today as a class have not benefited from generational wealth created by systemic racism? What do you think slavery was if not crushing others with privilege?
How could we expect these people to work in the interest of a movement that only seeks to take from them indiscriminately?
So now equality is stealing? Just because I don’t think that white men are the most disadvantaged people in our country, I’m now taking from them indiscriminately?
What is progressive to these young men, what else could they possibly want that other people have?
And wouldn’t it be natural for them to simply follow the example that you have given them? Be wrathful, spiteful, hateful, boil down human beings to their perceived class, do anything to get a win for their own group.
Yeah… Seems to be exactly what they are doing. You have heard of Andrew Tate, correct?
Hell just look at the news, abortion rights are being repealed in America. This is happening in real time, and I promise you neither of us are happy about it.
And your solution is to …validate the men’s right movement? You’re literally claiming that men are not privileged, yet they are able to pass abortion laws. Further more you are saying that they are doing this because we don’t baby them enough in progressive political spaces.
Socioeconomics can say whatever it wants about groups and demographics and “numbers this” or “numbers that”, that doesn’t change the fact that we are individuals in a world of many other individuals.
You do understand that we don’t make policies around individuals?
Privilege, true and quantifiable privilege, is always relative
Relative to what…?
we should listen when people tell us about their problems, since it will encourage and empower them to do the same.
Oh yeah, I’m sure that encouraging the klansmen to air his grievances will surely benefit me, a man of color?
but that requires that we don’t waste our lives away trying to hold each other down out of a need for revenge.
It’s problematic to me that you think equality euates to revenge. I’m not saying to be mean to young white men, or even judge them. My only claims is that we shouldn’t prioritize white men’s problems over other demographics. And to you that means I’m thirsty for revenge?
Every step we take for ourselves or our own perceived group is a step backwards
And how does that apply to your original claim?
I still find it hilarious that you haven’t answerd my original rebuttal. How exactly are young men any worse off than anyone else in a similar demographic?
it’s just that equality feels like prosecution to those who have traditionally lived charmed lives
I cannot speak for “that country”, assuming you mean the US, as I don’t live there. That said, I think people don’t have actual past lives as a reference. If my grandfather or father lived in a different world, this can at most create expectations, but cannot be really generating a feeling of prosecution, because the current one is the only life I have actually lived and I know.
Then there is another issue, which is that in reality there are a lot of factors that determine whether you are born “in third base”. Gender, historically, has been one of them, but it’s far from being a guarantee. However, the political discourse often flattens this issue and makes it almost two-dimensional. If you are a white man, you are privileged, period. Fact is, there are tons of white man that are absolutely not privileged, and are also victim of an unequal and oppressive society. These people are substantially alienated because their voice is simply not represented anywhere.
My leftist interpretation is that some of the egalitarian discourse (feminism, LGBT rights etc.) has been to some extent swallowed by the status quo, and lost a lot of the revolutionary potential it had, becoming more focused on individual perception and rights, rather than on systemic issues that therefore could capture also the dynamics of a white man being also oppressed, even if from a different angle.
In other words, if feminism is purely focused on battles of women as a group of individuals, and not as part of a system that oppresses them within a wider mechanism, then oppressed people that don’t strictly belong to that category have a much harder time to see in women a reflection of their own oppression.
Basically, a realization such as:
We’re all the same to them now, and will all be exploited as such.
was true already decades (centuries) ago, and that’s why lots of feminist battles were linked to socialism and leftist ideologies. This is nothing new, really, and forcing to read the current issues only from the racial perspective or only from the gender perspective (etc.) makes it much harder to build solidarity between groups who are instead left to fight battles within the system, without a perspective or a struggle to move past it.
If my grandfather or father lived in a different world, this can at most create expectations, but cannot be really generating a feeling of prosecution, because the current one is the only life I have actually lived and I know.
The problem is that even if your grandfather isn’t around to tell you about it, the evidence of his accomplishments outlive him. You don’t need to embody someone’s personal lives to understand that your grandfather lived an upper middle class working at a factory, and you can barely afford to make rent. That your father married his highschool sweetheart and started a family in his twenties, and you’re thirty and can barely afford groceries for yourself.
the political discourse often flattens this issue and makes it almost two-dimensional. If you are a white man, you are privileged, period. Fact is, there are tons of white man that are absolutely not privileged, and are also victim of an unequal and oppressive society.
Right…but can you claim in an academically honest way that a poor white man has historically been offered more opportunities to succeed than a poor black man? That poor white men and poor black men have the same opportunities to lift themselves out of their class structure?
These people are substantially alienated because their voice is simply not represented anywhere.
Idk, I would say the majority of the United States Congress has been very open to mens rights advocacy. This discourse revolves around people like Tate who have created space specifically for men to air their grievances.
Some say they are driven there because they have no progressive place to go. I just think they don’t want anything to do with progressive spaces, because progressive spaces do not put them on a pedestal. They are included vicariously, the progressive ideology of supporting young people doesn’t preclude young men. It just isn’t solely focused on them.
was true already decades (centuries) ago, and that’s why lots of feminist battles were linked to socialism and leftist ideologies.
I agree, but until recently there has always been a social understanding that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. So long as the upper class threw enough scraps down from the table, the pet class would support the hierarchy.
This is nothing new, really, and forcing to read the current issues only from the racial perspective or only from the gender perspective (etc.) makes it much harder to build solidarity between groups who are instead left to fight battles within the system, without a perspective or a struggle to move past it.
That is my problem with specifically focusing on mens rights, it’s just another division in class solidarity.
You don’t need to embody someone’s personal lives to understand that your grandfather lived an upper middle class working at a factory, and you can barely afford to make rent. That your father married his highschool sweetheart and started a family in his twenties, and you’re thirty and can barely afford groceries for yourself.
Sure, and that’s why I spoke about expectations. But a feeling of being prosecuted requires something else, in my opinion. Everyone in the situation you describe would realize that the problems are common, and not “mine” because male. What I thought you were referring to was the dissonance between expecting a privileged life and having a regular one, such as not being handed over things on a silver platter and having to simply “work” for them.
Right…but can you claim in an academically honest way that a poor white man has historically been offered more opportunities to succeed than a poor black man? That poor white men and poor black men have the same opportunities to lift themselves out of their class structure?
Sure, but that doesn’t help anybody, because we don’t live in statistics and we don’t live historically. If I am a struggling person, telling me that historically the category that I happened to belong to was privileged hence I am privileged feels like adding insult to injury. In fact, the moment arguments such as “sorry, it has been centuries the turn for [CATEGORY] now it’s the turn of [OTHER CATEGORY]” are thrown around is the moment those categories will see themselves as adversaries for vital space, and not on the same side fighting against an oppressor, which is exactly what I think happens in many instances today. And make no mistake, I think this is by no means a coincidence, this is absolutely functional as such struggle is less threatening to who detains power.
Idk, I would say the majority of the United States Congress has been very open to mens rights advocacy. This discourse revolves around people like Tate who have created space specifically for men to air their grievances.
I am talking about mainstream and daily life. And it’s not even about men’s right, it’s about struggle of people independently from the individual social group(s) they belong to, but more focused on class (for example). The “men’s right” movement is a reactionary movement that sees in feminism and other movements a threat, and to some extend, they are a threat. Intersectional feminism is not mainstream, it did not really breach the social norm or discourse. What did breach is the superficial/apolitical version of it that stays on the surface. This is what people see everyday in movies, TV series, on the workplace, on social media etc. This is what I mean by not having representation, not having a voice.
They are included vicariously, the progressive ideology of supporting young people doesn’t preclude young men. It just isn’t solely focused on them.
I can’t talk about what’s going on in US, but what reaches on the other side of the ocean, doesn’t include men at all. In fact, the main cultural result of progressive movements that I can observe from here is “woke”-ism, which I lack a better term to define, which is basically apolitical and fully focused on individual elements within the status quo, but lacks a proper political frame and analysis and therefore is very narrow in scope (women, race and LGBT).
so long as the upper class threw enough scraps down from the table, the pet class would support the hierarchy.
I mean, the biggest political struggles happened almost 50 years ago. I really don’t see what you are referring to, nor I do see right now in any form a coherent political movement who focuses on the class struggle as main objective. Am I missing something, maybe?
That is my problem with specifically focusing on mens rights, it’s just another division in class solidarity.
I addressed this point earlier, but I will repeat it just to elaborate. I don’t care about men’s rights. I care about a class analysis and a political movement that uses it, which is able to channel all the struggles from oppressed people, starting from women and other minorities, without alienating some of them due to irrelevant differences.
This is in essence my problem: the current mainstream “progressive” discourse has been so neutered politically that has become individualist and as such doesn’t capture the whole dynamic of class oppression.
To make a concrete example, in tech the debate about women and other minorities is extremely hot and it’s absolutely common to be the sole focus of diversity initiatives etc. Obviously this is posturing from the companies’ perspective, but even the progressive people often fail to talk about other issues such as ageism (and many other things, ofc), which is an even bigger discriminatory factor in tech. It’s not that one is more important of the other (or viceversa), it’s that they are both results of the same exploitative dynamic and focusing on one of them without capturing the higher level problem becomes neutered and alienates people.
Sure, and that’s why I spoke about expectations. But a feeling of being prosecuted requires something else, in my opinion. Everyone in the situation you describe would realize that the problems are common, and not “mine” because male.
I am not that confident this is true. I don’t expect that level of self awareness in the majority of young people.
because we don’t live in statistics and we don’t live historically. If I am a struggling person, telling me that historically the category that I happened to belong to was privileged hence I am privileged
First I do think we live in statistics, some of us may be unaware of this but it affects nus either way. Secondly, I think the internal contradiction is that a poor white person is likely to believe they should be more privileged based on their race, but are not because of progressive policy. The same way poor people protect the wealthy from taxation.
Finally we are discussing social class, not how individuals react to the idea of social class. I didn’t say all white people were privileged people, I said white people belong to a privileged class. It’s the same as saying San Fransisco is a rich city, instead of saying everyone in San Francisco is rich. If you are not a rich person in San Francisco, and I said the problem is inherent in the wealth of San Francisco, would you take it personally?
am talking about mainstream and daily life. And it’s not even about men’s right, it’s about struggle of people independently from the individual social group(s) they belong to, but more focused on class (for example). The “men’s right” movement is a reactionary movement that sees in feminism and other movements a threat, and to some extend, they are a threat. Intersectional feminism is not mainstream, it did not really breach the social norm or discourse. What did breach is the superficial/apolitical version of it that stays on the surface. This is what people see everyday in movies, TV series, on the workplace, on social media etc. This is what I mean by not having representation, not having a voice.
Right, but who does have that kind of representation or voice if not white men? Even in your example you highlighted how intersectional feminism never got its time in the mainstream.
doesn’t include men at all. In fact, the main cultural result of progressive movements
I mean, I think that’s fairly natural if there really isn’t much room for men to progress in a society. If you’re already at the top, where else is there to make progress other than supporting allies who haven’t made it yet?
First I do think we live in statistics, some of us may be unaware of this but it affects nus either way.
What I mean is that if I am a white unemployed, poor, knowing that 90% of rich people are white and male doesn’t make me any richer or privileged.
a poor white person is likely to believe they should be more privileged based on their race
based on what you think so?
Finally we are discussing social class, not how individuals react to the idea of social class. I didn’t say all white people were privileged people, I said white people belong to a privileged class. It’s the same as saying San Fransisco is a rich city, instead of saying everyone in San Francisco is rich. If you are not a rich person in San Francisco, and I said the problem is inherent in the wealth of San Francisco, would you take it personally?
But this is the problem. Class is not tied with demography in itself, class has to do with relationship to wealth. White people don’t belong to a privileged class, the privileged class is mostly composed by white people. They are not the same thing.
I would take it personally if you defined policy that worked on the assumption that “San Francisco” is rich, if I am one of the thousands of homeless people, indeed.
Right, but who does have that kind of representation or voice if not white men? Even in your example you highlighted how intersectional feminism never got its time in the mainstream.
Women and other minorities today have that representation. Mainstream discourse involves a lot these topics. Unfortunately not intersectional feminism, because that’s way too threatening.
I mean, I think that’s fairly natural if there really isn’t much room for men to progress in a society. If you’re already at the top
That’s the thing, being a man doesn’t make you on top. Thinking this way, with airtight categories is indicative of the kind of idea that as long as “a proportionate amount of women” are going to be “on top” (i.e., in position of power), we are fine. We are not. This always leave a significant amount of people oppressed. That’s why I think feminism should be (and partly is!) a transformative movement, and why I think it’s a problem that it has been swallowed by the status quo. This, to me, is the wrong battle.
If someone told me that since I am man I am “on top”, and therefore I should just be an ally, I would feel alienated, because this fails completely to capture the mechanism of the system that oppresses both me and women.
What I mean is that if I am a white unemployed, poor, knowing that 90% of rich people are white and male doesn’t make me any richer or privileged.
Would that person be claiming that young white men are the most disadvantaged class?
Remember, I didn’t claim that all white people were privileged. Only that if you were to for some reason break class down to race and gender, young white men would not more discriminated against than anyone else.
based on what you think so?
I mean we are talking about people who are claiming that young white males are being ignored or specifically discriminated against. So they’re already drawing conclusions based on race. In America a common trope is to blame minorities for economic disparity. Going back prior to the civil war, where poor white farmers blamed the slaves for ruining the labor market.
Class is not tied with demography in itself, class has to do with relationship to wealth. White people don’t belong to a privileged class, the privileged class is mostly composed by white people. They are not the same thing.
Again, the original context was about a group who already specified their demography. The premise was that young white men were specifically disadvantaged.
My rebuttal was that specifying young white men, instead of just young people was problematic. But if we were to examine this demographic as a class, it would be hard to say they were disadvantaged. I did not define the structure of class in this argument, the person I was originally responding to did.
Women and other minorities today have that representation.
And white men do not?
That’s the thing, being a man doesn’t make you on top. Thinking this way, with airtight categories is indicative of the kind of idea that as long as “a proportionate amount of women” are going to be “on top” (i.e.,
When I said the top, I meant in policy. If we are talking about political equality, there are not a lot of reasons for men to justifiably advance their own rights.
If someone told me that since I am man I am “on top”, and therefore I should just be an ally, I would feel alienated, because this fails completely to capture the mechanism of the system that oppresses both me and women.
And if they told you they were progressive about mens rights?
Would that person be claiming that young white men are the most disadvantaged class?
I don’t think so, and I don’t see why it’s relevant. Young white men are not a class, also, and I don’t see why they should think in those terms. The fact is, if you are told that you are on top due to the population you belong to, but you effectively are not, you are alienated by that movement. I think it’s fairly straightforward, no? A movement that considers “young white men” a class (a privileged one), is alienating because it fails to capture the reality of class structure.
Only that if you were to for some reason break class down to race and gender, young white men would not more discriminated against than anyone else.
And I agree with this.
I mean we are talking about people who are claiming that young white males are being ignored or specifically discriminated against. So they’re already drawing conclusions based on race. In America a common trope is to blame minorities for economic disparity. Going back prior to the civil war, where poor white farmers blamed the slaves for ruining the labor market.
Yeah but we are not talking about the people of this article specifically, are we? I am talking about generally poor men. Why these people should think that they should be more privileged based on race? I think that the majority of people would simply want to have more, exactly like everyone else. The idea that people should deserve more based on their race seems closer to white suprematism which is a minoritarian ideology. Also this is very unlikely in countries that don’t have the same racial divide as the US.
The premise was that young white men were specifically disadvantaged.
And this - to some extent - is also my argument. Specifically, they are because their oppression is not acknowledged nor part of the agenda for the progressive movements. They are alienated as oppressed and they are not member of the upper class by virtue of their population, hence they are as oppressed as others, without anybody representing their problems. So they are specifically disadvantaged from this perspective as there is not even a movement that they can support in which they recognize themselves. Some of them, turn to reactionary ideologies/people (like the ones in this article) that capture their problems.
And white men do not?
Not in the same way. Again, the mainstream cultural discourse lost a lot of the political connotation and flattened purely on gender/racial issues, so no, white oppressed men don’t have a political outlet that capture their struggle in the same way, right now. This to me explains the growth of the Jordan Peterson & co., which act as representation for those people’s issues, and are the exact reflection of the progressive movement who -failing to put class struggle at the center, and focusing on individual populations- pushes the idea that oppressed populations are actually in competition with each other for vital space (sorry, nothing to do for white men, you are already on top, now we need to support [POPULATION]).
When I said the top, I meant in policy.
Well this in my opinion is an extremely limited perspective, because oppression and inequality is not solved by policy.
And if they told you they were progressive about mens rights?
I would answer the same I answered before, I don’t care about mens right per se. I generally strongly oppose this idea that class should be divided in the different population, each with its own set of problems and demands. This to me seems like a perfect way to shatter class unity which becomes purely based on mutual support (being an ally) rather than on common interests and reciprocal recognition as members of the same class and victim of the same dynamics.
I had a teacher point this out to me too by just pointing out the percentage of girls in the class. They call them the lost boy generation because good intentions to get women into paths like STEM resulted in forgetting about investing in the boys.
But also some of us boys need lots of damaging things its not a one size fits all. Not traumatizing stuff but damage is needed for boys. Boys need to be pushed and discipline and we need to break bones and fight and get dirty to become an adult who can go on to teach a new generation how to do those things safely and responsible.
On top of all that, these days most rejection of men happens before there is even any opportunity for the men say anything. With dating apps putting so much emphasis on looks (a very small minority of users of these apps do anything but look at the first photo before swiping left or right), and surveys finding that women consider over 80% of men less attractive than ‘medium’ (i e. a 3 or lower on a 7 point scale), mean that tons of men reach that conclusion in the final panel simply from getting no traction with women at all, making whether they’re a Tate acolyte or whatever not even relevant.
Backwards thinking.
Andrew Tate isn’t creating these young men out of well adjusted people.
Young men today face a mountain of issues with zero sympathy from the people or institutions around them. And grifters prey on these men.
Having grown up in the “teach boys not to rape” era of progrssive rhetoric, it’s actually insane to see all these people just insist being in a guy’s world is all sunshine and rainbows and all these men are just awful people falling of their own accord.
Young men get told some pretty damaging things growing up, even from progressive people.
Everyone has problems, lots of people are coming of age all kinds of fucked up, and we can’t fix this by implying it’s all their own doing.
You mean there is more to this than a black and white interpretation of the issues??
Young men in many areas are ridiculously hopeless with despair - its not really something that is talked about.
With uncontrolled climate change slowly destroying the world as we know it, can you blame them for being hopeless with despair?
You just revealed a lot more than I think you realize.
Climate change isn’t part of the discussion.
No one is trying to blame anyone in this context.
We’re talking about cultural issues that are tied in with the mental and emotional growth of people.
So very much hate and malicious intent is created by unstable people brought up to sincerely believe that what they do and believe is right. Often this is due to some religious indoctrination, though other reasons exist. Few are those who are truly evil at their core. In another group we have the confused and the uncertain trying to just exist in a world that is often cruel and unfair. As they grow and in moments of extreme vulnerability they reach out for answers.
As an online community one of the healthiest activities we can do is talk about these things. Express that shit is hard and offer encouragement and positive, safe places away from conmen and manipulators, as much as we are able. To do that we need to focus where we can.
Idk, I don’t feel like young women are really offered any kind of safety net or support system that isn’t being offered to boys.
This is the thing, I constantly hear how awful young men are being treated. I don’t ever really hear any specific reasoning that can’t be explained by other means other than sexism against men.
Imo this is one of the first generations of young men, especially young white men, that weren’t born on third base. The men’s right movement is a reactionary movement that’s just upset about being placed on an equal footing, and then falling to achieve the same results of previous generations of young white men.
That feeling of slowly rolling a stone up a hill all day as others unbound by such heavy burdens briskly walk by is the same feeling poc and women have experienced in this country since it’s inception. You aren’t being treated worse than everyone else, it’s just that equality feels like prosecution to those who have traditionally lived charmed lives. Welcome to the jungle, I hope you learn to enjoy your stay. I think the affectations of the moneyed class have ended, they have decided they don’t have to keep up the charade. We’re all the same to them now, and will all be exploited as such.
Ignoring the issues people face becuase they come from what you determine to be a “privileged” class is just another form of bigotry.
Young men don’t stand to benifit from the same patriarchal systems we do, nor do we stand to benifit from the patriarchal systems our fathers did. And even if it did, one privileged doesn’t nullify the issues faced by other inequalities such as race, wealth, class, ability.
The issues they face are real reguardless of what privilege they have or are assumed to have.
Equality should be about giving every individual a fair chance at life regardless of who they are or what they came from. Not some team sport where “one side” must be crushed under to goosestep of self proclaimed progress seekers.
Simply stating that the problems are not intrinsic to being male is not ignoring the problem.
Who is we? What I’m saying is that young males are not being hurt anymore than any other demographic, they just aren’t culturally inoculated to it, and so they think they’re worse off.
I never claimed it did?
Like? As I said, I keep hearing these blanket statements attesting to unique issues, but no one claims what they are or how they occur.
Do you think that we are living in some sort of post scarcity society? If there is an elevated class, its only means of elevation is to stand on the heads of it’s "equal"counterparts.
Lol, and those who stood on our heads suddenly proclaimed themselves victims. How do you think they stand elevated if not by crushing down the competition?
It’s only goose-stepping when the boot is on your face, when its someone’s else’s face they’re told to turn the other cheek.
Nobody is arguing for “elevation”, nobody in their right state of mind anyway, and I’m not asking anyone to turn their cheek to anyone wrong doings done to them. However, when it’s men who feel wronged you ask them to turn the other cheek. Man up. Deal with it.
The fact of the matter is it’s exactly this dogmatic rejecting of men that pushes them towards people like Andrew Tate. If the progressive zeitgeist refuses to listen to someone, they will follow anyone else who will. We shouldn’t tolerate the intolerant, but if we truly seek to defeat it we must understand it and treat the systemic issues that cause it to arise. It’s not the romantic ideal of the rebel taking down the empire in a victorious display of self-satisfaction, but it is the method that gets lasting results.
I’ve never stood on anyone’s heads, least of all yours. I’d appreciate it if you could at least treat the next generation with the same respect.
I think validating the claim that young men are specifically being treated worse than others in similar demographics is a tacit validation of allowing them to maintain their hierarchy.
I can’t control how people feel? If someone feels wronged, but can’t explain how or why, am I supposed to genuflect in agreement? If two people are struck in the face, and only one of them cries, should I ignore the stoic? We should be improving the lives of all young people, not just the ones who shout about it the most.
I’m not rejecting that young men face problems, I’m just claiming they don’t face any problems more dire than anyone elses problem in the same demographics.
You just interpret that as rejection because you don’t empathize with the others.
And we do that by being more concerned about the problems of young men than others?
What do they want, what are you willing to give them? According to the men’s right movement, their problem is that women are too free to turn down their advanced, women are too educated, no one wants to be their trad wife, and that there’s just too much competition in the job place because of things like affirmative action.
If that’s their problem, I don’t care, and I don’t really feel like he needs to validate their opinion.
You are an individual…we are talking about socioeconomics. We are talking about the systemic abuse that’s affected every demographic in America besides white men since the inception of this country.
Do you think the golden era of American history that the men’s right wants to revert to was shared by everyone in the country? That black families were able to afford a spacious house and take care of a large family on one person’s income? No, that was only a possibility for certain demographics. White men were given free home loans from the government, black families were sent to the projects, and women weren’t even able to open bank accounts.
You aren’t worried about the next generation, you’re only worried about the next generation of young white men.
Progress isn’t a competition, there need not be losers. We can acknowledge two things being bad at the same time. As we type there are children being forced to mine toxic cobalt with no protection just so we can have these electronics to argue. How can we argue our lives are any bad compared to them? Might as well put off anyone’s progress until we finally beat out the modern salve trade. It’s a unproductive way of thinking.
Do you think a newborn “white male” as your oppressor too? Someone who has never had the chance to do anyone wrong? Must they really be subject to your scorn?
And what of the white men today? If they gain nothing from your progress, then why must they be concerned with it? After all you seem to think that white men as a class have the ability to crush others with their privilege. How could we expect these people to work in the interest of a movement that only seeks to take from them indiscriminately? And wouldn’t it be natural for them to simply follow the example that you have given them? Be wrathful, spiteful, hateful, boil down human beings to their perceived class, do anything to get a win for their own group. Hell just look at the news, abortion rights are being repealed in America. This is happening in real time, and I promise you neither of us are happy about it.
Socioeconomics can say whatever it wants about groups and demographics and “numbers this” or “numbers that”, that doesn’t change the fact that we are individuals in a world of many other individuals. Privilege, true and quantifiable privilege, is always relative and we should listen when people tell us about their problems, since it will encourage and empower them to do the same.
We can together to build a world that’s better for everyone, but that requires that we don’t waste our lives away trying to hold each other down out of a need for revenge. Every step we take for ourselves or our own perceived group is a step backwards, and it’ll be our children who will have to make up for that. Do you care for the next generation, and what you’ll leave them to deal with?
Then why do you insist that we divide class solidarity among gender? Why not advocate for improving life for all young people instead of insisting that men’s problems take priority?
Lol, what kind of rhetoric is that? Children in other countries work in cobalt mines, so it’s okay if American kids work at McDonald’s…
We are talking about equity in our own country, we are talking specifically about whether young men in the west are really experiencing more or worse problems than their counterparts.
Lol, we are talking about sociology, not an individuals psychology. I don’t scorn individuals for being a part of any class, but i do scorn individuals try and preserve the class hierarchy for their own benefit.
That’s the thing, when we protect the most disadvantaged class we help protect every other class perceived as better than. This is a foundational to ideologies like feminism. If you can’t charge a disadvantaged class with some accusation, then there is no fear for the classes perceived to be more valuable.
This is one of problems with labeling white men as the most disadvantaged class. If we spend all our effort protecting A class that doesn’t really need protection, then we are leaving people actually in danger out on a line.
Do you think white men today as a class have not benefited from generational wealth created by systemic racism? What do you think slavery was if not crushing others with privilege?
So now equality is stealing? Just because I don’t think that white men are the most disadvantaged people in our country, I’m now taking from them indiscriminately?
What is progressive to these young men, what else could they possibly want that other people have?
Yeah… Seems to be exactly what they are doing. You have heard of Andrew Tate, correct?
And your solution is to …validate the men’s right movement? You’re literally claiming that men are not privileged, yet they are able to pass abortion laws. Further more you are saying that they are doing this because we don’t baby them enough in progressive political spaces.
You do understand that we don’t make policies around individuals?
Relative to what…?
Oh yeah, I’m sure that encouraging the klansmen to air his grievances will surely benefit me, a man of color?
It’s problematic to me that you think equality euates to revenge. I’m not saying to be mean to young white men, or even judge them. My only claims is that we shouldn’t prioritize white men’s problems over other demographics. And to you that means I’m thirsty for revenge?
And how does that apply to your original claim?
I still find it hilarious that you haven’t answerd my original rebuttal. How exactly are young men any worse off than anyone else in a similar demographic?
I cannot speak for “that country”, assuming you mean the US, as I don’t live there. That said, I think people don’t have actual past lives as a reference. If my grandfather or father lived in a different world, this can at most create expectations, but cannot be really generating a feeling of prosecution, because the current one is the only life I have actually lived and I know.
Then there is another issue, which is that in reality there are a lot of factors that determine whether you are born “in third base”. Gender, historically, has been one of them, but it’s far from being a guarantee. However, the political discourse often flattens this issue and makes it almost two-dimensional. If you are a white man, you are privileged, period. Fact is, there are tons of white man that are absolutely not privileged, and are also victim of an unequal and oppressive society. These people are substantially alienated because their voice is simply not represented anywhere. My leftist interpretation is that some of the egalitarian discourse (feminism, LGBT rights etc.) has been to some extent swallowed by the status quo, and lost a lot of the revolutionary potential it had, becoming more focused on individual perception and rights, rather than on systemic issues that therefore could capture also the dynamics of a white man being also oppressed, even if from a different angle. In other words, if feminism is purely focused on battles of women as a group of individuals, and not as part of a system that oppresses them within a wider mechanism, then oppressed people that don’t strictly belong to that category have a much harder time to see in women a reflection of their own oppression.
Basically, a realization such as:
was true already decades (centuries) ago, and that’s why lots of feminist battles were linked to socialism and leftist ideologies. This is nothing new, really, and forcing to read the current issues only from the racial perspective or only from the gender perspective (etc.) makes it much harder to build solidarity between groups who are instead left to fight battles within the system, without a perspective or a struggle to move past it.
The problem is that even if your grandfather isn’t around to tell you about it, the evidence of his accomplishments outlive him. You don’t need to embody someone’s personal lives to understand that your grandfather lived an upper middle class working at a factory, and you can barely afford to make rent. That your father married his highschool sweetheart and started a family in his twenties, and you’re thirty and can barely afford groceries for yourself.
Right…but can you claim in an academically honest way that a poor white man has historically been offered more opportunities to succeed than a poor black man? That poor white men and poor black men have the same opportunities to lift themselves out of their class structure?
Idk, I would say the majority of the United States Congress has been very open to mens rights advocacy. This discourse revolves around people like Tate who have created space specifically for men to air their grievances.
Some say they are driven there because they have no progressive place to go. I just think they don’t want anything to do with progressive spaces, because progressive spaces do not put them on a pedestal. They are included vicariously, the progressive ideology of supporting young people doesn’t preclude young men. It just isn’t solely focused on them.
I agree, but until recently there has always been a social understanding that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. So long as the upper class threw enough scraps down from the table, the pet class would support the hierarchy.
That is my problem with specifically focusing on mens rights, it’s just another division in class solidarity.
Sure, and that’s why I spoke about expectations. But a feeling of being prosecuted requires something else, in my opinion. Everyone in the situation you describe would realize that the problems are common, and not “mine” because male. What I thought you were referring to was the dissonance between expecting a privileged life and having a regular one, such as not being handed over things on a silver platter and having to simply “work” for them.
Sure, but that doesn’t help anybody, because we don’t live in statistics and we don’t live historically. If I am a struggling person, telling me that historically the category that I happened to belong to was privileged hence I am privileged feels like adding insult to injury. In fact, the moment arguments such as “sorry, it has been centuries the turn for [CATEGORY] now it’s the turn of [OTHER CATEGORY]” are thrown around is the moment those categories will see themselves as adversaries for vital space, and not on the same side fighting against an oppressor, which is exactly what I think happens in many instances today. And make no mistake, I think this is by no means a coincidence, this is absolutely functional as such struggle is less threatening to who detains power.
I am talking about mainstream and daily life. And it’s not even about men’s right, it’s about struggle of people independently from the individual social group(s) they belong to, but more focused on class (for example). The “men’s right” movement is a reactionary movement that sees in feminism and other movements a threat, and to some extend, they are a threat. Intersectional feminism is not mainstream, it did not really breach the social norm or discourse. What did breach is the superficial/apolitical version of it that stays on the surface. This is what people see everyday in movies, TV series, on the workplace, on social media etc. This is what I mean by not having representation, not having a voice.
I can’t talk about what’s going on in US, but what reaches on the other side of the ocean, doesn’t include men at all. In fact, the main cultural result of progressive movements that I can observe from here is “woke”-ism, which I lack a better term to define, which is basically apolitical and fully focused on individual elements within the status quo, but lacks a proper political frame and analysis and therefore is very narrow in scope (women, race and LGBT).
I mean, the biggest political struggles happened almost 50 years ago. I really don’t see what you are referring to, nor I do see right now in any form a coherent political movement who focuses on the class struggle as main objective. Am I missing something, maybe?
I addressed this point earlier, but I will repeat it just to elaborate. I don’t care about men’s rights. I care about a class analysis and a political movement that uses it, which is able to channel all the struggles from oppressed people, starting from women and other minorities, without alienating some of them due to irrelevant differences. This is in essence my problem: the current mainstream “progressive” discourse has been so neutered politically that has become individualist and as such doesn’t capture the whole dynamic of class oppression. To make a concrete example, in tech the debate about women and other minorities is extremely hot and it’s absolutely common to be the sole focus of diversity initiatives etc. Obviously this is posturing from the companies’ perspective, but even the progressive people often fail to talk about other issues such as ageism (and many other things, ofc), which is an even bigger discriminatory factor in tech. It’s not that one is more important of the other (or viceversa), it’s that they are both results of the same exploitative dynamic and focusing on one of them without capturing the higher level problem becomes neutered and alienates people.
I am not that confident this is true. I don’t expect that level of self awareness in the majority of young people.
First I do think we live in statistics, some of us may be unaware of this but it affects nus either way. Secondly, I think the internal contradiction is that a poor white person is likely to believe they should be more privileged based on their race, but are not because of progressive policy. The same way poor people protect the wealthy from taxation.
Finally we are discussing social class, not how individuals react to the idea of social class. I didn’t say all white people were privileged people, I said white people belong to a privileged class. It’s the same as saying San Fransisco is a rich city, instead of saying everyone in San Francisco is rich. If you are not a rich person in San Francisco, and I said the problem is inherent in the wealth of San Francisco, would you take it personally?
Right, but who does have that kind of representation or voice if not white men? Even in your example you highlighted how intersectional feminism never got its time in the mainstream.
I mean, I think that’s fairly natural if there really isn’t much room for men to progress in a society. If you’re already at the top, where else is there to make progress other than supporting allies who haven’t made it yet?
What I mean is that if I am a white unemployed, poor, knowing that 90% of rich people are white and male doesn’t make me any richer or privileged.
based on what you think so?
But this is the problem. Class is not tied with demography in itself, class has to do with relationship to wealth. White people don’t belong to a privileged class, the privileged class is mostly composed by white people. They are not the same thing. I would take it personally if you defined policy that worked on the assumption that “San Francisco” is rich, if I am one of the thousands of homeless people, indeed.
Women and other minorities today have that representation. Mainstream discourse involves a lot these topics. Unfortunately not intersectional feminism, because that’s way too threatening.
That’s the thing, being a man doesn’t make you on top. Thinking this way, with airtight categories is indicative of the kind of idea that as long as “a proportionate amount of women” are going to be “on top” (i.e., in position of power), we are fine. We are not. This always leave a significant amount of people oppressed. That’s why I think feminism should be (and partly is!) a transformative movement, and why I think it’s a problem that it has been swallowed by the status quo. This, to me, is the wrong battle. If someone told me that since I am man I am “on top”, and therefore I should just be an ally, I would feel alienated, because this fails completely to capture the mechanism of the system that oppresses both me and women.
Would that person be claiming that young white men are the most disadvantaged class?
Remember, I didn’t claim that all white people were privileged. Only that if you were to for some reason break class down to race and gender, young white men would not more discriminated against than anyone else.
I mean we are talking about people who are claiming that young white males are being ignored or specifically discriminated against. So they’re already drawing conclusions based on race. In America a common trope is to blame minorities for economic disparity. Going back prior to the civil war, where poor white farmers blamed the slaves for ruining the labor market.
Again, the original context was about a group who already specified their demography. The premise was that young white men were specifically disadvantaged.
My rebuttal was that specifying young white men, instead of just young people was problematic. But if we were to examine this demographic as a class, it would be hard to say they were disadvantaged. I did not define the structure of class in this argument, the person I was originally responding to did.
And white men do not?
When I said the top, I meant in policy. If we are talking about political equality, there are not a lot of reasons for men to justifiably advance their own rights.
And if they told you they were progressive about mens rights?
I don’t think so, and I don’t see why it’s relevant. Young white men are not a class, also, and I don’t see why they should think in those terms. The fact is, if you are told that you are on top due to the population you belong to, but you effectively are not, you are alienated by that movement. I think it’s fairly straightforward, no? A movement that considers “young white men” a class (a privileged one), is alienating because it fails to capture the reality of class structure.
And I agree with this.
Yeah but we are not talking about the people of this article specifically, are we? I am talking about generally poor men. Why these people should think that they should be more privileged based on race? I think that the majority of people would simply want to have more, exactly like everyone else. The idea that people should deserve more based on their race seems closer to white suprematism which is a minoritarian ideology. Also this is very unlikely in countries that don’t have the same racial divide as the US.
And this - to some extent - is also my argument. Specifically, they are because their oppression is not acknowledged nor part of the agenda for the progressive movements. They are alienated as oppressed and they are not member of the upper class by virtue of their population, hence they are as oppressed as others, without anybody representing their problems. So they are specifically disadvantaged from this perspective as there is not even a movement that they can support in which they recognize themselves. Some of them, turn to reactionary ideologies/people (like the ones in this article) that capture their problems.
Not in the same way. Again, the mainstream cultural discourse lost a lot of the political connotation and flattened purely on gender/racial issues, so no, white oppressed men don’t have a political outlet that capture their struggle in the same way, right now. This to me explains the growth of the Jordan Peterson & co., which act as representation for those people’s issues, and are the exact reflection of the progressive movement who -failing to put class struggle at the center, and focusing on individual populations- pushes the idea that oppressed populations are actually in competition with each other for vital space (sorry, nothing to do for white men, you are already on top, now we need to support [POPULATION]).
Well this in my opinion is an extremely limited perspective, because oppression and inequality is not solved by policy.
I would answer the same I answered before, I don’t care about mens right per se. I generally strongly oppose this idea that class should be divided in the different population, each with its own set of problems and demands. This to me seems like a perfect way to shatter class unity which becomes purely based on mutual support (being an ally) rather than on common interests and reciprocal recognition as members of the same class and victim of the same dynamics.
I had a teacher point this out to me too by just pointing out the percentage of girls in the class. They call them the lost boy generation because good intentions to get women into paths like STEM resulted in forgetting about investing in the boys.
But also some of us boys need lots of damaging things its not a one size fits all. Not traumatizing stuff but damage is needed for boys. Boys need to be pushed and discipline and we need to break bones and fight and get dirty to become an adult who can go on to teach a new generation how to do those things safely and responsible.
deleted by creator
On top of all that, these days most rejection of men happens before there is even any opportunity for the men say anything. With dating apps putting so much emphasis on looks (a very small minority of users of these apps do anything but look at the first photo before swiping left or right), and surveys finding that women consider over 80% of men less attractive than ‘medium’ (i e. a 3 or lower on a 7 point scale), mean that tons of men reach that conclusion in the final panel simply from getting no traction with women at all, making whether they’re a Tate acolyte or whatever not even relevant.