this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2023
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I just don't have time to do a proper response right now. I think pretty much everything you've said is incredibly helpful and I can only speak for myself here, but I hope you stick around.
Except one thing. Blaming it all on the patriarchy. I'm pretty sure that it's not your intent, but I think this is not a good thing to do, especially when speaking to a vulnerable man. I'm sure you have your definition of what the patriarchy is and that it clarifies why what you said is perfectly reasonable, but from the perspective of a vulnerable man hearing "patriarchy" this and "toxic masculinity" that (which to your credit, you didn't say the latter), rationally or not leads many to start seeing masculinity itself as problematic. Which for vulnerable men, especially those with anxiety issues leads to self loathing and a lot worse problems down the road.
Frankly, I think, when trying to help vulnerable men, you should make sure to keep feminist ideology out of it. Otherwise you risk making things worse, not in a big hit, but in a death of a thousand cuts kind of way.
Does that make sense?
If you live in an oligarchy, does that make you an oligarch? Are you responsible for what the oligarchs do? If not, then why does the same not apply to patriarchy?
Contrary to your perspective here, I think it is useful to examine the social context, including how gender is systemically wielded to reinforce power structures that were designed to support the lifestyles of a select few. Living in a patriarchal society doesn't mean you inherently benefit simply by being a man. It's more about putting you into a box so you behave as expected and perform the roles pushed onto you. Having narrow definitions of masculinity or femininity and strictly defined gender roles (no crossing over!) are a big part of building and maintaining those boxes for everyone.
This post above particularly emphasized the value of breaking out of those expectations:
Exactly. It's not men in general that have been in power, but a select few men and women. It is then incorrect to use the terms patriarchy and patriarchal systems (as commonly understood) to describe our society. Because there are plenty of men at the bottom too, even more so.
that "and women" part does not get said often enough
Most of these institutions were created by monarchies to keep the monarchies in power. The last monarch of any real note was a woman, and had decades of ruling time under her belt. This, however, still gets blamed on "patriarchy" and men as a whole, as if the men being subjugated were responsible for their own subjugation.
It's an extension of the hyperagency society forces on to men, and incredibly sexist to keep using the term "patriarchy" or especially to throw it in a victim's face, it's essentially victim blaming at that point. "Oh it was men who caused the problems so any problems you, as an individual man, face are your own fault!"
This is not contrary to my perspective. I completely agree with this. I disagree with naming the cause of this problem "patriarchy". I consider this to be engaging in victim blaming.
Agreed.
It's feminist terminology meant to blame men for any and every problem, including problems men bring up. Even if they weasel out of it technically not meaning "all men are at fault and to blame", that is very much how it is used in practice, and certainly how this commenter used it to invalidate the emotions of OP
This is a great definition. It shows how these hierarchical systems are set up to support just a few. Everyone else gets just enough to survive but only by sacrificing a portion of their selves. They are suppose to feel lucky since they are not at the bottom.
except we don't live in a patriarchal society
men do not benefit just from being men, they have to claw and compete and struggle to get to those positions of power, and usually once they they stop other men from getting in
It's the implication that this is a male issue, and that females would and do behave at all in any way better when in those same positions that we take issue with.
They don't, they wouldn't have, it's insanely sexist to believe otherwise, and insisting on using terms like "patriarchy" when we definitely don't live in one in western society and haven't for at least a century is incredibly problematic, especially when speaking to a victim of geocentrism and using it to dismiss his valid feelings.
This may seems like a strange source by I really enjoyed the Copenhagen Pride definition of feminism
This IS progress. Much better than the previous but simpler definition that went like "Feminism is a movement that fights for gender equality for women". Which is a bit of a oxymoron if you ask me.
The next step is to recognize that cultural norms that harms people on the basis of gendered expectations isn't uniquely or even primarily caused by an elite few, but is a systemic wide cultural problem for which both men and women are responsible. Using "patriarchy" as the term to refer to this problem is a best misleading, causes unnecessary division and leads to a certain myopia when looking at how to address the problem.
The step after that is that it is obviously absurd to name a gender equality movement after only one of the genders. Again this alienates certain groups of people and prevents them from contributing to the conversation on an equal footing.
But in practice, that's not what's going to happen. There's not going to be a flipped switch and everyone agrees to stop using the word patriarchy to refer to the ills of society or to rename feminism to something else. Instead, little by little, the more sensible people recognize these issues and individually choose to no longer use the patriarchy and feminist terminologies. Until the only the only people left still willing to call themselves feminists will be the most radical of misandrists.
What other words are there to switch to? It is hard to argue that we should use different terms if those don't exist yet.
This might give you a case of déjà-vue, but "harmful gender expectations" is a pretty good alternative. It doesn't cover all the reasons why someone might want to use the term patriarchy, but it covers a large portion of them, in particular it does cover the use of it in this thread that set off all this discussion.
And I think using clearer more precise terms depending on circumstances would be greatly beneficial. The terms patriarchy seems easily misunderstood and misused and I've seen many people go so far as to believe that the term is intentionally misused or intentionally misunderstood.
On a somewhat related topic, what do you think of male privilege. Are men a privileged class?
There was a guy in this thread that talked about how acknowledging his male privilege literally saved his life (I'm exaggerating). But he also had the misfortune of using the word "Toxic" followed by the word "Masculinity" without any irony and therefore suffered the wrath of our merciless mod.
I spent 30 minutes preparing a reply before I realized there was nothing left to reply to, I ended up sending it to him in a dm. But you seem to have a bit more advanced understanding of these topics so I'm curious what you think of this one.
Patriarchy just means "society", but sneaks in blaming men for any problems caused by it
Egalitarian is a word that means equality between all peoples, and that existed before feminism as a word, to give you an idea of how far back their sexist bias goes
"Toxic Masculinity" really is a victim blaming way to say "gender expectations placed on men by society, which are harmful to others but maybe sometimes we'll admit are harmful to the man subject to the abuse, but who gives a fuck about that guy he hasn't solved his own problems and instead made them known to others, how can we make him shut up?"
And for that last one we actually prefer the terminology feminism used before they realized it applied to men as well: "sexist gender roles and expectations"
This definition of feminism is what they want you to think. If you actually read the ideologies behind OG feminists, what feminism means is far from just equality between men and women. It's just a misandrist movement that really stands for female superiority. The concepts they came up with such as patriarchy theory and male privilege really comes from blaming societies gender problems on men. Read Elizabeth Stato, Kate Millett, Andrea Dworkin, and idk this subs opinion on Janice Fiamengo but if you don't wanna do the grueling research, she can break it down for you. This will tell you everything you need to know about real feminism, not the brainwashed crap that hides behind a progressive mask that's out there.
Good comment!
There will be a range of opinions, I guess. Mine is that I like her and many of the points she makes, but she leans a bit too much into traditionalism.