#notallmen- cause while women talk about violence, make sure no mens feelings are hurt 👀

[Soph0571]

I’m not here to mansplain the experiences of women. My point is that this commentary was responded to by men insisting that they not be tarred with the same brush. While women talked about their experiences of rape, sexual assault and daily street harassment, the only response men could come up with was to wave their little victim arms for fear that they be thought of badly. Social media even came up with #notallmen, just to make sure no boy feelings were hurt.

And yes – even here I have to do it – not all men responded this way. Not even most of them. There you go, diddums.

Yet the fact that even a minority of men insisted that an exception be made in the normal social contract illuminates the problem. It’s about territory. While women spoke about their experiences and fears, (some) men felt they had the right to barge in and try to dominate the terms of that conversation; many with the express aim of trying to de-genderise the issue: it’s about crime, not the behaviour of (some) men. Some of the (some) men even tried a self-defeating equivalence by pointing out that men suffer more from violent crime. From other men.

[link:https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/sean-moncrieff-of-course-most-men-are-not-rapists-why-does-this-need-to-be-said-1.4511921#.YFWl3LIj_T4.twitter
Emphasis mine

For (some) men, they need to hijack the conversation women and girls are having because for (some) men their fragile ego's can't take it when the conversation is not all about them, or about calling them out for their behaviours which (may) endanger women, they need to make it all about them. Misogyny can by about benign neglect of the danger and women face as much as it can be the cat caller or the rapist... but #notallmen mansplaining to women and girls that their lived experience must be wrong, because as (some) men they NEED to make it all about them...

[ms liberty]

1. K&R. n/t

[zentrum]

2. And it's not just about the street....

.....it's about salary disparity, about who does more housework, about not getting credit in science, about having to signal marriage via the term "Mrs." or "Ms"---does a man get a new designation? This means something profound actually. And the list goes on and on.....

[niyad]

3. KNR.

[BarbD]

4. I raised four daughters born in the 1960's.

Teaching them how to navigate in a man's world, I was determined to show them how to be independent. Each of them ended up with a marketable skill after high school. They also were good looking but I purposely never told them they were pretty. When people commented on how pretty they were, I simply said, "Thank you".

People called our household a hotbed of feminism.

[FailureToCommunicate]

5. Kicked and Recommended.

[ancianita]

10. haha

Either I'm seeing what you did there, or maybe I just see what you meant to do.

[FailureToCommunicate]

16. I doubt I'm clever enough to do whatever you thought I was doing. I was just remembering...

yesterday some DUer complaining that "we" use too many abbreviations here.

So I wrote out "KnR"

[ancianita]

17. Yup.

I guessed that, but just wanted to hear you say you'd read the same acronyms thread I did. Now that you have, I can chuckle in recognition and say you're adorable.

The thing is, the K&R stuff here is site based textspeak, and so the "full first reference" rule of acronyms doesn't apply, because acronyms are stand-ins for too-long proper names of organizations, agencies or projects. That's what Stuart G's complaint was about -- acronyms use, not textspeak.

So yeah, nt, K&R, WTF, FTW and TFW are just shortcuts of phrasings, right? So no full first reference needed.

Anyway, on the heels of that hot mess thread, I thought you were funny AF.

[FailureToCommunicate]

20. Whew. Now I'm just happy to be on the same page as one of the cool people here.

LOL'd at "AF"
I'm a preacher's kid and could tell you the flavors of many kinds of soaps, so I am grateful people here understand when I (rarely) need to abbreviate swear words instead of having to spell them out.

[Random Boomer]

6. #notallmen is so predictable

I've been a member of an online community for over a decade now, with a decided left-leaning membership. But every single time the women on the board started talking in depth about how we cope with the spectre of male violence or the constant barrage of sexual aggression from men, "some" men jumped into the discussion to make it all about their hurt feelings because they don't do these things. Or how hurtful it is that women in the street avoid them out of fear when they're "not that guy."

Every. Single. Time. So yeah, not all men change the conversation to be about them, but enough do it that we eventually just stopped having those conversations. Which was rather the point of the derailments by those men "who aren't that guy".

[flibbitygiblets]

7. #notallmen is the equivalent of #alllivesmatter

Maybe that is a good retort next time this idiotic response comes up. “Do you also think we should say ‘all lives matter’? Why not? Oh, because it discounts the original message entirely and simply changes the subject? Huh!”

[NH Ethylene]

8. In the defense of men by a woman - if it's allowed in this group

Nobody likes to be lumped into a group stereotype. Nobody.

It's irritating when it happens to me: all women are __________ , old people are so ___________ , white folks are _____________ , and it goes on and on. And I would really be upset if I was lumped in with rapists!

As a woman who has experienced many sexual assaults in my youth (most of them minor) while traveling the country alone, I feel I can say that most men do not behave this way. The ones who do are certain types, those who exude 'toxic masculinity', those who live in a subculture that deems it acceptable, those who were raised to look down on women. Of course all bets are off when dealing with mental illness.

Yet I see writing like this that portrays all men as the enemy, either through violent action or for inadequate deference to an accusatory argument.

Men need to be allied with women in this cause. You can't build an alliance by treating all men like rapists and bullies.

[ancianita]

12. "All men as the enemy"

is not an example of a stereoTYPE, which generalizes about a definableTYPE, or category of men.

Not criticizing your post at all, just pointing out that when you see "writing like this that portrays all men as the enemy," it's not a fair leap of logic to imply that the meaning and uses of stereotype even play into "all men as the enemy" thinking.

One example is that all the men some women know is their only map of "all men," and so their map is valid and precise, even if incomplete and inaccurate. Only by moving out of their life context and into other contexts can they enlarge and then adjust their map. Until then, what they say would be true for any of us in their context, too. We accept that their map is precisely true, but not accurate because it's not complete. But it's not fair to criticize them for using a map that works for them.

The flaws of stereotypical thinking are similar mental map flaws in all kinds of mental biases. Men are just as guilty of them.

When men are allied with women in the cause of "not all," as allies, they both will recognize men who have problems and know it (that their maps are precise but not accurate), and men who have problems and don't know it (that their maps are precise but not accurate).

Over millennia women have learned all kinds of social/visual signals and cues about men that they've come to depend on for their very survival. When men really change, women will see the absence of those signals and cues -- not just a male or media presentation of their absence, but a whole and nothing-but-the-truth absence.

[NH Ethylene]

15. That is very thought provoking.

And a different way of looking at women's experiences for me. It's easy to assume that everyone has had interactions with a variety of people when that can be far from true.

[LizBeth]

13. When having a discussion about whites or Christians I feel no need to state not me.

I clearly see an issue with whites and Christians, and it is the problem I am centered on, not defending my white ass.

[Soph0571]

18. The issue for me is this

Not all men are a danger to women. Of course not. But we do not know which men are not a danger, so we have to behave like any man could be a danger. And that is not on us. It is on them. They have to police their brothers, sons, fathers, friends in what a feminist ally looks like. Some men do, most men don't. And until all men do, all men need be considered a danger, because some men are a deadly danger.

As an aside, I would rather treat all men as a threat, than get raped. Because some men will rape and kill us. How do you know NH which one that might be? I am not a man hater. Some of my closest friends are men, but they are tried and tested feminist allies. We see it all the time here on Du, and we are blessed for it. Good dudes trying to do the right thing, and without trying to put words in their mouths they understand we are not talking about them, because in heart and spirit they are not a danger and they are allies of our movement.

[NH Ethylene]

23. You make good points.

And practically speaking, I am the same way with all men who are strangers. And in my youth I found I had to be leery of men who I thought were safe, simply because I knew them.

I'm glad I posted. The responses have added more nuance to my thinking.

[cayugafalls]

9. It will take a massive realignment of our teaching curriculum to combat this disease.

There will be no progress until it is taught in schools in order to combat the indoctrination children get at home.

[ancianita]

14. Back when I taught "women's literature," we tackled this need for realignment at the classroom level

and the males in the class tried hard to "get it." But since most males don't identify the words and actions of other males as dangerous for them, they had to work extra hard to see how the females in class saw those same words and actions, and why they fought them or adapted to them. It was hard for both to see their gender training, but they learned.

Our tackling the gender training issues did some good, but I also learned that saying one "gets it" is one thing, and applying it to their lives is completely different. The males had no incentive to work toward "mere equality" with the females. They tended to say the problem is not one of their making and excepted themselves from "the work," until the females made them realize how much they suffered financially, emotionally and socially from their gendered privilege training.

And another experience helped. Once some of my students returned from college (around Thanksgiving), they told the high schoolers how well the work of that class served them later.

What you say is true about curricula realignment. I'd add that even if this is done, this work seems to have to be done anew with every generation, and every teacher should have to be formally teacher-trained in schools of education (in both content and methods) to enlarge their own capacities to do that work in their classrooms.

Schools are the last standing institutions of democracy, and when right wing forces want to privatize and defund public schools, we see the rise of gendered inequality. So fighting for funding all levels of public schooling, and funding the broadening of public school teacher training are good first steps.

[ybbor]

11. I had an Emily Litella moment with the title

I read “no tall men” and couldn’t figure what it was about.

That being said, having read the post I, once again, am ashamed of all the horrible things men do, especially white men.

Please know that I am trying to help as much as an old, white man can.

As the father to a teen daughter, there is so much that I am oblivious about the life a women lives. I have never once thought about safety at night, walking alone, entering a parking garage, etc. And to be honest, I felt shame when I began to understand.

So from this “average height”, white man, know that you are not alone and hopefully some day soon this will change. It does have to happen on the men’s side for it to happen though. Much like racism isn’t a minority issue, it’s a white issue. Misogyny is a male issue. We need to do better.

[Soph0571]

19. Please know we appreciate you

Firstly title - LOL

BUT we can not affect change without our brothers showing solidarity and doing what they need to do within their spheres of influence to challenge this insidious Patriarchy. We need all of the average height white guys to get soooooo vocal Your analogy is spot one. White supremacy patriarchy sucks! It is all part of the same bollocks.

[vercetti2021]

21. As a transitioning woman

I can give a fuck about their feelings. I've been called a soy boy and all that typical rw horseshit when I called out their toxic masculinity. My friend is like that. He is in that mgtow crowd and hes literally borderline incel almost. I hurt his feelings when I told him I was transitioning and he went into his typical misogynistic behavior over it. Ignoring it would still be me just changing the outside to match how I feel and am. He basically sacrificed our friendship over his dislike of women and I said fine. I'm not gonna remain sad to please you and I didn't care I hurt his fucking feelings

[Habitation]

22. The worst adjusted people in my family are women

because they were assaulted as children by men and raised by men & women who taught them to not talk about negative things like abuse.