Sexism and Men's Issues

It's a manipulative ad to assuage bitter men who don't want to engage in introspection that they don't need to improve themselves and that they are the real victims (so they should treat themselves to a watch).

The Gilette ad at least is a manipulative ad that tries to convince men that they can and should be better (and if part of that means buying a new razor...).

Edited by M84 on Jan 22nd 2019 at 4:30:48 AM

Disgusted, but not surprised

Context matters. When communicating, what you say is just as important as how you say it and when.

By framing this as a "response" to Gillette, rather than making it its own thing some time later or earlier, the message changes from "these are real problems that need to be solved" to "Those people at Gillette are wrong, here's how things really are."

I mean, it is so bizarre. Nothing in this video has anything to do with the Gillette video at all. It doesn't disprove anything, or add on. Had they chosen not to attach their message to Gillette's, I would be kinda okay with it. Now, however, all they've produced is a very poor counterargument and the MRA's are lapping it up.

Edited by Kayeka on Jan 21st 2019 at 9:55:37 PM

I agree it shouldn't be attached to Gilette's ad. But I have no problem with it otherwise. I guess I just commented because, like I said, you'd be surprised how rarely I see media admitting with any degree of seriousness that men are facing problems like this at all.

Everybody's all "Jerry's old and feeble" till they see him run down a skyscraper and hijack a helicopter mid-flight.

That's because they don't actually care. The only reason it was brought up in this case was to mock the Gilette ad and pander to MRA assholes.

You can't just judge it in a vacuum. You have to look at it in context. And the context makes this ad pretty shitty.

Edited by M84 on Jan 22nd 2019 at 4:43:09 AM

Disgusted, but not surprised

I did say I agree it shouldn't be attached to the other ad, because doing that makes it shitty.

But now I've got the problem that if the only people who I see bringing up problems like this are just trying to make money, then nobody seems to actually care, and that's bad. This is just me...saying that, I guess. Saying that it shits me.

Everybody's all "Jerry's old and feeble" till they see him run down a skyscraper and hijack a helicopter mid-flight.

The actual problem is that this ad is only bringing up these issues to tell men that they don't need to improve themselves because they are the real victims. And that's very bad.

Disgusted, but not surprised

Is pretty much and act of poison the well: by using this stuff to stick with feminist, the MRA make dificult to actually talk about this issue in the way it deserve.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Which is really the standard MRA MO. They love these statistics and keep bringing them up, but only in response to feminism or accusations of toxic masculinity, thus robbing it of all meaning.

Because they don't actually want to do anything about these problems. They just use them as a shield against criticism and introspection.

Edited by Kayeka on Jan 21st 2019 at 9:54:43 PM

Just seems like nobody wants to do anything. Absolutely nobody.

Everybody's all "Jerry's old and feeble" till they see him run down a skyscraper and hijack a helicopter mid-flight.

Pretty sure there's only party adamantly trying to not do anything or change at all and it's not the Gillette guys.

Oh really when?

Like I said, you'd be surprised how rarely I see anybody acknowledge that men might face problems. That makes it feel, to me, like absolutely nobody gives a damn. As a woman who has some fantastic men in her life, that absolutely shits me.

I'm speaking all from my own experience here. Not sure what else to say.

Everybody's all "Jerry's old and feeble" till they see him run down a skyscraper and hijack a helicopter mid-flight.

As a man who also deals with these issues I gotta tell you, the MRA types are the absolute last people who will ever do anything at all to help men.

A lot of men's issues are specifically because of toxic masculinity, which is a problem that the MRA types will refuse to address because they don't want to solve issues. They just want to enforce the status quo and push back against feminism.

This is why that Gillette ad is such a great thing. Anything that challenges men to actually stop and be introspective and better to one another is great because that's what helping men looks like right now.

Oh really when?

Feminists do care from what I have seen. Only the very extreme kind like TER Fs or radfems don't care for men and they are very much in the minority and are universally hated.

I have been in MRA circles in the past, I was enticed into them after having gone through a bad time in my life.

They don't fucking care.

Any men that have suffered they just use as shields from criticism. MRA circles these days have gotten scarily worse since then too as now they are overrun by incels whom are all kinds of creepy and destructive if you look into them.

The sad fact of the matter these groups that were intended to help men. Mens Right Activists, Men Going Their Own Way, and incels have all been hijacked by crazy misogynists of the absolute worst of the worse type. Mens Right Activists as far as I know was always kind of crazy but MGTOW had a decent message for men, that men should focus on their own happiness separate from societal expectations, that got hijacked and the whole concept behind incels was actually created by a woman. It was intended to be a support group for men that just couldn't get a date no matter what they tried.

All of those groups were hijacked by the worst of the worst. Incels advocate for rape and pedophilia and constantly deify mass shooters, serial killers, and serial rapists. On top of that they routinely goad eachother into killing themselves and going on more shootings (and there has been a several shootings attributed to them). MGTOW is the same with nazism mixed in and MR As are all subscribed to that that stupid redpilled shitshow of a concept on top of the shit pile.

The only group that will help men is feminists, nothing else.

Edited by Wispy on Jan 21st 2019 at 1:33:43 AM

Most men's rights groups have a very strong hatred of men.

The ones who treat women as people.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

Thats why you see white knight and cuck pop up whenever a guy even tries to defend a woman for whichever reason.

Men face problems. Institutionalised sexism, aside from some edge cases, are usually the least of them.

Let's go over the statistics of that watch video one by one, and some potential solutions, shall we?

• Men account for 93% of workplace fatalities. That is because dangerous jobs where such accidents are common generally hire men to do them. The reasons for this are varied, but it's either because they prefer hiring people with greater muscle mass, or because they hire cheap immigrants, who tend to have rather conservative views on gender roles, or because the companies themselves have some interesting views on what constitutes a "man's job" . Solutions: Better workplace safety, and see what you can do about hiring more women if percentages are scary.
• Men comprise of 97% of war fatalities. Okay, question: were these numbers included in the "workplace fatalities" bit? Because I can see how that would scew the numbers. In any case, the problem is largely the same as there: war is considered a "man's game" because of tradition and the reality of muscle mass. It is not that men are thrown into the grinder because nobody cares about them, its that women are effectively refused an opportunity to serve in battlefield roles. Solutions: Don't wage dumb wars, more women soldiers if percentages are scary.
• 79% of homicide victims are male. Yes, and it is almost always male-on-male violence, because "manhood" is often proven by one's ability for violence. This is literally toxic masculinity at work. Get some numbers for male-on-male vs female-on-male, then you might have a conversation. Solution: Teach boys about alternative conflict resolution, don't shackle your manhood to your ability for violence.
• Nearly half of fathers without visitation rights still financially support their children. Now, I'll admit that matters of custody and visitation rights are steeped deeply into sexism, and is one of the few areas where men get the short end of that stick. However, the reason these fathers are still financially supporting their children is because, by law, both parents are financially responsible for their off-spring, even if they are deemed unsuitable by the court to actually act as a parent. Solution: More equal gender roles, use a condom, or just take some responsibility for the fact that someone has to care for your child and just post that check already.
• Men account for 80% of all suicide victims. Yeah, because according to toxic masculinity, psychiatric health is for pussies. Also, the numbers are scewed because men generally choose more destructive methods for their suicide and are thus likely more "successful", because women are pressured to look pretty, even in death. Solution: Teach men that it is okay to ask for help.
• 75% of single homeless people are men. Yes, and the vast majority of them have serious psychiatric and psychological issues. Also, 12% are veterans. I probably don't have to explain how these numbers got scewed. Solution: Teach men its okay to ask for help. Actually take care of your veterans besides lip service.

These are all real problems, but tackling them from a "Men's Rights" perspective is going about it entirely the wrong way. In fact, feminism seem to do a lot more good against these exact problems.

Edited by Kayeka on Jan 21st 2019 at 11:29:59 AM

Oh really when?

Also there are groups that actully try and address said issues, there aren’t many of them but they do exist. The UK has the Man Kind Initiative (a men’s doemstic violence charity), I’ve seen local government starting to put up posters telling younge men to check on their friends and talk to each other about issues, the YMCA still exists out there, we’ve also got CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably), who leaflet universities.

There aren’t enough groups, far from it, but such groups do exist and you’ll note that they’re not associated with the internet based MRA lot.

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

I have heard of YMCA but not the others. Its nice to know other groups exist that aren't hijacked by the crazies.

Also a bit relieving in a sad way how their is one that functions as a male domestic abuse shelter. That's always a main talking point of MR As yet they never have started one because they are too cowardly to actually do something about the problems they claim to be fighting, instead they focus on hating women.

Those shelters I think are sorely needed as male abuse victims are likely more numerous then any statistics will suggest as most cases go unreported due to the toxic gendered belief that getting help is bad and the belief that men can't get domestically abused.

Edited by Wispy on Jan 21st 2019 at 3:35:12 AM

Uuuuuh...

How the hell are these not systemic sexism?

So men are harmed by societal attitudes that 1) men's lives are worth less than women's, so dangerous work is "men's work"; 2) man should be strong, so men try to prove their strength both by demonstrating their "superiority" over other men and by refusing to seek help when they need it; and 3) men's primary role in child care is to provide financially for the child, so as long as they're paying child support they don't actually need to be involved in their child's life.

This is the definition of systemic sexism. The fact that you write it off as "it's an example of toxic masculinity, not systemic sexism" is bizarre to me. Toxic masculinity is systemic sexism! It's a set of cultural attitudes that demand certain behaviors of people based solely on their gender. These demands are unreasonable and unhealthy, and do serious harm to both men and women. How could you call that anything but systemic sexism?

The "muscle mass" then you mention a few times is bullshit, by the way. While men have more upper body strength than women on average, many women are stronger than many men on an individual basis. If a job requires a baseline level of physical strength, that's a shitty excuse for considering it a "man's job" —- unless it requires so much strength that most men wouldn't qualify either, then plenty of women will be strong enough to handle it as well. And that's above and beyond questions like why does any particular job "require" a certain level of raw physical strength instead of doing things differently so that you can expand the labor pool by allowing people who are less physically strong to do the work?

So yeah, the issues the watch ad brings up are all real issues of real systemic sexism faced by real men. The fact that it's brought up as a response to the Gillette ad is a problem, because the issues it points out are in a large part caused by the issues that the Gillette ad points out (ie, toxic masculinity). Ideally the two would be complementary, approaching the same issue from different directions (the Gillette ad addressing the underlying attitude, the watch ad addressing the ultimate end result), but instead the watch ad chose to frame itself as in opposition to the Gillette ad. That sucks, and it ultimately makes the problem worse because it ultimately suggests that men would be doing fine if not for those damn evil feminazis holding men back. (Read the comments on that video if you don't see it — just be forewarned, it's ugly in there.)

But, equally important, a bad message about real problems doesn't mean they aren't real problems. Don't Shoot the Message, basically. Regardless of some watch company being shitty and feeding into MRA talking points, the fact remains that men do die far more often at work, in combat, by murder, and by suicide; a considerable majority of the homeless population are men; the family law system does generally favor women over men in matters of custody and child support. These are all real problems, rooted in systemic sexism, and they deserve attention regardless of the fact that hypocritical assholes like to trot out those statistics to justify their own agenda of preserving the sexist status quo.

Edited by NativeJovian on Jan 21st 2019 at 10:33:47 AM

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

No one is saying these aren't real problems. The issue is that this commercial only brought them up to pander to MRA victim complexes. It's not going to draw attention to these problems in a way that actually solves them. All it's doing is giving MRA assholes and incels yet another excuse to avoid improving themselves.

This commercial deserves to be reviled, even if the statistics within it are not.

It's blatant whataboutism.

Edited by M84 on Jan 21st 2019 at 11:44:39 PM

Disgusted, but not surprised

Yes, I literally said that. What I was pushing back against was the claim made in this thread that the issues raised (however poorly and in bad faith) by the watch ad weren't examples of systemic sexism.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Kayeka's post pointed out that a lot of those issues are examples of systemic sexism and toxic masculinity.

Disgusted, but not surprised

X3 Kayeka was saying that they aren't problems of "institutional sexism", which they very clearly are.

Edited by Silasw on Jan 21st 2019 at 3:55:02 PM

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran