naruball said:
1. I doubt that's true. Sure, I do think many of the statistics are misleading, but looking at most corporate jobs, you can easily see how women don't get the same treament/promotion and, as a result, salary. 2. Not sure how domestic violence is determined. But based on my limited experience (i.e. I don't think this is a proper argument) most men are victims of verbal abuse by women. I see it all the time whether it's just bfs and gfs or married couples. It makes me sick how much they oppress men. 3. Not sure about that. If the male toddlers keep being given dolls, I'm sure they'll have great fun with them. If they keep being given trucks and one day the show them both, they most likely will choose trucks over dolls. But, yes overall I do think it's more than genitalia, hence trans people. I just don't trust studies when I don't know how they were conducted. 4. Excellent points. |
Please don't validate his "points". Some of the factoids that Louie provides are true, but here's the catch: none of them (in aggregate) are caused by women and thus they do not count as gender oppression!
For example, Louie suggests that males are just as likely to be domestic violence survivors as women. First of all, that's just not true (ESPECIALLY when it comes to sexual violence); women are more likely both to be attacked by an intimate partner and also to be attacked more severely. Secondly though, and more importantly, almost all of that violence is also conducted by men. The perpetrators of domestic violence (indeed of violence in general) tend overwhelmingly to be male. As in more than 90% of the time (and 99% of the time in cases of sexual assault). (It should be understood here that no, I am not counting "verbal abuse" in the domestic violence category.)
Likewise, men may die younger, but that is not the fault of women, but rather that of men's own biology and lifestyle choices. The trade-off is that you tend to get more sex.
Or, on a less serious note, we could talk about the psychological impact of gendered toys, particularly insofaras toys did not used to be so gendered, believe it or not. That's more of a new thing and the experts say it's causing harm.
The larger point here though is that Louie's arguments are logically akin to saying that more men die in war than women. Well yes, but...who tends to control the military and the levers of government (decide when to go to war, how to fight, and who goes to war and who doesn't) and who most likely freely (especially here in the U.S.) signs up and is actually allowed to participate in all branches and roles in the army of any given country? In all cases, the answer tends to be: men. How are WOMEN responsible for this? You see my point?
Seriously, look at the demographic composition of America's corporate board rooms or Congress or the White House or the police or your college professors or the Internet (including not least this message board) or the pro sports teams you watch or who the center of the media's attention is (be it movies, video games, TV, comic books, whatever) or who owns that media, etc. Men control basically everything in America, to say nothing of the world writ large. There are marginal exceptions here and there that you can point to, but that's really a matter of reaching, not an honest look at the big picture. The big picture is that women still make 20% less than men overall despite working longer hours (once you take both paid and unpaid labor into account) and being better educated, both. And yet Louie complains of being oppressed by women. You see how that's kind of disingenuous from where I'm standing? Men don't get to blame women for the the actions and choices of other men. That's not fair at all. But let's face it: so-called men's rights activism has nothing to do with fairness.
