Among those MRAs who are actually willing to acknowledge that women actually suffered oppression in the past, you sometimes find this argument: “Sure, things were bad for women back then – in the 1950s, or 1890, or whenever — but these days women don’t suffer from sexism. It’s men who are the real victims.”
This argument not only flies in the face of, you know, reality; it also reflects a naïve and simplistic understanding of how prejudice works, and why it persists. Misogyny, like other prejudices, is deeply rooted; it’s been around for literally thousands of years, and permeates culture and cultural/social/political institutions. The idea that a couple of decades of feminism have been enough to eradicate centuries-old attitudes and beliefs is, if you know anything at all about history or sociology or psychology, simply absurd.
How persistent is prejudice? A recent article in Slate looks at a historical study of anti-Semitism in Germany. As Ray Fisman notes in the Slate article, the study found that:
Communities that murdered their Jewish populations during the 14th-century Black Death pogroms were more likely to demonstrate a violent hatred of Jews nearly 600 years later. A culture of intolerance can be very persistent indeed.
Let’s just let that sink in for a second: Six. Hundred. Years. The noxious ideas of anti-Semites in the 14th century deeply affected what their great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren believed (and did) when the Nazis rolled into town six centuries later. (I’m assuming an average 4 generations per century here; if that’s an incorrect assumption you may need to add or subtract a handful of “greats.”)
Here are more details, from the study’s abstract:
This paper uses data on anti-Semitism in Germany and finds continuity at the local level over more than half a millennium. When the Black Death hit Europe in 1348-50, killing between one third and one half of the population, its cause was unknown. Many contemporaries blamed the Jews. Cities all over Germany witnessed mass killings of their Jewish population. At the same time, numerous Jewish communities were spared. We use plague pogroms as an indicator for medieval anti-Semitism. Pogroms during the Black Death are a strong and robust predictor of violence against Jews in the 1920s, and of votes for the Nazi Party. In addition, cities that saw medieval anti-Semitic violence also had higher deportation rates for Jews after 1933, were more likely to see synagogues damaged or destroyed in the ‘Night of Broken Glass’ in 1938, and their inhabitants wrote more anti-Jewish letters to the editor of the Nazi newspaper Der Stürmer.
As Fisman notes,
Changing any aspect of culture—the norms, attitudes, and “unwritten rules” of a group—isn’t easy. Beliefs are passed down from parent to child—positions on everything from childbearing to religious beliefs to risk-taking are transmitted across generations.
You can read more about the details of the study on Slate; the actual study is available here.
EDITED TO ADD: And, on a lighter note, here’s what happens when a “white-men-are-the-real-victims” dude (who clearly has been reading about pick-up artistry) goes a-courtin’ on OkCupid.
EDITED AGAIN: Added more details from the study’s abstract.
As a fab of the-Spearhead (and other men’s advocate websites and blogs) I wonder just how you KNOW this, justmorethanorifices? Has being a feminist given you telepathic powers where you can divine the intentions and inner (sometimes even subconscious) feelings of people whom you almost certainly have never met, that you can authoritatively state:These men are OBSESSED (caps yours) with proving women inferior.IT CONSUMES THEIR ENTIRE LIFE! …The spectre of WOMAN always casts her shadow upon them and their pathetic efforts to throw arrows at this paradigm is quite amusing to watch. If it were not so pathetically sad, it would actually be funny! To these misogynists—where would you egalitarian extremists be without namecalling?–women are enemies hiding behind every corner…They warm themselves by the ‘fires of misogyny’ to feel better about themselves”
Almost every article–and post–on the Spearhead gives clear, thoughtful and reasonable arguments how feminism–and feminist–injure society, damage the family, and corrode love and harmony between the sexes! IF feminists were correct in their assumptions of gender equality, everyone–both men and women, and especially the up-and-coming generation, would be strikingly better off! Divorce would be fewer, families would be stronger, drunkenness, drug abuse, urban crime and crime–especially among young people, would be a rarity, and perhaps even unknown in many communities, the workweek would be shorter (especially given the immense technological advances of the past 50-75 years), rape and sexual pathology would be almost unheard of, and equality could and would have fulfilled its promises made so noisily in the ’60s and early ’70s!
We clearly experienced not only disappointment, but the diametrical opposite as far as results are concerned! Feminists (and nonwhite racial egalitarians) have had everything their own way for the better part of a century, they have had the single minded might of the United States Government–the most powerful nation on Earth, a comprehensive and universal system of brainwashing and conditioning (“publik skoolz”) amplified by network news and the idiot box– and the resultant bloody mess is what you see being commented upon in the Spearhead and similar websites and blogs. YOU feminists (both manboobs and grrrlz) have a LOT to answer for! Don’t blame us for the manifest consequences of YOUR recklessness and irresponsibiltiy! I don’t know if we would be a better and more humane country if feminism never existed–but I can’t blame anyone for feeling that way.
PEACE AND FREEDOM!!
David K. Meller
xD I just woke up from a nap and in the space of my nap somebody apparently trolled and flounced :O
That was efficient…
We should have badges.. or prizes… “most efficient troll”
“most likely to show up at a thread”
“most persistant”
“least likely to concede a point”
just a few more, we should have an awards thread with ballots and everything! 😛
“most self-obsessed”
“worst at math”
“most repetitive”
“least correct”
“the Ami Angelwings XD Award” for commenter most likely to make commenters feel like XD
Like the “Alka Seltzer Plus Award” or the other sports awards named after sponsors xD
Not to be confused with the “XD Ami Angelwings Award,” given to the comment most pissed off by the use of XDs.
Come on, Ju Ju. If you make statements that amount to “Throughout history, feminism or something like it shows up in societies at their peak – today, we have unprecedented gender parity thanks to birth control and the social safety net,” while leaving yourself plausible deniability on the implied corollary, “After the peak comes collapse! If you don’t want your society to collapse, you should get that birth control and welfare away from women!”
…folks will call you out for straight-up trolling.
No troll prize for you, either. Your appearance-to-flounce time was efficient, but you were a little too heavy-handed. Should’ve kept us guessing, so the more generous among us would still be giving you the benefit of the doubt.
“the Ami Angelwings XD Award” for commenter most likely to make commenters feel like XD
No fair! You would always win that one!
Until I heard welfare state and orgies being explained as female liberation. …..
@kirbywarp
Like others have said, a society can be sexually free/hedonistic without giving women equality.
Cf., the late 1960s.
I’m pretty sure only trolls even use the term “welfare state.”
“No fair! You would always win that one!” Well, it is named after her for a reason.
We could have the “Anti-Ami Anglewings Award”, which is given to the commenter with the least emoticons! That could take a while to award, though, as most people don’t use them quite as often…
Also, agreed with Kirbywarp, change is scary! Unless it involves a preview function. Comeon, David! You know you want to.
@Elizabeth,
“if you have a town totally destroyed where a large portion of the population is gone-will the hatred of Jews remain?”
I imagine it could get worse among the survivors, and if there are no survivors, then those in the surrounding communities. That hatred, just as that before it, would be unjustified, but predictable, and at least equally as unjustified as the collective punishment of an entire town, which I can’t imagine was populated entirely by racists, even if we aren’t counting children. Now, obviously, we know what did happen with Germany; the Nazis were defeated and the German people learned that all the rumours were true and were horrified, and they became a normal, stable country. But just because that was the outcome I don’t think justifies flattening whole cities, towns, and villages.
It could be that they still held their hatred but it could also be that they learned that if you hate others, you might get your entire town destroyed so perhaps it is a good idea to avoid that in the first place.
No, I do not think teaching someone to accept another is best achieved by trashing their hometown. I think the best way is to make sure that person spends a lot of time around others who are not the same as them.
That seems vanishingly improbable. Shitty things happening to people tend to make them more angry.
Also, why are we still talking about destroying cities?
@Elizabeth:
Good to know you don’t want to start bombing people, but this is getting into iffy territory, as you are starting to sound like you think destroying cities could be justified by the possibility that people might link that to them hating others.. =_= Sooo… Let’s turn to,
David K. Meller. Who has shown up to shout about how feminists have been in control of America The Most Awesome And Powerful Thing in the Past Two-Hundred Years Since It’s Been Around, and yet for some reason they haven’t managed to obliterate crime and divorce! Also that “almost all” posts and comments are actually quite intelligent really. Unless he’s a one off, attack my feminist minions! Attack! Mwa ha ha ha ha ha ha haaaa!
I just un-moderated a couple of comments from a new commenter, David K. Meller. Well, sort of new; you may have seen a comment or two of his from The Spearhead quoted in one of my old posts. Anyway, scroll up and read them. And discuss!
PEACE AND FREEDOM11!!!11!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@David K. Meller,
“I wonder just how you KNOW this, justmorethanorifices? Has being a feminist given you telepathic powers where you can divine the intentions and inner (sometimes even subconscious) feelings of people whom you almost certainly have never met, that you can authoritatively state:These men are OBSESSED (caps yours) with proving women inferior.IT CONSUMES THEIR ENTIRE LIFE! …The spectre of WOMAN always casts her shadow upon them and their pathetic efforts to throw arrows at this paradigm is quite amusing to watch. If it were not so pathetically sad, it would actually be funny! To these misogynists—where would you egalitarian extremists be without namecalling?–women are enemies hiding behind every corner…They warm themselves by the ‘fires of misogyny’ to feel better about themselves””
LOL! I think you just proved it yourself.
To these misogynists—where would you egalitarian extremists be without namecalling?
This is why it’s always important to read what you have written.
What I find particularly telling is the willingness, even eagerness, to accept and perpetuate one kind of discrimination (against men) while simultaneousness whining discrimination is hard to get rid of once it’s established.
Alright Kratch, name something I (or others) have done in discrimination against men, as a whole (not just a group that is mostly male). Also give evidence, because just naming it doesn’t make it true. 😛 Let me repeat, discrimination against a group that is mostly male, or against a single male, is not necessarily rooted in misandry.
Almost every article–and post–on the Spearhead gives clear, thoughtful and reasonable arguments how feminism–and feminist–injure society, damage the family, and corrode love and harmony between the sexes!
No.
Feminists (and nonwhite racial egalitarians) have had everything their own way for the better part of a century, they have had the single minded might of the United States Government–the most powerful nation on Earth, a comprehensive and universal system of brainwashing and conditioning (“publik skoolz”) amplified by network news and the idiot box– and the resultant bloody mess is what you see being commented upon in the Spearhead and similar websites and blogs.
No.
And here’s the real irony of this comment; most of the things I see on the Spearhead about the oppression of men has much less to do with modern feminism or modern civil rights movements than it does hundreds-year old class systems. But its comments like this that highlight the MRM’s frequent refusal to address the issue of classism among both themselves and society at large. (I assume that “classism” is too Liberal a word.)
Also, no one who isn’t a grad student should be allowed to read Nietzche. Really.
“most likely to abuse history”
“most likely to completely misunderstand history”
“most creative use of grammar and spelling”
“best made-up words”
I know Kratch was whining about how we have not immediately denounced and complained that men were left out of the Violence Against Women Act. Apparently since women want to prevent violence against their sex, have worked hard to get help from government and other groups to do so, it means that teh menz are all discriminated against and we are misandrist because we are not focused on teh menz.
I pointed out that the nonpsycho MRAs could, you know, lobby Congress to replace that law with funding for both genders in an End Domestic Violence Act as anything that excludes one class can be viewed as discriminatory. He just went on complaining and demanding denouncements of whatever problems he has with women getting any benefit ever if it means a man is not paramount in everyone’s consideration.
Also, I have a hard time! taking someone! who uses so many! exclamation points! seriously.