Never underestimate the ability of Men’s Rights Activists to get worked up over the most ridiculous nonsense.
I found the meme above on the Men’s Rights Australia Facebook page, accompanied by this explanation:
Women are allowed to wear whatever they like to work, including sleeveless tops, short skirts, and even thongs. Yet if a man were to wear sleeveless tops, shorts, or thongs you can be sure he’d be sent home from work or even fired. In summer men have to suffer in the heat wearing trousers, long sleeve shirts, and tie. Feminists claim they also care about inequalities facing men so why aren’t they fighting against this? -ms
YEAH FEMINISTS WHY AREN’T YOU FIGHTING AGAINST THIS TERRIBLE INJUSTICE, WOMEN NEVER HAVE TO WEAR ANYTHING UNCOMFORTABLE OR AWKWARD AT WORK 0h wait
Note: I should point out that the “thongs” being referenced aren’t the ones that ride up your butt, but rather are the ones you wear on your feet and that are also called flip flops, at least here in the US.
BONUS MEME: This isn’t a Men’s Rights meme, obviously, but it literally made me laugh out loud.
Apparently the best way to fight communism is to do nothing while the oceans rise. I guess the Communists have their secret bases on the Marshall Islands?
I’m reminded of this legendary toilet paper ad.
A spectre is haunting the bathroom — the spectre of really really scratchy toilet paper.
@Ruprect
Your response doesn’t address what I said.
Restating:
You say sexual harassment in the workplace can’t be addressed without “serious structural reform.”
But unions do piecemeal work–not serious structural reform, aka revolution–all the time. A sexual harassment policy helps women feel safer at work. That’s a plus for workers–because women are workers too. No revolution is needed to achieve this goal. Not even a union is needed for a company to implement a sexual harassment policy.
Also, who are you to tell us how to achieve our goals? A real revolutionary is led by the people.
We don’t need to convince you. You need to convince us. You’re failing spectacularly. Covering yourself in glory? Not at all.
M8 I was born after 1990, stultifying drudgery is all I know in the world of work. But I’d still prefer to have it acknowledged that I put work into doing a good job, even if the work I put in was 99% the energy it took not to shake a customer by the lapels or drop on the floor and cry, than have that ignored in favour of sexualising me and making me add the pressure of dealing with that into an already exhausting day of work.
@Ruprect
No, you haven’t. The type and amount of harassment that small, weak, male coded people experience is categorically different to that inflicted upon female-perceived people. I can tell you this from personal experience in both cases.
Ruprect sez:
Fine, so far.
Why is it up to the person being harassed to leave the situation? Why is that the ideal solution? Why isn’t the solution to make the person doing the harassing STOP FUCKING DOING IT?
This bullshit of context being so murky and inscrutable is…well…bullshit. You are at work, not a fucking nightclub. While you’re at work, assume that the women you work with don’t give a shit about the status of your boner. It’s really quite simple.
Words mean things, bro. The words you use matter because THEY FUCKING MEAN THINGS. You can’t be considerate of someone else’s boundaries if you’re going to pretend that the words you use are irrelevant. If you’re continuing to speak the same damn way to someone because you reject the notion that your words mean what they fucking mean, you are not being considerate.
This shit really all comes back to consent. It’s all a fucking pretense that noticing that you’re making other people uncomfortable is just soooooo verrrryyyyyyyy harrrrrrdddddd and it’s just sooooooo terribly oneroussss to expect poor widdle menz to think about it. Really, the answer should be that we continue to let men blunder about spewing whatever shit springs to mind while women just wait patiently until some magical, instantaneous and perfectly flawless solution presents itself at some indeterminate point in the future. Obviously that’s the only viable solution for reasons which I’m sure are completely sound and grounded in reality and which totally have nothing to do with Rupreloli only wanting equality on the condition that it can be achieved with no actual effort on his part.
@Kale, I’m so sorry that kid came into your workplace wearing that. That’s awful. If I worked with you, I would have been shaken enough that I think I would have needed to go home.
See, everyone? Ruprect has a problem – some kind of weird issue about being told he’s doing a good job when he doesn’t respect his job – and that’s the only real problem that exists. Being sexually harassed at work? Maybe that could be classified as a subset of Ruprect’s issue, which is the only real problem in the world. Or maybe it just doesn’t exist at all. He views everything women tell him with extreme skepticism, after all, and it’s other people’s job to convince him that their experiences aren’t inventions.
But Ruprect expects everyone to accept his word at its face, and does not anticipate anyone treating his experience as inventions the way he treats the experiences of others.
No, you weren’t. What kale described is nothing like what you’ve described.
Now, if I were you, I wouldn’t even take you at your word and I would be extremely skeptical of what you’ve shared about that. However, I am not as awful as you, so I believe what you said. Nevertheless, what you experienced – although bad, and although something no one should have to experience – is not the same as sexual harassment. You can choose to believe this or not, but women experience the same kind of harassment that you experienced, and in addition to that, sexual harassment, which is something you have clearly not experienced and which you probably never will because it’s not a thing that happens to men with any frequency.
That’s your privilege, to only have to face one kind of harassment, not two.
And it’s your privilege to have the ability to “grow out of” the type of harassment you experienced. Female-presenting people never have that option.
I love the “perhaps” in the middle of this. What the fuck makes you think there is even a possibility that you could have a “full grasp of” something that has never happened to you and won’t ever happen to you? Do you think your almighty imagination is that powerful because: penis?
HAH HAH HAH HAH
And your experience is the only real one in the world. Weird how we keep coming back to that.
Sorry for the double comment. I just got caught up on a bunch of stuff I’d missed.
On men identifying as feminists:
I used to really like it when men referred to themselves that way, but I’ve seen so many dudes call themselves feminists just so that they could dress up their sexism and misogyny as progressive, so now a dude calling himself a feminist tends to set off red flags in my head. I’m not ideologically opposed to men referring to themselves that way, I’m just primed not to trust them.
The real test, though, is in asking a man who calls himself a feminist if he’d be willing to refer to himself as a feminist ally instead. If he throws a huge fit, I know for sure that I don’t want anything to do with him or his “feminism.”
On Ruprect:
Uh, dude, it’s not obvious at all from the arguments that you’re making that you don’t disagree with that.
There is a HUGE difference between feeling uncomfortable because you’re given praise for something that you don’t want to be praised for and being in a hostile work environment. You do not have the same experience as women and POC and you seriously need to stop assuming that your one example of an uncomfortable work conversation you’ve experienced is in any way similar to what we go through. You don’t fucking care because you’re a coward who doesn’t want to see the system that currently benefits you change. I’m willing to bet that you’ve climbed your way up from the mindless cog work you hated so much and now you feel like you’ve earned the power and privilege you’re enjoying and you think we all just need to grin and bear the discomfort you assume is equivalent to what you once experienced and one day we’ll get to enjoy similar power and privilege. That’s why you’re arguing for dismantling the entire system but not for making little changes to the current system; you agree that the current system is bad, but if it changes you only feel it’s fair if it changes simultaneously for everyone. A change that lessens your power and eases the discomfort of others is unfair because it hurts you while benefitting others.
Sweet fancy Moses, this thread.
@Ruprect,
These are your thoughts on the issues? That’s fair, everyone gets to have opinions. Solving problems starts with identifying that problem, and forming opinions on how to fix it. Great.
Know what doesn’t follow that step? Telling other people who are also considering that problem “Convince me that you’re right and I’m wrong.”
Why? Two reasons. First reason is that places too high a value on your own opinions. you should be assuming that your ideas have flaws, since they’re the first things to leap into your skull upon recognizing the issue. They’re raw and untested.
Second reason is because other people have been considering this problem for fucking decades and it would behoove you to do a little research. All of these things have been thoroughly discussed by people who have dedicated their lives to pulling this puzzle apart. It is the height of arrogance to consider ones’ personal opinion as something needing to be convinced from when such a body of work exists. It is a blinding example of male privilege to think that one’s unrefined opinions are worthy of equal consideration.
Humility, reservation, and an eagerness to change your mind. Listen to people who have experienced it. Consider pushback as a sign that you’re going the wrong direction. If you honestly care about harassment (in the workplace and elsewhere), throw away your opinions and do your goddamn homework.
Ruprect is like those dipshit gamergators who imagine that growing up as a nerdy person who can’t get dates is something that only cis boys experience. And so they are justified in being horrible people to women, because they think of it as revenge against all the girls who wouldn’t date them in high school.
They are completely oblivious to the fact that nerdy cis girls exist and have that same high school experience. It just literally never crosses their minds. Just like it literally never crosses Ruprect’s mind that women might also know what it’s like to work a low-wage drudge-work job, or what it’s like to be physically threatened on the street.
Oh, fuck off. Don’t act like we’re all spoiled princesses who’ve never had to work at a crap job before. I think most of us have had shitty, low paying, unfulfilling jobs. Being complimented for work you don’t care about or like is not even close to sexual harassment. Sexual harassment is something women are frequently targeted for so often that it keeps them out of their chosen career path. It’s not a matter of feeling a little comfortable, it’s targeted abuse, frequently based on gender and mean to tell us that we aren’t welcome in a particular workplace or field. Or in some cases, it’s meant to let us know that if we are doing a specific job, we become objects to be treated however men want.
With the latter, I’m referring to restaurants. There was a survey done with female servers, 90% have been sexually harassed by customers. But with the reliance on tips, can’t do much about it.
Class oppression is an important issue and it can intersect with misogyny, but misogyny is its own thing.
You can take a fucking swan dive into the nearest Lego pit if you think it’s unimportant, if you think it’s the same as being a little uncomfortable, and if you still can’t fucking listen to us, pull your head out of your miserable asshole, and understand that working on class issues alone will not solve misogyny.
I love how the regulars on here can pick apart misogynistic arguments and articulate what I’m thinking in such a perfect way.
And @Ruprect
Seriously, you’ve been harassed in the street a couple of times? Ask most men when was the last time they were harassed and they’ll be unlikely to have an example that happened within the last year. Ask most women, it will be within the last few days. Context is important. You can’t compare one example of you being harassed with one example of a woman being harassed. It’s not the same because that woman was likely harassed last week too, and the week before, and a few times the month before that.
It’s like saying that because you kicked a football in a park once, you’re an expert on football and know more about it than a professional football player.
I don’t know how Ruprect’s proposed solution would even work. I’m no capitalist, but I’m not sure there’s any model of society where no one has authority over anyone else in any context.
“I guess I’ll just say that once you’ve reached the same level as men, there will still be plenty to complain about. I don’t think the normal working male’s situation is anything that anybody should be *aspiring* to-”
First of all Rupert – fuck you, fuck off, go fuck yourself, you inconsiderate, insensitive, mysogynist lying shit-prick. You are wasting our time and putting us through mental anguish for NO reason. You dont listen, you have no interest in learning, & no one here is going to just sit up and say. gee. guess my horrible experiences with harassment werent bad bc a man who didnt even listen to them says they werent. Fuck your privileged male entitlement that you cling to like the constipated shit you are. Stop it. you said you would stop, then you came back as a sock purely to troll and aggravate. dude, fuck the hell off already. For like the third time, if you wanna spew sexism and be agreed with, 99.99% of spaces on the internet will give you that weak little hand job you so desperately crave. why you wanna harass people who are sick of your shit is beyond irrational. but hey, if you get off on closing your eyes pissing all over women’s worst experiences, you can do that in lots of other places too.
When women reach the level of men, here’s what we no longer have to SUFFER WITH. most of these things happened to me or a family member or close friend. a few happen to men, but much less frequently. Some of these dont happen much in “the west” as of less than 100 years ago, but global women’s issues matter:
– having multiple grown men, several times a week, yell “nice tits!” at us as 11 year olds or younger up to adulthood
– being followed in cars by creepy men trying to abduct us
– brutally violent rape of a nature that could have killed us
– being forced to be pregnant even if it kills us
– making less money and having less job opportunities simply for being female
– when experiencing homelessness, being trans, PoC, or other such marginalizing factors, even MORE likely to be raped
– saying you dont like sex with men and having men insist you do
– telling a man over and over no and being told he doesnt care while your friends do nothing
– having a grown man flash you as a child
– being told rape was your fault for how you dressed, or that you like sex, or that you somehow invited it, or you werent careful enough, even when the victim is a child and the perpetuators a group of men
– being shamed for taking precautions against rape
– being shamed for liking sex, not liking sex, having sex while not the property of a male
– being forbidden to vote, own property, drive, etc just because of assigned sex
– being traded as property and regarded as such even where that isnt the law anymore
– being shamed if we wear too much or too little clothing
– being shamed for staying home as a mom OR for working
– less likely to be elected, promoted, to be a CEO or Principle or doctor or priest or even a chef or published poet because women are rarely allowed to rise in rank
– being told that sexual harassment is not a big deal and you shouldnt even talk about it
– having a picture of your murdered body on a damn concert t shirt because men think murdering women is sexy and fun
– rarely see yourself as a full person in a film, even though women are the majority of humans, Almost never see anything but a sexist & sexualized image of yourself
– suffer from eating disorders due to pressure to be unrealisticly thin
You think men’s work & lives is so fucking hard? poor goddamn baby man, You dont think that the LOWER PAYING LEAS RESPECTED jobs women are relegated to like nursing, parenting, teaching, manual labor, customer service,office support are hard? Fuck you, asshat. YES WE WANT FULL EQUALITY. WE DESERVE IT.
I could go on. and on and on and on and on but Rupret wont even read it. He wont think about it. He will never even try to get it, Because he doesnt give a fuck about women. & everyone here already knows this shit and more.
So put th fucking cork on the fucking fork and gtfo.
drops mic
PS: ( and again, thats far from a full list. like, I didnt even mention having multiple men and boys grab your body, slap your body, from childhood and think its funny and cute. & seeing that behavior promoted as cool. or having a man call himself a feminist and then talk over women and tell is to stop fighting and just accept this treatment. Like I could write a damn thousand+ page book just briefly listing the little, shitty things women and girls deal with that men rarely if ever even know about).
ruprect
… has clearly never considered for one second what “the normal working woman’s situation” is like.
Hint: job for job, level by level, it has all the same problems as the situation of a normal working man plus the extra added cherry on top of sexism in the workplace, sexism in the street and sexism in the family/at home.
FFS. How is it possible not to even consider this? Even if in your wisdom, ruprect, you elect not to agree with it?
Provided, in many cases, by those exact same boys, because they would never date a girl that doesn’t meet their movie-star expectations. They feel entitled to a beautiful girl even though they’re rather ordinary-looking, so they definitely don’t ever consider the nerd-girls around them.
Sorry, but I feel the need to point out that these guys who are SO ANGRIEEEES about the girls who won’t date them are also massive hypocrites because they won’t date nerds either.
OT YES EXACTLY *fist pump*
It’s not actual violence (I have been fortunate enough not to experience that in my life, and I know that’s rare) but the thing that gets me the most is the presumption of competence men get. I have to go to great lengths to prove myself in every new work environment whereas everyone just assumes men know what they’re talking about.
And when I have an idea it’s often dismissed, but when that same idea is brought up later by a man it’s lauded and adopted.
I just can’t tell you how frustrating that is when it just keeps happening over and over again for a decade.
I am competent! You didn’t hire me for my beauty! LISTEN TO WHAT YOU ARE LITERALLY PAYING ME TO SAY.
It’s also visible in the behavior of guys like Ruprect who think they’re going to show up with nothing but presumption-fueled hand-waving and go “I think that…”, “It seems to me…”, etc. and be taken seriously by people whose views are based on years (lifetimes, even) of direct experience and study. He expects to be taken at his word on things he admits to having zero experience with but regards women’s word with extreme skepticism and requires convincing that supplying his female coworkers with regular updates on the impact their appearance is having on his boner might be a thing he shouldn’t do.
Hey guys wouldn’t it be so much EASIER if everyone focused on solving the problems that affect cis men (and maybe women too, if they actually know what it’s like to do scut work and thankless drudgery), and then after all of those things are taken care of, we can maybe look at the “problems” that women face? /sarcasm
yup. I rarely pass as a man, but I noticed a HUGE difference in how Im treated just by presenting as one – less harassment, but also less men offended by me expressing an opinion and feeling the need to talk over and argue with me just to be a manly argument winning man. More respect in general. and thats without even passing! Other trans men will tell you the same, while trans women experience the opposite.
Jesus kale, I’m so sorry that happened to you/your loved ones. I wish peace and healing for all.
SSomb. thanks. Im sorry it happens to women because they are women. Thats the only reason I posted. Im fine in my life. most of these women are – one is still suffering horrible PTSD & depression sadly… Because part of being assigned woman is that we have to put up with this so much that it becomes background noise. & guys like Rupret dont even notice it.
And oh my, heaven forbid if I should appear to be angry. This is so often commented on in dismissive terms. “Tell us how you REALLY feel” or similar baloney. Women straight up are not allowed to ever be angry and efforts are made to delegitimise any anger we show.
Men get a similar reaction if they should ever dare to show sadness or hurt, so it’s not super awesome-great for them either. I don’t want my poor little nephew to have to become all stoic and emotionless. 🙁