Young Men Are Turning Against Feminism

https://www.americansurveycenter.org/newsletter/why-young-men-are-turning-against-feminism/

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Gender gaps are nothing new in American politics, but a recent survey reveals young men and women are increasingly at odds when it comes to views of feminism. The Survey Center on American Life found a nearly 20-point gender gap between Gen Z men and women in identifying as feminist. Only 43 percent of Gen Z men say they generally think of themselves as “feminist,” compared to 61 percent of Gen Z women. The gender gap is more pronounced among Generation Z than any other generation.

"""

My personal guess is that this is a result of mass media generally antagonistic views of masculinity, (referring to it as "toxic", and relating it to negative anti-social behavior), views of men as privileged (even if they find themselves in a difficult economic, social or academic situation), generalizations of negative behavior of some men to all men and dismissal of any problem more specific to males (academical underachievement, high suicidal rates, higher work related accidents, parental custody after divorce, etc).

We have created a communication sphere in which negative views of men are very prevalent and constantly reinforced and women's positions are validated by virtue of their gender. In which any situation that is disadvantageous to a woman is considered to be a result of discrimination and every situation that is disadvantageous to a man is seen as a consequence of his own actions. Even efforts to address men specific problem are often seen as attacks on women.

I believe that if the current media situation continues, we will see an increase in the current gender political views gap.

For some it is difficult for them to see that others fighting for equal treatment does not mean TAKING AWAY something THEY currently enjoy.

We see similar backlashes in the "all lives matter" people, or the people against marriage equality, etc...

It's over.

This generation is very depressing😭

The rise of cancers such as the manosphere really cause a lot of damage to impressionable boys. The idea of being nice to others is completely uninteresting to them, they like the idea that they are superior and higher ranked to women more.

Considering its been such a dirty word for so long, I'm surprised even 43% of young men consider themselves feminist.

Putting that aside, this is the "internetification" of politics really. We were already heading in this direction, but breaking down complex issues to 100 word tweets (sorry, Xs) has made everything into simple binaries. Left/right, woke/red pilled, whatever.

For example "toxic masculinity" is taken to mean masculinity is toxic, when it was really intended to describe very specific traits. "Boys don't cry" type shit, homophobia, or using violence to gain dominance. But that's too much nuance for internet talk.

@judaspete: That's very weird to me because the internet (and exposure to the broader viewpoints that come with it) has been a key component of slowly eradicating my false beliefs. It's helped root out cognitive dissonance and left me less prone to black and white thinking.

It's difficult to see how it could have the opposite effect, frankly.

@mattbbpl: That's good, it's how the internet was supposed to work. But making money requires clicks, and outrage clickbait is the best way to get clicks. Throw in an algorithm that feeds people into a loop => profit.

It's what young men do, isn't it... turn against things?

Fortunately young men don't rule the world. Old men do, and we're massive lactating vaginas now. So go suck on one, young men!

That title seems misleading. Not identifying as a feminist does not mean you're automatically anti-feminist.

Fyi. I believe It's the same guy who was upset because Spain was hiring female firefighters. The thread on that was also misleading.

@SUD123456: I was complaining about a fixed quota (40%, when generally less than 10% of applicants are women)and a lowering of the entry physical requirements to achieve that quota.

Talk about misleading while misleading.

But I do wonder, do you remember or did you go through my history of posts? Either way, you should pay attention when reading.

@shellcase86: well actually this article doesn't mention it, but other articles do write that there has been a rise of Young men that considered feminism to have been more harmful than positive for society.

https://amp.theguardian.com/news/2024/feb/01/gen-z-boys-and-men-more-likely-than-baby-boomers-to-believe-feminism-harmful-says-poll

I originally didn't want to use this article, since it tends to relate anti feminism with Andrew Tate, who is very extreme guy with some personal issues against women.

And using his name can be a very easy way to portray these views as extreme and therefore very easy to dismiss.

@Willy105: I am big believer in being respectful and nice to others by default (which is something I practice with both men and women), but I am one of those people that despite being myself a millennial have become gradually more against current feminism.

I am against it because I see as 1. over simplifying inequality to a single characteristic. 2. interpreting gender relationship through an historical perspective that doesn't fit current society and 3. Deliberately miss attributing outcome differences to discrimination. 4. Minimizing or ignoring situation in which men are a disadvantage.

I will explain a bit further each:

1. This is the simplest one: a person is not made of a single attribute, aspects like race, economical situation, legal residence, language proficiency, height, appearance affect your social outcome even more than sex.

Feminism generalizing views of men minimize these differences. To put an example: having a white, blonde beautiful woman complain about her place in society while ignoring that she is favored in treatment over a large majority of people.

2. It's common to use arguments of circumstances of the past to justify current policy even if it doesn't make much sense now. For instance, you may use the fact that women have had historically lower access to education to justify special support for women in math and stem fields, even if currently they are much more advanced academically.

3. Aspects like a gender wage gaps ( only applies to women with children due to the time used for rearing them) and stem field graduates gender ratio gap ( originates in difference of interest between sexes and is larger in more gender equal societies) are missatributed to gender discrimination despite no proof that it's the case.

4. Negative social outcome that mostly affect men ( as mentioned in the og: academical underachievement, high suicidal rates, higher work related accidents, parental custody after divorce, etc), tend to get ignored and attributed to individual responsibility. I don't disagree with attributing those outcomes to individual responsibility, but it's very much a double standard.

Of course it's very hard to speak about feminism as whole since it's basically a chimera of a thousand heads. But I think I am talking about a rather mainstream version of feminism.

Yeah weak masculinity figures like Shapiro and such have been brainwashing young males for some years now. At the same time this has been pushing females to the left.

But what really worries me are feminists who smoke weed.

There is a stark difference between moderate feminism and the dominant neo-Marxian US wokester garbage. Unfortunately, people are so conditioned, they don't see a difference and conflate.

Thanks to political division, the ignorance in society is at an all-time high.

The main reason is because of the red pill movement, which is basically a backlash against feminism.

Can't be a feminist anymore without offending other groups.

Would be cool if more people were like me and didn't give a shit about labels. I'm nice towards people, no matter what they are or how they look. That's the only thing that matters. I don't get our fascination with belonging to groups we can battle other groups with, and I'm staying out of it.

"Feminism" "anti-feminism", please stfu already.

You got in before the algorithms for creating a bubble were introduced. Good for you!

Yeah, I don't identify with either camp. I reject labels like these. All it does is create a sense of blind tribalism.

Apparently I hit a nerve.

And I know full well about what and why you were complaining. Trope (look it up). I can think of other examples as well, as my memory is excellent.

Reminds me of a female officer colleague of mine from 30 yrs ago who wanted to try out for JTF2 (look that up too) when it was first forming, but she was not allowed. Too bad, since she was spiderwoman and could best any man on the obstacle course, could free climb the most difficult mountain faces, and competed in ultramarathon (you shòuld look that up too, too). But hey, she did female push-ups, not male.

The survey was done by a branch of the American Enterprise Institute, a right-wing think tank:

Founded in 1938, the organization is aligned withconservatism and neoconservatismbut does not support political candidates.^[5]AEI advocates in favor of private enterprise, limited government, and democratic capitalism.^[6]Some of their positions have attracted controversy, including their defense policy recommendations for the Iraq War, their analysis of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, and their energy and environmental policies based on their more than two-decade-long opposition to the prevailingscientific opinion on climate change.

Take what is stated in the original post with a grain of salt, folks. And always know your sources. This study wasn't really done without a conflict of interest, I'd argue.

They clearly take issue with facts, reason, and science, as indicated by their stances on the Iraq War, climate change, and economics.

Their board of directors consists of:

• Cliff Asness, hedge fund manager and the co-founder of AQR Capital Management
• Dick Cheney, former U.S. vice president
• Pete Coors, vice chairman of the board of Molson Coors Brewing Company
• Harlan Crow, chairman and CEO, Crow Holdings, the Trammell Crow family's investment company
• Ravenel B. Curry III, president, Eagle Capital Management
• Dick DeVos, president, Windquest Group
• John V. Faraci, chairman and CEO, International Paper
• Tully Friedman, chairman and CEO, Friedman Fleischer & Lowe
• Christopher Galvin, former CEO and chairman, Motorola
• Harvey Golub, retired chairman and CEO, American Express Company
• Robert F. Greenhill, founder and chairman, Greenhill & Co.
• Frank Hanna III, CEO, Hanna Capital
• Bruce Kovner, chairman, Caxton Alternative Associates (former AEI chairman)
• John A. Luke Jr., chairman and CEO, MeadWestvaco
• Kevin Rollins, former president and CEO, Dell
• Matthew K. Rose, executive chairman, BNSF Railway
• Edward B. Rust Jr., chairman and CEO, State Farm (former AEI chairman)
• Mel Sembler, chairman emeritus, Sembler Company

Yes, that Dick Cheney. And Harlan Crow, Dick DeVos (of the DeVos family), and more.

@SUD123456: if you were using your memory then it was absolutely not Great, unless you were deliberately misleading.

Your description was "upset because Spain was hiring female firefighters" which is something that has been happening since decades prior and I have no objections to.

On the other hand, I would not be proud that your deliberate misrepresentation caused me not to like your comment. Being offensive is not difficult.

Ya they're too afraid to make peace with their shortcomings and/or work on them, so instead of just admitting they're pussies they say it is feminism's fault, call the female orgasm a mystery, and talk shit about men that are supportive of women. It's kind of sad when you get down to it.

People just have to chill.

Honestly it's not that divided, we just have an extremely vocal fringe minority on both sides.

I'd argue most people are "feminists" (or not "anit-feminist" if you prefer that) in the traditional sense (in that they are supportive of equal rights), while most just sort of stumble on errors that alienate the easily-triggered minority of extremists on both sides.

I don't know, I think this is part of the issue with the far-right these days. They've really skewed our moral center.

Moderate stances--in this case, being a feminist--suddenly puts you into a "camp" and now you are apparently a leftist simply for having what is objectively a moderate stance.

Wanting women to have equal rights, access to home loans, the right to vote, to be called a "woman" instead of a "girl", not not be objectified, to have equal pay, equal opportunities, to be encouraged to pursue scientific careers, and so on and so forth...I don't think that's really a left or right issue, but it is feminism.

And it is still something we need to identify, because if you pay attention to what is going on concerning reproductive health in this country, women are still very much under attack by religious zealots and far-right whackos. This isn't a "right vs left" issue, this is an "everyone-that-isn't-a-far-right-whacko vs far-right whacko".

*sorry for triple post, this is a fun topic to discuss!

Extremism can exist on all sides, whether it's the far left, "moderate" left, "moderate" right, or far right. Sure, the far right can often produce the most extreme nutcases, but I don't buy this whole "lesser of two evils" nonsense that many often use as a cop-out to justify shitty behaviour from their own team.

Feminism is way more complex than that. You have first wave feminism, second wave feminism, third wave feminism, fourth wave feminism, white feminism, black feminism, Asian feminism, Christian feminism, Islamic feminism, Jewish feminism, lesbian feminism, trans feminism, trans-exclusionary feminism, radical feminism, conservative feminism, sex-positive feminism, intersectional feminism, colonial feminism, third-world feminism, etc. And each of these feminist movements have their own ideas and definitions of feminism that conflict with other feminist movements.

Ultimately, it's best to just debate individual issues on their own merits, rather than just siding with whatever your team says regardless of the issue. Even if you agree with your team on most issues, there might be some issues where you agree with the opposing team. It's not so black-and-white and good vs. evil like Hollywood makes it out to be.

In terms of reproductive rights, women have full reproductive rights here in the UK, so it's basically a non-issue down here. But I'm aware it's a big issue over in the US, where it's heavily restricted in certain states. In those cases, a strong feminist movement can help push back against such legislation. As far as the UK is concerned, only late-term abortions (24+ weeks) are restricted except for health reasons, which most Brits agree with but a small minority of feminists disagree with.

@horgen: I recently trained most of my feeds to consist primarily of Calvin and Hobbes comics and NFL off-season news, haha.

#Winning

How do I do this?

I am surprised, instagram reels are suddenly showing shit loads from particular user about the price for electricity here. I've done nothing to get that shit. Took a look at the profile. Wonder if it has been sold or hijacked by a bot or something similar.

It does nothing but trying to push people away from the common middle ground.

Rather have chicks promoting their OF.

@mrbojangles25: I agree with the view mentioned by jag85 that its a topic that should be separated in to individual issues.

But I don't like when people mention topics like "Wanting women to have equal rights, access to home loans, the right to vote," it feels like a strawman argument and it makes it hard to try to bring up other individual topics that I find unfair about current feminism, since it paints opinions different than feminism as extremist.

This also relates to my previous comment as using an historical view to justify current policy, even if the current situation is completely different from the past.

So you want to cherry pick rather than address the reasons for why it exists. If you only deal with your own biases, you learn nothing.

@horgen: It's all about what you "interact" with. The tricky part is that just stopping your scrolling on a post will register as an interaction (albeit a lower weighted one).

I trained mine by simply making sure to stop on and click the type of content I wanted to see. There will be some false positives in there because you'll naturally stop on something you didn't intend to, but your other interactions will drown them out.

I sorta know how it works, that's why I am surprised I get spammed with stuff about electricity prices. Yeah those prices are a big deal here, but I go otherplaces to for info about it and whatever is said.

You have to take the good with the bad, and I'd argue feminism as a whole is a pretty good, moderate, easy thing to tolerate (if not support).

Segregating it down into bits and pieces in order to make it easier for people to not tolerate is a dirty tactic, and dishonest.

Look, I don't really like the blue-haired rabid cat ladies that make up the extreme parts of feminism where they think it's OK to, I don't know...throw used tampons at men they don't like (I don't know, just trying to imagine someone's nightmare scenario of a feminist)...but you have to take the bad with the good and the sooner we just make some progress the sooner they'll go away.

Bingo. Once again you manage to say what I'm trying to say in a more concise format haha.

@nirgal: @Jag85: What are the parts of feminism you disagree with?

@mattbbpl:

Depends what issue we're debating. If you want an example, then I already gave an example above:

Not sure I agree with the whole idea that feminism is a single unified position. There are a lot of different, often contrasting, schools of thought there. Being anti-feminist, however, is, as far as I can tell, a single dismissive position.

@Jag85: Ah, I don't think I've ever heard of pro late term abortions as a mainstream feminist stance. Really, I don't hear much about feminism these days at all outside of a few cooks trying to use the label to smear trans folks.

@mattbbpl: There are hardcore pro-choice activists trying to legalize late-term abortion right up to the moment of birth, just as there are hardcore pro-life activists trying to ban abortion right from the moment of conception. Both extremes have been so indoctrinated by their respective ideologies that they don't want to even consider any grey area.

never trust a male 3rd wave feminist

Is that because they are trying to protect the mothers life right up until birth? It is possible for the mother to experience complications right up until giving birth that may threaten her life. Should we make life-saving measures illegal at that point?

Or do you subscribe to the far-right wing belief that pro-choice activists are trying to legalize late-term abortion in order to provide human sacrifice to their communist gods?

Who's your team?

@sargentd said:

never trust a male 3rd wave feminist

What is wrong with you....

Read my post above:

As for your strawman argument:

Liberals and right-wingers are two sides of the same coin. Both sides have indoctrinated fanatics willing to sacrifice human lives for their team. It's all just a big team sport for them.

@mrbojangles25: I will clear up a bit my position by using the example that appeared in this thread when SUD123456 brought back my previous thread about Spanish female firefighters.

My original complain was about a 40% quota for female firefighters (generally less than 10% of applicants are female) and the elimination of several physical tests that women generally found difficult to pass.

I considered this reduced the effectiveness of a an important force and that it was unfair for the male applicants that could loose their spot even if they have gotten better grades on the test.

Then comes SUD123456 and accuses me of being against allowing women to become firefighters. This is probably based on the fact that several decades ago women were indeed not allowed to become firefighters.

But that has not been the case for decades.

By painting my position as being against female firefighters, instead of being against lower and uneven entry requirements, my position is seen as extremist and unfair. Thefore easy to dismiss. This is why I see it as a strawman argument.

So when discussing why I oppose certain kind of feminism ideologies it's much better for me to speak about individual topics because I can mention which aspects I do not consider to be fair. If on the other hand, several unrelated issues are conflated and my position is misrepresented as being against obviously very fair older feminism achievements (such the ability of women to vote, the ability to get a loan or simply being allowed in certain jobs), then my ability to argue a point is immediately shut down.

@nirgal: I don't doubt that the statement is true. Just was pointing out that the source didn't back it up.

@sargentd: Da Bears.

It's been an exciting off-season.

@Jag85: As usual, the key difference appears to be what is mainstream in each party. Allowing late term abortions of choice up to just prior to birth is a fringe position that the Democratic party doesn't support or push for. Meanwhile, preventing abortions of choice immediately after conception is supported and actively pursued by the party. Even preventing abortions for health reasons have been famously pursued by the party recently.

@mattbbpl: Sure, I agree Republicans trying to ban abortions even in the first trimester is an extreme restriction on reproductive rights. In such a scenario, a strong feminist movement is necessary to fight back against Republicans on this issue. But it's a very America-specific issue and doesn't really apply on this side of the ocean, where there are no mainstream parties trying to push what Republicans are pushing in the US.

@Jag85: Sure, our Overton window is very.... different, lol.