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> they've consistently been told that everything is their fault because they have male privilege. This is not me. This is not anyone I know. This is not anyone

> they've consistently been told that everything is their fault because they have male privilege. This is not me. This is not anyone I know. This is not anyone I've ever known. However, this is what I see people say online about other people who they've never met. Did you grow up consistently being told that every single thing is your fault because you have male privilege, or are you repeating something you read online or in the media?

ryandv 1y ago
This sentiment seems to be especially common with white progressive women in urban metropolitan areas and their (so-called) "allies." It is the first setting in which I encountered these ideas being regularly and shamelessly circulated. As a visible and ethnic minority I did not encounter such rhetoric growing up in predominantly immigrant socially conservative suburban environments.
- immibis 1y ago
  I've not seen anyone express this sentiment, beyond a few internet trolls, either. I've only seen a certain kind of men claiming that it's always expressed towards them. It appears to be mostly imagined in their heads, though I'm open to seeing the evidence that every time you walk down the street you are heckled for not using your male privilege to solve climate change.
  - ryandv 1y ago
    Well I guess I won't be heard here either then, when my lived experience as a visible and marginalized ethnic minority is being literally erased.
    - kjkjadksj 1y ago
      How is that the conclusion you draw from the post you replied to?
    - freejazz 1y ago
      litrally
    - btilly 1y ago
      As DBT teaches, "Two things can be true at the same time." My son's lived experience doesn't invalidate yours. Just as it also doesn't invalidate my half-brother Tom's, who lives on a native reservation, nor my nieces, who are members of that tribe. You are wrong if you believe that I would not be willing to hear your experience. Remember, I'm the one saying, "Polarization is bad, we have to be willing to hear each other!" Sure, I'm sharing my son's experience. Which may be a hard experience for you to accept. But that really doesn't mean that I'm unwilling to hear your experience. Just as I have heard the experience of other family members with vastly different life stories.
- graemep 1y ago
  I noticed the same thing in the UK. There is a certain group of women who cannot accept that women can be at fault, for example that a woman can be an abuser, regardless of the facts. > As a visible and ethnic minority I did not encounter such rhetoric growing up in predominantly immigrant socially conservative suburban environments. Not even social liberal ethnic members of minorities seem to be as inclined to do it was affluent white women. I think some people who are actually privileged play up being women (or being gay, or ethnic minority, or whatever) in order to play at belonging to an oppressed group. Its a bit like people claiming to be working class because they were as children, even if they are now living in a mansion. I am visible ethnic minority but did not grow up in a predominately immigrant or socially conservative area in the UK. I have lived elsewhere though.
graemep 1y ago
It is something a lot of people say online, and some aspects of it happen in real life.
- ryandrake 1y ago
  "A lot of people say" all sorts of stupid things online. That doesn't mean it's some sort of societal movement. I'd love to see actual concrete examples of "they have grown up in a world where they've consistently been told that everything is their fault." Not imaginary slights conjured up by people with a persecution complex. Actual social institutions actually telling men that everything is their fault. If they are growing up "in this world" then there must be plenty of examples of this somewhere.
  - btilly 1y ago
    Actual concrete examples as judged by whom? Any concrete example can be dismissed as imaginary slights conjured up by people with a persecution complex. You just indicated your willingness to do so. Doing so creates a version of a No True Scotsman fallacy. You demand examples, but any example you are provided with, you will dismiss. In this discussion you've had the opportunity to hear several concrete examples. For example my description of my son's experience, and JulianChastain's in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45918197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45918197. If you're opening to listening, there are plenty of young men out there who are willing to share their stories. Granted, the men doing so are generally hurt. And hurt people overgeneralize. So you need to listen, with empathy, for the hurt. And not dismiss because of the overgeneralization.
    - ryandrake 1y ago
      I look at that thread and I see "some people" (who?) and "a conversation" (with whom??). This stuff doesn't generalize to something that's happening in the world at large, and the OP even admits that himself. When I went to high school there were a handful of bullies and I could tell you I have personal experience with bullies, but that doesn't mean that in general, people are growing up in "a world of bullying" or that there is some kind of institutional push to increase bullying. What's more likely? The entire world is actually persecuting young men, or: people are having a handful of bad personal experiences, extrapolating them to the whole world, going online to find validation of this world view, and then finally finding the exact SubReddit dedicated to that world view endlessly pumping out examples of it?
JulianChastain 1y ago
I grew up with the sentiment that forms of masculinity are some of the chief evils of society being the dominant narrative. I grew up learning that the US is patriarchal culture, and that it must continue to evolve and progress in order to truly provide equal opportunity to women. This narrative always seemed to view men as a kind of primordial oppressor. I remember in high school and college it was common for some people to say, "Kill All Men!" as a half joking slogan. I'm 24 for reference.
- kjkjadksj 1y ago
  No, it is only referring to men who are, you know, evil to other people. Of which there are plenty of examples. One of them is our president.
  - Uhhrrr 1y ago
    I confess, I'm not very bright and am having trouble decoding the subtleties of "Kill All Men!" as you have done. Could you explain how you got from "All" to "just the bad ones"? Would you interpret "Kill All Women" in the same manner? Tangential question: do you advocate death for all bad people, a group which according to you includes the president?
    - neutronicus 1y ago
      I think GP is more in response to "view[ing] men as a kind of primordial oppressor", then the "Kill All Men" statement. In any case - "Kill All Men" was always just a shibboleth. Treating it as an actual policy recommendation is prima facie risible. Throwing it out there to see who is oblivious enough to object is the point.
      - JulianChastain 1y ago
        When I grew up, I was taught that if someone in your friend group makes a racist joke, you should stand up to them, and inform them that casual racism leads to normalizing racism. Even if "Kill All Men" was just a shibboleth of a specific online culture, it seems like objecting to it would be a kind of moral duty (for the same reasons), as long we are in agreement that normalized misandry is bad. But again, in my generation I don't think there was any kind of consensus that misandry is wrong. That's why objecting to a shibboleth like this would be evidence of how "oblivious" and behind the times you are
BryantD 1y ago
There's a nuance here: a lot of times, it's people hearing "male privilege is a problem" and immediately being told that this means "you personally are at fault!" So it's very understandable that people believe that they're being told "everything is their fault because they have male privilege" when they're not.
btilly 1y ago
This is a strawman argument, which is already answered in my comment. My impression is not based on something I read online or in the media. Nor is it based on my experiences back when I was growing up in the 1980s. My impression is based on the lived experience of my children, as consistently described by them. And particularly of the opinion of my son, who has become radicalized against it. His radicalization started with outrage that when he applied to college, his excellent SAT scores were not allowed to be submitted to most of the colleges that he wanted to go to. "Because the tests are racist and sexist." Luckily he managed to get into UC San Diego. But there he found a requirement for taking a series of courses that he saw as straight up DEI indoctrination. The content of which often outraged him. It didn't help that his very real struggles were often dismissed by the very same people who were lecturing him about his privilege. He learned that he will never be heard, and he is mad about it. Do you have any more takes demonstrating your unwillingness to hear the lived experiences of people you disagree with? Demonstrating the dismissiveness that my son is overreacting against?
- miltonlost 1y ago
  > But there he found a requirement for taking a series of courses that he saw as straight up DEI indoctrination. The content of which often outraged him. Oh no, having to take courses he didn't like. And content of which we just have to take his word for is enough to be outraged about. Is college not a place to go to open yourself to other ideas?
- ranger_danger 1y ago
  A quick look at their post history will tell you exactly what kind of person they are.
- drivebyhooting 1y ago
  Can you elaborate on the SAT score interdiction?
  - layer8 1y ago
    For example: https://publiccounsel.org/press-releases/milestone-settlement-in-higher-education-reached-between-students-and-university-of-california/ https://publiccounsel.org/press-releases/milestone-settlemen...
tshaddox 1y ago
If I was a conservative activist and I wanted to persuade you to join me, something I would consider is trying to use social media to convince you that my political opponents or society at large are your enemy.
neutronicus 1y ago
"Grow up", no. In college 2006-2010 none of this was in the zeitgeist. In middle school in the 90s and aughts we (I included) casually used slurs that would get your business boycotted if you used them today. I first became of it online (through ShitRedditSays, for anyone who remembers that) ~2011. Studying Physics in graduate school 2012-2018 my female contemporaries used basically the same lexicon I'd become familiar with through lurking online gender wars ("patriarchy", "male privilege", "rape culture"). In parallel to this I was involved with a competitive card game community that was initially composed of standard gamer dude types unfamiliar with the above lexicon but that eventually became very proud (in online spaces) of adopting it. This transition was sort of messy - old-guard gamer-dude types were often uncomfortable with their freshly-politicized gaming community and left for other communities. There was more ... jejune drama where guys liked their semi-horny anime-girl card-game accoutrements (playmats, card sleeves) and there was much bickering over the decision to ban this type of thing. And then, in-my-view more-serious drama over whether to ban MAGA attire from tournaments. Pre-Trump-victory people thought it was funny to do it ironically, afterwards there was again all kinds of bickering of how much MAGA stuff needed to be banned in order for the community to be sufficiently LGBT/minority-inclusive. "All of it" was the viewpoint that eventually won out. A lot of this was online but everybody had thoughts on it and talked about it at in-person tournaments, of which I attended a lot. In general there was an implicit invitation for young men like myself to learn this lexicon and accompanying intellectual framework and distinguish ourselves from "incels" (this term was sort of late in the game, I guess its predecessor was "neckbeard"? who remembers) by using it frequently and taking the opportunity to declaim its importance to other young men who weren't yet on board. Public and vitriolic denunciation of the gaming community was expected. You can probably tell from my above recap that I engaged with all this enough to understand the main perspectives being voiced and restate them in a way that made me seem at least open-minded and thoughtful, if not fully convinced. I also believed at every point that this was pretty much necessary in order to be in good standing socially speaking. This was pretty much orthogonal to getting laid, which occurred through other channels and with women who didn't seem particularly aware of any of this (or, in the case of my now-wife, just not all that bought-in). I am 37 and now married with kids and the vibe has changed a lot. Women of my acquaintance use these terms a lot less but when they are used they are completely uncontroversial. Husbands now have more right to kind of push back on the whole intellectual superstructure in spots without being slapped down. Having young sons changes the texture of things, as does living in a city (Baltimore) where young (black) men are mistreated in ways that privileged women feel duty-bound to confront and discuss. So. w/r/t your question. That specific framing is hyperbolic. But I do think that I viewed as necessary for me to publicly affirm my unconscious participation in Patriarchy and Rape Culture, and the importance of educating other young men on these topics, and the importance of participating in the ostracism of young men who didn't display openness to making the same kinds of affirmations, for a good decade or so of my life. I also think that the necessity I describe was something that came primarily from online spaces and bled over to interactions with hyper-online people (Physics grad students and competitive card game players). Make of that what you will.
_DeadFred_ 1y ago
And I've watched my boy go from doing City Year and being very liberal to wanting to move to Texas to be with people he can be comfortable around because of this.

ryandv 1y ago

This sentiment seems to be especially common with white progressive women in urban metropolitan areas and their (so-called) "allies." It is the first setting in which I encountered these ideas being regularly and shamelessly circulated. As a visible and ethnic minority I did not encounter such rhetoric growing up in predominantly immigrant socially conservative suburban environments.

immibis 1y ago
I've not seen anyone express this sentiment, beyond a few internet trolls, either. I've only seen a certain kind of men claiming that it's always expressed towards them. It appears to be mostly imagined in their heads, though I'm open to seeing the evidence that every time you walk down the street you are heckled for not using your male privilege to solve climate change.
- ryandv 1y ago
  Well I guess I won't be heard here either then, when my lived experience as a visible and marginalized ethnic minority is being literally erased.
  - kjkjadksj 1y ago
    How is that the conclusion you draw from the post you replied to?
  - freejazz 1y ago
    litrally
  - btilly 1y ago
    As DBT teaches, "Two things can be true at the same time." My son's lived experience doesn't invalidate yours. Just as it also doesn't invalidate my half-brother Tom's, who lives on a native reservation, nor my nieces, who are members of that tribe. You are wrong if you believe that I would not be willing to hear your experience. Remember, I'm the one saying, "Polarization is bad, we have to be willing to hear each other!" Sure, I'm sharing my son's experience. Which may be a hard experience for you to accept. But that really doesn't mean that I'm unwilling to hear your experience. Just as I have heard the experience of other family members with vastly different life stories.
graemep 1y ago
I noticed the same thing in the UK. There is a certain group of women who cannot accept that women can be at fault, for example that a woman can be an abuser, regardless of the facts. > As a visible and ethnic minority I did not encounter such rhetoric growing up in predominantly immigrant socially conservative suburban environments. Not even social liberal ethnic members of minorities seem to be as inclined to do it was affluent white women. I think some people who are actually privileged play up being women (or being gay, or ethnic minority, or whatever) in order to play at belonging to an oppressed group. Its a bit like people claiming to be working class because they were as children, even if they are now living in a mansion. I am visible ethnic minority but did not grow up in a predominately immigrant or socially conservative area in the UK. I have lived elsewhere though.

graemep 1y ago

It is something a lot of people say online, and some aspects of it happen in real life.

ryandrake 1y ago
"A lot of people say" all sorts of stupid things online. That doesn't mean it's some sort of societal movement. I'd love to see actual concrete examples of "they have grown up in a world where they've consistently been told that everything is their fault." Not imaginary slights conjured up by people with a persecution complex. Actual social institutions actually telling men that everything is their fault. If they are growing up "in this world" then there must be plenty of examples of this somewhere.
- btilly 1y ago
  Actual concrete examples as judged by whom? Any concrete example can be dismissed as imaginary slights conjured up by people with a persecution complex. You just indicated your willingness to do so. Doing so creates a version of a No True Scotsman fallacy. You demand examples, but any example you are provided with, you will dismiss. In this discussion you've had the opportunity to hear several concrete examples. For example my description of my son's experience, and JulianChastain's in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45918197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45918197. If you're opening to listening, there are plenty of young men out there who are willing to share their stories. Granted, the men doing so are generally hurt. And hurt people overgeneralize. So you need to listen, with empathy, for the hurt. And not dismiss because of the overgeneralization.
  - ryandrake 1y ago
    I look at that thread and I see "some people" (who?) and "a conversation" (with whom??). This stuff doesn't generalize to something that's happening in the world at large, and the OP even admits that himself. When I went to high school there were a handful of bullies and I could tell you I have personal experience with bullies, but that doesn't mean that in general, people are growing up in "a world of bullying" or that there is some kind of institutional push to increase bullying. What's more likely? The entire world is actually persecuting young men, or: people are having a handful of bad personal experiences, extrapolating them to the whole world, going online to find validation of this world view, and then finally finding the exact SubReddit dedicated to that world view endlessly pumping out examples of it?

JulianChastain 1y ago

I grew up with the sentiment that forms of masculinity are some of the chief evils of society being the dominant narrative. I grew up learning that the US is patriarchal culture, and that it must continue to evolve and progress in order to truly provide equal opportunity to women. This narrative always seemed to view men as a kind of primordial oppressor. I remember in high school and college it was common for some people to say, "Kill All Men!" as a half joking slogan. I'm 24 for reference.

kjkjadksj 1y ago
No, it is only referring to men who are, you know, evil to other people. Of which there are plenty of examples. One of them is our president.
- Uhhrrr 1y ago
  I confess, I'm not very bright and am having trouble decoding the subtleties of "Kill All Men!" as you have done. Could you explain how you got from "All" to "just the bad ones"? Would you interpret "Kill All Women" in the same manner? Tangential question: do you advocate death for all bad people, a group which according to you includes the president?
  - neutronicus 1y ago
    I think GP is more in response to "view[ing] men as a kind of primordial oppressor", then the "Kill All Men" statement. In any case - "Kill All Men" was always just a shibboleth. Treating it as an actual policy recommendation is prima facie risible. Throwing it out there to see who is oblivious enough to object is the point.
    - JulianChastain 1y ago
      When I grew up, I was taught that if someone in your friend group makes a racist joke, you should stand up to them, and inform them that casual racism leads to normalizing racism. Even if "Kill All Men" was just a shibboleth of a specific online culture, it seems like objecting to it would be a kind of moral duty (for the same reasons), as long we are in agreement that normalized misandry is bad. But again, in my generation I don't think there was any kind of consensus that misandry is wrong. That's why objecting to a shibboleth like this would be evidence of how "oblivious" and behind the times you are

BryantD 1y ago

There's a nuance here: a lot of times, it's people hearing "male privilege is a problem" and immediately being told that this means "you personally are at fault!" So it's very understandable that people believe that they're being told "everything is their fault because they have male privilege" when they're not.

btilly 1y ago

This is a strawman argument, which is already answered in my comment. My impression is not based on something I read online or in the media. Nor is it based on my experiences back when I was growing up in the 1980s. My impression is based on the lived experience of my children, as consistently described by them. And particularly of the opinion of my son, who has become radicalized against it. His radicalization started with outrage that when he applied to college, his excellent SAT scores were not allowed to be submitted to most of the colleges that he wanted to go to. "Because the tests are racist and sexist." Luckily he managed to get into UC San Diego. But there he found a requirement for taking a series of courses that he saw as straight up DEI indoctrination. The content of which often outraged him. It didn't help that his very real struggles were often dismissed by the very same people who were lecturing him about his privilege. He learned that he will never be heard, and he is mad about it. Do you have any more takes demonstrating your unwillingness to hear the lived experiences of people you disagree with? Demonstrating the dismissiveness that my son is overreacting against?

miltonlost 1y ago
> But there he found a requirement for taking a series of courses that he saw as straight up DEI indoctrination. The content of which often outraged him. Oh no, having to take courses he didn't like. And content of which we just have to take his word for is enough to be outraged about. Is college not a place to go to open yourself to other ideas?
ranger_danger 1y ago
A quick look at their post history will tell you exactly what kind of person they are.
drivebyhooting 1y ago
Can you elaborate on the SAT score interdiction?
- layer8 1y ago
  For example: https://publiccounsel.org/press-releases/milestone-settlement-in-higher-education-reached-between-students-and-university-of-california/ https://publiccounsel.org/press-releases/milestone-settlemen...

tshaddox 1y ago

If I was a conservative activist and I wanted to persuade you to join me, something I would consider is trying to use social media to convince you that my political opponents or society at large are your enemy.

neutronicus 1y ago

"Grow up", no. In college 2006-2010 none of this was in the zeitgeist. In middle school in the 90s and aughts we (I included) casually used slurs that would get your business boycotted if you used them today. I first became of it online (through ShitRedditSays, for anyone who remembers that) ~2011. Studying Physics in graduate school 2012-2018 my female contemporaries used basically the same lexicon I'd become familiar with through lurking online gender wars ("patriarchy", "male privilege", "rape culture"). In parallel to this I was involved with a competitive card game community that was initially composed of standard gamer dude types unfamiliar with the above lexicon but that eventually became very proud (in online spaces) of adopting it. This transition was sort of messy - old-guard gamer-dude types were often uncomfortable with their freshly-politicized gaming community and left for other communities. There was more ... jejune drama where guys liked their semi-horny anime-girl card-game accoutrements (playmats, card sleeves) and there was much bickering over the decision to ban this type of thing. And then, in-my-view more-serious drama over whether to ban MAGA attire from tournaments. Pre-Trump-victory people thought it was funny to do it ironically, afterwards there was again all kinds of bickering of how much MAGA stuff needed to be banned in order for the community to be sufficiently LGBT/minority-inclusive. "All of it" was the viewpoint that eventually won out. A lot of this was online but everybody had thoughts on it and talked about it at in-person tournaments, of which I attended a lot. In general there was an implicit invitation for young men like myself to learn this lexicon and accompanying intellectual framework and distinguish ourselves from "incels" (this term was sort of late in the game, I guess its predecessor was "neckbeard"? who remembers) by using it frequently and taking the opportunity to declaim its importance to other young men who weren't yet on board. Public and vitriolic denunciation of the gaming community was expected. You can probably tell from my above recap that I engaged with all this enough to understand the main perspectives being voiced and restate them in a way that made me seem at least open-minded and thoughtful, if not fully convinced. I also believed at every point that this was pretty much necessary in order to be in good standing socially speaking. This was pretty much orthogonal to getting laid, which occurred through other channels and with women who didn't seem particularly aware of any of this (or, in the case of my now-wife, just not all that bought-in). I am 37 and now married with kids and the vibe has changed a lot. Women of my acquaintance use these terms a lot less but when they are used they are completely uncontroversial. Husbands now have more right to kind of push back on the whole intellectual superstructure in spots without being slapped down. Having young sons changes the texture of things, as does living in a city (Baltimore) where young (black) men are mistreated in ways that privileged women feel duty-bound to confront and discuss. So. w/r/t your question. That specific framing is hyperbolic. But I do think that I viewed as necessary for me to publicly affirm my unconscious participation in Patriarchy and Rape Culture, and the importance of educating other young men on these topics, and the importance of participating in the ostracism of young men who didn't display openness to making the same kinds of affirmations, for a good decade or so of my life. I also think that the necessity I describe was something that came primarily from online spaces and bled over to interactions with hyper-online people (Physics grad students and competitive card game players). Make of that what you will.

_DeadFred_ 1y ago

And I've watched my boy go from doing City Year and being very liberal to wanting to move to Texas to be with people he can be comfortable around because of this.