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We must have grown up in drastically different times then - I'm barely 20 and for the majority of my life I have been taught that boys are smelly and girls are

We must have grown up in drastically different times then - I'm barely 20 and for the majority of my life I have been taught that boys are smelly and girls are sweet, boys do the dirty jobs and that men are dangerous and shouldn't be left alone with women. Sure, men have had the upper hand for centuries but we live in an age where the scales have tipped - we need to be careful that instead of having a substantial boost for having a dick, or a vagina, that instead every has the same substantial advantage.

ritchiea 14y ago
Barely 20 is pretty young, I suspect as you get older you will notice more and more ways men still have societal advantages. Around 20 most of your life you've spent in school, where if you're in a relatively progressive environment your teachers and administrators have made a point to put students of both genders on equal footing.
- BSousa 14y ago
  The problem (at least here) is that they don't. Boys are usually given harsher sentences for same misbehavior as girls. Also, there is more boys dropping out than girls. Girls tend to grade higher than boys as well. Unemployment of young folk (<30) is more prevalent in men than women. I don't want to take anything from the women's struggle, but more and more, they are getting the upper hand. (Heck, my boy is 11 months old, and even now, he gets more 'insults' about behavior then his female cousin about same age)
jk215 14y ago
Men have had the upper hand since the dawn of existence and still have the upper hand in basically every society in the world.
- nawitus 14y ago
  Nope, men have the upper hand and lower hand, and if you take the average out of that then women are men are equal at least in all Western nations. Even though 60-80% of politicians may be male, that's contrasted with 80% of homeless people being male, 80% of suicides made by men. If we look at young people, then women clearly have the uppder hand. In addition to having the upper hand in dating, they out-earn young men and have greater success in education. Interestingly, if women are better than men at something, then the explanation is never discrimination, but if men are better than women, then the reason is discrimination.
  - fluidcruft 14y ago
    If "men have the upper hand and lower hand"; then, yes men actually do have the upper hand.
    - nawitus 14y ago
      "X have upper hand" implies that on average X are better off than non-X. Therefore it's not very honest to talk only about the well-off subset of X, if there's a similarly sized not-so-well-off subset of X which mirrors the successful subset.
      - fluidcruft 14y ago
        > "X have upper hand" implies that on average X are better off than non-X. I don't think that's a valid inference, honestly. Firstly, "average" is too tied to distribution and biased outliers and asymmetry. Perhaps you intended to compare medians. "have the upper hand" I think means that when you compare proportions of X to non-X within strata that the proportion of X decreases with increasing status.
  - sophacles 14y ago
    Query: why are 80% of men homeless. That stat on it's own is not indicative of disadvantage towards men. There needs to be some analysis of the why to determine that. Quey: how does the suicide give women an "uppper hand" this is a personal choice, and doesn't seem to be about gender equality at all. Sure you could say "men are more pressured..." but you could also say "women aren't empowered to make decisions about their body and don't see it as viable". Again: how does the stat show an upper hand? About dating: I don't think you can declare women have the "upper hand". At best they have an "even hand". Sure there are pretty girls that get an absurde level of "power of choice", but there are plenty of men in the same category. Similarly when the traditional "men approach" role is taken, women are stuck with what comes their way. Putting it another way: in my experience the problems women experience in dating are the same as the problems men experience: shitty candidates, lots of fear of rejection, insecurity and incompatability issues. Leading to: Query: how do women have the upper hand in dating in your mind?
wpietri 14y ago
Well, honestly, I didn't start noticing my privilege until I was a fair bit older than 20. It's a normal cognitive bias. Nobody wakes up in the the morning saying, "Thank goodness I have legs," as they jump out of bed. We just accept the positives life hands us as normal. What we notice are the negatives. Racial privilege was the one I noticed first. And that was mainly because I lived in places where as a foreigner I was outside the normal framework. That made it much easier to see race and class dynamics at work. It was only after that I could start seeing gender dynamics more clearly. But they're still hard, because you can't try be an outsider to that in the same way. I agree that we should be working toward parity. I just don't think we're there yet.
malcolmmcc 14y ago
The scales still have a way to go. Sure, it's sometimes more acceptable to make sweeping negative generalities about men than women, because we're more tuned in to misogyny than misandry, but the reality remains that women still have serious issues to contend with, including by not limited to: - lack of representation in media (look up the Bechdel test) - street harassment - pay discrepancies - discrimination in hiring processes, etc And even calling women "sweet" isn't always appreciated. See http://rookiemag.com/2013/04/no-more-nice-girls/ http://rookiemag.com/2013/04/no-more-nice-girls/
GhotiFish 14y ago
As a man, at least here in north America. You're expected to have a thick skin, to not care if someone has a better lot, and to more or less take what you want (so long as it's not immoral to do so). There are quiet a few men who don't fit this bill, but I have to ask: What's so bad about these expectations? If these expectations remain, what possible social change could occur that would put our "brutish" gender in the crapper? As long as that cultural push exists to be stoic, strong, tough, and to go for what they want, then our male culture is ingrained to be immune to a social upheaval. It's a good way to live if you ask me. My recommendation is to not care. I do not care. I hope the girls have fun on LuLu. Now if the girls want to change their cultural expectations to make their lives better? Sounds great! I don't care.

ritchiea 14y ago

Barely 20 is pretty young, I suspect as you get older you will notice more and more ways men still have societal advantages. Around 20 most of your life you've spent in school, where if you're in a relatively progressive environment your teachers and administrators have made a point to put students of both genders on equal footing.

BSousa 14y ago
The problem (at least here) is that they don't. Boys are usually given harsher sentences for same misbehavior as girls. Also, there is more boys dropping out than girls. Girls tend to grade higher than boys as well. Unemployment of young folk (<30) is more prevalent in men than women. I don't want to take anything from the women's struggle, but more and more, they are getting the upper hand. (Heck, my boy is 11 months old, and even now, he gets more 'insults' about behavior then his female cousin about same age)

jk215 14y ago

Men have had the upper hand since the dawn of existence and still have the upper hand in basically every society in the world.

nawitus 14y ago
Nope, men have the upper hand and lower hand, and if you take the average out of that then women are men are equal at least in all Western nations. Even though 60-80% of politicians may be male, that's contrasted with 80% of homeless people being male, 80% of suicides made by men. If we look at young people, then women clearly have the uppder hand. In addition to having the upper hand in dating, they out-earn young men and have greater success in education. Interestingly, if women are better than men at something, then the explanation is never discrimination, but if men are better than women, then the reason is discrimination.
- fluidcruft 14y ago
  If "men have the upper hand and lower hand"; then, yes men actually do have the upper hand.
  - nawitus 14y ago
    "X have upper hand" implies that on average X are better off than non-X. Therefore it's not very honest to talk only about the well-off subset of X, if there's a similarly sized not-so-well-off subset of X which mirrors the successful subset.
    - fluidcruft 14y ago
      > "X have upper hand" implies that on average X are better off than non-X. I don't think that's a valid inference, honestly. Firstly, "average" is too tied to distribution and biased outliers and asymmetry. Perhaps you intended to compare medians. "have the upper hand" I think means that when you compare proportions of X to non-X within strata that the proportion of X decreases with increasing status.
- sophacles 14y ago
  Query: why are 80% of men homeless. That stat on it's own is not indicative of disadvantage towards men. There needs to be some analysis of the why to determine that. Quey: how does the suicide give women an "uppper hand" this is a personal choice, and doesn't seem to be about gender equality at all. Sure you could say "men are more pressured..." but you could also say "women aren't empowered to make decisions about their body and don't see it as viable". Again: how does the stat show an upper hand? About dating: I don't think you can declare women have the "upper hand". At best they have an "even hand". Sure there are pretty girls that get an absurde level of "power of choice", but there are plenty of men in the same category. Similarly when the traditional "men approach" role is taken, women are stuck with what comes their way. Putting it another way: in my experience the problems women experience in dating are the same as the problems men experience: shitty candidates, lots of fear of rejection, insecurity and incompatability issues. Leading to: Query: how do women have the upper hand in dating in your mind?

wpietri 14y ago

Well, honestly, I didn't start noticing my privilege until I was a fair bit older than 20. It's a normal cognitive bias. Nobody wakes up in the the morning saying, "Thank goodness I have legs," as they jump out of bed. We just accept the positives life hands us as normal. What we notice are the negatives. Racial privilege was the one I noticed first. And that was mainly because I lived in places where as a foreigner I was outside the normal framework. That made it much easier to see race and class dynamics at work. It was only after that I could start seeing gender dynamics more clearly. But they're still hard, because you can't try be an outsider to that in the same way. I agree that we should be working toward parity. I just don't think we're there yet.

malcolmmcc 14y ago

The scales still have a way to go. Sure, it's sometimes more acceptable to make sweeping negative generalities about men than women, because we're more tuned in to misogyny than misandry, but the reality remains that women still have serious issues to contend with, including by not limited to: - lack of representation in media (look up the Bechdel test) - street harassment - pay discrepancies - discrimination in hiring processes, etc And even calling women "sweet" isn't always appreciated. See http://rookiemag.com/2013/04/no-more-nice-girls/ http://rookiemag.com/2013/04/no-more-nice-girls/

GhotiFish 14y ago

As a man, at least here in north America. You're expected to have a thick skin, to not care if someone has a better lot, and to more or less take what you want (so long as it's not immoral to do so). There are quiet a few men who don't fit this bill, but I have to ask: What's so bad about these expectations? If these expectations remain, what possible social change could occur that would put our "brutish" gender in the crapper? As long as that cultural push exists to be stoic, strong, tough, and to go for what they want, then our male culture is ingrained to be immune to a social upheaval. It's a good way to live if you ask me. My recommendation is to not care. I do not care. I hope the girls have fun on LuLu. Now if the girls want to change their cultural expectations to make their lives better? Sounds great! I don't care.