Stonespring's Men thread - title edited by host
stonespring
Shipmate
I know it's probably bad that I think this way - I'm not sure how bad though - but I believe that anyone who is born with an expressed Y chromosome is inherently more likely to commit physical and sexual violence than anyone else and that any other seemingly noble action or intention that comes from such a person is likely to come from a sublimated desire to dominate and harm (forgive the pseudoscientific Freudian term, but I can't come up with a better one). Therefore, if science makes it possible (making sperm from an egg or other cell, or foregoing sperm altogether by making an embryo from two eggs) and if there is an ethical way to do it (say by a boycott of reproducing with men by all women), then humanity should come up with a way to not have men anymore.
As I have said elsewhere, I have a very hard time identifying as a Christian precisely because Christ incarnated into a male body. Even if, by being God, Jesus managed to live sinlessly, I have a very hard time worshipping anything with a male body. The only kind of Christian I think I could be is one with a deep devotion to the Virgin Mary and female saints as a way of getting to Christ and God without having to look or think about Jesus' body and maleness, although the fact that there is no female or intersex incarnation strikes me as the injustice of the patriarchy being carried out on the scale of eternity, which infuriates me even further.
All of this isn't to say that women don't ever commit physical or sexual violence - but I haven't seen any evidence in my life that doesn't say that women do so much, much less often than men do. I'm also aware of the possibility that in a society without men, but one that still had been formed by thousands of years of patriarchy, some women might come to occupy violent, coercive roles that had previously been almost entirely occupied by men, but I can't help but think that as enough time passes without men this behavior would become less and less common without disappearing entirely.
I'm aware that in believing this I am fueling the fantasies and conspiracy theories of the manosphere and far right who think that liberals want to get rid of masculinity and manhood altogether. If it were technologically possible and some women tried to do what I propose, there is the first problem that many women, especially those with sons or those whose privilege is defined by their roles in a traditional patriarchy, would oppose it strongly and may even endorse violent opposition of it (although I suspect most of the violence would be done by men). I also fear that if such an effort to have humanity not have men started to have any success, the remaining men and their female supporters would try to stage a coup and institute a type of patriarchal fascism that would make Gilead in The Handmaid's Tale seem liberal in comparison.
Finally, I'm aware that I'm ignoring the existence of intersex, trans, and nonbinary people in this thought exercise. In a world with no Y chromosomes (which might come to pass by entirely natural means in a few million years, some scientists suggest), there would be no trans women, but there would still be nonbinary people and trans men (if sex assignment at birth even occurs in such a society). Even if the whole idea of sex or gender as an innate immutable quality ceases to exist or seems irrelevant in such a society, I think it is likely there would still be people who experience dysphoria related to the sexual characteristics of their bodies even if there are no cisgender men to make comparisons to. I think that even if such people continued to receive testosterone and other medical treatment to affirm their gender identity (which may not be called "male" or "nonbinary" in such a society), they, unlike cisgender men, trans women and assigned-male-at-birth non-binary persons today, would not have been raised to think they are "men" in a patriarchal society and hence would probably not be a danger to humanity in the way that people assigned male at birth are today.
I write all this as someone assigned male at birth, someone who doesn't want to be a man or masculine but is equally repelled by feminine clothing and mannerisms because I see in them the oppression and enslavement of women. I'm ok with they/them pronouns but I don't think I deserve to not use he/him pronouns because I want to remind myself and others that I am dangerous and in an ideal world should not be allowed to have power of any sort. So although I am, as I have said elsewhere, kinda-maybe-sorta nonbinary, I don't think I deserve a non-binary or trans identity just as Rachel Dolezal did not deserve to identify as Black. If I had "real" gender dysphoria, the kind that made life as a man intolerable, that might be different, but it isn't my body that I hate, but the maleness of my mind, upbringing, and lifelong accumulated, often invisible, privilege, something that estrogen could only alter in part.
I get that it's probably wrong for me to think this way, but I can't fully unpack why. As I said on another thread, I worry that I am harmful to the cause of justice and equality because I resemble the bogeyman of the right wing so much in the radicalness of my beliefs. I have no idea what I can do to try to change my beliefs while still remaining committed to justice for people of all genders (but especially for those who are not male).
As I have said elsewhere, I have a very hard time identifying as a Christian precisely because Christ incarnated into a male body. Even if, by being God, Jesus managed to live sinlessly, I have a very hard time worshipping anything with a male body. The only kind of Christian I think I could be is one with a deep devotion to the Virgin Mary and female saints as a way of getting to Christ and God without having to look or think about Jesus' body and maleness, although the fact that there is no female or intersex incarnation strikes me as the injustice of the patriarchy being carried out on the scale of eternity, which infuriates me even further.
All of this isn't to say that women don't ever commit physical or sexual violence - but I haven't seen any evidence in my life that doesn't say that women do so much, much less often than men do. I'm also aware of the possibility that in a society without men, but one that still had been formed by thousands of years of patriarchy, some women might come to occupy violent, coercive roles that had previously been almost entirely occupied by men, but I can't help but think that as enough time passes without men this behavior would become less and less common without disappearing entirely.
I'm aware that in believing this I am fueling the fantasies and conspiracy theories of the manosphere and far right who think that liberals want to get rid of masculinity and manhood altogether. If it were technologically possible and some women tried to do what I propose, there is the first problem that many women, especially those with sons or those whose privilege is defined by their roles in a traditional patriarchy, would oppose it strongly and may even endorse violent opposition of it (although I suspect most of the violence would be done by men). I also fear that if such an effort to have humanity not have men started to have any success, the remaining men and their female supporters would try to stage a coup and institute a type of patriarchal fascism that would make Gilead in The Handmaid's Tale seem liberal in comparison.
Finally, I'm aware that I'm ignoring the existence of intersex, trans, and nonbinary people in this thought exercise. In a world with no Y chromosomes (which might come to pass by entirely natural means in a few million years, some scientists suggest), there would be no trans women, but there would still be nonbinary people and trans men (if sex assignment at birth even occurs in such a society). Even if the whole idea of sex or gender as an innate immutable quality ceases to exist or seems irrelevant in such a society, I think it is likely there would still be people who experience dysphoria related to the sexual characteristics of their bodies even if there are no cisgender men to make comparisons to. I think that even if such people continued to receive testosterone and other medical treatment to affirm their gender identity (which may not be called "male" or "nonbinary" in such a society), they, unlike cisgender men, trans women and assigned-male-at-birth non-binary persons today, would not have been raised to think they are "men" in a patriarchal society and hence would probably not be a danger to humanity in the way that people assigned male at birth are today.
I write all this as someone assigned male at birth, someone who doesn't want to be a man or masculine but is equally repelled by feminine clothing and mannerisms because I see in them the oppression and enslavement of women. I'm ok with they/them pronouns but I don't think I deserve to not use he/him pronouns because I want to remind myself and others that I am dangerous and in an ideal world should not be allowed to have power of any sort. So although I am, as I have said elsewhere, kinda-maybe-sorta nonbinary, I don't think I deserve a non-binary or trans identity just as Rachel Dolezal did not deserve to identify as Black. If I had "real" gender dysphoria, the kind that made life as a man intolerable, that might be different, but it isn't my body that I hate, but the maleness of my mind, upbringing, and lifelong accumulated, often invisible, privilege, something that estrogen could only alter in part.
I get that it's probably wrong for me to think this way, but I can't fully unpack why. As I said on another thread, I worry that I am harmful to the cause of justice and equality because I resemble the bogeyman of the right wing so much in the radicalness of my beliefs. I have no idea what I can do to try to change my beliefs while still remaining committed to justice for people of all genders (but especially for those who are not male).
Comments
All the science fiction imaginings of the idea I can think of have been written by cisgender men and view female-only societies at the very least with the male gaze if not explicit sexualization. Which makes me think even less of men.
1. More violent actions are perpetrated by men than women - that's statistically demonstrable.
2. All men are more violent than women.
2 may explain 1, but it is not the same thing. It is also not the only possible explanation. Another is that:
3. the proportion of men who are violent is higher than the proportion of women who are.
The important distinction is that your statement that anyone who is born with an expressed Y chromosome is inherently more likely to commit physical and sexual violence than anyone else is only true if we accept proposition 2, and not proposition 3.
Only if they meet the stereotypes. As a rather unco-ordinated and not physically capable boy I was effectively socialised to be submissive and fearful of the "real boys" - the sporty and strong ones.
I would add re the op - it is possible to be a woman and not be “femme”.
Exactly, they were trying to get you to fulfil a particular version of the gender role. Conversely, I was not considered sufficiently feminine into early adulthood.
Yes. These things cut both ways, of course.
Even in my 60s I still feel the long shadow this cast.
Given the many places where women and/or Black people were at times barred from entry, this hypothetical proposition isn't accomplishing what you appear to be trying to do.
It seems to me that the social construct of "real man" is meant not only to subjugate women but to create a hierarchy among men so that a few can dominate all the rest.
This. Like @KarlLB (though I think I may be a couple of decades older than him), I certainly didn't fit into the strong, sporty, and brainy groups at the fairly up-market Grammer Skool I attended.
Sixty years on, and I don't give a Fig if I don't fit into anyone's mould...what you see is what you get...
I don't follow. The title is something of a rhetorical question, I guess, but in what way is it inciting hatred?
If I said we should get rid of black people, isn't that similar?
A better comparator would be "should we (not we should) get rid of white people?"
Because power structures, historical and current oppression etc.
Although I'd have re-worded the title myself; something along the lines of 'Maybe even men would be better off if we got rid of patriarchy"
Perhaps that's what @stonespring was getting at? I have to admit that the OP was too long for me to read and comprehend...
But the text of the OP discusses ways of preventing the conception of males. This is getting rid. Admittedly, nobody is taking it seriously, because its so sick.
To be honest, I think many of us read this and the AMAB OP’s Purg thread and thought it reflected a level of personal distress on the part of the writer, that left us not wanting to add to it with a harsh critique.
Well, yes, many bigots are probably traumatised in some way. What do we do, wipe their nose, and pat them on the back?
Emapthy is a great quality, but if there is any accountability for actions at all, we can't go on with this sort of pointless hairshirtery..
The position is dire, on both sides of the Atlantic. Reality takes second place to simplistic, nonsensical fantasies of revenge against a world which progressives have the temerity to deal with as it is. The only point on which there is any blame is an unquestioning acceptance of the capitalist marketing-based model of politics, which again is bullshit. Politics is ultimately accountable to reality. If voters vote for idiots who can't deal with reality, more the fool them. It doesn't mean we can all become idiots.
You were told it was sexist on the Hell thread so you know exactly what you're doing. This is a formal hostly warning.
Louise
Epiphanies Host
Of course, a lot of the idiots in question are men, but I would still argue that the problem is the idiocy, not the sex/gender, or however you want to define it. Idiocy is equally open to all comers, in theory at least.
There is, I think, a question to be investigated as to why the Idiot position is so attractive to those that our current culture privileges. I suppose it's because it protects their power. The question is how the citadel can be stormed, not whether we dare do so, and whether we are accountable for any harm to its occupants. Our accountability, our responsibility, is to storm the citadel. Let those who can be safe (I originally wrote "sauve qui peut", and that is what I meant), because without the storming, everyone and everything is universally doomed, because the idiocracy is fatal.
It means to overturn the power of those who are currently holed up in the defensive structure of their own vile stupidity. Aiming all of your fire, your energy, at yourself doesn't strike me as the ideal starting point.
I really don't want to add to your troubles
and distress as Doublethink has said
However at the same time defining an entire group by their chromosomes and attacking them on the basis that their chromosomes determine character and morality really isnt OK in Epiphanies.
I can't put spoiler tags in the thread title so have changed it.
Please don't make arguments for prejudice against entire groups on the basis of biology here.
Thanks!
Louise
https://hbr.org/2018/09/use-your-everyday-privilege-to-help-others
Eirenist you have already been told not to import this to this thread.
Ruth and others please do not respond to this post by Eirenist who has already been warned.
Louise
Epiphanies host
hosting off
Would that be a wild generalisation?
For example, the UK army didn’t start accepting women into all combat roles until 2018.
Would you care to share some statistics on that?
What percentage of men? Or men in general?
Which was kind of my point.
What form would you expect those statistics to take when a lot of what is being described operates at the level of cultures and institutional structures?
Consider the experience described by @KarlLB above - what role does that sort of framing play in setting the 'norming norm' for what male behaviour is supposed to be? How would you expect that to be represented as a statistic?
It's the back story of "Consider Her Ways" by John Wyndham, and probably other Golden Age stories.
It is clear that there is a huge socialization effect. It is less clear to me whether there is a residual biological effect. One can imagine choosing to raise groups of children in isolated communes with either no sex-based socialization, or the "opposite" socialization, but it's hard to imagine getting such a proposal past an ethics panel.
Men are, on average, bigger and stronger than women, so surely this must have an effect: as a matter of practicality, it's difficult for a group of smaller, weaker people to physically intimidate bigger, stronger people.
Depends on how well each group is armed! More seriously: this explains why women are more frequently the victims of domestic violence, but not why most violent crime is male-on-male. Men are not only more likely to commit violent crimes than women are, they are more likely to be victims of violent crimes.