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Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

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Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#141

Post by hosh »

em-bee wrote: post #63
hosh wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I really want, is women to show they can overpower a society of competitive values (which is typically male), with more values of mutual help, and I mean this in the political realm, as in socialism and a society made of collectives, not a society made of owners. Wouldn't "overpowering" those "competitive values" be using a competitive mindset and sabotage the effort for "values of mutual help"?

the competitive mindset pits every individual against every other individual. this is different from a group of people combining their forces to push out an unwanted trait.

Characterizing competition as exclusively individualistic is I think, a very limiting and overly simplistic way to see this. There is such a thing as collectives and institutions being competitive.

Both cooperation and competition is part of the human psyche, and there is a place for competition as well (such as the refinement of personal character and development of capabilities). More problematically are such things as, exploitation, rent-seeking, status-seeking, etc. There are also problems when people in cooperation are not mature or capable enough to take care of themselves and cannot then adequately contribute, and others who contribute to the point of undermining their own health and development.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#142

Post by acdha »

asdiovjdfi wrote: post #131
dustedrob wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Do you really think that is gender specific?

There are pronounced differences in the behaviors and how they manifest. That doesn’t mean one is better or worse in absolute terms, but it does mean that you need different approaches for different problems.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#143

Post by bloopernova »

Certainly some "interesting" voting and flagging going on here. With topics like this, which get a lot of comments that are flagged and hidden, I'd love to see a report on the page. Such a report could show whether multiple IPs/users are coordinating on hiding comments they find objectionable.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#144

Post by ClumsyPilot »

quantified wrote: post #127
danjoredd wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the article you are commenting on? He mentions that schools don't service men very well and that most dropouts are men

> But overall, young men hit the labor market or college or whatever less well-prepared as a result of the education system. No facts about it, just some random assertion. Schools aren't going to change the way males relate to playing games, sports, and farting around in general compared with actually studying. What other part of the article did I miss? Oh, this: > the education system isn’t doing very well by lots o…

> Schools aren't going to change the way males relate to playing games, sports, and farting around in general compared with actually studying

Sounds like you have already thought about this and came to a sexist conclusion.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#145

Post by gspencley »

belltaco wrote: post #123
Gibbon1 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My problem besides pure misandrists hiding behind feminism is the quasi-marxist idea that men are a separate species that exploits women. As opposed to the reality that ordinary men are exploited as much but different. In particular you see pointless bashing of young men. Who are actually at the very bottom of the patriarcal order, completely disposable and a seen mostly as fodder. So punching at young men is actuall…

> In particular you see pointless bashing of young men Examples? >the quasi-marxist idea that men are a separate species that exploits women How is that quasi-marxist?

> How is that quasi-marxist?

One of Marxism's core tenets is class struggle: The bourgeois vs the proletariat. Feminism offers a similar narrative, only the proletariat is patriarchy. A group or institution that allegedly serves to advance the interests of men at the expense of women; placing men into positions of power and leadership so that they can enjoy social benefits and privileges intentionally not offered to women.

Most "*-isms" offer this type of narrative. The only thing that changes are the particular power groups vs oppressed. It's not a "left" or "right" phenomenon. Nazism offered the same story and used its ideological bullshit to justify persecution of the Jews: by painting them as a self-serving group that was occupying institutions of power.

The most effective way to get people to hate others is to make the others look both powerful and self-interested.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#146

Post by cultofmetatron »

quantified wrote: post #127
danjoredd wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the article you are commenting on? He mentions that schools don't service men very well and that most dropouts are men

> But overall, young men hit the labor market or college or whatever less well-prepared as a result of the education system. No facts about it, just some random assertion. Schools aren't going to change the way males relate to playing games, sports, and farting around in general compared with actually studying. What other part of the article did I miss? Oh, this: > the education system isn’t doing very well by lots o…

> Do male teachers make that much difference?

lets flip this around. lets say we live in an alternative universe where primary school is primarily male dominated. just drawing from your own life experience, would you ask if not having female teachers affects female students?

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#147

Post by PaulHoule »

clipsy wrote: post #99
PaulHoule wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your fellow man.

From the post I originally replied to: > It seems fair that if women claim more rights, then men can claim some of these "soft" rights too. So it seems the argument is that because men prevent other men from exercising their rights, women deserve to be stripped of rights? Interesting logic. If men are stopping you from exercising your rights perhaps you should listen to the folks talking about toxic masculinity -- wh…

Somebody else may be saying something else in this thread but I am not saying anything about women, I'm talking about the burden of being a man and the way "the patriarchy" or whatever it is can very much kick your ass. That is, it is not a system that works to the benefit of all men but rather a system that privileges some men and uses violence to keep the rest in line.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#148

Post by hdjjhhvvhga »

gopherthon wrote: post #67
mellosouls wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The overwhelming way the left talks about it is in terms of "toxic" masculinity or through the perspective of feminism. The latter is a valid perspective, but dominates the discourse which is hardly a balanced approach.

[flagged]

But it's not a binary choice. You can point out the right is irrational about the situation of women and at the same time agree with them on certain points regarding the situation of boys and men.

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#149

Post by ZeroGravitas »

NickC25 wrote: post #120
wGEric wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The left talks about stagnate wages, rising costs of college, and healthcare all the time. They talk about it as issues for everyone and not just men. Raising minimum wage helps everyone including men. Making college cheaper and easier to access helps everyone including men. Free healthcare helps everyone including men.

They do, but they also vote in politicians who don't really do much to help those issues beyond giving them lip service. Multiple Democratic presidents have not done anything substantial to address some of the issues you mentioned. Not saying that the GOP is better, they are objectively far worse. But the Democrats have squandered every chance to really help this country in meaningful drastic ways. Shit, Biden was TH…

> You think someone who was completely bought and paid for by the healthcare lobby was going to allow Obama to deploy a government-backed healthcare option, instead of the mess we got with the ACA?

Are you talking about Biden, or every single Republican here?

Re: Boys and Men in the United States Are Struggling. The Left Should Talk About It

#150

Post by norwalkbear »

majormajor wrote: post #83

Anyone who isn't a religious fundamentalist needs to find a non-combative way to talk about it that doesn't make it into a zero-sum game between boys and girls because the far-right evangelicals approach this as a means to an end: "here's this thing that will be easy to point at as a justification for the reversion to traditional gender roles that we already wanted." So anyone who wants to advance the experience of p…

Feminists make it zero sum too.
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