I'm sorry, this will be a long post; but my wife and I have both had this on our minds for a while, and this seems to be a good avenue to share it.
What we have to realize is that we live, in fact, in a rather misandrist culture. We have actually REGRESSED in that arena from misogyny to misandry. It's such a little-thought upon idea that even the spell-checker thought I was trying to type misanthropy. Look at all of the media commercials and sitcoms of the day...fat, balding, underpaid, ill-spoken-of and ill-speaking, uncoordinated, undersized [you know what I mean], wishy-washy pussies of men [or any combination of these traits and others] who happen, by some mystery, to enjoy the love of Mary Sue, who is obviously much too good for this schlub in any sense.
The only reason all of these statistics exist to be measured and all of these opinions are floating around to be heard is because, plainly, more women in more nations all over the world have more rights and comforts than they ever had in all of human history. The right to vote, the right to free speech, the right to work, the right to dress, the right to spend money, the right to choose who they marry...the list goes on and on. Naturally, this will cause dissension whenever a woman is depicted in ways "unbefitting" in pop culture, as it should. The debate should continue until peaceful resolution is achieved.
But...we have tipped the scales inadvertently the other way. We need to stop hating on our men, and stop hating on how they express themselves in Escapism through Fantasy, where they fulfill their base biological desires by objectifying men AND women both...not often do we hear of how impossible Kratos' form is to achieve without drugs that would desiccate his testicles, do we? No, we hear about how big [you know what I mean] he and Snow must be.
Seems like I'm going all over the place, but I'm really not; what I'm trying to illustrate is the existence of a double-standard. Very unpopular to hear, but not any less true. Women want to be accepted and recognized for their independence, but when men treat them as an individual who can take care of themselves [most women have no idea the amount of degradation, insults, and general abuse that occurs in male circles as the social equivalent of displaying their plumage, which requires that one show his plumage back; often called "locking horns"], they lash out at their oppressors, and decry for a return to chivalry...only to scream at its approach when it comes, saying, I Am Woman, I can take care of myself, who are you insinuate I need your financial security? Yet, this does not abate the tide of marriages of convenience, gold-digging, and the proliferation of divorce.
Through these and other techniques, men are objectified, as well...there is a reason that 9-inch dildos and larger are the highest-selling masturbation products on the market; not all of them are gag-gifts, and not by a long shot. Do women hear men saying, "All you want is a big, hard, steaming wang to punish you until you scream with delight, that's all we are to you!" No, men go out and research crazy ways to make their schlongs larger and harder, from pills to hormones to devices to surgery, and spend hundreds of millions of dollars on them, all so they can give what they believe to be a woman's fantasy to them in reality. Men now spend factors of their income on skin, facial, and hair products, along with clothing, baubles, and trinkets, to please women. Men traditionally spend two months income on an engagement ring for women, that they may compete with other women in the who-has-the-biggest-shiniest-rock-regardless-of-how-many-human-lives-it-cost contest...when you are fascinated by a rock that sparkles, you, also, are no better than prehistoric-man-with-club. Men, however, do hear women tell them all the time that they are just degrading them to their biological components, and that kind of hypocrisy isn't right.
The hard, brutal truth is this--and I know it will upset many men and women, but truth it remains: The world has long been the domain of men; ruling it, policing it, protecting it, trading amongst it, deciding for it. The push from the codependency/opression of women through suffrage to their independence and campaign for equal [or NOT equal, if you actually listen to some arguments] power and control has happened too quickly. The human body and brain cannot evolve beyond tens of thousands of years [only measuring from the time we developed culture, mind you, it took millions of years to evolve from our reptilian traits] of culture and biology in less than a hundred, or even a thousand.
What is the solution? Is it for women to lie down, taking whatever position their man requires? No. Is it for women to beat men into submission, taking control for themselves? No. The solution is that men need to act a little more like women, and women need to act a little more like men. Men, be more supportive and emotionally understanding...not of women only, but of all people; being a little more diplomatic might not hurt, either. Women, take a side and stick with it...either you can open the car door for yourself, or you think it would be noble of the man to do it; choose and stop vacillating!
Remember the age-old truth: Whenever two people in a room are telling the same story, the truth is never one or the other, it is always somewhere in the middle. The same principle applies here. Another good one to remember is Postel's Law, dictating the potential interactions between computers not running on the same [spoken or programming] language: Be liberal in what you allow, conservative in what you do. Sounds a bit like Christ, doesn't it? If everyone did that, by consciously making the choice to do so, against all Pavlovian response, then we would need neither to be liberal in what we allow nor conservative in what we do, the median would work itself out...and in relatively short order, too.
Disagree with what I've said? Think I'm hitting off of the mark? Well, then ponder this:
What would be the fallout if the response to "vaginaphobia" was a call to Vaginophilia? A series of literature and films, ranging from "The Idiot's Guide to the Female Genitalia, All of it's Working Parts, and How to Please It Satisfactorily Without Degrading It," to "Dr. Strangefist, or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the ****"?
Tell me it wouldn't be hypocritical.
