WhiteNachos said:
Who has it worse is an opinion, because better and worse are subjective. You don't get to ask that everyone start the conversation by agreeing with you..
So what you're saying is that if someone has a hang nail, and another person is hemorrhaging internally and will die without immediate treatment, the hemorrhaging patient being in worse condition than the person with the hangnail is a matter of opinion? In case you've forgotten we're not talking about just a bunch of hurt feelings on the internet. We're talking about women who are still beaten, drugged, raped, abused, killed and generally treated like cattle, even in the US.
In case you demand 'proof' let's not forget that just 2 short years ago the 'war on women' was considered a viable, inspiring campaign point for a large segment of the conservative party.
Frankster said:
Proto Taco said:
Out of curiosity how can the heretosexual male hive mind convince you they are "big" enough to "admit" that women have it worst then them? Do you want male posters to have a disclaimer "women have it worst then me, now please let me say my piece" in all their posts? There hasn't bee a lot of posters that I've seen here claiming they have it worst then women but the way you say it makes it seem it's a widespread attitude.
Also whilst I couldn't make sense of some parts of that comic (the transwoman panel in particular just makes me scratch my head), there was some panels that I felt were actually kinda true and you can find the sentiment echoed in statements other posters made here.
Yet you casually dismiss all that as "insecurities" because you personally don't agree/relate to it as if you were a sort of gatekeeper figure deciding what is ok to feel hurt by and what isn't. Not cool and doesn't exactly make people want to share their personal vulnerabilities if it's only to be shit on.
Well a good start would be not using quotes as a key starting point for your counter argument. It starts off your entire argument by assuming the other person is widely considered to be full of excrement.
In terms of your broader statement I'm afraid you're again using "quotes" out of context to try and prove something. Good thing you snipped my post, because we can't have any of that nasty context mucking up your counter argument can we?
Here, let me get that for you:
Proto Taco said:
Grahav said:
Well, these are basically the most common complaints:
This may upset some people
That entire comic doesn't prove a point so much as it offers absolution to insecure men. Plus, the arguments don't make any sense. One example would be how at first the comic is suggesting that in fact men ARE sensitive, and don't really care what a woman looks like, and then it proceeds to deride femme transwomen who don't pass well because they're 'not trying'. The mental gymnastics required to make sense of that comic are on par with the impressive stylings of the Chinese Olympic team.
If men want to discuss gender issues as 'equals' they need to be big enough to admit that women, in fact, do still have it worse them and work from there. Acting like men have it 'as bad' as women in the gender arena is right up there with complaining about inflation because all the slaves were freed.
Aha! Here we can clearly see I said, verbatim, "That entire comic doesn't prove a point so much as it offers absolution to insecure men." Now, I don't know about you, but where I come from, offering 'absolution to insecure men' is not the same as 'all of those arguments are insecurities'. In fact, absolution arguments need to use kernels of truth to effectively offer soothing footholds to their target audience. Unless of course you're invoking a religion, then the deity in question does it for you.
One thing that both of your posts share in common is that they would like to know, sarcastically or otherwise, how to approach the situation fairly. It's quite simple really;
Instead of replacing someone else's problems with your own in the discussion, relate to them.
Instead of: "200 women raped last year you say? Ha! 300 men were beaten up by other men last year! See!?! I've got problems too!"
Say this: "Wow, seems like men are sure hurting a lot of people. Why don't we try to change how men are perceived and socialized so violence isn't so 'normal' for them?"
And no, I did not approach the above posts that way because it irritates me to hear someone shouting at the top of their lungs about how bad their hangnail is in the middle of an emergency room. My 'opinion', as it were, is that several thousand women still getting raped every year is worse than a few hundred men getting attacked by intoxicated soldiers. Girls being expected to starve themselves to look thin and 'attractive' because society still largely equates a woman's value with her sexual allure, is worse than men being expected to be tough and strong.
Does that mean men don't have problems? No, of course not. We could spend all day talking about the 'G.I. Joe problem'. But the fact of the matter is men's problems are both smaller in scale and intensity, and men are in stronger positions to solve those problems themselves. You want men to stop raping? Stop laughing at your buddies' rape jokes. You want men to not be viewed as vapid and lusting only after a woman's physical features? Don't talk about how 'hot' women are in the hallway.
If men talk, people will listen.
If women talk, they get a special on Bravo.
