At first, it may be hard to recognise the privileges patriarchy gives men. Totally worth taking them into consideration, especially if we want equality in society.
Studies I’ve read for work suggest that around 1 in 10 men have experienced unreported sexual abuse. Same studies suggest the statistic is 1 in 5 women, which is much worse, but it does a disservice to male victims to suggest ten percent is ‘negligible.’
(as someone whose crotch was aggressively groped by a female in college and never reported I’m admittedly a bit sensitive)
7 is about rape. You talk about sexual abuse. They are not synonyms.
Also, in the link above the following passage might interest you:
As McIntosh points out, men also tend to be unaware of their own privileges as men. In the spirit of McIntosh’s
essay, I thought I’d compile a list similar to McIntosh’s, focusing on the invisible privileges benefitting men.
Due to my own limitations, this list is unavoidably U.S.-centric. I hope that writers from other cultures will create
new lists, or modify this one, to reflect their own experiences.
Go do some reading before you try to get pedantic:
A review of 38 studies across 21 countries suggest that as many as 20 percent of females and 10 percent of males are able to recall childhood sexual victimization.[2]
[2] German Dunkelfeld Project, 12 J. Sexual Medicine at 533.
I’m wondering how old this is because it has some fantastic points but is missing some big ones that are a part of modern feminist discourse and some of its points are lacking some nuance that’s become more common in the current discourse.
That said for the most part it’s very good and is likely to hit on several things that in my experience many men don’t really think about. The bits about having to ask yourself if something was misogyny really hits hard. And I think a reasonable summary of several of these points is that men are treated as the default kind of person
ETA: the nuance here that I think was really missing is that as time has gone on we’ve gotten more acknowledgement of male victims of sexual and domestic violence and the ways in which toxic masculinity uses threats of emasculation to push men into a specific role. This is all bad and the ways in which toxic masculinity hurts men are real things. But it too privileges a theoretical maleness and the punishment it presents to failure is accusations of womanhood or femininity (alongside genuine physical or economic violence). The degendering that women are threatened with is rarely accusations of manhood, but more often accusations of not even being a woman.
And to clarify toxic masculinity is not the claim that masculinity is toxic but that there is a set of expectations placed on men by each other and by women that pushes them into a rigid role devoid of gentleness and emotional honesty. In that role they are granted agency and power as the trade off. It is a role that often would rather they hurt others for their own pleasure than to display vulnerability. And that role comes with varying degrees of manifestation. It can be calls for young boys to not cry but it can also be things like frat bro rape culture. In the end it hurts everyone.
At first, it may be hard to recognise the privileges patriarchy gives men. Totally worth taking them into consideration, especially if we want equality in society.
Good list but 7 seems wrong.
Studies I’ve read for work suggest that around 1 in 10 men have experienced unreported sexual abuse. Same studies suggest the statistic is 1 in 5 women, which is much worse, but it does a disservice to male victims to suggest ten percent is ‘negligible.’
(as someone whose crotch was aggressively groped by a female in college and never reported I’m admittedly a bit sensitive)
7 is about rape. You talk about sexual abuse. They are not synonyms.
Also, in the link above the following passage might interest you:
Go do some reading before you try to get pedantic:
A review of 38 studies across 21 countries suggest that as many as 20 percent of females and 10 percent of males are able to recall childhood sexual victimization.[2]
[2] German Dunkelfeld Project, 12 J. Sexual Medicine at 533.
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I’m wondering how old this is because it has some fantastic points but is missing some big ones that are a part of modern feminist discourse and some of its points are lacking some nuance that’s become more common in the current discourse.
That said for the most part it’s very good and is likely to hit on several things that in my experience many men don’t really think about. The bits about having to ask yourself if something was misogyny really hits hard. And I think a reasonable summary of several of these points is that men are treated as the default kind of person
ETA: the nuance here that I think was really missing is that as time has gone on we’ve gotten more acknowledgement of male victims of sexual and domestic violence and the ways in which toxic masculinity uses threats of emasculation to push men into a specific role. This is all bad and the ways in which toxic masculinity hurts men are real things. But it too privileges a theoretical maleness and the punishment it presents to failure is accusations of womanhood or femininity (alongside genuine physical or economic violence). The degendering that women are threatened with is rarely accusations of manhood, but more often accusations of not even being a woman.
And to clarify toxic masculinity is not the claim that masculinity is toxic but that there is a set of expectations placed on men by each other and by women that pushes them into a rigid role devoid of gentleness and emotional honesty. In that role they are granted agency and power as the trade off. It is a role that often would rather they hurt others for their own pleasure than to display vulnerability. And that role comes with varying degrees of manifestation. It can be calls for young boys to not cry but it can also be things like frat bro rape culture. In the end it hurts everyone.
Fantastic list! Thanks for sharing that.