Male Privilege

I must have communicated my meaning incorrectly. I in no way meant that the discussion of male/female power dynamics is without merit. I was trying to say that the language that is being employed by the discussion of 'privileges' is counterproductive to a reasonable debate environment.

I agree with this.



But when that "advantage" encompasses the entirety of a type of life style, so say, professional careers, I'm fairly certain "privileged" is more than suitable.



"Men can have a lot of sex and not be judge (respected in fact), or not have sex and not be respected"

"Women can have a lot of sex and be considered sluts, or not have sex, and only respected, sexually, in that regard."

Your "flip/two side(s)", only told me that women "can not" enjoy sex, else be condemned, while at the same time, made into a goal of conquest. There's even the idea, that if a man puts in effort to receive sex from a woman, and she does not respond to those efforts, she is a "b*tch". Holding onto virginity, is not something a woman has a choice in, when it comes to the opinions of others.



I do agree that both, sides and races, should be discussed to have a complete scope of the issues.



I'd like to test that before conjecturing from bias.

The scale always leans in favor of male, just varies, how much so, depending on where your looking.

While I admit, I do think this discussion fails to cover a lot, I don't think it's stupid just because it starts off small. I would find, completely discarding any discussion, simply because it does not encompass the entirety of the issue forthright would be "stupid". Even though it may be a small portion, there is always something to be gain through discussion.

Also, while I also agree with your comment towards the language used by the original poster(s), that doesn't prevent us from changing the direction and nature of the conversation.



I completely agree. I'll infer your last paragraph as being directed to the entirety of the thread itself.

Male Privilege doesn't exist and is used on the internet by feminists to win arguments, while in real life everyone from women to men, young and old laugh at these angry, miserable people

Truefax evvybody. The patriarchy is a myth! Everyone everywhere are completely equal! Anyone saying otherwise is an angry and miserable person that everyone else laughs at!

Well, I'm glad we sorted that out.

I hope that is some kind of joke that you are using the word patriarchy un-ironically. Especially when talking about the Western world. The bias against men in divorce courts, men ending up in jail over a women regretting getting drunk and consenting to sex, the wage gap myth. Feminism isn't needed here. More women would be CEO's if they would go stop taking gender studies classes and took classes that would help them become CEO's.

It's not a joke, and if you think that the western world isn't a patriarchal society then well, I'd say that you're wrong. The business world is largely biased towards men, for various reasons.

I want to address some of your points. I'll ignore the "wage gap myth" as you call it. The wage gap is there because of several reasons(With about 1-3% difference that are unaccounted for, being the actual wage gap. So small that it hardly matters and a likely scenario is that with the systematic oppression of women many simply accept a lower pay when some negotiation raise it up to that of their male colleagues.) and those reasons have more to do with feminism as a movement towards equality for both genders than simply oppressing women, a discussion for another time.

Men ending up in jail over false rape claims are uncommon, to say the least. Obviously a problem, but not really one that has to do with feminism as much as a corrupted justice system not adhering to "innocent until proven guilty." and in these word against word cases I can assure you that the vast majority falls in favor of the alleged "rapist". However, this is also true of actual cases of rape where the victim actually was raped. Which is a far more common situation, and the rapist goes free. Surrounding this we have the entire "What were you wearing? Were you intoxicated? Did you say or do something suggestive?" deal that is clearly demeaning and for some reason exist when it's sole purpose is to somehow justify rape.

You somehow claim that women don't take classes that will boost them on their career path, which is false. The main reason we don't see female CEO's is that we already have a stab of males in high-up positions. Men tend to hire men (And women tend to hire women, simple case of "We like similarities, basic human behavior.) and with a majority of men calling the shots, a majority of people in high positions will remain male. This is a remnant from back when we really did have big problems with female oppression. Maybe it will go away by itself through the shift of female standing in general, I like to think that it will, but that doesn't make it less of a problem in the present. If we look at smaller, newer companies there's a bigger number of women in high-up positions, most likely due to these companies not having the old "boys-club" jargon that many of the big, old companies still have.

Clearly, these issues are not so simple as "men have it better than women, and women are treated as dirt". But I assure you that in the western society, in this day and age, it's still easier to be a white man than any other group of people being treated as a minority. Be it gender, sexuality or color.

Then we have the entire issue about inequality that's not limited to men necessarily having it easier than women, and certainly not in all cases. You bring up divorce cases which is a very valid point. Maternity vs. Paternity leave from work is another issue where I'd say that it's important to encourage men that want to take time off work to be with their children to do so. There are a lot of inequalities going both ways, but overall women have clearly drawn the shorter straw.

I'll leave it to Forbes to prove you wrong on the wage gap myth

http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/04/16/its-time-that-we-end-the-equal-pay-myth/

Yeah, alright, this is where I leave the building. (Too late.)

Wanna re read it because it does and your other points are moot

https://www.facebook.com/TheMensRightsInitiative?fref=ts

I've been following these guys on facebook for quite a while, and the things they post are quite interesting. Well, some are, some are irrelevant and stupid. As you'd expect.

random pictures:

Hmm, well it's not always about innocent until proven guilty but a lot of the times a person not being able to confront his accuser/s, and the fact there's a clear...well not really instinct, but something of that sort to protect a female. Sometimes there really isn't enough evidence for the courts to come to a satisfying conclusion and it becomes a clusterfuck. This crime although you think isn't common(some reports show less than 10%), is more common than we think thought it was, we just don't pay attention to it because we don't want to.
False accusing someone of rape isn't an exactly hard thing to do, and the reasons are for doing so are unfortunately numerous. Revenge, attention, an excuse for personal failure(an alibi), a scapegoat for misdeed (cheating, pregnancy etc.), money, etc. etc. It's honestly not surprising to see it happen, but disgusting because it takes away a lot of legitimacy from actual victims...

False rape accusations also have very little deterrent. It is unlikely you will be found guilty of the crime, and even if you are, the punishment will be a relative slap on the wrist; and you are shielded from public opinion by current laws. The man(person I guess but usually man) isn't exactly freed from public scorn, and any injustice done to him will not be corrected.

It's a bit strange when we have figures suggestion that not only men(and very few women) get thrown unjustly into prison, but that also show a majority of rapist who face a trial get off free. Technologies like DNA testing are also showing that a lot more people are wrongfully put into jail.

I think it's wrong to say feminist or gynocentrism has nothing to do with this since they actively push a certain viewpoint that falls along the usual view that men have agency and act upon on others, while women in many cases have no agency(yeah that "did you drink" comment is pretty ignorant and implies people should be absolved from personal responsibilities) or objects that can only be acted upon.

OT:
I think my views have shifted a bit since I last posted in this thread, but I still think that a lot of these gender issues especially in the west come from different expectations that we both get back a pretty shitty deal. One is worse than either depending on your viewpoint and isn't an objective fact.

I don't think you understood my post then, I will try to explain it to you.
This means that the "wage gap" is explainable, and for a number of valid reasons "exist" in the way that there is a gap in the median of women vs. mens wages because, as your article there said, women tend to gravitate against lower payed jobs. This doesn't mean that they aren't getting the same pay for the same work, just like the article you posted explains.
These are the numbers from the US. Gov Accountability Office.

"[...]when accounting for diminishing differences in variables including chosen occupation, education, and experience, the variable wage gap among federal workers can be brought to roughly 1-2%.” - US. Gov Accountability Office.

I was wrong on 1%, I thought it was 1-3 when it was 1-2, my bad. But this means that there IS a wage gap that is unaccounted for, for some reason women in general get payed 1-2% less for the same work. This number can probably still be explained, just that it hasn't been yet.
This means I think it's hardly worth talking about, reasons following.
I don't know if you ever negotiated your wage with your employer, but it usually goes down something like this:

Employer: So, what level would you like your salary to be on?

Employee: Say, $4500 (I don't know what a reasonable salary in the US is though.)

Employer: That's a bit high, will you settle for $4000?

And so on, it's a lot like haggling in general. If someone goes in with a lower opening offer chances are that they'll end up with slightly less in the end. One reasonable explanation for the actual 1-2% wage gap is that most women simply go in with, or accept, a lower wage than some of their male colleagues.
Such as "male" vs. "female" professions, in both ways. The fact that employees sees pregnancy as a risk affecting the female party more than the male. Which it does in some cases, but as I brought up later: Some men are even afraid to take out paternity leave, while maternity leave is more or less obligatory. There are some things beneficial to women, and some to men, we should get rid of them all.
This part means that I don't think the discussion about the wage gap really fits in here, since I argued that the small actual wage gap that exist is there because of other reasons than discrimination and doesn't really have a place here, and that we should discuss it in another place on another time. I will assume you missed this.

I still really don't see where further proving a point that I initially agreed with, with an article that doesn't really address the point I brought up (It doesn't, it talks about the median wage, which I didn't, because arguing from that standpoint leads nowhere.) is any kind of contribution to the discussion at hand.

Jesus, I really didn't think I would have to spell everything out like I'm talking to a class of special-needs 12 year olds with severe learning disabilities.

My opinion is this: men and women are equal and should be treated equal in the eyes of the law. Any abuse of ones own gender to gain an unfair advantage over someone should be punished severely (such as men coercing women into unwanted sexual relations by hindering them from getting a job due to being in a position of power in a company, or women using their gender to unfairly influence the courts in domestic/child custody disputes and vice-versa).

I personally believe that the law/legal rights should be made absolutely equal for both genders, and after promptly making sure that that is the case all organizations that seek to gain an unfair advantage/influence/dominance over the other party based on their gender should be forcefully disbanded.


But alas this can never be implemented in real life, because people always seek to dominate others by any means, including their gender.

I used to know a few girls who would flirt and tease men to get what they wanted. i've never seen a male get away with that.

I think in today's world that women recove equal opertunies as men, but they are not treated equally. Men still make an average of 30 percent more than the average women who has the same credentials. This is wrong, and a problem that our generation has to make an effort to change.

ya that's bull shit males have the same privileges as females. if anything because men cant hit back it gives women privilege to hit men.

Men on average do get employed and get payed more than women. Women also get objectified in our culture a lot so I can kinda see where she is coming from but I do not believe there is a level like segregation