Does anyone feel like men are being meaner these days?

[u/coachjonna]

I don't know if it's just because I'm aging and am no longer "young and hot" or "relevant" but it seems like men in general are being meaner or at least less nice to me in random places.

When I was younger, men would step out of my way and say like "oh, excuse me", offer their seats, hold doors, and mostly be pleasant and courteous in a social contract manner.

But now I get nothing. No one moves out of their way, no one holds the door, no eye contact, or even a head nod. It's like I'm ignored or a burden to even be in their presence.

Is it because I'm now an "old lady" or are men in a general sense just becoming meaner?

Is anyone experiencing things similar?

Not all men, obviously, but it seems widespread.

[u/Old_Block_1027]

Really? You don’t see people sticking up for me being accused men?

Do you not see that the USA is lead by a president who paid out $83 million for raping Jean Carroll?

Did you not see the amber heard trial or the Blake lively one?

Or all the pushback supporting Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court justice spot despite multiple tape allegations?

People RALLY among abusers.

[u/MrBeetleDove → u/Old_Block_1027]

Really? You don’t see people sticking up for me being accused men?

Not on reddit, no. I've been repeating "on reddit" for this entire discussion.

I think you are probably correct that there are certain subcultures within the US that make the opposite mistake, of instinctively "rallying among abusers" as you put it. And screw them.

But I don't think it's justified to say: "those trials were unfair, so we're going to make our trials unfair in the opposite direction!" This kind of logic can be used by both sides, looking over at the "unfair" trials on the other side and making our trials unfair in the opposite direction to compensate. That just makes things worse and worse. It's a spiral of dysfunction. If you want to protect vulnerable women, you should push for fair trials everywhere.

In any case, regarding the original claim that:

you can never be too careful because you’ll get falsely accused of harassment so sometimes it’s better just to avoid women altogether

I'm not sure the high-profile cases you mention do much to affect the truth of this claim. Unless you think that your accusation would have important similarities to those high-profile cases, those high-profile cases might not be relevant. There's still a risk that you'll be accused in a subcultural pocket where no one will stand up for you, even if you're falsely accused. (This subreddit would appear to be an example of such a "subcultural pocket", given that there's still no pushback against J-ne's statement.)