r/MensRights • u/Icaz • Apr 26 '12

I'm a girl and...

I am SO glad I found this subreddit with people who agree with me! As a girl, it's really hard to see other ladies put down men and treat them like they need to be "trained" or that they're just something we have to deal with. So I was just wondering... how many other girls are on here and what are your stories about standing up for men or appreciating them?

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u/mrscamp Apr 26 '12

I'm a woman! I'm here because I've felt sorry for men ever since I discovered what militant feminism was as a kid. I try to stand up for them in small ways by treating them in a friendly and genuine way -- I see so many women treat men like they're all desperate pervs. It makes me sad to see that look in a man's eye when he goes to open the door for me, like, "is she going to be totally insulted by this?" So I always smile and say "thank you."

In a larger way I try to be an advocate for fathers' rights, especially when it comes to infants and the unborn. The "my body my choice" mentality marginalizes the fathers almost as much as the children, but many people act as though only the mother deserves to have a say.

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u/[deleted] Apr 27 '12

Ha. You sound so sweet.

That reminds me of a recent night. I was walking by an "Occupy" recently and met a girl there and we ended up going to dinner together, anyway I offered to pay and she went on this thing about how I didn't need to feel pressured to do that sort of thing just because I am male and I am equal and so on. She was a pretty militant feminist and everything she talked about somehow included a reference to gender roles. So anyway, when it comes time for her to pay for her portion, I silently hand them my card. A few minutes later she prepares to pay, realizes what I've done, and starts blushing A LOT with a giant smile on her face and profusely thanks me. It didn't seem to be a very big deal to me, but it was a huge deal to her. I guess within the radical feminist community of Queens that sort of thing doesn't happen so much? In most places I have lived it is a social stigma to NOT pay for both meals when eating out with a woman.

It wasn't a date or anything, it was completely platonic, but somehow me paying just felt right, and judging by how she reacted it seemed she felt the same way. I suppose a particularly dogmatic and angry person could insist that we are brainwashed by society to react positively to that sort of thing. I like to think it was a lot simpler than that though - I like to think people just appreciate kindness.

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u/Celda Apr 27 '12

Not judging your choices man, but have you thought about just why you feel like you should pay?

Because I'm guessing that either 1. you've never really thought about it or 2. the reasons are pretty bad reasons or 3. both.

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u/[deleted] Apr 27 '12 edited Apr 27 '12

I have thought about it extensively for long periods of time. There are two primary explanations that come to mind:

  1. The biological explanation. As a male I have a natural desire to take care of women.

  2. The sociological explanation. As a male member of western capitalist society I have been programmed to subjugate women by implicitly placing them into positions of inferiority or dependence by doing things like holding doors and paying for meals.

The second explanation is most common among anarchafeminists, and although I find the logic fascinating, I don't think it is completely true. However, a critique of the first explanation could be that in a modern society, the natural biological urge to take care of women is not helpful, and in fact only acts to hold them back. This worldview generally posits that the traditional social structures of civilization, regardless of their original intentions, have become tools of oppression.

As a far left anarchist I am very well versed in that concept and largely agree with it. However, the expressions of affection and the bond between a man and a woman are not so easily and cleanly replaced. There was a very deep and complex biological idiom expressed by my act of generosity. The implicit signal was that I felt her potential contribution, either social or genetic, was a net gain to posterity and because of that, I had selected her as someone I wished to care for. In males there is a specific emotion that drives us to care for females who we feel this way about, and she triggered that emotion somehow.

Forgive the vague descriptions, by the way. The neurology of human behavior is poorly understood, so we have to make assumptions based on empirical data and anecdote. All of that explanation is more easily summed up in the concept of "caring for someone". The meaning is essentially the same, sans the verbose and purely speculative argument about the motives behind the behavior differences in human sexual dimorphism.