US Politics Mega-thread - Page 16

On November 29 2012 14:34 BlueBird. wrote:
Sunprince, most reasonable feminists do not believe that the reason that men are homeless and commit crime is because they are biologically inferior.

On November 29 2012 14:34 BlueBird. wrote:
I don't know the exact reason that more men are homeless, or more men commit crime, I actually do think that current gender roles on society encourage violence by men. Also men are looked down upon if they ask for help, so someof the male homeless that don't have mental disabilities might be scared of asking family/friends for help or their friends/family are unlikely to help them because they don't view them as the weak dainty female that needs their help to survive. This is just speculation though.

On November 29 2012 14:34 BlueBird. wrote:
As for the violence, i watched a documentary "tough guise" recently, recommend you watch that and get back to me. It's not perfect but it made me think about men in our society.

On November 29 2012 15:25 smokeyhoodoo wrote:


You're not talking about meritocracy then. It can exist just fine without even starting positions. It is, by definition, about favoring the person who achieves the most. Not about a hypothetical of who would have achieved the most if their life was a little different. But you effectively changed the subject of your post, because before you were talking about bias against women and minorities, which wouldn't exist in meritocracy, and now you're talking about bias against people who don't achieve as much due to life circumstances, which is perfectly consistent with meritocracy.

On November 29 2012 15:15 Souma wrote:
Well, actually, men are more biologically predisposed to exert aggressive behavior (crime), aren't they? Haven't looked up any studies but it's what I assume (they are, at the very least, more biologically endowed with the physical attributes to commit crimes which may explain why they actually engage in violent crime more than women).

On November 29 2012 15:36 NicolBolas wrote:


I don't really see the difference. Being born a woman or a minority is a "life circumstance", just like being born poor. If this meritocracy is willing to allow someone who might have shown merit to be squelched by being born to poor people, why is that any different than bias against women/minorities? Neither is something that the person could control, and both can in theory be overcome. The same goes the other way around: being born to wealthy parents is an advantage, but that advantage has no more to do with a person's personal merit than being born white and male.

Why does your definition of meritocracy allow one and not the other? By what logic do you say that one kind of bias is good and the other is bad? They're both equally unfair; they both have the same ability to remove people of merit from achieving success through no fault of their own. And so forth.

Is it because society labels people who are biased against women/minorities, but it's OK to be indifferent to the poor?

On November 29 2012 15:41 sunprince wrote:


Another way to look at it is that laws have been designed to criminalize male behavior while leaving female behavior alone. Domestic violence is an obvious one: the CDC finds that gender violence is close to 50/50, yet feminist-crafted legislation/approaches like VAWA and the Duluth model encourage prosecution almost entirely against men. Similarly, the CDC finds that men are raped by women almost as often as women are raped by men, yet very few women are prosecuted. False accusations of rape are almost never prosecuted even when they were obviously criminally malicious, for fear of offending feminists who argue that such prosecutions would "discourage real victims from coming forward". Throw the sentencing and conviction disparity on top of things like that, and you end up with a very skewed view.

If you criminalize only the things that male criminals do, then obviously men are going to look predisposed towards crime. It's no different from how black people wind up in jail longer if you impose heavy sentences on selling weed and light sentences on white collar crime.

On November 29 2012 15:41 sunprince wrote:


Another way to look at it is that laws have been designed to criminalize male behavior while leaving female behavior alone.

Domestic violence is an obvious one: the CDC finds that gender violence is close to 50/50, yet feminist-crafted legislation/approaches like VAWA and the Duluth model encourage prosecution almost entirely against men. Similarly, the CDC finds that men are raped by women almost as often as women are raped by men, yet very few women are prosecuted. Feminist-crafted statutory laws disproportionately criminalize male behavior, because men are generally attracted to younger women while women are generally attracted to older men (and cases with female statutory rapists rarely result in social disapproval or criminal punishment). False accusations of rape are almost never prosecuted even when they were obviously criminally malicious, for fear of offending feminists who argue that such prosecutions would "discourage real victims from coming forward". Throw the sentencing and conviction disparity on top of things like that, and you end up with a very skewed view.

If you criminalize primariily the things that male criminals do, then obviously men are going to look predisposed towards crime. It's no different from how black people wind up in jail longer if you impose heavy sentences on selling weed and light sentences on white collar crime.

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:


Most feminists dismiss problems with men by victim blaming men for those problems, as mcc and TS-Rubpar both did in this thread.

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:


Gender roles encourage violence by men on other men (and only other men).

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:
Men are not only looked down on when they ask for help, they are also less likely to get help when they ask for it

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:
(just look at how feminists call men "whiners/babies" and tell them to "man up" when they talk about male problems).

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:
Both of these tie back into male disposability as a gender expectation, as I noted when I stated "males have less intrinsic value to society and are discarded when they break".

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:


I've seen it. The documentary throws around a lot of false statistics taken from ideological sources (easily debunked if you read legitimate sources like the the CDC's National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, scholarly journals, etc) and blatant cherry picking in order to promote a feminist worldview.

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:
The "documentary" simply perpetuates the false notion that gender violence is a male-on-female phenomena (when the CDC's stats show that it's 50/50 and primarily reciprocal) and tries to guilt men about being male by tarring all men as violent (or at least sexist). It's little more than a propaganda piece.

On November 29 2012 15:58 Souma wrote:


Domestic violence is not that obvious. While women do tend to throw hissy-fits and resort to physical violence as often as men do in relationships, women way more often receive serious damage than men do (this is obvious as the average man overpowers the average woman).

On November 29 2012 15:58 Souma wrote:
From statistics I've looked at before, men are overwhelmingly more often the perpetrators in cases of rape (men rape men too). Though if anything, I would say society does play a role in keeping men quiet if they are raped by a woman. Regarding false accusations, I haven't seen the stats but I'm not surprised.

On November 29 2012 15:58 Souma wrote:
But really, men are biologically more inclined/able to commit crimes. Whether it's labelled as domestic violence or not, it's still violence that is generally deemed illegal, and rape is illegal for obvious reasons, not because it's male behavior (the reason why men get more flak for DV is because of the history behind domestic violence and the amount of damage a man generally inflicts on a woman as opposed to vice-versa).

On November 29 2012 16:00 TheFrankOne wrote:


I'm not sure where the CDC says what you said. I have found where it says this:

• 1.3 million women were raped during the year preceding the survey.
• Nearly 1 in 5 women have been raped in their lifetime while 1 in 71 men have
been raped in their lifetime.
• 1 in 6 women have been stalked during their lifetime. 1 in 19 men have
experienced stalking in their lifetime.
• 1 in 4 women have been the victim of severe physical violence by an intimate
partner while 1 in 7 men experienced severe physical violence by an intimate
partner

http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/pdf/NISVS_FactSheet-a.pdf

So a source for that 50-50 thing would be nice.

On November 29 2012 15:58 Souma wrote:
Domestic violence is not that obvious. While women do tend to throw hissy-fits and resort to physical violence as often as men do in relationships, women way more often receive serious damage than men do (this is obvious as the average man overpowers the average woman).

On November 29 2012 15:47 smokeyhoodoo wrote:


No, it's not okay to be indifferent to the poor. Its just stupid to put someone in a job they're incompetent in because you feel sorry for them. That kind of policy would make everyone poor.

Furthermore I'm not arguing the poor shouldn't be helped. I'm not arguing that people shouldn't be placed in positions to foster their potential talent and ability. I'm arguing that meritocracy is the logical way to go in either circumstance.

On November 29 2012 16:08 NicolBolas wrote:


Except for the fact that mcc didn't do that. You heard it that way, but that's not what he actually said.

He said that he felt homelessness is a choice. Whether you agree or disagree with this notion is up to you, but that is the point he was making.

You interpreted this through your own bias. You read, "I think homelessness is a choice, and more men are homeless than women. Therefore, I blame men and only men for these things." Despite him never mentioning men once, you assumed "homeless == men".

On November 28 2012 20:48 mcc wrote:

Most of the statistics you cite are issues that have nothing to do with policies and little to do with outside societal pressures. Most of them are results of biological differences between man and women. Women being paid less is something that the woman herself cannot influence. Being criminal or homeless is a choice of the individual in question. In multiple threads you showed yourself as dismissive of any real issues with discrimination of women and on the other hand whining all the time about discrimination of men, where non actually exists. And you debunked nothing, as all your arguments are faulty and fallacies.

On November 29 2012 16:08 NicolBolas wrote:


Yeah, keep dreaming.

On November 29 2012 16:08 NicolBolas wrote:


By other men just as much if not more than by women.

On November 29 2012 16:08 NicolBolas wrote:


I love how you're speaking for people. Because the best way to know what a group of people think is to ask someone who hates them. Because obviously, a hater understands them better than they know themselves.

On November 29 2012 16:08 NicolBolas wrote:


This is a classic dodge of sexism-against-women. You point at something that's sexist against men, then claim that this either balances things or makes them worse towards men in some way.

As if that somehow made the sexism against women disappear. Nor is it an indictment against those trying to fight sexism against women that they aren't also taking up the banner of sexism against men.

If you want to push forward on that issue, be my guest. But don't act like it somehow negates the prevalence of sexism against women in society. There's a lot of sexism in society to go around.

On November 29 2012 16:23 WolfintheSheep wrote:

Not obvious in the slightest. The more physically inferior you feel to a person, the more likely you are to use a tool or weapon to compensate for the difference (regardless of gender).

You're essentially claiming that a smaller person cannot harm a larger person.

More surprisingly, women are also just as likely as men to express hostility—in this case physically—in the context of a romantic relationship. The popular stereotype of a domestic abuser is a man who habitually hurts his female partner. Yet research by Archer and sociologist Murray Straus of the University of New Hampshire calls this scenario into question. Surprisingly, their analyses demonstrate that men and women exhibit roughly equal rates of violence within relationships; some studies hint that women’s rates of physical aggression are slightly higher. This apparent equality is not solely a result of women fighting back, because it holds even for altercations that women start. Still, domestic abuse within intimate relationships poses a greater threat to women than to men. Women suffer close to two thirds of the injuries, largely because men are stronger on average than women. In addition, women and men differ in the severity of their actions; women are more likely to scratch or slap their partners, and men more commonly punch or choke their partners.

Until recently, most psychologists thought differences in the degree to which men and women exhibit physical aggression stemmed largely from societal reinforcement of traditional gender roles. Social factors undoubtedly account for a part of the differences. But in a study published in 2007 psychologist Raymond Baillargeon of the University of Montreal and his colleagues reveal that as early as the age of 17 months, 5 percent of boys but only 1 percent of girls engage in frequent physical aggression, such as kicking and biting. What is more, this gap does not widen between 17 and 29 months, as might be expected if environmental influences such as socialization by parents were to blame. These findings suggest that biological factors—such as the effects of testosterone on brain function—contribute to sex differences in violent behavior.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=are-men-the-more-belligerent-sex

On November 29 2012 15:34 sunprince wrote:


Most feminists dismiss problems with men by victim blaming men for those problems, as mcc and TS-Rubpar both did in this thread.



Gender roles encourage violence by men on other men (and only other men). Men are not only looked down on when they ask for help, they are also less likely to get help when they ask for it (just look at how feminists call men "whiners/babies" and tell them to "man up" when they talk about male problems). Both of these tie back into male disposability as a gender expectation, as I noted when I stated "males have less intrinsic value to society and are discarded when they break".



I've seen it. The documentary throws around a lot of false statistics taken from ideological sources (easily debunked if you read legitimate sources like the the CDC's National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, scholarly journals, etc) and blatant cherry picking in order to promote a feminist worldview.

The "documentary" simply perpetuates the false notion that gender violence is a male-on-female phenomena (when the CDC's stats show that it's 50/50 and primarily reciprocal) and tries to guilt men about being male by tarring all men as violent (or at least sexist). It's little more than a propaganda piece.

On November 29 2012 16:19 sunprince wrote:


You need to read the actual study, rather than a fact sheet. Here's the relevant part: http://i1.minus.com/ibdWhAGbVpHg9Z.png

On November 29 2012 16:23 NicolBolas wrote:


And my point is that meritocracy as you define it wouldn't do any of those things. Merit, by your definition, is what you actually achieve, not what you might have achieved, given an opportunity. A meritocracy rewards those who manage to get ahead, regardless of how they did so. It punishes those who fail to get ahead, regardless of why they did so.

In a meritocracy, people who don't measure up do not deserve to be helped. They don't have merit, so they are of little value to society. That's what a meritocracy is all about: the people who have merit are the ones who matter and are rewarded with power and control. The people who don't are left to the whims of those who managed to achieve things.

Why would the privileged class in a meritocracy ever want the underprivileged to be helped? Outside of the most basic self-interest (ie: Bread and Circuses. Keep the hoi polloi fat and happy so they don't realize that you're using them as chattel), they get nothing from it. Their children's futures in the meritocracy are secure so long as the playing field isn't level. If it is... their children's futures aren't secure.

It's the fox guarding the hen house: the people in control of the society are the ones with the greatest interest in making sure that social mobility is restricted if not completely unavailable.

A meritocracy founded without an enforced level playing field simply leads to the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. No poor will be helped outside of some charity and basic necessities to keep them in line. No people will be put into positions to "foster their potential talent and ability." There is no incentive for this to happen in such a society. So why should it?

On November 29 2012 16:25 sunprince wrote:


It is socially unacceptable to hit women. If you're unaware of this, I don't know where you've been living, but it's not in Western civilization for the last millenia.

On November 29 2012 16:25 sunprince wrote:


Oh, look, more victim blaming. Who gives a shit who does it? Most slut-shaming is woman-on-woman, does that make it okay or stop feminists from using it as an example of sexism?

On November 29 2012 16:25 sunprince wrote:


I have plenty of personal experiences to reinforce this notion. Shit tons of examples can be found all over the web.

On November 29 2012 16:25 sunprince wrote:


That statement has nothing to do with comparing sexism. I'm merely explaining to someone else one of the main reasons why more men are homeless.

On November 29 2012 16:25 sunprince wrote:
You're also dodging the burden of proof, like many others. Instead of taking for granted that there is a "prevalence of sexism" against women in society, prove it. Demonstrate that society systemtically discriminates against women, as feminists and others in this thread have repeatedly argued.

On November 29 2012 16:37 BlueBird. wrote:
No real feminist that understands the gender issues in society would call men whiners and cry babies, your cherry picking.

On November 29 2012 17:19 NicolBolas wrote:


Last millenia? Bullshit; violence against women has been pretty much pervasive among Western culture for much of the last 1000 years. The whole rape, pillage, and plunder thing that happened? Yeah, that wasn't buggering the menfolk of the village in question.

Wife-beating was common through the 50's and 60's. It was socially unacceptable to hit a woman who wasn't your wife. And in the early 20th century, it was socially unacceptable to hit your wife in public. But doing it in private was not merely acceptable, but expected if she got out of line.



I didn't say it was OK; my point is that it isn't the fault of women or Feminist in general.



It's the Internet; assholes are legion here.

The presence of assholes proves nothing about what Feminists in general think, act, or do. It only proves what those individual Feminists think, act, or do.



First, it very much has to do with comparing sexism. You're saying that there is no pervasive sexism against women. And your prime evidence is what you consider pervasive sexism against men, to the point that you accuse society itself of feeling that men are disposable.

How is that not comparing sexism?

Also, you're inventing explanations about why more men are homeless. You've gone from a fact (a larger percentage of homeless people are men) to an inference not supported by said fact (society sees men as less important) to random nonsense (therefore, society doesn't have a bias against women). The fact that more men than women are homeless only means, at best, that society is less willing to allow women to be on the streets than men. It says nothing about how it feels about men in general. And equally importantly, you can't take a fact about the world and decide that this fact exists because "society" wants that to happen.

Oh and do note: the reason that those extra safety nets exist for women? Women helped make them. They went out and did the legwork for themselves to help get their people into shelters. If you want more men's shelters, great; go get it done. It's not going to happen because you whine about it on a forum.



The evidence is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very thread. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.



And you were doing so well, then stooped to his level with a No True Scottsman fallacy. Yes, there are Feminists who do indeed indulge in such things. And just like the more reasonable Republicans among us are ashamed when dickhead social conservatives start talking about "legitimate rape", so too are other Feminists when those under the banner take things too far.

It does happen, and pretending that it doesn't isn't helping anyone.