Men face sexism too!
You might have heard people dismissing misandry as unimportant because ‘there’s no systemic discrimination against men’ or the famous saying “Misandry irritates. Misogyny kills”
Occasionally, you might hear that there is systemic misogyny, which may occasionally backfire against men occasionally.
But is this true? Let’s look at the facts
The Law
According to a very indepth review by Sonja Starr, she deduced that Men get 63% longer sentences for the same crime. While it is true that men are more likely to commit crimes, it doesn’t explain the gender disparity, which is alot longer than racial disparity, which means even an African American woman would get a shorter sentence than a white man.
Men’s troubles don’t start there. Men are more likely to be stopped by the police, and even when women are stopped, we are less likely to be arrested.
Women are also less likely to be killed by the police. And overally, men are 90% of those in prison, 98% of death row inmates, and and 98.8% of those executed.
Now when we hear that African Americans are unjustly being killed by police at higher rates than white people, we rightly protest and accuse the police of discrimination. We also say that if African-Americans commit more crimes than whites it’s due to systemic discrimination against them, but if men receive much harsher sentences than women for the same crime and sentencing history, isn’t it systemic discrimination.
So, why does this discrimination exist? It’s in part due to the ‘women are wonderful effect’. Some have argued this is only due to women following traditional gender roles, but even when women are not, we are still seen as wonderful
Violence against women is seen as almost universally evil especially Western nations. According to research done by Richard B Felson, people see violence against women worse than violence against men, especially if the perp is a woman.
Men are discriminated against even when they are the victims, As criminals get harsher punishments for killing women than for killing men.
Mental Health
It’s a well known fact that men commit suicide more than women in every country in the world. But what is behind this rate? People argue that since women attempt suicide at higher rates than men, it proves that women are the ones in need of help not men. But men have a higher rate of suicidal intent than women. It seems that many women could be making a suicidal gesture rather than actually wanting to commit suicide.
As a woman, I used to be suicidal but I was able to benefit from therapy, which is what most want.
Some also say that men choose more lethal methods, but this is also not indicative of men’s suicide rate because even when men choose the same methods, they still die more than women.
Some say it is due to toxic masculinity, but even that has problems. First of all, if women were more oppressed than men, why would they commit suicide at a higher rate? Secondly, 91% of men who committed suicide did seek help before doing it
So, what is the reason? Well, suicide prevention programs work much better for girls than for boys.
This study shows that men are dropping out of therapy prematurely because therapy was created with women in mind.
To summarize, if men all over the world commit suicide more than women, even when using the same methods, and men drop out of therapy because it doesnt suit their needs, than isn’t it systemic discrimination?
Physical Health
Now, everyone knows that women live longer than men in almost every country on Earth. But leave alone the fact that men are more likely to commit suicide, die at work (more on than later), die during a conflict (more on than later), drown, die from an injury, and die from child abuse, let’s look at mens health. Men are more likely to die from cancer, heart attacks, and even coronavirus
Despite all this, women’s health receives FOUR TIMES as much funding as men’s health
Hate crimes
Almost everyone agrees that gay men are oppressed to some degree. But gay men suffer hate crimes more often than gay women do. Other feminists say this is because lesbians are seen as ‘sexier’ than gay men. But even transwomen are more likely to be victims of hate crimes than trans men. The key here is that even though trans women are women, transphobes dont consider them women, they consider them ‘men in dresses’ and thus deserving of violence. While transmen usually say that people generally treat them with kid gloves when they find out they were AFAB (assigned female at birth). Bisexual men endure more discrimination than bisexual women.
72 countries have laws against homosexuality, but only about 40 have laws against female homosexuality So in 27 countries, it’s banned for men but not for women.
So if men are more likely to be victims of hate crimes, male homosexuality is punished more than female homosexuals, while trans women are being targeted because they are seen as men pretending to be women, doesn’t it mean men are systemically discriminated against?
Work
You’ve probably heard that women make less money than men, and that is an example of discrimination, but the truth is that women choose more fulfilling and safer jobs than men. We also choose jobs closer to home, so we commute less, and we take less overtime and work shorter hours. Here is a video explaining it all.
According to this research, men work almost twice as long as women in a week, do more work in a week even when unpaid labor is considered.
According to this study, men are much more unhappy at work than women
Men are more than 10 times more likely to die at work than women
Boys are more likely to be put in child labor than girls, and according to this study, the work they do is very dangerous and harmful.
So, how is all of this systemic? Well, there is a general cultural and religious duty of men to provide for women. In Christianity as well as Islam, men are told (and sometimes harshly condemned for not) to provide for women, and our children. This leads to men choosing higher paying but more dangerous, less emotionally fulfilling, and farther away jobs so they can provide for women.
However, even though men are in a way ‘punished’ for choosing such careers by dying more on the job and being more unhappy at work, women aren’t really ‘punished’ for our careers because we still control most of consumer spending.
Which means that many men work punishing hours at a job they dislike and STILL benefit less than women.
This doesn’t even take into account all the concessions offices make for women, like breastfeeding rooms, worker maternal leave, etc
Military
Currently, about 60 countries have mandatory drafts for males but only 9 have mandatory drafts for women. In some countries, women serve for a shorter time, like in Israel, women service two years while men serve for 2.5 years.
In some cases, men and boys will be targeted in a military operation or massacre.
Retirement rates
Several countries still have a lower retirement age for women
Homes and homelessness
Men are more likely to be homeless in almost every country on Earth.