Toxic Masculinity

https://t.co/DddqnZtP67

Toxic masculinity teaches that men cannot assert their own manhood absent sex with a woman that they alone possess

Being brought up male in a few tweets.  Storified by miniver.

An Atheist Feminist Shouts Bullshit.

beliefnet

Atheists like most arbitrary groups tend to reflect the dominant mores of the society in which they are embedded.  I suspect that male feminists are as unusual in atheist groups as in any other that doesn't have misogyny as a central group tenet. 

Atheists generally have weak belief systems, and therefore might be influenced more by advocacy groups with a useful message.  Many won't listen, even weak belief systems are hard to counter, but I suspect that feminism will generally find fertile ground in the rapidly growing atheist and secular part of the overall society. 

And you're basing this on survey and polling data, right? Not just on anectdote and making shit up?   Fematheist

False dichotomy.  In any event survey and polling data finds whatever the constructor of the survey or poll wants to find.  See any partisan political poll.  Did you ever hear of or write a "push poll?"  If not why not?  You claim to be a social scientist, you must have been taught about them in something like Surveys 101.

Unbiased observation of convention activity, social functions, and comments of members of a study group are much more reliable than any poll or survey unless you have access to the actual questions asked in the poll, the demographic of the polling subjects, and the bias of the poll constructor.  Got any?  Or are all your observations and data biased by feminist activism?

I am sorry, are you suggesting that because some companies polls do push calling that gives you the right to just make bullshit up on these boards and pass it off as reality? Is that SERIOUSLY what your argument is?  Attacking bad polling instead of defending or evening acknowleding the bullshit you just MADE UP?

I would call that a fundy evasion tactic there, JC.Fematheist

You can call it anything you like from your social science ivory tower.  I am not talking about company or think tank push polls, I am talking about the biased polls and surveys from proper respected academic departments in economics and social science, two areas of interest for me.  I do read past the popular articles in the news to the published data and read the protocols and the questions themselves.  Some good, some garbage. 

In any event I have been living atheism and feminism for many more decades than you have been alive and I am not a convert to either.  Before you sling your projection of fundy on me you should at least identify the fundamentalism I allegedly identify with.  What is it? A convert's fundamentalist anti-theist beliefs?  A feminist activist's fundamentalism that all men are pricks?

I am a trained scientist and scholar although not working in either field I am able to observe behavior from a scientific POV generally without bias or belief based conceptual blocks.  It is a fact that I am a feminist man living in a male dominated world, and an atheist in a Christian dominated culture, but I do observe without bias how both of those positions of privilege affect me and the others around me. 

Shouting about making bullshit up does not make the assertion true. One must in academia or in the real world, take the bullshit apart and demonstrate that it is wrong.  So far you have done neither.  

To be fair to Fematheist she is promoting a feminist atheist channel on YouTube (Search Kristi Winters) that is well worth subscribing to if you are into Video.  I skip to the references to see whether the transcript is worth reading. 

Feminists Hate Moms?

beliefnet

I find it ironic that feminism is supposed to be about women being able to choose their lives, yet so many actual feminists get mad when women make choices that the feminists don't like.IronLDS

I suppose it would be ironic if that is what they did.  While there are probably extremists who will personify their attack on the system that supports this choice and indeed forces it on many women.  But they are really mad about the system that in some influential religions conditions women from birth into the brood mare role, and justifies higher pay for men because "they have to support their brood mare."

These days being a brood mare for a "financially secure man" is a cushy job at least until he is unable or unwilling to support his family, or decides that a more attractive brood mare will advance his career. 

At that point his brood mare becomes a "welfare queen" as she tries to support his kids with no help from him, and no educational tools to support anything but minimum wage service jobs which in most states are inadequate to support a family without government assistance and in any event do not give her the time necessary to raise her kids to be anything besides cannon fodder in one war or another: the war on drugs or a foreign war if she has the connections to get her kids into the military. 

It is the system that is broken, not the women who are brought up to exploit it if they are fortunate. 

To the extent that it stays within the church culture and the church culture takes care of its own failures I have no real issue with the system.  It is just another business model.  Mormons and to a lesser extent Jews and Catholics are business cultures more than churches, and as such have the right to compete in the larger society just like any other group.  I think eliminating half their population from productive work in a technological society is a losing business model, but that is a testable hypothesis which may or may not prove to be true. 

Growing Up Atheist and Feminist

beliefnet
I grew up as a secular feminist male in a Sunday Country Club society.  Everybody went to church but nobody took it very seriously.  At the university few went to church and so few took it seriously that I had to travel to a nearby Jesuit University to get a good religious discussion.

Nevertheless the echoes of male dominance and sexual entitlement were everywhere. Even the women at the university seemed to think that the Mrs. was as important as the BA.  The way to the Mrs. was universally understood as submissiveness in everything from academics to sex. 

There were a few women on campus that would whup yer ass in anything ya tried to compete in including finding them on top in sex. But the word on campus was that they were failures as women destined to a life of loneliness and frustration.  It generally didn't work out that way as there were some men in the academic world that respected that attitude and were looking for a partner rather than a "wife" and lived happily, if not ever after, long enough to propagate their genetic line. As might be expected their kids were awesome.

Here is a question, what would a gender equal society look like?

beliefnet 

Almost any Heinlien novel including the Juveniles.  The women characters are almost always more equal in brains and competence than the men.  The only problem feminists have with Heinlein is that the women generally are interested in contributing their more than equal genes to the gene pool.  Nothing unusual, most of the women I know about who are in the feminist trenches being more competent than the average man in their chosen work are interested in contributing their more than equal genes to the gene pool as well.  They generally choose men who have been brought up to be partners rather than "husbands" and who use their male privilege to support their partner. 

Case in point: A well educated, extremely intelligent and broadly competent man (brought up by a dual career couple) did odd jobs throughout his partner's US military supported medical training, required service in a base ER, and residency; fathering and parenting 2 children in the process.  The doctor took over a small metropolitan area family practice, which needed a practice manager as well so that odd job fell to the partner.  Those of you from the yellow boards on this forum will appreciate knowing what gooddogma-sit and Tarakyan have been doing since they got too busy to post here.  Yep.  True story.

Men and Women are Different

beliefnet

Feb 2, 2015 -- 11:28PM, A Creationist wrote:

Your male-nurse-counterpart, would recognize some other differences, though.  [Women] have body parts which complement [which have different functions from him,] and [women] were designed for reproducing offspring. [Along with most other human activities.] Your body produces eggs, monthly, and you menstruate, monthly, and his produces sperm, continually.  Your breasts were designed to suckle a baby [and women have] in a womb which he doesn't have.

The two brains differ; the types of thought processes differ; the body structures differ; the emotional reactions differ; the topics of conversation differ....

If the designs differ, why fight the roles and functions, associated with them?

[Minor edits in red].

In the ERSSG with which I identify women are generally smarter and more competent at anything they choose to do than the men.  The men are smart and competent as well, the SSG selects for intelligence and competence, but the women seem to be slightly higher on both curves than the men.   Evolution selects for smart, competent women because smart, competent women produce smart, competent children of both genders which are valuable assets in the reproduction of the species. 

It is true that the women gestate the children.  It doesn't seem to slow them down much, as their men pick up the slack.  One scientist I knew was in the lab at 10am went to a scheduled medically indicated induction for her second child at 2, and was back in the lab the next day. Something about a grant application that was inconveniently due about the due date of the child.  Dad picked up the slack at home with the first child, he took a week vacation (before paternity leaves) in anticipation of extra work at home due to the grant and anticipated birth.  He also handled the middle of the night feeding: get up when the baby cried, hang the baby on the teat of the sleeping mom, change the diaper when indicated, and tuck the baby in the crib.

Home chores are usually more equally divided with men taking the more equal half.  The men take the more equal hit on accommodating their careers to the needs of the women as well.  Only proper as they are the privileged ones.  A white male MBA changes jobs and careers like underwear anyway, doing so to stay near the woman's workplace is no problem.  The only racism in that statement is in the larger society, the non-white males have more difficulty changing jobs and careers for any reason.  

Religious Persecution

I doubt you're being persecuted.  Why do you play the victim?

Because "me" would be in fact persecuted by any religion she is being asked to respect.  In fact "me" would be persecuted in any culture dominated by any religion she is being asked to respect.  Could "me" go to Saudi Arabia on business, rent a car and drive it in western clothing? Could "me" go to the good old USA and visit Planned Parenthood without being harassed?  Could "me" go to Paris and publish an article on child abuse by Muhammad?

Now tell me again from your position of male religious privilege why "me" should not play your victim?  Please be specific.  Tell "me" what respect atheist women have from you that they should respect your religious views. 

Homemaking is Hate?

beliefnet
If I infer correctly you are holding up the following as an example supporting your religion is hate thesis.

A radical feminist quoted:

You know what? She needs to be working on breakfast. She needs to be working on lunch. She needs to be working on dinner. She needs to be working on homeschooling the children. And teaching them, and cleaning, and that’s enough work.  "Pastor Anderson"

For most of human history this was a necessary reality if the human race was to continue.  When child and maternal mortality was in significant double digits women had little choice if they were to get their 2.3 replacement offspring to puberty but to provide for the man who was providing external resources to the family, keeping the home sanitary, feeding the family, and educating the children to be productive citizens of their community. 

As late as the early 20th century my own grandmother had 7 children two of which were stillborn, and died in childbirth with the 7th.  The family was well off and well-educated, so four of the five surviving became productive adults.  The two women although independent, well-educated feminists were still relegated by their society, not their church, to homemaking. The fifth was incapacitated with childhood diseases and became a ward of the family. 

I am not arguing that modern medicine and contraception have not changed the equation and that religion should drag itself into the modern world, but religion is very conservative, and a significant portion of the world population is still locked in the septic, hidden estrus world that is our genetic heritage. 

You may rail from your position of privilege that religion should be changing.  That is what positions of privilege are good for.  I have done my share from my position of privilege, but accusations of hate, misogyny, and bigotry as if that is all there is, are in my opinion counterproductive. 

WEPC, Morality and Humanism

beliefnet

In my opinion, preaching the innate superiority of Western European Protestant Culture as he is doing skirts very close to fascism.amcolph

You realise that you are insulting the majority of atheists who post here, amcolph?  For them, morality is mere fashion, and Twenty-First Century Western Liberal Culture (which is a not-very-developed development of "Western European Protestant Culture") is the zeitgeist which molds their fashion, so it must be "superior".  Thus, for example, they frown on slavery because Western Liberal Culture considers slavery to be "bad"; but in the rest of the world, slavery is the norm. Thus, again, they consider women to be full members of society, equal to men; but in the rest of the world, women are chattels of men.Lavengro

The morality of many of the atheists who post here is humanism which is complete and utter repudiation of the elitist "Western European Protestant Culture" (WEPC).  The WEPC is being dragged, kicking and screaming, to a more humanistic morality. 

Humanists oppose slavery, all forms including wage slavery, as slavery only benefits the fascist elite and the syncophant WEPC priests/preachers/pastors/vuvuzelas who provide God's moral blessing on the fascist elite in exchange for a tithe.  But as one of the elite warns, the pitchforks are coming. Here as well as the rest of the world.  In the immortal Janis Joplin line "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose."

The rest of the world is finding out that women as chattels of men is not working too well as women gain control over their fertility.  Hobby Lobby notwithstanding.  That minimum wage slavery is easy to buy into and an independent nuliparous woman can use it as a springboard to personal fulfillment while working men's egos for pleasure and additional support without a care about hosting some prick's seed.  She may choose to do so but the choice is hers in the US as well as India, China, and much of the western world.  So much for WEPC misogyny.

Dual Careers and Sex

Excerpt from Amanda Hess in Slate

Gottlieb’s story relies heavily on a 2012 study (PDF) published in the American Sociological Review that found that when men in heterosexual marriages performed chores that are traditionally coded as feminine—like “folding laundry, cooking or vacuuming”—the couple had sex less frequently. But if the husband performed traditionally masculine chores, like mowing the lawn or taking out the trash, the couples “reported a 17.5 percent higher frequency of sexual intercourse”—and the wives were more sexually satisfied, too. The data on which the study is based was collected 20 years ago, when the husband who cooks dinner or does the dishes was still an anomaly, but Gottlieb cites one contemporary couple she’s treated in her psychotherapy practice as further evidence of the trend. The couple came to her looking for help distributing their career and household duties but found that once their responsibilities were balanced, their sex life suffered. The wife claimed that she was highly sexually attracted to her husband ”when you’re just back from the gym and you’re all sweaty and you take off your clothes to get in the shower and I see your muscles,” but that desire turns to irritation when the husband tossed his dirty clothes onto the floor, sparking an argument about his failure to vacuum the house. “So if I got out the vacuum, then you’d be turned on?” the husband asked. “Actually, probably not,” she replied. “The vacuuming would have killed the weight-lifting vibe.”

J'C rant here:

To the lady for whom the weight lifting vibe was turned off by vacuuming: Get out of that business suit, buy a Victoria Secret's maid uniform, do the vacuuming yourself and be ready when he comes home from the gym after a hard days work sucking up to the boss to pay for the secret.

As one who has been there, and done that with two high powered jobs and two high maintenance kids in the household, sex frequently was a cuddle in bed before sleep.  If we both had any energy left the cuddle might get more active, but the sexual attraction in either case was two multifaceted jobs at work and at home well done for the benefit of the family. 

Having to be turned on by some socially mandated "vibe" misses the point of sexual equality in the first place.  If one is a sex object on either side of the bed.  Forget the equality, you will never understand.  Go buy the maid outfit and find a partner that can afford it in exchange for sex. 

Socially Responsible Humanism

Thad Yep, J'Carlin. That's my sense of "prick", too. And I reiterate: unfortunately, any prick can be a father, too. "Father" is not some noble vocation, unfortunately, and neither is "parent". In the U.S. today, the terms seem to be increasingly confused with "unpaid juvie officer". ...
 
Thad J'Carlin, you're doing a lot of generalizing there and in my experience, that sort of thing doesn't work very well. "Humanism" is also a grand phrase that's devoid of any practical meaning. What does one do if one is a humanist? What does treat everyone as if they had inherent worth really mean, in practice?

As my virtual friend Stream Angel well knows, I believe that it's quite easy to make these great sweeping statements about justice and equality and human worth and what not. What I think is difficult is to actually boil those down into concrete practices.

It's all well and grand to talk about "good parenting", for example, but what does that really mean in terms of practices? Some people will tell you a good parent needs to swat their kid's rear end occasionally. Others are horrified by the very idea and feel no compulsion against dropping a dime on a parent who'd do that.

Is it "good parenting", for example, to take a child to a brothel? Be careful: the question is a hell of a lot more tricky than you might expect.

 I may be generalizing, admittedly a harder row to hoe, but cherry picking specific examples, what we call in Bible arguments prooftexting, is really worthless in any argument.  For any shit you sling on the wall I can find different shit to cover it up.  The only result is a shitty wall.  
 
 The takeaway is that it is all solved by the principles of humanism (lc h) that is all people are humans.  Not men, not women, not children, not Christians, not Jews, not [whatever.]  Simply humans. Not all the same humans certainly, humans are all different, but if you put "human" before the [whatever] it really does change the way you think about and look at people.

 If it is a human body builder does it really make a difference which costume the human is wearing?

If it is a human dancer does it really make a difference which costume the human is wearing?

If it is a human CEO does it really make a difference which costume the human is wearing?

If it is a human street person does it really make a difference which costume the human is wearing?

or for more difficult cases 

If it is a human bigot does it really make a difference which -ism the human is wearing?

If it is a human criminal does it really make a difference which suit the human is wearing?

 Humanism does not mean noble or even not a prick.  But the assumption of inherent worth and dignity does change the way you think even of a prick.  Maybe a victim of bad parenting, or the wrong associations while an adolescent, or any of a host of factors.  Hesh is still a prick, a crippled human, but a human nonetheless.  

 Please note.  I am saying nothing about what a humanist society will do to protect itself from crippled humans.  It must do so.  Even humanist societies remove threats, but even threat removal must recognize the dignity and humanness of the threat. The current US paradigm of throwing the threat in a for-profit prison benefits no one as "prisoners" are by definition not human.  The Norwegian model of assuming the person temporarily removed from society is not only human but is a potentially good citizen if properly educated in the mores of the society.   

 Parenting is a different issue.  But the same principles apply.  A parent, that is a person or persons who chooses to accept a child into their family, also accepts the societal obligation to nurture and socialize the child to become a responsible human adult in the society.  The society will provide resources to help, but ultimately it is the responsibility of those who choose to parent to choose the most useful resources to supplement their nurturing guidance.  This is a joint effort of the parents and the society but parents have some choice in the society they wish to associate with, and even within the society they choose may make choices to emphasize certain mores vs others. 



 

 

Is is sex or sexism that sells?

Jonathan Korman

“Everyone says sex sells, but actually sexism sells. There’s a difference.” -@femfreq (via @mmjordahl)

Not so. If the attractive and provocative model pitching the oversize SUV convinces the buyer of either gender that the SUV will compensate for lack of the necessaries for attractiveness where is the sexism. Pure sex sell. Also, is Yuja Wang being sexist by selling her music by dressing appropriately for a star of her age? It sure makes the reviewers drool all over their copy, who is sexist here?

Jonathan Korman  The process is sexist. It doesn't need to be located in any individual.

A process cannot be sexist. It is the individual reaction only. Dressing appropriately for the job is not sexist. Consider a CEO in a power tie or scarf and shoulder pads, at the head of the table. Is hesh being sexist? Using sex to sell, or what?

This is the same argument that a runner in a sports bra/top and tight shorts is asking to be raped. It doesn't fly.

More later... 11/? 

How to Get Laid in a Society of Empowered Women

You don't.

There is no dearth of sex in the society, they like sex as much as the next woman.  But due to a very busy schedule time effectiveness means that the woman needs a reliable circle of men frequently only one available on short notice for an evening of pleasurable activities leading to sex.  This implies a relationship well established to ensure that the evening will well spent, and the sex a reward for both partners.  Yep.  That nasty relationship word again.  One must respect the choices the EW has made and fit into the range of interests other than sex to make that evening enjoyable.  Even in hot social environments of conventions one can expect several hours or even days of common enjoyable activities, before the evening that includes sex.   

Practical Atheism and Feminism.

beliefnet
Both Skep-Chick and Blag Hag are also feminist sites in addition to atheist sites. Perhaps as both claim, of necessity, but there is nothing that brings out the little shits with shriveled pricks like a woman who claims that women are not toys that are the property of any man who happens to notice they are not dressed in burqa.

I have been involved in practical feminism almost since utero as my mother was a practical feminist in politics who had no problems chilling any man who suggested that her place was at home with her kids or at church as she was also an atheist. But in my many decades of active involvement in practical feminism and atheism dealing with the misogynists is by far the more difficult. While it is relatively easy to lose the God associated with the Abrahamic religions it is nearly impossible to lose the misogyny which was taught before God.

This is not an apology, it is reality.

Atheists Behaving Badly.

Blag Hag: When Gender Goes Pear-Shaped

Let's continue to flog the messengers here. That will allow us to continue to avoid dealing with the real problem which has nothing to do with feminism but the fact that atheists have become so full of their Atheist BS that they can't be wrong about anything. Bad behavior? Atheists don't do that. They have the righteous Atheist TRUTH™.
J'Carlin

568 posts and counting worrying about whether a woman at panel discussion about making women welcome to Atheism© had the right to question their use of female in place of woman or women. The title of the post could have well as been Atheists behaving badly, although all the examples were men behaving as sexists as there were many other examples of inappropriate behavior by men, oh yes by women also for dressing provocatively (showing cleavage and causing men to stare at it.)

Jen actually had to delete the male half of the million dollar challenge "A $million to any man who thinks he could boff one of the attendee's by midnight." Apparently there was some controversy about whether the overall STRONGLY feminist tenor of the speech excused the challenge which would have been unacceptable at most bars. I objected to the original academic, dual sex challenge, as an inappropriate focus on a zipless fuck. In this day and age I think it would be inappropriate in any setting despite the excuse that we are genetically predisposed to fuck anything that moves. We may be, but anybody that has no control over that instinct had better find God to help. God will provide Burqas or Habits to disguise the fact that the moving thing is a woman. It might even work although available evidence says it won't.

One of the reasons I no longer identify as an atheist, is that many atheists seem to think that they have First Amendment rights to talk and behave any way they want to. The argument that fundies do it doesn't cut any ice with me. An asshole is an asshole no matter which God or NoGod is pushing out the shit.

Feminist men.

Blag Hag: When Gender Goes Pear-Shaped

If feminist men don't speak out on feminist issues, the only ones left to do so are those rad-fem women who object to sexist language and treatment. I can call a sexist a prick and get away with it because I have one. (I try very hard not to think with it. Long socialization in a family of very strong women.) The women have to be oh-so-careful not to be seen as 'one of them.' Hang in there, you will get flack from both sides but that is the way entrenched mores get changed.

Feminist men have much more clout because we can't be simply dismissed as one of those hysterical women. We can even be polite about it. Simply reminding another man about a poor choice of words by suggesting a better one is frequently as effective as calling him a prick. If not and some men just don't get it either willful sexism or stupidity the fallback is always available.

Parents

Owning Your Own Shadow - Beliefnet

Your parents must have had a very good, loving relationship. You must have really valued your mother, also.
iamachildofhis

My parents' relationship lasted more than half a century, the usual bumps and frictions, but in general I would agree with your assessment.

My mother was an intelligent, independent, and strong woman, and the iconic ancestor was similar. Not domineering as many such women can be, but not submissive either. She knew she was equal to anybody else. Not better, but no worse. My older sisters who were important in my early life inherited these traits. One might say I had no experience with other types of women or at least didn't notice other types. My father was an equal partner in my parenting and in his marriage, but traditional gender role models were basically ignored.