Men Inequality: are men falling behind in society?

[John K]

The social contract over thousands of years was: women provide babies, men provide resources and security. .

I suspect that this stereotype is actually incorrect, though there is truth in it too. Women's role was certainly domestic, and until about 1900 many women would either be pregnant or nursing an infant from age 20ish - 45ish, if they survived that long. But there's a lot more to it than that because women formed the social axis of their communities and men were beneficiaries of this rather than formative participants. This social network was almost certainly as important a resource as the income of the men and the protection they provided. Going further back into hunter gatherer days, I understand that it was women who were the main food providers judging by modern people who live that way. The women and kids were the ones who went out looking for plant food, while the men went off hunting game, and the women tended to be more successful providers than the men at this. Of course the men fought with neighbours when necessary and had to protect their group - but you can argue that this is because men were a lot more expendable than women in those days. You could lose half your men and still produce babies at the same rate, but that wouldn't be true if you lost half your women.

But all of this becomes unnecessary when you can control how and when you have children, when infant mortality is very low, when resources are plentiful. Darwinian forces rule very strongly here - we lived like that in the past because that's what meant we survived. We don't need to live like that to survive any more, and we are starting to evolve in a way that adapts us to our present environment instead. Like I said, the forces are pretty strong and if we come back in 200 or 300 years, we will find that the survivors are the ones who best adapted to our present world - they will be descended from the ones who had the most surviving children.

 

[just me]

@Wyote
It was written in the mid to late eighties, not 45 years ago. I wrote this to share with others where my paths had taken me, around age 35. Almost twice that age now, it was hard to remember it all. It has been edited as close to verbatim as when I wrote it. Why did I share it?
While you said you didn't agree with the doom and gloom assessment, I actually walked that same road and know many others have. Feelings are never right or wrong: they are feelings. I found the end of that road, and the rest is my spiritual journey to enable my mind to continue. Just thought to share it.

"Boulevard of Broken Dreams" is more about dreams that have not been realized, or maybe fell apart when achieving such dreams. It is about broken expectations. It is about failures and disappointments in life. Why did you quote this?

 

[Wyote]

While you said you didn't agree with the doom and gloom assessment, I actually walked that same road and know many others have. Feelings are never right or wrong: they are feelings. I found the end of that road, and the rest is my spiritual journey to enable my mind to continue. Just thought to share it.

Oh ok, so you were responding to what I said but not intending it for me directly.
Got it, thanks.

 

[just me]

"The poorer the society, the more people assume their natural gender roles. Wokeism only thrives when life becomes too comfortable" - Andrew Tate

The weaker the world is, the more we tend to grasp our morals.

"Empathy and goodness are writ as deeply in our genes as murder and savagery." Jeffrey Klug

Define normal?.....from the movie "The Accountant"
Great movie, by the way.

This is not pointed at you, just saying.

 

[Wyote]

Relax, mon amie. It was not pointed at you.

It actually was since you were replying to me specifically, which is what created my confusion.
Telling someone to relax when they're just looking for clarity is pretty condescending.

 

[just me]

It wasn't my intention. Deleted it for you.

One of my childhood favorite commercials I still remember used the word much differently: "So, you're gonna have a baby. Relax: have a pickle." It was a Vlassic Pickle ad using a stork.

 

[philostam]

The weaker the world is, the more we tend to grasp our morals.

"Empathy and goodness are writ as deeply in our genes as murder and savagery." Jeffrey Klug

Define normal?.....from the movie "The Accountant"
Great movie, by the way.

This is not pointed at you, just saying.

I don't know. Where I am from, we don't get a lot this stuff. I know one classmate who changed his gender from male to female. He was depressed before, he's still depressed now, I hear.

I say live and let live. I don't really oppose any of this stuff, I just find it unnatural. A fad that will probably disappear in a few years.

The same way I look tatoos. I find it stupid, would never do it, but people do. I find it amusing to observe and think about their motivations for getting a tattoo. I'd admit I have prejudices about people who have tatoos on their neck, but I'll still give them a chance.

 

[Wyote]

It wasn't my intention. Deleted it for you.

One of my childhood favorite commercials I still remember used the word much differently: "So, you're gonna have a baby. Relax: have a pickle." It was a Vlassic Pickle ad using a stork.

Deleting it isn't a kind action either.
It's not about an interpretation of the word itself, that's irrelevant.
It's the context that you're using it in, which is dismissive.

 

[Tamagochi]

I suspect that this stereotype is actually incorrect, though there is truth in it too. Women's role was certainly domestic, and until about 1900 many women would either be pregnant or nursing an infant from age 20ish - 45ish, if they survived that long. But there's a lot more to it than that because women formed the social axis of their communities and men were beneficiaries of this rather than formative participants. This social network was almost certainly as important a resource as the income of the men and the protection they provided. Going further back into hunter gatherer days, I understand that it was women who were the main food providers judging by modern people who live that way. The women and kids were the ones who went out looking for plant food, while the men went off hunting game, and the women tended to be more successful providers than the men at this. Of course the men fought with neighbours when necessary and had to protect their group - but you can argue that this is because men were a lot more expendable than women in those days. You could lose half your men and still produce babies at the same rate, but that wouldn't be true if you lost half your women.

But all of this becomes unnecessary when you can control how and when you have children, when infant mortality is very low, when resources are plentiful. Darwinian forces rule very strongly here - we lived like that in the past because that's what meant we survived. We don't need to live like that to survive any more, and we are starting to evolve in a way that adapts us to our present environment instead. Like I said, the forces are pretty strong and if we come back in 200 or 300 years, we will find that the survivors are the ones who best adapted to our present world - they will be descended from the ones who had the most surviving children.

The ability to form social support networks is a survival strategy for women. You know, in case their husband dies in a conflict, runs away or is just a derelict tool. It is not directly related to a contract between sexes.

As for "control how and when you have children" part - that's where we are in most trouble actually. Birthrates are below replacement in 70% of the world and are expected to fall further. This has never happened before in human history and will have HUGE negative consequences in our lifetimes. Think of "Children of Men" type of shit. And even with all that advanced technology and vast resources in our hands, there is nothing we can do about it.

 

[John K]

The ability to form social support networks is a survival strategy for women. You know, in case their husband dies in a conflict, runs away or is just a derelict tool. It is not directly related to a contract between sexes.

I don't think there ever was a contract between the sexes - things just find their own level in the cup, like water does. The social networks aren't just utilitarian - social interaction is almost a defining feature of humans. Men got great benefit from the networks that women create.

As for "control how and when you have children" part - that's where we are in most trouble actually. Birthrates are below replacement in 70% of the world and are expected to fall further. This has never happened before in human history and will have HUGE negative consequences in our lifetimes. Think of "Children of Men" type of shit. And even with all that advanced technology and vast resources in our hands, there is nothing we can do about it.

I'm not really disagreeing with you on this in a yes/no sort of way, but for me the issue is more nuanced. With an exponentially increasing population, and one that isn't based on closed cycles of consumption in balance with the environment, there will eventually be a limit and a crash. The more efficient we are at extracting finite resources the worse the crash will be, because hyper efficient systems that are over-adapted to their environment are unable to adapt to sudden changes in that environment. So it may well be a blessing that we are facing significant population reduction already, before we hit such resourcing crises in a big-time way - it's a lot kinder than hitting the buffers and finding out how cruel nature can be when it needs to. That will buy us time to move to a way of living that's in balance with our world rather than acting like an infestation of locusts out of control.

It's going to be an uncomfortable time over the next couple of hundred years. Maybe we will find out if the Great Filter idea of why there are no aliens around is a valid one!

 

[aeon]

I say live and let live. I don't really oppose any of this stuff, I just find it unnatural.

Things external to me are what they are. I don’t have any sense of unnatural for the world.

But I finally figured something out. I understand gender as a social construct of both identity and expression, and there may be a biopsychoneurological correlate as well. And I know the usual genders, masculine and feminine, and how those can be cisgendered as applied to males (men) and females (women).

When I look inside myself, and I ask myself who/what I am as it regards a gender identity—there’s nothing there.

I have the sense I am a person, and nothing more.

So I say all that to explain why, to me, to consider myself a man seems unnatural. On some level, it doesn’t make sense to me. I have no idea how to integrate that with my identity. I’m a person, but just that. So I figured out I am agender. That makes sense in a way that nothing else does.

A fad that will probably disappear in a few years.

Aspects of the social presentation, and conversation, and flag-waving—most certainly.

But I finally know who and what I am. Just shrugging and saying “I’m an odd duck” wasn’t going to work anymore. I couldn’t explain away the nagging discontinuities. When that final psyche shell cracked, I was bewildered, but I also knew immediately that I was home. I could stop pretending to be something I was not.

I’m thankful for all the people talking, and work done. Their efforts meant I had the tools and resources to both discover and navigate.

Best to You,
Ian

 

[Sloe Djinn]

That will buy us time to move to a way of living that's in balance with our world rather than acting like an infestation of locusts out of control.

[Sulking] But I want planetary conquest!

 

[John K]

[Sulking] But I want planetary conquest!

But it's all so horribly messy don't you find, all that conquering? There is a better way ....

Spoiler

 

[Anemoia]

An interesting take but it's only half of the equation. The other half is: what do women bring to the table?

I don't think they have to bring anything to the table to benefit from the human instinct to protect them at all costs. The 'compact' between the sexes is not subject to contract lawyers and intense scrutiny, it is something tuned over the span of evolutionary time.

Take the 'missing white woman syndrome' of the modern media - a beautiful white woman goes missing, and it's a tragedy. If she's murdered, people will protest and say that 'the streets aren't safe for women'.

And all of this is carried on in the face of the evidence - men are more likely to go missing, men are more likely to be murdered, men are more unsafe on the streets, &c. But it does not matter if men are unsafe, only that women are safe, and this is simply how people feel instinctively whether or not women are actually upholding their side of the bargain.


This is why I say that if men really are 'declining', they will not get anywhere by adopting the same strategies as women have done - by attempting to generate sympathy or make demands for their safety. Human beings are not tuned to care about male safety. Human beings are tuned to want male duty, service, and sacrifice, and will grant them authority if that's what they claim to want to do.

And we should be wary of this because it's essentially the formula for fascism - 'our men are claiming more authority to protect us. We will give it to them.'. Just like you say in your point '4' - demographic imbalances with male surplus are likely to lead to violent (fascistic) movements of young men, and it happens all the time. Islamic State is a good example of this correlation.

It's no surprise - the existence of men in those circumstances becomes Darwinistic in a way that it does not for women. They understand they they must compete, and fascistic ideologies of strength and competition simply reflect their existence back to them.

 

[just me]

Resolved by Communication

 

[Tamagochi]

I don't think they have to bring anything to the table to benefit from the human instinct to protect them at all costs. The 'compact' between the sexes is not subject to contract lawyers and intense scrutiny, it is something tuned over the span of evolutionary time.

I don't think there is an instinct to protect women - it's all social conditioning. Otherwise there would be no rape, abuse and murder of women. There's plenty of men out there who don't give a shit about hurting them. There is an instinct however to protect one's biological children.

This is why I say that if men really are 'declining', they will not get anywhere by adopting the same strategies as women have done - by attempting to generate sympathy or make demands for their safety. Human beings are not tuned to care about male safety. Human beings are tuned to want male duty, service, and sacrifice, and will grant them authority if that's what they claim to want to do.

The only strategy guys need to follow is to just walk away. Then when things start to go south, women will flock to them.

We're not going to advance as human race if we treat half of it's members as disposable. That's why we need a new social contract.

 

[Tamagochi]

When I look inside myself, and I ask myself who/what I am as it regards a gender identity—there’s nothing there.

I have the sense I am a person, and nothing more.

You can't discover gender by introspection - it can only be defined in a relationship with other people. That's why all those made up genders like xe/xir make no sense as others cannot relate to them in a meaningful way.

If you identify as agender it means you're not connected to others.

 

[aeon]

If you identify as agender it means you're not connected to others.

That’s very true.

Cheers,
Ian

 

[Anemoia]

I don't think there is an instinct to protect women - it's all social conditioning. Otherwise there would be no rape, abuse and murder of women. There's plenty of men out there who don't give a shit about hurting them. There is an instinct however to protect one's biological children.

This is not a matter of opinion, unfortunately, and your argument here is a non sequitur.

The existence of psychopaths does not preclude the existence of compassion. I'm not quite sure how you can present this as a serious argument.

 

[Tamagochi]

This is not a matter of opinion, unfortunately, and your argument here is a non sequitur.

The existence of psychopaths does not preclude the existence of compassion. I'm not quite sure how you can present this as a serious argument.

I find it amusing that a woman in her twenties is lecturing a man in his forties about how men's instincts work. So let's leave it that