You're going to have a hard time selling me on "male privilege", Carl. A lot of those "160 examples" are examples of privileges that larger/stronger people enjoy, privileges that disagreeable people enjoy, or are simply examples of mean things that women do to other women (or that mean people do to other people). Very little of it has anything to do with one gender being more privileged than another.
I ask you to re-read that list while keeping in mind that females do the sexual selection of our species and that females do the majority of female bullying in our society. Females "slut shame" overwhelmingly more than males. Females apply negative peer-pressure on other females that don't conform to societal standards. Males love promiscuous females, males don't care about shaved legs or the 100 other things that females hound each other about. Males simply want to be chosen as mates by females and act in ways that they believe will accomplish that goal.
All people have privileges and burdens. The fact that males are generally larger and physically stronger than females doesn't mean that there's something wrong with men. There are many small males that have the same burdens that females have (being worried when walking alone at night, being intimidated by larger people, being overlooked in group conversations, etc).
The fact that males are generally less agreeable than females isn't an example of "male privilege". Disagreeableness is a key personality trait that determines income and position in the workplace. Disagreeable females make more money than agreeable males, but more males are disagreeable than females. Agreeable people accept the wages offered to them, disagreeable people fight for more.
You have two young boys. Did you know that they are 10% more likely to drop out from school than girls in Oregon? It turns out that agreeableness is a key trait for determining educational success, and girls are generally more agreeable. Is that a "female privilege" that females should be educated about and made to feel bad about? Or is it simply something to keep in mind if you notice that your boys are particularly disagreeable?
The female half of our species is responsible for the sexual selection of our species. If masculinity was so toxic, females would have stopped mating with "manly men" many generations ago. Males compete amongst themselves and females choose which ones to mate with. This is true for most mammals. Is it "toxic" that we mammals exhibit normal mammalian behaviors?
Women drive 70-80% of all consumer purchasing, through a combination of their buying power and influence. Those terrible toy stores and Amazon's marketplace are primarily shaped by the purchasing decisions of females. Should we change our stores and limit the purchasing freedoms of females for the sake of "equality"? Are you forcing your boys to be into dump trucks and karate chops? Or do they simply like building and destroying, breaking and fixing, and competing versus socializing? Could it be that this is their nature and that no matter how much you try to reason with them, they will like what they like? Shouldn't females be allowed to simply like what they like as well? Even if that means pink toys for girls and blue toys for boys.
I appreciate the sentiment of your post, Carl. If women (or any other groups) are being treated unfairly, we should recognize it and address the problems. But I don't see anything in your post about specific rights that males have but females don't have. I don't see any examples blatant unfairness or lack of opportunity for women.
Obviously, rape is bad. This is why I don't rape and don't associate with rapists. Besides encouraging opposition to rape (which is our society's default), what do you hope to accomplish with this post?
I don't see this post doing anything other than encouraging people to look at the world through a "women versus men" lens. Life is too complex to be seen from such a black and white perspective and the overwhelming majority of humans don't view the opposite sex as their enemy. Human society needs males and females. It needs agreeable and disagreeable people, it needs conservatives and liberals, it needs adventurers and homebodies. Our species cannot survive with only a female perspective. It cannot survive with only a male perspective. This is why we team up and become stronger when we pair with people who are different than us.
Your boys aren't privileged because of their sex. They are going to be told over and over that they have unearned privilege. That idea is false and harmful to their development. Your boys, like every other human, will face struggles and difficulties. They will have to fight and compete for what they get. That is the burden of being a human on the planet earth. Modern feminism views this as unfairness caused by "toxic masculinity", but it's simply the nature of being hierarchical creatures in a hierarchical society.
I'd upvote this post, but I have no idea what @teamgirlpowa will use the money for. I've seen no evidence that females on Steemit are in need of extraordinary support or activism. Without definable goals, things like "the value of girl power, gender equality, race equality, lgbtqinb rights, and be open to helping empower women" are just a bunch of buzzwords. Show me where, and how, specific actions will fix legitimate issues and I'll see if I can help. Repeating words and phrases that are impossible to act on seems counterproductive and is not something that I want to empower or give credibility to.
I appreciate the respectful and well reasoned tone. I suggest if statistics are not something that would convince you on this issue, to talk to women :) The easiest way to see this, I think, is to just ask some women in your life about #metoo. I have done this myself. The most common response has been "Of course. Of course me too." I have yet to talk to a woman about this (and I have talked to quite a few) who didn't assume that every woman they knew had been sexually assaulted. You can wrap it up in as many different ways as you want. You can say the cause of this is whatever you want. You can agree or disagree with feminist theory. As a man it is relatively likely that you have not been sexually assaulted. If you have, I apologize - that doesn't change that the majority of the men you know have not. Try just talking to some women about this and listening. The issue goes way beyond just sexual assault but the reason I am focusing on this, in the post and my response, is because it is the easiest to see and the most repulsive example.
Ahhbut Carl, then hed have to take us at face value and trust.
As for "what we will do" we having been working on our white paper but want it to be as airtight as possible. Its especially difficult because we have to find, assemble , and compile both irl and blockchain data.
What is clear is that there is only one female identified person in the top 50 witnesses. I'm not sure where @patrice is at but its not top 50 even tho i have campaigned for her as the creator of @steemcleaners The female identified person is @crimsonclad who is a partner with @followbtcnews Of course, when i mention this, i am often reminded that @followbtcnews is a man and msny dont know they they work together. They dont know all of the work she does unless they are in @minnowsupport and at that, she still doesn't have a seat at the hardfork table unless she went back in to the top 20. Why is that? Because no woman wants to run a server and run a program 24/7 in order to have a voice is the answer i get.
When i suggsted tgp run a witness server pretty much everyone was saying "are you crazy" ?! Not enough women whales to get the support to break even. At that , who knows who all of the few female supporting whales are and how do we ask for their support? To do so would be intimidating at the least.
@stellabelle has supported us in the past and i hope that still stands.
"The money"
Will be put into SP as we are working towards being a curation guild and media outlet.
But... thats a ways off. If this works. With the year we will be employing our moderators just as curie does! Into the following year work for on-the-ground-efforts in venezuela, south africa, nigeria, and either aceh or manilla. But these are lofty goals. Only time will tell if we get anywhere close. Thank the universe some folks believe in us !!! @carlgnash is one of them
Why would you assume that I don't take firsthand accounts at face value? I haven't written anything to indicate that I don't trust women or take them at their word.
I voted for Patrice for witness, she deserves a higher spot
I agree that it is important to listen to people and try to empathize with others. I can't imagine the horror of being sexually assaulted. It's a crime that should rightly be punished by law. I have been the victim of violent crimes and I know how terrifying they can be, I can't imagine adding a sexual element to that experience.
I think that I see more clearly your objective for this post. Listening to others and gaining empathy for their situation and making sure that you're not making their situation worse (please correct me if I'm still not getting it). I agree with that objective wholeheartedly.
My problem with the statistics that you used is that they appear to highlight how victimized females are and how bad males are for victimizing females. The nature of our reproductive organs guarantees that more males will commit rape than females, obviously. The nature of our society's sexual selection process guarantees that more males will commit rape than females.
The reality is that both genders are victims of horrific crimes and circumstance. Males in America make up 77.8% of homicide victims. 93% of people who suffer workplace fatalities are male. 1 in 3 women, and 1 in 4 men are victims of domestic abuse. We all face potential victimization.
Maybe I'm just being defensive, or maybe I only care about issues that affect me, but it seems like posts like this are used to highlight how easy men have it, and how unfair life is for women. A big section of your post is dedicated to male privilege, after all. I believe that both genders face near-insurmountable obstacles and hardships. Both genders face dangers and challenges that are unique to their gender. Highlighting one group's adversity while diminishing another group's adversity seems like the opposite of equality to me. Not that I'm accusing you of diminishing a group's adversity, but "male privilege" robs male victims of their ability to be heard when speaking out.
I appreciate the response, Carl. I no longer see your post as only helping to reinforce the "male vs female" lens. We should all be aware of how our actions and attitudes affect others around us. My fear is that these kinds of posts lead people to the false conclusion that men have "privilege" and therefore are solely responsible for the problem and the solution. If humanity is going to solve any of these problems, we'll have to do it together. I don't believe that sentiments like "girl power" bring us together.
Thanks for the response. You are pretty much right on the money as far as what I am trying to do. I have been considering writing a post specifically about the defensive reaction. And I knew I ran a very real risk of triggering a defensive reaction when I chose to talk about male privilege. I believe I even correctly predicted that many of my male readers would point to reasons that they are not privileged. Why does supporting women have to come at the cost of tearing down men? I don't think it does. But then again, I also don't think that acknowledging male privilege tears down men. I could have written a post that just said I support women and I support #womenspeakout and it would probably not have triggered this reaction in you.
But ultimately I think I also wanted to trigger a reaction. I want to spark a discussion. I am ashamed that at one instance in my responses above (not to you) I failed to maintain the level of decorum that I expect of myself and descended into a snarky personal attack. That was not my intention. My intention was to provoke men that think this is a non-issue and get them to engage in a conversation. You can be both privileged by gender, and unprivileged for many other reasons (sexuality, race, socio-economic status, geography, etc.). There is a lot to untangle here. That being said I absolutely think that there are gendered differences that cut across all these other lines, in western society and most if not all other societies that I am aware of. To say that the reason more women are sexually assaulted than men is a factor of biology is exactly what I am talking about here - THAT is male privilege. The privilege of being born with a penis, sir. You have hit the nail on the head. You came around to the idea from the other direction even if you are saying this statement as an argument against male privilege.
More makes do the raping due to physiology, I’ll acceot that as truth. But doesn’t negate the 1 in 5 women stat. That is an alarming number. And does include the women that are too afraid to speak up and report it.