“Let’s combat the pay gap! Sexual harassment! Glass ceiling! STEM inequality! Ignored heroines! Rape culture! Sexist language! Pressure to be pretty! Down with the patriarchy!”
“Uh… What about male lifespan, work casualties, military deaths, the draft, parental fraud, traffic accidents, suicide victims, homicide victims, homelessness, imprisonment, drug abuse, family courts, work hours, concrete floor, educational attainment? Shouldn’t we at least talk about that too?”
“Yeah, that’s all the patriarchy! See? It’s a system that oppresses both #women and men. We feminists work to dismantle it. It’s in men’s best interest, too. Aren’t you a #feminist?”
“Sure I am — if it’s about equal treatment of both sexes under the law, and about removing any discrimination on the basis of sex.”
“Then you’re against the #patriarchy, too.”
“Well, I would prefer a word that is less divisive and doesn’t suggest that #men are the problem… I don’t think ‘patriarchy’ really means what you just said. But if we have to unite under that banner… so be it! Down with the patriarchy! Down with sexism!”
“Well said! See? We’re in this together! Let’s combat the pay gap! Sexual harassment! Glass ceiling! STEM inequality! Ignored heroines! Rape culture! Sexist language! Pressure to be pretty!”
“Wait. What?”
@tripu I'm not sure if I agree or disagree with you based on this, but the work deaths stat was kind of a shock when I first heard it. iirc men are something like 16-17x more likely to be killed at work?
@tripu how the fuck is work deaths a sex equality issue? what's your solution, make sure more women die at work so it's equal, yay, we're done? No, the solution is to make sure less people die in general and that has nothing to do with their sex. Yes if the cultural inequality is decreased you might expect that statistic to also become more even, but that is just a side effect to observe as a curiosity. Same goes for most of your other "men issues" that is literally just mortality, or things like homelessness, imprisonment or drug abuse for same exact logic, the solution to those problems is not in equality of sexes. That leaves you with parental fraud and family court, you may talk about those things in this context... obviously these are very important problems that affect majority of people throughout their lifetime... major major things yes, and not at all a side effects of different issues...
sidenote: objective devaluation of men's lives stem exactly from the same logic as objective valuation of women's, and yes it is patriarchy
> but that is just a side effect to observe as a curiosity
The fact that you think it's merely a curiosity doesn't change that it's an inequality based on sex. I agree with you that we should strive for equity, not simple equality of outcomes, but again that doesn't suggest that the current inequality doesn't have a basis in sex.
I also don't understand why you think that because sex isn't the only issue at play that makes it irrelevant. Take homelessness. Historically, the concept of the deserving vs the undeserving poor has changed very little in the last 2000 years. Widows and "pure" women throughout that time have been thought of as the deserving poor, i.e. they deserve our sympathy and charity. It's said that they aren't at fault for their circumstances. Contrast that with men and "impure women" who, except for veterans, are largely lumped in with the undeserving poor. There is a ton of cultural, religious, and economic baggage wrapped into these concepts, and sex is part of that, it's not just a bizarre side effect.
I want to reiterate that I agree that we shouldn't simply be looking to make the numbers equal. Making sure more women die at work is an absurd proposal that nobody is suggesting. I'll go a step further and agree that if we only treat these issues as sex-based the solutions are likely to fail. They are deeply intertwined with many aspects of our society and I think will probably require significant and radical changes that the status quo simply won't tolerate. However, to say the majority of the issues @tripu brought up have nothing to do with sex is patently false.
@b6hydra are you aware context... like the concept of it? It' s curiosity in context of inequality sexes, not for me. It's not a cause or some sort of a central issue, it's what you get as a result of the established culture.
Now care to actually answer my question? What is your proposed solution to decreasing work related fatalities, homelessness and the likes and how is it in any way related to inequality of sexes? Whatever solution your propose if it makes any sense what so ever it would not have anything to do with one's sex, it's out freaking context, while the OP tries to present it as if it is problem in context of inequality of sexes. Yes a man's life is valued less than woman's, in some cases it's valued less than property (which btw some people see woman as), that is a result of patriarchal culture, not the cause of it. Men die performing dangerous task on their own free will (as much as such a thing is possible) while women are safe and sound as slaves in their households. One of these problems you can solve by convincing people to treat sexes equally, while the other you can't. It's a derailing, a straw-man, that @tripu is using to make you think that this some kind of a all men vs all woman battle royal of who got it worse, while also trying to pretend that he's arguing against such sentiments.
@b6hydra I questioned your conception of context in hopes that you would read the OP again and stop derailing. The context I'm talking about is specifically the OP not what you and I happen to think is important at any given point of time.
I'm not asking you to propose the solution, I'm asking you to realize that the solution indeed needs to comprehensively address all social woes and problems, achieve world peace, cure cancer and find god, which you did, so good progress. The fact that the inequality of sexes tips the statistic is at most a curiosity. Now imagine someone talking about actual sex inequality issues, that can actually be solved with equality to various degrees, and then a wild tripu appears and goes like "but what about world peace, cancer and god, shouldn't you be talking about that as well, right now?". Now what do you call that? I call that derailing, and that's pretty much the OP.
@namark Am I aware of the concept of context? Is there any purpose to that question other than to be smug and insulting?
I'm talking about historical continuities as they relate to homelessness on the basis of not just sex, but religion and economics, as well as how they are represented in today's "established culture." If that's not context then no, I suppose I'm totally ignorant on the concept.
I won't be answering your question for several reasons. Primarily, I don't have a comprehensive plan to address all social woes such that they address not only sexism, but also poverty, devalueing of life, etc. Moreover, nobody does. However, if you think you have the answer I'm all ears. Second, I never said I agree completely with @tripu. In fact, if you read what I said previously you would know I don't believe the issues he identifies can be solved solely by focusing on inequality based in sex.
My main disagreement with you is that you say sex is out of context. It isn't. It might not be the whole picture, but it makes no sense to discount it entirely given the _context_ from which these issues evolved.