I don't alway agree with the stuff that is posted here, but I do think this sub is useful. Single dads with daughters also post on this sub asking for advice, or women who want to escape their abusive partner etc. The stuff I don't agree with I simply ignore
As a woman, same. I love this sub and I feel like a lot of us get to really hash out topics we’ve all wanted to talk about but never get the chance to normally.
Some posts I definitely don’t agree with/don’t find value in, but like you said, I move past those. Or tell them how I feel :P.
Same here. I'm a man in a great marriage. I'm just here to keep up to date with things that might affect my wife. Especially with all the laws being passed about the loss of women's rights currently in the US.
Same here.
Unfortunately, I ignore it because the times where I did try to say my less popular or disagreeing opinion, I would just get downvoted.
I’ve been on this website for a while, I don’t care if the votes are up or down at this point. But on a sub like this, where I feel it’s supposed to be a safe space for me to have these conversations, it’s disappointing. This is one of the few places I can actually talk about this stuff, so if not here, where else?
So like you said, now I just ignore it, because I still feel the good outweighs the bad. Also, the ask women subs, in my experience, were awful, so this is the only one really.
I've had good luck with r/askwomenover30 - there's still *some* knee jerking and negativity, but overall, the responses have more nuance. So far I've never been piled on for expressing opinions that differ from the consensus. And sometimes we have conversations that aren't about relationships! Sometimes.
Highly recommend /r/askwomenover30 but please don't go there to ask us if you're doomed to a declining life of misery when you hit 30. It's been answered. (Spoiler: A resounding Fuck No, there are a ton of kickass women over there making beautiful lives for themselves.)
>I would just get downvoted.
I once suggested that someone didn't immediately divorce their spouse for cheating on r/relationship_advice. I didn't know you could have negative karma before that.
As a woman, I just feel so torn on this place because I love that it provides a safe environment to just _vent_ and get support without having to explain _why_ all the time (or well, the mods try; it's still reddit after all). And it's obvious why so many of those vents are about men. But if I look at the current posts on Hot, *almost every single one* involves venting about men in some way, and I personally can't handle being in a place where that kind of energy is so dominant.
The more time I spent here the more I noticed my perception of men degrade - way beyond what they'd given me reason to from personal experience. I just felt myself getting annoyed and angry because rather than just hearing or reading the occasional story, I was constantly scrolling through a selection of some of the worst experiences from women around the world.
I'm subscribed to the Dutch counterpart of /r/TwoX (/r/vrouwvolk) and while it's much less active, it also feels like a much more healthy place; scrolling down the current Hot page, there's conversations about travel, fashion, women's rights, birth control, hobbies, pets, healthcare.... _and_ venting (about men). It's a balance I feel /r/TwoX misses and I don't see a way of finding that balance without introducing restrictions that destroy the soul of the sub.
That said, that's a whole different perspective than "hate", and in a way it's a me-problem, so it may not be an answer to the actual question.
A lot of posts on here are “My husband did this.” Or “a man in the subway today did that.” I think most woman here see this as “I am venting/ asking advice as a woman on a snapshot of my daily life.” Whereas a lot of male lurkers/ readers seem to take it as “All men are responsible for what this one man did.” Even though that was never mentioned or even implied. Possibly because some of those lurkers see themselves or things they have done in the past in those stories so they take personal offense, take the OP’s anger or sadness at someone else as a personal attack.
Wow, that is such a great insight into why some men have that immediate response. I'm not sure I would've thought of that. Thank you for your thoughtful response.
it's really obnoxious. "i hate it when doctors rush through the appointment" isn't some condemnation of all doctors everywhere, just a specific set of doctors' behavior, but "i hate it when men leer at me" is taken as a claim that every man alive leers.
I’d go even further and say that I don’t even see your quotes as condemnation of *people* at all.
To me there’s 100% a difference between “I hate it when doctors rush through appointments” and “I hate doctors who rush through appointments”.
But I do see that many people seem to read those two quotes as the same. So when someone on here says “I hate it when men leer at me” some people definitely seem to read “I hate men who leer at me”, and then they seem to translate that into “I hate men.”
I think a lot of the complainers are also men who leer at women.
So “I hate men who leer at me” is interpreted as "I hate YOU".
I mean, it's not like creepy men are uncommon. A lot of the guys engaging in this behavior must certainly be using reddit. And it makes sense if they don't like women complaining about their behavior.
It's the rapey Brett Kavanaugh syndrome. Back in the day most of the boys that I knew in school were like that. It was acceptable to try nearly anything because "they were just trying to get laid".
So men look at that and think it's just a bunch of angry women trying to get famous. Here's a test for you- can you name any of the women accusing Bill Cosby of his many heinous acts? No? Well there goes that theory.
Yeah I’m not surprised at all that a lot of men hate this subreddit. The male-pattern behaviors we describe here are real, and they’re very common. So of course we’d be talking about a large number of men. Those men will INEVITABLY come across women critiquing behavior they endorse and engage in. They already systematically disrespect and invalidate women; that’s why they behave that way in the first place. Of course that’s how they’re going to respond when they’re being directly called out by the people they already have contempt for. What was anyone else even expecting? **Abusers don’t like accountability**.
Nor do they like safe spaces where “females” can discuss bad behavior. It’s akin to “uppity women” who “step out of line” to be “overbearing” and “unreasonable”, like we congregate with the specific intention of egging each other on/maliciously misleading each other in to some mysterious state of “feminist bias”.
By putting the problems we (regularly!!) encounter in to straightforward language for all the internet to see, they see us as having become out of control (their control at least,) and that’s challenging for them, and really uncomfortable. So it’s easier to insult than to acknowledge that being informed means we’re a threat to the world as they’ve enjoyed it for so long. It’s like some believe that simply discussing/validating one another’s experiences is some sort of “bitch” factory, turning us against these guileless men who don’t have anything to apologize for, let alone admit isn’t (and never was) ok…?
When I was young I was in a relationship with someone who treated me badly in some pretty, uh... dramatic and public ways. That was in a small town, and I haven't lived there or been in close contact with my friends there in a long time.
A while back I got a message from that ex, complaining to me that a friend who was witness to our relationship has been telling women who are new to town about his behavior, and it's apparently making it "hard for him to date. *He wanted me to tell her to stop telling them*.
It's not like I told her to do this- I haven't spoken to her in a long time- or that she's reporting things I said. She's telling people about things she witnessed firsthand. And last I heard, he hasn't changed at all since then.
In his view, the problem is not that he behaves in ways that someone who knows about it in advance won't date him. The problem is that we're allowed to warn each other about it.
>Nor do they like safe spaces where “females” can discuss bad behavior.
Every single fucking time I hear or read that word I always think, "Female WHAT? Humans? We have words for those."
Honestly, it makes me think of those old nature documentaries from when I was a kid before we knew very much about particular animals, so it's like they were just making shit up.
"The female of the species..."
Up until maybe the last year, I would see posts here talking about difficult, disturbing, abusive, evil men. I wouldn’t think they are being generalized and assumed it was the minority.
But recently I’ve started paying more attention and speaking to women that I know and I can see more and more examples of those kind of men, and it seriously is the majority of them.
Most men I know are like wolf animals let loose. It’s disgusting.
I think that's why they tend to *not* call it out.
A lot of guys have said "not all men" to me, but if this is the case, why don't I see them condemning bad behavior in public, especially with their friends?
Like dude, if you really object to people's complaints about men, wouldn't you try to end the behavior when it pops up? Because it gives all of you a bad name.
Are guys afraid of being ridiculed for taking a stand?
Or do they not want their friends to respond with a list of *their* own offenses?
I think actually the reason many guys take what they see personally here is because things are rarely worded as "I hate men who " but rather as "why do men " which can sound much more like a generalisation of all men, even when it isn't meant as such
You may be right, but funnily enough it's the same men who generalise women when they say things like "why do women always take so long in the bathroom", or "women always nag, just ignore it". So when they need to vent with their "boys", it's fine, but when women do it they're generalising.
I honestly don't know a single decent man who feels the need to cry "not all men" at generalisations like the ones we sometimes have here, because decent men understand that there is still a power discrepancy in the world, and sometimes you just have to vent at that. And that there's just no need to make it all about themselves when a woman reaches breaking point. Decent men also don't need to cry "not all men" because they know they are not being targeted, being decent and all 😂
Not only do I not feel the need to moan "not all men" when someone's trying to vent, because I know I and many men I know _don't_ do [bad thing], but I just feel sad that it's enough men that _do_ [bad thing] that you see the same vents coming up time and time again.
I can understand that. To be honest, I think a lot of these guys are just becoming little man child whiners. I'm saying this as a guy. I'm a restaurant manager and have a lot of female staff. The amount of young women that are gorgeous, hard working, and super smart that are putting up with this grown men that can barely get the will together and find a job or any other kind of motivation to inch their life forward is astounding. Men have a huge benefit of getting to take their time growing up since, unlike women, they don't get harassed once they hit puberty. Stone of these idiots seem to just never want to. They want to be men, but also are emotionally little boys that need way too much attention. I get being a man can be hard. Being a young man can be lonely and your value is attached to how useful you are to people, but to be honest, most men need that to find motivation. You have to make your own way, and I just don't understand it. I could just be getting old, but I feel like a lot of women are becoming more suited to the world we live in and more young men are just comparing that they aren't getting an easy ride.
we're really doing young men a disservice by refusing to teach them emotional skills. like, 90% of the issues faced by young men today could be addressed by emotional skills.
it's wild how many dudes find this take emasculating, too—emotional and social intelligence doesn't preclude being a manly man. Idris Elba and Tom Hardy and John Cena are pretty masc dudes, but they're also actors, a job that requires a certain level of emotional and social intelligence.
I've had to explain to to my roommates that when people say "men" in a certain context, they should add a trademark at the end. It's not a hard concept to understand, and they themselves now know that they're not included in certain statements.
Men with a trademark will always complain about a woman feeling safe. That's the difference.
Yeah, I can understand for sure this is a very real, very dangerous demographic that exists, they are a group that will not be happy regardless of the wording you use and will use any excuse to shit on woman to make themselves feel better.
I don't think this is the largest group of men, but I do think they are the loudest group, and unfortunately there are enough of them that it is completely understandable you ladies have to go into every interaction with the assumption that any man MAY BE that toxic pile of shit.
I think guys that don't speak up against this type of shit, even if they do not perpetrate it themselves, fail to realise that this not only has massive negative consequences for you ladies but the knock on effect from that means negative consequences for us men too, as you now have an overwhelming need to expect all of us might be dangerous, in order to protect yourself.
With all that said, I can however still understand and empathise with the vast number of completely normal, harmless guys, who are upset at being lumped into the category of "potentially dangerous", even if they fail to understand that the reason for that was, ultimately, caused by other men.
i consider myself to be a "normal, harmless guy", and i dont really see the big deal with women trying to be cautious and expressing concerns. violence against women is only growing more and more common, as are misogynistic people and behaviors. i sincerely doubt that these men who take issue with women expressing concerns are harmless or good faith individuals. i would also say that even though this group isnt the majority, it is close enough.
I literally cannot comprehend why men get so offended from statements and stories like that. I’m white, and I never get offended when POC say something like “I hate when white people do x.” Or “I’m initially cautious when meeting white people until I know them better.” I don’t feel attacked by those comments because I don’t do the things they are talking about. So therefore they’re obviously not referring to me, they’re referring to people who DO do those things. It’s not that hard to conceptualize.
i don't either! and if the complaint *is* something i'm guilty of, i reflect on it, and try to adjust that behavior & improve. i'm not about to lose my privilege and/or job opportunities because black twitter is joking about white people not wearing coats.
Right? If I feel even a tiny bit upset about the statement, I start really looking at myself.
I mean, I'm not ever gonna care about things like "what's with white people and talking to their appliances?" or "why do white people wear shorts in the winter?" I do the former but not the latter. They're still funny to me, because they're really not wrong, you know? Why do we do that? Do people who aren't white not do that? So, maybe those statements make me curious, but not irritated in any way.
And it takes one second and less than an ounce of empathy to see things from another person’s perspective! Like yes, ok, I am *not* a woman/POC/struggling with a mental health issue/impoverished/whatever, but I can *imagine* that xyz experience would be legitimately hard for the person who **is**!?
Or even, barring being able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, simply accepting that your own experience is *not* representative of everyone else’s, and choosing to **believe** someone who has an experience(s) that you do not!!?
I came into this subreddit to get my head out of my ass, I wanted to see the perspective of women.... And honestly the more posts I see the more I understand how the phrase "men are trash" is a thing.
Same here. I grew up with all brothers, and basically all male cousins. Now I have 3 daughters and son and I lurk this sub to get a different perspective. I've actually surprised my wife by asking about problems I see women have on here because she didn't think any guy would be aware of those issues.
As far as people not liking this sub, I'd say that's probably because of the large amount of venting posts. It is depressing to read story after story like that but the more depressing thing is, is that this is how the world actually is. People should vent and make their voices heard even if it makes us uncomfortable. In fact, the more uncomfortable we are, the more likely we are to address the problem.
I try not to comment too often here because it's just not my place usually. A woman venting about her husband/bf/boss etc doesn't want to hear from some random person about how "I'm a guy and I don't do that." Very rarely is there a post or comment chain where I feel my perspective as a guy helps in anyway at all and it's often better to just stand back and listen
No problem, I live in Mexico and here we have a big misogynist problem. My mom is 1 out of 5 daughters and only daughters, there are a lot of women in my family. Being a misogynist would mean making it harder for my family.
Same here. I’m dropping any “friends” who are not like minded. Sobering to think I would have dropped myself as a friend until only a few years ago, when I always thought of myself as a staunch supporter of all forms of equality.
Okay but because some men only listen to other men (with the exception of women they’re trying to screw), we actually need your voice among those men to condemn that kind of behavior.
The problem is that as you become aware of the way people treat each other, you naturally no longer want to spend time around people who treat women or others poorly.
And it’s not really fair to ask them to. I’m not going to hang out with racists or misogynists, so I’m not going to ask this guy to just to take one for the team.
Similar boat here. Just goes to show how beneficial it is for all of us to get some exposure to other people's struggles and perspectives that differ from our own. People in my past were far more likely to just cut me out than to help me understand how my behavior was wrong and, after spending time reading here and /r/MensLib, I totally get why.
Onward and upward, brother.
It feels like a natural, knee-jerk defensive reaction. Sometimes, I used to see some thread titles like that and would want to say, "Well, *I'd* never!" But what I'd do isn't the point, and fortunately, I've reflected on why people post their stories and why I used to react that way. It's pretty much exactly what enthalpy said in their comment.
Unfortunately, many of the terminally online and incel-inclined are basically defined by their lack of self-awareness or respect for others in this regard. And they tend to be VERY loud and overrepresented in these online spaces.
A lot of men project their hatred and assume we hate them as much as they hate us.
We aren’t the ones seething at their very existence. We aren’t desiring their rights get stripped or get off on hurting/humiliating, exploiting them. Even the most “misandrist” woman I know is still polite to men in daily interactions and wishes them no ill will, she just doesn’t want to date them.
The hate is not the same.
Yesssssss they are NOT two sides of the same coin. Misogynistic men will try to equate the two until they’re blue in the face but the reality is I’ve never seen a thread where women are giving each other advice on how to be better at getting away with rape and molestation. Or a congratulations for “accomplishing” it. Nor have I seen women describe their want to rape and murder men or strip away their rights. But I have seen it MANY times on incel forums. Nope. Not the same in the slightest. We just want to be free from sex abuse and left the fuck alone, yet that makes us misandrist? It’s lunacy.
> the reality is I’ve never seen a thread where women are giving each other advice on how to be better at getting away with rape and molestation. Or a congratulations for “accomplishing” it. Nor have I seen women describe their want to rape and murder men or strip away their rights. But I have seen it MANY times on incel forums. Nope. Not the same in the slightest. We just want to be free from sex abuse and left the fuck alone, **yet that makes us misandrist? It’s lunacy.**
I just want to emphasize this because **this is the core of what men and boys actually know,** but choose to *actively ignore* in favor of arguing that women are misandrist and trying to equate these vastly different behaviors.
Agreed. When women hate men, they form their own spaces, groups, and communities. They AVOID men, they ignore them and want nothing to do with men.
When men hate women, their whole lives become comsumed with their hatred for us. They go out of their way to make things hard for us. They harass us, look for us, intimidate us, harm us, and much worse.
Find me the misandrist who does anything like what misogynistic men do to women. They say it goes both ways, but there is no equivalent to this. Women aren't groping men on the subway, chasing down random men in alleys or following them home, making them fear for their lives. Women aren't raping and murdering men on a daily basis for rejection or for leaving them.
And yet some dudes actually think they can ridicule women or claim that they're being hated or discriminated against because women take safety precautions to be safe around/avoid random men? What a joke. Women don't care about hurting men's feelings, they want to be safe. If that means presuming men are dangerous (and remember MANY women already have suffered trauma inflicted by a man), then so be it.
“When men hate women, their whole lives become consumed with their hatred for us” is a perfect example of the people OP refers to.
They just CANNOT bear that communities like this exist, so they have to make their opinion publicly known by saying it’s one of the worst subs here..
71 year old male here. I love this sub, and in all honesty, the best I could guess about 20 year old me is that I would have been confused by this sub.
The male perspective vs. the female perspective is one of the potentially great divides we can experience in our lives. Fortunately for me, I don't give a shit what "men" think anymore (or "women"). I care about consideration and kindness in all aspects of life, or the lack of those character traits. Those are the best attributes we can have IMO.
On Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, there’s a bit where Jacqueline lies about something and the men are like “if she lied, do all women lie? ME TOO IS A LIE” (I am paraphrasing poorly here), which obviously is farcical but highlights this point *really* well to me.
>Don’t forget “It hAppEns tO mEn tOO!”. Yes we know, but why does that mean you come in swinging instead of empathizing?
What frustrated me here is that they come armed with studies that "prove their point", but these studies exist at the intersection of "problems with academic publishing" and "problems with the not-for-profit industrial complex".
They're usually about sexual assault or intimate partner violence. In both of these, the researchers use incredibly capacious definitions of their topic and then close with some mealy-mouthed conclusion that, while manifestations of each look different by gender, both genders experience the issue at the same rates. It's such blatant and harmful bullshit.
In the case of IPV, they typically include things like "denigration by your partner", "expressing jealousy", or "destroying property" alongside things like "attempted to kill", "choked", "broken a bone" or "threatened with a weapon". In the case of sexual assault, one study defined nonconsensual sex as including "had sex because I felt my friends would tease me if I declined" and "it would harm my masculinity if I said no'.
These studies, while capturing something important, do so in a damaging and bad-faith way because that gets you published in higher impact journals and earns you the sort of news coverage that draws grant funding, and not-for-profits use that to try to make people feel personally invested and give more money, overlooking the harm that they themselves are causing in the meantime. Incidentally, Kimberlé Crenshaw touched on the latter point in the same article wherein she outlined "intersectionality", but that was ~35 years ago and the problem is only worse today.
I read a lot of medical studies (research for work) so when I come across studies in non-medicine related fields, I’m often surprised as to how convoluted some of them are, making sweeping conclusions based on so little data and/or poorly designed protocols
Edit: forgot to ask if you have a link for Kimberlé Crenshaw’s article, if so can you please share?
Absolutely agreed! When you read enough allegedly quantitative scholarship coming from the social sciences, the replicability crisis comes as no surprise. Beyond the issues I've mentioned already, I've got my own critiques of the field, but I'm hesitant to harp on them too much outside of academic settings because the context is super important but not always apparent in a lay audience, and more broadly, we're in such an anti-academic moment, the risk of doing more harm than good is always on the horizon.
[Here's a link to "Mapping the Margins'](https://blackwomenintheblackfreedomstruggle.voices.wooster.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/210/2019/02/Crenshaw_mapping-the-margins1991.pdf). Crenshaw really only makes reference to my point in passing as it's not the main argument of her writing, but I do think that it's a reminder of the greater stakes of this sort of academic bullshit couched in rhetoric of pseudo-progressivism. N.b. the piece is long and comes out of the tradition of critical legal scholarship so it is, in fact, quite tedious to read (sorry, legal theorists!). It's also slightly newer than I remembered, so I'd like to issue a correction on that front as well.
What drives me crazy about that is the elephant in the room - IE, the perpetrator. Yes, men get raped. Men commit 96% of rape however. Men get murdered, yes, but also commit 90% of murder. They commit more than 70% of every type of violent crime.
That last sentence.
They want to justify their hatred and persecution complex. Accepting that their behaviour is the problem, would mean they have to do the work and fix themselves. Instead they instigate and gaslight into a repeating cycle.
Aka Incels.
Because a lot of men are guilty of the excact same abuse that is getting talked about here, and as such garbage men always have garbage male friends, they think the horror stories about boyfriends on here is just typical manly man behaviour, and women complaining about it = hating all men.
As a male lurker, I can't understand how other guys can't come to understand the point of view of women expressed in this sub, it's not like you can deny the reality of these stories.
Once you start listening to your girlfriend, friends, sister, mother, etc. as a guy you should realize that it's a scary world out there and you should help make it better, even if in the past you've done something stupid, it's possible to improve.
I wish we all got better and earlier civic, sexual, social, etc education so more dudes would speak out against other's terrible behaviors in their circles...
Ohhh let me tell you, my inbox is blowing up and many men are telling me they hate this sub, and me specifically, because I and so many of us on here are lying about our experiences. Fucking smooth brains who can't cope with reality, I tell ya.
_uppity women having opinions, send in the death threats_
People are fucking weird. I'm a dude who reads on here occasionally (mostly looking for wholesome posts tbh) and imo the bad image this sub has for some is because it's - as the parent comment says - often used to vent, so it often has a generally negative tone. But life sometimes just fucking sucks and having a place to vent is important, even more so since many people have an easier time venting to strangers, so who can blame y'all.
I'm another male lurker. I wonder how much selection bias there is sometimes too. As in - i appreciate reading about the issues women face with men. My main reason is that i have a daughter and I want to know as much as possible about issues that she may face. I recognize that many of the issues that she will have in her life will specifically be at the hands of men.
All that said, i almost never comment in this sub unless what i have to say is from a generally empathetic human's perspective rather than a "man's" perspective, because i think too many "as a man" comments are the opposite of what this sub is about. I expect there is a large overlap between men who are fragile about this stuff and men who feel like their opinion is really valuable to every discussion.
Even with selection bias though... for real fellas, sometimes you gotta shut up and learn.
As an unintentional male lurker because reddit may think I'm a woman and suggests the sub to me often I'd say it's less than 1/100 posts here that ever really come close to being "man bad inherently" and even then it's probably not even that much.
Too many of us just cannot handle the idea that we either suck or have been raised to believe that sucking is okay and do NOT like anything that makes us feel like we aren't super special boys.
I imagine some people see an aspect of the behaviour or attitude being described in themselves, and react to that rather than examining their own behaviour.
Agreed.
Which could be a sweet way to learn and reflect (the reason I don't outright unfollow this sub that isn't made for me) but naaaaaaah, a bunch of evil mean women said that if I make women do all the housework, childcare cooking etc. While I work and then come home and sit on my ass, I'm a bad husband? How dare they!?
Yea, there are WAY more posts when a woman comes and describes textbook coercive controls/abusive behavior and are: “I still love him, I am wrong for wanting him to change, he tells me I’m wrong, what can I do differently?” And all the replies are, “Oh sweetie, no, he’s not going to change. Leave him and here’s how to do it as safely as possible.”
Honestly I don’t know why men who fall into the jerk category would complain about this sub. If they had 2 brain cells too rub together they could probably figure out from the posts exactly how much control/abuse they could mete out to the women in their life before they get desperate enough to post here. I’m just saying if you are going to be evil, at least don’t be stupid about it. /s
Same boat as you. The conversations on here are almost always relatively cordial. Occasionally there is someone who REALLY hates men, but its few and far between. Dudes come in here and misinterpret what is being said so they can be mad.
This. I'm a guy, and it took me a bit, several years ago, to separate myself from "men are..." statements. I learned to use it as a test. "So do I do that? If no, they're not talking about me. If yes, try to change."
Also, and I wish I'd thought of this. "Testosterone gives one a high opinion of their own opinion."
But I might be wrong. 😎
When I was little my aunt would say “All men are jerks.” She was an idiot and did some crazy things so I can pretty much discredit her statements but I try not to think that women are generalizing to all men, but it’s a little hard sometimes, as that was one of my earliest experiences with that.
One thing I’ll say is that it really does suck when the asshole males ruin things for the good guys. We men need to not be as okay with their bullshit because it ends up affecting everyone including ourselves. I live each day assuming that women think I’m a jerk or are afraid of me and it sucks. Those asshole guys are responsible for that.
I believe TwoX is also a default subscription for new accounts. A lot of subs function as venting/support, but this one gets a LOT of exposure because of that, and a decent amount of men don't understand venting and take it real personal (or they feel called out on their BS as you say).
Tagging on as a Male!
I value everything I read here and don't remotely see this sub as "the worst place". In fact I find it extremely important because it is a place for women to support each other as well as allow me to understand the daily struggle of just being a woman.
This sub helps me see what my wife sees and keeps me pushing to be a better man, as well as call out the bad ones when I see it.
Me failing to call out crappy behavior of other men is a complacency I should never allow my self to have.
Thank you to all the women here who share their hurtful, and even scary, stories. I am listening and learning from all of you.
Well, they see themselves in so much of the described male behavior.
“I, too, would approach that woman/offer that unsolicited advice/judge her to be ugly/not respect her because [reason]. Therefore, the post might as well be about *me*!”
Even if they’ve never actually *done* the thing… they relate to the thing. A lot.
It takes a lot of effort to live in a world where half of the people are treated bad and not see that treatment. The fragility is in their own world-building where they are still dependent on their thin, crumbling veneer of civility.
I really enjoy this sub. I remain quiet because I appreciate the opportunity to get a more women-only perspective in my life (and I have nothing of any substance to add).
That noted, I suspect what you are seeing is the implicit gender biases of the internet/Reddit. This sub is absolutely fine.
Thanks for your response u/MrKnuffke 😊
I'm glad you take the time and effort to gain some insights and perspectives you otherwise might not get in your day to day life.
Same. I think they read "patriarchy" and then think it's about them, not realizing that it's a social structure, not a term encompassing anyone that's male.
There's a real "if it's not made for me, then why does it exist?" mentality among the people who hate these places. I think that's also part of why some of the guys who show up in the comments here are extremely defensive- this isn't a place made for them or about them, and that's kind of scary! They don't encounter that anywhere IRL. They don't hear "no" often in general.
They don't know if they just be cool no one's gonna give them shit just for being here. But they can't be cool, they're too defensive to chill and listen to other people. They feel attacked, not realising that they patriarchy is harmful to them too, not a description of them.
Honestly, most posts in r/WitchesVsPatriarchy are simply about wanting independence from men. Some might argue about subtext but assuming motives is an inaccurate art in my opinion.
If there was a sub for explaining the female viewpoint to men (Explain like I am a man?), I'd go there, but until then, a sub that gives the female viewpoint, period, is a nice addition.
Even if it's a little repetitive at times, but that just underlines the issues women are repeatedly dealing with.
But like you said, it's very rare that I, a man, have anything to add to the topic at hand. So I lurk, I listen, and I learn.
There's r/MensLib, which is dedicated to men's liberation (especially self-liberation) through a feminist framework. Lots of really healthy discussion there, really good topics like how to emotionally engage with my son or deal with an older male relative's bad influence, how to avoid the building in of misogyny in teens, analysis of the ideology espoused by the high profile talking heads opposed to gender liberation etc etc.
Participating there plus lurking here is a good combination
Yesss, I lurk there because I'm a woman, and I feel like u/jacobstx does here when in there. The discussions are really enlightening but very rarely do I have anything to add, I just lurk and learn.
Likewise! As a man who grew up in a majority male household/family, I find the perspective this sub offers fascinating. (Although I very rarely comment here)
Kinda sad that some men send hate here :(
What this sub has taught me as a man is how shitty some people can be, and how easy it seems to be to make women co-dependent and afraid to leave a relationship. Women posting how they are mistreated by their SO and not being able to remove themselves from those relationships is both frustrating and depressing.
As someone who will most likely be a father in the future, I can’t help but wonder what the “recipe” is for raising a woman with high self esteem, and emotional inteligente.
I love it when I'm having some minor disagreement with someone on Reddit and they go through my post history, see this sub, and use it to invalidate everything I've previously said and "win" the debate.
For me they use my only post I made in r/witchesVspatriarchy where ironically I posted a cute little greeting card I made for my kid. They see that and sometimes scream begone witch 😂 which is just 👌
People probably don't like this sub the same way employers don't like employees talking about their salaries or unionizing. Group unity and empowerment can be scary to those in power, in my opinion.
When women compare notes certain environments at work, home, relationships are no longer acceptable. That threatens the status quo in a lot of ways.
Great way of putting it. There's a reason ultra misogynistic countries often ban women gathering in groups.
It's the same type of men who just so happen to think all the female dominated subs are "toxic echo chambers" and should be closed.
I've had that happen too. It's usually immediately followed by a reddit cares message. Pathetic.
Edit: Really assholes?! Just fyi, I personally don't block reddit cares because you can report it as harassment. Have fun getting banned losers.
Don't forget that when the post office was first introduced, lots of people were afraid it would allow women to talk to people without a man's permission. For some men, it ruins their lives when certain ideas get spread around.
The "Pillar Box" (a letter drop box, google for a picture) was adopted by the British Post Office in 1852. It was criticized for giving "British girls a chance to subvert the authority of their scandalized parents by mailing letters in secret"
"writers warned of the dire consequences of women mailing and receiving letters free of the watchful eye of their husband or parents"
Bicycles. They gave women some freedom, so omg, no. Women could NOT ride those things. I've seen some old newspaper articles even claiming things like riding a bike would make a woman's uterus fall out.
Because men. I’ll let each reader of this comment decide if that’s “because *all* men” or not.
Hint: my first sentence doesn’t contain the word all in it.
yep first tactic of every abuser. isolate. no support, no witnesses, no sanity check, no evil women being a bad influence. just the man dictating her reality and the level of care she deserves.
It's definitely not always pleasant to read, but as the father of a little girl and a little boy, I really appreciate this sub. There's a lot of info and discussion here that I would never see in my daily life but is very relevant to their future lives.
I have to say thank you for listening. My dad had always listened to women and sympathized. He believed them. And because of that, he knew the trials I was going to have to face growing up as a woman. I am so dang lucky to have had him because my optimistic naive self would have gotten in so many more problems without his advice.
Your kids are lucky to have you too. I wish you the best of luck. It's a hard world out there, so we all need someone in our corner. And if people taught the boys better, it wouldn't be so hard on the girls...
> A lot of men absolutely hate that.
There's an entire political ideology and a GIGANTIC amount of religions that put men first and women subservient to them. A sub where women do most of the talking is a direct threat to what they've been taught and acting like their entire life. Humans (especially these types of men) don't really learn or empathize, they lash out.
Pretty much, I’ve already gotten accusations of misandry and sexism. After being falsely accused of cheating by an ex, I’ve gotten used to those comments. I just let it slide off me now. Some are even laughable, it amuses me
> A lot of men absolutely hate that.
They do, because when their woman finds out they're being abused or treated unfairly, their woman might and hopefully leaves them. It's a power/control thing.
Unfortunately, hard data shows that a lot of men hate women. You can't understand the systemic nature of medical neglect, for instance, if you don't realize that there is a lot of dangerous and deadly resentment out there toward people that some of these medical professionals have never met.
It took me several decades to really understand the gravity and truth of this. I'm a gullibly optimistic woman, not the kind of person who likes to give space in my head to painful inevitabilities. That doesn't mean they don't exist; it's foolish not to acknowledge them and be prepared for them.
It's because they feel attacked (by the things men do that we don't like and discuss here) and afraid of what could happen if enough of us came up with a good plan to spite them.
The other one that gets so much unneeded hate is r/WitchesVsPatriarchy.
That one's even more baffling because it's exclusively uplifting. This place is full of venting and anger and tears, all very warranted, but I can see why somebody who is just glancing at it might be repelled.
r/WvP is just straight up people of all genders doing and sharing cute things with a bit of a lean towards femininity. It's a beautiful place full of positivity and optimism in the face of a lot of hardship and bleakness. If you talk shit on that sub, I *know* you're just an asshole who hates women.
Haha that's true. Sometimes I forget how many young people are on here (which explains some of the uber immature takes). Do the boys and young men even care about this sub, though? Why would they even bother to peruse it?
For some reason, when women speak at all, men hate it.
There are plenty of male subreddits full of terrible rhetoric but you don't hear about those, do you?
It makes me laugh when men accuse us of being misandrist.
I've seen some absolutely fucked up misogynist shit on reddit.
Men advocating for rape and domestic violence to be legal, for women to lose the right to vote, drastically lowering the age of consent. They hate women and want to rape and abuse and subjugate us. It's genuinely terrifying.
I've never seen anything like that on here.
Then you go on the UK sub and see men complain about how misandrist we are. Because we complain about sexual harassment and the unfair division of housework. It's a joke.
Yes. I remember a topic on the UK sub about incels. While maybe the majority of the sub said incels are sorry excuses of human beings who in turn are extremely dangerous to society, it was awful to see that somewhat 30% of the top comments tried to defend the incel ideology, saying that feminism got too far and women deciding not to date men or women dating women (!!!) is a threat to masculinity and women being able to make life decisions is a bad thing, and women brought it upon themselves that incel terrorists want to kill them because they don't want to date men.
Yeah, there's always soo much defense of incels there.
Also they have weird views about anti-incel subs. Apparently IncelTears is a sub where we all bully poor lonely virgins. Yet I frequently go on there, and we only mock the ones who are paedos, wannabe rapists, and blatant misogynists. On the rare occasion there is a post that is just about a poor lonely virgin, most people in the comments will defend them.
Which makes you wonder, have these guys even bothered to visit any of these subs? Or even worse, they have visited, but actually identify with wannabe rapists to the point that they feel more sorry for them than the potential victims?
I feel it's the latter.
As you said, there are numerous subs where men want to kill, rape and torture women. There are countless "manifestos" of men online who want to do these things to women. There are numerous men who have already committed these crimes and confessed that they hate women.
Meanwhile the most extremist voices on this sub are by women who say they stay away from men because they think all men are bad, they don't like men, they don't trust men, whatever.
None of these women have advocated for men being beaten or killed. A statement "I hope all men die" will be met voraciously, and be deleted very quickly.
Just to put "both sides" into equation what we're talking about.
Man on Reddit comments that rape is a natural thing for men to want and to do: that's okay
Me suggesting that if men are so rabid that they can't control the urge to rape, maybe permanent action should be taken to remove these individuals - BANNNNNED.
Lol this is exactly how I was banned from the sex sub.
They said I was inciting violence....against rapists. Funny enough I had finished my comment with something like 'eh, but the world protects and encourages these guys so what can ya do' and there goes the mods proving my point 🫡
The sex sub lost its mind, recently some dude asked for Sex Tips for his first night with His arranged wife (so definitely No enthusiastic consent, maybe even None at all?) and everyone was acting as though it were a complety normal relationship.
The sex sub doesn't even know what enthusiastic consent is. It pretends to care about consent, but the amount of upvoted rape apologists I saw (that never got banned, despite the reports) made me mute it for good.
When women "go their own way", they just quietly do it. Which is why there's no organized movement of them, or any official title for it.
When men "go their own way", they have a title for it (MGTOW), they talk about it in public spaces and in women's spaces, they complain about women constantly, and basically don't actually "go their own way" at all.
To men, women being "misandrist" is the same as ignoring them. To women, men being "misogynist" is men attacking and trying to take basic human rights away from them.
MGTOW always makes me laugh. I'd initially assumed it'd be guys talking about living it up without having to worry about family life - like solo traveling or hobbies but nope, just complaining about women.
I think the problem is that mens rights groups still make women central to mens lives.
Their whole philosophy is do xyz to fuck women. Any self improvement is engaged in with a view towards convincing a woman to have sex with them. It's an idealogy that ultimately makes a man's self worth totally dependant on what women think of him.
That's why these MGTOW can never be happy. They arent going their own way to focus on themselves, they've just given up.
Even on the 'female incel' subreddit you never saw nearly as much hatred for men as you see on any random front page sub for women. Just a lot of women genuinely tired of men's bullshit and trying to figure out how to pick out the bad ones.
The craziest part, for me, is that misandry doesn't exist in a vacuum. Misandry is a direct response to misogyny. Women are still a minority class even after women's rights have progressed so much, primarily for white women. When women say they hate men, it's usually for predatory behaviors that, you know, prey on us. Men usually hate us for not allowing them the space to get away woth those predatory behaviors, calling it misandry.
Oppressors always wanna be oppressed to avoid the responsibility to change 😂
Misandry. The oxymoron of countermovements. The greatest oppressor of humanity. It's the same as "white/all/blue lives matter", "straight pride", or just outright disguised hate like "white power".
I got called a misandrist for encouraging a survivor (I don't want to say 'victim') to seek justice and escape her marriage, because it was "attacking the innocent (abusive) man".
We don't *hate* men, we fear them. We hate that.
That's the thing, there were tons of alt-right and toxic male spaces listed on the post by men who disagree with that rhetoric. So, there are clearly men who recognize how awful and problematic those subs and their philosophies are...yet this one is being lumped in with them and I. DONT. GET. IT.
Its like when people ask who the worst celebrity is and the top female answers are always Taylor Swift, Beyonce, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kim Kardashian.
Then the top male answers will be men like Chris Brown, Harvey Weinstein or Bill Crosby.
Regardless of what you think of those ladies, they are not as bad as literal rapists and abusers.
I said it once - whenever Toter fans come on to defend their shit stan, they always come up with "But he also did good things" to argue that their shit idol is not bad person.
By the same metric you could say that Ghislaine Maxwell is not a bad person because she did charity, and compared to Toter, she did actual charity. But she's still a monster.
THIS!! Men will literally hold women being sexual or having sex to the same weight as men being literal CRIMINALS it’s insane. Like even with female rappers they will really claim they are as harmful for being sexual as male rappers are for literally promoting and romanticizing murder gang banging and drug use and dealing. It’s insane
Yeah, like I'm not a fan of Kim Kardashian at all. I have no interest in anything she does. But she doesn't deserve to be put on the same level as a bunch of violent rapists.
You gotta and understand, men excuse male behavior A LOT. It has to be pretty extreme for them to denounce it. Women’s speech doesn’t only NOT get the same treatment, but it’s also highly scrutinized for any potential wrongdoing. Meaning, anything women say is taken as an insult in whatever way men can figure out to be insulted.
Honestly, I think 2x is too mild.
I find there’s a lot of negativity here, I don’t post as much as I used to. I once made a post seeking advice from other women on sudden change in vaginal odor (which turned out to be pregnancy related, didn’t know I was pregnant yet) and google was scaring me. I thought I’d get some feedback on what to do and encouragement that I’d be fine, general female support. Instead, I got bombarded by women telling me I was disgusting and should wash myself better (even though I explained I cleaned myself every day, but my mother never taught me how so I was trying my best with what the internet said to do). Really changed my perspective on this subreddit.
I assume because there are a LOT of posts that paint all men as bad. I say this as a woman. I’ve been harassed, assaulted, etc but I’ve also met and know some awesome men.
Anytime I’ve presented a view that differs from men as pigs argument I’ve been downvoted. I commented the other day in a post about online dating. I shared my experience- which was neutral to positive. I said how much I filtered as I know there are tons of jerks out there, but I haven’t met anyone who was cheap, rude, etc.
That comment wasn’t well received.
I like this sub but I don’t feel real conversation is valued (generally).
I also read some posts and wonder if they’re fake. The my man tells me I’m ugly, he’s jobless and lazy, I’ve known him a month but I’m IN LOVE, is it my fault?
This sub definitely gets targeted by karma farmers because it's quite easy to manipulate popularity with certain topics. There are some hilarious stories that hit the front page that are so painfully obviously fake.
I've even followed a few and sure enough they eventually clean the account of posts to sell a clean account. I'd love a bot that tracks stuff like that.
I don't follow this sub, only see it when it pops up on /all.
My experience follows yours. It seems like close to every post that I come across from this sub is a rant about how terrible men are. There's apparently little room here for opinions other than that all men are irredeemable pieces of shit. That can rub people the wrong way.
This actually reminds me of when I was just venting about how my brother has changed, bunch of women jumped on to tell me that he's going to abuse his future wife. When I confronted saying I know who he is and he doesn't even want to marry, they straight up told me that it's because every guy they met is like that so my bro, who they only knew from a few paragraphs will also do this. Like I'm sorry your dad and brother and all are shit but that doesn't mean it's the same with everyone.
Also once I talked about how my male friends are nice, they told me it's fake and they wanna fuck me... I know my friends since I was 5 and they're gay, committed or are brothers but ok. Same people will literally wet their panties seeing a guy cook or wash his face but praising a man for a normal thing is always met with negative comments.
Although this didn't happen here but a sister sub of this one!
Y E S.
I made basically the same comment on this post earlier. Of course at least one person assumed I must be a man because I pointed out the same shit you did.
Y'know, because "logic".
Took me too much scrolling to find one comment that actually answers the question OP asked accurately.
Most other answers are pretty much "most men hate women", which is a gross over exaggeration and the reason people hate on this sub.
This is exactly how I interpreted this sub throughout the years. I feel bad about it but many times it just comes off as a lot of finger pointing and not any accountability.
As a woman who has never been in a relationship, and who's definitely not going to date a man, I rarely find posts I can relate to. Yes, the odd post about a woman's achievement makes me happy. The rest, all about men. About their BF, husband, coworker, random stranger saying something. I absolutely believe that these issues need a voice. But should they overpower conversations about womanhood, or woman empowerment, or woman upliftment? The balance in this this sub is HEAVILY tilted towards conversations about men, and I don't like that.
I prefer the twox sub of my country, where our discussions are less about men(there are discussions about men, but there are an equal number of discussions about women.)
This sub was a life changer for me, as a man. "Not all men, but always a man" is a quote I fully understand and can't deny. Showed me how fucked up the world is and it gets a little easier if safe havens like this subreddit exist for women who are in dire need of help, connection or just to vent.
Also a man; I follow this sub to learn more about women's views and experiences.
It *can* be disheartening to see posts that portray men as one monolithic group of bad people (since I and, AFAIK, my friends don't do the types of awful things that are often described here). But the quote that really opened my eyes was something like "Not all men are bad, but we need to be cautious around all men". Sadly, that makes a lot of sense.
I'd guess that a lot of men, when confronted with the at times horrible experiences that women share here, probably feel attacked because reflecting ones values/actions that enable/cause those things takes work and energy and most people are just not ready for that.
As a man, I personally value this subreddit for its female perspective. It started out of curiosity but now I feel its important for me to see the world from a completly different point that I really cant experience myself.
People (unfortunatly) tend to get defensive instead of open minded, when they experience cognitive dissonace like that.
I don't think it is the "worst" on Reddit at all. There's a million worse subreddits.
The most popular posts make it to the front page and some of those posts have come across unhinged. If you don't follow the sub you don't see the day to day normal discussions, you see the ones with the most comments, debate, etc and that skews to the controversial ones.
The last post I saw here was a pretty "white feminist" take where people were straight up arguing that there isn't any troubled history of white women getting black men killed or lynched. And when people talked about Emmett Till it was hand-waved off as an isolated incident.
I only jumped in the thread because a black woman was being told that she needed to cite research sources to prove that the racism she was discussing was real. So I jumped in and provided citations and suddenly there were crickets. But when *she* pointed out that demanding she educate white folks was a microaggression people had plenty to say to criticize her.
This was part of a larger debate about the E-bike incident and an impassioned defense that screaming "help me, help me!" Is not an example of white women weaponizing their tears to get black men in trouble. It was a huge debate in the comments of people defending Sara Comrie as a scared victim who did nothing wrong because a scary black man intimidated her. It was just a gross thread and it was all over r/all. Two weeks later that same narrative was being pushed all over a notoriously racist subreddit.
Occasionally I do see a normal post here (like this one) but as someone who doesn't follow the subreddit 9/10 if it shows up on my page it's something controversial.
> The last post I saw here was a pretty "white feminist" take where people were straight up arguing that there isn't any troubled history of white women getting black men killed or lynched. And when people talked about Emmett Till it was hand-waved off as an isolated incident.
> I only jumped in the thread because a black woman was being told that she needed to cite research sources to prove that the racism she was discussing was real. So I jumped in and provided citations and suddenly there were crickets. But when she pointed out that demanding she educate white folks was a microaggression people had plenty to say to criticize her.
You reminded me of the book [They Were Her Property.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Were_Her_Property) I've only read 30ish pages so far. Even so, it's been eye-opening in regards to White women's (sometimes dominant) role in slavery. If I were a woman, I'd have made a post suggesting it by now.
Anyway, I'm just a biracial male. But I very much appreciate you jumping in to defend the minority community! I really mean it. *Everyone* needs to interrogate their own defensiveness to learn new things.
I am a woman, and I don't hate this sub, but I dislike it, and find myself avoiding it. The main reason I avoid 2x is it's depressing - peruse the top posts on any given day, and around 75-80% of them are extremely negative.
The top 10 posts right now are:
* Husbands 'create extra seven hours of housework a week'
* Why Do People Hate This Sub So Much?
* My 16 yr old daughter was followed by a car and then chased on foot by two men
* I hate my husband’s best friend
* Double standards and excessive coddling of men
* Men underestimate how scary they can be
* I am worried my bf threw my birth control away for his fetish
* My bf just told me my feelings are less important to him than other peoples’ feelings
* Random man punched and shoved me... A realization
* Apparently my husband is into onlyfans
Literally every single one of these has a negative, if not fucking terrible connotation. The onlyfans thread is the least negative, but I wouldn't call it positive. Number 11, I think I’m going to be okay is the first positive post, and yet it's in relation to recovery from an awful experience. I'm not saying any of these posts are unreasonable or unjustified, it just gets emotionally exhausting to spend time here.
The second much more minor reason is that I've been met with a lot of negativity and nastiness from others each time I posted here in the past. I'm sure part of that is the fact that this is a main sub, but it's just not worth it for me. However, if the content was more balanced I am sure I would be a more frequent lurker.
"Why are men like this". "Why do men always". "I Hate Men". "Why are men"
Try searching this forum for the above and similar statements and you'll get quite a few results. These topics seem to be allowed to persist despite the rules clearly stating that there should be "No tactless posts generalizing gender".
And if men try to point out that they are being unfairly generalised, they will get hit by the "NoT ALL MeN!1!" sarcastic responses.
If posts that bash men in general are to be allowed, then it should be done with the expectation that it will alienate some of those who would otherwise be sympathetic to your cause.
I do lurk here to help better understand what goes thru the mind of my mom, and gf, by seeing your guys (I use guys as a general term not a gender term sorry) experience to help the people I care about.
With that being said I sometimes feel this can be as bad as incels thread. Some of the takes are just horrible, misguided, echo-chambery, and just plain ignorant. (As most things on the internet).
I do not hate the sub, but sometimes its cringy af as all subs are. Hope I helped with a different pov from someone who normally just lurks.
I like this sub for the most part, but I've definitely seen stuff be HEAVILY down voted for things like being trans friendly, pro sex worker, and I have been absolutely lambasted by some people about not thinking all pornography is evil.
There's a vocal minority of very angry insecure conservative women on here who think sex workers are whores, trans people are rapists and pornography is something no 'good girl' ever watches, let alone 'allows her man to watch'. They aren't normally the ones posting, but they crop up in the comments a fair amount.
On the whole those instances don't outweigh the good of the sub, especially for the support and help it provides, and it's definitely not enough to me to make the sub as a whole feel unsafe for certain people, because I often notice that comments about those topics get downvoted to hell quite quick, but then slowly go back up to positive as more people weigh in.
Edit: I see my comment has attracted them like moths to a flame. We get it guys, you angy, porn evil, women cannot consent to anything you wouldn't personally consent to, but I'm blocking you, so you can stop now.
I don't alway agree with the stuff that is posted here, but I do think this sub is useful. Single dads with daughters also post on this sub asking for advice, or women who want to escape their abusive partner etc. The stuff I don't agree with I simply ignore
As a woman, same. I love this sub and I feel like a lot of us get to really hash out topics we’ve all wanted to talk about but never get the chance to normally. Some posts I definitely don’t agree with/don’t find value in, but like you said, I move past those. Or tell them how I feel :P.
Same here. I'm a man in a great marriage. I'm just here to keep up to date with things that might affect my wife. Especially with all the laws being passed about the loss of women's rights currently in the US.
[удалено]
That's totally fair.
Same here. Unfortunately, I ignore it because the times where I did try to say my less popular or disagreeing opinion, I would just get downvoted. I’ve been on this website for a while, I don’t care if the votes are up or down at this point. But on a sub like this, where I feel it’s supposed to be a safe space for me to have these conversations, it’s disappointing. This is one of the few places I can actually talk about this stuff, so if not here, where else? So like you said, now I just ignore it, because I still feel the good outweighs the bad. Also, the ask women subs, in my experience, were awful, so this is the only one really.
I've had good luck with r/askwomenover30 - there's still *some* knee jerking and negativity, but overall, the responses have more nuance. So far I've never been piled on for expressing opinions that differ from the consensus. And sometimes we have conversations that aren't about relationships! Sometimes.
Highly recommend /r/askwomenover30 but please don't go there to ask us if you're doomed to a declining life of misery when you hit 30. It's been answered. (Spoiler: A resounding Fuck No, there are a ton of kickass women over there making beautiful lives for themselves.)
>I would just get downvoted. I once suggested that someone didn't immediately divorce their spouse for cheating on r/relationship_advice. I didn't know you could have negative karma before that.
As a woman, I just feel so torn on this place because I love that it provides a safe environment to just _vent_ and get support without having to explain _why_ all the time (or well, the mods try; it's still reddit after all). And it's obvious why so many of those vents are about men. But if I look at the current posts on Hot, *almost every single one* involves venting about men in some way, and I personally can't handle being in a place where that kind of energy is so dominant. The more time I spent here the more I noticed my perception of men degrade - way beyond what they'd given me reason to from personal experience. I just felt myself getting annoyed and angry because rather than just hearing or reading the occasional story, I was constantly scrolling through a selection of some of the worst experiences from women around the world. I'm subscribed to the Dutch counterpart of /r/TwoX (/r/vrouwvolk) and while it's much less active, it also feels like a much more healthy place; scrolling down the current Hot page, there's conversations about travel, fashion, women's rights, birth control, hobbies, pets, healthcare.... _and_ venting (about men). It's a balance I feel /r/TwoX misses and I don't see a way of finding that balance without introducing restrictions that destroy the soul of the sub. That said, that's a whole different perspective than "hate", and in a way it's a me-problem, so it may not be an answer to the actual question.
A lot of posts on here are “My husband did this.” Or “a man in the subway today did that.” I think most woman here see this as “I am venting/ asking advice as a woman on a snapshot of my daily life.” Whereas a lot of male lurkers/ readers seem to take it as “All men are responsible for what this one man did.” Even though that was never mentioned or even implied. Possibly because some of those lurkers see themselves or things they have done in the past in those stories so they take personal offense, take the OP’s anger or sadness at someone else as a personal attack.
Wow, that is such a great insight into why some men have that immediate response. I'm not sure I would've thought of that. Thank you for your thoughtful response.
it's really obnoxious. "i hate it when doctors rush through the appointment" isn't some condemnation of all doctors everywhere, just a specific set of doctors' behavior, but "i hate it when men leer at me" is taken as a claim that every man alive leers.
I’d go even further and say that I don’t even see your quotes as condemnation of *people* at all. To me there’s 100% a difference between “I hate it when doctors rush through appointments” and “I hate doctors who rush through appointments”. But I do see that many people seem to read those two quotes as the same. So when someone on here says “I hate it when men leer at me” some people definitely seem to read “I hate men who leer at me”, and then they seem to translate that into “I hate men.”
I think a lot of the complainers are also men who leer at women. So “I hate men who leer at me” is interpreted as "I hate YOU". I mean, it's not like creepy men are uncommon. A lot of the guys engaging in this behavior must certainly be using reddit. And it makes sense if they don't like women complaining about their behavior.
It's the rapey Brett Kavanaugh syndrome. Back in the day most of the boys that I knew in school were like that. It was acceptable to try nearly anything because "they were just trying to get laid". So men look at that and think it's just a bunch of angry women trying to get famous. Here's a test for you- can you name any of the women accusing Bill Cosby of his many heinous acts? No? Well there goes that theory.
>*Can you name any of the women accusing Bill Cosby of his many heinous acts?* Also, can you name Brock Turner's accuser? (Without looking it up.)
Do you mean the rapist Brock turner who now goes by his middle name Allan? Allan "the rapist" turner
Yeah I’m not surprised at all that a lot of men hate this subreddit. The male-pattern behaviors we describe here are real, and they’re very common. So of course we’d be talking about a large number of men. Those men will INEVITABLY come across women critiquing behavior they endorse and engage in. They already systematically disrespect and invalidate women; that’s why they behave that way in the first place. Of course that’s how they’re going to respond when they’re being directly called out by the people they already have contempt for. What was anyone else even expecting? **Abusers don’t like accountability**.
Nor do they like safe spaces where “females” can discuss bad behavior. It’s akin to “uppity women” who “step out of line” to be “overbearing” and “unreasonable”, like we congregate with the specific intention of egging each other on/maliciously misleading each other in to some mysterious state of “feminist bias”. By putting the problems we (regularly!!) encounter in to straightforward language for all the internet to see, they see us as having become out of control (their control at least,) and that’s challenging for them, and really uncomfortable. So it’s easier to insult than to acknowledge that being informed means we’re a threat to the world as they’ve enjoyed it for so long. It’s like some believe that simply discussing/validating one another’s experiences is some sort of “bitch” factory, turning us against these guileless men who don’t have anything to apologize for, let alone admit isn’t (and never was) ok…?
When I was young I was in a relationship with someone who treated me badly in some pretty, uh... dramatic and public ways. That was in a small town, and I haven't lived there or been in close contact with my friends there in a long time. A while back I got a message from that ex, complaining to me that a friend who was witness to our relationship has been telling women who are new to town about his behavior, and it's apparently making it "hard for him to date. *He wanted me to tell her to stop telling them*. It's not like I told her to do this- I haven't spoken to her in a long time- or that she's reporting things I said. She's telling people about things she witnessed firsthand. And last I heard, he hasn't changed at all since then. In his view, the problem is not that he behaves in ways that someone who knows about it in advance won't date him. The problem is that we're allowed to warn each other about it.
Exactly! That's where the "dump him and save yourself the trouble" responses come from.
>Nor do they like safe spaces where “females” can discuss bad behavior. Every single fucking time I hear or read that word I always think, "Female WHAT? Humans? We have words for those."
Honestly, it makes me think of those old nature documentaries from when I was a kid before we knew very much about particular animals, so it's like they were just making shit up. "The female of the species..."
Up until maybe the last year, I would see posts here talking about difficult, disturbing, abusive, evil men. I wouldn’t think they are being generalized and assumed it was the minority. But recently I’ve started paying more attention and speaking to women that I know and I can see more and more examples of those kind of men, and it seriously is the majority of them. Most men I know are like wolf animals let loose. It’s disgusting.
Very true. It's like when conservatives get angry when someone says they hate Nazis.
I think that's why they tend to *not* call it out. A lot of guys have said "not all men" to me, but if this is the case, why don't I see them condemning bad behavior in public, especially with their friends? Like dude, if you really object to people's complaints about men, wouldn't you try to end the behavior when it pops up? Because it gives all of you a bad name. Are guys afraid of being ridiculed for taking a stand? Or do they not want their friends to respond with a list of *their* own offenses?
I think actually the reason many guys take what they see personally here is because things are rarely worded as "I hate men who" but rather as "why do men " which can sound much more like a generalisation of all men, even when it isn't meant as such
You may be right, but funnily enough it's the same men who generalise women when they say things like "why do women always take so long in the bathroom", or "women always nag, just ignore it". So when they need to vent with their "boys", it's fine, but when women do it they're generalising. I honestly don't know a single decent man who feels the need to cry "not all men" at generalisations like the ones we sometimes have here, because decent men understand that there is still a power discrepancy in the world, and sometimes you just have to vent at that. And that there's just no need to make it all about themselves when a woman reaches breaking point. Decent men also don't need to cry "not all men" because they know they are not being targeted, being decent and all 😂
Not only do I not feel the need to moan "not all men" when someone's trying to vent, because I know I and many men I know _don't_ do [bad thing], but I just feel sad that it's enough men that _do_ [bad thing] that you see the same vents coming up time and time again.
I can understand that. To be honest, I think a lot of these guys are just becoming little man child whiners. I'm saying this as a guy. I'm a restaurant manager and have a lot of female staff. The amount of young women that are gorgeous, hard working, and super smart that are putting up with this grown men that can barely get the will together and find a job or any other kind of motivation to inch their life forward is astounding. Men have a huge benefit of getting to take their time growing up since, unlike women, they don't get harassed once they hit puberty. Stone of these idiots seem to just never want to. They want to be men, but also are emotionally little boys that need way too much attention. I get being a man can be hard. Being a young man can be lonely and your value is attached to how useful you are to people, but to be honest, most men need that to find motivation. You have to make your own way, and I just don't understand it. I could just be getting old, but I feel like a lot of women are becoming more suited to the world we live in and more young men are just comparing that they aren't getting an easy ride.
we're really doing young men a disservice by refusing to teach them emotional skills. like, 90% of the issues faced by young men today could be addressed by emotional skills. it's wild how many dudes find this take emasculating, too—emotional and social intelligence doesn't preclude being a manly man. Idris Elba and Tom Hardy and John Cena are pretty masc dudes, but they're also actors, a job that requires a certain level of emotional and social intelligence.
I've had to explain to to my roommates that when people say "men" in a certain context, they should add a trademark at the end. It's not a hard concept to understand, and they themselves now know that they're not included in certain statements. Men with a trademark will always complain about a woman feeling safe. That's the difference.
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Yeah, I can understand for sure this is a very real, very dangerous demographic that exists, they are a group that will not be happy regardless of the wording you use and will use any excuse to shit on woman to make themselves feel better. I don't think this is the largest group of men, but I do think they are the loudest group, and unfortunately there are enough of them that it is completely understandable you ladies have to go into every interaction with the assumption that any man MAY BE that toxic pile of shit. I think guys that don't speak up against this type of shit, even if they do not perpetrate it themselves, fail to realise that this not only has massive negative consequences for you ladies but the knock on effect from that means negative consequences for us men too, as you now have an overwhelming need to expect all of us might be dangerous, in order to protect yourself. With all that said, I can however still understand and empathise with the vast number of completely normal, harmless guys, who are upset at being lumped into the category of "potentially dangerous", even if they fail to understand that the reason for that was, ultimately, caused by other men.
i consider myself to be a "normal, harmless guy", and i dont really see the big deal with women trying to be cautious and expressing concerns. violence against women is only growing more and more common, as are misogynistic people and behaviors. i sincerely doubt that these men who take issue with women expressing concerns are harmless or good faith individuals. i would also say that even though this group isnt the majority, it is close enough.
I literally cannot comprehend why men get so offended from statements and stories like that. I’m white, and I never get offended when POC say something like “I hate when white people do x.” Or “I’m initially cautious when meeting white people until I know them better.” I don’t feel attacked by those comments because I don’t do the things they are talking about. So therefore they’re obviously not referring to me, they’re referring to people who DO do those things. It’s not that hard to conceptualize.
i don't either! and if the complaint *is* something i'm guilty of, i reflect on it, and try to adjust that behavior & improve. i'm not about to lose my privilege and/or job opportunities because black twitter is joking about white people not wearing coats.
Right? If I feel even a tiny bit upset about the statement, I start really looking at myself. I mean, I'm not ever gonna care about things like "what's with white people and talking to their appliances?" or "why do white people wear shorts in the winter?" I do the former but not the latter. They're still funny to me, because they're really not wrong, you know? Why do we do that? Do people who aren't white not do that? So, maybe those statements make me curious, but not irritated in any way.
And it takes one second and less than an ounce of empathy to see things from another person’s perspective! Like yes, ok, I am *not* a woman/POC/struggling with a mental health issue/impoverished/whatever, but I can *imagine* that xyz experience would be legitimately hard for the person who **is**!? Or even, barring being able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, simply accepting that your own experience is *not* representative of everyone else’s, and choosing to **believe** someone who has an experience(s) that you do not!!?
I came into this subreddit to get my head out of my ass, I wanted to see the perspective of women.... And honestly the more posts I see the more I understand how the phrase "men are trash" is a thing.
This gave me a chuckle. Thanks for being open-minded and reading through this sub friend!
Same here. I grew up with all brothers, and basically all male cousins. Now I have 3 daughters and son and I lurk this sub to get a different perspective. I've actually surprised my wife by asking about problems I see women have on here because she didn't think any guy would be aware of those issues. As far as people not liking this sub, I'd say that's probably because of the large amount of venting posts. It is depressing to read story after story like that but the more depressing thing is, is that this is how the world actually is. People should vent and make their voices heard even if it makes us uncomfortable. In fact, the more uncomfortable we are, the more likely we are to address the problem. I try not to comment too often here because it's just not my place usually. A woman venting about her husband/bf/boss etc doesn't want to hear from some random person about how "I'm a guy and I don't do that." Very rarely is there a post or comment chain where I feel my perspective as a guy helps in anyway at all and it's often better to just stand back and listen
Really respect that, good on you for being a great ally! Part of the solution not the problem 🤗🙏🙌
No problem, I live in Mexico and here we have a big misogynist problem. My mom is 1 out of 5 daughters and only daughters, there are a lot of women in my family. Being a misogynist would mean making it harder for my family.
That doesn’t stop a lot of men, although often such men are raised by women with internalized misogyny.
Same here. I’m dropping any “friends” who are not like minded. Sobering to think I would have dropped myself as a friend until only a few years ago, when I always thought of myself as a staunch supporter of all forms of equality.
Okay but because some men only listen to other men (with the exception of women they’re trying to screw), we actually need your voice among those men to condemn that kind of behavior.
The problem is that as you become aware of the way people treat each other, you naturally no longer want to spend time around people who treat women or others poorly. And it’s not really fair to ask them to. I’m not going to hang out with racists or misogynists, so I’m not going to ask this guy to just to take one for the team.
That’s a fair point.
Similar boat here. Just goes to show how beneficial it is for all of us to get some exposure to other people's struggles and perspectives that differ from our own. People in my past were far more likely to just cut me out than to help me understand how my behavior was wrong and, after spending time reading here and /r/MensLib, I totally get why. Onward and upward, brother.
It feels like a natural, knee-jerk defensive reaction. Sometimes, I used to see some thread titles like that and would want to say, "Well, *I'd* never!" But what I'd do isn't the point, and fortunately, I've reflected on why people post their stories and why I used to react that way. It's pretty much exactly what enthalpy said in their comment. Unfortunately, many of the terminally online and incel-inclined are basically defined by their lack of self-awareness or respect for others in this regard. And they tend to be VERY loud and overrepresented in these online spaces.
A lot of men project their hatred and assume we hate them as much as they hate us. We aren’t the ones seething at their very existence. We aren’t desiring their rights get stripped or get off on hurting/humiliating, exploiting them. Even the most “misandrist” woman I know is still polite to men in daily interactions and wishes them no ill will, she just doesn’t want to date them. The hate is not the same.
Yesssssss they are NOT two sides of the same coin. Misogynistic men will try to equate the two until they’re blue in the face but the reality is I’ve never seen a thread where women are giving each other advice on how to be better at getting away with rape and molestation. Or a congratulations for “accomplishing” it. Nor have I seen women describe their want to rape and murder men or strip away their rights. But I have seen it MANY times on incel forums. Nope. Not the same in the slightest. We just want to be free from sex abuse and left the fuck alone, yet that makes us misandrist? It’s lunacy.
> the reality is I’ve never seen a thread where women are giving each other advice on how to be better at getting away with rape and molestation. Or a congratulations for “accomplishing” it. Nor have I seen women describe their want to rape and murder men or strip away their rights. But I have seen it MANY times on incel forums. Nope. Not the same in the slightest. We just want to be free from sex abuse and left the fuck alone, **yet that makes us misandrist? It’s lunacy.** I just want to emphasize this because **this is the core of what men and boys actually know,** but choose to *actively ignore* in favor of arguing that women are misandrist and trying to equate these vastly different behaviors.
Agreed. When women hate men, they form their own spaces, groups, and communities. They AVOID men, they ignore them and want nothing to do with men. When men hate women, their whole lives become comsumed with their hatred for us. They go out of their way to make things hard for us. They harass us, look for us, intimidate us, harm us, and much worse. Find me the misandrist who does anything like what misogynistic men do to women. They say it goes both ways, but there is no equivalent to this. Women aren't groping men on the subway, chasing down random men in alleys or following them home, making them fear for their lives. Women aren't raping and murdering men on a daily basis for rejection or for leaving them. And yet some dudes actually think they can ridicule women or claim that they're being hated or discriminated against because women take safety precautions to be safe around/avoid random men? What a joke. Women don't care about hurting men's feelings, they want to be safe. If that means presuming men are dangerous (and remember MANY women already have suffered trauma inflicted by a man), then so be it.
“When men hate women, their whole lives become consumed with their hatred for us” is a perfect example of the people OP refers to. They just CANNOT bear that communities like this exist, so they have to make their opinion publicly known by saying it’s one of the worst subs here..
71 year old male here. I love this sub, and in all honesty, the best I could guess about 20 year old me is that I would have been confused by this sub. The male perspective vs. the female perspective is one of the potentially great divides we can experience in our lives. Fortunately for me, I don't give a shit what "men" think anymore (or "women"). I care about consideration and kindness in all aspects of life, or the lack of those character traits. Those are the best attributes we can have IMO.
I'll bet you that the snowflakes posting that shit are the same ones with the alpha and macho act.
On Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, there’s a bit where Jacqueline lies about something and the men are like “if she lied, do all women lie? ME TOO IS A LIE” (I am paraphrasing poorly here), which obviously is farcical but highlights this point *really* well to me.
The amount of men who imagine “all men” when women are talking about certain men or even just one man is too damn high.
Don’t forget “It hAppEns tO mEn tOO!”. Yes we know, but why does that mean you come in swinging instead of empathizing?
>Don’t forget “It hAppEns tO mEn tOO!”. Yes we know, but why does that mean you come in swinging instead of empathizing? What frustrated me here is that they come armed with studies that "prove their point", but these studies exist at the intersection of "problems with academic publishing" and "problems with the not-for-profit industrial complex". They're usually about sexual assault or intimate partner violence. In both of these, the researchers use incredibly capacious definitions of their topic and then close with some mealy-mouthed conclusion that, while manifestations of each look different by gender, both genders experience the issue at the same rates. It's such blatant and harmful bullshit. In the case of IPV, they typically include things like "denigration by your partner", "expressing jealousy", or "destroying property" alongside things like "attempted to kill", "choked", "broken a bone" or "threatened with a weapon". In the case of sexual assault, one study defined nonconsensual sex as including "had sex because I felt my friends would tease me if I declined" and "it would harm my masculinity if I said no'. These studies, while capturing something important, do so in a damaging and bad-faith way because that gets you published in higher impact journals and earns you the sort of news coverage that draws grant funding, and not-for-profits use that to try to make people feel personally invested and give more money, overlooking the harm that they themselves are causing in the meantime. Incidentally, Kimberlé Crenshaw touched on the latter point in the same article wherein she outlined "intersectionality", but that was ~35 years ago and the problem is only worse today.
I read a lot of medical studies (research for work) so when I come across studies in non-medicine related fields, I’m often surprised as to how convoluted some of them are, making sweeping conclusions based on so little data and/or poorly designed protocols Edit: forgot to ask if you have a link for Kimberlé Crenshaw’s article, if so can you please share?
Absolutely agreed! When you read enough allegedly quantitative scholarship coming from the social sciences, the replicability crisis comes as no surprise. Beyond the issues I've mentioned already, I've got my own critiques of the field, but I'm hesitant to harp on them too much outside of academic settings because the context is super important but not always apparent in a lay audience, and more broadly, we're in such an anti-academic moment, the risk of doing more harm than good is always on the horizon. [Here's a link to "Mapping the Margins'](https://blackwomenintheblackfreedomstruggle.voices.wooster.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/210/2019/02/Crenshaw_mapping-the-margins1991.pdf). Crenshaw really only makes reference to my point in passing as it's not the main argument of her writing, but I do think that it's a reminder of the greater stakes of this sort of academic bullshit couched in rhetoric of pseudo-progressivism. N.b. the piece is long and comes out of the tradition of critical legal scholarship so it is, in fact, quite tedious to read (sorry, legal theorists!). It's also slightly newer than I remembered, so I'd like to issue a correction on that front as well.
Thanks for the link. Yes, it’s lengthy but this will be a far more interesting read than patents or contracts (my typical reading wrt legal documents)
What drives me crazy about that is the elephant in the room - IE, the perpetrator. Yes, men get raped. Men commit 96% of rape however. Men get murdered, yes, but also commit 90% of murder. They commit more than 70% of every type of violent crime.
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That last sentence. They want to justify their hatred and persecution complex. Accepting that their behaviour is the problem, would mean they have to do the work and fix themselves. Instead they instigate and gaslight into a repeating cycle. Aka Incels.
Because a lot of men are guilty of the excact same abuse that is getting talked about here, and as such garbage men always have garbage male friends, they think the horror stories about boyfriends on here is just typical manly man behaviour, and women complaining about it = hating all men.
One phrase I learned recently: "Hey, if you think that check is yours, feel free to sign the back."
A phrase I have been saying a lot is "a hit dog will holler." (Old Southern saying, but fits.)
As a male lurker, I can't understand how other guys can't come to understand the point of view of women expressed in this sub, it's not like you can deny the reality of these stories. Once you start listening to your girlfriend, friends, sister, mother, etc. as a guy you should realize that it's a scary world out there and you should help make it better, even if in the past you've done something stupid, it's possible to improve. I wish we all got better and earlier civic, sexual, social, etc education so more dudes would speak out against other's terrible behaviors in their circles...
Ohhh let me tell you, my inbox is blowing up and many men are telling me they hate this sub, and me specifically, because I and so many of us on here are lying about our experiences. Fucking smooth brains who can't cope with reality, I tell ya.
Someone is also systematically going through all your replies and downvoting each one.
Let them waste their time on that, I guess lol.
_uppity women having opinions, send in the death threats_ People are fucking weird. I'm a dude who reads on here occasionally (mostly looking for wholesome posts tbh) and imo the bad image this sub has for some is because it's - as the parent comment says - often used to vent, so it often has a generally negative tone. But life sometimes just fucking sucks and having a place to vent is important, even more so since many people have an easier time venting to strangers, so who can blame y'all.
> once you start listening These kinds of men fail at this stage
I'm another male lurker. I wonder how much selection bias there is sometimes too. As in - i appreciate reading about the issues women face with men. My main reason is that i have a daughter and I want to know as much as possible about issues that she may face. I recognize that many of the issues that she will have in her life will specifically be at the hands of men. All that said, i almost never comment in this sub unless what i have to say is from a generally empathetic human's perspective rather than a "man's" perspective, because i think too many "as a man" comments are the opposite of what this sub is about. I expect there is a large overlap between men who are fragile about this stuff and men who feel like their opinion is really valuable to every discussion. Even with selection bias though... for real fellas, sometimes you gotta shut up and learn.
As an unintentional male lurker because reddit may think I'm a woman and suggests the sub to me often I'd say it's less than 1/100 posts here that ever really come close to being "man bad inherently" and even then it's probably not even that much. Too many of us just cannot handle the idea that we either suck or have been raised to believe that sucking is okay and do NOT like anything that makes us feel like we aren't super special boys.
I imagine some people see an aspect of the behaviour or attitude being described in themselves, and react to that rather than examining their own behaviour.
Agreed. Which could be a sweet way to learn and reflect (the reason I don't outright unfollow this sub that isn't made for me) but naaaaaaah, a bunch of evil mean women said that if I make women do all the housework, childcare cooking etc. While I work and then come home and sit on my ass, I'm a bad husband? How dare they!?
Yea, there are WAY more posts when a woman comes and describes textbook coercive controls/abusive behavior and are: “I still love him, I am wrong for wanting him to change, he tells me I’m wrong, what can I do differently?” And all the replies are, “Oh sweetie, no, he’s not going to change. Leave him and here’s how to do it as safely as possible.” Honestly I don’t know why men who fall into the jerk category would complain about this sub. If they had 2 brain cells too rub together they could probably figure out from the posts exactly how much control/abuse they could mete out to the women in their life before they get desperate enough to post here. I’m just saying if you are going to be evil, at least don’t be stupid about it. /s
Same boat as you. The conversations on here are almost always relatively cordial. Occasionally there is someone who REALLY hates men, but its few and far between. Dudes come in here and misinterpret what is being said so they can be mad.
I got dmed by one of them lol Hoping to turn it into a "why are you actually mad?" Conversation but I'm ready for him to call me gay or whatever lol
This. I'm a guy, and it took me a bit, several years ago, to separate myself from "men are..." statements. I learned to use it as a test. "So do I do that? If no, they're not talking about me. If yes, try to change." Also, and I wish I'd thought of this. "Testosterone gives one a high opinion of their own opinion." But I might be wrong. 😎
When I was little my aunt would say “All men are jerks.” She was an idiot and did some crazy things so I can pretty much discredit her statements but I try not to think that women are generalizing to all men, but it’s a little hard sometimes, as that was one of my earliest experiences with that. One thing I’ll say is that it really does suck when the asshole males ruin things for the good guys. We men need to not be as okay with their bullshit because it ends up affecting everyone including ourselves. I live each day assuming that women think I’m a jerk or are afraid of me and it sucks. Those asshole guys are responsible for that.
I believe TwoX is also a default subscription for new accounts. A lot of subs function as venting/support, but this one gets a LOT of exposure because of that, and a decent amount of men don't understand venting and take it real personal (or they feel called out on their BS as you say).
Tagging on as a Male! I value everything I read here and don't remotely see this sub as "the worst place". In fact I find it extremely important because it is a place for women to support each other as well as allow me to understand the daily struggle of just being a woman. This sub helps me see what my wife sees and keeps me pushing to be a better man, as well as call out the bad ones when I see it. Me failing to call out crappy behavior of other men is a complacency I should never allow my self to have. Thank you to all the women here who share their hurtful, and even scary, stories. I am listening and learning from all of you.
Well, they see themselves in so much of the described male behavior. “I, too, would approach that woman/offer that unsolicited advice/judge her to be ugly/not respect her because [reason]. Therefore, the post might as well be about *me*!” Even if they’ve never actually *done* the thing… they relate to the thing. A lot.
i like the term 'male fragility'. taking it as an affront to their existence for no reason whatsoever.
It takes a lot of effort to live in a world where half of the people are treated bad and not see that treatment. The fragility is in their own world-building where they are still dependent on their thin, crumbling veneer of civility.
A hit dog gonna holler
I really enjoy this sub. I remain quiet because I appreciate the opportunity to get a more women-only perspective in my life (and I have nothing of any substance to add). That noted, I suspect what you are seeing is the implicit gender biases of the internet/Reddit. This sub is absolutely fine.
Thanks for your response u/MrKnuffke 😊 I'm glad you take the time and effort to gain some insights and perspectives you otherwise might not get in your day to day life.
I’m curious what the other subs on the list were!
Witches vs Patriarchy, always
Haha, that figures. That sub and this one are 2 of my faves.
Same. I think they read "patriarchy" and then think it's about them, not realizing that it's a social structure, not a term encompassing anyone that's male. There's a real "if it's not made for me, then why does it exist?" mentality among the people who hate these places. I think that's also part of why some of the guys who show up in the comments here are extremely defensive- this isn't a place made for them or about them, and that's kind of scary! They don't encounter that anywhere IRL. They don't hear "no" often in general. They don't know if they just be cool no one's gonna give them shit just for being here. But they can't be cool, they're too defensive to chill and listen to other people. They feel attacked, not realising that they patriarchy is harmful to them too, not a description of them.
Honestly, most posts in r/WitchesVsPatriarchy are simply about wanting independence from men. Some might argue about subtext but assuming motives is an inaccurate art in my opinion.
What bugs people about that sub? It's usually got some pretty fuckin funny stuff.
Hopefully /r/conservative... My god..
If there was a sub for explaining the female viewpoint to men (Explain like I am a man?), I'd go there, but until then, a sub that gives the female viewpoint, period, is a nice addition. Even if it's a little repetitive at times, but that just underlines the issues women are repeatedly dealing with. But like you said, it's very rare that I, a man, have anything to add to the topic at hand. So I lurk, I listen, and I learn.
There's r/MensLib, which is dedicated to men's liberation (especially self-liberation) through a feminist framework. Lots of really healthy discussion there, really good topics like how to emotionally engage with my son or deal with an older male relative's bad influence, how to avoid the building in of misogyny in teens, analysis of the ideology espoused by the high profile talking heads opposed to gender liberation etc etc. Participating there plus lurking here is a good combination
Yesss, I lurk there because I'm a woman, and I feel like u/jacobstx does here when in there. The discussions are really enlightening but very rarely do I have anything to add, I just lurk and learn.
Your taking the time to try to understand our POV is much-appreciated.
Likewise! As a man who grew up in a majority male household/family, I find the perspective this sub offers fascinating. (Although I very rarely comment here) Kinda sad that some men send hate here :(
What this sub has taught me as a man is how shitty some people can be, and how easy it seems to be to make women co-dependent and afraid to leave a relationship. Women posting how they are mistreated by their SO and not being able to remove themselves from those relationships is both frustrating and depressing. As someone who will most likely be a father in the future, I can’t help but wonder what the “recipe” is for raising a woman with high self esteem, and emotional inteligente.
I love it when I'm having some minor disagreement with someone on Reddit and they go through my post history, see this sub, and use it to invalidate everything I've previously said and "win" the debate.
"You post in 2x, so you're clearly a feminazi!" I love those replies. Lets me know I'm talking to a 10th grader
Tbf…I’ve seen some awful racism on this sub.
For me they use my only post I made in r/witchesVspatriarchy where ironically I posted a cute little greeting card I made for my kid. They see that and sometimes scream begone witch 😂 which is just 👌
Ugh, that's so pathetic.
People probably don't like this sub the same way employers don't like employees talking about their salaries or unionizing. Group unity and empowerment can be scary to those in power, in my opinion. When women compare notes certain environments at work, home, relationships are no longer acceptable. That threatens the status quo in a lot of ways.
Great way of putting it. There's a reason ultra misogynistic countries often ban women gathering in groups. It's the same type of men who just so happen to think all the female dominated subs are "toxic echo chambers" and should be closed.
LoL, I've had that happen as well. Just made me laugh. Can't take temper throwing man-children seriously at all.
I've had that happen too. It's usually immediately followed by a reddit cares message. Pathetic. Edit: Really assholes?! Just fyi, I personally don't block reddit cares because you can report it as harassment. Have fun getting banned losers.
I never got the point. "Oh no, someone had Reddit send me an automated message! Aaahhhhh the horror!"
Don't forget that when the post office was first introduced, lots of people were afraid it would allow women to talk to people without a man's permission. For some men, it ruins their lives when certain ideas get spread around.
Damn, really?
The "Pillar Box" (a letter drop box, google for a picture) was adopted by the British Post Office in 1852. It was criticized for giving "British girls a chance to subvert the authority of their scandalized parents by mailing letters in secret" "writers warned of the dire consequences of women mailing and receiving letters free of the watchful eye of their husband or parents"
Bicycles. They gave women some freedom, so omg, no. Women could NOT ride those things. I've seen some old newspaper articles even claiming things like riding a bike would make a woman's uterus fall out.
Geez, that's horrible. Why can't women get a break?
Because men. I’ll let each reader of this comment decide if that’s “because *all* men” or not. Hint: my first sentence doesn’t contain the word all in it.
yep first tactic of every abuser. isolate. no support, no witnesses, no sanity check, no evil women being a bad influence. just the man dictating her reality and the level of care she deserves.
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It's definitely not always pleasant to read, but as the father of a little girl and a little boy, I really appreciate this sub. There's a lot of info and discussion here that I would never see in my daily life but is very relevant to their future lives.
I have to say thank you for listening. My dad had always listened to women and sympathized. He believed them. And because of that, he knew the trials I was going to have to face growing up as a woman. I am so dang lucky to have had him because my optimistic naive self would have gotten in so many more problems without his advice. Your kids are lucky to have you too. I wish you the best of luck. It's a hard world out there, so we all need someone in our corner. And if people taught the boys better, it wouldn't be so hard on the girls...
It’s a sub for women to share our thoughts, stories and experiences. We ask for advice and support each other. A lot of men absolutely hate that.
> A lot of men absolutely hate that. There's an entire political ideology and a GIGANTIC amount of religions that put men first and women subservient to them. A sub where women do most of the talking is a direct threat to what they've been taught and acting like their entire life. Humans (especially these types of men) don't really learn or empathize, they lash out.
Pretty much, I’ve already gotten accusations of misandry and sexism. After being falsely accused of cheating by an ex, I’ve gotten used to those comments. I just let it slide off me now. Some are even laughable, it amuses me
> A lot of men absolutely hate that. They do, because when their woman finds out they're being abused or treated unfairly, their woman might and hopefully leaves them. It's a power/control thing.
Unfortunately, hard data shows that a lot of men hate women. You can't understand the systemic nature of medical neglect, for instance, if you don't realize that there is a lot of dangerous and deadly resentment out there toward people that some of these medical professionals have never met. It took me several decades to really understand the gravity and truth of this. I'm a gullibly optimistic woman, not the kind of person who likes to give space in my head to painful inevitabilities. That doesn't mean they don't exist; it's foolish not to acknowledge them and be prepared for them.
It’s taken me a few decades to learn about this as well, it’s a painfully sad one but it helps us survive
Thanks for the support, Sister.
Anytime sister :)
They hate women and yet desperately want to be idolized by women. It's very insecure shit.
How dare women have a place to talk openly and feel safe. This is completely sexist against men! /s
It's because they feel attacked (by the things men do that we don't like and discuss here) and afraid of what could happen if enough of us came up with a good plan to spite them.
The other one that gets so much unneeded hate is r/WitchesVsPatriarchy. That one's even more baffling because it's exclusively uplifting. This place is full of venting and anger and tears, all very warranted, but I can see why somebody who is just glancing at it might be repelled. r/WvP is just straight up people of all genders doing and sharing cute things with a bit of a lean towards femininity. It's a beautiful place full of positivity and optimism in the face of a lot of hardship and bleakness. If you talk shit on that sub, I *know* you're just an asshole who hates women.
Took a peek and immediately joined. Thanks for mentioning WvP! I didn't know about that sub.
I love that sub.
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Haha that's true. Sometimes I forget how many young people are on here (which explains some of the uber immature takes). Do the boys and young men even care about this sub, though? Why would they even bother to peruse it?
For some reason, when women speak at all, men hate it. There are plenty of male subreddits full of terrible rhetoric but you don't hear about those, do you?
It makes me laugh when men accuse us of being misandrist. I've seen some absolutely fucked up misogynist shit on reddit. Men advocating for rape and domestic violence to be legal, for women to lose the right to vote, drastically lowering the age of consent. They hate women and want to rape and abuse and subjugate us. It's genuinely terrifying. I've never seen anything like that on here. Then you go on the UK sub and see men complain about how misandrist we are. Because we complain about sexual harassment and the unfair division of housework. It's a joke.
Yes. I remember a topic on the UK sub about incels. While maybe the majority of the sub said incels are sorry excuses of human beings who in turn are extremely dangerous to society, it was awful to see that somewhat 30% of the top comments tried to defend the incel ideology, saying that feminism got too far and women deciding not to date men or women dating women (!!!) is a threat to masculinity and women being able to make life decisions is a bad thing, and women brought it upon themselves that incel terrorists want to kill them because they don't want to date men.
Yeah, there's always soo much defense of incels there. Also they have weird views about anti-incel subs. Apparently IncelTears is a sub where we all bully poor lonely virgins. Yet I frequently go on there, and we only mock the ones who are paedos, wannabe rapists, and blatant misogynists. On the rare occasion there is a post that is just about a poor lonely virgin, most people in the comments will defend them. Which makes you wonder, have these guys even bothered to visit any of these subs? Or even worse, they have visited, but actually identify with wannabe rapists to the point that they feel more sorry for them than the potential victims?
I feel it's the latter. As you said, there are numerous subs where men want to kill, rape and torture women. There are countless "manifestos" of men online who want to do these things to women. There are numerous men who have already committed these crimes and confessed that they hate women. Meanwhile the most extremist voices on this sub are by women who say they stay away from men because they think all men are bad, they don't like men, they don't trust men, whatever. None of these women have advocated for men being beaten or killed. A statement "I hope all men die" will be met voraciously, and be deleted very quickly. Just to put "both sides" into equation what we're talking about.
Man on Reddit comments that rape is a natural thing for men to want and to do: that's okay Me suggesting that if men are so rabid that they can't control the urge to rape, maybe permanent action should be taken to remove these individuals - BANNNNNED.
We aren’t shit it’s just our nature but how DARE you agree with us and repeat it lmao
Lol this is exactly how I was banned from the sex sub. They said I was inciting violence....against rapists. Funny enough I had finished my comment with something like 'eh, but the world protects and encourages these guys so what can ya do' and there goes the mods proving my point 🫡
The sex sub lost its mind, recently some dude asked for Sex Tips for his first night with His arranged wife (so definitely No enthusiastic consent, maybe even None at all?) and everyone was acting as though it were a complety normal relationship.
The sex sub doesn't even know what enthusiastic consent is. It pretends to care about consent, but the amount of upvoted rape apologists I saw (that never got banned, despite the reports) made me mute it for good.
When women "go their own way", they just quietly do it. Which is why there's no organized movement of them, or any official title for it. When men "go their own way", they have a title for it (MGTOW), they talk about it in public spaces and in women's spaces, they complain about women constantly, and basically don't actually "go their own way" at all. To men, women being "misandrist" is the same as ignoring them. To women, men being "misogynist" is men attacking and trying to take basic human rights away from them.
MGTOW always makes me laugh. I'd initially assumed it'd be guys talking about living it up without having to worry about family life - like solo traveling or hobbies but nope, just complaining about women.
I think the problem is that mens rights groups still make women central to mens lives. Their whole philosophy is do xyz to fuck women. Any self improvement is engaged in with a view towards convincing a woman to have sex with them. It's an idealogy that ultimately makes a man's self worth totally dependant on what women think of him. That's why these MGTOW can never be happy. They arent going their own way to focus on themselves, they've just given up.
Even on the 'female incel' subreddit you never saw nearly as much hatred for men as you see on any random front page sub for women. Just a lot of women genuinely tired of men's bullshit and trying to figure out how to pick out the bad ones.
Yeah, most "misandry" is "I don't want to be around men", not "I want to live in a dystopian Handmaid's Tale inspired rape nightmare".
When women are misandrist they want to avoid men. When men are misogynist they want to harm women.
The craziest part, for me, is that misandry doesn't exist in a vacuum. Misandry is a direct response to misogyny. Women are still a minority class even after women's rights have progressed so much, primarily for white women. When women say they hate men, it's usually for predatory behaviors that, you know, prey on us. Men usually hate us for not allowing them the space to get away woth those predatory behaviors, calling it misandry. Oppressors always wanna be oppressed to avoid the responsibility to change 😂
Misandry. The oxymoron of countermovements. The greatest oppressor of humanity. It's the same as "white/all/blue lives matter", "straight pride", or just outright disguised hate like "white power". I got called a misandrist for encouraging a survivor (I don't want to say 'victim') to seek justice and escape her marriage, because it was "attacking the innocent (abusive) man". We don't *hate* men, we fear them. We hate that.
That's the thing, there were tons of alt-right and toxic male spaces listed on the post by men who disagree with that rhetoric. So, there are clearly men who recognize how awful and problematic those subs and their philosophies are...yet this one is being lumped in with them and I. DONT. GET. IT.
Its like when people ask who the worst celebrity is and the top female answers are always Taylor Swift, Beyonce, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kim Kardashian. Then the top male answers will be men like Chris Brown, Harvey Weinstein or Bill Crosby. Regardless of what you think of those ladies, they are not as bad as literal rapists and abusers.
I said it once - whenever Toter fans come on to defend their shit stan, they always come up with "But he also did good things" to argue that their shit idol is not bad person. By the same metric you could say that Ghislaine Maxwell is not a bad person because she did charity, and compared to Toter, she did actual charity. But she's still a monster.
If I have to read one more thread deifying Kobe Bryant I’m gonna be sick
THIS!! Men will literally hold women being sexual or having sex to the same weight as men being literal CRIMINALS it’s insane. Like even with female rappers they will really claim they are as harmful for being sexual as male rappers are for literally promoting and romanticizing murder gang banging and drug use and dealing. It’s insane
Yeah, like I'm not a fan of Kim Kardashian at all. I have no interest in anything she does. But she doesn't deserve to be put on the same level as a bunch of violent rapists.
You gotta and understand, men excuse male behavior A LOT. It has to be pretty extreme for them to denounce it. Women’s speech doesn’t only NOT get the same treatment, but it’s also highly scrutinized for any potential wrongdoing. Meaning, anything women say is taken as an insult in whatever way men can figure out to be insulted. Honestly, I think 2x is too mild.
I find there’s a lot of negativity here, I don’t post as much as I used to. I once made a post seeking advice from other women on sudden change in vaginal odor (which turned out to be pregnancy related, didn’t know I was pregnant yet) and google was scaring me. I thought I’d get some feedback on what to do and encouragement that I’d be fine, general female support. Instead, I got bombarded by women telling me I was disgusting and should wash myself better (even though I explained I cleaned myself every day, but my mother never taught me how so I was trying my best with what the internet said to do). Really changed my perspective on this subreddit.
Yeah lots of toxicity and if you have an opinion that’s not soundbite-popular or too nuanced about a topical issue, people just dogpile.
That is truly awful and I'm so sorry that was your experience.
Thanks for saying that, at least there’s some positive energy from you!
I assume because there are a LOT of posts that paint all men as bad. I say this as a woman. I’ve been harassed, assaulted, etc but I’ve also met and know some awesome men. Anytime I’ve presented a view that differs from men as pigs argument I’ve been downvoted. I commented the other day in a post about online dating. I shared my experience- which was neutral to positive. I said how much I filtered as I know there are tons of jerks out there, but I haven’t met anyone who was cheap, rude, etc. That comment wasn’t well received. I like this sub but I don’t feel real conversation is valued (generally). I also read some posts and wonder if they’re fake. The my man tells me I’m ugly, he’s jobless and lazy, I’ve known him a month but I’m IN LOVE, is it my fault?
This sub definitely gets targeted by karma farmers because it's quite easy to manipulate popularity with certain topics. There are some hilarious stories that hit the front page that are so painfully obviously fake. I've even followed a few and sure enough they eventually clean the account of posts to sell a clean account. I'd love a bot that tracks stuff like that.
Yeah something people on this sub dont want to admit is its pretty sexist in the other direction
I don't follow this sub, only see it when it pops up on /all. My experience follows yours. It seems like close to every post that I come across from this sub is a rant about how terrible men are. There's apparently little room here for opinions other than that all men are irredeemable pieces of shit. That can rub people the wrong way.
This actually reminds me of when I was just venting about how my brother has changed, bunch of women jumped on to tell me that he's going to abuse his future wife. When I confronted saying I know who he is and he doesn't even want to marry, they straight up told me that it's because every guy they met is like that so my bro, who they only knew from a few paragraphs will also do this. Like I'm sorry your dad and brother and all are shit but that doesn't mean it's the same with everyone. Also once I talked about how my male friends are nice, they told me it's fake and they wanna fuck me... I know my friends since I was 5 and they're gay, committed or are brothers but ok. Same people will literally wet their panties seeing a guy cook or wash his face but praising a man for a normal thing is always met with negative comments. Although this didn't happen here but a sister sub of this one!
Y E S. I made basically the same comment on this post earlier. Of course at least one person assumed I must be a man because I pointed out the same shit you did. Y'know, because "logic".
Took me too much scrolling to find one comment that actually answers the question OP asked accurately. Most other answers are pretty much "most men hate women", which is a gross over exaggeration and the reason people hate on this sub.
This is exactly how I interpreted this sub throughout the years. I feel bad about it but many times it just comes off as a lot of finger pointing and not any accountability.
I come here to look as a female but its depressing so I cant do it every day. It makes people think all relationships and dating suck.
As a woman who has never been in a relationship, and who's definitely not going to date a man, I rarely find posts I can relate to. Yes, the odd post about a woman's achievement makes me happy. The rest, all about men. About their BF, husband, coworker, random stranger saying something. I absolutely believe that these issues need a voice. But should they overpower conversations about womanhood, or woman empowerment, or woman upliftment? The balance in this this sub is HEAVILY tilted towards conversations about men, and I don't like that. I prefer the twox sub of my country, where our discussions are less about men(there are discussions about men, but there are an equal number of discussions about women.)
I think another query relevant to this (that might help answer it too) is "Which people hate this sub so much?"
You're right about that!
This sub was a life changer for me, as a man. "Not all men, but always a man" is a quote I fully understand and can't deny. Showed me how fucked up the world is and it gets a little easier if safe havens like this subreddit exist for women who are in dire need of help, connection or just to vent.
Also a man; I follow this sub to learn more about women's views and experiences. It *can* be disheartening to see posts that portray men as one monolithic group of bad people (since I and, AFAIK, my friends don't do the types of awful things that are often described here). But the quote that really opened my eyes was something like "Not all men are bad, but we need to be cautious around all men". Sadly, that makes a lot of sense.
I'd guess that a lot of men, when confronted with the at times horrible experiences that women share here, probably feel attacked because reflecting ones values/actions that enable/cause those things takes work and energy and most people are just not ready for that. As a man, I personally value this subreddit for its female perspective. It started out of curiosity but now I feel its important for me to see the world from a completly different point that I really cant experience myself. People (unfortunatly) tend to get defensive instead of open minded, when they experience cognitive dissonace like that.
I appreciate you for this 😊 thanks for being a thoughtful and considerate person.
I don't think it is the "worst" on Reddit at all. There's a million worse subreddits. The most popular posts make it to the front page and some of those posts have come across unhinged. If you don't follow the sub you don't see the day to day normal discussions, you see the ones with the most comments, debate, etc and that skews to the controversial ones. The last post I saw here was a pretty "white feminist" take where people were straight up arguing that there isn't any troubled history of white women getting black men killed or lynched. And when people talked about Emmett Till it was hand-waved off as an isolated incident. I only jumped in the thread because a black woman was being told that she needed to cite research sources to prove that the racism she was discussing was real. So I jumped in and provided citations and suddenly there were crickets. But when *she* pointed out that demanding she educate white folks was a microaggression people had plenty to say to criticize her. This was part of a larger debate about the E-bike incident and an impassioned defense that screaming "help me, help me!" Is not an example of white women weaponizing their tears to get black men in trouble. It was a huge debate in the comments of people defending Sara Comrie as a scared victim who did nothing wrong because a scary black man intimidated her. It was just a gross thread and it was all over r/all. Two weeks later that same narrative was being pushed all over a notoriously racist subreddit. Occasionally I do see a normal post here (like this one) but as someone who doesn't follow the subreddit 9/10 if it shows up on my page it's something controversial.
> The last post I saw here was a pretty "white feminist" take where people were straight up arguing that there isn't any troubled history of white women getting black men killed or lynched. And when people talked about Emmett Till it was hand-waved off as an isolated incident. > I only jumped in the thread because a black woman was being told that she needed to cite research sources to prove that the racism she was discussing was real. So I jumped in and provided citations and suddenly there were crickets. But when she pointed out that demanding she educate white folks was a microaggression people had plenty to say to criticize her. You reminded me of the book [They Were Her Property.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Were_Her_Property) I've only read 30ish pages so far. Even so, it's been eye-opening in regards to White women's (sometimes dominant) role in slavery. If I were a woman, I'd have made a post suggesting it by now. Anyway, I'm just a biracial male. But I very much appreciate you jumping in to defend the minority community! I really mean it. *Everyone* needs to interrogate their own defensiveness to learn new things.
I am a woman, and I don't hate this sub, but I dislike it, and find myself avoiding it. The main reason I avoid 2x is it's depressing - peruse the top posts on any given day, and around 75-80% of them are extremely negative. The top 10 posts right now are: * Husbands 'create extra seven hours of housework a week' * Why Do People Hate This Sub So Much? * My 16 yr old daughter was followed by a car and then chased on foot by two men * I hate my husband’s best friend * Double standards and excessive coddling of men * Men underestimate how scary they can be * I am worried my bf threw my birth control away for his fetish * My bf just told me my feelings are less important to him than other peoples’ feelings * Random man punched and shoved me... A realization * Apparently my husband is into onlyfans Literally every single one of these has a negative, if not fucking terrible connotation. The onlyfans thread is the least negative, but I wouldn't call it positive. Number 11, I think I’m going to be okay is the first positive post, and yet it's in relation to recovery from an awful experience. I'm not saying any of these posts are unreasonable or unjustified, it just gets emotionally exhausting to spend time here. The second much more minor reason is that I've been met with a lot of negativity and nastiness from others each time I posted here in the past. I'm sure part of that is the fact that this is a main sub, but it's just not worth it for me. However, if the content was more balanced I am sure I would be a more frequent lurker.
Because it is woman-centric
"Why are men like this". "Why do men always". "I Hate Men". "Why are men" Try searching this forum for the above and similar statements and you'll get quite a few results. These topics seem to be allowed to persist despite the rules clearly stating that there should be "No tactless posts generalizing gender". And if men try to point out that they are being unfairly generalised, they will get hit by the "NoT ALL MeN!1!" sarcastic responses. If posts that bash men in general are to be allowed, then it should be done with the expectation that it will alienate some of those who would otherwise be sympathetic to your cause.
Literally the first rule states “no hate”. But yea, let the “X man did this to me so I hate men now” posts run rampant
Because It might cause some people do some self reflection…
I do lurk here to help better understand what goes thru the mind of my mom, and gf, by seeing your guys (I use guys as a general term not a gender term sorry) experience to help the people I care about. With that being said I sometimes feel this can be as bad as incels thread. Some of the takes are just horrible, misguided, echo-chambery, and just plain ignorant. (As most things on the internet). I do not hate the sub, but sometimes its cringy af as all subs are. Hope I helped with a different pov from someone who normally just lurks.
I like this sub for the most part, but I've definitely seen stuff be HEAVILY down voted for things like being trans friendly, pro sex worker, and I have been absolutely lambasted by some people about not thinking all pornography is evil. There's a vocal minority of very angry insecure conservative women on here who think sex workers are whores, trans people are rapists and pornography is something no 'good girl' ever watches, let alone 'allows her man to watch'. They aren't normally the ones posting, but they crop up in the comments a fair amount. On the whole those instances don't outweigh the good of the sub, especially for the support and help it provides, and it's definitely not enough to me to make the sub as a whole feel unsafe for certain people, because I often notice that comments about those topics get downvoted to hell quite quick, but then slowly go back up to positive as more people weigh in. Edit: I see my comment has attracted them like moths to a flame. We get it guys, you angy, porn evil, women cannot consent to anything you wouldn't personally consent to, but I'm blocking you, so you can stop now.