this post was submitted on 31 Jul 2023
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The left needs to own healthy masculinity and properly address very legitimate issues that disproportionally hurt boys in our society.
Otherwise we will lose a whole generation to toxic male role models in the manosphere.
I read a great WaPo article on this recently. Basically on the left, no one can define healthy masculinity and it's really opened up a spot for the right wing to swoop in and define it for us.
The left side of politics has always struggled to bring people along for the journey, they can advocate for people but building a coherent argument and inspiring people to come along for the ride will always be their downfall. They cannot achieve progressive change if they fail to recognize the concerns of the right.
Shame that the concerns of the right are mostly just disguised misogyny, racism and classism.
You're right. Nothing that's truly valuable in legislation is simple. It's hard to turn something complicated into a sound byte without making shit up, and the Left in most countries have to be careful alienating the intellectuals if they start making shit up. We don't vote for bullshit.
The Right has no problem making shit up and those who vote for them are not really affected by it. When the Notch Baby bullshit was going on (a US thing... there was basically a big hoax about a generation being owed money, and a lot of politicians ran with it), I didn't know a single right-leaning voter who would give the least bit of a shit that they were voting for people who were willfully taking advantage of the elderly. I guarantee a left-party candidate who pulled that shit would lose by a landslide.
So the Right can bad-faith point out a concern that "toxic masculinity" is just "masculinity" and a good thing. They know the Left can't soundbyte their way out of it because it's not a one-liner to say "it's not about masculinity or feminity, it's about not being a dick and all of us helping the underdog". It's VERY easy to sell people who aren't the underdog on victim complexes.
John Oliver, John Iadorola from the damage report, Mike Figuredo from the Humanist report, Kyle Kulenski from secular talk, David Doel from the rational national, Sam Seder from the majority report, Lance from the Serfs, Matt Binder from the majority report. Left leaning positive male role models. I'm sure there is more but they stand out as I watch them every week.
Jon Stewart, Trae Crowder, and Beau of the Fifth Column are three more excellent examples of positive male role models.
I fucking love Beau
Who is our Jordan Peterson equivalent?
Reporters and intellectuals can be role models but they are more passive than actively preaching what masculinity should mean.
We've also got Brian Tyler Cohen, Hasan Piker, David Pakman as well. Beau Of The 5th Column I know has already been listed, but I feel when it comes to instilling change in the hearts and mind of radicalized young men, he's up there with Hasan and BTC.
They do, but they are not mainstream. "Average person" probably never heard of them.
JOHN OLIVER IS A REAL PERSON?
No he is just a meme on r/pics
This, want it or not, it is not hard for boys to feel incredibly alienated in the left hemisphere. We gone from "girls have issues too" to "only girls can have issues". It's ridiculous, and even more ridiculous when you remember that girls reach their growth spurt sooner than boys, effectively eliminating many of the purported advantages of boys over girl, making them feel even more alienated.
I'm pretty far left and in my entire life I've never experienced "only girls can have issues" as more than an extreme fringe statement.
What I tend to see regarding men is how they, too, are victims of toxic masculinity, taught to internalize their emotions until they have literal breakdowns. The Left gives a fuck about that, and it's one of the cited reasons they have problems with toxic masculinity.
I wonder where you get the impression that "the left" is saying "only girls can have issues"? It feels to me like people have spun this reactionary tale in the backlash to feminism but no one is actually saying that.
It is like every time someone tries to talk about issues women face this is seen as an attack on men. Which I find frankly ridiculous. At the same time, in many cases when people bring up boy's or men's issues they will only do so while simultaneously attacking feminist talking points. This is especially prevalent on social media platforms like Reddit and YouTube.
It does seem like anti-feminists and sometimes straight up misogynistic people have monopolized the entire discussion surrounding men's issues. When you look up information regarding issues men face it is really hard to not end up in a hateful corner of the internet. Some of these sources do not actually have the people looking for help at heart, they are simply anti-feminist and will even go so far as to provide inaccurate information or withhold information just so that they can keep up their narrative.
This is very much a talking point by "only girls can have issues" people.
"Men don't have issues, men's rights groups only exist to spread misogyny!"
That is a key point of why the idea that men's issues are not taken seriously is spreading, because simply talking about / focusing on men's issues quickly gets people labled as misogynists.
This both gets people to stop caring about the idea of misogynism, because "apparently simply talking about men's issues is misogyny", and thereby also pushes people to develop more problematic views.
This is simply not true.