That happened five minutes ago. — Jamal

Thank you!!

It was entrapment

probably a fly in the bottle

Excellent thread, Tobias. Gotta love Hegelian analysis. The definition of masculinity and femininity has me puzzling. Is there anything more to it than stipulation - perhaps a study that shows the traits in the table coinciding statistically, or other empirical support? — Banno

Not that I know of. They have been researched by the sociologist Hofstede and there is a lot to find online. I am sure he has elaborated on them, but whether he done so statistically I do not know. I admit it would be good to look into that, but I severely lack the time to do so... :yikes:

The funny thing is he changed his terminology from masculine to MAS it seems to make it more gender neutral.

I do find the idea of some place where inequalities naturally exist to be slightly worrying without more flesh on the bones. — Tobias

Here is a natural inequality: a woman knows her own offspring with a certainty that a man cannot match. This much is inescapable biology, that any social gender construction must take account of.

The significance is a matter of inheritance. So it has importance for the propertied classes in the first place. For a propertied male, "faithfulness" becomes the prime virtue of womanhood, and 'the bloodline' must be protected by her subjugation. Hence, erstwhile Prince Charles could not marry his love, Camilla, but must instead marry a certified virgin. Well, you know the story.

Of course the biological story we are told is the inverse, that it is the woman who rejects casual sex because of some need for 'support', poor little thing and the huge investment she makes into the child relative to the male. Or is that the propaganda? It really is hard to tell.

Especially when the likes of Gregory are keeping themselves 'pure', as virginal men, whilst denigrating women as the great manipulators, to ends we can only guess at.

Dudes and Dudettes, were gender to be fully biologically determined, empirically verifiable examples such as these would never occur:

Some of the most compelling evidence against a strong biological determination of gender roles comes from anthropologists, whose work on preindustrial societies demonstrates some striking gender variation from one culture to another. This variation underscores the impact of culture on how females and males think and behave.

Margaret Mead (1935) was one of the first anthropologists to study cultural differences in gender. In New Guinea she found three tribes—the Arapesh, the Mundugumor, and the Tchambuli—whose gender roles differed dramatically. In the Arapesh both sexes were gentle and nurturing. Both women and men spent much time with their children in a loving way and exhibited what we would normally call maternal behavior. In the Arapesh, then, different gender roles did not exist, and in fact, both sexes conformed to what Americans would normally call the female gender role.

The situation was the reverse among the Mundugumor. Here both men and women were fierce, competitive, and violent. Both sexes seemed to almost dislike children and often physically punished them. In the Mundugumor society, then, different gender roles also did not exist, as both sexes conformed to what we Americans would normally call the male gender role.

In the Tchambuli, Mead finally found a tribe where different gender roles did exist. One sex was the dominant, efficient, assertive one and showed leadership in tribal affairs, while the other sex liked to dress up in frilly clothes, wear makeup, and even giggle a lot. Here, then, Mead found a society with gender roles similar to those found in the United States, but with a surprising twist. In the Tchambuli, women were the dominant, assertive sex that showed leadership in tribal affairs, while men were the ones wearing frilly clothes and makeup. — https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Courses/HACC_Central_Pennsylvania%27s_Community_College/ANTH_205%3A_Cultures_of_the_World_-_Perspectives_on_Culture_(Scheib)/12%3A_Gender_and_Sexuality/12.04%3A_Gender_Variability_and_Third_Gender

I saw a documentary of the Tchambuli back in university days. Quite telling to so see first hand. And there are many, many other examples as well. In the west, there are stories of the Amazonian women who, for example, were stated to partake in the battle at Troy in the Illiad (Troy no longer being a mere "myth"). With burial mounds of Scythian woman worriers quite possibly aligning to the purported tales of Amazonian women having traveled north.

Culture plays a heavy role in what genders are expected to be. For better or most likely worse, with the "weaker sex" motif being quite central to today's typical western culture.

I don't think many people outside of the types of chambers in which these one-sided conversations happen would recognise a lot of the OP as accurately describing much about htem, their views, or what they want for hte world/society. Makes it tough going to even get off that post something that can be adequately responded to without sounding off topic. So here we are. Sounding off topic.

Edit: Having read a couple pages now, I see nothing reasonable was going to come out of this. Sigh.

So here we are. Sounding off topic.

Edit: Having read a couple pages now, I see nothing reasonable was going to come out of this. Sigh. — AmadeusD

OK, going back to the OP in addressing the problem of masculinity:

Is the occurrence of "masculinity" of itself contingent on there existing "a weaker sex"?

(Examples such those I linked to in my previous post indicate otherwise. Nevertheless, this seems to be the implicit assumption of most - at least most I've been acquainted with either directly or via media.)

-------

To be upfront about my own stance, as a heterosexual male who values my own masculinity, I'm an egalitarian at heart, and thereby view the power (ability to accomplish) of both sexes/genders to be both of equal ability and of equal value in at least principle - though not always in practice, modern culture playing a large part in this. I also uphold that "if there will be a war between the sexes, there'll be no people left". This pretty much summing up my own view.

Not something which homophobic attitudes will much enjoy, but all the same:

It doesn't much matter for the purposes of the discussion if masculinity and femininity match biological gender. Margaret Thatcher comes to mind.

My question to is more about the listed characteristics being consistently found in individuals. Do we know that ego oriented, economic growth high priority, conflict solved through force, import of religion, traditional family structure and seeing failing is a disaster are characteristics found together in some individuals, while others work in order to live, negotiate to solve conflicts, accept women priests and don't mind when boys cry? Or is this an expectation brought to the table by the theories? Is someone who doesn't see women as managers more likely to give economic growth a higher priority than the environment?

And it doesn't matter that it might be otherwise in some cultures, since the topic is our own culture.


Hofstede’s dimensions originated in a study of IBM workers, using factor analysis. Other studies have supported and extended the four original dimensions. So to answer my own question, it does have an empirical base and across various global samples.

Here are a few of the papers found:
Relationships Between Response Styles and the Hofstede and GLOBE Dimensions of Culture in a Sample of Adolescents From 33 Countries

The Correlation between Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions and COVID-19 Data in the Early Stage of the COVID-19 Pandemic Period

The effect of the dimension of culture masculinity/femininity in communication in multinational projects

Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions Theory & Examples

Apparently the masculinity/femininity dimension is now referred to as the "Motivation Toward Achievement and Success dimension", which alleviates some of my concern.

The third of these papers might give some insight into why those with a "high" motivation toward "achievement and success" dimension appear to summarily reject the content and thrust of the discussion in this thread. Of course, the sample here is pretty small...

So having established the viability of the masculinity/femininity dimension, and since it is pretty clear that the movement in the politics of the USA is towards the masculinity end of the scale, my next question concerns why we should have a preference for one dimension over anther - why not allow a "movement" towards the masculine end? Consequentialism would seem to provide a useable answer here - given the present environmental crisis, this is precisely a time in which cooperation is needed.

It doesn't much matter for the purposes of the discussion if masculinity and femininity match biological gender. — Banno

:smile: OK, you, I'll take you're word for it. All the same, I can't escape the hunch that many, if not most, tend to disagree with this. "Power" being often strictly equated to control and dominance over other, and in this way with the capacity to domineer, with this capacity tending to be seen as what ought to be a strictly male characteristic, which most term "masculinity".

That said, I'll endorse your statement: yes, plenty of women are domineering and in this sense alone masculine. Moreover, though, plenty more feminine women and masculine men are, despite their gender differences, alike in being neither submissive to domineering factions nor attempt to domineeringly subjugate others. But this regards a type of power utterly different from that just specified.

Hello philosophy forum!

This is an interesting conversation, and an important one, but I don't see much awareness of the fact that women raise our children, boys and girls, more than men do, and that some of the 'crisis' of masculinity can be perceived as a preference for 'female' values, by females, in feminized spaces.

The 'caregiver burden' is argued as evidence for the patriarchy, so surely this implies agreement that moms parent more than dads, in general. And we can count the number of teachers. I'd be happy to provide stats in anyone wants, but two thirds to three quarters of your kids teachers being female, throughout their lives, is a fair estimation most places. Certain boys are not well-served by a lack of male role models. Surely, this is not contentious?

I know I can get in trouble here if not careful to provide evidence, but it is beyond dispute that boys have been falling behind girls in schools, the first major socializing institution in the lives of most people in the WEIRD world, for decades. Christina Hoff Sommers outlines this with "The War Against Boys" in 2000, and Richard Reeves re-confirmed the same trends in 2022 with his "Of Boys and Men". But those are just two of many worthy titles.

I certainly saw this from the outset of my high school teaching career in 1997. Anecdotal, but anecdote has value when it illustrates statistics.

One thing I appreciate about Reeves is his insistence that if moderates can't offer compelling alternatives, radicals will fill the void. So if it's between 'boys are inherently toxic' and 'Andrew Tate'? It's not like we are offering boys much of a choice in the first place.

I would suggest that the majority of people generally worried about 'problems of masculinity' are worried about it from the perspective of women, but in so doing they are failing to recognize how harmful constructions of masculinity and femininity both are for men and boys as well as women and girls, and to what degree women are also responsible for these constructions.

It should go without saying that gendered violence IS dramatically more of a male-caused problem, that there are many legit, negative examples of 'the patriarchy', especially in powerful 'elite' males. This shouldn't prevent us from discussing the less visible problem. I find it strange to call boys underperforming girls in schools 'less visible' given how striking the data is, but this topic was almost never addressed in my decades teaching.

Sociological arguments that men are 'afraid' of seeing their power base diminished strike me as particularly inane. Certain elites perhaps, but the majority of people on the planet, male and female and however else people choose to define themselves, simply do not think this way.

The average incel, for example, is not operating from a position of 'power'. This is where intersectionality fails - only certain intersections count. Class is downplayed, unless as evidence of the greater (identity-based) evils of racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. Certain elements are left out of these conversations entirely. For example, 'beauty privilege' is likely more 'objective' - measurable - than 'racial privilege'.

It takes tremendous educational privilege to understand intersectionality, another example.

I see much of this debate as technocratic. Technocrats' educational privilege is why they get to determine who gets hired, what gets taught in schools, what laws are passed, which professions need affirmative action, and for whom, etc. Intersectionality can offer value, but to argue, as many technocrats do, that our public education is still primarily patriarchal, for example, is nuts.

We need programs, still, for girls in STEM, despite decades of females dominating education in general, but programs for boys in HEAL is misogyny? If you doubt me, simply Google Reeves' book and read some reviews.

From the first review I found after typing that, in The Guardian, the opening sentence:

"Something is rotten in the state of manhood. Guilty of the crime of patriarchy, it is also tainted by toxic masculinity, the belief that most social ills – everything from murder and rape to online abuse – stem from men being men".

And this is one of the fair reviews! Reeves himself is a centrist, kind to a fault towards those that disagree with him, and yet if you head to Reddit, say, it's pretty common for he and his arguments to be outright derided. Hoff Sommers is in the same boat.

Frankly, what other identity discipline is dominated by people outside of that identity? The majority of modern books about men are written by women, which is literally unimaginable for any other demographic group outside of 'white people'.

Is evolutionary biology so tainted, 'coded right', that we can't acknowledge that as a species with two primary sexes, (leaving intersex and trans out as the statistical minority they are, for the sake of simplicity) one sex live lives as smaller and physically weaker on average than the other? And that sex is the one who carries and births the next generation? Who are then best equipped to form the original primary bond with the child? And that there are evolutionary differences in the sexes as a result of this, that exist in conversation with the 'social construction' of gender?

Not to excuse bias, ignore abuse, or suggest that past norms should dictate the present. But these roles, male and female, are essential, historical aspects of human existence. Those don't change quickly.

If one acknowledges some role for biology, it's no wonder our schools prefer 'feminized' behaviour. Given that girls are more empathetic, at younger ages, than boys, they are better behaved. They are more mature, thus able to integrate with others earlier. They are less prone to physical explosions of energy, so as we reduce recess time and non-academic course options in our schools, they adapt more quickly than boys.

When doing sociology, we are not predicting what one individual will do, nor why they will do it. We are charting what happens when groups of people engage in certain similar types of behaviour. It is by definition a 'soft' science. Too often, I fear, we forget that, and ascribe problematic morals to members of
groups based solely on their membership in said group.

Long story short, I think that, to the extent that we have problems with masculinity, it is because we are failing to raise boys AND girls both. The hideous Tates of the world are symptoms, not causes.

My fourth comment here on the PF. I hope I'm managing to do this respectfully!

Cheers.

That girls are doing well in PISA only matters if one supposes that it ought be boys that are doing well. Why not just say "good on 'em!"?

Why restrict ourselves to raising boys or girls when we can raise children?

Rather than ask why boys are not doing as well as they might, ask why some kids are not doing as well as they might. I've some professional familiarity with the PISA results and can assure you that differences between genders are far outweighed by differences in family income.

Seems to me the question in the OP is about preferred leadership styles. The present move away from cooperative leadership is... regrettable.

[...] but I don't see much awareness of the fact that [...] some of the 'crisis' of masculinity can be perceived as a preference for 'female' values, by females, in feminized spaces. — Jeremy Murray

The present move away from cooperative leadership is... regrettable. — Banno

I’ll add that both global and national percentage differences between male and female populations, though not perfectly equal, are so negligible as to pretty much round out to equal standing in most, if not all, cases. (reference)

If we in fact honor power of leadership by representation in our culture, leadership ought then be just about equally divided between males and females at all levels of governance, without any glaring exceptions.

So, given the yet occurring disparity in this leadership by representation, and in acknowledging that women have made some progress over the years toward this just mentioned ideal:

Can anyone explain to me how the fear of (else the roundabout concern that) “women are taking over and are destroying the core of masculinity” is in fact not a communal projection of personally held aspirations by a certain male faction in society, one composed of individuals that themselves desire to be domineering over all others - women very much here included as those whom they deem themselves entitled to subjugate? Entitled by Nature, by God, it doesn't much here matter.

(I don't mean for this question to be insulting. It's quite sincerely asked. To maybe make this more clear: Such that this one male faction of society might typically hold a belief in something along the lines of, “the weaker sex needs to be barefoot and pregnant with mouths closed in obedience to whatever 'the man' says”. While this might in no way depict you, it is a paraphrased sentiment I’ve, again, unfortunately often enough encountered. The majority of rapes in the world, after all, are perpetrated by men on women; men who often enough hold this or a similar enough mindset in respect to women at large.)

So having established the viability of the masculinity/femininity dimension, and since it is pretty clear that the movement in the politics of the USA is towards the masculinity end of the scale, my next question concerns why we should have a preference for one dimension over anther - why not allow a "movement" towards the masculine end? Consequentialism would seem to provide a useable answer here - given the present environmental crisis, this is precisely a time in which cooperation is needed. — Banno

Thank you for doing my work Banno ;) It is a jocular comment but I am really thankful. It is easy to just dismiss something and saying, 'huh, I do not buy the research behind it'. It is harder to think along and I am having a hard time with the people that simply shoot the assumptions to pieces. I do not mind it, but it makes discussion so difficult. That said, I do not see why I or anyone else who contributes needs to have a normative commitment. The way I see it there are simply types of oppression, types of power wielding. The best wielder of power though, in our current society, remains unknown. As for the environment. There are two conceptions. One is shrinking and de-growth, a policy that will have enormous ramifications for the current distribution of power and wealth in society, the other one is radical technological optimism, a policy that will have enormous ramifications for the distribution of power and wealth in society. For me myself the de-growth option if probably more appealing but whether it is better... who am I to say?

OK, you, I'll take you're word for it. All the same, I can't escape the hunch that many, if not most, tend to disagree with this. "Power" being often strictly equated to control and dominance over other, and in this way with the capacity to domineer, with this capacity tending to be seen as what ought to be a strictly male characteristic, which most term "masculinity".

That said, I'll endorse your statement: yes, plenty of women are domineering and in this sense alone masculine. Moreover, though, plenty more feminine women and masculine men are, despite their gender differences, alike in being neither submissive to domineering factions nor attempt to domineeringly subjugate others. But this regards a type of power utterly different from that just specified. — javra

I would not see power in that way. In fact I think power is wielded far more efficiently when one does not know it is being wielded. "Masculine" power, as you describe it as overt power, seems to me to be a very crude way to wield power. Crudeness may well be effective though. However, I do not think that for instance the medicalization of crime is any less devoid of power relations than the retaliatory discourse. I would actually be tempted to defend the opposite thesis, that the medicalization of crime needs a far more complex assemblage of power relations then the retaliatory view on crime. Retaliation has a 5000 year history, difficult to overcome that.

Can anyone explain to me how the fear of (else the roundabout concern that) “women are taking over and are destroying the core of masculinity” is in fact not a communal projection of personally held aspirations by a certain male faction in society, one composed of individuals that themselves desire to be domineering over all others — javra

I think it is such a projection. In my view everyone, irrespective of sex, tends to 'dominate', in the sense that they favour societal arrangements that are most conducive to them. So yes, some men who feel like their favourite model of dominance is at stake, will cause a backlash against currently popular discourses of 'harmony', 'protection' or 'vulnerability'.

Re: legacy of absentee / abusive fathers reinforced by pervasive religious-cultural misogyny ...
Here's all you have to know about men and women: women are crazy, men are stupid. And the main reason women are crazy is that men are stupid.
— George Carlin
Case and point: ↪Gregory :eyes: — 180 Proof

Is there such a legacy really? The pervasive religious and cultural misogyny I understand, but what happened to the fathers in your opinion? There may well be a link. Before the second world war fathers were regularly absent, drinking in the bars. I do not know what happened in the 1960s or 1970s. There might well be something there, but how have the sins of the father influenced our current state as men and women?

For Gregory I feel pity actually. I had a discussion with him in the Hegel thread. Perhaps that caused him to come here and go on a path which led him to banning. I find it ood. Why would someone that studies philosophy go off into such an odd absolutist reading of femininity and masculinity? Well, people are strange, when you're a stranger...

edit: I also wanted to add that I miss you guys and therefore I was actually touched with @Banno brining in the literature. The forum is for me a place for off beat discussions, for 'misfit thinkers' as @180 Proof once put it. Those places are becoming rare as discourse becomes increasingly mean and self serving. Enjoy it while you can.

Hey Banno, I am glad girls are doing well in STEM. One thing that’s missing from this conversation is the recognition that there do seem to be strong sex-based preferences in terms of areas of study and careers. Women and girls placing more value on personal and family time. Subject matters of higher interest. I can’t think of any Specific benefits for having both male and female engineers, but what we know about education with children does show real value for students to have both. So the fact that we get programs for girls in STEM but not boys in HEAL reveals that this is not about the advantages of diversity in all fields, but rather the advancement of a political belief based on oppression and victimhood, a political belief that is based in some objective truth, but blind to its own limitations.

Richard Reeves goes through this issue at length in his book. He argues that considerations of sex and gender do not need to be viewed as zero-sum, but due to political trends, conversations about the struggles of young men and boys are often framed as threatening to the progress of girls and women.

Remember, we are talking about boys and girls here. In our public schools, boys have been falling behind for decades, and yet people seem to be oblivious to this fact, or worse, seem to think it’s warranted retribution. Again, we are talking about children.

Are you aware of how far behind boys and men are in the past decades? Deaths of despair? Educational outcomes? Perhaps you are. I imagine that if you polled your people, the average response would be that girls are more disadvantaged in school still.

You can’t address a problem that you don’t recognize exists, and I sincerely worry that the majority of my teaching colleagues do not realize this, despite the decades of data.

Richard Reeves goes through this issue at length in his book. He argues that considerations of sex and gender do not need to be viewed as zero-sum, but due to political trends, conversations about the struggles of young men and boys are often framed as threatening to the progress of girls and women. — Jeremy Murray

That's very well put.

Remember, we are talking about boys and girls here. In our public schools, boys have been falling behind for decades, and yet people seem to be oblivious to this fact, or worse, seem to think it’s warranted retribution. Again, we are talking about children. — Jeremy Murray

Yes. I think at the higher studies level we're at the point where similar incentive structures that were made for women in STEM should be made for blokes in other fields, a similar drive and marketing campaign anyway. But I don't think this is zero sum - it would still be nice to see "women in construction" alongside the occasional "men in nursing" adverts I sometimes see!

I think the worst instance of the above I heard, again just this year, is in the context of body dysmorphia. Body dysmorphia among young boys is at parity with young girls these days. The response I heard was, paraphrase, "well men will just have to get used to doing what women have all this time".

There is a lot of needless combativeness.

Why would someone that studies philosophy go off into such an odd absolutist reading of femininity and masculinity? — Tobias

He is not the first erudite person I've seen start to go off that deep end. I do think it's related to your thread topic, subterranean norms and trying to find a partner these days. There are contexts that have relatively fixed gender scripts, and ye olde dating has that. I think I threw a reference at you about that before.

I also want to say that I believe it's everyone that ends up doing shitty identity category essentialism in this context, I've heard "men are trash", "men are apes", "men are assholes", "women are inherently more valuable than men", "men should worship women", "women should be in every position of power in society" - these are either paraphrases or direct quotes - as a result of mild romantic disappointment this year. I throw that in with every misogynist comment I've heard this year. And the incredibly unfortunate remarks you hear about Asian men and bi people in queer spaces, which I've not heard this year. Something about how that's configured is simultaneously dehumanising and essentialising.

Sure, all that, more or less.

Boys outperformed girls in mathematics by 11 score points; girls outperformed boys in reading by 22 score points in Australia. Globally, in mathematics, boys outperformed girls in 40 countries and economies, girls outperformed boys in another 17 countries or economies, and no significant difference was found in the remaining 24. In reading, girls, on average, scored above boys in all but two countries and economies that participated in PISA 2022 (79 out of 81). — Gender differences in performance

Mixed results. But...

In Australia socio-economically advantaged students (the top 25% in terms of socio-economic status) outperformed disadvantaged students (the bottom 25%) by 101 score points in mathematics. — PIZA results

11 points, 22 points... and 101 points. Which should be our primary concern?

My critique of Reeves is the common one that he is blaming schools for general societal problems. It's a strategy adopted by folk - politicians - so they can ignore the actual issue by blaming the teaching profession.

For Gregory I feel pity actually. — Tobias

Me, not so much. A recent discussion on Mathematics showed that he had a very poor grasp of some basic concepts, together with an unwillingness to learn. That attitude was apparent here, as well. And the selfie taken from the vicinity of his groin was just weird.

Yes. — fdrake

I urge caution. Start with two cohorts, one lower than the other, and then reduce that inequality, and it can be said that the other cohort is "falling behind". Especially when the two cohorts exhaust the population.

Start with two cohorts, one lower than the other, and then reduce that inequality, and it can be said that the other cohort is "falling behind". Especially when the two cohorts exhaust the population. — Banno

Well taken. For something like income I'd agree. That proceeded from inequality to {now} relative equality within the same role.

What I'm thinking of are school exclusions, finishing degrees, primary school performance and the like. The thing that makes women equal to men in expected performance in almost every competence is also what makes it suspect when men's performance is worse in something odd.

You could look at it from the perspective that "these boys are given every advantage and are still failing", but I don't believe that, because the outcomes show disadvantage in instances like the above.

It would be nice to understand and address how this works in a gendered fashion - like an explanation for why boys face longer exclusions in schools for equivalent transgressions - but it's probably a clusterfuck of mediation like you're saying.

like an explanation for why boys face longer exclusions in schools for equivalent transgressions — fdrake

...and why more men are in gaol. It's very easy to point the finger at schools becasue they are examined in microscopic detail, and the data is ready at hand, but the ailments need not be peculiar to school communities so much as more easily identifiable in school communities. You can see the misbehaviour more easily in school statistics than in the broader community.

And then go watch a movie where the solution is more often than not found in being more violent than your opponent.

There's a lot of hocuspocus in schools, a lot of political interference and, at least in English speaking countries, a failure to acknowledge the expertise of teachers.

How did we get on to this sidequest?

...and why more men are in gaol. — Banno

Yes, and why men face significantly harsher sentences for the same crime.

How did we get on to this sidequest? — Banno

IMO noting persistent disparities in how genders are treated reveals what norms regarding them are. That's where I'm coming from anyway. The specific things I brought up were with regard to "masculinity as a problem" in the OP.

Well said. :up:

Re: legacy of absentee / abusive fathers reinforced by pervasive religious-cultural misogyny — 180 Proof

Is there such a legacy really? — Tobias

Yes, especially among the urban (& suburban) poor, working & lower middle classes in post-1950s America, where most (black brown & white) children are raised in homes without both parents (usually unwed single mothers).

The pervasive religious and cultural misogyny I understand, but what happened to the fathers in your opinion?

Too many fathers were raised without fathers in the home by unwed single mothers, etc. Simplistically, my guess is that boys tend to grow-up more feminized (submissive, lower self-esteem) whereas girls grow-up de-feminized (dominant, lower self-esteem) by the 'genders imbalanced' example of their husbandless mothers and women teachers primarily in authority throughout primary school.

There may well be a link. Before the second world war fathers were regularly absent, drinking in the bars. I do not know what happened in the 1960s or 1970s. There might well be something there, but how have the sins of the father [& the mother] influenced our current state as men and women?

IME, there is clearly "a link" – strong correlation – in the United States at least since the 1970s and 'gender antagonisms' have been ratcheted-up by ubiquitous, incessant social media since the 2000s. In sum: collapse / delay of marriage and explosion of intentional single motherhood by unwed young women and adolescent girls. Generational vicious cycle (re: social pathologies).

Why would someone [@Gregory] that studies philosophy go off into such an odd absolutist reading of femininity and masculinity?

(cue apt Freddie quote)

"It has gradually become clear to me what every great philosophy up till now has consisted of – namely, the confession of its originator, and a species of involuntary and unconscious autobiography; and moreover that the moral (or immoral) purpose in every philosophy has constituted the true vital germ out of which the entire plant has always grown. [ ... ] Accordingly, I do not believe that an “impulse to knowledge” is the father of philosophy; but that another impulse, here as elsewhere, has only made use of knowledge (and mistaken knowledge!) as an instrument." (BGE)

Well, people are strange, when you're a stranger...

"Women seem wicked / When you're unwanted" :smirk:

* * *

In @Gregory's disHonor
(food for 'contrarian' thought):

Patriarchy (=/= misogyny?) is a lesser, or necessary, evil?

male authority over women =/= male superiority (contra the "Western" myth of equality)? :chin:

Too many fathers were raised without fathers in the home by unwed single mothers, etc. Simplistically, my guess is that boys tend to grow-up more feminized (submissive) whereas girls grow-up de-feminized (dominant) by the 'genders imbalanced' example of their husbandless mothers and women teachers primarily in authority throughout primary school. — 180 Proof

Growing up a a single-parent household increases criminality for both boys and girls, and it is more pronounced in children who grew up without a father, so rather it implies the opposite of what you're suggesting.

The lack of a healthy male role model translates into an inability to deal with authority, not being able to accept boundaries, etc. - the typical 'out-of-control youth' archetype.

I've long thought that Francis Fukuyama's "Last Man Thesis" (oft neglected, because everyone focuses on the "End of History" thesis), goes a long way to explain the rise of the "Manosphere."

From an article I wrote a while back:

One problem for Fukuyama is that his thesis leads to a “paradox;” one he is happy to acknowledge. The end of history will be an age where liberal democracies meet the [basic] economic and psychological needs of every citizen. There will no longer be a need to struggle for respect, dignity, and recognition. However, part of what makes us human is our desire to be recognised as something more than just creatures with basic needs to be met. This leads to a paradox because when we will have finally arrived at the end of history, our basic needs are satisfied, and there will no struggle by which our superiority to animals can be recognised.

-David Macintosh — The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fukuyama

This is the “Last Man Thesis.” No longer having to struggle, the human being, whose basic needs are now easily met, sees themselves degraded into a bovine consumer. The name comes from Nietzsche:

For this is how things are: the diminution and leveling of European man constitutes our greatest danger, for the sight of him makes us weary. — We can see nothing today that wants to grow greater, we suspect that things will continue to go down, down, to become thinner, more good-natured, more prudent, more comfortable, more mediocre, more indifferent, more Chinese, more Christian — there is no doubt that man is getting ‘better’ all the time. —

Friedrich Nietzsche — On the Genealogy of Morals

I would argue that this problem has indeed materialized. It is made all the worse by steep declines in religiosity, and even steeper declines in the share of people who belong to civic organizations, clubs, and unions, as well a drop in the share of adults who are parents or in romantic relationships (all important sources of identity and meaning).

That many people are forced into unfulfilling, alienating jobs, or else become reliant on welfare programs, also makes this problem worse. One’s career can be a powerful source of meaning and identity, but it can also be a source of shame. It’s not uncommon in America to see someone denigrated precisely because of their vocation. “Don’t listen to him, he’s a pizza delivery guy,” or “you’re a failure, look at you, you bag groceries for a living,” etc.

You are correct that many adherents to the Manosphere are not particularly "privileged." They are often downwardly mobile men who feel they have had the "rug pulled out from under them" vis-a-vis their capacity to earn enough to support a household, etc. (although it is worth noting here that consumption patterns contribute to this inability, and people spend a great deal of their income to buy masculinity/status symbols in some cases).

This phenomena isn't unique to the far-right. I think it explains many trends across our culture, e.g., the widespread popularity of post-apocalyptic media. The basic idea is: "if everything falls apart I can actually become a hero, actually have a meaningful life, rather than living a meaningless life reduced to a bovine consumer," or even "war or crisis will help make me into something more heroic." And this also helps explain other changes in patterns of consumption (e.g. "tactical" everything flying off the shelves, people driving off-road vehicles for their suburban commutes, etc.).

The effects of this sort of thinking are particularly strong in the sphere of gender politics because sex is one of the last elements of human life not to be wholly commodified. Hence, sex remains a strong source of validation, a source of self-worth. And yet, as de Beauvoir points out, Hegel's lord-bondsman dialectic ends up playing out between men and woman here, because the misogynist, having denigrated woman, can no longer receive meaningful recognition from her. This search for meaning helps explain why far right enclaves like 4chan have also surprisingly become "the new home of the elite reader."

However, I think the analyses so far provided are usually too one sided, not only in the threads here, but also in general.

Absolutely. For instance, while there is much of worth in Donna Zuckerberg's Not All Dead White Men: Classics and Misogyny in the Digital Age (her analysis of why Tyler Durden of Fight Club became such a cult icon is spot on for instance; men want to rebuild themselves and assert themselves). However, it falls into the habit of cherry picking the most radical misogynists and painting the entire loose "movement" with this brush. It's a way to dismiss the group rather than seriously engaging with it. It is not unlike how liberal pundits and media outlets moved to brand anyone speaking of "replacement migration" as Neo-Nazis, despite the fact that the UN and liberal think-tanks had themselves long spoke of "replacement migration" as a solution to labor shortages, or that one might have non-racist concerns about rapid demographic change (e.g. German children born today will be minorities in Germany by middle age, that is a sea change, and it is hardly clear to me that concerns over that level of change are necessarily racist.)

That can be quickly dismissed as the whining of losers, but there is some scientific support for this hypothesis. From a study on delinquency and dating behaviour: "Of particular importance, results suggest that delinquency does not appear to increase dating by increasing the delinquent's desire for dates. Instead, they suggest that delinquency increases dating outcomes by making the delinquent more attractive to prospective mates.

Right, being a low-level gang member does not actually pay much better than unskilled wage work and comes with significant risks. As my police commissioner put it once in a budget hearing on social outreach programs: "if women stopped wanting to date gang members, guys would stop joining." That's obviously a bit simplistic, (men also join for the status they receive from other men), but I think her point had some merit.

I consider masculinity, femininity, homosexuality and all other gendered concepts to be social constructs which interpret biological features in ways that vary from era to era and culture to culture. What you seem to be doing is turning one such era-specific construct , the masculine-feminine binary, into a biologically essentialized universal and then using it to explain traditionalist thinking on the political right in the West today. I argue instead that what you understand as masculinity and femininity are not only culturally relative constructs, but do not explain right wing populism. Rather, they are themselves subordinate elements of a larger traditionalist worldview which is about much more than gendered behavior. Do MAGA supporters embrace guns, authoritarianism, oppose abortion, immigrants, climate science, Transgender rights and feminism because of masculine thinking, or are the very concepts of masculinity and femininity they espouse reflections of a traditionalist worldview?

A lot of the Manosphere and "nu-Right" is not very traditionalist though. They tend to be atheists. They tend to have little respect for traditional loci of authority. For example, Rollo Tomassi's The Rational Male is a sort of "Manosphere classic," and is one of the more bearable reads. It tends to frame human relations in terms of a reductive account based in evolutionary psychology. Most of the "Pick-up Artist" literature reads in this way. It is very modern in many respects. The Alt/Nu-Right tends to be even more post-modern. It's a movement loosely aligned to traditionalist elements, e.g. traditional religious organizations, Evangelicals, etc., but also quite different.

There is, of course, a strong attraction in these circles to a certain sort of traditionalist aesthetic, and more traditional fascist elements that have infiltrated these spheres do tend to have their own modern-traditionalism they try to push. But this is often very much skin deep; the aesthetics of Rome are borrowed, maybe guys watch 300, but they're not reading Cicero or Horus. In terms of the intellectuals popular there, e.g. Land, Alamariu, and Yarvin, these guys are referring to Foucault and Nietzsche, not St. Augustine and Aristotle.

I would imagine atheism is major component in this. So much of "traditional" world views, including pagan ones, are grounded in religion that it becomes inaccessible. The big counterexample might be this broad sphere's embrace of Stoicism, but this petered out fairly quickly, and at any rate it was a modernized, athiestatized, less ascetic Stocism that got popular. So much of the philosophy here is based around the idea of freedom as freedom to consume and control, the have one's prerogatives recognized and met (in line with modern welfare economics), that the widespread asceticism in much traditional thought makes it anathema. Striving and pleonexia are almost virtues in this sphere, rather than vices, while humility, a prized virtue, becomes a sort of vice.

Consequentialism would seem to provide a useable answer here - given the present environmental crisis, this is precisely a time in which cooperation is needed.

If masculinity is associated with a lack of cooperation, then yes, that makes sense. I'm not sure it is though. The idea of cooperation, of sacrifice for the whole, is sort of an ideal in military/sports contexts. It's something they try to drill into people, one of the few places left where they openly admit to a period of "indoctrination." But militaries have always required extreme levels of cooperation, coordination, and the subjugation of the needs of the individual to the needs of the whole. Or, to use maybe a bad example, the Third Reich was very much "masculine focused," but it was able to get its population to largely support pretty drastic reductions in consumption and real wages during peace time in order to achieve progress on autarky and other prerogatives.

Likewise, stoic and ascetic ideals, which certainly have been historically consistent with masculinity, also fit with something like 's "degrowth."

Hence, I would caution against conflating "masculine" and "right wing" policies. Traditionally, a lot of left-wing movements very much embraced masculine imagery; it seems to me to be a more recent phenomenon that the left has become "masculine skeptical"

Yes. I think at the higher studies level we're at the point where similar incentive structures that were made for women in STEM should be made for blokes in other fields, a similar drive and marketing campaign anyway. But I don't think this is zero sum - it would still be nice to see "women in construction" alongside the occasional "men in nursing" adverts I sometimes see!

It's unclear how well these work in practice. There is a well-observed phenomenon of some vocations becoming more gender segregated as societies move towards greater gender quality on high level metrics. Elementary education is one strong example.

My question would be "why is this important?" If men and women are identical, then it isn't a useful category to worry about. But they clearly aren't identical. And so, since they aren't identical and interchangeable, we should hardly be surprised that they might self-sort into different sorts of careers.

Can anyone explain to me how the fear of (else the roundabout concern that) “women are taking over and are destroying the core of masculinity” is in fact not a communal projection of personally held aspirations by a certain male faction in society, one composed of individuals that themselves desire to be domineering over all others - women very much here included as those whom they deem themselves entitled to subjugate? — javra

I don't know a single person who could take this as anything other than an insult to their morality (restrict this to males I know). No, that's not a fact - but in response to your question, I dont recognise this as even a tacitly motivating factor. It may be something totally unnoticed by most men (i.e, that their power exists, and whatever they're doing unfortunately promotes it) but that its a 'projection' of some intent to keep power is patently ridiculous when applied to the majority of men outside of boards and governments (even then, most are literally working day-in-day-out to promote women and women's rights - current administration notwithstanding, given they're not the totality of politicians by a long shot, in that one country).

A much bigger and better question is why we don't care that most of hte world is out-right misogynistic and violently so, with the backing of the law? What does the West have that these other cultures don't? No idea. Probably an attempt to dispose of arbitrary rules (read: an attempt to jettison religion) but that's not a very serious note I'm ending on.

Is the occurrence of "masculinity" of itself contingent on there existing "a weaker sex"? — javra

I doubt it, unless you mean physically. Femininity isn't inherently 'weak' other than physically.
That in mind, It's simply stupid to argue that a. men and women don't significantly differ in average strength, and b. that this isn't extremely important to intersexual relations/relationships. Even removing all arbitrary uses of force, this will remain one the most fundamental differences and motivation factors for the inevitably different approaches the sexes take to each other, overall. Though, I do think a belief that this extends to psychology and emotional maturity/intelligence has been a significant and embarrassingly shit motivation for, at the least, bad expressions of masculinity.

I also uphold that "if there will be a war between the sexes, there'll be no people left". This pretty much summing up my own view. — javra

My position is that htis is utterly preposterous and the only foreseeable outcome of that kind of war would be a return to the physical subjugation of women, globally.

I'm a bisexual man, but a fairly 'masculine' one, it seems. I don't recognise the vast majority of accusations laid at the feet of 'masculinity'. Why not just acknowledge that some people are total assholes? Women are just as capable of being pernicious and socially destructive. The difference is men hurt people physically whcih must be accounted for - but the principle does not change. Both sexes are capable of 'sexed' behaviour which is utterly toxic and destructive to society.

I don't know a single person who could take this as anything other than an insult to their morality (restrict this to males I know). — AmadeusD

Sorry to hear you so say. I, for one example, am in no way insulted by the question,