Antisocial, societal issues thread

[dirty harry]

Must say I find some of these subjects to be a real minefield and educating myself more is something I definitely need to do.

I feel there is growing divide between men/boys and women/girls and I think both need to make more effort to understand the others' struggles and fears. The Government in conjunction with the media should be doing more to help with this IMO.

Violence against women and girls is a huge problem and having spoken to female friends I have really tried to educate myself in understanding their fears and concerns e.g. walking home from a tube station or bus stop after dark. Some of my friends spend a fortune on Uber/Bolt because there are too many creeps walking behind them late at night and they don't feel safe. That is not right. I have learned not to walk up closely behind women & girls when it's dark even though I know I am not a threat to them. I generally cross the street where possible if I need to overtake them. It saddens me that the actions of a minority of men have made women & girls so fearful of men in general. If I saw a woman or girl being attacked on the street I wouldn't hesitate to step in and help them. I would like to think many other men would do the same.

I also think there is a lack of appreciation of boys & mens' struggles. Depression, loneliness, low self esteem, constant rejection, lack of role models. It is no wonder that suicide rates are rising and boys are turning to people like Tate.

I agree with all of this, although the stats around women being attacked in public massively disprove this fear, but I also recognise fear isn't always based on rationality, and can massively empathise the situation in which a small female has found themselves somewhere dark and sketchy alone at night. What I would say is that professionals used to teach risk assessment, and analysis, and taking responsibility for your own safety, however this has been replaced with teaching all men not to do bad things (again it's politically convenient).

Where I would add, is that funding and culture all talk about violence against women and girls continuously. There's a whole home affairs committee looking to redirect more money toward this issue, there are female only spaces, gender equality programmes, and a garage of places they can go for help. I'm not playing down girls issues, I actually think this is all politically convenient and they ignore some of the biggest dangers for girls, especially within the care system (where coercion, manipulation and sexual abuse is rife and hidden) and how care experienced girls are treated by the police, it's disgraceful.

I also don't think there really is a growing divide, not in the inter personal anyway. On social media, in the news and according to politicians yes, it seems the cavern is growing, but on the day to day people need people.

Scaring for clicks, votes or views has always been the way, as is control, and using the notions of race, gender, religion etc is the easiest way to keep us all squabbling amongst each other arguing about nothing.

My concern is a whole generation of boys, failed by the education system, failed by poverty, failed by the police force, but mostly failed by their own government. There is not one stat where boys are achieving any success currently. That's my fear, the entire western world is seemingly celebrating woman and girls while demonising boys, through policy, media, and criminilisation.

I'll leave you with 1 scary stat, the criminalisation of young boys in the uk is so bad, currently 28% of the entire country has a criminal record, and 48% of boys between 18-24 have had run ins with the police. This was getting so bad, the ONS released a statement in 2019 bragging about how crime reduction was working, and that the rate of young offenders in court had dropped 78% between 2007 and 2018. Seems amazing, until you realised they changed the metrics for court appearance, and only included first timers instead of multiple offenders. The true stat is probably that court appearances doubled.

 

[dirty harry]

I think one of the issues isn't the lack of appreciation. But the likes of Tate and other right wing reactionaries coopting the issues.

The reaction to metoo with people needing to say not all men or engaging whataboutary in saying about men's issues. Is a prime example.

It's frustrating you try to have sensible conversations sbout a certain topic and people want to make it about something diffrent. The amount of people I know who bring up men's health issues and actually are an activist rather than someone trying to move from a diffrent discussion (usually about violence towards women) I can count on one hand.

It isn't the lack of appreciation at all, it's the lack of empathy or forward thinking about how a generation of boys are vilified, and the negative consequences that will heap on society. Right wing ideals are sweeping the western world, and the more young boys are rejected by everything in their life the more they will turn to those with bad intentions holding out their arms of support.

Have you been to any of these manosphere places, they are incredibly intoxicating. It's easy to see why the numbers are on the increase, when a society not only tells you they don't care about your issues, but you are the problem for all others issues as well.

I recently tried to assist a boys mental health charity to apply for government funding for a venue where boys and young men could sit in a safe space, a mere 3k for an annual slot at a YMCA space. I'm not a fundraiser but have assisted enough tenders to know how to play the game. The response wasn't just a rejection, but an allegation of discriminatory practice against women. The conclusion was that the charity could get the money if they changed their male centric name to something gender neutral, and encouraged a 50% participant rate of girls.

Make that make sense!

I listened to a very good podcast recently on the issue of education disparity, and the claim was made by a senior US pedagogy specialist, that boys and girls should be educated separately until the age of around 6-8, to allow different learning styles, and increase appetite for learning in both genders. They broke down the neurological and behavioural reasons for it and I was gobsmacked at how much sense it made.

 

[Weldit]

I think a lot of it is a horrible side effect of the current climate too. It's just impossible for the average person to do anything anymore. They've decimated the working class (and here we are) and now they're going after the middle.