Greetings, Kbinners (and anyone else from the 'verse who might be reading this). Back on the platform most of us migrated from, there was/is a subreddit called r/menslib, which was like r/mensrights minus the misogyny and shitting on marginalized groups and minorities. Those of you who subbed will remember it was a great place to chat about mental health, gender roles, societal expectations, toxic masculinity, things like that.
So far, I’ve not been able to find its equivalent in the fediverse. Here on Kbin, there’s m/men, but that basically mirrors the old mensrights sub. It’s gross. I found https://lemmy.ca/c/mensliberation in lemmy.ca, but that community is small (9 members) and inactive. I used Kbin’s magazine/community search and only found those two; I then tried Google, came up with no leads and figured either my Google fu just sucks or their algorithm is getting worse (likely both), so I tried duckduckgo and still found nothing. Pretty much everything I found that is even remotely related is from people looking for the same thing or is a post or comment on Reddit itself.
Is there a place out there like the old menslib? I mean, there must be, right? Help me, fediversers. You’re my only hope.
Edit: I have been banned from m/men. I mean, that’s fine, I wouldn’t fit in there anyway, because I don’t think men are the ones being oppressed.
It’s very difficult to create those spaces without being overrun by the toxic misogyny you’re specifically trying to discuss and avoid. On the other hand, it’s perfectly acceptable to simply discuss those topics in public. Women’s liberation was successful not because women had safe spaces to discuss it, but because it became part of the popular discourse. Damaging gender norms and societal expectations were ever-present, and women were forced to challenge them everywhere.
Simply put, men don’t face the same levels or types of discrimination. That doesn’t invalidate your experiences as a man. It just means you have to be sensitive to the perception of your message.
It also means being your own sheriff when it comes to the toxic side of our gender. We have to call out misogyny when we see it, and reject hateful bigotry that is frighteningly common in these discussions.
Women’s liberation was not a liberation from men, but a liberation from patriarchal society that placed women below men (coincidentally run my self-serving men). Men’s liberation is liberation from the exact same society and the same gender-biased expectations and pressures. They are different expectations, and different severities, but while the enemy is the same, a collection of ideas, the enforcement is entirely different.
For women, it was very often an actual group of men that they were fighting, and the fight was frequently violent. Recognizing that our struggles are analogous but not equivalent, it’s going to be important to stay on topic and not devolve into hate and whining.
But when those topics arise, get involved. Talk about mental health, feelings of isolation, parental rights, social pressures and anxiety, and intersectionality. Don’t go looking for the safe place to have the conversation, make all spaces safe for the conversation to take place. We’re going to have to be pioneers on this one, because the previous generation was fairly inept at such efforts.
I (not OP) agree with everything you said, but I can see why sometimes men dont talk about these things openly. Toxic masculinity is still pervasive, and I think a lot of guys are afraid to talk about their issues, because they don’t want to get painted as being inconsiderate by other people online. For instance, suppose a guy posts about sexism affecting him. It would be really easy for him to be dogpiled by women or feminists. Men, too, can be affected by the systems that opress others, and be upset that such systems exist.
In general, I think men need to talk more about their feelings and experiences. The more we talk, the more we can process negative emotions, and get exposed to veiwpoints other than our own.
This. No safe space in the world will fix the problem. Safe spaces aren’t for addressing concerns, but simply outletting them. Venting without fear. That’s all they’re good for. If you want to affect change you need to challenge the problems where they arise, when they arise. Directly. That’s how you “be a man” today without being toxic: by having the courage it takes to say what ought to be said instead of the cowardice to let bad ideas go unchecked.
Safe spaces are places where you can ask questions and get useful answers without being attacked. When the problem is social norms and social pressure it can be hard for people to learn about the problem or even why it’s a problem because the people fighting for change so often get shouted down or drowned out by the larger society. Too often safe spaces do devolve into places where people can go to listen to each other complain or share justice fantasies but they should be, and the good ones are, welcome centers for new people and counseling/advice centers for members facing a problem they don’t know how to deal with.
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I think to try and be concise about it, we need more online discussion forums to discuss mens issues in a civil and non-toxic way to try and stop people ending up in incel and other manosphere forums. That is an issue that is a massive problem for men and women at the moment. Men are looking online for help and those are the places they find.
I think that what OP is trying to say, that he wants to create an antidote to those spaces online, and that’s a perfectly valid thing to want to do.