Teachers describe a deterioration in behaviour and attitudes that has proved to be fertile terrain for misogynistic influencers

“As soon as I mention feminism, you can feel the shift in the room; they’re shuffling in their seats.” Mike Nicholson holds workshops with teenage boys about the challenges of impending manhood. Standing up for the sisterhood, it seems, is the last thing on their minds.

When Nicholson says he is a feminist himself, “I can see them look at me, like, ‘I used to like you.’”

Once Nicholson, whose programme is called Progressive Masculinity, unpacks the fact that feminism means equal rights and opportunities for women, many of the boys with whom he works are won over.

“A lot of it is bred from misunderstanding and how the word is smeared,” he says.

But he is battling against what he calls a “dominance-based model” of masculinity. “These old-fashioned, regressive ideas are having a renaissance, through your masculinity influencers – your grifters, like Andrew Tate.”

  • Flying Squid
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    210 months ago

    As I have already said at least twice now, she has more friends now than she did when she was in public school. She has more self-esteem now that she is no longer in public school. She is asking to go to things like events at the teen room at the library and make friends when she wasn’t even willing to join afterschool clubs about things that interested her.

    Maybe read some of my other comments? I go into great detail about this.

    You do not know my daughter. You do not know her situation. You do not know what you are talking about. I can see you’re trying to castigate me for being an abusive parent, so just come out and say it.

      • Flying Squid
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        110 months ago

        Yeah, maybe it’s something about someone implying I’m abusing my child when I am literally stopping her from committing suicide.

        • @dezmd
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          110 months ago

          Yeah, maybe stop broadcasting your daughter’s personal life publicly on an open federated system on the internet then?

          • Flying Squid
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            10 months ago

            Ah, I see, so it’s my fault I’m being accused of child abuse, much like it’s my child’s fault that she was being bullied. Fascinating things I’m learning here.

            • @dezmd
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              10 months ago

              No, but you do kinda seem to angle more into playing victim when convenient than learning.

              My comment’s intent was to help you see how ridiculously red tinted and narrow your vision has become to the point of using your child’s mental health issues as a gotcha moment to feel like you’ve won an unimportant argument with a random stranger on the internet.

              Take a step back and just cogitate on that for a few minutes. This isn’t reddit, after all.

              Have a nice day, and give that kid a hug to show her you love her.

        • @[email protected]
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          010 months ago

          If it’s such a touchy subject for you then why did you post about it to begin with. Log out bro.

          • Flying Squid
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            -110 months ago

            Putting my daughter in online school is not a touchy subject. I’m glad I did it. So is she.

            Someone suggesting I’m abusing her is a touchy subject. Can you really not understand why I might possibly take offense at that when I already told you I was dealing with a suicidal child?

            Do you have any children? Do they have mental health issues? If so, what have you done about it? If not, who the fuck are you to judge me?

              • Flying Squid
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                110 months ago

                And unlike you, I don’t judge you for that. In fact, I’m glad you don’t have children if you don’t want any.

                How about this- if you’re so convinced that I am abusing my daughter, how about I PM you my address and phone number and you can call CPS on me. Do remember that making a false call to CPS would probably put you in legal jeopardy, but you are convinced about it, so that shouldn’t be a problem.

                • @[email protected]
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                  110 months ago

                  I don’t understand why you think I think you’re abusing your daughter lol. All I said is that home schooled people I know are socially incompatible. And they suffer for it. That’s just my own anecdote and if you don’t like it I’m sorry.

                  • Flying Squid
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                    -110 months ago

                    Me: “Why the fuck would I reconsider my decision to help stop her from being suicidal?”

                    You: “Still not developing real social skills in online classes. Social skills is by far the most important thing kids learn during their time in school”

                    If I am not allowing her to do “by far the most important thing kids learn during their time in school,” I’m abusing her. That would fit the definition of abuse, not allowing them to learn the most important thing they learn in school. It is neglectful and neglect is a form of child abuse.

                    I’m just going to paste these from another comment that I made since you aren’t going to bother reading it in the thread. You probably won’t bother reading it here either, but I’ll paste it anyway and then if you read it, you can decide whether or not I’m a bad father who is doing the wrong thing for his child:

                    my daughter was so severely bullied that she actually had developed anxiety to the point that she had trouble going to a lunch party at the house of an old high school friend of mine with about 20 people in it. She was starting to get suicidal. She broke down one day and told us she literally could not go to school one more day because she was so bullied that even the bullied kids bullied her.

                    she’s so mentally healthy now that she was able to tell some girls from her old school that were harassing her at the roller skating rink to fuck off. She has never had that much self-esteem. She’s also never had as many friends as she has now.

                    So somehow, according to you, I am not allowing her to do the most important thing in school, that thing being socialization, despite the fact that she was too bullied to be able to socialize properly in school and the fact that she has far more friends now than she ever had in her 6 1/2 years in public school. Which makes me an abusive father.