Rodent said:
I know I didn't address non-heterosexuals or transgender people but that is its own battlefield and I think this one is already big enough for me. Trying to compare the situations of transwomen and straight men...I just don't think it works, there are even more factors to consider and we all know how complex the situation is already.
Rodent said:
Straight men do not get much comfort from the idea that there are millions of other men out there struggling on the dating market, considering that they also perceive most of them as competition. To say they don't have to deal with being laughed at is just incorrect, I think plenty do deal with that and have been all their life. A single factor can be enough to draw ridicule. I think I would have understood it better if we were talking about the threat of being assaulted, because that's more apparent for trans people. But I think it would've also seemed somewhat hyperbolic, so I'm saying it instead.
^I agree with all of these points.
It's true that straight men are less likely to get assaulted, but it's also true that straight men who are seen as not measuring up to traditional masculine ideals, can and do get laughed at - by women, other men, and society in general. In fact, for years, the same slurs that are used against gay people, were also used to describe straight men who were considered not masculine enough, for whatever reason - not strong/tough, rich, risk-taking, charismatic and popular enough, guys whose interests are seen as silly and childish (which is I think how a lot of "nerdy" guys are seen, unless they're the kind that makes money like programmers and such - and even they have to come up with something make up for not being macho)/don't have the right "masculine" and "adult" interests, shy/reserved or friendly instead of cold, competitive, sarcastic, cynical, contemptuous, "too cool for you", cocky/mocking and mean, and so on - in other words guys who are seen as too "harmless" to be a man, to be exciting, and competitive in a Darwinistic way - although now I feel like "incel" is taking over as the new term to use to replace those, for "loser", "weak/low status/inferior straight man", which strikes me as ironic - changing the term but meaning the same, still makes the person using it, the same monster. That's where leftists lose me, cause it's like, so you still support hierarchical thinking - cool story bro. Maybe it isn't as heavy as discrimination, but it does wear on you when society treats you as a joke or as inherently inferior - like inferiority is just built into who you are at your core. Like you fail at the thing you are supposed to be, and as such, there's no mercy or understanding for you.
Like the inadequacy/incompetence/weakness is an inherent quality to you, baked into your DNA - like everything you do or project out into the world is "multiplied" by your inferiority, and just comes out as less. Everything you do is lesser, because YOU are lesser.
1,000,000 units of hard work * 0.0000000000000001 units of being "right" = I'm too lazy to do math right now, but not much of a result.
Maybe it's all an illusion, but it can be one that's hard to break when you've had a lot of negative reinforcement, and little positive reinforcement.