I've been thinking about this for about half an hour, trying to form my words correctly.
I've been in groups of people trying to deal with trauma before, and what I discovered is that venting about trauma does not have a steady target. A lot of people get caught in the crossfire, and the more trauma, the more crossfire. I find that the more direct the target, the less people get caught. Hating men may be the most logical thing to do, especially from your life experience, but I don't think it is the most compassionate thing to do. I think the best way to move forward is to aim directly at the patriarchy and fire.
Based on watching leftist men for a while now, seeing posts from other women, and reading a few libcom posts about sexual abuse in leftist spaces: when you aim directly at the patriarchy, many men think "I'm not part of the patriarchy" and turn brain off. Like everyone here loved dunking on Jordan Peterson for hating plus size models for 2 weeks but if we even suggest that guys here might possibly have issues the levels of buttmad go off the charts immediately.
Like yeah, the patriarchy is the problem, obviously, but everyone is the patriarchy. And when these sorts of reactions happen it feels like people are going "yeah, everyone but me."
It costs $0 to ignore the post and let it drop off the end of the TL. Happened with her last vent post that got 16 upvotes and 0 comments. My posts drop off the front page all the time. The algorithm this sites runs on is designed to put the spotlight on frequently commented posts and people don't maintain an awareness of how their behavior affects that.
I only upvote posts I want to get higher and frequently do shitposty comments on things I want to have more visibility but don't have the expertise or will to go in depth on.
lmfao maybe people should learn to read the other comments in the thread then, sorry that im pissed and wanted people to actually vent with and didnt come up with a focus grouped title that would please the men of this site who say shit like 'nuke america' all the time
guess i'll just say 'nuke men' next time this invariably happens to me :xi-plz:
My issue with this sort of thing is that it's all about spectacle. Girls/fembies/etc. on here who vent are looking for others to commiserate with. Men or people who identify with them see the title and then inflate the spectacle instead of allowing it to be a small vent thread that drops off the TL. Similarly, posts about sexism in non-leftists explode in popularity with dunks of "I'm glad I'm not like that."
But when people try to post constructive helpful threads for working through stuff it gets 6-16 replies and 24 upvotes at best. Men want to complain about the patriarchy in other men but working on themselves is not a focus. Hell, I'm still working on myself and my post history shows that I'm trying to share the results of that with others. I can't be everywhere all at once but I feel like I am at least trying to practice what I preach.
I don't think you're a bad person, Melty. I mean, I guess you wouldn't know cause the one time we interacted I just gave you some advice on a fightstick, lol. I'm fully on board that wrangling users is a pain and a half, been there.
I'm just kind of frustrated with this place on a technical level. It always feels like you're fighting the software in a way I generally don't have to on vanilla. Even just having user-level blocks would be gamechanging. Putting the default view back on subscriptions would help avoid cross-contamination issues and make special interest comms more visible (and whoever put the view-change button behind the cogwheel on mobile, just, ugh). A lot of the aesthetic changes to this place put all the focus on the main TL and make exploring comms a huge pain, so people spend 99% of their energy on the front page of the site rather than clicking the convenient comm links that Lemmy has sitting right in the sidebar, always visible. I think it kind of homogenizes things.
No, I specifically asked for it not to be and honestly got really angry when they did it without asking me my opinion and then following it up with calling me reactionary over something that wasn't reactionary in the slightest
Like yeah, I am distraught, but I'm gonna be distraught for the next couple of days anyways and while I can vent to my bf and hes awesome for it I like to talk to other (anonymous) people with similar experiences
This is true, but being able to air out trauma in an unfiltered way is still important. Victimized people shouldn't be held back by "not all men" or "not all white dudes" or "not all cishets" concerns for civility, they should be allowed to vent their grievances freely when they need to.
I understand that for men, particularly white men, other intersections like neurodivergence, ability and especially class often get overlooked (not to mention that this often coincides with the erasure of trans men and masc-presenting NBs), which leads to struggling white boys being left alone during the time when they're most needing of help, most exploited, most destitute etc. and that's a legitimate problem that we as a leftist movement have to adress.
But adressing these needs cannot come at the expense of tone policing women.
I could also make valid criticisms of @kristina 's post arguing in a gender essentialist way (and i can already say with 100% certainty that this is not what she intended) - as a trans woman, i am very, very aware that toxic masculinity is not tied to sex or gender, but is imposed on people, beginning with the moment they're assigned male, and that this imposition can be fully reversible, that you can completely recover from society trying to make you a man against your will. Likewise, all men are not born men, they are made men, and their toxic traits, whether merely aggravating and annoying or outright dangerous to their fellow human beings and the planet as a whole are not an immutable fate, but the result of the material conditions and the patriarchal superstructure they grow up under. "Men are inherently, essentially bad" is a TERFoid position that is idealist and intellectually indefensible.
That doesn't change the fact that a much, much, much too large number of men have ended up so bad that they are beyond repair - understanding that we are all products of our environment doesn't excuse destructive behavior, it merely explains it. This also doesn't change the fact that women need great leeway in airing their grievances. This should only be curbed when marginalized groups are caught in the crossfire. It also doesn't change that even though men can be marginalized, they are never marginalized for being men. They may be harmed by being men, but that harm comes from being shoehorned into the violently oppressive role our society has for them. It is damage incurred from being enticed to harm others. Healing it starts with confronting the destructive nature of what it means to be a man in our society, and you cannot fully do that if you retreat to the safety of "not all men".
I normally stay out of struggle sessions, but i had hoped that i could add some useful things to the conversation. I'm glad that worked in at least one case.
well you literally did say it. what do you expect me to do? agree that im not acting 'human'?
i do agree that if you vent trauma to other victims, that can lead to a cascade. once i realized the giant pushback i was getting from a vent post that i figured socialists would largely agree with, I tagged this nsfw as a content warning so that other victims didnt have to interact with this garbage heap of male condescension and concern trolling
I've been thinking about this for about half an hour, trying to form my words correctly.
I've been in groups of people trying to deal with trauma before, and what I discovered is that venting about trauma does not have a steady target. A lot of people get caught in the crossfire, and the more trauma, the more crossfire. I find that the more direct the target, the less people get caught. Hating men may be the most logical thing to do, especially from your life experience, but I don't think it is the most compassionate thing to do. I think the best way to move forward is to aim directly at the patriarchy and fire.
Based on watching leftist men for a while now, seeing posts from other women, and reading a few libcom posts about sexual abuse in leftist spaces: when you aim directly at the patriarchy, many men think "I'm not part of the patriarchy" and turn brain off. Like everyone here loved dunking on Jordan Peterson for hating plus size models for 2 weeks but if we even suggest that guys here might possibly have issues the levels of buttmad go off the charts immediately.
Like yeah, the patriarchy is the problem, obviously, but everyone is the patriarchy. And when these sorts of reactions happen it feels like people are going "yeah, everyone but me."
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It costs $0 to ignore the post and let it drop off the end of the TL. Happened with her last vent post that got 16 upvotes and 0 comments. My posts drop off the front page all the time. The algorithm this sites runs on is designed to put the spotlight on frequently commented posts and people don't maintain an awareness of how their behavior affects that.
I only upvote posts I want to get higher and frequently do shitposty comments on things I want to have more visibility but don't have the expertise or will to go in depth on.
lmfao maybe people should learn to read the other comments in the thread then, sorry that im pissed and wanted people to actually vent with and didnt come up with a focus grouped title that would please the men of this site who say shit like 'nuke america' all the time
guess i'll just say 'nuke men' next time this invariably happens to me :xi-plz:
:this:
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My issue with this sort of thing is that it's all about spectacle. Girls/fembies/etc. on here who vent are looking for others to commiserate with. Men or people who identify with them see the title and then inflate the spectacle instead of allowing it to be a small vent thread that drops off the TL. Similarly, posts about sexism in non-leftists explode in popularity with dunks of "I'm glad I'm not like that."
But when people try to post constructive helpful threads for working through stuff it gets 6-16 replies and 24 upvotes at best. Men want to complain about the patriarchy in other men but working on themselves is not a focus. Hell, I'm still working on myself and my post history shows that I'm trying to share the results of that with others. I can't be everywhere all at once but I feel like I am at least trying to practice what I preach.
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I can pass that feedback to the mod team, but I'm not an admin/sitemod (or mod of this comm). I also don't have any negativity towards you
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I don't think you're a bad person, Melty. I mean, I guess you wouldn't know cause the one time we interacted I just gave you some advice on a fightstick, lol. I'm fully on board that wrangling users is a pain and a half, been there.
I'm just kind of frustrated with this place on a technical level. It always feels like you're fighting the software in a way I generally don't have to on vanilla. Even just having user-level blocks would be gamechanging. Putting the default view back on subscriptions would help avoid cross-contamination issues and make special interest comms more visible (and whoever put the view-change button behind the cogwheel on mobile, just, ugh). A lot of the aesthetic changes to this place put all the focus on the main TL and make exploring comms a huge pain, so people spend 99% of their energy on the front page of the site rather than clicking the convenient comm links that Lemmy has sitting right in the sidebar, always visible. I think it kind of homogenizes things.
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No, I specifically asked for it not to be and honestly got really angry when they did it without asking me my opinion and then following it up with calling me reactionary over something that wasn't reactionary in the slightest
Like yeah, I am distraught, but I'm gonna be distraught for the next couple of days anyways and while I can vent to my bf and hes awesome for it I like to talk to other (anonymous) people with similar experiences
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i literally typed numerous nuanced comments after all the men got angry :think-mark:
which is honestly impressive since ive been ptsd flair up'd for like 3 days straight now cause of the grocery store thing
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because otherwise youre harassing someone for no fucking reason lmfao
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so calling a victim not human or 'lesser than human', cool stuff. really getting a lot of cool vibes from this 'socialist' site today
That's not what I'm trying to say :kitty-cri: . I'm just trying to say that airing out trauma can get people caught in the crossfire.
This is true, but being able to air out trauma in an unfiltered way is still important. Victimized people shouldn't be held back by "not all men" or "not all white dudes" or "not all cishets" concerns for civility, they should be allowed to vent their grievances freely when they need to.
I understand that for men, particularly white men, other intersections like neurodivergence, ability and especially class often get overlooked (not to mention that this often coincides with the erasure of trans men and masc-presenting NBs), which leads to struggling white boys being left alone during the time when they're most needing of help, most exploited, most destitute etc. and that's a legitimate problem that we as a leftist movement have to adress.
But adressing these needs cannot come at the expense of tone policing women.
I could also make valid criticisms of @kristina 's post arguing in a gender essentialist way (and i can already say with 100% certainty that this is not what she intended) - as a trans woman, i am very, very aware that toxic masculinity is not tied to sex or gender, but is imposed on people, beginning with the moment they're assigned male, and that this imposition can be fully reversible, that you can completely recover from society trying to make you a man against your will. Likewise, all men are not born men, they are made men, and their toxic traits, whether merely aggravating and annoying or outright dangerous to their fellow human beings and the planet as a whole are not an immutable fate, but the result of the material conditions and the patriarchal superstructure they grow up under. "Men are inherently, essentially bad" is a TERFoid position that is idealist and intellectually indefensible.
That doesn't change the fact that a much, much, much too large number of men have ended up so bad that they are beyond repair - understanding that we are all products of our environment doesn't excuse destructive behavior, it merely explains it. This also doesn't change the fact that women need great leeway in airing their grievances. This should only be curbed when marginalized groups are caught in the crossfire. It also doesn't change that even though men can be marginalized, they are never marginalized for being men. They may be harmed by being men, but that harm comes from being shoehorned into the violently oppressive role our society has for them. It is damage incurred from being enticed to harm others. Healing it starts with confronting the destructive nature of what it means to be a man in our society, and you cannot fully do that if you retreat to the safety of "not all men".
Excellent comment. You've given me something to think about.
I normally stay out of struggle sessions, but i had hoped that i could add some useful things to the conversation. I'm glad that worked in at least one case.
Thank you :cat-trans:
Yayyyyy :meow-hug: I try to take the "struggle" out of these sessions as much as possible and actually learn something instead.
:this:
well you literally did say it. what do you expect me to do? agree that im not acting 'human'?
i do agree that if you vent trauma to other victims, that can lead to a cascade. once i realized the giant pushback i was getting from a vent post that i figured socialists would largely agree with, I tagged this nsfw as a content warning so that other victims didnt have to interact with this garbage heap of male condescension and concern trolling
I changed it to compassionate, I hope that's a little bit better.
slightly better, but youre still a guy mansplaining what the proper response to patriarchal abuse is :shrug-outta-hecks:
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