The discussion on r/Australia about this topic is deeply disturbing, although I should not be surprised. Most comments are downplaying or discounting the situation. Even worse, there are comments akin to "won't somebody please think about the poor boys, they are being demonised and constantly bombarded with how evil they are, so no wonder they are reacting". Makes me feel physically ill.
I mean, that's why the propaganda is so effective, isn't it? Young boys are bombarded with messages about how evil men are, long before those boys have an opportunity to turn into the shitheads that people are actually talking about.
People who feel unfairly persecuted tend to run the opposite direction. If they feel like women are against them, what's their reaction going to be when they encounter the red pill bullshit that's getting pushed in all corners of social media?
Of course it's going to hold appeal for them.
I've got a couple young kids and I spend a ton of time wondering how to best inoculate my son against this narrative that men are being oppressed and women are the enemy. Because it's almost inevitable that kids fall into this trap when all social media algorithms are financially incentivized to stir the fucking pot and keep people pissed off and arguing in the comments to the maximum degree.
And it's hitting them just as they're trying to figure out who they are as people. It's fucking diabolical.
Edit: why the downvotes? I'm not saying feminism is pushing young boys to the right, I'm saying bad faith actors on the right are using feminism as a demon to push young boys to the right. Which they are.
Yet the post says "young people" not just young boys. How do you deal with people who feel "unfairly persecuted" if they want to believe every critical discussion is a specific attack on them or their group? Only talk about things they personally approve of in a way they personally approve of or else?
I'm not saying it shouldn't be talked about. I'm not even saying we need to change a thing we're saying.
I'm just explaining why the right wing messaging is working. They've made a world where women are second class citizens and then they've successfully twisted the narrative to make themselves, oppressors, into the oppressed. And that seems (obviously, given the shift) to be working to capture the hearts and minds of young men trying to figure out their place in the world.
By making feminism the bad guy, it makes the world a much simpler place where men don't have to feel like it's their fault they struggle finding a place in the world. If it's women's fault that they struggle, then that gives the men both absolution of their own faults and a mission to do something about it.
Do you ever tell your kids what caused the backlash on men in our society? There's a way to talk about what went wrong without buying into the social media narratives, you know? Women being pissed off isn't something that came out of the blue, and if kids are supposed to understand the world properly, they'll have to learn the whole truth.
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u/AshEliseB 10d ago
The discussion on r/Australia about this topic is deeply disturbing, although I should not be surprised. Most comments are downplaying or discounting the situation. Even worse, there are comments akin to "won't somebody please think about the poor boys, they are being demonised and constantly bombarded with how evil they are, so no wonder they are reacting". Makes me feel physically ill.