Boys are Stupid…?
When digging through the digital world about the misandry I found about a T-shirt that said “Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them!” that had raised huge controversy somewhere in America. First it seemed rather insignificant, because I remember my self telling people that boys are stupid in certain age very young age. Yet throwing stones at them would never even occurred to me.
The boys are stupid maybe innocent, but adding the ending somehow makes the t-shirt a hate-shirt. Yet it is true that t’s that have similar messages about women and girls are probably more widespread and probably only slightly less controversial. And does anybody pay any attention on them? Not at least in this scale.
I don’t support those t-shirts and I think it was unfeeling to make them, but why are people making so much noise, because it is nothing that is not happening in much larger scale for women and girls every where. The misogyny is so much more widespread that for example the spellchecker does not even know the word misandry or misandrist. (And I am happy that is not more common than it is, but so should also misogyny be.)
It did not also take much work to find t-shirt like this - just had to add “sexist t-shirt” in Google.
“I thought that shirt was very offensive, and I’m sure people who made that shirt thought it was cute,” District Attorney Evert Fowle said: “But when you prosecute 728 domestic violence cases a year, it’s not cute.”
There was discussion about this t-shirt and it’s message was considered insignificant. The reason given was that it was cartoon kind of violence, while the other was not? And the world is fully of similar and worst sexist t’s.
So why make a fuss only about the single one that reverses the roles?
Filed under: Children, Thoughts, men, women | Tagged: calling names, cartoon violence, discrimination, domestic violence, funny t-shirts, misandry, misogyny, sexism, t-shirts
There are numerous feminist sites that address issues related to women and girls, very few serious “men’s rights” groups that aren’t “over the top.”
One of the problems is that we line up in camps (men’s rights, women’s rights) when the issues are really the same — gender stereotyping and treating people unfairly because of their gender. From your perspective you see the woman’s point of view and it’s up to you to point that out. The objectification of women is a major problem in this cournty, and most women seem to promote it. via the fashion industry, etc. On the men’s side, a lot of men (and women) who work in family law will tell you quite candidly that the system is heavily biased against men — fathers being torn from the children and forced to pay several times what the child needs, and the threat of jail time if he doesn’t.
But it’s up to ALL of us, to speak out against all instances of gender stereotyping, and treating people unfairly because of their gender.
It is also major problem in my country that mothers seem to be getting custodial rights far too easily and there have been several cases, where this has led to serious tragedies in the childrens life. I agree that this way most societies are biased. Also childrens right to get to know their father is not well enough guardeed by the system. I my self am strongly against the idea that you only need woman to bring up well-balanced kids. Fathers involvement is as important and for the girls too.
My point here was only to say that if women protest against sexist t-shirts or other sexist jokes that is seen as being too serious - and in the case of the discussion I mentioned above hysterical or even paranoid - but in the case when somebody makes something similar of the male sex, there are huge amount of people on the barricades making case about it and it is taken death serious. It gives a message that treating women badly is OK, while treating men is not, When it should be no-no for both. They should have protested against the whole phenomenon of the insulting t’s not just the only one that was against male sex.
And it is still the case that women are much more likely to be victims of serious home violence than men are. It is not necessary due to men being more violent just that men are stronger. It is not so easy to seriously hurt person that is stronger than you, if you don’t intend to kill them. And even cases of the intentional killings made inside the family the men are leading, at least in my country. Yet I am not expert in this in US. Anyway women need to be very careful when picking the partner. It is not so easy to identify good men from bad apples.
I want to be clear here that I don’t think men are born more violent than women, just that our (western) culture promotes male violence yet discrases female violence widely (the later which is not such a bad thing). It has long been a custom that men have had right to treat their women as they please. This case of t-shirts shows the bias very well. It is just funny and even cute to present male mistreating female in cartoon way, while men being mistreated is not funny at all any more. And in many families boys still grow up exposed to idea that women are inferior to men and should be treated that way. This does not mean that majority of men would be brought up this way only that it is still accepted way to bring up your kids.