I think the fact that in general women are considered to have more mental health issues and men committing suicide way more often shows that this headline is true.
This is not something I think about much (fortunately), but what is the point in attempting suicide by means that are not likely to work? How do we measure "true attempts" vs "cries for help." I guess ultimately they are very close together... but all the same it seems harder to attempt and not succeed.
The person may not definitively want to die, but may wake up one day and not care either way, so attempting is a roll of the dice.
It also may be down to what was available to them at the time. There’s a famous case study where a lot of women in the UK were dying by putting their heads in the oven and gassing themselves in the 1950s. The UK government changed the formulation of gas that was being piped to homes and the suicides stopped. If those women really were dead-set on suicide, they would have just chosen a different method.
What people who’ve never had extreme depression might not realize is that in those low moments it feels like you will always feel this way and it will never ever change. Then you wait an hour or so and the feeling passes. So a person may not feel suicidal 24 hours a day, only at specific moments. But in those low moments, the chances of suicide dramatically increase and as the UK case shows, accessibility to quick suicide methods makes a big difference.
Yeah, because women tend to seek more clinical assistance than men do so of course the attempt % would be higher for them as well, because how are you even gonna know that number for men if they aren't even getting recorded.. the suicide numbers are the only actual real recordable evidence unfortunately.
To ignore the terrible things going through the minds of people trying¹ and the effects attempts, especially successful ones, can have on others, for a moment²… I wonder if anyone has looked deeper into those two stats to, see if the attempt rate is actually the same but the lower success rate means that the average women in that sort of crisis position attempts more times.
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[1] Speaking as one who did some decades ago, as irritating as life is right now I'm glad I bucked the trend of any “men have a higher 'success' rate” stat.
[2] Sometimes my nerd side takes control and empathy takes a back seat.
Commonly proposed reasons I've seen mostly involve conscientiousness around impact on their body and setting. For the most stereotypical two methods: a gunshot to the head leaves a mess and means you're going to need a closed casket, while the mess from a slit wrist in a bathtub can be washed down the drain, and easily hidden while still having an open casket. But it's harder to "succeed" with a slit wrist in a bathtub, and it takes longer, giving more time to be found or to change your mind.
This is a common observation, but it only addresses part of the gap:
In the US, more men commit suicide by every broad method -- except poisoning, which is similar for both men and women.
Firearm deaths are the leading suicide method for both, and more men commit suicide even when excluding firearm deaths. And even when excluding men's firearm deaths and including women's.
Men and women have different mental health crisis spirals.
It's like the difference between killing yourself drunk crashing your car into a pole vs winding up in a wheelchair because you crashed into everything of value on the street before hitting the same pole slower.
There's too many men in this world, a surplus. Some percent of men will be the winners (not a large percent) and the rest will be losers who never reproduce and have unhappy lives doing hard work with little reward.
In the past we had large wars, harsh labor, that killed off men, but not today. There's roughly 5% males born than females. India and China have aborted 10s of millions of female babies. In the Western world, massive numbers of men (from low to high skilled) have move there. So here we are, men everywhere, roaming around grocery stores trying to talk to women, 70 to 80% of the population on dating apps are males, bars are filled with men. It's not a good time to be a low status man.
The vast majority of heterosexual men who are unsuccessful romantically has nothing to do with their "status." A bit of self-confidence and the ability to listen to and empathize with women is literally all it takes. Women don't want to date chuds, shocker.
Also, dating apps are pointless. Go volunteer for a community organization or join a pickleball league. Don't force it.
> Expressed another way, that would mean that 10% of all males surviving to adulthood would perish in combat.
> We’ll get back around to fertility rates later in the series but for how if we assume each woman in this society is having on average five live childbirths, a 2% chance of death at each stage adds up pretty quickly – a woman who gave birth five times with a 2% chance of dying each time has a total chance of dying at one stage or another of 9.607%, which as you will note is not far off from the chance of dying in a battle
Does it imply also fewer men getting diagnosed? I presume it does.
I remember reading something about mental health in Iceland being much more even between men and women due to less perceived stigma and more equality, leading to men seeking help.
You might be interested in operationalization. Every measurement is also an operationalization - even things like temperature, speed, and weight.
Eliding or obscuring the act of operationalization leads to reification - treating concepts like real tangible things. I wish reification was taken as seriously as our taboo of anthropomorphization. It happens way more, and sneakily smuggles in human values into the sciences. In some ways it's unavoidable, but being opaque about it and doing it without knowing is a sin.
> The findings will now help guide the development of Canada's first Federal Men and Boys' Health and Well-being Strategy, expected to be released in early 2027.
It would not surprise me to see protesting over this, as has been similarly done in the past. The person who organized a men's-support-group some years back in Canada, if I remember right, ended up committing suicide after it was forced to be shut down by protestors.
Wikipedia says nothing about protests, only indicates neglect as the driver for suicide. Guess its drummed up internet drama taken at face value again.
The birds they sing,
At break of day.
Start again I heard them say.
Dwell not on what has passed away,
Or what is yet to ring,
Forget your perfect offering,
There's a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in.
National health reports cannot fix deep-seated cultural issues. I'm sure they'll come out with a nice report on strategies to improve men's wellbeing that won't make a lick of difference unless the world at large starts to shift.
Can you expand on this? It seems to me that deep seated cultural issues are the sort of thing that therapy is supposed to address. However, I may be looking at this from the wrong angle.
The people who see issues with themselves get therapy. The ones that see no issues with themselves don't.
That is what "deep-seated cultural issues" means. Some subset of the population aren't seeing a problem with their own behavior. They see nothing that needs addressing. The rest have to learn how to put up with or avoid them.
Government reports like this sometimes motivate additional studies and think pieces, which in turn creates a framing that may be used later when society decides it's truly ready for change.
So no, they can't change the world, but sometimes they can plant a seed.
This all is just pure virtue signaling and the only beneficiary will be some NGO who gets some money and produces a report and a slide deck which only they will read. It's like the Soviet joke of "we had a 4 hour meeting about improving production in communism in the factory today and after this we will work not better and not worse than before". Until that suffering actually causes measurable damage that affects something on a grand scale that the country needs, nothing really will happen.
Nationwide change doesn't happen overnight. It involves years of unglamorous work by hundreds or even thousands people you and I don't even know about.
The report gives no indication its a male problem. It’s just a survey targeting men. Maybe its a general mental health problem. We know mental health issues in women have increased over the same time period.
Carney will still milk it as a way to get votes. There will be 3+ press conferences with leadership, and they will try to talk about it in ways that won't alienate the "remember École Polytechnique" crowd.
ultimately they will do nothing and pass more bills allowing big businesses to do whatever tf they want
Yet.. they say a man's worth is "not" the value they put in the bank account.
2) What's deadly about this space is that surveys can be toxic.
Too often, it's researchers looking to slowly understand things, have people open themselves up, then leave them like that, for little to no progress in 5-10 years.
That kind of system needs supply, no?
3) I have heard from some men that sometimes there can be things that only other men understand. That can be similar to women's health issues can be understood differently, or men can feel more comfortable with other men.
4) It's important for authors to try and be aware of their own unconscious biases. Much like medicine is horribly behind at understanding women's health (for example, women hearts are not the same as men's), it means the inverse can be true too, beginning with asking men.
> 1) "Poor men's health carries economic costs"
>
> Yet.. they say a man's worth is "not" the value they put in the bank account.
That's not what is meant by "economic cost". Helping young men feel better early long term is obviously better and cheaper for society than letting them grow up and live a whole life where they suffer and hurt themselves or others.
Nothing about this is surprising or unknown. We know how to prevent and treat despair-related lives. It's a political choice that most of the world has insufficient or even broken (mental) healthcare. We could choose to vote differently, but we don't.
FWIW, in these sorts of situations I try to link the place where I found the news. If some tiny local news website brought something to my attention that the bigger players don't, then I think they deserve to be rewarded with the add revenue if people follow my link.
Like those social media videos about how therapists won't tell you, because they'll lose their business, that the real way to feel better is to just go to Italy. :)
Literally nothing stopping men from being confident, strong providers if they want to be. Most do not because that is hard and videogames and porn is easy.
That’s a very good example of how problems of men vs women are approached. Women typically get support (which is great! We should continue that) and men are typically blamed for being weak. It’s same pattern for many things, like mental health (like here), general health („it’s not our fault that men don’t take care of themselves”) to men being less educated than women.
There would first need to be a fundamental change in the way boys are socialised, shifting them more towards how girls are socialised. Which I don't see happening any time soon. You can't help people that don't want to be helped and a significant portion of men's brains are in a permanent state of rejecting all help offered to them.
"Traditional Masculinity" is just in general maladaptive in the current age.
I got downvoted earlier today for saying that there's nobody out there that would argue that men and women are exactly the same, except for a little bit of environmental nudging.
That appears to be exactly what you're arguing here: All we need to do is socialize boys more like we socialize girls, and then the men they become will be happier in our society. Is that your position?
If so, can you say a little bit more about what you mean or what you envision that socialization would look like for boys?
"Literally nothing" stopping the perfectly spherical massless man in a social, environmental, cultural and economic vacuum from self-actualising into an ubermensch. Go gett'm, Tyger - The Stars, Your Destination!
Women are successful because they became more like men, to catch up men now need to become more like women, which they will not do because that would be gay.
Women seem to have this special blind spot for men. It's all "empathy this" and "acceptance that," until it's a man. When they see a weak man, what they feel is disgust. And in their disgust, they try to find reasons to invalidate the suffering. He brought it on himself, or he's choosing to suffer because he refuses to open up, or women are suffering worse, etc.
I think this is an intuitive reaction. It's like being grossed out by dog poop on the ground. You feel the disgust first, and although an evolutionary psychology explanation for that disgust may be true (eg, "you have evolved disgust for dog poop to prevent illness and infection) intellectualizing it further would be totally superfluous. People experience the proximate cause for these sort of evolved behaviors, even when they intellectually know better. If you think you're above this sort of reaction, try "choosing" to be attracted to an 80 year old woman.
There are subcultures in which men showing vulnerability are considered bad. But in those subcultures, men are just as mean to other men as women are. And women embracing this are usually not very "empathy this" and "acceptance that" towards anybody.
There is definitely a part of feminist culture is openly aggressive toward men in general while being "empathy this" towards women. But they are usually way more aggressive towards cocky men than weak men.
It starts in college, having lived through those first couple sentences verbatim. There is a group / pack mentality around this behavior as well, but I'm not really educated on psychology enough to describe it further.
None of us chose to be born in our bodies or as humans (as opposed to aliens or AIs or whatever). Our brains have to make the most of the circumstances given to us, and we spend our entire lives trying to do this.
Jealousy, the desire to spite others, spread rumors, speak negative or ill, feel self-pity - these are further evolutionary games we play to climb the fitness landscape and escape local minima.
The rewards of this life are finite and your biology will always want more. Even if you're the richest and most handsome person, the hedonic treadmill will keep you running. However high the highs are, they're finite and ephemeral. Everyone living on this earth with you today will be dead in ~80ish years. And that's the blink of an eye. None of their riches or victories or accolades will go with them anywhere.
Look up, not down. Build towards a better tomorrow. Don't worry about other people. Be the best you can be.
I have had similar experience in my personal life in multiple relationships, including my wife. I've learned to never complain about anything in front of women and just white knuckle whatever difficulties I get at any given moment. This approach helped me secure more respect and better overall response from women. Showing weakness triggers the disgust response that you mentioned. It could be masked under pity, but you lose respect quickly. Working through my issues with male friends is more productive for me.
The only woman who actually cares for me has been my mother.
That is the precise mechanism how this works: when you see a weak man, first apply a label, then express disgust against the label.
When challenged, make it a discussion about the label, why the label actually deserves the hate. (Not about why the weak man automatically deserves the label.)
- Currently, the dominant ideology is that there is a victim hierarchy, and if you're in the wrong group (ie, you're privileged) then your opinions and needs don't matter. Moving away from this sort of identitarianism would one important step.
- I think it's important to try to understand why male socialization has fallen apart. (statistically, yes, I'm sure a lot of you still socialize) It's clearly a gendered effect, and I'm genuinely not sure what a reasonable explanation would be. (your comment, men supporting men would play nicely here, although I'm not sure how we make that happen.)
A good start would be enforcing truly gender neutral laws by governments all over the world. I personally know at least a dozen men who have been harassed by biased laws and judges when it comes to divorce. These are good men, who worked really hard and took care of their wives very well, only to get either cheated on or scammed for money and lost everything. 2 of them are even almost homeless now. Most of them have aged so poorly after just 2 years into the divorce. Their wives aren't even homemakers who sacrificed anything who are getting paid, mostly working women who have good lawyers who just abuse the laws to steal wealth. Until this system is fixed, men's mental health will always be down the toilet.
What I really learned from these men is never sign a contract where the other party is incentivized to break it.
"The very limited set of protections under the current law can leave cohabitants facing significant financial difficulties when relationships end, which disproportionately affects vulnerable groups such as women, and children..."
All else aside for a second... yes? Women are both physically and economically (primarily when they are stay at home moms) vulnerable. No, that doesn't mean I'm saying that no men are vulnerable at all but averaged out to a population it's clear.
Is this actually borne out by the data? According to a quick Google search, men make up 73% of Canadian homicide victims and 66% of the homeless population.
Pro-tip (for both unmarried men and women): You can sign a pre-nup even if you never have any nuptials. It turns out that people can choose to enter into a contract with each other at any time. There are plenty of reasons why people in a relationship may choose not to get legally married, but that does not mean you have to leave yourself at the mercy of the defaults in the law, which may or may not make sense for you.
This is especially important if there are children involved in your situation.
Cool. You think that explains the findings in TFA related to adolescent boys?
From a better write up of this same story:
Young men aged 15 to 24 show concerning trends in their self-rated mental health and rates of mental illness. For instance, between 2012 and 2022:
the percentage who reported "very good" or "excellent" mental health fell from 70% to 52%
the percentage who experienced:
mood disorders increased from11% to 16%
generalized anxiety disorder increased from 4% to 10%
Everyone hates on Sharia law but it solves the problem cleanly by requiring the man to agree on a fixed sum deposit (Mahr) that the wife will get on divorce (with some paid up front and some potentially deferred to divorce time), rather than requiring him to give up half the property he earned while married regardless of how much his wife did or didn't contribute to it.
Sharia law solves the problem cleanly by requiring the man to agree on a fixed sum deposit (Mahr) in the divorce contract that the wife will get on divorce (with some paid up front and some potentially deferred to divorce time), rather than agreeing to an arbitrary large liability. For people who don't like that idea, consider that if current western divorce laws aren't reformed, and marriage and birth rates continue to dwindle, it'll eventually become the law of your land purely by demographics, as natural selection favors cultures that encourage higher birthrates.
I have thought of that. Regardless, there is a pretty obvious discrepancy of supply/demand in heterosexual relationships, which only becomes more evident through my relations with women.
We're all here arguing the "hender pay gap", yet women have the single most amazing gift granted to them by the universe that men will never have. What I'd give to be the one to have given birth to my own children.
Distinction is always going to be less effective than universally agreed declaration. We can declare: all human beings have equal rights.
Pandora's box is the universality aspect, which must be manifest by those agreeing to declare the nature of ones rights in respect to others rights, both for oneself and for others. This is the reason a distinction-based legal position is poor policy.
We cannot distinguish between a man and a woman if we are agreeing to the universality of their equal human rights.
The we part is the difficult part, apropos pandora's boxes. But ultimately, universality is very empowering to the individual.
If a man and a woman are both drunk and have sex, the man is declared the rapist. (This is said as an example of where the laws, as applied, are not gender neutral)
Yeah, not all states actualize human rights, whether they are party to the declaration or not, as well as others. I don't need to focus on any particular state - I've seen many of them - and understand that there are definitely shifting loads in the worlds cultural fabric.
There is a very big spectrum of actual rights being manifest in a greater or lesser degree in the world - the free, free world - but on the other hand, it results in freedom, not free food.
Folks still have to find a way to work together to feed each other, on top of those rights. Irrespective of gender or role or duty, one must participate in the effort of subsistence in order to express ones own rights, in the first place, comfortably.
Two people having sex with each other should probably just form a contract before they do it, and then both have 50/50 responsibility from that point forward - the fact that this is 'not normal' is a cultural thing, and perhaps to a greater or lesser degree current laws are designed to protect the mouths to feed, for years to come, which may result from that original act of interaction...
It'd be best if we raised generations to understand the responsibilities of sex such that they don't have it until they're ready - but this ideal reality is of course, unrealistic in the modern world.
Until then, there needs to be better help for new parents, and for anyone whose lives are impacted by an act of sex. Since the state profits from the registration of citizens born within its confines, the state has a 'duty' to its citizens.
The extent to which the state apparatus respects the human rights of its growing (and dying) population, depicts the reality of unfair gender rights. On what is the lien rate balanced - military-aged men, or stay-at-home moms?
the desired outcome seems to be that men and women are the same in situations where being a man is beneficial. In situations where being a woman is beneficial that goes away.
I don’t even get how I am supposed to hold my partner to the same standards I would hold a close male friend/family member. If I knew a dude who freaked out and yelled/sobbed several times a month over something inane like where to get dinner I would drop them immediately. I have found just using the old adage “happy wife happy life” is most effective, but isn’t that inherently disrespectful? Like “I can’t reason with this person but if I upset them it’s gonna go poorly for me so I better let them have their way!”. The only way my relationship survives is if I have a bit of internalized misogyny and hold her to a different standard than I do myself or another man.
> have never once seen someone pushing to correct that imbalance.
Conservative men rights advocates find such proposition insulting to men. It is not a manly men job.
Men in those positions are mocked by supposedly pro-male groups
> If I knew a dude who freaked out and yelled/sobbed several times a month over something inane like where to get dinner I would drop them immediately.
Why are you dating someone like that? Genuine question. I dont know ANY woman that cries that often. Not a single one.
The Swedish government has made several studies on why gender segregated professions stay segregated, for both men and women, and their findings have been very similar for both genders. There are indeed some incidents of in-group peer pressure to gender conform. However the biggest factor for both women and men is not negative reinforcement, but rather a lack of positive reinforcement. Women who work in STEM, or men who becomes teachers, has a significant smaller support network for their chosen careers compared to the majority. This in turn provide a poor insulation against setbacks and significant increase the risk of leaving the chosen path. The leaky pipe analogy has thus less to do with people being bullied out of their chosen professions, even if that idea has latched on to the public mind.
I'm not sure if it's about same or universal, someone else already said it's about universal human rights that all humans must agree to demonstrate a practice of care with and towards each other.
Do you have any examples of laws (real or imaginary) that couldn't just be thought out better and anchor their reasoning more accurately and neutrally? Falling back to using gender often just feels like a quick hack.
Falling back to gender (or race, or whatever protected class you’d like to consider) is far less about rote equality or equity than it is about correcting earlier imbalances of power/access.
People chafe against things like DEI as arbitrary favoritism completely failing to note that yes, this policy is meant to promote equality, not to represent it. In the case of promoting female stem workers you might say it’s a policy designed to give women equal-ish access to the job market by way of giving them preferential treatment in hiring, to counteract biases of men favoring men during that process.
The ideal outcome of any policy like this is that once the systemic inequity is resolved, the policy can be retired.
Assuming all humans and populations of humans are interchangeable parts. We are not. Not so much "race" - which is a fairly idiotic concept as it's applied -- but hereditarianism is very much a real thing. IQ equates with life outcomes and is highly heritable. How people migrate (or are forced to migrate) can help you understand a population and population differences. Nigerians who immigrate to the U.S. now do far better than populations that were brought over during chattel slavery. Likely those who were captured by their neighbors and sold to European slavers had to lose battles of some variety. Selection effect. There are also documented differences between native populations in regions. Things like the harsh winter hypothesis pose that harsher environments lead to higher IQs. Otherwise, why doesn't every country look like Japan? If we don't diagnose the real problems societal interventions will fail to help anyone in a lasting/meaningful way.
The "harsh winter hypothesis" is self-evidently risible. You have to ignore huge chunks of human history, during which the hot-weather civilizations did stuff like invent algebra while the cold-weather civilizations were barely worthy of the label "civilized", in order to take it seriously.
Right, that's my point. The hypothesis is specific to cold climates; it's a just-so story about why southern "races" are less intelligent, and it falls apart instantly on first inspection, unless you think evolution just started to happen 200 years ago.
Intelligence and progress are not the same thing. You claimed alegbra was invented in a hot weather place, which is simply not true. To paraphrase Lee Kuan Yew, if not for air conditioning, Singapore would still be a backwater.
No, I said that there are long stretches of history where hot-weather civilizations outcompeted cold-weather civilizations, and that implied (correctly) that algebra was not the product of adaptations to harsh winters, which is what the cold winter hypothesis argues (generally, about selection for intelligence).
That 1500 BC Babylon was neither a cold-weather clime nor an arid clime is evidence against the cold winter hypothesis.
You changed your statement from "during which the hot-weather civilizations did stuff like invent algebra" to "there are long stretches of history where hot-weather civilizations outcompeted cold-weather civilizations". I am only contesting the original statement.
That sounds good in theory, but all too often people create discriminatory practices to counteract alleged biases that don't actually exist.
For instance, empirical evidence finds that gender bias in tech hiring favors women over men [1]. So DEI ends up exacerbating the bias, not counteracting it.
This is a place where gender neutral language would benefit the outcomes. The application of preferential treatment in hiring could be done based on the imbalance between minority and majority for any profession which are not deemed gender equal. That way it would counteract biases of the majority gender, in any given industry, that is favoring their own gender during the hiring process. The systemic inequity that leads to gender segregation could then be resolved.
DEI does not need to be selective favoritism. It could just be a policy to promote equality. It also happens that the government is the employer, and customer, of professions that has the highest grade of gender inequality (for both men and women).
> DEI does not need to be selective favoritism. It could just be a policy to promote equality.
I'm curious if you could describe a DEI policy that's flawed in this way and then go on to explain how you would implement it in such a way where it wouldn't be subject to the same criticism.
most DEI policy pushes for a narrative saying their work is not done until their is equal _outcomes_ not just equal opportunity. And I know that it will never end because the more freedom we give the genders the more exacerbated their expressions become (in short, and on average, men orienting to objects and women orienting towards people).
> most DEI policy pushes for a narrative saying their work is not done until their is equal _outcomes_ not just equal opportunity.
This is just flat wrong. Both because the word narrative makes no sense in the way you've used it in this sentence, and because equality of outcome is specifically not what is being targeted by these policies.
I'm inclined to think you've imbibed a lot of propaganda on this subject as the use of the word "narrative" in this incorrect fashion is as strong an indicator of that as the emdash is of copying stuff from ChatGPT.
>> I'm calling it out here because it's a typical technocratic bad-faith argument that I'm personally tired of hearing.
I’m guessing you don’t have a uterus, am I right? A man doesn’t end up pregnant if the condom breaks. So don’t lecture us about your “bad faith arguments” when you’re making one.
Sure, biology is not sex-blind. But the law can still be written to favor a parent that's a primary caregiver, regardless of whether that parent is male or female.
Trying to interpret your comment in the best way possible, I'd say that my viewpoint is that it matters more how society treats a pregnant woman and the man that impregnated her, rather than the fact that the woman got pregnant and the man didn't.
It's probably best for laws to be dynamic to how cultural norms evolve regarding impregnation, which means unfortunately for hyperrational technocrats, it's best to pay attention to outcomes rather than focus on things like "biological differences between man and woman". An unwed woman getting pregnant in 1940 USA is treated culturally much differently than an unwed woman getting pregnant in 2026 USA, for example.
A man still ends up legally and morally responsible for the child.
Certainly women have have nine months of hard work men spared. On the other hand it is not a very big par of a lifetime. A man can end up with more work and responsibility long term.
My ex carried our kids for 9 months. I did a lot to support her but I agree that does not compare with the constant physical impact of pregnancy.
Once they were born we were pretty much equal parents bar breastfeeding/expressing. As they got older I became the primary parent because she was just not good with older kids. By the time each was seven or eight I was the primary parent. By the time they were eight or nine I was home educating them I has also the sole earner. When the younger one was a teenager I divorced and became a single parent. You really think 9 months of pregnancy outweighs all that?
What you're revealing is an underlying difference in constitution of Lib/Cons (to apply labels a bit grossly), in that L is usually concerned with enforcing outcomes despite the values it violates and R is usually concerned with enforcing values/rulesets despite the outcomes it produces.
Is "right" defined by the nature of existence or just by the ends? Some would say an outcome of hunger is unacceptable, some would say there are plenty of "wrong" (try to not make that moral meaning) behaviors which should result in hunger. (Such as refusing to work or trade value for other people's property ie food)
While this line of thinking seems to match, there is a direct competing theory. Both sides focus is on benefiting their voting demographics, one using arguments based on enforcing outcomes and the other values/rulesets.
For example, there was an initiative in Sweden to improve diversity in the student body by giving minority demographics free bonus points during application. For any given minority the outcome would be a small but meaningful advantage compared to the majority so that over time the balance would improve and become closer to represent society as a whole. It was a very unpopular imitative, especially by the left, and later was found to be deemed discriminative. Such initiatives are only supported and approved by the legal system if they are selective.
Equality and justice are certainly noble goals. but they are at this point merely goals. But in parallel, we very much need better support for the men going through the challenges that may come from the lack of equality in divorce proceedings.
Last week's tragedy here, with a father throwing his two young kids off a roof before jumping himself, has caused our community to focus - at least for a while - on what was missing and what our system did wrong and what could have been sone better to prevent that from having happened.
Maybe men don't have supports until it's rock bottom or too late.
At the same time I don't think there's many men who beleive think the standard of supporting women, and children, early and often, should never be reduced or changed. Maybe it could be expanded.
I agree that divorce proceedings could be more equal than they are. But society is not gender neutral, so things like divorce proceedings aren't either. Women are far, far more likely to be stay at home parents. That means they're far more involved in childcare and far less likely to be earning money independently. That makes the situation very difficult when it comes to divorce.
There is the underlying reality and bias. When I'd pick up my kid from Kindergarten it was me and 20-30 other moms hanging out on the playground afterwards. So yes, in that sense we may not see gender neutral outcomes.
The bias however is absurdly strong. My first lawyer said I should have taken my ex's offer of slightly less than 50/50. She said that my ex's floor was 50/50 and that if we couldn't show that we could effectively coparent they'd give it to the Mom.
That's exactly what happened and it held through her completely cutting me off from my son. I even went through a modification try and the same Judge upheld the situation.
As a result I haven't spoken with my son in almost 2 years now.
I would definitely have preferred to have had a couple more days a week off with my kids while they grew up, and given their Mum a chance to do her thing, too. Instead, it became my responsibility to pay the bills, and the rest of the crews right to make them. So yeah, that's what I did.
>2 years
Kids need their Dads, and Dads have to be strong as hell for them, even still, in this modern world. I am super glad to have gotten my two giant oafs into adulthood well enough to be surfing the wonders the world has in store for them both .. but yeah, you'll get your ass kicked. Be a kick ass Dad, then.
The most important thing is that your son knows you're there for him as he grows up. Maybe keep a journal, don't stop writing important things to him, notes and ideas from his Dad, for him to read when he gets his own agency over things.
How is it even possible for someone to prevent you from seeing your own child for two years? That would be completely illegal in my country. Can one parent really just decide to cut the other parent out of their child's life and get away with it? It's absolutely proven than this is against child's children best interest.
How is it possible? Well, theoretically it's not. The order I got and subsequent denial of modification blatantly violate state law and appealate precedent. But it's all procedural. The standard for the underlying opinion of the judge is that if there is one fact to support that opinion then the ruling is upheld.
So I could have appealed and won. But then I go back to the same judge that doesn't think my kid should have any contact with me and all she has to do is find one fact to support that.
More often a custody order is just a piece of paper. The primary parent can screw with visitation easily and it takes time and money to go to court. The original divorce cost me $100k, another contempt motion $7k, and the failed modification $20k.
Custody ends for Fathers when they give up. I gave up unusually early (which royally pissed off the judge) and this is my punishment.
Family court is a scam, and if you end up there you’ve already lost. For some reason your usual legal rights don’t apply; the entire system seems to be constructed to drain everyone of money. It’s basically the definition of “the process is the punishment.” I’ve never seen a good outcome from it.
You don't even have to sign a contract to end up in this situation. In California at least, just habituating with someone for 10 years is enough for the courts to consider you effectively married. That needs to be fixed. Marriage should absolutely be a contractual agreement where one party is fully aware what they're giving up, signing over, or potentially losing, not something you end up in through no fault of your own.
this "just habituating with someone for 10 years is enough for the courts to consider you effectively married" is completely false and a myth. Especially in California.
Only a few states have something like the common-law 'marriage' you picture - but it's a really high bar.
There needs to consideration AND usually clear intent to marry (w/ nuance of course);
You can't simply fall into this by happenstance because you cohabitate for {n} amount of years.
California does have a (ever barrowing) Marvin Action.
But it's an incredibly high bar and not family court
You need to prove that essentially a contract exists between the parties; * e.g. consideration *
You need to really fuck up to end up common-law married. You are simply wrong about California (we don't do common law marriage at all), and in all jurisdictions I'm aware of that do have common law marriages, you need to present yourself as married in order for there to be any claim.
That's not some "oh, we live together, and under old-timey understandings that means we're married" requirement. That's publicly making a pattern of referring to each other as your spouses, often including at least some public documentation. Common law marriage is much more about protecting people who failed to dot their 'i's and cross their 't's when registering their marriage than it is about surprising a breakup partner with divorce precedings.
> EDIT: Turns out this is NOT true, or at least, nothing I can find seems to point to it being true. Just habituating with someone for a long time is not enough.
It isn't true in California, it appears. It is true in a number of other places worldwide, Australia in particular.
Even in Australia, a de facto relationship – in which partners have a right to a property settlement upon separation – requires more than mere cohabitation of sexual/romantic partners. However, in practice, relatively few long-term cohabitating partners will be found not to be in a de facto relationship.
I started reading this thinking I would disagree, but you're right, in some countries (Canada for sure), there's a weird thing that some genders are more equal than others. I know this sounds bad, but I am a left-leaning feminist.
I've seen first hand where spouses of equal education and opportunity are treated as traditional values applied.
And nearly always it's the male that has to take a second job/cash in their retirement to meet societies demands.
I went through a divorce in Canada, there is a thing called "amiable divorce/separation". Where both parties negotiate a fair divorce agreement rather than the standard "Pay continued support for X months/years + lump sum".
So there is some variability, and of course in my case it was a "happy path" scenario where both me and my ex-wife mutually wanted the divorce.
But by default you have to pay spousal support regardless of how well-off your partner is. The assumption is that women will be worse off after a divorce financially. Which is really not a contemporary point of view to make as a blanket statement.
But again, it seems weird when a male has to work 2 jobs in their 50's to send large monthly payments to a female that has a larger or equivalent net worth.
And it happens routinely. Of course, there are also a lot of men out there that just want to stiff their ex. But that doesn't mean my former example isn't happening.
> The assumption is that women will be worse off after a divorce financially
And this was exactly what happened to my friends. The women who sought alimony actually earned much more. The financial burden was so tough that it turned a good hard working member of the society into almost a criminal (if you don't pay alimony, you can be even arrested for it in some countries).
I guess you missed the last part of my comment. Women are majorly incentivised legally to walk out of a marriage while being financially rewarded for it. Even if you marry the "right" woman, it doesn't guarantee she won't turn into the "wrong" woman over time. And in modern times, it doesn't take a lot for that transition especially with social media really rallying to take advantage of the legal loopholes - eg. you can cheat on your partner AND walk away with 50% of the marital wealth.
Brazilian law is far superior to US laws on this matter.
You only get to choose either:
* Partial Community of Property - the default: applies only to property acquired after the marriage; in case of divorce only that property is split 50/50
* Universal Community of Property - applies to all property before and after the marriage; in case of divorce all property is split 50/50
* Separation of Property - no property is shared at all; in case of divorce nothing at all is split. If you want buy and share property you have to do it explicitly. This is also mandatory in cases where one of the spouses is 70+ years old
Divorce is much less litigious here. It's basically impossible to lose all of your assets. It works the same for men or women.
There are some of the same issues in custody law as in North America but from what I read it still seems way better than in the US.
It's more that these are the only options. No other laws govern marriages. I'm sure other countries have sensible ones too. In the US they have all matter of legal dispute because it's too wide open.
In Islam, we have it much simpler. There's a dowry paid to the woman that becomes her property. Other than that, each person leaves with their own assets they came in with. If, during marriage, they acquired assets they decided to split half way (or any other percentage), that split holds post divorce.
> Universal Community of Property - applies to all property before and after the marriage; in case of divorce all property is split 50/50
This should not even be an option. If you worked your ass off to acquire wealth before marriage, someone new into your life should not be entitled to that.
You can definitely make a fair argument for wealth built together as partners. That is really fair. They can even have 100% of that. But wealth accumulated before that should not even be up for discussion as there was 0 contribution from the other partner.
Some people want to share everything they have. The idea that there shouldn’t be an optional legal mechanism that enshrines that in marriage is ludicrous.
There are few mechanisms preventing someone from sharing all of their assets with anyone else (living relatively locally). Having the law enforce the sharing after a breakup (where it would be surprising if the parties are still interested in sharing) is just insane. There are good reasons after a couple of thousand years of the legal concept existing most places have concluded it's a really bad idea to have the law enforcing marriages being for life.
Unfortunately, losing decades of your hard work for a less than a three year marriage makes for unbearable suffering and loss of any hope. The person losing that realizes they no longer matter.
One decision can ruin your life very quickly.
There is no confusion as to why suicide feels like the only option to so many.
It's basically impossible to lose all of your assets. It works the same for men or women.
The issue isn't assets, it's alimony. Brazil has the same issues with alimony as the U.S. does. Most modern countries do. (Asset splits are generally governed by statute and case law. Asset-related conflicts are about whether prenups are valid, or whether an asset is community/marital property subject to split. These same issues arise in Brazilian divorces.)
Also...Britney Spears and most other famous women with unfamous (or less succesful) husbands would like to weigh in on this conversation. It's not that men always get "screwed." It's simply that the more successful partner always ends up paying the other partner.
It's important for people to remember they don't marry other people.
Legally, people are marrying a law in their place of residence, marriage is a contract and agreement with the government.
Through a marriage to the government's law first, two people are married in the eyes of the law.
The first time I came across this it made me wonder how much people are aware of this central, third party in between the two people in their marriage.
> It's important for people to remember they don't marry other people.
Of course you do. As you even point out yourself, you marry the government, which is people.
> The first time I came across this it made me wonder how much people are aware of this central, third party in between the two people in their marriage.
Considering that the traditional marriage process involves two people standing in front of representatives of the government and declaring promises to them it seems like it'd be a bit hard to miss? I suppose if others also don't realize that government is people then they might not realize what the people in the audience are doing? But, then again, given that the two people prepared to make those promises are usually responsible for inviting that audience to the wedding you'd think they would have questions about why they are there otherwise?
Both marriage to the law and marriage to the government was said. I chose to focus on the latter, but the law is also just people, so either way nothing changes.
That's fair, but I'm not sure I understand what the point is by saying it's all people at the end of the day.
People come and go and change.
When I think about people in this context, if anything, it's a snapshot of an agreed to interpretation in words. That are created by people, and then agreed to by people, and maybe held accountable to by people.
In that way, people are in a relationship with the agreement.
The idea behind an uneven split is that, in a lot of marriages, the partners do not act fully independently of each other. In marriages where one partner stops working to have or raise kids, they do so knowing the other partner will continue to work. Splitting according to the ratio before marriage would suit this (extremely common) type of relationship very poorly, because the partner who raised a child would have an interrupted career while the other wouldn't. It would be unfair and would discourage this (normal, often desirable) type of relationship
It still doesn't seem quite fair for the partner that simply married, didn't contribute financially, and has every incentive to simply leave and take 50% of the assets with them.
Hence why I said a Prenup ratio based upon what both groups had while single makes more sense.
Ambiguous without more context. 50% of assets for the time period determined by your relevant laws.
In my part of the world, that’s 50% of community property built after the relationship is formally recognized (e.g. marriage, cohabitation, etc.). You own less individually the more time you choose to commit to the relationship. That’s an incentive for the one with more assets to leave, not the other way around.
Didn’t the marriage laws start favoring women because patriarchy caused immense bias and harm to women over the millennia and left them persecuted and penniless?
True. But society has largely achieved gender equality (and by many metrics such as educational attainment and life expectancy women are seeing better outcomes than men), yet many systems still favor women under the outdated assumption male privilege.
When a couple with two working spouses and no children splits, what is the rationale behind ordering the man pay alimony to his ex-wife that outearns him?
To attack a group of people you always need a convenient revenge myth. Like the Jews oppressed our poor people over millennia and now their children's children must pay.
A teenager boy or young man, what is his share of the guilt for any past injustices? Assuming that all women alive today have a father, don't they also share half of this supposed "guilt"?
The other side of the story is already in the comments. They cheated. Convenience. Some of them even literally confessed literally that.
I am curious, is it because you think women can do no wrong and can only be victims? Otherwise, why would you say that in a narrative about declining men's mental health with hard data points by a government agency?
Because I've known a couple different dudes who have gone thru nasty divorces and have said that kind of thing, how the laws and judges are biased and the deck was stacked against men. And in both those cases I happened to know, either via a trusted third party, or their kids, or their wives, or even from things they themselves had previously told me, that there was a whole lot more to the story that they weren't saying.
It's the same kind of thing as parents complaining their grown children have gone no contact, and if you only listen to the parents you think maybe they have a point, maybe the kids are blowing things way out of proportion, and it's unfair they don't get to see their grandchildren. But then if you talk to the kids and hear their stories it's quickly crystal clear why they did what they did.
People, especially men, need to get way more actively political than passively political in order to solve these issues. The biased judges are often ignorant and not even thinking philosophically about right or wrong or fairness in most of these cases. Also men have a natural bias to protecting women and children, which is also taken advantage of knowingly or unknowingly by the other side. People or individuals can be unfair and inconsistent, but systems can be fair and consistent. Make systems for this. Currently we don't exactly have consistent or fair systems for this. A decently defined system for the scope of handling divorce that is fair to both man, woman and children isn't something that is hard. It may feel like the brain would hurt, if you have not been thinking much.
Hmmm yes my country expects women to earn their own money (the government is paying for your university degree so you better use it you lazy harlots!) but then people start whining about declining birth rates. You just can't win.
Social contributions towards retirement should be lower, but taxes should be higher so the government can get the same money from man they've raised as from woman.
This is an issue that us men need to take charge on. While no demographic is immune from engaging in the toxicity that begets the mental health issues plaguing men, men are undoubtedly the worst offenders when it comes to reinforcing said toxicity.
Fixing this will require us to have tough conversations about what it means to be a "man", and to also engage in analysis of the material conditions that ALL people are currently facing in modern society.
I have read lots of calls to have afromentioned tough conversations, but almost never any content from the conversations themselves. So, how would they look?
The premise is already offered by the preceding post: Blame the man/men up front for the ailment, as a select few overtly seem to volunteer in this whole comments section.
These conversations are happening, you're just not tuning in.
The conversations involve examining how the resources in society are allocated, and who gets to make those decisions. Both of these have great influence over our societies, and so much of toxic masculinity lies downstream from them.
Yes, those are the usual conversations in left-wing circles, and they're important conversations to have! They can also have good results, i.e. in the current protests in France and other countries, or the Midterm elections in the US.
I just don't see how this has anything to do with masculinity in particular.
There also exists toxic masculinity in liberal left and in anticapitalist circles as well.
>I just don't see how this has anything to do with masculinity in particular.
Masculinity is a social concept, which makes it inextricably linked to how societies are governed and how resources are allocated within them.
There are other aspects to masculinity that are not neatly confined to such terms, but a lot of the toxicity stems from the social aspects--primarily how we perceive, and talk about, men.
I do not share this position but I understand it may be someones legitimate opinion in general. I do not understand it here - when we are talking about a report like that.
Is it better to go unreported if the alternative is that an LLM was used in the articles creation?
Most people don't have time to read every article posted to Hacker News. Avoiding the AI slop in favor of human-written articles that promise a higher return on investment seems like a reasonable strategy. For that to work, AI slop must be accurately labeled as such.
As Charles Darwin deliberated, and concluded... MARRY MARRY MARRY. Q.E.D.
"My God, it is intolerable to think of spending ones whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all. No, no won’t do.
Imagine living all one’s day solitarily in smoky dirty London House. Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & books & music perhaps. Compare this vision with the dingy reality of Grt. Marlbro’ St. Marry — Marry — Marry Q.E.D."
I strongly oppose all comments that seem to have the causal relationship reversed, that somehow by some biological effect they are now more depressed than in the past. I think that instead the extreme demands of society are the cause and that suffering in silence is the result.
What do you expect when most men have been priced out of a happy life? What do you expect when most men are villainized in the stories that dominate narratives in modern media? What do you expect when men are uniquely dehumanized and calling men less-than is okay regarding height, looks, money, or outward masculinity? If anything I am surprised that the numbers indicating suffering in silence aren't worse.
>What do you expect when most men have been priced out of a happy life?
Most PEOPLE are being priced out of a happy life. I'm not aware of any "man tax" men are having to pay when they go out to eat, or when buying groceries, or renting/paying their mortgage.
Your anger is misplaced. You we're raised to believe that a mans job was to earn a high enough income to provide for their family, and now that shit is expensive, that perception society forced unto you makes you feel like a "failure". You're not a failure, you're just someone living in a capitalist society.
>What do you expect when most men are villainized in the stories that dominate narratives in modern media?
Most men are not being made up as villains. This reads like your algorithm/news feed is trying to enrage you.
Are there idiots out there who are attributing the wrongdoings of certain men, and/or the issues of men as a whole to individuals? Yes, but that some idiots voice their opinions on social media is nothing new, nor is it unique to men to be unfairly judged on the internet. Every demographic has bullshit thrown their way these days.
Men and their ideals, are portrayed as inherently evil in a good chunk of western media. It's pretty obvious to anyone looking at the West from the outside.
It's also a reason why the West is failing, but certainly not the only one. Social Welfare states like Europe are burning, since it was never sustainable.
America is fighting among itself, because there is no Asabiyyah (social cohesion), and the wealth inequality (wealth pump) is growing massively.
Compare that with China or Singapore, where social harmony is perhaps the most important thing in their society, food is subsidized, education as a high priority, their laws are punitive, infrastructure is extremely new, etc.
I don’t think you’re open for a discussion but I’ll try; just judging from experience talking to other people who hold similar entrenched beliefs, I might be very wrong.
> Social Welfare states like Europe are burning
I live there and wasn’t aware that it’s burning - Europe also isnt a singular entity.
> the West is failing
I wasn’t aware of that either! Seems to me that western countries (I assume you mean US and EU with that?) still hold most of the power worldwide?
> Men and their ideals, are portrayed as inherently evil in a good chunk of western media
The opposite is also true. I think it’s just because most heroes and villains in western media are men - hell most characters are men.
France is burning because they're defaulting and can't pay for their social welfare benefits, and Germany's economy isn't doing so well. That's a good chunk of Europe's economy in a nutshell. Only Poland I believe, has improved and officially was considered developed since 2018.
France's West African colonies are also leaving France as they inch closer to China, politically and economically.
China is rising, and so are other (previously and currently) Third World nations. It's a matter of when they take power, not if. India and Indonesia seem to be heavy hitters, for now and probably for the near future. I wouldn't count out Africa (Nigeria, Kenya, Botswana, Rwanda) or Latin America (Mexico, El Salvador, Brazil, etc).
I stand by my statement of Western entertainment demeaning men, probably out of anger, or as something of an alibi for Hollywood after the #Metoo movement. Occupy Wallstreet is also notable for happening before this.
Germany has the third largest GDP worldwide so I don’t think it’s “not doing so well” considering how tiny it is.
China/Asia, South America and Africa have the most space, people and natural resources so it just makes sense that they would be more successful in the long run though.
>I stand by my statement
That is fair. I stand by mine that this doesn’t convince me.
Of course men are the villains when they hold the most power.
You can’t really be an effective or convincing villain if you’re powerless.
Germany made its money through high end production (which is handled by Asia) and its Mittelstand (which like most of the West, is starting to slow down massively).
Germany is still in a good position for Europe, but it can't compete as well as it once did compared to Asia or the US. Even then, the US is having issues with China.
"Of course men are the villains when they hold the most power."
I agree with the statement, but not the context.
Looking at Velma, Dragon Age: Veilguard, Ghostbusters 2016, Star Wars sequels, She-Hulk, and much more, a good chunk of such Western media feels like they have some disdain for a large portion of fans who watch them.
Like a Superiority complex formed out of deeprooted insecurities of their feelings towards men.
You could argue men have reacted to this in the same way, especially in Instagram and the like.
If you're going to use art to back up your point that society hates men, then there is a literal mountain of artwork throughout humanity that vilifies women.
This is about a trend of the recent decades to reboot popular franchises with formerly male heroes and replace them with female versions (instead of, i.e. think up new female heroes).
If we're talking about where future art direction is going, then how much artwork from centuries ago exists is not relevant.
I think it's gotten better? Ghost Busters: Afterlife (the movie following the 2016 one) also went back to their original cast and instead introduced Phoebe as a new protagonist.
I was noticing it most strongly with Disney. Not sure what was their strategy there, but for some period in the last few years, they seemed to go mechanically through their IP catalog and produce a life action reboot for each classic. The reboots were mostly unremarkable IMO, but they had a strange recurring pattern: Almost every one of them included one controversial change to the original setup that was guaranteed to rile up certain fans and cause drama, ostensibly in the name of DEI.
It became such a predictable occurrence that I'm honestly not sure if they really felt the need to "modernize" their classics, or if they were deliberately causing those controversies as a promotion tactic.
Disney's Quality has been downhill since Pinocchio, that being said, I'm not expecting Jorge Borgesian tier quality of prose, introspection and self-awareness within the plot. I'm expecting it to be enjoyable popcorn flicks.
But i'm getting terrible movies that also preach massively. Even without the preaching, it's terrible, but preaching certainly makes it even worse than what it was due to the immense hypocrisy of a gigantic corporation asking us to do better while it absolutely does worse daily.
those examples you listed are really not representative of media in general - i don’t even know half of them!
Most of these are fanslop anyway, utter garbage even before their woke 1.0 versions.
Like ghostbusters or Star Wars sequels were never good
And to my knowledge for example the ghostbusters was a major flop.
Sounds to me like you get your knickers in a twist for a huge nothingburger
Consistent releases of the machine known as Hollywood always influences (or attempts to influence) the wider Western zeitgeist.
This was true for America's soft power for years, until very recently, which happened to coincide with the #Metoo movement, and the drying up of (direct) American governmental funding.
Deriding them for quality alone misses the point i'm trying to make. This wouldn't be ok if the demographics were swapped with a more "vulnerable" one. So why should this be ok?
> I live there and wasn’t aware that it’s burning - Europe also isnt a singular entity.
As a resident of Portland OR, I'm all too familiar with people pointing to protests confined to a few downtown city blocks as evidence of the entire city being burned to the ground.
Seems like France/Europe is currently suffering from that same sort of propaganda. "Europe is so far gone because thr Gucci store in Paris got looted and some cop cars burned."
French protests are known for their ferocity in European context, yes. But what was dominant in the recent weeks were not protests, it was the rioting. Obviously.
People protesting poor school conditions don't burn down their schools or random public buildings.
Your description seems to ignore that a historic town hall that survived two world wars was invaded and torched, and burnt to the ground, and that entire neighbourhoods -public spaces- in major cities have been turned into warzones from weeks of riots involving hundreds of thousands of people, causing extensive property damage, widespread feeling of insecurity and environmental damage.
Your takeaway from this was apparently 'looted luxury store and burned cop cars'.
Is it your source of news that's to blame for that misapprehension, or your personal stance on things?
The sex ration of completed suicides in the USSR as a whole between 1984 to 1990 was 3,9 men to 1 women.
That is, near exactly the same as in the 'capitalist' world then, and now.
(In the Slavic-predominant part of the USSR, that is Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, it was an even worse 4,6-to-1. Somewhat lower in Central Asia at ~2,7-to-1).
Okay snowflake. Nobody is "vilifying men" in general. If you feel targeted, perhaps you should wonder why? I've lived as a man, benefitting of male privileges that I could CLEARLY SEE were there, and that's unfair, so it's normal that women demand an equal play field. And I've never felt "vilified" because I'm a man.
I've been asked to try to think about what privilege I have without having "merited" them. And I did. And I think it's only fair.
Haven't this been known for a loooooooong time now...? I recall listening to TED talk (silly times) at least 15 years ago already talking about how behavioral pattern difference of seeking help between men/women pointing to this.
By now I would've hoped the conversation have moved from re-recognizing the problem and iterative solution seeking?
Silent suffering of this cohort have for the last maybe 10 years been too profitable segment to milk out of, to actually try to solve the underlying issue. (manosphere for example being one of the vicious extractor of this suffering)
The solution have always had some alignment with the observation that for guys, a sense of belonging, purpose, (and if younger) guidance and healthy rawmodels have been important. It warms me to see how some local efforts have addressed this. How much lively the surrounding became when they installed a free-to-use outdoor gym and football courts, for people to mingle. (and for the older cohort, Frisbee golf court apparently).
It doesn't help that when this conversation comes up, people start to project a lot and inevitably people will start to bring up women (in antagonistic tone) creating a cesspool of bitterness to hijack the conversation.
Predictably, many of the comments here are already about women
I don't believe I suffer, but it seems pretty obvious why someone would do it in silence. Many times when I tried to get help from institutions for anything nobody seemed to care much at all. It's like you could either deal with your problems in silence or deal with them "out loud" and have people pretend to care while looking helpless.
To be sure, not referencing mental health here but rather virtually any issue institutions claim to care about.
I have difficulties, mostly due to overload, and sometimes it would be good looking at it from an other angle, discussing with someone. There are some male peers I am being able to discuss certain matters, usually a different detail with different peers, but not everything. I look with curiosity how my wife is able to discuss things with a professional. My concern are usually: the professional can only know about what she explains, the way she explains, the amount she explains. The output can only be based on that constrained input (sessions are bound by time). Probably it is not a surprise that things do not get changed much. I have no time for that - did I mention that I am overloaded? By the time I was able to tell it in a decent granularity, complemented by details from people knowing me a certain way - no-one have full picture - so the picture is not distorted by looking through my eyes only, by all this time I'd be really frustrated that things went on and we got nowhere. And all those assume that I am able to phrase and express clearly what the heck is going on, very difficult sometimes. Also that the professional is good at listening and is not trying to force a pattern on me. I am from an upbringing that taught me doing something when something is wrong, try my best and accept what comes out of it. Suggestions of others are pieces that may help or may not. Possibly pretty random (e.g. the person was basically me in that scenario and came out well, so they really know what they are doing, not just meddling for some reason).
Yeah, getting any external help is difficult. Need some inner source some way, accepting some level of 'flaws'.
Have you not seen the message? You should forget the success ladder. The top is full. Elite overproduction. Instead be happy with the mindless consumerism available to you as you drift slowly back into the peasantry from which you came.
So the commanders of those men dying in battle or the ones running the companies whose coal miners were dying, or or or...just because men have suffered doesn't mean men has a cohort have not been at the top of the food chain. The point is that it is men controlling everyone else: men, women, etc until somewhat recently, historically.
So no, not useless and maybe should help color the conversation a bit more on WHY men are feeling as they are, because the power dynamics of society are shifting, of which men have been led to believe that they would, in fact, be at the top forever.
> "just because men have suffered doesn't mean men has a cohort have not been at the top of the food chain"
It does mean exactly that. 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, assume half were men, what specific benefit did they get from the German leader at the time having a penis? Zero. Zero benefit. Russia is conscripting 300,000 people/year into their war in Ukraine since 2022. What benefit do they get from Putin being a man at the top? Zero. Zero benefit.
Men and women have done dirty, dangerous, and back-breaking work through history, but the harder it is physically and the more likely to have injury and death associated with it, the more likely it's a "man's job". Plenty of women carrying children bent double standing in water plantint rice all day or picking tealeaves. Not so likely for women to be conscripted, laying stone for roads or railway, digging foundations and wells, bricklaying, construction, carving roadways through mountains, loading ships as dock workers, shipbuilding, soldiering, mining, oil drilling, blacksmithing, chemical refining, chimney sweeping, sewer cleaning.
Most men through history had no position of power whatsoever, and were not at the top of anything, and most men alive today don't and aren't.
It doesn't matter about the objective power of any given man, I don't know why you keep reverting back to the laymen example. The virtue of men being at the top is in and of itself the issue. From the micro to the macro, you can find gender power imbalances that are residual from the sociological evolution of humans. I'm not sure why this is so hard to grasp. We have been socially conditioned to rank men higher then women, and white men at the top.
Who held what job when, who died when, who actually held power when is irrelevant.
What relevance is the sex of the person on top of the pyramid to everyone else? You have inserted this useless metric, which half of society knows is useless. You can say 'the richest person in the world is a man', but this doesn't make the median man any richer. It's just bad logic.
There's this weird performative social media hostility to it that leaks out into reality. I don't think most people are really bothered by them even if they don't know what they're about.
445 comments
[ 0.14 ms ] story [ 294 ms ] threadIt also may be down to what was available to them at the time. There’s a famous case study where a lot of women in the UK were dying by putting their heads in the oven and gassing themselves in the 1950s. The UK government changed the formulation of gas that was being piped to homes and the suicides stopped. If those women really were dead-set on suicide, they would have just chosen a different method.
What people who’ve never had extreme depression might not realize is that in those low moments it feels like you will always feel this way and it will never ever change. Then you wait an hour or so and the feeling passes. So a person may not feel suicidal 24 hours a day, only at specific moments. But in those low moments, the chances of suicide dramatically increase and as the UK case shows, accessibility to quick suicide methods makes a big difference.
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[1] Speaking as one who did some decades ago, as irritating as life is right now I'm glad I bucked the trend of any “men have a higher 'success' rate” stat.
[2] Sometimes my nerd side takes control and empathy takes a back seat.
In the US, more men commit suicide by every broad method -- except poisoning, which is similar for both men and women.
Firearm deaths are the leading suicide method for both, and more men commit suicide even when excluding firearm deaths. And even when excluding men's firearm deaths and including women's.
It's like the difference between killing yourself drunk crashing your car into a pole vs winding up in a wheelchair because you crashed into everything of value on the street before hitting the same pole slower.
In the past we had large wars, harsh labor, that killed off men, but not today. There's roughly 5% males born than females. India and China have aborted 10s of millions of female babies. In the Western world, massive numbers of men (from low to high skilled) have move there. So here we are, men everywhere, roaming around grocery stores trying to talk to women, 70 to 80% of the population on dating apps are males, bars are filled with men. It's not a good time to be a low status man.
Also, dating apps are pointless. Go volunteer for a community organization or join a pickleball league. Don't force it.
An alarming number of my wife's female friends married chuds, or seem to only pursue chuds.
One of her friends is cheated on by almost every man she's dated. She also almost exclusively seems to date men who have been to prison
Obviously "not all women" but come on. Women date chuds all the time.
> Expressed another way, that would mean that 10% of all males surviving to adulthood would perish in combat.
> We’ll get back around to fertility rates later in the series but for how if we assume each woman in this society is having on average five live childbirths, a 2% chance of death at each stage adds up pretty quickly – a woman who gave birth five times with a 2% chance of dying each time has a total chance of dying at one stage or another of 9.607%, which as you will note is not far off from the chance of dying in a battle
I remember reading something about mental health in Iceland being much more even between men and women due to less perceived stigma and more equality, leading to men seeking help.
It's 26%women/19%men some mental health issue and 7%women/4%men serious mental health issue
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/mental-illness
Eliding or obscuring the act of operationalization leads to reification - treating concepts like real tangible things. I wish reification was taken as seriously as our taboo of anthropomorphization. It happens way more, and sneakily smuggles in human values into the sciences. In some ways it's unavoidable, but being opaque about it and doing it without knowing is a sin.
It would not surprise me to see protesting over this, as has been similarly done in the past. The person who organized a men's-support-group some years back in Canada, if I remember right, ended up committing suicide after it was forced to be shut down by protestors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Silverman
if anything we need everyone to come together, men and women need each other
women aren't happy about men being losers either, the dating pool is unhealthy and awful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8-BT6y_wYg
That is what "deep-seated cultural issues" means. Some subset of the population aren't seeing a problem with their own behavior. They see nothing that needs addressing. The rest have to learn how to put up with or avoid them.
So no, they can't change the world, but sometimes they can plant a seed.
But we live too comfortably for anyone to take those actions.
Like a boiling frog, ppl will wake up when its too late.
It starts with an objective report on reality
ultimately they will do nothing and pass more bills allowing big businesses to do whatever tf they want
Yet.. they say a man's worth is "not" the value they put in the bank account.
2) What's deadly about this space is that surveys can be toxic.
Too often, it's researchers looking to slowly understand things, have people open themselves up, then leave them like that, for little to no progress in 5-10 years.
That kind of system needs supply, no?
3) I have heard from some men that sometimes there can be things that only other men understand. That can be similar to women's health issues can be understood differently, or men can feel more comfortable with other men.
4) It's important for authors to try and be aware of their own unconscious biases. Much like medicine is horribly behind at understanding women's health (for example, women hearts are not the same as men's), it means the inverse can be true too, beginning with asking men.
That's not what is meant by "economic cost". Helping young men feel better early long term is obviously better and cheaper for society than letting them grow up and live a whole life where they suffer and hurt themselves or others.
Nothing about this is surprising or unknown. We know how to prevent and treat despair-related lives. It's a political choice that most of the world has insufficient or even broken (mental) healthcare. We could choose to vote differently, but we don't.
Like maybe https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/healthy-livi...
Good luck with that.
"Traditional Masculinity" is just in general maladaptive in the current age.
That appears to be exactly what you're arguing here: All we need to do is socialize boys more like we socialize girls, and then the men they become will be happier in our society. Is that your position?
If so, can you say a little bit more about what you mean or what you envision that socialization would look like for boys?
....no. Hard no.
Boys mentally respond differently to girls. The delusion of universality will only lead to MORE male deaths.
I think this is an intuitive reaction. It's like being grossed out by dog poop on the ground. You feel the disgust first, and although an evolutionary psychology explanation for that disgust may be true (eg, "you have evolved disgust for dog poop to prevent illness and infection) intellectualizing it further would be totally superfluous. People experience the proximate cause for these sort of evolved behaviors, even when they intellectually know better. If you think you're above this sort of reaction, try "choosing" to be attracted to an 80 year old woman.
There are subcultures in which men showing vulnerability are considered bad. But in those subcultures, men are just as mean to other men as women are. And women embracing this are usually not very "empathy this" and "acceptance that" towards anybody.
There is definitely a part of feminist culture is openly aggressive toward men in general while being "empathy this" towards women. But they are usually way more aggressive towards cocky men than weak men.
Jealousy, the desire to spite others, spread rumors, speak negative or ill, feel self-pity - these are further evolutionary games we play to climb the fitness landscape and escape local minima.
The rewards of this life are finite and your biology will always want more. Even if you're the richest and most handsome person, the hedonic treadmill will keep you running. However high the highs are, they're finite and ephemeral. Everyone living on this earth with you today will be dead in ~80ish years. And that's the blink of an eye. None of their riches or victories or accolades will go with them anywhere.
Look up, not down. Build towards a better tomorrow. Don't worry about other people. Be the best you can be.
The only woman who actually cares for me has been my mother.
When challenged, make it a discussion about the label, why the label actually deserves the hate. (Not about why the weak man automatically deserves the label.)
- Currently, the dominant ideology is that there is a victim hierarchy, and if you're in the wrong group (ie, you're privileged) then your opinions and needs don't matter. Moving away from this sort of identitarianism would one important step.
- I think it's important to try to understand why male socialization has fallen apart. (statistically, yes, I'm sure a lot of you still socialize) It's clearly a gendered effect, and I'm genuinely not sure what a reasonable explanation would be. (your comment, men supporting men would play nicely here, although I'm not sure how we make that happen.)
We are in 95% still the same animal and 5% intelligent human.
Vast majority of all of our weird discussions is about us not accepting this fact.
In this case its:
1) Men are competing with each other for resources and women
2) Women want only strong resourceful men
3) Our only purpose was defined by first living cell being born - we have to sustain life
Outcome of the above is:
Nobody cares about men that dont succceed (which ofcourse will cause a lot of men depression).
edit: typo
Men had that, and then those places were torn down because they were "boy's clubs".
what are non-anecdotal things that support the idea, "When [women] see a weak man, what they feel is disgust."
do men demonstrate the same "disgust" when _they_ "see a weak man"? why or why not?
What I really learned from these men is never sign a contract where the other party is incentivized to break it.
https://www.setfords.co.uk/2026/09/01/new-rights-for-cohabit...
At the request of the family law lobby, naturally ...
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/a-fairer-end-to-...
"The very limited set of protections under the current law can leave cohabitants facing significant financial difficulties when relationships end, which disproportionately affects vulnerable groups such as women, and children..."
Women...so naturally vulnerable ?! In 2026?
All else aside for a second... yes? Women are both physically and economically (primarily when they are stay at home moms) vulnerable. No, that doesn't mean I'm saying that no men are vulnerable at all but averaged out to a population it's clear.
And I don't make a habit of pointing out women's smaller stature to call them vulnerable?? Wtf
This is especially important if there are children involved in your situation.
The law isn't simply a "default" in this matter that you can opt out of AIUI
From a better write up of this same story:
Young men aged 15 to 24 show concerning trends in their self-rated mental health and rates of mental illness. For instance, between 2012 and 2022:
the percentage who reported "very good" or "excellent" mental health fell from 70% to 52% the percentage who experienced: mood disorders increased from11% to 16% generalized anxiety disorder increased from 4% to 10%
I wonder why.
If men and women have meaningful differences then it makes sense to have gendered laws.
I think pandora's box is open never to be shut again on the conversation if we're the same or different.
The status quo of "sexual liberation" doesn't do much to mitigate this difference. We no longer live in a monogamous society.
Have you ever spoken with a woman?
Distinction is always going to be less effective than universally agreed declaration. We can declare: all human beings have equal rights.
Pandora's box is the universality aspect, which must be manifest by those agreeing to declare the nature of ones rights in respect to others rights, both for oneself and for others. This is the reason a distinction-based legal position is poor policy.
We cannot distinguish between a man and a woman if we are agreeing to the universality of their equal human rights.
The we part is the difficult part, apropos pandora's boxes. But ultimately, universality is very empowering to the individual.
There is a very big spectrum of actual rights being manifest in a greater or lesser degree in the world - the free, free world - but on the other hand, it results in freedom, not free food.
Folks still have to find a way to work together to feed each other, on top of those rights. Irrespective of gender or role or duty, one must participate in the effort of subsistence in order to express ones own rights, in the first place, comfortably.
Two people having sex with each other should probably just form a contract before they do it, and then both have 50/50 responsibility from that point forward - the fact that this is 'not normal' is a cultural thing, and perhaps to a greater or lesser degree current laws are designed to protect the mouths to feed, for years to come, which may result from that original act of interaction...
It'd be best if we raised generations to understand the responsibilities of sex such that they don't have it until they're ready - but this ideal reality is of course, unrealistic in the modern world.
Until then, there needs to be better help for new parents, and for anyone whose lives are impacted by an act of sex. Since the state profits from the registration of citizens born within its confines, the state has a 'duty' to its citizens.
The extent to which the state apparatus respects the human rights of its growing (and dying) population, depicts the reality of unfair gender rights. On what is the lien rate balanced - military-aged men, or stay-at-home moms?
I don’t even get how I am supposed to hold my partner to the same standards I would hold a close male friend/family member. If I knew a dude who freaked out and yelled/sobbed several times a month over something inane like where to get dinner I would drop them immediately. I have found just using the old adage “happy wife happy life” is most effective, but isn’t that inherently disrespectful? Like “I can’t reason with this person but if I upset them it’s gonna go poorly for me so I better let them have their way!”. The only way my relationship survives is if I have a bit of internalized misogyny and hold her to a different standard than I do myself or another man.
Conservative men rights advocates find such proposition insulting to men. It is not a manly men job.
Men in those positions are mocked by supposedly pro-male groups
> If I knew a dude who freaked out and yelled/sobbed several times a month over something inane like where to get dinner I would drop them immediately.
Why are you dating someone like that? Genuine question. I dont know ANY woman that cries that often. Not a single one.
Maybe be wise and break up.
People chafe against things like DEI as arbitrary favoritism completely failing to note that yes, this policy is meant to promote equality, not to represent it. In the case of promoting female stem workers you might say it’s a policy designed to give women equal-ish access to the job market by way of giving them preferential treatment in hiring, to counteract biases of men favoring men during that process.
The ideal outcome of any policy like this is that once the systemic inequity is resolved, the policy can be retired.
When algebra was invented the Fertile Crescent was significantly wetter and cooler than it is now.
The claim is that severe winter conditions select for intelligence, not that intelligence grades continuously with average temperature!
That 1500 BC Babylon was neither a cold-weather clime nor an arid clime is evidence against the cold winter hypothesis.
For instance, empirical evidence finds that gender bias in tech hiring favors women over men [1]. So DEI ends up exacerbating the bias, not counteracting it.
1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25069644
DEI does not need to be selective favoritism. It could just be a policy to promote equality. It also happens that the government is the employer, and customer, of professions that has the highest grade of gender inequality (for both men and women).
I'm curious if you could describe a DEI policy that's flawed in this way and then go on to explain how you would implement it in such a way where it wouldn't be subject to the same criticism.
This is just flat wrong. Both because the word narrative makes no sense in the way you've used it in this sentence, and because equality of outcome is specifically not what is being targeted by these policies.
I'm inclined to think you've imbibed a lot of propaganda on this subject as the use of the word "narrative" in this incorrect fashion is as strong an indicator of that as the emdash is of copying stuff from ChatGPT.
> If men and women have meaningful differences then it makes sense to have gendered laws.
This framing of the issue puts the discussion down an awkward rhetorical path that is difficult to recover from.
What if it doesn't matter whether someone looks or acts different; but it matters how society treats them and the outcomes that they face.
Black chess pieces and white chess pieces are superficially, trivially distinct. Yet, the player with the white pieces wins 52% to 56% of the time.
I'm calling it out here because it's a typical technocratic bad-faith argument that I'm personally tired of hearing.
I’m guessing you don’t have a uterus, am I right? A man doesn’t end up pregnant if the condom breaks. So don’t lecture us about your “bad faith arguments” when you’re making one.
Trying to interpret your comment in the best way possible, I'd say that my viewpoint is that it matters more how society treats a pregnant woman and the man that impregnated her, rather than the fact that the woman got pregnant and the man didn't.
It's probably best for laws to be dynamic to how cultural norms evolve regarding impregnation, which means unfortunately for hyperrational technocrats, it's best to pay attention to outcomes rather than focus on things like "biological differences between man and woman". An unwed woman getting pregnant in 1940 USA is treated culturally much differently than an unwed woman getting pregnant in 2026 USA, for example.
Certainly women have have nine months of hard work men spared. On the other hand it is not a very big par of a lifetime. A man can end up with more work and responsibility long term.
My ex carried our kids for 9 months. I did a lot to support her but I agree that does not compare with the constant physical impact of pregnancy.
Once they were born we were pretty much equal parents bar breastfeeding/expressing. As they got older I became the primary parent because she was just not good with older kids. By the time each was seven or eight I was the primary parent. By the time they were eight or nine I was home educating them I has also the sole earner. When the younger one was a teenager I divorced and became a single parent. You really think 9 months of pregnancy outweighs all that?
Is "right" defined by the nature of existence or just by the ends? Some would say an outcome of hunger is unacceptable, some would say there are plenty of "wrong" (try to not make that moral meaning) behaviors which should result in hunger. (Such as refusing to work or trade value for other people's property ie food)
For example, there was an initiative in Sweden to improve diversity in the student body by giving minority demographics free bonus points during application. For any given minority the outcome would be a small but meaningful advantage compared to the majority so that over time the balance would improve and become closer to represent society as a whole. It was a very unpopular imitative, especially by the left, and later was found to be deemed discriminative. Such initiatives are only supported and approved by the legal system if they are selective.
Last week's tragedy here, with a father throwing his two young kids off a roof before jumping himself, has caused our community to focus - at least for a while - on what was missing and what our system did wrong and what could have been sone better to prevent that from having happened.
Maybe men don't have supports until it's rock bottom or too late.
At the same time I don't think there's many men who beleive think the standard of supporting women, and children, early and often, should never be reduced or changed. Maybe it could be expanded.
The bias however is absurdly strong. My first lawyer said I should have taken my ex's offer of slightly less than 50/50. She said that my ex's floor was 50/50 and that if we couldn't show that we could effectively coparent they'd give it to the Mom.
That's exactly what happened and it held through her completely cutting me off from my son. I even went through a modification try and the same Judge upheld the situation.
As a result I haven't spoken with my son in almost 2 years now.
>2 years
Kids need their Dads, and Dads have to be strong as hell for them, even still, in this modern world. I am super glad to have gotten my two giant oafs into adulthood well enough to be surfing the wonders the world has in store for them both .. but yeah, you'll get your ass kicked. Be a kick ass Dad, then.
The most important thing is that your son knows you're there for him as he grows up. Maybe keep a journal, don't stop writing important things to him, notes and ideas from his Dad, for him to read when he gets his own agency over things.
How is it possible? Well, theoretically it's not. The order I got and subsequent denial of modification blatantly violate state law and appealate precedent. But it's all procedural. The standard for the underlying opinion of the judge is that if there is one fact to support that opinion then the ruling is upheld.
So I could have appealed and won. But then I go back to the same judge that doesn't think my kid should have any contact with me and all she has to do is find one fact to support that.
More often a custody order is just a piece of paper. The primary parent can screw with visitation easily and it takes time and money to go to court. The original divorce cost me $100k, another contempt motion $7k, and the failed modification $20k.
Custody ends for Fathers when they give up. I gave up unusually early (which royally pissed off the judge) and this is my punishment.
Only a few states have something like the common-law 'marriage' you picture - but it's a really high bar.
There needs to consideration AND usually clear intent to marry (w/ nuance of course);
You can't simply fall into this by happenstance because you cohabitate for {n} amount of years.
California does have a (ever barrowing) Marvin Action.
But it's an incredibly high bar and not family court
You need to prove that essentially a contract exists between the parties; * e.g. consideration *
https://www.wgslawfirm.com/family-law/divorce-mediation/2025...
That's not some "oh, we live together, and under old-timey understandings that means we're married" requirement. That's publicly making a pattern of referring to each other as your spouses, often including at least some public documentation. Common law marriage is much more about protecting people who failed to dot their 'i's and cross their 't's when registering their marriage than it is about surprising a breakup partner with divorce precedings.
It isn't true in California, it appears. It is true in a number of other places worldwide, Australia in particular.
Even in Australia, a de facto relationship – in which partners have a right to a property settlement upon separation – requires more than mere cohabitation of sexual/romantic partners. However, in practice, relatively few long-term cohabitating partners will be found not to be in a de facto relationship.
I've seen first hand where spouses of equal education and opportunity are treated as traditional values applied.
And nearly always it's the male that has to take a second job/cash in their retirement to meet societies demands.
So there is some variability, and of course in my case it was a "happy path" scenario where both me and my ex-wife mutually wanted the divorce.
But by default you have to pay spousal support regardless of how well-off your partner is. The assumption is that women will be worse off after a divorce financially. Which is really not a contemporary point of view to make as a blanket statement.
But again, it seems weird when a male has to work 2 jobs in their 50's to send large monthly payments to a female that has a larger or equivalent net worth.
And it happens routinely. Of course, there are also a lot of men out there that just want to stiff their ex. But that doesn't mean my former example isn't happening.
And this was exactly what happened to my friends. The women who sought alimony actually earned much more. The financial burden was so tough that it turned a good hard working member of the society into almost a criminal (if you don't pay alimony, you can be even arrested for it in some countries).
This, a thousand times.
And I say that as a man who has lived in multiple countries in my lifetime, raising my family, through thick and thin.
>mens mental health
I no longer see it as a man problem, its a we problem.
I guess you missed the last part of my comment. Women are majorly incentivised legally to walk out of a marriage while being financially rewarded for it. Even if you marry the "right" woman, it doesn't guarantee she won't turn into the "wrong" woman over time. And in modern times, it doesn't take a lot for that transition especially with social media really rallying to take advantage of the legal loopholes - eg. you can cheat on your partner AND walk away with 50% of the marital wealth.
You only get to choose either:
* Partial Community of Property - the default: applies only to property acquired after the marriage; in case of divorce only that property is split 50/50
* Universal Community of Property - applies to all property before and after the marriage; in case of divorce all property is split 50/50
* Separation of Property - no property is shared at all; in case of divorce nothing at all is split. If you want buy and share property you have to do it explicitly. This is also mandatory in cases where one of the spouses is 70+ years old
Divorce is much less litigious here. It's basically impossible to lose all of your assets. It works the same for men or women.
There are some of the same issues in custody law as in North America but from what I read it still seems way better than in the US.
I would be really surprised if the US didnt have these options too…
Just living together, informally, is already enough for the woman to take half your assets as it's already considered `Partial Community of Property`.
I can't think of anything where Brazil is generally superior to the US in terms of law.
This should not even be an option. If you worked your ass off to acquire wealth before marriage, someone new into your life should not be entitled to that.
You can definitely make a fair argument for wealth built together as partners. That is really fair. They can even have 100% of that. But wealth accumulated before that should not even be up for discussion as there was 0 contribution from the other partner.
But you have to go out of your way to choose it.
Unfortunately, losing decades of your hard work for a less than a three year marriage makes for unbearable suffering and loss of any hope. The person losing that realizes they no longer matter.
One decision can ruin your life very quickly.
There is no confusion as to why suicide feels like the only option to so many.
The issue isn't assets, it's alimony. Brazil has the same issues with alimony as the U.S. does. Most modern countries do. (Asset splits are generally governed by statute and case law. Asset-related conflicts are about whether prenups are valid, or whether an asset is community/marital property subject to split. These same issues arise in Brazilian divorces.)
Also...Britney Spears and most other famous women with unfamous (or less succesful) husbands would like to weigh in on this conversation. It's not that men always get "screwed." It's simply that the more successful partner always ends up paying the other partner.
Legally, people are marrying a law in their place of residence, marriage is a contract and agreement with the government.
Through a marriage to the government's law first, two people are married in the eyes of the law.
The first time I came across this it made me wonder how much people are aware of this central, third party in between the two people in their marriage.
Of course you do. As you even point out yourself, you marry the government, which is people.
> The first time I came across this it made me wonder how much people are aware of this central, third party in between the two people in their marriage.
Considering that the traditional marriage process involves two people standing in front of representatives of the government and declaring promises to them it seems like it'd be a bit hard to miss? I suppose if others also don't realize that government is people then they might not realize what the people in the audience are doing? But, then again, given that the two people prepared to make those promises are usually responsible for inviting that audience to the wedding you'd think they would have questions about why they are there otherwise?
People come and go and change.
When I think about people in this context, if anything, it's a snapshot of an agreed to interpretation in words. That are created by people, and then agreed to by people, and maybe held accountable to by people.
In that way, people are in a relationship with the agreement.
Hence why I said a Prenup ratio based upon what both groups had while single makes more sense.
In my part of the world, that’s 50% of community property built after the relationship is formally recognized (e.g. marriage, cohabitation, etc.). You own less individually the more time you choose to commit to the relationship. That’s an incentive for the one with more assets to leave, not the other way around.
When a couple with two working spouses and no children splits, what is the rationale behind ordering the man pay alimony to his ex-wife that outearns him?
A teenager boy or young man, what is his share of the guilt for any past injustices? Assuming that all women alive today have a father, don't they also share half of this supposed "guilt"?
Because I've known a couple different dudes who have gone thru nasty divorces and have said that kind of thing, how the laws and judges are biased and the deck was stacked against men. And in both those cases I happened to know, either via a trusted third party, or their kids, or their wives, or even from things they themselves had previously told me, that there was a whole lot more to the story that they weren't saying.
It's the same kind of thing as parents complaining their grown children have gone no contact, and if you only listen to the parents you think maybe they have a point, maybe the kids are blowing things way out of proportion, and it's unfair they don't get to see their grandchildren. But then if you talk to the kids and hear their stories it's quickly crystal clear why they did what they did.
Kid takes immense toll on the body, career development and retirement savings of the woman.
Untill men could give birth to the child the truly gender neutral laws are unreachable goal.
Also men live shorter life - should their tax rate be higher?
The rest of your comment is full of non-sequiturs, and even an outright error.
If anything it should be the opposite: men spend fewer years post-retirement and thus as less of a burden on social security and pensions.
Fixing this will require us to have tough conversations about what it means to be a "man", and to also engage in analysis of the material conditions that ALL people are currently facing in modern society.
The conversations involve examining how the resources in society are allocated, and who gets to make those decisions. Both of these have great influence over our societies, and so much of toxic masculinity lies downstream from them.
I just don't see how this has anything to do with masculinity in particular.
There also exists toxic masculinity in liberal left and in anticapitalist circles as well.
Masculinity is a social concept, which makes it inextricably linked to how societies are governed and how resources are allocated within them.
There are other aspects to masculinity that are not neatly confined to such terms, but a lot of the toxicity stems from the social aspects--primarily how we perceive, and talk about, men.
https://www.salahadawi.com/hacker-news-ai-detector/50429475
Is it better to go unreported if the alternative is that an LLM was used in the articles creation?
"My God, it is intolerable to think of spending ones whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all. No, no won’t do.
Imagine living all one’s day solitarily in smoky dirty London House. Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & books & music perhaps. Compare this vision with the dingy reality of Grt. Marlbro’ St. Marry — Marry — Marry Q.E.D."
What do you expect when most men have been priced out of a happy life? What do you expect when most men are villainized in the stories that dominate narratives in modern media? What do you expect when men are uniquely dehumanized and calling men less-than is okay regarding height, looks, money, or outward masculinity? If anything I am surprised that the numbers indicating suffering in silence aren't worse.
Most PEOPLE are being priced out of a happy life. I'm not aware of any "man tax" men are having to pay when they go out to eat, or when buying groceries, or renting/paying their mortgage.
Your anger is misplaced. You we're raised to believe that a mans job was to earn a high enough income to provide for their family, and now that shit is expensive, that perception society forced unto you makes you feel like a "failure". You're not a failure, you're just someone living in a capitalist society.
>What do you expect when most men are villainized in the stories that dominate narratives in modern media?
Most men are not being made up as villains. This reads like your algorithm/news feed is trying to enrage you.
Are there idiots out there who are attributing the wrongdoings of certain men, and/or the issues of men as a whole to individuals? Yes, but that some idiots voice their opinions on social media is nothing new, nor is it unique to men to be unfairly judged on the internet. Every demographic has bullshit thrown their way these days.
It's also a reason why the West is failing, but certainly not the only one. Social Welfare states like Europe are burning, since it was never sustainable.
America is fighting among itself, because there is no Asabiyyah (social cohesion), and the wealth inequality (wealth pump) is growing massively.
Compare that with China or Singapore, where social harmony is perhaps the most important thing in their society, food is subsidized, education as a high priority, their laws are punitive, infrastructure is extremely new, etc.
I don’t think you’re open for a discussion but I’ll try; just judging from experience talking to other people who hold similar entrenched beliefs, I might be very wrong.
> Social Welfare states like Europe are burning
I live there and wasn’t aware that it’s burning - Europe also isnt a singular entity.
> the West is failing
I wasn’t aware of that either! Seems to me that western countries (I assume you mean US and EU with that?) still hold most of the power worldwide?
> Men and their ideals, are portrayed as inherently evil in a good chunk of western media
The opposite is also true. I think it’s just because most heroes and villains in western media are men - hell most characters are men.
France's West African colonies are also leaving France as they inch closer to China, politically and economically.
China is rising, and so are other (previously and currently) Third World nations. It's a matter of when they take power, not if. India and Indonesia seem to be heavy hitters, for now and probably for the near future. I wouldn't count out Africa (Nigeria, Kenya, Botswana, Rwanda) or Latin America (Mexico, El Salvador, Brazil, etc).
I stand by my statement of Western entertainment demeaning men, probably out of anger, or as something of an alibi for Hollywood after the #Metoo movement. Occupy Wallstreet is also notable for happening before this.
China/Asia, South America and Africa have the most space, people and natural resources so it just makes sense that they would be more successful in the long run though.
>I stand by my statement
That is fair. I stand by mine that this doesn’t convince me. Of course men are the villains when they hold the most power. You can’t really be an effective or convincing villain if you’re powerless.
Germany is still in a good position for Europe, but it can't compete as well as it once did compared to Asia or the US. Even then, the US is having issues with China.
I agree with the statement, but not the context.
Looking at Velma, Dragon Age: Veilguard, Ghostbusters 2016, Star Wars sequels, She-Hulk, and much more, a good chunk of such Western media feels like they have some disdain for a large portion of fans who watch them.
Like a Superiority complex formed out of deeprooted insecurities of their feelings towards men.
You could argue men have reacted to this in the same way, especially in Instagram and the like.
If we're talking about where future art direction is going, then how much artwork from centuries ago exists is not relevant.
I was noticing it most strongly with Disney. Not sure what was their strategy there, but for some period in the last few years, they seemed to go mechanically through their IP catalog and produce a life action reboot for each classic. The reboots were mostly unremarkable IMO, but they had a strange recurring pattern: Almost every one of them included one controversial change to the original setup that was guaranteed to rile up certain fans and cause drama, ostensibly in the name of DEI.
It became such a predictable occurrence that I'm honestly not sure if they really felt the need to "modernize" their classics, or if they were deliberately causing those controversies as a promotion tactic.
The reboots are utter garbage even if you disregard the woke1.0 updates
Btw Disney has always been garbage and always will be. If we use that as the measuring stick for culture idk
But i'm getting terrible movies that also preach massively. Even without the preaching, it's terrible, but preaching certainly makes it even worse than what it was due to the immense hypocrisy of a gigantic corporation asking us to do better while it absolutely does worse daily.
Sounds to me like you get your knickers in a twist for a huge nothingburger
This was true for America's soft power for years, until very recently, which happened to coincide with the #Metoo movement, and the drying up of (direct) American governmental funding.
Deriding them for quality alone misses the point i'm trying to make. This wouldn't be ok if the demographics were swapped with a more "vulnerable" one. So why should this be ok?
As a resident of Portland OR, I'm all too familiar with people pointing to protests confined to a few downtown city blocks as evidence of the entire city being burned to the ground.
Seems like France/Europe is currently suffering from that same sort of propaganda. "Europe is so far gone because thr Gucci store in Paris got looted and some cop cars burned."
People protesting poor school conditions don't burn down their schools or random public buildings.
It's unspoken, but obvious in their culture, to almost act barbaric in protests.
Your takeaway from this was apparently 'looted luxury store and burned cop cars'.
Is it your source of news that's to blame for that misapprehension, or your personal stance on things?
edit: typo
That is, near exactly the same as in the 'capitalist' world then, and now.
(In the Slavic-predominant part of the USSR, that is Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, it was an even worse 4,6-to-1. Somewhat lower in Central Asia at ~2,7-to-1).
I've been asked to try to think about what privilege I have without having "merited" them. And I did. And I think it's only fair.
Isn't "okay snowflake" a vilification in itself?
By now I would've hoped the conversation have moved from re-recognizing the problem and iterative solution seeking?
Silent suffering of this cohort have for the last maybe 10 years been too profitable segment to milk out of, to actually try to solve the underlying issue. (manosphere for example being one of the vicious extractor of this suffering)
The solution have always had some alignment with the observation that for guys, a sense of belonging, purpose, (and if younger) guidance and healthy rawmodels have been important. It warms me to see how some local efforts have addressed this. How much lively the surrounding became when they installed a free-to-use outdoor gym and football courts, for people to mingle. (and for the older cohort, Frisbee golf court apparently).
It doesn't help that when this conversation comes up, people start to project a lot and inevitably people will start to bring up women (in antagonistic tone) creating a cesspool of bitterness to hijack the conversation.
Predictably, many of the comments here are already about women
To be sure, not referencing mental health here but rather virtually any issue institutions claim to care about.
Yeah, getting any external help is difficult. Need some inner source some way, accepting some level of 'flaws'.
Try solving a difficult problem that has more meaning other than trying to form a problem that is easier solve.
How many men dying in battles or enslaved building pyramids, or getting lung diseases in coal mines were celebrating "Men's day" throughout history?
So no, not useless and maybe should help color the conversation a bit more on WHY men are feeling as they are, because the power dynamics of society are shifting, of which men have been led to believe that they would, in fact, be at the top forever.
It does mean exactly that. 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, assume half were men, what specific benefit did they get from the German leader at the time having a penis? Zero. Zero benefit. Russia is conscripting 300,000 people/year into their war in Ukraine since 2022. What benefit do they get from Putin being a man at the top? Zero. Zero benefit.
Men and women have done dirty, dangerous, and back-breaking work through history, but the harder it is physically and the more likely to have injury and death associated with it, the more likely it's a "man's job". Plenty of women carrying children bent double standing in water plantint rice all day or picking tealeaves. Not so likely for women to be conscripted, laying stone for roads or railway, digging foundations and wells, bricklaying, construction, carving roadways through mountains, loading ships as dock workers, shipbuilding, soldiering, mining, oil drilling, blacksmithing, chemical refining, chimney sweeping, sewer cleaning.
Most men through history had no position of power whatsoever, and were not at the top of anything, and most men alive today don't and aren't.
Who held what job when, who died when, who actually held power when is irrelevant.
Which one was it?
Pedantry can be useful, but you have to at least be correct about it.