From Misanthrope to Misandryphobia; Individualism vs collectivism among the gender movements.

in #individualism8 years ago (edited)

"Meninism" as it has come to be called, is part of a larger male gender movement, which also includes the Men's Rights Movement (MRM), Men's Rights Activism (MRA), and "Men Going Their Own Way" (MGTOW). These movements have the potential to become forms of in-group favoritism, which is a pattern of bias that favors members of one's in-group over out-group members. This interaction has been researched by many psychologists and linked to many theories related to group conflict and prejudice. Similar to feminist claims of misogyny, this can be driven by a collective fear reaction to perceived "misandry", which I've termed as "Misandryphobia".

mgtow mra vs feminists

It may be healthier to view both misandry and misogyny as similar types of misanthrope, free of any collective fear response that generates the "us vs them" mentality so often seen among feminists and other activist groups. Such conflict and prejudice could play right into a divide and conquer agenda for males vs females, to keep individuals compartmentalized in a potential "gender war" that could be positioning itself to make the race war look like a "cake walk".

"Only the individual thinks. Only the individual acts." - Ludwig von Mises

There are collectivist and individualist aspects of both gender movements. The individualist aspects of the male movement are somewhat characterized by MGTOW, and personified by individuals like Sandman, while the individualist aspects of the female movement are mostly characterized by 4th wave feminism, and somewhat personified by individuals like Karen Straughan. Both groups also contain a degree of authoritarian collectivism as well. The collectivist aspects of the male movement are exemplified more by the more authoritarian forms of Meninism and MRA, while the collectivist aspects of the female movement are infamously known as 3rd wave feminism. If one were to plot a political compass of these groups, there would be some overlap between them, but the overall political compass would look something like this:

Gender Compass

It's my understanding that the more Individual and anti-authoritarian aspects of both gender movements have a common ground within the philosophy of Individualism. If you were to take those aspects of MGTOW, like self-ownership, self-reliance, self governance, and individual responsibility, and combine them with those same aspects of 4th wave feminism, you'd have a shared base of Individualism on which to build solid relations between both gender movements in unity against authoritarianism, instead of against each other.

happy-march-8.preview


My name is Shane, and you can find me @ my Facebook page, as well as a number of libertarian and voluntaryist oriented Facebook pages that I help admin for, such as Anarcho-Consciousness, Psychologic-Anarchist, Living In Modern Times, Anarchy is for Lovers, Counter-Establishment Economics, Self-Ownership, Non Aggression Principle, Strictly Liberty, The Pull Out Method, The Iconoclast, and my newest page Autonomous.

My goal is to help unify the separate activist spheres of philosophy, psychology, and spirituality into a cohesive and multidisciplinary movement which aims to free the body, mind, and spirit of autonomous individuals everywhere.