Most of the time I'm not one to demand apologies, but I think the three of you, in your eagerness to be sympathetic, may have failed to consider the place where this apology came from. It seemed to me like Sajainta was apologizing for personal reasons, not to earn anyone's forgiveness or sympathy. Perhaps I'm mistaken in that, but it's easy to see how I could be right. For one thing, there is the fact that not all males are rapists or even harassers, and in this community we've always been quick to discourage lumping people together in groups when the group descriptions are not inherently representative of the character of the individuals. For another thing, if Sajainta strives toward the same standards of self-betterment that we do, she is totally in the right to recognize a prejudice within her--whether or not that prejudice may be emotionally justifiable--and to want to do better than that in her thoughts and even, eventually, her feelings.
If I'm right, then it's not an apology that's ours to accept...and we don't really have any place rejecting it, either.
As for the subject of misandry itself, I think, as I just pointed out, it is more emotionally justifiable than misogyny is. It would be hard to paint an interpretation of history where females were the aggressors and males the victims. Males are more likely much more likely to find sexist outlets in their search for sexual partnership and social validation. Whether that's genetic or social, it's undeniable that malekind produces a lot of sexists. And, frankly, "sexist" in this wider sense is almost a euphemism, since what we're usually talking about is rape, murder, and slavery. Who wouldn't resent that?
But to hold males a group solely responsible for the kinds of abuses which are more common to males is still sexism, as surely as racism is upheld by pointing out the cultural disparities between blacks and whites and then using that to make blanket judgments about all members of the various communities. It simply isn't defensible to hold all males responsible for the abuses of misogyny, because it assumes that practically
every male is either a rapist or a rapist-in-waiting, and that's not true. We are a domesticated species. We can be made to accept--or reject--almost any premise. I think of that every time I think of the Sean Hannity show and consider that he gets a larger audience than Rachel Maddow.
Misandry, like misogyny, is practiced by both sexes and is just as counterproductive--albeit not as destructive--as its counterpart. Many of the problems with our images of masculinity are generated from misandristic sources...which are often themselves misogynistic in intent. For instance, there's a stigma on crying (unless they're "manly" tears). The unspoken--or, in the case of "manly," spoken--implication is that crying is weak and only females do it. That itself is misogynistic, but the ban on a perfectly reasonable behavior is misandristic because it punishes males. A cleaner example of a more direct form of misandry is the idea that males are somehow stupider, coarser, less sensitive, and less considerate than females are. This one is practiced by both sexes, and it's all wrong. Individual variation once again defies sex-specific categorizations. And then there's something like this:
As soon as a man walks into a room, within the next ten seconds he knows the position of every woman in the room, as if this were Metal Gear Solid with its onscreen radar. When he talks to a woman he finds attractive part of his mind is devoted to the mission of discovering whether there's any kind of ring on her finger. It's subconscious, and happens that fast. What I'm not sure about is whether it's completely a societal construct or if this is an evolutionary throwback. And I'm not sure whether women experience these kinds of things to the same degree as we do.
Look at that last sentence. His reasonable and well-meaning expression of ignorance is nevertheless a glaring affirmation that he saw fit to judge all males in exactly the same manner which he was so hesitant to judge all of females. I think most people are too comfortable speaking on behalf of their entire sex simply by virtue of membership in it. Now, it may be true that males instinctively and instantaneously scan all individuals who come into their range for sexual desirability. Or it may not be true. Or it may be true for only some males. And he already admits he doesn't know how the equations balance for females. What, then, are we to make of the implications of the declaration?
More practically, misandry prevents males from otherwise legitimate behavioral outlets, and makes it more difficult for all people to judge male individuals objectively. I cannot but be against it, and I suspect we will find that defying misogyny cannot be achieved without defying misandry as well.
Anyone who proclaims their resistance to misandry, and is even willing to admit it of themselves--and we all do have some portion of sexism in ourselves, great or small, known or unseen--deserves acknowledgment. Sajainta may have structured her proclamation as an apology, but I think that says more about her perspective coming from a hard life, and very little about the significance of the proclamation itself.
