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Comment by smallnamespace | Hacker News Reader

One interesting question this article brings up is -- is there a legitimate place for gender-segregated institutions in our society?

It's a bit ironic that people will justify women-only spaces (e.g. a train car[1] or taxi[2]) as creating a safe space for women, but in the same breath deny the legitimacy of traditionally male spaces as being sexist and degrading to women, e.g. the push to make fraternities and sororities co-ed [3][4].

IMO, men have their own insecurities and worries, often with respect to their relationship with women, and having a 'safe space' to work out those issues is not only useful, but symmetrically fair.

[1] http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2016/04/04/47299760...

[2] http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/new...

[3] http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/09/16/should-colle...

[4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-harvard-shouldnt...

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Safe space for women: a train car or taxi where for once, she doesn't have to feel the threat of sexual assault, molestation, groping, what-have you. (Problem men in these environments won't usually have cause to fear.) Safe space for men: A smoking chair at the freemason's lodge where he can network his way up through society without worrying about competition from pesky women?

I'm sure I'm exaggerating, but bear with me: A lot of the traditional men's spaces look like avenues for social advancement that are closed to women. This may be incidental because men have historically run things and the politicking and networking naturally occurred in spaces where men congregated, but incidental or not, attempting to bar women from traditionally male spaces today has the effect of locking women out of society, so to speak. In a vacuum, a club where men hang out exclusively is no different than a club where women hang out exclusively, but in reality the sheriff and mayor are rubbing elbows at the elk lodge, not at the women's gym down the road. As long as men hold the reins, locking women out of the spaces where men hobnob is another tool of control.

I agree with your assessment, but the lesson that society seems to have learned is that 'all-male communities are bad', even when those communities are not loci of prestige and power.

For example, I think a lot of the hostility coming out of the Gamergate community is partly an attempt to claim 'gaming' as an all-male space. These aren't country-club millionaires figuring out how to buy the next local election.

Unless I've misunderstood you, you seem to have a weirdly different view of the Gamergate fracas than I had.

I thought the whole thing was a rejection of the attempt by members of the gaming media to paint "gaming" as some exclusively male (and explicitly anti-woman) subculture. There was no shortage of women speaking out as "members" of gg.

Via the avenue of widespread harassment of women, starting with Zoe Quinn and continuing with Anita Sarkeesian and Brianna Wu amongst many others. Thats certainly a different history.

That is a lovely joke though.

Yeah, Gamergate was probably closer to an attempt to claim gaming as a space for gamers (which might sound tautological, but the term "gamer" was heavily politicized by the gaming press because... it's complicated). It's not a good example in any case.

The example that personally comes to mind is a Daily Show segment a long time back about an all-male retreat, hosted by one Samantha Bee and shot through with mockery of the idea it was needed, condescension, and the general assumption that she understood men better than they did. (This idea that women know men's own needs, desires and experiences better than they do seems pretty commonplace. Think I've even seen men accused of "mansplaining" their own personal experiences.)

For the record, there are masonic affiliated organizations that do admit females, including females not related to a mason.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masonic_bodies

That's certainly the most common rationalization that's given for the disparity, but even if accepted as valid, the criterion of being an "avenue for social advancement" is difficult to apply to one, but not the other. What's to stop people from 'networking' in women-only cars, and what of the myriad 'women in business' networking events and clubs that exist?

As long as you ignore who in society actually has power, that will work just great.

On a totally unrelated note, there are 31 women who have served in the Senate. Ever. And there are zero women who have served as president, though that will change in February. There are a tiny minority of female board members. There is a high of 22 of the fortune 500 with female ceos.

You think that no attendees of 'women in business' networking events hold any kind of power?

> As long as you ignore who in society actually has power

> ....Senate...president...board members...ceos.

A man or a group of men having power is not the same as men, as a class, having power.

When you're discussing gender-segregated networking or social events that underlie a gender-segregated power structure it is exactly a denial of access to women.

Kiiiiinda but not really?

You're forgetting about the implied sub-selection (or lack thereof), which then needs to be re-applied to the situation over which the group has power.

Take random small town A containing subgroup B, which holds most seats of power in town A. This is the same as: Subgroup B, as a class, having power, within town A.

So let's rephrase: American men, as a class, have power in America.

Now, what happens if our sub-selection ISN'T a sub-selection, and is just "humanity"? Human men, as a class, have power in humanity.

This is backed up by leadership statistics.

Now, I think what you're trying to say is: Correlation of the "man" attribute with power is the not the same as the "man" attribute causing power".

Again, this kinda makes sense, but, AFAIK/IMHO, so long as the attribute in question is disproportionately shared by the people with power vs the distribution amongst the population, that attribute IS causing some degree of the power held.

Not really. What I was getting at was that social forces change over time. Certain members of the "man" class benefited from past social forces, not some innate powerful characteristic of the "man" class. So, it's wrong enact (and justify) policies to counteract that non-existent characteristic, like denying that class access to sex-segregated networking groups that are equivalent to those available to other classes.

Power usually goes to the classes who are most organized and cooperative. If you forbid cooperation, you eventually forbid (equal) power as well.

And what is the right number of Fortune 500 CEOs or women Senators?

~250, because the average age of a CEO is 55 and it looks like the gender ratio (at least in the US and Canada) is about 50/50 at that age: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tableaux/sum-som/l01/cst01/d...

Is there any natural limit to this?

If we take this to its logical conclusion, should every group of humans should form a stratified sample[1] of the population? What should the variables be -- age, gender orientation, sex, religion, disability status, race, color, national origin, pregnancy, marital status, number of pets, ... ?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratified_sampling

Do you see any downsides to making every group 'representative'?

Dear god yes there are downsides.

Here's my thinking:

First, consider that the sample size vs population size of CEOs is goddamn tremendous, and the size of both pools is pretty substantial. It's one thing to try to select a stratified sample of 10 out of 20; it's another to select a stratified sample 500 out of millions. I would expect the transition point to be around when people stop being people, and start being statistics.

Second - It's like dark matter, and then it gets more complicated. Notionally, men and women are equal in capability; given just that, I'd expect to see a sample representative of the population demographics. This is not what is observed, so we can posit a) inequality in capability and/or b) other forces acting on the system.

A isn't born out by other experiments, leaving B. So then it becomes a question of: What are those other forces AND are they ones we want to keep?

Contrast with age, which clearly has a correlation with inequality in capability, so less of the disparity with the theoretical stratified sample must be explained by B.

Of course, shit gets complicated fast; the correlation of skill with age is not only non-linear, but is more like a non-linear probability function of skill given an age; self-selection might at first seem to be a reasonable B force, but then you have to consider what's causing the self-selection, and what effect that should have on the "equally capable" population sizes...

At 55, it looks like CEOs should be equally split down the middle. That this is not the case means there's more forces in play than explained by the "theory".

This is classic tribalism -- like-minded people will congregate in safe spaces to share ideas and whatnot while denying entry to outsiders. Attributing it to some kind of banal hostility towards all women is nonsense, it is simply indicative of hostility towards outsiders (and in a male-dominated environment, women are outsiders).

Rigid power structures, nepotism, and the like are present everywhere but it wasn't until recently that women have been regarded as partners rather than servants. The trend will inevitably change but attacking "manliness" with silly terms like "mansplaining" and "manspreading" will only get you labelled a nitwit (and rightfully so). The goal should be to empower women, not degrade men.

I am a man. "Mansplaining" isn't degrading. It's the recognition of a common facet in Western society where men assume that women aren't competent in mathematical and technical fields at first glance and presume without cause that they need it explained to them by those men. And that first glance is because they're women. It is not, unless you get shitty when called on it, some deep character flaw. Societal inculcation is a thing and it's hard to shake without being confronted with it.

I've seen plenty of people apologize when called on it and avoid making that assumption a second time. Recognize it, do better, move on.

Just call it condescension, making it into a gendered term is bigotry. Tolerating the usage of that term is acknowledgement that bigotry towards men is acceptable.

The fact that you are a man is irrelevant, I'm also a man and I find the acceptance of bigotry towards men to be abhorrent.

Please define "bigotry" and explain, in very if-A-then-B form, exactly how "mansplain" is either an example of bigotry or encourages such.

If you believe that words mean things--which, even in today's climate, is a generally accepted position--this might be a difficult one for you.

Mansplain means taking a neutral world, "explain", and associating it with both gender and a negative connotation. It also implies that only men can be condescending in this way, and that it's impossible for a woman to do the same.

Would it be all right to say that somebody is "whitesplaining" or "gooksplaining" or "blacksplaining"?

Recognizing and calling out a particular common gendered pattern of condescension isn't bigotry toward anyone.

...Implying women don't also talk for long streams wherein men are expected to listen to them.

Any socially astute man knows that women benefit from being listened to in sustained streams-of-thought speech. It's commonly called "processing." And if you're not doing it currently, then all the women in your life, from your family to friends to lovers, will be happy when you start. It's a way of showing women respect and demonstrating that you're listening to them and take them seriously.

So both men and women will talk for long paragraphs. It's only recently that a small, vocal subset of women decided to genderize it with the term "mansplaining" to mock and dismiss men. It was kind of funny when it was just a joke, but now that it's used to shout down men and these women are forgetting their own propensity for endured, one-sided conversation, it's not funny anymore.

But secretly, I'm happy when I hear a woman use the phrase "mansplaining." It's a signal that helps me decisively eliminate her from my social life. Anyone using that term as anything more than a small side joke doesn't deserve my attention.

No, not implying that at all; thats not even rationally connected to what you are responding to.

Yes, it is. Please set aside your need to be right and think about it:

Women talk for long streams. If men were to refer to it as "womensplaining," it would be condescending.

Men talk for long streams. When the small, vocal subset of women refer to it as "mansplaining," it is condescending.

The error in logic is to say that it's a gendered pattern of condescension. Because both genders do it, it only becomes gendered when you forget that women do it, too.

Who is the Zen master who makes the grass green? It is you. You make the grass green.

Mansplaining has nothing to do with "talk[ing] for long streams". It has to do with what is being said and why. Mansplaining is when there is an assumption of ignorance on the part of a woman that can only be rectified (and must be rectified) by a man educating her on a topic, where that assumption of ignorance stems from gendered biases. And it does happen. And the reverse does not happen in any serious proportion--in no small part because of the social conditioning where women would be considered pushy and bitchy for doing so, but where men are considered leaders and experts for it.

You've failed to even grasp the topic, and yet you would condescend towards dragonwriter (one of the wisest, most insightful posters around here on a wide variety of topics) about his "need to be right" while inventing an argument out of whole cloth. Tremendous.

On topics that were traditionally feminine, like housework, childcare or cooking, women can be really condescending.

I still remember the tone used by the nurse when she "taught" to my brother how to change the diapers of his newborn. I've never seen someone that condescending.

> Mansplaining is when there is an assumption of ignorance on the part of a woman that can only be rectified (and must be rectified) by a man educating her on a topic, where that assumption of ignorance stems from gendered biases

So 'mansplaining' goes beyond simply noting a man's condescending behavior, but suggests that the only motivation is sexism. Is the evidence sufficient to prove the charge?

Maybe the man is simply rude towards everyone; maybe the woman is ignorant on the topic; maybe the guy was having a bad day.

The problem with the word is the logic that it implies. Soon we'll be finding that if a man is ever rude to a woman in public for any reason, he is automatically labeled a sexist. I'm not sure that's a very useful, or fair heuristic.

It's unfortunate that you have such a strong desire to use clearly sexist language, to the extent that you'll write at such length defending it. This is your right, of course, but please keep it off HN, which is an inclusive site.

Speaking as a woman in tech, HN is PRETTY FUCKING FAR from an "inclusive site". It's repulsive, which is why i mostly stay the fuck away from it. 4chan is at least honest about being a cesspool.

What makes you think it's not inclusive?

The usual use of "mansplaining" isn't limited to scientific and technical fields, in fact, I'd argue that is neither the original nor most common domain in which "mansplaining" was and is called out.

Oh, sure--they're just where people I know have most egregiously run into it.

> men assume that women aren't competent in mathematical and technical fields at first glance and presume without cause that they need it explained to them by those men.

Wow, what a minefield.

I don't expect anybody to be competent in mathematical or technical fields, so I generally start from the beginning until somebody says "Oh, I already worked with this particular tech stack this is the problem I can't figure out."

Immediately attributing that to the fact that they're women and the main thing they need is explanation, by a man, that's a huge leap.

Calling it Mansplaining is horrible. Like somebody else pointed out, condescending is the gender neutral way to say it, and calling it mansplaing indicates it's problem exclusive to men. Can Caitlyn Jenner mansplain? Can Oprah mansplain?

Mansplaining = commisseration + condescension

Ironically, I learned valuable psychological hacks from manspreading: When you feel down, spread yourself out and take up a bunch of space. It's really empowering!

> The goal should be to empower women, not degrade men. Yes, but - Mansplaining is meant to point out situations when men are degrading women. So it's not about degrading men, it's about degrading assholes, although yeah, the term is inherently gender'd.

Then call it what it is -- condescension.

Do we label Asians that cheat on tests in college as "chinks"? No! That's awful and bald-faced racism, we just call them cheaters with low moral standards.

This sounds like a tightly reasoned argument but is in fact just an exercise in the rhetoric of rationalist dismissal. You can see this by simply looking carefully at the words you've chosen. "Classic tribalism", you say. Apart from begging the question of what exactly is "classic" about it, there's the bigger problem of how hard it is to come up with any human conflict that can't be cast and dismissed a "tribal", from the proper border between Kaliningrad and Lithuania to whether and how cities should regulate Uber drivers.

You know the complaint about "mansplaining" is utterly bogus because of the real problem with the term, which is that English already has a universally-accepted word that means literally --- exactly literally --- the same thing: "patronizing". What you object to isn't the term: you object to the people using it, and seek to dismiss and mock them.

My strawperson-per-minute meter just pegged.

Don't you find it unreflexive and ironic to dismiss their writings as rationalistically dismissive then proceed to nitpick denotative meanings?

And how on Earth do you get that deploying a bigoted version of an existing word means the person who doesn't like getting targeted with it has no right to complain about it?

For example, how do you feel about people who call women "cunts"? By your logic, objecting to that practice would be utterly bogus (not just bogus, mind you, but utterly bogus...), because the jerks doing it have a right to do it. In your logic, the bigoted, offensive term "cunts" is fine. Anyone complaining about getting called a "cunt" doesn't dislike the term, they just want to dismiss and mock the jerks calling them that...

That's ridiculous. People who call women "cunts" are trying to verbally intimidate them through gendered, offensive references. And the same is true with people who label others "mansplainers." They're just offensive namecallers, trying to use sexual imagery to shame someone into shutting up, to demonstrate that they will go further in a conflict, that they have less to lose, and dare them to push back.

Look, I kind of understand where you're coming from, tptacek. I've read a lot of the same social theory as you in grad school. I've read a lot of your writings here and elsewhere. And I object to mainstream society in a big way, too. And I object to a lot of the tech scene as well, from the huge bets on stupid tech to the path of tech from research to military to police to consumer.

But take this from someone who wants to see you succeed: You're flipping out and not being persuasive. You're relying too much on trying to overwhelm people with big words from the literature and failing to communicate. You're letting yourself get triggered and losing the ability to relate to those who disagree with you and see two or more simultaneous perspectives in your mind at once. You're moving into all black and white territory, but you know reality isn't like that.

Once again: the word "patronize" means literally the same thing as "mansplain". It doesn't just have the same connotation. "Mansplain" is essentially the Newspeak version of "patronize".

But nobody is infuriated by "patronize", either its meaning or its clear connotation, because "patronize" is mainstream standard written English, and thus presents no good opportunities to use otherization to deflect criticism.

I don't know why you think I've been "triggered", but I assure you that I spent the next 4 minutes after writing that comment drawing a Trogdor-shaped United States to illustrate on Twitter one of Hillary Clinton's proposed campaign slogans, and I remember my emotional state during that effort far better than I do picking apart the dumb comment I replied to. But: I do appreciate the concern.

What's this about Newspeak: In my experience Newspeak was a dialect of language dictated by the illegitimate power structure to prevent the accidental communication of truthful expression which could undermine its authority.

When you say "mansplain" is the Newspeak version of "patronize," that would make the gender-less "patronize" the unspeakable, but truthful expression...

...Yet it would upset the illegitimate authority to say "patronize," so the powers require us to use "mansplain" to not reveal the underlying, genderless truth?

I think I relate to Winston Smith simply wanting a peaceful Red Barchetta cabin in the forest!

You may have "Newspeak" confused with "Doublespeak" (or I may have denuded Newspeak of its political goals). Isn't the word "doublespeak" itself an instance of Newspeak (or Basic English)? Replacing a latinization with a pair of simpler words, for instance, is what has happened in the conversion from "patronize" to "mansplain".

At any rate: the two words, patronize and mansplain, mean the same thing, so feigning offense at the gendering of "mansplain" is a pitiful way to build an argument.

Newspeak was a political tool that was supposed to limit society's freedom of though by making ideas that went against the ruling power's goals literally impossible to express. Think about how that might apply here - by replacing the genderless "patronize" with the gendered "mansplain"[1], we embed the idea that this is something only men do to women into the language itself. (Obviously this doesn't make it impossible to criticize other kinds of patronizing behaviour, just harder than with this kind - Newspeak was a fictional conceit.)

[1] And yes, one is clearly gendered while the other one isn't. If someone claimed that you couldn't describe a woman as "patronizing" because that term only applied to men, this would seem like nonsense to any English speaker, whereas "mansplaining" was explicitly coined as something only men could do to women.

"Patronize" is not genderless.

How is that?

Currently is it. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/patronize

Nowhere in there is patronize used in a gender based way at all.

A patron is simply somebody who supports you and bankrolls you. Christopher Columbus had a female patron.

Or are you grasping at straws here? Even m-w lists a male gendered meaning for the root word patron at the eighth definition. From m-w (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/patron): 8: the chief male officer in some fraternal lodges having both men and women members

The ultimate root of patronize is the Latin pater meaning ‘father’.

Yes. Words change meanings over time/society. Why are you debating etymology? Patronize no longer has a gendered meaning. You would ask a women whether or not she patronized a store, for instance.

If you're a small business owner, you'd equally thank a woman or a man for their patronage, or yell at them equally for them to stop patronizing your employees.

The word has two meanings, and the one you invoke in your latter example is gendered. You would be yelling at your women customers for talking down to your employees as if from a father to a child. Which is fine; women can act like obnoxious men, too.

Not only is Latin mostly gendered and the Latin root of this word clearly male, but the female root "matron" is also a common root for English words.

>The word has two meanings, and the one you invoke in your latter example is gendered.

Oh, tptacek, maybe you need to go outside and get some air. You really think that people are leafing through unabridged Latin dictionaries looking for ways to be subtly sexist?

No, that is not at all what I am saying. I am not criticizing the word "patronizing".

Well I found this at wikipedia:

Newspeak is the fictional language in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, written by George Orwell. It is a controlled language created by the totalitarian state Oceania as a tool to limit freedom of thought, and concepts that pose a threat to the regime such as freedom, self-expression, individuality, and peace. [1]

It matches my definition very well:

"In my experience Newspeak was a dialect of language dictated by the illegitimate power structure to prevent the accidental communication of truthful expression which could undermine its authority."

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspeak

I thought the problem was that in the current usage(or misusage), it's a quick, snappy, gendered means of shutting someone up.

Even in the original intended usage of the term, patronizing and mansplaining aren't quite the same; despite roughly analogous root words, mansplaining includes a degree of gender essentialism that patronizing lacks.

> I'm sure I'm exaggerating, but bear with me: A lot of the traditional men's spaces look like avenues for social advancement that are closed to women. This may be incidental because men have historically run things and the politicking and networking naturally occurred in spaces where men congregated, but incidental or not, attempting to bar women from traditionally male spaces today has the effect of locking women out of society, so to speak. In a vacuum, a club where men hang out exclusively is no different than a club where women hang out exclusively, but in reality the sheriff and mayor are rubbing elbows at the elk lodge, not at the women's gym down the road. As long as men hold the reins, locking women out of the spaces where men hobnob is another tool of control.

Why can't they get their own elk lodge, hmmm?

Money/Control/Power is not a fixed quantity jealously guarded by ragtag formations of men.

It's something generated by an activity of some sort.

Do the activity, reap the rewards.

I'll let Bill Burr explain the simple male brain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWhZ2XS08aQ

> Safe space for men: A smoking chair at the freemason's lodge where he can network his way up through society without worrying about competition from pesky women?

Well, a space when you can engage in so called "locker room talk" without getting accused of being sexist or rude.

Basically, at least for me, a lot of the time, when I'm with women in spaces, I feel judged. I can't say things like "son of a bitch" or "asshole" without feeling somewhat watched.

And yes I agree I swear too much, but where's my safe space?

Maybe you, y'know, shouldn't engage in so-called "locker room talk" (because let's be really real here, the "locker room talk" going around right now is bragging about committing sexual assault).

That such things can be so normalized should be proof enough that you don't need a safe space. Your safe space (and, as a white male, mine too) is the entire Western world by default.

> Maybe you, y'know, shouldn't engage in so-called "locker room talk" (because let's be really real here, the "locker room talk" going around right now is bragging about committing sexual assault).

No, that's reframing it in the context of the current presidential election.

The sort of thing that I'm talking about is "Hey, what are you doing this weekend? Oh, I'm going out with this Cuban girl I just met. I hear they're supposed to be tigers in the sack".

Notice no sexual assault there, just a conversation females might kick up a big fuss over. "Stop objectifying and stereotyping us."

Or even "What happened to your car? Oh, the transmission guy bent me over and fucked me good for 800 bucks to replace some shitty gears he probably yanked out of a junkyard".

These things should be allowed and have a safe place where you can say them.

The former is a conversation I--as a white male--would think you are, at best, skeevy, objectifying, and a little bit racist for having. Thinking that is not restricted to women at all. And you can be that kind of asshole anywhere you want to be. But you'll be considered in the context of the world you live in when you do. Why do you need a "safe space" where you can be shitty? Why not just don't be shitty?

The latter--I've used very similar phrasing in conversations with feminist advocates and not gotten a bit of static because the context they were used in was perfectly clear and not avowedly harmful, as per your first example. I think you're misunderstanding the objections that would be raised about your speech.

It's very interesting the quick journey from "skeevy, objectifying and a little bit racist" to shitty and asshole and avowedly harmful. I fail to see how that statement is harmful at all.

> feminist advocates and not gotten a bit of static because the context they were used in was perfectly clear and not avowedly harmful

Do they even have the right to complain? You use whatever language you want, and they can choose whether or not to hang out with you. "He's boring to talk to, all he wants to talk about is Yankees baseball". Any allegation of misogyny these days or even worse, sexual misconduct will ruin the life of a man. Even if he managed to clear himself of criminal wrongdoing, his career is over.

That's not so much true as a thing that "mens rights" advocates seem to enjoy saying. In fact: the available evidence points sharply in the other direction.

Case in point, duke lacrosse players and Derrick Rose.

Heck, Derrick Rose's accuser didn't even have her name made public whereas Derrick Rose had his name dragged through the mud and had to spend plenty of time and money on lawyers. Whatever happened to the legal system being public record?

That's the best case scenario. The woman was trying to settle, but ended up trying to sue for 21 million. Again, that is the best case scenario, that you have enough time and resources to lawyer up.

If somebody accuses you of something like that when you're at work, there is no due process when it comes to HR. You can sue for wrongful termination, but that's hard to prove and requires expensive lawyers.

Neither of these examples support the point you attempted to make.

> Maybe you, y'know, shouldn't engage in so-called "locker room talk" (because let's be really real here, the "locker room talk" going around right now is bragging about committing sexual assault).

You're shitting me. The leap you just made from "locker-room talk" equating to "bragging about sexual assault" is holy-fuck-what-the-hell-wrong-with-you absurd.

I just can't.

Did you miss "going around right now", somehow? "Locker room talk" has emerged as a defense in the last two weeks for Donald Trump bragging to Billy Bush, with a hot mic, that he sexually assaults women.

That phrase wouldn't be being used if it were not at the forefront of the public consciousness, and that it is being used to moderate bragging about sexual assault is telling.

No, I didn't miss it.

Those of us who aren't obsessing over this reality TV-show, joke of an election don't think like that.

You're taking a phrase which has existed for, oh, I don't know, probably as long as locker rooms have existed, and re-branding it as "locker room talk now equals bragging about sexual assault" henceforth until the end of time.

Do you realize how dangerous that is?

In the same vein as this article (tangentially): the term "mancave" has been branded forever as offensive to feminists. We're apparently heading down the same road with "locker room talk". Unreal.

Again, I just can't.

No, how do you equate Trump bragging about his success with women to sexual assault?

He basically said that if you're famous, women let you do things to them. As an example, he just said "I'm automatically attracted to beautiful [women]—I just start kissing them. It's like a magnet. Just kiss. I don't even wait. And when you're a star they let you do it. You can do anything ... Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything."

He didn't sexually assault anybody, they consented. Where are you getting sexual assault from? And his statement is true once you hit a certain level of fame/wealth.

Just because they let you do it doesn't mean they want you to do it. Consent is not about whether or not you can get away with it. It's about ensuring that the other person also wants it.

No it's not. Consent is a synonym of permit (permission).

I consent to the groping of my ball sack at the airport because those are the rules, but I'd prefer they didn't do it.

I really hope i'm never in a room with you.

You're saying people should censor and filter themselves at all times, to everyone, about everything? That's fucked up. Everyone needs a place to be themselves regardless of how often they say things that would micro-aggress people. That's why men find places to have locker room banter. Just because they are misguided by your own standards doesn't mean they deserve social solitary confinement. You should be glad they have the sense to only speak their mind in private settings rather than at the workplace or in public.

You don't have to censor or filter yourself. But objectification and sexism and racism aren't "being yourself" and the idea if it is ludicrous; it's just being hidebound and shitty. Why should you have a sinecure from which to be hidebound and shitty? Why not just not be hidebound and shitty?

I would rather they not have the sense to "speak their mind in private settings"; I would like to know who I should not trust because of who they have decided to be.

This is a really narrow minded and judgmental perspective. I hope some day you encounter more diversity in your life and have more empathy towards others.

I presume the safe space you're looking for does in fact exist, but that it's located in a country that doesn't outlaw sexual battery.

That's a hell of leap from "not having to be politically correct" to "sexual battery".

How did you get there exactly?

The specific language you're referring to with "locker room talk".

What, "just kiss, don't even wait"?

Who are you kidding here? If you pay enough attention to invoke "locker room talk", you know what I'm referring to.

As long as it's voluntary and the other genders can just as easily make their own spaces then I don't see there being a problem with it. But I fear that this won't be the case. I can't imagine male-only organizations/services/etc being take lightly. There is a lot of historical baggage that gets lumped onto these ideas when you reframe it to be for a non-historically oppressed group.

These have to be looked at individually with more context than just gender division. Such as why they exist, in the case of female only subway cars for safety in Mexico city. Having experienced the chaos and overcrowding of subways in Mexico city I'm not surprise at all this was done. But I did notice the women's cars were far emptier so these compromises always have trade-offs that need to be considered so they don't add resentment, or further create societal divisions, and end up fueling the problem.

There have been white only organizations at universities that were shut down even though the same schools had black-only and asian-only organizations, but there was more context to this issue than just race as the white groups political positions of white empowerment were seen as masking a racist movement (the founder later joined a white nationalist group after leaving school). So it wasn't a straight forward comparison of race equality as they wanted it to seem.

So I don't think the idea can be easily accepted/dismissed at a high level without context.

I've heard of a few Men's Circles around LA; there seem to be more Women's Circles, but it's still a thing.

And the idea is just what you're talking about, and really, it's just an application of the support group idea: A group of people with a shared experience get together to talk about it.

There is an experience of "being a man", and there's an experience of "being a woman". Things really only get tricky when you have people with both experiences.

> women-only spaces (e.g. a train car[1] or taxi[2])

I'm sure that an equivalent men-only train car or taxi could be established if necessary. At least I haven't heard about any resistance to making that kind of safe space. I don't think anybody is trying to justify gender biased transportation; the difference is simply due to lack of demand.

We tried having a 'Men's Shed' in our town, but I think it got shut down by a bunch of harpies.

That negative experience aside I think it is fine for men and women to spend time apart if it is voluntary.

When a member of the opposite sex, even one, is in a group of the other sex then the atmosphere changes. I don't have a better way to describe it, but unsurprisingly it suppresses some activities.

I think what I hate most, and I really do mean hate, about the left is how they have damaged something which used to be much stronger, which is male friendship. They associated male friends with homoerotic implications because gay sexuality is their fixation. There is nothing wrong with being gay, I support all forms of civil liberties for gays including marriage, I voted for it in the Irish election recently even though I had to visit 4 polling stations to get it in properly. Nonetheless I believe also that platonic male friendship has suffered badly in the last few decades for no good reason. Gay sexuality does not threaten male friendship, but the politically motivated and constant insertion of it into everyday life, especially through the media has been destructive. Many many men have not evolved a deeper friendship because they were afraid of being sniggered at as homosexuals, and I think that is wrong.

If you read books about generations gone by it is obvious that many men had much deeper friendships than they do today. Today those sorts of friendships are not really possible without stupid irrelevant discussions about sexuality.

LOL! Somebody has just gone through my entire post history and downvoted all of it.

I don't care about internet points jackass.

Many men feel the way I do about this. Making who you fuck the main part of your identity is as pointless as making your race the main part of your identity. This is a valid opinion and I'm sticking to it unless somebody has a good argument for why I'm wrong.

We've asked you before not to do this—please stop.

I agree that male friendship has suffered a lot over the past few decades, and the decline of overtly exclusively male organisations for adults probably has something to do with that. The only real exceptions I can think of are athletic leagues and religious activities. Basically you can play in a men's soccer league or go to a men's bible study and nobody will think it's odd or sinister, but joining an overtly male only social club will probably be viewed differently. I wonder if the guys in this article would have just joined a local lodge of some kind 50 years ago and been happy with that.

You could just try sending a dude you want to get to know better a Facebook or Twitter DM suggesting a beer or two. I don't know. Maybe the "harpies" are after the men hanging out at bars where you are. That trick seems to work pretty well for me.

That's what it is.

It is creepy to be hyperaware of male socialization but then to be ok with women only gyms and yoga classes.

Most young men aren't interested in Church or the GAA (sporting organization) today, which leaves basically the pub, not a healthy environment in some cases, as the remaining place a male could make new friends.

Here I'll suggest something controversial (on HN) but obvious. I don't believe men have the same kind of friendships most women do. This is because for many woman in society they have a stronger connection to their family.

Friendships for men are something more, they require them in order to build cooperative things like companies.

The fact is that the majority of risky enterprises are created and led by men. I don't need to put in caveats as legally required in California /s, it is so and has been so for millennia.

Several famous entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley have said that the best people to start a company with, are people you have known for a long time beforehand. That can only mean a friend or close associate.

My question would be: Why on earth are we surprised at a decline in new business creation when the basic link that makes it work, friendship, has been under strain for decades?!

> We tried having a 'Men's Shed' in our town, but I think it got shut down by a bunch of harpies.

happy is a place where the mythical Greek creatures dwell, and where they have enough good sense to shut down questionable establishments

> I voted for it in the Irish election recently even though I had to visit 4 polling stations to get it in properly

I call bullshit. Everyone here knows it was a referendum, not an election, and everyone here knows where they're supposed to vote

regarding the homosexuality scare, it's the right and conservatives you have to thank for, not the left.

Harpy's a rather unpleasant term to use, sure. On the other hand, at least around where I am Men's Sheds is a program that was created to tackle social isolation amongst elderly men, and the reason it's gendered is because the problem it's solving is (possibly because elderly women already have a bunch of gender-specific options). Given that, I can understand why someone wouldn't be terribly happy with people who campaigned to block it based on the fact it's aimed at men.

> I call bullshit. Everyone here knows it was a referendum, not an election,

I meant referendum.

> and everyone here knows where they're supposed to vote

I didn't receive the card in the post that enables you to know which polling station to go to so I had to visit the nearest ones by process of elimination.

> regarding the homosexuality scare, it's the right and conservatives you have to thank for, not the left.

I am fully aware that the right, specifically the Christian right has persecuted homosexuals in the past.

However today it is primarily the left that are manufacturing moral panics.

> happy is a place where the mythical Greek creatures dwell, and where they have enough good sense to shut down questionable establishments

It was nothing more than a woodworking cooperative, not a cabal of sinister intrigue against the sisterhood.

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