I teach in schools and I have never seen young men as radicalised by the far right as they are now. I have never been so often warned by teachers about students before taking their classes. There is a level of rage there that is startling.
Polls in the US have shown gradual drifting of young voters to the right, and much of the left/liberal reaction has been ‘these polls are wrong, because young people are hard to poll’, and maybe they’re right, but there is no shortage of evidence for the trend elsewhere.
Why is this so gendered?
It is reflected in most far right protests too, where men FAR outnumber women.
Isn’t it time we stopped looking just at race/poverty/religion as drivers of far-right terrorism in the Western world, and address the uncomfortable fact that maleness drives it too?
Then ask why?
Once we know that male supremacy is the crux of it, then what? How does one undermine the toxic bits and bring these boys back to democracy and equality? We already know that equality feels like oppression to the privileged, how do we activate empathy in them and undermine grievance?
It starts by how we treat them as babies, toddlers and children. Baby boys are more likely to have abusive head injuries, boys are more likely to have avoidant attachment. And so on.
Yes. But difficult in a society as firmly patriarchal as the US. That needs dismantling too. But can’t see it happening. “Handmaid’s tale” seems a much more likely future
Thanks for the recommendation. I read this review about it: collider.com/the-mask-you...
Seems it’s a lot of describing it without actionable suggestions for solving it, but maybe it could be useful to people who don’t already see how they’re conditioned.
Of the phrase “male supremacy” we have two options for what is the root cause; either “male” or “supremacy,” and it’s 100% supremacy, not “male.”
Problem is, everyone believes in “meritocracy” so we can’t reject “supremacy” without rejecting the “supremacy of academics or technocrats,” lol
This leads to heavily motivated reasoning. To protect “academic elites” (and our partisan elites of whatever field), we avoid critiquing supremacy generally, fail to critique neoliberalism and “centrism” (fiscal conservatism), and we miss the boat. We instead blame “males.”
It’s not “blaming males” any more that white supremacy is “blaming whites”.
That’s a (forgive me) very silly reduction of what is something serious & threatening to women. All fascistic authoritarian governments have forced women into the home, the kitchen & the delivery suite
Come the fuck on. You said it was “maleness” that drives “terrorism.”
That’s backwards.
It’s the political ideology that drives both terrorism generally, and each of the specific supremacies, including white and male.
I have a friend who was very much a Democrat. She even worked for a Democratic politician. Then, she got married to a man who I think was abusive and controlling. She ended up completely radicalized and went full QAnon/MAGA. I definitely believe her now ex-husband played a huge part in it.
Same reason you see the same dudes, and the influencers that create them like Jordan Peterson, pining for patriarchal worldviews where women are considered property of the men in their lives.
I personally believe that it's all rooted in a deep seated insecurity, which also drives their belief any any equity in treatment must be an assault on their own privilege. A view which is heavily cultivated by the grifters that prey on them.
Y’all keep looking for the magic identity that causes this, but it’s not merry one aspect of identity. It’s rightwing ideology, and specifically “fiscal conservatism” that’s the core problem, but that’s probably part of you own ideology, so you’ll say that it’s “males” or whatever.
That’s not what the research reveals. Misogyny goes hand in hand far-right extremism. It is a core value
You cannot ignore the huge gender disparity within far right groups
Nor the huge importance the far right of the Republican Party is placing on delivering laws that harm women….👇🏻
Anti abortion, anti sex education, anti contraception, monitoring periods in athletes and so on and so on
None of that is explained by “fiscal conservatism”. Just because a truth is unpalatable to you doesn’t negate its validity
The need to dominate, control and use women really is a thing!
You have causality backwards. It’s not “maleness” that causes rightwing ideology, but rightwing ideology that generalizes and spreads, causing all those other political effects. Yes, it’s “fiscal conservatism” that is a root of it.
Does “maleness” always imply “rightwing ideology?” No, it doesn’t.
Does “rightwing ideology” always imply “male supremacy” and “toxic masculinity?” Yes, yes it does.
The causality goes in one direction, and yours was backwards.
“Fiscal conservatism” is rightwing ideology implemented fiscally. That’s what it is. People think it’s just about “balanced budgets” but that’s not at all what it’s really about. If rightwing ideology has a position, “fiscal conservatism” has a policy for it.
I think part of the equation is that white women, as a large group (I'm not saying all or anything like that), keep voting for that, as opposed to every other race in America so it's not something that seems to cross certain boundaries, as a whole (even though there are swings and outliers)
