• GhostFence@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    The major one I’ve noticed is putting down women for having a preference on height or even dick size, but men are allowed to only want big boobs or petite women because it’s “a natural expression of human sexuality.”

    I see men being constantly shamed and catching blowback for those preferences. I mean we can’t hope to succeed in shaming women into wanting short men or poor men, etc. but shouldn’t the same rule apply to men? More insane is that wanting a tall man is more “legitimate” than wanting big boobs or athletic build in women. The rules are constantly altered to justify all women’s preferences and demonize men’s.

    Also as a man you can be banned from Reddit not for saying “no trans woman” but just for saying “I want a cis woman”. Feminist subreddits will go for your head, too. (Don’t get me wrong if one of my kids is dating a trans person I will support them totally also.) I’ve gotten the vibe that you risk your account here over that, too.

    • Sombyr@lemmy.zip
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      10 months ago

      You are correct that in most environments, it is the other way around. In most places, women wanting tall men is considered normal and acceptable, but men having any preference at all is not. My point was not about how things are in society as a whole, but how things are on the larger Lemmy instances. However, even that seems to have rapidly changed since I made this comment. There was a thread about men’s issues I saw recently that didn’t devolve into “this is why women are awful” and actually stayed on topic, and that was really nice to see.

      What I was frustrated about was that there was no space where both men’s and women’s preferences were respected, and also not resorting to body shaming when people do not meet those preferences. Lemmy is primarily dominated by men, which naturally makes it easier to talk about men’s issues without being shamed for it, but it did lead, for a while, to women’s issues not only being overlooked, but also often being intentionally ignored or outright shamed, mostly because men could not understand these issues they’d never experienced, so they didn’t feel as real (which is largely the same reason women often have trouble respecting men’s issues.)

      I’m guessing it has to do with Lemmy’s population finally growing again and new perspectives being thrown into the mix, but I’ve noticed a lot more empathy about gendered issues lately, which is nice to see.

      As far as whether you risk your account for only wanting cis women, probably depends heavily on the instance. A shocking amount of the time people use preference as a cover for bigotry, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some mods are heavy on the trigger finger when it comes to that. Not that there’s not legit reasons to not want to date trans women. We can’t provide biological children and a large portion of us have no desire to “fully” transition, which are both reasonable reasons to not want to be with a trans woman (and of course that’s not an exhaustive list of every valid reason.) It’s just often people who say that mean they don’t view trans women as actual women and don’t want to date them because they’re “not gay.”

      • GhostFence@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        You are correct that in most environments, it is the other way around. In most places, women wanting tall men is considered normal and acceptable, but men having any preference at all is not. My point was not about how things are in society as a whole, but how things are on the larger Lemmy instances. However, even that seems to have rapidly changed since I made this comment. There was a thread about men’s issues I saw recently that didn’t devolve into “this is why women are awful” and actually stayed on topic, and that was really nice to see.

        I used to be a MRA until Trump happened and the gender loyalism just got too much to handle. I can’t put up with gender jingoism (“my gender, right or wrong”) nonsense from either side. I had to part ways for good when they started saying the 19th should be revoked. “This is why wo/men are awful” is basically saying one sucks at vetting people without actually saying one sucks at vetting people.

        As for women wanting tall men, or men not wanting fat women for that matter, the ramifications of said preference leaves a lot of men and women out in the cold, but what can you do? Freedom to choose who you want to be intimate with is sancrosanct. Depressing (I got a 12 year old son aging into this shithole situation) but can’t be fixed because it isn’t biology, it goes way deeper than that, it’s spiritual. What can and must be fixed, though, is the shaming: shit like “Fat shaming month” or women walking up in bars using measuring tape to see a guy’s actual height. The “fat women / short men kill yourselves” shit that sometimes flourishes unchecked in social media before admins step in and nix it long after it has hit a ton of eyeballs.

        There is a prevalent culture of shaming someone for what they can’t help or can’t easily help and then acting like they are the problem when you cause them to have insecurities related to that. Full scale industrialized cultural-level gaslighting without apology. We need to end that… but how? It’s like it’s also part of our spiritual zeitgeist. I mean some of us are aware and awake, but overall? Might as well say everyone stop being human. But it’s also spiritually embedded for those who are awake to refuse to stop fighting the good fight. That windmill will see no peace from my lance.

        As far as whether you risk your account for only wanting cis women, probably depends heavily on the instance. A shocking amount of the time people use preference as a cover for bigotry, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some mods are heavy on the trigger finger when it comes to that. Not that there’s not legit reasons to not want to date trans women. We can’t provide biological children and a large portion of us have no desire to “fully” transition, which are both reasonable reasons to not want to be with a trans woman (and of course that’s not an exhaustive list of every valid reason.) It’s just often people who say that mean they don’t view trans women as actual women and don’t want to date them because they’re “not gay.”

        I have a special pile of beef for the whole “you’re dating a trans woman hahahaha you suck” mentality. Mods and admins being trigger happy af about trans issues is an affront, but so is that. I’m buying plenty of lances for tilting against that windmill, too. Break one, I come back with another…