International Men's Day is apparently controversial

[rustypouch]

This falsely assumes there is rationality to an issue that is heavily influenced by culture.

For example, in my earlier underpaid years as a nurse, we were frequently short staffed. Normally in a labor market, when there is a shortage of supply, demand should dictate that wages rise.

But it didn't because wages were kept low by what in any other profession would have been considered illegal collusion. Hospitals colluded to all pay the same wages to nurses. They colluded not to compete for each others' nursing staff. The excuses proliferated, nurses couldn't strike because patients would suffer and so on.

1199 came in and began to provide better union representation than we had with nurses organizations that had union branches. But it wasn't enough to break the hospital monopoly on wages.

A change occurred in the mid-eighties, somewhat of a perfect storm:

• Insurance companies began paying by the diagnosis instead of by patient need. Hospitals were forced to send sicker patients home sooner.
• Advances in medical care upped the technology in intensive care units by a large degree.
• Nursing staffing agencies began providing ICU nurses that hospitals needed more and more. It was more and more difficult for hospitals to function if short staffed.
• As hospitals faced competition for the first time, agencies started paying nurses more and more, and hospitals were forced to pay the rising costs. Nurses began fleeing the hospitals in droves to work for the agencies.
• In no time hospitals were forced to pay nurses more to keep them from leaving.

For the first time in the history of nursing in the US, the market forces of supply and demand hit hospital labor forces. I was in the first wave of nurses that went to work for the agencies and eventually became an independent contractor cutting out the agency middle-men. My wages went up 300% in just a few months then doubled in the subsequent year.

Today nursing wages have reached parity in many positions. Nurse managers are still seriously underpaid compared to equivalent managerial fields, but it's much better than it used to be because the hospitals had to pay managers more than floor staff. But nursing management position pay still isn't comparable to hospital administrator pay despite the fact nurse managers have greater responsibilities. There was a saying among us that nurses were rewarded with titles rather than better pay.


Edited to add: So don't try to tell me women are only underpaid relative to men because they work fewer hours and take time off to have kids. I watched the cork suppressing supply and demand pop off first hand. I was involved in the the court case we had to pursue to become independent contractors in this state because the people at the state labor and industry that made these judgements had an image of a nurse as the little bedpan girl. We had to educate them that nursing was a profession in its own right and we weren't a mere extension of doctors.

And yes, it was a sexist issue, first and foremost. But we had another saying that nurses were their own worst enemy because women are just as much a product of the culture as men are.

Why the need to turn a thread about how people who are not you might need help, into whining about your perceived oppression?

Why is total compensation important, but not hourly?

 

[cullennz]

I'm still trying to work out how a thread about a mens day keeps being threadjacked into a conversation about how bad women have it

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Why the need to turn a thread about how people who are not you might need help, into whining about your perceived oppression?

Why is total compensation important, but not hourly?

I didn't turn the thread. I made a comment about how people who objected to the movement might have acted instead and I was jumped on because the example of how that might have been done used phrasing that was carelessly too broad for a bunch of red herring nitpickers.

Don't blame me for defending an important women's issue just because a bunch of boys didn't like their male privilege pointed out.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I'm still trying to work out how a thread about a mens day keeps being threadjacked into a conversation about how bad women have it

The thread was about why the proposed men's day was controversial. Perhaps the OP was only seeking cheerleaders for the cause?

 

[cullennz]

The thread was about why the proposed men's day was controversial. Perhaps the OP was only seeking cheerleaders for the cause?

The threadjacks aren't talking about why it's controversial. They are moaning about sexism against females

 

[rustypouch]

I didn't turn the thread. I made a comment about how people who objected to the movement might have acted instead and I was jumped on because the example of how that might have been done used phrasing that was carelessly too broad for a bunch of red herring nitpickers.

Don't blame me for defending an important women's issue just because a bunch of boys didn't like their male privilege pointed out.

Even if you didn't start the derail, you continued it. And that's a great non-answer.

What's wrong with pointing out that men have problems and issues, that society tends to ignore, and that they could use support? There are many negative things which overly affect men. Or is a suicide rate four times that of women because of privilege, and doesn't matter?

 

[Information Analyst]

I can assure you that the Building Trades are all constantly saying that they need more women in their ranks.

I think the point was more that while the trade wants to change, it's not a big issue for radical feminists. ISTR seeing it noted that in the UK, at least, women on construction sites are far more likely to be qualified professionals than grunts doing the manual work.

 

[Information Analyst]

Women would welcome with open arms more men in traditionally women's fields because we know it would mean those professions would move higher up the pay-value scale.

I wouldn't bet on that. There are plenty of crappily-paid male dominated jobs.

 

[Information Analyst]

From the files of shooting fish in a barrel:

Male Nurses Make More Money

More Men Becoming Nurses—With Higher Pay

Male nurses overtake females on career ladder

There Will Be More Male Nurses; They’ll Still Get Paid More

When you've been discriminated against half your working career, it isn't just an anecdote.

But this is in an unregulated market, right? I'd be very surprised if it were true in a regulated market, e.g. the NHS in the UK. Certainly the only UK-based reference I can find suggests that males nurses here earn on average only 1% more than female nurses - far less of a difference than in the US. Certainly my experience of working in the NHS is that women predominate in the majority of roles, and at virtually all levels.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Well I shall flog myself 30 times.

My bad for giving you chip-on-the-shoulder-men a semantic sidetrack, nitpicking something I've already said I didn't mean literally.

How about addressing the actual issues instead of a gotcha misstatement?

Actually, I wasn't even participating in the discussion, I only commented on the way you'd posted something incorrect and then when it was pointed out, instead of withdrawing it or admiting you'd made a mistake you try and blame the people who called you on it of being nitpicky or ludicrously pedantic because apparently the difference between "all men" and "men who can be shown to earn more money for doing the same job as women with equal seniority who earn less than them" is 'pc language' and doesn't change the meaning of what you wrote at all.. But I'm impressed by the way that you're able to turn your own mistake into little digs at people who point it out, accusing people of nitpicking, PC language and semantic sidetracking is much less derailing than 'Sorry, I miswrote let me restate it' would have been.

I'll make a point of telling my wife about how I'm a chip-on -the-shoulder man though , she'll be very amused to hear that I want her to earn less, she's paying the mortgage and bills since her extremely successful career that she enjoys allowed me to quit my own relative successful one that I absolutely hated and do jobs that I enjoy but don't generally make much money. It's nice that you feel you know me we'll enough to insult me, I guess. I apologise if I don't do likewise, on the whole I prefer not to call people names, even if I think I might not agree with them.

 

[d4m10n]

Men are greatly overrepresented in many negative metrics. Suicide, homelessness, workplace injuries and fatalities, life expectancy, etc.

If we work in a clever evidence-based way to reduce suicide, homelessness, workplace injuries, mass incarceration, etc. we can expect that the benefits will tend to flow to the groups hardest hit by those social ills.

If we try to frame those same ills as "men's issues" then feminists will come along and start complaining about "male apologies" and whatnot, and they will find some way to derail the topic back to women's issues, male privilege, and the perpetual war of the sexes.

Not helpful, imo.

 

[Corsair 115]

Oh for pity's sake, give up with the BS excuses and male apologies.

You are wrong. And you need to look further than apologists' websites.

Evasion noted. Use of emotional language ("apologists") noted.

(How exactly is the BLS web site an "apologist" site? Inquiring minds want to know.

I find it amusing demonstrable differences in hours worked between men and women are, magically one assumes, of no consequence in what one will end up earning in a year.)

 

[Corsair 115]

Why is total compensation important, but not hourly?

Unless one is being paid a fixed yearly wage, the rate of pay per unit of time worked and the total number of time units worked in a year will, quite obviously, affect the earnings for the year.

This data is inconvenient to certain ideological arguments, hence why it is often quietly brushed under the carpet.

I'm still trying to work out how a thread about a mens day keeps being threadjacked into a conversation about how bad women have it

A cynic or wag would say it is a standard (third wave) feminist argumentation tactic. (The possibility that women in the western world are not quite the hapless victims they are typically portrayed as by third wave feminism is a possibility that cannot be tolerated.)

 

[Corsair 115]

We all know how those stats are manipulated to make that case.

I missed this earlier. There's a substantive allegation made in the above, to which no citations to supporting evidence is offered. I'll ask directly: What is your evidence that statistics are being deliberately manipulated? Your allegation, on its face, is rather conspiratorial.

How about Scarlet Johansson's pay? I'd like to point out that actors are not exactly paid by the hour, and it's difficult to reach a conclusion based on anecdotes.

Other than certain union-mandated minimum pay rates, pay generally follows box office draw or broadcast ratings, and the negotiating ability of the actor/actress or their representative.

 

[Belz...]

I missed this earlier. There's a substantive allegation made in the above, to which no citations to supporting evidence is offered. I'll ask directly: What is your evidence that statistics are being deliberately manipulated? Your allegation, on its face, is rather conspiratorial.

I've already asked and have been ignored. Or perhaps I'm on ignore.

 

[Corsair 115]

You are wrong. And you need to look further than apologists' websites.

Returning to the above for a moment, I have a few questions re: the bolded.

• What is the definition of what constitutes an "apologist"?
• What are the criteria which go into that definition?
• What exactly makes a web site an "apologist" web site?
• Do you have a list you can show of all the web sites you consider "apologist"?
• Do you have a corresponding list of web sites which are not "apologist"?

These are the questions that immediately come to mind. I may have others later.

I've already asked and have been ignored. Or perhaps I'm on ignore.

D'Oh! I missed that too.

Well, can't hurt to have someone else ask the question as well I suppose.

 

[pharphis]

I've been reading along but haven't had much time to respond so I've probably missed some things. Let me know in case I forget

So men want what, more counseling?

Not sure about "the same crimes" but just like child custody, I'll give you that one.

Job satisfaction? Sorry, that sounds like padding the list. Feel free to post a citation explaining further how that is men getting an unequal deal.

Men in nursing not only are NOT discriminated against, they get promoted faster and paid more than female nurses. You need to check your facts there.

Male circumcision is not a gender discrimination issue. I could say women suffer more complications in pregnancy if you want a tit for tat medical list by gender.

You want to claim men are disadvantaged in sports scholarships?

Well, women do claim that abortion rights for example are women's rights. I would agree, personally, and by that same reasoning I would treat issues with circumcision to be male issues. Everything to do with pregnancy has to do with women. After birth however, things become more complicated imo (how tolerable is abandonment (such as adoption) by a father compared to a mother? Frankly I don't know the answer to this)

I think you misunderstood what I said about sports scholarships. I don't care about those at all because sports are already mostly separated by sex and for good reason. I consider amount of scholarships with regard to sports irrelevant because it's more of a market issue (men's sports are a bigger industry).

What I meant to say was that men are discriminated against in academia by being left out of the equation for sex-specific scholarships. There are plenty of scholarships in plenty of fields that only women can get and this is seen as fair. I'm not aware of any scholarships for the opposite and if there are, how many? I imagine very few. I think both male and female-specific scholarships are anti-meritocratic to begin with but I'm just highlighting an inequality. I don't support the existence of either type.

But anyway, we're established that there are some problems that men face exclusively or predominantly. We can talk about the significance of each of these things and what to do about them, if anything, bu that is frankly entirely irrelevant to the point of this thread:

Using the same logic as those who think an International Women's Day is important, the same is true for men. Of course, the reason I made this thread was to point out the hypocrisy of those who claim to be for equality but who only pay lip-service to the idea and instead shout down any discussion about men's issues. This is obvious even in this thread, where several people instead of acknowledging the hypocrisy or denying it simply complained about women's issues instead - the very thing these radical feminists did, have been doing, and will continue to do.

BTW, I forgot homelessness and domestic abuse shelters which are some of the most common commonly brought up issues

 

[pharphis]

Of course, the reason I made this thread was to point out the hypocrisy of those who claim to be for equality but who only pay lip-service to the idea and instead shout down any discussion about men's issues. This is obvious even in this thread, where several people instead of acknowledging the hypocrisy or denying it simply complained about women's issues instead - the very thing these radical feminists did, have been doing, and will continue to do.

and here are some of those examples

We should have a day to remember men's long and ongoing struggle for suffrage and franchise.

Somebody page me when men become an oppressed minority.

In related news, pretty much every day is International Men's Day.

Male societal problems are inisignificsnt in comparison to female ones. Add to that the fact that female lack of rights is the result of a historic male hegemony.

 

[Fudbucker]

Well I shall flog myself 30 times.

My bad for giving you chip-on-the-shoulder-men a semantic sidetrack, nitpicking something I've already said I didn't mean literally.

How about addressing the actual issues instead of a gotcha misstatement?

So now you're saying I shouldn't have to take a pay cut?

What about the fact that I'm underpaid compared to the my female co-workers? (who were all hired before me, but I don't want to be accused of mansplaining, so I'll just tuck that little fact into this here parenthetical statement)

Should the women who teach alongside me get a pay cut because they make more than me? Or is that my white male priviledge talking?

 

[wobs]

The asterisked items all have the same root cause: that childcare still falls mainly on women and not their husbands. It's easier for a man with a wife and children to work longer hours, commute further, work offshore, etc when it's his wife who's taking the kids to daycare, arranging her hours to be home when school gets out, taking the kids to the doctor, etc.

If there were better options for childcare for working parents (of either sex) it would go a very long way to fixing workplace inequality. In an ideal world, people would earn enough that one parent could actually stay home with the kids until they hit school age but that died out when salaries stagnated decades ago--mine is the likely the last generation where stay-at-home moms was the norm. (Barring a Bernie Sanders democratic socialism revolution, of course.)

This study come up on my news feed the other day, which kind of inks in with your post:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/11/151130182516.htm
" If the majority of young women and men who plan to have families expect to "work it out" when those caregiving responsibilities emerge rather than deliberately accommodating family plans, she said, employers must work harder to institute flexibility policies and re-entry programs that will retain talented workers."

So most people do not choose career paths based upon caregiving considerations in the future. Yet women are still choosing careers that fit in with a different lifestyle choice to men.