> and, yes, the severity of female-on-male domestic abuse
I really don't believe that claim. Male upper body strength is obviously far higher than a woman's, so injury is much more likely, and men engage in the most severe kind of violence (homicide) at many multiples the rate at which women do.
Oh, one other thing. While I'll use round numbers rather than precise ones, I can illustrate why it is entirely believable that as many men are killed by women as vice versa, even though that's intuitively surprising. (Unbelievability is part of the problem innocent male victims face.)
Assumption: Men commit roughly 9 out of 10 homicides, as you note above. Women commit roughly 1 out of 10.
Assumption: Roughly 9 out of 10 homicide victims are men, regardless of the gender of the killer. (This is roughly true.)
So, out of 100 murders, we have this:
Total committed by men: 90
Total committed by women: 10
Men killed by men: 90 x 90% = 81
Women killed by women: 10 x 10% = 1
Women killed by men: 90 x 10% = 9
Men killed by women: 10 x 90% = 9
Which makes the number of men killed by women equal to the number of women killed by men, despite the fact that the vast majority of total killings are committed by men. In our society, feminism focuses us on the 9 women killed by men, and not on the 90 men killed in total, nor on the 9 men killed by women.
The answer I remember, from someone who had studied the stats on that, was "It is non-intuitive, but it is true. Enraged men use their fists. Enraged women use weapons." In his usage, "weapons" included a wide range of hard or sharp objects found around the home, notably in the kitchen, such as knives, cookware and glassware.
I think you’re probably right, but having read Ferrell’s book (many years ago so don’t count on my memory here) I think he’d make two points.
1) as far as non-fatal injury goes, few male victims would go to the police. A guy who’s wife hits him in the face with a skillet probably isn’t going to call the police. Ferrell’s data here I think is based on surveys, not just on victimhood, but even self-reported female hitting of male partners is surprisingly high. At the level of cuts and bruises, it seems plausible to me that female perpetration is much closer to parity than arrest statistics suggest.
2) On fatalities, I think Ferrell argues that women tend to choose poisoning as their principle means of spousal homicide, and that poisoning is much less likely to be detected (it’s possible I’m conflating Ferrell with someone else but I think he argues this somewhere), and unexplained deaths possibly attributable to poisoning are supposedly much higher in men.
The second point seems farfetched. I can believe women hit men almost as often as vice versa, but I think at the point of breaking bones or killing, men are much more likely to do so than women.
One of the factors that never seem mentioned in the discussion about the male-female wage gap is the litigation risk. Given the choice between equally attractive candidates, an employer has to consider the risk of hiring a woman or a person in any other group covered by discrimination law. A young white male is the only person who cannot sue for discrimination if fired. For this reason, I have argued that discrimination laws hurt the people they are trying to protect.
Having done a lot of hiring, I don't think most employers think about litigation risk at all when makibg hiring decisions. Even in cases where employees win discrimination cases against employers, the payouts are tiny and often covered by insurance. Also most companies outsource the legal aspects anyway so it doesn't distract management much even when there is an active case.
It's a tax sure, but a tiny one. I doubt it makes it into any employers' top20 lists of annoying risks.
Point taken. For the reasons you mention I am assuming it is a bigger problem for small firms that don't have the insurance, time and resources to indicate etc.
I suspect you're right, but this sounds like an argument that belongs in the bucket with "taking welfare payouts undermines your work ethic!" and "eating candy will spoil your dinner!"
I'm not sure how I feel about Farrell. A few years back I read The Boy Crisis which he co-wrote with John Gray. Or, I should say I started reading it. The first half, which if I recall was written by Farrell, seemed quite good. Well argued, compassionate, gives data, etc.
The second half was John Gray, and it very quickly starts talking positively about homeopathy -- yes, homeopathy -- as an effective ... something. TBH, I don't even remember anymore why it was brought up in the context of the book. But I couldn't continue reading it at that point.
Like I said, I think the second half was the other author, but I have a lot of trouble taking Farrell seriously if he'll willingly put his name on a book that unironically pushes homeopathy.
I first encountered Warren Farrell 30 years ago. He has been a voice in the wilderness. Unfortunately, he's still a voice in the wilderness: the fact that you hadn't heard of him until now speaks volumes. And, as you see, the things he has been saying have needed to be heard. And he has been saying them for 30 years. Thirty. Three decades.
Phase II of the equal rights movement - getting equal rights for men - stalled maybe 40 years ago and even now that observation is so thoroughly ignored and dismissed that it hasn't even reached the status of being "controversial" yet.
Sorry for the length of this, its somewhat off topic but it relates to a women's issue that is being ignored. I received this blurb from a political newsletter and if you look at the site it has solid evidence and logic raising even larger issues of concern, this is just one tiny bit of it:
Fair elections require protection against coercion
Over the last couple decades, there's been lots of fuss over the ability to use mail-in ballots. The idea being that, if someone could have their ballot mailed to them, we'd see more participation, and thereby conclude there was less "disenfranchisement." Although this change has made the voting process more convenient by not needing to travel to a poll, I believe it undermines a more fundamental requirement of fair election. That is true privacy.
You see, nearly 2000 years ago, the Athenians came to know the importance of people being able to cast their vote without any outside influence. At the time, all citizens had to worry about the Roman aristocracy employing bribes and threats to influence the vote outcome.
Nearly every western country followed suit and eventually adopted secret ballots. With France starting in 1795, the UK in 1872, and the US in 1884.
Private voting at a polling place was the norm - except for rare exceptions, such as during times of war - until about 25 years go. Additional, an exception was allowed for votes to be cast using an absentee ballot, assuming someone had a specific reason for requesting an absentee ballot.
Along with increased convenience, however, a seldom-discussed problem as accompanied the mail-in ballot, that being domestic coercion.
While domestic violence has become more openly discussed, other forms of abuse remain hidden. According to a CDC survey, 42% of both men and women report being physically abused by a partner in their lifetime. Even today, it's not well known that many people experience coercive control by a partner, 49% of women and 46^ of men. A significant minority also confess that in their lifetime a partner "made decisions that should have been yours to make", affecting 26% of women and 21% of men. Moreover, there exists another form of domestic abuse that still is not acknowledged in the US which exposes a flaw in our democracy.
The Center for American Progress states, "Survivors of intimate partner violence must be able to make their voices heard in elections. To do this, they need access to election information materials, along with the ability to register to vote and vote safely in person at polling places or other designated voting locations."
So while we might cheer the increased convenience of mail voting, let's not be so naive as to think there's no downside to it.
To address that issue a bit differently:there is a widespread trap most of our society has fallen into where lack of critical thinking skills has led them to accept something by very direct analogy is as absurd as this scenario:
"Imagine a government-created online test that 10 million students take from home with a $500 reward for passing. The tests are unsupervised. The program manager — who has the same mindset of those in the 1950s who ignored what happens behind closed curtains — proclaims, 'Of course no one cheated! Where is your evidence someone cheated?'.
Would you accept that no cheating would occur? It sounds absurd, doesn’t it? The manager might argue for the students’ innocence until proven guilty. But this is only relevant to individuals. If someone accuses John of cheating on his test, John is innocent until proven guilty.
We can’t accuse specific students without evidence. But we can challenge the validity of the entire system. "
John Stuart Mill declared that falling for the trap I'll mention would be "fatal" to society, and Grover Cleveland feared for the survival of this country due to a similar problem in 1889 that we solved then, but forgot history. Its like the era before the 1970s when we thought bad things like domestic violence couldn't occur behind closed doors. Despite magical thinking that human nature has changed since Grover Clevelands era to lead to a different result, we abandoned secret ballots with widespread mail voting. There is no logical reason to think we can't wind up with the same problems that arose in our past, even if they haven't yet: data from elsewhere suggest problems with coercion are likely enough to tip close elections, and domestic voter abuse, coercing the vote of a partner is depriving many vulnerable people fo their right to vote. That is the tip of an iceberg of other issues John Stuart Mill and the founders saw that we are ignoring since we aren't thinking clearly.
The result deprives many vulnerable women and others of their right to vote in reality, even if in theory we claim they have it. Details at
I grant that it is possible that in a world without female feminists, a man could have become a feminist, and perhaps astute students of history will provide examples. But I wonder if in the real world a man has ever become a feminist via any route other than caring about what female feminists think (likely for psychopathological reasons).
I get viscerally upset when I read about the practice of bride kidnapping in third world countries. If I got that same strong visceral feeling of disgust from popular feminist talking points like the pay gap, and you shuffled around my beliefs to a form that's not even that uncommon (most people exclusively think of domestic violence as something a man does to a woman!), I could be a male feminist for ideological reasons, even if I didn't know a single female feminist.
It's hard to say what percentage of male feminists are ideologically driven vs driven by conformity, but considering that most men can get along just fine never even mentioning or thinking about these issues, I suspect it's mostly ideology.
> and, yes, the severity of female-on-male domestic abuse
I really don't believe that claim. Male upper body strength is obviously far higher than a woman's, so injury is much more likely, and men engage in the most severe kind of violence (homicide) at many multiples the rate at which women do.
Oh, one other thing. While I'll use round numbers rather than precise ones, I can illustrate why it is entirely believable that as many men are killed by women as vice versa, even though that's intuitively surprising. (Unbelievability is part of the problem innocent male victims face.)
Assumption: Men commit roughly 9 out of 10 homicides, as you note above. Women commit roughly 1 out of 10.
Assumption: Roughly 9 out of 10 homicide victims are men, regardless of the gender of the killer. (This is roughly true.)
So, out of 100 murders, we have this:
Total committed by men: 90
Total committed by women: 10
Men killed by men: 90 x 90% = 81
Women killed by women: 10 x 10% = 1
Women killed by men: 90 x 10% = 9
Men killed by women: 10 x 90% = 9
Which makes the number of men killed by women equal to the number of women killed by men, despite the fact that the vast majority of total killings are committed by men. In our society, feminism focuses us on the 9 women killed by men, and not on the 90 men killed in total, nor on the 9 men killed by women.
The answer I remember, from someone who had studied the stats on that, was "It is non-intuitive, but it is true. Enraged men use their fists. Enraged women use weapons." In his usage, "weapons" included a wide range of hard or sharp objects found around the home, notably in the kitchen, such as knives, cookware and glassware.
I think you’re probably right, but having read Ferrell’s book (many years ago so don’t count on my memory here) I think he’d make two points.
1) as far as non-fatal injury goes, few male victims would go to the police. A guy who’s wife hits him in the face with a skillet probably isn’t going to call the police. Ferrell’s data here I think is based on surveys, not just on victimhood, but even self-reported female hitting of male partners is surprisingly high. At the level of cuts and bruises, it seems plausible to me that female perpetration is much closer to parity than arrest statistics suggest.
2) On fatalities, I think Ferrell argues that women tend to choose poisoning as their principle means of spousal homicide, and that poisoning is much less likely to be detected (it’s possible I’m conflating Ferrell with someone else but I think he argues this somewhere), and unexplained deaths possibly attributable to poisoning are supposedly much higher in men.
The second point seems farfetched. I can believe women hit men almost as often as vice versa, but I think at the point of breaking bones or killing, men are much more likely to do so than women.
Playing devil's advocate ...
Men are told over and over and over again that only cowards hit women. It is manly to fight men who hit women, indeed even considered a civic duty.
Women know they have a good chance of hitting men without retaliation.
One of the factors that never seem mentioned in the discussion about the male-female wage gap is the litigation risk. Given the choice between equally attractive candidates, an employer has to consider the risk of hiring a woman or a person in any other group covered by discrimination law. A young white male is the only person who cannot sue for discrimination if fired. For this reason, I have argued that discrimination laws hurt the people they are trying to protect.
Having done a lot of hiring, I don't think most employers think about litigation risk at all when makibg hiring decisions. Even in cases where employees win discrimination cases against employers, the payouts are tiny and often covered by insurance. Also most companies outsource the legal aspects anyway so it doesn't distract management much even when there is an active case.
It's a tax sure, but a tiny one. I doubt it makes it into any employers' top20 lists of annoying risks.
Point taken. For the reasons you mention I am assuming it is a bigger problem for small firms that don't have the insurance, time and resources to indicate etc.
I suspect you're right, but this sounds like an argument that belongs in the bucket with "taking welfare payouts undermines your work ethic!" and "eating candy will spoil your dinner!"
I'd add in this link: "Young women are out-earning young men in several U.S. cities" [https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/28/young-women-are-out-earning-young-men-in-several-u-s-cities/]
Maybe TC will enjoy this opinion-piece from today's conservative NZZ (Swiss-German). By a female feminist: "Women have never had it so good. Nevertheless, new disadvantages are always being identified. Patriarchy lives on as a phantom - The men are fought with a militancy that was justified fifty years ago but is alienating today. Feminism runs out of arguments if the enemy image of men is not kept alive." https://www.nzz.ch/meinung/maenner-als-feindbild-die-klage-des-feminismus-vom-patriarchat-ld.1738076?kid=nl164_2023-5-18&ga=1&mktcid=nled&mktcval=164_2023-05-19&reduced=true
I'm not sure how I feel about Farrell. A few years back I read The Boy Crisis which he co-wrote with John Gray. Or, I should say I started reading it. The first half, which if I recall was written by Farrell, seemed quite good. Well argued, compassionate, gives data, etc.
The second half was John Gray, and it very quickly starts talking positively about homeopathy -- yes, homeopathy -- as an effective ... something. TBH, I don't even remember anymore why it was brought up in the context of the book. But I couldn't continue reading it at that point.
Like I said, I think the second half was the other author, but I have a lot of trouble taking Farrell seriously if he'll willingly put his name on a book that unironically pushes homeopathy.
(I hope I'm not misremembering that terribly)
I first encountered Warren Farrell 30 years ago. He has been a voice in the wilderness. Unfortunately, he's still a voice in the wilderness: the fact that you hadn't heard of him until now speaks volumes. And, as you see, the things he has been saying have needed to be heard. And he has been saying them for 30 years. Thirty. Three decades.
Phase II of the equal rights movement - getting equal rights for men - stalled maybe 40 years ago and even now that observation is so thoroughly ignored and dismissed that it hasn't even reached the status of being "controversial" yet.
Sorry for the length of this, its somewhat off topic but it relates to a women's issue that is being ignored. I received this blurb from a political newsletter and if you look at the site it has solid evidence and logic raising even larger issues of concern, this is just one tiny bit of it:
Fair elections require protection against coercion
Over the last couple decades, there's been lots of fuss over the ability to use mail-in ballots. The idea being that, if someone could have their ballot mailed to them, we'd see more participation, and thereby conclude there was less "disenfranchisement." Although this change has made the voting process more convenient by not needing to travel to a poll, I believe it undermines a more fundamental requirement of fair election. That is true privacy.
You see, nearly 2000 years ago, the Athenians came to know the importance of people being able to cast their vote without any outside influence. At the time, all citizens had to worry about the Roman aristocracy employing bribes and threats to influence the vote outcome.
Nearly every western country followed suit and eventually adopted secret ballots. With France starting in 1795, the UK in 1872, and the US in 1884.
Private voting at a polling place was the norm - except for rare exceptions, such as during times of war - until about 25 years go. Additional, an exception was allowed for votes to be cast using an absentee ballot, assuming someone had a specific reason for requesting an absentee ballot.
Along with increased convenience, however, a seldom-discussed problem as accompanied the mail-in ballot, that being domestic coercion.
While domestic violence has become more openly discussed, other forms of abuse remain hidden. According to a CDC survey, 42% of both men and women report being physically abused by a partner in their lifetime. Even today, it's not well known that many people experience coercive control by a partner, 49% of women and 46^ of men. A significant minority also confess that in their lifetime a partner "made decisions that should have been yours to make", affecting 26% of women and 21% of men. Moreover, there exists another form of domestic abuse that still is not acknowledged in the US which exposes a flaw in our democracy.
The Center for American Progress states, "Survivors of intimate partner violence must be able to make their voices heard in elections. To do this, they need access to election information materials, along with the ability to register to vote and vote safely in person at polling places or other designated voting locations."
So while we might cheer the increased convenience of mail voting, let's not be so naive as to think there's no downside to it.
For more information on this topic, see TheBigIllusion.com
To address that issue a bit differently:there is a widespread trap most of our society has fallen into where lack of critical thinking skills has led them to accept something by very direct analogy is as absurd as this scenario:
"Imagine a government-created online test that 10 million students take from home with a $500 reward for passing. The tests are unsupervised. The program manager — who has the same mindset of those in the 1950s who ignored what happens behind closed curtains — proclaims, 'Of course no one cheated! Where is your evidence someone cheated?'.
Would you accept that no cheating would occur? It sounds absurd, doesn’t it? The manager might argue for the students’ innocence until proven guilty. But this is only relevant to individuals. If someone accuses John of cheating on his test, John is innocent until proven guilty.
We can’t accuse specific students without evidence. But we can challenge the validity of the entire system. "
John Stuart Mill declared that falling for the trap I'll mention would be "fatal" to society, and Grover Cleveland feared for the survival of this country due to a similar problem in 1889 that we solved then, but forgot history. Its like the era before the 1970s when we thought bad things like domestic violence couldn't occur behind closed doors. Despite magical thinking that human nature has changed since Grover Clevelands era to lead to a different result, we abandoned secret ballots with widespread mail voting. There is no logical reason to think we can't wind up with the same problems that arose in our past, even if they haven't yet: data from elsewhere suggest problems with coercion are likely enough to tip close elections, and domestic voter abuse, coercing the vote of a partner is depriving many vulnerable people fo their right to vote. That is the tip of an iceberg of other issues John Stuart Mill and the founders saw that we are ignoring since we aren't thinking clearly.
The result deprives many vulnerable women and others of their right to vote in reality, even if in theory we claim they have it. Details at
https://TheBigIllusion.com
I grant that it is possible that in a world without female feminists, a man could have become a feminist, and perhaps astute students of history will provide examples. But I wonder if in the real world a man has ever become a feminist via any route other than caring about what female feminists think (likely for psychopathological reasons).
Almost certainly.
I get viscerally upset when I read about the practice of bride kidnapping in third world countries. If I got that same strong visceral feeling of disgust from popular feminist talking points like the pay gap, and you shuffled around my beliefs to a form that's not even that uncommon (most people exclusively think of domestic violence as something a man does to a woman!), I could be a male feminist for ideological reasons, even if I didn't know a single female feminist.
It's hard to say what percentage of male feminists are ideologically driven vs driven by conformity, but considering that most men can get along just fine never even mentioning or thinking about these issues, I suspect it's mostly ideology.
Quote From Man Psyopped
"What are you gonna do, psyop me?"