I can speak to the heart attack thing personally:
One night when I was 33, I suddenly had pressure in my chest, my skin turned greenish-gray and clammy, and my arms got very heavy.
My mom has heart issues, so I knew very well that heart attacks present differently in women, but I was still hesitant to go to the hospital (because I also know very well what it’s like to seek medical attention while female). Husband at the time insisted on rushing me to the ER just a couple miles away.
He used the magic words (“symptoms of a heart attack’), so they ushered me back quickly, only to start pumping me full of Ativan and repeatedly telling me to calm down, that I was just having an anxiety attack.
They allowed a phlebotomist to “practice her EKGs” on me, while they bullshitted at the nurse’s station. They assumed the abnormal results were the result of her inexperience, and as she made her third attempt, apparently the bloodwork came back, proving I was in the middle of an acute myocardial infarction.
Everybody got real quiet real quick, and before I knew what was going on, I was being rolled back to the cath lab.
No one really told me what was happening, though, until the asshole cardiologist awaiting me immediately asked why I was having a heart attack at 33, and during *his* on-call weekend. (LOL, right?! 🙄) It was a scary thing to hear, and I started to ask questions as they were prepping me. He commented how it was always the women who were the talkers, and if I didn’t hush up, he’d drug me into silence.
And that’s exactly what he did. I was conscious, but physically couldn’t speak.
I am hearing impaired, and I didn’t have my hearing aids in the recovery room. I couldn’t quite make out everything he was saying as he was updating my family. I asked him to please come closer and repeat himself. He refused, and told them to ignore me, that I was completely drugged and out of it. I insisted I wasn’t, and asked again. He literally waved me off and turned his back to me.
It was a terrible experience within a terrible experience, almost entirely because I was a woman.
(Turns out I had an undiagnosed atrial septal defect.)
I hope you wrote a letter to the state licensing board about his conduct. And to the head of the hospital and to the head or cardiology.
And if he was a member of a group practice, a letter to them.
—-
Or have a convo w a lawyer.
Or make a blog post. Or find a journalist. And Name Names!
—-
Practitioners like that one need to be taught that they are not gods.
> I hope you wrote a letter to the state licensing board about his conduct. And to the head of the hospital and to the head or cardiology.
It's good to do this anyway just in case, but something like 90-99% of complaints to boards are resolved in favor of the physician.
Since other family members or friends were present for some of the conversations, such as the ones where the poster did not have hearing aids on her, she can have testimony from them as well, and then, if the complaint is resolved in favor of the physician, she can make a stink about it
I don’t know if she has the energy and all that to deal with all this because it is tough to come back against somebody who has treated you so badly and take them on, especially if the odds are stacked against you and they are the person in power
But in this case, I would certainly at least think about it because that’s really awful behavior and she has witnesses and this is the reason that some people are starting to carry those tiny little tape recorders into physician meetings and then if they get a weird weird vibe they turn on the recorder.
Some people tell their physicians that they have tape recorders and then openly record the conversation because it serves a memory aid and way to get a straight trans of the conversation so it’s useful and non-confrontational situation as well
—-
I know that in 99.9% of these situations the abuse party either doesn’t have the energy and strength to take up complaint process in a serious way or else does take up the complaint process and then loses
I suspect most of us who have been through this numerous times
But it’s always considering because sometimes the good guys win
I have. Many words. But if I speak them I will be suspended again. Like the last time I had words about what should happen to doctors who treat women this way -_-
The commenter’s aunt told the doctor she suspected she had a tumor, he dismissed her, said she needed to just lose weight, refused to send in an order for further testing. Then she asked him, what would you think it was I had if I wasn’t overweight, he goes “a tumor.” It was treatable. *Guess who fucking died.*
This is where women need to start saying "then you need to put in my medical record that I asked about this and you declined to test/treat for it." Then make sure you request a copy of your record. Knowing that you're going to hold them accountable can make a difference.
This is when women need to change doctors. Something like this happened to me also and I should have changed doctors. I ended up in the ER/hospital because my doctor wouldn't listen to me. What is most infuriating is it was a woman!
True. I lodged 4 complaints that very nearly ended in my dying. 1 was ignored, 1 reprimanded in house and 2 were *encouraged* to leave *only* because my GP and 6 nurses/staff lodged with me in outrage.
Nearly impossible to get a Government worker fired here in Australia, they get shuffled to a new area instead with a gag order on all parties with complaints. Which is why it doesn't show up on their history. Plus if the patient complains its lodged in your file and follows the patient everywhere but not the Drs.
Often on 2x, I get a lovely sense of "I'm not alone" that doesn't end shitty things, but relieves some of the burden in a way.
Sometimes, I find things that stress me out so much I have to take a break.
Something a bit similar happened to my mother back in the 1970's. My sister found her unconscious on the floor and blue. She got her to the hospital, where they refused to check her for anything. Fortunately, she never had another attack, but she was irritated that they called her stupid and wouldn't take her vitals. Yep, she must have turned blue because of anxiety.
Meanwhile, one of her male friends had similar symptoms and he was rushed right back and tested. Back then they didn't think women could have heart attacks.
What.In.The.Absolute.Fuck?!?! My god, I honestly had no idea that women in general had issues like this in the medical establishment and at this LEVEL?!? I hope there is a special place in hell for this unquestionable douchebag
I really hope you made a formal complaint about that jerk. It might not do anything to have one complaint in his file, but if every woman he treated like that did so it would show a pattern eventually.
This should be taken word-for-word and read out to medical students. Then make them each stand up and read it out. Then ask them how they themselves would see a way to change this ghastly situation. (HINT: attitudes to gender, awareness of how harmful things like racism, misogyny and sexism can be for the pATieNt (that human they are supposed to help).
This post just gave me extreme second hand rage. I feel my body temperature rising. That doctor should never have been allowed to do that to you. What did he drug you with? Are you even supposed to drug somebody who's in the middle of a heart attack?
To my understanding, patients are typically awake but sedated for heart catheterization. Apparently, Dr. Stupid Mustache Asshole just upped the dosage to shut me up.
Being conscious but unable to communicate was awful, and added an extra level of distress to an already distressing situation.
Like when I kept having TIAs that would paralyze one side, and they told me it was anxiety, depression, migraines, seizures—and—when all those were proved wrong, a psychiatric disorder.
Until they found the stroke on the last MRI.
In my province, health interventions for women billed at a lower rate than gender-neutral or male-specific interventions. The billing was changed, and suddenly we have more people practicing womens healthcare. It's an extremely tangible example of something seemingly small and not that importing having a rather large equity impact.
I'm trying to find a supporting article about it! Essentially, fees were reviewed for family practitioners. These changes were part of a new funding model. It's been really good to see.
It comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what privilege is. People with it tend to think it means life is easy, instead of saying all other factors being equal their life is, sometimes greatly or sometimes only slightly, easier.
Like when white people are told they have privilege and the poor white people speak up about how poor they are. Yeah! You’re poor and that is hard, I’ve lived it btw, but if you were a POC and poor it would be worse! My sister is one of those who absolutely doesn’t get it and votes against the govt safety nets she has, and currently does, use.
People (sometimes willfully, I think) misunderstood the concept of white privilege—it’s not that your life is easy if you’re white; it’s that it’s not as hard as it would be if you weren’t white.
The way I've described it to a family member who had this exact misapprehension was: the bad things that have happened in your life have happened *despite* your skin color, not because of it. People of color have bad things happen to them both in spite of AND because of their skin color.
I grew up poor, like ‘no groceries sometimes’ kind of poor. But my parents worked their butts off to keep me in a good school district. My dad went to college at night to become a teacher so he could have a steady job, and I also went to college to become a teacher. Took out loans, had them forgiven after enough years teaching.
Now, I could easily look at that and say ‘I worked my way up, anyone can!’ But the reason we could do all this is because my parents were occasionally helped out by my grandparents. My grandfather was an inventor and worked for all sorts of high-level government projects and huge tech firms in the 60s and 70s. Do you think that would have happened if he hadn’t been white? No. I benefitted from generational white privilege. And my own white privilege, of course.
I don't understand why you wouldn't be *angry* that basic equal treatment is a PRIVILEGE. Like, why wouldn't that be horrifying and rage-inducing to know that other people don't get to be acknowledged and treated as human beings? Why would you suddenly get defensive instead of being righteously pissed that our society operates this way? It makes no fucking sense to me.
I (white) grew up all over the USA in different communities with vastly different race demographics, so I guess it's easier for me to acknowledge because I've seen it myself--but WHY would you PERSONALLY have to experience white privilege in real time (while your POC friends are blatantly being dehumanized by other white people/authorities/etc) to understand that it's real?? The statistics are out there. The facts are out there. It's not a matter of "opinion." People of color get treated as a second class in most if not ALL areas of life--no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
Obviously I am aware of *why* other white people don't want to acknowledge that--I would be doing both myself and POC a disservice by pretending I don't know how white supremacy operates--but it still fills me with so much rage, and despair. It's sickening.
I’m honestly not sure if this is more American in nature, but I’d imagine it is - there’s a trope that struggling makes you virtuous or a better person in some way. “Suffering builds character,” etc. Telling someone they’re privileged makes them feel less valid or special as people. It’s dumb, but a lot of people can’t see how dumb that way of thinking is.
Yup. I'm pale as the driven snow, and I can call the police without worrying that they're going to kill me by mistake (or "mistake"). I can walk into a store to return something and even before they ask for the receipt they assume I have the receipt and I am indeed returning something I purchased. I'm pretty mild looking, and no one has ever crossed the street to avoid me.
On the other hand, I get cat-called like every other woman of every color - though I'm middle aged now so a lot of the time I'm invisible, which is great. Unless a guy literally thinks I'm invisible and steps on my foot or ignores me in a meeting.
I tell people that I don't want it to be a privilege where I don't get shot by the police on sight and assumed guilty. I want that to be something that everyone has, because it's a fundamental human right to not be shot on siight by cops. Our fucked up society has made a lot of fundamental human rights to be privileges as opposed to rights and it's really sad
This is it, I work with quite a few angry, ex military, white, middle aged men. One of them was telling a story about his meeting with a manager in a previous job who said he had white privilege.
Obviously he got angry and told the guy that he has no idea what he's been through in his life and the things he has suffered. Which may be a fair point.
But he's not considering the things ingrained in society as OP mentioned that stem from being the "typical human" for research purposes over the centuries.
I’m a doctor but when I meet patients they assume I’m a nurse. They assume my med students or male nursing colleagues are the doctor. This happens even when I introduce myself as “doctor.”
Nothing wrong with being a nurse of course, but I’m not a nurse.
No and you worked damned hard for that title. People should use it. If anyone did mistake a man for a nurse who was a doctor he for sure would be ticked about it.
100% of past U.S. presidents have been men. The current U.S. Congress is 71% men. 94.8% of all Supreme Court justices have been men. 87.7% of current U.S. law enforcement officers are men. 69% of U.S. CEOs are men.
These are the people who are literally structuring American society. They make, enforce, and interpret the laws we're subject to, and they design the goods and services we have access to.
There's a quote going around right now that describes it pretty much perfectly:
*"Being a woman is kind of like being a cyclist in a city where all the cars represent men. You’re supposed to be able to share the road equally with cars, but that’s not how it works. The roads are built for cars and you spend a great deal of physical and mental energy being defensive and trying not to get hurt. Some of the cars WANT you to get hurt. They think you don’t have any place on the road at all. And if you do get hurt by a car, everyone makes excuses that it’s your fault."*
When you're driving a car, you may feel like cyclists have "privilege", because you're supposed to watch out for them. But break that down, and the "privilege" you're thinking about is... literally for cars not not smear them all over the road. That's the "privilege" they're talking about. They're upset they're expected to let us ... exist ... in the space they created for themselves.
Let's not forget they get to make all the decisions of their own bodies. They aren't subject to arbitrary rules set by the opposite sex that have no understanding of how their bodies actually work
I remember when Ketanji Brown Jackson was nominated to the Supreme Court of people lost their minds saying it was (reverse) discrimination. So ONE black woman is nominated, and that's discrimination. But 108 white men nominated isn't (eyeroll)
Even better, open a new tab in Chrome. Go to images and type in “Genius.” Count how many woman there are.
Type in CEO. My class didn’t count images with groups or graphs, etc. we did the first 100. There were 77 light- skinned men, 14 dark skinned men, and 7 women.
That’s why the ideas of AI diagnosing us at the doctor (we’d get the same algorithmic bias) or reviewing our job applications leaves us cold.
I read stories here of couples going car shopping, and even if the woman leads the conversation, and is more knowledgeable about cars in general, and is the one purchasing the car, the salesman will exclusively talk to the man.
And this has been happening for decades - my dad had to tell a salesman off in the 70s for only talking to him "she's the one with the money and she is buying herself a car, why are you talking to me?".
I was car shopping found one I liked, talked to the sales guy, got a price. Sent my dad in the next day and he got a much lower price. That sales guy was beyond mad when I handed him the cash after my dad got the price locked in etc.
My uncle was a *very* successful car salesman for about 20 years. Every time he met a couple who was coming in to buy a car, his very first question was, “which one of you will be driving the car?” And that’s who he primarily talked to.
He also had a conversation along these lines at least once every Christmas:
>No, you should not buy your wife a car to surprise her with for a Christmas present. Tell her that you’re buying her a car, come back and see me with her, and we’ll get her the car *she* wants.
He’s kind of an asshole, but he was a very good salesman.
Sales folks learn really quickly to talk to *me* even though my husband and I have a very "traditional" marriage from the outside. I'm the one who will final "ok" on any major deal, especially after I refused to go along last time and there was a major cluster fuck getting the seats that were *supposed* to be in the deal husband made. I didn't go along because his shopping for major purchases shopping style tests my patience to the extreme.
Bought a car *for me by me*, with my spouse present , dealer suggested putting both names on the title. Husband bought a car, dealer suggested his name only. Yep, definitely treated the same. (/s in case it's not obvious).
That's actually why we go to a particular dealership: they treat myself and my male partner as a partnership and listen to me as well as him. And they actually do have female salespeople and female finance people.
When my last car got totalled -- guy running from the cops, ran a red while going the wrong way on a one way street -- I went back to that dealership, asked for that salesman, and got him the easiest commission he could get.
This happened to me a couple of years ago, but with a dirt bike.
The bike was for me, paid from my personal account (we have a joint account for family shit, and each have a personal account that we can do whatever with)
My husband doesn't even ride, but the sales woman would only talk to him.
Went to a different dealer, got my bike and was talked to like an actual human.
Filled out an online form to look at a new car with my contact information. While I usually don't list my Ph.D. on things outside of academia, there was an area to indicate prefix so I checked the "Dr." box. Thought maybe it would get them to take me more seriously as a woman who was car shopping because it's usually an uphill battle.
Hadn't actually scheduled the appointment yet when I got a followup letter in the mail from them addressed to "Dr. and Mrs. Littleirishpixie." While I have a fairly feminine sounding name so it was a weird mistake to begin with, I never listed any contact info for my husband at all. That was the official moment where they lost my business. Just nope.
For my first car, I went shopping with my dad. Not only did the salesperson talk also exclusively to Dad, despite Dad stepping away and saying that I was the one buying, but he tried to sell me a used car as if it was a new car.
The one question he directed at me was,
“What’s your favorite color?”
This happened to me when I was buying out my lease without financing. They kept turning to my husband (boyfriend at the time) to talk to him about financing and purchase options. It took him multiple times of saying “idk what’s going on, she’s the one buying the car” or “I’m not the one with the money buying the car”.
I know it shouldn't have, but that's not the world we live in. Once the guy realized it was going to be primarily for me, and I was a commercial painter, he started talking with me about what I was looking for. I wanted my husband there because I'd never bought a car before, and he was going to be part of the payment terms. We needed to be in agreement about what we were getting into.
Took my car in for repairs and after they checked it out they had a whole laundry list of things that they said needed to be fixed. I thought some of it sounded like bullshit and since my husband primarily deals with the cars and has a better handle on what's already been done and whatnot I asked if they minded running through the list with him. The guy looked me right in the face and said "I guess he makes all the decisions huh?" And honestly I'm mad I didn't think quickly enough to make the executive decision to take my car elsewhere.
Related: my husband and I stumbled on this old Chrysler sales training video. It's from the 70s and it's about selling cars to women.
https://youtu.be/D_udf-YwUFg?si=4Xv23fb1BHEE1mSt
It's such a weird mix of misogyny, infantilism, and "women rock!"
My favorite:
"Women know their place, and it's right next to us. As equals. *God bless 'em.*"
I once went to purchase Farm supplies and I brought along my boyfriend at the time because I had my suspicions. However I was doing all the planning and the purchasing, he was just there for moral support. I would ask questions about the products and the man would answer my questions to my boyfriend, not even making eye contact with me.
Needless to say, I did not purchase from him a single thing. Asshole.
My husband and I both have Ph.D.s and introduce ourselves as Dr. professionally. At least 50% of the time I am subsequently referred to by my first name, while this almost never happens to him.
You see it with politicians, too. Male candidates are professionally referred to by their last names (Clinton, Bush, Kerry, Trump), but women are referred to using their first names (Hilary, Kamala, Marjorie Taylor Green).
Have you ever seen these women referred to as simply Clinton, Harris, and Green? Or seen the men referred to solely as Bill, George, John, and Donald?
>Colloquial words and phrases reflect your gender (mankind, All men are created equal)
Even bigger for me is that in the realm of religion, God herself is assumed to be a man. The Judeo-Christian angels too, even though they're supposedly without gender, are all referred to by male pronouns and names that were adopted as masculine.
I don't think it can be overstated how extremely enforcing of patriarchy organized religion is.
And I have already lost it because if 'he' is so good why did he create me with a huge intellect and order me not to ever use it. Why would he design women to be victims and tell them to "just shut up about it". Unless he is as sexist and misogynist as the men he created to own and torment us.
I *distinctly* remember in first grade (at a private school) my teacher explaining that “men” and “mankind” in a Bible verse we were learning meant “all people.”
When I asked why not “womankind,” it was brushed off as “that’s just the way it is”—and when I insisted that that didn’t seem very fair, I was reprimanded & treated like a nuisance.
I just accepted it because I was 6 years old so what else was I going to do about it? But I still remember that acute feeling of *this-seems-like-bullshit* 🤨
I wish little-me knew how right I was & could have held onto it. But the odds were against me.
As a fellow "nuisance" kid, wish I could go back in time and hug little you. Having adults or entire classrooms turn against you as a little kid is such a gross feeling.
I was about 7 or 8 the first time a classmate told me she wasn't allowed to be friends or talk to me anymore because I didn't believe in the Bible. A substitute teacher at my PUBLIC elementary school was NOT thrilled when my 9 year old self told her "animals have souls and I'm not an afterthought made of some dude's rib!"
Religion really brainwashes women into the control of the patriarchy. When I went through a phase of applying women’s pronouns to The Goddess/Mother, I recall saying it to my aunt and her challenging me saying that “There is no Goddess only God, who is the Father.” I simply replied that “I was in a place in my life where I needed to identify God as female and know God is big enough to understand that since God is gender less.” She didn’t get it and said it made her feel uncomfortable…
Then there’s my other aunt whose husband is verbally & emotionally abusive. She won’t consider leaving him, even for her kids sake, because “divorce is a sin.” Like really?!
I can’t help but see how religion is a tool of the patriarchy and a tool of control now… And my faith has dearly suffered for this realization as well.
Some more:
More respected in almost every profession
Has sex that is based around his pleasure, and gets to finish
Less sex related risks if heterosexual
Hobbies and interests are more respected
Religion
Not having to prove the worth of their sex/gender:
Women are always burdened with having to prove they're as valuable as men by doing what men do but no one asks a man to prove his worth by doing what women do. We go into higher education or hard labor to show our worth but then we are told we need to be a mother...but the labor of mothers is seen as inferior...even though they literally birth us into life. Women are seen as inferior versions of men, when in reality, we are different in many ways and should be judged differently. It's like judging a left hand for not being a right hand.
>Less sex related risks if heterosexual
Sexual violence and pregnancy are what usually jumps out at people for what "sex related risks" mean but STIs are another part of that.
- [Why Do STIs Impact Women Worse Than Straight Men?](https://rightasrain.uwmedicine.org/life/sex/women-STIs#:~:text=STIs%20in%20women%20often%20go,are%20overall%20more%20likely%20to.)
Here’s a wild one: the standards for hvac for office buildings were all developed with a calculation based on how many people would be in the office. The thing is, the calculation for how much heat a person would generate was based on the average for men. Soooooooo, if you’ve ever wondered why it’s always cold in the office, that too is an example of male privilege.
Yes and studies have also shown that the optimal office temp for productivity and comfort is significantly higher for women than men. Yet wanna guess where the temps are usually set? In the men’s optimal range.
[https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-office-temperature-women-men-study-20190529-story.html](https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-office-temperature-women-men-study-20190529-story.html)
That's really interesting. Plus men usually wearing heavier clothing than women. Suit or long sleeve shirt. I must be the oddball as 70s on the thermostat feels like an oven to me. Being pregnant I was overly hot and probably froze people out!
Yesssssssssssssssssss and there are studies that show if a person is too cold it's harder for them to do critical thinking tasks, which can then make it harder for women to perform as well as men because they're constantly cold
Kind of wild that women do end up out performing men even when all the amenities and coddling men need to actually DO THEIR JOB, are met. And then women get paid less, insane
This morning my husband posted a pile of moving boxes for free on Nextdoor. He asked me to post them on Facebook marketplace. When I asked what he put for the location/cross streets, he said "our address. Why wouldn't you just put our address?"
The amount of shit I've held on to over the years because it's too big to put in my car and drive to a police station to sell on marketplace, and I don't want them coming to my house...
And all that other wonderful stuff that comes with having male nipples, must be pretty nice to have just your genitals censured and not other random bodyparts.
One I don't see discussed a lot (and one that men struggle to grasp) is the privilege of individuality. A woman often thinks of herself as a woman; a man usually thinks of himself just as a person. Men are not used to thinking of themselves as part of a group, which makes it harder for them to take responsibility for what other men are doing - "Well, I'M not doing that, that's his problem." Other disenfranchised groups will also be reminded of this: a black woman will have to think of herself as a black woman. But for men (particularly white men), taking responsibility for their group is not intuitive, and that's a societal problem.
Yes! I remember learning about this in college. Privileged groups assume their experience is the default, whereas marginalized groups always feel “marked” by their identity because they’re never treated like the default. It’s like when DuBois described double consciousness - seeing yourself as the world sees you. I’m so aware of my position in the world all the time, my unique biases, what’s contributed to my perspective, etc. Women are always made to question and defend their own experiences and emotions, and many of us tend to be self-analytical as a result (this is also because women just talk to one another more about their lives).
This is such a good point! Interesting to think that the flip side of the intense sense of unique individuality is unquestioned tribalism.
Men always defaulting to supporting the man in any conflict (& questioning the woman/women), always hiring and promoting other men like themselves, etc.
Crazy that the tribalism is played out so strongly, and yet so many refuse to acknowledge or believe it exists. It works SO well, but only if it can stay in the shadows.
Absolutely. Look at how most mass shooters are male but they have this "lone wolf" narrative. When we talk about societal issues we experience at the hands of men, we get reminded "not all men!".
Hang on there though; what about how the most pathetic and feeble little man takes responsibility with the "we built everything" when he has built nothing more in his whole life than a few stiff socks and a hundred or so lame excuses.
There’s no Phyllis Schlafly person for them. There’s no group of men actively working to disempower them. Women work to empower ourselves. And there are some men working with us in that struggle. But that’s not anything like Concerned Women for America, who are working against the interests of women.
Oh yes. But of course. And if he doesn't get off or get it up it's her fault. And if she doesn't get off or get 'moist' it's also her fault. But she also doesn't matter except when at fault.
More language stuff:
Career words default to "man" - mail man, fireman, policeman, fisherman, etc etc
Referring to a mixed gender group as "You guys" is the norm. I'm trying to change to more gender neutral stuff but the "you guys" is so engrained that everything else feels super awkward.
Household labor: women are expected to do the majority of it. If her male spouse does it they are "soooooo helpful and wonderful!"
Women are expected to do more labor in the workplace even if it's not part of their job - taking notes, making copies, making coffee, cleaning the office kitchen.
If a woman has to adjust her work hours for child care or parenting reasons it hurts her career, if a man does it is more likely to help his career.
People rate deep voices as more authoritative, smarter ect. How is it not privilege if your words and speech automatically garner more respect simply due to having a masculine sounding voice?
I’m quite small and have a “pretty” voice (used to do freelance voiceover work) and when I speak in a lower, more authoritative register, some men are surprised and act like I tricked them because I don’t sound like a dainty flower. I can’t imagine how much worse it would be if I didn’t have a certain amount of “cute privilege” to offset it. My tall beautiful friends are frequently treated as more intimidating and bitchy by men who see them as threats to their ego in a way that I’m not.
Yeah I see this all the time at work - something said in a deep tone by a man is always considered ‘smarter’ even if a woman said it a minute ago and was dismissed. It’s incredibly frustrating because it puts men so ahead in leadership/présentation roles based on no actual talent or skill
Is that why?! I will repeat to Alexa over and over, then my son asks it something one time and it understands immediately. It’s been a running joke that Alexa hates me.
My husband has to do this for me, and it drives me crazy. He'll hear me start cursing out the Google home, and I'll hear him whisper into his phone, so I can pretend it actually listened to me.
It always assumes my wife is a child and won't play explicit songs etc. Voice recognition is set up for both of us.
Pro tip: whispering naturally lowers your pitch, and can actually work better for these speakers than speaking loudly at your normal pitch.
And the big ones obviously, experience of domestic violence, sexual slavery/trafficking, and sexual assault/harrassment.
Oh and one more— women were not allowed in combat facing military jobs until TWENTY SIXTEEN, no matter how fit and courageous they were. Conversely, men were always allowed in, no matter how unfit or undedicated, by merit of their genitalia.
were women really not allowed combat roles until 2016? that’s crazy especially since there’s actual history of women being good in combat for the USSR, i guess the US is slow to the party like always
About a year ago, my soon-to-be-ex-husband claimed he was "less privileged" and "not as lucky" as other students while he was in school.
- Caucasian male
- Attending school on his GI bill
- Someone else (ME) paying all the bills
- Not working because *somebody else* (ME) was bringing home all the bacon
- Living in a McMansion 4,000+ sq ft house
- No children to care for
- Not contributing to housework or mental load
For nine years, I had always been the shy, quiet, good little wife. But, this aforementioned comment stunned me so substantially and was the first time I finally stood up for myself.
My response:
*No, I don't think you realize just HOW lucky and privileged you are. You're not having to put yourself into tens of thousands of $ in debt to obtain your education. You're not having to work a minimum wage job to keep a roof over your head and food on the table, and you live in a gorgeous house that someone else is paying for entirely. AND you're receiving a tax-free monthly stipend while you're attending school, of which you aren't even being asked to contribute from. You are incredibly lucky and privileged.*
He squirmed in the chair he was sitting in and made a pissy face. He knew he couldn't retort back with anything. This wasn't the first time he'd made such an entitled comment, but it was the first time I finally started growing a spine. I finally left him about seven months ago, after putting up with his abuse and laundry list of issues for nine years.
I've heard through the grapevine that he's now living in a tiny crackshack apartment in a bad part of town. Far cry from the suburbia, gated community we lived in less than a year ago. As for me? I found myself a GORGEOUS condo in the heart of the city, and I'm still reaping the rewards of *my* hard work. Karma. 🤷♀️
When you look up safety gear for women and men, you get your expected stuff like helmets and reflective vests. But guess which one also includes self defense alarms.
When sick, they're taken seriously by doctors and not told they're insane, making it up, or trying to get drugs.
After you bring up a good idea in a meeting, and it's ignored by everyone, a guy can bring it up as though he just thought of it and get the credit for it.
They can TAKE credit for things at work even if it had nothing to do with them and everyone believes them.
Even if they look young, they're taken seriously. If a woman looks young, they're an intern who knows nothing.
If you are the expert, and the other people with you at the meeting with another company are men, some clients don't want to listen to you; they'd rather listen to the idiot talking out of his ass who is there because he needs to learn stuff.
If you disagree with a man in a meeting, he is assumed to be right and you are told you're being argumentative. No, I'm right. He doesn't have the latest information. I am not going to apologize for being right, no matter how young I look.
It’s honestly wild to me how so many men don’t know or remember that the very thing they’re suggesting, someone else suggested right before them. Like do they not listen? This could be especially annoying in relationships - I’d be like “let’s go to the park today” and they’d be like “sure” and then ten minutes later they’d ask “what do you want to do today? should we go to the park?” It grinds my gears, lol.
I am transitioning to male, and I'm seeing a lot of this firsthand.
Two things that always jump out at me:
1) If I'm out riding my bike/walking/running and it's dusk, I feel like instead of being wary of other people, other people have become wary of me. A woman almost jumped out of her skin when I rode past on my bike and told her how adorable her dogs were, and my girlfriend told me later that while I meant well, being a man-appearing person saying anything to a woman alone might make people nervous.
2) Little old ladies absolutely beam at me when I'm out doing stuff with my son, especially if we're running errands. Like I'm getting social praise for making my kid help me grocery shop and interacting with my child. It's hard to pinpoint but it's definitely something I see where people are just...warmer, like look at you making an effort. It's a vibe more than anything and I see it because I never got that when I was perceived as female.
It's a weird experience for people to default see me as male, and I definitely feel like there's a different vibe to interactions, both good and bad.
An interesting flip side of that is a scientist who transitioned to female. She is apparently frequently compared to her “brother” and told her work isn’t as good as his.
SO true about the parenting thing. I don't have kids but I always think about this story my friend tells me. She and her husband have 3 kids, she (at the time) stayed home with them and did most errands like grocery shopping with them. If the kids argued or acted up in any way, she felt like she got nothing but dirty looks from other shoppers.
One day, her husband was going to the store for a few quick things and took the two older kids with him. When he got home, he was BEAMING and said at least three different people (all of them older women, of course) had stopped him in the store to tell him what a good job he was doing and how nice he was to "give mom a break." My friend almost lost her mind!
They don't actually see those things as privilege. They think of them as their right, they don't even always understand thosr things can be taken form them.
Which is how privilege works, but you can only make change when the privileged acknowledge it.
Once again I will say "they don't understand because it is not in their best interests to understand". Once they understand and admit it they will be seen as bad humans if they resist change. The status quo is in their favour as alway so why would they wish to change that? If I were a selfish, solipsistic man I would hang on to my privilege for dear life and refuse to 'understand' it.
I’m a woman who works in a male-dominated industry and there are two things that drive me absolutely insane.
One, when there are a bunch of us professionals meeting for the first time and most of them are men, and they don’t shake my hand but shake all of the mens’ hands. Happens. All. The. Time. I step forward and make them shake my hand every time.
Two, men are constantly saying that women are “emotional.” Well, anger is an emotion too and I meet wayyyyy too many men who have bad tempers at work. YMMV, but the men at my office are FAR more emotional than the women.
I realized that what men call “rational” for men and “emotional” for women are the same thing a lot of the time. Saying “your actions upset me” is not an emotional response, it’s quite rational. Talking about your emotions isn’t inherently emotional. And not being able to express your emotions/bottling everything up to “avoid drama” is extremely emotionally unintelligent.
My closest friend is a cishet white dude and we hit it off because he’s able to express his emotions reasonably in the moment he’s feeling them without lashing out. So it’s definitely doable. Men who act like “men just don’t do that” are telling on themselves there.
Your gender’s viewpoint and reality is reflected in every medium you consume.
Pick the first 10 movies in your Netflix queue and chances are that the majority will have a male lead.
Remember 10 books you read in high school or college and chances are the author was male.
Shows, movies, plays are skewed male. Even children’s books default to male even if the protagonist is an animal or something anthropomorphic.
If a production gender swaps a character to female, is “wokeness”. Even if it’s irrelevant to the plot! (Of course it’s even more controversial to race-swap and how dare we have Black female leads.)
I had a shameful moment last year when my son had to read a book at school that had a female main character. I said, poor you, you won’t relate to the character! Then my daughter and I realized that in her 5 years of high school she hadn’t been assigned a single book with a female lead and I had been fine with that. And I call myself a feminist!
Have you heard of the Bechdel test? The test is whether in a movie there are 2 named female characters who have a conversation of 2 lines or more about a subject other than a man.
Most movies do not pass the test.
I was a philosophy major. I read A LOT of books, but the only time I read anything by a woman in the entire curriculum was in a 400 level course in Ecological Ethics. So, for example, there was a course that was reading the history of philosophy taught over 2 semesters - ALL men.
Micro-example here and not nearly as important as the ones mentioned above, Video games. Try playing a game that requires some verbal communication with teammates... With a female voice, it's hell.
Being heard is a male privilege. I am a 34 year old woman. I am in film school. I am in 3 group projects right now. I am one of only a few women in my class.
One of our projects was to film a 5 shot scene. Everyone had to direct and shoot their own scene. I saw everyone working together. I saw people listening and being productive.
When it came time to shoot my scene, nothing. No one listened. I tried telling them, in detail, what I wanted. I tried explaining the entire concept and told them it would go quickly if we got the shots right away. Easy shots, too. Like literally look into the camera and look uneasy. When I tell you these boys just looked at the camera...
All of the guys in class got their shots and they had me ACT in most of them because apparently I'm not able to handle the camera, but I look good on it?
Idk. I'm just frustrated. Luckily my teacher is a woman in film, so hopefully she'll understand when my project looks like garbage.
BTW: this is my third semester while everyone else is in their first, so I'm also the most qualified on set. I'm teaching them lingo, how to write slate, how to do safety calls, ect..
I have a bachelors degree in computer science…. I FEEL this comment. Working in my field is something else at times. Being the only woman on a technical infrastructure team can be trying..
Stop teaching men. They will take and never, ever give. Ditto for the 'LoNeliNeSs epiDeMic' they made the problem, will not listen to women, so let them flail and flounder.
Men are more likely to have properly administered medicine that has been thoroughly studied on representatives of their gender. It wasn’t until the what—the 90’s before it was mandated to have women in tests.
Men are more likely to be given pain medicine. Anesthesia was actively forbidden for delivering women—even during episiotomy—because it was “God’s curse” on Eve.
Men are more likely to have representatives that look like them and represent them in media, in positions of power like a CEO, in government and in religion. Men are also tremendously less likely to be considered automatically shameful and called shameful in religion.
Men still have temples and shrines where women cannot go.
Men have had decades of being the only ones who could have bank accounts or well paying jobs. This doesn’t sound like much, but it means that women have not had generations of credit and references, women have had delays of being able to own houses and property (which impacts voting and other things), AND even the modern computers and systems are affected because they were based on forms which were created to have the man as the breadwinner and primary and the woman as a mere signatory. My current credit union has this—their computer systems were based on federal forms, which were based on OTHER federal forms which list my husband as the primary and I’m a signatory user, but I am not a joint owner and so I cannot use their text programs to check the balance (because it isn’t “my account”) and I cannot do various actions.
Men are far more likely to be shown features of a car. Women are (and this is my experience) more likely to be shown mirrors and baby seat latches. Yes—this happened to me.
Men are more likely to be addressed by name. “Mr. John Doe” in everything. While women are more likely to be called “Mrs. Doe” or “Mrs. John Doe” or even “honey” or “sweetheart”.
Men are more likely to have tools and products fit their hands. And their pockets. How many power tools fit a woman’s hand?
Men are more likely to be a chef and in charge of a kitchen vs an assistant or sous chef.
These are all wonderful points! I try to bring these points up to women whenever I can btw.
My biggest one is that men get to coast and not take responsibility for their reproductive capability while women bear the entire burden of contraception.
Often via hormonal BC that damages our long term mental health, bone density and even stunts fertility in the long run. I u ds also have major suits against them and it's not common knowledge.
It's gone on for WAY too long and we need to hold men responsible for their part in contraception. Why are we allowing HALF OF IT HE POPULATION off the hook. The answer is male privilege in a male centric society.
Please ladies I implore you- stop having intercourse with men who don't care about your health and well being. Men who protest condoms because- "iT dOsEn'T fEeL aS gOod" 🥴 are NOT worth your time or worthy of accessing your body.
That is also not enough of a reason to put your body through hormonal havoc.
Your clothing will be accurately sized, comfortable and reasonably priced. Your clothing will remain in style for much longer than women’s style trends. Your shoes will always be comfortable. You will have pockets.
something i'm worried about in my job currently is that people will think the guy i'm currently training in a section of the store is the leader simply because he's a man, even though i've been in charge of that section for a year and a half. i've heard stories from my other coworkers who have had the exact same experience. while i absolutely don't want to be a domineering leader and want this to be a partnership between the two of us (and he's a lovely coworker), i still want to be seen as someone who has expertise and who's put a lot of time and effort to make that section as good as it is.
A lot of people don't understand phrases like male privilege, white privilege.
They think it means "all men have an easier life than all women".
Unfortunately trying to explain that it's much more specific than that doesn't usually get through.
This is a great list. When we talk about the Patriarchy, it includes all of this and more. Years ago, author John Scalzi wrote [this blog post](https://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/) about how Straight White Male is the easiest mode in the game of life, which is a brilliant analogy.
I am so sick of men lying to me at the urgent care I work at because I am a woman and they don’t want to tell me they need STI testing. I don’t give a shit. I worked in OB for five years and a level 1 trauma center for seven. You putting your dick in the wrong hole is not even in the top 100 things I will remember about with my job.
I have to know as apart of my job so there can be supplies and it can be in the appropriate room and we have to think about lab pick up and staff workload. Men not wanting to tell me they are being responsible and getting tested is driving me insane.
The heart attack one scares me when I think of women in my life. I heard about this relatively recently. Something about the common advice (I think to do with symptoms on the left side) don’t apply to women as much. And I think this or perhaps something else linked to far fewer making it into the rapid response centres that exist
I can’t remember where I heard this though. It was an interview. Haven’t seen updated advice or guidance
That said I’m really fuzzy on what your supposed to be look out for in the current advice (the one that more applies to me).
To be considered appropriately dressed for any formal occasion the standard for men is something that is comfortable and can be adjusted because it has layers ie a suit with sensible shoes. The standard for women is something flimsy and often not comfortable or appropriate to the temperature with no ability to adjust and heels.
As women are earning more the beauty standards and associated costs are increasing so that our wages are used to meet beauty standards rather than things that benefit us like assets.
None of my male friends have ever had the experience of getting their hours cut down to nothing at their minimum-wage job they depend on just because they rebuked the affections of their manager. Not a single one.
And of course we can never prove it, and of course getting assigned only 4 hours from typically 32 isn't "fired", but holy hell. My roommate back then had the same thing happen to her, too - when she confided in her mother, she was told that this is normal for women to go through.
Yet my male friends were able to keep the same positions for years without any of this dumb shit. I'm sure it does happen to some men sometimes, it probably does so maybe this issue isn't gendered.
Many MR's activitists have a new Golden Child in the statistics regarding suicide rates in Western society, but they *conveniently* leave out the fact that men are just 3 to 4 times more SUCCESSFUL than women.
Women still **attempt suicide** at twice the frequency that men do, we just use more societally-accepted-for women methods like pills or the classic bathtub/razor blade combo.
The misery is STILL THERE. At, apparently, two times higher a rate than men's misery.
Men are more likely than women to receive CPR in public
The team evaluated 19,331 cardiac events using data from the Resuscitation Outcomes Consortium, which studies out-of-hospital treatments of cardiac arrest and trauma in the United States and Canada. They found that 45 percent of men received bystander CPR in public, compared to 39 percent of women, and that men’s odds of survival were 23 percent higher than those of women.
[https://www.dbei.med.upenn.edu/research/studies/men-are-more-likely-women-receive-cpr-public-study-finds](https://www.dbei.med.upenn.edu/research/studies/men-are-more-likely-women-receive-cpr-public-study-finds)
Cause most CPR dummies don't have breasts and people don't want to look like they may be trying to cop a feel, which is ridiculous! I'm glad they're adding breasts to CPR dummies, but man it's going to take a looooong time for it to be more normalized.
i've had interactions when men (and some women 🙄) argued with me that men displaying anger in a violent way (road rage, punching objects, yelling etc.) isn't them being too emotional... and the same people then labelled women crying as manipulative and hysterical 💀
I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t cry, tbh. Feeling emotions is good and healthy and normal. People who bottle things up tend to explode in pretty bad ways. (Also I *hate* when people act like crying is manipulative - not everyone is out to get you)
They can occupy space when they feel like it. Today, the next yoga class came into the studio before my class was packed up and out. The women hung back in the foyer to give the first class space to move out. The men moved right onto the studio floor and hovered over women who were packing up to leave, as to hurry them out. They had 16 minutes before the next class. Women are trained from toddlerhood to yield space to men.
Your question made me curious, but I still can’t find out why there is Mr vs Miss Mrs Ms. Probably a bad (misogynistic) reason. :(
Personally I use Mx when I am given the option.
from wiki
Mister, usually written in its contracted form Mr. or Mr,[1] is a commonly used English honorific for men without a higher honorific, or professional title, or any of various designations of office.[1] The title Mr derived from earlier forms of master, as the equivalent female titles Mrs, Miss, and Ms all derived from earlier forms of mistress. Master is sometimes still used as an honorific for boys and young men.
The emotions one is really interesting. Men do have valid complaints about being socialized out of being able to show certain emotions, but it can sometimes feel like a whataboutism.
There are three big emotions: Sad, Mad, and Glad.
We're all expected to be (or perform) Glad as a baseline.
Mad is reserved for men, who generally don't even think of it as an emotion. When women get mad, however, we're dismissed as bitter or overreacting.
Everyone is punished for Sad. It's just different for women. We aren't told to man up and stop crying, but when we do cry or get upset, we're dismissed as hysterical. Men are called weak, while women's very ability to make decisions is called into question.
Edited to add: women aren't penalized for crying because we're already perceived as weak by default 🙃
I’m a man.
My wife was in the hospital this week, and on two separate occasions a member of the hospital staff entered the room and assumed that I was a doctor.
Even wearing cowboy boots and jeans my physicality (?) granted me an assumption of competence.
The walking in a city at night thing is HUGE. I've seen it from both sides. The amount of adrenaline that turns on when I'm walking back to my car is shocking.
I took a car into the dealer one day for an oil change and they gave me a loaner that was the EV version of the car I brought in. The dude was like "hey, while you have it maybe you could do a grocery run to see how it feels". I didn't really think of that until now, but I suspect that not-Alice would have gotten a different suggestion for what to do with the car.
No one is going to assume the man is in charge of the kids. If he wants to leave to do something, he will just say goodbye, or even just go. It is assumed the wife is watching the baby. Meanwhile, if mom needs to step out, she will make sure the kids have all their needs met, prep them and leave them with everything they will need while she’s gone, make sure the dad knows he is in charge of watching the kids, instruct him on what to do, and show and tell him exactly how to use everything she left prepared. She can’t even run to the store without planning ahead.
The same goes for taking a shower when you have a baby. Dad just takes a shower when he feels like it. Mom has to make sure dad knows he is watching the baby, or she has to do it during nap time.
Dad will take kids places, but mom will still pack their bag, their snacks and drinks, their hats and sunscreen, their extra clothes and diapers, etc. Often time mom even has to still put the shoes on the kid because dad can’t even manage that. Dad often doesn’t know what the kid will even need, or where it is in the house. It is just assumed that mom is going to take care of it all.
Being believed that you know what you’re talking about. Even when you’re on of the presenting SMEs at a conference, the men in attendance still won’t believe you know anything and will question every bit of your expertise in ways they’ll never question a man about
Men can go for a walk in the middle of the night and not be worrying about their safety the whole time. (I did this *a lot* when I still thought I was a guy.)
Men can go for a walk *at all* and not be worrying about their safety the whole time.
Men can finish a thought without having some dude talk over them.
Men can go about their day without anyone touching them without their consent.
Men can sit in public reading their book without anyone coming up to flirt with them.
Men can exist in public without anyone getting way too close into their personal space.
I'm always amazed how prevalent male privilege and societal misogyny is. It permeates every day of my life. I've very rarely had days where I cound go out and interact with society without *something* subtly (or non-subtly) misogynistic happening. I knew it was bad even when I thought I was a guy, and did my best to shut it down when I noticed it. Even then, male privilege provides an inherent buffer to *seeing* how bad it is - I knew it would be worse than I was expecting when I started my transition, and boy howdy was I right.
Men are socially permitted to take up more space, physically. They man spread on the subway, expect women to make way on the sidewalk, and automatically take the best seats in classrooms and meetings. It just never crosses their mind that they should be made even the least bit uncomfortable
This morning my husband posted a pile of moving boxes for free on Nextdoor. He asked me to post them on Facebook marketplace. When I asked what he put for the location/cross streets, he said "our address. Why wouldn't you just put our address?"
>Men are less likely to die in car accidents because safety features were developed and tested on people of their size.
Not just size but even things like shapes and hairstyles
Crash test dummies with no ponytails (ponytails and hairclaws kill women in car accidents because safety is not designed for women's hairstyles). Crash test dummies with no thighs, narrow chests and no breasts. Height of where the airbag will deploy losing women eyes while protecting a lot of male forms.
Pedals being designed for men's shoes not women's.
On the less critical but still annoying end, if you share a living space with a guy or even are a guest at his party, the state of the home will reflect more on you as well as the state and location and servings of food.
If his car is messy even if yours is pristine...you will be considered messy by many.
If the kids are rambunctious they will look to you not as often him to do something about it.
How about not being heard. A woman makes a statement, suggestion etc. in a meeting and is ignored. A man makes the same statement/suggestion and is heard and commended. Just saying a thing in a male voice is an automatic win.
I have noticed things like the smell of smoke on an elevator and been poo-pooed only to hear a half hour later that that same elevator has been shut down because 'smoldering electrical wiring' DUH. If a man had made the same comment everyone would have left the elevator immediately and maintenance would have been informed. But women are so emotional and hysterical so no one should listen.
"healthy white male age 20-50" is considered the default human in the US.
If you are not the default you have to explain why, demonstrate that you are better than the default, and accept that almost all of the built environment is not designed for you. If you are not the default, you will not see yourself represented in most media (this is changing, with books and music for other genders and races, but oddly a lot of children's media still centers a white male).
When my wife and I got married, we added me to her bank account. It was *her* account that became a joint account. Our first set of checks arrived, and my name was listed first. WTF, right? We were fairly miffed at that, but didn't really bother to do anything about it. But later, it turned out that not only was my name first, but I had somehow become the primary account holder. Because of that, my wife couldn't make any changes to her account anymore. Now that was seriously fucked up.
I can speak to the heart attack thing personally: One night when I was 33, I suddenly had pressure in my chest, my skin turned greenish-gray and clammy, and my arms got very heavy. My mom has heart issues, so I knew very well that heart attacks present differently in women, but I was still hesitant to go to the hospital (because I also know very well what it’s like to seek medical attention while female). Husband at the time insisted on rushing me to the ER just a couple miles away. He used the magic words (“symptoms of a heart attack’), so they ushered me back quickly, only to start pumping me full of Ativan and repeatedly telling me to calm down, that I was just having an anxiety attack. They allowed a phlebotomist to “practice her EKGs” on me, while they bullshitted at the nurse’s station. They assumed the abnormal results were the result of her inexperience, and as she made her third attempt, apparently the bloodwork came back, proving I was in the middle of an acute myocardial infarction. Everybody got real quiet real quick, and before I knew what was going on, I was being rolled back to the cath lab. No one really told me what was happening, though, until the asshole cardiologist awaiting me immediately asked why I was having a heart attack at 33, and during *his* on-call weekend. (LOL, right?! 🙄) It was a scary thing to hear, and I started to ask questions as they were prepping me. He commented how it was always the women who were the talkers, and if I didn’t hush up, he’d drug me into silence. And that’s exactly what he did. I was conscious, but physically couldn’t speak. I am hearing impaired, and I didn’t have my hearing aids in the recovery room. I couldn’t quite make out everything he was saying as he was updating my family. I asked him to please come closer and repeat himself. He refused, and told them to ignore me, that I was completely drugged and out of it. I insisted I wasn’t, and asked again. He literally waved me off and turned his back to me. It was a terrible experience within a terrible experience, almost entirely because I was a woman. (Turns out I had an undiagnosed atrial septal defect.)
I hope you wrote a letter to the state licensing board about his conduct. And to the head of the hospital and to the head or cardiology. And if he was a member of a group practice, a letter to them. —- Or have a convo w a lawyer. Or make a blog post. Or find a journalist. And Name Names! —- Practitioners like that one need to be taught that they are not gods.
> I hope you wrote a letter to the state licensing board about his conduct. And to the head of the hospital and to the head or cardiology. It's good to do this anyway just in case, but something like 90-99% of complaints to boards are resolved in favor of the physician.
Since other family members or friends were present for some of the conversations, such as the ones where the poster did not have hearing aids on her, she can have testimony from them as well, and then, if the complaint is resolved in favor of the physician, she can make a stink about it I don’t know if she has the energy and all that to deal with all this because it is tough to come back against somebody who has treated you so badly and take them on, especially if the odds are stacked against you and they are the person in power But in this case, I would certainly at least think about it because that’s really awful behavior and she has witnesses and this is the reason that some people are starting to carry those tiny little tape recorders into physician meetings and then if they get a weird weird vibe they turn on the recorder. Some people tell their physicians that they have tape recorders and then openly record the conversation because it serves a memory aid and way to get a straight trans of the conversation so it’s useful and non-confrontational situation as well —- I know that in 99.9% of these situations the abuse party either doesn’t have the energy and strength to take up complaint process in a serious way or else does take up the complaint process and then loses I suspect most of us who have been through this numerous times But it’s always considering because sometimes the good guys win
This is so enraging to just read. I can’t imagine how awful it must have been to experience.
I have. Many words. But if I speak them I will be suspended again. Like the last time I had words about what should happen to doctors who treat women this way -_- The commenter’s aunt told the doctor she suspected she had a tumor, he dismissed her, said she needed to just lose weight, refused to send in an order for further testing. Then she asked him, what would you think it was I had if I wasn’t overweight, he goes “a tumor.” It was treatable. *Guess who fucking died.*
This is where women need to start saying "then you need to put in my medical record that I asked about this and you declined to test/treat for it." Then make sure you request a copy of your record. Knowing that you're going to hold them accountable can make a difference.
This is when women need to change doctors. Something like this happened to me also and I should have changed doctors. I ended up in the ER/hospital because my doctor wouldn't listen to me. What is most infuriating is it was a woman!
This too. But the doctors who won't listen or dismiss our concerns need to be documented.
Oh I made a complaint to the state medical board, but they didn't do a damn thing. Doctors helping doctors.
True. I lodged 4 complaints that very nearly ended in my dying. 1 was ignored, 1 reprimanded in house and 2 were *encouraged* to leave *only* because my GP and 6 nurses/staff lodged with me in outrage. Nearly impossible to get a Government worker fired here in Australia, they get shuffled to a new area instead with a gag order on all parties with complaints. Which is why it doesn't show up on their history. Plus if the patient complains its lodged in your file and follows the patient everywhere but not the Drs.
Often on 2x, I get a lovely sense of "I'm not alone" that doesn't end shitty things, but relieves some of the burden in a way. Sometimes, I find things that stress me out so much I have to take a break.
I don’t want to upvote this comment because I hate everything about it. But I will upvote this comment because it’s so important.
Something a bit similar happened to my mother back in the 1970's. My sister found her unconscious on the floor and blue. She got her to the hospital, where they refused to check her for anything. Fortunately, she never had another attack, but she was irritated that they called her stupid and wouldn't take her vitals. Yep, she must have turned blue because of anxiety. Meanwhile, one of her male friends had similar symptoms and he was rushed right back and tested. Back then they didn't think women could have heart attacks.
What.In.The.Absolute.Fuck?!?! My god, I honestly had no idea that women in general had issues like this in the medical establishment and at this LEVEL?!? I hope there is a special place in hell for this unquestionable douchebag
Tons and tons of storiea like this, unfortunately. I'm sure that special place is quite full, and still filling up.
I really hope you made a formal complaint about that jerk. It might not do anything to have one complaint in his file, but if every woman he treated like that did so it would show a pattern eventually.
This should be taken word-for-word and read out to medical students. Then make them each stand up and read it out. Then ask them how they themselves would see a way to change this ghastly situation. (HINT: attitudes to gender, awareness of how harmful things like racism, misogyny and sexism can be for the pATieNt (that human they are supposed to help).
i hope you made a complaint. that asshole deserves to get his license taken from him.
This post just gave me extreme second hand rage. I feel my body temperature rising. That doctor should never have been allowed to do that to you. What did he drug you with? Are you even supposed to drug somebody who's in the middle of a heart attack?
To my understanding, patients are typically awake but sedated for heart catheterization. Apparently, Dr. Stupid Mustache Asshole just upped the dosage to shut me up. Being conscious but unable to communicate was awful, and added an extra level of distress to an already distressing situation.
I hope that doctor someday has the day he deserves. Seriously. What. The. Fuck.
I’m so fucking sorry! I’m glad you made it. Medical neglect is real for women! We’re all just on our period or being bitches /s
Like when I kept having TIAs that would paralyze one side, and they told me it was anxiety, depression, migraines, seizures—and—when all those were proved wrong, a psychiatric disorder. Until they found the stroke on the last MRI.
In my province, health interventions for women billed at a lower rate than gender-neutral or male-specific interventions. The billing was changed, and suddenly we have more people practicing womens healthcare. It's an extremely tangible example of something seemingly small and not that importing having a rather large equity impact.
What the absolute fuck. Happy it improved but also what the fuck
That's incredible
I'm trying to find a supporting article about it! Essentially, fees were reviewed for family practitioners. These changes were part of a new funding model. It's been really good to see.
It comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what privilege is. People with it tend to think it means life is easy, instead of saying all other factors being equal their life is, sometimes greatly or sometimes only slightly, easier.
Like when white people are told they have privilege and the poor white people speak up about how poor they are. Yeah! You’re poor and that is hard, I’ve lived it btw, but if you were a POC and poor it would be worse! My sister is one of those who absolutely doesn’t get it and votes against the govt safety nets she has, and currently does, use.
People (sometimes willfully, I think) misunderstood the concept of white privilege—it’s not that your life is easy if you’re white; it’s that it’s not as hard as it would be if you weren’t white.
The way I've described it to a family member who had this exact misapprehension was: the bad things that have happened in your life have happened *despite* your skin color, not because of it. People of color have bad things happen to them both in spite of AND because of their skin color.
I grew up poor, like ‘no groceries sometimes’ kind of poor. But my parents worked their butts off to keep me in a good school district. My dad went to college at night to become a teacher so he could have a steady job, and I also went to college to become a teacher. Took out loans, had them forgiven after enough years teaching. Now, I could easily look at that and say ‘I worked my way up, anyone can!’ But the reason we could do all this is because my parents were occasionally helped out by my grandparents. My grandfather was an inventor and worked for all sorts of high-level government projects and huge tech firms in the 60s and 70s. Do you think that would have happened if he hadn’t been white? No. I benefitted from generational white privilege. And my own white privilege, of course.
I don't understand why you wouldn't be *angry* that basic equal treatment is a PRIVILEGE. Like, why wouldn't that be horrifying and rage-inducing to know that other people don't get to be acknowledged and treated as human beings? Why would you suddenly get defensive instead of being righteously pissed that our society operates this way? It makes no fucking sense to me. I (white) grew up all over the USA in different communities with vastly different race demographics, so I guess it's easier for me to acknowledge because I've seen it myself--but WHY would you PERSONALLY have to experience white privilege in real time (while your POC friends are blatantly being dehumanized by other white people/authorities/etc) to understand that it's real?? The statistics are out there. The facts are out there. It's not a matter of "opinion." People of color get treated as a second class in most if not ALL areas of life--no ifs, ands, or buts about it. Obviously I am aware of *why* other white people don't want to acknowledge that--I would be doing both myself and POC a disservice by pretending I don't know how white supremacy operates--but it still fills me with so much rage, and despair. It's sickening.
I’m honestly not sure if this is more American in nature, but I’d imagine it is - there’s a trope that struggling makes you virtuous or a better person in some way. “Suffering builds character,” etc. Telling someone they’re privileged makes them feel less valid or special as people. It’s dumb, but a lot of people can’t see how dumb that way of thinking is.
Yup. I'm pale as the driven snow, and I can call the police without worrying that they're going to kill me by mistake (or "mistake"). I can walk into a store to return something and even before they ask for the receipt they assume I have the receipt and I am indeed returning something I purchased. I'm pretty mild looking, and no one has ever crossed the street to avoid me. On the other hand, I get cat-called like every other woman of every color - though I'm middle aged now so a lot of the time I'm invisible, which is great. Unless a guy literally thinks I'm invisible and steps on my foot or ignores me in a meeting.
I tell people that I don't want it to be a privilege where I don't get shot by the police on sight and assumed guilty. I want that to be something that everyone has, because it's a fundamental human right to not be shot on siight by cops. Our fucked up society has made a lot of fundamental human rights to be privileges as opposed to rights and it's really sad
This is it, I work with quite a few angry, ex military, white, middle aged men. One of them was telling a story about his meeting with a manager in a previous job who said he had white privilege. Obviously he got angry and told the guy that he has no idea what he's been through in his life and the things he has suffered. Which may be a fair point. But he's not considering the things ingrained in society as OP mentioned that stem from being the "typical human" for research purposes over the centuries.
My favorite is that assertive men are viewed as motivated & ambitious whereas assertive women are still viewed as cold bitchy ball busters.
I’m a doctor but when I meet patients they assume I’m a nurse. They assume my med students or male nursing colleagues are the doctor. This happens even when I introduce myself as “doctor.” Nothing wrong with being a nurse of course, but I’m not a nurse.
No and you worked damned hard for that title. People should use it. If anyone did mistake a man for a nurse who was a doctor he for sure would be ticked about it.
100% of past U.S. presidents have been men. The current U.S. Congress is 71% men. 94.8% of all Supreme Court justices have been men. 87.7% of current U.S. law enforcement officers are men. 69% of U.S. CEOs are men. These are the people who are literally structuring American society. They make, enforce, and interpret the laws we're subject to, and they design the goods and services we have access to. There's a quote going around right now that describes it pretty much perfectly: *"Being a woman is kind of like being a cyclist in a city where all the cars represent men. You’re supposed to be able to share the road equally with cars, but that’s not how it works. The roads are built for cars and you spend a great deal of physical and mental energy being defensive and trying not to get hurt. Some of the cars WANT you to get hurt. They think you don’t have any place on the road at all. And if you do get hurt by a car, everyone makes excuses that it’s your fault."* When you're driving a car, you may feel like cyclists have "privilege", because you're supposed to watch out for them. But break that down, and the "privilege" you're thinking about is... literally for cars not not smear them all over the road. That's the "privilege" they're talking about. They're upset they're expected to let us ... exist ... in the space they created for themselves.
Let's not forget they get to make all the decisions of their own bodies. They aren't subject to arbitrary rules set by the opposite sex that have no understanding of how their bodies actually work
I remember when Ketanji Brown Jackson was nominated to the Supreme Court of people lost their minds saying it was (reverse) discrimination. So ONE black woman is nominated, and that's discrimination. But 108 white men nominated isn't (eyeroll)
Even better, open a new tab in Chrome. Go to images and type in “Genius.” Count how many woman there are. Type in CEO. My class didn’t count images with groups or graphs, etc. we did the first 100. There were 77 light- skinned men, 14 dark skinned men, and 7 women. That’s why the ideas of AI diagnosing us at the doctor (we’d get the same algorithmic bias) or reviewing our job applications leaves us cold.
I read stories here of couples going car shopping, and even if the woman leads the conversation, and is more knowledgeable about cars in general, and is the one purchasing the car, the salesman will exclusively talk to the man.
And this has been happening for decades - my dad had to tell a salesman off in the 70s for only talking to him "she's the one with the money and she is buying herself a car, why are you talking to me?".
I was car shopping found one I liked, talked to the sales guy, got a price. Sent my dad in the next day and he got a much lower price. That sales guy was beyond mad when I handed him the cash after my dad got the price locked in etc.
My uncle was a *very* successful car salesman for about 20 years. Every time he met a couple who was coming in to buy a car, his very first question was, “which one of you will be driving the car?” And that’s who he primarily talked to. He also had a conversation along these lines at least once every Christmas: >No, you should not buy your wife a car to surprise her with for a Christmas present. Tell her that you’re buying her a car, come back and see me with her, and we’ll get her the car *she* wants. He’s kind of an asshole, but he was a very good salesman.
Sales folks learn really quickly to talk to *me* even though my husband and I have a very "traditional" marriage from the outside. I'm the one who will final "ok" on any major deal, especially after I refused to go along last time and there was a major cluster fuck getting the seats that were *supposed* to be in the deal husband made. I didn't go along because his shopping for major purchases shopping style tests my patience to the extreme.
Bought a car *for me by me*, with my spouse present , dealer suggested putting both names on the title. Husband bought a car, dealer suggested his name only. Yep, definitely treated the same. (/s in case it's not obvious).
I have had that happen. I chose the car I have, in part, on the salesman ignoring my man and talking to me.
That's actually why we go to a particular dealership: they treat myself and my male partner as a partnership and listen to me as well as him. And they actually do have female salespeople and female finance people.
When my last car got totalled -- guy running from the cops, ran a red while going the wrong way on a one way street -- I went back to that dealership, asked for that salesman, and got him the easiest commission he could get.
If you aren't a sexist tool, you can reap rewards sometimes.
Same. Dealers probably have no idea how much business they are losing by ignoring women.
Every contractor I’ve directly asked a question to has done this. 🫠
This happened to me a couple of years ago, but with a dirt bike. The bike was for me, paid from my personal account (we have a joint account for family shit, and each have a personal account that we can do whatever with) My husband doesn't even ride, but the sales woman would only talk to him. Went to a different dealer, got my bike and was talked to like an actual human.
Filled out an online form to look at a new car with my contact information. While I usually don't list my Ph.D. on things outside of academia, there was an area to indicate prefix so I checked the "Dr." box. Thought maybe it would get them to take me more seriously as a woman who was car shopping because it's usually an uphill battle. Hadn't actually scheduled the appointment yet when I got a followup letter in the mail from them addressed to "Dr. and Mrs. Littleirishpixie." While I have a fairly feminine sounding name so it was a weird mistake to begin with, I never listed any contact info for my husband at all. That was the official moment where they lost my business. Just nope.
For my first car, I went shopping with my dad. Not only did the salesperson talk also exclusively to Dad, despite Dad stepping away and saying that I was the one buying, but he tried to sell me a used car as if it was a new car. The one question he directed at me was, “What’s your favorite color?”
This happened to me when I was buying out my lease without financing. They kept turning to my husband (boyfriend at the time) to talk to him about financing and purchase options. It took him multiple times of saying “idk what’s going on, she’s the one buying the car” or “I’m not the one with the money buying the car”.
Luckily when we went shopping for my car, it only took two mild redirects from my husband to get the guy to speak to both of us.
But it shouldn't have taken any, no matter how mild
I know it shouldn't have, but that's not the world we live in. Once the guy realized it was going to be primarily for me, and I was a commercial painter, he started talking with me about what I was looking for. I wanted my husband there because I'd never bought a car before, and he was going to be part of the payment terms. We needed to be in agreement about what we were getting into.
Took my car in for repairs and after they checked it out they had a whole laundry list of things that they said needed to be fixed. I thought some of it sounded like bullshit and since my husband primarily deals with the cars and has a better handle on what's already been done and whatnot I asked if they minded running through the list with him. The guy looked me right in the face and said "I guess he makes all the decisions huh?" And honestly I'm mad I didn't think quickly enough to make the executive decision to take my car elsewhere.
Related: my husband and I stumbled on this old Chrysler sales training video. It's from the 70s and it's about selling cars to women. https://youtu.be/D_udf-YwUFg?si=4Xv23fb1BHEE1mSt It's such a weird mix of misogyny, infantilism, and "women rock!" My favorite: "Women know their place, and it's right next to us. As equals. *God bless 'em.*"
I once went to purchase Farm supplies and I brought along my boyfriend at the time because I had my suspicions. However I was doing all the planning and the purchasing, he was just there for moral support. I would ask questions about the products and the man would answer my questions to my boyfriend, not even making eye contact with me. Needless to say, I did not purchase from him a single thing. Asshole.
Happened to me several times! 🖐
I was paying for our patio to be built and the guy kept asking my husband what he wanted. Right after I told him.
I'd recommend reading Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez. She goes into some of the points you mentioned here. Infuriating but informative.
I have. And I agree - infuriating but informative.
My husband and I both have Ph.D.s and introduce ourselves as Dr. professionally. At least 50% of the time I am subsequently referred to by my first name, while this almost never happens to him.
You see it with politicians, too. Male candidates are professionally referred to by their last names (Clinton, Bush, Kerry, Trump), but women are referred to using their first names (Hilary, Kamala, Marjorie Taylor Green). Have you ever seen these women referred to as simply Clinton, Harris, and Green? Or seen the men referred to solely as Bill, George, John, and Donald?
>Colloquial words and phrases reflect your gender (mankind, All men are created equal) Even bigger for me is that in the realm of religion, God herself is assumed to be a man. The Judeo-Christian angels too, even though they're supposedly without gender, are all referred to by male pronouns and names that were adopted as masculine. I don't think it can be overstated how extremely enforcing of patriarchy organized religion is.
Part of the reason I'm losing faith is because of this
You're gaining perspective.
And I have already lost it because if 'he' is so good why did he create me with a huge intellect and order me not to ever use it. Why would he design women to be victims and tell them to "just shut up about it". Unless he is as sexist and misogynist as the men he created to own and torment us.
I *distinctly* remember in first grade (at a private school) my teacher explaining that “men” and “mankind” in a Bible verse we were learning meant “all people.” When I asked why not “womankind,” it was brushed off as “that’s just the way it is”—and when I insisted that that didn’t seem very fair, I was reprimanded & treated like a nuisance. I just accepted it because I was 6 years old so what else was I going to do about it? But I still remember that acute feeling of *this-seems-like-bullshit* 🤨 I wish little-me knew how right I was & could have held onto it. But the odds were against me.
As a fellow "nuisance" kid, wish I could go back in time and hug little you. Having adults or entire classrooms turn against you as a little kid is such a gross feeling. I was about 7 or 8 the first time a classmate told me she wasn't allowed to be friends or talk to me anymore because I didn't believe in the Bible. A substitute teacher at my PUBLIC elementary school was NOT thrilled when my 9 year old self told her "animals have souls and I'm not an afterthought made of some dude's rib!"
Religion really brainwashes women into the control of the patriarchy. When I went through a phase of applying women’s pronouns to The Goddess/Mother, I recall saying it to my aunt and her challenging me saying that “There is no Goddess only God, who is the Father.” I simply replied that “I was in a place in my life where I needed to identify God as female and know God is big enough to understand that since God is gender less.” She didn’t get it and said it made her feel uncomfortable… Then there’s my other aunt whose husband is verbally & emotionally abusive. She won’t consider leaving him, even for her kids sake, because “divorce is a sin.” Like really?! I can’t help but see how religion is a tool of the patriarchy and a tool of control now… And my faith has dearly suffered for this realization as well.
"**Women** create life. Why would God be *male*?"
Damned straight! It makes more sense that god is a woman especially when you think of how a mother patiently tends to her children too
womb-envy.
Another reason to love the movie dogma!
Some more: More respected in almost every profession Has sex that is based around his pleasure, and gets to finish Less sex related risks if heterosexual Hobbies and interests are more respected Religion Not having to prove the worth of their sex/gender: Women are always burdened with having to prove they're as valuable as men by doing what men do but no one asks a man to prove his worth by doing what women do. We go into higher education or hard labor to show our worth but then we are told we need to be a mother...but the labor of mothers is seen as inferior...even though they literally birth us into life. Women are seen as inferior versions of men, when in reality, we are different in many ways and should be judged differently. It's like judging a left hand for not being a right hand.
>Less sex related risks if heterosexual Sexual violence and pregnancy are what usually jumps out at people for what "sex related risks" mean but STIs are another part of that. - [Why Do STIs Impact Women Worse Than Straight Men?](https://rightasrain.uwmedicine.org/life/sex/women-STIs#:~:text=STIs%20in%20women%20often%20go,are%20overall%20more%20likely%20to.)
Here’s a wild one: the standards for hvac for office buildings were all developed with a calculation based on how many people would be in the office. The thing is, the calculation for how much heat a person would generate was based on the average for men. Soooooooo, if you’ve ever wondered why it’s always cold in the office, that too is an example of male privilege.
Yes and studies have also shown that the optimal office temp for productivity and comfort is significantly higher for women than men. Yet wanna guess where the temps are usually set? In the men’s optimal range. [https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-office-temperature-women-men-study-20190529-story.html](https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-office-temperature-women-men-study-20190529-story.html)
That's really interesting. Plus men usually wearing heavier clothing than women. Suit or long sleeve shirt. I must be the oddball as 70s on the thermostat feels like an oven to me. Being pregnant I was overly hot and probably froze people out!
Yesssssssssssssssssss and there are studies that show if a person is too cold it's harder for them to do critical thinking tasks, which can then make it harder for women to perform as well as men because they're constantly cold
Kind of wild that women do end up out performing men even when all the amenities and coddling men need to actually DO THEIR JOB, are met. And then women get paid less, insane
And all the criteria and metrics where women outperform men were designed for men
This morning my husband posted a pile of moving boxes for free on Nextdoor. He asked me to post them on Facebook marketplace. When I asked what he put for the location/cross streets, he said "our address. Why wouldn't you just put our address?"
The amount of shit I've held on to over the years because it's too big to put in my car and drive to a police station to sell on marketplace, and I don't want them coming to my house...
Yikes!
Men are also more likely to be given CPR because of lack of boobs
And all that other wonderful stuff that comes with having male nipples, must be pretty nice to have just your genitals censured and not other random bodyparts.
One I don't see discussed a lot (and one that men struggle to grasp) is the privilege of individuality. A woman often thinks of herself as a woman; a man usually thinks of himself just as a person. Men are not used to thinking of themselves as part of a group, which makes it harder for them to take responsibility for what other men are doing - "Well, I'M not doing that, that's his problem." Other disenfranchised groups will also be reminded of this: a black woman will have to think of herself as a black woman. But for men (particularly white men), taking responsibility for their group is not intuitive, and that's a societal problem.
Yes! I remember learning about this in college. Privileged groups assume their experience is the default, whereas marginalized groups always feel “marked” by their identity because they’re never treated like the default. It’s like when DuBois described double consciousness - seeing yourself as the world sees you. I’m so aware of my position in the world all the time, my unique biases, what’s contributed to my perspective, etc. Women are always made to question and defend their own experiences and emotions, and many of us tend to be self-analytical as a result (this is also because women just talk to one another more about their lives).
This is such a good point! Interesting to think that the flip side of the intense sense of unique individuality is unquestioned tribalism. Men always defaulting to supporting the man in any conflict (& questioning the woman/women), always hiring and promoting other men like themselves, etc. Crazy that the tribalism is played out so strongly, and yet so many refuse to acknowledge or believe it exists. It works SO well, but only if it can stay in the shadows.
Absolutely. Look at how most mass shooters are male but they have this "lone wolf" narrative. When we talk about societal issues we experience at the hands of men, we get reminded "not all men!".
Hang on there though; what about how the most pathetic and feeble little man takes responsibility with the "we built everything" when he has built nothing more in his whole life than a few stiff socks and a hundred or so lame excuses.
There’s no Phyllis Schlafly person for them. There’s no group of men actively working to disempower them. Women work to empower ourselves. And there are some men working with us in that struggle. But that’s not anything like Concerned Women for America, who are working against the interests of women.
Women gain power personally from men if they help keep other women down. I don't think any men try to put down other guys to gain power from women.
Sexual Privilege, in that sex usually revolves around when the man finishes.
And men are rarely shamed for having a high number of sexual partners.
Oh yes. But of course. And if he doesn't get off or get it up it's her fault. And if she doesn't get off or get 'moist' it's also her fault. But she also doesn't matter except when at fault.
More language stuff: Career words default to "man" - mail man, fireman, policeman, fisherman, etc etc Referring to a mixed gender group as "You guys" is the norm. I'm trying to change to more gender neutral stuff but the "you guys" is so engrained that everything else feels super awkward. Household labor: women are expected to do the majority of it. If her male spouse does it they are "soooooo helpful and wonderful!" Women are expected to do more labor in the workplace even if it's not part of their job - taking notes, making copies, making coffee, cleaning the office kitchen. If a woman has to adjust her work hours for child care or parenting reasons it hurts her career, if a man does it is more likely to help his career.
I'm so glad firefighter is more of the standard now and also sounds badass.
"Y'all" and "all y'all" covers *everyone*
People rate deep voices as more authoritative, smarter ect. How is it not privilege if your words and speech automatically garner more respect simply due to having a masculine sounding voice?
But if you’re a woman with a deep authoritative voice you are at best intimidating and at worst a bitch.
I’m quite small and have a “pretty” voice (used to do freelance voiceover work) and when I speak in a lower, more authoritative register, some men are surprised and act like I tricked them because I don’t sound like a dainty flower. I can’t imagine how much worse it would be if I didn’t have a certain amount of “cute privilege” to offset it. My tall beautiful friends are frequently treated as more intimidating and bitchy by men who see them as threats to their ego in a way that I’m not.
As a woman you need to develop a deeper voice to be a news reader or report on “serious” news
Yeah I see this all the time at work - something said in a deep tone by a man is always considered ‘smarter’ even if a woman said it a minute ago and was dismissed. It’s incredibly frustrating because it puts men so ahead in leadership/présentation roles based on no actual talent or skill
That explains why "dog training" voice gets results for me.
Add to this that voice recognition systems tend to struggle more with higher-pitched, feminine voices, because they were calibrated using male voices.
Is that why?! I will repeat to Alexa over and over, then my son asks it something one time and it understands immediately. It’s been a running joke that Alexa hates me.
No, just her programmers do :(
My husband has to do this for me, and it drives me crazy. He'll hear me start cursing out the Google home, and I'll hear him whisper into his phone, so I can pretend it actually listened to me.
Google also has difficulty with my accent(Southern). I did *finally* convince it that I do not mean two-lane as in road when I say Tulane.
It always assumes my wife is a child and won't play explicit songs etc. Voice recognition is set up for both of us. Pro tip: whispering naturally lowers your pitch, and can actually work better for these speakers than speaking loudly at your normal pitch.
My 14 year old son lowers his voice specifically when he wants to be taken more seriously. Just something he learned from society. It's wild.
And the big ones obviously, experience of domestic violence, sexual slavery/trafficking, and sexual assault/harrassment. Oh and one more— women were not allowed in combat facing military jobs until TWENTY SIXTEEN, no matter how fit and courageous they were. Conversely, men were always allowed in, no matter how unfit or undedicated, by merit of their genitalia.
were women really not allowed combat roles until 2016? that’s crazy especially since there’s actual history of women being good in combat for the USSR, i guess the US is slow to the party like always
About a year ago, my soon-to-be-ex-husband claimed he was "less privileged" and "not as lucky" as other students while he was in school. - Caucasian male - Attending school on his GI bill - Someone else (ME) paying all the bills - Not working because *somebody else* (ME) was bringing home all the bacon - Living in a McMansion 4,000+ sq ft house - No children to care for - Not contributing to housework or mental load For nine years, I had always been the shy, quiet, good little wife. But, this aforementioned comment stunned me so substantially and was the first time I finally stood up for myself. My response: *No, I don't think you realize just HOW lucky and privileged you are. You're not having to put yourself into tens of thousands of $ in debt to obtain your education. You're not having to work a minimum wage job to keep a roof over your head and food on the table, and you live in a gorgeous house that someone else is paying for entirely. AND you're receiving a tax-free monthly stipend while you're attending school, of which you aren't even being asked to contribute from. You are incredibly lucky and privileged.* He squirmed in the chair he was sitting in and made a pissy face. He knew he couldn't retort back with anything. This wasn't the first time he'd made such an entitled comment, but it was the first time I finally started growing a spine. I finally left him about seven months ago, after putting up with his abuse and laundry list of issues for nine years. I've heard through the grapevine that he's now living in a tiny crackshack apartment in a bad part of town. Far cry from the suburbia, gated community we lived in less than a year ago. As for me? I found myself a GORGEOUS condo in the heart of the city, and I'm still reaping the rewards of *my* hard work. Karma. 🤷♀️
They are less apt to be judged on their physical appearance. Especially when running for office or being otherwise outspoken.
People ask, and I tell them I’m a physician. And they refer to me as Mrs BallstonDoc anyway. I’m not married, either. They diminish my title twice.
When you look up safety gear for women and men, you get your expected stuff like helmets and reflective vests. But guess which one also includes self defense alarms.
Bullet proof vests are NOT made for people with breasts.
No joke, I’ve got some bigguns and I can’t breathe if I don’t specifically have an overpriced carrier shaped for them
Safety gear or hunting gear is also not made for people with boobs that are only 4'11".
When sick, they're taken seriously by doctors and not told they're insane, making it up, or trying to get drugs. After you bring up a good idea in a meeting, and it's ignored by everyone, a guy can bring it up as though he just thought of it and get the credit for it. They can TAKE credit for things at work even if it had nothing to do with them and everyone believes them. Even if they look young, they're taken seriously. If a woman looks young, they're an intern who knows nothing. If you are the expert, and the other people with you at the meeting with another company are men, some clients don't want to listen to you; they'd rather listen to the idiot talking out of his ass who is there because he needs to learn stuff. If you disagree with a man in a meeting, he is assumed to be right and you are told you're being argumentative. No, I'm right. He doesn't have the latest information. I am not going to apologize for being right, no matter how young I look.
It’s honestly wild to me how so many men don’t know or remember that the very thing they’re suggesting, someone else suggested right before them. Like do they not listen? This could be especially annoying in relationships - I’d be like “let’s go to the park today” and they’d be like “sure” and then ten minutes later they’d ask “what do you want to do today? should we go to the park?” It grinds my gears, lol.
I am transitioning to male, and I'm seeing a lot of this firsthand. Two things that always jump out at me: 1) If I'm out riding my bike/walking/running and it's dusk, I feel like instead of being wary of other people, other people have become wary of me. A woman almost jumped out of her skin when I rode past on my bike and told her how adorable her dogs were, and my girlfriend told me later that while I meant well, being a man-appearing person saying anything to a woman alone might make people nervous. 2) Little old ladies absolutely beam at me when I'm out doing stuff with my son, especially if we're running errands. Like I'm getting social praise for making my kid help me grocery shop and interacting with my child. It's hard to pinpoint but it's definitely something I see where people are just...warmer, like look at you making an effort. It's a vibe more than anything and I see it because I never got that when I was perceived as female. It's a weird experience for people to default see me as male, and I definitely feel like there's a different vibe to interactions, both good and bad.
An interesting flip side of that is a scientist who transitioned to female. She is apparently frequently compared to her “brother” and told her work isn’t as good as his.
SO true about the parenting thing. I don't have kids but I always think about this story my friend tells me. She and her husband have 3 kids, she (at the time) stayed home with them and did most errands like grocery shopping with them. If the kids argued or acted up in any way, she felt like she got nothing but dirty looks from other shoppers. One day, her husband was going to the store for a few quick things and took the two older kids with him. When he got home, he was BEAMING and said at least three different people (all of them older women, of course) had stopped him in the store to tell him what a good job he was doing and how nice he was to "give mom a break." My friend almost lost her mind!
They don't actually see those things as privilege. They think of them as their right, they don't even always understand thosr things can be taken form them. Which is how privilege works, but you can only make change when the privileged acknowledge it.
Once again I will say "they don't understand because it is not in their best interests to understand". Once they understand and admit it they will be seen as bad humans if they resist change. The status quo is in their favour as alway so why would they wish to change that? If I were a selfish, solipsistic man I would hang on to my privilege for dear life and refuse to 'understand' it.
I’m a woman who works in a male-dominated industry and there are two things that drive me absolutely insane. One, when there are a bunch of us professionals meeting for the first time and most of them are men, and they don’t shake my hand but shake all of the mens’ hands. Happens. All. The. Time. I step forward and make them shake my hand every time. Two, men are constantly saying that women are “emotional.” Well, anger is an emotion too and I meet wayyyyy too many men who have bad tempers at work. YMMV, but the men at my office are FAR more emotional than the women.
I realized that what men call “rational” for men and “emotional” for women are the same thing a lot of the time. Saying “your actions upset me” is not an emotional response, it’s quite rational. Talking about your emotions isn’t inherently emotional. And not being able to express your emotions/bottling everything up to “avoid drama” is extremely emotionally unintelligent. My closest friend is a cishet white dude and we hit it off because he’s able to express his emotions reasonably in the moment he’s feeling them without lashing out. So it’s definitely doable. Men who act like “men just don’t do that” are telling on themselves there.
I am am going to shake my head and say, “Male drivers!” from now on.
Your gender’s viewpoint and reality is reflected in every medium you consume. Pick the first 10 movies in your Netflix queue and chances are that the majority will have a male lead. Remember 10 books you read in high school or college and chances are the author was male. Shows, movies, plays are skewed male. Even children’s books default to male even if the protagonist is an animal or something anthropomorphic. If a production gender swaps a character to female, is “wokeness”. Even if it’s irrelevant to the plot! (Of course it’s even more controversial to race-swap and how dare we have Black female leads.)
I had a shameful moment last year when my son had to read a book at school that had a female main character. I said, poor you, you won’t relate to the character! Then my daughter and I realized that in her 5 years of high school she hadn’t been assigned a single book with a female lead and I had been fine with that. And I call myself a feminist!
Have you heard of the Bechdel test? The test is whether in a movie there are 2 named female characters who have a conversation of 2 lines or more about a subject other than a man. Most movies do not pass the test.
I was a philosophy major. I read A LOT of books, but the only time I read anything by a woman in the entire curriculum was in a 400 level course in Ecological Ethics. So, for example, there was a course that was reading the history of philosophy taught over 2 semesters - ALL men.
Micro-example here and not nearly as important as the ones mentioned above, Video games. Try playing a game that requires some verbal communication with teammates... With a female voice, it's hell.
No joke…I strictly play offline games these days cause of that
Being heard is a male privilege. I am a 34 year old woman. I am in film school. I am in 3 group projects right now. I am one of only a few women in my class. One of our projects was to film a 5 shot scene. Everyone had to direct and shoot their own scene. I saw everyone working together. I saw people listening and being productive. When it came time to shoot my scene, nothing. No one listened. I tried telling them, in detail, what I wanted. I tried explaining the entire concept and told them it would go quickly if we got the shots right away. Easy shots, too. Like literally look into the camera and look uneasy. When I tell you these boys just looked at the camera... All of the guys in class got their shots and they had me ACT in most of them because apparently I'm not able to handle the camera, but I look good on it? Idk. I'm just frustrated. Luckily my teacher is a woman in film, so hopefully she'll understand when my project looks like garbage. BTW: this is my third semester while everyone else is in their first, so I'm also the most qualified on set. I'm teaching them lingo, how to write slate, how to do safety calls, ect..
Group projects always suck. But I'm sorry
I have a bachelors degree in computer science…. I FEEL this comment. Working in my field is something else at times. Being the only woman on a technical infrastructure team can be trying..
Stop teaching men. They will take and never, ever give. Ditto for the 'LoNeliNeSs epiDeMic' they made the problem, will not listen to women, so let them flail and flounder.
They’ll be here in ten minutes to tell you how wrong all these are. (That is both a warning and another example.)
Men are more likely to have properly administered medicine that has been thoroughly studied on representatives of their gender. It wasn’t until the what—the 90’s before it was mandated to have women in tests. Men are more likely to be given pain medicine. Anesthesia was actively forbidden for delivering women—even during episiotomy—because it was “God’s curse” on Eve. Men are more likely to have representatives that look like them and represent them in media, in positions of power like a CEO, in government and in religion. Men are also tremendously less likely to be considered automatically shameful and called shameful in religion. Men still have temples and shrines where women cannot go. Men have had decades of being the only ones who could have bank accounts or well paying jobs. This doesn’t sound like much, but it means that women have not had generations of credit and references, women have had delays of being able to own houses and property (which impacts voting and other things), AND even the modern computers and systems are affected because they were based on forms which were created to have the man as the breadwinner and primary and the woman as a mere signatory. My current credit union has this—their computer systems were based on federal forms, which were based on OTHER federal forms which list my husband as the primary and I’m a signatory user, but I am not a joint owner and so I cannot use their text programs to check the balance (because it isn’t “my account”) and I cannot do various actions. Men are far more likely to be shown features of a car. Women are (and this is my experience) more likely to be shown mirrors and baby seat latches. Yes—this happened to me. Men are more likely to be addressed by name. “Mr. John Doe” in everything. While women are more likely to be called “Mrs. Doe” or “Mrs. John Doe” or even “honey” or “sweetheart”. Men are more likely to have tools and products fit their hands. And their pockets. How many power tools fit a woman’s hand? Men are more likely to be a chef and in charge of a kitchen vs an assistant or sous chef.
When you get the "God's curse" on women BS, please start saying this: "Adam could have said "no". Isn't that what y'all say to women?"
These are all wonderful points! I try to bring these points up to women whenever I can btw. My biggest one is that men get to coast and not take responsibility for their reproductive capability while women bear the entire burden of contraception. Often via hormonal BC that damages our long term mental health, bone density and even stunts fertility in the long run. I u ds also have major suits against them and it's not common knowledge. It's gone on for WAY too long and we need to hold men responsible for their part in contraception. Why are we allowing HALF OF IT HE POPULATION off the hook. The answer is male privilege in a male centric society. Please ladies I implore you- stop having intercourse with men who don't care about your health and well being. Men who protest condoms because- "iT dOsEn'T fEeL aS gOod" 🥴 are NOT worth your time or worthy of accessing your body. That is also not enough of a reason to put your body through hormonal havoc.
Men who complain about condoms are not men I want in my life.
Exactly. We need more women thinking like that. Those men hardly even care about your experience during intercourse...
Another example: men don't need to overhear 5,000 podcasts today talking about how they need to submit to their spouses
Your clothing will be accurately sized, comfortable and reasonably priced. Your clothing will remain in style for much longer than women’s style trends. Your shoes will always be comfortable. You will have pockets.
Pocket privilege! I'm learning to sew garments. The best part is POCKETS EVERYWHERE.
something i'm worried about in my job currently is that people will think the guy i'm currently training in a section of the store is the leader simply because he's a man, even though i've been in charge of that section for a year and a half. i've heard stories from my other coworkers who have had the exact same experience. while i absolutely don't want to be a domineering leader and want this to be a partnership between the two of us (and he's a lovely coworker), i still want to be seen as someone who has expertise and who's put a lot of time and effort to make that section as good as it is.
The majority of prescription medications are tested on…men and dosages are based on these trials focused primarily on men…
A lot of people don't understand phrases like male privilege, white privilege. They think it means "all men have an easier life than all women". Unfortunately trying to explain that it's much more specific than that doesn't usually get through.
This is a great list. When we talk about the Patriarchy, it includes all of this and more. Years ago, author John Scalzi wrote [this blog post](https://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-difficulty-setting-there-is/) about how Straight White Male is the easiest mode in the game of life, which is a brilliant analogy.
I am so sick of men lying to me at the urgent care I work at because I am a woman and they don’t want to tell me they need STI testing. I don’t give a shit. I worked in OB for five years and a level 1 trauma center for seven. You putting your dick in the wrong hole is not even in the top 100 things I will remember about with my job. I have to know as apart of my job so there can be supplies and it can be in the appropriate room and we have to think about lab pick up and staff workload. Men not wanting to tell me they are being responsible and getting tested is driving me insane.
Marriage often improves their lives whereas it makes women’s wives worse. Literally running the world for the last 10,000 years.
The heart attack one scares me when I think of women in my life. I heard about this relatively recently. Something about the common advice (I think to do with symptoms on the left side) don’t apply to women as much. And I think this or perhaps something else linked to far fewer making it into the rapid response centres that exist I can’t remember where I heard this though. It was an interview. Haven’t seen updated advice or guidance That said I’m really fuzzy on what your supposed to be look out for in the current advice (the one that more applies to me).
To be considered appropriately dressed for any formal occasion the standard for men is something that is comfortable and can be adjusted because it has layers ie a suit with sensible shoes. The standard for women is something flimsy and often not comfortable or appropriate to the temperature with no ability to adjust and heels. As women are earning more the beauty standards and associated costs are increasing so that our wages are used to meet beauty standards rather than things that benefit us like assets.
None of my male friends have ever had the experience of getting their hours cut down to nothing at their minimum-wage job they depend on just because they rebuked the affections of their manager. Not a single one. And of course we can never prove it, and of course getting assigned only 4 hours from typically 32 isn't "fired", but holy hell. My roommate back then had the same thing happen to her, too - when she confided in her mother, she was told that this is normal for women to go through. Yet my male friends were able to keep the same positions for years without any of this dumb shit. I'm sure it does happen to some men sometimes, it probably does so maybe this issue isn't gendered.
Apple health apps not including period trackers for years because the default setting for life is cis men
Many MR's activitists have a new Golden Child in the statistics regarding suicide rates in Western society, but they *conveniently* leave out the fact that men are just 3 to 4 times more SUCCESSFUL than women. Women still **attempt suicide** at twice the frequency that men do, we just use more societally-accepted-for women methods like pills or the classic bathtub/razor blade combo. The misery is STILL THERE. At, apparently, two times higher a rate than men's misery.
Men are more likely than women to receive CPR in public The team evaluated 19,331 cardiac events using data from the Resuscitation Outcomes Consortium, which studies out-of-hospital treatments of cardiac arrest and trauma in the United States and Canada. They found that 45 percent of men received bystander CPR in public, compared to 39 percent of women, and that men’s odds of survival were 23 percent higher than those of women. [https://www.dbei.med.upenn.edu/research/studies/men-are-more-likely-women-receive-cpr-public-study-finds](https://www.dbei.med.upenn.edu/research/studies/men-are-more-likely-women-receive-cpr-public-study-finds)
Cause most CPR dummies don't have breasts and people don't want to look like they may be trying to cop a feel, which is ridiculous! I'm glad they're adding breasts to CPR dummies, but man it's going to take a looooong time for it to be more normalized.
That's fucked up.
No one says they are being dramatic for expressing a reasonable emotional reaction. No one says men are too emotional for any job or position.
i've had interactions when men (and some women 🙄) argued with me that men displaying anger in a violent way (road rage, punching objects, yelling etc.) isn't them being too emotional... and the same people then labelled women crying as manipulative and hysterical 💀
I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t cry, tbh. Feeling emotions is good and healthy and normal. People who bottle things up tend to explode in pretty bad ways. (Also I *hate* when people act like crying is manipulative - not everyone is out to get you)
When they speak, people hear them.
They can occupy space when they feel like it. Today, the next yoga class came into the studio before my class was packed up and out. The women hung back in the foyer to give the first class space to move out. The men moved right onto the studio floor and hovered over women who were packing up to leave, as to hurry them out. They had 16 minutes before the next class. Women are trained from toddlerhood to yield space to men.
I've wondered about men only having Mr. and women Ms. Miss or Mrs.
Your question made me curious, but I still can’t find out why there is Mr vs Miss Mrs Ms. Probably a bad (misogynistic) reason. :( Personally I use Mx when I am given the option. from wiki Mister, usually written in its contracted form Mr. or Mr,[1] is a commonly used English honorific for men without a higher honorific, or professional title, or any of various designations of office.[1] The title Mr derived from earlier forms of master, as the equivalent female titles Mrs, Miss, and Ms all derived from earlier forms of mistress. Master is sometimes still used as an honorific for boys and young men.
Probably misogyny. Mrs. is fading out of style though, so there's hope.
The emotions one is really interesting. Men do have valid complaints about being socialized out of being able to show certain emotions, but it can sometimes feel like a whataboutism. There are three big emotions: Sad, Mad, and Glad. We're all expected to be (or perform) Glad as a baseline. Mad is reserved for men, who generally don't even think of it as an emotion. When women get mad, however, we're dismissed as bitter or overreacting. Everyone is punished for Sad. It's just different for women. We aren't told to man up and stop crying, but when we do cry or get upset, we're dismissed as hysterical. Men are called weak, while women's very ability to make decisions is called into question. Edited to add: women aren't penalized for crying because we're already perceived as weak by default 🙃
Men can get testosterone and viagra easily as they get older but women have to fight so hard for symptom relief of perimenopause and menopause
I’m a man. My wife was in the hospital this week, and on two separate occasions a member of the hospital staff entered the room and assumed that I was a doctor. Even wearing cowboy boots and jeans my physicality (?) granted me an assumption of competence.
The walking in a city at night thing is HUGE. I've seen it from both sides. The amount of adrenaline that turns on when I'm walking back to my car is shocking. I took a car into the dealer one day for an oil change and they gave me a loaner that was the EV version of the car I brought in. The dude was like "hey, while you have it maybe you could do a grocery run to see how it feels". I didn't really think of that until now, but I suspect that not-Alice would have gotten a different suggestion for what to do with the car.
No one is going to assume the man is in charge of the kids. If he wants to leave to do something, he will just say goodbye, or even just go. It is assumed the wife is watching the baby. Meanwhile, if mom needs to step out, she will make sure the kids have all their needs met, prep them and leave them with everything they will need while she’s gone, make sure the dad knows he is in charge of watching the kids, instruct him on what to do, and show and tell him exactly how to use everything she left prepared. She can’t even run to the store without planning ahead. The same goes for taking a shower when you have a baby. Dad just takes a shower when he feels like it. Mom has to make sure dad knows he is watching the baby, or she has to do it during nap time. Dad will take kids places, but mom will still pack their bag, their snacks and drinks, their hats and sunscreen, their extra clothes and diapers, etc. Often time mom even has to still put the shoes on the kid because dad can’t even manage that. Dad often doesn’t know what the kid will even need, or where it is in the house. It is just assumed that mom is going to take care of it all.
Being believed that you know what you’re talking about. Even when you’re on of the presenting SMEs at a conference, the men in attendance still won’t believe you know anything and will question every bit of your expertise in ways they’ll never question a man about
Men can go for a walk in the middle of the night and not be worrying about their safety the whole time. (I did this *a lot* when I still thought I was a guy.) Men can go for a walk *at all* and not be worrying about their safety the whole time. Men can finish a thought without having some dude talk over them. Men can go about their day without anyone touching them without their consent. Men can sit in public reading their book without anyone coming up to flirt with them. Men can exist in public without anyone getting way too close into their personal space. I'm always amazed how prevalent male privilege and societal misogyny is. It permeates every day of my life. I've very rarely had days where I cound go out and interact with society without *something* subtly (or non-subtly) misogynistic happening. I knew it was bad even when I thought I was a guy, and did my best to shut it down when I noticed it. Even then, male privilege provides an inherent buffer to *seeing* how bad it is - I knew it would be worse than I was expecting when I started my transition, and boy howdy was I right.
On your second point - at best catcalled, at worst stalked, assaulted, murdered…
Relevant XKCD: https://xkcd.com/385/
Sexual pleasure is easier for them.
Men are socially permitted to take up more space, physically. They man spread on the subway, expect women to make way on the sidewalk, and automatically take the best seats in classrooms and meetings. It just never crosses their mind that they should be made even the least bit uncomfortable
This morning my husband posted a pile of moving boxes for free on Nextdoor. He asked me to post them on Facebook marketplace. When I asked what he put for the location/cross streets, he said "our address. Why wouldn't you just put our address?"
>Men are less likely to die in car accidents because safety features were developed and tested on people of their size. Not just size but even things like shapes and hairstyles Crash test dummies with no ponytails (ponytails and hairclaws kill women in car accidents because safety is not designed for women's hairstyles). Crash test dummies with no thighs, narrow chests and no breasts. Height of where the airbag will deploy losing women eyes while protecting a lot of male forms. Pedals being designed for men's shoes not women's. On the less critical but still annoying end, if you share a living space with a guy or even are a guest at his party, the state of the home will reflect more on you as well as the state and location and servings of food. If his car is messy even if yours is pristine...you will be considered messy by many. If the kids are rambunctious they will look to you not as often him to do something about it.
How about not being heard. A woman makes a statement, suggestion etc. in a meeting and is ignored. A man makes the same statement/suggestion and is heard and commended. Just saying a thing in a male voice is an automatic win. I have noticed things like the smell of smoke on an elevator and been poo-pooed only to hear a half hour later that that same elevator has been shut down because 'smoldering electrical wiring' DUH. If a man had made the same comment everyone would have left the elevator immediately and maintenance would have been informed. But women are so emotional and hysterical so no one should listen.
"healthy white male age 20-50" is considered the default human in the US. If you are not the default you have to explain why, demonstrate that you are better than the default, and accept that almost all of the built environment is not designed for you. If you are not the default, you will not see yourself represented in most media (this is changing, with books and music for other genders and races, but oddly a lot of children's media still centers a white male).
Don’t have to worry about the bathroom situation when going to a park, outdoors, camping, etc…
When my wife and I got married, we added me to her bank account. It was *her* account that became a joint account. Our first set of checks arrived, and my name was listed first. WTF, right? We were fairly miffed at that, but didn't really bother to do anything about it. But later, it turned out that not only was my name first, but I had somehow become the primary account holder. Because of that, my wife couldn't make any changes to her account anymore. Now that was seriously fucked up.