Beware the urge to sell out feminism to reach young men
Trump beat Harris and fingers are pointing. White women proportionally have shifted to Trump, Black and Latinx men as well but there is one group that keeps being mentioned .
Young white men.
Trump got 3 million fewer votes than he did in 2020 and yet has won the Presidency, the Senate, and probably Congress because the Democratic vote collapsed from 81 million to 66. The biggest demographic to leave the democrats? Young men.
Not Arab or Muslim voters, or Jill Stein spoilers.
56% of white men who voted in 2020 did so for Joe Biden — in 2024 that number was 42%.
So what now? What do we do with the dilemma of young men, specifically young white men who we see continually being preyed upon and radicalised into the manosphere and Incel communities?
Men’s health proponents such as Dr Zac Seidler, the Global Director of Research at Movember has this to say:
“Whether or not we agree on the ‘truth’ of the matter, the ‘reality’ here for this group of young men is that they feel fundamentally disenfranchised and disempowered by the political system, and Trump offered them something Harris did not… to be seen. While there is no doubt a horrifying truth to the fact that some of these men came out to vote against women’s rights, it seems more likely that they all came out to vote for themselves, for their future, or at least a promise of a world that deems them important and useful. Last night I watched hundreds of TikTok videos showing young men coming out of voting booths saying a variation of “I voted for Trump because he doesn’t make me feel stupid, or evil.” We can sit back and laugh at the irony or we can take this seriously.”
I can agree with the analysis but worry about the conclusions that comes from positions like these when patriarchy isn’t explicitly framing the issue.
“Pragmatic progressivism must reign, requiring the realisation that this group of young men has to be connected with and listened to, on their terms.” Emphasis my own.
There is a strong movement from men’s health to avoid any and all language or terminology that discomforts young men. I’ve seen it countless times in the comments of LinkedIn posts such as these. They cite that young men are alienated by terminology such as toxic masculinity, claim that privilege is deceptive because young men don’t feel privileged, and the hottest take on the block:
The move to rescue men from discomfort
How much are we willing to sell out and give up to “reach and listen to young men on their terms”? Why are young men so special in this regard?
Can you fathom telling an anti-racist campaigner to not use the term white supremacy or white privilege because it alienates white people? It’s so absurd it borders on offensive. What happened to engaging with discomfort as a form of feminist praxis?
Are men and boys truly so fragile we cannot even mention patriarchy or privilege? I believe men and boys are far more intelligent and capable than that.
No, for a just world we should not be reaching out to men “on their terms.”
We should be reaching out to men on feminist terms.
With a feminism that is for everybody, a feminism that is intersectional, that is able to operate within the messy mosaic of privileges and oppressions we all occupy, a feminism that says:
“I see you, and that you are hurting.
“Can you see that I am hurting too?
“Can you see that what is hurting me and hurting you is the same thing?”
It is true, that young men don’t feel privileged, that most young men, especially young white men are growing up in an alienating world and that markers for their health and wellbeing are dropping. If that wasn’t true, the manosphere would have little appeal. But it is also true that patriarchy continues to privilege men. I have written before about how privilege works through its own invisibilisation. Privilege is not about the outcomes of one’s life but instead the absence of barriers caused by systemic discrimination.
Men do face systemic discrimination; we should highlight and rally against every instance that we identify. In Ukraine, it is young men most at risk of being conscripted for instance, that is a systemised gender vulnerability, and it exists because of patriarchy. Men all over the world are rewarded or forced into risky jobs that put their bodies on the line, and it’s all because of patriarchal norms that see us as expendable in order to protect nation — it’s not feminism or progressives doing that.
Rapid finger pointing at progressives for “alienating language” is having an effect of tacitly empowering more harmful voices in their comments to point the finger at feminism itself.
This zealous abandonment of feminist terminology such as privilege and patriarchy should be extremely alarming to anyone interested in men’s health because the root cause for the gendered vulnerabilities that exist for men is cisheteronormative patriarchy.
The same social system that grants us permission to take up space, encourages and teaches us to be assertive, and doesn’t hold us as contemptible for focusing on our careers over our families and friends is also the source of extreme alienation from oneself and others, the driver of violence towards others and ourselves.
Patriarchy does privilege us, but we pay a tax for access to these privileges. We pay in our capacity to form relationships and connect to one another.
In my 10 years of experience of working with boys and men, in schools, workplaces, international gatherings, and in humanitarian crises I have never been held back by the terminology of privilege or patriarchy. I haven’t been held back by hegemonic masculinity or even toxic masculinity.
I have never had to sell out feminism to reach men.
