[MENTION=8936]highlander[/MENTION]
To respond to the OP directly, there IS somewhere in the middle here. Mansplaining is not 'drivel' ... it is a real thing that happens to women. All the time.
Famous case in recent news, not 30 years ago:
Astrophysicist Katie Mack lays the smackdown on mansplainer with droll Twitter burn – Women in the World in Association with The New York Times – WITW
You couldn't watch, anywhere in the US, the very first female UFC fight without a "catfight" or cat-noise or "there should be mud in there!" being sounded off by some ass thinking he's so funny. And when it turned out to be a better fight than all the shitty men cuddling on the ground, people shut the fuck up and started cheering. And the whole time, I was scared--scared it'd be a meh fight like all the rest had been and no one would ever take women's fighting seriously.
You look at some of the most famous women out there--let's take Oprah for example.. and while she doesn't dwell on it constantly, she DOES acknowledge how she DID have to work harder. There are whole interviews where she talks about having to muscle her way to being one of the most powerful PEOPLE in the US, not just woman, with key men def spouting shitty rhetoric that we'd all find appauling today.
Or the toxic philosophy career choices for women..
What is it like to be a woman in philosophy?
It's there. The reason feminism is there is very clear. And men DID start this... You can't have a movement as large as feminism without the majority of the people in power (not-even-arguably men) doing too many shitty things to push people into starting it.
... But here's the thing. You CANNOT Have toxic masculinity without women being involved. Men alone did not create this within themselves.. Men didn't just keep telling men that women like this and need this and women pretending they had no hand in it is garbage. Half the population does not develop like this when they have sisters, mothers, cousins, and females all around them.
Toxic femininity is ALSO a thing. It is merely toxic behavior... and assigning the stereotypes of that gender to it. For masculinity it is refusing emotions to the point of harm, harrassing women for sex, and generally acting like a psychopath. For women? It's acting like women have an air of superiority, belitting the men around them, falsely accusing men of rape, manipulating men with the promise of sex, and generally acting like a psychopath.
For an example of the behavior I see that disgusts me and pulls me away from feminism.... Here is a quote I lifted, keeping it anon, from my FB feed. Took me all of 2 minutes to find this BS. This isn't an extreme lady painting her body with "MEN SUCK" running naked in the square. This is just someone's friend, a normal person.
" "Just like your witty DM slide is actually just one more wave in a never ending ocean of mediocre cock crashing on the beach of a woman's day." Oh my. This person obviously visited both my Facebook page and my Twitter feed today. So brilliant. I need to save this one. "
1. Why the FUCK would you keep ANYONE on your FB feed or twitter feed if this is the kind of responses you are getting? Man or woman. I don't receive comments like this. From anyone. It isn't that it NEVER happens... but when it has, I have made active choices to cut them out of the situation. You get to control who talks to you on social media--big shocker. You can fucking change it.
2. I have more male friends than female ones 10:1 ratio. That's a large margin. I worked with men mostly in all of my careers except this one... Yet. I don't get hit on even a fraction of the time my fellow females say they do. I don't get rando dick pics. I don't get men clamoring at my social media door. In the past year I have made 8 new male friends--and not an issue with any one of them. Some single, some not. While I can definitely say the way I carry myself is different from others (I do not place emphasis on my sexuality in public spaces in general) around me... it is also, I believe, that I see men as humans and respectable first. Even when I was clearly more mature than them, and they were making awful awkward mistakes.. I worked with them instead of treating them as another cock trying to land on my beautiful, unique beach of independent individuality. I don't find mysef superior to any man or woman.
Because women are fucking boring and generic too if men are. Because we are products of our environment. When you treat men like "a sea of cocks" Why the fuck am I going to respect your opinion on how shitty men are? YOU DO NOT USE THE WEAPONS YOU CLAIM TO BE AGAINST. If men are all just a sea of cocks, women are all just sexual objects waiting for the right guy to crash against them.
https://lookism.net/Thread-Black-Pill-Child-rapist-tinder-experiment-FULL-PICS-OF-MODEL-MORE-CONVOS
TLDR: Guy pretends to be a pedophile, says so right there, but looks hot, so women still message the fuck out of him. You think these are all lovely, serene beaches that are just getting attacked by dick pics? People are PEOPLE. They're all shallow, awkward, thirsty sums a bitches. While trends DO show in some genders, you can always find the other side of the coin.
No one tells this woman she sounds like a psychopath. That she sounds like she's playing victim when YOU HAVE 100% CONTROL OVER WHO MESSAGES YOU ON THESE THINGS. No one does ANYTHING but like and congradulate her repeating this nonsense that is belittling men in a tantrum of horseshit.
I don't see any feminists talking about the issues in their own group. And that's where I have the fucking problem with them. I don't believe in anything that pits men vs women. Everyone loses that game.
I have women ATTACK me when I post my opinions and I happen to have a male face in my avatar. I tell them I'm female and the tone immediately changes to a softer one. It's horseshit. I have women and men telling ME I'm the rude one when a woman posts in our small group, "can we start a women's only group to discuss the needs of our part of the community?" and I reply, "I don't believe in arbitrarily excluding half the population here." The leader of the group is male, and this is the most loving, hippy ass group I've ever been a part of. And STILL women INSIST they need their own space from these guys that are doing NOTHING but showing them platonic affection and interest in similar hobbies. They tell me "I'm missing the point." I'm just daft for thinking that seems really unnecessarily exclusive for no god damned reason.
All of it is horseshit to me. All of it.