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Culture War Roundup for the week of April 6, 2026

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I think there's a few things going on, personally.

One is that men aren't really a group, in a sense that they defend themselves or have social legitimisation to fall back on, qua being men. Even when "the patriarchy" was a thing, "men" weren't a group, "old powerful fathers" were. Young men have historically always been shafted. Because men don't really constitute a group (in the sense of banding together or defending each other's interests, purely based on their sex), they don't and can't defend themselves very well (or at all) against being tarred like that. Women are a group, women see each other as a (weak) collective, they advocate for group interests and repudiate attacks against women-as-identity. Even when masculinity was more of a thing it was never really a thing for men for themselves (rather for family, nation, etc.)

Also, women are better at advocating their positions through appealing to social consensus. That's again because they form a meaningful group but also because they are better at some interpersonal stuff (not all of it). So they are better at making "men suck" be a social consensus thing.

Black people very much are a group. I think the study showing that black people show great in-group solidarity, greater than other ethnicities, has been shared a lot here. Black identity is something that's cared about, it's high status, it has social legitimisation, etc. Black people argue as a collective, men don't.

Muslims also are a group that strongly defends its honour, sometimes to the point of violence (cf. Quran burning). And, well, sadly that works. Politicians would rather introduce blasphemy laws than piss them off.

But black men aren't a group qua being men - only qua being black. So black women saying men suck being OK is not surprising.

Of course this all pre-supposes you don't buy into the tenets of modern liberalism at face value - that it's about people being treated equally rather than power between people (the often repeated "Who, whom?"). But I think at this point even ardent liberals don't pretend the movement is about actual equality anymore.

Even when "the patriarchy" was a thing, "men" weren't a group, "old powerful fathers" were.

Notably, since then there has been a pretty effective campaign that has largely eliminated, reoriented, or discredited male-specific spaces. There are a few around still, but there were prominent men's colleges and other groups last century. Many have adapted to allow women (and I'm not sure I'm personally upset by this), but women's specific spaces (women's colleges, Girl Scouts) are still allowed.

Similar, but even more aggressively for race-specific spaces.