The results from the 2004 APA Study used throughout this series has been neither retracted or contradicted by any other reproducible, larger-scale study. Even in the unlikely event that the claim of 100% of Women and 0% of Men having automatic in-group bias scales to the entire population, the fact that males are generally less social and appear to be less capable of automatically accepting other men as in-group members is evident. It is far too easy for both men and women to view men as subhuman.
Men and women have both made habit of the perpetual out-group derogation of men and boys. For some, it is even part of their jobs, including judges, police, prison guards, parents, teachers, social workers, etc. Men, it seems, are less likely to signal empathy toward men than are women.
The dangerous ways in which men and boys respond to derogation are hard to ignore. (Suicide, murder, terrorism, etc.) Additionally, the lengths men will go to in order to avoid derogation from their in-group become more severe as societal stress increases. While every genocide in history began with the systematic derogation of men and boys, it usually doesn’t stop there.
Men are the overwhelming majority of the perpetrators of this systemic violence, but women and children quickly become victims. In this, the second to last article in our series, we’ll explore the 50 year rise in stress relating to technology and explain why women are the only hope we have to be saved from what appears to be impending destruction.
In order to understand why men may be incapable of fixing this problem, we must first explore some of the study’s hypothesis for why men may not be able to see other men as part of an automatic in-group and therefore, see them as subhumans.
The study cites 5 possible Hypotheses:
1) Male Aggression
2) Possible Competitor
3) Emotional Conditioning
4) Cognitive Balance
5) Sex Positivity
Male Aggression
In animals, where dominance hierarchies have been observed, the more dominant the in-group, the greater the preponderance of in-group bias. This is observed in humans when the local Sportsball Team wins the big game and fans line up en masse to support them at the World Sportsball Championship.
One would expect and reasonably deduce, that men, being the most dominant group, would be involved in a global fraternity, collectively celebrating their dominance, but as it turns out, this may not be the case.
Possible Competitor
Keeping the out-group down is a way to improve in-group standing. Resources may be rare and there is no reason to make life easier for the out-group.
Emotional Conditioning
In a Weak Case for the Humanity of Men, I discuss the stereotypes of men and boys. It is easy to imagine how some men might easily abuse their power to derogate other men. Minority groups adopt similar attitudes for themselves that are held by predominant groups and sometimes members even strive to conform to the stereotypes. Our collective stereotype of men as a group must be considered if we are considering grossness as a human value.
This grossness may simply make men an undesirable group of assholes with which to automatically identify.
The last two hypotheses are pretty self-explanatory.
Cognitive Balance
This is expressed as the belief, “I am a member of this group, and I am good, therefore, all members of this group are good.” Men seemingly lack this conceptual thinking and therefore do not apply their own attributes to “all men.”
Sex Positivity
Men like sex. Some of them like to have sex with women. It turns out, the more they like to have sex with women, the more they tend to like women as a group. Sex positive men will pretty much always like women better than other men.
Regardless of the reasons, the study’s findings clearly demonstrate that to one degree or another, men simply don’t exist as an in-group. For practical purposes, men exist only as an automatic out-group.
Likely because of this phenomena, it may be all too easy to exploit men and boys to derogate men of another race, class, sexual preference, social class, or religion. In-group/out-group dynamics can be demonstrated among even the most trivial of differences, and men, in turn, are targets for derogation from men of other groups. This is true amongst women as well.
It appears that evolution may have played an interesting trick on our species. These behaviors seem to be linked to an increase of general stress, as well as parasite and pathogen stress, and compel us all, as a species, to derogate men and to view men as subhumans.
Based on the numbers of men derogated in the last 47 years, we may be seeing the beginnings of the worst holocaust in human history. In the 47 years since Future Shock was published, historical stress levels and interconnected social technologies have risen, right alongside prison populations and homelessness. Both overwhelmingly male phenomena. During this period we’ve also seen the declining mental health of children, increased unhappiness among women, and a male suicide rate that has become alarming to professionals who study those phenomena.
The War on Drugs, Parasite Stress and Rise of Interconnected Technologies
Drugs have been framed as an epidemic and thereby subtly linked to pathogen and parasite stress to increase our willingness to derogate “other” men. This has reached national crisis levels and incarceration in this country has grown at alarming rates right under our noses, in part, because we don’t see 94% of the prisoners as full humans. If your family has been blissfully unaffected by having a father, son, brother, or uncle derogated to prison, you likely view this apocalypse as a type of academic problem for “other” families.
Our stress and parasite stress is increasing and this has an established link to authoritarian catastrophes. Only women will be heard, and only the brave ones will speak against the herd. It is a powerful herd who will throw their shit when they are made aware of their own out-group biases against men and boys. Early testing shows that women predict that men have 40-60% parity in automatic, in-group bias, where there actually seems to be little to none.
In short, your baby boy, son, teenaged boy, brother, uncle, father, grandfather, boyfriend, and/or husband live in a world where others will abuse them, often times in an attempt to treat the abusers own mental illness (see Chemical Rewards). This could have disastrous effects for you and your family.
What Can Women Do?
Given the risk of exposure and increased risk to actual pathogens and parasites, it is no wonder girls are trained from a very young age to reinforce boundaries with men and boys, and to keep the others around them in line with correct, appropriate, and safe practices.
The wrinkling of noses, fake gagging, looks and shrieks of horror, as well as mocked arm distancing are long established and well understood indicators of social grossness and disgust derogation. Women, who report a greater disgust sensitivity, play a vital part in alerting others to the discovery of pathogens and parasites.
Unfortunately, boys and men, like Carrie in the Stephen King book, do not always realize that behavioral corrections are important for the protection of the species.
Carrie, who was perhaps less socially intelligent or sophisticated than her cohorts, didn’t realize that the gentle locker room hazing was really just a good hearted attempt at getting her to understand that she wasn’t dying from her period, and that she just needed to take reasonable steps to protect the herd.
Disgust derogation has been used time immemorial, across cultures, to create and perpetuate hostility toward out-groups. Many movements, political and religious, have abused pathogen and parasite stress to great effect in getting in-group members to accept terrible behavior against the out-group. In-group members stand by helplessly lest they be derogated by proxy. This frustrating cycle of silence in the face of derogation gets people to believe irrational things.
What can Men Do?
Discuss this article respectfully with women. Women acutely feel the injustice of a Men’s Rights issue, especially when it affects them personally or they see how these issues affect women and children, i.e. suicide, military and job related deaths, even transgender issues.
Fight the urge to talk about the issues, or the statistics; talk about the people. Women are just as affected by non-custodial child support issues, visitation, or child safety/neglect issues. They’ve struggled getting their sons the services he needs, fear the stigma of a false rape allegation, or being shipped a loaded body bag.
Women care more about people and the effects on people than statistics. Stories are sticker than statistics.
When women experience men’s issues through one of the men in their lives, they understand it in a way that men never can. They understand how other women will be affected by the same issue. She sees this issue as an issue for any other woman in her situation. Men suck at that. As it turns out, virtually no men identify as men.
Be less of a dick to other men and boys. Be less of an asshole to other men and boys. Stop being such a fucker to other men and boys. Stop getting your shit all over other men and boys. Of course, if you’re doing to it women and girls, you should stop doing that as as well. But recognize, society accepts and even encourages you to derogate men and boys.
Where are We Headed?
Perhaps as a response to concerns about the rise of socially connected, cost effective hive technologies, or perhaps as a result of the rise of active derogation, through the War on Drugs, divorce, Ritalin abuse, and some vocal seemingly anti-male political movements, the last 40 years has spawned out-group concern about a certain variety of flying parasites. I’m referring to a type of out-group terror I will refer to as “Tazerdronophobia.”
There seems to be an entire internet subculture, again, mostly white men in the tech industry, fixated on armed drones or other technologies being weaponized against them.
While Dronophobia has been reported in areas where actual drones have killed actual people, the concern seems irrationally high in the US where there is, as of yet, not been a single tazerdrone to enter the marketplace. (UPDATE: Tazerdrone Prototype Spotted In Russia)
In the unlikely event that tazerdrones actually become available in the US, the relative low cost could have severe derogation consequences for out-groups. For instance, the U.S. Federal Government’s >widely publicized plan to build a $65B wall across the southern United States to keep out “Bad Hombres.” With a similar spend, the US Government could buy and operate 6.5 million solar powered tazerdrones.
A tazerdrone mindhive would likely be a cost effective way to silence dissent and keep gross people very nicely contained. If they are men, particularly white men, all indicators are that not much fuss will be raised.
This out-group fear of subjugation through hive technology seems to have come with a sensitivity to out-group statements (you’re a racist, sexist, nationalist…) and a sudden inability to see the humor in harmless jokes and innocent comments.
The uproar over a simple hashtag #killallmen, and its variant #killallwhitemen as being somehow actually offensive was silly. Men, as the more dominant group, should not feel threatened by the statements of disadvantaged groups.
This over-sensitivity is often referred to as male fragility and has been widely reported upon.
This may also explain the connection between parasite and pathogen stress and the rise of populist, authoritarian strongmen (Trump, Hitler, Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson). When humans are distressed, they will beg for protection from those they deem as “enemies.” they also want simple solutions to very complex problems.
Because of the ease of derogating men and boys, they are typically the first slated for removal.
Brave women must begin speaking against the systematic derogation of men and boys. There is a very loud voice amongst the elite screaming for the rise of their favorite type of totalitarian government, or pleading requests for martial law. Very few authoritarian governments actually deliver on what they promise, but all of them will derogate “undesirables.”
Very few women, and virtually zero men, are willing to speak up about the derogation of men and boys for fear they may be shunned for appearing to be pro-man or anti-woman and children. Those who do stick up for the out-group often do so at the risk of getting shit hurled at them.
In the Stephen King Movie Carrie, the only survivor of Carrie’s reaction, is the one girl who spoke up for Carrie’s humanity and dignity. Perhaps that is the lesson we are meant to take away from all of this.
If we allow grossness to be the measure of human worth, the war waged against men and boys will only continue to ramp up as stress increases, and more and more of them will be removed. Women and girls follow soon after.
THE END.
In my next and final article of this series, we’ll explore the Big Secret.
To read all of the articles in this series:
Article #1 – Otto Warmbier, Philando Castile and the Outgroup Derogation of Men
Article #2 – Grossness as a Human Value Indicator
Article #3 – A Weak Case for the Humanity of Men
Article #4 – Oh Fuck; We’re Doomed and Only Women Can Save the Day
Article #5 – Philando Castile, Justine Damond, and the In-Group Bias Toward Woman
