Rex Kerr
1 min readAug 21, 2023

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Excellent article, and I think this is exactly right.

I'm not quite sure feminism (of any wave) has the correct formula--people are complicated!--but it's not hard to see that feminism is enormously less wrong than Tate's formula when it comes to having stable societies of empowered and satisfied people. But how do you get the Tate-enamored to listen?

I think that the term "feminism" is exceedingly unfortunate for modern sensibilities. It's pretty hard to argue "well, 'feminism' is for everyone--you shouldn't draw any implication from the 'fem' part" while simultaneously arguing "no, 'he' can't mean a generic person--the implication that men are the important ones can't be avoided". The latter seems to me the more realistic take (not least because people bought the argument and switched), but if so, branding an alternative outlook as "feminism" seems like it would cause distancing from the very people who most need to consider an alternative. The content is a leap too far to begin with, and the name adds insult to injury.

Perhaps a more pragmatic strategy is to direct such men away from Tate and towards Jordan Peterson. Peterson appeals in some of the same ways, but his outlook is massively less socially exploitative. Once men are comfortably in Peterson territory, maybe some would be willing to consider other alternatives even if the name seems at first glance to exclude them.

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Rex Kerr
Rex Kerr

Written by Rex Kerr

One who rejoices when everything is made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Sayer of things that may be wrong, but not so bad that they're not even wrong.

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