Hello! You've reached the Not All Men Hotline!

It may not be all men, but it's definitely you if you want to undermine women's pain.

This is a reprint and update of my original Not All Men piece. I’ve gotten so many new #notallmen excuses that it was time to make a new post, merge it with the old one, and bring it over here to Substack. Even if you’re familiar with the old piece, I hope you enjoy the updated version!

Welcome to the Not All Men Hotline! We care about you and your #notallmen emergency, and are here to help. You've been directed to this hotline because you have derailed a post about women's pain with a reminder that some men aren't sexist.

We understand that anything that paints men as less than heroic and perfect can feel like an emergency and a threat in a patriarchal society. We sympathize with your concerns, and so we're here to address them and explain why your #notallmen proclamations are harmful, derailing, and make you look like a misogynist.

Everyone already knows that it is not literally all men. You know everyone knows that, too. So the purpose of your #notallmen proclamation isn’t to educate, and to show us that we need to pack up the feminist project because you found a nice guy. It’s to redirect the attention back to men—usually in a discussion where women are sharing their pain.

We’re here to help you direct your empty proclamations elsewhere. Please continue to hold.

Debunking Your #NotAllMen Arguments

If you've been directed to the Not All Men Hotline, it is because you've derailed a conversation and other people are not interested in dealing with your feelings and your deflections. At the Not All Men Hotline, though, we take all injured male egos very seriously. So let's talk about some of the most common #notallmen arguments, and what's wrong with them:

But I'm a Good Guy!

A successful feminist movement demands the participation of good men. We at the Not All Men Hotline are so excited that you have decided to self-identify as a Good Guy. The problem here is that what matters is not how you see yourself or how you want to be perceived, but how you treat women. That includes strangers on the Internet. Do you think they see you as a good guy? Do good guys interrupt women’s discussions of their pain to demand praise?

You reveal a lot about your character by whom you stand up for, and when. Do you speak up when you see oppression, even when it's difficult? Or do you chastise women for speaking out on their own behalf, demanding that they refocus on what really matters--you?

Good men care about oppression. They care about the lived experiences of women. They understand that, without listening to women, they cannot learn what women experience. They believe women. When women share their experiences and your responses is, "But not all men!" you undermine those experiences. You show no concern for oppression. You are not behaving as a good guy.

Imagine a friend was sharing with you that they had cancer. You wouldn’t jump in and proclaim that not all people have cancer, now, would you?

There’s also the now-infamous thought exercise of not all snakes. Imagine being put into a box with snakes. Only a few are venomous. It’s not all snakes! What are you so worried about?!

This is what life is like as a woman. It is irrelevant that there are some nice guys out there. It’s irrelevant even in a world where most guys are decent, because so many guys are not decent. So we have to act as if all men are a danger, because we know also that when men victimize us, society won’t believe us—and that random people will pop into the discussion to tell us that our suffering doesn’t matter because it’s not all men.

I Don't See This Sexism You Claim Exists

We usually don't see things we aren't looking for. How often do you really pay attention to the experiences of women around you? Or do you spend more time trying to tell them they misinterpret and misunderstand their own experiences, or perhaps that they wouldn’t have these experiences if they behaved differently?

The world is full of things you don't see. That doesn't make them any less real. One of the many reasons women share their experiences with sexism is to make it more visible to men who claim not to see it. They are doing you a favor by drawing attention to the shortcomings of your own powers of observation.

And let’s be clear: growing up in a sexist society blunts critical thinking. It makes you unable to see things that are plainly in front of you. That’s why so many men think it’s fine and normal to relax while their partners work, to ignore their partners’ needs, to see sexism as somehow irrelevant to them. Women who draw your attention to reality are trying to help you, trying to make you smarter and better.

To believe that sexism is not real and pervasive, you would also have to believe:

• The overwhelming majority of women are lying about their experiences, and men are more trustworthy sources about women's experiences.

• There is a vast scientific conspiracy devoted to presenting sexism as real, and despite this ability to engage in a decades-long, cross-cultural conspiracy, women don't have the ability to rise, at representative levels, to the top of governments and corporations.

This belief system is incoherent. If you don't see something that exists, consider your own observational shortcomings--and listen to those trying to rectify them.

Not My Man!

There are lots of great men in the world. There are men who think equitable relationships are important, that there's nothing a woman can do to deserve being raped or abused, and that women deserve a representative number of seats at every table where decisions are made. People who write about sexism know this.

When you brag about your partner, you take attention away from a pressing social issue, and demand that women thank a man they do not know for doing something he should be doing anyway. Men do not deserve thanks and gratitude for not beating/cheating on their partners. Helping to raise the children you created should not earn one the acclaim of the entire Internet.

When you make comments like this, you imply something sinister, too: that women who see sexism are lying about it, or that they somehow deserve it because they didn't choose the right man. If you really love it that your man is a feminist, if you really think it's important for men to do the right thing, then don't side with the patriarchy by denigrating other women.

And let’s be real: It very often is your man. Couples don’t generally get equal, high-quality relationships unless they spend significant time talking about how to build them. Interrupting these discussions to demand praise for your husband suggests you don’t have these discussions, and therefore likely don’t have a balanced, healthy relationship.

Some women feel the need to draw attention to tiny acts of goodness (like not beating them or cheating on them, or occasionally getting them presents) as a way of distracting themselves from all the ways that their partner is actually a bad father, a bad husband, or both. If you need women to interrupt their discussions of real pain to praise your husband, ask yourself why. Why do you need other people to reinforce for you that your husband is a good man?

Why Do You Hate Men So Much?

As my grandmother always said, a hit dog hollers.

Good men never feel threatened by my content. They know it’s not about them; it’s about all the assholes around them. And they love calling out those assholes, because then they stand out.

The real hatred of men is in the belief that men can’t do better, and that the bad behavior of men is inevitable. If you think speaking against bad male behavior is an attack on men, then you think bad behavior is an inevitable part of manhood.

If you think a woman hates men because she hates rapists/abusers/assholes, then you think that all men are rapists/abusers/assholes, and the real person who hates men is you.

This nonsense remark is basically a sexist dog whistle used to paint women who criticize men as lonely, pathetic man-haters who are too hysterical to see the world as it is. Its close cousin is "No wonder you can't get a man!"

The overwhelming majority of women, including feminists, have loving relationships with men they respect. They don't hate men. They hate cultural norms that force men into tiny boxes of aggression and abuse. To claim that a woman hates men because she hates some things some men do is a failure of reading comprehension.

If you feel hated by my content, it’s because it’s about you, you violent misogynist piece of shit.

Arguments Like This Turn Good Men Bad

Good men do not become abusers or rapists for any reason--least of all because a random woman somewhere on the Internet said something they don't like.

Good men care about oppression. Bad men respond to claims of oppression by ignoring women. And the worst men respond to oppression by becoming violent.

If you think a man can be turned "bad" by an Internet argument, then you never were one of the good guys.

But Some/Most Men Are Good!

Does this change the fact that some men are not? This re-centers men in the conversation. Rather than focusing on the real, lived pain of women harmed by x percentage of bad men, you demand that women thank y percentage of good men for not being abusive.

People do not deserve credit for not being abusive. Even men. Men are better and smarter than that. Men can and should aspire to more than just not being abusive and reminding women to praise them for not being abusive.

Why Is it Bad to Remind People That Not All Men are Bad?

It’s bad because literally everyone already knows not all men are bad. Shouldn’t you use your limited time on something of actual value?

Here at the Not All Men Hotline, we understand the struggle men and their defenders face. You want people to know that not all men are rapists, or abusers, or otherwise causing harm. So why is it so bad to remind people that not all men are bad? In short, it's because people already know this fact. Most #notallmen comments are left in response to general complaints about common male behavior--not posts indicating that 100 percent of men, everywhere, for all time are harmful.

When you shriek, "not all men," you are saying that what's important is not to address serious social harms such as rape, domestic violence, or a pay gap. Instead, what matters most is reminding people of something they already know. You derail a conversation and demand that people devote time to defending men. The implication here is that men and manhood are so fragile that they must continually be defended even in the midst of a critique.

When you prioritize men's bruised egos over the lives and health of women, you ignore important pieces of information, such that rape is common and wage inequity is pervasive, and instead demand that people prioritize a trivial factoid. When you do this, you're not being one of the good guys. You're looking at women's pain, and telling them it's irrelevant and insignificant compared to the desire of men to be perceived as universally good.

When you do this, you put your sexism on full display. So while all men might not be sexist, you certainly are.