u/Oneanddonequestion

Consider this a critique of all gender issue movements, from Egalitarians, Feminists and MRAs, but more largely a consistent failure of the advocates and adherents. Whether it be the ivory-towered academics and Ph.D level instructor, all the way down to the lowliest high school student unexperienced, uninformed and relying solely upon whatever Pathos inspired argument sways them, there is something that continually stands out to me when discussion starts.

It doesn't matter if its the Red-Pill Chugging Dude-Bro Supplement pusher or the stuffy, blue-haired, septum-pierced and tattooed pink-hatter, both tend to fail at a very simple action. The acknowledgment of another's pain or lived experience.

I assume all of you nodded your heads at the assertion that your opponent fails to understand the pain that your side experiences. Most of us have, had that moment where someone of the opposite gender or the opposite ideology simply stood up during a discussion and without data, without statistics, without any shred of evidence simply dismissed you. "That didn't happen", "That's not true." "You're making things up.", amongst a host of other synonymous statements.

I am a man. And like many, many men that I have known. I spent the majority of formative teenage years and into my early adult life 15-22, having numerous comments made about my body. Both sexually charged and derisive. This has lead to body dismorphic disorder. Oscillating between disgust and fear at times trying to keep myself from being overweight, but not highly desirable as I have very little interested in sexual relations.

I've been told by more women than I can count, that I just need to get over it and that what would be construed as sexual assault towards a woman, is just a complement, or I should be grateful it happened. This has been said to me not only in this context, but as a rape-victim that was drugged and had the act disseminated to the internet.

On the same token, it hasn't just been women that have said it. But there has been many, many, many times that those pushing against gender norms and saying they want to push towards a gender neutral society through the lens of Feminism, have rejected that those incidents happened or that they are even common. It is a denial of my very lived existence, and a push away from me expressing how society has failed me, and how I might want resources that are normally reserved only for women.

MRAs and men are not innocent of this sin either. No one here needs me to tell them that there are some men out there who would view that all as being some "irresistible stud", or would hear about the same things happening to women and respond with the same level of dismissiveness.

And there in lies a major problem with either end of our gender spectrum. The vast majority of the discourse purposefully blinds itself to the problems advocates or in some cases, the opposite gender brings up. They look towards their own gender like a new born looks upon the world. Seeing the problem presented and nodding, because their lived experience reinforces it as a reality; however, when the sheet of paper that is the opposite gender covers the problem, suddenly, the problem no longer exists.

Obfuscating many of these ideas further is often how faulty, one sided, cherry-picked or many times just out right ancient much of our research and data into these issues are. To say nothing of the semantic games that get played, societal pressures and the self-reported surveys that get produced. Only further complicated by the varying desires of each individual.

As this community inevitably grows or crumbles, I want to encourage everyone to push towards a simple idea. A simple course of action, if we truly want positive discussion and discourse. If want to find some middle-ground or healthy form of debate.

We can not simply dismiss. While the adage of Hitchen's Razor is a reddit favorite, "What can be presented without evidence, can also be dismissed without evidence", it often simply falls apart in gender discussions. Because the burden of producing most of the evidence for these issues now, comes primarily from anecdotes and personal experiences. We also can not just out of hand dismiss studies with data we don't like. We have to be able to engage with it, or pinpoint WHY the study was bad or faulty.

Failure to assume good faith, failure to address a study as valid without proving invalidity and most of all simply turning every conversation into a "who has it worse", serves no other purpose than to win a pissing contest and create endless "whataboutisms", that address no issues and widen the divide in gender discussion and issues.

Hey everyone, I lived in Topeka, KS in the Overlook from 2015-2018. While there I had the best burgers I’ve ever had from a bar that I can’t recall the name of. I’m sure it’s out of business now, but it was out in the Barmudea triangle and across the road from Skinny’s. Can anyone jog my memory? It was a smaller grungier place with a little side spot for people to smoke. Usually cheap beer, but always had angus burgers and duck fat fries.

Honestly, I feel like the Sub-Reddit needs some less news right now and something else we can talk about for a little while. So, let's explore some ideas and personal preferences.

The question here is pretty simple:

Starting with Bush Jr's first term, because let's all be honest with ourselves, for the majority of users on this Sub-reddit, that's going to be the first president of our lives or the first one we have any memories of. Assume that you, via some magical time traveling ability, have full control of Election outcomes (Senate/House/Presidency and their Primaries). Who do you have running in each of the races. Who replaces who where, and who wins. And most of all...how does this change the trajectory of the United States and Geopolitics in your eyes?

And for those of you reading, how do you counter-act these ideas, or see the responder's choices either working out or backfiring?

>The youngest of the MAGA coalition that helped return President Donald Trump to the White House is showing new signs of discontent — particularly over the administration’s handling of the war in Iran, rising gas prices and growing fears of another prolonged Middle East conflict.

>Interviews with six chapter leaders of the youth conservative movement Turning Point USA in swing states revealed a striking level of frustration. In particular, many of them said the president’s approach to Iran has undercut one of the central promises that animated younger right-wing voters in 2024: no new wars.

>“From a lot of my peers, especially in Gen Z right now, there is a lot of frustration and now, distrust, in our current administration over the decisions with the war in Iran,” said Rebekah Bushmire, vice president of the University of West Georgia’s Turning Point USA chapter. “A lot of people are seeing it as a betrayal. We were promised no new wars.”

>None seemed particularly enthused at the prospect of Vice President JD Vance or Secretary of State Marco Rubio leading a post-Trump GOP. Some described growing interest among younger conservatives in figures like Tucker Carlson, whose anti-war posture has increasingly resonated with parts of the MAGA base frustrated by the administration’s approach to Iran.

>Disaffectation among young conservatives is a worrisome sign for the MAGA movement, who helped buoy Trump to victory in a second term. Trump captured some 46 percent of voters aged 18 to 29, up from 36 percent in 2020 according to the Tufts Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.

>White House spokesperson Olivia Wales defended the administration’s approach, arguing that Trump is fulfilling a core campaign promise by preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. She dismissed concerns driven by “fluid opinion polls.”

>“President Trump is courageously protecting the United States from the deadly threat posed by the rogue Iranian regime – which past Presidents have talked about for 47 years, but only this President had the courage to address,” Wales said. “President Trump campaigned proudly on his promise to deny the Iranian regime the ability to develop a nuclear weapon, and he’s kept his promise. While the President has been clear about short-term disruptions as a result of Operation Epic Fury, the Administration is focused on implementing the proven Trump agenda of tax cuts, deregulation, and energy abundance to keep America on a solid economic trajectory.”

>But for those interviewed, neutering Iran’s nuclear ambitions didn’t rise to the top of young conservatives’ concerns – certainly not as much as the war itself. And at least one of those interviewed said he was not convinced that Iran remains enough of a nuclear threat to continue the war.

>Connor Darby, vice chair of a TPUSA chapter at the University of North Georgia, pointed out Trump’s comments about pre-war strikes having destroyed Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

>“I thought that was accomplished,” Darby said. “If there is a nuclear weapon that us American citizens don’t know about it, put our life and security above our finances,” but that “at this current point in time, with the knowledge we have in front of us … no, the financial situation is what comes next. We have to pay for food and bills.”

>Darby, who called the war “distasteful” to young voters, said “we don’t want to be back in the Middle East again fighting another forever war. … The goal is America first.”

>Trump, last week, said his primary goal is keeping Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and that he did not take Americans’ financial hardship into consideration.

>“Not even a little bit,” he said before departing for China.

>A spokesperson for the national Turning Point USA organization did not respond to requests for comment.

>Polls also show a significant generational split among the Republican voting bloc. A POLITICO/Public First poll conducted between April 11-14 found younger Trump voters are significantly more skeptical of the war in Iran than older Republicans. While 59 percent of Trump voters over 55 said they strongly supported the U.S. military action in the Middle East, just 28 percent of Trump voters ages 18 to 34 said the same.

>Younger Trump voters were also far more likely to say the war ran against MAGA principles and that the U.S. should avoid additional American casualties even if it means leaving objectives in Iran unfinished, the POLITICO poll found.

>The generational split has become especially visible in the online ecosystem shaping younger conservative politics, where distrust of foreign intervention and hostility toward the Republican establishment often blend together. Several of the student leaders described younger conservatives — particularly men — as increasingly influenced by media figures like Carlson and more fringe online personalities such as Nick Fuentes rather than elected Republicans or traditional conservative media. “Personally, I would say I trust Tucker Carlson’s approach — and everyone I’ve talked to, at least my age — is more anti-war, more on Carlson’s side than Trump’s side,” said Oliver Genovese, president of the Davidson College Turning Point USA chapter in North Carolina.

>That gap appears especially pronounced on college campuses, where younger conservatives feel squeezed by rising costs of living such as gas prices and housing – while Washington focuses on another foreign conflict.

>“The problem is, [for] a lot of young people … There’s a lot of problems that we have that aren’t being addressed by the administration, like the housing crisis,” said Darrius Singh, president of Penn State’s TPUSA chapter. “Gas, especially after the war, has become so bad.”

>For many of the students interviewed, Carlson has become the clearest vessel for that worldview.

>Bushmire said there is “absolutely” a path for Carlson to mount a serious 2028 campaign among younger conservatives if economic frustrations continue.

>“I think it’s absolutely possible. 100 percent,” she said. “Because young people are struggling to afford housing and make money.”

>Genovese went even further, arguing that Carlson could better channel the anti-war, anti-establishment energy that fueled Trump’s rise in 2016.

>“If we wanted the same young turnout, I think Tucker Carlson would be a good option,” he said. “I don’t see a lot of young excitement particularly of [Vice President] JD Vance being the nominee.”

>And despite frustration with the administration, most students interviewed by West Wing Playbook still saw Rubio and Vance as the top 2028 contenders among younger conservatives — though not without reservations.

>And, all of the students interviewed called for an open Republican primary in 2028, rather than for Trump to hand pick a successor.

>“I would want a genuine candidate,” Bushmire said. “I would rather vote for you for your word and your ideals, than the word of someone else.”

TLDR: Younger Conservative voters, or individuals who were once part of Trump's MAGA base, are reporting increasing dissatisfaction with the Iran war. The claim is that it is going against Campaign promises for no new wars, and that exhaustion with the Middle East is only growing.

My personal thoughts on this comes back to the ideas we discussed recently with Hochul and other regions of the U.S. all claiming to want Affordable Housing and Wind power and other initiatives, but when it comes time to begin construction, there's always an excuse for why it can't be in their backyard.

Part of it is pragmatic. If it comes down to a war in the Middle East, it will be the young who are required to fight it, even if a draft is highly improbable. Likewise, whatever costs incurred from the fight are going to effect the young the most over their life times in the form of taxes, population shifts, changes in public perception, you name it.

On the other hand, my sentiment for the media is low and the idea of the "Walls closing in" on Trump or his base finally turning against him are catnip to the disaffected liberal/progressive voter, who eat it up to assuage their egos or give them that burst of hope to keep them reading.

It is a difficult game to keep playing, because on one hand I can see where the interviewees are coming from. On the other hand, how wide spread is that view actually, and can it overcome the frustrations that youth, especially young men have with the Democratic party?

>NEW YORK — Three years ago, Gov. Kathy Hochul went to war with the suburbs.

>Looking to those low-slung, leafy towns rimming New York City — where restrictive zoning has helped drive sky-high housing costs — she tried to override local rules that have long blocked apartment construction.

>The political backlash was fierce and swift. To move forward, Hochul eventually settled for carrots instead of sticks. But her incentive program aimed at enticing localities to build more densely has drawn relatively little interest from suburbs with the highest housing costs — and where requirements faced the staunchest opposition.

>“Voluntary programs consistently fail to move the high-cost, high-opportunity suburbs where housing is needed most, which is exactly the problem that New York faces,” said Annemarie Gray, head of the pro-housing advocacy group Open New York. “Incentives alone just don’t work.”

>The governor’s original approach, called the Housing Compact, won her plaudits from housing advocates and was an early example of the so-called Abundance-style politics that have since sparked a national conversation among Democrats. High-cost blue states like New York and California make it too difficult to build, the argument goes, and the resulting shortages drive up costs.

>But for Hochul, taking on this paradigm has posed a vexing political dilemma: a more forceful approach — while perhaps more effective — triggered a revolt in parts of the state like Long Island where it remains increasingly difficult for Democrats to make gains.

>Nassau County Republican Bruce Blakeman, who’s now challenging Hochul’s bid for reelection, had this to say in 2023 of her proposed housing mandates: “There would be very, very serious political implications to anybody that supported that.”

>The following year, the governor backed off the proposed requirements to avoid rocking the boat in New York’s battleground congressional districts that were seen as key to Democrats winning the House. Instead, she leaned into an incentive program that reserves state funding for towns and cities that obtain a “pro-housing” certification from the state.

>The early results are mixed, but to several housing experts, they already illustrate the limits of such an approach.

>Downstate counties that surround the five boroughs — Nassau and Suffolk on Long Island and Westchester and Rockland north of the city — account for just 9 percent of the localities included in Hochul’s pro-housing program, despite being home to roughly 21 percent of the state’s population. And the wealthiest parts of these regions largely are not participating, including the toniest towns where extra state funds may not be sufficient bait.

>“Long Island communities have used local control to keep in place their racially-segregated communities,” said Elaine Gross, of ERASE Racism, a civil rights group that organized in support of Hochul’s 2023 plan. “Incentives are not a great way of having communities change because the reason why they are the way they are is very intentional and they have no interest in changing.”

>Local governments in the region have often resisted multi-family construction, particularly when it includes affordable housing — prizing neighborhood character above growth. Take the village of Garden City in Nassau County. About 45 minutes from Midtown Manhattan by train, it’s one of the most affluent suburbs on Long Island: the median household income is nearly $250,000, and the median home value is more than $1 million.

>Some two decades ago, the village government rezoned a 25-acre site to block the planned construction of affordable apartments — prompting a racial discrimination lawsuit that ultimately forced the county to pay out a $5.4 million settlement nearly 15 years later.

>As part of that case, in 2014, a federal court ordered that future development in Garden City must include affordable units. In an illustration of how rare such construction is, it was another decade before any affordable apartments were actually completed. A 150-unit luxury complex that opened last year, containing 15 affordable units, was the first rental development in the village in more than 50 years.

>Hochul has attempted to change that dynamic by seeking to spur more apartment construction along the region’s vast network of rail stations. But the overwhelming majority of Long Island remains zoned for single-family homes, including many prime areas around mass transit.

>Local leaders framed the push for more apartment construction as an attack on their way of life.

>Jennifer DeSena, town supervisor of North Hempstead in Nassau County, said in 2023 that Hochul’s proposals would “[turn] our neighborhoods into overcrowded urban centers.”

>Joseph Saladino, supervisor of neighboring Oyster Bay, said they would “overcrowd classrooms, greatly increase traffic and cars parked on our streets, strain emergency services, and threaten the environment.” The region must “fight to keep single-family neighborhoods intact,” he said.

>Both towns have not sought the “pro-housing” certification. Garden City hasn’t, either.

>“Just speaking for the district I represent, it’s mostly single-family homes. I think most of our neighbors want it to continue to be that way,” Republican Assembly Minority Leader Ed Ra, who represents parts of Nassau County, said in an interview.

>“There are not huge tracts of undeveloped land to build more housing on, so what you start talking about is, to what extent are people okay with tearing down a few single-family homes and doing something multi-level?” Ra continued. “That is not something that a lot of communities on Long Island are going to be interested in.”

>Ra noted that some towns have still embraced development around train stations. But he thinks the carrots offered through Hochul’s incentive program haven’t been attractive enough and that there should be more investment offered on the front-end in local infrastructure upgrades.

>There’s relatively little required of municipalities in order to get this certification. One option is to illustrate that they’ve increased their housing stock by a certain rate — at least 3 percent over three years in downstate counties. But they can also simply pass a resolution saying they “endeavor” to adopt more pro-housing zoning policies.

>Even as housing experts continue to argue incentives are insufficient — and as the Abundance movement attracts a more receptive audience — Hochul doesn’t seem inclined to bring back the sticks.

>“I was told last year that people didn’t want to be told what to do, not even gently suggested what to do,” Hochul joked in 2024 at a roundtable with mayors where she pulled out a literal bunch of carrots to show she was embracing a gentler approach.

>“I’m told this is what you’re willing to eat to build more housing, and I’ve got 600 million carrots on the table,” Hochul said.

>She has, however, continued to stress the need for more development. This year, as part of an agenda she termed “Let Them Build,” Hochul proposed reforms to the state’s extensive environmental review requirements that often slow down construction. These changes are expected to be included in a forthcoming state budget deal. And in 2024, Hochul and the state legislature approved a wide-ranging deal aimed at boosting residential construction that was focused largely on New York City.

>“There’s NIMBYism on steroids in this state. And that’s what we’re up against,” Hochul told a friendly crowd Thursday at a conference of affordable housing developers and advocates. Referencing her 2023 push, she continued: “We had a plan. It was an ambitious plan, wildly ambitious plan — not exactly embraced by many parts of the state. But what we did was we continued. We never gave up.”

>More than 400 communities across the state have been certified as “pro-housing,” including New York City and many municipalities upstate, where the housing shortage is not as acute as in the downstate metro area. About half of the state’s population, excluding New York City, falls within a “pro-housing” community, according to the governor’s office. As part of the program, certified communities get exclusive access to some $750 million in state discretionary funding, but Hochul’s office would not say how much of that has been awarded to participants thus far.

>In 2023, when she proposed the mandates**,** Hochul landed on a sticks-based approach after seeing how housing production incentives had failed to yield results in other states like California and Massachusetts — which both eventually shifted toward mandates.

>New York’s suburbs have some of the most restrictive zoning in the nation, with one 2020 paper from the Furman Center noting the state “stands alone” among its peers in how much authority it gives local governments to restrict housing growth.

>California, for example, has been much more aggressive with localities, with Gov. Gavin Newsom not shying away from taking on towns and cities for failing to meet state-issued housing production mandates.

>Hochul said in 2023 the state would need some 800,000 new homes over a decade to meet demand. She noted at the time that New York City’s in-state suburbs were underbuilding relative to their peers in New Jersey and Connecticut. The relative lack of housing production in the city’s in-state suburbs drives up costs for the entire region — which has added jobs at a faster rate than homes, advocates say.

>“We like to think of ourselves as select communities, but the reality is we’re all interconnected,” said Tim Foley, head of the The Building & Realty Institute and a leader of the Welcome Home Westchester campaign, a coalition that has pushed towns and cities just north of New York City to build more housing. “A lot of folks that are migrating out of the suburbs of New York City are less migrating down to Florida or Arizona, they’re just going across the river. They’re going to New Jersey and Connecticut because they’re finding more stuff that’s affordable and in their price range there.”

>The suburbs around New York City are by no means uniform, and some parts of the region have illustrated more openness toward housing growth. Westchester, for example, has been more receptive to residential development than Nassau, with places like New Rochelle seeing a massive boom in housing construction in recent years. Still, affluent Westchester towns like Bronxville, Scarsdale and Rye have not opted into the program.

>There are also examples like the village of Mamaroneck, which is a “pro-housing” community that also recently rolled back rules favoring development amid controversy around a specific multi-family housing proposal.

>Foley said the pro-housing program has helped some towns and villages on the margins embrace housing growth, but that the state could make it stronger by offering more direct funding for infrastructure improvements. Requirements, he added, would also help.

>“At a certain point,” he said, “you’re going to need some kind of mandate to get everybody involved.”

Honestly, flipping through the article brings me back to a huge issue that the United States has in pursuing any measure of actual "equality of opportunity" within the country, especially in regards to housing. It is the NIMBY attitude. New York is one of the Bluest States in the country, and even if the outliers are Red, it's often where we here the loudest screams for more affordable housing. Despite this, when an idea is brought up to expand housing options and to build such, those in the region are quick to vote it down.

And now we're resorting to tossing out carrots to the "haves" to try to offer anything to the "have nots", likewise, the sentiment appears to be that: adding affordable housing would "damage the character" of the neighborhoods. Ultimately, I'm struck by how often we end up talking out of both sides of our mouth when it comes to affordability legislation.