Hmm, I'm not sure - because women talking openly about male privilege might find agreement from some quarters but ridicule or worse from other quarters.
This is like saying that black people have the privilege of talking about race in the US, but whites don't. That might have some truth to it, but overall it's a point-missing half-truth, since black people who talk about that kind of thing are often treated as "angry blacks" or "to ideological" or whatever, and the broader context makes "feeling mildly uncomfortable about race discussions" a comparatively trivial complaint.
Personally I don't find it problematic to talk about female privilege at all. I think one has to be careful (just as women have to be careful talking about male privilege) but there are areas where it is so blatant and damaging that it must be talked about, particularly in areas of domestic violence.
When I was just out of college, I was (as a male) the victim of some pretty intense domestic violence several times a week for about six months. It was a very hellish situaiton, but one thing that made it a lot worse was the sense that if I went to the authorities, I would be blamed for the attacks against me. Yet I was assaulted with lethal weapons (knives mostly) several times a week.
Nobody can tell me that there aren't key areas where female privilege doesn't exist. The problem is that it is as invisible to females as male privilege is to males.
A related problem is the distinction between isolated incidents and social problems. Your story counts as an isolated incident because you're male, whereas if you were female and the attacker was male it would be treated as a serious issue by some well-organised lobbyists and any attempt to question this or suggest that male victims exist too would be shot down as a direct attack on you.
Of course, this doesn't just affect men; female victims of violently abusive women get similar treatment. There was a lovely incident where a really major feminist blogger wrote a post [1] which talked about her experience of domestic violence and attributed it to the fact that the abuser was male, just completely erasing victims who'd been treated in the same way by a women. Another women had actually experienced this from a female abuser and was quite distressed by being erased in this way, leading to a long discussion[2] in which said big-name feminist claimed without any sense of irony that not allowing her to treat other victims' experiences as impossible was somehow an attack on her and an attempt to erase her experiences as impossible, before going on to further erase the other victim's experiences and call her irrational.
As far as I can tell there's pretty much no real movement towards gender equality anywhere, and most of the anti-domestic violence organisations are actually anti-violence against women (but only if it's by men). Sady Doyle is still a respectable member of the online feminist community, the moderators of that blog went against their stated goals and the interests of their commenters to side with her, and I don't think anyone else cared.
There is more and more work being done in social justice circles now to degender the assumptions in discussions about rape and domestic violence. Many members of earlier generations of feminists found it easy to dismiss talk about problems like domestic violence that affected heterosexual men as unimportant, which is obviously unfortunate. But as gay, lesbian, and transgender people gain visibility within the social justice community, it becomes more obvious that this is based on gender essentialist, heterosexist assumptions that are simply not valid.
Of course, this doesn't change the fact that most resources for rape and domestic violence are geared toward women. This is a problem not only for straight men, for for gay men and transgender people as well. There's a lot more work that has to be done in this area, and if you feel strongly abut it, I would strongly encourage you to get involved.
What's infuriating to me was that even when I was going through this (mid-1990's), I was aware of the statistics, that everyone who had studied gender and violence concluded that there was no significant difference in severity or frequency of domestic violence--- that men were more likely to "beat up" their partners but women were far more likely to assault with weapons. This isn't new data. The problem is that talking about gender privilege has taken place entirely in a discussion about sexism rather than a discussion about society in general.
When we talk about trying to get rid of "heterosexism" (I prefer the term heteronormative because it's purely descriptive but also a lot broader), I don't think that still leaves room at the table for heterosexual male victims of DV. We are still well outside a problem that is mainstream to talk about.
You're right -- the erasure of straight male domestic violence survivors is not an example of heterosexism, it's gender essentialism. It involves the assumption that being male means being stereotypically masculine, and being female means being stereotypically feminine. (Heterosexism occurs when domestic violence survivors in same-sex relationships are erased because the relationships don't follow the heteronormative male/female dynamic.)
> The problem is that talking about gender privilege has taken place entirely in a discussion about sexism rather than a discussion about society in general.
I agree. Because the first waves of gender studies were "women's studies", it made it much harder to discuss topics outside the basic men-oppress-women dynamic of sexism. And even as gay and lesbian studies became more prominent, there wasn't nearly as much work being done on gender roles as they apply to heterosexual males. Most of the work I've seen that's really applicable to the problem is being done either (to a lesser degree) in studying masculinity and femininity in the context of butch and femme lesbian roles, or from a trans* point of view. Some trans men, in particular, claim the right to be considered men and still be feminine or androgynous, and they can approach the topic without the stigma attached to either gay or straight cis men when they broach the topic outside of narrow venues like drag performances. Hopefully this will be the precursor to constructively reconsidering the entire topic and a general fight against that stigma.
I think a lot of times it is more helpful to see things in terms of normative and liminal models and narratives. The problem at present is that even with this opening up, you still see male victims of DV as liminal (at best!) figures in the conversation. Self-defence defenses in DV however are still very gender-biased, and I still run into lots of people who deny that female on male DV is even a problem.
I don't see this changing right away in any fundamental manner but you are correct that there are slow positive steps in the right direction.
Well, put it this way: As a white male, I would be extremely uncomfortable having this discussion in public. When this sort of thing comes up, I tend to leave the room or at least sit there quietly.
See, men also may find support in some quarters, and ridicule or worse in other quarters. One of those quarters they may encounter "or worse" happens to be workplace environments where overzealous HR departments can end careers.
What's unique to this situation is the social construct of the "stronger" and "weaker" sex. A claim of victim hood coming from a female aligns with bias we already hold about women. Women are socialized to emotionally connect with others as a way of support and people are socialized to respond back positively.
A claim of victim hood by a male violates this norm. There is little established protocol for this situation and is basically taboo. So even outside of a politically fragile context there's already a power differential as far as talking frankly or seeking empathy goes.
