it’s complicated

There are a lot of complexities to the situation. And things have changed a lot.

Two essential aspects:

1) In many societies only men had full social agency.

2) Often, in certain ways, women were treated better and life was harder for some of the men.

It seems that there was more general egalitarianism when lifeways were simpler. That included gender-based egalitarianism. With the labor and martial imperatives of statist-productive society physical strength distinctions and the ability to travel induced more in the way of role division. Women, spending much time during the prime of life being pregnant or nursing, remained relatively more confined to the domestic sphere. Men “went out” . . . worked, soldiered, governed, etc. playing social roles. The successful among them (only a minority) gained aggrandizement and position.

“Women and children” were subordinated together.

But less-successful men also were subordinated.

At least the subordinated women had the chance of being treated tenderly. Their role was special. They were central in the stream of generational sustenance and continuance . . . the biological and social “life-flow.”

The subordinated males lacked all consideration.

It’s understandable that feminism has tended to focus on the subordination of women. Not needing to be confined to the domestic sphere, there is no longer any basis for it. But the complexity of the situation in regard to the subordination and lack of consideration for the majority of men has been a significant blind spot. Almost all the sociopathology statistics indicate that the subordinated men are more oppressed, less thriving, more dissatisfied.