The way Ive have been thinking about this is to work backwards: I dont think that you can have a situation where someone is morally obligated to date someone (at least when dating vs not dating is the limit of the situation. Obviously, if you add more negative things, like a trolley problem where it was somehow the only way to save people, that would be another matter, but nobody has set up such a thing here), because a forced relationship is quite harmful to the person so forced.
I suspect that you agree with that, since you acknowledge that “nobody is entitled to anything”. I also think one has a moral obligation to not act in a bigoted manner (this feels pretty much self evident to me, since bigotry harms people). Third, I consider misandry a form of bigotry, pretty much by definition, since I would define that term as “bigotry against men”.
If we consider some other case that would be clearly and obviously misandry, such as, say, someone firing an employee specifically because they were a man, in a case where the man himself had done nothing to warrant the firing, and everyone involved knew this and just didnt want a man, it would seem clear that the ethical thing to do is to not fire the guy. Depending on how the law in the place in question worked, it may or may not be a legal right, but morally speaking, I would say that since the motivation is bigotry and there is no other reason to justify the firing, theres a moral obligation not to do it.
But, if we apply that same reasoning to the situation of a woman deciding to swear off dating because they want to punish men for many of them shifting to the right, and we assume that this is misandry, we would then have to say that, since misandry is bigotry and doing bigoted things is wrong, the “not dating” must be wrong, and therefore that there is a moral obligation to date. But that is a conclusion that, as I said in the beginning, I dont think makes sense. And since it seems like it should follow from adding the assumption that a woman swearing off dating men is misandry, I think I have to conclude that that assumption must be wrong. I cant necessarily explain how it is wrong, just that I think that it leads to a nonsense conclusion if it is correct, and so cannot be even if it appears that it should be on first glance.
Say to some male employee, “Hey, at the end of the quarter, I am planning on giving you a raise.” Now, I’m not obligated to give them that raise, as I’m well within my power to change my mind. I think it’s safe to say we both agree on this.
However, some other guy says to me “go fuck yourself” and so when the end of the quarter comes around I say to the male employee, “Sorry, but I’m not giving you that raise because some other guy told me to fuck myself.”
Would you argue that I haven’t punished that guy, simply because whether to give you the raise is completely up to me? To me, this is clearly a punishment: they were going to get something, but I decided to not do so in retaliation to how I was treated.
To be more accurate, your analogy should actually read something like this:
Origionally you give raises to your employees based on performance.
Then one of them says “fuck you”.
After that point giving a raise to any of them has a 5% chance of killing you, per raise.
How many raises do you now give?
There is no retaliation or punishing involved at all. Just a healthy respect for the consequences, however unlikely.
I’ve yet to see anyone say they are doing this because they are afraid of dying if they get pregnant. The article quotes someone who says it’s about respect, and all of the other things I’ve read are about fighting the patriarchy and men being controlling.
I think you want it to be justifiable, and are trying to figure how to spin it so it is.
This is a different situation though, for a few reasons: first, I actually don’t agree, once you’ve promised the raises, people will reasonably make plans in anticipation of them, so I do think you have an obligation (maybe not a legal one, but that isn’t what we’re talking about) to give them once you’ve made those promises. I don’t recall the women involved in any of this 4b stuff promising a relationship to any man or group of men, it isn’t like they “were going to get it” already.
Second, and perhaps more importantly, the stakes for business and personal relationships are different. We don’t generally require continuing and revokable consent for giving someone money, the state can for example issue someone a monetary fine, and that’s considered an acceptable consequence for many things. If you promise to buy something, and they then come to deliver it and you decide “actually I’ve changed my mind, keep it, I’m not buying it from you anymore”, the other person can in a number of circumstances sue you for breaking your agreement.
However, if the state were to mandate that someone enter into a relationship, or have sex with someone, as a penalty for something, that would be considered a human rights abuse where the monetary fine would not, and if you were to tell someone that you found some type of flower super romantic, and then they came over with those flowers to give, but you then told them you weren’t feeling a connection, no reasonable person would take their side if they tried to sue you to force you into a romantic relationship with them.
To put it a simpler way, if you promise someone a raise, the default state once that promise is made is getting the raise, as in professional matters, honoring promises and agreements is fundamental, revoking it later is therefore taking something from them, because you’re changing that default state to something worse for them. Personal relations do not have the same dynamic. It is well known and understood that people sometimes change their minds on romantic and sexual relationships, or sometimes just aren’t in the mood anymore. Promises don’t carry the same weight, when there exists an absolute right to revoke consent at any point and have things not continue. As such, the default state is “not having a relationship/encounter with a particular person”, right up until it happens. If the person in question never decides to enter into that relationship, because they have decided that they don’t want to even deal with having one at all, they haven’t taken anything from whoever else might have been interested in them, because they haven’t changed that state. There was never a reason for a guy to expect one of these 4b women would date them in the first place, and no reason to expect that they wouldn’t one day leave again if they did.
I actually don’t agree, once you’ve promised the raises, people will reasonably make plans in anticipation of them, so I do think you have an obligation (maybe not a legal one, but that isn’t what we’re talking about) to give them once you’ve made those promises. I don’t recall the women involved in any of this 4b stuff promising a relationship to any man or group of men, it isn’t like they “were going to get it” already.
I was very careful with my words, and very intentionally avoided the word “promise” because I knew it would be spun this way, even though I would argue that even if one promises to do something, they still have the right to say no (i.e. Is a woman who promises to have sex with a man required to have sex with that man? Or does she still maintain the right to change her mind?)
So can we retry again without putting the word “promise” in my mouth? Am I punishing that person by deciding to not give them a raise as a retaliation of the person saying “fuck you” to me? Or is it because the raise was never theirs, it’s impossible for me to punish them by taking it away?
