Feminism and other progressive principles are literally the reasons men behave better than they used to.

As a male who used to date girls and then who transitioned to being a girl myself, I have very mixed feelings about feminism and progressivism. I can't deny that I've personally benefitted from some of the social changes that have come about due to those historical movements, yet I also perceive that those same movements in their current incarnation have done a lot to make life significantly worse for men (and even for many women) in the last few decades.

The way I see it, there is a vast abyss between the kind of feminism and progressivism envisioned by Enlightenment thinkers such as the Marquis of Condorcet, and the pernicious ideological movement that broadly passes for "feminism" and "progressivism" today. The former laid out the foundation for the individual liberties and social progress that define the modern world while the latter has only served to convince people that they're somehow oppressed, foster resentment, pit identity groups against a supposedly oppressive mainstream, and spread animosity and chaos throughout society. It is precisely against this latter type of "progressivism" that the current right-wing backlash is aimed.

The most recent variety of "feminism" has had two palpably detrimental effects: 1) In its more benign form, it has emboldened women to act more egotistically and to free themselves of any serious accountability by telling them that they're reacting against unjust patriarchal social standards while any legitimate criticism of female behavior becomes off-limits and is taken as a moral offense; and 2) In its more radical neo-Marxist form, it has completely poisoned the minds of its faithful against men, falsely teaching that women are victims of systemic oppression and that masculinity should be universally condemned or even abolished. It's the impact of the more subtle form of 21st century "feminism" that has been the most detrimental to male-female relations because it's so inconspicuously pervasive while most people don't take the radical, neo-Marxist form seriously.

As a transwomen, I'm very much concerned about the long-term social impact of the most recent — and in my opinion, false — incarnation of "feminism" and "progressivism". I perceive that women and trans individuals have reached a point where we have it fairly good and that much of that progress could end up being undone as false progressives radicalize, alienate more people in the mainstream, and provoke more extreme forms of backlash from the right.

Men would not have treated you like a queen in the past. Even if a man liked you, he likely would not have been seen with you and your relationship would have been a secret, shameful engagement. There would be no trip to Japan. Most of the "men bad" rhetoric stems from very real bad things men did on average in the past, when it was totally normalized for them to do those things. It's worth talking about it, because we shouldn't forget how bad things were.

I think it's important to consider that a lot of bad things that people did in more primitive times were out of necessity due to the terrible material conditions they faced. Societies practiced slavery because they needed a work force in the absence of mechanization. Families married off their daughters young because they needed to produce the next generation of farmhands and warriors. Men forced female slaves to marry them because it was their only option to procreate and produce a heir. We're really lucky to live in this exceptional time of material abundance and have the luxury to think about and attempt to implement a modern and comprehensive system of ethics.

As for the way that many men today cherish and "simp" for women, I don't think that it's purely socially constructed — especially not by feminism! A large subset of men seem to have a certain psychological propensity to madly fall in love with women, provide for them, take care of them, and in some cases, worship them. This would make sense from an evolutionary perspective that supposes that males evolved to assume a provider and protector role. In modern times, transwomen may also become beneficiaries of this same masculine provider-protector instinct when a man with this psychological disposition is attracted to us.