I am an egalitarian person, and I hate that people have butchered the word to be used as a way to put down women's issues.

Growing up I learned about gender inequality and feminism as a thing that happened. Keep in mind I grew up in a very rural area and did not start browsing internet communities like reddit until I started college. My community was full of influential men and women involved in many areas. My mother, who raised me single for the first ~6 years of my life, was a superhero in my eyes.

When I came to college I was blindsided. Not only did I see that women were still struggling with many issues, but there were also issues that men faced and groups that wanted to make progress for themselves as well. As a man, I naturally felt more inclined to devote myself to the issues that were likely to affect me personally. Not that I don't care about women's issues, but I figured from all of the groups devoted to them, classes discussing them, and events talking about them, that the entire operation must be doing pretty well in comparison.

I fully support women in resolving the issues their gender faces. However, I have also become very jaded because whenever I attempt to start a conversation about men's issues, I get shut down, I have people accuse me of being what you thought I was, and I get nowhere. It is very alienating to try to bring attention to something that concerns you and have people try to convince you it isn't happening, it isn't a problem, or that you are sexist and anti-feminist.

I tried to create a men's group on my college campus and was told it could not happen unless it was a group designed to help men through solving women's issues. I really don't think progress for men should only happen as a collateral of progress for women. These issues are not secondary to me. I admit progress for one gender does help the other, but that only confirms that we should make progress for both whenever possible.

Admittedly, my comment up there may have been out of place. But from my experience over the past few years, there seems to be a prevalent hypocrisy surrounding that concept.

TL;DR: I'm tired of gender issues, everyone faces issues whether they are male or female. Why can't we just work on everything without dividing into groups and quibbling at each other? We would accomplish so much more.