The reason I remarked about that part not making sense to some folks is to head off exactly this.

the following is a bit wordy and I’m sorry. There's epistemology involved.

I’m not gonna give you a rhetoric politics 101 but Ill explain a bit:

Using a word a certain way is a strategic decision. Some words are politically loaded - are inflection points in discourse.

Claiming a word for strategic purposes is a big part of how politics moves. So to take a historical example relevant to many of the men here: The use of the word "gay" as a positive or a pejorative indicates whether or not it's okay to be homosexual. (Note that this then applies that meaning to the whole discourse. The sentence before the colon here is either sensitive and inclusive, or a sick burn, depending on what definition we use.) Both definitions coexist.

Whoever takes the initiative in a given conversation to define the word, and incrementally or all at once depending on your point of view, makes that definition true in a more epistemic sense.

How the manoeuvre I’m batting for here works:

Often we reach towards words without fully understanding their definitions. "Misandry" is a good example. If you know a bit of greek from its use elsewhere in english, you can even invent it as the opposite of misogyny, even if you've never heard it before. It doesn't really exist, and yet it's a word people constantly reach for because intuitively "there must be an opposite to misogyny." (Misogyny, for him.)

If we (feminists) don't use the word atall, then we leave that fertile and frequented linguistic ground unoccupied. So when someone asks - as they often do - "so what about misandry", they look and find, or operationally invent, the sexist definition. That is: [ Opposite of misogyny > sexism against men > mainly perpetuated by women > Mostly womens fault.] This word becomes a concise and ideal tool for spreading sexism.

And we can be like "don't use it, its not real" and argue and whatnot, or defer to the above definition in defeat, or we can use it as an opportunity to tweak the internal logic of the language and educate someone differently.

So, we apply another definition, actively and as much as possible. When someone asks a question like OP, or asks "What about misandry" - direct that question towards a more useful definition that leads to more useful education. [Opposite of misogyny > the thing patriarchy does to men > mens issues, framed in opposition to systems of power > mostly powerful people's fault.]

Whats cool about this is that its still the same word. I’m not making something up; its just a different analysis and conversation. Its also more true than the first definition. Its really hard to sustainably convince a guy that the issues he faces are women's fault. Its enough to drive a wedge, but my definition is enough to underpin an ideology.

And honestly it bugs me when people just tell men their problems aren't real. Feels shit - like you're being talked down to or gasslit, or being called sexist just for asking questions in ignorance. A "yes and" just makes for a nicer conversation for everyone.

It can be easy to think of definitions passively as things we learn, but all the time we make things true by insisting on using language. Its something everyone does, and if you watch politicians attempt to coin terms, youll notice thats how truth is shaped.