TV

‘Hack Live’ Debated Male Privilege And People Are Seriously Pissed Off

"I've had it on for 15 seconds and I already want to set fire to the TV."

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Last night Hack Live debated whether the concept of male privilege is “bullshit” and people were really into the complex, nuanced discussion that flowed through from the self-described men’s rights activists and “feminist apostates”.

LOL JK, people were absolutely not into it.

Hosted by Tom Tilley, the debate show on ABC2 featured a panel that included feminist writer Clementine Ford, conservative writer Daisy Cousens, transgender author Nevo Zisin and men’s rights activist Adrian Johnson (which isn’t actually his real name; he chose not to use his real name because he was afraid of being “targeted” by feminists).

Before the show even began, a number of people took issue with how the topic was being framed.

The panelists touched on several issues often raised by the men’s rights movement, such as male suicide rates and mental health. “We’re mobilising because we’re sick and tired of these issues being ignored” said Adrian.

But his insistence that the root of these problems was feminism did not go down well.

The MRA was also lambasted for his take on domestic violence and sexual assault, equating it with the experience of being “kicked in the nuts”. Ford was quick to dispute this point, remarking that “that’s hardly the same as the statistic reflecting on average one women a week is killed by her partner.”

The person with the most unique perspective was probably Zisin, who has experienced life being treated as both a woman and a man. “I don’t get spoken over as much [as a man],” they said. “I get rewarded for being a feminist. People are blown away I care about women whereas when I was a woman I was called bossy and emotional.”

Anyway, the whole thing is on iview if you feel like making yourself very, very angry.