Being more likely to die young and not being allowed to talk about your feelings or ask for help certainly seem to me like major issues. The fact that these things are simply a given in our culture and we accept them mostly without question (and indeed ridicule anyone who brings them up as major issues) tells me this is systematic discrimination. I'm not sure anyone is consciously oppressing men - it's just the way the world is set up.
In many ways this is how it was for women before feminism. Domestic and sexual violence were just a normal part of life, as was being burdened with endless pregnancies, as was simply being excluded from a whole range of activities that were available to men. No doubt some women objected but they were mostly urged, by their fellow women as well as men, to keep quiet about it and not rock the boat. There is safety in stability and tradition - especially for the poor and uneducated.
I've found at least three other quite major issues that are worse for men than for women, and they too are accepted as completely normal in our culture.
The second is about dress codes.
Women often complain that their bosses and teachers enforce dress codes on women that they don't on men - usually about hem lines (too high) and neck lines (too low), without noticing that the limitations on men are far more draconian. We don't notice this because mostly, men stick to the rules, so there are no complaints, but men who cross the line are heavily sanctioned. I'm talking about the obligatory suit, shirt and tie required of almost all men who work in offices. I've always been aware of the problem because I absolutely don't want to be cooped up in a stiff uniform all day. I've never worked in an office and never owned a proper suit.
The suit-and-tie ensemble is pretty much totally designed to cover up any bare flesh on the man except for the hands and head. Essentially the instruction is to dress modestly. In hot weather it is perhaps ok to take off the jacket, undo the top button and roll up the sleeves, but certainly not when meeting clients, or being visible to the general public. The suit usually has to be grey or blue, maybe black, possibly brown. Men can maybe get away with having a more jolly tie or socks - but not too gaudy. Jewellery maybe a simple ring or cufflinks, or a watch. Obviously no make-up and short hair is standard. Women in the same office may have short sleeves, a lower neckline, and maybe calf- or knee-length skirts or dresses in a whole range of shapes, colours and fabrics, or they can dress modestly in a suit (trouser or skirt) of a more sombre colour if they want to. They can wear earrings, bracelets, necklaces and rings, and any amount of make-up and hair styling, all without being pulled in by HR for indecency. There are cases of men being pulled in for wearing skirts - plain and modest, but for most men it would not be worth the trouble, or the ridicule. It's just not done.
Outside of the office, men and women in most jobs are required to wear overalls or other work wear. I'm a gardener and most of us, men and women, wear various sorts of outdoor wear - fleeces, work boots, shorts etc - and it's all fairly unisex.
Away from work, again women can wear an extremely wide range of outfits that I am not qualified to describe, but men generally wear some sort of trousers and tops combo - jeans and tee-shirts and trainers most obviously, usually again in fairly plain colours - white, grey, blue, black, brown, maybe some green. You can have a colourful logo on your tee shirt maybe, or if you really want something colourful, wear a football shirt. Women of course can also wear plain modest clothes too if they want. Nobody will object.
A trip to any high-street clothes shop - comparing the men's to the women's section illustrates this very well. The men's is usually smaller, much less colourful and far less varied. Frankly it's incredibly boring and although I'd like to dress in a more interesting way I've found it very difficult to find anything inspiring. In fact it's so difficult, it's hard to imagine what the alternative might be, but we went through a phase in the 60s, 70s, and early 80s (my formative years) when men's fashion was as extravagant as anything women wore but now that look, with the flares, the wide collars, the platforms, the glam, the long hair, the eye make-up, the bling, and most of all, the bare skin, is laughable and liable to get you attacked in the street. Gay pride can get away with it, at least for the day, and tellingly, black men still seem to be permitted a more stylish wardrobe.
This may seem a rather trivial complaint but making yourself look fabulous has been a basic part of human culture forever. People think it's just a throw-away superficial thing but I see it as a genuine art form. When my step-daughter was hugely excited to receive a huge box of make-up for Christmas my feminist mind was saddened to think she was so in the clutches of western commercialised sexist culture, but I was wrong. For her it was as much an art as any paints or musical instrument might have been. We've been making jewellery and decorative clothes with coloured cloth, feathers and fur, using body paint and piercings and mucking about with our hair since the dawn of humanity, and many cultures still do. The western countries did until quite recently, but now look what's happened to us. How terribly dull we've become! It's a form of self expression as important as singing and dancing, but which western men can also only do under fairly prescribed circumstances, and often only in a very modest way. Imagine not being allowed to dance for fear of being ridiculed or even attacked.
Women's complaint about clothing is that there are social pressures - they are 'expected' to wear certain kinds of clothes - to sexualise them, so men can objectify them. My feeling is that women really don't have to go along with expectations or social pressure. It may be difficult sometimes but nobody is actually forcing them to wear sexy clothes. Many women don't and people do not point and laugh. Women now have the power to not do what society tells them if they wish, but only women can grasp that opportunity - we can't do it for them. Don't wait for other people to stop criticising - there will always be critics. If you don't want to wear sexy clothes - don't. It really is as simple as that.
But also it seems most of the pressure does not come from men. Frankly we are nowhere near as bothered about this stuff as women seem to think we are. We don't mind if your clothes are from last year, or last century for that matter. We don't generally care if you're carrying a few extra pounds, and we often would rather you wear less make-up. There are of course some young men especially, for whom what woman you're with is a matter of status - like which car you own or what watch you wear, and among their kind, there is a lot of bitching, but for the majority of men, no, it's not that big a deal. But no, a lot of the flack comes from other women, who are far harsher judges than men, and of course this all has its roots in the fashion, cosmetics, surgery and dieting companies, which are absolutely enormous powerful wealthy industries. Women talking about who is judging them should probably look closer to home. You don't have to do what the adverts tell you to do, but it's certainly not men's fault if you do. We have our own social pressures to deal with (of which, more later).
And of course women are very free with their criticism and derision of men - and particularly venomous when it comes to how we try to make ourselves attractive. One theme that I will come back to repeatedly is that it's unrealistic to campaign about men being rude to women when women are so rude to men. Men are also rude to each other and from what I gather, women can be extremely rude to other women. The reason people generally aren't so much rude to men about their clothes is because, as I said about office wear, mostly we stick to some very narrow rules - our rather plain modest and unimaginative clothing is just not that interesting. If we do step out of line sartorially though we get pilloried. I remember the African politician who appeared in the House of Commons recently in a suit but no tie - oh the outrage. Likewise the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appearing in the US Capitol without a suit.
Women can choose to dress interestingly, or not. Men don't have that choice unless they are very bold. Women get criticised because there is something to have an opinion on, whereas with men, generally, there's nothing much to say because we don't dare step out of line.
So who is the more oppressed here?
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