Double Standards

Sexism goes both ways.  While in modern American society women's rights are a common topic of conversation, there are also ways in which society discriminates against men.  These ways may be less in number, but in many cases they are more serious.  For example, one of the best-known ways in which society discriminates against women is by paying them less than men for the same amount of work.  This is without doubt a serious inequality, but it makes less difference to individual women than do some of the inequalities directed towards men, such as the judicial system's tendency to mete out more severe punishments to men than to women for the same crimes.  Other examples of discrimination against men occur in the social norm requiring men to repress their emotions, many people's tendency to dismiss domestic violence against men (by other men or by women) or even find it funny, and the exclusivity of selective service.