I kept dismissing complaints from men that feminist advancements were leading to an unfair double standard. But they kept coming. Could it really be true?

Something interesting happens every time I write a story about gender issues. Men I know, and many more I do not, reach out to me to tell me they feel wronged – silenced, even.

Under a recent article of mine, a Guardian commenter wrote that nowadays he avoided saying much at all to progressive women, but that around conservative women he felt he could talk about “everything and anything – the same as I would most males”. I raised an eyebrow and moved on.

It finally took an email from a well-educated, professionally successful and mostly very progressive male friend of mine featuring a link to a video of women beating up men to make me fully take notice. The video served as an illustration of the ills of the “post-feminist” world it claimed we lived in.

“Come on,” I replied, taking the provocation, and citing statistics showing women are still socially, economically and politically at a clear disadvantage. “You and I both know we do not live in such a world.”

The friend retorted quite seriously that while that may be the case, he believed women were still “having their cake and eating it too”. Feminist advancements had led to double standards, meaning that women were now getting away with stuff men never would, and it wasn’t fair.

Now, a lot of guys have to watch what they say. That’s got to be hard

I had previously dismissed those arguing that an increasingly equal society had made men the suffering sex. I had thought these views to be marginal – the kinds of things men’s rights activists or dyed-in-the-wool misogynists would chant. But as frustrating as the pushback felt, it became increasingly obvious that there was no denying the consistency, and therefore validity, of the feelings that were being thrown at me.

Acknowledging the validity of this sentiment, I began to wonder if silencing was legitimately what was going on. So I thought to really understand how misunderstood, robbed, wronged and silenced men felt, I should hand over the microphone to them.

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“What is being challenged here is the general sense of entitlement,” explains Michael Kimmel, a professor of sociology and gender at State University of New York, and the executive director at the Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities.

“If the whole world used to be our locker room, then we could say what we wanted with complete impunity. Now a lot of guys have to watch what they say. That’s got to be hard.”

But for many men I spoke to – chosen because of their diversity, openness to dialogue, honesty and lack of overt disrespect towards women – it went beyond no longer speaking freely. Frustrations seemed to run quite deep.

Tom Coss, a 32-year-old butcher based in Seattle, says he is grateful for the opportunity to be silent and learn about some gender issues women face (like catcalling, a reality that he says he was “oblivious” to until recently). Such behavior makes him “embarrassed to be male, and mad”, he says.

But he fails to see why he should be held accountable for problems that are systemic, and to which he did not necessarily contribute to.

“I might be more comfortable walking home at night down a dark city street. I might be more likely to get a job, but I am not necessarily the cause for any of those things. You’re born into that privilege, but you didn’t do anything to expedite that privilege.”

Coss says that in conversations with friends and potential female romantic partners, his experience has sometimes felt disregarded and he has felt misunderstood.

“We talk about accepting people – that someone didn’t choose to be trans, or gay, so don’t judge me for that either: I didn’t choose to be straight, white and male.”

Coss expresses frustration that people seem to be paying attention to gender and race as forms of oppression, something he keeps on being told he doesn’t understand. “If you want to talk about privilege, I feel class is the big divider, much more than race and gender.”

The sense of defeat appears to be shared by others, in other forms.

It is a positive thing from a woman’s perspective, from a man’s perspective I don’t know Ishwar Chhikara

“I actually feel like women are taking over the world,” says Ishwar Chhikara, a 36-year-old investment officer at an international development bank, citing statistics showing more women now have college degrees in the US than men. He says this laughing, but with no audible irony.

“I feel bad for men, especially those who don’t go to school, or study. The whole system is changing drastically with the coming of the information age. It’s not about strength anymore, it’s about the brains.”

While muscles at the center of an economy made the physically stronger sex have more power, Chhikara isn’t so convinced with the switch-up.

“It is a positive thing from a woman’s perspective, from a man’s perspective I don’t know.”

Like all men interviewed, Chhikara does not deny the historical presence of male privilege. That presence is what makes its loss harder, he says.

“It’s because of this sense of entitlement. If you are brought up understanding there is an inherent favorable bias towards men, and that is taken away, it isn’t easy.”

Such a feeling matches up to a number of recent studies done on race and perception in America. One study from 2011 showed that despite still persistently experiencing much better outcomes when it came to income, employment, home ownership and health, white Americans felt that as black Americans had gained in rights over the second half of the 20th century, white Americans had experienced a mirror decrease in rights.

This understanding is false – both when it comes to race and gender – says Kimmel, the professor of sociology. Gender progress, just like progress towards a more racially equal society, is far from a zero-sum game. Using a “rising sea lifts all boats” argument, Kimmel says gender equality is not just fair, just and democratic, it also makes for happier outcomes and lives for women and men.

Treva Lindsey, a professor at Ohio State University in the department of women’s, gender and sexuality studies, says the big question here is: what does it mean to move outside of privilege when privilege is normalized?

“This is a hard unlearning process that has to happen, but feeling silenced and learning how to be quiet is a different thing,” she says.

Lindsey says this is more of a question of learning to create space for other people, and understanding that your thoughts and ideas do not automatically get to be at the center of all conversations.

John Acosta, a 31-year-old design student who grew up in what he describes as a small, conservative town, says that as he has traveled and lived in different cities across the US, he has had to learn to repress some of the behaviors he was taught were right, or polite, growing up.

“The way I was brought up, I would give up my seat to women in the subway – young or old. Now I don’t. I think, OK we are equal. But I still worry. Does she realize that I am not giving her my seat because I think she is as capable as I am of going that one stop?”

When he was an installer at a furniture store, he would go out of his way to help his female bosses, but he quickly had to revisit his approach.

The way I was brought up, I would give up my seat to women in the subway – young or old. Now I don’t John Acosta

“We [men] can be annoying while trying to be helpful. You have to shift your questioning – and instead of saying ‘let me help’, you have to say ‘OK, you’re in charge, what can I do?’”

Jose Oliveras, a 26-year-old bike messenger and independent contractor, says it is hard to know how to talk to or approach women nowadays. Feminism has made him unsure about courting rituals, and driven him to silence.

“You can’t say hello, you can’t compliment, you got to have some prince charming stuff up your sleeve.”

Oliveras recounts simply saying “excuse me” to a woman and being met by a hissing sound through teeth.

“Women aren’t giving it a chance anymore. They are saying I don’t have to do that, make an effort for men. You are removing the men who are trying to create a bond with you. It’s like, OK fine, but it sucks, you know.”

This was echoed by Burton Williams, a 35-year-old senior data engineer who says many women still expect men to be chivalrous, carry bags for them and open doors, but others take offense for the exact same behavior, screaming “woman power” at “almost everything”.

It is confusing, and the mixed messaging can leave men feeling portrayed in the wrong way just for trying to do the right thing.

“I am all for women empowerment but it’s like they want to empower themselves so much that they want to eliminate men from the equation,” Oliveras says, speculating that women these days are no longer interested in creating intimate ties now that they’re less economically dependent on men.

Kimmel, the sociologist, says that the changes that have happened on a gender level within society over the past two generations have been “dizzyingly fast”.

Women have entered every single profession, every single arena, provoking changes that have left some men “bewildered”, Kimmel says.

The consequence of this is that men sometimes do not see women’s entry into previously male fields as an entry, but rather an “invasion”, Kimmel says. “It feels like a loss for men. They feel they are being invaded.”

“Ever since women started to argue for equal rights, men have started to think that this is something against them personally,” he laughs.

Coss, the butcher, flags that we should be aspiring to be ending patriarchy and marching towards equality, not creating a new world order of matriarchy.

And not making presumptions goes both ways, he states.

“I would never say women have it easier in the office place because people will be nice to them, because they do not want to hurt their feelings. I would never presume to know what it’s like to be a woman. That presumption is not shared towards straight white men ... But having that presumption [about straight men] is still a presumption.”

Both Lindsey and Kimmel agree there are many parallels to be drawn between these kinds of feelings, and the rhetoric used to enable and justify the political rise of Donald Trump as a presidential candidate (although none of the men interviewed for this article declared themselves to be Trump supporters).

“Make America great again” as a slogan clearly recalls the nostalgic loss of some kind of self-proclaimed and self-righteous prestige, highly tied to privilege, and the perceived loss thereof. “I think it is a direct relationship. If you look at the motto ‘take our country back’ or ‘make America great again’, that is the very definition of entitlement. The only Americans who can say that are native Americans,” Kimmel says.

“What exactly has been taken away?” Lindsey asks. “If you force the articulation of what has been taken away, you will find that some of these answers are very gender and race related.”

But it is the other banner so often seen at Trump rallies that resonates even more clearly in this context: “The silent majority stands with Trump.”

“I don’t think they have been very silent,” Lindsey says of Trump supporters.