Yes, I know parents who wonder why the boys at school seem to have no ambition, and don't apply for scholarships and get involved in things as much as they used to. The same parents also notice that all the literature at school now has female protagonists--not half of it, but nearly all of it.
They don't seem to make the connection between these things. Boys at school are told to sit down and shut up (and take drugs to do so if necessary) so the girls can thrive, and they internalize that. Some people act as though this is reparations for the many years when the reverse was true. But even if they're right about the past, they're not improving the situation by swapping the injustice.
People have a hard time reconciling the difference between “raise group X up” and “knock group Y down”.
The former is a universal good and the correct way to remedy historical injustice. The latter is punishing people, literally, for the sins of their fathers.
There is of course complexity and some zero sum situations where raising X harms Y, but most of the world is not zero sum and you do not have to start from that default position.
True. I suppose the problem is that knocking down Y is often easier than raising up X. And group revenge can feel good.
Indeed, it is a dysfunction of our political system that the most politically engaged & active on each side .. rarely touches grass.