I first heard about The Red Pill when a kickstarter supporting the creation of the film went live. Apparently Cassie Jaye's supporters of her original films pulled all support for The Red Pill when it was discovered she was creating a documentary about the challenges men face with concern to civil and human rights violations, and specifically, it wasn't a hit piece to paint all men as violent, lying, crybabies. As a supporter of free speech and advocate of intellectual discussion, I supported the kickstarter, as many did. Upon the films creation, she premiered it in several cities across the United States, and I drove from my home in Sacramento, CA, to Berkeley, CA to see it on the big screen. Suffice to say, I was not in any way disappointed. She addresses topics such as men's lack of paternity rights, men's incredibly high rate of suicide (several times that of any female suicide demographic), men's demonizing in the media and popular entertainment, men's disposability in the workplace as well as in war, and more. She interviews many prominent men's rights activists, as well as known feminists, allowing both sides to present their views and opinions, all the while interposing her own video diaries to detail her experiences. The film comes across with a powerful message, one almost completely unheard in the modern day, and it's delivered with a maturity and honesty seldom seen in the world of documentaries.
On another level, it reminds me of documentaries made several decades ago about the lived experiences of black Americans, detailing the challenges they faced in the civil rights era of Martin Luther King. Many white Americans of the time were interviewed, speaking about how black Americans didn't have any problems to speak of and were simply trying to get unnecessary support, and many black Americans that spoke in those old documentaries discussed the oppression they experienced on a daily basis. There are some parallels here that might be worth pondering, if you feel up to the challenge.
If you are reading this and you feel that you wouldn't object to challenging your predisposed notions of the problems men experience in the world, I'd recommend watching it. Once you watch it, give it a week and think about how the film made you think and feel. Then sit down and watch it again. I would hazard to guess that it's easily worth a repeat viewing, but more importantly, oftentimes we can't comprehend a message that directly contradicts our tightly held beliefs about the world on a single exposure.
