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Reverse sexism is a controversial term for discrimination against men and boys or for anti-male prejudice.
Often, the debate surrounding reverse sexism involves the innate definition of sexism, for example, whether the concept of sexism itself requires systemic power, or can exist on an individual level, and whether males can experience prejudice and discrimination in a system that some would argue benefits them.
Reverse sexism has been compared by sociologists to reverse racism, and "reverse ethnocentrism," in that both can be a response to affirmative action policies that are designed to combat institutionalized sexism and racism, and are a form of backlash, through which members of majority categories assert that they are being discriminated against. In more rigid forms, this stance assumes that the historic imbalance in favor of men in the contemporary era is no longer applicable, or that women are now viewed as the superior gender or sex.Feminist theorist Florence Rush characterizes the idea of reverse sexism specifically as a misogynist reaction to feminism; men's rights activists such as Warren Farrell promote the idea of reverse sexism to argue that the feminist movement has rearranged society in such a way that it now benefits women and harms men.