I watched the D-Day commemoration from France this week, and couldn’t hide my emotions as Emmanuel Macron pinned Legion of Honor medals on American veterans, all of them around 100 years old, most lifted from wheelchairs so they could stand before the French President, as Macron spoke each of their names with reverence and respect.
Hi George, I’m always a fan - and bummed by your recent workplace experience with intolerant people. I would like to add my perspective (as a “cisgender” older white male who has enjoyed all the privileges that come with this accident of birth): the “toxic” in toxic masculinity does not refer simply to the expectation that males conceal their emotions and act tough. It also includes aspects of dominance and the expectation a man can get or take whatever he wants, simply because he’s male (eg: “boys will be boys” as an excuse for teen date rape).
On your larger point about the value of therapy: it’s not the profession’s fault that parents raise their kids as if their feeling are the most important thing in the world. I don’t know about your experience with therapy, but mine have been great - the focus has never been to feel better, but rather to learn to recognize and deal with difficult feeling that we’re blocking me from being a whole, healthy and responsible person. Fear, chief among them. Men who are afraid of life, afraid of women’s power, and hide behind stereotypes of masculinity, actually could benefit a lot from developing the courage to face their true feelings. And overcoming them. That’s where there’s growth.
Thanks Tim, I always respect what you have to say very much. While a handful of men throughout history have led privileged lives, often with tremendous social contribution made of their advantage, very few men throughout history, especially now, meet any definition of privileged at all. While I may simply have a great family and choose my friends well, I can't think of any man I know who any reasonable person could describe as toxic. As for therapy, more on that later.
You're blind. And you're so steeped in the privileges you have, that you can't see the forest through the trees. You have NO clue, none, of the privileges you have. As a white woman, I will tell you that I, too, get shunned from society when it's now the norm to insist I state my "gender" and my pronouns- and that movement was engineered by MEN who want to take away women's safety and women's space/opportunities, as well as by drs and pharmaceutical cos. who want to profit off selling surgery and drugs to ppl they claim are "born in the wrong body." And women, tragically, have been co-opted into this movement.
"Toxic" is another pop psychology term. But I guarantee you that the vast majority of the men you know and of men period, are dangerous to women, if not to the entire planet -- and men of color are just as guilty. You are raising a daughter,; you seem like a devoted father. I urge you to educate yourself before she gets much older and is in real trouble. I suggest the book Refusing to be a Man, by John Stoltenberg. I know you would shrug-off anything written by a woman. And if you think Stoltenberg is exaggerating, then the women in your life are not telling you the whole truth about their lives -- we never do. We know the consequences. And remember what you wrote, on this site, about your early life experiences, watching movies that indicated that women like being raped, and how it affected you-- only one minor example of to what I'm referring.
Thanks Barbara for your comment, although it would be pointless to begin any sort of dialogue with you as your opinion of all men is so wretchedly distorted. Still, as an author it's nice to encounter a reader who can quote verbatim what I've written, albeit completely out of context.
"This is what we mean when we say 'patriarchy'; a system that does not take the oppression of women seriously, that does not, in function, truly consider women as full human beings.... "
Men are being set up to fail, and it's obviously working.
I am supposed to be so cosmopolitan, so broadminded that I won't stand up for myself or advocate for my own children. As if doing so is some sort of expression of hate and not my duty as a man.
Masculinity is supposed to be noble, strong, kind, magnanimous.
It's those who lack those qualities branding them as toxic, and they're succeeding.
Thanks Tim. I concur with your definition of masculinity. In a world of relativity over moral absolutes too many have lost sight of the fact that a man has a role that comes with responsibilities and sacrifice, as well as great joy, and society benefits when men accept and meet this role.
Hi George, I’m always a fan - and bummed by your recent workplace experience with intolerant people. I would like to add my perspective (as a “cisgender” older white male who has enjoyed all the privileges that come with this accident of birth): the “toxic” in toxic masculinity does not refer simply to the expectation that males conceal their emotions and act tough. It also includes aspects of dominance and the expectation a man can get or take whatever he wants, simply because he’s male (eg: “boys will be boys” as an excuse for teen date rape).
On your larger point about the value of therapy: it’s not the profession’s fault that parents raise their kids as if their feeling are the most important thing in the world. I don’t know about your experience with therapy, but mine have been great - the focus has never been to feel better, but rather to learn to recognize and deal with difficult feeling that we’re blocking me from being a whole, healthy and responsible person. Fear, chief among them. Men who are afraid of life, afraid of women’s power, and hide behind stereotypes of masculinity, actually could benefit a lot from developing the courage to face their true feelings. And overcoming them. That’s where there’s growth.
Thanks Tim, I always respect what you have to say very much. While a handful of men throughout history have led privileged lives, often with tremendous social contribution made of their advantage, very few men throughout history, especially now, meet any definition of privileged at all. While I may simply have a great family and choose my friends well, I can't think of any man I know who any reasonable person could describe as toxic. As for therapy, more on that later.
You're blind. And you're so steeped in the privileges you have, that you can't see the forest through the trees. You have NO clue, none, of the privileges you have. As a white woman, I will tell you that I, too, get shunned from society when it's now the norm to insist I state my "gender" and my pronouns- and that movement was engineered by MEN who want to take away women's safety and women's space/opportunities, as well as by drs and pharmaceutical cos. who want to profit off selling surgery and drugs to ppl they claim are "born in the wrong body." And women, tragically, have been co-opted into this movement.
"Toxic" is another pop psychology term. But I guarantee you that the vast majority of the men you know and of men period, are dangerous to women, if not to the entire planet -- and men of color are just as guilty. You are raising a daughter,; you seem like a devoted father. I urge you to educate yourself before she gets much older and is in real trouble. I suggest the book Refusing to be a Man, by John Stoltenberg. I know you would shrug-off anything written by a woman. And if you think Stoltenberg is exaggerating, then the women in your life are not telling you the whole truth about their lives -- we never do. We know the consequences. And remember what you wrote, on this site, about your early life experiences, watching movies that indicated that women like being raped, and how it affected you-- only one minor example of to what I'm referring.
Thanks Barbara for your comment, although it would be pointless to begin any sort of dialogue with you as your opinion of all men is so wretchedly distorted. Still, as an author it's nice to encounter a reader who can quote verbatim what I've written, albeit completely out of context.
from a twitter account ♀
@Women___Exist:·
"This is what we mean when we say 'patriarchy'; a system that does not take the oppression of women seriously, that does not, in function, truly consider women as full human beings.... "
Lol!
You're quite welcome! :-) Always happy to contribute!
"Toxic Masculinity" is a lie.
Men are being set up to fail, and it's obviously working.
I am supposed to be so cosmopolitan, so broadminded that I won't stand up for myself or advocate for my own children. As if doing so is some sort of expression of hate and not my duty as a man.
Masculinity is supposed to be noble, strong, kind, magnanimous.
It's those who lack those qualities branding them as toxic, and they're succeeding.
Thanks Tim. I concur with your definition of masculinity. In a world of relativity over moral absolutes too many have lost sight of the fact that a man has a role that comes with responsibilities and sacrifice, as well as great joy, and society benefits when men accept and meet this role.