Masculine?
We have a holiday weekend here in the UK, and I’m off visiting friends. I leave you with this question: do men need their own liberation movement?
Fr Richard Rohr has worked in the field of men and spirituality for many years in his vision of Men as Learners and Elders (MALEs) programme. This seems to fill an important space in social and spiritual work with men.
Now David Benatar, head of philosophy at Cape Town University, is making headlines with his book The Second Sexism, in which he argues that men and boys are routinely discriminated against. There’s an interesting article about it here.
Is he right? Is a men’s movement overdue? Or is this another reaction to women becoming stronger and more successful?
What do you think?
photo credit: cliff
This idea that “big boys don’t cry” is as hurtful and damaging to men as some of the cultural expectations women have had to put up with. However, there is one good aspect of the “John Wayne” persona, respectfulness to women and children, that should be kept and expanded to include both sexes and all ages. Both sexes are a lot happier when they can freely express their emotions in a healthy way and are allowed to be who they are. I, for one, would like to see a “unisex” role model for both sexes that emphasized kindness, caring, nurturing, honesty, respect, compassion, trustworthiness, integrity and tolerance. Apparently, we got the idea that good manners are stilted and Victorian, and for several generations now, nobody seems to have taught their children manners (especially table manners!). I think we are learning the hard way as a society that manners are the grease in the wheels that keeps things running smoothly. Shakespeare was dead on target when he said, “Manners maketh the man.” They “maketh” the woman, too. (and bad manners can “unmake” them both pretty darn quick as well!) As I have said before, I don’t always act like a lady, but I always try to be a gentleman.
woL recently posted..Goings and Doings
Great comment WOL, and don’t even get me started on table manners!
Tess, your questions (Is a men’s movement overdue? Or is this another reaction to women becoming stronger and more successful?) are important ones and I am not sure of the answer.
I don’t feel discriminated against (yet?) and I know that there still areas of life in which women still need to advance towards equality. In some parts of the world, women have to strive hard to claim their equality, but perhaps the inequalities are more subtle in the UK.
So, my feeling is that some of the claims that men are the victims of sexism are a reaction to the advancement of women. Some, but perhaps not all?
Thanks for this perspective Barney, I agree that inequalities (of all kinds) tend to be more subtle in the UK. As other commenters have said, I think there is a sense that there are expectations of men which can be damaging emotionally.
If men and boys are discriminated against, the results on the women’s side is not very noticeable. Men are still heading corporations, politics, banks, the clergy…
I remember men’s awareness groups in the 70s in reaction to women’s awareness groups. Men did in fact want to get in touch with their feelings and their feminine side. Some have succeeded
claire recently posted..Sexual Time Lag
It’s almost as if some institutions and ways of life are inherently masculine, isn’t it?
I both agree and disagree with his article. I totally agree that women are allowed to say things about men that if reversed would be condemned. I see it every day.
But then he says this – “When women are underrepresented as CEOs of companies that is deemed discrimination. But when boys are falling behind at school, when 90% of people in prison are male, there’s never any thought given to whether men are discriminated against.”
I absolutely agree with him when he says that boys falling behind at school is a problem. I think the way that children study is more geared to girls than to boys (on the whole). However, when he says that 90% of people in prison are male, he loses me a little (and I’m interested to examine that, if I have maybe some unvoiced assumptions going on that need to be exposed in myself). The reason why 90% of males are in prison is because males are much more violent than women (on the whole) and use violence to try to solve their problems.
As for custody being awarded to women way more than men, I agree there is a real bias towards men. I transcribe Family Court hearings and it is quite marked. But again, there is partly a reason for that.
I wonder though if *this* is why there needs to be a men’s movement – because maybe men are ingrained into being more violent with the 2000 years of Western history behind them, along with the thousands of years before that of more patriarchal dominance and violence. After all, there are men of other cultures who seem able to contain themselves.
This sounds very anti-men, I don’t mean it to be. I have lots of conflicting thoughts and feelings on this and look forward to hearing other people’s views. My view is probably clouded by my history, which contains a male-dominated family where females didn’t feel able to speak up for their right to see things how they see things.
Sue recently posted..I Am the Ocean
Actually, I think the *culture* needs a movement. Even though everything is changing and has changed so much over the past 40 years, it still feels to me like our Western cultures are totally unnurturing. I think it might have something to do with the fact that we now worship the economy god. We are made to bow down to that thing every day of our lives. How free can you been when you’re enslaved to that?
It still feels to me that people living in the West are not free, even though we have far more freedom than everybody else.
Sorry to rave on so much, I should just go away and stop talking here, haha, with my disjointed thoughts. I remember my cousin always saying about her two boys that there is a cultural conditioning that girls get more love and gentle care than boys. That even though we are way past the 50′s, there are still those ingrained sorts of ways of behaving and treating males and females differently. Those ways that are so ingrained that we can’t even see them. Those are the spaces where discrimination gets to reign, aren’t they.
Okay, I’m going away now. Sorry for raving so long
Sue recently posted..I Am the Ocean
Sue, your thoughtful thoughts cannot be described as ravings!
I’m responding to both of your comments here, even if fairly briefly.
In terms of women saying things about men which wouldn’t be acceptable in reverse, I also agree.
I think your two comments are strongly linked, with behaviour stereotypes from both genders fuelled by our materialistic culture. For example how can the average out-of-town shopping mall, with its garish colours, non-stop muzac, screaming children and frazzled parents nurture the best human qualities in either gender?
Indeed. It’s an environment built for the economy, not for the people.
Sue recently posted..New Blog Lurve
“In the resurrection, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels.” The true self has no gender. We all need a helping hand, a loving friend, some invaluable wisdom from ancestors who walked these paths before us, to make the journey more viable.
Thanks Sarah. I’ve often wondered how deep into the true self awareness of gender goes. I look forward to a time when those loving hands and friends are helping with our deep humanity. Meanwhile I think there does need to be gender-related help.
Barney Leith (see comment above), just shared on Google+ an article about boys, reading and literacy which I think is really relevant to this discussion: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-bloom/how-to-talk-to-little-boy_b_1473167.html