So, back when I was “still cis tho”, there were a lot of aspects of male gender norms that bothered me deeply and of course I totally understand why now. Even though these days I obviously have a clear reason for feeling that way, I’m still curious if cishet men also have issues with how norms or expectations around gender and sexuality impact them in a negative way.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on how those norms impact you, whether good or bad.
Also, I should mention that since this is a bit of a sensitive subject we’re talking about here, please be thoughtful and sensitive when discussing with others in this thread. Thanks! <3
EDIT: Much thanks for all the great responses here! I know it’s a difficult topic of course, so I appreciate you sharing your thoughts/feelings like this.
Speaking of which… I just looked at /c/menby and some of the posts on the front page there are over 2 years old. I see a lot of the discussion here centered around not being able to share feelings and/or not having the spaces or support to do that in. /c/menby seems like the perfect place for that, just sayin’.
The absolute fucking rancid vibes everybody emitted when I took my kids out alone in public. I even had the cops called on me once, when one of them was throwing a tantrum at the grocery store. I am so grateful that I was paranoid about that exact scenario happening, and carried copies of the kids’ birth certificates at all times. No officer, I’m not a stabber. Just a very tired dad. Kindly stop detaining me, thanks.
It’s well over a decade since any of them have been that small, but the experience is still haunting.
edit: I just realized I still have the laminated birth certificate copies in my bag. I should probably get rid of them. Carrying around another grown-ass-man’s birth certificate is weird for entirely different reasons.
I volunteer with kids on international camps, which means I get given legal guardianship of them for the duration of camp, and a bunch of paperwork to go with it. When travelling, I always keep that paperwork as the closest thing to hand, because I’m a young adult travelling with 4 kids that are obviously not my own so everyone and their aunt wants to make sure I’m not a kidnapper.
Anyway, I brought it up during training one year and found out none of the women have ever had to deal with that. The closest they’d got was one particularly short woman who had trouble convincing airport staff that she was actually the responsible over 21 adult, and not another child.
Now in my particular case I don’t think regarding me with suspicion is unwarranted, but it even more clearly demarks how society treats men and women around children - Men aren’t trusted even with their own children, while women are trusted with absolutely any children, both of which are seriously problematic.A flipside of this is that when you aren’t around a bunch of breathless nitwits who think a father solo parenting is actually a child trafficker, there are also women who look at you like
just for existing positively with children. Expectations are both too damn high and too damn low. It’s so stupid.there are also women who look at you like
just for existing positively with children.I wouldn’t know. My children were all born girls. Most of them weren’t girls, as it turns out, but that’s another story. And it probably colored my experience a bit differently.
And it probably colored my experience a bit differently.
This is a good point. I have a son and most of the kids involved in the programs I volunteer with are boys (or at least male presenting, they’re young so who knows who they will be in 10 years). You saying this has helped me appreciate how my experience has been colored. When I am a male mentor figure to a boy, his mother sees a positive male role model teaching and supporting her son and dad sees a patriarch training a recruit. There’s the same low level paranoia about pedophilia that permeates any interaction an adult man has with any child, but it’s not the same level of paranoia as when an adult man interacts with a girl child. When I am interacting with girl children, mom is more likely to see a threat and dad is more likely to see a queer, because interacting with children is women’s work. Also, by age 8-10 I’m sure girl children have started internalizing the very real dangers of maleness to them as young women.
I’m thankful that for the most part these are just vague societal undercurrents and systemic forces rather than factors that play a real role in my day to day life doing volunteer work. Really I just want to be a safe person to kids including nd/queer kids and teach them to value and understand the natural world.
You saying this has helped me appreciate how my experience has been colored. When I am a male mentor figure to a boy, his mother sees a positive male role model teaching and supporting her son and dad sees a patriarch training a recruit.
I appreciate being seen. That means a lot to me.
You hit the nail on the head. If I brought a couple boys to go play with dinosaur toys in the sand at the park, and I watched them intently, and engaged with their interests the whole time, I’d be the coolest, most extremely bangable single Dad in the region.
But I brought a couple girls to go play with dinosaur toys in the sand at the park, and I watched them intently, and engaged with their interests the whole time. There’s now a weirdo playing with little girls at the park. Where are their mothers? POLICE???
Living with that hanging over your head as a dad who’s a primary caregiver really fucks a guy up.
Also, just based on my experience pushing a giant stroller around, I could probably rant for a week straight about wheelchair accessibility in public spaces. And I was just pushing a baby around! I didn’t have to deal with that ABSOLUTE FUCKING BULLSHIT for the rest of my life! And I’m still mad about it! Imagine how wheelchair users feel! Holy shit. I am mad again.
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Having mental illness and being a man seem like they’re not compatible under the patriarchy. I’ve had my dad tell me straight up to my face I’m just faking it and looking for sympathy with my anxiety, depression, OCD, because according to him my life is good. So there’s that.
Thanks for sharing and I’m sorry you gotta deal with that
I’ve never been good at sharing my feelings for many other reasons on top of it, but not having any kind of emotional support also always hit me pretty hard as well. One of the many great things that’s happened to me since realizing I’m trans is both being able to get rid of that shame/mental block around expressing my real self as well as having positive spaces to do it in (thanks tracha!). Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems to me like even in relatively positive male spaces there’s still a lot of discomfort for men around expressing certain feelings openly in the same way. Not sure what it takes to break that, but it at least seems like a good thing to bring up that stuff more often like you’re doing right now.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems to me like even in relatively positive male spaces there’s still a lot of discomfort for men around expressing certain feelings openly in the same way.
Yeah there’s still a lot of shame involved with being open as a man. Though I have seen a recent change in people’s perceptions of what you can say/do in regards to feeling while being masc so that’s a positive. We just need to de-brainworm more people.
Though I have seen a recent change in people’s perceptions of what you can say/do in regards to feeling while being masc so that’s a positive. We just need to de-brainworm more people.
I found that being in the right situation, being open with one or two other guys about my own fears and distress (this was during covids first days and i just fuggen needed to vent honestly) was usually a catalyst for them to drop the charade as well, talking about their own feelings of helplessness and dread. Once that hurdle was cleared i was the guy they’d come share their worries and the younger ones would bitch to me about the ‘bullshit’ machismo of the older gen. Course it helps a lot that i present as cishet and look and talk like a tradesman, but my experience is even the crustiest looking steelworkers, rather than embodying the chud alpha ideal, were putting on a brave face just like me.
That experience went a long way towards fixing my own fear of guys (tho i am in fact amab im ace and adhd/aut, so was mentally and physically bullied throughout school until i learned how to mask up and act like a “proper” Midwestern male).
I wish this info was useful, i wish just anyone could try that but i understand my position as a somewhat older well-spoken crackerjack was what really helped me break thru their facade.
I’ve had that happen by randoms as a woman
An assumption built on another assumption, that seeking sympathy from other people is somehow weak and not like
What every social species does
The fundamental axioms that generation takes for granted about people and the world are so heart wrenchingly sad. And then they go and try to inflict it on their kids
Actually I just caught my own assumption, that weak=not serious or worth respecting. I don’t consciously think that, but I did use the word as a stand-in for that. This shit is insidious and multilayered, like an onion with a ghost in it.
In a moment of vulnerability, I expressed my feelings of weakness, frustration, and just general helplessness in regard to mental issues, financial issues, and a few other things that I can’t quite remember because the response was so strange. I was talking to a partner, and I don’t really remember what spurred it, but I kinda broke down a little bit and just expressed how things weren’t really going well for me.
She was quiet for a few seconds and just looked at me, with what looked like a feeling of disgust, and said something along the lines of, “Men aren’t supposed to act like this.” So, since then, I’ve kept a lot of my emotions in check and withdrawn a lot. I don’t do it intentionally, but that wasn’t the response I expected, especially since I had consoled them many times without complaint or judgement because that’s what you’re supposed to do.
Another example is with an ex that accused me of being gay because I didn’t want to have sex 24/7. Sometimes I think I’m maybe aromantic or asexual, or maybe just haven’t found someone I’m really compatible with sexually.
I engage with a lot of “traditional” masculine hobbies like boxing, weightlifting, etc, and even though I still feel comfortable adhering to certain traits or roles considered masculine, I guess this is why I sometimes don’t feel comfortable with the label of cis. Like, I used to have people say “you’re the gayest straight man I’ve ever met.” Which is weird cause I’m a big bald dude with tattoos and a beard but having interests outside of the traditional gender norms is weird for some folks I guess.
She was quiet for a few seconds and just looked at me, with what looked like a feeling of disgust, and said something along the lines of, “Men aren’t supposed to act like this.”
Oh jesus, that’d become an ex immediately right there if it were me; you have my sincerest condolences my guy.
I’m gonna recommend you stop dating cishet women. I’m seeing a lot of heteronormative brainworms in the women you’ve described that are causing you distress. There’s nothing wrong with you. There are plenty of people who don’t just want to fuck all the time. Queer people will not treat you like this.
Some queer people will, speaking from experience.
Yeah, not everyone’s great but my queer dating experiences have been majority positive, even if we don’t end up working out. People are generally much more open and vulnerable than cishets
For sure
I was talking to a partner, and I don’t really remember what spurred it, but I kinda broke down a little bit and just expressed how things weren’t really going well for me.
She was quiet for a few seconds and just looked at me, with what looked like a feeling of disgust, and said something along the lines of, “Men aren’t supposed to act like this.”
In my experience, if you allow yourself to be vulnerable (really vulnerable, not the kind of vulnerable where you just shed a single tear while watching Old Yeller) with a woman, it usually marks the end of the relationship. It won’t happen immediately, but she’ll become disgusted that you’re not holding up your end of the gender role bargain, and things start to fall apart.
Obviously not all women are like this, and I don’t want to come across like an incel screeching about females, but I’ve had a couple of relationships fail after a moment of “weakness,” even if I thought my partner was progressive about heteronormativity. I think this is one of the nasty ways that the patriarchy programs women in particular and is yet another example of why it harms us all.
Yeah I had a partner who would complain I never told her anything, and when I did she would complain that there “was no room for her.” She would also make fun of men not sharing their feelings. Or the way they shared them. When I told my best friend I had a depression he made me feel better. We were making jokes about it after 10 minutes. Was it how women would handle it? Probably not. She told me I was bad at talking about that kinda stuff, but whenever I talked to her about my issues, I felt like shit too. I just figured we had different methods of talking about it, her method was probably great for her girlfriends. I didn’t tell her she was terrible at it though, because why would I?
That sucks. I think I might be able to relate. I dated someone who was clinically depressed. Takes a lot to be a partner for that kind of person, a lot of patience a lot of understanding. She could break down over any issue, because that’s what depression does. Makes any issue difficult, so difficult you might just break down. And I was there for it.
My foot is fucked, and that has kept me from doing elite sports. I can’t put a lot of weight on it for a long time. I thought it had finally healed and her and I went out for some bouldering. Then my foot started hurting. I cried. I couldn’t take it anymore - She was having a Good Day, I thought I was healed, we both wanted to go out, we both had the energy and the will to do stuff, we both wanted to be active, we both had an activity we loved. But I couldn’t and the only obstacle was something I had no way of doing anything about and it was just the result of me being born weird. I couldn’t take it so I told her “it just feels so unfair, I just really want to climb” and I cried.
She told me “just get over it.”
Later on, before we broke up she would complain that I never told her anything. Whenever I did, she’d tell me “there was no space for her.”
Well for instance where I come from, men are not allowed to cry and boy did I cry a lot as a kid. Got called a “crying pussy bitch” as a kid a TON. Even by my dad.
Now I have anxiety, keep to myself a lot and I’m afraid of standing up for myself because I’m scared of being physically overpowered. So yeah, “good” stuff.
Ah yes, solid quote from my dad “crying is only for when you’re injured”
Not even that lol. My dad says “Just grit your teeth and be a man!”.
I got yelled at for crying when I fell of my bike. Like idk, I maybe be injured or something?
I was having a panic attack and my mother laughed at me.
I used to have frequent panic attacks when I was younger, and laughing at someone going through one is absolutely horrible. I’m sorry that happened to you.
There is a very narrow range of acceptable expression as a cis dude.
I grew up in the norwegian equivalent of the bible belt. Think, small town, less than 10k inhabitants surrounded by endless farmland.
There were only two socially acceptable ways to be a guy. You could be a Car Guy, or you could be a Sports Guy.
Anything else, and you’d automatically be labelled as a [homophobic slur] and become an outcast.
Being a book loving, neurodivergent weeaboo was beyond the pale, so I spent my entire youth as an outcast.
Though life didn’t seem better for the other guys trying to squeeze into the only two available moulds you could fit into.
I remember one guy was so neurotically competitive that he absolutely HAD to be the first or number 1 in everything, or else he’d have a mental breakdown.
Even during warmup in PE, he had to be FIRST, when running from one end of the field to the other, and he’d be so exhausted that spittle would fly from his mouth just from having to be the first in everything sports related, no matter how insignificant.
It’s no wonder Norwegians are so socially broken. There are so many ways to be a dude, but the only acceptable ways to be one are so restricted and narrow that it’s easier to just drop out of society and cling to the same 2-3 people you’ve known since kindergarten, instead of socialising and interacting with new people.
We men are so insanely varied, naturally curious and seeking. It’s almost comical how hard so many men cling to strict patriarchal ideas when most men don’t really benefit from it or even live up to the patriarchal ideas.
I don’t know where I’m going with this. I’m drunk and exhausted from nonstop working. I’ll hit the pipe and go watch a movie or something.
Growing up out in the country sucked if you didn’t like football or cars. I went back recently and it felt like travelling back to the 00’s. Absolutely terrible. I would never have kids there. Seeing little boys shy away from drawing because “that’s girl stuff” broke my heart.
Oh God, terrible childhood memory unlocked.
I was sitting at my desk and doodling while waiting for the next lesson to start and I drew this guy with a dinosaur head, playing a guitar that was also on fire. Shit was so cash.
Suddenly, a classmate grabbed my drawing, held it up and yelled “haahaa look at what big_bob is drawing!” And people would point and laugh.
I was already an outcast for mentioning that I found football boring, but after the drawing incident, people actively avoided me. I changed schools shortly after.
I fucking hate norwegian society.
:yea:
I worked with kids and the adults suck too. They’d separate boys and girls all the time. It was always a woman working in arts and crafts, always a man in sports. Whenever kids had social problems we’d ignore it (if it was a boy) or have a girls meeting (only girls, they talk it out, at 7 years old). The adults would invite kids to join their activities and it was always girls to arts and crafts, boys to sports. Terrible. I remember a few boys, kids I guess they don’t have a gender at that age, who obiously hated all the sports shit and were just starving for something creative. Likewise with girls and sports. I did so much to shake that shit up, made hockey leagues where they played across genders (girls beat the shit out of boys, because they’ll do that at age 7) and arranged masc-coded arts and crafts things - Campfire tales where they could draw the monsters I was talking about, competitions about making “the biggest drawing”, folding paper planes and then painting them “cool”. I tried to make them comfortable as well as I could within the system I was stuck in. It was tough.
I read books, sometimes cried under stress, was not big or very good at sports, and stuck up for a friend in a ridiculous hypothetical (would you still be friends with someone if they had AIDS) and so obviously I was gay. This was 30 years ago when being gay was more synonymous with bad, to both kids and teachers, authority figures alike.
When I was young, this affected me by getting bullied and me spending a lot of time ashamed, alone and angry, though I still had friends in the other weirdos. As I grew up, I developed better social masking skills around manly men and the idiotic women who also internalized and weaponized those kind of gender norms. I now exclude a lot of people from my actual life and generally get along with women better than men.
I still carry baggage around. Recently one of my close female relatives was cheated on by her manly man husband. While I am mostly sad and frustrated for her and their kids, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t also mad for my own reasons. He’s openly friendly, but inside he’s the kind of misogynist asshole that told me I wasn’t a man when I was younger. He was a cop too. Never trust a fucking cop.
This friend speaks my mind.
He’s openly friendly, but inside he’s the kind of misogynist asshole that told me I wasn’t a man when I was younger. He was a cop too.
Oh Jesus. Seriously fuck that guy. He sounds horrible.
Yeah it blows. I’d love to just say he’s dead to me and never think about him again, but I love their kids and their mom, and since he’ll be part of their lives for better or for worse even after divorce, by extension he will be part of mine. He’s such a shit.
I’m a Han Chinese who grew up partially in China and in Australia. While I avoided a bunch of expectations for certain forms of classic Western masculinity because I am an inscrutable removed, other aspects were unavoidable. It wasn’t a faux pas to not play footy or whatever, and it was probably expected that I was more academically inclined over playing contact sports.
Half my family are CPC revolutionaries and cadres. The other half are the peasantry that we fought for, regardless of how money hungry and reactionary.
A lot of conflicting ideas of what I should be, from 老百姓 from the country, Western liberalism and hardline Communists have been… Bestowed upon me. I have to be a breadwinner, I have to service the people, I have to be stoic (or at the very least not beheld by emotion), I have to find a high paying profession, I have to be a protector, I have to produce an offspring, I have to consider the greater good, I have to be assertive, I have to change or suppress myself to get women. As the only male heir from the one child policy, it’s a lot.
A (white) girlfriend once asked me how I was feeling after a particularly gruelling double shift where smarter workers than I walked off the job. I didn’t answer immediately. Should I be reserved because it was nothing compared to someone that walked the Long March? Or someone who immigrated to a different continent to seek a better life? Or the Platonic ideal of a masculine man? I replied “I will be fine”, which was an honest response. A bad day doesn’t mean I won’t overcome it. My grandfather became the man of the house at the age of 13 because his father was killed by Japanese, his mother couldn’t work because her feet were bound because it was the style. We were living on land stolen after a genocide. My Sous chef worked 19 hours to my 16 and a bit. Our bills were paid. There was food on the table. There was a roof over our heads. There were no bombs or snipers aiming for us. I genuinely meant what I said. I will be fine. I was 22. Now that I’ve learned to communicate better, after learning that your gender, racial and class identity aren’t as separate as you’d think, I probably would have answered differently. I could have communicated better.
My hardships didn’t stem from being a cisgender male. Nor would being trans or gay make it better. The world isn’t kind to the proletariat. It’s why I’m a communist. Your identity plays a role, it’s why I didn’t fall into stupidpol.
Who knows, I may have been able to speak about my emotions properly before I was 30.
Should I be reserved because it was nothing compared to someone that walked the Long March? Or someone who immigrated to a different continent to seek a better life? Or the Platonic ideal of a masculine man? I replied “I will be fine”
Thank you for sharing your experience comrade. It’s interesting to hear how patriarchal ideals are similar and different across cultures. Clearly the political project that was the Long March is very different than say the settlement of the western US, but also clearly those experiences are transmuted into some similar social pressures.
The Long March was less a political project than a matter of survival. The Nationalist government purged both the left wing parts of their government and the Communist Party. Reactionaries killed off communists, socialists and the left wing of the KMT. After begging for leftists for help.
The liberals begged for help to oppose the imperialists then turned around and removed the leftist party and left leaning individuals in the KMT. When they asked again during the second war the communists were rightfully against the notion.
Fair, I was using the Long March as a stand-in for the greater project of the a Chinese communist revolution. The political project that was the settlement of the North American West generated a lot of enduring American/Canadian stereotypes of manliness (cowboys, prospectors, outdoorsmen, hunters, homeateaders, explorers that lived off the land).
From your post it sounds like the Chinese revolution also left enduring stereotypes of manliness.
For the redacted word, it’s not the C slur for Chinese you’re thinking of but the more 1700’s one. I wasn’t called the “sound effect” slur because thats a bit too old even for modern Australians.
I have no idea which one you’re referring to which must mean Australians are on a new level of racism
If it’s the one I think it is (the one Amerikans used to use regarding their imported rail workers) then holy shit, I didn’t think that was still in vogue for the crackers.
Thanks for writing this up. I’m also chinese diaspora, but with a slightly different experience than you because I was both born and raised in the good ol us of a. I’m still completely unsure of my roots, but I do know my grandfather was a revolutionary before he passed. I’m just sad I was too young to ever talk to him about my experiences when I was back in china. I can definitely relate to these social pressures, and especially the social pressures that happen at the intersection of being from an asian culture in a western environment. Get good grades, get into a good college, i’ve heard that my entire life and now that i’ve done it, get a good internship, get a good job… and the pressures to conform never stop. I don’t have too much to say, but thank you for writing this, it really resonated with me.
Circumcision. Give me my whole dick back.
I can’t believe nobody on this site has offered you their whole dick as a consolation yet. Where are people’s manners?
Unironically it is so incredibly fucked up how normal it is for women to make fun of uncircumcised men. “Haha his dick looks weird, it wasn’t mutilated by a hyper christian doctor who wanted him to feel no pleasure from masturbation.”
Imagine if a man sat in a public forum - a talkshow or something - and made a funny comment about going down on a girl, discovering her vulva was uncut and then feeling disgust and having to leave the sexual encounter because of it.
Several of them have been in the past.
I’ve always preferred to wear my hair a little long, when I was in elementary school the other kids called me transphobic slurs several times. To be clear, I am cis, but it still hurt seven year old TheLepidopterists’s feelings.
The idea that expressing feelings other than anger is inappropriate for boys was also not great for me growing up, but the folks in the bell hooks book club thread have elaborated on that way more eloquently than I could.
EDIT: just realized this said cis-het which is only half true, but in spite of being attracted to men as, I’ve only ever dated women (I wasn’t even consciously aware of being attracted to men as well until I was years and one kid into a relationship with my wife, who rules and is the only person I’m interested in a relationship with). I do present fairly straight though, I think and socially I’m I think effectively cis-het.
I’ve always preferred to wear my hair a little long, when I was in elementary school the other kids called me transphobic slurs several times. To be clear, I am cis, but it still hurt seven year old TheLepidopterists’s feelings.
I’m sorry that happened to you
It’s of course a bit different for me, but I also really hated being made to feel ashamed for anything I might do that could be considered “girly” at all. I even made a funny post about this topic recently. There is a scene in I Saw the TV Glow where the evil dad says something like “Isn’t that a show for girls?” and it cut through me pretty hard having heard it so many times and having that fear/shame ingrained into me. But yeah, policing gender norms is pretty evil, including when it’s done to cis men, and we should all push back against it whenever and wherever it appears.
Isn’t that a show for girls
Me and enjoying WINX
I’m old so it was Sailor Moon. Many such cases in my age bracket.
You’ve gotta be so weird about women to fit in with other dudes. Trying to understand women as people and not as some mysterious alien species makes you an immediate outcast.
Fairly benign example: men will frequently complain about how women will “complain about something and then get mad when you tell them how to fix it”. Trying to explain the concept of venting (they’re doing it right now! They’re venting right now about women!) has usually gotten me reactions that range from weird looks and disbelief to arguments that women actually just love not solving problems.
Obvs this isn’t as big of a problem as having to put up with men refusing to understand you but it still sucks being expected to participate in it
I made a whole post a while back about how there just aren’t cishet men’s spaces where you can talk about women and be normal. Like I think i was comparing, wlw spaces where people are just like "omg women i cannot function aaaaaaa
" and how there are no equivalent cishet men spaces.You know what i do wonder if this is why i always struggled to form a romantic relationship because of other men telling me “this is how you should treat/speak to women”, then making some fucked statement.
You’ve gotta be so weird about women to fit in with other dudes.
A friend from school was getting married. I hadn’t seen him for years for one reason or another. I met up with him and his future wife and a few others. She was sat between him and me.
Thought it would be a nice to speak to her as if she was a person. He starts calling me homophobic names as if that would be the only reason why I would talk to a woman as an equal. So his wife just sat there for the whole meal in silence as he spoke with the person to his right and kind of forbade her from talking to me.
What a dick head. I left before dessert and never saw him or her again. I can’t stand that kind of man.
You’ve gotta be so weird about women to fit in with other dudes.
Women?? Oh, you mean feeeeemales?
Fuck, it makes me cringe so hard when dudes say that. Just the other day I got the “men / females” red flag, but it was my literal first day of work at a new place so I couldn’t really say anything. Hate that fucking shit.
Had a friend the other day tell me about how “females” in a relationship are different than “men”, but since he’s my best friend I could break down for him why literally all his points were wrong and he got it but, damn, it’s so constant. Dudes just expect you to literally dehumanize and hate women all the damn time, and if you don’t then you’re a sensitive white knight snowflake.
It’s worse being a woman on the other side of that, of course, but it’s still so annoying to be thought of as being cool with that in-group.
I agree, but I wanna go the other way too. I think women are weird about dudes too. My female friends will complain that guys are “bad about talking about their feelings!” (which they are at times) but really they’re just bad at talking about their feelings the way women talk about their feelings.
I am very lucky to have very good guy friends and we are good at sharing emotions and our life and so on, it’s nice. We often end up joking about it, sometimes there’s tears but it’s rare. But it’s there. We don’t talk about it the way women talk about it though, and for some reason we’re wrong for that. In my experience feelings are treated less… seriously, like another thing to worry about rather than a separate entity, which - in my experience - is how I see it treated when a group of all women speak of feelings. Neither is wrong or right, as long as both result in better mental health.
I also agree about the “you’re venting right now!” but I also here want to point out it goes both ways. When I vent to my friends and they suggest a solution, I’m happy. When they ask for clarification, I’m happy. It helps me process my emotions. Sometimes I’ll tell them “I just need to vent” though and then they do that. I tell them that though, which is not something I’ve ever experienced from a girlfriend.
I don’t want to sound like an incel, I agree with your observations and frustrations, I just… I feel like this is a safe space and I wanted to share some too.
Guys are incredibly weird about women. I don’t talk to my dad anymore. When I was 12 I remember him looking at some 20-year old walking boy and him saying “boy I wish I had painted the pants on her” (she was wearing tight fitting pants). My mom was present. At my graduation he kept commenting about the looks of my female classmates. He’s a pig and I hate him and I am glad mom left him.
I agree with a lot of what others have to say but what makes me upset is how no one gives a shit about it. People will pay lip service to the idea of loosening these norms but the vast majority of people still expect it. Even among more progressive people, they won’t make you a pariah but they’ll still treat you differently. It’s just like everyone agrees that women should be allowed to have both a career and children. But in practice the woman is expected to take on the burden of childcare. People can say that men should allowed to be emotional but if they catch you crying then you’re forever something different in their eyes.
I’ve talked with a lot of my friends and I genuinely believe a lot of men are aware of how toxic these behaviors are. But the second they get in front of their partners they’re back to that cold, confident mask. Most young men understand it’s bullshit but they see it as a requirement for relationships and societal respect. While there are always exceptions, I wouldn’t say they’re wrong.
I’ll keep it light. I’m for all intents and purposes, a dude’s dude. I work out, BBQ, drink beer, and in general, am loud and obnoxious. But…
I hate sports and in particular American Football. And to a plurality if not majority of supposed free society I might as well turn in my bro card.
I hate sports and in particular American Football.
Same! And good for you for hating American football in particular. It’s a terrible sport run mostly by racist chuds that causes long term injuries (including brain damage) for the people who play it, which also includes kids in many cases. I do admit that I like watching Kaiju Big Battel sometimes (which is really more entertainment than actual wrestling) and robot wars type stuff, but that’s mostly it these days for watching sports.
robot fighting is the best sport in existence unless u count police chases
It really is, isn’t it? Do you ever watch NHRL stuff? If not, you should. It’s pretty fun/exciting and there’s a decent amount trans/queer presence in the league which is cool, like here for example: https://youtu.be/pJMko14GWio&t=840
that’s awesome, that definitely seems like something that would attract trans people. ive watched a little but i should watch more
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Police chases
You ever been to a riot bar night? I’ve been to a few punk venues that have done it. Throw up a projector screen and show compilations of cops getting owned. Drink beer, cheer for runners, protestors, rioters, robbers and so on.
ive never been to a bar because of ronald reagan. ill try it though
lol what does reagan have to do with bars?
he raised the drinking age to 21 by withholding federal highway funding from states that didn’t raise it
Bastard, when I become dictator all minors will be forced to do fireballs
When youre in a public place and people come up to you and just start talking about some football game that happened because you’re a male and they have no other idea how make small talk that doesn’t involve sports.
they have no other idea how make small talk that doesn’t involve sports.
Hey, they might know how to make small talk about cars, which I also don’t give a fuck about.
Same but in Portugal and with football, here everyone is from one of the 3 big teams (green, blue red) and you’re expected to pick 1 of them and tease/get teased the day after 2 teams play each other. And you ought to have at least 1 item branded with your team
cw: genitals, just kinda gross
As a former cis dude and current penis owner, I didn’t realise until recently how oppressive men being required to wear trousers or shorts actually is until I tried wearing a skirt. I spent years thinking that vaguely warm days just meant my balls and arse were going to turn into the Sudd, when all I needed was some airflow. Everything’s just so much better when your balls aren’t pasting themselves to your leg with every step.
It’s completely incomprehensible how society could convince itself that skirts are for women. I’d happily bet that a majority of men would generally be a in a much better mood if they just wore a skirt when the sun comes out.
skirts only being for women is a very recent change, they’ve been the default for everyone in most places for most of history
I did once see a company that sells modern utility “kilts” for men but they’re pretty expensive and no idea how well they’d go over with most people in reality. Kind of an interesting idea though and tbh I might dig something similar (especially with the pockets) that’s more fem.
Those are either spectacularly good quality or incredibly overpriced - I’ve seen plenty of similar utility kilts in the UK for £50-£100. For $400 I’d expect a full 8 yards of handspun tartan.
that’s pretty cool, i think this is the best they could do to market them to men. $400 for a skirt is crazy though, they better be made out of the golden fleece
The Scots and Irish are on to something!
Or the fact that gird your loins is for a tunic, a Maxi dress for men, worn literally across every civilization that marble-statue-pfp’s worship.
“Skirts are for women”…unless youre Scottish, then theyre really fucking manly.
Maybe men really should “return to tradition”, though not in the way chuds want them to. Skirts for men and deep platonic male love/affection deserve to make a comeback, judging by some of the responses here.
Wish I could wear skirts without it being a statement. So much more comfortable. Also wish mens “fancy clothes” had as much freedom of expression as womens. There’s more or less one style of suit and that’s it, you can pick colors though! All the way from black to dark blue.
I think I’m emotionally underdeveloped because of male gender norms. Specificly the norm that men are not emotional. It feels like my non-male friends run laps around me when it comes to navigating their/others emotions.
The harm of this deficiency it no doubt obvious to most. But it took me a long time to even recognize that it was a problem. The harm I’ve experienced from this is the damage I’ve done to my relationships throughout my life.
Caveat - I’m not sure how much responsibility societal pressures bear alone since my parents were not great emotional models.
Other then that, I think I’ve only benefited from gender norms.
This is my general experience as well.
