(The Guardian) Mankeeping

DueGuest665 · 2025-06-24T06:27:12+00:00

Imagine the freak out if men told their partners to quit whining and go work on themselves.

Jesus h Christ.

Punder_man · 2025-06-24T09:50:34+00:00

Oh boy.. another gendered term I get to add to my list of negative terms which are gendered as masculine or male..

Moving on..

I don’t understand. A whole generation of men don’t feel comfortable opening up to their male friends, which means some of them dump their worries on their female partner. It’s an extension of emotional labour – remembering birthdays, organising social calendars – but effectively it requires the partner to act as an unpaid therapist.

Counter point: How often are men hen pecked and told they aren't allowed to hang out with their male friends by their partners?
So.. how can we as men.. open up to our male friends if we are constantly barred from you know.. hanging out with or interacting with said friends?

I also note how Emotional Labor is always considered one sided in of the fact that its solely women who have to handle / balance "Emotional Labor" yet men often have the same expectations put on them and are simply told to "Man up" by their female partners if they complain at all..

That's not even getting into the whole Men are expected to be strong, stoic reliable emotional rocks for women to cling to while they saddle them with emotional baggage or trauma dump on them. All without any complaint of expectations of it being reciprocated I might add. which sounds to me like men are also expected to be unpaid therapists for women..

But hey.. I guess being a man and having "Privilege" means it's "Different" when women do it right?

TL;DR: this article is pure low grade feminist garbage..

Langland88 · 2025-06-24T06:12:53+00:00

There is only one truth in life at this point. Men, we are damned if we do and damned if we don't. But I really wish these publications would just stop publishing these garbage tier articles already.

ExternalSea9120 · 2025-06-24T09:17:54+00:00

Funny because in the last few years any conversation about men spending time with their friends turned out to be an attack, one way or another.

Remember the story about the study saying men need at least 2 nights out/week with their friends, that raised hell in terms of feminist backlash.

Or the systemic attack on "men only" spaces, accused of being the root of all evils and forced to be more inclusive.

Or that men together in the gym are doing unrespectful "locker room talks". Or they might be "manchild" or "Peter Pan" if they gather for videogames or need stuff. Or that if a man meets his friends out for drinks, it is because they are having a "Bros night out" where they just get drunk, harass random women and go to strip clubs.

And let's not forget when a female partner is the first person asking to cut contacts with friends.

Considering all the above , I am not surprised that lots of men end up being without friends and perhaps relying only on their partner...

Initial_Zebra100 · 2025-06-24T07:51:15+00:00

Ug. I hate the guardian. People love to label double standards. That was dripping with bias and patronising tone.

If only men worked on themselves and stopped forcing women to do all the emotional labour. Sadly they'll just use it to lie. Imagine if they went to therapy

Why is something somehow different when it affects a woman?

Uh, I need to go talk to some normal women offline. This crap annoys the hell out of me.

Parking_Scar9748 · 2025-06-24T11:33:42+00:00

I don't believe a word anybody says if they talk about women being unfairly expected to do emotional labor. The amount of emotional labor I have to put into my family, with the majority going towards my mother, is astounding. I quite literally act as her therapist, a confidant, the person who walks her through solving her problems. You shouldn't complain about your kids to your kid. The level of aggression she shows me when she has any anger or frustration at all is unreal. And take a guess if she reciprocates and lets me confide in her. Tell me again how women perform disproportionate amounts of emotional labor.

philosopher_leo · 2025-06-24T12:13:13+00:00

We already know that this wouldn't survive the gender swap, but it's still kind of shocking.

The article doesn't list any sources, studies, data of what's happening, they just know it's happening. It doesn't try to add any nuance to how it's different from women sharing their problems. It doesn't try to explain what type of problems men are bringing to their significant others that need psychological help or even how women do it "better" than men when they share their problems.

Nothing but an opinion that's passed as truth.

It seems more and more like for women who think like that there's only one path for a woman's life: perfection.

If a man is not actively contributing to make the woman's life perfect, he's by default to blame for making it worse.

henrysmyagent · 2025-06-24T12:40:29+00:00

So it is men's fault they are lonely and it is also men's fault that women are lonely? I'm calling bullsh!t.

Women claim they would rather run into a bear in the woods than a man.

Ok.

Now ask men if they would rather tell their problems to a woman or a tree...or a rock...or a dog.

Women would be in 4th place on that list of 4.

Why?

Because most women do not give two shits about a man's problems. Most would tell their man to suck it up, get over it, or they would say goodbye.

WanabeInflatable · 2025-06-24T09:38:58+00:00

They continue bitching about how useless men are and how much 'emotional labor' they need to invest.

Solution is simple - GTFO and not deal with men. These kind of women are toxic and their supposed emotional labor and coaching is nagging and slow grinding down mental health of their men. They aren't doing any good.

Women who claim that they are doing some mental labor - just stop and GTFO. It will actually improve men's lives.

hello_marmalade · 2025-06-24T14:44:56+00:00

I've been struggling to figure out how to explain it, but this new 'go to therapy' line is incredibly frustrating. I haven't been able to fully describe why though. It's like a very particular level of dismissal. Or... something. I haven't been able to find the right word.

Like, going to therapy is a good thing, but the way it's used feels degrading.

YooGeOh · 2025-06-24T09:28:32+00:00

This is the side of the political aisle I reside on, yet it is this side of the political aisle that pretends it doesn't talk to/about men in this disgusting way.

Waht a shit piece from the guardian. They'd never evee talk about women that way.

Onemoretime536 · 2025-06-24T18:18:00+00:00

Another word with man in it which just comes off as sexist.

A lot of men don't open up what their issue to their partner due to them not wanting to burden when with it which could leave to worse mental for those men.

I have never heard a man complain about their partners sharing their problems with them.

MaximumDestruction · 2025-06-24T21:20:01+00:00

The contempt radiating off of this article at the very idea of supporting one's partner is insane.

When everything becomes transactional, basic humanity becomes something you can be aggrieved about.

2025-06-24T15:36:58+00:00

She's discovered nothing. This is just codependency, and anyone can do it to anyone. There's a whole 12-step program for it. All this does is single out one particular direction (man codependent on woman) as if its a new discovery. I suspect the reason they don't want to call it codependency is because then you'd have to confront the fact that (1) codependency is generally a result of growing up in an addicted or otherwise dysfunctional home, and then that blows up the whole clean "victim vs. oppressor" narrative and (2) women can be codependent on men too and it's just as limiting.

Gayfunguy · 2025-06-24T17:19:11+00:00

Women like this are only angry that THEY are expected to go to therapy. Theres alot of bile around that word that the writer indicates they dont think of it in a positive way. And that by men being forced to go would punish them. And If you're a bully ( like this woman is) and your therapist is any good, they will have issues with your behavior and want to work on those to change. How horrible! Its almost like being asked to respect other people and your partner as humans with emotions. Developing communication skills and compassion for others is just too hard for her to do.

I would say this is not all women just the most egregious narsisistic ones. And narsisistic women tend to hang out in groups.

Pod_people · 2025-06-25T06:41:55+00:00

The "so-called male loneliness epidemic"

Cool-Equipment-668 · 2025-06-25T13:50:09+00:00

That’s why the male counterpart to the joke about whether you'd rather run into a man or a bear in the woods is whether you'd rather talk about your problems with a tree or with a woman. In the end, it's the same thing. Jokes aside, even bell hooks writes in her books about the discomfort she felt when her partner opened up emotionally — it’s a very difficult shift, one that women may never fully be able to make. In any case, we men tend to open up emotionally with our romantic partners, but we should be doing it with our male friends too. That’s the path forward for us

thomastypewriter · 2025-06-26T16:55:26+00:00

The press runs one of these stories every single day and has since the election. WaPo started running the “men are evil” column by Carolyn Hax daily.

44% of women voted for Trump. 47% of white women did. And they NEVER acknowledge this. Just like with Russia in 2016, they have to press the narrative that 2024 was all men’s fault to avoid any discussion of class. Hopefully Zohran’s election will help dispel this narrative perpetuated by the monied classes and maybe lead to a domino effect if he’s successful.

People now get their news from social media more than anywhere else. Most Americans are independents, but they do see one “side” making men the enemy daily and expecting them to endure all manner of ridicule while they tell women they’re above the law, they deserve everything simply for being born, and that they’re somehow superpowered angelic beings incapable of doing anything wrong or having moral deficiencies and can do anything while simultaneously being perpetual victims whose failings can all be attributed to men.

Puzzleheaded_Pea_889 · 2025-06-27T00:39:11+00:00

Oh look, the new buzzword for dismissing men's feelings just dropped! I guess "fragile", "entitled", "emotional labor" and "making her your therapist" are passé now? But remember everyone, it's patriarchy that teaches men not to express their feelings, not women or feminism!

But seriously though, this stuff is deliberate rage-bait. Might be better not to share these kinds of articles unless such buzzwords become widespread in popular use, or else we'll just encourage it.

Akhenath · 2025-06-27T06:23:00+00:00

But I thought they wanted men to open up emotionally, so now it's an issue

ciaobellapgh · 2025-06-30T15:09:40+00:00

This is one of the dumbest, and most obnoxious, articles I've ever read. Calling this journalism is like shitting on a canvas and calling it art.

IkujaKatsumaji · 2025-08-03T13:02:38+00:00

When I hear about a new social development in dating or culture from a newspaper before I hear about it from anyone else, my first assumption is that it is virtually not happening at all. It's the same thing as all the news reports when I was a kid about all the drugs and sex things your kid is definitely doing, which we were never actually doing.

This is sensationalists hearing about one person saying something one time, and then really running with it.

frogjokeholder · 2025-06-24T10:06:18+00:00

It's "pass notes" which typically uses a snarky tone for humorous effect. I wouldn't worry about it- it's the source material that's the problem.

Rare-Discipline3774 · 2025-06-26T16:37:09+00:00

That's not new

Solomnhollow · 2025-07-29T00:44:51+00:00

I can see these women, or even gay men, having a lot of bad relationships with men who are emotional wrecks in relationships and instead of saying “maybe I need to check what kind of guys I’m actually into,” they go and say every guy is that way and causing these ridiculous posts…blaming it on every man instead of themselves. Telling themselves “ME..THE PROBLEM!! NO WAY ITS GOT TO BE THE MENS FAULT!..”

No_Positive8576 · 2025-07-30T21:35:45+00:00

This story is actually about something that's super fucked up for men in our culture - the fact men don't feel safe opening up to each other and don't even have the kinds of social groups they used to have that let them at least vent in manly ways to each other. Our grandfathers were in politically, civically active unions, and the Rotary Club, Kiwanis Club, lodges, churches, bowling leagues, where they could sit around drinking scotch and bitching about the way of things. Mankeeping is not, in fact, about blaming men for being wrong in some way. It's acknowledging the fact that men are suffering socially, and it's also taking a toll on the women trying to form relationships with them.

Instead of raging against women for saying something about it, maybe it's time to acknowledge the world as it exists isn't working very well for men either, and it's not women's fault for not silently enduring it. We need systemic change.

I'm pretty sure this answer will be downvoted to oblivion, because everyone in here sounds so insanely bitter and anti-woman, it's kind of crazy. If some terrible woman did a number on you, I'm genuinely sorry. But heads up, brothers, when every woman you've ever been with is a crazy bitch, I have bad news: you're the crazy bitch.

Quick_Clue_9436 · 2025-11-16T12:34:04+00:00

Maybe people will now understand the red pill and why real men encourage each other to not talk about your emotions with woman and how its a massive turn off. Progressive men likely get cheated on by how many rules they violate and how feminized they become to please their woman.

BlackCatGamer204 · 2026-01-31T17:40:08+00:00

yall are so fuckin sensitive jesus. Ban me if you feel so inclined but know this: It's all true

Individual_Key4701 · 2025-06-24T17:41:41+00:00

What do secular people think marriage is for? The loss of religion has made marriage into finding the viewer and enabler of "my life: the movie" it keeps us forever juvenile

Title	(The Guardian) Mankeeping
Author	BaroloBaron
Upvotes	261
Comments	78
Date	June 23, 2025 2:39 PM UTC (1 year ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/1liibem/the_guardian_mankeeping/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/the-guardian-mankeeping.1555401 https://theredarchive.com/post/1555401

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