"A powerful trans author says America socializes boys to fail". Do you agree or disagree?

Aaod · 2020-03-21T00:48:16+00:00

This article is a joke look at the response to this question as an example.

What’s the biggest threat to men in America today? Why?

The deeply rooted belief for many white men, that power and masculinity and whiteness are an entwined birthright

What a fucking nutter like I was not expecting much but holy fuck. The reason you are killing yourself is because you had power and hate people HURP DURP. What a fucking asshole.

SchalaZeal01 · 2020-03-21T00:46:44+00:00

I think Me Too was an excellent reminder for me that, despite my socialization (and my own experience with male violence), I don’t always know how to best support the women around me in my male body. Its rise coalesced with a moment in my life where I was really trying to think differently about how I moved in the world, and it was a really great framework for the simplest acts of allyship a man (cis or trans) can perform for women: Listening. Making space. Believing. Standing in solidarity. Speaking to other men. It was useful to be able to work on those skills in a larger social movement, rather than a vacuum.

This presumes that sexual harassment and sexual violence generally that is denounced by MeToo happens only or so overwhelmingly to women that men are a footnote, that perpetrators are always men... That already gets me cold.

I acknowledge and share in emotional labor. I use my privilege to highlight injustice.

That's like a textbook from gender studies talking.

The deeply rooted belief for many white men, that power and masculinity and whiteness are an entwined birthright.

I'm sure I can find some really backwards people who believe this...but I can find Nazis too. Doesn't mean its any widespread, even less basic socialization.

(men are much less likely than women to be stewards of the environment)

Men are 67% of full electric cars buy, and 50% of gas cars buy. Ahem. Men are less afraid of the 'threat' of being stranded without charge (it makes as much sense as being afraid to run out of gas, as a constant fear).

It is hard to give up power, and I understand that it might feel counterintuitive for cis men to do so. But I really believe that we each have a true north, and there is not a person alive who can look me in the eyes and tell me that their true north involves homophobia, violence toward women, transphobia—or living within a constricted reality where emotionality is suspect and empathy is discouraged.

Thankfully, I don't think those are male norms either. Not in the West, even conservative west. Though you always get some assholes everywhere, and some are bolder in places.

Men are often bystanders, thereby making us complicit in behavior even if we don’t participate in it outright.

TIL bad stuff only happens to women.

Sounds like someone who internalized male original sin, but decided he's better than that, like Hugo Schwyzer.

That it’s not about winning. It’s about being in reality. As a culture, we systemically socialize boys out of so many of the skills they need to navigate relationships: empathy and intimacy are traded for power and domination.

I'm sure all boys and men seek power and domination...maybe in World of Warcraft they do. But in real life its not happening.

that other men can decide if you are a “real man” or not

Real men stuff is often used against men, by both men and women, to get men to sacrifice. It's pure manipulation. I agree its bad, I don't agree its mostly men doing it.

Before my transition, I could talk at the same time as a woman on occasion and it made me part of a chorus. Now, it makes me a bulldozer.

He sees his maleness as oppressing the woman, as he didn't see it that way before, for the same behavior. Maybe the outlook is the problem, not the behavior.

Gender is actually a lot of fun. There’s nothing more liberating than living authentically, standing up for what you believe in, and not giving a fuck what anyone else thinks of you.

I agree with this.

Sewblon · 2020-03-21T02:53:09+00:00

Gender is actually a lot of fun. There’s nothing more liberating than living authentically, standing up for what you believe in, and not giving a fuck what anyone else thinks of you.

That is a lie. Its never actually fun to fight for what you believe in when no one else agrees with you. Everyone cares about what someone else thinks of them. Human beings are social animals. Edit: Living authentically, or at least, the feeling of living authentically, doesn't come from not giving a fuck what anyone else thinks of you, it comes from being perceived by others the way that you want to be perceived. So its the opposite of what this person thinks. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/authenticity-under-fire/

Pretty much nothing about masculinity is monolithic. There is very little truth to the idea that gender is mostly biologically “innate.” This myth upholds the power dynamic that keeps men in charge, but at a great cost: our ability to be fully expressed human beings, since our power is predicated on our ability to deny all that is “feminine” within and outside of us. We, like all organisms, are very reactive to our environments. I try to make my environment an empowering, humane, and equal one, every day.

The point that I would disagree with here is that men are "in charge." Men are in control of the big and prestigious decisions, when one unit of people interact with another unit of people. But women are in control of the decisions that affect most people most of the time, when one unit of people interacts with itself. Lindiebeige on Youtube went into how this worked historically. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPmbDPsyt6I Warren Farrell went into this in "The Myth of Male Power." and "The Boy Crisis" for how it works now.

The deeply rooted belief for many white men, that power and masculinity and whiteness are an entwined birthright. I think the tendrils of that belief are ingrained in our unconscious. It is encoded in our social systems, our child-rearing, and our behavior in ways that, if left unexamined, will continue to destroy us (skyrocketing suicide rates among men), the environment (men are much less likely than women to be stewards of the environment), women (men commit violent acts at rates highly disproportionate to women), and each other.

That would make some kind of sense if those problems only happened with white men. But that is not the case. Suicide rates are rising for both men and women. Native men have the same suicide rates as white men.https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hestat/suicide/rates_1999_2014.htm Black men are more violent than white men interpersonally. Not entirely sure what he means by being a "steward of the environment." https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-black-americans-commit-crime

In my writing, my primary focus has been to highlight the reality that men have a gender, and that masculinity isn’t a fixed state, or something that “happens” to you, but a political and social gender role that we have total control over.

We don't have total control over anything. We don't even have total control over our own personalities, they are at least 40% heritable. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068715/ Same with political beliefs. https://www.livescience.com/4454-political-preference-genetic.html We aren't even in total control of our own thoughts. Trying to not think about something just makes you think about it more. If you are like me and have ADHD, then you legit can't focus on any one subject indefinitely.

Edit:

There is no scarcity in an equal world. I think, in our hearts, if we really are willing to look, we all know that.

Not even the kind of scarcity imposed by conservation of mass and by entropy?

That it’s not about winning. It’s about being in reality. As a culture, we systemically socialize boys out of so many of the skills they need to navigate relationships: empathy and intimacy are traded for power and domination. Winning is the problem.

Being in reality is literally the one thing that you can't fail at, even if you try. Also, I don't agree that winning is the problem. The evidence that I know if indicates that the desire to win is positively associated with well-being. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/finding-new-home/201903/new-findings-toxic-masculinity

If men criticize you for saying something you know is true, perhaps it’s worth getting centered in your own truth and questioning the notion that you have been taught to believe: that other men can decide if you are a “real man” or not. That’s a bizarre and pretty brilliant structure to keep you silent when you see things that aren’t right.

I have had people call me "Pussy" "faggot" "tranny" and "beta-cuck." (That last one was just referring to me, not directed at me. But still, I saw it and knew what it meant.) But I haven't had guys attack my masculinity for saying that the women's movement has valid complaints. Just jumping straight to the "real man" thing seems like leaping to conclusions.

Melthengylf · 2020-03-21T12:50:58+00:00

If men criticize you for saying something you know is true, perhaps it’s worth getting centered in your own truth and questioning the notion that you have been taught to believe: that other men can decide if you are a “real man” or not.

There’s nothing more liberating than living authentically, standing up for what you believe in, and not giving a fuck what anyone else thinks of you.

Fine, I'll use my critical thinking to decide that entitlement to power is not in fact the cause of male pain in this society. And that I won't continuously blame men for whatever that happens to them entrenching the gender roles that I want to abolish.

Strikester101 · 2020-03-21T00:14:17+00:00

/u/lady_coraline2 /u/Threwaway42 /u/ThatQueerWerewolf What do you think of the article? Do you agree or disagree?

Sewblon · 2020-03-21T03:03:40+00:00

I think Me Too was an excellent reminder for me that, despite my socialization (and my own experience with male violence), I don’t always know how to best support the women around me in my male body. Its rise coalesced with a moment in my life where I was really trying to think differently about how I moved in the world, and it was a really great framework for the simplest acts of allyship a man (cis or trans) can perform for women: Listening. Making space. Believing. Standing in solidarity. Speaking to other men. It was useful to be able to work on those skills in a larger social movement, rather than a vacuum.

Words words words words words words words

Title	"A powerful trans author says America socializes boys to fail". Do you agree or disagree?
Author	Strikester101
Upvotes	18
Comments	19
Date	March 21, 2020 12:05 AM UTC (6 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/fm5oaw/a_powerful_trans_author_says_america_socializes/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/a-powerful-trans-author-says-america-socializes.1063801 https://theredarchive.com/post/1063801

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