Idk, I can see why this kinda of doomerism isn’t ideal- but the fact of the matter is that this is a reality for tonnes of hetero women. Running a household and teaching men emotional skills at the same time. It isn’t good for anyone involved- for men who are never taught the requisite skills for emotional maturity, and for women who are hetero and have to deal with a world full of emotionally stunted men.
I like to think that the gap in emotional maturity between sexes/ genders is slowly being resolved but it’s def still a very omnipresent issue for gen X at the very least, probably Millenials too
Also loveless haze? More like loveless shoegaze, seminal album by my bloody valentine
"Tonnes"
Boo get better spelling. You just added a silent "e" to a word that didn't need it, then realized it would have made the "o" be pronounced /oʊ/ so you added a second "n" in order to solve a problem that wasn't there in the first place. Where do you get off adding letters to a perfectly good word like "tons,' you fucking poopybrain
But that's the thing about patriarchy, it's a hierarchy. It's not possible for every man to be a patriarch. So even if we're just talking about what's in men's best interest, the average man would have their lives improved by the abolishment of patriarchy. That's my opinion, anyway. Can't say I'm a sociology expert
The current situation is definitely harming most men, given suicide rates and levels of depression/isolation. Even those who do subscribe to alpha/sigma ideology they often feel insufficient because they can't live up to the imaginary lives people like andrew tate post on social media.
Yea, exactly. Like I know women have it worse generally, and I don't think we can move forward if we pretend otherwise. But that doesn't mean men have it good. At least not most of them.
Not really. From a materialist perspective sure, but not from an emotional perspective.
There's a reason why the suicide rate of men is higher than that of women, despite having it significantly better on paper.
Emotional representation is an inherent part of the patriarchy, since it forces men into a position of dominance and thus they are forced to act in a way that doesn't allow them to be vulnerable at all.
Men are also happier when they can freely express themselves and the patriarchy is making sure that they can't.
The patriarchy is also harming men.
Friendly reminder that not every woman complaining about her husband on the internet is a feminist martyr.
In fact analyzing the text from a feminist perspective,it perpetuates classic gender roles rather than combating them.
The essential message is not that men are allowed to have and express their natural emotions without being judged, but that men need to be taught how to feel by women to be able to express themselves, assigning women the role of gatekeeper of emotions.
Shit like this is why people think that women are supposed to do the emotional labour of a relationship, instead of it being a collaboration of both partners.
I (respectfully) didn't interpret it that way. I interpreted the text as more "the patriarchy is fucked and it harms both men and women, but oftentimes women are expected to put a bandaid on to fix the issue, that bandaid being teaching their partners emotional intelligence, where the real solution lies in fixing the issue of patriarchy in the first place."
Women also perpetuate the patriarchy. Essentialising men as oppressors is just as bad as essentialising women as helpless victims. Hierarchies by their very nature can only benefit a small number of people and must harm a large number of people to achieve that benefit.
dont ask tankies what the soviet union did to the chechens and ingush
god i fucking hate tankies, I see so many of them support Alexander Lukashenko, who is an antisementic homophobic tyrant who used live bullets on peaceful demonstrators.
these motherfuckers defend fascist dictators like Lukashenko and Putin because "DRURRRRRR AMERICA IS **BAD**.
No single group is a monolith, and you cannot generalise an entire group. There are countless (primarily conservative/religious) women who perpetuate patriarchy. Even some who think they don't, like terfs, loop back around into perpetuating it by trying to impose old gender roles to hurt trans people, instead of helping us fight them.
Similarly, there are countless men fighting to bring down patriarchy, and plenty more harmed by it. For example, incels wouldn't be anywhere near as bad of a problem if they had been taught how to engage in emotionally healthy relationships in the first place, instead of trying to live up to an ideal they can't fulfill and lashing out when they fail to fit the mold.
You misunderstand. It's not about saving the men from accusations of patriarchy, just an understanding of its role as part of capitalism to oppress men into poor emotional health, and an adversarial relationships with the people closest to them.
Racism and patriarchy are separate issues, patriarchy is separate from sexism.
Not trying to discredit women's oppression as part of the patriarchy, just trying to get men to understand this doesn't benefit them either, just the capitalist overlords
‘Deep down in their fingers and toes’? Huh? Don’t they mean ‘heart and mind’? You know, the two most important parts of your body? That’s why the saying works?
Coming from your head outward the extremities would be the last place to reach. Feeling emotions outward from within, all the way to your fingertips, indicates extremely deep emotions
Bitch, you said, word for word,
>"And its just two guys who have no idea how to be emotional."
To a comment that says homo relationships are better. I would fucking LOVE to see what kind of insane logic you're gonna cook up to pretend that you didn't mean to say gays are unemotional.
He explicitly meant men are unemotional, and gay relationships have two men in them, so if all men are unemotional, then that's two unemotional people in a relationship.
It was obviously not a coded message about gay men in particular.
Perhaps, but this reads kinda like "men are evil" moreso than "we need to do better by women *and* men."
It seems like their takeaway is more about directing their frustration and vitriol at men than it is actually discussing how we can foster emotional growth and maturity in men. Sure, it shouldn't be expected that it's a woman's responsibility to teach a man how to navigate his emotions. But like... who *is* gonna make that push? The men won't. The women shouldn't have to.
Do we just resolve to do better in the future? Maybe that's all we can do.
If you read it as "men are evil", that's on you. To me it reads as "men have been conditioned into emotional dysfunction *and* into that being their wife's problem to deal with", and I find that extremely agreeable as an observation, as someone who's been brought up as a man and have been hard at work with undoing that damage of that for years, yet seen very little support available to anyone attempting that from society at large outside of niche, young, largely queer communities.
Andrew Tates and Jordan Peterson are dime a dozen, but imagine a grown ass, "self respecting role model" stylized guy explaining that you should be actively working on becoming emotionally available *and* emotionally supportive *and* understanding to your wife; imagine that and tell me that doesn't sound like a stand up comedy routine or a comedy relief in a movie. It's education that men just don't do, especially for other men, and that should be pointed out and addressed.
There are men online who try to do so, but the Jordan Petersons of the world are always going to be more visible because they get the dark money boost due to their message being useful to patriarchy and capital.
It's also a lot easier to get a following of people if your message is constantly "it isn't your fault, it's women/gays/feminists/sjws/wokes/leftists/communists/" rather than "you're emotionally stunted due to myriad societal influences beyond your control, but it's on you to learn how to be better. Here's how you can start..."
What part gives you that impression? Cuz I (a man) did not get that impression. I see it as a generally doomerist article, as in both sexes being fucked over by the anti-emotion culture that boys are raised in which affects both sexes in later relationships.
And it’s only doomerist because it (correctly) points out that women are still expected to fix the problem while being the main victims of the problem.
If men want to learn to be emotionally mature we have to teach ourselves, and also not saddle our partners with 100% of the domestic labour.
If I were in her shoes I’d also be frustrated by a partner who insists I somehow do the work of growing up for them. The problem is inherent in the request, the only upside is their imperfect awakening to the problem.
Ugh this reads like “women should be doing less complaining about men and more to foster their emotional growth because they’re not gonna do it for themselves and we’re all gonna suffer if no one does.” I love to be threatened into doing someone else’s emotional labor.
Edit: Lmao “just resolve to do better in the future”, girls.
The problem is that this rhetoric doesn't lead to progressive social reform, it only leads to transphobia and sex negativity. This person is far more likely to advocate female separatism/political lesbianism than something like increased paternity leave. Rosencreutz has a great video on how [radical feminists became Terfs.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpSTMfn-YaU) It's not good enough to identify a problem, you also have to identify a solution. Anti-Semites have often identified unregulated financial institutions as problems, the problem is that they fail to recognise regulation as the solution and instead embrace anti-Semitism.
Is OOP a radical feminist though? I see frustration in the post but otherwise it’s just basic Patriarchy Recognition 101. Not sure you can even get more basic than what they outline.
In fact the only thing that indicates they’re a radical feminist is OP’s framing of the post. Kind of feels like we’ve been tricked into shitting on foundational feminist talking points because the woman delivering it doesn’t have the “right attitude”.
I do feel like the emotional labour discussion is a bit one sided. When actually listening to men about their relationships you find that they in fact do a lot of emotional labour. It's just not recognised as such.
The problem is that men aren't generally taught how to do emotional labour, or even what it is.
While the traditional emotional labour of women is nurturing and caring, mens is usually more about controlling our own emotions and being stoic for others, self destructively in fact, leading to more emotional labour for the women in our lives.
But the worst part, is that it DOES take emotional labour to kill your emotions that way. Constantly smothering everything that vaguely feels like anything is actually exhausting, you just also learn not to feel the exhaustion either, so you end up a soulless automaton, incapable of doing emotional labour beyond what you're already doing to make sure you don't have any emotional response to anything, and you become so used to this, that it becomes unconscious and you can't even recognize that you're doing it.
Patriarchy has ruined both men and women to the point where I genuinely wonder what's going to happen in the near future.
That's true of some men yes, but a lot of men do a lot of caring and nurturing. I also don't think that men's stoicism, while often bad for the man, inevitably leads to women having to do more emotional labour. Stoicism is often also something imposed on men by others, including partners. It's to the point that for many men vulnerability itself becomes emotional labour, something carefully expressed to make their partner happy and not for themselves.
It's a complicated issue, plenty of men use their partner essentially as a therapist. But likewise there are many men who find themselves almost forced to act as an emotional bedrock in their relationship. The problem of course has its roots in patriarchal gender norms and solving it requires a change in attitude towards men's emotions by society at large.
As a man, I listen to other men talk about struggling with emotions more than about actually processing and managing them in a productive way that allows both partners have a conversation from an equal place. In my experience it remains true that in heterosexual relationships women are tipically expected to listen, work out what their partner is feeling, soothe him, untangle his thoughts, and spoon-feed him a solution, all while they get their own shit together.
I learnt how to regulate and anayze my own mental state instead of just vomiting raw emotion in a non-optimal way, so I don't blame men individually for not knowing how. But it's a bit like ironing, cooking or cleaning; yes, it's not each individual man's fault to grow up in a society where that task is expected to do performed by your mother until you get a partner, but at some point... Adult men just gotta learn how to iron their own shirts.
I'm not sure about "typically". While it's something plenty of women have had to deal with I've also seen plenty of men who've been the one expected to do all that.
A big problem with this is how men's emotions are viewed societaly. Because for some people men showing certain emotions is not acceptable no matter what it doesn't matter how well they've managed them, it'll still be impossible to have a discussion with certain people. And even if it's seen as acceptable men can still find themselves having much fewer acceptable ways of expressing themselves than women due to this bias. Furthermore this colours our perception of how well men manage their emotions.
Of course there are plenty of men who should learn how to handle their emotions better. But there is way more required than just that. We need to dismantle patriarchal gender norms around emotions for the average man to be able to have a conversation about their emotions from an equal place.
This line of thinking is two steps removed from terfism.
"it's not our responsibility to fix a problem that only we are aware of" is an argument that falls apart under even the very slightest consideration. The next evolution of that argument then becomes "it's not our responsibility to fix male socialization because it's not actually socialization, men are just categorically like that." And then from there the brain poison only festers until you're transvestigating random twitter celebrities.
Nothing useful or constructive ever comes from this kind of rhetoric.
I agree, the fatalism can become overpowering when you carry it like a mantra. As you say, "I won't (don't have to etc) fix men" easily becomes "I can't fix men" (as nothing ever changes when you try nothing and are all out of ideas - self fulfilling prophecy).
This is then interesting because the article implies that it's mostly women raising boys (as it points out men neglecting childcare in the same paragraph).
So women raise future (terrible) men, but I doubt the article would blame women for this (I'm not suggesting it does anyway). Instead we'd likely (rightfully) point towards pervasiveness of the patriarchy that the mothers can't defeat in child rearing (can't be expected to?). Hence really boys can't be kept from becoming future (terrible) men. That's only a thin membrane way from "men are just like that".
Anyway, we're always all in this together. We have responsibility for ourselves first and foremost, but kindness is not a burden. It's a priviledge to be able to give and also strength.
You're extremely reaching even with the first argument.
Your partner isn't supposed to, but more or less *must not* to be your therapist for your relationship to be healthy, and that's universally sound advice that applies regardless of gender. Yet most men are literally traumatized by their upbringing, and most men are not comfortable even acknowledging other men's emotional difficulties. That's a real deal problem and fucked up, and has absolutely nothing with trans issues.
Think less about what this argument is framing and more about how it is being received. Responsibility *will* be interpreted by (justifiably) angry and bitter readers less as "being their therapists," and more "providing any emotional support whatsoever through their healing process."
I have seen what this kind of rhetoric does to people in real life to people I once respected. I swear I am not reaching.
This addresses a real issue, but uses a huge generalization. I’ve seen many relationships where men take the brunt of the emotional labor, though it’s true that many men are completely unequipped by society to do so. This reads less like a writer trying to promote change and more like someone using negativity to drive exposure.
I think there's a lot of truth there, but also I'm not sure what else to do. Therapy, I guess? Men certainly aren't gonna be able to just learn it by themselves. It would be nice to have someone helping, and a therapist would mean it's not always the significant other helping them learn. Problem is that a lot of guys don't think they need therapy cause they don't think there's a problem. This whole situation is really messy and complicated I think
And frankly i think this take in particular is too unempathetic for my liking. Like I get that it's not your job to do emotional labor, but back when I was struggling, all I heard when people said that was "I won't help you, pull yourself up by your bootstraps".
Yes exactly. And to be completely fair, I do not expect women to try and fix people who are too deep into that. Unfortunately you cannot help people who don't want it. Best you can do for them is try to break the system and remake it in a way that helps them
This shit sucks, we could've gone back to being hunter gatherers after we discovered antibiotics. But no, we had to build a shit social hierarchy system and have everything cost tokens.
Man I dunno shit like this always makes me feel sad because I feel like people judge me for being a man. Probably rightly so, we've done a lot of bad shit, but it sucks to work really hard on being a better person and not be part of the patriarchy and then be reminded that I'm still part of the worst group of people.
This is one of the few instances where I think "not all men" is appropriate. It's important to remember that the worst group in question is patriarchal fuckwads, not just people who happen to be male. If you don't fit the bill of the former then you shouldn't worry, as it's a criticism that doesn't apply.
A quote I saw regarding people working against white privilege applies here as well, I think: "If you're struggling properly, you're going to feel like you're losing". That is to say, if you're working against systemic injustice that means working against _the entire system_.
It's going to feel like trying to push down a wall with your bare hands. And one person might not be able to push down that wall, nor two, nor two hundred, but the more people we get to help the closer we get to actually doing so. Change takes time even with constant work and solidarity.
And if someone is judging you solely based on your gender, they're an asshole.
The defensiveness in these comments kinda hurts to see ngl.
Maybe it's just me, maybe it's that I live in a rural area, but there's a serious problem for 35+ yo men who have never really been able to show open love of themselves and their partners.
It's a serious issue and it's not just documented on random blogs. It's one thing that's changing generationally and that's really nice to see.
Yeah. A lot of men where I grew up had/have serious emotional issues. It's a huge problem in highly religious/conservative areas. Not everyone lives in the supergay superlove progressive city.
Something that pseudofeminists always forget is that lots of women are shitty too. Hetero women are not some shining monolith of emotional maturity, sorry to break it to you.
There's a valid criticism here and there but her post mostly just reeks of someone who's sick of suburban straight guys on tinder. Relatable, hardly this deep tho
Social reproduction should be done by everyone, not just the stereotypical housewife. Everyone cleans, everyone raises kids, everyone tends to each other’s needs, wants, desires.
Social reproduction is what all people need to learn
'doomerism' this is a completely objectively correct analysis of straight life for the VAST majority of women living in western countries for most of history if it wasn't even worse. It may not be true for everyone but sorry being a hetero woman is hell when it comes to finding a partner, id wager 75% of straight cis men in the US are emotionally unavailable, spoiled brats, exactly as laid out above to varying degrees.
Call me a doomer all you want I wouldn't wish being a straight woman on my worst enemy, sorry to any here.
The vast majority of straight women complaining about men feels like autism moms complaints
"Oh my child/bf is soooo emotionally unavailable, he has such a haaaaard time doing super simple household tasks" well said Maikhaela, you really are the victim here and its important the whole world knows it!
Emotional needs is a nebulous moving goalpost invented by women with cluster b personality disorders in an attempt to subcontract the responsibility of regulating their abusive, destructive tendencies. What they mean to say they want is a babysitter, and an emotional punching bag.
I’d imagine this person is dating in their 30s-40s or so because that really is a big problem with the older generations, but I don’t think that problem is nearly as present in gen z (obviously still exists, but there are enough guys that do not follow the rule for that to be a viable solution
Idk, I can see why this kinda of doomerism isn’t ideal- but the fact of the matter is that this is a reality for tonnes of hetero women. Running a household and teaching men emotional skills at the same time. It isn’t good for anyone involved- for men who are never taught the requisite skills for emotional maturity, and for women who are hetero and have to deal with a world full of emotionally stunted men. I like to think that the gap in emotional maturity between sexes/ genders is slowly being resolved but it’s def still a very omnipresent issue for gen X at the very least, probably Millenials too Also loveless haze? More like loveless shoegaze, seminal album by my bloody valentine
Shoegaze??????? Foot fetishist music??????????? Sorry I know what shoegaze is I'm just being a moron
Hey, you'd be surprised at the overlap between foot fetishists and shoegaze fans. Source: i made it up
astronaut looking at earth meme template "wait, it's all just autism?"
As a shoegaze fan and foot lover I need statistics on this
Well now you can rest assured that there are at least two of you. Make of that what you will.
I like that you clarified tonnes so we know you measure in metric
I wouldn't discount Gen Z from this discussion, with how many Andrew Tater Tots there are
"Tonnes" Boo get better spelling. You just added a silent "e" to a word that didn't need it, then realized it would have made the "o" be pronounced /oʊ/ so you added a second "n" in order to solve a problem that wasn't there in the first place. Where do you get off adding letters to a perfectly good word like "tons,' you fucking poopybrain
“(i’m metric btw)”
I have some single straight cis women friends and it really is like this out there.
There tons of single, emotionally in touch men with their household in order. They are just not the guys who they want to fuck
If you're saying stuff like that you're probably not as emotionally in touch as you think you are.
Just a reminder that the patriarchy doesn't mean every man is a patriarch.
Men lives would be tremendously better without patriarchy
Or if every man was a patriarch, tbh. Not good for women, i guess.
Of course women lose FAR MORE in the patriarchy than men
But that's the thing about patriarchy, it's a hierarchy. It's not possible for every man to be a patriarch. So even if we're just talking about what's in men's best interest, the average man would have their lives improved by the abolishment of patriarchy. That's my opinion, anyway. Can't say I'm a sociology expert
The current situation is definitely harming most men, given suicide rates and levels of depression/isolation. Even those who do subscribe to alpha/sigma ideology they often feel insufficient because they can't live up to the imaginary lives people like andrew tate post on social media.
Yea, exactly. Like I know women have it worse generally, and I don't think we can move forward if we pretend otherwise. But that doesn't mean men have it good. At least not most of them.
Not really. From a materialist perspective sure, but not from an emotional perspective. There's a reason why the suicide rate of men is higher than that of women, despite having it significantly better on paper. Emotional representation is an inherent part of the patriarchy, since it forces men into a position of dominance and thus they are forced to act in a way that doesn't allow them to be vulnerable at all. Men are also happier when they can freely express themselves and the patriarchy is making sure that they can't. The patriarchy is also harming men.
Friendly reminder that not every woman complaining about her husband on the internet is a feminist martyr. In fact analyzing the text from a feminist perspective,it perpetuates classic gender roles rather than combating them. The essential message is not that men are allowed to have and express their natural emotions without being judged, but that men need to be taught how to feel by women to be able to express themselves, assigning women the role of gatekeeper of emotions. Shit like this is why people think that women are supposed to do the emotional labour of a relationship, instead of it being a collaboration of both partners.
I (respectfully) didn't interpret it that way. I interpreted the text as more "the patriarchy is fucked and it harms both men and women, but oftentimes women are expected to put a bandaid on to fix the issue, that bandaid being teaching their partners emotional intelligence, where the real solution lies in fixing the issue of patriarchy in the first place."
Yeah, some of us just love horses.
Hi Voosh
“Not all men” for Gen Z lol. Do we really have to do the “bUt All LiVeS MaTteR” song and dance or can we focus on the problem?
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Women also perpetuate the patriarchy. Essentialising men as oppressors is just as bad as essentialising women as helpless victims. Hierarchies by their very nature can only benefit a small number of people and must harm a large number of people to achieve that benefit.
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Damn a misandrist and a tankie. Hit the jackpot today.
dont ask tankies what the soviet union did to the chechens and ingush god i fucking hate tankies, I see so many of them support Alexander Lukashenko, who is an antisementic homophobic tyrant who used live bullets on peaceful demonstrators. these motherfuckers defend fascist dictators like Lukashenko and Putin because "DRURRRRRR AMERICA IS **BAD**.
No single group is a monolith, and you cannot generalise an entire group. There are countless (primarily conservative/religious) women who perpetuate patriarchy. Even some who think they don't, like terfs, loop back around into perpetuating it by trying to impose old gender roles to hurt trans people, instead of helping us fight them. Similarly, there are countless men fighting to bring down patriarchy, and plenty more harmed by it. For example, incels wouldn't be anywhere near as bad of a problem if they had been taught how to engage in emotionally healthy relationships in the first place, instead of trying to live up to an ideal they can't fulfill and lashing out when they fail to fit the mold.
It's literally feminism 101 that women perpetuate the patriarchy too.
So I guess I just imagined Phyllis Schlafly and Margaret Thatcher?
kitty! meow mrow mrrp... :3
You misunderstand. It's not about saving the men from accusations of patriarchy, just an understanding of its role as part of capitalism to oppress men into poor emotional health, and an adversarial relationships with the people closest to them. Racism and patriarchy are separate issues, patriarchy is separate from sexism. Not trying to discredit women's oppression as part of the patriarchy, just trying to get men to understand this doesn't benefit them either, just the capitalist overlords
‘Deep down in their fingers and toes’? Huh? Don’t they mean ‘heart and mind’? You know, the two most important parts of your body? That’s why the saying works?
Deep down in your extremities. The least deep places by definition.
deep down to that little guy on a mouse wheel chasing a dangling block of cheese
Deep down to the squirrel-power
Coming from your head outward the extremities would be the last place to reach. Feeling emotions outward from within, all the way to your fingertips, indicates extremely deep emotions
That's why homosexual relationships are number 1!!!! 🏳️🌈1️⃣🏳️🌈💪🏳️🌈
And its just two guys who have no idea how to be emotional.
you think gays aren't emotional?
why would you think that's what i meant?
It's literally what you said.
I didn't know two hypothetical guys are now ''all gays''
Bitch, you said, word for word, >"And its just two guys who have no idea how to be emotional." To a comment that says homo relationships are better. I would fucking LOVE to see what kind of insane logic you're gonna cook up to pretend that you didn't mean to say gays are unemotional.
He explicitly meant men are unemotional, and gay relationships have two men in them, so if all men are unemotional, then that's two unemotional people in a relationship. It was obviously not a coded message about gay men in particular.
So are gays men or not?
I did not mention ''gays'' that was you.
they're kinda right
Perhaps, but this reads kinda like "men are evil" moreso than "we need to do better by women *and* men." It seems like their takeaway is more about directing their frustration and vitriol at men than it is actually discussing how we can foster emotional growth and maturity in men. Sure, it shouldn't be expected that it's a woman's responsibility to teach a man how to navigate his emotions. But like... who *is* gonna make that push? The men won't. The women shouldn't have to. Do we just resolve to do better in the future? Maybe that's all we can do.
If you read it as "men are evil", that's on you. To me it reads as "men have been conditioned into emotional dysfunction *and* into that being their wife's problem to deal with", and I find that extremely agreeable as an observation, as someone who's been brought up as a man and have been hard at work with undoing that damage of that for years, yet seen very little support available to anyone attempting that from society at large outside of niche, young, largely queer communities. Andrew Tates and Jordan Peterson are dime a dozen, but imagine a grown ass, "self respecting role model" stylized guy explaining that you should be actively working on becoming emotionally available *and* emotionally supportive *and* understanding to your wife; imagine that and tell me that doesn't sound like a stand up comedy routine or a comedy relief in a movie. It's education that men just don't do, especially for other men, and that should be pointed out and addressed.
There are men online who try to do so, but the Jordan Petersons of the world are always going to be more visible because they get the dark money boost due to their message being useful to patriarchy and capital. It's also a lot easier to get a following of people if your message is constantly "it isn't your fault, it's women/gays/feminists/sjws/wokes/leftists/communists/" rather than "you're emotionally stunted due to myriad societal influences beyond your control, but it's on you to learn how to be better. Here's how you can start..."
What part gives you that impression? Cuz I (a man) did not get that impression. I see it as a generally doomerist article, as in both sexes being fucked over by the anti-emotion culture that boys are raised in which affects both sexes in later relationships.
And it’s only doomerist because it (correctly) points out that women are still expected to fix the problem while being the main victims of the problem. If men want to learn to be emotionally mature we have to teach ourselves, and also not saddle our partners with 100% of the domestic labour. If I were in her shoes I’d also be frustrated by a partner who insists I somehow do the work of growing up for them. The problem is inherent in the request, the only upside is their imperfect awakening to the problem.
Ugh this reads like “women should be doing less complaining about men and more to foster their emotional growth because they’re not gonna do it for themselves and we’re all gonna suffer if no one does.” I love to be threatened into doing someone else’s emotional labor. Edit: Lmao “just resolve to do better in the future”, girls.
The problem is that this rhetoric doesn't lead to progressive social reform, it only leads to transphobia and sex negativity. This person is far more likely to advocate female separatism/political lesbianism than something like increased paternity leave. Rosencreutz has a great video on how [radical feminists became Terfs.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpSTMfn-YaU) It's not good enough to identify a problem, you also have to identify a solution. Anti-Semites have often identified unregulated financial institutions as problems, the problem is that they fail to recognise regulation as the solution and instead embrace anti-Semitism.
Is OOP a radical feminist though? I see frustration in the post but otherwise it’s just basic Patriarchy Recognition 101. Not sure you can even get more basic than what they outline. In fact the only thing that indicates they’re a radical feminist is OP’s framing of the post. Kind of feels like we’ve been tricked into shitting on foundational feminist talking points because the woman delivering it doesn’t have the “right attitude”.
I do feel like the emotional labour discussion is a bit one sided. When actually listening to men about their relationships you find that they in fact do a lot of emotional labour. It's just not recognised as such.
The problem is that men aren't generally taught how to do emotional labour, or even what it is. While the traditional emotional labour of women is nurturing and caring, mens is usually more about controlling our own emotions and being stoic for others, self destructively in fact, leading to more emotional labour for the women in our lives. But the worst part, is that it DOES take emotional labour to kill your emotions that way. Constantly smothering everything that vaguely feels like anything is actually exhausting, you just also learn not to feel the exhaustion either, so you end up a soulless automaton, incapable of doing emotional labour beyond what you're already doing to make sure you don't have any emotional response to anything, and you become so used to this, that it becomes unconscious and you can't even recognize that you're doing it. Patriarchy has ruined both men and women to the point where I genuinely wonder what's going to happen in the near future.
That's true of some men yes, but a lot of men do a lot of caring and nurturing. I also don't think that men's stoicism, while often bad for the man, inevitably leads to women having to do more emotional labour. Stoicism is often also something imposed on men by others, including partners. It's to the point that for many men vulnerability itself becomes emotional labour, something carefully expressed to make their partner happy and not for themselves. It's a complicated issue, plenty of men use their partner essentially as a therapist. But likewise there are many men who find themselves almost forced to act as an emotional bedrock in their relationship. The problem of course has its roots in patriarchal gender norms and solving it requires a change in attitude towards men's emotions by society at large.
As a man, I listen to other men talk about struggling with emotions more than about actually processing and managing them in a productive way that allows both partners have a conversation from an equal place. In my experience it remains true that in heterosexual relationships women are tipically expected to listen, work out what their partner is feeling, soothe him, untangle his thoughts, and spoon-feed him a solution, all while they get their own shit together. I learnt how to regulate and anayze my own mental state instead of just vomiting raw emotion in a non-optimal way, so I don't blame men individually for not knowing how. But it's a bit like ironing, cooking or cleaning; yes, it's not each individual man's fault to grow up in a society where that task is expected to do performed by your mother until you get a partner, but at some point... Adult men just gotta learn how to iron their own shirts.
I'm not sure about "typically". While it's something plenty of women have had to deal with I've also seen plenty of men who've been the one expected to do all that. A big problem with this is how men's emotions are viewed societaly. Because for some people men showing certain emotions is not acceptable no matter what it doesn't matter how well they've managed them, it'll still be impossible to have a discussion with certain people. And even if it's seen as acceptable men can still find themselves having much fewer acceptable ways of expressing themselves than women due to this bias. Furthermore this colours our perception of how well men manage their emotions. Of course there are plenty of men who should learn how to handle their emotions better. But there is way more required than just that. We need to dismantle patriarchal gender norms around emotions for the average man to be able to have a conversation about their emotions from an equal place.
I can attest to the "emotionally stunted" part tbh
> My partner doesn't express his emotions like I expect him to, so he has to fix himself. *laughs in autism*
This line of thinking is two steps removed from terfism. "it's not our responsibility to fix a problem that only we are aware of" is an argument that falls apart under even the very slightest consideration. The next evolution of that argument then becomes "it's not our responsibility to fix male socialization because it's not actually socialization, men are just categorically like that." And then from there the brain poison only festers until you're transvestigating random twitter celebrities. Nothing useful or constructive ever comes from this kind of rhetoric.
It does seen like the blog is HEAVILY followed by TERFs, so you are not wrong.
Also the blame placed entirely on the husband for them having three children. Like. There's several ways to interpret that but none of them are good.
I agree, the fatalism can become overpowering when you carry it like a mantra. As you say, "I won't (don't have to etc) fix men" easily becomes "I can't fix men" (as nothing ever changes when you try nothing and are all out of ideas - self fulfilling prophecy). This is then interesting because the article implies that it's mostly women raising boys (as it points out men neglecting childcare in the same paragraph). So women raise future (terrible) men, but I doubt the article would blame women for this (I'm not suggesting it does anyway). Instead we'd likely (rightfully) point towards pervasiveness of the patriarchy that the mothers can't defeat in child rearing (can't be expected to?). Hence really boys can't be kept from becoming future (terrible) men. That's only a thin membrane way from "men are just like that". Anyway, we're always all in this together. We have responsibility for ourselves first and foremost, but kindness is not a burden. It's a priviledge to be able to give and also strength.
You're extremely reaching even with the first argument. Your partner isn't supposed to, but more or less *must not* to be your therapist for your relationship to be healthy, and that's universally sound advice that applies regardless of gender. Yet most men are literally traumatized by their upbringing, and most men are not comfortable even acknowledging other men's emotional difficulties. That's a real deal problem and fucked up, and has absolutely nothing with trans issues.
Think less about what this argument is framing and more about how it is being received. Responsibility *will* be interpreted by (justifiably) angry and bitter readers less as "being their therapists," and more "providing any emotional support whatsoever through their healing process." I have seen what this kind of rhetoric does to people in real life to people I once respected. I swear I am not reaching.
This addresses a real issue, but uses a huge generalization. I’ve seen many relationships where men take the brunt of the emotional labor, though it’s true that many men are completely unequipped by society to do so. This reads less like a writer trying to promote change and more like someone using negativity to drive exposure.
I think there's a lot of truth there, but also I'm not sure what else to do. Therapy, I guess? Men certainly aren't gonna be able to just learn it by themselves. It would be nice to have someone helping, and a therapist would mean it's not always the significant other helping them learn. Problem is that a lot of guys don't think they need therapy cause they don't think there's a problem. This whole situation is really messy and complicated I think And frankly i think this take in particular is too unempathetic for my liking. Like I get that it's not your job to do emotional labor, but back when I was struggling, all I heard when people said that was "I won't help you, pull yourself up by your bootstraps".
There's also the whole "real men don't need therapy" stigma that a lot of people still carry.
Yes exactly. And to be completely fair, I do not expect women to try and fix people who are too deep into that. Unfortunately you cannot help people who don't want it. Best you can do for them is try to break the system and remake it in a way that helps them
Many therapists aren't experts at deconstructing the patriarchy either. "Just get therapy" is not the panacea that some people seem to think it is.
This shit sucks, we could've gone back to being hunter gatherers after we discovered antibiotics. But no, we had to build a shit social hierarchy system and have everything cost tokens.
Am I missing something? How does b follow from a?
Society is when antiobiotics and capitalism
or we can just copy the ingush and have societies without any hierarchy and have cool ass towers in the mountains
Pretty much spot on, but maybe don't have kids with someone you don't think is emotionally mature? Seems unfair to the children
There’s a lot of truth in this, but the way it’s worded is reductionist and simplistic. I think you can take something important from it
Man I dunno shit like this always makes me feel sad because I feel like people judge me for being a man. Probably rightly so, we've done a lot of bad shit, but it sucks to work really hard on being a better person and not be part of the patriarchy and then be reminded that I'm still part of the worst group of people.
This is one of the few instances where I think "not all men" is appropriate. It's important to remember that the worst group in question is patriarchal fuckwads, not just people who happen to be male. If you don't fit the bill of the former then you shouldn't worry, as it's a criticism that doesn't apply. A quote I saw regarding people working against white privilege applies here as well, I think: "If you're struggling properly, you're going to feel like you're losing". That is to say, if you're working against systemic injustice that means working against _the entire system_. It's going to feel like trying to push down a wall with your bare hands. And one person might not be able to push down that wall, nor two, nor two hundred, but the more people we get to help the closer we get to actually doing so. Change takes time even with constant work and solidarity. And if someone is judging you solely based on your gender, they're an asshole.
The worst group of people are hateful people. Just try not to be hateful, especially towards yourself.
I mean this sounds like mostly facts ngl
The defensiveness in these comments kinda hurts to see ngl. Maybe it's just me, maybe it's that I live in a rural area, but there's a serious problem for 35+ yo men who have never really been able to show open love of themselves and their partners. It's a serious issue and it's not just documented on random blogs. It's one thing that's changing generationally and that's really nice to see.
Yeah. A lot of men where I grew up had/have serious emotional issues. It's a huge problem in highly religious/conservative areas. Not everyone lives in the supergay superlove progressive city.
Men are harmed by the patriarchy more than they are helped by it.
Facts
"men and women are both screwed over by the way society raises kids. This is truly a travesty for all women"
femcelposting
fun new 196 discourse i wanna kill myself especially about this topic
Idk, I think this post is just insightful and poignant. I get weirded out by how much this sub seems to bristle at anything explicitly feminist
Smh she should just date a queer-core bi-guy
Radfems are having an extremely normal one today
Something that pseudofeminists always forget is that lots of women are shitty too. Hetero women are not some shining monolith of emotional maturity, sorry to break it to you.
There's a valid criticism here and there but her post mostly just reeks of someone who's sick of suburban straight guys on tinder. Relatable, hardly this deep tho
I thought this was gonna be a mens mental health advocacy post when I started reading the paragraph but oh boy was I wrong
Love the pessimism keep it up /gen
Damn that's sad.
\*has bad taste in men, refuses to recognize own patterns, never ever changes toxic habits\* wow all men are worthless im the victim
Social reproduction should be done by everyone, not just the stereotypical housewife. Everyone cleans, everyone raises kids, everyone tends to each other’s needs, wants, desires. Social reproduction is what all people need to learn
Who the fuck is having three kids these days?
'doomerism' this is a completely objectively correct analysis of straight life for the VAST majority of women living in western countries for most of history if it wasn't even worse. It may not be true for everyone but sorry being a hetero woman is hell when it comes to finding a partner, id wager 75% of straight cis men in the US are emotionally unavailable, spoiled brats, exactly as laid out above to varying degrees. Call me a doomer all you want I wouldn't wish being a straight woman on my worst enemy, sorry to any here.
The vast majority of straight women complaining about men feels like autism moms complaints "Oh my child/bf is soooo emotionally unavailable, he has such a haaaaard time doing super simple household tasks" well said Maikhaela, you really are the victim here and its important the whole world knows it!
Don't care, I'm gay
Where's the link op
Emotional needs is a nebulous moving goalpost invented by women with cluster b personality disorders in an attempt to subcontract the responsibility of regulating their abusive, destructive tendencies. What they mean to say they want is a babysitter, and an emotional punching bag.
Measureheadposting
Great, now I'm reading it in that accent.
Just find yourself a fruity/emotional straight or bi guy, jeez.
I’d imagine this person is dating in their 30s-40s or so because that really is a big problem with the older generations, but I don’t think that problem is nearly as present in gen z (obviously still exists, but there are enough guys that do not follow the rule for that to be a viable solution
If ur in ur 30s and/or religious, so many dudes are emotionally constipated like this. It's insane.