This is why I continue to champion the dismantling of patriarchy. I will showcase what accessing feminine traits looks like. I will continue to teach how patriarchy impacts and limits men. I will continue to support lgbtq+ rights who exemplify broader expressions of the gender spectrum.
It's a sad thing that the viewpoint of men expressing vulnerability and emotions aside from anger is seen as something along the lines of what is feminine. It's *human* to have emotions and vulnerability! Of all the things that needs the most change....this one is up there.
I completely agree that it’s a shame that men aren’t free to express their vulnerable emotions; however - and I know this won’t be well received here - my experience is that the current state of affairs is at least as much a function of women’s reactions to men’s emotions as it is other men’s. For men, crying or showing sadness in front of a woman is a one-way ticket to the friend zone, at best. Despite what they may say about wanting men to be vulnerable - and most do say it, because they know it’s the “correct” opinion for public consumption - women perceive such displays as weakness, and are disgusted by them at a primal, hard-coded biological level.
Maybe one day men will have the same freedom to express all of their emotions that women do, and won’t have to hide most of them to avoid social and relational penalties and precipitous drops in their status in the eyes of women. But I have a feeling that that’s thousands of additional years of evolution away.
Source: personal experience with a number of women who I otherwise consider high quality. Partly my fault for believing them when they said they wanted less stoicism from me. Current fashions just don’t stand a chance against instinctual reactions.
The role of "gender norms enforcement good squad member" is at least as likely to be played by a woman as by a man.
Do you remember the ending of the movie "Inside Out", when after having spent the movie wanting Riley to stay happy, Joy tells Sadness to take control, and Riley starts crying and admitting to her parents how miserable she's been since they moved? And it was a moving scene, showing that, among other things, Joy now understands the purpose of Sadness: showing people that you need help.
Now imagine that Riley was an 11-year-old *boy* having that same breakdown. It doesn't quite feel the same, does it?
Why are you so sure that men's aversion to/fear of expressing vulnerability is socially imposed, but women's aversion to seeing men express vulnerability is "at a primal, hard-coded biological level?"
Women are shaped and molded from childhood by society at large, and especially their parents, families and social environment, just like men are.
It's ugly to assume that women are "instinctual" and controlled by "biology," whereas men are reacting to social pressure. I doubt that you mean to do it, but you're basically saying that women are animals and men are human, so if men want women to respect and desire them, they HAVE to appeal to some kind of "primal, hard-coded biological" animal instinct that women are controlled by.
“Why are you so sure that men's aversion to/fear of expressing vulnerability is socially imposed, but women's aversion to seeing men express vulnerability is "at a primal, hard-coded biological level?"
Because I’ve seen it play out that way for the nearly five decades in which I’ve been upright & sentient. There’s a social cost to men for expressing vulnerable emotions in most situations, and when expressing them to women in relationships, there’s often (if not usually) a relational penalty. So men learn to keep their emotions to themselves. I’m sure there are exceptions, but generally speaking, I’m not seeing how this is controversial.
“It's ugly to assume that women are ‘instinctual’ and controlled by ‘biology,’ whereas men are reacting to social pressure.”
It would only be ugly if you chose to assign value judgments to those two different reactions and decided one was somehow worse than the other. I simply described what I’ve observed and experienced. If I sounded harsher towards women, it’s probably because my experiences of being told by women that I should be more vulnerable, and then becoming the object of their disgust when I believed them and actually did so, were extraordinarily frustrating and outright betrayals of trust.
With other men, it’s sort of a given that you normally don’t bring up or express those emotions (outside of a setting like a men’s therapy group, at least), so there’s at least a consistency there in that men in general aren’t telling each other to open up but then subjecting the ones who do to shame and disgust. We assume that’s the reaction we’d get from other guys and act accordingly. It’s not ideal, but there are no surprises.
“…you're basically saying that women are animals and men are human, so if men want women to respect and desire them, they HAVE to appeal to some kind of ‘primal, hard-coded biological’ animal instinct that women are controlled by.”
To conclude that I’m saying women are animals and men are human based on my observations of a single facet of interaction between men and women is
a huge, unsupported leap. I’ll leave it at that. But the other part of the bit quoted above, which I accept as an accurate paraphrase of or possibly corollary to something I said, seems so obvious that I genuinely can’t imagine what your objection to it could be. And to be clear, it works both ways; i.e. men and women both have to appeal to each others’ animal instincts to attract each other. That’s what attraction largely is. We might be able to rationally explain part of what attracts us to a particular person, but that person got our lizard brain’s attention first. Usually. I’m sure there are exceptions to everything I’ve said. And I would understand if you were to say that I’m generalizing too broadly from my own experiences. No one has to agree with me. But I flatter myself that I’m decent at observing patterns, and these are the patterns I see.
I agree with you. Men don't know how to express, and sometimes women don't know how to receive and support or validate men's emotions. But is the behaviour to view it as a weakness pressure from society, do you think? Are both parties subject to the whims and wants of some over-arching 'other'?
I share your hope--but also hope that is' not *that* far away! Fifty to seventy years, tops ;)
No, I agree with you about current fashions as opposed to instinctual reactions. I held the same belief for a long time--that women would be turned away from me for expressing emotions, save one--but I was proven wrong by my partner, who encouraged me to be more open and vulnerable.
“But is the behaviour to view it as a weakness pressure from society, do you think? Are both parties subject to the whims and wants of some over-arching 'other'?”
I’m very late replying to this, but here’s what I think, for what it’s worth given that I have no more actual knowledge on the subject than anyone else and am relying mostly on impressions formed through personal observation.
I think the human disgust reaction, regardless of the stimulus is that’s causing it, is purely automatic and while it can be stifled to one limited degree or another once it’s felt (more easily and to greater extents the more repeated the exposure), it’s a lizard-brain phenomenon. I think most women experience this instinctual reaction when a man expresses vulnerable emotions like fear, sadness, grief, etc. and since they aren’t exposed to it much and thus don’t get much practice tamping down the visceral reaction it provokes in them, the disgust is obvious to the man, who now feels shame on top of whatever emotion he was expressing to begin with.
My intention is not to blame women or imply that there’s something wrong with them. I think women believe it intellectually when they say men should be just as free as women to express the whole range of human emotions. But I think there’s a clear dissonance between that idea in their heads and the physical “ewwww” feeling they get when a man actually does.
None of that actually answers your question though. I agree that societal influence goes a long way towards explaining why people explain away male emotional expression as a sign of weakness, but I think that explanation arose as a way to explain the primal disgust reaction, which has always been there first.
I understand what you're saying, and yep--the instinctual reaction response is a hard thing to beat. Although...I think women are more prone to express this sort of thing because they're sort of...raised to? expected to? in a way. No, I don't blame them either--we're all guiltless to what society puts us up to to an extent.
It makes me wonder, for example, about a prevalent example--Tolkien's writing, particularly with Aragorn. Throughout the books, many men will openly express themselves with bare emotions. I wonder what the overall response was, and if it was seen as a breakthrough at the time? Surely society can't've been so stringent for SO many years....but I don't know.
I think this is a great counter-point to bring up - even though I disagree with your conclusions. Please take this reply with full respect to your intellectual argument and personal experience. If I understand correctly, you are arguing that there is a biological hard-wired disgust reaction from women who experience men showing vulnerable emotions - crying, sadness etc. I assume; and therefore, this is why heterosexual men hide these feelings from the world - particularly romantic partners.
I think it is important to validate your experience of women’s reactions to your feelings, as something that a good number of men anecdotally report and many, many men fear deeply. However, I think it is a stretch to generalise this to a universal. My experience is the opposite, I regularly cry in front of my wife - and vice versa - and we are closer because of it. But I have known women who were quite open about their disgust and dismissal of male vulnerability- I have to say they all had significant issues, mainly a high valuation of masculine coded values that seemed to originate from their father.
I guess for your hypothesis to be proved correct we would have to find empirical evidence, perhaps measuring unconscious and involuntary disgust markers - similar studies have been used to look at unconscious racial bias. I haven’t seen studies around your hypothesis but they could exist.
I would also dig into what you mean by “biologically hard-wired”. Our brains are plastic and hence constantly developing, although most of the big work gets done in childhood of course. Our personalities seem mostly settled by our mid twenties but obviously significant experiences can change that. Social and cultural norms will be internalised early on in childhood, and this will become hard-wired in our brains. In this way, memes (cultural units of information) can affect gene expression - in what neurones get wired together etc. So, in this sense what women (and men) learn in society at a young age is biologically encoded and hard-wired.
However, I suspect you meant a more evolutionary genetic kind of hard-wiring. Like an instinctual startle reaction to a sudden loud noise. Well, the problem with this is that firstly we would have to find evidence for a survival or reproductive advantage for carrying the trait of disgust at male vulnerability- a “just so” story could be that vulnerable men signal a lesser genetic fitness but this would just be a story. But then we could easily make up a story that argues the other way. There are other complex reasons why traits hang around in natural selection too - e.g. that they are advantageous in some circumstances not in others, are neutral, they represent the extreme of an advantageous trait or represent a trade-off (birds with long wings are less agile but can glide further so they tend to find a mean for different species).
One thing I would say is that we have basically found no [edit: very few] traits that are 100% genetic or environmental. Height is up there but still has an around 30% environmental component. Behavioural traits like intelligence, mental illnesses etc. are much lower. The more idiosyncratic behaviour the lower the heritability. I think we have strong reasons to doubt disgust at male vulnerability is evolutionary or instinctual.
What I think is biologically hard-wired in both an evolutionary and neurobiological sense is attachment. I won’t do justice to this massive psychological topic, but essentially it is the effort of an infant who is completely helpless and dependent on caregivers to ensure their survival by doing everything they can to foster and protect that connection - attachment - to the caregivers. The various patterns in attachment have big implications for our romantic and personal relationships as adults. You will probably have heard of secure, anxious, avoidant etc. attachment types.
Humans need connection to survive - we evolved in small groups, and even today in mass society our survival from our basic needs as infants, to the labour that goes into the production of every good and service we need in adulthood - we depend on others. The way manage this is our attachment style and it tends to be set in early development.
This is relevant to your experiences. What we think as children (and then this is carried through into adulthood) will threaten or compromise our attachment is automatically hidden and becomes shameful - because it is connected to our survival and then our successful reproduction. When a father (or mother) tells their young son “boys don’t cry, don’t be such a wuss, walk it off”. The son internalises the message “sadness is not okay, I will be shunned if I show it, ultimately if I am sad it means I’m weak and that makes me unlovable.” Even if this isn’t true for the parent, the message will be internalised.
If a woman grows up idolising their hyper-masculine father they might look for a partner that reflects the traits in their father that they unconsciously admired as a girl. A man that secretly feels un-masculine might look for this type of woman to help sure up his masculinity - “she only goes for super masculine guys so if she likes me then I must be super masculine”. I should be clear - I am not/cannot psychoanalyse your experiences, there are many potential roads to a given behaviour, feeling, personality trait etc.
What I am saying is that we are hard-wired to evacuate any parts of ourselves that we think will compromise our attachment, our survival depends on it, but they don’t go away and we feel deep shame about them. This shame might be founded on reality in some relationships, and that must feel awful. Analysis of the patriarchy has shown that women are often the ones defending it and enforcing its rules.
Absolutely! Thanks for the tiktok repost - he nails it. When I taught Women's Lit I brought in a bunch of my male colleagues to explain their experience with masculinity. Football coach, older teachers, younger ones - we all changed that day when they started sharing things they had NEVER told anyone. The loneliness, lack of touch and constant pressure to PROVE they were actually men were heartbreaking. It does suck to be a woman but I get to just be one, I don't have to step up and BE a man in the same way that men have to do in the US. One book that really helped me teach my course was For the Love of Men by Liz Plank. Very curious to see the comments on this great essay!
Did those men, I wonder, also discuss pressure when it comes to being a provider, or living up to the expectation as such? I don't know if the topic is too-often talked about, but in my own experience, it can be quite stressful and crumbling.
They didn't at that time but I know from watching my brother and other male relatives that this pressure is unceasing. And in the dating world as well - men have been getting these subtle and not so subtle messages their whole lives and will often sacrifice their own pursuits to do this supposedly more valiant one of supporting everyone...
I keep coming back to your comment. It says so much. Watching my own spouse go through tremendous personal growth after decades of believing he had to provide—and at the same time letting go of pursuits that I know bring him joy—tells me you’re not alone.
Celeste! Like always, you put into words what I couldn’t. Thank you!
Last week I was having a conversation with my very traditional, conservative brother-in-law about gender inequality in the education system, how more women are getting higher ed degrees than men. He goes, “well I’m pretty sure it’s because of the feminist movement. Those women have made it harder for men and made everything worse, turning men into losers…” (why he thought it was okay to say that to me, a woman and strong feminist, I cannot fathom — but I digress).
I instinctively knew he was wrong but didn’t have the language for how it’s not women’s fault and that’s absurd. Thank you for articulating what I couldn’t, and hopefully I can next time! Not that I think he will change his mind listening to me, one of those damn feminist woman, anyway :)
He didn't blame women, he blamed FEMINISM, the IDEOLOGY of FEMINISM. Your conflation between the two is beyond egregious. And yes, for the record, the education system is unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs. The fact fact that the very notion that boys ARE unique in non-trivial ways is treated with such reactionary hostility is incontrovertible proof of the blatant dehumanization boys are systematically subjected to, as if the only valid way TO BE HUMAN is to NOT BE MALE. And presumably the reason he thought it "was okay" to say what he said to you is because he assumed himself to be in a position of interacting with you AS AN EQUAL, and thus felt no prejudicial compunction about expressing his AUTHENTIC thoughts to you (however right or wrong you might feel they are, he probably expected you to be capable of navigating your disagreement with his perspective like a competent adult).
"the education system is unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs"
The entire concept of Western education, starting around a thousand years ago, was built exclusively for and around boys. Girls were not allowed in school.
The basic structure of the classroom, where students are required to sit quietly, listen to the teacher, raise a hand for permission to speak, do their assignments legibly and on-time, was structured for BOYS ONLY. Since girls were not permitted to go to school, it's absurd to claim that any of the basic expectations of Western-style education are somehow biased in favor of girls.
To claim that NOW, after at least a millenium of boys-only schooling and education and maybe 100+ years of girls being allowed in schools in Western Europe and the US, the structure of classroom education INVENTED EXCLUSIVELY FOR BOYS is suddenly "unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs" because girls are doing better than they are, is ridiculous.
Oh, by the way -- the "ideology of feminism" is simply that women are human, and equal in value, dignity and ability to men. That's the entire thing, right there.
Yes. That is the argument and the research findings. There is NOW a clear gender bias against boys since women now dominate the profession. Moreover, the sit still and pay attention method was never conducive to boys which is why much of educational activity throughout history also emphasized physical activity. In the US, recess and PE have been on the chopping block, leaving most boys with a lot of unspent energy.
Does that negate feminist goals? No. It’s simply stating that boys are harmed in the current atmosphere. To say otherwise is to invalidate men’s experience.
You are 100% right when you say "In the US, recess and PE have been on the chopping block, leaving most boys with a lot of unspent energy," except I would add that it's terrible for ALL kids. The loss of PE, recess and other active pursuits has been a disaster for boys AND girls. Children need exercise; they need to run and play.
But the reason recess and PE (and art and music) are all on the chopping block is not because of a feminist conspiracy against boys! It's because of a right-wing conspiracy against public education, and the tyranny of standardized testing (used by conservative politicians as a cudgel to cut off funding for schools that don't "achieve" high enough scores).
But -- you say there is "a clear gender bias against boys since women now dominate the profession." SINCE women dominate the profession? As in, women dominating a profession causes boys to be discriminated against?
Do you really mean to say "Women hate little boys, and now that they've taken over teaching, they're deliberately trying to hurt them, because of course they would, the minute they got the chance?"
You do realize that little boys' MOTHERS are women, and they love them very much? I hope yours loved you!
Would you also say there is a clear gender bias against women in professions dominated by men, just "because?" If so, it's quite the admission. and explains a helluva lot about the last, oh, 300 years or so.
No, you are referring to a specific time and place in which education was tailored by a war-loving regime to meet its specifications. Classical Western education dates to far, far before that time, and was intended to cultivate the minds of future nobles, scribes, clergy and other elites, with heavy emphasis on Greek and Latin classical literature and philosophy.
Makes a lot of sense. I've been meaning to write a piece about how men need help. One thing I do notice is that the system of patriarchy exists and continues to thrive not just because of men but also because of women who propagate it. It does offer perks for both genders while insiduously being toxic. The biggest consequence of this is that it inherently makes men lonely. I believe that lacking communities younger men gravitate to some of these bros and their communities online who blame women for everything.
So profound. It never quite clicked to me why men were unhappy in a system they set up, until you delicately pointed out it's a small minority of men running the show. I haven't heard of the Tiktoker you quoted but his content looks amazing!
The presence of a consistent, good male leader, model, and father figure goes a long way for men, as individuals. Especially for boys with absent fathers. Without this, the expectations and norms of “being a man” falls to something like the least common denominator: gangs and tribal displays of prowess. This is the importance of a healthy masculine in any culture. This makes “men as a group” weak. We can get there. Some men are there. Spaces for men to share with each other is an important part of this.
This is exactly why that song “I’m still a guy” by Brad Paisley has always bugged me! He sings about oh I’ll do all this feminine stuff with you but not because I want to. I’m too manly.” It’s so annoying!
Noticed that Michael Kimmel was cited here and was excited. His book "Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era" was my gateway to reframing my feminism to be more inclusive of helping men breakaway from psychological patriarchy.
Once upon a time, I had a lower management job in a company section that nobody cared about. My office was an old supply closet.
I'm a guy. My boss was a guy. On day one, he said I could do whatever I wanted in my section if I didn't cost him money, didn't take up any of his time and, above all, I had to promise that there would be no swearing. I thought that was odd, but I was told later thst his wife was religious. It wasn't a big deal to agree to those rules.
I was not management material - I was a worker-bee. Even though I had experience, I was overwhelmed by my new job. The section was assigned an impossible amount of work that nobody cared about. The structures in place were truly ridiculous and unfocused. Most guys associated with my section were indifferent to me, were working to get out of the company and avoided my broom closet.
Luckily, a few intelligent, experienced women stepped up and engaged with me and the work. They completed their assignments professionally, comprehensively, and on time - always!
Of course, I gave the eager women more assignments and maximum freedom to do their work however they pleased. In turn, this attracted other women to my section.
As a group, we cooperated and got a lot done in a short amount of time. Our female-powered section of the company expanded, and we had fun. It was exciting to go to work—even the guy-guys caught on to the fun, too.
Cut to a year later. Thanks to the women on our crew, our section went from being a joke to a shining star that gave our invisible company an enormous public profile—the local public response to our work dominated corporate communications.
The gruff CEO of the company surprised me with an unannounced visit to my broom closet. He looked around and simply said “continue” and walked out.
My boss enjoyed telling me that some of our competition had called to complain about how we were doing our work and that it was unfair.
The competition didn't know our secret weapon was letting women do their jobs without interference.
I also suspect my boss's wife was our most secret weapon. I never met her, but I always knew she was watching us. How?
One day, my boss called me into the office to tell me his wife heard one of the guys on my crew swear. It was news to me. I asked what was said.
A local fast-food chicken mascot was called the "Chicken from Hell."
I knew my boss wasn't joking. There may have been a family connection to the fast-food joint. I didn't know, and I didn't care. I reminded the crew not to swear. It was the one rule we couldn't break. We all agreed and went back to work.
However, forever after, during meetings, on the street or on a coffee break my crew would always slide in references to the "Chicken from Heck."
They knew it made me nervous. I did not want my boss's wife to feel mocked. I strongly suspected she was championing a path for our crew - all driven by ambitious women.
Many of the women went on to successful careers.
One of the superstars of the crew had previously worked as a grocery checkout clerk. She went on to be a VP of a multi-billion dollar company. A few years ago, she reconnected with me and thanked me in front of friends for sparking her successful career. I got a bit teary.
With the help of my boss's anonymous wife, all I did was get out of the way and let everyone do their work. The women just took to the opportunity with more gusto.
So brilliantly put Celeste thank you & I will immediately be following Cyzor, when/if I sign up for TikTok (yes I'm that old). I often think this when thinking about my nephews, the oldest is about to turn 17 and how hard it must be to be a young man. The patriarchy is only really benefitting a few and dismantling it is about creating a more equitable world rather than pitting women against men.
Thought provoking and very well written. I appreciate your notes at the bottom where you identify your hypotheses and findings are based on ‘white’ men. I do think that race must also enter the conversation because it does affect gender and the patriarchy. Keep enlightening others!
This is why I continue to champion the dismantling of patriarchy. I will showcase what accessing feminine traits looks like. I will continue to teach how patriarchy impacts and limits men. I will continue to support lgbtq+ rights who exemplify broader expressions of the gender spectrum.
Go Arturo go! We are cheering you on 🙌🙌
It's a sad thing that the viewpoint of men expressing vulnerability and emotions aside from anger is seen as something along the lines of what is feminine. It's *human* to have emotions and vulnerability! Of all the things that needs the most change....this one is up there.
I completely agree that it’s a shame that men aren’t free to express their vulnerable emotions; however - and I know this won’t be well received here - my experience is that the current state of affairs is at least as much a function of women’s reactions to men’s emotions as it is other men’s. For men, crying or showing sadness in front of a woman is a one-way ticket to the friend zone, at best. Despite what they may say about wanting men to be vulnerable - and most do say it, because they know it’s the “correct” opinion for public consumption - women perceive such displays as weakness, and are disgusted by them at a primal, hard-coded biological level.
Maybe one day men will have the same freedom to express all of their emotions that women do, and won’t have to hide most of them to avoid social and relational penalties and precipitous drops in their status in the eyes of women. But I have a feeling that that’s thousands of additional years of evolution away.
Source: personal experience with a number of women who I otherwise consider high quality. Partly my fault for believing them when they said they wanted less stoicism from me. Current fashions just don’t stand a chance against instinctual reactions.
The role of "gender norms enforcement good squad member" is at least as likely to be played by a woman as by a man.
Do you remember the ending of the movie "Inside Out", when after having spent the movie wanting Riley to stay happy, Joy tells Sadness to take control, and Riley starts crying and admitting to her parents how miserable she's been since they moved? And it was a moving scene, showing that, among other things, Joy now understands the purpose of Sadness: showing people that you need help.
Now imagine that Riley was an 11-year-old *boy* having that same breakdown. It doesn't quite feel the same, does it?
Why are you so sure that men's aversion to/fear of expressing vulnerability is socially imposed, but women's aversion to seeing men express vulnerability is "at a primal, hard-coded biological level?"
Women are shaped and molded from childhood by society at large, and especially their parents, families and social environment, just like men are.
It's ugly to assume that women are "instinctual" and controlled by "biology," whereas men are reacting to social pressure. I doubt that you mean to do it, but you're basically saying that women are animals and men are human, so if men want women to respect and desire them, they HAVE to appeal to some kind of "primal, hard-coded biological" animal instinct that women are controlled by.
“Why are you so sure that men's aversion to/fear of expressing vulnerability is socially imposed, but women's aversion to seeing men express vulnerability is "at a primal, hard-coded biological level?"
Because I’ve seen it play out that way for the nearly five decades in which I’ve been upright & sentient. There’s a social cost to men for expressing vulnerable emotions in most situations, and when expressing them to women in relationships, there’s often (if not usually) a relational penalty. So men learn to keep their emotions to themselves. I’m sure there are exceptions, but generally speaking, I’m not seeing how this is controversial.
“It's ugly to assume that women are ‘instinctual’ and controlled by ‘biology,’ whereas men are reacting to social pressure.”
It would only be ugly if you chose to assign value judgments to those two different reactions and decided one was somehow worse than the other. I simply described what I’ve observed and experienced. If I sounded harsher towards women, it’s probably because my experiences of being told by women that I should be more vulnerable, and then becoming the object of their disgust when I believed them and actually did so, were extraordinarily frustrating and outright betrayals of trust.
With other men, it’s sort of a given that you normally don’t bring up or express those emotions (outside of a setting like a men’s therapy group, at least), so there’s at least a consistency there in that men in general aren’t telling each other to open up but then subjecting the ones who do to shame and disgust. We assume that’s the reaction we’d get from other guys and act accordingly. It’s not ideal, but there are no surprises.
“…you're basically saying that women are animals and men are human, so if men want women to respect and desire them, they HAVE to appeal to some kind of ‘primal, hard-coded biological’ animal instinct that women are controlled by.”
To conclude that I’m saying women are animals and men are human based on my observations of a single facet of interaction between men and women is
a huge, unsupported leap. I’ll leave it at that. But the other part of the bit quoted above, which I accept as an accurate paraphrase of or possibly corollary to something I said, seems so obvious that I genuinely can’t imagine what your objection to it could be. And to be clear, it works both ways; i.e. men and women both have to appeal to each others’ animal instincts to attract each other. That’s what attraction largely is. We might be able to rationally explain part of what attracts us to a particular person, but that person got our lizard brain’s attention first. Usually. I’m sure there are exceptions to everything I’ve said. And I would understand if you were to say that I’m generalizing too broadly from my own experiences. No one has to agree with me. But I flatter myself that I’m decent at observing patterns, and these are the patterns I see.
I agree with you. Men don't know how to express, and sometimes women don't know how to receive and support or validate men's emotions. But is the behaviour to view it as a weakness pressure from society, do you think? Are both parties subject to the whims and wants of some over-arching 'other'?
I share your hope--but also hope that is' not *that* far away! Fifty to seventy years, tops ;)
No, I agree with you about current fashions as opposed to instinctual reactions. I held the same belief for a long time--that women would be turned away from me for expressing emotions, save one--but I was proven wrong by my partner, who encouraged me to be more open and vulnerable.
“But is the behaviour to view it as a weakness pressure from society, do you think? Are both parties subject to the whims and wants of some over-arching 'other'?”
I’m very late replying to this, but here’s what I think, for what it’s worth given that I have no more actual knowledge on the subject than anyone else and am relying mostly on impressions formed through personal observation.
I think the human disgust reaction, regardless of the stimulus is that’s causing it, is purely automatic and while it can be stifled to one limited degree or another once it’s felt (more easily and to greater extents the more repeated the exposure), it’s a lizard-brain phenomenon. I think most women experience this instinctual reaction when a man expresses vulnerable emotions like fear, sadness, grief, etc. and since they aren’t exposed to it much and thus don’t get much practice tamping down the visceral reaction it provokes in them, the disgust is obvious to the man, who now feels shame on top of whatever emotion he was expressing to begin with.
My intention is not to blame women or imply that there’s something wrong with them. I think women believe it intellectually when they say men should be just as free as women to express the whole range of human emotions. But I think there’s a clear dissonance between that idea in their heads and the physical “ewwww” feeling they get when a man actually does.
None of that actually answers your question though. I agree that societal influence goes a long way towards explaining why people explain away male emotional expression as a sign of weakness, but I think that explanation arose as a way to explain the primal disgust reaction, which has always been there first.
I understand what you're saying, and yep--the instinctual reaction response is a hard thing to beat. Although...I think women are more prone to express this sort of thing because they're sort of...raised to? expected to? in a way. No, I don't blame them either--we're all guiltless to what society puts us up to to an extent.
It makes me wonder, for example, about a prevalent example--Tolkien's writing, particularly with Aragorn. Throughout the books, many men will openly express themselves with bare emotions. I wonder what the overall response was, and if it was seen as a breakthrough at the time? Surely society can't've been so stringent for SO many years....but I don't know.
Men show vulnerability. But nobody listen.
I think this is a great counter-point to bring up - even though I disagree with your conclusions. Please take this reply with full respect to your intellectual argument and personal experience. If I understand correctly, you are arguing that there is a biological hard-wired disgust reaction from women who experience men showing vulnerable emotions - crying, sadness etc. I assume; and therefore, this is why heterosexual men hide these feelings from the world - particularly romantic partners.
I think it is important to validate your experience of women’s reactions to your feelings, as something that a good number of men anecdotally report and many, many men fear deeply. However, I think it is a stretch to generalise this to a universal. My experience is the opposite, I regularly cry in front of my wife - and vice versa - and we are closer because of it. But I have known women who were quite open about their disgust and dismissal of male vulnerability- I have to say they all had significant issues, mainly a high valuation of masculine coded values that seemed to originate from their father.
I guess for your hypothesis to be proved correct we would have to find empirical evidence, perhaps measuring unconscious and involuntary disgust markers - similar studies have been used to look at unconscious racial bias. I haven’t seen studies around your hypothesis but they could exist.
I would also dig into what you mean by “biologically hard-wired”. Our brains are plastic and hence constantly developing, although most of the big work gets done in childhood of course. Our personalities seem mostly settled by our mid twenties but obviously significant experiences can change that. Social and cultural norms will be internalised early on in childhood, and this will become hard-wired in our brains. In this way, memes (cultural units of information) can affect gene expression - in what neurones get wired together etc. So, in this sense what women (and men) learn in society at a young age is biologically encoded and hard-wired.
However, I suspect you meant a more evolutionary genetic kind of hard-wiring. Like an instinctual startle reaction to a sudden loud noise. Well, the problem with this is that firstly we would have to find evidence for a survival or reproductive advantage for carrying the trait of disgust at male vulnerability- a “just so” story could be that vulnerable men signal a lesser genetic fitness but this would just be a story. But then we could easily make up a story that argues the other way. There are other complex reasons why traits hang around in natural selection too - e.g. that they are advantageous in some circumstances not in others, are neutral, they represent the extreme of an advantageous trait or represent a trade-off (birds with long wings are less agile but can glide further so they tend to find a mean for different species).
One thing I would say is that we have basically found no [edit: very few] traits that are 100% genetic or environmental. Height is up there but still has an around 30% environmental component. Behavioural traits like intelligence, mental illnesses etc. are much lower. The more idiosyncratic behaviour the lower the heritability. I think we have strong reasons to doubt disgust at male vulnerability is evolutionary or instinctual.
What I think is biologically hard-wired in both an evolutionary and neurobiological sense is attachment. I won’t do justice to this massive psychological topic, but essentially it is the effort of an infant who is completely helpless and dependent on caregivers to ensure their survival by doing everything they can to foster and protect that connection - attachment - to the caregivers. The various patterns in attachment have big implications for our romantic and personal relationships as adults. You will probably have heard of secure, anxious, avoidant etc. attachment types.
Humans need connection to survive - we evolved in small groups, and even today in mass society our survival from our basic needs as infants, to the labour that goes into the production of every good and service we need in adulthood - we depend on others. The way manage this is our attachment style and it tends to be set in early development.
This is relevant to your experiences. What we think as children (and then this is carried through into adulthood) will threaten or compromise our attachment is automatically hidden and becomes shameful - because it is connected to our survival and then our successful reproduction. When a father (or mother) tells their young son “boys don’t cry, don’t be such a wuss, walk it off”. The son internalises the message “sadness is not okay, I will be shunned if I show it, ultimately if I am sad it means I’m weak and that makes me unlovable.” Even if this isn’t true for the parent, the message will be internalised.
If a woman grows up idolising their hyper-masculine father they might look for a partner that reflects the traits in their father that they unconsciously admired as a girl. A man that secretly feels un-masculine might look for this type of woman to help sure up his masculinity - “she only goes for super masculine guys so if she likes me then I must be super masculine”. I should be clear - I am not/cannot psychoanalyse your experiences, there are many potential roads to a given behaviour, feeling, personality trait etc.
What I am saying is that we are hard-wired to evacuate any parts of ourselves that we think will compromise our attachment, our survival depends on it, but they don’t go away and we feel deep shame about them. This shame might be founded on reality in some relationships, and that must feel awful. Analysis of the patriarchy has shown that women are often the ones defending it and enforcing its rules.
It has nothing to do with patriarchy. The matriarchy won't allow men alternate models to be valued EQUALLY AS WOMEN.
The last 3 words are extremely important.
Absolutely! Thanks for the tiktok repost - he nails it. When I taught Women's Lit I brought in a bunch of my male colleagues to explain their experience with masculinity. Football coach, older teachers, younger ones - we all changed that day when they started sharing things they had NEVER told anyone. The loneliness, lack of touch and constant pressure to PROVE they were actually men were heartbreaking. It does suck to be a woman but I get to just be one, I don't have to step up and BE a man in the same way that men have to do in the US. One book that really helped me teach my course was For the Love of Men by Liz Plank. Very curious to see the comments on this great essay!
Wow that class sounds really powerful- what a cool experience. And yes so many of my essays are sparked from For the Love of Men! Paradigm shifting.
Did those men, I wonder, also discuss pressure when it comes to being a provider, or living up to the expectation as such? I don't know if the topic is too-often talked about, but in my own experience, it can be quite stressful and crumbling.
They didn't at that time but I know from watching my brother and other male relatives that this pressure is unceasing. And in the dating world as well - men have been getting these subtle and not so subtle messages their whole lives and will often sacrifice their own pursuits to do this supposedly more valiant one of supporting everyone...
I wish I'd known earlier as a way to prepare myself.
I keep coming back to your comment. It says so much. Watching my own spouse go through tremendous personal growth after decades of believing he had to provide—and at the same time letting go of pursuits that I know bring him joy—tells me you’re not alone.
Thank you. It’s a silent struggle, and a hard one too. I count myself lucky to have a partner who understands the same as you do.
Celeste! Like always, you put into words what I couldn’t. Thank you!
Last week I was having a conversation with my very traditional, conservative brother-in-law about gender inequality in the education system, how more women are getting higher ed degrees than men. He goes, “well I’m pretty sure it’s because of the feminist movement. Those women have made it harder for men and made everything worse, turning men into losers…” (why he thought it was okay to say that to me, a woman and strong feminist, I cannot fathom — but I digress).
I instinctively knew he was wrong but didn’t have the language for how it’s not women’s fault and that’s absurd. Thank you for articulating what I couldn’t, and hopefully I can next time! Not that I think he will change his mind listening to me, one of those damn feminist woman, anyway :)
He didn't blame women, he blamed FEMINISM, the IDEOLOGY of FEMINISM. Your conflation between the two is beyond egregious. And yes, for the record, the education system is unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs. The fact fact that the very notion that boys ARE unique in non-trivial ways is treated with such reactionary hostility is incontrovertible proof of the blatant dehumanization boys are systematically subjected to, as if the only valid way TO BE HUMAN is to NOT BE MALE. And presumably the reason he thought it "was okay" to say what he said to you is because he assumed himself to be in a position of interacting with you AS AN EQUAL, and thus felt no prejudicial compunction about expressing his AUTHENTIC thoughts to you (however right or wrong you might feel they are, he probably expected you to be capable of navigating your disagreement with his perspective like a competent adult).
"the education system is unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs"
The entire concept of Western education, starting around a thousand years ago, was built exclusively for and around boys. Girls were not allowed in school.
The basic structure of the classroom, where students are required to sit quietly, listen to the teacher, raise a hand for permission to speak, do their assignments legibly and on-time, was structured for BOYS ONLY. Since girls were not permitted to go to school, it's absurd to claim that any of the basic expectations of Western-style education are somehow biased in favor of girls.
To claim that NOW, after at least a millenium of boys-only schooling and education and maybe 100+ years of girls being allowed in schools in Western Europe and the US, the structure of classroom education INVENTED EXCLUSIVELY FOR BOYS is suddenly "unambiguously hostile to boys and their unique developmental needs" because girls are doing better than they are, is ridiculous.
Oh, by the way -- the "ideology of feminism" is simply that women are human, and equal in value, dignity and ability to men. That's the entire thing, right there.
Yes. That is the argument and the research findings. There is NOW a clear gender bias against boys since women now dominate the profession. Moreover, the sit still and pay attention method was never conducive to boys which is why much of educational activity throughout history also emphasized physical activity. In the US, recess and PE have been on the chopping block, leaving most boys with a lot of unspent energy.
Does that negate feminist goals? No. It’s simply stating that boys are harmed in the current atmosphere. To say otherwise is to invalidate men’s experience.
Here’s some basic info: https://aibm.org/why-we-exist/focus-areas/education-skills/
You are 100% right when you say "In the US, recess and PE have been on the chopping block, leaving most boys with a lot of unspent energy," except I would add that it's terrible for ALL kids. The loss of PE, recess and other active pursuits has been a disaster for boys AND girls. Children need exercise; they need to run and play.
But the reason recess and PE (and art and music) are all on the chopping block is not because of a feminist conspiracy against boys! It's because of a right-wing conspiracy against public education, and the tyranny of standardized testing (used by conservative politicians as a cudgel to cut off funding for schools that don't "achieve" high enough scores).
But -- you say there is "a clear gender bias against boys since women now dominate the profession." SINCE women dominate the profession? As in, women dominating a profession causes boys to be discriminated against?
Do you really mean to say "Women hate little boys, and now that they've taken over teaching, they're deliberately trying to hurt them, because of course they would, the minute they got the chance?"
You do realize that little boys' MOTHERS are women, and they love them very much? I hope yours loved you!
Would you also say there is a clear gender bias against women in professions dominated by men, just "because?" If so, it's quite the admission. and explains a helluva lot about the last, oh, 300 years or so.
No, you are referring to a specific time and place in which education was tailored by a war-loving regime to meet its specifications. Classical Western education dates to far, far before that time, and was intended to cultivate the minds of future nobles, scribes, clergy and other elites, with heavy emphasis on Greek and Latin classical literature and philosophy.
Wow. OK. Sorry I triggered you.
I can hear the pain in anguish that wears the mask of blind rage in your writing. I hope you find peace with yourself, as a human and a man.
Yeah, I’m not responding to any of that.
Thanks for this post! You clarified a lot for me on how to explain how patriarchy hurts men too. And thanks for quoting me!
Makes a lot of sense. I've been meaning to write a piece about how men need help. One thing I do notice is that the system of patriarchy exists and continues to thrive not just because of men but also because of women who propagate it. It does offer perks for both genders while insiduously being toxic. The biggest consequence of this is that it inherently makes men lonely. I believe that lacking communities younger men gravitate to some of these bros and their communities online who blame women for everything.
Yes - all very true
So profound. It never quite clicked to me why men were unhappy in a system they set up, until you delicately pointed out it's a small minority of men running the show. I haven't heard of the Tiktoker you quoted but his content looks amazing!
Thanks for writing this article. I believe it should be mandatory reading for everybody.
The presence of a consistent, good male leader, model, and father figure goes a long way for men, as individuals. Especially for boys with absent fathers. Without this, the expectations and norms of “being a man” falls to something like the least common denominator: gangs and tribal displays of prowess. This is the importance of a healthy masculine in any culture. This makes “men as a group” weak. We can get there. Some men are there. Spaces for men to share with each other is an important part of this.
This is exactly why that song “I’m still a guy” by Brad Paisley has always bugged me! He sings about oh I’ll do all this feminine stuff with you but not because I want to. I’m too manly.” It’s so annoying!
"It would be a whole lot easier without patriarchy." Hell, yes.
Noticed that Michael Kimmel was cited here and was excited. His book "Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era" was my gateway to reframing my feminism to be more inclusive of helping men breakaway from psychological patriarchy.
Women were the secret to our success.
Once upon a time, I had a lower management job in a company section that nobody cared about. My office was an old supply closet.
I'm a guy. My boss was a guy. On day one, he said I could do whatever I wanted in my section if I didn't cost him money, didn't take up any of his time and, above all, I had to promise that there would be no swearing. I thought that was odd, but I was told later thst his wife was religious. It wasn't a big deal to agree to those rules.
I was not management material - I was a worker-bee. Even though I had experience, I was overwhelmed by my new job. The section was assigned an impossible amount of work that nobody cared about. The structures in place were truly ridiculous and unfocused. Most guys associated with my section were indifferent to me, were working to get out of the company and avoided my broom closet.
Luckily, a few intelligent, experienced women stepped up and engaged with me and the work. They completed their assignments professionally, comprehensively, and on time - always!
Of course, I gave the eager women more assignments and maximum freedom to do their work however they pleased. In turn, this attracted other women to my section.
As a group, we cooperated and got a lot done in a short amount of time. Our female-powered section of the company expanded, and we had fun. It was exciting to go to work—even the guy-guys caught on to the fun, too.
Cut to a year later. Thanks to the women on our crew, our section went from being a joke to a shining star that gave our invisible company an enormous public profile—the local public response to our work dominated corporate communications.
The gruff CEO of the company surprised me with an unannounced visit to my broom closet. He looked around and simply said “continue” and walked out.
My boss enjoyed telling me that some of our competition had called to complain about how we were doing our work and that it was unfair.
The competition didn't know our secret weapon was letting women do their jobs without interference.
I also suspect my boss's wife was our most secret weapon. I never met her, but I always knew she was watching us. How?
One day, my boss called me into the office to tell me his wife heard one of the guys on my crew swear. It was news to me. I asked what was said.
A local fast-food chicken mascot was called the "Chicken from Hell."
I knew my boss wasn't joking. There may have been a family connection to the fast-food joint. I didn't know, and I didn't care. I reminded the crew not to swear. It was the one rule we couldn't break. We all agreed and went back to work.
However, forever after, during meetings, on the street or on a coffee break my crew would always slide in references to the "Chicken from Heck."
They knew it made me nervous. I did not want my boss's wife to feel mocked. I strongly suspected she was championing a path for our crew - all driven by ambitious women.
Many of the women went on to successful careers.
One of the superstars of the crew had previously worked as a grocery checkout clerk. She went on to be a VP of a multi-billion dollar company. A few years ago, she reconnected with me and thanked me in front of friends for sparking her successful career. I got a bit teary.
With the help of my boss's anonymous wife, all I did was get out of the way and let everyone do their work. The women just took to the opportunity with more gusto.
Reading this has removed a huge load from my shoulders. Thank you Celeste.
So brilliantly put Celeste thank you & I will immediately be following Cyzor, when/if I sign up for TikTok (yes I'm that old). I often think this when thinking about my nephews, the oldest is about to turn 17 and how hard it must be to be a young man. The patriarchy is only really benefitting a few and dismantling it is about creating a more equitable world rather than pitting women against men.
Love Cyzor! He posts most of his did on Instagram as well if you use that more
I've just found him, thanks Stephanie
Been following him on instagram for awhile. 🙌🏼
Thought provoking and very well written. I appreciate your notes at the bottom where you identify your hypotheses and findings are based on ‘white’ men. I do think that race must also enter the conversation because it does affect gender and the patriarchy. Keep enlightening others!