LGBTQIA+ acceptance is the solution feminism has been looking for
For an article with LGBTQIA and feminism in the title, this one is mostly about problematic masculinity--an issue which LGBTQIA+ movements are a lot better at addressing than feminism.
Is the goal of feminism for women to win at patriarchy?
It shouldn’t be, but it often is.
As
explains in her article The Girl Boss is Out:“Corporate feminism maintains hierarchies rather than deconstructing them…. it explains why feminism has felt so inefficient as a movement. The goal of white wealthy women at the top has often been power rather than freedom.”
For the first time in history, more women are educated than men, outnumbering men in undergrad, Master’s degrees and PhDs.
To an unprecedented historical degree, women do not need men to live. Many are choosing to live without them entirely.
The Gloria Steinem in me hates that I’m about to ask this question, but if all the women are liberated, what will the men do?
I’m not asking in a “Oh no! Poor babies! Let’s center men again!” kind of way but in a “Oh shit, the most violent demographic in our society is young single men. What will happen when they are even MORE isolated?” kind of way.
Peel back the onion of war, violence, rape, assault, school shootings and at the core lies the ugly face of toxic masculinity, or rather “masculine discrepancy stress” which
describes so well:“Evidence suggests that it is not innate aggression that makes men violent, but the internalized belief that they fall short of society’s perceived standards for masculinity. Psychologists call this phenomenon, “masculine discrepancy stress” and research shows that the more acutely a man suffers from this, the more likely he is to commit almost every type of violence, including sexual assault, intimate partner violence and assault with a weapon.” - Ruth Whippman
I’m currently reading
’s excellent book For the Love of Men.
She makes the point that politicians should be talking about masculinity every single day given how correlated toxic masculinity is with every pressing issue facing our world (environmentalism, terrorism, nuclear war, prejudice, wealth inequality).1
“There is no greater threat to humankind, than our current definition of masculinity.” - Liz Plank
But instead, if we talk about gender at all, we talk about feminism, and when we talk about feminism, we exclusively talk about women.
We focus programs and policy on decreasing the wage gap2 rather than on promoting positive, healthy masculinity.
Reading Plank’s book, I am struck again and again by just how firmly a boy’s “how to safely navigate the world” compass is stuck on “act masculine.”
This unconscious north star is set so early and never lets up. Kindergarteners making fun of a boy for having a pink back pack. A teacher encouraging the sensitive boy to tough it out. Parents not putting their son in dance class in case he gets made fun of. Little boys ridiculed for running like a girl.
In a million ways, every single day boys and men are encouraged to act masculine. It’s tied to their sense of safety in the world.
This is a video of a man asking why dudes can just paint their nails these days. He says if he painted his nails as a teen, his dad would have kicked him out.
Liz Plank responds with,
“The arc of this video follows every interview I had with men… The beginning sounds bigoted and sexist, putting down anything that is feminine, but then you get to the core of why- which is that the smallest transgression of traditional masculinity, leads to huge, enormous acts of rejection from other men. Often from the men they care the most about.” - Liz Plank
What exactly constitutes the unconscious compass of boys and men? The
posted this helpful note this week:
A man’s sense of safety in the world is at risk unless he performs masculinity.
Ironically, the safety of the world is at risk by men performing masculinity.
Ok so what does queer acceptance have to do with this?
I’m getting there! I’m getting there!
Let’s get back to programs for healthy masculinity.
These are helping. One program in Chicago called “Becoming a Man” helps at risk youth develop mindful, positive masculinity focusing on emotional development. It has decreased arrests and increased graduation rates.
Interestingly though,
whom I quoted earlier just wrote an article making the excellent point that while movements encouraging positive masculinity are a step in the right direction, they do nothing to dismantle the idea that masculine is the MOST IMPORTANT THING a boy can be.Positive masculinity improves masculinity, but it does not question the gender hierarchy or the position of masculinity at the top.
This article sounded familiar to me because I had just written how feminism does something very similar- tries to pull women up the gender hierarchy ladder instead of dismantling it.
What we actually need are new ways for men and women to move about in the world that do not center masculinity.
If only there was a way to blur the gender binary and disrupt gender norms!
If only there were more examples of different ways to be a man or a just human that had nothing to do with valuing masculinity!
If only men were allowed to dress like women, act like women without repercussion or fear.
If only we saw gender as a construct that didn’t define you in the first place.
If only, instead of only two options- pink or blue- there was a whole rainbow of acceptable ways to live in this world.
(See I told you we’d get there.)
If only boys could wear pink backpacks, take ballet classes or be sensitive without EVER getting the message that these things were unsafe or undesirable for them.
If only boys could regularly see a wide array of acceptable ways to be a boy. If only they regularly encountered boys with painted nails (who were never made fun of).
If only they didn’t get the message that being ‘like a girl’ is the worst possible thing to be.
As
serendipitously put it this week: Gender fluidity is the future of feminism:“I often imagine a future, perhaps for my great-grandchildren, in which pink and blue are merely colors of the rainbow that anyone can like, in which there are no boy’s toys and girl’s toys, in which kids can don skirts or pants or headbands or baseball caps based simply on what they feel like wearing that day.
I imagine a future in which our so-called “feminine” and “masculine” qualities are equally celebrated, in which we have permission to lean into each.
The present can be murky and confusing, and that’s okay. Let’s muddle our way to a future in which the genitals we were born with have no bearing on the work we do or the amount of money we make, on who we love or who gets up to feed the baby at 3 a.m.” - Kerala Taylor
If Liz Plank’s claim is true that there is no greater threat to humankind than our current definition of masculinity, feminist efforts often fall short in addressing this. Or worse, uphold the gender hierarchy ladder by helping women to climb it.
By expanding the gender binary, by encouraging gender fluidity, by removing masculinity from its top spot on the hierarchy, LGBTQIA+ acceptance3 is the solution feminism has been looking for.
Yet masculinity has never received mention in any major political speech or policy push.
This is good! Let’s not stop this please!
This article focuses on how LGBTQIA+ helps the world and feminism, but queer people deserve life and expression on their own terms for their own reasons regardless of whether it is helping anybody or not. (it just so happens that by being themselves they DO help the world).
I am a feminist that is working on decentering men, that is also raising a son and a daughter. These masculine paradigms are sooooo hard on boys. They feel even that accepting the love of a parent reduces their masculinity. I make sure my son knows that boys need love too, they need to feel safe, and that is their humanity speaking, not their masculinity. I try to convey that NOTHING can take my son's masculinity, that it needs no defense.
I call the post patriarchy men, bubblegum pink men. What you describe is exactly what I advocate for. I want to express myself beyond the Marlboro Man image of masculinity. I want the pink back pack, homemaker, glitter nails, and romcom. I want all that and be a woman loving man, cis het man all the way where my gender expression is expansive and my orientation unquestioned.