Okay, so nuke this if it is a terribly insensitive idea. I just thought maybe it would be good to have a space for people who identify as male to have a space to process the modern world without derailing conversations/making non-male users have to endure our bullshit. I kind of thought of it as a positive thing though; a place to inform and challenge each other, taking the ethos that we need to police ourselves.
Maybe we can quote examples of inappropriate posts in here as well, so it can be highlighted?
Just on a personal note, recent revelations are making me think that certain things I used to use to define myself are actually pretty negative. So it would be good to build up an identity again that doesnât rely so heavily on my privilege
Could be a good idea I guess. I donât mean to dig anyone out here though, but I canât be the only one thatâs a little tired of men being shocked by the whole patriarchy thing? Like, the whole âoh my god thatâs horrifyingâ thing. Just feel like itâs stopped being an appropriate response to stuff, just looking at it and saying how awful it is.
So I suppose what Iâm saying is I hope that we can all move beyond the point where we just express our negative reaction to how bad toxic masculinity/male privilege is, or whatever.
Thereâs probably space in the world for men to specifically âtheoriseâ openly about how masculinity (possibly but not necessarily their own) is constructed, and how this informs power relations both amongst men and between men and women & non-binaries. But self-examination shouldnât descend into self-loathing I donât think - itâs a bit of a cop out.
Do you think there can be such a thing as âpositive masculinityâ? Before recent developments, before I realised I was connected to this to a greater extent than I realised, I was toying with the idea in my head. But potentially itâs just another form of reconciliation⌠accentuating positives rather than tackling problems.
Really good post though, Iâve been thinking personally, when I start a new job in March, itâd be good to try and seek out other guys who may understand some of this stuffâŚand try and do a strength-in-numbers tackling of workplace sexism. Nothing major, just take the slack off non males a bit. An issue for me is courage, and standing up to people without back up
There is such a thing as positive masculinity I think, like my dad was a good role model mostly. I mean he taught me how to box and the basics of fixing a car - like âtraditionallyâ masculine things - but he always emphasised the non-meathead aspects of this stuff, etc.
But I think mostly the general societal view of masculinity is very poisonous and frequently destructive for men and women alike tbh.
Perhaps these things shouldnât be regarded as âmasculineâ anymore thoughâŚand opened up to a wider audience (just in terms of developing going forwardâŚIâm not having a go at your dad!)
Oh sure, I mean he taught me and my sister the same stuff, bit of boxing, fixing random shit, etc, so we didnât think âoh thatâs a MANâS thingâ, even though society views them as âtraditionallyâ manly jobs. So I guess thatâs what I mean by a positive kind of masculinity (although I guess my dad actually neutralized the âmasculineâ element so we just thought of them as handy skills to have).
Yeah agreed. There are traditionally âmasculineâ things that are totally acceptable and harmlessâŚbut thereâs no reason why they need to remain âmale-orientedâ anymore.
Idk, the more I question it, the more I think that positive masculinity will always revert to stereotyping.
I mean, we canât erase gender, so you have to believe in the possibility of masculinityâs transformation to something thatâs not oppressive, or even emancipatory. But, as you kind of touch on a bit, the idea of âpositive masculinityâ contains contradictions. Masculinity inherently dominates, so inherently inculcates particular power relations which depend upon subordination and ultimately oppression.
So positive/emancipatory masculinity is an impossibility even though we have to believe in it as a possibility because we can see in the real world, right now, how better masculinities are brought into being. We can therefore try and envision what it would look like to have masculinity sort of work in harmony with justice. In that sense itâs kind of like what Derrida says about justice itself - it is âtherefore always to come in the future, it is never present⌠Justice â this is undeniable â is impossible (perhaps justice is the âimpossibleâ) and therefore it is necessary to make justice possible in countless ways.â (actually thatâs a quote of someone explaining Derrida on justice in this article https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/derrida/).*
Like making justice possible in multiple ways, we can transform masculinity in multiple ways. One way I guess is through the sort of âshock therapyâ thatâs gone on in recent weeks. Another way is the sort of straight-faced discussion weâre having right now. Other ways are through play, which is pretty important imo. This could be linguistic, just subverting masculine norms of how to communicate oneself, your views etc. Or it could be social or sexual. âPlayâ is a really strong transformative tool because itâs creative and itâs imaginative, and through its un-seriousness it gives room for experimentation that takes a part of somethingâs meaning and twists it into something that can be repackaged to have a very different meaning. I mean, thatâs a foundation of a lot of kink play innit.
*I would say that Iâm sure someone like Judith Butler has said a lot about this, but I wouldnât be the person to ask unfortunately.
So what about the possibility of erasing the idea of âmasculinityâ altogether? In your first paragraph you made a point about gender being an unavoidable certaintyâŚbut do we have to ascribe each gender certain characteristics? Beyond obvious physical differences, Iâm wondering if we have to group things by gender at allâŚother than in a social sense (for example, as a white, cishet male I should be looking to use that privilege to elevate those less fortunate).
So what iâm gathering from this (although Iâm probably simplifying it greatly) is that youâre advocating a sort of âharm reductionâ approach? That masculinity, because of itâs inherent power relationship, can never really align with justice, but a more enlightened approach can at least get us part way there.
As for your last pointâŚIâm probably very conservative when it comes to âplayâ, so perhaps greater exploration of it would open my mind somewhat. Though perhaps the fact that I get enjoyment out of studying to be a male nurse, and the reactions that sometimes get from people who still see it as an aytpical job choice.
Again, really informative stuff. if youâve got any particular sources that you think would be good for a relative novice like myself Iâd be really interested.
100%, but I guess Iâm just outwardly processing the idea that trying to tie my identity to my gender isnât a good ideaâŚwhich is where my initial thought around âpositive masculinityâ came from.
As a man, I hate the concept of masculinity as I knew it. It made me feel like shit as a teenager and not being the ârightâ kind, and as an adult it is something that is used mostly by cunts to hid behind.
My own masculinity is far removed than the masculinity of the majority of people I know. - and I am more than comfortable with my own masculinity. That wasnât the case 3 year ago though.
How do others feel in their work environment? Do you notice much abuse/exploitation going on, or any discussions between other guys that over step the mark? How do you feel about confronting it, are there things that make it easier/harder?
My current work environment, itâs encoraged to pulls shit like this up. I did pull a couple of guys up shortly after I joined when they talked about making a woman who was a grade above us âbleedâ whilst they âfucked her sillyâ. I told them that was a) reprehensible given they were both apparently in loving relationships and b) reprehensible given they were talking about another human being.
Did it change their attitude towards women? I donât know, quite honestly. But I felt perfectly okay confronting it. I felt, that if necessary, it would be really good test of the companyâs equality and diversity process if pushed forward.
Itâs good to hear about that ethos, I hope I have similar experiences in the future. Also, even if it didnât change their viewsâŚat least a message has been sent out to say that kind of thing is unacceptable.
I was talking with someone the other week who said they wished instead of a âme tooâ campaign, there was a sincere and sober âI didâ campaign - whereby it wasnât the females having to bring up the injustices, and then maybe analysing why theyâd done those things and how they hope to/have improved.
I briefly thought about making it a thread on here but thought people would hate it or turn it into a joke.
Pretty much the reaction I thought this thread would get, tbh. Thankfully not the case!
âI haveâ certainlyâŚI think my most frequent crimes are making gendered assumptions, but I remember one time when I said to a girl âand people say youâre just a big pair of titsâ. Still recall her look of shock. It was awful and I rightly feel very guilty
Good thread, I definitely feel like challenging the way gender is constructed is something I could do with learning a little more about as it doesnât really feel like thereâs anything approaching a consensus.
I remember watching a talk on toxic masculinity recently and I was struck by the fact that no one in the room could actually settle on a definition of what masculinity actually was. All there were were vague allusions to masculine archetypes. I donât however see this as necessarily a bad thing in that I think this ambiguity itâs paving the way for âalternative masculinitiesâ to emerge and be embraced.