Is feminism unfairly demonising boys/men?

People who reject critical race theory and the like will always ring alarm bells for me.

Oh really? Why's that then?

Your point 2 - this won't be in support of trans people. MRAs are transphobic as well as misogynistic in general.

Valuing motherhood isn't the same as expecting women to become permanent SAHMs and by extension expecting men to be sole bread winners.

I'm very interested in the maternalism branch of feminism and generally consider the role of raising children heavily undervalued by UK society, but the solution to/opposite of that undervalue is not to assume the answer is more women being SAHMs.

I agree that feminism should not be about telling women they should never be SAHMs, but it isn't. I had a friend like that as a young woman and given that I had children at 21, felt like I didn't "belong" in feminism anymore. It was a sad time and was completely wrong of me and her.

It's also a privileged perspective to be able to consider women working while being mothers are "pursuing economic glory". Lots of women work because they cannot afford to do otherwise. And sometimes women don't work because they can't afford to do otherwise.

I do think having said all that, that it's important to be self reflective of our frame of reference and the values we hold, and how this relates to our view of feminism. While conversations are valid and different view points are to be respected, some opinions are simply not compatible with feminism. Teaching our sons that they should be sole bread winners and expect their female partners to bear their children and stay at home to raise them, without talking about any other options or supporting their partners with work and taking on equal childcare, is not feminist. It's not insidious, but it's not feminist.

1. This piece isn't gender critical in the slightest. As pp have already pointed out, it's based on all sorts of lazy cliches about girls being naturally meek and good at sitting still, etc. etc.

1. What it does do is provide an excellent example of "trans" as an extension of run of the mill Men's Rights discourse, which is what the first two thirds of the text consist of. As such, I'm not entirely sure if it's sincere or a parody...

@CarPoor

My whole assumption is NOT that women aspire to be a SAHM, however I am uncertain as to the classic feminist aim to never be a SAHM. Doesn't this somehow devalue motherhood - a female only role?

It's thorny.

I just don't think motherhood is not valuable. I think it is incredibly valuable, probably the most valuable thing I have done, and I actually do have a decent career. But would I say my career is more satisfying than being a mother? I'm not sure. And that's what studies show most women think - they voluntarily drop out the rat race at a frightening pace (if they can) so I just sometimes question whether the pursuit of economic glory for women in feminism is serving exactly what most women want.

I don't know of course. I have just become increasingly suspicious of this devaluing of motherhood and (dare I say it, traditional) family - I am not sure who it is serving.

@waterwitch mansplaining isn't a concept, it's a label for a very specific form of behavior by some/many/whatever men towards women. That said, there are certainly instances for the label being used inappropriately.

The worst thing of all of this is he seems like quite an uncontroversial figure. He's a successful author, has article on sites such as Psychology Today and Glamour UK so he's not just relegated to the seedy underbelly of the Manosphere.

'resting bitch face'. The phenomenon of bravely not arranging your features to pander to socialisation and the male gaze.

This!

The whole thing says more about the author than it does about either other men or feminism.
To the Rules of Misogyny mentioned above, I'd add #1: Women are responsible for what men do.

I mean, some women are too ashamed to leave the house without putting on make up. They are ashamed of having a normal human face.

Your whole assumption is that women are going to become SAHM.

Everyone needs to take responsibility for their families. This isn't masculine.

I started reading his blog, and even his definition of shame smacks of male privilege.

He says shame is the ‘conscious awareness’ of having ‘done something wrong or foolish’.

Erm, no, not if you are born female.

Women are shamed simply for being a living being-

eg- women are shamed for having body hair, for going to the toilet, for having an appetite, for having complex emotions and no permasmile, for menstruating, for having opinions, for having muscles, for aging, for the numbers of years they’ve lived increasing, for having veins…. I could go on and on and on.

If only there were a just cause for the shaming of women - we would be living the dream.

I disagree with this

Yes men are expected to be in control of their behaviour and disciplined. As are women. That's basic adult behaviour. I disagree they are expected to be masculine. I think most women are happy to raise a child with another woman. Men are expected to be supportive and calm but these aren't masculine traits

Everyone having children needs to appreciate the responsibility and financial burden this will entail. I don't know many men who are the sole breadwinners for their family anymore, and I think it would do society good if we stopped teaching men this.

I don't think it's a fine line between respecting differences and seeing them as inferior. Its pretty easy to distinguish different from inferior.

I'm not sure what you mean by believer. But by your own admission your husband gets aggressive and abusive, the epitome of a man who throws his weight around to make his opinions heard and seem more valid. So no I have no empathy for him. You are using the same techniques as the article, trying to tap into female empathy to excuse shitty behaviour.

And sorry to spam this thread but just to reiterate my last post, his weird assertion that all men go through this dark descent into graphic and violent porn and him illustrating it as a natural consequence to seeing girls getting into less trouble at school is just.. Ugh.

@CarPoor

Boys watch porn, but again they can't help it. Then they watch bad porn but again not their fault. Poor poor men. They learn about rape culture, they worry they might be a rapist because they want to do things with their body and aren't sure how to do this without raping people. Again apparently not something he has control over

Yes, literally what the fuck? Reading that article was a complete mind fuck, the leap from point A to point B was insane.

But you didn't give any thought to the scenario, did you?

No. Because you are a believer no doubt.

Being told to get to fuck for mouthing judgemental stupidity is to be expected, surely

I'm seeing a lot of pushback at feminism in 'gender critical' circles because it's being lumped in with critical social justice

I'd be interested in what circles you are running in where people are gender critical but not feminist. And feminist but completely against CSJ theory.

People who reject critical race theory and the like will always ring alarm bells for me. A lot of people don't understand what it means and there's just a knee jerk reaction because people feel criticised.

Just checking in to see if some posters are still saying women are somehow to blame for male behaviour.

Do you mean saying that Stella O’Malley shouldn’t have published this? To be fair, I don’t know that she is exclusively responsible for the blog. I assumed it from the context in the rest of the thread. But whoever chose to promote this fringe MRA type to another audience, I think it’s reasonable to criticise that choice.

Just checking in to see if some posters are still saying women are somehow to blame for male behaviour.

Stella should really be ashamed of herself for platforming this man. I wonder if she had read the article on “The Malestrom.”

Estrogen also regulates the menstrual cycle, of course, during which it produces a number of familiar changes such as mood swings, irritability and – in the more severe state of PMS – depression, feelings of helplessness, bouts of crying, and rage.

No, it doesn’t. In fact it does the complete opposite. (Though I’ve seen men saying exogenous estrogen makes them depressed, perhaps he’s getting his information from those guys.) Someone tell this plonker to shut his uninformed ass up and never speak on any subject again. He doesn’t deserve to be listened to. What an egregiously stupid mistake made in the service of an even stupider argument.

And for the record in case the fuckwit finds this thread: no one’s blaming men for their hormones or their moods but for their behaviour. And they aren’t held responsible for their behaviour nearly enough.

I found another link from the same author about a similar topic, masculine traits.

Stuff like this just fills me with a tingling sense of dread and fear. Do men really think like this? I'm not saying I don't agree with some points of the article, and I do understand that it must be hard for men to live with the disconnect that women are subject to as well of seeing idealised versions of themselves, but he's ultimately saying - men are designed to be violent, aggressive and domineering. So why criticise us for it?

themalestrom.com/culture/dr-joseph-burgo-manshame/

I think it was Jung that said - "The most masculine man has a feminine soul" and that makes sense in this context. This very masculine man who is 'taking responsibility for the family' is doing it for very good 'feminine' reasons (i.e. care and nurture)

So it's more accurate to say that men who are good men are good men because they don't define themselves by their view of what "masculine" stereotypically means, rather that they are able to embrace aspects of themselves which would be described as both masculine or feminine.

Perhaps we should push this further though and do some critical thinking about why we associate good qualities in either sex as either masculine or feminine. And why we don't just consider them as good qualities for a person to have. Does it stem from us having set perceptions about what men and women in society should be doing?

Honestly? Part of my belief in feminism is directly rallying against the notion that I once becoming a mother should be aiming to be a SAHM while my partner works out of the home and is the sole breadwinner.

I still don't understand what you mean though when you say about men needing to be most masculine at the time of their partners giving birth. Because in my view, being stereotypically masculine in the eye of society conjures up buzz words and images that are not at all associated with how I would want my male partner to be like around me or a newborn. Is it masculine to be attentive to your partner, to put others first and to be nurturing and tender with a woman in a delicate position and your baby?

What makes it definitively masculine?

I'm not having a go at you btw, tone is hard to read on the internet, I'm just very interesting in further exploring the idea of good qualities being associated with masculinity in men, and femininity in women. Because it's precisely where I think society is going wrong and I think it's precisely the values a patriarchal society is built on.