If young men want ‘traditional’ gender roles, we need to know why - Kathleen Stock

I am getting increasingly uncomfortable with how negative women are about men. I have friends (who say they are happily married) always moaning about the patriarchy and how awful men are. This is despite the main relationship they have with men being a good one. I think it’s just seen as good to slag men off.

Social media seems to pit everyone against each other and this includes men and women.
Men and women seem to want supportive relationships but are confused on how that works in todays society.
Some young men look to people like Andrew Tate because they feel like society doesn't value their masculinity. They seem to think that they're being told that all masculinity is toxic and need to change.
We need to tell these young men that it's fine to be traditionally masculine and that doesn't mean that you can't be a decent partner that values equality and fairness in a relationship.
I don't think we can put the blame solely on Andrew Tate. There's a whole bunch of social media that's emphasising really unhealthy messages regarding the supposed roles men and women play in society. Much of it is wrong, exaggerated or focused on a minority of people but as ever, social media has a strong influence and makes it seem that these young men don't have a place in mainstream society.

A lot of this comes from the broader culture. I know a lot of people banging on about what’s expected of women in the manner of America Ferrera in the Barbie movie. In real life though, the expectations come from women themselves. My DH is a heavily involved parent but he is not bothered by: buying thoughtful birthday presents, arranging extracurriculars, high standards of neatness/cleanliness. Those are all things that I want for my kids and put myself under pressure to deliver, but it is not my DH or my kids or even society making me do it.

In reality I think that in general, mothers are different to fathers. We want more/different things for our kids. We now want or need to work but we can’t stop being mothers and we are limited in how far we can get our DHs to take on the mindset of a mother. Naturally this causes enormous stress but it is not the fault of the patriarchy.

I'm not sure about this. Yes, there's an awful lot of books, TV etc featuring dystopias, apocalyptic times, murder, abuse etc.
But there's also Mortimer & Whitehouse Gone Fishing, and Strictly, and those shows about pootling around canals, and Monty Don looking at beautiful gardens, and novels in which women inherit a charming cottage in a village and cause uproar among the locals and then get together with the local hunk and all is well.
And on social media there are many accounts and individuals dealing in the pleasures and joys of small things like hearing a lovely conversation in the street, or posting pictures of your dog.
Along with the many podcasts about true crime, corruption and The State Of The World are lovely, silly, sometimes deep but sweet ones like Grace Dent's Comfort Eating, Walking the Dog with Emily Dean, Shaun Keaveny...

I tend to agree with this. If men have a lot of intent and energy that in the past they would have expended on working/providing, then why can't they turn that to figuring out what it might look like to be a man now?

Where are the men's groups for, say, men who want to be nurses?

Why don't men, if they don’t want to clean and do childcare, look at why they think it's acceptable to hope/assume/insist that a woman do these jobs for free?

Why don't men turn their minds to the issue of people like Andrew Tate, why some young men find him so appealing, and what might be done to address it?

Everything about this resonates - mostly misery in books and film and TV.

this in particular stuck out "But I don't think we are living in a world where you are socially allowed to feel joy or delight anymore"

yes. It's an irritant to people if you are cheerful about something.

That'll be your super powers at work.

Wouldn't be massively surprised if men and boys were deeply interested in maintaining gender roles created to flatter and facilitate them and their view of themselves.

I thought this article about a French advertising campaign, targeting male drink drivers was really interesting: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/08/toxic-masculinity-fuels-dangerous-driving-like-drink-french-advert-says

I think authorities need to work harder to present this alternative vision of what a man can be: kind, sensitive, self-sacrificing, involved in loving relationships with others. And that that is not a loss to him or anyone else, but a massive gain. We should have advertising campaigns speaking to men in this way and showing them an alternative to the toxic culture that pervades so many views of masculinity. Particularly if we want to address issues like the falling birthrate - yes, women are choosing to have fewer children, but - given more than 90% of single parent households are led by women - why should they be expected to shoulder that alone?

Wasn't there once a study or something that said men who did more housework had better relations with women than those who did not?

Doing more housework could also be a way of providing as well. The provision of a clean household makes lots of people feel happier. Why can't men use their provider instincts to do that?

Well for sure... but cleaning and childcare (some aspects, anyway) aren't all that appealing to many women either.

If anyone has seen the documentary 'Cambridge Analytica' it's clear there is an industry which sows political discord using social media. This is a valuable product, one that certain politicians and even other countries find valuable.
You can now weaken a country without having to send troops or use weapons. Huge instability can be created just by pumping enough divisive ideas into the youth.

I truly think that is happening. Possibly Russia, possibly china, maybe both. I think many aspects of our society atrebeing completely undermined. One of those could well be the undermining of positive male and female roles.

Ultimately you can never know what messages any social media feed is pumping into another individual's brain - you don't see what they are scrolling through, and it will be entirely different from yours (this is the problem of non-shared realities)

What is Facebook/Instagram/tik tok telling these children?

I don't think it's positive, inspiring, hopeful or makes them want to contribute positively to society.

I think we need to get to grips with this pretty soon, or our society will collapse.

Could it also be that a lot of “traditional female roles” aren’t appealing to men? They don’t want to clean and do childcare and would rather a wife or gf do those jobs for free. This is reflected in how it’s still acceptable for men to not see their child(ren) after a split and have new partners quickly step into mother role eg asking new partner to go part-time to accommodate their stepchildren.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

I am not surprised that GCSE students went for dark themes. It’s an age where my kids enjoyed horror movies and have you seen how dark some of the GCSE English language texts are? My dd did GCSEs a few years ago and the text came from a book where a young girl is sexually assaulted. (The assault wasn’t in the exam extract)

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division. Being more extreme than the content already out there is a good business tactic if making money and notoriety are the primary objectives.

Fee thoughts:

• perhaps a reaction (by kids) to selfishness of Gen X dads (first gen allowed to walk away during the first gen where single mums were seen as acceptable?)

• millenial dads (age late 20-40 now) are v different, hands on, 50/50, more stay at home dads, more only wanting 1 child to give good childhood. Interesting to see their kids GCSE performabce in 5 or so years!

• lack of acceptable comedy means focus on disaster/ violence in dramas now eg every play in the same space as less options

• young boys/ teens now have a wider range of transparency on rubbish/ average/ great dads now. Seems more of a range than when i was young. I know for a fact several of my DS age 12 friends are jealous of his v involved sporty dad (absent dads)

• girls/ young women expectation of boys/ men has risen (good). Now want a partner who is a decent dad, can controbute towards home, does 50/50 round house etc. when a partner fails, maybe he becomes violent? Maybe these kids see men as struggling more with these new demands.

I think part of it is due to economic changes- I grew up in boom times, people felt hopeful and the norm among young men was to embrace progressive causes (such as women's equality)- after all, there was plenty to go round so why not share? Perhaps harder times make young men perceive equality more as a threat than a blessing.

I also think it's part of the tendency of the internet to broaden any division.

Shooting arguments down in such a way achieves nothing.

I think it is true that many young men find it difficult to know how to deal with male - female relationships, when there is a generalised atmosphere in which men/boys are perceived always as potential oppressors or as sexist pigs. It's no different to telling that white children that they have 'privilege' and should mind what they say, how they behave, and always defer to a black child when talking about their experience.

I do think a lot of the theatre stuff is very much repeating tropes, and there is a tendency for young people to want to wallow somewhat in the dystopian. Sometimes teachers almost encourage this. So it's very very possible that in many cases, the kids aren't really writing this stuff from their own experience. They want to be edgy and topical.

My main reason for thinking this is just watching kids develop these scenarios in theatre classes over the years. It's rare to see them really dig inside themselves and really writing from their own experiences. Which is why so much of what teen theatre groups produce can be so bad, tbh. I find they do better in many cases with comedy, it seems to be more authentically representing the world they see and experience.

I do think there is a lot of mixed messaging boys get about family life, how to treat girls, academics, and life in general. With family life in particular, they get sidelined and seen as non-essential, while at the same time, blasted if they don't provide financially and step up with helping with care. Mums are seen as really essential by many women, dads not so much. In some instances, particularly where the parents are young and not living together, it becomes quite toxic and there is really no positive parental role available for the dads.

I don't think a society as a whole can really maintain the idea that dads are unnecessary alongside the idea that they are necessary. One will lose out in the end.

I can see how people banging onn about "the patriarchy" all the time can be very annoying indeed. I find it annoying, myself. When feminism becomes all about 'oppressors' and 'oppressed' and women as 'victims' then it is no better, in my mind, than any other form of intersectionalist identity politics.

Personally I think a lot of what people refer to as 'the patriarchy' are just those patterns that arise out of sex based differences. Certainly in the West, where we have established equalities legislation and women well established in all sorts of roles in society.

if one of them even looks at a women it’s somehow sexual harassment or misogyny.

Bollocks!

Men have not been freed.

its gotten worse for them!

if one of them even looks at a women it’s somehow sexual harassment or misogyny.

its miserable for them. And as a survivor of sexual harassment assaulting to me and other women as well.

crazy