the behaviour of most men

[notevensurprised]

I’m in my 50s.

Almost all important and non important men in my life, have disappointed me in catastrophic ways. Some directly treating me badly. Some indirectly by treating people I love badly.

I’m at the stage where the scales have fallen from my eyes. Not just fallen, but disappeared into a black hole. I know this happens for many women in perimenopause. I know we suddenly look up and around at this age and we are absolutely done with tolerating bad behaviour.

Some of my own personal stories relating to bad behaviour from men relate to verbal and physical abuse, financial and economic abuse, infidelity and cheating, inequality within the home in terms of chores and life admin, inequality in the workplace and in salaries.

I am just so done.

I’ve been devastated by the actions of my own DF, my own DH, ex BFs, uncles, cousins, friends.

There was one remaining man who I held in high esteem my entire life. BIL of decades. The brother I never had. I learnt recently he has cheated for years. When my DSIS told me, it was just like the last remaining shred of… I can’t even think of the word…. died within me.

It could not be more shocking in terms of who he appears to be from the outside. And yet I am numb.

The world seems to be run and controlled by lunatic men at the moment and this is just the icing on the cake.

This final revelation means I have zero belief in the goodness of any man any longer. I was holding on to it by a shred anyway.

AIBU to feel that the majority of men are cheating, abusive, lazy, weak willed, insecure, selfish, overpaid, mediocre, disrespectful fools?

Where did OP say she hates them? Might’ve missed it.

I have recently read that men have approximately 70% more energy than women. It might explain something.
And yes, I am of the same opinion as OP about men. No use to us after having children, if woman can support herself financially. Why suffer their cheating, financial manipulation, wanting to control everything, constant badgering for sex, even their farting, when you could live in peace be herself and enjoy life?
When couple retire, he happily immerses himself in hobbies, yet, she still has to cook, clean and organise their lives, while husband HELPS HER!
Yes, I am too of the opinion that all men are disappointing.

Nor mine.

My abusive mother was the first person to hurt me, followed by my sister who for some god knows what reason, thought I was mother's golden child. Mother abused both of us, but my sister always blamed me for the abuse and treated me so badly that I have cut her out of my life.

I loved my father with all my heart (he died 10 years ago) and I am lucky to be married to a loyal and loving husband.

Despite my experience, I don't think all women are evil, abusive bitches. I realise some people - of both sexes - can be wicked, but most are not.

@notevensurprised YANBU to feel that way. I think facing the reality of male behaviour can be very healthy, especially if it inspires you to refocus your energy on yourself and on supporting other women. As you'll likely see from many replies here, our culture often conditions women to centre their lives around men, minimise the prevalence of male violence, and rush to defend men's honour and deflect blame to women whenever toxic male behaviour is discussed. Breaking free from that conditioning can be a good thing.

It's not unreasonable to feel fed up both from personal experience and the news that's around us.

I think it's unreasonable and unhelpful to put it down entirely or even mostly to being male, much like it's unreasonable and unhelpful to put down age for the reason those born before 1964 are significantly more likely to commit fraud and other financial crimes or DUIs and alcohol-related public order crimes. There is more to it.

Obviously, no one should be in any kind of relationship they don't want, and I get why some women just don't want to anymore and see the value of just focusing on women. I do think societally, building better relationships between groups rather than what it feels like to me this constant push to push people apart by demographics would do a world of good. Part of good relationships is being able to pull someone up on things and accept being pulled up on it, and I don't think socially we have that.

A third of men have a criminal record by age 50.

In a data analysis of men born in 1953, where over half of that third have a single offence before the age of 21 and the vast majority of the offences were summary offences for things like drug possession, common assault against other men, minor property damage, and breach of the peace.

Yes, young men commit significantly more crimes, but let's not twist that into the types of behaviour most people complain about when it comes to men. It's no where close to a third of men who are responsible for sexual and other serious violence from our current understanding. Of course, those types of violence are not the only reason why so many women are fed up with so many men.

There is the argument that those who have the power to do will do more horrendous things - I don't think men are alone in this, but are more likely to have the power to do so. There is also the issue that human nature means our picture is unclear.

We have the issue that when women are arrested for violent crimes - even significant ones - it's more likely to end in a release with no further action. There are several reasons for that - one is the social view around women's violence not being as serious. Much as we have many unreporting of crimes of men against women because so many see them go free or feel the stress of it isn't worth the likely outcome, there is under reporting for women's crimes. I've been one of them - I have the records from my violent mother's arrests where even child endangerment got dropped through pleaing to a lesser crime - my life nearly ending was apparently worth a few hundred in a fine - so when I was violently attacked by women as adult and left for dead, I didn't report it - I didn't even know their names to do so - and much as I hear from others regarding men, it felt too risky for likely nothing as they had far, far more social power than I did. We'll likely never have an entirely clear picture, but IME and from the data I've seen, having the power to get away with it influences men and women alike, and the minority of both who are cruel and violent will use whatever power they have to their advantage when they can. I think finding a cultural way to pull people up on that younger could help, just as the young men in the cohort who committed a crime young and were punished never did so again.

I cant say what? Like you with your ex judgements are formed by experiences and thankfully having a close relationship with all my children I dont have a narrow lens and am aware of failings that everyone has. And I know from my experiences that woman can be just as cruel and vile as men.

I see exactly where you are coming from, my world has been rocked by a very close friend finding out that her DH of 20 years had been having an affair for 18 months.

So far so normal but this man is not a womaniser has been a supportive loving and attentive father and husband.

They were the couple everyone said appeared to be living ‘the dream’.

He lied schemed and gas lit her for over a year. The children who he adored have been devastated.

I , and many of their friends, have been shocked how someone can can change so much and were they always like that? To be so duplicitous and lie so easily.

My faith in my own instincts has been ground to dust. While other friends hope she meets ‘someone nice’, I hope she grows strong in her own self that she never needs anyone else.

That’s why it’s better/healthier to have a realistic view of men as a class. It’s not as shocking/foundation rocking/reality questioning when things like this happen.

Is this a UK problem, men are shit? Because it certainly is not my experience where I live.
Odd.

It can vary from country to country as standards of what constitutes good, or least decent behaviour is shaped by the society we live in. Misogynistic societies will automatically have a higher number of crap men than societies where things are more equal/egalitarian .

YANBU.

But I hope the next generation will be better at least in terms of pulling their weight when it comes to cooking, cleaning, etc and not being man children. I say that because my 2 grown up daughters seem to have nice boyfriends and male friends. Time will tell on that though (especially if children become part of the mix). However both my daughters have already suffered sexual harassment and assault so forgive me for remaining cynical....

So yeah, men seem to exist on a scale of crapness from psychotic to bumbling incompetence. And let's face it, the bar is so low that women have been socialised into thinking they've got a good one if he doesn't murder / hit / rape / financially abuse / abuse children.

Even the nice switched on ones generally exhibit selfish and entitled attitudes towards women at some level. And they generally think they are pretty fucking great because they look after they're own kids sometimes (as long as it doesn't affect their career) and cook a bit (using all the pots and fancy expensive ingredients whilst expecting a round of applause) or "help" their women clean the house they live in (although rarely cleaning the toilet, those unseen bits around the dishwasher or generally having a clue of all the tiny acts of tidying and cleaning that women do without thinking constantly).

And let's face it, they all benefit from the behaviour of the bad ones (which probably explains why they don't en masse try to do anything about it). They benefit because women are grateful for being with a bloke who doesn't hit, etc her so we'll put up with being exploited in the home, underpaid and under recognised in the workplace and under represented in places of power.

It's not good enough.

Your point is lost by using sexist language which kinda leads me to think you're not sure what a power dynamic looks like

Reminds of my mum’s friend who asked my opinion about her then partner. He was a dick and I tactfully said that and she replied with “at least this one doesn’t beat her”. Oh , well, great then!

Even the decent ones are fucking disappointing and never measure up to female friends in terms of how they treat you. I hate being attracted to men honestly it feels like a humiliation ritual.

No, it is the ops experience which is very sad, it is not my experience or many other women’s as witnessed by the thread, men and women are the same the world over, most decent good people some bad apples.

I bet Giselle Pelicot believed most men in her community were good, decent people even if her husband was one bad apple.

Most men in her community were, it was still a small percentage. And I am not sure she’d be supportive of you tarring her whole community, as from what I’ve seen of that woman she’s back bone.

There's always one . . .

There’s loads on this thread.

Citation, please.

In my 40s. Have a wonderful DH and know a handful of truly good men. But the rest are awful. I have very little respect for 'D'F who treated DM like shit. The worst imho and most dangerous, are the ones who masquerade as decent but in reality are women hating toxic narcissists. Had a neighbour once who was the epitome of this. All the awful things that happen in the world stem from megalomaniac men.