I agree we need to continue talking about it, and thank you for taking the time to provide me a response and some sample articles.

tl;dr

The hard part is the balance from treating a “guy” like a child to full on radical candor.

Each has it’s place and time, and one school of thought is “fuck it” women doesn’t have the option so neither should you (very valid). The unintended consequence I believe is shown every day in areas where men are detached from their masculinity (say suburbs), where they go without masks for now. So they shut down … and act with the ability to handle gender issues and sexuality akin to a grade school person, meanwhile women are working on their masters/ph.d in these issues every day.

So maybe the best way is radical candor.

It is pretty sad today that we (as a society) have to revert to a “would you do this to the ‘Rock’” moment in some situations or “would you do this in the room with your mother, sister etc?”, but here we sit. The time I guess is past in trying to soften/sugar coat the views since it is distasteful.

Masculinity in America (because of societies clinging on to the worst of traditions as defined as the Patriarchy) is hurting bad and hard. I have fought these battles, and it took several years of therapy and dealing with it, but I actively stepped up. It took severe health issues, and sadly women in my life who pointed out to me (since I self internalized my pain and never took it out on others) are you trying to kill yourself for me to deal with this.

I am thankful that some folks in my life cared deeply about me to call it out.

I saw a great tweet by Jessica Valenti asking why boys were being called out in class more than girls during Zoom. My view is the why is because teachers are concerned that boys are checked out in school and becoming vastly uneducated and the teachers see and know this. Now couple what you talk about now with the “dumbification” [my made up word] of quite a few guys/boys on their life path and their only teaching view is through mimicking what other male figures do …. it is a perfect storm which means we may need to push hard on this.

I have so much to learn and grow in these areas (I look at my self now in high school to early college in gender studies via life training), that it makes it hard to quantify and communicate via a male perspective how hard this really is.

What I can tell you is men are in a fight, flight, freeze moment with only anger and sexual urges for communication and that can be a deadly combination for all genders. The blessing women have is they have built systems to work together, while men are lone men on island talking to a soccer ball.

Sorry for the ramble ….