Posted on 07/17/2017 11:21:13 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Jody Allard July 6, 2017
Share285 men If the feminist men—the men who proudly declare their progressive politics and their fight for quality—aren’t safe, then what man is? No man, I fear.
I have two sons. They are strong and compassionate—the kind of boys other parents are glad to meet when their daughters bring them home for dinner. They are good boys, in the ways good boys are, but they are not safe boys. I’m starting to believe there’s no such thing.
I wrote an essay in The Washington Post last year, during the height of the Brock Turner case, about my sons and rape culture. I didn’t think it would be controversial when I wrote it; I was sure most parents grappled with raising sons in the midst of rape culture. The struggle I wrote about was universal, I thought, but I was wrong. My essay went semi-viral, and for the first time my sons encountered my words about them on their friends’ phones, their teachers’ computers, and even overheard them discussed by strangers on a crowded metro bus. It was one thing to agree to be written about in relative obscurity, and quite another thing to have my words intrude on their daily lives.
One of my sons was hurt by my words, although he’s never told me so. He doesn’t understand why I lumped him and his brother together in my essay. He sees himself as the “good” one, the one who is sensitive and thoughtful, and who listens instead of reacts. He doesn’t understand that even quiet misogyny is misogyny, and that not all sexists sound like Twitter trolls. He is angry at me now, although he won’t admit that either, and his anger led him to conservative websites and YouTube channels; places where he can surround himself with righteous indignation against feminists, and tell himself it’s ungrateful women like me who are the problem.
I teeter frequently between supporting my son and educating him. Is it my job as his mother to ensure he feels safe emotionally, no matter what violence he spews? Is it my job as his mother to steer and educate, no matter how much that education challenges his view of himself? I think it’s both, but the balance between the two has proven impossible to pinpoint. When I hear his voice become defensive, I back off but question whether I’m doing him any favors by allowing his perception of himself to go unchallenged. When I confront him with his own sexism, I question whether I’m pushing too hard and leaving him without an emotional safe space in his home.
As a single mother, I sometimes wonder whether the real problem is that my sons have no role models for the type of men I hope they become. But when I look around at the men I know, I’m not sure a male partner would fill that hole. Where are these men who are enlightened but not arrogant? Who are feminists without self-congratulation? If my sons need role models, they may have to become their own.
I joined Bumble recently, after a six-plus year break from dating. I’m not overly interested in dating in the first place, but I’m starved for adult conversation so dating feels like a necessary evil. Bumble, as I explained to my married friends, is like the feminist Tinder. Women have to initiate contact with men, so at least there’s no inbox full of dick picks every day. But, feminist or not, the men are no different from the men anywhere else and I quickly felt deflated. If the feminist men — the men who proudly declare their progressive politics and their fight for quality — aren’t safe, then what man is? No man, I fear.
I know I’m not supposed to cast an entire sex with a single paint brush — not all men, I’m sure some readers are thinking and preparing to type or tweet. But if it’s impossible for a white person to grow up without adopting racist ideas, simply because of the environment in which they live, how can I expect men not to subconsciously absorb at least some degree of sexism? White people aren’t safe, and men aren’t safe, no matter how much I’d like to assure myself that these things aren’t true.
My sons won’t rape unconscious women behind a dumpster, and neither will most of the progressive men I know. But what all of these men share in common, even my sons, is a relentless questioning and disbelief of the female experience. I do not want to prove my pain, or provide enough evidence to convince anyone that my trauma is merited. I’m through wasting my time on people who are more interested in ideas than feelings, and I’m through pretending these people, these men, are safe.
I love my sons, and I love some individual men. It pains me to say that I don’t feel emotionally safe with them, and perhaps never have with a man, but it needs to be said because far too often we are afraid to say it. This is not a reflection of something broken or damaged in me; it is a reflection of the systems we build and our boys absorb. Those little boys grow into men who know the value of women, the value that’s been ascribed to us by a broken system, and it seeps out from them in a million tiny, toxic ways.
I don’t know what the balance is between supporting these men and educating them, but I know the toll it takes on me to try. I am too valuable and too worthy to waste my time on men who are not my flesh and blood. But as my boys grow into men, I wonder whether I’ve done enough to combat the messages they hear from everyone but me. They are good boys, and maybe that’s the best they can be in the system we’ve created for them.
Jody Allard is a former techie-turned-freelance-writer living in Seattle. She can be reached through her website, on Twitter or via her Facebook page.
I think she's saying she's doing everything she can think of to turn her sons into serial killers.
Either that or flaming queers.
Bumble-brand catfish in a can ...mmmmm....
This is not the Susan B. Anthony kind of feminist. This is a harridan, willingly devil-pushed.
Even if nothing happened.. And you’re their son! Poor kids, I’m sorry, make that good boys.
After that fetid bilge pump spew covering an entire page of me, me, me, me, I'm too exquisitely sensitive and attuned to ever be subjected to anyone who isn't just as exquisitely sensitive and attuned let alone men, you feel the need to ask this question?
What man could put up with the keening, wailing and constant harangue long enough to have even managed to reproduce with... that? That's the big question in my mind.
I pity her sons, I truly do. She's already driven one of them away and blames him. The other is going to follow just as surely. Then, she'll be alone, and it'll be all their fault.
Child abuse. Report her to Social Services.
Well I’m pretty sure she loathes them.
I hope they find some good male “role models” independent of this harridan.
Uggh. I read that.
There are few times when I think kids would be better off if the State took them and placed them in an orphanage.
In her case, I make an exception. Those poor children.
If Social Services wasn’t possibly even worse, that might make sense.
Norman Bates had a mother like this.
She’s soooooooooooooooooooo selfish.
I wonder if some other family approached her and offered to do it, she’d say yes, good riddance?
This woman is nuttier than a squirrel turd. She should be charged with endangering a child.
The mistake many people make is to confuse message(s) with intent. For most men & conservatives, competition (and confrontation) is more obvious, with clear lines delineated between opposing sides.
For many woman and most leftists, the true strategic objectives (ie territory, resources & women) are buried under rhetoric, with dissembling promotion obscuring true intent. [This of course is where the term 'useful idiot' comes when referring to beta followers who actually believe the BS lies.]
It's all part of the same game of conquest - which alphas are programmed to pursue - regardless of which environmental arena they find themselves fighting in out for dominance.
I’m sooooo sick of these people.
L
Modern third-wave feminism postulates that the greatest moral and ethical choice a modern man can make is to be ‘harmless.’ Unfortunately, most women consider harmless men to be ultimately useless as well. It turns out most women have zero respect for ‘harmless’ men. They don’t like them. In fact, they hate them; They want to claw them to pieces!
What women really desire, consciously or otherwise, is a man who is dangerous - but tame. And they want to be the one who tames him.
Look at the romance novels women purchase. About what kind of character do most women enjoy fantasizing? Who is the sexually desirable male protagonist?
He is nearly always an alpha male who is powerful, successful and talented. He is physically strong and dangerously handsome. He generally does as he pleases and doesn’t care about other people’s feelings. He is, in short, a huge @sshole. Except... to that one special woman, the girl with the virginal beauty, the female who suddenly enters his life and stirs his loins and his heart like no woman ever before. The woman who will teach him to be more than he’s ever been. The beauty who will tame this beast among men.
Examples?
The best selling erotic romance novel in history: Fifty Shades of Grey, over 100 million copies purchased, 80% of them by women.
And what are the five most popular types of male protagonists in womens romance novels?
1. Vampires
2. Werewolves
3. Surgeons
4. Billionaires
5. Pirates
No woman in her right mind wants to be with a man who is utterly harmless.
Unless... what she really desires is someone she can dominate and treat like an infant.
Hat tip: Prof. Jordan B. Peterson, clinical psychologist and professor of psychology at the University of Toronto.
Boy, this one really hates testicles. Unless you offered her a pair for herself I’m sure.
My daughter was talking to a woman with similar views. She told my daughter that we shouldn’t teach women self-defense, because then their attacker would go rape somebody else and that’s not fair to the other woman. Instead, we should have a culture that says “it’s not OK to rape.” Yeah, she really did say that...
I told my daughter she should ask her if she has locks on her house, because if she does, she’s a hypocrite. After all, locks just mean thieves just go rob somebody else, and that’s not fair to them. Instead, we should say, “don’t take things that don’t belong to you.” Yeah, that’ll work.
Tell me about women and mental cruelty.
I think my own mom (confession time) would earn an honorary PhD in this. And yeah she was one of the hyper liberal kind. Armed with degree in sociology, she thought she could reinvent the world. Without God being anything more than honorary at best. Result: passably kind to strangers. Materially competent, but in attitude evilly cruel to family. I would have rather had someone plunder material goods from the family and be kind to it otherwise.
She did it to two boys and a husband.
But what she sowed, she reaped... she became a nervous wreck, and kicked the bucket at an early age.
God took a good, long time to turn my life around. It was like a battleship full of the contents of a garbage scow. But I am finally coming into sight of what real manhood should be, and it isn’t like any of the social caricatures of it we know.
Does she have her pussy hat prominently displayed in her home? Did she have Consuela knit a pair for her sons so they could join her? I’m betting she did.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.