> Well, if the men want their stories, let them go and find them
She then goes on to mention the first(ish) man to do so, Robert Bly. The New York times, for his obiturary, wrote that Bly "started a controversial men’s movement with a best seller that called for a restoration of primal male audacity." Which underlines why most men don't want to do it and why actually it is better if women lead this study at this current time: even if your intentions are good, your statements may be misjudged by some. In Bly's case, it was misjudged by some anti-feminists to launch some actual misogynistic countercultures and misjudged by some feminists to blame Bly for some of this and prior misogyny.
Anyways, a round about way to say thank you, Dr. Sharon Blackie for writing this. As opposed to it being misplaced, I quite appreciate it and find it necessary.
"actually it is better if women lead this study at this current time"
This is such an indictment of our society.
I still believe that the proper response to women's mistreatment in the past and present is to stop mistreating women, not to start mistreating men.
Constraining men from discussing things of interest and value to them, basically because they're not women and don't have the societal "indulgence" of being female, is sexism and should be opposed.
Maybe that's the wrong read of the situation, I'd appreciate being steered aright, but that seems like the situation to me right now.
I just don't understand the controversy around this book (although I know nothing of the movement people often speak about). For me the book gave me great insight in to becoming a man. Something I and most men do by accident and not by design. Crucially I learned how I as an older man have a responsibility to guide younger men when they are a bit lost.
Why are people so fixated on gender? We all mostly want the same things, feel the same things and do the same things, both good and bad. Individual variety overwhelms slight difference in averages between the groups.
When it comes to anything except children, "I'm a man" is no more meaningful than "I'm a Libra". Objectively meaningless, subjectively can screw you up but only if you believe in zodiac.
> "I'm a man" is no more meaningful than "I'm a Libra".
I think you're overstating things here, by a lot. I understand not wanting to get mired in gender politics, as I find it tedious as well. But "man" and "woman" goes deeper than star signs.
I think that's your issue. In isolation, maybe you think it's objectively meaningless. But if that were true in life and society, you would not see such drastic statistical significance between men and women. For example, wouldn't you expect murders, suicides, pay, life expectancy, etc etc to be a 50/50 split if gender is objectively the same?
I don't know for sure, but I imagine your star sign or whatever is not a significant predictor of anything. But being a man or woman is a significant predictor in many things.
> We all mostly want the same things, feel the same things and do the same things, both good and bad
The irony is that it’s clear from this affirmation that you are a man, because any woman knows how false this is. This is the same for pretty much any situation where some group dominates another: the dominants think everything is fine because they don’t experience any discrimination and don’t understand why the dominated complain and are "so fixated on gender" (or race, etc).
> I hate it more than I can say when I read books or listen to talks and performances by men who tell and ‘interpret’ women’s stories, and who are kind enough then to suggest to us ways in which our lives as women might be improved. I’ve never wanted to do the same to them
What a weird take on things: let's apply neat little discrete labels to every person and pretend that the experiences of each particular combination of labels is so radically different from everybody else's that we can't possibly learn anything from anybody else.
> but the knowledge of psychology, myth and folklore that I’ve acquired over the past several decades isn’t restricted to women, and it seems a pity to hold back information and ideas that might be useful
Ah, some common sense prevailed. Thank goodness. It can't possibly be the case that when men do the same it's somehow with the same goal of trying to be useful; no, it must be that they are trying to "'interpret' women's stories".
Look, I'm an immigrant queer disabled man, and if all I did was listening to what other immigrant queer disabled men had to say and looked down on input from other people my information bubble would be very small indeed.
Fortunately, most people are willing to listen to all sorts of other people and judge what they have to say fot what it is, not based on some labels we assigned to the source. And conversely, when the information they have provided falls below our standards, we should place the blame on the individual rather than the collective that we think they belong to.
As a heterosexual immigrant woman, the two people in the world who understand me best are men. And also not immigrants. Indeed, our personal experiences have rather little overlap, but they understand me best because their thought processes are similar to mine and because they are thoughtful, empathetic people. I'll take their life advice over anyone's.
I agree, it saddens me that they feel they can't (or maybe shouldn't) write about men because you are not one. As a man I can only learn more from the different perspective they would bring. If only one perspective is offered we all lose and in the past we lost a lot because of this.
> What a weird take on things: let's apply neat little discrete labels to every person and pretend that the experiences of each particular combination of labels is so radically different from everybody else's that we can't possibly learn anything from anybody else.
This is called "intersectionality", a term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw in the late 1980s but some of the key concepts date back to the work of bell hooks in the 1970s. It's a generally accepted pillar of modern feminism.
Something bubbled up on StalkedIn a couple days back: it had images of King Charles III and Ozzy Osbourne, and it said both were white, male, British, born in 1948, married twice, and on and so forth. And it said "A customer is not their demographics. A customer is their individual goals and needs" or something like that. Which, while still laden with business-speak, was something of a contrarian take in today's DEI-mediated world. You gotta be careful with this intersectionality stuff. The endgame of intersectionality is -- gasp -- considering people as individuals.
> [...]I hate it more than I can say when I read books or listen to talks and performances by men who tell and ‘interpret’ women’s stories
This is of a piece with a disturbing trend in the world of fiction where writing about anything that "you aren't" is considered inauthentic, or wrong.
If I read a story about a man written by a woman that resonates with me deeply, it's just as real and true as it would be if a man had written it. Maybe even a little more so.
Keep in mind that masculinity and femininity are constructed - they only exist because some properties associated with each other. Because of its construction, its an opinion, not a fact. What one considers masculine or feminine is basically arbitrary and random and everyone is free to disagree.
An evil spirit could claim that none of the mentioned archetypes is gender-specific at all and they would not be provable wrong.
How could it be a construct of our modern times if their themes are consistent throughout history of humankind? Delving into mythology and legends which explore the nature of our kind, the description of male and female is fairly consistent.
You might as well say "everything is subjective, there is no truth".
Gender is an opinion, but it is a sufficiently coherent opinion across different people and different times that it can be studied and discussed from an almost objective historical and anthropological perspective; the "evil spirit" cannot claim that, for example, typical blacksmiths in stories are not male.
[+] [-] 082349872349872|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] BlackFly|1 year ago|reply
She then goes on to mention the first(ish) man to do so, Robert Bly. The New York times, for his obiturary, wrote that Bly "started a controversial men’s movement with a best seller that called for a restoration of primal male audacity." Which underlines why most men don't want to do it and why actually it is better if women lead this study at this current time: even if your intentions are good, your statements may be misjudged by some. In Bly's case, it was misjudged by some anti-feminists to launch some actual misogynistic countercultures and misjudged by some feminists to blame Bly for some of this and prior misogyny.
Anyways, a round about way to say thank you, Dr. Sharon Blackie for writing this. As opposed to it being misplaced, I quite appreciate it and find it necessary.
[+] [-] joshhansen|1 year ago|reply
This is such an indictment of our society.
I still believe that the proper response to women's mistreatment in the past and present is to stop mistreating women, not to start mistreating men.
Constraining men from discussing things of interest and value to them, basically because they're not women and don't have the societal "indulgence" of being female, is sexism and should be opposed.
Maybe that's the wrong read of the situation, I'd appreciate being steered aright, but that seems like the situation to me right now.
[+] [-] dazzawazza|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] blueflow|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] scotty79|1 year ago|reply
When it comes to anything except children, "I'm a man" is no more meaningful than "I'm a Libra". Objectively meaningless, subjectively can screw you up but only if you believe in zodiac.
[+] [-] d-z-m|1 year ago|reply
I think you're overstating things here, by a lot. I understand not wanting to get mired in gender politics, as I find it tedious as well. But "man" and "woman" goes deeper than star signs.
[+] [-] hn92726819|1 year ago|reply
I think that's your issue. In isolation, maybe you think it's objectively meaningless. But if that were true in life and society, you would not see such drastic statistical significance between men and women. For example, wouldn't you expect murders, suicides, pay, life expectancy, etc etc to be a 50/50 split if gender is objectively the same?
I don't know for sure, but I imagine your star sign or whatever is not a significant predictor of anything. But being a man or woman is a significant predictor in many things.
[+] [-] hk__2|1 year ago|reply
The irony is that it’s clear from this affirmation that you are a man, because any woman knows how false this is. This is the same for pretty much any situation where some group dominates another: the dominants think everything is fine because they don’t experience any discrimination and don’t understand why the dominated complain and are "so fixated on gender" (or race, etc).
[+] [-] david-gpu|1 year ago|reply
What a weird take on things: let's apply neat little discrete labels to every person and pretend that the experiences of each particular combination of labels is so radically different from everybody else's that we can't possibly learn anything from anybody else.
> but the knowledge of psychology, myth and folklore that I’ve acquired over the past several decades isn’t restricted to women, and it seems a pity to hold back information and ideas that might be useful
Ah, some common sense prevailed. Thank goodness. It can't possibly be the case that when men do the same it's somehow with the same goal of trying to be useful; no, it must be that they are trying to "'interpret' women's stories".
Look, I'm an immigrant queer disabled man, and if all I did was listening to what other immigrant queer disabled men had to say and looked down on input from other people my information bubble would be very small indeed.
Fortunately, most people are willing to listen to all sorts of other people and judge what they have to say fot what it is, not based on some labels we assigned to the source. And conversely, when the information they have provided falls below our standards, we should place the blame on the individual rather than the collective that we think they belong to.
[+] [-] RoyalHenOil|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] dazzawazza|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bitwize|1 year ago|reply
This is called "intersectionality", a term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw in the late 1980s but some of the key concepts date back to the work of bell hooks in the 1970s. It's a generally accepted pillar of modern feminism.
Something bubbled up on StalkedIn a couple days back: it had images of King Charles III and Ozzy Osbourne, and it said both were white, male, British, born in 1948, married twice, and on and so forth. And it said "A customer is not their demographics. A customer is their individual goals and needs" or something like that. Which, while still laden with business-speak, was something of a contrarian take in today's DEI-mediated world. You gotta be careful with this intersectionality stuff. The endgame of intersectionality is -- gasp -- considering people as individuals.
[+] [-] junke|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] mock-possum|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] d-z-m|1 year ago|reply
This is of a piece with a disturbing trend in the world of fiction where writing about anything that "you aren't" is considered inauthentic, or wrong.
If I read a story about a man written by a woman that resonates with me deeply, it's just as real and true as it would be if a man had written it. Maybe even a little more so.
[+] [-] williamcotton|1 year ago|reply
You get there by hitting the gas pedal as you approach narcissism.
[+] [-] blueflow|1 year ago|reply
An evil spirit could claim that none of the mentioned archetypes is gender-specific at all and they would not be provable wrong.
[+] [-] DarkNova6|1 year ago|reply
You might as well say "everything is subjective, there is no truth".
[+] [-] HelloNurse|1 year ago|reply