Rolling Maleness and Masculinity Discussion Thread

when was in high school and trying to stay afloat in a sea of toxic masculinity, almost everyone acted like they thought women smelled bad

idk Alfred what is the gay analog to the straight guy that can't establish or maintain a relationship w women and turns that into "it's not me, it's THEM!" standard misognist perspective (honest question!)

itt many mispellings of mesoginey

I have genuinely never heard of this thing about women smelling bad as a thing before. It seems...kind of insane and completely out of sync with reality?

Kind of like misogyny!

that's universal.

x-post

cooties yo c'mon man xps

i mean "it's not me, it's THEM!" is kinda universal. unisex.

Also, "smells like fish" is lazy-joke-about-women #1 and I don't believe anyone who says they've never heard it before.

I loved the Ferrante books but most of my female friends did not get into them at all (except for one, who's a writer).

i mean "it's not me, it's THEM!" is kinda universal. unisex.

I guess... but a gay man doesn't feel crushing sexual frustration if he doesn't have any female relationships, it doesn't seem realistic to me to just overlook that dynamic in straight guys.

xxpost Okay, that I've heard, but like in dumb movies or whatever. I genuinely don't remember kids in school saying stuff like that about girls, though. Not to say that they didn't exist, but I was pretty good at avoiding the CHUDs.

i had a gay roommate in high school (when i got sent away to bad boy's school) and he totally thought the idea of smelly pussies was hilarious/terrifying. i can still see him rolling around on his bed in agony at the idea. his saving grace was a great love for "no parking on the dance floor". his obsession with Clinique products was the only smell i had a problem with.

Sorry to divert the thread, but I think I just stumbled upon the sad endpoint of masculine stupidity.

Look. A man thought toilet seats were for girls only and has spent his entire life taking uncomfortable dumps because he is MANLY pic.twitter.com/n6gN3TvUQ3

— Another Scary Ghost (@stavvers) October 12, 2017

i had a gay roommate in high school (when i got sent away to bad boy's school) and he totally thought the idea of smelly pussies was hilarious/terrifyin

haha yes I *definitely* encountered this. not so much from straight guys that I can recall.

(of course a thread about masculinity promptly devolves into a discussion of what female genitalia smell like lol)

Also, "smells like fish" is lazy-joke-about-women #1 and I don't believe anyone who says they've never heard it before.

― Marcus Hiles Remains Steadfast About Planting Trees.jpg (DJP), Thursday, October 12, 2017 2:27 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark

agree
even if they claim not to have heard of it, even girls said this in high school
the degree to which the early 90s were saturated in toxic masculinity is what has come back to me the most strongly with this weinstein thing

as distinct from which era?

not distinct, just not the utopia of riot grrl power that the early 90s are characterized as sometimes

No one is overlooking that dynamic in straight guys.

I am saying that the driving behavior, which is common to men across the board, is one that is about controlling women like playthings. Some men want to have sex with their toys. Some want to dress them up. Some want to punch and kick them. It's all coming from a place where the person in question is seen as an object rather than an autonomous being.

I keep going back to Isaac Mizrahi's appearance on the 2006 Golden Globes preshow for E!, where he fondled Scarlett Johannsen's breasts, looked down Teri Hatcher's dress, and kept asking all the women if they were wearing any underwear. I don't think this was driven by sexual desire.

It's possible that recognizing from an early age that one has a constantly-spewing fountain of toxic masculinity for a dad helps one to recognize and avoid those who are similarly skewed. Thankfully.

i must have the male macho asshole look or something because the number of times i've been in situations with strangers or semi-strangers and they start talking inappropriately like i'm good with it is way too high.

then there's m1lo Y, who is another unholy creature entirely. xxp

in re things the Weinstein scandal has reminded me of and general toxic masculinity, it occurred to me that growing up there was a lot of popular media that had the trope of a woman who "slept with someone to get the job/part", and we usually learned this from an envious woman (and that woman was presumably scripted by a man) and it was always presented as though that woman was conniving and unscrupulous, and not as though the man was exploiting a massive power imbalance, and it literally just never fucking occurred to me what was really going on there, it was just this accepted, slightly curious thing to me growing up "Oh, there are women who sleep with men to get jobs". As though women would just want to do that, of their own volition.

and it always worked out great for them in the end!

Also, "smells like fish" is lazy-joke-about-women #1 and I don't believe anyone who says they've never heard it before.

― Marcus Hiles Remains Steadfast About Planting Trees.jpg (DJP),

I heard it in gay circles when I was younger, never in straight ones.

let's not forget the super attractive woman who invades a successful man's life, seducing him and later trying to ruin his career and also KILL him

Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton?

my question to you all is: what are you going to do about this? i don't think you need to go around educating random assholes, but if some guy you know makes you feel uncomfortable when he (for example) objectifies the waitress, what are you going to do?

may i recommend shunning. it's about time people stopped inviting assholes to the table regardless of how powerful they are.

I'm an excellent shunner of assholes.

I def shun and will continue to shun.

I'm hoping-not-hoping this comes up in the course of my tutoring/mentoring so that I can hopefully engage in some conversations and healthy redirection in that regard. Which is probably more constructive than the freeze-out I'm more likely to give to adult assholes.

I'm an excellent shunner of assholes.

― the scarest move i ever seen is scary move 4 (Old Lunch),

first sentence of your memoir

ian’s post about not being perfect/an angel in his past really resonates w me because of the whole glass houses thing. trying to be a better ally for me is about shutting the f up and getting out of the way as much as possible when surrounded by friendly/strange company. i have no problem rolling on assholes if i am thrust into a situation that i wouldn’t be in by choice.

I already shun, both socially and professionally. I plan to continue doing so.

but if some guy you know makes you feel uncomfortable when he (for example) objectifies the waitress, what are you going to do?

honestly this scenario is so inconceivable to me, I can't think of anyone I know who would do this. and if it was just some random guy I didn't know but happened to be eating with, my immediate instinct would be "note to self: avoid this person". I guess I could start an argument but that's usually not a good tactic when in public with strangers.

how are y'all defining "objectifies"?

"The waitress is beautiful" is a level I can tolerate.
"Damn, them titties!" is not.

shunning is insufficient in most circumstances (though it's a fine step)

murder is against the law, though

I do shun but I usually just freeze people out, make it plain, non-verbally, I don't want to talk to them. That I'm pretty good at.

I suspect there are other options in most situations xp

I was defining it as "makes a comment on waitress' appearance" or worse

xp

as i mentioned in the other thread my field is 80% women so the gross outright sexist statements aren't as common (though they do happen obv, and even though it's 80% women i think the leadership positions are taken slightly more by men), it is more about men dominating conversations, not listening to or valuing perspectives offered by women, ignoring the labor of women that generally keep everything running in this field. when i see that happening firsthand i try do things like properly credit ideas, highlight the labor that was done for a given project, show active listening.

the only kind of gross thing i've seen firsthand in my field was at a professional conference chatting w/ two colleagues, one a younger woman about my age and the other a middle-aged dude. the young woman had to leave and when she left the guy said to me "boy she is a cutie huh" and I was kind of stunned and didn't know what to say so I didn't say anything :/

after the boys of shunner are gone

"The waitress is beautiful" is a level I can tolerate.

if one of my (relatively few) single male hetero friends made this comment I would look on them more with pity than disdain but I would still think it's kinda weird. Like, you keep those thoughts to yourself, I don't need or want to know about your preferences.

xp

Sometimes mocking can actually work, in the right scenario, like "Holy shit, the waitress is a woman and has breasts, so cool!"

treating a person like an object
i am against "the waitress is beautiful" fwiw -- it is objectifying

i think it's the same mentality that leads to phrases that end with a woman being called a "thing" (pretty little thing, sweet young thing, delicate precious thing) i loathe being called a thing and i've even had women call me a thing and it feels really condescending.

i'm kind of uncomfortable w/even that low-level flirting with women working at restaurants because they're not there to be flirted with, they're doing a job and as a part of the job they feel pressured to put up with it. i know a lot of people who do that, which doesn't rise as obviously to the level of objectifying but it's still something i'm not really into.

it IS objectifying