Didn't really think about it like that, but definitely rings true to myself. The past weeks there were some conflicts whose root was in the fear to tell my truth. Now that I think about it, ever since I decided to wear my truth openly, I've been slowly feeling more whole and secure on myself. Not that I've become flawless at that, but progress is made.
Thank you for writing in here Dr. Al — I appreciate your reflection. I feel you about "The fear to tell my truth" man. I felt that so much for so much of my life. Now when it comes up it's like treasure, because I know it makes me more me. Sounds like you are getting that feeling as well. Like anything else, we get good at what we do. It builds up over time. Truth yoga builds the muscle of self.
Some truth here, but I never equated the provider myth with love. The provider has self worth and power in that formulation. And this is as true for women, via second wave feminism, as it has been for men. The mother is conventionally associated with unconditional and unlimited love--a myth that nearly every mom memoir busts. The devaluation of motherhood (or childcare by fathers) is part of the larger equation. But these are complex issues, and I’m wary of sweeping claims about them.
thanks for reading, and for your comment here Joshua. Good point about sweeping claims—I tend to be wary of those too, and I realize that my title seems like it's making a broad statement... although what I mean by it is _my_ truth about love.
I'll have to think a bit more about the rest of your comment!
Wow, I’m so glad I stumbled on this gem! You’ve basically written the piece on masculinity I’ve had in my head for a while. Also, as I was reading, I kept thinking “man bell hooks really speaks to this”; and then you quoted bell hooks! Again with Richard Rohr.
It’s very true: men need to learn to love, and love can gain much from men. The false promises of wealth and power have led us away from our humanity. I also agree that men need to address this problem directly ourselves; we can’t wait for women to save us, nor should we foist our issues on them.
In my writing I hope to hammer out some ways we can reimagine masculinity as loving and life-giving. I think the gays have a head start: our whole deal is loving men as men. But I also think homosexuality has been hoodwinked by the same false promises of normalcy, acceptance, status, etc that got straight men into this mess in the first place.
Hi Peter and thanks so much for writing in! As I've always said, "Anarchy now, Ask me how," so, consider me a fan already. You said it, I said it, many of us have and are saying it, not nearly enough, but some progress is being made. We each do our own work—and, to borrow something from my friend Roddy, who was part of the original inspiration for this piece, "when one man works, we all work."
I absolutely agree about "reimagining masculinity," and that there's a lot to be learned from the gays as you put it yourself—and, what I'd say is that rediscovering homosociality is what applies more broadly—same-sex relationships not of a romantic or sexual nature, but that do include intimacy, closeness, physical touch and affection. Chris Ryan and I touch on this in our interview here
I arrived on the tail end of the Baby Boomers but in many ways my family's emotional history was a precursor to what so many young men are suffering today. The issue for me was never a lack of connection with my father, who took me camping, taught me wilderness skills, built models with me, etc. It was with a mother who was emotionally incapable of relating to her son. Without going into too many personal details I will say that this broken maternal bond sent me on a lifelong quest for love with women that most often ended in disaster. Perversely, we often seek the very malady that made us ill, so I often ended up with other women just as incapable of expressing love or forming a bond. We constantly hear how awful men are thanks to third wave feminists propagating the "toxic masculinity" crap, as if this kind of blaming polarization will in any way help the situation. (When all else fails, just blame the man.) But my experience, and I suspect the experience of younger men today, is that women too can be just as inept at forming emotional attachments. We have to question gender stereotypes even—or especially—when they come from feminists.
Thanks so much for reading, and for your comment here Sean. Neither of my parents were equipped to speak much in the way of truth, and although I don't talk about my mother in this piece, I share some a similar experience with her. I agree that it's definitely all part of our cultural system—where we've ended up, FB&FW, and that we all have our parts to do in trying to connect in more interesting ways. To be clear (and I think you got this) my point here was not to blame the man, but to suggest that perhaps part of what we can focus on in particular as men is telling the truth, with each other, and with others.
Wow. I love this in-depth analysis. A lot of material here.
“By my early teens, I stopped trusting them. My mother’s empty sighs emptied out my insides, and I was left feeling the same way. I felt hollow. As for my father, we talked of the many things he loved to do—climbing and sailing and backpacking—but we had no language for ourselves. Once I reached puberty, I began to feel more and more angry with him for avoiding so much, and before long, we stopped speaking almost entirely.”
This was me almost exactly as a kid and teen. Nailed my experience.
It’s funny, thinking of my recent Note/post about women bashing men: Something occurred to me while reading your essay: As shitty as men can sometimes be, where would society--and women--be without men? There are physical, external realities in the world which have always had to be dealt with, to survive. Women have historically needed men for basic reasons such as physical strength, hunting, gathering, etc. And yet simultaneously men have historically caused women great harm over the millennia. It’s not an either/or; it’s a both/and. Your point about men being disconnected from love/emotional truth due in part to being providers and being forcefully thrust out into the world feels generally correct.
There’s the history of nations at war/in conflict but: Would that really be any different if women were running society? Do we genuinely think a matriarchy would be some Utopia? Do women not thrill to power in the same way? This reminds of the absurd idea that, had Africans led the globe as the west had, no war would have occurred, that war is a uniquely white western phenomenon. But look at the history of Africa: inter-tribal warfare and slavery were/are rampant before, during and after the west fought major wars and started/ended slavery. In the same way: Why do we think women would be different were they in power? Women are human beings are they not? Women have done horrible things just like men, both personally and nationally/politically have they not? I just think this idea that white western man is ‘the problem’ is silly. The problem is human beings exist. It happened to be white western man who rose to the top geopolitically. Had it been any other group I think the outcome would have been basically the same.
Very astute comments, sir. Lord Acton's famous dictum about power did NOT say: "Power corrupts MEN and absolute power corrupts MEN absolutely." He said that "power corrupts," period, no gender qualification. Power is a HUMAN problem, not a gender problem. Feminists have flattered themselves that they are above this particular human foible, but it's a lie. The results are all around us.
Definitely oversimplified and maybe obvious but maybe the lack of man’s understanding what love is is the root cause of violence and war
Didn't really think about it like that, but definitely rings true to myself. The past weeks there were some conflicts whose root was in the fear to tell my truth. Now that I think about it, ever since I decided to wear my truth openly, I've been slowly feeling more whole and secure on myself. Not that I've become flawless at that, but progress is made.
Thank you for writing in here Dr. Al — I appreciate your reflection. I feel you about "The fear to tell my truth" man. I felt that so much for so much of my life. Now when it comes up it's like treasure, because I know it makes me more me. Sounds like you are getting that feeling as well. Like anything else, we get good at what we do. It builds up over time. Truth yoga builds the muscle of self.
Cheers!
Some truth here, but I never equated the provider myth with love. The provider has self worth and power in that formulation. And this is as true for women, via second wave feminism, as it has been for men. The mother is conventionally associated with unconditional and unlimited love--a myth that nearly every mom memoir busts. The devaluation of motherhood (or childcare by fathers) is part of the larger equation. But these are complex issues, and I’m wary of sweeping claims about them.
thanks for reading, and for your comment here Joshua. Good point about sweeping claims—I tend to be wary of those too, and I realize that my title seems like it's making a broad statement... although what I mean by it is _my_ truth about love.
I'll have to think a bit more about the rest of your comment!
Wow, I’m so glad I stumbled on this gem! You’ve basically written the piece on masculinity I’ve had in my head for a while. Also, as I was reading, I kept thinking “man bell hooks really speaks to this”; and then you quoted bell hooks! Again with Richard Rohr.
It’s very true: men need to learn to love, and love can gain much from men. The false promises of wealth and power have led us away from our humanity. I also agree that men need to address this problem directly ourselves; we can’t wait for women to save us, nor should we foist our issues on them.
In my writing I hope to hammer out some ways we can reimagine masculinity as loving and life-giving. I think the gays have a head start: our whole deal is loving men as men. But I also think homosexuality has been hoodwinked by the same false promises of normalcy, acceptance, status, etc that got straight men into this mess in the first place.
Hi Peter and thanks so much for writing in! As I've always said, "Anarchy now, Ask me how," so, consider me a fan already. You said it, I said it, many of us have and are saying it, not nearly enough, but some progress is being made. We each do our own work—and, to borrow something from my friend Roddy, who was part of the original inspiration for this piece, "when one man works, we all work."
I absolutely agree about "reimagining masculinity," and that there's a lot to be learned from the gays as you put it yourself—and, what I'd say is that rediscovering homosociality is what applies more broadly—same-sex relationships not of a romantic or sexual nature, but that do include intimacy, closeness, physical touch and affection. Chris Ryan and I touch on this in our interview here
https://bowendwelle.substack.com/p/e13-coming-out-and-letting-go-with
...and Grayson Perry's book _The Descent of Man_ is a great read as well.
By the way, I'm a KSR fan too—and I had the opportunity to interview him not long ago! Check out this interview I did with him ⬇️
https://open.substack.com/pub/bowendwelle/p/e14-wayfinding-with-kim-stanley-robinson
Thanks for the shoutout, and the suggestions! I’ll definitely add these to my reading list.
I arrived on the tail end of the Baby Boomers but in many ways my family's emotional history was a precursor to what so many young men are suffering today. The issue for me was never a lack of connection with my father, who took me camping, taught me wilderness skills, built models with me, etc. It was with a mother who was emotionally incapable of relating to her son. Without going into too many personal details I will say that this broken maternal bond sent me on a lifelong quest for love with women that most often ended in disaster. Perversely, we often seek the very malady that made us ill, so I often ended up with other women just as incapable of expressing love or forming a bond. We constantly hear how awful men are thanks to third wave feminists propagating the "toxic masculinity" crap, as if this kind of blaming polarization will in any way help the situation. (When all else fails, just blame the man.) But my experience, and I suspect the experience of younger men today, is that women too can be just as inept at forming emotional attachments. We have to question gender stereotypes even—or especially—when they come from feminists.
Thanks so much for reading, and for your comment here Sean. Neither of my parents were equipped to speak much in the way of truth, and although I don't talk about my mother in this piece, I share some a similar experience with her. I agree that it's definitely all part of our cultural system—where we've ended up, FB&FW, and that we all have our parts to do in trying to connect in more interesting ways. To be clear (and I think you got this) my point here was not to blame the man, but to suggest that perhaps part of what we can focus on in particular as men is telling the truth, with each other, and with others.
Wow. I love this in-depth analysis. A lot of material here.
“By my early teens, I stopped trusting them. My mother’s empty sighs emptied out my insides, and I was left feeling the same way. I felt hollow. As for my father, we talked of the many things he loved to do—climbing and sailing and backpacking—but we had no language for ourselves. Once I reached puberty, I began to feel more and more angry with him for avoiding so much, and before long, we stopped speaking almost entirely.”
This was me almost exactly as a kid and teen. Nailed my experience.
It’s funny, thinking of my recent Note/post about women bashing men: Something occurred to me while reading your essay: As shitty as men can sometimes be, where would society--and women--be without men? There are physical, external realities in the world which have always had to be dealt with, to survive. Women have historically needed men for basic reasons such as physical strength, hunting, gathering, etc. And yet simultaneously men have historically caused women great harm over the millennia. It’s not an either/or; it’s a both/and. Your point about men being disconnected from love/emotional truth due in part to being providers and being forcefully thrust out into the world feels generally correct.
There’s the history of nations at war/in conflict but: Would that really be any different if women were running society? Do we genuinely think a matriarchy would be some Utopia? Do women not thrill to power in the same way? This reminds of the absurd idea that, had Africans led the globe as the west had, no war would have occurred, that war is a uniquely white western phenomenon. But look at the history of Africa: inter-tribal warfare and slavery were/are rampant before, during and after the west fought major wars and started/ended slavery. In the same way: Why do we think women would be different were they in power? Women are human beings are they not? Women have done horrible things just like men, both personally and nationally/politically have they not? I just think this idea that white western man is ‘the problem’ is silly. The problem is human beings exist. It happened to be white western man who rose to the top geopolitically. Had it been any other group I think the outcome would have been basically the same.
Michael Mohr
‘Sincere American Writing’
https://michaelmohr.substack.com/
Very astute comments, sir. Lord Acton's famous dictum about power did NOT say: "Power corrupts MEN and absolute power corrupts MEN absolutely." He said that "power corrupts," period, no gender qualification. Power is a HUMAN problem, not a gender problem. Feminists have flattered themselves that they are above this particular human foible, but it's a lie. The results are all around us.