I think we very much do understand it's a problem and there is not a whole lot women can do about it that we aren't already doing. The majority of feminists would love for men to see a fucking therapist. They keep fighting it tooth and nail, though.
They'll either not open up at all for fear of being judged, or they'll ONLY lean on the women in their life. The one or two women in their life, because in my anecdotal experience they don't seem to stick around women they can't sleep with.
You guys want and desperately need actual emotional support, but you seemingly refuse to support each other. When we tell you to so much as just give each other the compliments you're looking for, it's met with whining because the respondents want women to do it. Even though mainly the compliments we get are...also from women, and going along with this request puts us in harm's way.
A lot of men are so beat to shit from such an early age that they can't even put a name to a lot of emotions besides anger. Which causes them to be both unable to manage what they can barely explain, and to feel significantly uncomfortable (outmatched) in marriage counseling, watching their wife run circles around them.
But biting the bullet and improving on emotional literacy via counseling and/or self-study and deep reflection never seems to strike the fancy. Their date has to teach them. And they WILL be fighting every step of the way.
I would love to date someone who doesn't define their entire existence through their job. That's nearly the entire reason two out of my four relationships fell to pieces.
-I- didn't give a shit. I met one of them when we were both homeless and said yes anyway. But if I made more money or they got laid off at any point, both of them would have a months-long binge drinking breakdown regardless of what I said.
You know you could just stop, right? That's what's incredibly frustrating about this for me. A lot of problems that are specific to men seem to be an issue of self-image, and are thus self-imposed, and you could just. Stop.
I can't make anyone not pick me up by the throat, but any day you could just wake up and decide your paycheck doesn't actually fucking matter and never date someone who thinks it does.
You could be excruciatingly nice to people for no reason instead of demanding women do it, work out what's going on with you and tell people about it, and give them both barrels if they think a human being needing help is gay.
As much as I feel for men as a group, it's the empathetic part that makes me want to hold them upside down and shake them till the sense falls out. Take. Care of each other.Fix the thing.
It's kinda sad that when men have problems, they're just expected to solve it themselves.
Words like "self-imposed" are just thrown around to handwave their issues away. But no one asks why the men think this way. Are women completely blameless?
How would women react if men were to say the lack of female representation in STEM is "self-imposed" and that women should just stop not applying for those jobs because of fear. It's unrealistic right?
No, it ain't sad at all. It's infuriating. Men aren't just having these problems. They are perpetuating them after having created them.
It's the misogyny, sure. But also the xenophobia, homophobia, racism, religious extremism, warmongering, gun humping, and whatever else makes these dudes vote for the most conservative and/or biggest asshole they can find.
The same crap makes other people, including the women in their lives, not want to be around them. And of course that government they voted in ain't going to offer any assistance as whatever calamities they've forced themselves to face alone, inevitably hit.
How would women react if men were to say the lack of female representation in STEM is “self-imposed”
To be fair, people are saying this all the time. Look up a Lemmy post about struggles of women. Ok, that was a rhetoric task because you won't find any with a significant amount of upvotes. But if you do on another platform, there will be plenty of people arguing that women should care for this themselves. Or discussing how bad it is for men, instead.
The majority of feminists would love for men to see a fucking therapist.
The majority of feminists would love for men to suffer and die and will say so in as many words, has been my experience.
But moving beyond that, therapy is a lazy, bullshit answer to the problem, for a number of reasons, a few of them being insurance.
The majority of men are not mentally ill, aka they don't suffer from a diagnosable disorder. Insurance won't pay for "Apparently I need non-specific therapy."
...If he has insurance that would cover mental health services, which many men don't.
Have you ever been to a therapist? I have. They just ask pointless question after pointless question. "How did that make you feel?" "Bad." "Why did it make you feel bad?" "...Why did being screamed at by my boss make me feel bad? That's what you're asking right now?" "Does that bother you?" They purposefully do not solve problems.
A lot of men are so beat to shit from such an early age that they can’t even put a name to a lot of emotions besides anger.
Who beats men to shit from such an early age? The majority of the people providing early childhood care are women. Elementary and middle school teachers, babysitters, daycare workers, hell, because of how pointlessly cruel the family court system is in this country, it's difficult to legally be a father. Men are systematically prevented from raising children. Men have been arrested for taking their children to play in the park. Men get accused of pedophilia for existing near children.
Remember the sitcom Home Improvement, starring Tim Allen as Tim Taylor? There was an early episode that starts up with his sons playing with a few neighborhood kids, one of his kids (whichever one was played by Johnathan Taylor Thomas, remember him?) had an ordinary deck of cards, and was apparently using it to tell "fortunes." The ace of spades was the "death card." Well apparently he drew the "death card" on one of the neighborhood boys, and this scared him. He comes running in the house crying, and Tim immediately rushes over, hugs the boy, rubs his back and goes to ask what's wrong, offer comfort, "It's just a game, you're not going to die."
Wholesome little scene, right? Made me physically uncomfortable. Because if I was seen acting that way toward a young boy, I would be accused of molesting him. I have been so sexualized, my touch has been so sexualized, that I'm only allowed to touch people who intend to fuck me. I absolutely will not be seen hugging a child, even those related to me, because I don't want to end up on a list.
Early childcare is almost entirely the domain of women, and little boys emerge from this, in your words, "so beat to shit." It's his fault though, right? He should figure it out and fix it?
I would love to date someone who doesn’t define their entire existence through their job.
Judging by what women say, they want a man who earns a lot of money, who doesn't spend a lot of time at work, who has time for hobbies but doesn't play video games, go to the gym, engage in sports, play with train sets or has a boat/motorcycle/dirt bike/whatever, and who doesn't just hang around the house. The only creature real or fictional I'm aware of that fits within this criteria is Janet from The Good Place.
Society absolutely perceives that. We can hardly help perceiving it when men are gunning us down, beating us to a pulp, and demanding our constant attention.
The thing is it's a problem that society can't solve. Only men can solve it.