A patient I dealt with had schizophrenia and dementia, "but I'm a man, not a little girl with panties" was his counterargument to everything.
You can only have one cigarette at a time because otherwise you lose them all and run out. "But I'm a man."
You know the doctor says your food needs to be cut up. "Do I look like a little girl to you?"
That's the communal cheese bowl, this is your plate. You can't eat from the communal cheese bowl with a fork. "Do you see me wearing panties?"
Whenever I hear people making these kind of gender essentialist arguments, they just sound pitiably out of touch with reality to me.
If Men want to feel like Men then they have ways to deal with their insecurity:
Redo their own plumbing, twice. Once to change things and again to fix the problem they caused.
Chop firewood.
Build a furnace that you're only going to use like 4 times, ever.
50 pushups. If not reaching it makes you sad, start skipping numbers.
Just waiting for the day when someone can explain to me what makes a man a man without describing skills, qualities, and actions that anyone can do regardless of gender.
And don't tell me it's "have a penis", because if that were true then effeminate men wouldn't be insulted all the time for not being "real" men, and there wouldn't be toxic masculinity.
I’ve always thought the least manly quality you can have is caring about how manly you are.
That's the perfect answer, IMHO.
More in general, it's not up to others to change the way they act to feed somebody else's self-delusions of having some kind of quality they do not have.
I've actually had to deal with something somewhat parallel to this when I moved from The Netherlands (whose people are known for being blunt) to Britain (were everything is sugarcoated and people are evasive, the higher the social class the worst it gets) and then proceeded to go around unknowingly insulting just about every insecure person I met in that place by giving them my blunt opinion on what they cared about, without evasiveness or sugarcoating.
The balance I found was to stop giving my opinion unless asked and if asked by somebody who didn't know my ways yet, give them a notice ("I used to live in The Netherlands so just point out ways in which things can be improved, but that doesn't mean I think they're bad") and then proceed to give them my blunt opinion.
As a biological male and someone who identifies as a man, it's pretty weak, IMO, to need someone else to make you feel a particular way.
Are you in control of your feelings, or do you constantly need someone else to reinforce, or induce a feeling in you?
Personally, I'm in control of my feelings, and bluntly, nobody else has control over me. Neither for how I feel, or what I think/do; with the only exception to what I do being governed in part by legality. Eg. If I know a thing isn't legal to do, then I won't do that thing. Beyond the rule of law, I do, think, say, and feel, whatever, and however I want.
To me, having that much control over my own self is what makes me a person living in a free country. Anyone who does not have the ability, like I do, to think, feel, do, and love, whomever and, whatever they want, is someone who I want to support in gaining that right.
I've never heard anyone say that phrase, is it possible that people use that expression to mean "a man likes to feel like a man... not a machine"? Ie he has thoughts, emotions, and priorities. He is not a commodity, his worth is more than just profit he can produce.
Not that women don't also have those attributes, just that "man" is being used as an outdated shorthand for humanity.
Is this a real thing? I don't believe I've ever encountered this. I suspect they're actually being demeaning to men in general, or men who don't fit their idea of masculinity. I've encountered people like that. Though the opposite is more common (men, and women, demeaning women who don't fit their idea of what a woman should be like, or just demeaning women in general).
What's wrong with wanting to feel like a man? There's nothing inherently negative about that. I like providing for my wife and I want nothing in return. I like doing typical man stuff with my friends. Why does that make you feel like I'm trying to be superior to anyone? I am comfortable in my masculinity and so should anyone who wants to be, stop treating that as toxic.
edit: Express your opinion by downvoting me if you must, but do me the courtesy of answering the question.
Normalize feeling like a man as somebody who is given space to feel anything beyond anger or shame. A man needs to feel like he can talk about things on his mind at any given time, to anybody he trusts. A man is somebody who can cry when he is hurting, and it be okay; that he won’t be labeled as weak or a coward.
This whole “like a man” thing sounds to me like an extension of the toxic cultural BS where “men” are not just humans with emotions and needs like every other human. It reeks of men who are too scared or ignorant to be self-aware and figure out what life really means to them, and thus they need the people around them (especially the partners) to play along in their power/masculinity fantasy.
What a man needs is to realize he’s just another human, and that for humans happiness and fulfillment can ultimately only come from within. Relationships with others are crucial, and you might even need some medication to get your brain chemistry unfucked, but neither of those are independently going to make you happy with yourself and “feel like a man.”
“A man” can refer to roughly half the adult population. It’s not exactly an exclusive club. Why not leave gender out if it and try to be “a good person” and see where that gets you?
Having the people around you walking on eggshells to keep your manly ego intact, whether it’s out of fear or pity, is the exact opposite of what a good person should strive for. What if the people around you instead trust you, feel safe with you, laugh with you, and are better off with you in their lives?
Source: Am man. Went through some stuff. Figured some things out. Made some things better. Have wife and child who enjoy life.
I mean it’s right there in the quote. They want to feel like a man. They don’t actually want to be one.
I hate dealing with some types of men, it's exhausting.
What is a man?! Nothing but a miserable pile of secrets. But enough talk... Have at you!
Geekandmisandry. Misandry ie. someone who hates men.
Well at least you're open about it. Many aren't when they attack men.
Here's the thing about "toxic masculinity". Some people are toxic. Women and men tend to express that toxicity in different ways. Attacking an entire gender for the behaviour of the worst is stereotyping.
More broadly it's part of the modern notion that we are on teams and that the other team is bad.
Why does he want to feel like Man? Is he stupid?
At this point, I'm not even sure what it feels like to be human.
