I very much agree. Patriarchal culture, even when it puts men at the top, is harmful to men. How harmful it is to men compared to women, we might disagree on, (it’s impossible for me to gage who have it worse here, men or women, that’s not the point though) but ultimately it hurts men and women, non-binary people and other genders as well. Patriarchy puts way to much pressure on men, denies their emotions, infinities them by expecting women to cater to them, reduces them to shallow stereotypes, is dehumanizing, and makes them resent women for all the things they have to go through. I can’t count all the times I’ve read women calling out how toxic sexist culture and men responding with “yeah but us men have it worse, we’re not allowed to show pain and we’re used to it, so suck it up and stop whining about rape. We men have to take our hits, so do you, that’s the way it is.”
Men are suffering, it’s clear. Male rape is ignored, it’s essentially a joke, but it happens, a lot, and men are shamed into silence, even more than women. Domestic violence toward men is ignored, patriarchy says only women should be subjected to that, so when a violent woman lashes out against her male partner, it is ignored at best but more often the man is shamed into silence because he “let himself be treated as a woman.” The clothing men wear becomes more and more narrow, while women have way more options. If we wear some boys clothes, it’s cute and tomboyish. Women do this all the time. I personally love to wear long flowy skirts, something that men in my culture aren’t allowed. They’re not even allowed to want to wear such clothing. In patriarchal culture, the worse thing you could ever want to be is a woman, so men have to constantly prove they’re not that, otherwise violence awaits them, to keep the gender roles inline. This is one of the reasons trans women experience more violence than other trans people, because patriarchy gifted them with the role of male, which is supposed to be the top, living as women is a betrayal to all that patriarchal rock that natal men are the best and no natal man would even steep so low as to be a woman. Women can want to be men, but never the other way. So we women are graced with the diversity of taking in masculine things, but the role of what is Manley becomes more and more narrow, forcing men into narrow little boxes, and insane expectations.
Feminism, in its true form about equality, is good for all genders because it promotes equality, and allows people to be themselves, not these binary narrow sexist roles that put way to much pressure on men, enslave women, and abuse/dehumanize anyone who does actively try to conform to this binary.
As a feminist, I think we should end toxic masculinity and let men be themselves.
Let’s end patriarchy, it hurts everyone to much, even men will be way happier.
