the.ink/p/vivek-murthy-loneliness-men-crisis
Surgeon General’s warning: American men are in crisis - "Dr. Vivek Murthy talks to us about the crisis of American masculinity, why pro-democracy leaders struggle to speak to the emotions, and whether social media should be banned for minors"
Considering it came up in the context of JBP, I'm more concerned with the interviewer validating the premise as "fact."
To the right-wing pundit, Masculinity is not in crisis because American men are in crisis. To these folks, America is in crisis because masculinity is not sufficiently embraced by men.
A foundational principle of conservative political thought is that all people have a "correct place" in society. When everyone is in their "correct place", society will function well. When people start existing outside of their "correct place", society breaks down. The snozzberries no longer taste like snozzberries. Conversely, if society is broken down, the most pressing reason must be that too many people are existing outside of their "correct place".
Your average social media purveyor hasn't read a lot of Edmund Burke, but I guarantee someone like Peterson has. This is a philosophy these folks are embracing unironically. Eat more football, watch more nachos, marry a tradwife, and everyone's lives will be fixed. If your life is not fixed by this, the problem is that too many other men aren't eating football, watching nachos, and marrying tradwives. If getting every man on Earth to eat football, watch nachos, and marry tradwives doesn't fix society, the problem must be the gays or the PoCs or anyone else on the list who just won't get into their "correct place".
This is the purest form of the "crisis of masculinity" that the Right is talking about. When folks outside the Right publish op-eds about the "crisis", they're typically either trying to sneak these ideas into the discourse or leverage the name recognition for something else (eg, to sell something).
And they've said it every election cycle since the 1700s.
Very well put.
Eat more football, watch more nachos,
Unrelated, but is this phrasing an accident, or is it some type of saying, meme etc? Because I would think it is suppose to be "watch more football" and "eat more nachos", not the other way around... lol. speaking as a non native speaker
They're swapped intentionally to convey the lack of seriousness I feel towards the prescriptions! It's not referencing any particular meme, just a pattern of humor I grew up with.
haha, ok! I noticed it was intentional because you said it twice,,, I just wanted to know if that was a common thing native speakers did hehe... anyway, ok, thanks
And far away in Sweden I read them and was hoping they were exactly that combination of humor an conveyeing-of-meaning.
Because it’s exactly my pattern as well. (But usually in Swedish obv)
Great writeup anyway!!!!!
Excellent comment
To the right-wing pundit, Masculinity is not in crisis because American men are in crisis. To these folks, America is in crisis because masculinity is not sufficiently embraced by men.
I've never heard of such a think even from Jordan Peterson (who is already a somewhat fringe person).
A foundational principle of conservative political thought is that all people have a "correct place" in society.
Again in today's world this is not something I'm aware of, or something I've heard.
Generally it's better to talk about what we think is good, and the way we want to change the world, rather than why other people are bad. We aren't going to change the world just by attacking others, we need our own vision.
Also generally it is better to let other people speak for themselves rather than trying to speak for them. Often when we try to speak for other people, we misinterpret what they are trying to say and maybe don't understand where they are coming from.
I've never heard of such a think even from Jordan Peterson
You've never heard the "men aren't men any more", "men are being castrated by women", "feminists are turning men into women-lite" rhetoric anywhere? Because this is that.
Again not something I'm aware of, or something I've heard.
Peterson has, though. The Heritage Foundation has. These are folks who read a lot of books and put a lot of effort into crafting messages that lead to the same place as their core beliefs.
Sometimes, for some audiences, those messages are direct and unencumbered. See: CPAC or any leaked conversation with donors. Most of the time, when crafted for consumption by a public that is largely not part of the ruling class, they're buried under 2-3 layers of abstraction. Not so much that people don't get the gist. Just enough to equivocate when people call them out.
Also generally it is better to let other people speak for themselves rather than trying to speak for them. Often when we try to speak for other people, we misinterpret what they are trying to say and maybe don't understand where they are coming from.
This is good practice for peers. PhD-wielding, think-tank-sitting, billionaire-backed pundits are not anyone's peers. They are extensions of an institution whose primary goal is the accumulation and retention of power and wealth.
There is a difference between a man ignoring Red Tie Guy because their ties are the wrong color and a man ignoring today's flavor of Right-wing propaganda because they've read the same authors whose ideas are being championed, see the messages loosely buried in that propaganda, and know that it's designed such that engaging with it at all is a victory for Conservatives.
It grants them control of the conversation. The premises they introduce are accepted uncritically and any effort you put into refuting their claims happens in the framing they introduced by making them.
This interviewer asked why the Right is better at messaging around "the fact of a crisis of masculinity". To even start on the "why" question itself, you first have to accept two premises: That the Right is actually better at "messaging" around the "fact of a crisis of masculinity", and that "the fact of a crisis of masculinity" even exists.
This is not esoteric nonsense. It's a basic rhetorical technique. It immediately makes a respondent look pedantic or avoidant if they back the question up to a premise. By including two of them, even a respondent willing to look a little pedantic by questioning if the Right is actually doing a better job on messaging still doesn't make it all the way to the assertion that there's a "fact of a crisis of masculinity".
Deconstructing these premises one by one also takes much, much more time and effort than asserting them. They're designed to "feel right", which is a lot easier to do for conservatives who have the benefit of the status quo.
The Right is "better at messaging"? Why? Because this particular social media audience of vaguely political cis-het white men feels vindicated when someone takes a jab at the Left? Despite young people, men and women alike, overwhelmingly becoming more Left leaning? Despite Millennials becoming the first generation in modern American history to become more Left wing as they age? Despite this pressure pushing the Democratic party platform even an inch Left for the first time since Clinton's Third Way Neoliberalism?
Whatever essay I write to take this down costs a lot more than the "vibes" spent to produce it. We can "high road" ourselves into taking every piece of bait Heritage throws at us or we can be intentional about which ideas deserve a comprehensive response and which require "pointing to the sign".
This is good practice for peers.
I understand that in the realm of politics, everyone is always trying to speak for whoever they are against. In fact in politics speaking for who you are against is much more important than speaking for yourself, or having your own ideas.
I think this way of interacting is poisonous and destructive for society. Politics tries to separate people into us and them and one of the main techniques is to demonize and purposely misconstrue what political opponents are saying and trying to do.
The politicians try to form people into groups, and try to make everyone inside the group have uniform beliefs. But in reality people do not have such uniform beliefs, people can (and do) agree on one topic while disagreeing on another.
Who and what benefits from this conflict created by "us versus them"? The patriarchy, the wealthy and powerful who love to see the masses arguing with each other, which is part of how the patriarchy maintains its power.
It seems though we agree that at least here on reddit or at least on this sub, people can speak for themselves and others should not speak for say me. (I guess that's the policy of this sub?)
You've never heard ...
Even though these are different statement from the one I said I never heard, also for these statements no I have not not even heard them online AFAIK your are the first person I have read who said these. Do you have a reference for when Peterson said "men are being castrated by women"? It would only surprise me slightly if there is one.
For sure online I have heard some crazy things. Also I would think probably someone has as some point said something like what you said (there are 8 billion humans so a lot of things will get said).
In any case I don't think we should allow our discussions to be dominated or taken over by the fringe (such as Peterson). We should try to have more reasonable discussions. On the other hand if you want to find enemies and people with crazy ideas, they are pretty easy to find.
This interviewer ...
I took this piece as a political piece made because of the upcoming elections. I think we shouldn't get coopted by partisan politics (as that just serves the interests of the patriarchy).
It grants them control of the conversation. The premises they introduce are accepted uncritically and any effort you put into refuting their claims happens in the framing they introduced by making them.
I'm all for debating and challenging ideas, but if we want to know the idea that is being challenging, we need to hear it from the person who has that idea. Because they have their own agendas third parties will often purposely misconstrue what people they don't like are saying.
Very interesting points about base assumptions (and using two etc). I'm more interested in discussions between commoners than discussions between people who have a political agenda.
I didn't really understand your point about messaging. The right always says the left is better at it, and the left always says the right is better at it. Israel says Hamas is better at it ... etc. Yes this is just a standard technique. Even before or more basic than that, is the patriarchy separates us into left and right (us and them) as a way to control the debate and keep the masses separated and fighting.
I don't understand this complaint. The American concept of masculinity is indeed a significant contributor to the male loneliness epidemic.
They're saying that framing puts "masculinity" in crisis, which mirrors a common rightwing sentiment that "masculinity" is in danger because men aren't "manly enough. Which us bullshit.
Saying "Men are in crisis" instead shifts the focus to what/who actually needs help.
Except "men" in general aren't in crisis. The issue specifically is the traditional ideas of American masculinity and how those societal pressures and expectations are negatively affecting a significant number of men.
The “loneliness epidemic” started in the late 20th century and has more to do with technology, the Internet, and social media providing people with instant access to distractions and entertainment without leaving home. Traditional masculinity has existed for most of human history so if that was the true cause, high levels of adult loneliness would have been an issue for far longer. And not all social ills are caused by masculinity.
You guys are all over the place. We're not talking about loneliness in general - we're talking about why men are uniquely suffering with loneliness. The things you mentioned are affecting everyone, men and women - people in general are suffering with loneliness and disconnection. And yet men are suffering in a unique way. I find it absolutely mystifying why you guys are trying to argue that traditional notions of masculinity in American culture aren't a significant and contributing factor - things like not discussing our feelings, not expressing our feelings, not showing vulnerability, etc. I.e., toxic masculinity. It's almost as if you've got some axe to grind.
And not all social ills are caused by masculinity.
No one said they are, and your attempt at a strawman here to discredit what I've been saying is pathetically obvious. Be better.
And yet men are suffering in a unique way. I find it absolutely mystifying why you guys are trying to argue that traditional notions of masculinity in American culture aren't a significant and contributing factor
That is at-issue actually, in and of itself, the report released by the surgeon general compiles a lot of evidence that the loneliness epidemic is absolutely affecting women, and some researchers have suggested that any difference in effect is because traditional social norms more firmly embed women in social units like family or friend groups than they do men.
We are to be clear, not entirely certain if traditional notions of masculinity in American culture do represent a major cause of the loneliness crisis, after all, one would expect then that it would be getting better rather than worse, that our fathers would have been lonelier than we are, and our grandfathers lonelier still.
There used to be a lot more spaces where men could hang out with each other. Hanging out decreases loneliness.
The American concept of masculinity is indeed a significant contributor to the male loneliness epidemic.
You talk about this as a fact. Perhaps you can explain? Other than saying there is a crisis this was not even touched on in the article.
The American concept of masculinity with respect to communication, emotions and feelings. Stoicism, bottling things up, being the "strong one," expressions of emotions (other than anger) being a sign of weakness, affection and vulnerability being 'feminine' traits, etc.
I think you guys fall prey to this misconception that a criticism of masculinity is a criticism of individual men. It's not. We individual men did not come up with this concept - society imposed it upon us. But it is our individual responsibility to recognize and break free from the toxic elements of it.
I guess you don't express your masculinity according to the "American concept of masculinity", so doesn't that mean that there is a lot of divergence in that concept? The problem isn't men getting together and talking to each other, the problem is the patriarchy, the powerful interests that try to keep men down.
Isn't it clear that if men get together and talk to each other they are more likely to share feelings and thoughts with each other?
In the same way that women interact differently when men are around, men act differently when women are around. Does that not agree with your experience?
I think you guys fall prey to this misconception that a criticism of masculinity is a criticism of individual men. It's not.
This statement doesn't apply to me, maybe you mean other people? Do you feel criticized when masculinity is criticized? (or if you are a women do you take a criticism of femininity as a criticism of you personally?)
My issue is more that "masculinity" is a very broad concept, there is no one "masculinity". People (including males) express themselves in different ways. If you want to change society you have to take into account the male experience, not just some rigid theoretical "masculinity" that is hypothesized to exist between the ears of men.
I feel most of this discourse is meant to bash down men and tell them (as a group) that there is something wrong with them. I think for this conversation it does matter what your gender is. Are you talking about your personal experience? Or are you hypothesizing about the experience of others? I'm assuming you are male, otherwise what roll would you have in telling men how to be men. I don't even think men should be telling other men how to be men.
My issue is more that "masculinity" is a very broad concept, there is no one "masculinity".
It's kinda not. There are several, but the differences are cultural not individual.
Masculinity is not an expression of self. It is a set of social norms recognized by the local culture. The impact of performing or failing to perform masculinity is dependent entirely on gender expression. For example, if downing beer and brats at tailgates is considered masculine in white American culture, then this behavior will be rewarded when performed by people who present as men and punished when performed by people who present as women.
Likewise, if practicing crochet and needlework are considered feminine in white American culture, then this behavior will be rewarded when performed by people who present as women and punished when performed by people who present as men.
Gender roles like masculinity and femininity are ontologically exclusive. Society can't adjust its reward/punishment response based on someone's gender if a behavior is positive when performed by people of any gender.
Because these roles are enforced externally, everybody within a culture has a certain degree of shared understanding of "masculinity" and "femininity". Identity doesn't impact this understanding. Otherwise, gender roles would only be enforcable internally.
Of course I'm not trying to exclude anyone. However I believe the lived experience of being a man, can only be experienced by a man. I think it is very different to relate your own experience than for someone else to tell you what your experience is or should be.
Are these things too exclusive, are they ideas that are not allowed to be expressed on this sub? I understand (and support the idea in general) that the mods can create whatever kind of sub they want and allow and disallow whichever ideas they want to.
Words are used by different people in different ways. I'm also not an absolutist about the meaning of masculinity. I don't think there is a "US masculinity", In my view different people should free to express themselves in different ways. Men should not be told they have to follow some kind of masculinity, they should be free.
You seem to be supporting the idea that there is only one acceptable way to be a man (ie one masculinity). I think there are (and should be) many. Similarly women express themselves in many ways and have many notions of what it means to be feminine or be a woman.
Gender roles like masculinity and femininity are ontologically exclusive.
For me this is too absolutist, both in the use of language and in assignment of characteristics and rolls to men and women. Also even if they are exclusive that's different from saying they are all encompassing. Meaning there are also non-gendered behaviours, which could be more important than gendered behaviours or roles.
Because these roles are enforced externally, everybody within a culture has a certain degree of shared understanding of "masculinity" and "femininity".
I agree that people do have some similarities in their understandings of "masculinity" and "femininity", though these vary widely (even say between me and my friends) and I've never met anyone who is of pure type (ie fully one or the other).
I'm also not so sure about the causality. You seem to subscribe to some particular theoretical framework, but whatever your framework is, it is not the only one, or absolutely correct.
Incidentally I know some men who knit and in no way punished for doing this. I think it is a crazy idea that men shouldn't knit (or even crochet). If I decided I like knitting, I would probably join up with the women I know who like to knit, nobody would have a problem with this (there is a very nice lady who would probably be happy to teach me). Maybe we live in completely different worlds.
Words are used by different people in different ways.
If any word could mean anything, communication would be impossible. There are plenty of variations in the interpretations of words that can affect their meaning, but these variations take place within certain boundaries. Otherwise, they stop having a shared meaning and communication breaks down.
Masculinity cannot refer to the male gender role and the male gender identity at the same time. The differences between these two concepts is very important and mixing them up can cause serious problems. The male gender role is both the colloquial definition of the word and the concept being discussed by just about every feminist scholar who uses the word masculinity.
You seem to be supporting the idea that there is only one acceptable way to be a man (ie one masculinity).
Masculinity does not refer to being a man. Masculinity refers to the socially acceptable way to perform the male gender under Patriarchy. Within a culture, masculinity and femininity are rigid. That's why feminism rejects the constraints imposed by masculinity and femininity.
The "rejecting femininity" part is what you're describing here:
Similarly women express themselves in many ways and have many notions of what it means to be
feminine or bea woman.For me this is too absolutist, both in the use of language and in assignment of characteristics and rolls to men and women
Hopefully that's true of most folks here, this being a pro-feminist sub and all.
Masculinity does not refer to being a man. Masculinity refers to the socially acceptable way to perform the male gender under Patriarchy.
What is socially acceptable varies widely. It depends on context, it can even differ for the same person. Again you are talking as if there is only one definition or notion of masculinity.
Words are used by different people in different ways. If any word could mean anything, communication would be impossible.
I can hold both of these ideas in my mind at the same time. Saying different people use words differently, doesn't mean words have no meaning.
More common words (say like "chair") have more common meanings between people, but even the notion of "chair" is not identical for all people. As you get into more abstract words like say "love" the variations in meaning become greater.
You want to define "masculinity" as follows. Again this is a choice of yours not an absolute truth.
Masculinity refers to the socially acceptable way to perform the male gender under Patriarchy.
For example if you look on wikipedia the definition is different from yours "Masculinity is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with men and boys."
There's something else about your definition. It makes reference to some other concepts about which there is a lot of debate or lack of good understanding and agreement. Ie the definition is based on other definitions which are not very well or precisely defined. Also some of the words in your definition are somewhat politically charged. In contrast the wikipedia definition uses terms that have a more common understanding and are not politically charged.
It can be important to use a good definition (by "good" for this sub I mean helpful to men, meaning helpful for the liberation of men).
In any case even working with your definition, "the socially acceptable way to perform the male gender under Patriarchy" varies widely. It depends on context, every family (or any other level of social organization you want to use) has a different notion what is "socially acceptable" and what it means to "perform the male gender". Society is not a monolith.
I am only vaguely familiar with the technical term "perform the male gender", but for me it is just the behaviour of men. So I'm turning the idea on its head. Whatever men behave is masculinity, I don't think of it as an idealized notion to be attained. That is the way I was trying to use the term.
Come on, I mean "I am only vaguely familiar with the technical term "perform the male gender", but for me it is just the behaviour of men. So I'm turning the idea on its head. Whatever men behave is masculinity, I don't think of it as an idealized notion to be attained. That is the way I was trying to use the term. "
That's you being pedantic. Of course we are talking about colloquial usage here.
"performing the male gender" is behaving and acting the way (society tells them) men should behave. - like how stereotypes exist for a reason. It's the same thing here. It is the way that is expected for men to behave and the way in which they are often less likely to be shamed or ostracised (aka a boy that plays with babies, or a man that has pink as his favourite colour is FAR more likely to get in trouble socially than a boy who plays with trucks or a man whose favourite colour is blue). It's not that complicated.
And you can turn the idea on its head all you want - when addressing that specifically - but in a general conversation with other people you don't get to say "WELL when I said abc what I really meant was abc" - that's not how communication works 😂
And no, masculinity is NOT manhood, like a woman can be masculine without being a man they are two different things. Yes there are ASSOCIATIONS. But not the same thing.
Masculinity literally equates to "the social expectations of being a man: The term 'masculinity' refers to the roles, behaviors and attributes that are considered appropriate for boys and men in a given society."(simplest and most accurate definition I could find. THE MEANING OF MASCULINITIES - National Democratic Institute THE MEANING OF MASCULINITIES - National Democratic Institute
Similarly "Masculinities are those behaviours, languages and practices, existing in specific cultural and organisational locations, which are commonly associated with men, thus culturally defined as not feminine" Masculinities - Gender Matters - The Council of Europe
Sorry for links, was on my phone
I think for this conversation it does matter what your gender is. Are you talking about your personal experience?
Since I skipped this in my initial reply*, I'm a cis male. White, Christian and progressive too (yes, really - it's a lonely island sometimes), in case any of those things are relevant to whether my opinion is valid to you.
*I honestly didn't read your whole post the first time - the blatant victimhood in your first paragraph about "powerful interests that try to keep men down" made me realize there's unlikely to be any point in engaging with you, although here I am anyway...
I noticed you edited your comments after my reply (you could instead just reply to my reply).
"powerful interests that try to keep men down"*
Isn't that what the patriarchy does? Keep all the masses down, that includes women and of course also men. You would refuse to engage with anyone who believes in the existence of the patriarchy? If you prefer I can use other language, I'm not attached to feminist language, I'm just as happy to use other ways to describe things. Do you refuse to engage with anyone who believes in the existence of a "1%"?
On your opinion about the lived experience of a (whatever you are) type of person, yes I would take your opinion differently compared to someone who does not have that lived experience and is only talking second (or higher) hand.
So for example generally speaking I would take a woman's words on what is it like to be a women differently than a man's words on what it is like to be a women. It is probably not best to call a man's words on what it is like to be a woman invalid, but I think it does matter if it is a woman talking about what it is like to be a woman or if it is a man talking about what it is like to be a woman.
I think for this conversation it does matter what your gender is.
With the mod hat on: We don't exclude people here based on their gender identity.
Serious question, how are you NOT able to get together to talk and spend time together?
Edit: word
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Well the problem is that men are suffering from what American masculinity enforces of them, right?
I mean looking at the political choices embraced by a majority of men, I have no problem blaming us. We are in crisis in this country because of a lot of factors and our need to remain in control of fucking everything is driving us deeper into crisis.
The loneliness epidemic is a symptom of this particular stage of capitalism. He even acknowledges it:
So what we have to recognize is that, yes, there are material concerns that people have in their lives around the economy, around safety, around other challenges like a housing crisis,
but then immediately hand-waves it away
but there is also a deeper spiritual crisis that's taking place in many of our communities, in our country and in the world more broadly, a crisis that's marked by people feeling a greater sense of disconnection from one another, feeling unmoored or disconnected from sources of meaning and purpose in their lives.
The former is the reason for the latter. People who can't pay rent are going to be a lot less likely to make friends, or go to church, or whatever. Nothing will get better until governments decide, as they did in the wake of WW2, to invest in more democratic economies.
Yeah, framing it as primarily a “spiritual” problem means that it can’t be solved with material solutions. Very convenient for the people in power.
And it justifies restricting access to social media by framing it as a moral plague rather than acknowledging it as a critical social lifeline and source of access to information that might inconvenience those in power - however imperfect. Really nefarious stuff.
Middle and upper classes still have loneliness issues.
Not EVERYTHING is an economic issue.
That loneliness is a direct result of an economic system that has alienated us from our communities and from one another. Capitalism primes people to view all interactions as simply "how can I profit from this". That kind of mindset can only produce loneliness because it is inherently focused only on the self.
I'd like to see the data for the upper classes.
What's left of the "middle" class is shrinking, precarious and dependent on either preying on lower classes with unethical business practices or being preyed on themselves.
Materials concerns aren't limited to lower classes. Keeping money is a concern of the middle and upper classes and is a material concern.
Speaking on behalf of the upper class, the working class can have this one.
It's way easier to have a fulfilling social life when you're healthy, wealthy, and happy. Going from teaching to software was the best anti-depressant I've ever taken.
They're still living in and impacted by the same society, even if they have a different place within it.
There is no middle class.
If I had more money I could hang out with friends more often but as it stands it’s hard to host at my place and even harder to go out
that's the case for women, too, but women seem to be better at this. why?
that's the case for women, too, but women seem to be better at this. why?
I think the data's a bit murkier on this.
If women attempt suicide at a higher rate than men, but men succeed more often, that suggests that women are by some metrics, on average, worse-off mentally than men (on average).
e: in other words: the loneliness epidemic is often painted as a "man" problem when it's actually a crisis that affects everyone.
Patriarchy.
Women seem to be better at this because Patriarchy expects them to be better at this.
Women are not actually better at this. Despite reporting higher numbers of close friends and having a much more expensive emotional vocabulary, women report actually being at least as lonely as men at every stage of their lives. Women over 40 are not only lonelier than men their age, but the gap widens continuously for the rest of their lives.
It turns out that taking on the same burden of late stage capitalism and then having a gender wage gap and a bunch of unpaid, unmatched domestic labor thrown on top of that is exhausting and isolating. Who knew.
There are women over 40 expressing that they are NOT in fact lonely. They have save up to be able to live comfortably and they are surrounded my family members and friends. Even here the WomenOver40 subreddit You can search it up for yourself. Studies have shown this as well. I wish I could site but I can’t.
EDIT: To add on to this, there are also plenty of women confessing that while they were married, they were in their loneliest state. It wasn’t until after divorcing, things started lighting up for them.
Folks who aren't lonely definitely exist. There is also an incentive to be vocal about a lack of loneliness among millennial and Gen X women, both because this is a Patriarchal expectation and because the Right is constantly attacking women by telling them that they'll "be a spinster with three cats by 30" if they don't "get with the program". In case it isn't clear, that's nonsense. I'm not on that train. Screw those guys.
However, women over 40 being lonelier than men is not a unique result in studies. The gap widens significantly with age, health, and disability status. Disabled women and women with poor mental or physical health over 40 are much less likely to receive full-time support from a spouse, for example.
One reason is that women are allowed and encouraged to have women (girl) only spaces, but men (boys) only spaces are discouraged and sometimes even not allowed.
Even if men-only spaces are allowed, though, how many actually try to address members’ issues? Every time I’ve seen someone make a serious effort to start up a “men only” space, they’ve been pushing back against “woke” concepts like allowing men to express their feelings and break the rigid mold of “conventional” masculinity.
Well, except gay bars I guess, but those are a bad place to work through serious mental issues for a whole different reason.
Anyway. Ultimately, I feel like you’re putting the cart before the horse. It doesn’t matter whether a space allows women or not when the “typical” man still struggles to express his troubles no matter who he’s with.
First of all I'm just exploring ideas here. Let me try to put it another way. If men are going to work through and discuss their feelings and find ways to interact with the world do they need a space or a place or an environment to do that?
What kind of space do you envision that to be?
The only time I've seen seminars on what is the "right kind" of masculinity, it was organized and run by women. Is this the best way to solve the problem? Do you think the 90%+ of female elementary school teachers are the best ones to set good examples to show boys how to be men?
Every time I’ve seen someone make a serious effort to start up a “men only” space, they’ve been pushing back against “woke” concepts like allowing men to express their feelings and break the rigid mold of “conventional” masculinity.
This is not at all my experience when I am in male only groups. My experience is the opposite. So I don't think putting a bunch of men together makes them against expressing feelings.
Are you saying all the men's groups you joined have been like this? If so I'm sorry, but keep trying there are a lot of men out there who like to share their emotions. For me personally it is much safer to do this with other men, who tend to be more understanding and less judgemental.
Well, I’m glad to hear you have found places where a men’s group can be something healthy. The only ones I’ve seen in my area have been “manosphere”-type “come get away from all that commie/queer/commie-queer shit and be REAL MANLY like the Good Old Days” BS.
But more to the point… I feel like expecting specifically exclusive spaces to be the place for personal growth and learning just isn’t a sustainable approach, for men or women. Not that they don’t have their place, but that place is more about sharing existing burdens and approaches to handling them than trying to find a new general worldview. And unfortunately, the way things are in the world today, people— and again, I think this goes for men and women, hence what other comments have mentioned about women self-reporting roughly equal levels of loneliness— need to change their general worldview before they can find a way out of late-capitalism-induced loneliness.
Sorry you haven't found a suitable place. I'm more worried about spaces that men have used in the past to connect with other men are being taken away. I'm almost 60 and married so my situation is likely different from yours and I might not be able to completely related.
In all my life I have always avoided any group or place there is of the type you describe as a "manosphere" place, and I hate anti-gay packaged bullying which I did occasionally bump into when I was a teenager and a pre-teen.
I would believe that it is more common for men to be lonely, but if it is equally true for women, I guess it has nothing to do with "masculinity".
Yeah, I’m half your age. And honestly? I think you’re right, except that it’s not just men. There aren’t really any women’s spaces around me either, and the mixed spaces are either expensive or empty. The suburbs keep growing, the gathering places keep shrinking, and connecting online ain’t the same…
It’s a rough time to be human.
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The root cause of loneliness is the usage of the internet and social media for solo consumption of content. Anecdotally speaking, women seem to be less likely to spend their free time “geeking out” on video games, fantasy sports, streaming media, etc.
It's like this dude's never heard of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.
Which shouldn't surprise me, honestly. A large percentage of people don't seem to grasp this fairly simple concept.
Air > Water > Food > Safety > Shelter.
Many, many, MANY people seem to think that the above list are the only things we need. Everything else is written off as nice but unnecessary. But we are a social species. A social, intelligent species. Sure, my ball python is perfectly content with this list, but he's a fucking snake.
We NEED love. We NEED connection. We NEED entertainment. Our brains literally atrophy without meaningful relationship. But capitalism barely accounts for base necessities that prevent people from actively dying, let alone everything else required for a healthy adult.
I have a friend right now who is falling apart at the seams, actively suicidal, too broke and too stretched thin to even consider anything other than his 16+ hour day, 5-6 days a week. Or longer. It's heartbreaking.
"Material"/economic concerns is not the same as acknowledging anything about "this particular stage of capitalism."
I think the discourse around masculinity would be healthier if it acknowledged the role of economic insecurity (which can have many causes) in people's mental health without going a step further and coupling that observation with any particular opinion on political economy, which is of course controversial and a mostly separate debate.
I think the discourse around masculinity would be healthier if it acknowledged the role of economic insecurity (which can have many causes) in people's mental health without going a step further and coupling that observation with any particular opinion on political economy, which is of course controversial and a mostly separate debate.
Patriarchy and capitalism are deeply intertwined - you can't talk about one without the other. I mean, what do you think is causing that economic insecurity in the first place? Are men just lazy these days? Is the masculinity of today just not as good as before?
Yes, we can and often should talk about patriarchy without talking about capitalism.
Economics is extremely complicated. "Capitalism causes economic insecurity" is a debatable and ideologically loaded claim. Even defining what capitalism is, or how much of it we have in one place vs. another, involves lots of grey areas where experts have no remote consensus. Someargue poverty is the default condition of humankind, and that some valuable aspects capitalism are the only thing that has ever lifted significant numbers of people out of it.
Artificial restrictions on the supply of housing and healthcare. Inflated demand for higher education. Improperly adjusted interest rates. Regulatory capture. Wars, pandemics, famines, earthquakes - 1,000 things can cause or exacerbate economic insecurity much more directly than a nebulous "capitalism." We should resist the urge to oversimplify problems and wrap everything into a neat little bow with a silver bullet solution.
It's fair to argue that younger generations today face reduced opportunities compared to their grandparents generation, and cite things like the prices of healthcare and college and housing as examples. And it's fair to observe that this, coupled with patriarchy's pressure on men to provide and win, exacerbates feelings of inadequacy and rage that fuel a masculinity crisis. But what causes each of those economic problems and what to do about it is biting off a lot more questions.
"Capitalism causes economic insecurity" is a debatable and ideologically loaded claim.
It's no more loaded than this claim:
some valuable aspects capitalism are the only thing that has ever lifted significant numbers of people out of it.
Which is and has been a piece of propaganda for a while now.
Artificial restrictions on the supply of housing and healthcare. Inflated demand for higher education. Improperly adjusted interest rates. Regulatory capture. Wars, pandemics, famines, earthquakes - 1,000 things can cause or exacerbate economic insecurity much more directly than a nebulous "capitalism." We should resist the urge to oversimplify problems and wrap everything into a neat little bow with a silver bullet solution.
It's fair to argue that younger generations today face reduced opportunities compared to their grandparents generation, and cite things like the prices of healthcare and college and housing as examples. And it's fair to observe that this, coupled with patriarchy's pressure on men to provide and win, exacerbates feelings of inadequacy and rage that fuel a masculinity crisis. But what causes each of those economic problems and what to do about it is biting off a lot more questions.
All of these are happening under capitalism, which is the dominant political and economic form in the world. Capitalism is the guiding ideology for the people deciding the responses to these things, whether they be politicians, captains of industry, or even the voters. Capitalism is what incentivizes the concentrating of economic power in the few that leaves less and less for the many. Capitalism actively advantages from and encourages men into thinking they need to work themselves to the bone in order to be "good men."
Also, you still haven't answered - if capitalism isn't doing this, then what is? Men's problems have become a big enough issue that the Surgeon General is weighing in on it. If this isn't due to finance capitalism causing historic levels of income inequality and a deterioration of our physical and mental health, then what is causing all these men to face these problems en masse?
I agree it's no more loaded than the bit you quoted - which is why I clarified that bit was the view of "some experts" rather than asserting it as unassailable fact. The point is just that reasonable people disagree on this stuff.
All of these things are happening in widely varying amounts, or sometimes not at all, in other countries which are also capitalist. Some of them are also happening in countries which are not capitalist, or which lie somewhere on the spectrum from more to less capitalist. And they're also happening under democracy, though almost nobody blames that. It's almost like the problems have more specific causes than the broadest possible description of a political or economic system.
I listed 8 plausible answers to your "what is causing this?" question and you hand waved them all away as "happening under capitalism." Which proves my point exactly. You've defined your causes broadly enough to be completely unfalsifiable: everything bad which happens you can blame on capitalism, and everything good which happens you can define as external to capitalism. Which is why conversations on political economy are so utterly unproductive, detached from real world policy tradeoffs, and largely a dead end for liberating men (or anyone else).
Even defining what capitalism is, or how much of it we have in one place vs. another, involves lots of grey areas where experts have no remote consensus.
News to me.
The patriarchy is deeply intertwined with whatever economic system is favored by definition. A more accurate statement would be “capitalism is deeply intertwined with the ruling economic consensus of a given country.” There is no reason to single out the patriarchy as being particularly powerful within capitalism, as that ignores non-capitalist patriarchies
Is poverty correlated with loneliness? Speaking from experience as a software engineer here, it seems like there are a lot of lonely software engineers and they are definitely not struggling to pay rent. As someone who grew up more or less middle class I often felt like if anything people at lower incomes (as long as they're not in desperate poverty/homelessness levels) tended to have more of a sense of community, helping each other out and organizing more communal events than the far more isolated suburbs. I could be wrong though - this is very much the perspective of someone who grew up as a lonely middle class suburbanite.
I don't disagree that economic conditions can contribute to loneliness but I don't think it's telling the full story here.
I think it’s a combination of two things. First, it’s become increasingly difficult to find just one job that will let you live a life that’s “lower income” but not constantly on the verge of homelessness— these days, most people who don’t have a solidly “middle class” job like yours are having to juggle multiple jobs and/or gig work and/or “side hustles” just to stay afloat. In other words, while there used to be a certain solidarity in poverty, more and more of the working poor are worked half to death and don’t have time or energy to go anywhere but home and work.
Second, however, we have a separate factor that’s also highly correlated with loneliness— suburbs. People in suburbs don’t interact with their neighbors much, and tend to converge on their workplaces from across a pretty wide geographic area— wide enough that anyone they meet at work is a long drive away, and thus harder to meet up with. Same goes for anyone they try to meet via dating apps. Same goes for anyone else they might encounter if they do join, say, a local gym. And so on… the further apart you are, the more difficult it is to get together in person.
So basically you’ve got two intersecting axes of loneliness: overwork, which has always been somewhat correlated with lower-paying jobs and has been getting more strongly correlated with them over the past few decades… and distance, which is generally correlated with the “scattered suburbs around larger hub of employment” model that modern urban development follows.
Edited to add tl;dr: you’re not wrong to say that life is also getting lonelier for middle-class people, because the places they live are harder to be social in. But the kind of jobs you’re thinking of, where people made enough to get by but not much more, no longer exist— and people who make that amount now are doing it by putting in so much time and energy, they have none left for friends.
He’s not hand waving it by saying “it’s not entirely economic,” he’s being accurate. Anyone who says the loneliness epidemic is solely economic should be ignored. Loneliness is mostly a problem now because technology has replaced human interaction. This is a cultural problem of disconnection with humanity. There’s an economic problem in that we’re very materialistic, but again that’s cultural. The idea that it’s economic is also funny when America is the richest it has ever been, with the median American being the richest they’ve ever been. The whole point of this loneliness epidemic is that despite making massive strives financially, people are still feeling bad. People were poorer and less lonely in the 90s and 80s and 70s. This stance doesn’t hold up at all. And that’s because the problem isn’t economic, but spiritual, and people are too materialistic to perceive it. It is entirely as Vivek Murthy says.
I find the framing of this issue particularly useless and frankly irresponsible. The masculinity angle is purely from the interviewer which I find bizarre (it's a polite way to put it). They focus on individualist notion of loneliness which is frankly absurd on its face, loneliness, especially if widespread makes no sense framed as an individual issue and is ripe for recuperation.
I'll quote a critique of the conceptualization because why not: "By locating loneliness in the individual, neoliberal discourse urges self‐management through prescribed behaviours, a discourse that appears to empower, but actually employs a moralist undertone to craft the person as both expert and manager of their care. Within such reiterated sentiments of ‘responsibilisation’ individuals are expected to take moral responsibility to be healthy, productive and sociable—the ‘wilful’, unengaged (lonely?) individual is steered towards behaviour change (Sagan, 2017a). This process of ‘responsibilising’ citizens (Pyysiäinen et al., 2017) widely critiqued by campaigners and academics opposed to the commodification of mental health (Esposito & Perez, 2014) also succeeds in ‘irresponsibilising’ governments and institutions (Cradock, 2007, 162). Paradoxically within the neoliberal context, while our well‐being is inextricably linked to the lives of others (Holland, 2022; Murthy, 2020) we are bombarded with both covert and overt messaging that our prosperity is based on competitive self‐interest, individualism and consumption." from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/dvr2.12008
Also I've searched the report here: https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-social-connection-advisory.pdf and there's hardly mention of any gender causality.
The proposed solution seem a bit lacking for my taste, build libraries and ask communities to enact policies helping alleviating loneliness? What?
spot on. neoliberalism will have us (individuals) blaming ourselves for systemic problems until we die. systemic problems require systemic solutions, such as:
https://www.google.com/books/edition/Health_Communism/5cBZEAAAQBAJ?hl=en
"Banning social media for minors" just means setting up rules to give it free reign to prey on adults.
Functionally that means forcing people to abandon the last remaining shreds of online anonymity, and giving platform owners even more power over their personal information with zero compensation or transparency in return.
We need to acknowledge how much social media is a poisonous black hole for everyone, how opaque algorithms that feed content to people are predatory regardless of the age of the targets, and re-work the rules so that it can't victimize anyone.
Instead of eliminating anonymity, we need to reinforce it and make it so that nobody can be tracked, micro-targeted or lose control over their information.
The fact that those kind of "Social media ID laws" are being "spontaneously" suggested in multiple corners of the political spectrum all at the same time should raise EVERY red flag possible.
want to be clear that I'm not arguing with you, just introducing a complication:
Instead of eliminating anonymity, we need to reinforce it and make it so that nobody can be tracked, micro-targeted or lose control over their information.
this would make law enforcement for CSAM very difficult.
No. Not would.
Online anonymity never left. CSAM has always been very difficult to enforce. There is absolutely nothing new about that reality.
The only way to do detective work is work. Any shortcut around detective work is just fascism in disguise; and fascism doesn't protect children.
Encouraging everyone to have a public digital life has introduced an attack surface to every legitimate user. The most significant meaningful difference from physical socialization to social media is that people can pretend to meet you, become your friend, commit fraud, and disappear without ever showing their face.
Personally I don’t think that anonymity online is going to significantly affect CSAM. I think this because although it is always used as an argument for compromising online privacy and a great many other things, actual CSAM that has actually happened is rarely prosecuted, nor are there many solid prevention efforts and let’s not even talk about how little support there is for people affected by it.
So, whenever CSAM is brought up to inch closer to totalitarian surveillance methods, be skeptical. Be very, very skeptical.
this would make law enforcement for CSAM very difficult.
As I understand that doesn't really happen on social media, it's on private servers and torrents, and those are a different issue.
I'm talking about social media specifically. Which ideally should simply cease to exist in its current form, as much as possible.
unfortunately social media is fucking packed with CSAM. Twitter is #1.
I'll have to take your word on that.
Either way using that as a reason to strip users of even their minimal existing levels of anonymity is a terrible idea.
Social media in general is toxic for other reasons, which need to be eliminated for all users. Algorithmic micro-targeting needs to become functionally impossible.
It makes every other kind of law enforcement harder too but this is an unfortunate consequence of freedom being a thing that exists.
The police should not be able to see everything we see and do, even if it means some people get away with crimes.
Was social media not already preying on everyone? Isn’t it better to shrink their pool of targets, especially the most at risk?
Or we could prevent it from preying on anyone rather than giving it designated targets to prey on.
Especially not "shrinking their pool of targets" by making the other targets even more vulnerable and exploited.
Why are you complaining that progress is made?
How does protecting kids from social media mean adults will now be more targeted? Exactly how does social media exploit adults and make them vulnerable?
It sounds like you think social media should just be banned. That's a very different perspective from most people who think it should be withheld from children who are uniquely vulnerable to it. Adults still are, but not nearly to the same degree children are.
Why are you complaining that progress is made
Absolutely no "progress" is being made here.
How does protecting kids from social media mean adults will now be more targeted? Exactly how does social media exploit adults and make them vulnerable?
Have you utterly failed to notice the "parent brainwashed by facebook" effect on older generations getting sucked into right wing rage bait stories? Yes, they are also victims.
Giving those same predators access to their real world ID information is going to make that even worse and push the balance of power even more to the side of companies running those sites.
It sounds like you think social media should just be banned
No that's not what I said at all and if you're going to lie and misrepresent my argument we're done here since bad faith trolls aren't worth my time.
It ain’t helping old people either
first off: Anand Giridharadas is an oracle for our time and you'd do well to read what he writes. he's great.
I'll just give you an example: If someone told me that my child was in imminent danger and they convinced me that they are the only ones that could help, I would overlook a lot of shortcomings, a lot of fundamental moral disagreements I had with that person. I’d put aside a lot of concerns about the impact that they might have on other parts of my life or the world if I thought they could save what was most important to me.
And that is one of the reasons why I'm concerned about this loneliness epidemic that we're experiencing not just in the United States but around the world. It has profound impacts for individual health, physical, and mental, but it also has a profound impact on the health of society. And I don't think it's a coincidence that we're seeing increasing polarization and division at a time where our connections to one another have deeply frayed.
this is so so so salient, and it's an argument I have a lot. we have to engage boys and men on an emotional, base, core level.
here's the annoying example I'll provide: every time some right-wing loser says, "my son came out to me, and that made gay rights real in my mind", my reaction is to wonder if these people are capable of abstract thought. or the classic, "well I have a wife and a daughter and I suddenly understand abortion rights!"
we are emotional beings. we have feelings. we can't fight them and we can't stop them, nor should we ask anyone to.
what we CAN do is design our thoughts and arguments and campaigns around healthily engaging those feelings.
The bit about being convinced your child is in danger and only the person telling you that can save them feels like such an obvious emotional manipulation. It’s like, “Hey, I’m going to short-circuit your ability to think critically by appealing to your primal fears because you strike me as a craven. Now obey me!”
It just feels like such an obvious confidence job that I wonder what kind of person falls for it.
It just feels like such an obvious confidence job that I wonder what kind of person falls for it.
Desperate people and emotionally compromised (whether by previous events or by prompting by the manipulator). That's basically it. The whole point of emotional manipulation from propaganda to the far right is that it bypasses most critical thinking.
It's not inherently bad. Anti smoking campaigns showing cancerous lungs is emotional manipulation. Pro choice posters saying "what if it was your sister" is emotional manipulation. Anti war posters showing stats and pictures about dead women and children is emotional manipulation.
Nobody puts a DOI on an anti smoking ad.
what we CAN do is design our thoughts and arguments and campaigns around healthily engaging those feelings.
My takeaway here is that folks reading this should pick up a copy of The Will to Change and pass it on to a friend when they're done.
If folks need something written by a man post-Covid, which seems a sticking point for some folks, Ben Almassi's Nontoxic was published in 2022 under the Creative Commons license which means it's free for everyone forever.
The right kind of messaging exists. Step 2 is engaging with it. Step 3 is amplifying it.
Low-effort gender war bullshit on social media isn't going away any time soon. Thankfully, I don't have a neuralink chip in my brain forcing me to read or engage with it.
here's the book for anyone who wants it
(scroll until you see it)
of course, I agree that your idea is ideal, and everyone should read the good literature about these issues.
however, we also must reckon with the reality of emotions and day-to-day choices most people make on the magic pocket brick, and that gets messy from a feelings perspective. we can't wish those choices away if we want to be effective.
of course, I agree that your idea is ideal, and everyone should read the good literature about these issues.
however, we also must reckon with the reality of emotions and day-to-day choices most people make on the magic pocket brick, and that gets messy from a feelings perspective. we can't wish those choices away if we want to be effective.
I'm struggling to pick up what you're putting down here. Healthy, empathetic messaging exists. We can engage with it ourselves. We can also direct those who need it towards it. Your OP is structured like a CTA, so presumably there's something you want people to do. But disengaging with unhealthy messaging, engaging with healthy messaging, and passing on the healthy messaging isn't it? It's just the ideal, unrealistic path?
If you're making a CTA to do something else, what exactly is that?
as individuals speaking to individuals - or, especially, a limited one-to-many situation, like we often encounter on social media - the very first thing to do is validate the feelings of a given audience.
my point replying to you is that handing that audience off to lit - which you frame as "messaging" - very rarely hits the feeling corner of a given person's brain.
as individuals speaking to individuals [...] the very first thing to do is validate the feelings of a given audience.
Totally. I get this. That's Step 1. But I feel like you're maybe framing this broadly and in the passive voice for a reason? Your OP was a lot more imperative .
or, especially, a limited one-to-many situation, like we often encounter on social media
And I feel like maybe this is that reason? Because a CTA about addressing boys and men in a one-to-many way on social media has a very limited audience. Social media strategy is very, very different from real life consciousness-raising. I don't know anyone reading this sub aside from the occasional lurking content creator who might actually engage in social media as something with organized campaigns and measures of success. Except maybe the mod team? In which case, should this whole conversation be a modmail?
nah man, we're all speaking one to many here. 90-9-1! I can't tell you how many messages I get from totally anonymous accounts that tell me how my style of writing makes them feel seen.
same for any top level comment made - those get consumed by far more people than actually engage with them by replying or even upvoting.
this is a mindset thing; engaging with an open mind and heart instead of thinking about how to, as you're framing it, pass them off to step 2, which is a path that vasnishingly few of these dudes will choose to walk.
to put it in a different way: above all, people will remember how you made them feel. make them feel seen.
instead of thinking about how to, as you're framing it, pass them off to step 2
My dude. You were just calling consciousness-raising "ineffective." Of course I dug a bit deeper on "effectiveness". Why turn that into a dig? Or even contrast it in the first place, as if Step 2 can exist without Step 1?
Encouraging a growth mindset does not invalidate anyone's current state of being. It doesn't preempt empathy or compassion or kindness. It simply recognizes that the current state is not a final state, that there are places to go from there, that steps can and should be taken to move there at the pace and in the way appropriate for the individual.
"You're perfect just the way you are" and "Nobody's perfect and that's actually okay" are not equally useful statements for everyone. If folks are struggling with the latter, then they're probably in a place where the former only prolongs their struggle.
You were just calling consciousness-raising "ineffective."
no, I was not. this is not accurate.
what I was saying, if you reread what I wrote, was that "hey you should go pick up The Will To Change!" is not effective messaging. That's the first thing you wrote in response to my submission statement, and by God it sucks as an idea!
"no one is making you read social media" (which is the end of your response to my submission statement) is, likewise, an ineffective way to frame how to reach these boys and men whose feelings are not being healthily engaged.
and I absolutely one hundred percent certainly never wrote
"You're perfect just the way you are"
what I was saying, if you reread what I wrote, was that "hey you should go pick up The Will To Change!" is not effective messaging.
To whom?
If you're writing a CTA to mentors and people in a position to be a positive role model, then what's the problem with the takeaway "engage with the healthy messaging that's already out there"?
The boys and men who are relatively healthy, stable, and in a position to actually do things for others, like crafting messaging, are not the same boys and men who are desperate, struggling, and adrift.
And if your OP was actually a message to the desperate and struggling all along, why frame it as if it was a CTA to anyone else? Is this all just shadowboxing to make these boys feel as if someone's going to bat for them?
For many, gay rights and other issues, it's an "over their problem," not an "over here problem," so they just don't care until they realize until it come into their backyard.
Take it to modmail.
I don't think banning social media would be effective, prohibiting something makes it very attractive. I believe it should be moderated according to an age bracket where a smarter use is best, because giving a smartphone in the hands of an eight year old kid is the worst move a parent can do. Bring back those LG flip phones to start a better relationship with such tech devices.
I find this to be a very poor framing. Any crisis would be of men not of masculinity. It should be framed as a crisis of the situations that men are in, instead of blaming men for being wrong in between their ears.