bell hooks
04/2019
masculinity feminism male-love
The reality is that men are hurting and the whole culture responds to them saying, "Please do not tell us what you feel." I have been a fan of the Sylvia cartoon where two women sit, one looking into a crystal ball as the other woman says, "He never talks about his feelings." And the woman who can see the future says, "At two P.M. all over the world men will begin to talk about their feelings--and women all over the world will be sorry." (6)
I often use the phrase ‘imperialist white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy' to describe the interlocking political systems that are the foundation of our nation's politics (17)
Men do oppress women. People are hurt by rigid sexist role patterns. These two realities coexist. Male oppression of women cannot be excused by the recognition that there are ways men are hurt by rigid sexist roles. Feminist activists should acknowledge that hurt, and work to change it--it exists. It does not erase or lessen male responsibility for supporting and perpetuating their power under patriarchy to exploit and oppress women in a manner far more grievous than the serious psychological stress and emotional pain caused by male conformity to rigid sexist role patterns (26)
Until we can collectively acknowledge the damage patriarchy causes and the suffering it creates, we cannot address mail pain. We cannot demand for men the right to be whole, to be givers and sustainers of life(30)
Where and how do boys learn what it means to be a man? They seem to learn it all too often from the mass media and from the most visible males in their community, particularly their peers. Boys' friends are their arbitrators of what is masculine and what is feminine, so resilience among the boys in a community depends upon changing macho attitudes among male peer groups and broadening their concept of what a real man is and does (38)
Feminist theory has offered us brilliant critiques of patriarchy and very few insightful ideas about alternative masculinity (39)
There are few male models for grieving... most adults are more comfortable confronting a raging teenager than one who is overwhelmed by sorrow and cannot stop weeping (51)
In patriarchal culture women are as violent as men toward the groups that they have power over and can dominate freely; usually that group is children or weaker females. Like its male counterpart, much female violence toward children takes the form of emotional abuse, especially verbal abuse and shaming, hence it is difficult to document (63)
There will always come a moment when patriarchy will ask [mothers] to sacrifice their sons. Usually this moment comes in adolescence, when many caring and affectionate mothers stop giving their sons emotional nurturance for fear it will emasculate them. Unable to cope with the loss of emotional connection, boys internalize the pain and mask it with indifference or rage (65)
In the past 10 years mass media have produced a number of movies aimed at boys that glorify war... that once again make it appear heroic to die alone, away from home, fighting for a cause you may or may not understand (71)
Everywhere men are in power, controlling virtually all the economic, political, and social institutions of society. Yet individual men do not feel powerful--far from it (83)
To take the inherent positive sexuality of males and turn it into violence is the patriarchal crime that is perpetuated against the male body (84)
Homophobia becomes amplified among heterosexual men because its overt expression is useful as a way to identify, among apparently similar macho men, who is gay and who is straight (87)
Women with class privilege have been the only group who have perpetuated the notion that men are all-powerful, because often the men in their families were powerful (99)
When we love someone and feel loved by them, somehow along the way our suffering subsides, our deepest wounds begin healing, and our hearts start to feel safe enough to be vulnerable and to open a little wider. We begin experiencing our own emotions and the feelings of those around us (104)
Only a feminist vision that embraces feminist masculinity, that loves boys and men and demands on their behalf every right that we desire for girls and women, can renew men in our society (111)
Teachers of children see gender equality mostly in terms of ensuring that girls get to have the same privileges and rights as boys within the existing social structure; they do not see it in terms of granting boys the same rights as girls--for instance the right to choose not to engage in aggressive or violent play, the right to play with dolls, to play dress up, to wear costumes of either gender, the right to choose (111)
We must first replace the dominator model with a partnership model... In a partnership model male identity, like its female counterpart, would be centered around the notion of an essential goodness that is inherently relationally oriented (117)
Despite the successes of the feminist movement, the socialization of boys--the making of patriarchal masculine identity--has not been radically altered. Feminist writing, whether fiction or theory, rarely focuses on male change (140)
Talking with men, I have been stunned when individual males would confess to sharing intense feelings with a male buddy, only to have that buddy either interrupt, to silence the sharing, offer no response, or distance himself. Men of all ages who want to talk about feelings usually learn not to go to other men (144)
This book makes me feel things so intensely. It digs up much of the pain I have felt growing up, and recognize myself having undergone.
It articulates male pain in a way I did not know could be articulated. Having this articulation allows for understanding and recognition. That which cannot be named cannot be understood, cannot be addressed. To have the vocabulary to describe male pain from patriarchy is to be liberated from darkness, even if what is illuminated is not beautiful.
I do not know how the readings of books like this will change my direction. It does feel incredibly important, much more important than, lets say, software engineering.