this post was submitted on 24 Dec 2024
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A space for masculine folks to talk about living under patriarchy.

Detoxing masculinity since 1990!

You don’t get points for feminism, feminism is expected.

Guidelines:

  1. Questions over blame
  2. Humility over pride
  3. Wisdom over dogma
  4. Actions over image

Rules (expansions on the guidelines):

  1. Mistakes should be learning experiences when possible.
    • Do not attack comrades displaying vulnerability for what they acknowledge are mistakes.
    • If you see good-faith behavior that's toxic, do your best to explain why it's toxic.
    • If you don't have the energy to engage, report and move on.
    • This includes past mistakes. If you've overcome extreme reactionary behavior, we'd love to know how.
    • A widened range of acceptable discussion means a greater need for sensitivity and patience for your comrades.
    • Examples:
      • "This is reactionary. Here's why."
      • "I know that {reality}, but I feel like {toxicity}"
      • "I don't understand why this is reactionary, but it feels like it {spoilered details}"
  2. You are not entitled to the emotional labor of others.
    • Constantly info-dumping and letting us sort through your psyche is not healthy for any of us.
    • If you feel a criticism of you is unfair, do not lash out.
    • If you can't engage self-critically, delete your post.
    • If you don't know how to phrase why it's unfair, say so.
  3. No singular masculine ideal.
    • This includes promoting gender-neutral traits like "courage" or "integrity" as "manly".
    • Suggestions for an individual to replace a toxic ideal is fine.
    • Don't reinforce the idea the fulfillment requires masculinity.
    • This also includes tendency struggle-sessions.
  4. No lifestyle content.
    • Post the picture of your new grill in !food (feminine people like grills too smh my head).
    • Post the picture of the fish you caught in !sports (feminine people like fish too smdh my damn head).
    • At best, stuff like this is off-topic. At worst, it's reinforcing genders norms..
    • If you're not trying to be seen as masculine for your lifestyle content, it's irrelevant to this comm. If you are trying to be seen as masculine, let's have a discussion about why these things are seen as masculine.

Resources:

*The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love by Bell Hooks

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"The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love" by bell hooks BOOK CLUB - Chapters 8 and 9 Discussion (hexbear.net)
submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Hello comrades, it's time for a new discussion thread for The Will to Change, covering Chapters 8 (Popular Culture: Media Masculinity) and 9 (Healing Male Spirit). Thanks to everyone who participated the last few weeks, I’m looking forward to hearing everyone’s thoughts again. And if you’re just joining the book club this week, welcome!

Putting the thread up early since I won't be able to do so tomorrow. This'll stay up a little longer than usual as well so everyone has the opportunity to share their thoughts during/after the busy holidays.

Chapter 8 briefly surveys popular media depictions of masculinity and how media either reinforces patriarchal roles in its male heroes, or forces them to reject those roles in favor of a healthier sense of self. Chapter 9 discusses healthy vs unhealthy conceptions of intimacy and how men are incapable of true intimacy until they allow themselves to be vulnerable and reject the dominator model of relationships.

If you haven't read the book yet but would like to, its available free on the Internet Archive in text form, as well as an audiobook on Youtube with content warnings at the start of each chapter, courtesy of the Anarchist Audio Library, and as an audiobook on our very own TankieTube! (note: the YT version is missing the Preface but the Tankietube version has it)

As always let me know if you'd like to be added to the ping list!

Our FINAL discussion thread will be on Chapters 10 (Reclaiming Male Integrity), 11 (Loving Men), and the book as a whole, beginning around New Years Day

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I wonder if its inclusion was because it was the action movie of its day that advertising and other similar movies had to address, which is lazy but obviously not an uncommon viewpoint at the time (a decade earlier the example would have been Die Hard, a much more straight example).

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I mean, i'm old enough to remember when the first movie came out, the impact it had on pop culture back then was huge. And that wasn't about any of its many subtexts, it was about the aesthetics and the fight choreography. Matrix tought Hollywood a new way of larger than life violence. It redefined how action heroes and action heroines look, dress and move, and how they punch people. From a 2004 perspective, i absolutely get why she includes it in that list. It's just funny how that has aged.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago

Bring back DVD "making of" extras

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

From a 2004 perspective, i absolutely get why she includes it in that list. It's just funny how that has aged.

I think the time is a large part of why she may have included it. Can't forget that it was one of the things being blamed by the MSM for the Colombine shooting. And at a surface level I can kinda see why she might have viewed it in the same way. Like for all the diversity and queerness that it had you still had a seemingly cis hetero white man as the savior figure (he's The One). I don't know if she ever watched before or after this book, but I would think she'd change her mind about it given what we know now.