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keihlfeminism · 7 years ago

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A new take on an old misconception

This piece discusses some upsetting topics and uses some offensive terminology. I’ll wait while you decide whether to move on.

Now that you are consenting, let’s try to go through this to the end. I hope it will be rewarding for you.

Sigmund Freud postulated that there was a dichotomy to how society views women, known as the virgin versus the whore concept. In politics, the conservative desire is for women to be virgins, because otherwise they are whores. The liberal stance is that a woman can be whatever she wants, as long as there is consent. I prefer to look on things sort of like the Golden Girls mixed with Wiccan concepts around the maiden, the mother, and the crone. You could see Rue McClanahan as the maiden, who feels young and vibrant, Betty White as the mother who is loving, nurturing, and supportive, and lastly you could see Estelle Getty as the crone, someone who has seen a lot and carries much wisdom and strength. At this point, either your mind is blown, or you’re thinking that I am one chromosome away from a potato.

As someone who is genderfluid, I do not like binary thinking, so I like to think of ways that we can break away from dichotomies into trichotomies or even matrices. So when I was reflecting upon the virgin versus whore dichotomy and trying to apply it to masculinity in society, I could not apply it in the same way, because the defining attribute for masculinity in western culture is that of strength.

When I suffered from severe asthma problems due to pneumonia or back issues due to injuries on the job, I was demoted in people’s eyes as a man, solely because I refused to wear out my damaged body with too much manual labor. People assumed that somehow making a pair of women set up a folding table, for example, was shirking my duties as a man. Masculine people are expected to stoically bear the burden of their labors and keep it bottled up. The old saying “are you a man or a mouse” is embedded in us as youngsters. But thinking about that saying, it means that we consider women to be nothing but rodents and pests. This illustrates aspects of a larger point, which is that binary thinking and toxic masculinity go hand in hand.

(You were expecting a GIF here, weren’t you?)

Think about it: in toxic masculinity, there is only straight or gay, and if you are gay, then you are not considered a real man, but more akin to a eunuch, as he is less so-called “competition” for the mating pool of eligible women. If you are a married man, then you are beholden to your vows and you do not want to break them. A man who can not provide for himself and others is demoted to being less of a man. While current generations have come to embrace the stay-at-home dad, many people still assume that he is just lazy. We have been taught that housework or “women’s” work is too easy for a man to do, and hence is not really fit for a man to do as his main responsibility. A loyally married man is considered almost cuckolded by his wife, but never the less controlled from what society considers men’s natural status of being a sexually aggressive creature.

Choose whatever term you like, but the descriptions all mean the same thing: Lothario, Casanova, Don Juan, Horndog, or the more offensive internet term, F__kboy.

The trichotomy of modern masculinity seems to exist on a spectrum between statuses of being a Horndog, a cuckold, and a eunuch. Each status has its different aspects to consider, so let’s start with the one we all know and hate: the horndog.

A lot of our iconic figures are horndogs: James Bond, Captain Kirk, Han Solo, Indiana Jones, and most male protagonists in action films or comedies are horndogs. We look at the horndog as the natural state of masculinity, looking only to have sex with everyone possible, disloyal and disrespectful to women unless he can use them. We see them as predatory animals, fiends and enemies, liars who will do anything to get what they want, and in turn, slaves to the fragile male ego.

By contrast, in society, you often see the cuckold and the eunuch grouped together. The cuckold has popular icons too, like Robocop, John McClane, and Jack Ryan. The eunuch has characters like Frodo, Luke Skywalker, and other characters who are both somewhat infantilized and therefore sexless.

You only have to look at shows like Two and a Half Men to see all three concepts lined up as caricatures in front of you. Cuckolds are essentially considered limitedly sexed and compared to the Don Juan, they are considered limitedly aggressive, not unlike livestock that has been broken. They work hard but do so for a reason, and are not given to excesses in their appetites, because their love is considered purer. Eunuchs are the men you consider harmless. They can be older to the point that they are determined toothless and weak by others. Of course, as we all know, age does not bring with it such things, but it is how society seems to consider such men, simply because they are no longer teenagers or young bucks as the saying goes.

When we find out that a man we have in our midst likes to date women, then we automatically lump him into the Don Juan category. We assume that he will not respect boundaries, that he is a sexual deviant, and that he is low and animalistic; hence the terms dog or pig. Single men are basically considered vagrants in polite society until they are older or married. Anything said or done by the Don Juan is deemed as in pursuit of sexual gratification.

Of course, when we lump men into these categories, we ignore the possibilities that they are queer, asexual but romantic, survivors of rape or incest, demisexual, or that they just aren’t interested in gratuitous sex. So comes the time, dear reader, when I put it to you that you may have been lumping men exclusively into these three categories. And why not? You had examples given to you of clearly defined pop culture figures who fall into these three areas. Except James Bond got married, as did Han Solo and Captain Kirk. Alan Harper on Two and a Half Men had quite a few girlfriends, while Charlie went steady with women a few times, and even Alan’s son, Jake had a few girlfriends in the show’s run.

The truth is that just like with the Virgin versus Whore dichotomy, no person is exclusively in one of these pigeonholes. For example, I was attending a church in Toledo, Ohio, and for some reason, everyone just assumed that I was married. I had a noncommittal partner whom I brought to services, but people assumed we were married. (I wanted marriage some day, but she was against it.) Once I explained that I was single, people assumed that I was interested in all women: married, single, or anything in between. I loved my partner, but we weren’t exclusive, so she gave me permission to date other women. I didn’t really date a lot during that time, but I would flirt a little.

We assume that unmarried men will commit every sexual taboo from adultery to dating someone much younger than him, and even certain crimes, like child molestation and rape. But of course, such presumption ignores the droves of married men who rape women and children every year, to say nothing of the Eunuch group, like Catholic priests, who take a vow of celibacy.

We assume that all men are basically sluts, rather than discussing matters with them, and will often send unmarried men off if they rise to our microaggressions or grow fond of anyone in particular and flirt a little. Toxic masculinity has dictated for so long that men can only feel anger or pride. If a man cries or feels mournful, then we demote him for being sensitive. If our harsh words or actions to marginalize him makes him cry foul, we ignore his pain and describe him as a weakling. If he loves someone, we still see it as only a means to sex. We have actually stopped considering a father’s love real: turning it into a form of responsibility and devotion. We say that fatherhood is his job, being a husband is his job, everything comes down to working. Your love and affection for someone is unappreciated, and the man who feels it is considered a milquetoast or a faggot.

One of the reasons why we have to employ women-only safe-spaces is because of the problem of male gaze. Women are conditioned to be highly sensitive to being looked at by men, and hidden camera footage from women walking the streets has shown that men do not just look: they stare!

So I will not call on the women in the audience to change their perceptions of men more than they are willing to, but I challenge all the men taking this in to reconsider themselves and the men around them.

And don’t simply call out men who are acting like Horndogs. Call them in and call them forth: which means you should encourage them to look on themselves as more than the horndog. Don’t look on horndogs as broken, either, because there are good aspects to being a horndog. Being confident and independent fosters spontaneity in your romantic life, surprising a partner or spouse with random gifts, compliments, love notes, or tender affection. There are positive sides to being a Eunuch when the time calls for it. You could work with beautiful women all day, and it is a good work habit to view your female coworkers as people. So it can be good to be asexual at work. Likewise, while we view the cuckold as a humbled figure of a man, or a noble one, let us instead just accept that being part of a family is a natural aspect to that individual man. If he is older and single, do not look down on him as broken or flawed, but as undiscovered. A lot of Millennials are marrying later in life, and many people with disabilities find it hard to date or maintain relationships; especially those with invisible disabilities like social anxiety.

The more we look at one another as whole people, the better off we are. Men and women have a lot more in common than we are taught. People like me who are nonbinary or gender-nonconforming understand this very well.

So while we could sit around, and try to label every person we know as one of two or three mutually exclusive things, it will not lead to a greater understanding of the person you’re examining.

If you want to look at men differently, start by not grouping them all together, and instead, really piercing his soul to understand him. He may need help reflecting on himself, so encourage the men in your life to be sensitive and to undertake emotional labors like empathy.

It will be worthwhile for every man to see himself in more than two dimensions, and for those around him to see him for everything he can be.

Part of the point of this discussion is that we often hold men to the virgin versus whore dichotomy in society, especially in progressive circles and safe spaces. Once we see a person in the light of the whore, our image of them as anything else tends to shatter. So as previously stated, we have to open up our definition to accept that people generally do not want to date someone, unless they like them as a friend first (eunuch - emotionally open and basically asexual, possibly oblivious/naive) and when building a relationship, someone may wish to engage in healthy, consensual affection in different ways (the cuckold - tempered and emotionally in tune with a partner), but once it feels appropriate to engage in sexuality, the Don Juan can emerge: wanting, spontaneous, emotionally engaged in connection with the other person. The average person exists on a state that is rarely exclusive to one camp, but exists in a blobby, grey area, the facets of which are more prevalent in one area of life than in others. It means that we can allow for men and those assigned male at birth in many spaces.

For example, we can allow for trans folks in public bathrooms, because they are not there as the Horndog, but as the Cuckold or the Eunuch. We can allow for bachelor men to be around kids, and encourage an air or respect and affection for the same reason.

The implications are far reaching, but the more we come to understand that there is more to men than anger, ego, and libido, the better off we will be.

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