Are We Not Men

Rebecca Traister reviews Linda Hirshman: ‘Conservatives contend that ... feminism ‘failed’ because it was too radical, because women didn't want what feminism had to offer,’ Hirshman writes. ‘In fact, if half or more of feminism's heirs ... are not working seriously, it's because feminism wasn't radical enough: It changed the workplace but it didn't change men, and, more importantly, it didn't fundamentally change how women related to men.’

Well of course not. We love them, if we are heterosexual, who else is there? But really, is it our responsibility if men remain incapable and unwilling sticks in the mud, when it comes to perceiving anything beyond pure self-interest?

Sorry, but as long as his brains remain below the belt, you aren't dealing with another person anyway. Our power to deceive ourselves, to hope, to believe, is astonishing. Damn oxytocin. But the power of the male to tune out the very humanity of another person, in my book, that trumps everything.

I'm still waiting, twenty, thirty years later, for some piddling little sign of movement, somewhere. For some guy to say, “You know, it's just not right. What we're doing sucks. Maybe we ought to take a look at ourselves.”

Ha. It eez to laugh. No, really. An adult is supposed to be able to review his own behavior. I mean, hold up any standard of what a responsible, caring human being is said to be, in this society. Hold up the values of any spiritual tradition.

I think men have a problem as a gender, I think it is a prime source of the grief in this world, and I'm still waiting for a sign that they feel impelled to do a single thing about it.


link: Salon Broadsheet