Submitted 5 months ago by TehBamski@lemmy.world to [deleted]
I figured a close stereotype for men, would be that they should all be farmers. The thing is, there are under two million farmers in the US as of 2023. So statistically, an equivalent occupation/role should have a larger number.
“Women should be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen” transcribes to “Men should be shirtless and mentally ill in the garage.”
As a millennial, if I could afford a house, I PROMISE you I wouldn’t also be able to afford mental health treatments, or a shirt.
So this tracks…if I could get a house.
I’m a Millenial with a house, but no garage. So, I’m shirtless and mentally ill under the carport.
Clearly you just need to be a man and work harder and more hours, at the expense of your mental health, to be a better provider because that is your only value to your family. The more emotionally shut-off and weekday war-torn you are, the better the space in which you can escape work and home stress by self-isolating and self-medicating with alcohol. Your chosen man-cave is totally not a place to hide your emotional breakdowns where you silently sob as you suffer the masculine burdens of building stress and feelings of inadequacy alone. Just remember, communicating your feelings is what women do; men dig their grave faster and deeper because that takes manly strength.
Honestly, us millenials not having houses is probably a huge win for climate change… if I had the space to setup up a forge and learn metalworking I don’t think I’d be able to resist. “But I can do it in minecraft…”
You might just have to move out of the city, things get way cheaper when you go rural, plus it opens you up for usda loans.
They’re for rural areas and they will put down 100% of your down payment, but your credit score has to be right and you have to find a nice house, like really nice.
The one I am about to buy was approved for a usda loan, until they found out that 1 corner of the crawlspace was technically in a 1 in a 100 year flood zone.
If that doesn’t work you can try fha, their guidelines are a little more lax, but you have to put 3.5% down.
That’s what I am using and I know that my rent for the next 30 years is fixed until my mortgage insurance falls off.
That is with no adjustment for inflation either.
So if shit spikes again, at least my rent effectively got cheaper.🤣😂😞😢
Realistically, you only need a garage
Who said it needs to be your garage?
Does being mentally ill in my own room count too?
So long as you are alone, your realized value has the ability to provide for a hypothetical family, and your liver can tank a half a bottle of brown liquor a night without the spins.
Men should swallow their feelings and go break their bodies and mind for a paycheck. Then die younger because of it.
We’re looking for fake answers, not real ones.
That’s definitely still a thing. I’m too tired and sore to move today, but at least I’ve got the day off I suppose?
That men should be able to fix things and be mechanically inclined.
Yup, I have an essential tremor and fucking hate that one. I don’t mind strength based tasks… but if I try and screw in a light bulb I’ll probably crush it accidentally… don’t even get me started on appliances like blenders and shit - in the best case scenario I’ll brick the device… but I’ll probably injur myself.
I mean no offense at all, and feel free not to answer, but how do you type?
Is it like a special keyboard, voice to text, or do I just completely misunderstand what you mean?
Unpopular opinion: We should. Obviously as someone who builds and fixes things for living I’m a little biased but I do look down on men that lack any handyman skills (and so do many women). I think doing things like being able to change a tire on a car is about the bare minimum a man should know how to do. I’ll cut you some slack if you don’t own a car or a licence.
Why a man though - why not just a person?
What is it that means that men ought to be able to do those things, but not women?
Yeah I think men and women should all have some basic level of repair skills. I feel like somewhere along the line everyone got too afraid to break things or hurt themselves.
I’m a little biased but I do look down on men that lack any handyman skills
That is a lot biased to the point that you can’t even see that other men’s lives may have put them in a position of not learning those things or even wanting to learn those things. It’s great that you know how to do those things but just because someone has a penis doesn’t mean they have to learn how to be handy. That doesn’t make them any less of a man, just different from you.
Protectors & providers
I don’t know about the provider thing these days but I feel like the protector part still holds true. If you hear a person messing with your door lock in the middle of the night it’s the guys job to go check out on it. Statistically virtually every man is stronger than all women so ofcourse that’s who you send in when there’s a risk for physical altercation.
I agree and that’s still poison.
The idea that when something growling outside the cave has everybody shaking inside, it’s the guy’s job to get a pointed stick and go outside, knees knocking, heart pounding.
This is not compatible with modern life. Especially if the person scrounging around outside is a meth-addled woman, and I happen to go out in uppercut her.
Men should all be (the sole) breadwinners.
In my area it would be something like “Men should go to war”.
That every man has to be a handyman.
Anecdotal, being from Louisiana, this is what I’ve been pressured with my entire life.
Men bring home enough bacon for the whole household to live off comfortably.
I think I’d just get tired of bacon.
That's like getting tired of having sex.
Heresy
Men should be climbing the corporate ladder
Aside… as a technical expert, can I just mention that the fact that we envision it as a “corporate ladder” is the biggest fucking load of bullshit?
I can confidently state that I’m much more competent than my fucking CEO.
Men should be the breadwinners, men should be the one to ask the woman out, men should pay for the first date, men have to be the ones who propose, men should be 6 feet tall… It sucks especially if you’re an introvert, shy, and nobody ever explained this shit to you as a teenager. Therapy ftw.
Men not being allowed to be emotionally expressive has led to so many mental health problems…
Have to be a raging bull of testosterone and manly interests while also being a round the clock worker to be a breadwinner and also being a father figure to any children in your life on demand
The most direct I can think of is that men should be the sole breadwinner of their family, and that if his wife earns more than him (or even has a job at all) then that’s some kind of failing on his part.
There are many other similar stereotypes. For example:
That men have an obligation to defend their/their significant other’s ‘honor’ with violence.
That men shouldn’t cry or otherwise show strong emotion under nearly any circumstance.
Men shouldn’t want to interact with children, especially other people’s kids.
I can go on all day.
This last one rarely gets mentioned, but it is very real
Kids are passionate, curious, and energetic. There’s a lot we as adults may learn from them, and playing with them brings me a lot of joy and also reminds me of simple and magical times of my own childhood.
Doesn’t mean I’m a child predator or something.
Somehow society created an expectation that men do not care for children, and then the same society wonders why there are so little genuinely attentive and great dads. Like, make up your mind.
Doing manual labor in general, not just farming. Or being in charge at work
If you're not useful, you're a burden.
Well, this one’s not entirely false, but also not solely applicable to men
No wait I know the answer to this one… If you have a penis, you should be able to use tools competently and perform basic maintenance and repairs. I learned this just by watching cartoons and tv when I was a child so I taught myself all that stuff just because I thought you were assumed to. I now take $75+ per hour from men who cant figure out how a screwdriver works. I am virtual husband to many women who married paper shufflers who can’t even tighten a loose doorknob screw.
If you have a penis, you should be able to use tools competently and perform basic maintenance and repairs.
I don’t think a penis is required. I personally think that every human being should know basic maintenance and repair skills.
No penis is really required.
But the beard is mandatory.
“Men should all love football.”
Wait, which football? The one they play with their hands, or the one they play with their feet?
Handegg
There is only one football, and it is played by the country that has been to the Moon 6 times and won two world wars.
Actually the one you play with a skull. Most call it Griffball though.
Everyone should love football
A man should get violent and angry and protective when someone hits on his woman.
This is something I’ve never understood. Surely it is a compliment rather than an insult to effectively say “your partner is very attractive”
Especially when that someone is themselves.
Should be bread-earners.
Men should all be working on the railroad like John Henry; the manliest man that ever man’d.
Worked himself to death, theo not manly way to go.
Not only is it manly, it’s American!
We should enjoy violence
The Cure - Boys Don’t Cry
It’s a man’s job to grill.
I mostly let my girlfriend do that. I trust her way more with food than I trust myself.
I usually just get the fire started.
One of my ex-GFs was fond of saying “Men are good for three things: heavy lifting, outdoor cooking, and sex.” Welp, two out of three ain’t bad.
I’m sure if you hit the gym for a few months you’ll have the strength to win her back.
As Red Green put it:
If women don’t find you handsome, they should at least find you handy!
The direct analogue would be “men should single handedly provide income to support a family”. So not farming necessarily, but men are pressured to be something other than just men, they get defined by their jobs more. Be a businessman, a farmer, a soldier. Women get defined more by their relationships to other people - a mom, a wife. Both of these are problematic in their own way.
Men should pour all their energy into their job, so they can earn money to support their family with. Men should not worry about spending enough time with their children, as working hard is the best way to show them that you care about them. Besides, being with children is what women are there for.
The result of this idea is that there are now a metric fuckton of movies about workaholic dads who don’t show up to their sons’ baseball games, only for contrived magical realism events to change their minds and convince them that family is more important.
riskable@programming.dev 5 months ago
Men shouldn’t be allowed near children that aren’t their own. It’s rarely stated but regularly assumed.
xmunk@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
This one fucking sucks… it’s especially awful for us beard havers.
Death_Equity@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I think it is more of the mustache only crowd that really faces a stigma about being good with kids.
Longpork3@lemmy.nz 5 months ago
My daughter is a very different skin colour than me. Somehow the worst I’ve encountered to date is an uppity mother who thought I was telling off a random child.
waz@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I think you were implying something different, but I feel like I get a ton of odd comments suggesting it’s weird for me to be out with my own kid. Things like “giving mom the day off?” or “what happened to his mom?”.
I had friends complain about this kind of thing before I had kids and I thought that they were exaggerating. Nope, it’s all over the place. It’s certainly not everyone, but it is much more common than I expected.
exanime@lemmy.today 5 months ago
I always hated the “are you babysitting?”
Like NO! These are my fucking kids, I don’t babysit them, I’m parenting
SurpriZe@lemm.ee 5 months ago
I’m 33 and never seen this IRL. Weird.
exanime@lemmy.today 5 months ago
By all means, take your own experience into account but don’t fall for this fallacy…
By you own logic, murder must be a myth because it hasn’t happened to you
otp@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
It’s likely a cultural thing. I’ve noticed it in urban Canada, myself.
A man smiling at a child who looks at him will get glares or weird looks from the parent. A woman smiling at a child who looks at her will be nothing out of the ordinary. The same man is “allowed” to smile at children if he’s with a woman and/or a kid of his own.
waz@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Before I had a kid, I heard this was a thing, but didn’t really care as I didn’t really have a desire to be around kids. Once I became a father, I realized a lot of people make strange assumptions about men around small humans. Its certainly not most people, but definitely some, and definitely not just online.