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The original was posted on /r/twoxchromosomes by /u/JonquilCary on 2023-09-27 14:21:45.
I have noticed a shift in my thinking in the last couple years that is starting to bother me more and more.
Just by being on the internet, I feel like I am constantly exposed to things about men being generally awful to women. Weaponized incompetence, leaving women to bear the brunt of child rearing and the mental load, sexual harassment and violence, laws limiting our access to reproductive care/abortions, belittling or disregarding our experiences, entire religions focused on subjugating women, women’s complaints being ignored in healthcare settings, the list goes on.
I find myself regularly expecting or thinking the worst of men. Maybe it’s the guy at the gas station who I feel is being creepy but he’s just getting gas, or watching a young family at the grocery store and mom is corralling the kids while dad blissfully is along for the ride, noticing at large family functions its the women who eat last and get up first to clean up, interpreting interactions with my male industry peers as disrespectful.
Even when I am watching a show/movie or reading a book, I spot negative behavior from the male characters and it sours it for me. For awhile if news came out about an artist or actor about them being general shitbags, I have an aversion to any media they put out, etc.
It’s frustrating for me bc I am not a hateful person at all and I know a lot of wonderful men in my life. My husband is amazing and very much equally shares the mental load/kids/work, has never treated me as anything different than a whole person first, cried with me when RvW was overturned. My BIL is the same way with my sister, my dad and stepdad both have had always been my supporters and never made my sister or me feel like we couldn’t do something because we’re girls. I have friends with equally as adjusted and contributing partners and my husband and BIL.
I have no lack of examples of loving, kind men around me but I still have this constant and nagging feeling that “men suck” and I can’t help but notice the most minute details of patriarchy and sexism affecting things around me.
I logically understand that this is a long standing societal and cultural issue and that any one individual is a sum of their experiences, and large changes are difficult to come about and maintain but that just feels like a cop out excuse to keep the staus quo and just ignore the very real and legitimate suffering women face daily.
I’ve considered a media diet, but that just feels like cognitive dissonance now that the veil has been pulled back for me. Idk, maybe I just needed to scream into the void or hear other people’s feelings on the subject.
Tldr: I don’t want to automatically dislike or think the worst of men, but don’t know how to not feel that way in face of the constant exposure to adversities women face daily.