Edit: Okay, wow. if the statement from a woman of “we owe you nothing” immediately sets you off emotionally, I would really encourage you to think through why that might be.

A more systemic phrasing could have been “we owe the patriarchy nothing”. I changed it to that for a second before realizing, again, that it was fine. A guy that has worked through internalized patriarchy around this will understand it’s not about them.

Patriarchy on the whole conditions men towards having a sense of entitlement towards women’s bodies, time, attention, labor, etc. It also conditions women that they should feel obligated to provide this without setting boundaries or expecting reciprocal solidarity.

Remember, we literally all have degrees of internalized bigotry, misogyny, racism, transphobia, etc because these are systemic issues. Our responsibility to ourselves and our comrades is to work through that. You are not a bad person for finding those brainworms in yourself, only if you refuse to do the work to address them.

  • TankGirl [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Love this. Emotional communication really is a learned skill and something I hope to see taught more in schools.

    Men are typically raised to avoid their own emotions to the point many feel they don’t have any at all. It’s deeply sad and also something that only they can work through.

    • Satanic_Mills [comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I'm not quite sure how saying Men shouldn't go to women for help with their emotional problems helps this?

      Is this just the leftist version of 'go to therapy'?

        • Tapirs10 [undecided,she/her]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Yeah it's like this is literally the idea that men who have emotions are a burden and a failure that is perpetuated by toxic masculinity, but couched in feminist language. Or at least that's how I read it, maybe I have some brain worms to purge

      • p_sharikov [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        I think their point is that it's not women's responsibility to fix the pathologies of male socialization. They disproportionately bear that burden because men won't talk about that stuff to other men.

        • Satanic_Mills [comrade/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Okay, so that's a clear and valid point. All I get from the poster is a #Girlboss vibe about how being asked to display empathy towards your family and loved ones is oppressive.