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[Tiruin]

This is an interesting post on one psychological interpretation of the Not All Men thing.

Well that just hit home too deeply.

 

I don't like how it generalizes [some] reactions though. If someone would complain to me that 'I'm not like x', I'd question first why s/he's assuming such.

[Graknorke]

I don't like how it generalizes [some] reactions though. If someone would complain to me that 'I'm not like x', I'd question first why s/he's assuming such.

I don't see how that's hard to understand in this context especially, since 'x' killed women for not having sex with him. I would like to think that most people are not like that, and that indeed you would assume a friend wasn't.

[scriver]

I was actually referring to the parts about friendships/relations and finding it easier to confide in women than in fellow men, nog the Not All Guys stuffs. The only time I've said that (well, at least in a long, long time) was as silly joke.

[misko27]

This is an interesting post on one psychological interpretation of the Not All Men thing.

Well that just hit home too deeply.

 

I don't like how it generalizes [some] reactions though. If someone would complain to me that 'I'm not like x', I'd question first why s/he's assuming such.

Note, but it's clearly she. She mentions her husband a few times, goes out of her way to say her *male* friend, and it's written with a notable female-perspective time vibe. Plus "You guys" when referring to men.

[Neonivek]

Plus "You guys" when referring to men

That just brings a smile to my face. Mind you mostly in an ironic "that sounds terrible" sort of way.

I'd read the article but I doubt it is badly written enough to be enjoyable.

*reads a bit*

Yeah not hilariously bad. I'd comment on the contents but it breaks my "not my problem" rule.

[nenjin]

While I didn't read the entire article, it kind of lost me where it generalized to men that, upon hearing about the killings and their motivations, went straight to a woman to describe how horrible it felt to hear about it, because we're supposedly incapable of sharing feelings with other men.

The first person I talked to about it was another guy, and we both agreed that it was a pretty pathetic place to be, predicating your entire happiness on whether or not you've had sex. It's like anti-confidence gone so far backwards it becomes murderous rage. We both felt pretty ashamed we had to share a gender with this guy.

Anyways, I didn't really like the tone of the article, pretty much throughout. She's got every right to be righteously indignant (on behalf of all woman and from her own experiences.) But the article generalizes to hell and back, like men are a blueprint to be read. Sorry, but I share plenty of "feels" with my male friends. Unless she's asserting female bonding is somehow special and, to use her term, "magical", in that it's just magically more meaningful sharing things between women vs. men.

[palsch]

...

IV) If you are a man who is becoming upset/depressed/overwhelmed/hopeless/defensive when you listen to the women in the world/your life talk about their experiences, you need to talk about it.  With another man.

I really, really mean this.  Not to complain about how crazy or uptight women are, please.  (I mean, personally, I don’t think that would help you or me very much at all).  But you absolutely need to talk to another guy.  A guy you are friends with and who you trust is ideal.  And if you don’t have that kind of guy in your life- and, seriously, you are not alone in that area- then you have the very hard, critical work of figuring out how to make that kind of friendship ahead of you.  If you are feeling a restless helplessness over all of this, that can be your challenge.  Because I think as women we really, really need you to form those relationships.  We really, really need you to have an emotional connection to each other.   And we need to know you guys can turn and talk each other through these hard things and support each other while you support us.

And if you are a guy who has already figured this out- if you’ve already figured out the circle thing and the male friendship and intimacy thing and how to be supportive of women thing- then my personal challenge to you is to go and find the guys in your world who haven’t totally made this connection, and pull them into your circle.  Mentor them.  Teach them how to do what you’ve figured out to do.  Seriously, I can’t do that.  Your girlfriends and lady friends and moms and sisters and classmates and bosses can’t do that.  But you can, and that is absolutely invaluable.

[Neonivek]

It must really be confusing to be a guy and listening to the advice given that it contradicts a lot of other advice they are given.

You know the "Guys stick together" as a negative... except in the article it is a positive, it is a "Just stick with other guys".

The article is kind of odd... In that it presents MANY negative male stereotypes (As palsch highlighted)... except as a positive.

[nenjin]

Neo, I have to ask.

It must really be confusing to be a guy and listening to the advice given that it contradicts a lot of other advice they are given.

Have I been mistaken all these years in the assumption you're a guy? Or am I just parsing this sentence strangely?

bring guys with intimacy issues into my circle

Mmm, I'd prefer to just call them out sincerely when they're being pigs.

[palsch]

Erm, I don't think men being emotionally available for each other and mutually supportive in that manner is a male stereotype, positive or negative.

If you dive into the comments people discuss the stereotyped forms of male interaction a bit. One example;

This is one of the distinctions between how men and women communicate. Women want to be listened to (at least according to the post) for the sake of sharing the experience. Men don’t do this – we communicate with the purpose of doing something about what was communicated (hence the stereotypical best buddies conversation: ” ‘sup. ‘sup – and silence for several minutes).

She also notes that, anecdotally, men in relationships with women tend to depend on those women for emotional support to the detriment of male friendships. This is certainly something I've noticed in myself and others around me (and I'd say it even fits a stereotypical narrative of women 'stealing' guys from their buds), even if it's hard to generalise universally.

[Neonivek]

Ohh no I am a guy Nenjin.

This is one of the distinctions between how men and women communicate. Women want to be listened to (at least according to the post) for the sake of sharing the experience. Men don’t do this – we communicate with the purpose of doing something about what was communicated

What men is this person talking about exactly?

I guess they are referring to the men on Mars.

[palsch]

What men is this person talking about exactly?

I guess they are referring to the men on Mars.

The stereotypes that live in their heads.

[Neonivek]

What men is this person talking about exactly?

I guess they are referring to the men on Mars.

The stereotypes that live in their heads.

Must be. Thanks for Clarifying, I was worried there for a second. xD

[Graknorke]

What men is this person talking about exactly?

I guess they are referring to the men on Mars.

Themselves.

[nenjin]

She also notes that, anecdotally, men in relationships with women tend to depend on those women for emotional support to the detriment of male friendships. This is certainly something I've noticed in myself and others around me (and I'd say it even fits a stereotypical narrative of women 'stealing' guys from their buds), even if it's hard to generalise universally.

Well it's interesting because one of my oldest friends got married a few years back and is still in that kind of...stupidly infatuated phase of their marriage. So yeah, I've lost a lot of time to his wife, as have several of his even closer friends, who live right next door. At its worst, it's viewed and excused as a faithful obligation. At its best, it's a "Hey, this is what I want to do." Because his wife is awesome. Lots of times he's there for her emotional support, as she's sometimes a worrier. As for him....yeah I guess I can kinda see that. I tend not to hear earnestly about what's bugging my friend. When he's stressed he doesn't really want to talk it out with people, but I always pry at the surface to see if he'll show me what's pissing him off, and can usually get him to at least say what's going on. It's not, like, an emotional decompression. Nor do I really want it to be. But at least I get to know what's eating away at him, instead of just having to deal with silence and him visibly trying to tamp down his angst or irritation or w/e. So I assume that he unloads his problems in detail to his wife, although I don't really know.

I guess it's ironic I chose to read that today, because we were out to lunch with one of his other close friends, his neighbor. Who was raging because during a meeting looking at his company's new website, (which features all women from the company, all a little over 30 or less and all very attractive. They're in insurance.) one of the women said of one of the pictures (of a client) "I thought we were only going to show the attractive ones." He proceeded to walk out of the meeting and come to lunch with us. And stew over this for the next hour. And we talked a lot about how blatantly sexist and shallow it is for his company to put the most attractive, and I mean classically attractive, women on the website. And not the other......70% of the company that does the rest of the work. And the women are the biggest supporters of it.

So I guess I'm a little primed to resent generalizations about guys right now, particularly in aftermath of this issue.