When you enter a space – any space – as a man, you carry with yourself the threat of harm.
Melissa Fabello, the queen bee of Everyday Feminism, teams up with Aaminah Khan to once again remind any male readers that there’s something fundamentally wrong with them, and all men currently striding about the planet:
The socialisation of men is such that even a good man – a supportive man, a respectful man, a trusted man – has within him the potential for violence and harm because these behaviours are normalised through patriarchy.
For those who find the above less than compelling, Ms Fabello and Ms Khan obligingly link to an earlier Everyday Feminism article, in which a male contributor, Jamie Utt, a “diversity and inclusion consultant,” recounts slamming a table in exasperation and consequently being chastised by his female partner, before rending his garments and rushing to the conclusion that,
My actions exist in the context of patriarchy. And patriarchy is violent. Full stop.
This is followed by a series of equally adamant reiterations – “Cis-masculinity is fundamentally oppressive and violent” says he. Apparently, a single incident of exasperated table-slamming is damning evidence of patriarchal brainwashing, proof that the author has been “socialised to be abusive,” along with all other men. However, the gender-damning meaning of female table-slamming, or door-slamming, or general fits of irritation, or any number of aggressive and passive-aggressive displays indulged in by women, remains oddly unexplored. Instead, Mr Utt equates this apparently all-pervasive patriarchy with “related systems of oppression like white supremacy.” Adding, “It’s important that I situate myself within my positionality.”
This being Everyday Feminism, Ms Fabello and Ms Khan are no less bold in their statements:
We know that even the men that we love, never mind random men who we don’t know, have the potential to be dangerous.
Though Ms Fabello and Ms Khan don’t acknowledge it, it seems that ladies have made great strides on that front too, with some taking advantage of the customary reluctance among men to repay female aggression in kind.
But in a world divided into the oppressed and the oppressors, the former learn to fear the latter as a defence mechanism.
Ah, the subtleties of “social justice.”
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