Feminism is for Everybody. Yes-Even You, Dude!

With the close of Women’s History Month in March, I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on the conversations the month has sparked around campus. Inevitably, discussions of women's history lead to conversations about modern feminist politics — after all, when we reflect on where we’ve come from, it’s only natural to wonder where we’re going. While many of the conversations I’ve overheard and engaged in seemed productive and informative, helping to mentally challenge and hone in on ways to fight gender-based discrimination better, others seemed to stop before they even began.

Repeatedly, I noticed a trend of the thought — expressed primarily by men — that feminism is anti-male. “A lot of guys I know feel threatened by the idea [of feminism],’” Torrey Joo (junior, psychology) told me, “They see it as an attack on men.” This popular idea was echoed by several of the respondents in a series of interviews published by the Student Movement in March, who worried that the modern feminist movement had gone too far and devolved into pointless man-hating. In fairness, the male respondents were usually more sophisticated in their thinking, admitting that this supposed anti-male faction of feminists represented a tiny minority.

But if it's such a small percentage and is really just a distortion of “true feminism,” as many of the respondents claim, then why does it continue to frame and dictate conversations? It seems that before meaningful discussions can really begin, participants get bogged down by trying to answer the man-hating accusation. To the point where nearly every one of the people, male and female, from the interview series felt it absolutely necessary to address this concern when asked to talk about feminism. These efforts would be completely unnecessary if there were already a popular consensus that feminism is not about hating men. Thus, it would seem that in many people’s minds, the relations between men and feminism are still largely ambiguous — if not outright hostile. This relationship must be clarified, and this accusation must be firmly answered if our student discourse on campus hopes to mature.

Let me reiterate what so many have said before: feminism is not about hating men. So since feminism isn’t about hating men, then why do so many people have this perception? Well, truthfully, probably because it's not uncommon to hear women say, “I hate men.” But something isn’t automatically feminist just because a woman says it. Phrases like “I hate men” or “men are trash” aren’t so much political messages as much as expressions of frustration stemming from women’s negative experiences with men. Torrey Joo told me that he understands where many of these women are coming from, “Because unfortunately, a lot of men are culprits of harassing and offending women,” he explained,  “I think it’s happened to enough women, enough times, to the point where women are justified in saying stuff like that.” In other words, women use this kind of language to vent to peers, not to espouse any articulated feminist goal or opinion. David Sandoval Suñe (junior, psychology and religion) told me that while he personally understands that comments like this are not a kind of “feminist agenda,” he thinks they often get interpreted that way, “mostly because most men don’t really know much about feminism.”

What men do know about feminism–all my interviewees agreed–they mostly learn through social media. But social media can be misleading, as Jordan Sarkodie (sophomore,  computer science) explained to me, “There are people on there that will make feminism look like the ‘I hate men’ thing.” Jacob Kim (sophomore, psychology) agreed with this observation: “On social media, if it's coming from another guy that doesn’t understand feminism completely and thinks that women are trying to fight for something that’s not even a real problem, then you’re going to get a very biased opinion.” As these quotes emphasize, men usually learn about feminism from what their social media algorithms choose to show them. Since most anti-feminist content targets men, they are more likely to see that. Under these algorithms, Torrey told me that “the bogus stuff gets pushed to the front. So that when men hear ‘feminism,’ their first thought is of compilations making fun of less well-spoken or aggravated women trying to defend feminist ideas.”

The end result is that most men learn about feminism through the absorption of women’s out-of-context frustration and the consumption of anti-feminist social media content, not through purposeful engagement with educational content. This leads to a skewed perception that feminism is somehow anti-male.

So if modern feminism isn’t about hating men, then what is it about? To answer this question, I’d like to use the definition of feminism proposed by popular feminist scholar bell hooks in her book Feminism is for Everybody: “Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.” From this definition, it's clear what feminists primarily identify as the problem — and it’s not men. It’s sexism and, more broadly, systems of gender and sexual oppression. And anyone can be sexist, no matter their gender. Sexism sets up a societal system that is prejudiced against women and supports male domination, which feminists call the patriarchy. Precisely because it is a system, everyone plays a part in it. Therefore, women can (and often do) support this system just as much as men. This definition of feminism, which welcomes men and identifies systems of power as the problem, is still far from absolving men of responsibility. In actuality, it draws men closer to working with feminism by inviting them to understand how they fit into this system and how that affects them.

So feminism necessarily includes men in its thinking, which differs from the oft-repeated sentiment that feminism purely concerns women. Most of the men I interviewed felt that the feminist movement had little to do with them. They usually spoke as if women’s liberation had no consequence to them, and they could only spectate and passively support. They were sympathetic to the movement but didn’t exactly relate feminist ideas to their own lives. They said they rarely actively thought about feminism and infrequently discussed it with any of their other male friends or relatives. When I asked them if they felt that feminism had anything to offer men, they had trouble coming up with an answer, “I want to say yes,” Jacob Kim told me, “but I also don’t know how.” Jordan repeated this idea, “I mean,” he paused, “How could it help men?” Men seem unaware that the rigid gender expectations patriarchy sets are often harmful to them. Because while yes, patriarchy is a system set up to privilege men, those benefits come with a price.

Probably the most talked about negative side effect of patriarchy on men is their mental health. Sexist stereotypes inhibit men from developing high emotional IQs and healthy coping mechanisms since being emotionally expressive is often deemed unmasculine and “girly.” Jacob Kim told me his experience: "I’ve been told many times to stop crying because ‘boys don’t cry’… you’re told to be emotionless.” But in reality, emotional expression is central to being a healthy human. “You have emotions for a reason. They’re meant to be expressed,” Jacob Kim continued, “And a lot of men bottle that up instead.” This emotional disconnectedness, in turn, makes it difficult for many men to experience deep interpersonal connections. Even platonic bonds can be difficult to establish; Torrey Joo explained, “Among guys, it's hard to make friends because of that tendency to be more emotionally numb.”

The patriarchy also creates a certain stigma surrounding male survivors of domestic violence. 1 in 9 men have experienced severe intimate partner violence, but often their experiences are not taken seriously. Men being abused by a romantic partner is treated more like a joke, since patriarchy assumes that men should be the ones dominating their romantic partner. This makes male survivors more ashamed and less likely to seek the support they need to heal from their traumatic experiences.

Another way the patriarchy negatively affects men is the way it divides up duties within the family. The patriarchy confines women to the domestic sphere, making them the primary parent of children. Consequently, a father’s role in child rearing is often downplayed and seen as less important than the mother’s. This makes it difficult for many men to be involved in their children’s lives and makes men feel estranged from their own children. Feminism encourages more equitable splitting of domestic duties in a way that could not only help relieve pressure from mothers but also help give fathers a more meaningful role in their children’s lives.

Lastly, underneath patriarchy, men are expected to be the breadwinner of the family in order to provide for the household. Jacob Kim explained that he saw this reflected in the advice he received growing up: “My mom was always like, ‘You need to work hard so you can make money,’ but my sister was told she can always just marry rich.” A man’s worth in this system is directly associated with his ability to make money — a setup that seems particularly unfair in a society where class mobility is limited and institutionalized bigotry disadvantages minority men.
These are just a few examples of ways that feminism can be applied to understand the stresses that men face under patriarchy. Feminism doesn’t see the world as a simple blue vs. pink, battle of the sexes, where men are undoubtedly villains, and women are unquestionably heroines. Feminism sees the world in terms of systems of power that privilege certain people over others. They recognize that patriarchy creates a system of inequality that subjugates women but also hurts the men it supposedly benefits. Because while patriarchy gives material benefits to men, it simultaneously robs them of something much more valuable: the ability to connect with themselves and with others. Feminism, far from being hostile or distant from men, could not be more relevant! The greatest joys of life are love and friendship, and this is precisely what is withheld from men when they adopt the sexist attitudes that patriarchy tries to instill. As long as a man holds sexist prejudices, he will never be able to view and appreciate the women or men in his life in their full human complexity. He’ll never truly understand his mother, sister, friend, romantic partner, or daughter. And he’ll be no more at rest among men.

If men want real intimacy in their lives, they should want feminism just as much as women. The stakes have never been higher, and the rewards never greater. If a man is ready to learn more about female oppression and join the fight to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression, then feminism is ready to receive him.