A lot of it is centered around achievement and feeling useful, so building or fixing something, physical activity, being seen as a provider etc.
It’s why men with families etc take being made redundant quite badly, not being able to provide for your family can really make you feel like a failure.
That’s also because we teach people that romantic relationships cannot be friendships. If your partner is your best friend then you aren’t redundant, you’re a power team.
When you take your shirt off, you lift something real heavy, open a beer without a bottlecap opener, and high five somebody and it hurts then you should be activating all the correct masculine endorphin triggers. A lot of it comes as a response from high testosterone hormone levels.
100% guy here, real man feel is when others can rely on me, when I can help, that kind of stuff. Not “big car hurr durr bbq male superyorr” and the likes.
I’m stumped at the simple task of trying to imagine what does imply to “feel like a man”.
I feel like a man when I know I’ve met all of my responsibilities to myself and the ones I care about, and that I’ve moved the world even an infinitesimally small way forward to help the others in it. This means lending a hand or an ear to those that need it either with my labor or my mind (or many time both).
I hope others have something close to this definition, but realistically I don’t think its common.
I guess what confuses me about all of this is why these things are in any way manly?
Like being reliable and following through on your commitments. Is it masculine when someone who isn’t a man is like that?
Or if I’m told someone is manly, have I now learned that he is in fact dependable?
I don’t mean to try and excessively pick apart what you’re saying, it’s just something I’ve always really struggled with understanding. People always seem to say things that strike me as being ungendered character traits when they’re asked about their gender.
I guess what confuses me about all of this is why these things are in any way manly?
I don’t mean to try and excessively pick apart what you’re saying, it’s just something I’ve always really struggled with understanding. People always seem to say things that strike me as being ungendered character traits when they’re asked about their gender.
I think I see the issue you’re encountering with the perspective you’re communicating.
You’re looking for things that are exclusively masculine. Besides the role in physical biological reproduction, I don’t think there is anything exclusively masculine by that measure.
The traits I listed could absolutely apply to people that are not men. However, the phrase “manly” is referring to societal measures not biological reproductive process abilities. If we distill that down further for this conversation, “manly” translates to “being worthy of respect”. We could dissect why “manly” translates to “being worthy of respect”, but that’s a tangent from your question.
Ergo, for a person that identifies with the biological reproductive role of a male, and would like to be seeing as being worthy of respect in society, then they should have favorable societal traits and behaviors, in my opinion, such as those I listed.
We could dissect why “manly” translates to “being worthy of respect”, but that’s a tangent from your question.
I think this pretty much gets to the root of the friction I experience when this topic comes up. I wouldn’t mind digging into it.
You likely have already guessed that I would think of it this way, but isn’t it just that “good people are worthy of respect”? Because it seems to me like if you try hard to take care of your family and do right by others, you’re a good person deserving of respect.
You know what I mean? If there’s no need for the trait to be exclusively masculine, then why do we do it? Translate “manly” into “worthy of respect”, that is. Is there some benefit to thinking about it in terms of masculinity rather than just in terms of goodness?
However, the phrase “manly” is referring to societal measures
they should have favorable societal traits and behaviors
Also, I do acknowledge this side of things. I wrote some thoughts about it in a reply to another comment in this thread, if you want to check that out. It’s an important point, and I don’t want you to think i’m just ignoring it. In summary, I think it’s kind of a bummer if in the end, manliness is just a tradition people feel compelled to participate in
I mean yeah, they should probably be ungendered, but in our society they still do get gendered. A lot of expectation is placed on men to be the kind of hard-working person that will work a 50 hour week, put food on the table, be a perfect and present father to their children and a dependable rock for their partner while being perfectly in control of their emotions themselves (and don’t you even think about crying) and still have time to build a furnace and teach the eldest how to change a tire and have an active social life and work out and improve themselves and do all those other things that a normal person needs to do.
It’s not good and it’s not right, and it’s not even what the OP was specifically talking about in the post, but that’s why you’ll see words like “strong”, “dependable”, “capable”, etc thrown around in this thread a lot, because men like to feel that way because it feels like they’ve achieved at least some part of the frankly impossible image that’s placed in young boy’s heads of what a man should be.
I appreciate your breakdown. In other words, what you’re saying is that a man’s feeling of manliness is most often rooted in how closely he resembles societal expectations.
I think it’s pretty much the most reasonable explanation. But it still strikes me that men generally do not themselves think about it in those terms, and in fact consider it to be inherently emasculating. Masculinity viewed through this lens in essence becomes an act of submission to an outside force, which stands in contrast to many evident directives of masculinity such as independence and inherent drive.
Indeed the OP touches on this, implying that masculinity simply must be secured from within, with brazen disregard for the way others perceive you.
So if it does really come down to matching expectations, then it seems to be, as you said, frankly impossible
That’s a good question. I think most of the traits described here also apply to women, but as always, we’re talking about overlapping Bell curves here. I think men derive their sense of self worth from things like strength, leadership and independence more so than women do on average. There’s also traditionally feminine traits men derive self worth from, like empathy, affection and devotion. The same is probably true for women; little of column A, little of column B.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, this is just how genders shake out on average, so the implication that a man shouldn’t like feeling like one kind of bothers me.
I’m stumped at the simple task of trying to imagine what does imply to “feel like a man”.
Imagine you know Rex-Kwan-Do and go home to Starla every night.
A lot of it is centered around achievement and feeling useful, so building or fixing something, physical activity, being seen as a provider etc.
It’s why men with families etc take being made redundant quite badly, not being able to provide for your family can really make you feel like a failure.
That’s also because we teach people that romantic relationships cannot be friendships. If your partner is your best friend then you aren’t redundant, you’re a power team.
I’m talking about losing your job, just to be clear.
Well that and not being able to put food on the table and a roof over their heads.
It’s not about feelings at that point, even if they still exist.
You listen to Shania Twain’s hit Man! I Feel Like A Woman backwards
Women’s shirts and long skirts
One might consider a blouse and kilt at least somewhat manly
When you take your shirt off, you lift something real heavy, open a beer without a bottlecap opener, and high five somebody and it hurts then you should be activating all the correct masculine endorphin triggers. A lot of it comes as a response from high testosterone hormone levels.
100% guy here, real man feel is when others can rely on me, when I can help, that kind of stuff. Not “big car hurr durr bbq male superyorr” and the likes.
I agree with you, but there’s no reason bbq needs to catch these strays.
Even trucks are great if you’re using them to help people move stuff. No comment on the pavement princesses with bigger cabs than beds.
Pavement princess is getting added to the lexicon. That’s amazing.
I feel like a man when I know I’ve met all of my responsibilities to myself and the ones I care about, and that I’ve moved the world even an infinitesimally small way forward to help the others in it. This means lending a hand or an ear to those that need it either with my labor or my mind (or many time both).
I hope others have something close to this definition, but realistically I don’t think its common.
I guess what confuses me about all of this is why these things are in any way manly?
Like being reliable and following through on your commitments. Is it masculine when someone who isn’t a man is like that?
Or if I’m told someone is manly, have I now learned that he is in fact dependable?
I don’t mean to try and excessively pick apart what you’re saying, it’s just something I’ve always really struggled with understanding. People always seem to say things that strike me as being ungendered character traits when they’re asked about their gender.
I think I see the issue you’re encountering with the perspective you’re communicating.
You’re looking for things that are exclusively masculine. Besides the role in physical biological reproduction, I don’t think there is anything exclusively masculine by that measure.
The traits I listed could absolutely apply to people that are not men. However, the phrase “manly” is referring to societal measures not biological reproductive process abilities. If we distill that down further for this conversation, “manly” translates to “being worthy of respect”. We could dissect why “manly” translates to “being worthy of respect”, but that’s a tangent from your question.
Ergo, for a person that identifies with the biological reproductive role of a male, and would like to be seeing as being worthy of respect in society, then they should have favorable societal traits and behaviors, in my opinion, such as those I listed.
I think this pretty much gets to the root of the friction I experience when this topic comes up. I wouldn’t mind digging into it.
You likely have already guessed that I would think of it this way, but isn’t it just that “good people are worthy of respect”? Because it seems to me like if you try hard to take care of your family and do right by others, you’re a good person deserving of respect.
You know what I mean? If there’s no need for the trait to be exclusively masculine, then why do we do it? Translate “manly” into “worthy of respect”, that is. Is there some benefit to thinking about it in terms of masculinity rather than just in terms of goodness?
Also, I do acknowledge this side of things. I wrote some thoughts about it in a reply to another comment in this thread, if you want to check that out. It’s an important point, and I don’t want you to think i’m just ignoring it. In summary, I think it’s kind of a bummer if in the end, manliness is just a tradition people feel compelled to participate in
I mean yeah, they should probably be ungendered, but in our society they still do get gendered. A lot of expectation is placed on men to be the kind of hard-working person that will work a 50 hour week, put food on the table, be a perfect and present father to their children and a dependable rock for their partner while being perfectly in control of their emotions themselves (and don’t you even think about crying) and still have time to build a furnace and teach the eldest how to change a tire and have an active social life and work out and improve themselves and do all those other things that a normal person needs to do. It’s not good and it’s not right, and it’s not even what the OP was specifically talking about in the post, but that’s why you’ll see words like “strong”, “dependable”, “capable”, etc thrown around in this thread a lot, because men like to feel that way because it feels like they’ve achieved at least some part of the frankly impossible image that’s placed in young boy’s heads of what a man should be.
I appreciate your breakdown. In other words, what you’re saying is that a man’s feeling of manliness is most often rooted in how closely he resembles societal expectations.
I think it’s pretty much the most reasonable explanation. But it still strikes me that men generally do not themselves think about it in those terms, and in fact consider it to be inherently emasculating. Masculinity viewed through this lens in essence becomes an act of submission to an outside force, which stands in contrast to many evident directives of masculinity such as independence and inherent drive.
Indeed the OP touches on this, implying that masculinity simply must be secured from within, with brazen disregard for the way others perceive you.
So if it does really come down to matching expectations, then it seems to be, as you said, frankly impossible
That’s a good question. I think most of the traits described here also apply to women, but as always, we’re talking about overlapping Bell curves here. I think men derive their sense of self worth from things like strength, leadership and independence more so than women do on average. There’s also traditionally feminine traits men derive self worth from, like empathy, affection and devotion. The same is probably true for women; little of column A, little of column B.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, this is just how genders shake out on average, so the implication that a man shouldn’t like feeling like one kind of bothers me.
penetrate things
Ask a transmasc person