I’m Mourning The Loss Of A Privilege I Didn’t Even Know I Had

Ever since posting my conversation with Dianne last week, I’ve been thinking about the social disconnect between men and women. 

It’s like when you have two friends, both of whom are great, but for some reason, they just can’t get along. Every time one of them speaks, the other gets defensive or angry or misunderstands. And you know that if they’d just listen to each other, they’d discover that they have a lot in common.

In this post, from Tumblr of all places, a trans man describes the “culture shock” of being perceived as a man. Far from being an orgy of dick-swinging and patriarchy, being a man can be quite…well, lonely.

As I’ve pointed out many times, nobody “feels” like a man or a woman. The feeling of being a man or a woman, if there even is such a thing, isn’t internal. It’s experienced, every day, in the way society treats you. We could learn a lot if we listened to each other.

Because, it turns out, it’s no picnic for either side.

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Skaldish:

I’m pretty quiet about the fact I'm a transman usually. But holy shit I need to tell you about the culture shock I’m going through because it’s blindsiding me.

There's a huge sense of social isolation that comes with being perceived as male, because now people are subconsciously treating me as a potential predator. All strangers, no matter their gender, keep their guard up around me.

It made me realize that there is no inherent camaraderie in male socialization as there is in female socialization unless, of course it’s in very specific environments And the fact I don’t ambiently experience this mutual kinship in basic exchanges anymore is an insanely lonely feeling.

You know how badly this would have fucked my mind up if I had grown up with this?

It is 4.30am and I’m mourning the loss of a privilege I didn’t even know I had.

Anyway, I’m going to figure out how to navigate this. Don't know how yet, but I’m gonna.

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Azaloset:

If you figure it out, can you share your insights? This is a fundamental as to why I’m still in the closet.

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Skaldish:

Absolutely, because it’s an extremely sticky issue.

Frankly, this is something I would've never understood without living the experience.

It’s now blatantly clear to me that most cis men probably experience chronic emotional malnutrition. They're deprived of social connection just enough for it to seriously fuck with their psyches, but not enough for them to realize that it’s happening and what’s causing it.

It’s like they’re starving, but don’t know this because they’ve always been served 3 meals...except those meals have never been big enough

This deprivation comes from all sides of aisle, by the way.

In the case of women: When I'm out in public and interact with women, all of them come off as incredibly aloof, cold, mirthless. I have never experienced this before even though I know exactly what this composure is—the armour that keeps away creepy-ass men.

As someone who used to wear it myself, I know this armor is 100% impersonal. Nobody likes wearing it, and I can say with absolute certainty that women would dump the armor in favor of unconditional companionship with men if doing this didn’t run the risk of actual assault. (Trust me when I say women aren’t just being needlessly guarded.)

But I only have a complete understanding of this context because I’ve experienced female socialization. If I hadn’t, I would’ve thought this coldness was a conspiracy against me devised by roughly half of the human population. Even now, with all that I know about navigating the world as a woman, I’m failing to convince my monkey-brain that this armor isn’t social rejection.

And as for male socialization? Again. it seems taboo for a man to be platonically intimate with men for reasons I have yet to fully understand, but I think it boils down to a) the fact society teaches boys that it’s not okay to be soft with each other, and b) garden-variety homophobia. Our media only shows men being intimate with one another when they’re teamed up against a dire situation, and I’d bet real money it’s a huge reason why men gravitate toward activities that simulate being teamed up against an opposing force.

But men are not machines of war. Yes, testosterone absolutely gives you Dumb Bastard Brain, but that just makes you want to skateboard a wagon down a hill or duct-tape your friend to the wall, not kill someone.

The human species looks so much colder standing from this side.

I can see how men might convince themselves that their feelings of emotional desperation is personal weakness as opposed to a symptom they’re all experiencing from Western* imperialism. Because this human connection, this frith, is as essential for out wellbeing as water is.

So sick. How sick. I want to destroy this garbage.

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Coincidentally enough, a few days ago, I read a different post, from a different trans man (now detransitioned), about the “armour” women wear. She didn’t attack men, she didn’t complain about men trying to interact with her, she just tried to explain why women sometimes worry about the reactions they’ll receive from men.

Here’s one of the reactions she received from a man:

It's because of feminist filth like this sewer troll that guys are so confused and can't form meaningful relationships. They scream when guys try to connect with them but they'd never take the initiative and ask guys out. They're scum-sucking hypocrites.

In my article, Andrew Tate And The Male Empathy Gap, I wrote about the “empathy gap” that men experience in society. I didn’t attack women, I didn’t claim that women owed men any special treatment, I just tried to explain that most men, especially young men, don’t deserve the condemnation they experience in society.

Here’s some of the condemnation I received from a woman:

All of you are GUILTY for allowing the problems to continue for so long. Men have more than earned all the bad karma you’re facing🤮

And what they both miss is that almost all of us, both men and women, are just good, ordinary people playing the cards we were dealt. They both make the mistake of viewing the opposite sex as a monolith. They both fail to appreciate that we’re all trying to connect with somebody without suffering too much in the process.

See? Even the extremists have a lot in common.