"Men are Trash"
"Fuck men"
"All men should die"
These were statements common around the media platforms I used in my undergrad - mainly Tumblr - and still speckle throughout my social media usage. As should come as no surprise, I was a heavy Tumblr user, however I also found conversation and discourse on Facebook and later Reddit. However, the term "tumblrina" was probably very applicable to a younger version of me. Yet, I see these kinds of statements that claim to be "resisting masculinity" outside of that main Tumblr force. Especially on Facebook but not exclusively.
Even as these statements permeated the speech of my peers around me, I found myself very unsettled by the anti-men sentiments. The only time I found these statements in any way useful, positive, or agreeable was when they were expanded out. When someone with extra time decided to devote a few minutes to explaining why certain feminist and LGBTQ+ spaces used these statements.
It would look something like this: "Saying 'all men are trash' is just more efficient than explaining the complexity of the hegemonic masculinity men are indoctrinated into and how it creates an environment that devalues basic human emotions as feminine traits and therefor inferior traits, making basic emotions from women and womanhood in general as inferior too. Since that's just complicated, we just say 'fuck men'" And... I suppose a younger me could have been on board with that.
One obvious problem with that is the leap from a deconstruction of society's gender ideals to... a negative statement about a gender... or gender catagory. Which the statement can be applied to both. I understand that masculinity is seen as the default by our society, and I understand that traditional gender ideals pitting masculinity against femininity creates an equation of toxicity toward both of those gender scales and also toxicity beyond the historical dual gender system our society is obsessed with. I understand it well, I was raised as a woman in a conservative family who did not completely feel comfortable in that assigned gender.
That doesn't change the fact that when men, and a majority of society that includes but is not limited to men, hear "All men are trash." They hear something to the affect of: feminists think i'm trash arbitrarily because of my gender. Which looks like the same sexist tendencies they champion to be against. Therefore they are both hypocrites and sexists.
Here is the thing. I don't necessarily think that is a jump in reasoning. Yes, from a surface level understanding - this claim of "men should die" and "men are trash" is very anti masculine. And therefore sexist if we view the term as based in individual action and not in systemic activity. Of course, the argument of those who use these statements is generally this rebuttal: Terms like "sexism" and "racism" are only relevant when referring to demographics that have historically been and are continuing to be systemically oppressed.
But - that is not the language critics are using. Racism and sexism are both defined as prejudice and discrimination against a group based on their "race" and their "sex" respectively. And we live in a society and culture that places individualistic meaning to be forefront to identity. Therefore, racism and sexism (also classism, for anther example) are actions of an individual - and to put it as quickly as possible - the majority of people do not think in terms of systemic oppression. Oppression is hard to feel like a tangible thing, even if you are surrounded by it and therefore actions by an individual are a stronger argument for sexism and racism for the average person who are not steeped in social scientific cultural analyzing
Beyond that, I also have lived a personal amount of harm from this shock value cry.
"Fuck men." Yes. I hear you girls, but - this is for you: My sisters and siblings. My fellow friends. I have a criticism for my community.
I have taken my years to slowly come out to myself and others as something other than womanly, perhaps because my idea of womanhood alienates me - but mostly because I was thrust into a gendered world that I was not completely comfortable existing in. But since I was not totally alienated by the idea of femininity - only the idea that femininity is lesser. My first path of identity through this world was by being a specifically strong, fierce, willed, feminist woman. One who took no shit. It was a direct rebellion against the very specific box of womanhood I was thrust into. That box was trickled down from my heratage - which is half Texan southern belle, still privileged from the antebellum, with spots of New England mannerisms, Basically, a Heinz 57 of heratage. I am English, Scottish, Irish, etc. I can do this all day... but I am an American woman who was raised by that brand of middle class white conservative christian. I hated that idea of womanhood. However, the further I dove into the world of femininity as an expanded identity... I found myself still lost.
At some point, I discovered that I was not a woman. Which was hard to come to, since we live in a binary society. One that understands masculinity and femininity to be on opposite sides of a spectrum. And that isn't quite right, they are complementary, not opposites - and while I enjoy dabbling in manhood and masculinity - I feel just as strongly that I am no man just as I feel strongly that I am no woman. That doesn't change the fact that womanhood is the closest thing to a gender I have been socialized to be, so I am comfortable looking the part.
For all you who may be browsing through this grumbling spree of specialized queer issues while being non-queer or questioning but not submerged to the various LGBTQ conversations... let me just kind of gloss over this. Because there is a lot of inter-conflict within the LGBTQ community that you have to be involved with to understand.
Firstly, its hard to be bisexual in the queer community when you date the opposite sex because it looks "hetero," Secondly, there is a conflict between the young LGBTQ community and in older LGBTQ, especially in regards to being a lesbian, a bisexual or in that catch all phrase of being Queer. Lastly, its hard to be transgender if you don't completely look like the gender you most identify with.
Let's focus on that last one. I am by some definitions, Transgender. But I do not wish to identify by that label. Usually, Trans is reserved for people who live their life as one gender for an extended amount of time before realizing or coming out. I say usually because some children transition and identify as trans. Trans is an identity and doesn't have ridged lines... yet, I don't feel trans. I feel queer. I feel I came out, not transitioned. I have a solid feeling that the first twenty or so of my lives I had to navigate an identity just because I was boxed in it, and that I had to bust down the walls a bit to feel more comfortable in that label.
But, I didn't have to erase my womanness, just expand my identity beyond womanhood. I am a woman, kind of.
I am no trans person - at least not in my mind - but I am not a woman like society thinks I am. I present as such, because on many levels I am closeted. But I do not see a world where I can present as my true gender, because I am a non-binary person. And I am not alone. I specifically lie somewhere between genderfluid and agender. For those of you at home uninformed, just think of me as someone who walks through the world pretty confused why people do the things they do. I don't understand - at least as an interactive form of identity - why some women feel the need to put on makeup as a feminizing ritual, or why some men feel most comfortable with short hair or button up. I can have fun putting on makeup, and I enjoy my hair styled both short and long. I like having boobs to show off and having a flat chest to pose in button ups.
Anthropology was the first real revelation to a lot of these gendered actions to me. A class went over how masculine and feminine intersected, just exhibited their behaviors differently. Women and men are supposed to both be emotionally strong. A fallacy in logic for one thing, but also one that exhibits itself so diversely that we forget the standard is still similar. Men are supposed to be the head, that supports the family by stoic example. While the woman is the neck and shoulders, distributing the emotional weight. These are both unrealistic expectations for men and for women.
I hate that it is somehow controversial to say - men have emotions and bottling those is toxic. Men should experience their emotions, not bottle them and it is often meaningful and intimate to experience these emotions with people and that can be a good example. Furthermore, it is unrealistic to expect woman to be the maternal figure who supports all emotional labor of a family unit or friend group because anyone who has been that shaman guide through emotional experiences can tell you it is EXHAUSTING to be that support.
And, as I was raised to be that emotional support, not the stoic example. Realizing these were two coping mechanisms for what can be boiled down to the same emotional expectation - mainly emotional strength, that was meaningful when I was young. I often gained my largest sense of identity when I was and still receive validation when I support people through emotionally turbulent times. But I don't think this makes me feel womanly.
Of course, the other example of womanness is one often weaponized against trans woman and trans men. Reproduction. I remember, especially during that awkward period of grade-school when we girls got to learn about menstruation, how many women exuberantly described "the miracle of birth," and I don't think I was the only little eleven year old just not feeling that.
And, however, I do want to have children one day. But that doesn't make me feel like a woman, just a person who has a uterus and therefor a reproductive system where I do not inject sperm but eject a baby. But I don't feel especially feminine because of my ability to push life out of me if I want to. Its... kind of cool, and part of me wants to pop a baby out and nurture it. Making a life is existentially horrible knowing the world I live in and my family medical history... but i'm still down to do it for some reason. I relate to the intensive feeling of parenthood and to easily communicate that I often describe one of my life goals to be "motherhood" but... I just want to be a parent. Not this feminine mother. I don't want to be anti-mother I just cannot truly describe easily with the limitation of language how the feminine ideal of parenthood is a fully formed picture that I do not fit into. I can cherry pick certain ideas of motherhood, womanhood, girlhood, etc. That I can enjoy as part of my identity but I don't feel comfortable in that box. I also don't feel comfortable in the other default box of fatherhood, manhood, boyhood.... but I am not a man. So, I personally reject the box, I made my own identity.
Yet... Femininity is a tool. A mask, one I can put on when going out into the world. So, like I have inferred, I look like a girl. I look like a duck and quack like one, because it's convieneint, easy. I can only imagine the social exhastion of wearing my binder outside more, or shaving my head like I want to. I don't, and therefor, I pass. Passing is a large part of this equation, which is part of the reason I rambled on about it. As someone who sits outside of that sphere, I have a unique insight on gender. However, effectively, to the average eye, I function as a woman. I'm kind of a secret agent. When we consider the main point of this piece - The goal of the statements such as "Men are trash" and such is to be anti toxic masculine, anti hegemonic masculine. But I do not hear that. The other reason is so other people confused about their appearance versus their identity can perhaps get a little look at another side.
And I date men. All kinds of men, not just cis men, but cis men - they really like me. I share interests with them in that "tomboy" way, I understand what lusting for a woman feels like, and... there are just a lot of cis men in my city. I don't get very many girls chasing after me because most of us are in the closet here in the midwest and the south.
Also, guess what? I am kind of in a closet too. Remember, I restrict my public actions into a box that I am not completely confortable in because... I haven't had much of an opportunity to expand outwards - for a lot of reasons. So when it comes to these statements, where I look like a cis girl dating cis men... What I end up hearing from my own queer community is "You are trash, because you like men."
Let me expand on this. I am a non-binary human in a female body who presents as feminine by default. We have already gone over this. What I cannot truly express is the pure anxiety I have had over this non-binary identity. I do not fit into either of the two boxes in a society that is already very rigid about which box you should fit in. Trans men and trans women can verify what i'm talking about. My coping mechanism for this has been to pass as a woman, which sort of creates this paradox where I am both a queer human and unaccepted in some corners of the queer community.
